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noun
Mile  n.  A certain measure of distance, being equivalent in England and the United States to 320 poles or rods, or 5,280 feet. Note: The distance called a mile varies greatly in different countries. Its length in yards is, in Norway, 12,182; in Brunswick, 11,816; in Sweden, 11,660; in Hungary, 9,139; in Switzerland, 8,548; in Austria, 8,297; in Prussia, 8,238; in Poland, 8,100; in Italy, 2,025; in England and the United States, 1,760; in Spain, 1,552; in the Netherlands, 1,094.
Geographical mile or Nautical mile, one sixtieth of a degree of a great circle of the earth, or 6080.27 feet.
Mile run. Same as Train mile. See under Train.
Roman mile, a thousand paces, equal to 1,614 yards English measure.
Statute mile, a mile conforming to statute, that is, in England and the United States, a mile of 5,280 feet, as distinguished from any other mile.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Mile" Quotes from Famous Books



... when swept by prevailing winds. It also explained why in our Western and Southwestern states the inhabitants of the houses situated on the south bank of a river, though but a short distance back from the stream, would suffer very slightly from malaria, while those living upon the north bank, half a mile back, or even upon bluffs fifteen or twenty feet above the water level, were simply plagued with it. The prevailing winds during the summer are from the south and mosquitoes cannot fly a foot against the wind, but will fly hundreds of yards, and even the best part of a mile, with it. ...
— Preventable Diseases • Woods Hutchinson

... narrowness, and were now blossoming under the generous modern influences. Squire Oliver Montague, a lawyer who had retired from the practice of his profession except in rare cases, dwelt in a square old fashioned New England mansion a quarter of a mile away from the green. It was called a mansion because it stood alone with ample fields about it, and had an avenue of trees leading to it from the road, and on the west commanded a view of a pretty little lake with ...
— The Gilded Age, Complete • Mark Twain and Charles Dudley Warner

... trees that line one of the main streets and fashionable drives leading out of Washington city, and less than half a mile from the boundary, I have counted the nests of five different species at one time, and that without any very close scrutiny of the foliage, while in many acres of woodland, half a mile off, I searched in vain for ...
— A Book of Natural History - Young Folks' Library Volume XIV. • Various

... yellowish fine-grained, fusible sediments. At eighty miles from the coast, in a cliff thus composed, there were a few layers of ferruginous sandstone, and of an argillaceous sandstone with concretions of marl like those in the Pampas. (At this spot, for a space of three-quarters of a mile along the north side of the river, and for a width of half a mile, there has been a great slip, which has formed hills between sixty and seventy feet in height, and has tilted the strata into highly inclined and even vertical positions. The strata generally ...
— South American Geology - also: - Title: Geological Observations On South America • Charles Darwin

... and flowed down to the edge of the cliff, swelling up round and steep towards the brow, a quarter of a mile back from the sea. He was standing at the foot of a prominent shoulder, curving away above him. On the right was a deep coombe, the hill at the blind-end of it sheer-seeming. On his left the jagged edge of the cliff ran up and up and out of sight. Beneath him the sea was ...
— The Gentleman - A Romance of the Sea • Alfred Ollivant

... of the Canon del Alamo, near enough to have its echo return to us every word we may shout down into its depths. Suddenly the timber grows sparse and we behold an open space on a gentle rise before us. It is a bare, bleak spot, perhaps a quarter of a mile long, and occupying the entire width of the mesa, which here is not much broader. Beyond, the timber begins again, and in the centre of the opening we see the fairly preserved ruins ...
— The Delight Makers • Adolf Bandelier

... Jonathan, 'I have my lord's orders, have I not? Little he gives me, but it's all my livelihood. And do you fancy, if I disobey my lord, I'm likely to turn round for a lass like you? No, I've that hell-fire of pain in my old knee, I wouldn't walk a mile, not for King George upon his bended knees.' And he walked to the window and looked down the steep scarp to where the river foamed in the bottom ...
— Lay Morals • Robert Louis Stevenson

... them, are designed to possess him with an untruth, they are dangerous; but if they signify no more than only to make him laugh, I do not see why a man need to be fortified against them. There are some so ridiculous, as to go a mile out of their way to hook in a ...
— The Essays of Montaigne, Complete • Michel de Montaigne

... directly interested to a considerable extent. Extensive warehouses for the storing of cork wood and machinery for the manufacture of bottle corks have recently been established at the Spanish lines, about a mile distant from this fortress, in Spanish territory, where large quantities of cork have already been stored. The cork is obtained and collected from the valuable trees, which are owned by the representatives of some of the oldest nobility of Spain, who have sold the products of their extensive ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 711, August 17, 1889 • Various

... special occasion,' remarked Miss Anne, with grave patronage. 'If you will get up early tomorrow, I will take you to a place, not more than four miles off, where you will find any quantity of hart's-tongue fern. It is a deep ditch, I suppose a quarter of a mile long, and the banks are covered. Of course I don't want any one to know, for it is so near Brighton it would be harried for the shops; but I will show you the place, as you will soon be going away now; and we can take ...
— The Beautiful Wretch; The Pupil of Aurelius; and The Four Macnicols • William Black

... not a mile out of his way, Malcolm rode to the fine old moated grange, where he found her sitting at her spinning, presiding over a great plentiful household, while her second son, a much shrewder-looking man than Sir ...
— The Caged Lion • Charlotte M. Yonge

... stated, a mixture of gravel and rocks, and our horses yielded under us at almost every step as they trod on the sharp pointed fragments. At eight miles we reached the outer line of hills, as they had appeared to us in the distance, and entered a pass between two of them, of about a quarter of a mile in width. At this confined point there were the remains and ravages of terrific floods. The waters had reached from one side of the pass to the other, and the dead trunks of trees and heaps of rubbish, were ...
— Expedition into Central Australia • Charles Sturt

... fair. And on another occasion, when asked where he had heard the French king's confessor hire an assassin to shoot Charles, he replied, "At the Jesuits' monastery close by the Louvre;" at which the king, losing patience with the impostor, cried out, "Tush, man! the Jesuits have no house within a mile of the Louvre!" Presently Oates named two catholic peers, Lord Arundel of Wardour and Lord Bellasis, as being concerned in the plot, when the king again spoke to him, saying these lords had served his father faithfully, and fought his wars bravely, and unless proof ...
— Royalty Restored - or, London under Charles II. • J. Fitzgerald Molloy

... Camp at Agincourt.] The French were about a quarter of a mile from them at Agincourt and Ruisseauville, and both armies proceeded to light their fires, and to make the usual arrangements for a bivouack. The night was very rainy, and much inconvenience is said to have been experienced in each camp from wet and cold, accompanied, among ...
— King Henry the Fifth - Arranged for Representation at the Princess's Theatre • William Shakespeare

... reached Tuscumbia. I found Mrs. Keller and Mr. James Keller waiting for me. They said somebody had met every train for two days. The drive from the station to the house, a distance of one mile, was very lovely and restful. I was surprised to find Mrs. Keller a very young-looking woman, not much older than myself, I should think. Captain Keller met us in the yard and gave me a cheery welcome ...
— Story of My Life • Helen Keller

... I am certain my two first shots had wounded him, and yet he made a third flight of nearly half a mile. But I had sworn to have him, and on I went. Impossible to get near him. He led me on, mile after mile, always flying away as soon as I came within fifty or sixty paces. I became furious. If I had caught him I think I should have eaten him alive, and the more ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Volume 55, No. 340, February, 1844 • Various

... "That reminds me. When I was a little girl not much older than you are now, my mother was very ill for a long time, and my sister Esther and I were sent away from home to live with a lame old aunt in a lonely little house about a mile from the nearest neighbor's. Needless to say, we got very homesick with no one to play with or amuse us, and the days were often so long that we were glad when night came so we could sleep and forget our childish troubles. Though Aunt Nancy ...
— The Lilac Lady • Ruth Alberta Brown

... very much mistaken if you want to die, like a cat in a cupboard, here ashore. Mend enough to get away on board the yacht to sea. There'll be time enough then to argue the question out, sir. Half a mile of blue water under your feet sends up the value of ...
— The History of Sir Richard Calmady - A Romance • Lucas Malet

... roar of despair brought me to my feet on the floor. Immediately grasping the situation and a long-handled shovel, I called on him to bring a bucket of water. The barrel was empty, as a matter of course; and Rory cantered away down the road a quarter of a mile, to where a deep crab-hole—replenished by the rain before referred to—furnished our supply. But, in the panic of the moment, it escaped his observation that he was affording a scandalous spectacle to two spring-cartloads ...
— Such is Life • Joseph Furphy

... of the Pavilion on the Links. No thoroughfare passed within three miles of it. The nearest town, and that was but a fisher village, was at a distance of six or seven. For ten miles of length, and from a depth varying from three miles to half a mile, this belt of barren country lay along the sea. The beach, which was the natural approach, was full of quicksands. Indeed I may say there is hardly a better place of concealment in the United Kingdom. ...
— New Arabian Nights • Robert Louis Stevenson

... old saying, however, that the pitcher which goes often to the well gets broken at last. Jack had heard from his faithful spy, Niuski, that some large stores existed on the shores of a lake about a mile from the coast, the river communicating with which was too shallow to allow of the boats proceeding up it. He had intended going himself, but an attack of illness made him feel that it would be imprudent to venture, as he might ...
— The Three Commanders • W.H.G. Kingston

... snows are melting the peak becomes a perfect catapult, volleys of ice and stones being discharged from its lofty precipices. The falling rocks, dropping, as some of them do, from ledge to ledge half a mile, acquire the velocity of cannon shots. Nobody ever lingers on this part of the route, and we had no desire to pause, although the Aiguille sends comparatively few stones down so late in ...
— McClure's Magazine, Vol. VI., No. 6, May, 1896 • Various

... No, no! Please don't give us the (to my mind) very ugly, quite modern costume, which shows with such cruel distinctness a podgy, pot-bellied (excuse the vulgarism) boy, who couldn't run a mile to save his life. I want Bruno to be strong, but at the same time light and active—with the figure of one of the little acrobats one sees at the circus—not "Master Tommy," who habitually gorges himself with pudding. Also that dress I dislike very much. Please give him a short tunic, and real ...
— The Life and Letters of Lewis Carroll • Stuart Dodgson Collingwood

... mourning, and followed the procession at a distance. The fifteen pieces of artillery were ranged along the road, and the gunners were at their posts ready to fire. Having advanced about a quarter of a mile beyond Hut's Gate the hearse stopped, the troops halted and drew up in line of battle by the roadside. The grenadiers then raised the coffin on their shoulders and bore it thus to the place of interment, by the new route which had been made on purpose ...
— The Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte • Bourrienne, Constant, and Stewarton

... closed fast, and the smaller ones on either side, intended for pedestrians, were fastened with a padlock. Wrayson stood for a moment looking through the bars into the park. The drive ran for half a mile perfectly straight, and then, taking an abrupt bend, passed upwards into the woods, ...
— The Avenger • E. Phillips Oppenheim

... beautifully crenelated wall thirty feet thick at the bottom, twenty feet thick at the top and twenty-five feet high, surrounded by a moat one hundred feet wide, is the Forbidden City, occupying less than one-half a square mile. In this city there dwells but one male human being, the Emperor, who is called the ...
— Court Life in China • Isaac Taylor Headland

... the embrasures. Bold as he was, he trembled as a blinding flash poured a flood of livid light over the plain and castle. It was not the sudden bolt that awed him; but the lightning streamed upon a host of armed men, stretching away as far as the eye could reach. They were not half a mile off. Another flash leaped out, and revealed a forest of spears. "It is the king himself!" muttered the palmer; "we will be surrounded by a host! God assist us, ...
— The Truce of God - A Tale of the Eleventh Century • George Henry Miles

... little lass is seldom to be found than Bab was, as she pattered after him, splashing recklessly through the puddles, and getting as wet and muddy as possible, as a sort of penance for her sins. For a mile or two she trudged stoutly along, while Ben marched before in solemn silence, which soon became both impressive and oppressive because so unusual, and such a proof of his deep displeasure. Penitent Bab longed for just one word, one sign of relenting; ...
— Under the Lilacs • Louisa May Alcott

... happy party tramped, all talking an unmitigated flow of merry nonsense, laughing and enjoying it, all the more the darker and stranger it grew, and merrier than all, when they got home, at Mrs. Wortley's dismay at their having dragged Marian a mile and a half, in the dark and dirt, after her long journey. "Pretty guardians to ...
— The Two Guardians • Charlotte Mary Yonge

... happen?" I asked more than once, but the Egyptian was only with me in the body, and she did not hear. I might have been talking to some one a mile away whom a telescope had drawn ...
— The Little Minister • J.M. Barrie

... get bolder, when he shut me off with a string of cuss words that ran all over me. I didn't suppose he could talk that way, but no one in the office seemed to mind, although I'll bet you could have heard him a mile down ...
— Cupid's Middleman • Edward B. Lent

... went, leaving one familiar object after another, till reddening daylight found her many a long mile, upon the open highway, on the way to the village of T—— upon the Ohio river, when she constrained herself to walk regularly and composedly, quickening the speed of her child, by rolling an apple before him, when the boy would run with ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol VIII • Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton, Eds.

... distinctly saw the fleeing camel in front of him, when he at last got his own to its feet, and being eager to keep his quarry well within his vision, continued to stare and strain his eyes, whilst he raced for hour after hour over mile after mile of sand, until in the end he saw the fleeing camel ahead of him when in reality it was well on its way back to Cairo; and continued, with eyes staring out of a white, dust-covered face, to pursue ...
— Desert Love • Joan Conquest

... Corporal, for it would surely end in no good,—sojers never did. Look at Mrs. Mugford's boy that went for a marine, and came back with the shakums so bad that you could hear his teeth chattering a mile away when the fit was on him. The conversation would have lingered long on the symptoms of "shakums," or in other words of ague, had not some one called to mind the bill on the church-door about ...
— The Drummer's Coat • J. W. Fortescue

... by deep bays so as to vary from three to seven miles in width; and is rendered extremely intricate and dangerous by shoals reaching nearly from shore to shore, on which, at times, the winds and currents produce foaming and tumultuous breakers. The mouth of the river proper is but about half a mile wide, formed by the contracting shores of the estuary. The entrance from the sea, as we have already observed, is bounded on the south side by a flat sandy spit of land, stretching in to the ocean. This is commonly called Point Adams. The opposite, or northern side, is Cape Disappointment; ...
— Astoria - Or, Anecdotes Of An Enterprise Beyond The Rocky Mountains • Washington Irving

... sail down the majestic Columbia is a memory-picture which lasts a life-time. It is eighty-eight miles by rail to Portland, the train skirting the river bank up to within a few miles of the city. By river, it is forty-five miles to the Upper Cascades, then a six-mile portage via narrow-gauge railway, then sixty miles by steamer again to Portland. The boat leaves The Dalles at about 7 in the morning, and reaches Portland at 6 in the evening. The accommodations on these boats are first-class in every respect; ...
— Oregon, Washington and Alaska; Sights and Scenes for the Tourist • E. L. Lomax

... shrines in a lonely field Where rustic faith the god reveres, Or flower-crowned cross-road mile-stones, half concealed By gifts ...
— The Elegies of Tibullus • Tibullus

... troops will, in the future, handle all short-range methods of firing gas, smoke, or high explosive. They will deliver the greatest quantities of material possible up to ranges of a mile and a half or a mile and three-quarters. So effective and so efficient are these short-range methods of projection that the No-Man's-Land of the future will be the width covered by these projectors ...
— by Victor LeFebure • J. Walker McSpadden

... of it is this: "When the sun rises behind a ridge of Pines, and those Pines are seen from a distance of a mile or two against his light, the whole form of the tree, trunk, branches and all, becomes one frost-work of intensely brilliant silver, which is relieved against the clear sky like a burning fringe, ...
— The plant-lore & garden-craft of Shakespeare • Henry Nicholson Ellacombe

... {216} queer old book of prophecies had foretold, more than a century earlier, that there should be a battle at Gladsmuir. The battle of Prestonpans was not fought really on Gladsmuir at all: Gladsmuir lies a good mile away from the scene of Charles's easy triumph and Cope's inglorious rout; but for enthusiastic Jacobite purposes it was near enough to seem an absolute fulfilment of the venerable prediction. A battle was to be fought at Gladsmuir; go to, ...
— A History of the Four Georges, Volume II (of 4) • Justin McCarthy

... attentively the bare down, on which we climbed like flies, did indeed resemble a vast round shield, about the rim of which this unseen water echoed. And the resemblance grew more startling when, a mile or so farther on our way, as the grey dawn overtook us, Harry pointed upwards and ahead to a small boss or excrescence now lifting itself above the long ...
— Old Fires and Profitable Ghosts • A. T. Quiller-Couch

... a mile up the river, they passed a point of land which shut out the fort from view. Here they paused to take a last look, and then pressed forward in silence, the thoughts of each being busy with mingled recollections of their late home and anticipations of the future. ...
— The Young Fur Traders • R.M. Ballantyne

... camp, where they were to be married at once by Chaplain Brudenell, Lady Harriet Acland and Madame Riedesel, wife of General Riedesel, in command of the Brunswick contingent, having consented to be present at the wedding. It had been arranged that Duluth should halt in the woods about a quarter of a mile from the house of a Mrs. McNeil where Jane was waiting to join him at the appointed time. Meanwhile it happened that a fierce Wyandotte chief named Le Loup, with a band of marauding Indians from the British camp, drove ...
— The Land We Live In - The Story of Our Country • Henry Mann

... land, pulling themselves along by their dippers which bit out chunks of earth as big as a cart when they "took a-hold"; the smack of pile drivers, the thump of dynamite, and the whistle of dredges filled the air. Buildings sprouted like mushrooms; in the meadow, half a mile from the nearest water, the shipyard of the Foundation Company began to take form. It was the plan to finish ...
— The Industrial Canal and Inner Harbor of New Orleans • Thomas Ewing Dabney

... his promise relative to his manner of travel. He ran all the way to the dock, half a mile. The Catwhisker was there, tied fast with cables, but nobody ...
— The Radio Boys in the Thousand Islands • J. W. Duffield

... iii. are descriptive of Annesley Park and Hall, and detail two incidents of Byron's boyish passion for his neighbour and distant cousin, Mary Anne Chaworth. The first scene takes place on the top of "Diadem Hill," the "cape" or rounded spur of the long ridge of Howatt Hill, which lies about half a mile to the south-east of the hall. The time is the late summer or early autumn of 1803. The "Sun of Love" has not yet declined, and the "one beloved face" is still shining on him; but he is beginning to realize that "her sighs are not for him," that she is out of his reach. ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 4 • Lord Byron

... house, inside the ploughed fire-breaks, grew a thick-set strip of box-elder trees, low and bushy, their leaves already turning yellow. This hedge was nearly a quarter of a mile long, but I had to look very hard to see it at all. The little trees were insignificant against the grass. It seemed as if the grass were about to run over them, and over the plum-patch behind ...
— My Antonia • Willa Cather

... population of St. Lide's—town, garrison, and country side—numbered a little over fourteen hundred. Garrison Hill, rising (as we have seen) with a pretty steep acclivity, attains the height of a hundred and ten feet above sea level. It measures about three-quarters of a mile in length and a quarter of a mile in breadth, and the lines of fortification extended around the whole hill (except upon the north-west side, which happened to be the most important); a circuit of one ...
— Major Vigoureux • A. T. Quiller-Couch

... quarter of a mile across at its widest point. Even if the whole party entered on the search they would have difficulty in making so strong a human barrier across the isle that a fugitive in the covert could not escape through ...
— The Girls of Central High in Camp - The Old Professor's Secret • Gertrude W. Morrison

... are, for your Lordship, two points beyond estimation; but the house is so comfortable, the furniture clean and good, and I never saw so many conveniences united in so small a compass. You have nothing but to come and enjoy immediately; you have a good mile of pleasant dry walk around your own farm. It would make you laugh to see Emma and her mother fitting up pig-sties and hencoops, and already the Canal is enlivened with ducks, and the cock is strutting with ...
— The Life of Nelson, Vol. II. (of 2) - The Embodiment of the Sea Power of Great Britain • A. T. (Alfred Thayer) Mahan

... you would come on a fist-fight, or maybe a fight with bottles, and a crowd, laughing and whooping, engaged in pulling the warriors apart and sitting on them. Through a mile or two of this kind of thing I made my way, my heart sinking deeper with misgiving. I got within a couple of blocks of the City Hall, and then suddenly I came upon the thing I dreaded—my friend Carpenter in the ...
— They Call Me Carpenter • Upton Sinclair

... our deeply-trodden war trail no more than a mile or two before we encountered the raw evidences of an army's occupation. Everywhere spotted leads, game trails, and runways had been hacked, trimmed, and widened into more open wood-walks; foot-paths enlarged ...
— The Hidden Children • Robert W. Chambers

... Lake Metoka, a clear and beautiful sheet of water upon which the twins loved to go boating. Mr. Richard Bobbsey was a lumber merchant, with a large yard and docks on the lake shore, and a saw and planing mill close by. The house was a quarter of a mile away, on a fashionable street and had a small but nice garden around it, and a barn in the rear, in which the children loved ...
— The Bobbsey Twins - Or, Merry Days Indoors and Out • Laura Lee Hope

... gathering shadows it took on indistinctly the shape of a building, and just as the rising moon crested the ridge of the Pembina hills the travellers swung up at the door. Arthurs had carried the key of the padlock in his hand for the last mile; everybody was out of the sleighs in a moment, and the next they were stamping their cramped feet on the cold wooden floor of the little shack. Arthurs walked unerringly to a nail on the wall and took down a lantern; its dull flame drove the mist slowly down the glass, and presently ...
— The Homesteaders - A Novel of the Canadian West • Robert J. C. Stead

... about long ago, though I have not had a corner to mention it in, that they "knew the Muffin Man," in an Aspen Street sense; and were no strangers to the charm of Mrs. Ripwinkley's "evenings." There was always an "evening" in the "Mile Hill House," as the little family and friendly coterie ...
— Real Folks • Mrs. A. D. T. Whitney

... foot and bit her lip. By this time the big touring car was gliding through the East Drive of Central Park with the swift, noiseless motion that denotes the highest development of the modern motor vehicle. Fully a mile of the curving roadway had slid under the wheels of the car before Helen resumed the ...
— Officer 666 • Barton W. Currie

... very doubtfully, but kept silence for about a mile, and then he said thoughtfully, "Ay, Denys, but then I am sustained by booklearning. These are simple folk that likely thought their village was the world: now what is this? more weeping. Oh! 'tis a sweet world Humph! A little girl that hath broke her pipkin. Now may ...
— The Cloister and the Hearth • Charles Reade

... two channels of nearly equal width. Tsushima had, for centuries, been the Japanese outpost in this part of the empire. To reach the island from the Japanese side was always an easy and safe task, but in the fifty-six-mile channel that separates Tsushima from the peninsula of Korea an invading flotilla had to run the risk of an attack by Korean warships.* The army assembled at Nagoya totalled over three hundred thousand men, whereof some seventy thousand constituted the first fighting line and ...
— A History of the Japanese People - From the Earliest Times to the End of the Meiji Era • Frank Brinkley and Dairoku Kikuchi

... anything, and everybody knows I'm a catch, and all that sort of thing. Now I don't say (for I don't know) if your governor has as much to leave behind him as mine—But halt a bit! You walk as if we were going in for athletics, and doing a two mile." ...
— Phoebe, Junior • Mrs [Margaret] Oliphant

... excellent good measure. All along the road people had stared at us, wondering, I suppose, why two men on such a blustering day should be pegging away in the middle of the road as if life depended on the speed they were getting over the ground. We had walked together many a mile before this, but never at such a rate as on this day. I had never seen his full power tested before, and I could not but feel great admiration for his walking pluck. We were both greatly heated, and, ...
— Yesterdays with Authors • James T. Fields

... leave at nine o'clock. The boys could see her lying at the pier, about half a mile distant from them. The air was misty, and there were some small trees in the way, but the boys could see the chimney distinctly. They dressed themselves as soon as they could, and went to Mr. George's room. They knocked gently at the door. Mr. ...
— Rollo in Scotland • Jacob Abbott

... usual, a circle round a basin. At one o'clock in the afternoon we reached within three miles of them, and had, from the mast-head, a clear view of their whole extent. While occupied in surveying them, we doubled their most southern point, at a distance of only half a mile from the reefs, and perceived that their greatest length is from east to west, in which direction they take in a space of ten miles. The aspect of these green islands is pleasing to the eye, and, according to appearance, they would amply supply the necessities of a population ...
— A New Voyage Round the World, in the years 1823, 24, 25, and 26, Vol. 2 • Otto von Kotzebue

... dispersed, but the old chief and Gretchen sat down outside of the tent, and listened to the murmuring music of the Dalles of the Columbia, and breathed the vital air. The Columbia is a mile wide in some places, but it narrows at the Dalles, or shelves and pours over the stone steps the gathered force of its many tides and streams. Across the river a waterfall filled the air with misty beauty, and a castellated crag arose solitary and solemn—the remnant of some ...
— The Log School-House on the Columbia • Hezekiah Butterworth

... droppers, made of wire and iron, can be obtained. Where timber is scarce such fences are cheaper. The droppers hold the wires to which they are attached in their place, but are not sunk into the ground. Fencing costs about $144.00 to $168.00 per mile. Netting the fences to keep out the rabbit costs an additional $192.00 to $240.00 per mile. If the new farm consists of improved, that is, cleared or partly cleared land, the settler will probably get his crop in before he does his ...
— Wheat Growing in Australia • Australia Department of External Affairs

... in the vineyards. The brown wrinkled old men and women, the lithe, slender youths in their suits of black broadcloth—wood gods disguised by cheap tailoring—all had left their work and come many a mile along the dusty roads and across fields to the town for the dear Madonna's sake, and to see the Palio. The country girls had all new dresses for the Ferragosto and they strutted in the Via Cavour like little pigeons pluming themselves in the sunshine. They were nearly all pretty, ...
— Olive in Italy • Moray Dalton

... with two of the Army, teaching the men how to drill, and a thundering big Chief comes across the snow with kettledrums and horns twanging, because he heard there was a new god kicking about. Carnehan sights for the brown of the men half a mile across the snow and wings one of them. Then he sends a message to the Chief that, unless he wished to be killed, he must come and shake hands with me and leave his arms behind. The Chief comes alone first, and Carnehan shakes hands with him and whirls his arms about, same ...
— The Man Who Would Be King • Rudyard Kipling

... movie has the talkie skinned a mile. Instead of mouthing somebody else's words, you are doing the thing yourself. There's action, and life—one day you are in the forest, the next in the desert, the next ...
— Laugh and Live • Douglas Fairbanks

... A quarter-mile queue of lady-voters was standing outside the polling booths at eight o'clock. Hundreds of them had their husbands in custody with them. In vain were representations of the Full Milk Jug and the Flowing Pint Pot paraded before them. The Wee Free procession, headed by a Brimming ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 158, March 10th, 1920 • Various

... fishing-grounds are confined to rather high latitudes. The coast-waters of the Scandinavian peninsula and the shores of the Canadian coast, especially the Banks of Newfoundland, are the chief areas. The fishing-grounds of the Canadian coast are closed to foreign vessels inside a three-mile limit; beyond the limit they are occupied mainly by Canadian, French, and American fishermen. By the terms of treaties foreign vessels may enter the three-mile limit under restriction to purchase bait and food-supplies, and ...
— Commercial Geography - A Book for High Schools, Commercial Courses, and Business Colleges • Jacques W. Redway

... only a few days later that Doctor Jim came out of Lum Chapman's house and paused in the path looking up Wolf Run. Jerry Lipps's sister lived half a mile above and he had just heard that her little daughter was down with the fever. Jerry might be staying with the sister, but Doctor Jim's duty was now up there and, in spite of the warnings given him, he did ...
— In Happy Valley • John Fox

... about those two walking the mile and a half which Soames had traversed so often in those long-ago days when he came down to watch with secret pride the building of the house—that house which was to have been the home of him and her from whom he was now going to seek release. He looked back once, up that endless vista ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy

... Kathleen, "where shall we go first? The Beech Walk, I suppose; it's half-a-mile long, so if we go to the end and back we shall have a constitutional before looking at the sights. The grounds are very fine here, and there is lots of room for all we want to do. You can find a sunny bit, or a shady bit, according to the weather, but ...
— Tom and Some Other Girls - A Public School Story • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey

... so many more pounds of flesh than he originally wedded. However, it was prime condition, and activity was not impeded, but rather received impetus. She had already, since her matutinal walk of more than a mile and back, overhauled the stores for the bazaar, inspected the town-hall, given her advice, walked through the ruins for the church, expressed herself strongly on the horrors of the plan, and begun to organize shilling cards, all before Sir Harry ...
— The Three Brides • Charlotte M. Yonge

... W—— Office returning about half-past four. One day when about half-a-mile from home, a lady in black silk and with a dark veil approached me; but as if she had made a mistake, when close to me, turned on one side and passed on. I looked back and saw she was standing still, then on she went, and so did I, and had nearly forgotten her, when I heard quick footsteps in ...
— My Secret Life, Volumes I. to III. - 1888 Edition • Anonymous

... on for a mile, across fields and over hedges; fences and ditches were leaped without effort and when he knew he was safe from capture he sank down at the foot of a tree ...
— File No. 113 • Emile Gaboriau

... "lads of Kilkenny," and many a gay time they had together,—rather too gay, some people thought. One of their favorite resorts was an old family mansion, which had descended from a deceased uncle to one of the nine lads. It was on the banks of the Passaic river, about a mile from Newark, New Jersey. It was full of antique furniture, and the walls were adorned with old family portraits. The place was in charge of an old man and his wife and a negro boy, who were the sole occupants, ...
— Four Famous American Writers: Washington Irving, Edgar Allan Poe, • Sherwin Cody

... it to Forster, I suppose, who furnished Macready with it, who made it over &c., &c., &c.—As short as I can tell, this way it happened: the captain woke me one bright Sunday morning to say there was a ship floating keel uppermost half a mile off; they lowered a boat, made ropes fast to some floating canvas, and towed her towards our vessel. Both met halfway, and the little air that had risen an hour or two before, sank at once. Our men made the wreck fast in high glee at having 'new ...
— Life and Letters of Robert Browning • Mrs. Sutherland Orr

... For a mile or two she walks steadily on, crunching beneath her feet with a certain sense of vicious enjoyment those early leaves that already have reached death. How very monotonous all through is a big wood! Trees, grass, sky overhead! ...
— Molly Bawn • Margaret Wolfe Hamilton

... us that in Dehra-Dun this kind of reed is planted on both sides of the central street, which is more than a mile long. The buildings prevent the free action of the wind, and so the sounds are heard only in time of east wind, which is very rare. A year ago Swami Dayanand happened to camp off Dehra-Dun. Crowds of people gathered round him every evening. One day he delivered a very ...
— From the Caves and Jungles of Hindostan • Helena Pretrovna Blavatsky

... more wide-spread scene of grandeur and cultivation that lay in the champaign country below it. On each side of the glen were masses of rock and precipices, just large enough to give sufficient wildness and picturesque beauty to a view which in itself was calm and serene. In the distance about a mile to the north, stood out a bold but storm-vexed headland, that heaved back the mighty swell of the Atlantic, of which a glimpse could be caught from an eminence above the village. Nothing indeed could be finer than the booming ...
— Lha Dhu; Or, The Dark Day - The Works of William Carleton, Volume Two • William Carleton

... fame, he could say that he had never been able to recollect the time when he could not read the Bible, and supposed that his first schoolmistress began to teach him when he was three or four years of age. His first school-house was built of logs, and stood about half a mile from his father's house, not very far from the beautiful Merrimack. All was then humble enough with this great American statesman. He attended school only during the winter months, and assisted his father ...
— Great Men and Famous Women. Vol. 4 of 8 • Various

... this trifle, as it seemed. From what centre did that faint but deep red light come, and from what—glass beads, buttons, toy decorations—was it reflected? We were lumbering along gently, having nearly a mile still to go. I had not solved the puzzle, and it became in another minute more odd, for these two luminous points, with a sudden jerk, descended nearer and nearer the floor, keeping still their relative distance and horizontal position, ...
— Green Tea; Mr. Justice Harbottle • Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu

... your mother lives," said John, who had heard the conversation. "She lives up the road a mile or so, in a little house with two rooms. It's where old Jake ...
— Only An Irish Boy - Andy Burke's Fortunes • Horatio Alger, Jr.

... other side of the river. There meadowland extends for some three-quarters of a mile, while beyond rises the slope of Picardy. Because this meadow was low, damp and frequently flooded, a causeway had been built leading from the bridge to the village of Margny, which rose on the steep slope of the hill. Some two miles up the river there towered the ...
— The Life of Joan of Arc, Vol. 1 and 2 (of 2) • Anatole France

... cause of her afflicting persons, though she thought nothing of it then till afterwards she heard of others having a mark upon them. She sayes, that some tyme after this the black man carryed her singly upon a pole to 5-mile pond, and there were 4 persones more upon another pole, viz. Mistriss Osgood, Goody Wilson, Goody Wardwell, Goody Tyler, and Hanneh Tyler. And when she came to the pond the Devil made a great light, and took her up and dypt her face in the pond, and she felt the water, and the ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 184, May 7, 1853 • Various

... hail; he laughed at the drenching spray that sprung high over the bows of his boat; and what harm ever came to him if he took the short-cut across the upper reaches of Loch Scridain, wading waist-deep through a mile of sea-water on a bitter January day? And where was the loneliness of his life when always, wherever he went by sea or shore, he had these old friends around him—the red-beaked sea-pyots whirring along the rocks; and the startled curlews, ...
— Macleod of Dare • William Black

... point of measuring the density of the population. I count from forty to sixty mole-hills on a surface of one square yard. The encampment is three paces wide and stretches over nearly three-quarters of a mile. How many Halicti are there in this Babylon? I do not venture to ...
— Bramble-bees and Others • J. Henri Fabre

... affair. I cannot remember how long it lasted; I am positive that the clock struck ten before I left home, but I had been up so long, I know not what time it began, though I am told it was between eight and nine. We passed the graveyard, we did not even stop, and about a mile and a half from home, when mother was perfectly exhausted with fatigue and unable to proceed farther, we met a gentleman in a buggy who kindly took charge of her and our bundles. We could have walked miles beyond, then, for as soon as she was safe we felt as though a load had been removed ...
— A Confederate Girl's Diary • Sarah Morgan Dawson

... considerable distance too. There! Now they've run aboard of that tarnation old water-barrel; they know what 'tis by this time, and I reckon the skipper of that frigate is ripping and tearing and cussing and going on till the air smells of brimstone for a quarter of a mile all round. Ah! just as I expected. They've hauled up to the nor'ard; her stern's towards us, for I can see the lights shining out of her cabin-windows; and now every minute 'll take us further apart. Waal, I'm glad I thought of laying for 'em with that old lantern; it'll sorter tell 'em that ...
— The Pirate Island - A Story of the South Pacific • Harry Collingwood

... glacis, while the short and steep decline behind offered protection for the reserves. The IId, IIId, IVth and VIth Corps were placed on the ridge of the hills between Roncourt and Rozereuilles, a distance of one mile and a half (German); thus there were eight or ten men to every ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. X. • Kuno Francke

... in the American target-ride, carrying a slug or cone of one ounce weight,—the gun itself weighing not less than thirty pounds,—and provided with a telescope-sight, and Clark's patent muzzle. At three-quarters of a mile this weapon may be said to be entirely trustworthy for an object of the size of a man, and to have force enough at that distance to disable three men. But it is obvious that such weight and such equipments as are required for it must render it utterly useless for ordinary field-service. ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. IX., March, 1862., No. LIII. - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics, • Various

... who was rash enough to attempt ascending to the Breche without a guide, was obliged to give up the task. 'The sight of this glacier,' he observes, 'was too appalling. I could not summon sufficient resolution to attempt the passage, which was in distance about a quarter of a mile, and wisely, I think, abandoned it. To understand all its terrors, the place must be seen. Once slip, and you are gone for ever, past all human aid: the death is too frightful ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 456 - Volume 18, New Series, September 25, 1852 • Various

... "Sometime there dwelled a priest in Stratford-on-Avon, of small learning, which undevoutly sang mass and oftentimes twice on one day. So it happened on a time, after his second mass was done in short space, not a mile from Stratford there met him divers merchantmen, which would have heard mass, and desired him to sing mass and he should have a groat, which answered them and said: 'Sirs, I will say mass no more this day; but I will say you two gospels for one groat, and that is dog-cheap for a mass ...
— Flowers from a Persian Garden and Other Papers • W. A. Clouston

... was lonely. A canal ran parallel with it at a distance of fifty yards, and on the canal a boat was moving in the direction of Hanbridge at the rate of a mile an hour. Such was the only other vehicle in sight. The outskirts of Knype, the nearest town, did not begin until at least a mile further on; and the Countess, dressed for the undoing of mayors and other ...
— The Card, A Story Of Adventure In The Five Towns • Arnold Bennett

... of the Hexamilion, from sea to sea, was 3800 orgyiae, or toises, of six Greek feet, (Phranzes, l. i. c. 38,) which would produce a Greek mile, still smaller than that of 660 French toises, which is assigned by D'Anville, as still in use in Turkey. Five miles are commonly reckoned for the breadth of the isthmus. See the Travels ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 6 • Edward Gibbon

... hunting in frantic haste when round the bend comes the swift-gliding canoe. With a note of alarm they are all off again, for she will not leave even the weakest alone. Again they double the bend and try to hide; again the canoe overtakes them; and so on, mile after mile, till a stream or bogan flowing into the river offers a road to escape. Then, like a flash, the little ones run in under shelter of the banks, and glide up stream noiselessly, while mother bird flutters on down the river just ahead of the canoe. Having lured ...
— Ways of Wood Folk • William J. Long

... fodder. Exports feature shipments of high-grade wool to the UK and the sale of postage stamps and coins. The islands are now self-financing except for defense. The British Geological Survey announced a 200-mile oil exploration zone around the islands in 1993, and early seismic surveys suggest substantial reserves capable of producing 500,000 barrels per day; to date no exploitable site has been identified. An agreement between Argentina and the UK in ...
— The 2002 CIA World Factbook • US Government

... increasing distance from the ship, soon protected me. A waterman, seeing the flashes and hearing the reports of the muskets, concluded that he might chance to pick up a fare. He pulled towards me, I hailed him, and he took me in, before I had got half a quarter of a mile from the ship. ...
— Frank Mildmay • Captain Frederick Marryat

... dancing ripples that seemed to be merrily racing the ship to port and starboard. Occasionally a break or clear space in the fog-bank swept down upon and overtook us, when it would be possible to see for a distance of a quarter of a mile for a few seconds; then it would thicken again and be as blinding as ever. But every break that came was wider than the one that preceded it, showing that the windward edge of the bank was rapidly drawing down after us; and as these breaks occurred ...
— A Pirate of the Caribbees • Harry Collingwood

... protection while they repaired the viaduct on the bridge, were severely censured. The makers of the car were subjected to a very searching cross-examination. The brakes and the uncertain light were blamed. Henri, who from the hillside a mile or more back had watched with ghastly face, was the only one who understood the accident, and ...
— The Mischief Maker • E. Phillips Oppenheim

... Kintla Lake. It lies, like Bowman Lake, in a recess in the mountains. We took some photographs of Kintla Peak, taking our boats to the upper end of the lake for the work. They are, so far as I can discover, the only photographs ever taken of this great mountain which towers, like Rainbow, a mile ...
— Tenting To-night - A Chronicle of Sport and Adventure in Glacier Park and the - Cascade Mountains • Mary Roberts Rinehart

... stated. Instead of receiving the foreign born as now, we should be compelled to send part of the native born away. But such is not our condition. We have 2,963,000 square miles. Europe has 3,800,000, with a population averaging 73 1/3 persons to the square mile. Why may not our country at some time average as many? Is it less fertile? Has it more waste surface by mountains, rivers, lakes, deserts, or other causes? Is it inferior to Europe in any natural advantage? If, then, we are at some time to be as populous as Europe, how ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various

... demands control of Russian government. Sept. 11—Russian deputies vote to support Kerensky. Korniloff's generals ordered arrested. Sept. 16—Russia proclaims new republic by order of Premier Kerensky. Sept. 20—Gen. Haig advances mile through German lines at Ypres. Sept. 21—Gen. Tasker H. Bliss named chief of staff, ...
— America's War for Humanity • Thomas Herbert Russell

... flanked with pyramidal bastions at regular intervals, and with the traces of gateways, draw-bridges and towers. It was formerly surrounded by a deep moat. Within this space, which may be a quarter of a mile square, are a few fragments of buildings, and toward the sea, some high arches and masses of masonry. The plain around abounds with traces of houses, streets, and court-yards. Caesarea was one of the Roman colonies, but owed its prosperity principally to Herod. St. Paul passed through ...
— The Lands of the Saracen - Pictures of Palestine, Asia Minor, Sicily, and Spain • Bayard Taylor

... it well in view. She could see, on her right hand, the clumsy old wooden bridge which crossed the stream, and served as a means of communication for the servants and the tradespeople, between the cottage and the village on the lower ground a mile away. ...
— The Evil Genius • Wilkie Collins

... mayhap if I leads him he may go on." "You are the best fellow I have met for a quarter of an hour. Do get him into open cruising ground as fast as you can, for I have been on his back more than an hour, and have not gained half a mile." He gave me a broad grin, and good-naturedly led the horse until I got clear of the houses. He then let go the bridle, gave the animal a smart slap on the flank, which set him off at a hand-gallop, ...
— A Sailor of King George • Frederick Hoffman

... head as he spoke, and saw dense wreaths of smoke rising up to the southward, below which I could distinguish a broad red line, extending for a mile or more ...
— The Trapper's Son • W.H.G. Kingston

... Saint Catherine looking rapturously at Celia's baby would not do for many hours in the day, and to remain in that momentous babe's presence with persistent disregard was a course that could not have been tolerated in a childless sister. Dorothea would have been capable of carrying baby joyfully for a mile if there had been need, and of loving it the more tenderly for that labor; but to an aunt who does not recognize her infant nephew as Bouddha, and has nothing to do for him but to admire, his behavior is apt to appear monotonous, and the interest of watching him ...
— Middlemarch • George Eliot

... the night." He came forward and said that was the right place, his master kept the landing, and he would watch the boat for five dollars. He showed the road, and said his master's house was one mile off and another house two miles. We mistook and went to the one two miles off. There a legion of dogs rushed at us, and several great, tall, black fellows surrounded us till the master was roused. ...
— Strange True Stories of Louisiana • George Washington Cable



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