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Limber   Listen
adjective
Limber  adj.  Easily bent; flexible; pliant; yielding. "The bargeman that doth row with long and limber oar."






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Limber" Quotes from Famous Books



... idee, and told her so. I like 'em both. Ury is a tall, limber-jinted sort of a chap, sandy complected, and a little round shouldered, but hard-workin' and industrious, and seems ...
— Sweet Cicely - Or Josiah Allen as a Politician • Josiah Allen's Wife (Marietta Holley)

... around Mr. Crow and admired him and talked about his great change, and Mr. 'Possum touched him and said his complexion seemed pretty solid, somewhat like a shell, and Mr. Crow told him how he had to move rather carefully in it, at first, though very likely it would limber up in time. Then he told them how he was going to do the kitchen that way, and perhaps other things, and they all got excited and talked about it, and Mr. 'Possum said that probably he would have them give him a coat next winter, to match the snow which would be handy, ...
— Hollow Tree Nights and Days • Albert Bigelow Paine

... the boys run up wi' you an' begin to git limber-jawed," league continued, "thes hang your thum' in that kinder keerless like, an' they'll sw'ar by you thereekly. Ef any of 'em asts the news, thes say they's a leak in Sugar Creek. Well, well, well!" he exclaimed, after a little pause; "hit's thes like I tell ...
— Mingo - And Other Sketches in Black and White • Joel Chandler Harris

... grass from the upper hole. A thick volume of smoke rolled out. The bear must be dead. No creature could live in such an atmosphere. I introduced my ramrod through the opening. I could feel the soft hairy body of the animal, but it was limber and motionless. It was dead. Feeling convinced of this, at length, we removed the rocks below, and dragged it forth. Yes, the bear was dead,—or, at all events, very like it; but, to make the thing sure, Cudjo gave him a knock on the head with his axe. ...
— The Desert Home - The Adventures of a Lost Family in the Wilderness • Mayne Reid

... cannot count them up. But I am rested now. Shall we walk about a little and get my knees limber? Where is Pierre?" ...
— A Little Girl in Old Detroit • Amanda Minnie Douglas

... excellent and obliging American. The British traveller is not a little struck, and in many instances disgusted, with a certain air of indifference in the manners of such persons in Canada, which is accompanied with a tone of equality and familiarity exceedingly unlike the limber and oily obsequiousness of tavern-keepers in England. I confess I felt at the time not a little annoyed with Mr. S—-'s free-and-easy manner, and apparent coolness and indifference when he told us he had no spare room in his house to accommodate our party. We endeavoured to procure lodgings ...
— Roughing it in the Bush • Susanna Moodie

... torpid all winter in his hole took advantage of the first warm day to limber up for the spring campaign. Having tied himself into an intricate knot, he was so overcome by the warmth of his own body that he fell asleep, and did not wake until nightfall. In the darkness he was unable to find his head or his ...
— Cobwebs From an Empty Skull • Ambrose Bierce (AKA: Dod Grile)

... blast that young Keeldar blew, Still stood the limber fern, And a wee man, of swarthy hue, Upstarted by ...
— The Lady of the Lake • Sir Walter Scott

... as he fell, had noosed one of his legs in the lazo that hung from the horn of his saddle, and was now dragged over the prairie after his wild and snorting mustang. As the animal swerved, at every jerk his limber body bounded to the distance of twenty feet, where it would lie motionless until slung into the air by a fresh pluck ...
— The Rifle Rangers • Captain Mayne Reid

... such word as this, we should naturally expect it to follow the signification of lithe; soft, limber: which will not suit with ...
— The Rowley Poems • Thomas Chatterton

... them up. They would leap and rear with impatience when taken into the open before they were hooked to the vehicle. They were being very well fed, and though once a week they had the hardest of work, for the rest of the time they had never more than enough to limber them up, for on schooldays I used to take them out for a spin of three or four miles only, after four. At home, when I left, my wife and I would get them ready in the stable; then I took them out and lined them up in front of the buggy. My wife quickly took the lines: I hooked the traces up, jumped ...
— Over Prairie Trails • Frederick Philip Grove

... its own divine art. Until Regina came among us that melodious siren in the front parlour had a chronic lock-jaw from want of use. Some of the white keys stuck fast when they were touched, and the black ones were so stiff they almost required a hammer to make them sound. Do let her limber them at her own 'sweet will.' Who wants a piano locked up, like that hideous old china and heavy glass that your grandfather's fifth ...
— Infelice • Augusta Jane Evans Wilson

... strapped in their appointed places, and the brown leather harness was polished like a lady's tan shoes. After the field batteries came the horse artillery and after the horse artillery the pom-poms—each drawn by a pair of sturdy draught horses driven with web reins by a soldier sitting on the limber—and after the pom-poms an interminable line of machine- guns, until one wondered where Krupp's found the time and the steel to make them all. Then, heralded by a blare of trumpets and a crash of kettledrums, came the cavalry; cuirassiers ...
— Fighting in Flanders • E. Alexander Powell

... last night I served the Duca di Sant' Agata, were my tongue so limber! The gondolier and the confessor are the two privy-councillors of a noble, Master Stefano, with this small difference—that the last only knows what the sinner wishes to reveal, while the first sometimes knows more. I can ...
— The Bravo • J. Fenimore Cooper

... to be picked. Some few things needed a little more December sun, but everything looked perfect. Some of the Jack-in-the-boxes would not pop out quite quick enough, and some of the jumping-Jacks were hardly as limber as they might be as yet; that was all. As it was so near Christmas the Monks were engaged in their holy exercises in the chapel for the greater part of the time, and only went over the garden once a day to see if everything was ...
— The Pot of Gold - And Other Stories • Mary E. Wilkins

... duty," answered Joshua, on whose grave features there came a smile. "Dame Linkon, if you would limber your joints we ...
— The Real America in Romance, Volume 6; A Century Too Soon (A Story - of Bacon's Rebellion) • John R. Musick

... upon the threshold of the "billet" (half a limber load of bricks and an angle iron) was quite sure the Salvage Company couldn't take a dog, as they had an infant wild boar and two fox cubs numbering on their strength; but he thought that he could plant my prodigy with a friend of his, a bombardier ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 153, August 1, 1917. • Various

... it's all the same to me. I'll be glad to limber my arm up a little, too. It feels a tiny bit stiff, and a good work-out ...
— The Boy Scout Fire Fighters - or Jack Danby's Bravest Deed • Robert Maitland

... Convert more than half inspir'd, Strait to his Closet and his Books retir'd. There for all needful Arts in this extreme, For knotty Sophistry t'a limber Theme, Long brooding ere the Mass to Shape was brought, And after many a tugging heaving Thought, Together a well-orderd Speech he draws, With ponderous Sounds for his much-labour'd Cause. Then the astonisht Sanedrim he storm'd, And with such doughty strength the Tug perform'd: Fate ...
— Anti-Achitophel (1682) - Three Verse Replies to Absalom and Achitophel by John Dryden • Elkanah Settle et al.

... to the head of the line, and positively delightful to the onlookers to see Hen Lord doing right and left, ladies' chain, balance to opposite and cast off, at a girl's beck and call. He was not a bad dancer, when his sluggish blood once got into circulation; and he was considerably more limber at the end of Money Musk, considerably less like a wooden image, than at the beginning ...
— Mother Carey's Chickens • Kate Douglas Wiggin

... parasites and epiphytes was observed, especially on the pines and oaks. The round yellow clusters growing on the branches of the oaks sometimes give the entire forest a yellow hue. In the foot-hills I saw a kind of parasite, whose straight, limber branches of a fresh, dark green colour hang down in bunches over twenty feet in length. Some epiphytes, which most of the year look to the casual observer like so many tufts of hay on the branches, produce at ...
— Unknown Mexico, Volume 1 (of 2) • Carl Lumholtz

... were trying out in one corner of the grounds in full view of the entire mass of spectators. Many curious eyes watched them limber up their arms for the work before them. Besides Hendrix and Donohue several reserve pitchers on either side were in line, sending and receiving in routine; but of course never once delivering their deceptive curves or drops, lest the opposing players get a line on their best ...
— Jack Winters' Baseball Team - Or, The Rivals of the Diamond • Mark Overton

... the afternoon As the band waltzed in on "the lion tune," And there, from the time that she'd go in, Till she'd back out of the cage agin, He'd stand, shaky and limber-kneed— 'Specially when she come to "feed The beast raw meat with her naked hand"— And all ...
— Nye and Riley's Wit and Humor (Poems and Yarns) • Bill Nye

... laid a hand on the breech of the Lewis machine-gun mounted in the gallery, its grim muzzle pointed out through a slit in the colloid screen. "The six guns we've got aboard, in strategic positions, look like good medicine to me! Wouldn't it be the correct thing to call the gun-crews and limber up a little? These chaps aren't going to be all day in getting here, and ...
— The Flying Legion • George Allan England

... head so high his limber ear bobbed in the murky air. He brayed mournfully. Anse glanced at the mule's long ...
— Rebel Spurs • Andre Norton

... out with the "reveille", call and instantly Major Robertson's voice "Battalion! Ready! Fire!" Eight guns thundered almost as one and continued to fire each about four shots to the minute for possibly six or eight minutes, when a Federal battery replied. Then came Robertson's command, "Limber to the rear! To the right, march! Gallop!" And away we went down the river under the cover of the sheltering woods. A piece of shell took off the arm of one of Lumsden's men, near the shoulder, as we moved away. His name was Ray, a private from somewhere ...
— A History of Lumsden's Battery, C.S.A. • George Little

... fat, fair, and rather more than forty—Puffington, no longer the light limber lad who patronized us in Bond Street, but Puffington a plump, portly sort of personage, filling his smart clothes uncommonly full. Men no longer hailing him heartily from bay windows, or greeting him cheerily in short but familiar terms, but bowing ceremoniously as they passed ...
— Mr. Sponge's Sporting Tour • R. S. Surtees

... was related to me at the time, but owing to our hurried movements and the vicissitudes of the battle, I have never had an opportunity to verify it. It was said that during the retreat of the artillery one piece of Stewart's battery did not limber up as soon as the others. A rebel officer rushed forward, placed his hand upon it, and presenting a pistol at the back of the driver, directed him not to drive off with the piece. The latter did so, however, received the ...
— Chancellorsville and Gettysburg - Campaigns of the Civil War - VI • Abner Doubleday

... numerous and strong positions; and our troops mounted the Huft Kothul, giving three cheers when they reached the summit. Here Lieutenant-colonel Cunningham, with a party of sappers, pressed the enemy so hard, that they left in their precipitation a twenty-four pound howitzer and limber, carrying off the draft-bullocks. Having heard that another gun had been seen, and concluding that it could not have gone very far, I detached a squadron of dragoons, under Captain Tritton, and two horse-artillery ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan

... Erebus and Night, Hie away; and aim thy flight Where consort none other fowl Than the bat and sullen owl; Where upon the limber grass Poppy and mandragoras With like simples not a few Hang for ever drops of dew. Where flows Lethe without coil Softly like a stream of oil. Hie thee thither, gentle Sleep: With this Greek no longer keep. Thrice ...
— Pastoral Poems by Nicholas Breton, - Selected Poetry by George Wither, and - Pastoral Poetry by William Browne (of Tavistock) • Nicholas Breton, George Wither, William Browne (of Tavistock)

... enemies. They still roosted on the long, thin branches of the hardwood trees among the thickest leaves, which protected them from foes in the air; the height saved them from foes on the ground, and left them nothing to fear but coons, whose slow, heavy tread on the limber boughs never failed to give them timely warning. But the leaves were falling now—every month its foes and its food. This was nut time, and it was owl time, too. Barred owls coming down from the north doubled or ...
— Lobo, Rag and Vixen - Being The Personal Histories Of Lobo, Redruff, Raggylug & Vixen • Ernest Seton-Thompson

... hard fight we got him limber, straightened out, and warm, it didn't rip so when he breathed, then they put him in the parlour on the big davenport. Leon said if the sparkin' bench didn't bring him to, nothing would. Laddie sat beside him and mother kept peeping. She wouldn't let Dr. ...
— Laddie • Gene Stratton Porter

... engine rounded the curve, then mount and settle to the race. It was counted fair, also, owing to the headway the train already had, to start a hundred yards or so before the engine came abreast, in order to limber up to the horses' ...
— The Duke Of Chimney Butte • G. W. Ogden

... and supple as she was, and moreover rendered swift with the terrible spur of hysteria, was no match for Annie Eustace who had the build of a racing human, being long-winded and limber. Annie caught up with her, just before they reached Alice Mendon's house, and had her held by one arm. Margaret gave a stifled shriek. Even in hysteria, she did not quite lose her head. She ...
— The Butterfly House • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman

... had been overturned into the limber containing its ammunition, and set fire to. This kept burning, hissing, and firing shots like a gigantic and malevolent cracker for a long time. But the Blue Jackets recovered the gun. When the victorious troops crowned the last ridge, the valley of Tamai lay below them, and ...
— For Fortune and Glory - A Story of the Soudan War • Lewis Hough

... carpenter, had been rather stiff. I took lessons of him, and as he was a practical business man, I escaped the vicious habit of flourishing in my writing. He insisted that I should write a plain, simple, round hand, which I did. As my fingers became limber, I made excellent progress, and I was ...
— Desk and Debit - or, The Catastrophes of a Clerk • Oliver Optic

... four days the Battalion was in the line, parties from D Company under 2nd Lieut. G. Angus did good work in distributing rations, which were brought up from Poperinghe to Zonnebeke Crossing by limber. The exact location of the different parties was doubtful, and the absence of roads, tracks or landmarks made the delivery of rations to the men a very ...
— The Story of the 6th Battalion, The Durham Light Infantry - France, April 1915-November 1918 • Unknown

... sorts: one quite heavy, almost like a sledge-hammer or maul, and with a short handle; the other much lighter, and with a longer, more limber handle. This last was used by men in war as a mace or war club, while the heavier hammer was used by women as an axe to break up fallen trees for firewood; as a hammer to drive tent-pins into the ground, to kill disabled animals, or to break up heavy bones for the marrow ...
— Blackfeet Indian Stories • George Bird Grinnell

... 'em,' answers Bill. 'Mine always has gorillas ridin' 'em.' Well, I looked around and I would have been scared myself if I hadn't recognized our own bunch of snakes, each one of 'em with the tail of the snake in front of him in his mouth. Old 'Limber Larry'—we called him that on account of his habit of going to sleep curled up in a true lover's knot—was in the lead, and behind him came about half ...
— Side Show Studies • Francis Metcalfe

... and with a wave of the hand indicated his purchase of the morning. This was a tall and strong negro, young, supple, and of a cheerful countenance. Rand was in high good-humour. "He's a runaway, Mocket says, but I'll cure him of that! He's strong as an ox and as limber as a snake." Taking the negro's hand in his, he bent the fingers back. "Look at that! easy as a willow! He'll strip tobacco! ...
— Lewis Rand • Mary Johnston

... a limber elf, Singing, dancing to itself, A fairy thing with red round cheeks, That always finds, and never seeks, Makes such a vision to the sight 660 As fills a father's eyes with light; And pleasures flow ...
— Coleridge's Ancient Mariner and Select Poems • Samuel Taylor Coleridge

... a dummy field piece, by dismounting a cart from its wheels and fixing on the axle a great old wooden pump, not unlike a big gun in shape; another cart was attached to this to represent a limber; four horses were harnessed to the affair; two men mounted these, and, amid a tremendous flourish of trumpets and beating of drums, the artillery went crashing along the streets and up the eminence crowned by the earthwork, where they wheeled the ...
— The Lighthouse • R.M. Ballantyne

... amain, And now with gleaming ring enfolds the world; Me on this cheerless nether world ye threw, And gave me nine unlighted realms to rule; While on his island in the lake afar, Made fast to the bored crag, by wile not strength Subdued, with limber chains lives Fenris bound. Lok still subsists in Heaven, our father wise, Your mate, though loathed, and feasts in Odin's hall; But him too foes await, and netted snares, And in a cave a bed of needle-rocks, And o'er his visage serpents dropping gall. Yet he shall one day rise, ...
— Poetical Works of Matthew Arnold • Matthew Arnold

... Miss Pritchard. "My dear Miss Pritchard, why do you let this charming child waste her time learning to do vaudeville stunts that any limber-jointed, pretty-faced chit could do, with a glorious ...
— Elsie Marley, Honey • Joslyn Gray

... so, when I was a lad of eighteen or nineteen," Captain Buckingham said. "I was a wild one, though not large, but limber and clipper-built, and happy any side up, and my notion of human life was that it was something like a cake-walk, and something like a Bartlett pear, as being juicy anywhere ...
— The Belted Seas • Arthur Colton

... steadily, but what's a horse good for? Thursday afternoon we had our cross-country run and the ground was horribly stiff. I thought he had sprained his off foreleg for he limped a good deal on the home stretch, but he seemed to limber up all right the last few miles. I was sorry not to let him rest yesterday; would have put him in better trim I suppose for to-day's twenty mile pull,—but Cartwright and Peterson wanted to make up a tandem, and when ...
— A Beautiful Possibility • Edith Ferguson Black

... very old man in strange clothes at window.) What brings me is to put my curse upon the whole tribe of kitchen boys that are gone and vanished out of this, without bringing me my request, that was a bit of rendered lard that would limber the swivel of my spy-glass, that is clogged with the ...
— Three Wonder Plays • Lady I. A. Gregory

... but at night there was a dance, for which my maiden aunt played the piano. The dear good soul, whose old brown fingers were none too limber, had skill that scarcely mounted to the speed of a polka, but she was steady at a waltz. There was one tune—bink a bunk bunk, bink a bunk bunk—that went around and around with an agreeable monotony even when the player nodded. There was a legend in the family that once ...
— Chimney-Pot Papers • Charles S. Brooks

... endeavours to imitate while manoeuvring out in rest, but for the first time we were doing it in reality. The battery dropped into action on innumerable occasions during the course of the day, and had only time to fire a few rounds before the enemy had decamped out of range. Then we would limber up with all speed, the teams waiting the orthodox two hundred yards in rear and to the flank, and gallop forward and take up a new position right out in the open, and help the enemy on his way with a few reminders that we were up and after him, and that he ...
— Three years in France with the Guns: - Being Episodes in the life of a Field Battery • C. A. Rose

... forms of grosser shade, all barred With lines of denser blackness, dexter-borne. Rank after rank, they came, out of the dark, So silently no pebble crunched beneath Their feet more sharp than did a woodchuck stir. And so came on the foe all stealthily, And found their guns a-limber, fires ablaze, And men in calm repose. With bay'nets fixed The section in advance fell on the camp, And killed the first two sentries, whose sharp cries Alarmed a third, who fired, and firing, fled. This roused the guard, but "Forward!" was the ...
— Laura Secord, the heroine of 1812. - A Drama. And Other Poems. • Sarah Anne Curzon

... good luck," breathed Mr. Phipps, as the lad rode away at the same time straightening out his rope which he allowed to drag behind his pony while he recoiled it, working it in his hands to limber the rawhide. ...
— The Pony Rider Boys in the Ozarks • Frank Gee Patchin

... and your naked feet in their sandals, And through the scent of the balcony's naked timber I distinguish the scent of your hair: so now the limber Lightning ...
— Look! We Have Come Through! • D. H. Lawrence

... "tossed." Tossing is not the sort of pastime any fellow would choose for fun, not if he were the party to be tossed, though it is a beanfeast for the onlookers. They manage it this way. A hide, freshly stripped from a bullock, smoking, bloody, and limber as a bowstring, is requisitioned; the hairy side is turned downwards, two strong men get hold of each corner, cutting holes in the green hide for their hands to have a good grip; they allow the hide to sag until it forms a sort of cradle, ...
— Campaign Pictures of the War in South Africa (1899-1900) - Letters from the Front • A. G. Hales

... attached, when the men fled to holding-vantage just ere the whale arrived. She struck the Mary Turner squarely amidships on the port beam, so that, from the poop, one saw, as well as heard, her long side bend and spring back like a limber fabric. The starboard rail buried under the sea as the schooner heeled to the blow, and, as she righted with a violent lurch, the water swashed across the deck to the knees of the sailors about the boat and spouted out of the ...
— Michael, Brother of Jerry • Jack London

... than the man Garnache had known as "Sanguinetti"—brought him, still clad in the clothes in which he had come. He was a tall, limber fellow, with a very swarthy skin and black, oily-looking hair that fell in short ringlets about his ears and neck, and a black, drooping mustache which gave him a rather hang-dog look. There was a thick stubble of beard of several days' growth ...
— St. Martin's Summer • Rafael Sabatini

... dat boy? Whyn't he hunch hisse'f up on dat saddle right? Jim, Jim, whyn't you limber up, boy; hunch yo'se'f up on dat hoss lak you belonged to him and knowed you was dah. What I done showed you? De black raskil, goin' out dah tryin' to disgrace his own daddy. Hyeah he come back. ...
— The heart of happy hollow - A collection of stories • Paul Laurence Dunbar

... the dress of the women that gives life and color to the shifting show of street life. In Europe it is the soldier, and in England the private soldier particularly. The German private soldier is too stiff, and the French private soldier is too limber, and the Italian private soldier has been away from the dry-cleanser's too long; but the British Tommy Atkins is a perfect piece of work —what with his dinky cap tilted over one eye, and his red tunic that fits him without blemish or wrinkle, and ...
— Europe Revised • Irvin S. Cobb

... chain, without which a morning call can scarcely be accomplished by either hostess or guest. This alone will give us a sense of perfect rest which we have never before experienced. Similar exercises are given for other portions of the body—legs and feet—a revolving of the head to limber the neck; a revolution of the shoulders and the body to gain that flexibility which ...
— Social Life - or, The Manners and Customs of Polite Society • Maud C. Cooke

... but it had to be made the best of; and both the civilian and the soldier agreed that their only chance was to fight. Williams opened fire with his Infantry, and Ricketts took command of the guns. At the first discharge the horses bolted with the limber, and never appeared again; almost at the same moment Williams fell, shot through the body. Ricketts continued the fight until his ammunition was completely expended, when he was reluctantly obliged to retire ...
— Forty-one years in India - From Subaltern To Commander-In-Chief • Frederick Sleigh Roberts

... o't; an' at most three, or may be four hour agone. See thar!" he continued, raising one of the limbs, and letting it drop again; "limber as a eel! Ef he'd a been dead last night, the leg'd ...
— The Wild Huntress - Love in the Wilderness • Mayne Reid

... really capable and cool-headed motor drivers will steadily increase. But it will be none the less invaluable to know how to manage a horse—whether to ride it, drive a wagon, or ride-and-drive in a limber. One of our limber horses is a grey captured from the Germans last year. He is a very good worker and doesn't seem to mind being a ...
— War Letters of a Public-School Boy • Henry Paul Mainwaring Jones

... short time several of the guns were dismounted, and four or five powder waggons blown up. Then a loud cheer burst from the Russian artillery-men as they saw the French bring up the horses from behind the shelter of the crest, limber-up and drive off with the guns. But from other points of vantage 150 guns were now pouring their fire into the town, and, as the flames broke out from several quarters, exclamations of grief and fury were heard ...
— Through Russian Snows - A Story of Napoleon's Retreat from Moscow • G. A Henty

... kind. They used to give her two or three hundred yards start, and then pass her under way; but always at the fag-end of the race she'd get excited and desperate-like, and come cavorting and straddling up, and scattering her legs around limber, sometimes in the air, and sometimes out to one side amongst the fences, and kicking up m-o-r-e dust, and raising m-o-r-e racket with her coughing and sneezing and blowing her nose—and always fetch up at the ...
— Humorous Masterpieces from American Literature • Various

... git himself through there with two pair o' pants on," answered Mr. Briley. "I expect they must have to keep limber as eels. I used to think, when I was a boy, that 'twas the only thing I could ever be reconciled to do for a livin'. I set out to run away an' follow a rovin' showman once, but mother needed me to home. There warn't nobody but me an' ...
— A Country Doctor and Selected Stories and Sketches • Sarah Orne Jewett

... 'im loose an' left 'im—'e was almost tore in two— But he tried to follow after as a well-trained 'orse should do; 'E went an' fouled the limber, an' the Driver's Brother squeals: "Pull up, pull up for ...
— The Works of Rudyard Kipling One Volume Edition • Rudyard Kipling

... under-petticoated all; their gowns, made to cover straddling hoops, hanging trollopy, and tangling about their heels; but hastily wrapt round them, as soon as I came up stairs. And half of them (unpadded, shoulder-bent, pallid-lips, limber-jointed wretches) appearing, from a blooming nineteen or twenty perhaps over-night, haggard well-worn strumpets of thirty-eight ...
— Clarissa Harlowe, Volume 9 (of 9) - The History Of A Young Lady • Samuel Richardson

... run," Smoke contradicted. "You can keep up with no man. Your backbone is limber as thawed marrow. If I run, I run alone. The world fades, and perhaps I shall never run. Caribou meat is very good, and soon will come ...
— Smoke Bellew • Jack London

... veils are washed at home they usually come out quite limber and flimsy. To give them the stiffness add a pinch of sugar to the ...
— Mother's Remedies - Over One Thousand Tried and Tested Remedies from Mothers - of the United States and Canada • T. J. Ritter

... never done any carpentry or such-like work in my life, and I spent day after day in experimental chopping and binding among the trees. I had no ropes, and could hit on nothing wherewith to make ropes; none of the abundant creepers seemed limber or strong enough, and with all my litter of scientific education I could not devise any way of making them so. I spent more than a fortnight grubbing among the black ruins of the enclosure and on the beach where the boats had been burnt, looking for nails and other stray ...
— The Island of Doctor Moreau • H. G. Wells

... fellow and put him through a number of acrobatic feats in breathless succession, till he was fairly hustled into good temper and everybody around was laughing, even Gerald. Jake Dexter was instantly incited to display some marvellous limber-jointed powers of his own, and had just demonstrated to the assembled company, to his and their entire satisfaction, that the impossible is after all sometimes possible, when luncheon was announced by the ringing of a cow-bell, and a gay onslaught upon the usual picnic table, rich in luxuries ...
— Only an Incident • Grace Denio Litchfield

... force from the north, which hoped later to be joined by the Freestaters and by a contingent of Germans and Transvaalers who were to cross the Free State border. It was an hour before dawn that the guns started, and the riflemen followed close behind the last limber, so that the first light of day fell upon the black sinuous line winding down between the hills. A spectator upon the occasion says of them: 'Their faces were a study. For the most part the expression worn was one of determination and bulldog pertinacity. ...
— The Great Boer War • Arthur Conan Doyle

... blades Of soft and vivid grass We lay, nor heard the limber wheels That pass and ever pass In noisy continuity until their stony rattle ...
— A Treasury of War Poetry - British and American Poems of the World War 1914-1917 • Edited, with Introduction and Notes, by George Herbert Clarke

... his shotgun cocked and loaded and ready, waiting to kill the bird that now typified for him guilt and danger and an abiding great fear. Gnats plagued him and about him frogs croaked. Almost overhead a log-cock clung lengthwise to a snag, watching him. Snake doctors, limber, long insects with bronze bodies and filmy wings, went back and forth like small living shuttles. Other buzzards passed and repassed, but the squire waited, forgetting the cramps in his elderly limbs and the discomfort of the water ...
— The Escape of Mr. Trimm - His Plight and other Plights • Irvin S. Cobb

... apparent. His hands were still behind his back; aye, when they trussed him up, they drew up his hands until they were on a level with his head, and secured him in that position. His feet were also ironed, and the chain lashed to a limber. So he stood, or rather hung—for he could not stand properly with his arms wrenched back in that position—and the whole weight of his body dragged upon his wrists and shoulder blades. So he had stood during the hours that had passed since afternoon. Torture, ...
— The Blood Ship • Norman Springer

... his son. There's no sort of business about him. I don't know just how you'd describe him. He's tall; and he's got white hair and a moustache; and his fingers are very long and limber. I couldn't help noticing them as he sat there with his hands on the top of his cane. Didn't seem to be dressed very much, and acted just like anybody. Didn't talk much. Guess I did most of the talking. Said ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells

... sick when a black cat with a long red dress comes out and murders the same pieces the prima donnas have sung. We have seen a colored girl attempt a selection from some organ-grinder opera, and she would howl and screech, and catch her breath and come again, and wheel and fire vocal shrapnel, limber up her battery and take a new position, and unlimber and send volleys of soprano grape and cannister into the audience, and then she would catch on to the highest note she could reach and hang to it like a dog to a root, till you would think they ...
— Peck's Compendium of Fun • George W. Peck

... and night, Hie away; and aim thy flight Where consort none other fowl Than the bat and sullen owl; Where upon thy limber grass, Poppy and mandragoras, With like simples not a few, Hang forever drops of dew; Where flows Lethe without coil Softly like a stream of oil. Hie thee hither, gentle sleep: With this Greek no longer ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol 6 • Various

... stretch her back with a straightening of his arm; I saw the limber length of him, the lean flank and the curve of his chest, as he half lay on ...
— The McBrides - A Romance of Arran • John Sillars

... "It'll limber us up and at the same time help the horses," he said. "Knowing what kind of rifles we carry and how we can shoot, the Sioux won't be in any hurry to ride into the forest directly after us. We've a big advantage now in being able ...
— The Great Sioux Trail - A Story of Mountain and Plain • Joseph Altsheler

... courage of the mighty ones to clash Hands in the gory play. Sooth, little spur Needed they for their eagerness for fight. But, ere they closed, they flashed out proving blows To wot if still, as theretofore, their arms Were limber and lithe, unclogged by toil of war; Then faced each other, and upraised their hands With ever-watching eyes, and short quick steps A-tiptoe, and with ever-shifting feet, Each still eluding other's crushing might. Then with a rush they closed ...
— The Fall of Troy • Smyrnaeus Quintus

... season," and the Peace, That now is foremost in your prayers, Shall crown your harvest with increase, And bless with smiles the home of tears; Your wounds be healed; your noble sons, Unhurt, unmutilated—free— Shall limber up their conquering guns, In triumph grand ...
— War Poetry of the South • Various

... be nice to Birdie on account of Mr. Smelts' stiff leg. Not that it ever did him any good when it was limber, but I always feel mean when I see it sticking out straight when ...
— Calvary Alley • Alice Hegan Rice

... frog, 'A little child, a limber elf,' With health and spirits all agog, He does the long jump in a bog Or teaches men to swim and dive. If he should be cut up alive, Should I not ...
— The Scarlet Gown - being verses by a St. Andrews Man • R. F. Murray

... on the ice of the river St Lawrence, with your knees up to your nose, or your toes stuck into your arm-pits, as does take place in some of your foreign complaints; but straight, quite straight, and limber, like a gentleman. Still Jack is a little mischievous, that's sartain. In the Euridiscy we had as fine a ship's company as was ever piped aloft—'Steady, starboard, my man, you're half-a-pint off your course;'—we dropped our anchor in Port Royal, and ...
— Peter Simple and The Three Cutters, Vol. 1-2 • Frederick Marryat

... said the major commanding the attack, and with one voice the drivers and limber gunners answered 'Hout!' while the colonel ...
— Life's Handicap • Rudyard Kipling

... of ordinary old shoes, stuff them out with newspapers, and use them for Santa Claus's feet. Roll two pieces of cardboard, or pieces of limber pasteboard boxes, into cylinders; ink or blacken them. When dry, cut a curve in one end of each, like Fig. 223, and fit these tops over the stuffed shoes to make them into boots. Set the boots on a bench or a low table, placed across in front ...
— Little Folks' Handy Book • Lina Beard

... no use in all this strife, An' hurryin', pell-mell, right thro' life. I don't believe in goin' too fast To see what kind o' road you 've passed. It ain't no mortal kind o' good, 'N' I would n't hurry ef I could. I like to jest go joggin' 'long, To limber up my soul with song; To stop awhile 'n' chat the men, 'N' drink some cider now an' then. Do' want no boss a-standin' by To see me work; I allus try To do my dooty right straight up, An' earn what fills my plate an' cup. An' ez fur boss, I 'll be my own, I like ...
— The Complete Poems of Paul Laurence Dunbar • Paul Laurence Dunbar

... He cried; he blubbered; tears rolled over his dusty cheeks, making furrows like plowshares of grief. He feared lest he might have killed his aunt Janet. Women, and not very young women, might presumably be unable to survive such rough usage as very tough and at the same time very limber little boys, and he loved his poor aunt Janet. He grieved because of his aunt, his parents, his uncle, and rather more particularly because of himself. He was quite sure that the policeman was coming for him. Logic had no place in his frenzied conclusions. He did not consider how the ...
— The Copy-Cat and Other Stories • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman

... Centerport. They saw that I was limber and could do a turn or two, and they made me join. They promised me good wages and a fine time, but as soon as we got on the road they treated me worse ...
— Out with Gun and Camera • Ralph Bonehill

... (He was there with a mouthful of toast.) "Take the mess limber and fetch 'em back if the Heavy Group Artillery will let you—they're in there ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 152, February 28, 1917 • Various

... took in a costly fur-lined overcoat with a sable collar, properly creased trousers with a perceptible stripe, grey spats and unusually glistening shoes that could not by any chance have been of anything but patent leather. Light tan gloves, a limber walking stick, a white carnation and a bright red necktie—there you have all that was visible of him. Even at a great distance you would have observed that he was ...
— From the Housetops • George Barr McCutcheon

... the middle of the pan. Let it heat slowly. Break the eggs in a bowl, add a tablespoonful of water to each egg and give twelve good, vigorous beats. To each six eggs allow a saltspoonful of pepper, and, if you like, a tablespoonful of finely chopped parsley. Take the eggs, a limber knife and the salt to the stove. Draw the pan over the hottest part of the fire, turn in the eggs, and dust over a half teaspoonful of salt. Shake the pan so that the omelet moves and folds itself over each time you draw the pan towards you. Lift the edge of the omelet, allowing the ...
— Many Ways for Cooking Eggs • Mrs. S.T. Rorer

... him that he would easily break a limber silken cord, since he had already burst asunder iron fetters of the most solid construction. 'But if thou shouldst not succeed in breaking it,' they added, 'thou wilt show that thou art too weak to cause the gods any fear, and we will not hesitate to set ...
— The Elder Eddas of Saemund Sigfusson; and the Younger Eddas of Snorre Sturleson • Saemund Sigfusson and Snorre Sturleson

... became limber Pinocchio began to walk by himself and to run about the room, until, having gone out of the house door, he jumped ...
— Pinocchio - The Tale of a Puppet • C. Collodi

... morning the pains were fiercest. How I groaned until the muscles became limber. I found myself using very rough language, groaning, gritting my teeth viciously. But I stayed with the work and held up my end, while the laymen watched us sedulously, and seemed to grudge us even a moment to wipe the sweat ...
— The Trail of '98 - A Northland Romance • Robert W. Service

... Ships Mast, and very streight, bearing only Leaves: which are of great use and benefit to this People; one single Leaf being so broad and large, that it will cover some fifteen or twenty men, and keep them dry when it rains. The leaf being dryed is very strong, and limber and most wonderfully made for mens Convenience to carry along with them; for tho this leaf be thus broad when it is open, yet it will fold close like a Ladies Fan, and then it is no bigger than a mans arm. It is wonderful light, ...
— An Historical Relation Of The Island Ceylon In The East Indies • Robert Knox

... the light," Roger called. He and Frank had the man from Boston down on the limber board and were holding him fast. The fight, though fierce while it ...
— The Mutineers • Charles Boardman Hawes

... singing garments Comes royally, at call - Comes limber-hipped Indiff'rence Free stepping, straight and tall - Comes singing and lamenting, The sweetest ...
— New Poems • Robert Louis Stevenson

... trying to limber up my German vocabulary he passed us along to his Ober-leutenant in the hut along the roadside. The Ober- Ieutenant was grave. He said we must report to army headquarters in Brussels, and that under no circumstances should we be ...
— The Log of a Noncombatant • Horace Green

... staggered up on tripod legs and became the first of the fighting-machines I had seen. The gun he drove had been unlimbered near Horsell, in order to command the sand pits, and its arrival it was that had precipitated the action. As the limber gunners went to the rear, his horse trod in a rabbit hole and came down, throwing him into a depression of the ground. At the same moment the gun exploded behind him, the ammunition blew up, there was fire all about him, and he found himself ...
— The War of the Worlds • H. G. Wells

... machine, and he meant to operate it himself, while his wife sold tickets and his boy acted as usher,—a family combination which to Luck seemed likely to be a success. This man, when Luck made known his needs, said he was perfectly willing to "limber up" his machine and himself on The Phantom Herd, if Luck would let his wife and boy see the picture, and would pay the slight operating expenses. So that was settled ...
— The Phantom Herd • B. M. Bower

... of the alleyway. "And you have been sprinkling it on this midshipman's uniform? You are the fellow who runs the temperance drinks place? A nice business for you to be in—drugging midshipmen and trying to ruin them! To prison you go, unless you limber up your tongue. Who put you up to this miserable business? Talk quickly—or off to ...
— Dave Darrin's First Year at Annapolis • H. Irving Hancock

... the tree and played lazily. Bosephus lay stretched full length on the leaves, following idly with any words that happened to fit the strain. A blue jay just over their heads bobbed up and down on a limber branch, waiting for them to go. The Bear took up the ...
— The Arkansaw Bear - A Tale of Fanciful Adventure • Albert Bigelow Paine

... brave sport with the above-mentioned species Number Two; but, so long as I remained, that was the sum total of their spoil. One could almost observe, by the gradual melancholy which settled upon their countenances as the time went on with no thrilling rap to make the top of the limber rod dance again, the hopeless fading out of these unsubstantial specimens from even the imagination. The east wind of course had been against everything ever since the trout season opened, and it was not ...
— Lines in Pleasant Places - Being the Aftermath of an Old Angler • William Senior

... orders, we should stop long enough to water horses. This we began to do, when suddenly, without any whistling or other warning, the train moved on, and Major Martin and Captain Burnett, who were with the horses, only just managed to catch the train, and had to travel the next stage on a flat with a limber. At St. Omer we were told where we should detrain, a fact hitherto concealed from us, and eventually at 2-35 p.m. in a blizzard and snow storm we reached Arneke, detrained at once, and marched about five miles to the little village of Hardifort, where ...
— The Fifth Leicestershire - A Record Of The 1/5th Battalion The Leicestershire Regiment, - T.F., During The War, 1914-1919. • J.D. Hills

... up in a big carry-all motor-van about the time Jack and his followers trooped on the field, and began to pass the ball around to limber up their muscles for the great test. They were given a royal reception, for there were many hundreds of Harmony rooters on hand to help the boys with cheers and the waving of flags and pennants. Besides, Chester was showing a fine spirit that could applaud a clever ...
— Jack Winters' Gridiron Chums • Mark Overton

... the limber and the rumble of a hundred of the guns. And there hums as she comes the roll of her ...
— On Nothing & Kindred Subjects • Hilaire Belloc

... long enough to limber up the muscles. Whaley handed to Jessie the revolver he had ...
— Man Size • William MacLeod Raine

... which are pitched along the road for four miles out. I did not destroy them, because I knew the enemy could not move them. The roads are very bad, and are strewed with abandoned wagons, ambulances, and limber-boxes. The enemy has succeeded in carrying off the guns, but has crippled his batteries by abandoning the hind limber-boxes of at least twenty caissons. I am satisfied the enemy's infantry and artillery passed Lick ...
— Memoirs of Three Civil War Generals, Complete • U. S. Grant, W. T. Sherman, P. H. Sheridan

... to its full flower for the bran-dances—which came into being, I think, because the pioneers liked to shake limber heels, but had not floors big enough for the shaking. So in green shade, at some springside they built an arbor of green boughs, leveled the earth underneath, pounded it hard and smooth, then covered it an inch deep with clean wheat bran, put up seats roundabout ...
— Dishes & Beverages of the Old South • Martha McCulloch Williams

... and Tom know how hornets sting! I was not afraid of the babies, but was not sure that all the old wasps were out. It was a cold day, and wasps get stiff very quickly, so I watched carefully to see whether the warm air of the room would not limber up some stiff joints which were perhaps in hiding up-stairs in the house. Sure enough, in a few moments out crawled a worker, looking quite dazed and sheepish at the change in temperature. I did not wait for it to become thoroughly awake, but picked it up with the forceps ...
— Little Busybodies - The Life of Crickets, Ants, Bees, Beetles, and Other Busybodies • Jeanette Augustus Marks and Julia Moody

... acquires considerable weight and hardness. Before it cools and hardens, however, they take care to turn the edges, made thin for this purpose, up toward each other, thus forming a groove extending through the whole length of the metal-coated thong, with the exception of the extremity, which is left limber that it may be wound round the hand of the executioner, while a strong iron hook is appended to the other extremity. The scaffold on which the victim suffers is called in Russian 'Kobyla,' literally a mare. It is an inclined plane, on which the sufferer is tied, his back is stripped naked, his ...
— Continental Monthly , Vol. 5, No. 6, June, 1864 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various

... as much docility as the slave had done, and by their united efforts the patient was soon dressed in warm dry clothes, wrapped in a hot, thick blanket, and tucked up comfortably in bed. But though her form was now limber, and her pulse perceptible, she had not yet spoken or opened her eyes. It was a half an hour later, while Hannah stood bathing her temples with camphor, and Mrs. Jones sat rubbing her hands, that Nora showed the first signs of returning consciousness, ...
— Ishmael - In the Depths • Mrs. E. D. E. N. Southworth

... but having broader leaves, which are thick like leather, and bearing small knobs like those of the cypress. From these trees hang down many branches into the water, each about the thickness of a walking-stick, smooth, limber, and pithy within, which are overflowed by every tide, and hang as thick as they can stick of oysters, being the only fruit ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. VIII. • Robert Kerr

... moment, the limber Yankee sprung into the wagon, and the steam man started ahead at a speed which was as fast as ...
— The Huge Hunter - Or, the Steam Man of the Prairies • Edward S. Ellis

... plank four or five feet long with a single grab-nail in the end,—the springboard of the Pacific coast logger, whose daily business lies among the biggest timber on God's footstool. Each then clambered up on his precarious perch, took hold of his end of the long, limber saw, and cut in to a depth of a foot or more, according to the size of the tree. Then jointly they chopped down to this sawed line, and there was the undercut complete, a deep notch on the side to which the tree would fall. That done, they swung the ends of their ...
— Big Timber - A Story of the Northwest • Bertrand W. Sinclair

... these dogs, my own puppies—and there they lay as dead as door nails. I whistled, and they didn't move; I then stooped down to see how the bear had killed 'em, and I found these bullet holes in 'em!" said Sneak, turning their limber bodies over with his foot, until their wounds were uppermost. "I'll be shot if I don't have pay, or revenge!" he continued, with tears ...
— Wild Western Scenes • John Beauchamp Jones

... crook'd their thighbones, and they shook their long shanks, And wild was their reeling and limber; And each bone as it crosses, it clinks and it clanks Like the clapping of timber on timber. The warder he laugh'd, though his laugh was not loud; And the Fiend whisper'd to him—"Go, steal me the shroud Of one of these ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - Volume 57, No. 352, February 1845 • Various

... might discover some sign of their passage—a discarded lorry, a broken limber, or an old camp site—he continued farther and farther into the west until well into the afternoon. Above a tree-dotted plain through the center of which flowed a winding river he determined to turn about ...
— Tarzan the Untamed • Edgar Rice Burroughs

... Even as I write our audience has gathered. Limber folk in front squat on the floor. Bearded folk behind perch on chairs as on a balcony. Already, behind the scenes, the captain of the pirates has assumed his hook and villainous attire. Patch-Eye mumbles his lines against a loss of memory. ...
— Wappin' Wharf - A Frightful Comedy of Pirates • Charles S. Brooks

... nutting expedition was organized, and with Jeff in advance, carrying a short ladder and a long limber pole, the party started for the hills. At first Johnny, oppressed with his dignity as Aunt Annie's "beau," stalked soberly at her side, and Susie also claimed Gregory according to agreement, and insisted on keeping ...
— Opening a Chestnut Burr • Edward Payson Roe

... right and left with such determined strokes, that the children kept carefully out of his way. Several persons looked back to wonder and laugh at this strange figure, the drollery of which was greatly enhanced by his limber style of walking, and a certain expression of the whole outer man, which said, "Who says I am not as good as anybody on this avenue; Mr. Fillmore, or any ...
— Aunt Phillis's Cabin - Or, Southern Life As It Is • Mary H. Eastman

... from the Signaller brought no comment until the last letter was read, but then the Limber Gunner ...
— Between the Lines • Boyd Cable

... shrunken. He was the schoolmaster of Wythburn, and his name Monsey Laman. The dalesmen found the little schoolmaster the merriest comrade that ever sat with them over a glass. He had a crack for each of them, a song, a joke, a lively touch that cut and meant no harm. They called him "the little limber Frenchman," in allusion to a peculiarity of gait which in the minds of the heavy-limbed mountaineers was somehow associated with the idea of a French ...
— The Shadow of a Crime - A Cumbrian Romance • Hall Caine

... coniferous woods, and Ba'tiste straightened. Soon he was talking and pointing,—now to describe the spruce and its short, stubby, upturned needles; the lodgepole pines with their straighter, longer leaves and more brownish, scaly bark; the Englemann spruce; the red fir and limber pine; each had its characteristic, to be pointed out in the simple words of the big Canadian, and to be catalogued by the man at his side. A moment before, they had been only pines, only so many trees. Now each was different, each had its place in the mind of the man who studied them with ...
— The White Desert • Courtney Ryley Cooper

... again." The circus man took hold of Pony and felt his joints. "You're put together pretty tight; but I reckon we could make you do if you'd let us take you apart with a screw-driver and limber up the pieces with rattlesnake oil. Wouldn't like it, heigh? Well, let me see!" The circus man thought a moment, and then he said: "How would double-somersaults ...
— Boy Life - Stories and Readings Selected From The Works of William Dean Howells • William Dean Howells

... jumped from the table and threatened to kill the doctor. The country physician only laughed at the wild and, to Evan, appalling curses and threats of the temporary lunatic. It mattered not to that rustic doctor whether his patient carried a stiff neck or a limber one—he would do his work just the same. He happened to be a dentist, which was fortunate, for he needed dental knowledge to extract a great tooth from the patient. The further skill of a veterinary surgeon ...
— A Canadian Bankclerk • J. P. Buschlen

... frank about it, the thing just naturally is not possible. I don't care if Young Lochinvar was as limber as a yard of fresh tripe—and he certainly did shake a lithesome calf in the measures of the dance if Sir Walter, in an earlier stanza, is to be credited with veracity. Even so, I deny that he could have done that croupe trick. ...
— A Plea for Old Cap Collier • Irvin S. Cobb

... like a scroll and once again was I back in the Kentucky foothills, a lean and lathy sprout of a kid, a limber six-foot length of perpendicular appetite; and it was twelve o'clock for some people, but it was dinner ...
— One Third Off • Irvin S. Cobb

... the start of that run. He got under way like a man on stilts, and he was about as limber as a pair of fire-tongs. But then, them leather cuffs on his legs, and the way his coat hugged the small of his back, wa'n't any help. I was enjoyin' his motions so much that I hadn't paid any attention to the kids, and I guess ...
— Shorty McCabe • Sewell Ford

... easily. "That is why. Catch a Yankee his age with joints as limber. The cold winters here stiffen folk up quick after ...
— The Debtor - A Novel • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman

... ready to send his first wireless message. Another morning's work and he had hoped to be ready, and that first message was to be a Christmas greeting to his wife; but now he made shift to get a message away in some fashion. With limber wrist and fingers he began to snap out his signal number. A dozen, twenty, surely a hundred times he repeated the letters, holding up every half minute or so to listen. By and by he caught an answering call. It was the Navy Yard ...
— Wide Courses • James Brendan Connolly

... eyes wide in horror, then his chest collapsed and his neck felt limber. "Oh, my God," he whispered, as though in appeal to the Infinite Father of Mercy and Justice, "what a thing to say about me! ...
— Amanda - A Daughter of the Mennonites • Anna Balmer Myers

... of butter rubbed in the flower and sugar, then wet it with the yolks of two Eggs, and halfe a spoonfull of white Rose-water, a spoonfull or little more of Cream as will wet it; knead the Past till it be soft and limber to rowle well, then rowle it extreame thin, and cut them round by little plates; lay them up on buttered papers, and when they goe into the Oven, prick them, and wash the Top with the yolk of an Egg beaten, ...
— The Compleat Cook • Anonymous, given as "W. M."

... than his in the world; but I'll have to limber out ever so much before I'm good for much in that line," said the boy, stretching his stout arms and legs with a curious mixture of satisfaction ...
— Under the Lilacs • Louisa May Alcott

... The limber, maturing, rounding form of Hulda stepped on the footstool of his mind, touched his knee, and exhaled the aroma of her youth like a subtile musk, till he leaned back languidly, as if he smoked a pipe and on its bowl her bust was painted, and all her ...
— The Entailed Hat - Or, Patty Cannon's Times • George Alfred Townsend

... one too; I know not if the storms think much of it. I may be shark's meat yet. And would your spell Be daunting to a cuttle, think you now? We had a bout with one on our way here; It had green lidless eyes like lanterns, arms As many as the branches of a tree, But limber, and each one of them wise as a snake. It laid hold of our bulwarks, and with three Long knowing arms, slimy, and of a flesh So tough they'ld fool a hatchet, searcht the ship, And stole out of the midst of us all a ...
— Georgian Poetry 1911-12 • Various

... should have seen Piddie make his first official entrance! You know how stiff and wooden he is as a rule? Well, as he marches in over the rug and comes to a parade rest by the desk, he's about as limber as a length of gas pipe. And solemn? That long face of his would ...
— Torchy, Private Sec. • Sewell Ford

... an' then I'm a-goin' to take 'em out, bend a rope around their middle, drop 'em overboard an' anchor 'em there all night. I see th' lad we opens up in No. 1 case has had a beautiful job o' embalmin' done on him, but if I let them soak all night, like a mackerel, they'll limber up an' look kinder fresh. Then first thing in th' mornin' I'll telephone th' coroner an' tell him I found two floaters out in th' bay an' for him to come an' get 'em. I been along the waterfront long enough t' know ...
— Captain Scraggs - or, The Green-Pea Pirates • Peter B. Kyne

... unfledged, A monkey with his tail abridged; A thing that walks on spindle legs, With bones as brittle, sir, as eggs; His body, flexible and limber, And headed with a knob of timber; A being frantic and unquiet, And very fond of beef and riot; Rapacious, lustful, rough, and martial, To lies and lying scoundrels partial! By nature form'd with splendid ...
— Heads and Tales • Various

... and carried him off his prisoner. Meanwhile Montbrun's cavalry and the cuirassiers came riding up, and the retreat now sounding through our ranks, we were obliged to fall back upon the infantry. The French pursued us hotly; and so rapid was their movement, that before Ramsey's brigade could limber up and away, their squadrons had surrounded him and captured ...
— Charles O'Malley, The Irish Dragoon, Volume 2 (of 2) • Charles Lever

... or ten days ago, when I leaves Vee and my peaceful little home after a week-end swing, I expects to be shot up to Amesbury, Mass., to inspect a gun-limber factory. Am I? Not at all. By 3 P.M. I'm in Bridgeport, Conn., wanderin' about sort of aimless, and tryin' to size up a proposition that I'm about as well qualified to handle as a plumber's helper called in to ...
— The House of Torchy • Sewell Ford

... modesty, both at the same time. In the first place," continued the captain, jerking at his line, and then beginning to count on his fingers—"There is the 'man- rope;' then come the 'bucket-rope,' the 'tiller-rope,' the 'bolt- rope,' the 'foot-rope,' the 'top-rope,' and the 'limber-rope.' I have followed the seas, now, more than half a century, and never yet heard of a 'cable-rope,' from any one who could ...
— Home as Found • James Fenimore Cooper



Words linked to "Limber" :   attach, flexible, limber pine, warm up, flexile, horse-drawn vehicle, limber up, supple



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