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Spy   /spaɪ/   Listen
Spy

noun
(pl. spies)
1.
(military) a secret agent hired by a state to obtain information about its enemies or by a business to obtain industrial secrets from competitors.  Synonym: undercover agent.
2.
A secret watcher; someone who secretly watches other people.



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"Spy" Quotes from Famous Books



... what I wished, and have it go unchallenged. Moreover, there was a want of bitterness between the contending parties, for one reason, possibly, because the deaths of Wolfe and Montcalm had softened enmity: and nobody has yet hurled the words 'traitor,' 'spy,' at me, and I feel I am not truly open to them, my task having been that of an intelligence officer on the highest scale. As much is recognized in the affability which I have continued to find among the French since the close of the siege, but they are by nature ...
— The Black Colonel • James Milne

... Army of the Cumberland, stretching down the Nickajack; but Johnston detected the movement, and promptly abandoned Marietta and Kenesaw. I expected as much, for, by the earliest dawn of the 3d of July, I was up at a large spy-glass mounted on a tripod, which Colonel Poe, United States Engineers, had at his bivouac close by our camp. I directed the glass on Kenesaw, and saw some of our pickets crawling up the hill cautiously; soon they stood upon the very top, and I ...
— Memoirs of Three Civil War Generals, Complete • U. S. Grant, W. T. Sherman, P. H. Sheridan

... to spy upon her," answered Alfred, "in self-defence. It's the only way I can keep her from making me utterly ridiculous." And he proceeded to read from the secretary's telegram. "'Shopped all morning. Lunched ...
— Baby Mine • Margaret Mayo

... through a large portion of the century, but she was impotent against the doings of a rich nobility, steeped in sensuous pleasures, and of the citizen circles that emulated the nobility. With the Chastity Commissions that she established, and in the aid of which an extensive spy-system was organized, she partly provoked bitterness, and partly made herself laughable. The success was zero. In frivolous Vienna, sayings like these made the rounds during the second half of the eighteenth century: "You must love your neighbor like yourself, that is to say, you must love your ...
— Woman under socialism • August Bebel

... answered Kate, "that my grandfather and your father, who of course were brothers, were so vehemently hated by the Protestant families, many of whose members had been betrayed to death by their means—your father in particular was relentless in his efforts to hunt down and spy out miserable victims—that when the Queen was known to be dead, and her successor and Protestant sister had been proclaimed in London, the Trevlyns felt that they had cause to tremble for their own safety. They had stirred up relentless enmity ...
— The Lost Treasure of Trevlyn - A Story of the Days of the Gunpowder Plot • Evelyn Everett-Green

... not contemplate confessing to Beverley that he had hidden himself and then taken the envelope. She would probably say: "I never dreamed that you'd be mean enough to spy upon me! Why didn't you show yourself, like a brave man, ...
— The Lion's Mouse • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson

... fell over the plains, Sleeping Dawn moved forward lightly, swiftly, toward the camp in the hollow of the hills. She had no definite purpose except to spy the lay-out, to make sure that her fears were justified. But through the hinterland of her consciousness rebellious thoughts were racing. These smugglers were wholly outside the law. It was her right to frustrate ...
— Man Size • William MacLeod Raine

... concealed: each word Of Sita and the fiends he heard, And in a maze of anxious thought His quick-conceiving bosom wrought. "At length my watchful eyes have seen, Pursued so long, the Maithil queen, Sought by our Vanar hosts in vain From east to west, from main to main. A cautious spy have I explored The palace of the Rakhshas lord, And thoroughly learned, concealed from sight, The giant monarch's power and might. And now my task must be to cheer The royal dame who sorrows here. For if I go, and soothe her not, A captive ...
— The Ramayana • VALMIKI

... bellowing of Big Aleck, beseeching aid. They advanced cautiously, to spy out what had happened and saw him rolling from side to side, striving to rise, falling back. The woman was ...
— The Sagebrusher - A Story of the West • Emerson Hough

... of the tower they Were approached by an obliging attendant and furnished with spy glasses of great power with which they could see more distinctly the beauty and greatness of the world, and the roughness and inconvenience of traveling the King's Highway. To each one was also given an ingenious pocket mirror ...
— Mr. World and Miss Church-Member • W. S. Harris

... such a companion, whose nature he could not comprehend, whose object in seeking him out he could not guess. Perhaps it felt affection toward him; perhaps, on the other hand, enmity. A lover, or a spy—it might be either. Or it might have no definite purpose, but simply drift near him in the air, as some human beings drift feebly along together through life, because they have long ago loved each other, or thought each other useful, or fancied, in some moment of madness, that ...
— Flames • Robert Smythe Hichens

... Connecticut rangers, had been for several days within the British lines gathering information. Just as he had accomplished his purpose, and was on the point of departing with his memoranda, he was arrested as a spy and hanged next morning, lamenting on the gallows that he had but one life ...
— The War of Independence • John Fiske

... bringing it by the cartload. But saving only all that money, the mendicant received nothing from the Gods at all, and the heart of the money-lender was uneasy on account of expectation. Therefore at noon of the third day the money-lender went into the temple to spy upon the councils of the Gods, and to learn in what manner that gift might arrive. Even as he was making his prayers, a crack between the stones of the floor gaped, and, closing, caught him by the heel. Then he heard the Gods ...
— The Kipling Reader - Selections from the Books of Rudyard Kipling • Rudyard Kipling

... to breakfast, when the sail was discovered, too far off to make her out. The boys all manifested a deep interest in the distant wanderer on the tempestuous sea, mingled with a desire to know how the stranger had weathered the gale. Many of them went up the shrouds into the tops, and the spy-glasses were in great demand. ...
— Outward Bound - Or, Young America Afloat • Oliver Optic

... night; and still neither the caravan nor the warriors who had determined to capture it made their appearance; and Walter and the renegade, for different reasons, began to entertain considerable alarm. As morning approached, however, one point was explained. In fact, a spy employed by Beltran reached the rendezvous, with intelligence that the Earl's intention to attack the caravan having been suspected, had caused the delay; but that, being aware that he was out of the way, its guards were preparing to hasten forward at dawn of day, confidently hoping ...
— The Boy Crusaders - A Story of the Days of Louis IX. • John G. Edgar

... by the way was an acquisition on which every man prided himself; and the writer lost much ground in the estimation of his batman for his refusal to arrest a wandering member of the Egyptian Labour Corps, whom that zealous youth asserted to be a German spy, "because he could not understand Egyptian." The el Arish children were as friendly and talkative as children all the world over, though one regretted their inveterate habit of demanding backsheesh. The ...
— The Fifth Battalion Highland Light Infantry in the War 1914-1918 • F.L. Morrison

... silent. Then I crept up and looked in at the window. 'See,' I whispered, 'he's in the library. We'll take him by surprise. Come!' It was not to be. There was a smell of tobacco on the air and the thud of a step on the grass. 'Who's that?' I said. 'Who should it be,' cried father, 'but the same spy again. I'll shake the life out of him yet as a terrier would a rat. No use, girl,' he shouted hoarsely, facing towards the darkness, 'they're driving me to destruction.' 'Hush!' I said, and covered his mouth with my hands, and his breath was hot, like ...
— The Manxman - A Novel - 1895 • Hall Caine

... place my wife and daughter in safety. When I came back, good-by! the Prussians had closed the doors. For more than a week, I wandered around Paris, trying to find an opening. I became suspected of being a spy. I was arrested. A little more, and ...
— Other People's Money • Emile Gaboriau

... and, from the front of Sawyer's barber shop, looked into Wildman's. He felt like a spy looking into the camp of an enemy. There before him sat the men into whose midst he had it in his power to cast a thunderbolt. He might walk to the door and say, truthfully enough, "Here before you is a boy that by the flutter of a ...
— Windy McPherson's Son • Sherwood Anderson

... replied sullenly. "Our saw-mill owner got the inevitable glimpse of the truth. He was blind before; now he was incredulous. He condescended to play the spy, and he was soon satisfied. This time it was a Government official-clerk of the local Court—a blackleg vagabond, with interest at head-quarters—about the vilest rat, and certainly the vilest-looking rat, that ever breathed the breath of life. ...
— Such is Life • Joseph Furphy

... British agent—in other words, the Counsel for Her Most Gracious Majesty. Smooth had no stronger evidence of this fact than that the gentleman seemed very contented with the way time went, amusing himself with making paper spy-glasses,[*] with which he quizzed objects on the floor, then took lunar observations through it, the broad disc of the Umpire's red face affording the medium of a planet. To General F——, who was then in the full pressure of his speech, making his, to him, crushing arguments a legal ...
— The Adventures of My Cousin Smooth • Timothy Templeton

... happier and more beautiful. Many times I went between La Tournoire and Paris,—always by way of Montoire. In Paris I saw much of Brignan de Brignan, whose moustaches had soon grown back to their old magnitude. And one day whom should I meet in the Rue St. Honore but that excellent spy ...
— The Bright Face of Danger • Robert Neilson Stephens

... study cockleology instead of boating, and read up on polywogs while we play tennis, or go poking round with your old spy-glass instead of having a jolly good time," said Jack, hauling away on the strap till all was taut and ship-shape ...
— Jack and Jill • Louisa May Alcott

... snapped Carnes vindictively. "She was never kidnapped in broad daylight. Haggerty says she went with them quite willingly and talked and laughed with them. She has deserted, if she wasn't simply acting as a spy from the first. I ...
— Poisoned Air • Sterner St. Paul Meek

... Arnold hidden in his stockings? I've always had a sneaking sympathy with Andre, because he was gallant and young and good looking, but Tarrytown isn't the place, I find, in which to express any such sentimental feeling. He is still the villain of the piece there, a mere spy, travelling in disguise, a treacherous wretch who long and stealthily worked to corrupt a hitherto honourable general. He is the villain, and David Williams, John Paulding, and Isaac Van Waart, the scouting militiamen who took and searched ...
— The Lightning Conductor Discovers America • C. N. (Charles Norris) Williamson and A. M. (Alice Muriel)

... and everlasting contempt. Praise a vain man or a vain woman aright and enough and you will get them to do anything you like. Give a vain man sufficient publicity in your paper or on your platform and he will become a spy, a traitor, and cut-throat in your service. The sorcerer's cup of praise—keep it full enough in a vain man's hand, and he will sleep in the arbour of vanity till he wakens in hell. Madam Bubble, the arch-enchantress, knows her own, ...
— Bunyan Characters (Second Series) • Alexander Whyte

... the sky the blood-reek high, And dimmed the lustrous sun; ’Twas sad to spy the brave men lie So thick ...
— King Diderik - and the fight between the Lion and Dragon and other ballads - - - Translator: George Borrow • Thomas J. Wise

... turned, but I saw Biddy raise her eyebrows warningly. The girl looked puzzled, as if, for an instant, she did not see what she had done that was wrong. But I guess that Biddy's distrust of Bedr as a possible spy was still alive in her breast. She did not know of my suspicions concerning the "camp thief," for the affair at Medinet, thanks to a white fib or two, had never assumed serious proportions in her mind. It did not need that, however, to make her ...
— It Happened in Egypt • C. N. Williamson & A. M. Williamson

... the long roll of the dead; I shall read the record of ages from the sacred belts. The eyes of the forest shall see for me; the ears of the wilderness listen for me; every tree shall whisper for me, every leaf spy for me; and the voices of a thousand streams shall guide me, and the eight winds shall counsel me, and the stars stretch out their beams for me, pointing the way, so that this man shall die and his wickedness be ...
— The Reckoning • Robert W. Chambers

... proofs to the contrary. His Majesty had seen me; and as I assisted him to change his clothing the Emperor gayly remarked to me, "Well, M. le Drole! Ah! ah! what were you doing in the Faubourg Saint Germain? I see just how it is! A fine thing really! You spy on me when I go out," and many other jests of the same kind; for on that day the Emperor was in such fine spirits that I concluded he had been much pleased ...
— The Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte • Bourrienne, Constant, and Stewarton

... one thinks him a spy," she explained, and touched the man's bowed head with a hand as gentle ...
— Great Britain at War • Jeffery Farnol

... especially in the early days of the Great War, has an interesting origin. It may mean a small body of soldiers or police sent out to go round a garrison, or camp, or town, to keep watch; or, again, it may mean a small body of troops sent on before an advancing army to "reconnoitre"—that is, to spy out the land, the position of the enemy, etc. The word patrol literally means to "paddle in mud," for the French word, patrouille, from which it came into English in the seventeenth century, came from an earlier ...
— Stories That Words Tell Us • Elizabeth O'Neill

... bag. Those slips of paper, I reflected as I worked, at least rent the veil of mystery enveloping the corpse that lay stiffening in the next room. This, at any rate, was certain: German or American or hyphenate, Henry Semlin, manufacturer and spy, had voyaged from America to England not for the purposes of trade but to get hold of that mutilated document now reposing in my pocket. Why he had only got half the letter and what had happened to ...
— The Man with the Clubfoot • Valentine Williams

... hider, and was searched for far and wide before Sam's "I spy! I spy!" gave the signal that a bit of the spotty cotton had been seen peeping out from under Purday's big potato-basket in the tool-house, and the whole party flew towards home. Bessie would not aim at Papa, for if so, she would certainly catch no one; but ...
— The Stokesley Secret • Charlotte M. Yonge

... was in my place when my messenger returned, and when he heard this, exclaimed, in his usual impetuous style—"He's a spy!" ...
— The Life Story of an Old Rebel • John Denvir

... angry that the creature should have played the spy that he gave chase, and just as the Diver Duck was getting into the water he gave him a kick, which is the reason that the diver's tail feathers are few, his back flattened, and his legs straightened out, so that when he is seen walking on land he ...
— The Junior Classics, Volume 1 • Willam Patten

... reason, or offering any alternative explanation, he rejected evolution as an unproved hypothesis. He played a most unfortunate part in the controversy as to the significance of the fossil human skulls of Spy and Neanderthal, and the comparison of them with the skull of the Pithecanthropus (Figure 2.283). All the interesting features of these skulls that clearly indicated the transition from the anthropoid to the man were declared by Virchow to be chance pathological variations. He said that the ...
— The Evolution of Man, V.2 • Ernst Haeckel

... since Jacques explained it to me, I have tried to learn it as a matter of course. We have chose a book which I am very fond of, Cooper's 'Spy;' and we amused ourselves by writing endless letters. Oh! it is very amusing, and it takes time, because one does not always find the words that are needed, and then they have to be spelled ...
— Within an Inch of His Life • Emile Gaboriau

... worse than you think, squire," answered Philemon, calmly; "I came but to see my father about your wish, but, caught as I was, they will never believe it, and will doubtless hang me as a spy the moment a ...
— Janice Meredith • Paul Leicester Ford

... are forts, father says, all around the city, and Monday we can see some of them. While we were riding up from the depot I saw six soldiers marching along with a Rebel prisoner. Father says they found him hanging around the Capitol, and that he was a Rebel spy. He had on a ragged coat, and a great many black whiskers, and he was swearing terribly. I didn't feel sorry for him a bit, and I hope they'll hang him, or something; but ...
— Gypsy's Cousin Joy • Elizabeth Stuart Phelps

... Pharaoh, bears the name Bithiah, "the daughter of God." She married Caleb later on, and he was a suitable husband for her. As she stood up against her father's wicked counsels, so Caleb stood up against the counsel of his fellow-messengers sent to spy out the land of Canaan.[60] For rescuing Moses and for her other pious deeds, she was permitted ...
— The Legends of the Jews Volume 1 • Louis Ginzberg

... about the streets for an hour or two. He could not make up his mind whether or not to fulfil the promise of calling to see Miss Madeley to-morrow morning. At one moment he regretted having taken lodgings in Gower Place; at another he determined to make use of his advantage, and play the spy upon Eve's movements without scruple. The interest she had hitherto excited in him was faint indeed compared with emotions such as this first glimpse of her had kindled and fanned. A sense of peril warned him to hold ...
— Eve's Ransom • George Gissing

... the flagellator was paid double (at the cost of the culprit), and did not fail to double his zeal. But the execution of a Jew was the best of all. And that Fra Giuseppe was a Jew there could be no doubt. The only question was whether he was a backslider or a spy. In either case death was his due. And he had lampooned the Pope to boot—in itself the unpardonable sin. The unpopular Pontiff sagely spared the others—the Jew ...
— Dreamers of the Ghetto • I. Zangwill

... coyote, Dona Maruja, that is unworthy of your father, of your mother, of YOU!" he gesticulated, in a fierce whisper. "I, Pereo, do not spy. I follow, follow the track of the prowling, stealing brute until I run him down. Yes, it was I, Pereo, who warned your father he would not be content with the half of the land he stole! It was I, Pereo, who warned your mother that each time ...
— Maruja • Bret Harte

... rid of her," she muttered. "She would have been a spy over me. I hope I have frightened her into the plague. But if she dies of fear, it will answer my purpose as well. And ...
— Old Saint Paul's - A Tale of the Plague and the Fire • William Harrison Ainsworth

... thrice-blessed, prosperous, and comfort-loving nation in civilization and morals; if I were come among them as a resident, this picture might alarm me; situated as I am, a nameless sort of person, a mere bird of passage, it concerns me not. I am not come to spy out the nakedness of the land, but to implore from her healing airs and lucid skies the health and peace I have lost, and to worship as a pilgrim at the tomb of her departed glories.—I have not many opportunities of studying the ...
— The Diary of an Ennuyee • Anna Brownell Jameson

... refreshing, as coming from the mouth of a spy," retorted the other. "If you are ready to talk business," he added, closing the door, "I am ...
— Boy Scouts on Motorcycles - With the Flying Squadron • G. Harvey Ralphson

... fly, Lest day and envy spy What only love and night may safely know: Fly, and tread softly, dear! Lest those who hate us hear The sounds of thy ...
— The Miscellaneous Writings and Speeches of Lord Macaulay, Vol. 3. (of 4) • Thomas Babington Macaulay

... Spangler shuddered at the thought of what would become of her if she should make some slip, some fatal error, and be discovered to her friends as a betrayer of confidences for money. A secret agent of Standard Steel! What a newspaper story she would make—"Society Favorite a Paid Spy"; "Woman Lobbyist Flees Capital." The sensational headlines flitted through her mind. Then she would grit her teeth and dig her finger nails into her palms. She had to have money to carry on the life she loved so ...
— A Gentleman from Mississippi • Thomas A. Wise

... turned. I was aware of how alert was his attention. He grinned. "Hold them, Moa. Don't let them do anything foolish.... So, little Anita, you were masquerading to spy on me? That was ...
— Brigands of the Moon • Ray Cummings

... for many years, while boasting of his perfect purity; he was transferred, like a mere dependent, from the Whigs to the Tories and back again. In the reign of George I. he consented to abandon his character in order to act as a spy upon unlucky Jacobite colleagues. It is to the credit of Harley's acuteness that he was the first English minister to make a systematic use of the press and was the patron both of Swift and De Foe. But to use the press was then to make a mere ...
— Hours in a Library, Volume I. (of III.) • Leslie Stephen

... good to catch a hen,— A duck and goose is vood vor men; And where good company I spy, Oh, thether gwoes my dog ...
— A Cotswold Village • J. Arthur Gibbs

... of that startling thought he looked up, and saw to the left, to the right, in front, men sitting far off in chairs and looking at him with wild eyes—emissaries of a distracted mankind intruding to spy upon his pain and his humiliation. It was not to be borne. He rose quickly, and the others jumped up, too, on all sides. He stood still in the middle of the room as if discouraged by their vigilance. No escape! He felt ...
— Tales of Unrest • Joseph Conrad

... then, he came, and, Pathan-like, not content with his own good facts, must needs begin by some fairy-tale that he was a secret agent of the government sent down to spy on that village. Then he warmed to it. Yes, he was that money-lender's agent—a persuader of the reluctant, if you like—working for a Hindu employer. Naturally, many men owed him grudges. A lot of the evidence against him was quite true, but the prosecution had twisted it ...
— Letters of Travel (1892-1913) • Rudyard Kipling

... was making fun of him. Was she a simple goose-girl? Was she not something more, something deeper? War-clouds were forming in the skies; they might gather and strike at any time. And who but the French could produce such a woman spy? Ehrenstein was not Prussia, it was true; but the duchy with its twenty thousand troops was one of the many pulses that beat in unison with this man Bismarck's plans. Carmichael addressed her quickly in French, aiming to catch her off ...
— The Goose Girl • Harold MacGrath

... or else had been overcome by some great fright in her past life; for she was apt to become alarmed in the night, and never liked to be alone in the dark. She had long performed the part of an old nun, which is that of a spy upon the younger ones, and was well known to us in that character, under the name of Ste. Margarite. Soon after her promotion to the station of Superior, she appointed me to sleep in her apartment, and assigned me a sofa to lie ...
— Awful Disclosures - Containing, Also, Many Incidents Never before Published • Maria Monk

... of "Sparrow the Tramp," "Flipwing the Spy," "The Winds, the Woods, and the Wanderer." With twenty-one illustrations by J. F. Goodridge. ...
— Nine Little Goslings • Susan Coolidge

... our game. Somebody's leaked, or else he has a spy in our councils—as we have in his, ...
— Bucky O'Connor • William MacLeod Raine

... all away afterward. Dear, dear, dear, it's horrid to think that Ermie could do anything wrong. And she looks so sweet in her sleep. I wish Miss Nelson hadn't woke me, and told me to be a sort of spy. But oh, poor Basil! I'd do anything in all the world—I'd even ...
— The Children of Wilton Chase • Mrs. L. T. Meade

... you have to get out of your head, my dear friend, if it is there, is that you are a spy. You are nothing of the sort. You are not connected with our remarkably perfect system of espionage in the slightest degree. You are a free agent in all that you may choose to say or do. You can believe ...
— The Great Impersonation • E. Phillips Oppenheim

... from the favour or gleam of an hour, but from widest acceptance of life. Here, as in much beside, desire and necessity quicken our senses. The hungry bee will discover the honey, be it hid never so deep in the cavern; and the soul that mourns will spy out the joy that lies hidden in its retreat, ...
— Wisdom and Destiny • Maurice Maeterlinck

... soon found the lovers needed my assistance more than I could have supposed; for they were absolute novices in any sort of intrigue, which to me seemed as easy and natural as lying. Francis had been detected by some tattling spy in his walks with Clara, and the news had been carried to old Mowbray, who was greatly incensed at his daughter, though little knowing that her crime was greater than admitting an unknown English student to ...
— St. Ronan's Well • Sir Walter Scott

... number. One of the spies now returned and informed me that they had discovered a Lipan village of seventeen lodges, situated on the banks of a small stream. I directed them to return and watch them closely, and to apprise me of any movement they might make. The spy went back, but soon returned and informed me that they had moved down the creek, which was a tributary of the Pecos, had passed through a small canyon, and were encamped near its mouth. I ordered him to send in all the spies except three, and direct these ...
— Seven and Nine years Among the Camanches and Apaches - An Autobiography • Edwin Eastman

... each other, for he plainly perceived they had (as we say) fallen in love at first sight: but to try Ferdinand's constancy, he resolved to throw some difficulties in their way: therefore advancing forward, he addressed the prince with a stern air, telling him, he came to the island as a spy, to take it from him who was the lord of it. "Follow me," said he, "I will tie you neck and feet together. You shall drink sea-water; shell-fish, withered roots, and husks of acorns shall be your food." "No," said Ferdinand, "I will ...
— Young Folks Treasury, Volume 3 (of 12) - Classic Tales And Old-Fashioned Stories • Various

... humble homes but that For the vile Hun to fire at? Did some spy, In bitter jealousy, betray my shirt? What boots it to lament? The shirt is gone. It was not meant for such an one as I, A plain rough gunner with one only pip. No doubt 'twas destined for some lofty soul Who in a deck-chair lolls, and marks the map And says, "Push here," while I ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 153, October 31, 1917 • Various

... had bound her, on her honor, to remain a prisoner in the Hall until the ban of displeasure should be lifted. She had tacitly promised to obey, and therefore the Madame had set no spy upon Nancy's footsteps. There was no watching of the girls suffering under punishment. That was not the system of Pinewood Hall and ...
— A Little Miss Nobody - Or, With the Girls of Pinewood Hall • Amy Bell Marlowe

... the bushes and vanished. Aunt never said a word at the time, but that night when they got home she charged uncle with what she'd seen and asked him what it all meant. He was quite taken aback at first, and stammered and stuttered and said a spy wasn't his notion of a good wife, but at last he made her swear secrecy, and told her that he was a very high Freemason, and that the boy was an emissary of the order who brought him messages of the greatest importance. ...
— The House of Souls • Arthur Machen

... whole morning, sometimes with Gerald, sometimes with Louisa, as the scouts of the family, consisting of a variety of brothers, little and big, informed the anxious girls. And Louisa was seen to cry on one of these occasions; and Gerald looked cross, said one little spy, whereupon he had his ears boxed, and was dismissed from the service. "As if Gerald ever looked anything but a saint!" said the younger sister, who was an advanced Anglican. Letty, however, holding other views, confuted this opinion strongly: "When ...
— The Perpetual Curate • Mrs [Margaret] Oliphant

... them are," said Mr. Fleck regretfully. "The German efficiency, for years looking forward to this war, carefully built up a far-reaching spy system. Years ago, long before the war was thought of—or at least before we in this country thought of it—many secret agents of Wilhelmstrasse were deliberately planted here. Many of them have been residents here for years, masking their real occupation ...
— The Apartment Next Door • William Andrew Johnston

... should arrive, it might be conducted well guarded. Then, in the morning, he set forth with his men in good array, for he had word that three leagues from there were four thousand men. And on the march three or four light horsemen went ahead so that, if they should meet a spy of the enemy's, they might take him prisoner to prevent his giving warning of their coming. At the hour of noon, they arrived at that bad pass of Tarma where warriors were said to be waiting to defend it. The pass seemed to be so full of difficulties that it would be impossible ...
— An Account of the Conquest of Peru • Pedro Sancho

... wonder at the popularity of these books; there is a freshness and variety about them, and an enthusiasm in the description of sport and adventure, which even the older folk can hardly fail to share."—Worcester Spy. ...
— The Wilderness Fugitives • Edward S. Ellis

... pressed the switch which reduced the interior of the spy's wireless instrument to a fused mass of metal, and Brookings called ...
— The Skylark of Space • Edward Elmer Smith and Lee Hawkins Garby

... class of Englishmen—especially in India—who have Russia on the brain, and those people see the Russian everywhere and in everything. Every humble globe-trotter in India must be a Russian spy—even though he be an Englishman—and much is talked about a Russian invasion of India, through Tibet, through ...
— Across Coveted Lands - or a Journey from Flushing (Holland) to Calcutta Overland • Arnold Henry Savage Landor

... 'The sixth class consists of those called "superintendents". They spy out what goes on in country and town, and report everything to the king where the people have a king, and to the magistrates where the people are self-governed, and it is against use and wont for them ...
— Rambles and Recollections of an Indian Official • William Sleeman

... Nevertheless the spy could return the candle to its place upon the table without perceptible tremor of lip or limb, and after bestowing one scrutinizing glance upon the nurse, who was fast asleep beneath it, she went to the ...
— At Last • Marion Harland

... mountains; Yarnell and the pack outfit to ride to Mammoth, Flatray to dive still deeper into the mesh of hills. He had the instinct of the scout to stick to the high places as much as he could. Whenever it was possible he followed ridges, so that no spy could look down upon him as he traveled. Sometimes the contour of the country drove him into the open or down into hollows. But in such places he advanced with the ...
— Brand Blotters • William MacLeod Raine

... praises? I know not, for now no longer, as of old, are men eager to win the renown of noble deeds, nay, they are the slaves of gain! Each man clasps his hands below the purse- fold of his gown, and looks about to spy whence he may get him money: the very rust is too precious to be rubbed off for a gift. Nay, each has his ready saw; the shin is further than the knee; first let me get my own! 'Tis the Gods' affair ...
— Theocritus, Bion and Moschus rendered into English Prose • Andrew Lang

... whenever they get the order. One of these visitors happened to be the sister of one of my men, named Baruti, who no sooner recognised her brother, than, without saying a word, she clasped her head with her hands, and ran off, crying, to tell her husband what she had seen. A spy of Kamrasi dropped the report that the Wanguana were returning from Mtesa's, and hurried on to ...
— The Discovery of the Source of the Nile • John Hanning Speke

... back again to our people, after thou hadst ridden away from us with Roger, I heard these tidings, that there was one new-come into our prison, a woman to wit, who had been haled before our old Queen for a spy and doomed by her, and should be taken forth and slain, belike, in a day or two. So I said to myself that I was not free of my vow as yet, because those friends of mine, I should in any case have done my best to deliver ...
— The Well at the World's End • William Morris

... expecting to contribute to Eastern periodicals. Clemens, however, was not yet through with Coast journalism. There was much interest just at this time in the Sandwich Islands, and he was selected by the foremost Sacramento paper to spy out the islands and report aspects and conditions there. His letters home were still infrequent, but this was ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain

... regard a servant in such a light? Or was it thus that she put him upon his honour? At the thought he winced with a consciousness of guilt. A third explanation occurred to his mind. Perhaps she left Lena behind, like a bait in a trap, with the old housekeeper as spy. This was a mean thought, he knew, suggested by his own duplicity, but he resolved to act upon the supposition and ...
— The Mayor of Warwick • Herbert M. Hopkins

... see the fire laid, I smell the smoke: it was for you to find the spark, you who have had a free hand in Amboise. But you play nonsense games with Charles, hanging upon the skirts of the unscrupulous woman who tutors him to revolt, or drink in taverns with a scurrilous thief turned spy to save his neck from a deserved hanging. Do you think you serve the King by philandering in a rose garden, or playing at French and English in the Burnt Mill? Francois Villon! Ursula de Vesc! Stephen, ...
— The Justice of the King • Hamilton Drummond

... foreigner in Paris. I never went out without my passport. But even a passport was no safeguard. It was enough for someone to make some utterly unfounded accusation, express some foolish, chance suspicion, for the non-Frenchman to be maltreated as a "spy." Both in Metz and in Paris, in the month of August, people who were taken for "Prussians" were hanged or dismembered. In the latter part of August the papers reported from the Dordogne that a mob there had seized a young man, a M. de Moneys, of whom a gang had asserted that he had ...
— Recollections Of My Childhood And Youth • George Brandes

... Tearsheet engaged at lips' length. To put it briefly, Shakespeare attributes lewdness to his impersonations, but will not emphasize the fault by instances. Nor will Shakespeare allow his "madcap Prince" even to play "drawer" with hearty goodwill. While consenting to spy on Falstaff in the tavern, the Prince tells Poins that "from a Prince to a prentice" is "a low transformation," and scarcely has the fun commenced when he is called to the wars and takes his leave in ...
— The Man Shakespeare • Frank Harris

... merchant-vessels would be passing with rich cargoes for the ports of Singapore, Penang, or to and from China. A scout-boat, with but few men in it, which would not excite suspicion, went out to spy for sails. They did not generally attack large or armed ships, although many a good-sized Dutch or English craft, which had been becalmed or enticed by them into dangerous or shallow water, was overpowered by their numbers. But it was usually the small unarmed ...
— Sketches of Our Life at Sarawak • Harriette McDougall

... can alter the procession of the seasons. Summer will arrive again in due course, and if your friends are not far more interested in something else by that time it is hardly likely that even Mrs. Abbott will sacrifice the comforts of Alta to spy on any one." ...
— Sleeping Fires • Gertrude Atherton

... were upon the most intimate and friendly terms, D' Ivernois wrote to me from Geneva, putting me upon my guard against the young Hungarian who had taken up his residence in my neighborhood; telling me he was a spy whom the minister of France had appointed to watch my proceedings. This information was of a nature to alarm me the more, as everybody advised me to guard against the machinations of persons who were employed to keep an eye upon my actions, and to entice me into France for the purpose ...
— The Confessions of J. J. Rousseau, Complete • Jean Jacques Rousseau

... providing either for a less destructive sparrow or a more indestructible crocus. The one consoling point about our garden is that it's not visible from the drawing-room or the smoking- room, so unless people are dinning or lunching with us they can't spy out the nakedness of the land. That is why I am so furious with Gwenda Pottingdon, who has practically forced herself on me for lunch on Wednesday next; she heard me offer the Paulcote girl lunch if she was up shopping on that day, and, ...
— The Toys of Peace • Saki

... brought me back to earth again. As he recovered his breath he took a letter out of his pocket, and, putting on a pair of horn-rimmed eye-glasses, he read it through very carefully. Without any design of playing the spy I could not help observing that it was in a woman's hand. When he had finished it he read it again, and then sat with the corners of his mouth drawn down and his eyes staring vacantly out over the bay, the most forlorn-looking old gentleman ...
— Round the Red Lamp - Being Facts and Fancies of Medical Life • Arthur Conan Doyle

... fraternal affection. To these teachers the pupils run in every difficulty for its solution, in every danger for protection; but with these exceptions the teacher is looked upon as a task-master, sometimes even as a spy; the tasks set to be shirked as much as possible, the observation of the teacher to be eluded ...
— The Philosophy of Teaching - The Teacher, The Pupil, The School • Nathaniel Sands

... only said, "We've been found out. That man who came to you this afternoon was a spy sent by Cheriton. He reported the result of his interview with you, and Lord Evelyn knows all about everything. Cheriton suspected from the first, you see.... From what Lord Evelyn said, I gather he means to prosecute.... He is ...
— The Lee Shore • Rose Macaulay

... shout burst from the bystanders—"A tory! a tory! a spy! a refugee! hustle him! away with him!" It was with great difficulty that the self-important man in the cocked hat restored order; and having assumed a tenfold austerity of brow, demanded again of ...
— Legends That Every Child Should Know • Hamilton Wright Mabie

... their ally by reminding the child that, though they could not see him in the pantry, God was there watching him. In the vivid memory of a childhood clouded by the thought of a police-detective Deity, may one protest against this act of irreverence and blasphemy? True, God was there; but not as a spy, a reporter of all that is bad, anxious to detect, but cowardly and cruel in silence at all other times! Let the child grow up with the happy feeling that God is always with him, rejoicing in his play, his ...
— Religious Education in the Family • Henry F. Cope

... springing up from below, some through the fore-hatchway, but a greater number through the main. The commander himself was standing near the companion-hatch— intended only for his own and the gun-room officers' use. Our tall, thin commander had just turned round to take his spy-glass from the beckets in which it hung, when a petty officer,—a knowing fellow, who had slipped through the gun-room passage in order to take advantage of the other men,—springing on deck, butted right into the pit of his stomach. The blow, doubling him up, sent him sprawling over ...
— Saved from the Sea - The Loss of the Viper, and her Crew's Saharan Adventures • W.H.G. Kingston

... brain—an idea that made him pat his breast-pocket, twirl his moustache, and smile contentedly. "Not much of a fisherman, I think," he murmured. "Ah, my friend, I know the cut of your jib, I fancy. After poor old Jean Dieppe, are n't you, my boy? A police-spy; I could tell him among ...
— Captain Dieppe • Anthony Hope

... his city was: Before his palace, in the sun, He sat to see his people pass, And judge them every one From its threshold of smooth stone They haled him many a valley-thief Caught in the sheep-pens, robber chief Swarthy and shameless, beggar, cheat, Spy-prowler, or rough pirate found ...
— The Poetry Of Robert Browning • Stopford A. Brooke

... loss of an eye; he had spent eight years in the mines at Kara. He began to sink. Let those blame him who know how hard it is to swim. From borrowing, from begging, he sank to I dare not guess what. I am afraid there can be no doubt that for a while he served the Russian secret police as a spy; but he proved an unremunerative spy; they turned him off. He took to drink, he sank lower and lower, he became whatever is lowest. I had not seen him or heard of him for years, when, yesterday, I read the announcement of ...
— Grey Roses • Henry Harland

... "A traitor! A spy!" shouted the preacher, at the top of his voice, seizing Harry by the doublet. The latter shook himself free just as Jacob, jumping in the air, brought his hand down with all his force on the top ...
— Friends, though divided - A Tale of the Civil War • G. A. Henty

... while the Little Scout—in fulfilment of her established character—plays the spy on sundry crumbs that slink from notice under the table, and while the twins, too busy to talk, wash the dishes and dispose them in a glistening row along the dresser, and, while David opens the ...
— In the Yule-Log Glow, Book I - Christmas Tales from 'Round the World • Various

... not the slightest doubt Betty will read it, and they will talk it over in the lower regions to-night; and to-morrow she will bring in my breakfast with a face of such entire imperturbable innocence, that no mortal could suppose her guilty of playing the spy. If you and the Captain have high words upon any subject, which is just possible, the circumstances of the quarrel, and the characters of both of you, will be discussed with impartial eloquence over the kitchen tea-table; and if Mrs. Smith's maid should by chance be taking a dish ...
— The History of Pendennis • William Makepeace Thackeray

... did; leastways, I suspeck I did. Didn't you spy 'mong the lot two or three that had ha'r on ...
— The Lone Ranche • Captain Mayne Reid

... the lid on us, each successive wave astern seemed to grow taller by feet. The rain appeared to have no effect in flattening their caps, though it came down with a weight that knocked half the breath out of our bodies, and with a roar above which it was hard to hear an order shouted. We could spy the other boats' lanterns but at long intervals, partly because of this down-pouring curtain and partly, I suppose, because when we topped up over a crest they would nine times out of ten be hidden in a trough, ...
— Foe-Farrell • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch

... of you to act the spy, stealing on us without warning! However, we are not afraid. Do ...
— Banked Fires • E. W. (Ethel Winifred) Savi

... the rich malcontent had observed him at their heels, and feared he might have overheard their words, I know not; but the next day appeared in one of the popular journals circulating among the ouvriers a paragraph stating that a Paris spy had been seen at Lyons, warning all honest men against his machinations, and containing a tolerably accurate description of his person. And that very day, on venturing forth, my estimable colleague suddenly found himself hustled by a ferocious throng, from whose hands he ...
— The Parisians, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... yet had found the New, The fairies oft in their frolics flew To the fragrant isles of the Caribbee— Bright bosom-gems of a golden sea. Too dark was the film of the Indian's eye, These gossamer sprites to suspect or spy,— So they danced 'mid the spicy groves unseen, And mad were their merry pranks, I ween; For the fairies, like other discreet little elves, Are freest and fondest when all by themselves. No thought had they that in ...
— Poems • Sam G. Goodrich

... k[e]leb, "dog"), in the Bible, one of the spies sent by Moses from Kadesh in South Palestine to spy out the land of Canaan. For his courage and confidence he alone was rewarded by the promise that he and his seed should obtain a possession in it (Num. xiii. seq.). The later tradition includes Joshua, the hero of the conquest of the land. ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 4, Part 4 - "Bulgaria" to "Calgary" • Various

... a backboard. The visit was extraordinarily long. The king, no longer galvanised with gin, said and did nothing. He sat collapsed in a chair and let a cigar go out. It was hot, it was sleepy, it was cruel dull; there was no resource but to spy in the countenance of Tebureimoa for some remaining trait of Mr. Corpse the butcher. His hawk nose, crudely depressed and flattened at the point, did truly seem to us to smell of midnight murder. When he took his leave, Maka bade me observe him going ...
— In the South Seas • Robert Louis Stevenson

... to ask them, she said. She expressed her opinions pretty freely as far as I could understand her. Mme. Mounier had heard of her before, and said she was much respected and admired. M. Mounier had heard that she was a spy of the Pasha's, but the people on board the boat here say that the truth was that she went before Said Pasha herself to complain of some tyrannical Moodir who ground and imprisoned the fellaheen—a bold thing for a girl to do. To me she seems, anyhow, far the most ...
— Letters from Egypt • Lucie Duff Gordon

... mingled with the heterogeneous assembly; half-ironically, his eye swept the group at the bar—the paid spy, the needy black-sheep; the patriot, the swashbuckler; men with and without a career. As Mauville stepped forward, a quiet, dark-looking man, obviously a Mexican, not without a certain distinguished ...
— The Strollers • Frederic S. Isham

... were searching for are going to be married this afternoon. We are going to the wedding, and you shall be best men," and the boys settled down, chuckling and whispering, but presently Ian looked up, as light dawned, and cried: "I spy! It's you, Uncle Martin, and Aunt Lavinia is your Mrs., only you couldn't find her all summer till to-day," and he hugged his friend around the legs, which were all he could reach, but Richard leaned backward until his head rested on Miss Lavinia's knees, and he reached up his ...
— People of the Whirlpool • Mabel Osgood Wright

... look for their names in this book. Those that, when once the long-suffering of God waited on them, made light of all admonition, and slighted the counsel of making their calling and election sure, would now give thousands of treasures, that they could but spy their names, though last and least among the sons of God. But, I say, how will they fail; how will they faint; how will they die and languish in their souls, when they shall still, as they look, ...
— The Riches of Bunyan • Jeremiah Rev. Chaplin

... brook, the wilder it grew. The opposite bank was covered with pines and hemlocks, ascending high upwards, black and solemn. One knew that there must be almost a precipice behind, yet we could not see it. At the foot you could spy, a little way within the darksome shade, the roots and branches of the trees; but soon all sight was obstructed amidst the trunks. On the hither side, at first the bank was bare, then fringed with alder-bushes, bending and dipping into the stream, which, farther on brawled through the midst ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 100, February, 1866 • Various

... say, Moses' spy and pioneer, Moses' successor and the captain of the Lord's covenanted host come back again. A second Joshua sent to Scotland to go before God's people in that land and in that day; a spy who would both by his ...
— Samuel Rutherford - and some of his correspondents • Alexander Whyte

... his instruction of his pupil by his chief spy and confidential messenger, an ex-monk from a great monastery in Punaka, the capital of Bhutan. This man, Tashi, before he wearied of the cloistered life and fled to India, had been always one of the principal actors in the great miracle plays and Devil Dances of his lamasery, ...
— The Jungle Girl • Gordon Casserly

... must hand in a written composition, a product of the imagination; it is with anguish, with oppression of the heart, with cold hands and eyes anxiously interrogating the clock in terror of the fleeting hour, under the distrustful surveillance of a teacher who for the occasion is transformed into a spy-warder like those in penal prisons, that he undergoes his torture to the end. Woe to him if he does not hand in his composition! He will be ruined, for this is the principal test, the one in which he is free to manifest his own worth, to give the true individual fruit ...
— Spontaneous Activity in Education • Maria Montessori

... You get that boy, make 'em wash, alle same. He no good! You look see?" Joe turned to spy the frightened deputy washerman wriggling under the verandah. "Bime-by I kill 'um," remarked Sing, composedly. "No got time now. Missie Jo, wagon come, ...
— Down the Mother Lode • Vivia Hemphill

... office of general spy and informer in the establishment, for which volunteer service he received a present at Christmas, over and above his weekly wage. He had grown into an extremely clear-headed, cautious, prudent young man, who was safe to rise in the world. His mind was so exactly regulated, that he had no affections ...
— Hard Times • Charles Dickens*

... good idea to have it so, and it shall be as you wish, for you can do better work as a spy, and I have full confidence in you, Harding. But we will talk over just what it is best to do when I have reported to Major Randall the holding up of the coach and killing of Dave ...
— Buffalo Bill's Spy Trailer - The Stranger in Camp • Colonel Prentiss Ingraham

... worse than this. There was an Albanian spy who had been much employed by him of late, a clever fellow, with access to society, and great facilities for obtaining information. Seeing that Lord Danesbury should not return to the embassy, would this fellow ...
— Lord Kilgobbin • Charles Lever

... when, thinking myself far off from any of those miscreants I so much dreaded, I lay down under a great log, and slept undisturbed until about noon, when, getting up, I reached the summit of a great hill with some difficulty; and looking out if I could spy any inhabitants of white people, to my unutterable joy I saw some, which I guessed to be about ten miles distance. This pleasure was in some measure abated, by my not being able to get among them that night; therefore, when evening approached I again re-commended myself to the Almighty, ...
— Woman on the American Frontier • William Worthington Fowler

... the Sheriff, coming up with his spy-glass, 'we are coming near the finest bit of rock scenery on the island; one of the finest, in my opinion, on this part ...
— The Adventure League • Hilda T. Skae

... Bath. He appears to have made a very unhappy marriage at this time, and returned to the Low Countries. Falling into the hands of the Spaniards he was recognized as having had a hand in the Antwerp disturbance, and was under sentence to be executed as a spy when he was saved by the intervention of a noble lady. This experience did not deter him from joining in the defence of Zutphen in 1572, but this was his last campaign, and the troubles of the remaining years of his ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 6, Slice 3 - "Chitral" to "Cincinnati" • Various

... morning, only half an hour ago. I let myself in by my pass-key, and, hearing voices in the parlor, I went round by the conservatory to spy out the land. Then and there I beheld this spectacle. ...
— Trumps • George William Curtis

... intrusion of informers and their agents. The most virtuous and honest were denounced for the crime of having been seen with a louis d'or in their possession. Servants betrayed their masters, one citizen became a spy upon his neighbour, and arrests and confiscations so multiplied, that the courts found a difficulty in getting through the immense increase of business thus occasioned. It was sufficient for an informer to say that he suspected any person ...
— Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions - Vol. I • Charles Mackay

... employed him to ferret out goods smuggled ashore by merchants, who, regarding the laws as unjust and oppressive, had no scruples in circumventing the customs officers. Richardson hated the Sons of Liberty, and haunted the Green Dragon to spy out their actions. ...
— Daughters of the Revolution and Their Times - 1769 - 1776 A Historical Romance • Charles Carleton Coffin

... the fort," snarled Marlanx. "Why don't you do it, sir, and let us have the benefit of your superior intelligence? No, gentlemen, all this prating of loyalty need not deceive us," he cried, springing to his feet. "The fellow is nothing more nor less than an infernal spy—and the Tower is the place for him! He can do ...
— Beverly of Graustark • George Barr McCutcheon

... unrevenged? thy pleasant wiles Forgotten, and thine innocent joy? Shall hollowhearted apathy, The cruellest form of perfect scorn, With languor of most hateful smiles, For ever write In the withered light Of the tearless eye, An epitaph that all may spy? No! sooner she herself ...
— The Early Poems of Alfred Lord Tennyson • Tennyson

... is a red or yellow horse-tail. This is the grand medicine scalp of the band. The hostile spy has to steal it. The leader goes around on the morning of the day and whispers to the various braves, "Look out—there's a spy in camp." At length he gets secretly near the one he has selected for spy and ...
— Boy Scouts Handbook - The First Edition, 1911 • Boy Scouts of America

... time nor feel willing to believe now without positive proof." Then in a deep ringing tone the stateliness of which it would be impossible to describe, he inquired, "Have the city authorities presumed to put a spy on my movements, that the fact of my speaking to a poor forsaken creature on the corner of the street should be not only noted ...
— A Strange Disappearance • Anna Katharine Green

... to play the spy upon Massetti, but, nevertheless, he determined not to quit the immediate vicinity of the cabin and to be as watchful as circumstances would permit. Nothing, however, occurred to arouse his suspicions as long as daylight lasted. Once or twice Giovanni quitted his chamber and ...
— Monte-Cristo's Daughter • Edmund Flagg

... private abode. Swayze was a resident of the Niagara District, and the representative of the Fourth Riding of Lincoln in the Legislative Assembly, but was nevertheless a man of indifferent character, and so illiterate as to be barely able to write his name. During the Revolutionary War he had been a spy and "horse-provider" to the loyalist troops. More recently he had been chiefly known as one of the most bigoted and unprincipled of the Compact's minor satellites; a hanger-on who was ever ready to undertake any disreputable work which the Executive might have for him to do. He ...
— The Story of the Upper Canada Rebellion, Volume 1 • John Charles Dent

... Residing in the family of General Putnam with her, and enjoying the opportunity of a close and intimate intercourse, at all times and on all occasions, he was enabled to judge of her qualifications, and came to the conclusion, notwithstanding her youth, that she was well calculated for a spy, and thought it not improbable that she might be employed in that capacity by the British. Major Burr suggested his suspicions to General Putnam, and recommended that she be conveyed to her friends as soon as might be convenient. She was, in consequence, soon after removed to Kingsbridge, ...
— Memoirs of Aaron Burr, Complete • Matthew L. Davis

... especially good ones and had pulled me out of many a previous scrape by their sagacity and endurance. Moody, Watch, Spy, Doc, Brin, Jerry, Sue, and Jack were as beautiful beasts as ever hauled a komatik over our Northern barrens. The messengers had been anxious that their team should travel back with mine, for their animals were ...
— A Labrador Doctor - The Autobiography of Wilfred Thomason Grenfell • Wilfred Thomason Grenfell

... the conviction of the master-spy, VON GERLACH, was effected by the aid of "the two most notorious burglars in Europe." Another ...
— Punch, 1917.07.04, Vol. 153, Issue No. 1 • Various

... great work was to kill; and no man—doge, councillor, or inquisitor—was beyond their reach. Secretly they pronounced a doom; and ere long the stiletto or the poison cup had done its work, or the dark waters of the lagoon had closed over a life. The spy was everywhere. No man dared to speak out, for his most intimate companions might be on the watch to betray him. Bronze vases, shaped like a lion's mouth, gaped at the corner of every square to receive the ...
— Masques & Phases • Robert Ross

... did no damage. I stood there, high on the cliff, and watched the boat, making a spy-glass of my hands. She had fetched in close under the point, and gone about on the port tack—the next would clear—when the first shot struck her, cutting a hole through her jib, and I expected the wind to rip the sail ...
— Old Fires and Profitable Ghosts • A. T. Quiller-Couch

... mode of procedure in one instance and upon a limited field, the freedom of the press.[1225] In December, 1790, M. Etienne, an engineer, whom Marat and Freron had denounced as a spy in their periodicals, brought a suit against them in the police court. The numbers containing the libel were seized, the printers summoned to appear, and M. Etienne claimed a public retraction or 25,000 francs damages with costs. At this the two journalists, considering themselves ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 3 (of 6) - The French Revolution, Volume 2 (of 3) • Hippolyte A. Taine

... lip. "What is it you want of me?" she asked. I merely want permission to visit your rooms at your home and to talk with your maid. I do not mean to spy on you, far from it; but consider, Mrs. Close, if I should be able to get at the bottom of this thing, find out the real cause of your misfortune, perhaps show that you are the victim of a cruel wrong rather than of carelessness, would you not be willing to let me go ahead? I am frank to ...
— Master Tales of Mystery, Volume 3 • Collected and Arranged by Francis J. Reynolds

... their quality. After a time Filippo found in the death of his wife, whom he adored, a pretext for renewing his relations with the Republican party, whose secret police becomes the more terrible in all republics, because every one makes himself a spy in the name of ...
— Catherine de' Medici • Honore de Balzac

... delightful! Of course I knew perfectly well that I should not always have free access to the rigging; but then—some day, no doubt, I should be an Admiral, and who then could prevent me? I remember seeing myself in my mind's eye, with cocked hat on my head and spy-glass under my arm, roaming at my own sweet will up aloft, regardless of the remonstrances which might reach me from below! Such was my childish ideal. But a time came—needless to say—when I conceived a different idea of the object ...
— Pagan & Christian Creeds - Their Origin and Meaning • Edward Carpenter

... forces; then wheeled northward, till they came to Aldrovandus's tomb, which they passed on the side of the declining sun. And now they arrived, with fear, toward the enemy's out-guards, looking about, if haply they might spy the quarters of the wounded, or some straggling sleepers, unarmed and remote from the rest. As when two mongrel curs, whom native greediness and domestic want provoke and join in partnership, though ...
— The Battle of the Books - and Other Short Pieces • Jonathan Swift

... the President and some members of the Government rode out with me to meet the bearer of this report. We did not wish to give him any opportunities to spy out our positions. Half way between the English lines and our own we met him. He presented us with ...
— Three Years' War • Christiaan Rudolf de Wet

... must needs have a fox taile fixed to ye ende of a long staff wherewith he may brush ye faces of them yt will have napps in time of discourse, likewise a sharpe thorne whereby he may pricke such as be most sound. On ye last Lord his day, as hee strutted about ye meeting-house, he did spy Mr. Tomlins sleeping with much comfort, hys head kept steadie by being in ye corner, and his hand grasping ye rail. And soe spying, Allen did quickly thrust his staff behind Dame Ballard and give him a grievous prick upon ye hand. Whereupon Mr. Tomlins did spring vpp mch above ye floore, ...
— Sabbath in Puritan New England • Alice Morse Earle

... of vain speculation this opened on the instant, speculation to which no answer came. How much and what had I told him during our voyage? How had he treasured it and where repeated it? For I had now no other thought than he was the spy who brought Yvard ...
— The Black Wolf's Breed - A Story of France in the Old World and the New, happening - in the Reign of Louis XIV • Harris Dickson

... they must have a spy up in Washington—a sneaker who c'n find out what's bein' hatched up so's to cook their goose an' that he manages to get warnin' down here to the workin' crews so's to put 'em on their guard—is ...
— Eagles of the Sky - With Jack Ralston Along the Air Lanes • Ambrose Newcomb

... bring Livius and Porcius to battle, though he had not judged it expedient to attack them in their lines. And now, on hearing that the Romans offered battle, he also drew up his men, and advanced towards them. No spy or deserter had informed him of Nero's arrival; nor had he received any direct information that he had more than his old enemies to deal with. But as he rode forward to reconnoitre the Roman lines, he thought that their numbers seemed to have increased, ...
— The Fifteen Decisive Battles of The World From Marathon to Waterloo • Sir Edward Creasy, M.A.

... the Alpine valleys to be each one village from one end to the other. Go where you please, houses will still be in sight, before and behind you, and to the right and left. Climb as high as an invalid is able, and it is only to spy new habitations nested in the wood. Nor is that all; for about the health resort the walks are besieged by single people walking rapidly with plaids about their shoulders, by sudden troops of German boys trying to learn to joedel, and by German couples silently and, as you venture to fancy, ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. XXII (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... "come-back." The latter, I incline to think; for come-back needs no facts, it is a self-feeder, and its entire absence in the anti-Englishman looks as if he had been a German. Germans do not come back when it goes against them, they bleat "Kamerad!"—or disappear. Perhaps this man was a spy—a poor one, to be sure—yet doing his best for his Kaiser: slinking about, peeping, listening, trying to wedge the Allies apart, doing his little bit towards making friends enemies, just as his breed has worked to set enmity between ...
— A Straight Deal - or The Ancient Grudge • Owen Wister

... war," he had advised. "If you know nothing, you cannot tell the enemy anything useful, and there will be less reason for our people to make trouble for you. Your only real danger lies in being taken for a spy. And if you are careful not to learn things, that will not be ...
— The Boy Scouts In Russia • John Blaine

... and that I hired him there, as the suitable instrument of a purpose I happened to have; I have no objection to tell you. In short, it was worth my while, for my own pleasure—the gratification of a strong feeling—to pay a spy who would fetch and carry for money. I paid this creature. And I dare say that if I had wanted to make such a bargain, and if I could have paid him enough, and if he could have done it in the dark, free from ...
— Little Dorrit • Charles Dickens

... heroine. Spy on heroine. Magic dresses Magic dresses ( starlings on (honey-bird ...
— More English Fairy Tales • Various

... defects of the "Turkish Spy," the author has shown one uncommon merit, by having opened a new species of composition, which has been pursued by other writers with inferior success, if we except the charming "Persian Letters" of Montesquieu. The "Turkish Spy" is a book which has delighted our childhood, and to which ...
— Curiosities of Literature, Vol. 1 (of 3) • Isaac D'Israeli

... the hills of the East we went, And long had we there to remain. When the word of recall was sent, Thick and fast came the drizzling rain. The heavenly gourds rise to the eye, With their fruit hanging under the eave. In our chambers the sow-bug we spy; Their webs on our doors spiders weave. Our paddocks seem crowded with deer, With the glow-worm's light all about. Such thoughts, while they filled us with fear, We tried, but in vain, ...
— Chinese Literature • Anonymous

... been down," he said, "at Lord Hadleigh's, where there was a gathering of many gentlemen of our way of thinking. I left London quietly, and thought that none knew of my absence; but it is clear that through some spy in my household my enemies learned both my journey and destination. I came down on horseback, having sent forward relays. When I arrived last night at Hadleigh my horse was dead lame. I misdoubt now 'twas lamed in the stable by one of the ...
— The Cornet of Horse - A Tale of Marlborough's Wars • G. A. Henty

... said the minister, "since I came here, eighteen years ago, not a mouse has crept out of Craig Ronald but I have made it my business to know it. I am no spy, and yet I need not to be told what ...
— The Lilac Sunbonnet • S.R. Crockett

... for alleged responsibility for the killing of Richard Yates during the "war" of 1857. The fact that the man was killed was not disputed; his brains were knocked out with an axe as he was sleeping by the side of two Mormon guards.* The defence was that he died the death of a spy. Wells was admitted to bail in $50,000, and the other two men were placed under guard at Camp Douglas. Indictments were also found against Brigham Young, W. A. Hickman, O. P. Rockwell, G. D. Grant, and Simon Dutton for the murder of one of the Aikin party at Warm Springs. They ...
— The Story of the Mormons: • William Alexander Linn

... Moonlighter and his men issued crowned with victory and covered with glory. A scarecrow in a wayside orchard was charged with desperate valour, and only saved from instant destruction as a particularly hateful police spy by the sudden intervention ...
— The Gold-Stealers - A Story of Waddy • Edward Dyson

... to what I saw, I stepped a little farther in. The narrow paved way descended swiftly. Prodigious tall houses sprang up on each side and bulged out, one story beyond another, as they rose. At the top only a ribbon of sky showed in. By what I could spy in the windows, and by the respectable persons that passed out and in, I saw the houses to be very well occupied; and the whole appearance of the place interested me ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 11 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... stupid zeal of some subordinate officer was manifested in this outrage. Some cowardly charge had perhaps been made against him at the prefecture. Every man who crosses a street has so many enemies that look at him as he passes as if they would spy on him! There are so many undeclared hatreds crawling in the rotten depths of this Parisian bog! One fine morning one feels one's self stung in the heel. It is nothing: only some anonymous gossip; some unknown ...
— His Excellency the Minister • Jules Claretie

... n't mean that, but it sounded so. Why should they tell that rough-neck their plans, and send him down here? I 'll find out what he knows, and how he knows it, before another ten hours. If he 's here to spy on us I 'll make him earn ...
— Gordon Craig - Soldier of Fortune • Randall Parrish

... while over-head The jays to one another call, And through the stilly woods there fall, Ripe nuts at intervals, where'er The squirrel, perched in upper air, From tree-top barks at thee his fear; His cunning eyes, mistrustingly, Do spy at thee around the tree; Then, prompted by a sudden whim, Down leaping on the quivering limb, Gains the smooth hickory, from whence He nimbly scours along the ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXIII No. 1 July 1848 • Various

... no apparatus and no great study. Any boy with keen eyes and nimble legs can play the game better than a man four times his age. Of course, "I spy" is not a game of solitaire. It needs at least two boys, but it will be more exciting if there are five or six times that number; the more ...
— Healthful Sports for Boys • Alfred Rochefort

... morning, I found Jackson still fast asleep. I waited for him for our morning meal; but, as he did not wake, I took mine by myself, and then I walked out to the rock, where I usually sat, and looked round the horizon to see if there was anything in sight. The spy-glass, from having been in sea water, was of no use, and I did not know what to do with it; nor could Jackson instruct me. After I had been out about an hour I returned, and found Jackson still snoring, and I ...
— The Little Savage • Captain Marryat

... appearing again over the edge of the basket, he seemed to be motioning to the breathless hordes below, the story of his failure. Then he dropped out of sight, and when we next saw him, he was reconnoitring the Confederate works through a long black spy-glass. A great laugh went up and down the lines as this cool procedure was observed, and then a cheer of applause ran from group to group. For a moment it was doubtful that the balloon would float in either ...
— Campaigns of a Non-Combatant, - and His Romaunt Abroad During the War • George Alfred Townsend

... on, poor Yorik, try once more In German Dress, thy fate of yore, Expect few Critics, such, as by The bucket of Philosophy From out the bottom of the well May draw the Sense of what you tell And spy what wit and Morals sound Are in thy Rambles to ...
— Laurence Sterne in Germany • Harvey Waterman Thayer

... an eye, and a tooth for a tooth,' so Donald Macgregor muttered to himself as he strode cautiously down the water of Coquet, halting at the many crooks of that wayward water to spy out the ...
— Border Ghost Stories • Howard Pease

... his friends hardly knew how to accept this offer. It might be, as the man had said, that he was a professional tour conductor, like those who have charge of Egyptian donkey-boys and guides. Or might he not be a spy? ...
— Tom Swift in the Land of Wonders - or, The Underground Search for the Idol of Gold • Victor Appleton

... have no Normans here, coming spying in disguise. Scourge him, I say, dog that he is! Away with him! A spy, ...
— The Little Duke - Richard the Fearless • Charlotte M. Yonge



Words linked to "Spy" :   perceive, comprehend, Margarete Gertrud Zelle, sleeper, secret agent, armed forces, find, military, tail, detect, military machine, inquire, notice, observe, foreign agent, discover, espionage agent, looker, watcher, mole, enquire, Mata Hari, war machine, monitor, armed services, intelligence officer, snooper, spy satellite, witness, investigate, operative, infiltrator, intelligence agent, shadow, spectator, stag, double agent, viewer, shadower, supervise



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