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Big   Listen
adjective
Big  adj.  (compar. bigger; superl. biggest)  
1.
Having largeness of size; of much bulk or magnitude; of great size; large. "He's too big to go in there."
2.
Great with young; pregnant; swelling; ready to give birth or produce; often figuratively. "(Day) big with the fate of Cato and of Rome."
3.
Having greatness, fullness, importance, inflation, distention, etc., whether in a good or a bad sense; as, a big heart; a big voice; big looks; to look big. As applied to looks, it indicates haughtiness or pride. "God hath not in heaven a bigger argument." Note: Big is often used in self-explaining compounds; as, big-boned; big-sounding; big-named; big-voiced.
To talk big, to talk loudly, arrogantly, or pretentiously. "I talked big to them at first."
Synonyms: Bulky; large; great; massive; gross.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Big" Quotes from Famous Books



... aft, and the wretched little second began to whine, 'You ain't going to hit a chap with a broken arm—and you call yourself a gentleman, too.' I heard a heavy tramp—one—two—and wheezy grunting. The other beast was coming at me, clattering his oar over the stern. I saw him moving, big, big—as you see a man in a mist, in a dream. 'Come on,' I cried. I would have tumbled him over like a bale of shakings. He stopped, muttered to himself, and went back. Perhaps he had heard the wind. I didn't. It was the last heavy gust we had. He went back to his oar. I was sorry. I would have ...
— Lord Jim • Joseph Conrad

... Crosshatch, who has the marvellous etching by Rembrandt, of which there are only three copies in the world, and which he will not sell,—no, Sir,—not to the British Museum. There is Mr. Brevier Lead, who has in my time successively and successfully smitten and smashed all the potentates, big and little, of Europe, and who has in his museum a wooden model of the Alsop bomb. Give them money, and Sanders will rebuild and refurnish the Alexandrian Library,—Smooch will bid every young painter in America reset his palette and try again,—and Brevier Lead will be fool enough to ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 3, Issue 15, January, 1859 • Various

... Christ is in this sacrament by way of substance, and not by way of quantity. But the proper totality of substance is contained indifferently in a small or large quantity; as the whole nature of air in a great or small amount of air, and the whole nature of a man in a big or small individual. Wherefore, after the consecration, the whole substance of Christ's body and blood is contained in this sacrament, just as the whole substance of the bread and wine was contained there before the ...
— Summa Theologica, Part III (Tertia Pars) - From the Complete American Edition • Thomas Aquinas

... their leader with a thousand questions. They wanted to know the names of all the big buildings in sight. They had all heard of the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel and they gazed up Thirty-fourth Street at this well-known hostelry with much curiosity. They had heard of the Times Building and ...
— The Secret Wireless - or, The Spy Hunt of the Camp Brady Patrol • Lewis E. Theiss

... a mania for big soldiers. With infinite expense and trouble he gathered a regiment of the biggest men he could find, which was known as the "Potsdam Giants,"—a regiment numbering 2400 men, some of whom were eight feet in height. Not only were the Goliaths of his own dominions impressed into the ...
— A General History for Colleges and High Schools • P. V. N. Myers

... hamlet is a single house, with its patriarch for president and judge. When the population outgrows certain limits, instead of being confounded with its neighbours, it adds a settlement upon neighbouring ground, and removal is the work of a single day. The towns are merely big villages, whose streets are labyrinths of narrow pathways, often grass-grown, because each man builds in his own way. Some translate the word "Banza" by city, unaware that Central African people do not build cities. Professor Smith rightly explains it "a village, which with them ...
— Two Trips to Gorilla Land and the Cataracts of the Congo Volume 2 • Richard F. Burton

... was opened far enough for Willie to stand on the top round of the short ladder, and beat a hole through to the light, which was only a foot above. He then shovelled off the top of the chimney, which was ornamented with a big round cushion of snow, and then by beating and shovelling he was able to clear the door, which he opened wide, and Mrs. Barnes came up on the ladder to look out. Dreary indeed was the scene! Nothing but snow as far as the eye could reach, and flakes ...
— The Children's Book of Christmas Stories • Various

... his little soul most woefully; and his ewes and his lambs would crop the grass about the entrance, and bleat to make him notice them and lead them farther afield, but all in vain. Even his dear sheep he hardly heeded, and his pet ewes, Katte and Greta, and the big ram Zips, rubbed their soft noses in his hand unnoticed. So the summer droned away—the summer that is so short in the mountains, and yet so green and so radiant, with the torrents tumbling through the flowers, and the hay tossing in the meadows, and ...
— Bimbi • Louise de la Ramee

... he was watching the horses, he came to the banks of a river, and saw a big fish, which through some mischance had been cast on the land, struggling hard to ...
— The Yellow Fairy Book • Leonora Blanche Alleyne Lang

... has, after long hesitation, recognized competition to be impracticable and the acceptance of monopoly as inevitable. As extremes often meet, the view of the industrial trust as a natural evolution is most favored on the one hand by men of "big business," already interested financially in trusts, and on the other hand by the most radical communists (or socialists) whose ideal is the complete monopolization of industry ...
— Modern Economic Problems - Economics Vol. II • Frank Albert Fetter

... friend, was in a bad fix; how he had lost his way, and 'They' were up and out hunting, and were chivvying him round and round. 'Then why didn't any of you do something?' I asked. 'You mayn't be blessed with brains, but there are hundreds and hundreds of you, big, stout fellows, as fat as butter, and your burrows running in all directions, and you could have taken him in and made him safe and comfortable, or tried to, at all events.' 'What, us?' he merely said: 'do something? ...
— The Wind in the Willows • Kenneth Grahame

... Some small line was found that served pretty well for fishing-lines, when Bill and Jack Windy, getting on the raft, paddled out to a little distance from the shore. Bill's line had not been in the water two minutes before he got a bite, and directly afterwards he hauled up a fine, big fish. In two or three minutes more he caught another; and, curiously enough, he had caught five, while Jack, who was on the other side of the ...
— Sunshine Bill • W H G Kingston

... one beautiful memory of my childhood. It is the face of my mother in its frame of poke bonnet and pink roses, as she leaned over to kiss me good-by. I never saw her again, nor my father. Yellow fever laid heavy tribute upon our southern United States. I was the only one left in the big house on the plantation, and my old black nurse was the sole survivor in the servants' quarters. She took me to an orphan asylum in a straggly little southern town where everything from river banks ...
— The House of the Misty Star - A Romance of Youth and Hope and Love in Old Japan • Fannie Caldwell Macaulay

... English. They invited him to join them on their walks, and made him give them information about Germany, and especially about Berlin, which they intended visiting; in return they told him all about the north coast of France, with its watering-places, big and little, which they had "done" last ...
— The Malady of the Century • Max Nordau

... sandalwood," he explained to Hyacinthe, pride of knowledge making him quite amiable, "a most precious wood that grows in warm countries, thou great goblin. Smell it, idiot. It is sweeter than cedar. It is to make a cabinet for the old Madame at the big house." ...
— Christmas Stories And Legends • Various

... fit for any drawing-room. Two gondoliers, in dark blue shirts, completed the list of guests, if we exclude the maid Catina, who came and went about the table, laughing and joining in the songs, and sitting down at intervals to take her share of wine. The big room looking across the garden to the Grand Canal had been prepared for supper; and the company were to be received in the smaller, which has a fine open space in front of it to southwards. But as the ...
— Sketches and Studies in Italy and Greece • John Addington Symonds

... to me, I approached the inn, and descending three steps entered its cool shade. Here I found four men, each with his pipe and tankard, to whom a large, red-faced, big-fisted fellow was holding forth in a high state ...
— The Broad Highway • Jeffery Farnol

... the front that seems so cold, And the voice that is wont to storm, We are certain to find, a big, broad mind And a heart that is soft and warm. And he carries his woes in a lordly way, As only the great souls can: And it makes us glad when in truth we say, We ...
— The Englishman and Other Poems • Ella Wheeler Wilcox

... later a big teamster, having found a bottle of fire-water, became separated from his reasoning faculties, crowded under an old ...
— The Last Spike - And Other Railroad Stories • Cy Warman

... hour of the panic had spent itself before the dazed crowds in the broker's offices read the startling news that caused the big break. The ticker shrieked its message above the storm's din like a ...
— The Root of Evil • Thomas Dixon

... housework aroused in her regrets which were despairing, and distracted dreams. She thought of the silent antechambers hung with Oriental tapestry, lit by tall bronze candelabra, and of the two great footmen in knee breeches who sleep in the big armchairs, made drowsy by the heavy warmth of the hot-air stove. She thought of the long salons fatted up with ancient silk, of the delicate furniture carrying priceless curiosities, and of the coquettish perfumed boudoirs made for talks at ...
— Library of the World's Best Mystery and Detective Stories • Edited by Julian Hawthorne

... the moment of the boy's release; but this morning he only stared. Behind the staring, thought was too inactive for either retrospect or forecast; and thought was inactive because both past and future now contained elements too big for the overtaxed mind to deal with. He could only sit wearily and expectantly on the bench, watching, at the end of one of the long wings, a small gray door on which he had been ...
— The Side Of The Angels - A Novel • Basil King

... exchange, and made two million dollars in a few minutes, so that she could get even with the wicked baron, and force him to recall Raoul. In this act the actress wore black velvet, and looked every inch French—Bleecker Street French. It was the "big" scene, and was considered very strenuous by those acting in it. To those in the audience, it merely accentuated the cheap vulgarity of the play, that had no redeeming point, either literary or dramatic. It was, in fact, ...
— Ainslee's, Vol. 15, No. 5, June 1905 • Various

... the bells of St. Clement's; You owe me five farthings, Say the bells of St. Martin's; When will you pay me? Say the bells of Old Bailey. I do not know, Says the big bell of Bow. Here comes a chopper to light you to bed! Here comes a chopper ...
— My Book of Indoor Games • Clarence Squareman

... we are, all dressed for the day!" said the girl gayly, as she led the frail little woman along the strip of Axminster carpet that led to the big chair. ...
— Across the Years • Eleanor H. Porter

... that we had finished this most refreshing bath the sun was setting; indeed, when we got back to the big cave it had already set. The cave itself was full of people gathered round fires—for several more had now been lighted—and eating their evening meal by their lurid light, and by that of various lamps which were set about or hung upon the walls. These lamps were of a rude manufacture ...
— She • H. Rider Haggard

... the lad quick enough, mynheer, because he's in company with Peter van Holp, and his hair curls up over his forehead like foreign folk's, and if you hear him speak, he talks of big and fast, only it's English, but that wouldn't be any hindrance to ...
— Hans Brinker - or The Silver Skates • Mary Mapes Dodge

... alias Big Stick Joram, alias Pinky; swindler, international confidence man, fence, burglar, gambler; convicted in 1887, and sent to Sing Sing for forgery; convicted in 1898, and sent to Auburn for swindling; arrested by my men on board ...
— The Tracer of Lost Persons • Robert W. Chambers

... think your lessons are hard, in a class like yours, what do you suppose mine must be, when I am in with such big girls;" but ...
— Ruby at School • Minnie E. Paull

... Bordering on the "Big Black" and "Little Black" rivers the growth of pine is large and apparently of good quality, and it is believed that most of the smaller streams falling into the St. John below the "Seven Islands" will be found fringed ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents: Tyler - Section 2 (of 3) of Volume 4: John Tyler • Compiled by James D. Richardson

... of it, cousin Berry. Lugena charged me dis berry mornin', jes ez soon ez I seed you an' Sally, ter invite ye ter help eat her big ...
— Bricks Without Straw • Albion W. Tourgee

... think they are out of danger. Some Inhabitants make Nurseries a-part, and transplant them to the Places where they are wanting: but as they do not all grow, especially when they are a little too big, or the Season not favourable, and because the greatest part of those that do grow languish a long time, it always seem'd to me more proper to set fresh Kernels; and I am persuaded, if the Consequences are duly weighed, it will be ...
— The Natural History of Chocolate • D. de Quelus

... in the hotel about Kittredge's movements, but nothing came to light except the statement of a big, liveried doorkeeper, who remembered distinctly the sudden appearance at about nine o'clock of a young man who was very anxious to get a cab. The storm was then at its height, and the doorkeeper had advised the young man to wait, feeling sure the tempest would ...
— Through the Wall • Cleveland Moffett

... in the neighborhood did the same, Hiram noticed. They all strained every effort to put in corn, cultivating as big a crop ...
— Hiram The Young Farmer • Burbank L. Todd

... she talked to the children last Sunday about swearing and other such sins of speech. Now sin and disease are cor—what-you-may-call-it. Tommy he came home with that big head of his running on the talk about swearing, and in two days here he is with a—a belief in a sore throat. If I had my way I'd take the children out of Sunday-school. But mother will have her own way, you know, and I ain't anywhere when it comes ...
— The Faith Doctor - A Story of New York • Edward Eggleston

... as Everlasting Layers, With Bantam's small Ex-Emperor, the Cock, In ruffled plumage and funereal hackle, Giving, undone by Cockle, a last Cackle! To see as stiff as stone, his un'live stock, It really was enough to move his block. Down on the floor he dash'd, with horror big, Mr. Bell's third wife's mother's coachman's wig; And with a tragic stare like his own Kemble, Burst out with natural emphasis enough, And voice that grief made tremble, Into that very speech of sad Macduff— "What!—all my ...
— English Satires • Various

... that on the other side will be more of the nature of a false alarm; so we will go with the main force. There are some strong batteries erected in the loop which will prepare the way for us and a big train of field-guns. The troops will begin to cross at early daylight, so we can't do better than remain where we are until five o'clock. Then we will go and take our place near one of the bridges and slip across as soon as we see an opportunity. With such a mass of troops to move, ...
— A Girl of the Commune • George Alfred Henty

... wore a new homespun suit of "butternut jeans," a gorgeous cravat, etc., the soldier opened his arms and cried out in intense accents, "Let me kiss him for his mother!" Another was desired to "come out of that hat." A big veteran, laying his hand on the shoulder of a small, scared-looking, little victim, and wiping his own eyes upon his old hat, whined out, "I say, buddy, you didn't bring along no sugar-teats, did you? I'm got a powerful hankerin' atter some." An innocent-looking soldier would stop suddenly ...
— Memories - A Record of Personal Experience and Adventure During Four Years of War • Fannie A. (Mrs.) Beers

... without success, the spider always succeeding in moving before it could be touched. Somewhat out of temper, I procured a hammer of large size and continued the chase until I was exhausted. When my hand grew steady again, I took my automatic pistol, used for big game, and, taking a steady aim on the fat body of the spider, I fired. But with another of the remarkably quick movements the spider landed the usual safe distance from destruction. Then I gave it up. For all I know, that animal, I can scarcely call it an insect after using a big ...
— In The Amazon Jungle - Adventures In Remote Parts Of The Upper Amazon River, Including A - Sojourn Among Cannibal Indians • Algot Lange

... "Big Bethel, Bull Run, and Ball's Bluff, Oh, alliteration of blunders! Of blunders more than enough, In a time full of ...
— Three Years in the Federal Cavalry • Willard Glazier

... with a big sob that he could contain no longer. "Does the King want my new ball of string, and ...
— In Convent Walls - The Story of the Despensers • Emily Sarah Holt

... the stifling sense of close cramped confinement. The dead weight of the huge stone prison seemed resting on our breasts. On the next day we were taken out to undergo some of the "usual prison discipline," and were subjected to a sort of dress-parade. We were first placed man by man, in big hogsheads filled with water (of which there were two), and solemnly scrubbed by a couple of negro convicts. This they said was done for sanitary reasons. The baths in the lake at Johnson's Island were much pleasanter, and the twentieth man who was ordered into either tub, looked ruefully ...
— History of Morgan's Cavalry • Basil W. Duke

... take my word for it, the harm is done. This man is no rattle-pated fool, who changes his fancies as readily as he changes his clothes. The fire that lights those big black eyes of his is not an easy fire, when a woman has once kindled it, for that woman to put out. I don't wish to discourage you; I don't say the changes are against us. But with Mrs. Milroy threatening me on one side, and Mr. Midwinter on the other, the worst of all risks to run ...
— Armadale • Wilkie Collins

... accident. I have just left my carriage at the Sarvoelgyi's. I have won a big suit in chancery, and have come to the 'old man' to see if I could sell him the property, which he said he was ready to purchase. Then I shall take my daughter home ...
— Debts of Honor • Maurus Jokai

... them, coming through Green Gully, and were scared to death at their looks; they said they were big, black-looking men, strangers to these parts; and they swore at the boys and ordered 'em off real ugly. Nobody else has seen them in honest daylight, but they broke into Dan'l Brown's house last night. He's deaf, you know, and didn't hear a sound. They came right into the room where he ...
— The Green Satin Gown • Laura E. Richards

... thing is the "sample" game. A small lot of garments are brought in, which, we are told, must be made up very carefully. We are made to rip, and do work over, to suit the notions of the big firms, who want the garments to send out on the road. It takes twice as long to make such a coat, but we get no more for it. Of course the game is played on us when the coats are not really samples. If we accidentally scorch the cloth a little, ...
— White Slaves • Louis A Banks

... to the big, fair-haired man in a rough tweed suit, who was apparently directing the inquiries into the affair, he took me eagerly into a small back room and began to question me. I was, however, wary not to commit myself to anything further than the ...
— The Czar's Spy - The Mystery of a Silent Love • William Le Queux

... Barney," whispered Teddy, who certainly did not wish that Burke should return as he came; "here, you great big fwhool you, give past your yowlin' dere—and lookin' at your blood—run out dere, come in an' shout the gauger an' ...
— The Emigrants Of Ahadarra - The Works of William Carleton, Volume Two • William Carleton

... deep and yellowish, that on the sides of the hills of a very brown colour, and not very deep, but rocky underneath, yet excellent planting land; the trees in general are neither very straight, thick, nor tall, yet appear green and pleasant enough; some of them bear flowers, some berries, and others big fruits, but all unknown to any of us; cocoa- nut trees thrive very well here, as well on the bays by the sea-side, as more remote among the plantations; the nuts are of an indifferent size, the milk and kernel very thick and pleasant; here are ginger, yams, and other ...
— Early Australian Voyages • John Pinkerton

... Raw material in big heaps lay about, waiting for the fire to ripen it. Here was a stack of long, rough, rusty pigs, clumsy as the shillelabs of the Anakim. There was a pile of short, thick masses, lying higgledy-piggledy, stuff from ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 09, No. 51, January, 1862 • Various

... years ago. It signifies little how it looked then. Today it has a large appearance. There is nothing worth either laughing or crying about so far as its exterior goes. It doesn't look like a church; it resembles not a chapel; and it seems too big for a house. There is no effort at architectural elaboration in its outer arrangements. It is plain, strong, large; and like big feet or leathern shirts has evidently been made more for use than ornament. ...
— Our Churches and Chapels • Atticus

... where you make the mistake," I said. "India's full of Stalkies—Cheltenham and Haileybury and Marlborough chaps—that we don't know anything about, and the surprises will begin when there is really a big ...
— Stalky & Co. • Rudyard Kipling

... Benedict Arnold was a traitor. This is not like that. America's large enough for a mort of countries. All the states are countries—federated countries. Say some man is big enough to make a country west of the Mississippi—Well, one day we may federate too. Eh, Lewis, 'twould be a powerful country—great as Rome, I reckon! And we'd smoke the calumet with old Virginia—and she'd rule East and we'd rule West. D'you think it's a dream?—Well, ...
— Lewis Rand • Mary Johnston

... Louvre; and the house was a hotel of the xviith century. Two street-doors, on the right for the male gynaeceum and the left for the female, opened at 4 p.m. in winter and 8 p.m. in summer. A decoy-lad, charmingly dressed in women's clothes, with big haunches and small waist, promenaded outside; and this continued till 1826 when the ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 10 • Richard F. Burton

... Obed in a low tone, his eyes glittering with excitement. "It isn't once in a dog's age that so big ...
— In A New World - or, Among The Gold Fields Of Australia • Horatio Alger

... his head with both hands he ran away in order not to look at her sufferings. He rushed blindly among tufts of grass and heather until he fell upon one of the tufts. He was unarmed. A leopard, lion, or even a big hyena would find in him an easy prey. But only Saba came running to him. Having smelt at him on all sides, he again began to howl, as if summoning aid ...
— In Desert and Wilderness • Henryk Sienkiewicz

... every member of the House could give instances that would surprise us all. Perhaps it would interest the House if I give one. The son of a friend of mine, who is well off, had been writing to the War Office, taking every step to try to be accepted in order to fight. He was a partner in a big business in Glasgow and with splendid prospects; he threw them all up. He came and hung about the doors of the War Office as if he was seeking some fat job, when all he wanted was to be placed, not as an officer, but as a private, in one of the most dangerous branches ...
— New York Times Current History: The European War from the Beginning to March 1915, Vol 1, No. 2 - Who Began the War, and Why? • Various

... her away, Lans, dear, and be right good to her as you have been to me, big brother," the sweet voice, the unutterable tenderness and firmness more and more carried everything before them; "and let the little child have its chance—poor lil' child! And by and by—oh! a long time perhaps—when ...
— A Son of the Hills • Harriet T. Comstock

... Billy Brackett—"a big man, a middle-sized man, and a little man, like the bears in the story-book. Why Winn, that's our raft, and I've been aboard it twice ...
— Raftmates - A Story of the Great River • Kirk Munroe

... in fact, so hungry and tired that they hardly noticed where they were going, or observed the beauties of the formal gardens through which the pink-silk Princess was leading them. They were in a sort of dream, from which they only partially awakened to find themselves in a big hail, with suits of armour and old flags round the walls, the skins of beasts on the floor, and heavy oak tables ...
— The Enchanted Castle • E. Nesbit

... me that my first encounter was fortunate in circumstance. My big rattler was old, and had led too easy a life; there was not much fight in him. He had probably lived there for years, with a fat prairie-dog for breakfast whenever he felt like it, a sheltered home, even an ...
— My Antonia • Willa Cather

... to peer down into the valley, and Arizona made no attempt to pursue the conversation. He was long since accustomed to the silences of his traveling mate. Seeing that Sinclair showed no disposition either to speak or move, he left the big cowpuncher to himself and started off through the trees in search of game. The sign of a deer caught his eye and hurried him on into a futile chase, from which he returned in the early dark of the evening. He was guided by the fire which Sinclair had ...
— The Rangeland Avenger • Max Brand

... ordered him to be tied to a stake, and suffer fifty lashes every morning till he should learn to speak out, as they said. Oh! Mr. Harley, had you seen him, as I did, with his hands bound behind him, suffering in silence, while the big drops trickled down his shrivelled cheeks and wet his grey beard, which some of the inhuman soldiers plucked in scorn! I could not bear it, I could not for my soul, and one morning, when the rest of the guard were out of the way, I found means to let him escape. I was tried ...
— The Man of Feeling • Henry Mackenzie

... slackened his pace that he might not interfere with her leap, gave vent to a sigh of relief. He pressed Aida's flanks firmly, and the big Irish mare jumped after her competitor, with the majestic ...
— Zibeline, Complete • Phillipe de Massa

... out, not so heavy, not so big as Mormon, but sheathed in flesh with the armor of ease and good living. He peered up at Sandy, then let ...
— Rimrock Trail • J. Allan Dunn

... shoulders and smiled unbelievingly. Her recollection of Pink Upham was of a big red-faced fellow overgrown and awkward, with a disgusting habit of twisting every one's remarks into puns, and of uttering trite truths with the air of just having discovered them. The warning whirr of a clock about to strike made her ...
— Mary Ware's Promised Land • Annie Fellows Johnston

... summer-house; Flamma was shouting an old song, with heavy emphasis here and there, with big capital letters:— ...
— Amaryllis at the Fair • Richard Jefferies

... that had me. I was back again in derelict Vermelles, with its spattered water tower, and the flat desolate plain in front. Loos is out of sight over the hill; only the great slag heap lies squat and menacing on one's left, with the remnants of Big Willie and Little Willie near to its base in the old blood-soaked Hohenzollern redoubt. Cambrin, Guinchy, La Bassee—silent and haunted, teeming with ghosts, lie stagnant in the morning sun. The cobwebs drift across the Hulluch road, and in the distance, by the first bend, a man pushing a wheeled ...
— No Man's Land • H. C. McNeile

... freedom from invasion, and to the condition which arise in our Colonial Wars, we have not yet, in England, arrived at a correct appreciation of the value of superior numbers in War, and still adhere to the idea of an Army just "big enough," which Clausewitz has so ...
— On War • Carl von Clausewitz

... many," Norah said. "And Michael will be a darling: and we'll all sleep together in one big room, and ...
— Captain Jim • Mary Grant Bruce

... sound broke the stillness of the night. The silence got on his nerves. He took another big drink and decided ...
— Gunsight Pass - How Oil Came to the Cattle Country and Brought a New West • William MacLeod Raine

... neither solemnity, sourness, nor bitterness to be seen anywhere; at the same time, there was no sign of levity. In every countenance was the same inexplicable mixture of wisdom and benevolence that distinguished Estra. Nowhere was there hostility, and nowhere was there crudity. Somehow, the big geologist would have felt more at home had he seen something antagonistic. Essentially, Van ...
— The Lord of Death and the Queen of Life • Homer Eon Flint

... the effect of restoring Stephen's composure. Hastily dashing away his tears, he flew with unwonted wrath at his enemy. Bramble, however, managed to get behind Padger and the rest, and thus fortified shouted out, "Yah, boo, howling young sucking pig! go home to your mammy, or your great big cheat of a blackguard thief of a caddish big brother! Do you hear? Who stole the exam paper? Eh, Padger? Yah, boo, pack of ...
— The Fifth Form at Saint Dominic's - A School Story • Talbot Baines Reed

... and he saw a big fat toad and round about her a crowd of little toads. The fat toad asked what his wish was. He answered, "I should have liked the most beautiful and finest carpet." Then she called a young ...
— Hidden Symbolism of Alchemy and the Occult Arts • Herbert Silberer

... about the pradhana, might take his stand on the latter, looking upon it as the Non-Self. In ordinary life a man who wishes to point out to a friend the (small) star Arundhati at first directs his attention to a big neighbouring star, saying 'that is Arundhati,' although it is really not so; and thereupon he withdraws his first statement and points out the real Arundhati. Analogously the teacher (if he intended to make his pupil understand the Self through the Non-Self) would in ...
— The Vedanta-Sutras with the Commentary by Sankaracarya - Sacred Books of the East, Volume 1 • George Thibaut

... but a wisdom which, unfortunately, was three centuries at least out of date, which even now we have not grown big enough to profit by. The Catholic princes and bishops were at work with fire and faggot. The Protestants were pulling down monasteries, and turning the monks and nuns out into the world. The Catholics declared that Erasmus was as much to blame as Luther. The ...
— Short Studies on Great Subjects • James Anthony Froude

... and of Isis. These mysteries used exactly the same kind of machinery which proves so effective every day in modern mysteries, viz., shows, processions, voices, lights, dark rooms, frightful sights, solemn mummeries, striking costumes, big talks and preachments, threats, gabbles of ...
— The Humbugs of the World • P. T. Barnum

... who had been thrown on shore with them had got off in the island boats, while they chose to remain. Whereupon the little Portuguese Commandant struck his sword firm down on the pavement of the ramparts, looked very big, and then ordered them to prison for ...
— The Phantom Ship • Frederick Marryat

... but where was the stair-carpet? Happy Jack, however, was clearly as happy as usual. He had a round, red face; and, I will add, a red nose. But the usual sprightly smile stirred the red round face, the usual big guffaw came leaping from the largely opening mouth, the usual gleam of mingled sharpness and bonhomie shone from the large blue eyes. Happy Jack closed the door, and, taking my arm, walked me backwards ...
— Chambers' Edinburgh Journal - Volume XVII., No 422, New Series, January 31, 1852 • Various

... off all the attacks of the Mexicans," replied the great borderer, "but when Santa Anna brings up his whole force an' makes a resolute assault it's bound to go under. The mission is too big an' scattered to be held by Travis an' his men against forty or ...
— The Texan Scouts - A Story of the Alamo and Goliad • Joseph A. Altsheler

... officer he continued with Buller until the relief of Ladysmith, and with Roberts until the fall of Pretoria. He was in many actions, in all the big engagements, and came out of the war with another medal and clasps for ...
— Real Soldiers of Fortune • Richard Harding Davis

... not have fell, had I not boarded them; but truly it was far from impossible but they might have forged into the Spanish fleet as the other two ships did." He was there, he could do nothing else, he saw with his rapid glance that he might do this, and he did it. And, after all, it was a big thing,—this boarding a first-rate ship over the decks of another hostile ship, not inaptly characterized in the fleet as "Nelson's patent bridge." We must mark, too, or we shall miss significant indications of character, that the same qualities which led him to the quarter-deck ...
— The Life of Nelson, Vol. I (of 2) - The Embodiment of the Sea Power of Great Britain • A. T. (Alfred Thayer) Mahan

... to have a good row of buttons upon it—not the common horn, or bone, or flimsy lead ones, such as are worn nowadays, but good, substantial metal buttons—as big as a shilling every way, and with strong iron eyes in them. Well was it for me they were so ...
— The Boy Tar • Mayne Reid

... than brow of milk or cheek of rose.[EN30] There were few changes. A half-peasant Bedawi had planted a strip of barley near the camping place; the late floods had shifted the course of the waters; more date-trees had been wilfully burned; a big block of quartz, brother to that which we had broken, had been carried off; and where several of the old furnaces formerly stood, deep holes, dug by the "money-hunter," now yawned. I again examined the two large fragments of the broken barrage, ...
— The Land of Midian, Vol. 1 • Richard Burton

... been born and bred on the estate, was of course bound to go with her. Then you see, Master Guy, haven't I taught you to use the bow and the quarter-staff, and carried you on my shoulder many a score of times when you were a little lad and I was a big boy? It would not have been natural for you to have gone out with a chance of getting into a fight without my being there to draw a shaft when you needed it. Why, Ruth Gregory, whose sworn bachelor you know I am, would have cried shame on me if I had ...
— At Agincourt • G. A. Henty

... caught by instinct the subject of conversation, "and the poor stharven people say, too, that there is plenty of money squandhered upon extravagance by the king and his coort to give them all bread; and that the forests that is kept for the deers and craythurs to be killed for the spoort of the big folks, would give every man a bit of fresh land, and that the potatoes would grow well ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXIII No. 4 October 1848 • Various

... them to strike the tents, and was urging on the ammunition to the front, and encouraging the bandsmen to carry it, when a Zulu shot him. A good and not painful end—God bless him! The Capt. Jones who told this, said also that one little bugler killed three big Zulus with his side-arms before he fell! Also that a private of the 24th saved Chard's life at Rorke's Drift by pushing his head down, so that ...
— Juliana Horatia Ewing And Her Books • Horatia K. F. Eden

... thy choice, then: To beg of thee, it is my more dishonour Than thou of them. Come all to ruin: let Thy mother rather feel thy pride than fear Thy dangerous stoutness; for I mock at death With as big heart as thou. Do as thou list. Thy valiantness was mine, thou suck'dst it from me; But owe thy ...
— The Tragedy of Coriolanus • William Shakespeare [Collins edition]

... with only moderate swiftness, like a great flame generating noises in the air; and the tremendous uproar made by the rare mingling with the rare, and when that air which is both swift and rare rushes into that which is itself rare and in motion, it is like the flame of fire which issues from a big gun and striking against the air; and again when a flame issues from the cloud, there is a concussion in the air as the bolt is generated. Therefore we may say that the spirit cannot produce a voice ...
— The Notebooks of Leonardo Da Vinci, Complete • Leonardo Da Vinci

... lost? How does the account stand? Is it worth while or not? Is there anything in convivial drinking that is too precious and too pleasant to be sacrificed for whatever pleasures or rewards there are in abstinence? What are the big equations? These are questions that naturally occur in a consideration of the subject; and these are the questions I shall try to answer, answering them entirely from my own experience and judging them from my own viewpoint, leaving the application of my conclusions to those who care to apply ...
— The Old Game - A Retrospect after Three and a Half Years on the Water-wagon • Samuel G. Blythe

... my manner changed as they opened the door. I have even held my own with gentlemen in plush, giving one my hat, another my stick, and a third my coat, and all done with little more trouble than I should have expended in putting the three articles on the chair myself. But this bold deed, and other big things of the kind, I did that I might tell my mother of them afterwards, while I sat on the end of her bed, and her face beamed with ...
— Margaret Ogilvy • James M. Barrie

... ensure their defeat. Roosevelt had one interesting and illuminating experience with the "black horse cavalry." He was Chairman of the Committee on Cities. The representatives of one of the great railways brought to him a bill to permit the extension of its terminal facilities in one of the big cities of the State, and asked him to take charge of it. Roosevelt looked into the proposed bill and found that it was a measure that ought to be passed quite as much in the public interest as is the interest of the railroad. He ...
— Theodore Roosevelt and His Times - A Chronicle of the Progressive Movement; Volume 47 in The - Chronicles Of America Series • Harold Howland

... it afforded him an opportunity of seeing the wild, majestic scenery of the Rocky Mountains, and shooting the big-horned sheep which abounded there, and the grizzly "bars," as Joe named them, or "Caleb," as they were more frequently styled by Henri and the ...
— The Dog Crusoe and His Master - A Story of Adventure in the Western Prairies • Robert Michael Ballantyne

... to tell you that ... he was detained....' I positively did not know what I was saying, and I did not dare to raise my eyes. Varia stood silent and motionless before me. I glanced at her: she turned away her head; two big tears rolled slowly down her cheeks. In the expression of her face there was such sudden, bitter suffering; the conflict between bashfulness, sorrow, and confidence in me was so simply, so touchingly apparent in the unconscious movement of her poor little head that it sent a pang to my heart. ...
— The Diary of a Superfluous Man and Other Stories • Ivan Turgenev

... care of our luggage. He was exactly what I expected. He wore a white smock with red and blue embroidery at the neck and wrists. His reddish beard was long and Tolstoyan. We followed him into the big, empty railway station, and there a soldier took away our passports and we were left waiting in the douane, behind locked and guarded doors, together with a crowd of ...
— Trapped in 'Black Russia' - Letters June-November 1915 • Ruth Pierce

... committee were not disposed to invite the humiliation of a third refusal and must have listened with no little relief, to this blunt summary of the situation by Beriah Green, who was one of the six. "If there is not timber amongst ourselves," quoth Green, "big enough to make a president of, let us get along without one, or go home and stay there until we have grown up to be men." The next day Green was chosen, and established in a manner never to be forgotten by his associates that the convention did possess "timber big enough ...
— William Lloyd Garrison - The Abolitionist • Archibald H. Grimke

... found my caribou, and returned to the lumber camp before sunset. At twilight there was Kookooskoos, an enormous fellow, looking like the end of a big spruce stub, keeping sharp watch over the clearing, and fortunately behind the camp where he could not see the door. I called the men and set them crouching in the snow under the low eaves.—"Stay ...
— Wilderness Ways • William J Long

... clouds, and there wasn't anything overhead but sky. Joe Kenmore looked out the plane window past the co-pilot's shoulder. He stared ahead to where the sky and cloud bank joined—it was many miles away—and tried to picture the job before him. Back in the cargo space of the plane there were four big crates. They contained the pilot gyros for the most important object then being built on Earth, and it wouldn't work properly without them. It was Joe's job to take that highly specialized, magnificently precise machinery to its destination, help to install it, and see ...
— Space Platform • Murray Leinster

... You do look uncomfortable. It was big enough when you tried it on last. You must have drawn in the arm-holes while you were sewing them. Yes, you have! I can see the puckers, and the sleeves are stretched so tight too. You didn't take them ...
— More About Peggy • Mrs G. de Horne Vaizey

... the guide said; "the sahibs will have a big fight here. It is a summer palace and garden of the king. Once past this we will leave the road. It is but two miles to the canal and we must not enter the city—not that I fear discovery, but there would be no possibility of entering the ...
— In Times of Peril • G. A. Henty

... the water the birds were flying in large flocks, like thick clouds big with a storm. Aquatic birds of all sorts were there, from the albatross which is common to the south, to the penguin of the arctic seas, but of enormous size. Their cries were deafening. In considering them the doctor found his knowledge ...
— The Voyages and Adventures of Captain Hatteras • Jules Verne

... Canute had taken the log across his knee and bent it into the shape he wished. There were two rooms, or rather there was one room with a partition made of ash saplings interwoven and bound together like big straw basket work. In one corner there was a cook stove, rusted and broken. In the other a bed made of unplaned planks and poles. It was fully eight feet long, and upon it was a heap of dark bed ...
— A Collection of Stories, Reviews and Essays • Willa Cather

... at a moment so big with the most horrible surmises, was decisive: furiously, therefore, he forced himself past her, and opened the door:—but when he saw them together,—the rest of the family confessedly excluded, his rage turned to horror, and he could ...
— Cecilia vol. 3 - Memoirs of an Heiress • Frances (Fanny) Burney (Madame d'Arblay)

... regardless of just how I was further embarrassing and complicating myself in the affairs of the two men I had thought I owned and was now finding out that I had to give up. I wish I had been looking at him, for I felt him start, but he said in his big friendly voice that is so much—and never enough ...
— The Melting of Molly • Maria Thompson Daviess

... is very easy to fight against the wrong which is done to popes, kings, princes, bishops and other big-wigs.[18] Here each wants to be the most pious, where there is no great need. O how sly is here the deceitful Adam with his demand; how finely does he cover his greed of profit with the name of truth and righteousness and God's honor! ...
— Works of Martin Luther - With Introductions and Notes (Volume I) • Martin Luther

... remember how, in "THE PONY RIDER BOYS IN THE ROCKIES," the four lads set off on horseback to spend part of their summer vacation in the mountains. The readers will remember too, the many thrilling experiences that the boys passed through on that eventful trip, between hunting big game in hand to hand conflict, fighting a real battle with the bad men of the mountains, and how in the end they discovered and took possession of ...
— The Pony Rider Boys in Montana • Frank Gee Patchin

... we read of two giants who lay down to sleep on opposite sides of the table after eating a big supper of thick peas-soup. An unfortunate man was hidden under the table, and the consequence was that he was blown backwards and forwards ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 5 • Richard F. Burton

... moment a big wave struck the bow of the boat and swept her from stem to stern, filling Mason's ...
— A Voyage with Captain Dynamite • Charles Edward Rich

... the job so quickly. It's the easiest thing in the world to write laudation; only an inexperienced grumbler would declare it was easier to find fault. The book was Billington's "Vagaries"; pompous idiocy, of course, but he lives in a big house and gives dinners. Well, from 10.30 to 11, I smoked a cigar and reflected, feeling that the day wasn't badly begun. At eleven I was ready to write my Saturday causerie for the Will o' the Wisp; it took me till close upon one o'clock, which was rather too long. ...
— New Grub Street • George Gissing

... t' set that child t' lookin' at me so funny?" he asked himself as he went to the field later, and being big-hearted and ignorant was unaware that a man could hamstring himself ...
— The Wind Before the Dawn • Dell H. Munger

... great silver cat in her lap, blinked indifferently. He was Gloria's newest pet, so named with the superstitious fancy that it might have the effect of making "his tribe increase," and Abou Ben Adhem's "tribe" was exceedingly valuable. Gloria set the big, warm weight gently ...
— Gloria and Treeless Street • Annie Hamilton Donnell

... coming. Jack awoke with a start of expectation. There was no moon tonight, but he had left a candle burning in a distant corner. It was all he could do to keep back a chuckle when he saw a big gray rat dart across the floor with a good sized twig in its mouth. Jack kept perfectly still and the little fellow, not even seeing him, continued its way across the floor to the bunk on which sat Jack beside the doll clothes. It clawed its ...
— Little Tales of The Desert • Ethel Twycross Foster

... "we tracked the carriage into the next county, to a place thirty miles from here—to a lodge—and there they stopped us. The place is well guarded with men and great big dogs. We heerd 'em bark, ...
— A Terrible Temptation - A Story of To-Day • Charles Reade

... Warlick again, and he drew a big revolver, and with the butt of it began to hammer Toot's clinched fingers. As he did this, Bradley and Hillhouse drew Wambush backward and ...
— Westerfelt • Will N. Harben

... not been used for a long time in cruising, the fuel receptacle was empty, though a spare gaff-topsail had been thrown into it. This locker was big enough to admit the body-corporate of the skipper. It was not a particularly clean place, for a portion of it had been economized for the stowage of the charcoal, which the skipper preferred to wood. But he did not rebel at the blackness of the retreat he had chosen, for ...
— Within The Enemy's Lines - SERIES: The Blue and the Gray—Afloat • Oliver Optic

... that each single one of these germs was a witness of, and a concurring agent in, the development of the parent forms from their respective germs, and that each one of them therefore, was shut up within the parent germ, like a small box inside a big one? ...
— The Note-Books of Samuel Butler • Samuel Butler

... to one another, one might have thought that the whole castle was in flames; but they were only letting down a drawbridge. As I was going over this bridge, a casement window opened in the castle; and a voice, which I knew to be old Ellinor's, exclaimed, "Mind the big hole in the middle of the ...
— Tales and Novels, Vol. IV • Maria Edgeworth

... boats, though with much regret, and resolved to manage so as not to lose sight of my detachment. I was in constant anxiety about the latter till 8 o'clock the next day, when we all came together, except one soldier topass, who, by his own fault, had remained on a big boat which we had abandoned, and a manjhi,[152] who was drowned in one of the two little ...
— Three Frenchmen in Bengal - The Commercial Ruin of the French Settlements in 1757 • S.C. Hill

... designs of men. Did fifty thousand persons, whose mental and whose bodily labour you might direct, and so many hundred thousand a year of a revenue, which was neither lazy nor superstitious, appear too big for your abilities to wield? Had you no way of using the men but by converting monks into pensioners? Had you no way of turning the revenue to account but through the improvident resource of a spendthrift sale? If you were thus destitute ...
— Selections from the Speeches and Writings of Edmund Burke. • Edmund Burke

... some rabbits and cooked them on hot coals, the adhering ashes making a substitute for salt. I reached the spring first and found little, round, beaming, Teemaroomtekai, who knew our plans, already there with a great big "Mericats" fire to welcome us, as well as a large pile of wood for feeding it. The Major got in soon after, but Jones failed to come at all, which worried us. Before we could go in search of him in the morning ...
— A Canyon Voyage • Frederick S. Dellenbaugh

... westward of this island. The boatman who ferried me knew about this chain, but thought it had been abandoned since traffic stopped. He says it runs right up into the Castle, and the moment a barge strikes against it, a big bell is automatically rung inside the stronghold, causing the Baron to laugh so loudly that they sometimes hear ...
— The Sword Maker • Robert Barr

... sermon, for staring and wondering at the uncouth apparition which had so unceremoniously appeared in the midst of them. This was not diminished, by her choosing to stand during those portions of the service, when pious females bend the knee. Miss Wilhelmina said, "that she was too big to kneel—that her prayers were just as good in one attitude as another. The soul had no legs or knees, that she could discover—and if the prayers did not come from the heart, they were of no use to her, or to any one else. She had not much faith in prayers of any ...
— Flora Lyndsay - or, Passages in an Eventful Life • Susan Moodie

... treaties, an amulet in danger, an affidavit, small change, a savings' bank, a wedding ring and a dress suit. To this day the belt of wampum is the storehouse of Indian treasure. In the Six Nations, when a big chief made an assertion in council, he laid down a belt of wampum, as though to say, "Money talks." The Iroquois sent a belt of it to the King of England when they asked his protection. William Penn got a strip when he made his treaty. ...
— Modern Eloquence: Vol II, After-Dinner Speeches E-O • Various

... and come back with a report, it would have been a great deal better for the pirate captain, but he chose to go himself, and he came to grief. No sooner did the people on the ships lying in the harbor behold a boat approaching with a big-browed, broad-jawed mariner sitting in the stern, and with a good many more broad-backed, hairy mariners than were necessary, pulling at the oars, than they gave the alarm. The well-known pirate was recognized, and it was not long ...
— Buccaneers and Pirates of Our Coasts • Frank Richard Stockton

... Two big tribal houses, each considerably larger than the one of Suba, rose pompously in a wide cleared space beside the stream. Before them, ranged in a semicircle, stood hundreds of Mayorunas—men, women, children—all silently watching the canoes of the newcomers. In the center of ...
— The Pathless Trail • Arthur O. (Arthur Olney) Friel

... we are almost willing that Pluto should carry her to some region from which she is not likely to come back. At the same time we are sorry not to provide her with an ointment for the blue marks which the big hands of Pluto are making on her soft flesh. The plain truth is, that this work makes a low and common thing of a subject which could be so treated as to be a "thing of beauty" in a ...
— A History of Art for Beginners and Students - Painting, Sculpture, Architecture • Clara Erskine Clement

... home from Boston last night, overtook Indian Will. He showed me a big iron tobacco-box nearly full of money—silver, with two gold-pieces, one a Spanish piece, the other an English half guinea. He got it for a lot of deer-skins in Boston. Begged him not to drink it all up, which he ...
— Not Pretty, But Precious • John Hay, et al.

... friends they take you gently up, And lay you gently down; They never saw a weed so big, Or quite so deadly brown. They, as a rule, smoke anything They pick up free of charge; But they leave you to rest while the bulbuls sing Through the night, my ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 99., December 13, 1890 • Various

... arsenic, jars of alcohol, butterfly-nets, snake-bags, pill-boxes, and a dozen other implements and appliances of science about which we knew nothing, were given to us by our enthusiastic naturalists and packed away in big boxes; Wrangell's (vrang'el's) Travels, Gray's Botany, and a few scientific works were added to our small library; and before night we were able to report ourselves ready—armed and equipped for any adventure, from the capture of a new species of ...
— Tent Life in Siberia • George Kennan

... shops, mamma," said Sophonisba, "dedicated A la belle Anglaise! Just think what people would say, walking along Oxford Street, if they were to see over a hosier's shop, written in big, flaring letters, 'To the ...
— The Cockaynes in Paris - 'Gone abroad' • Blanchard Jerrold

... Richard now a boy. A little boy and a big boy. I am not sure now of his voice. I can only remember certain words. 'Clari,' and 'Don Ricardo,' and his laugh. He used to be full of fun. Once we laughed all day together tumbling in the hay. Then he had a friend, and began to write poetry, and be ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith

... Liberty had not in the nick of time transformed the leaders into Clown, Pantaloon, Harlequin, Columbine, Harlequina, and a whole family of Sprites, consisting of a remarkably stout father and three spineless sons. We all knew what was coming when the Spirit of Liberty addressed the king with a big face, and His Majesty backed to the side-scenes and began untying himself behind, with his big face all on one side. Our excitement at that crisis was great, and our delight unbounded. After this era in our existence, we went through all the incidents of a pantomime; it was not by any ...
— The Uncommercial Traveller • Charles Dickens

... the airman, pushing his big, round goggles higher upon his brow, "we sometimes wonder when ...
— The White Lie • William Le Queux



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