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Scamper   Listen
verb
Scamper  v. i.  (past & past part. scampered; pres. part. scampering)  To run with speed; to run or move in a quick, hurried manner; to hasten away. "The lady, however,... could not help scampering about the room after a mouse."






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Scamper" Quotes from Famous Books



... took each a horse out of his team and scamper'd; their example was immediately followed by others; so that all the waggons, provisions, artillery, and stores were left to the enemy. The general, being wounded, was brought off with difficulty; his secretary, Mr. Shirley, was killed ...
— The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin • Benjamin Franklin

... an inept precentor gave out, by way of liturgical canticles, a perfect menagerie of outlandish tunes, which, let loose on Sunday, seemed to scamper like marmosets up the pillars and under the roof. And the artless voices of the choir-boys were drilled to these musical monkey-tricks. At Chartres it was impossible to attend High Mass in the ...
— The Cathedral • Joris-Karl Huysmans

... owing to the thinness of the shell wall, but such men as it killed were not a pretty sight. Fortunately, too, the shells could be seen both by day and night, and rose to such a height before dropping that men could scamper for shelter from the threatened spot. But no dug-out could withstand its explosion, and a series of craters, eight or ten feet in depth and twelve feet in diameter, marked ...
— From the St. Lawrence to the Yser with the 1st Canadian brigade • Frederic C. Curry

... sky still powdered thick with stars. Nothing moves, and yet a something changes! The darkness shivers as to a cold touch. A pallid haze breathes wanly on the surface of the impassive sky. The gold deepens swiftly and turns to a faint rose flush. The stars scamper away ...
— The Dragon Painter • Mary McNeil Fenollosa

... from his chair to assist his friend, upsetting Mr. Stubbs from his seat, causing him to scamper up the tent pole, with the napkin still tied around his neck, and to scold in his most vehement manner. Before Toby could reach the skeleton, however, the fat woman had darted toward her lean husband, caught him by the arm, and was pounding his back, by the time Toby got there, so vigorously that ...
— Toby Tyler • James Otis

... might be passed by. But they forgot that the blue smoke of their fire curled up through the foliage and revealed their presence at once. On observing the smoke, the savages gave a shout, and, running their canoe close in to the bank, leaped ashore and began to scamper through ...
— The Red Eric • R.M. Ballantyne

... chicks are scattered in search of food, upon seeing a hawk, utters a note of warning which we have all heard, and the young scamper to her for protection beneath her wings. When she has laid an egg, Cut-cut-cut-cut-ot-cut! announces it from the nest in the barn. When the chicks are hatched, her cluck, cluck, cluck, calls them from the nest in the wide world, and her chick, chick, chick, uttered quickly, selects for them ...
— Birds Illustrated by Color Photography [August, 1897] - A Monthly Serial designed to Promote Knowledge of Bird-Life • Various

... mice especially love these snow-fields for some unknown reason. All along the edges you find the delicate, lacelike tracery which shows where little feet have gone on busy errands or played together in the moonlight; and if you watch there awhile you will surely see Tookhees come out of the moss and scamper across a bit of snow and dive back to cover under the moss again, as if he enjoyed the feeling of the cold snow under his feet in the summer sunshine. He has tunnels there, too, going down to solid ice, where he hides things to ...
— Northern Trails, Book I. • William J. Long

... speedometer, odometer, tachometer, strobe, radar speed detector, radar trap, air speed gauge, wind sock, wind speed meter; pedometer. V. move quickly, trip, fisk^; speed, hie, hasten, post, spank, scuttle; scud, scuddle^; scour, scour the plain; scamper; run like mad, beat it; fly, race, run a race, cut away, shot, tear, whisk, zoom, swoosh, sweep, skim, brush; cut along, bowl along, barrel along, barrel; scorch, burn up the track; rush &c (be violent) 173; dash ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget

... of trees nodded together in the friendliest fashion. Yonder a solitary tree, well-grown and clean, was contented with its own bright company. A bush crouched tightly on the ground as though, at a word, it would scamper from its place and chase rabbits across the sward with shouts and laughter. Great spaces of sunshine were everywhere, and everywhere there were deep wells of shadow; and the one did not seem more beautiful ...
— The Crock of Gold • James Stephens

... "Little pig, why are you here before me? Are they nice apples?" he replied at once: "Yes, very; I will throw down one for you to taste." So he picked an apple and threw it so far that whilst the wolf was running to fetch it he had time to jump down and scamper away home. ...
— Childhood's Favorites and Fairy Stories - The Young Folks Treasury, Volume 1 • Various

... a ghost! a ghost! haste, scamper off, My friends; we've kill'd the body, and I know The ghost will have no mercy ...
— Miscellanies, Volume 2 (from Works, Volume 12) • Henry Fielding

... confound it with any other, and in the thickest of the fight was always near the banner he had chosen; and if in the camp he met a soldier from the regiment he had deserted, he would droop his ears, drop his tail between his legs, and scamper off quickly to rejoin his new brothers in arms. When his regiment was on the march he circled as a scout all around it, and gave warning by a bark if he found anything unusual, thus on more than one occasion ...
— The Private Life of Napoleon Bonaparte, Complete • Constant

... dry by the last tide, awakened his nervous suspicions, and dreading an ambuscade, he would stop suddenly and bark at the dreadful object, until we arrived at his side, when, wagging his tail and looking slyly up with his joyous eyes, he would scamper away again as though he would have us believe he had been all ...
— The Bushman - Life in a New Country • Edward Wilson Landor

... sweeps the hall, More varied trick and whim displays To catch the admiring stranger's gaze. Doth power in measured verses dwell, All thy vagaries wild to tell? Ah, no! the start, the jet, the bound, The giddy scamper round and round, With leap and toss and high curvet, And many a whirling somerset, (Permitted by the modern muse Expression technical to use)—These mock the deftest rhymester's skill, But poor in art, ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol 3 • Various

... echoed mockingly. Then he stepped swiftly across the hall and flung the door suddenly open. I believe he thought that he really had surprised Jean's slow aged scamper ahead of him. ...
— The Indiscretion of the Duchess • Anthony Hope

... beneath it all! We stood there in the vestibule like rats taking council together in the hold, when the vessel is beginning to take in water without the crew suspecting it, and I saw plainly enough that everybody, footmen and lady's maids, would soon scamper away at the first alarm. Can it be that such a catastrophe is possible? But in that case, what would become of me and the Territoriale, and my advances and ...
— The Nabob, Vol. 2 (of 2) • Alphonse Daudet

... sobering down; "you can't have yours till Davie wakes up, too. Scamper off to bed, Joey, dear, and forget all about 'em—and it'll be morning before ...
— Five Little Peppers And How They Grew • Margaret Sidney

... wriggle, stood forth free, seized the stick with a joyous shout, snapped it in two, and flourished round the room: then stopping before her afflicted Accal, she solemnly handed her one of the pieces, and with a bound and a scamper like a triumphant puppy, was off to the very end of her world with the other half of ...
— Lotus Buds • Amy Carmichael

... who were members of the Makado tribe, were howling lustily, and one of them waved his bark hat in the air. Kennedy took aim at him, fired, and his hat flew about him in pieces. Thereupon there was a general scamper. The natives plunged headlong into the river, and swam to the opposite bank. Immediately, there came a shower of balls from both banks, along with a perfect cloud of arrows, but without doing the balloon any damage, where it rested with its anchor snugly secured ...
— Five Weeks in a Balloon • Jules Verne

... moonlight night, and Peter was sharp enough to keep in the shadows whenever he could. He would scamper as fast as he knew how from one shadow to another and then sit down in the blackest part of each shadow to get his breath, and to look and listen and so make sure that no one was following him. The nearer he got to the Old Pasture, the safer he felt from Old Man Coyote and Granny and Reddy ...
— Mrs. Peter Rabbit • Thornton W. Burgess

... among the Rocky Mountains, and watered by the Big Horse River and its tributary streams; but, though these are properly their homes, where they shelter their old people, their wives, and their children, the men of the tribe are almost continually on the foray and the scamper. They are, in fact, notorious marauders and horse-stealers; crossing and re-crossing the mountains, robbing on the one side, and conveying their spoils to the other. Hence, we are told, is derived their name, given ...
— Astoria - Or, Anecdotes Of An Enterprise Beyond The Rocky Mountains • Washington Irving

... reef tells him that a shark or kingfish is driving the mullet into the lagoon, where he may easily spear them. He can tell to a quarter of an hour when the fish will leave off biting; he hears the scamper of the iguana in the grass when the "white fella" fails to catch a sound, and knows when the giant crabs will be "walking about" in the mangroves. He is trustworthy and obliging, and ready to impart ...
— The Confessions of a Beachcomber • E J Banfield

... lot of young bunnies with tails on the frisk scour everywhere over the warren. Up and down the grassy dips and yellow piles of wind-drift, and in and out of the ferny coves and tussocks of rush and ragwort, they scamper, and caper, and chase one another, in joy that the winter is banished at last, and the ...
— Springhaven - A Tale of the Great War • R. D. Blackmore

... intervals were short, isolated mountains, known in the vernacular as "buttes." On the ground was not the withered remnant of a blade of grass; but there were many fissures, and some of them were deep and wide. Of the things that crawl and scamper and fly there was no sign, not even a hole in the ground; for even reptiles must have food to eat, and there was nothing here to sustain man nor beast. The fleckless sky was a deep, hot blue; a blood-red sun toiled ...
— The Valiant Runaways • Gertrude Atherton

... swimming about, with noses pointed upward, and snatching at floating ships; then, emerging, they shake themselves, scattering a horizontal shower on the clean gowns of ladies and trousers of gentlemen; then scamper to and fro on the grass, with ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 104, June, 1866 • Various

... equipped, I began to think that it was time that I should attempt a book. During a previous hurried scamper in Normandy I had just a glimpse of Brittany, which greatly excited my desire to see more of it. So I pitched on a tour in Brittany as the subject of my ...
— What I Remember, Volume 2 • Thomas Adolphus Trollope

... sheep always well knew where to go. I railed off a piece of the garden and laid it down in grass, and on one side I built a house for the animal; but as there was not food enough in the little plot, the captain had it up to a paddock near his house, where it used to scamper about with Harry on its back ...
— The Loss of the Royal George • W.H.G. Kingston

... long time the two ships continued to race up and down. The NX-1 would plunge, pirouette around the other, and scamper away towards the ceiling as if enjoying it all hugely, abruptly to forsake her course and come zooming down once more. She would weave in romping circles and seem to go utterly crazy as her jumbled navigator pulled his levers and turned his wheels in a frantic ...
— Astounding Stories, February, 1931 • Various

... tresses, green tresses. Slow dipping, caressing, I've heard A whisper, a chuckle of laughter, a scamper; and high, High up in the air the cry, the call of a bird. And when the night came with a flicker of wings I have heard the earth breathing quiet and slow Like a pulse in the ...
— Miscellany of Poetry - 1919 • Various

... hungry little beggar you are! Come, sit in my lap, and I will hum you a dear little tune. Then you must positively scamper away to bed, or your mamma will scold us both, and ...
— Infelice • Augusta Jane Evans Wilson

... opened into the bakery and there stand gazing wistfully down upon the loaves of fresh bread as they were taken from the large oven. Sometimes some crusts or stale biscuits were given them, and with these they would scamper away to the pump to moisten the bread before dividing it. It sometimes happened that there was not sufficient bread for each child to have even a bit, and when it happened thus, Edwin always gave his share to some one else. And when asked if he would like some certain thing, his answer was always, ...
— The Poorhouse Waif and His Divine Teacher • Isabel C. Byrum

... Outdoors they scamper to their play With merry din the livelong day, And hungrily they jostle in The favor of the maid to win; Then, armed with cookies or with cake, Their way into the yard they make, And every feathered playmate comes To gather up his share of crumbs. The finest garden that I know Is one where little ...
— A Heap o' Livin' • Edgar A. Guest

... with this polite addition. It is no mean praise to say that the word gentlemanly naturally applies itself to a traveller's work. And it is necessary to allow that the majority of Americans who have printed their impressions of a scamper over Europe have fallen as hopelessly below it as a few have risen far above it. Some word of deeper meaning must characterize the sterling sentences of "English Traits"; some epithet of more rare and subtile ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. XII. September, 1863, No. LXXI. - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various

... moment when Clara was with him and he had a good retreat through folding-windows to the lawn, in case of cogency on the enemy's part, to attack his cousin regarding the preposterous plot to upset the family by a scamper to London: "By the way, Vernon, what is this you've been mumbling to everybody save me, about leaving us to pitch yourself into the stew-pot and be made broth of? London is no better, and you are fit for considerably better. Don't, I beg you, continue to ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith

... and it never had occurred to him that it ought to be different. He didn't care for Robbie: Elsie didn't, and so he didn't. Elsie said he was a spoilt baby, therefore Duncan knew he must be one; and certainly he couldn't scamper over the moor, and climb the trees, and fly here, there, and everywhere, like he ...
— Little Folks (July 1884) - A Magazine for the Young • Various

... the longing, for he kept running off a little way and stopping to frisk and bark, then rushed back to sit watching his master with those intelligent eyes of his, which seemed to say, "Come on, Ben, let us scamper down this pleasant road and never stop till we are tired." Swallows darted by, white clouds fled before the balmy west wind, a squirrel ran along the wall, and all things seemed to echo the boy's desire to leave toil behind and roam away as care-free as they. One thing restrained him,—the ...
— St. Nicholas, Vol. 5, No. 4, February 1878 • Various

... pot of ink from a shelf, and pushed the house-door ajar to give me light, and I have got the time on with writing for twenty minutes; but my companion is impatient, and proposes that we should appropriate the dairywoman's cloak, and have a scamper on the moors, under its shelter. A pleasant suggestion—and then, if the surly old man come in, he may believe his prophecy verified—we cannot be damper, or colder, in the ...
— Wuthering Heights • Emily Bronte

... good people adieu before I went to bed, and gave the man "Pat" a dollar to stand by my horse while I slept, and to awake me at any disturbance, that I might be ready to scamper. The man "Pat," I am bound to say, woke me up thrice ...
— Campaigns of a Non-Combatant, - and His Romaunt Abroad During the War • George Alfred Townsend

... to whom harsh fate has dealt A captive's birthright—thou wilt never scamper With winged feet across the windy veldt, Where are no crowds to stare nor bars to hamper; Thou wilt not ring upon the rhino's pelt In wanton sport. But there—why put a damper On thy young spirits by recounting what Africa is but Regent's ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 153, Oct. 10, 1917 • Various

... whip. He took his own way and did very much what he liked in spite of the animated protests of his mistress. Dora and May went out walking with Tray instead of Tray going on a walk with them, and not infrequently the walk degenerated into an agitated scamper at his heels. The scamper was diversified by a number of ineffectual attempts to reclaim him from forcing his way into back-yards and returning triumphantly with a bone or a crust between his teeth, "as if we starved him, as if his dish at ...
— A Houseful of Girls • Sarah Tytler

... dogs of the house," answered the other. "Only!" said the Country Mouse. "I do not like that music at my dinner." Just at that moment the door flew open, in came two huge mastiffs, and the two mice had to scamper down and run off. "Good-by, Cousin," said the Country Mouse. "What! going so soon?" said ...
— The Junior Classics, Volume 1 • Willam Patten

... fall?" questioned Willis in a voice which betrayed his feeling. They advanced cautiously toward the corner. There was a scamper of tiny feet, and a large gray rat bounded across the floor and dropped out of sight through a long opening between the floor and the wall. In a moment Willis was down on ...
— Buffalo Roost • F. H. Cheley

... Sheldon demanded that I should scamper back to Huxter's Cross as fast as my legs would carry me, in order to be in time for the hybrid vehicle that was to convey me to Hidling station; and here was this dear girl inviting me to linger, and promising me a welcome ...
— Birds of Prey • M. E. Braddon

... seen alongside the railroad, after a day and night's ride, dotted over with mounds a foot or so high. Sometimes a thousand or more congregate in the town, and their holes are a few rods apart. When approaching these towns, or the cars pass along, you see them scamper off to the top of the mound, stand up on their hind-legs and bark, shaking their little short tails at each bark, and presently plunge head first into their holes. They are of a brown color, size of a squirrel, but ...
— Three Years on the Plains - Observations of Indians, 1867-1870 • Edmund B. Tuttle

... host for not keeping better ale and a wench of more charm; to reach St. James's in time for a random toilet and so off to dinner. Which of our dandies could survive a day of pleasure such as this? Which would be ready, dinner done, to scamper off again to Ranelagh and dance and skip and sup in the rotunda there? Yet the youth of that period would not dream of going to bed or ever he had looked in at Crockford's—tanta lubido rerum—for a few ...
— The Works of Max Beerbohm • Max Beerbohm

... experience Mrs. Halfpenny had never known the like! And taking Dolores by the hand, she led the wrathful and indignant girl back into her bedroom, untied and tied, unbuttoned and buttoned, brushed and combed in spite of the second bell ringing, the general scamper, and the sudden apparition of Mysie and Val, whom she bade run away and tell her leddyship that 'Miss Mohoone should come as soon as she was sorted, but she ought to come up early to have her hair looked ...
— The Two Sides of the Shield • Charlotte M. Yonge

... thicket with the oddest little clatter Sings his rattling little, prattling little, tattling little tune; Fleet the feet of tiny stars go patter, patter, patter, As they scamper from the heavens at the rising of the moon. Beaming little, gleaming little fireflies go dreaming To the dearest little, queerest little baby lullabies. Creep! Creep! Creep! Time to go to sleep! Baby playing 'possum ...
— Poems Teachers Ask For, Book Two • Various

... "Good! I'll scamper home and tell Maryllia! I'll say I have met you, and that I've been as impudent as I possibly could ...
— God's Good Man • Marie Corelli

... what he knew about the fellow, from past experiences, Paul thought no dependence could be placed on Ted. As likely as not if his hands were free, he would seize the very first chance to snatch up the bag and scamper off, leaving the others to bear the brunt ...
— The Banner Boy Scouts - Or, The Struggle for Leadership • George A. Warren

... would give her horse a touch with the whip, and off she would go at a gallop, feeling happy with the wind blowing in her face, and he whom she loved by her side to smile on and encourage her. Then they would scamper along; the dog with his thin body almost touching the ground, racing and frightening the rabbits, which shot across the road swift as bullets. Out of breath by the violent ride, Micheline would stop, and pat the neck of her lovely chestnut horse. Slowly the ...
— Serge Panine, Complete • Georges Ohnet

... heard shouts of childish laughter, and a scamper of childish feet, and Maida and Adelaide Edes rushed past, almost jostling him from the sidewalk. Maida carried a letter, which her mother had written, and dispatched to the last mail. And that letter was destined to be of more importance to Von Rosen ...
— The Butterfly House • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman

... darkness, like that of green stone: this was the under side of the wave. Then the top of it would curdle, the southern end of the wave would collapse, and with exceeding swiftness this white feathery falling would plunge and scamper and bluster northward, the full length of the wave. It would be neater and more workmanlike to have each wave tumble down as a whole. From the smacking and the splashing, what looked like boiling milk would thrust out over the brown ...
— Jurgen - A Comedy of Justice • James Branch Cabell

... also a horn, stalks majestically along with all the dignity of a royal marshal of processions, and the goats follow him, with a good deal of lagging behind for play, or nibbling, if they should chance to see anything green. Still, they scamper after their generalissimo in the end, and meanwhile he is much too dignified to look back. Taking advantage of this, I have seen women come out of their cottages on the roadside and milk a goat or two as it passed; and from the way the animal made a full stop, and lent itself ...
— Spanish Life in Town and Country • L. Higgin and Eugene E. Street

... wise one, he that had made a study of Shibli Bagarag. Thereupon that monkey stalked scornfully from them; and Abarak cried, 'O Master of the Event! it was better for me to keep the passage of the Seventh Pillar, than be an ape of this order. Wah! the flashing of the Sword scorcheth them, and they scamper.' ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith

... he had told me; for in my musings they were not shoes, but "Spot" and "Brindle," live Eskimo dogs, that had drawn families of queer little people in sleds over the frozen sea, and had always been hungry and ready to fight over their scanty meals. At times I imagined that they wanted to race and scamper about as happy dogs do, and I would run myself out of breath to keep them going, and always stop with ...
— The Expedition of the Donner Party and its Tragic Fate • Eliza Poor Donner Houghton

... to the listening ear; even their eloquent silences were as deep, and, I wot, perhaps as dangerous, as the darkened pool that filled so noiselessly a dozen yards away. So quiet were they that the tremor of invading wings once or twice shook the silence, or the quick scamper of frightened feet rustled the dead grass. But in the midst of a prolonged stillness the young man sprang up so suddenly that Nellie was still half clinging to his neck as he stood erect. "Hush!" he whispered; "some one ...
— Frontier Stories • Bret Harte

... said Scattergood, "but if you don't scamper into his room fairly spry, the seat of your pants is goin' to have an appointment with my hand." He leaned over the railing as he said it, and the boy, regarding Scattergood's face a moment, arose and ...
— Scattergood Baines • Clarence Budington Kelland

... charming. Apartments so decorated can have been meant only for the recreation of people greater than any we know, people for whom life was impudent ease and success. Margaret Farnese was the lady of the house, but where she trailed her cloth of gold the chickens now scamper between your legs over rotten straw. It is all inexpressibly dreary. A stupid peasant scratching his head, a couple of critical Americans picking their steps, the walls tattered and befouled breast-high, dampness and decay striking in on your heart, and ...
— Italian Hours • Henry James

... Hamet el Zegri, had careered wide over the Campina of Utrera, encompassing the flocks and herds, when he heard the burst of war at a distance. There were with him but a handful of his Gomeres. He saw the scamper and pursuit afar off, and beheld the Christian horsemen spurring madly toward the ambuscade on the banks of the Lopera. Hamet tossed his hand triumphantly aloft for his men to follow him. "The Christian dogs are ours!" said he as he put spurs to his horse to take the enemy ...
— Chronicle of the Conquest of Granada • Washington Irving

... incident, but the idea of frightening my visitors appealed to my sense of humor. I tiptoed to the front stairway, ran lightly down, found the front door, and, from the inside, opened and slammed it. I heard instantly a hurried scamper above, and the heavy fall of one who had stumbled in the dark. I grinned with real pleasure at the sound of this mishap, hurried into the great library, which was as dark as a well, and, opening one of the long windows, stepped out ...
— The House of a Thousand Candles • Meredith Nicholson

... uncle Tom whithersoever he went, came skurrying out of the stables as the dog-cart drove off, and joined in the general scamper. ...
— Vera Nevill - Poor Wisdom's Chance • Mrs. H. Lovett Cameron

... give a good specimen of the whole livelong Sunday, which presented only an alternation of similar scenes until sunset, when a universal unchaining of tongues and a general scamper proclaimed that ...
— The May Flower, and Miscellaneous Writings • Harriet Beecher Stowe

... to see how they stared, how they scamper'd, By furze-bush, by fern, by no obstacle stay'd, And the few that held council, were terribly hamper'd, For some were vindictive, and some were afraid. I saw they were dress'd for a masquerade train, Colour'd ...
— May Day With The Muses • Robert Bloomfield

... scrupulous historian), yet I can now and then make him bestow on his enemy a sturdy back stroke sufficient to fell a giant; though, in honest truth, he may never have done anything of the kind; or I can drive his antagonist clear round and round the field, as did Homer make that fine fellow Hector scamper like a poltroon round the walls of Troy; for which, if ever they have encountered one another in the Elysian Fields, I'll warrant the prince of poets has had to make ...
— Knickerbocker's History of New York, Complete • Washington Irving

... and breeding, and are most at home in a drawing-room or on a well-kept lawn, they are by no means deficient in sporting proclivities, and, in spite of their short noses, their scent is very keen. They thoroughly enjoy a good scamper, and are all the better for not being too much pampered. They are very good house-dogs, intelligent and affectionate, and have sympathetic, coaxing little ways. One point in their favour is the fact that they are ...
— Dogs and All About Them • Robert Leighton

... upward between stream and sky, with a look of sheepish surprise and shame, as of a school-boy caught stealing apples, in their foolish visages. Pleasant new national schools at the bridge end, whither the urchins scamper at the sound of the two o'clock bell. Though it be an ugly pile enough of bright red brick, it is doing its work, as Whitbury folk know well by now. Pleasant, too, though still more ugly, those long red arms of new houses which Whitbury is stretching out along ...
— Two Years Ago, Volume I • Charles Kingsley

... praise, thanks, and complaints, he had an answer ready for everybody without losing aught of his affability. Since early morning he had been resisting the assault of the petty painters of his set who found their pictures badly hung. It was the usual scamper of the first moment, everybody looking for everybody else, rushing to see one another and bursting into recriminations—noisy, interminable fury. Either the picture was too high up, or the light did not fall upon it properly, or the paintings near it destroyed ...
— His Masterpiece • Emile Zola

... Johnny would whistle sharply. That meant "Run!" Then they would scamper as fast as they could along the nearest little path to the house under the old apple-tree in the far corner, and never once look around. They would dive head first, one after the other, in at the doorway, and not show their noses outside again until Johnny or Polly Chuck ...
— The Adventures of Johnny Chuck • Thornton W. Burgess

... many private little paths under the grass all over the Green Meadows, and along these he can scamper ever so fast without once showing himself to those who may be looking for him. Of course he started to take Grandfather Frog along one of these little paths. But Grandfather Frog doesn't walk or run; ...
— The Adventures of Grandfather Frog • Thornton W. Burgess

... being one of the party, and having already supped, said to her mother that she was going to find Skipping Rabbit and have a run with her. You see, Moonlight, although full seventeen years of age, was still so much of a child as to delight in a scamper with her little friend, the youngest child of ...
— The Prairie Chief • R.M. Ballantyne

... cheetah from its cage to the chase is by no means an easy matter. The keeper leads him along, as he would a large dog, with a chain; and for a time as they scamper over the country the leopard goes willingly enough; but if anything arrests his attention, some noise from the forest, some scented trail upon the ground, he moves more slowly, throws his head aloft and peers savagely round. A few more minutes perhaps ...
— The Tribes and Castes of the Central Provinces of India - Volume IV of IV - Kumhar-Yemkala • R.V. Russell

... so brave, so better tho' they be, It nothing skills if He begin to plague. Look now, I melt a gourd-fruit into mash, Add honeycomb and pods, I have perceived, Which bite like finches when they bill and kiss,— 70 Then, when froth rises bladdery, drink up all, Quick, quick, till maggots scamper thro' my brain; Last, throw me on my back i' the seeded thyme. And wanton, wishing I were born a bird. Put case, unable to be what I wish, I yet could make a live bird out of clay: Would not I take clay, pinch my Caliban Able to fly?—for there, see, he hath wings, And great comb like the hoopoe's ...
— Browning's Shorter Poems • Robert Browning

... Islamabad.[16] It was surrounded at some distance by trees, which had tended apparently to preserve the building, for the stone carvings were clearer and less decayed by time than any others we had seen. Being caught here in a heavy rain, we had a scamper for our boats, and after a wet journey, reached Sirinugger about ...
— Diary of a Pedestrian in Cashmere and Thibet • by William Henry Knight

... rest in the scamper for cups and a pan nor follow them out into the back yard. He patted Kathleen's head and then went into the kitchen when he had heard the screen door slam and knew the Mullarkey children were all out of the house. He took down a bottle from the shelf by the table and slipped quietly out ...
— The Circus Comes to Town • Lebbeus Mitchell

... to put his pen behind his ear and watch him. It was quite a scene in a play to see how Fred would start at the least sound. A mouse nibbling behind a box of iron chains made him beside himself until he had scared the little gray thing from its hole, and saw it scamper away out of the shop. But after the first hour the watching FOR NOTHING became a little tedious. There was a "splendid" game of base ball to come off on the public green that afternoon; and after that the boys were going to the "Shaw-seen" for a swim; then there was to be a picnic on ...
— The Errand Boy • Horatio Alger

... thousands of them, scrambling, pushing and jumping, scurrying and hurrying, falling and tumbling, as they pressed onwards through the wide doors and then dispersed in the vastness of the gigantic arena, like ants that scamper away to ...
— "Unto Caesar" • Baroness Emmuska Orczy

... Edward, "I give him a bath in lukewarm water and with Castile soap. I rinse the soap off with clear water, rub him dry, and let him have a good scamper in the fields. I comb and brush him thoroughly every day. That makes his coat clean and glossy. Once when he had fleas I washed him with carbolic soap, and then took him in swimming. I have been told that for a small dog the yolk of an egg is better than any kind of soap, but I have never ...
— Friends and Helpers • Sarah J. Eddy

... owner, just ready to feed his chickens. As he flung out the grain they came from every direction, crowding and jostling each other and frantically pecking for the tiny morsels he threw on the ground. Several dozen flocked around him. But three or four stayed on the outer edge, ready to scamper for the big grains he threw now and then amongst the boulders ...
— How to Analyze People on Sight - Through the Science of Human Analysis: The Five Human Types • Elsie Lincoln Benedict and Ralph Paine Benedict

... kind; they make short work of cellars, bee-hives, clothes-presses, and poultry-yards. They eat, drink, and break, giving themselves up to it heartily, not only in the town, but in the neighboring villages. One detachment goes to Brusque, and proceeds so vigorously that the mayor and syndic-attorney scamper off across the fields, and dare not return for a couple of days.[3218] At Versol, the dwelling of the sworn cure, and at Lapeyre, that of the sworn vicar, are both sacked; the money is stolen and the casks are emptied. In the house of the cure of Douyre, "furniture, clothes, ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 3 (of 6) - The French Revolution, Volume 2 (of 3) • Hippolyte A. Taine

... him, thou Infinite Spirit! transform the reptile again into his dog-shape? in which it pleased him often at night to scamper on before me, to roll himself at the feet of the unsuspecting wanderer, and hang upon his shoulders when he fell! Transform him again into his favorite likeness, that he may crawl upon his belly in the dust before me,—that I may trample him, the outlawed, under foot! Not the first! O woe! ...
— Faust • Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe

... melting substance between his teeth as no connoisseur of wine ever revelled in the juices of the choice vintages of Spain and France. Then he would shake and clap his hands because of what he called the 'hot ache' that seized them, only to scamper off again after some new object around which to weave another ...
— Lancashire Idylls (1898) • Marshall Mather

... enthusiasm as he went on: "Just wait until the lightning begins to play around some of these birds. Then you'll see them scamper. I'm going to the city to-morrow to have a talk with the C.E. and I've just got a sneaking hunch that I'm going ...
— El Diablo • Brayton Norton

... so in their hands that they could scarce see the figures. Their master left off the beating when he saw his father, and consequently young Rabbit, for the first and perhaps only time in his life, was very glad to see the old man. The class was dismissed; and if you had seen these four youngsters scamper off, shaking their white tails and jumping half a yard high as they ran to the Warren, you would have thought it was a good thing to have the light-heartedness ...
— The Comical Creatures from Wurtemberg - Second Edition • Unknown

... afflict yourself, my good master. You have nothing else to do but to give me a bag and get a pair of boots made for me that I may scamper through the dirt and the brambles, and you shall see that you have not so bad a portion ...
— The Blue Fairy Book • Various

... they had brought with them; they then proceeded to descend on the other side, passing through the Protestant and Catholic cemeteries, both elaborately laid out, and looking like beautiful flower gardens, rather than burial grounds. As they neared Cote des Neiges Miss Cuthbert commenced to scamper along like a child, and at one short declivity, she started off at a run, calling on the others to follow. Clarkson took his companion's hand and invited her to descend in like manner, but, almost at the first step, ...
— The Mysteries of Montreal - Being Recollections of a Female Physician • Charlotte Fuhrer

... mighty quick if he doesn't want Something to get him. The essence of this decision is quite the same whether the mortal be eight years old or eighty. Now the Tree of Truth stands just over this line at which all but the gods' own turn to scamper back before supper. It is the first tree to the left—an apple-tree, twisted, blackened, scathed, eaten with age, yet full of blossoms as fresh and fertile as those first born of any young tree whatsoever. Those able rightly to read this tree of Truth become ...
— The Seeker • Harry Leon Wilson

... scamper to and fro; They have no tasks to do. It's here and there and high and low For them, the whole day through; Up to the tops of highest trees, In holes and caves, ...
— Zodiac Town - The Rhymes of Amos and Ann • Nancy Byrd Turner

... is to be broken up: scamper off to Adele to get ready: I'll ask mamma to let you drive to the station in the coupe to meet Mr. Brown: there will certainly be room for such little folks.—And as to you, Miss Featherstone, as head of the house pro tem. I ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 26, September 1880 • Various

... reached the car; in as many seconds the powerful engine was throbbing. The screaming horn gave warning, the quiet herds in the valley heeded, lifted their heads and stood at attention, ready to scamper this way or that as need arose. The wheels turned, the car jolted over the inequalities presented by the field, swerved sharply, turned, gathered speed and whizzed away toward ...
— Man to Man • Jackson Gregory

... with affectionate roughness, "There, that's enough. Scamper along with you. And don't ...
— The Brimming Cup • Dorothy Canfield Fisher

... perfectly inoffensive, and would hurt nobody, some of them ventured so far as to examine the texture of my clothes; but many of them were still very suspicious; and when by accident I happened to move myself, or look at the young children, their mothers would scamper off with them with the greatest precipitation. In a few hours, however, they all became ...
— Life and Travels of Mungo Park in Central Africa • Mungo Park

... recollections being with Italy, and my business, consequently, being to scamper back thither as fast as possible, I will not recall (though I am sorely tempted) how the Swiss villages, clustered at the feet of Giant mountains, looked like playthings; or how confusedly the houses were heaped ...
— Pictures from Italy • Charles Dickens

... sacrificing to Bacchus, and each of them an amulet (the ensign of Priapus) in her hand. More than that we could not get to see; for they no sooner perceived us, than they set up such a shout, that the roof of the temple shook agen, and withal endeavoured to lay hands on us; but we scamper'd and made what haste we could ...
— The Satyricon • Petronius Arbiter

... about the human pale, I love to scamper, love to race, To swing by my irreverent tail All over ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 14 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... shops, and inspires The buyers To crawl over counters and climb upon chairs; It trickles on tailors, it spatters On hatters, And makes little milliners scamper up-stairs. ...
— The Admiral's Caravan • Charles E. Carryl

... of the question; it saves a good two miles of walking, and that is no trifle, especially under a heavy burden, or in slippery weather. In the second place, it may be said to be often cheaper than dirt, seeing that the soil and injury to clothing which it saves by avoiding a two miles' scamper through the muddy ways, would damage the purse of a decent man more than would the cost of several journeys. These are considerations which the humbler classes appreciate, and therefore they flock to the cheap boats, and spend their halfpence to save their pence and their time. This latter ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 438 - Volume 17, New Series, May 22, 1852 • Various

... then the train would start up some more tempting game. A brace or two of partridges or a covey of quails would settle down in the stubble, or a cock pheasant drop head and tail and slide into the copse. Rabbits also would scamper back from the borders of the fields into the thickets or peep slyly out, ...
— Winter Sunshine • John Burroughs

... and in the coach 13s. As I was pressed for time, I was obliged to go by the first. The roads are excellent; not a hill, not a stone is there to impede the rapid rate at which the horses, that are changed every eight miles, scamper along. ...
— A Woman's Journey Round the World • Ida Pfeiffer

... bars if you can," said Ernest. "It will be fun to see this outfit scamper over, and besides it will be closer to the ...
— Battling the Clouds - or, For a Comrade's Honor • Captain Frank Cobb

... Ikey would furnish the comic relief. Nor did Ikey disappoint them. He was a wayward son. When his parents were laboriously engaged in a boxing-match, or dancing to the "Merry Widow Waltz," or balancing on step-ladders, Ikey, on all fours, would scamper to the foot-lights and, leaning over, make a swift grab at the head of the first trombone. And when the Countess Zichy, apprised by the shouts of the audience of Ikey's misconduct, waved a toy whip, Ikey would gallop back to his pedestal and howl at her. To every ...
— The Nature Faker • Richard Harding Davis

... while it seemed doubtful on which side victory should fall, until through the trees the commander caught sight of a glancing banner, and with a shout he announced that reinforcements had arrived. The enemy had seen it also, and at once began a retreat, which soon became a scamper. ...
— The Story of Garfield - Farm-boy, Soldier, and President • William G. Rutherford

... moment I saw the boy who had been speaking with Henry dart off suddenly, and scamper away in the direction of the village. Henry at the same ...
— Ellen Middleton—A Tale • Georgiana Fullerton

... farmer's name, isn't it—Hiram?" and she laughed—a clear and sweet sound, that made an inquisitive squirrel that had been watching them scamper away ...
— Hiram The Young Farmer • Burbank L. Todd

... scamper up the pathway than climb the wooden steps, and the dog hurried to reach the top; but a slight noise made him pause and look at the thick brush near him. There was nothing to be seen, but Jan's ears listened sharply while his sensitive nose sniffed the air suspiciously. ...
— Prince Jan, St. Bernard • Forrestine C. Hooker

... festival of the jubilee, it happened that one day Anna Apenborg went to the brew-house, which lay inside the convent walls (it was one of Sidonia's praying days), and there she saw a strange apparition of a three-legged hare. She runs and calls the other sisters; whereupon they all scamper out of their cells, and down the steps, to see the miracle, and behold, there sits the three-legged hare; but when Agnes Kleist took off her slipper, and threw it at the devil's sprite, my hare is off, ...
— Sidonia The Sorceress V2 • William Mienhold

... of being interested in the dialogue of "John Smith and Minnie Bowl, can you shoe a little foal?" and actually thrust out his own bare feet that Jan might make them take part in the drama of the "twa wee doggies who went to the market," and came back "louper-scamper, louper-scamper." ...
— Jan and Her Job • L. Allen Harker

... the handkerchief was clean. The old man, though ragged enough to scare the crows, was clean from his bare head to his bare sea-bleached feet. He munched the rest of the pasty, talking between mouthfuls. To his discourse Dicky paid no heed, but slipped away for a scamper ...
— Lady Good-for-Nothing • A. T. Quiller-Couch

... the policeman that dim object of dread called "a summons." This it is that keeps the village children within the bounds familiar to them, where they know who is who, and what property belongs to which owner, and how far they may risk doing mischief, and round what corners they may scamper into safety. ...
— Change in the Village • (AKA George Bourne) George Sturt

... from the still piercing wind; and, each wrapped in a gay blanket, lunch as operatic gypsies might, in a romantic glen, enjoying mightily our steaming chocolate, and the warmth of our friendly stove—for dessert, taking a merry scamper for flowers, over the ragged ascent from whence the boulders came. Everywhere about is the trumpet creeper, but not yet in bloom. The Indian turnip is in blossom here, and so the smaller Solomon's seal, yellow spikes of toad-flax, blue and pink ...
— Afloat on the Ohio - An Historical Pilgrimage of a Thousand Miles in a Skiff, from Redstone to Cairo • Reuben Gold Thwaites

... in her doorway listening, and heard the dog scamper up to Theo's door. There he listened and nosed about for a moment, then down he came again, and with a short, anxious bark, dashed down the stairs to the street. Nan waited a long time but the dog did not return, ...
— The Bishop's Shadow • I. T. Thurston

... the day of an English girl in town. Transplant her into the country, and the task of frittering away existence, though it becomes more difficult, is faced just as gallantly as before. Mudie comes to the rescue with the back novels which she was too busy to get through in the season; there is the scamper from one country house to another, there are the flirtations to keep her hand in, the pets to be fed, the cousins to extemporize a mimic theatre, the curate—if worst comes to worst—to try a little ritualism upon. With these helps ...
— Modern Women and What is Said of Them - A Reprint of A Series of Articles in the Saturday Review (1868) • Anonymous

... pity, Eester," the husband coolly answered, "that you did not take it; I reckon it would have done considerable good. But, boys, if it should turn out as Ahiram thinks, that there are Indians near us, we may have to scamper up the rock, and lose our suppers after all; therefore we will make sure of the game, and talk over the performances of the Doctor when we have nothing better ...
— The Prairie • J. Fenimore Cooper

... little wind kept swaying the top-most branches, where the youngest beech-leaves flickered, like golden-green butterflies bewitched by some malicious fairy, so that they could never fly into the sky till summer was over, and all the leaf butterflies in the world would be free to scamper with the wind. ...
— Far to Seek - A Romance of England and India • Maud Diver

... be supposed, they proceeded with various success, and occasioned the most uproarious mirth whenever any unfortunate devil who had overtasked his powers in the attempt, happened to fail, and was forced to scamper out of the subsiding flames with scorched limbs that set him a dancing without music. In fact, those possessed of activity enough to clear them were loudly cheered, and rewarded with a glass of whiskey, a temptation which had ...
— The Evil Eye; Or, The Black Spector - The Works of William Carleton, Volume One • William Carleton

... the creatures" said Bridget; "yonder, on the further side of the prairie—I dare say the two parties will join each other, and have a famous scamper, in company." ...
— The Crater • James Fenimore Cooper

... on his neck). Infamous! most infamous Charles! Oh, had I not my forebodings, when, even as a boy, he would scamper after the girls, and ramble about over hill and common with ragamuffin boys and all the vilest rabble; when he shunned the very sight of a church as a malefactor shuns a gaol, and would throw the pence he had ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller

... Bella Curtis did scamper for her two cents to pay the postman! and how delighted she looked when he gave her the letter! The postman thought there must at least be a gold watch inside of ...
— The Little Nightcap Letters. • Frances Elizabeth Barrow

... inspected the espaliers. Pecuchet tried to discover the buds. Sometimes a spider would scamper suddenly over the wall, and the two shadows of their bodies appeared magnified, repeating their gestures. The ends of the grass let the dew trickle out. The night was perfectly black, and everything remained motionless in a ...
— Bouvard and Pecuchet - A Tragi-comic Novel of Bourgeois Life • Gustave Flaubert

... Franco!" said Jonas again; and, stooping down, he took a piece of hardened snow or ice from the road, and threw it towards him. The ice fell, before it reached Franco, and rolled along towards his feet, which made him scamper along a little farther; and then he stopped, and turned around, and ...
— Jonas on a Farm in Winter • Jacob Abbott

... Then out they scamper'd all, vull run, An' out cried Tom, "I think The grinden-stwone is up on tun, Vor I can zee the wink. This is some kindness that the vo'k At Woodley have a-done, min; I wish I had em here, I'd poke Their numskulls down ...
— Poems of Rural Life in the Dorset Dialect • William Barnes

... where he left them, looks up and down the street as half expecting to see them astray, suddenly pricks up his ears and remembers all about it. A thoroughly vagabond dog, accustomed to low company and public- houses; a terrific dog to sheep, ready at a whistle to scamper over their backs and tear out mouthfuls of their wool; but an educated, improved, developed dog who has been taught his duties and knows how to discharge them. He and Jo listen to the music, probably with much the same amount of animal satisfaction; likewise as to awakened ...
— Bleak House • Charles Dickens

... over with the wine of life. I thought the cool, moist air had never seemed so sweet and fragrant; that nature's garb had never seemed so blithe. There was no hint nor sign of death in all the wooded prospect. The birds were singing joyously; the squirrels, scarce alarmed enough to scamper out of sight, sat each upon his bough to chatter at us as we passed. And once, when we were filing through a bosky dell with softest turf to muffle all our treadings, a fox ran out and stood with one uplifted foot, and was as still ...
— The Master of Appleby • Francis Lynde

... the lad had kicked out with the clumsy wooden shoes he wore, and the soldier fell back half stunned into the sea. The rest of the fellows instantly raised their guns, but George did not wince; he perceived what they in their wild scamper after him had not noticed, that they had dragged their muskets through the water, and for the time had rendered the weapons useless. The boy laughed in spite of his predicament, as he hastily ran ...
— With Marlborough to Malplaquet • Herbert Strang and Richard Stead

... away than it looked, but they reached it after a good sharp scamper. "And now we'll just be after eating a bit of something before we go any farther," Elsie said, dropping down on the grass, very ...
— Little Folks - A Magazine for the Young (Date of issue unknown) • Various

... heavy brass, an indefinable conceit of airy fantasy, with here and there a line of sober melody peeping between the mischievous pranks. There is no contrasting Trio in the middle; but just before the end comes a quiet pace as of mock-gravity, before a final scamper. ...
— Symphonies and Their Meaning; Third Series, Modern Symphonies • Philip H. Goepp

... should be glad, for the park was a far nicer place after all. Still she did feel pleased, and without thinking where she was going, or whether Sister Agatha would like her to go or not, Mary began to scamper ...
— The Bountiful Lady - or, How Mary was changed from a very Miserable Little Girl - to a very Happy One • Thomas Cobb

... smilingly shook his head and said, "You are an enviable youth! Every time I think of you I think that. As a child amuses himself at an annual fair, you scamper through the world, feast your eyes on what you like to look at, take your pleasure in what you see, and build ...
— The German Classics of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries - Masterpieces of German Literature Vol. 19 • Various

... be saying some foolish speech or other. I pray you, if you have no objection, let me quickly have a few stripes, and then allow me to scamper off. ...
— The Love-Tiff • Moliere

... ballrooms of plantain and mango They scamper, they slither and slide In the throes of a tropical tango, In the grip of a Gibbony glide; 'Tis thus in these desolate spaces, Away from humanity's ken, They mimic the civilised races And strive to ...
— Punch or the London Charivari, Vol. 147, November 11, 1914 • Various

... Free speech was first due to the Pantomimi. A proud boast that. They hymn Tell and chant Savonarola and glorify the Gracchi, but I doubt if any of the gods in the world's Pantheon or the other world's Valhalla did so much for freedom as those merry mimes that the children scamper after ...
— Wisdom, Wit, and Pathos of Ouida - Selected from the Works of Ouida • Ouida

... the view-halloa is raised, is to scamper headlong, pounce on the victim and pull him apart (or so it feels) until fortune, superior strength, or some such element decides the point; and then more often than not it is the victim's fate to be carried between two ...
— The Ivory Trail • Talbot Mundy

... adventurer. What he finds there is chiefly conjectured, so secretive are the little people of Naboth's field. Only when leaves fall and the light is low and slant, one sees the long clean flanks of the jackrabbits, leaping like small deer, and of late afternoons little cotton-tails scamper in the runways. But the most one sees of the burrowers, gophers, and mice is the fresh earthwork of their newly opened doors, or the pitiful small shreds the ...
— The Land of Little Rain • Mary Austin

... of science was seen to put his rifle quickly to the shoulder; the arches of the forest rang with a loud report; various horrified creatures were seen and heard to scamper away, and next moment a middle-sized orang-utan came crashing through the branches of a tall tree and fell dead with a ...
— Blown to Bits - The Lonely Man of Rakata, the Malay Archipelago • R.M. Ballantyne

... and main tacks were boarded, and the top-gallant-sails set. This revealed our intention, and the clamour on the shore even reached the ship. Preparations were making to get a piece of light artillery to bear on us, and some twenty gunners began to scamper towards the detached battery. The whole thing was now reduced to a sheer race. We passed the last battery ten minutes before the French could reach it, the latter having to go round a considerable bay; and six minutes later, we went out to sea, with the American ensign, and jacks, and pennants ...
— Miles Wallingford - Sequel to "Afloat and Ashore" • James Fenimore Cooper

... with Mr. Proctor to the hunt. Mother rode Jocko Root, Ted a first-class cavalry horse, I rode Renown, and with us went Senator Lodge, Uncle Douglas, Cousin John Elliott, Mr. Bob Fergie, and General Wood. We had a three hours' scamper which was really ...
— Letters to His Children • Theodore Roosevelt

... alone in the forest. Only men belong to the society; women and children are excluded from it and look upon it with fear and awe. If any one raises a cry, "Asa is coming," or the sound of the musical instruments of the society is heard in the distance, all the women and children scamper away. The natives are very unwilling to let any stranger enter one of the lodges of the society. The interior of such a building is usually somewhat bare, but it contains the wooden masks which are worn in the ceremonial dances of the society, ...
— The Belief in Immortality and the Worship of the Dead, Volume I (of 3) • Sir James George Frazer

... along a stately avenue, wondering what he could do to avert the retribution that moved toward the Downeys, and finding that his assistant city-editor's resourcefulness availed him naught, he heard the scamper of feet behind him and whirled about with cane upraised in time to bring a snarling chow dog to ...
— O. Henry Memorial Award Prize Stories of 1921 • Various

... see Master Duckbill, they watch him waddle along in his funny, awkward way and bark at him, but they will not touch him. When cats first see this queer creature, they scamper ...
— Dew Drops - Volume 37, No. 18, May 3, 1914 • Various

... he said, "there was no show after all, you see. It seems that the raid didn't quite come off; and we had our scamper for nothing, worse luck! The Boy going on ...
— Captain Desmond, V.C. • Maud Diver

... In the scamper that followed, the blood surged back to her face, and her spirits rose again; but in her secret heart there yet remained a nameless dread that she was as powerless to define as ...
— The Way of an Eagle • Ethel M. Dell

... scamper as men fled for their horses. Barebacked, many with the bridle scarcely secure, all without weapons, the men of Waroona ...
— The Rider of Waroona • Firth Scott

... depths of the burrows. But they are very inquisitive, and if they are not harmed they soon put out their heads again to see what is taking place. Hunters who have walked through a dog-village, hoping to get a shot at one of the little householders, have been amused to see them scamper indoors as they approached, and come out again as soon as they had passed. All around, within the range of a gun, there was not a marmot to be seen, but at a safe distance there were hundreds, or even thousands, on ...
— Chatterbox, 1906 • Various

... pistol would startle him and prevent my getting a quiet shot. But patience was rewarded. When satiated, the brute retired as stealthily as he had advanced; and as he passed within seven or eight yards of me I let him have it. Great was my disappointment to see him scamper off. How was it possible I could have missed him? I must have fired over his back. The men jumped to their feet and clutched their rifles; but, though astonished at my story, were soon at rest again. After this the kettle was never robbed. Four days later we ...
— Tracks of a Rolling Stone • Henry J. Coke

... historian of Ireland can be said to have even attempted. This work, the final volume of which has not yet appeared, so completely covers the whole ground that it seems to afford an excuse for an even more hasty scamper over the same area than the exigencies of space have elsewhere ...
— The Story Of Ireland • Emily Lawless

... fisking and giggiting. Both these words have practically the same signification, i.e., to frisk or scamper about heedlessly, cf. Rules of Civility (1675), in Antiquary (1880):—'Madam ... fisking and prattling are but ill ways ...
— The Works of Aphra Behn, Vol. II • Aphra Behn

... all swear at them, but we love them; you shall see how they follow her. Talila, off with you and your babies." And the next moment there was a general scamper of brown children headed by this tall, vacant-looking woman. "Take the lady to the sea," continued Lisetta. And Mae arose, as if in ...
— Mae Madden • Mary Murdoch Mason

... you think you should very faithful be, For having such a loving friend to comfort you as me? And when your leg is better, and you can run and play, We'll have a scamper in the fields and see ...
— Pinafore Palace • Various

... considerable time feeding. Their method seemed to be much the same as individuals, except that when danger was suspected by any member, he would give a few quick leaps, and all the flock would scamper to some high rock and face about in various directions, no two looking the same way. These maneuvers were often performed, perhaps once every ...
— American Big Game in Its Haunts • Various

... instinctively scented out the man's infirmity, and, softly approaching, commenced eating noiselessly, lapping up the soup daintily; and, when a rather loud licking of the tongue awakened the poor fellow's attention, it would prudently scamper away to avoid the blow of the spoon directed at it by ...
— A Comedy of Marriage & Other Tales • Guy De Maupassant

... satisfactory. He had no more idea than a spring lamb how we were to get to Rye, but thought perhaps a coach set out at that hour in the morning. When I told him I had a horse saddled and waiting for him, he was pleased, for Father Donovan could scamper across the country in Ireland with the best of them. So far as I could judge, the coast was clear, for every one we met between the "Pig and Turnip" and the bridge seemed honest folk intent on getting early to their work. It was ten minutes past seven when we clattered ...
— The O'Ruddy - A Romance • Stephen Crane

... came the keeper thud on the sward. The bough fell down with him, and as it fell it struck the gun, and the gun exploded, and although the dogs scampered aside when they heard the crack, they did not scamper so quick but one of them was shot dead, and the other two ...
— Wood Magic - A Fable • Richard Jefferies

... Lord, it's the best night of any; there's always a riot,-and there the folks run about,-and then there's such squealing and squalling!-and, there, all the lamps are broke,-and the women run skimper scamper.-I declare I would not take five guineas to miss ...
— Evelina • Fanny Burney

... not even give a thought to picking up the scissors, but crawling up on to his feet again, he tried to scamper outside. But just at that very moment Pao-ch'ai and the rest of the young ladies were dismounting from their vehicles, and the matrons and women-servants were closing them in so thoroughly on all sides that not a puff of wind or a drop of rain could ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book II • Cao Xueqin

... over with soot, they kick'd up such a rout, And caper'd the sick man's apartment about, And chatter'd and squall'd in a manner so hideous, Like young imps of darkness, that, not to be tedious, The sufferer forgot both his gout and his prayers, And scamper'd, pursued by these phantoms, ...
— The Monkey's Frolic - A Humorous Tale in Verse • Anonymous

... "You needn't scamper away up the tree so fast. I'm not going to stay round here long enough to interfere with your looking over your spiritual wardrobe. I wonder if your soul wears soft gray fur?" And the story-teller walked quickly on through the woods, chanting to herself: "Old world, ...
— The Wide Awake Girls in Winsted • Katharine Ellis Barrett

... back stairs. All the outer doors were locked, she was sure; all the boys lay in their places, for she could see and count the three long figures and little Gus in a bunch on the sofa. The girls had not stirred, and this was no rat's scamper, but a slow and careful tread, stealing nearer and nearer to the study door, left ajar when the last load of wood was ...
— Aunt Jo's Scrap-Bag, Vol. 5 - Jimmy's Cruise in the Pinafore, Etc. • Louisa M. Alcott

... wild boars fed in gulches, and where the stunted oaks grew close and thick. Higher up in the mountains there were bears, which occasionally came down and made the wild pigs scamper. You could always tell when the bears were around, for then the little pigs would run out into the open. The bears had a liking for little pigs, and the bears had a liking for the honey in the bee-trees, too. Aristo could find the bee-trees better than ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great Philosophers, Volume 8 • Elbert Hubbard

... of his boyish daring, it is told that when a mere child, hardly into his first trousers, he went one day to catch a colt in one of his father's fields bordering on the Contoocook. The colt declined to be caught and after a sharp scamper took to the river and swam across. Nothing daunted, the plucky little urchin threw off his jacket, plunged into the swift current, and safely breasting it, was soon in hot pursuit on the other side; and after a long chase and hard tussle made out to catch the spirited ...
— The Bay State Monthly - Volume 1, Issue 4 - April, 1884 • Various



Words linked to "Scamper" :   haste, scurry, rush, scuttle, run



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