"Zag" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... operation of the one as that of the other. Mournful complaint is as impotent as an infant crying against the fury of the wild wind. History has taught you that the path of moral progress has never taken a straight line, but has ever been a zig-zag course amid the conflicting forces of right and wrong, truth and error, justice and injustice, cruelty and mercy. Do not be discouraged, then, that all the wrongs of the universe are not righted at your bidding. The great ...
— The American Missionary - Volume 52, No. 3, September, 1898 • Various
... controversy between the two Houses of Congress over the first section of the Tenure-of-Office Bill while that bill was pending, and to avoid defeat on the first vote taken, which was inevitable on that Article—and also to explain, so far as any explanation is possible, the zig-zag method of conducting the ballot—skipping all the first ten Articles and going down to the bottom of the list for the first vote, with the promise of then going back to the first Article and continuing to the end. but, instead, skipping that for the second time, and starting ...
— History of the Impeachment of Andrew Johnson, • Edumud G. Ross
... suppleness and fluent rapidity. What, after all, is the use? She is expected to play the sixths and octaves with the greatest velocity (which no man will accomplish, not even Clementi), and if she tries she will produce a frightful zig-zag, and nothing more. Clementi is a Ciarlatano like all Italians. He writes upon a sonata Presto, or even Prestissimo and alla breve, and plays it Allegro in 4-4 time. I know it because I have heard him! What he does well is his passages in thirds; but he perspired over these day and night in London. ...
— Mozart: The Man and the Artist, as Revealed in his own Words • Friedrich Kerst and Henry Edward Krehbiel
... about four hundred men. The line of march was about ninety miles in length, as estimated by the zig-zag course ...
— Chronicles of Border Warfare • Alexander Scott Withers
... governor, council, and garrison, were secured without bloodshed, and immediately marched off for Wilmington, Macneil and his party travelling by night, and concealing themselves in swamps and woods by day. However, the country was alarmed, and a hostile force collected. He proceeded in zig-zag directions, for he had a perfect knowledge of the country, but without any provisions except what chance threw in his way. When he had advanced two-thirds of the route, he found the enemy occupying a pass which he must open by the sword, or perish in the swamps for want of food. At this time he ...
— An Historical Account of the Settlements of Scotch Highlanders in America • J. P. MacLean
... to escape the coming downfall, Miss Whichello climbed up the street towards the cathedral as quickly and steadily as her old legs could carry her. Just as she emerged into the close, a shadow blacker than the blackness of the night glided past her. A zig-zag of lightning cut the sky at the moment and revealed the face of Mr Cargrim, who in his turn recognised the old lady ...
— The Bishop's Secret • Fergus Hume
... in the heat and dirt below, the steamer steadily plowed its way up stream, meeting with no vessel bound down, or even a drifting barge; nor did I perceive the slightest sign of any settlement along the banks. Our course ran zig-zag from shore to shore in an endeavor to follow the main channel, and progress was slow, the wheelsman evidently not being well acquainted with the stream. The cry of a leadsman forward was almost constant. Once we tied up against the western bank for ...
— The Devil's Own - A Romance of the Black Hawk War • Randall Parrish
... rage for a wild irregularity in the laying out of gardens was carried to its extreme, the garden paths were so ridiculously tortuous or zig-zag, that, as Brown remarked, a man might put one foot upon zig and the ...
— Flowers and Flower-Gardens • David Lester Richardson
... is almost priceless. It is not only lovely in itself, but an obvious attempt to recover the zig-zag outline and varied cadence of seventeenth century born—the things that Shelley to some extent, Beddoes and Darley more, and Tennyson and Browning most were to master. I subscribe (most humbly) to his suggestions, ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge - Vol I and II • Samuel Taylor Coleridge
... turned once a second, thus marking the picture off into exact fifths of a second. The vibrations of the microscopic quartz thread were enormously magnified on the sensitive film by a lens and resulted in producing a long zig-zag, wavy line. The whole was shielded by a wooden hood which permitted no light, except the slender ray, to strike it. The film revolved slowly across the field, its speed regulated by the flywheel, and all ...
— The Dream Doctor • Arthur B. Reeve
... beginning to hope the major had contrived a new approach to the place, the carriage took an unexpected turn, and he found presently they were climbing, by a zig-zag road, the height over the Lorrie burn; but the place was no longer his, and to avoid a sense of humiliation, he avoided taking ...
— Sir Gibbie • George MacDonald
... chimney-piece, with some mildewed remains of ink in the bottle. There were two coarse china ornaments of the commonest kind; and there was a square of embossed card, dirty and fly-blown, with a collection of wretched riddles printed on it, in all sorts of zig-zag directions, and in variously coloured inks. He took the card, and went away, to read it, to the table on which the candle was placed; sitting down, with his back resolutely turned to ...
— The Lazy Tour of Two Idle Apprentices • Charles Dickens
... twenty-three miles in diameter, with a floor 7000 feet depressed; but this formation is not nearly so bright as its neighbour. That high plateau between them is notable on account of the T-shaped cleft in it, which runs into that other long zig-zag cleft (in some parts two miles wide and 1600 feet in depth), whose direction changes abruptly several times in its length of over ...
— To Mars via The Moon - An Astronomical Story • Mark Wicks
... term from henceforth is meant the house, and not its sign—the Maypole was an old building, with more gable ends than a lazy man would care to count on a sunny day; huge zig-zag chimneys, out of which it seemed as though even smoke could not choose but come in more than naturally fantastic shapes, imparted to it in its tortuous progress; and vast stables, gloomy, ruinous, and empty. The place was said to have been built in the days of King ...
— Barnaby Rudge • Charles Dickens
... own he's not fam'd for a reel or a jig, Tom Sheridan there surpasses Tom Bigg.— For lam'd in one thigh, he is obliged to go zig- Zag, like a crab—for no dancer is Bigg. Those who think him a coxcomb, or call him a prig, How little they know of the mind of my Bigg! Tho' he ne'er can be mine, Hope will catch a twig— Two Deaths—and I yet may become Mrs. Bigg. Oh give me, with him, but a cottage and pig, And content I ...
— Memoirs of the Life of Rt. Hon. Richard Brinsley Sheridan Vol 2 • Thomas Moore
... ahead now, I sheltering him slightly from the cold blast with my body, as I walked before him. Presently the way turned abruptly, to zig-zag up a gap in the rock face, and I shouted a warning to Joseph to look after Innocentina and the animals, so steep and ruinous was the path. But I need not have been alarmed. A backward glance showed me that Joseph had anticipated my instructions, ...
— The Princess Passes • Alice Muriel Williamson and Charles Norris Williamson
... young men had been using sacred things in a profane and unlawful way, when the occurrence, which was variously explained, took place. The story of the Appearance in the chamber was, I suppose, invented afterwards; but of the injury to the building there could be no question; and the zig-zag line, where the mortar is a little thicker than before, is still distinctly visible. The queer burnt spots, called the "Devil's footsteps," had never attracted attention before this time, though there is no evidence that they had not existed previously, except that of the late Miss M., a "Goody," ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. IV, No. 22, Aug., 1859 • Various
... and we have a violent gale, and as we zig-zag this at times catches us full on the port side and the ship rolls badly. She creaks from ...
— The Incomparable 29th and the "River Clyde" • George Davidson
... Loth we were informed the last wolf in Scotland was killed, and about half a mile before reaching Brora we climbed over a stone fence to inspect the ruins of a Pictish castle standing between our road and the railway. The ruins were circular, but some of the walls had been built in a zig-zag form, and had originally contained passages and rooms, some of which still existed, but they looked so dark that we did not care to go inside them, though we were informed that about two years before ...
— From John O'Groats to Land's End • Robert Naylor and John Naylor
... availed himself of it, as before. This hope was also disappointed. His foe still hung with staunch perseverance on his trail. He now perceived by their movements, that they were conducted by a dog, that easily ran in zig-zag directions, when at fault, until it had re-scented his course. The expedient of Boone was the only one that seemed adequate to save him. His gun was reloaded. The dog was in advance of the Indians, still ...
— The First White Man of the West • Timothy Flint
... Stonehouse could see his look of wan indifference. He was no better. All day long he lay on his bed in the small spare room Robert had given him and stared up at the white ceiling. There was a crack, running zig-zag from the window to the door, which reminded him, so he said, of a river in Angola, a beastly slimy thing trailing through mosquito-infested swamps and villainous-tangled jungles. When he dozed it became ...
— The Dark House • I. A. R. Wylie
... Europe, and, perhaps, the changes of plumage in none of the feathered races are more remarkable than those which the ptarmigans undergo. Their full summer plumage is yellow, more or less inclining to brown, beautifully barred with zig-zag lines of black. Their winter dress is pure white, except that the outer tail-feathers, the shafts of the quills, and a streak from the eye to the beak are black. This singular change of plumage enables it, when ...
— The Illustrated London Reading Book • Various
... feeling something run lightly and swiftly across my face. I thought it was a spider. It seemed to run in a zig-zag. Then feeling nothing more I set it down to fancy and dropped off to sleep again, face turned towards that idol. Later, I felt the same kind of thing run across my neck. I knew it was no fancy then, and my scare vanished because ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1921 and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various
... to Mr. Bray, once affording through them a view of this chapel. In the east end, on the north side, are three lancet-shaped windows, forming one great window, divided by slender pillars, and having mouldings, with zig-zag ornaments. The tracery windows on the south side are masoned up, but much of the original tracery remains. At the north-east corner are remains of sharp-pointed arches; here also is an enclosure with table, desk, and elevated ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. 19. No. 534 - 18 Feb 1832 • Various
... ornament is the chevron or zig-zag, which is frequently found doubled, trebled and quadrupled. The next most common form is the beak-head, consisting of a hollow and large round. In the hollow are placed heads of beasts or birds whose tongues ...
— Our Homeland Churches and How to Study Them • Sidney Heath
... fringe. On approaching the mountains their snow caps look like huge tents encamped along the rolling prairie. Up to this great camp, of which a length of 200 miles is sometimes visible, the rivers wind in trenches, looking like the covered ways by which siege works zig-zag up to a besieged city. On a nearer view the camp line changes to ruined marble palaces, and through their tremendous walls and giant woods you will soon be dashing on the train for a winter basking on the warm Pacific coast. You have a country ...
— Memories of Canada and Scotland - Speeches and Verses • John Douglas Sutherland Campbell
... battle line in the world today is more interesting than the Italian front was in the autumn of 1917. The south face of the Alps often is green and beautiful, but generally the northern faces of those mountains are bleak and rugged and steep. The battle line ran a zig-zag course through the mountains, now meeting in gulches, now scurrying away up to mesas, again climbing to the top of the barren heights. We stood one sunny day on a quiet sector of the Pasubio. We were with the Liguria brigade, ...
— The Martial Adventures of Henry and Me • William Allen White
... off, and thus for two hours, until the sum of victories gained by individuals entitles one party or the other to claim success. The race decided, the runners range themselves in two facing lines, and, preceded by the drum, begin a slow zig-zag march. ...
— My Native Land • James Cox
... of licences is really odious to an honest man. Some of the traps were civil enough; aye, they felt the shame of their duty; but there were among them devils at heart, who enjoyed the fun, because their cupidity could not bear the sight of the zig-zag uninterrupted muster of piles of rich-looking washing stuff, and the envy which blinded their eyes prevented them from taking into account the overwhelming number of shicers close by, round about, all along. Hence they looked upon the ragged muddy blue ...
— The Eureka Stockade • Carboni Raffaello
... They may be also constructed just in rear of a series of fire trenches to provide a means of communication from one to the other. Communicating trenches also extend to the rear of the cover trenches and provide safe passage to fresh troops or supplies. These trenches are usually laid out in zig zag or curved lines (Fig. 39), to prevent enfilade fire from sweeping them. As a general rule excavated earth is placed on both sides of the trench to afford protection, the depth is usually from 6 to 7 feet. (Fig. 15) shows ...
— Manual of Military Training - Second, Revised Edition • James A. Moss
... he continued, "things happened more or less at one and the same time. Cellette giggled and squirmed. Then the boy got angry and cried, 'Will you keep still? and grabbed her by the shoulders and shook her! Shook Cellette till her little head went zig-zag-zigzag. It took her the sixteenth part of a second to get to her feet, and when she slapped him I myself saw stars. At the same time I saw her face, and I yelled, 'Run, boy! Run!' For a second he stood paralyzed with wonder,—just long enough for her ...
— Through stained glass • George Agnew Chamberlain
... up and down, in a very zig-zag course, now looking forward towards the Cheese-Wring from the top of a rock, now losing sight of it altogether in the depths of a hollow. By the time we had advanced about half way over the distance it was necessary for us to walk, we observed, ...
— Rambles Beyond Railways; - or, Notes in Cornwall taken A-foot • Wilkie Collins
... cheering of the crowd. When standing for so many miles tired him, he sat high up on the folded hood, with one of his suite to hold him, and he did not stop waving his hat. In this way he accomplished the thirty-six miles ride, only slipping down into his seat as the car mounted the stiff zig-zag that led up Mount Royal to ...
— Westward with the Prince of Wales • W. Douglas Newton
... a natural fact. It forms its compositions out of meaningless fragments of colour and flowings of line . . . It will not draw a man, but an eight-armed monster; it will not draw a flower, but only a spiral or a zig-zag." Because of this aversion from Nature the Hindu and his art tended to evil, we read. But of the Scot we are told, "You will find upon reflection that all the highest points of the Scottish character are connected with impressions ...
— Essays • Alice Meynell
... and yet how different the same man is! Our lives, then will zig-zag instead of keeping a straight course, if we let desires that are limited by anything that we can see guide and ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Ephesians; Epistles of St. Peter and St. John • Alexander Maclaren
... death, looking as "creamed faced" as the messenger to Macbeth; and when the shock was over, he was so sick, that he ran out of the house without making any remarks. The scarlet hucamaya, with a loud shriek, flew from its perch, and performed a zig-zag flight through the air, down to the troubled ...
— Life in Mexico • Frances Calderon de la Barca
... monkeys along the side of the hill; so were the country boys with their curs; old Trinder moved parallel with them along its base. Jerry galloped away to the ravine, and there dismounting, struggled up by zig-zag cattle paths to the comparative levels of the summit. I did the same, and was pretty well blown by the time I got to the top, as the filly scorned the zigzags, and hauled me up as straight as she could go over the rocks and furze bushes. A few other fellows ...
— All on the Irish Shore - Irish Sketches • E. Somerville and Martin Ross
... in torrents, the thunder echoed clap on clap, each detonation preceded by an awful zig-zag of fire. The tempest grew in fury, and, scarce able to ride on the shifting wind, the plaintive voices of the bells ...
— An Eagle Flight - A Filipino Novel Adapted from Noli Me Tangere • Jose Rizal
... Ali-Musjid. The ascent commences immediately where the Choky is seen from the camp, by a very good road cut out of slate rock; the rocks are steep on both sides, and very zig- zag; a short partial descent in one place occurs to a small pool of water. From the Choky, a descent takes place by a similar road for perhaps two miles, until the ravine which we left at camp is turned; this is thence ...
— Journals of Travels in Assam, Burma, Bhootan, Afghanistan and The - Neighbouring Countries • William Griffith
... been introduced into this work, with the view of exhibiting a Norman village church of unquestionable antiquity, having its walls, on either side, built of a coarse dark stone, fashioned like Roman bricks, and disposed in a zig-zag, or, as it is more commonly termed, a herring-bone direction. A similar disposition of the masonry is observable in a portion of the church of Perriers, the subject of the following plate: it is still more conspicuous ...
— Architectural Antiquities of Normandy • John Sell Cotman
... myself drift out the hatch. I had enough sense to twist so that my back jet wouldn't hit the ship. Then I took a zig-zag course through the darkness to my bird, got oriented at the open gate and went back to work. Before I could ...
— The Trouble with Telstar • John Berryman
... only regret was that we could not have that same broom to take away; but on our zig-zag journey, when we were likely enough to stop over or turn off anywhere, that was an absurdity not to be thought of. We did, however, "buy a broom" that we could take—and an excellent one it proved—and we accepted a small package of broom-corn seed which the ...
— Illustrated Science for Boys and Girls • Anonymous
... Finland, and although they look so shaky and tumbledown, they withstand the winter storms, which is no slight matter. The same loose fences are to be found in the United States or Canada, but there they are made zig-zag, and called snake-fences. In Finland, the gates do not open; they are simply small pine trunks laid from one fence to the other, or any chance projecting bough, and when the peasant wants to open them, he pulls them out and wrecks ...
— Through Finland in Carts • Ethel Brilliana Alec-Tweedie
... out of the solid earth; arched in the roof and supported here and there by rough posts to make it still more secure. Charlie at once concluded that it led to one of those concealed caverns, of which he had heard more than once while crossing the country, the entrances of which are made in zig-zag form in order to prevent the possibility of a ray of light issuing ...
— Charlie to the Rescue • R.M. Ballantyne
... lightning, breaks through the air in a quick slash from cloud to ground. Mamise's whole thought was from zig to zag in some such procedure ...
— The Cup of Fury - A Novel of Cities and Shipyards • Rupert Hughes
... That oont[28] will simplify it, though. Look here—I'll drop down and land you by it, and then come here again and hover. You bring the beast up—you'll be able to ride most of the way if you zig-zag, and lead him most of the rest. Then you'll have to carry the casualty to the oont ...
— Snake and Sword - A Novel • Percival Christopher Wren
... lounging in a wicker chair on the shady lawn of the Hotel de l'Europe. He wore white buckskin shoes—I begin with these as they were the first point of his person to attract the notice of the onlooker—lilac silk socks, a white flannel suit with a zig-zag black stripe, a violet tie secured by a sapphire and diamond pin, and a rakish panama hat. On his knees lay the Matin; the fingers of his left hand held a fragrant corona; his right hand was uplifted in a gesture, for he was talking. He was ...
— The Joyous Adventures of Aristide Pujol • William J. Locke
... the rising sun, without a ripple on its surface, until it dashed its gigantic undulations against the face of the precipitous cliffs on the shore, and flew up in smoke. The entrance to the harbour is very narrow, and looked from my perch like a zig—zag chasm in the rock, inlaid at the bottom with polished blue steel; so clear, and cahn, and pellucid was the still water, wherein the frowning rocks, and magnificent trees on the banks, and the white Moro, rising with its grinning tiers of cannon, battery above battery, were reflected veluti ...
— Tom Cringle's Log • Michael Scott
... and the raw-ribbed mare, And scorn to move for tumbril or for dray, And feel themselves as good as farmers there. From the young corn the prick-eared leverets stare At strangers come to spy the land—small sirs, We bring less danger than the very breeze Who in great zig-zag blows the bee, and whirs In bluebell shadow down the bright green leas; From whom in frolic fit the chopt straw darts ...
— Georgian Poetry 1920-22 • Various
... prevent any force from attempting so impossible and foolhardy an exploit as the ascent of the high cliffs. The visitor to the historic places around Quebec will be deeply interested in a cove, just above Sillery, now known as Wolfe's Cove, but in old times as the Anse-au-Foulon. A zig-zag and difficult path led from this cove to the top of the height, and Wolfe conceived the hope that it was possible to gain access in this way to the table-land where he could best give battle to Montcalm. He saw that the cliff at this point ...
— Canada • J. G. Bourinot
... hundred years old, and in the twilight, which now prevailed, was growing very dark. As side-by-side we walked along this road, hemmed in by two loose stone-like walls, something running toward us in a zig-zag line passed us at a wild pace, with a sound like a frightened laugh or a shudder, and I saw, as it passed, that it was a human figure. I may confess, now, that I was a little startled. The dress of ...
— A Stable for Nightmares - or Weird Tales • J. Sheridan Le Fanu
... said Pratt as they halted to let the horses breathe. A minute, zig-zag line of deep green disclosed the course of the Cannon Ball, deep sunk in the gravelly soil as it came down to join the Big Sandy. All about stood domed and pyramidal and hawk-headed buttes. On the river bank huge ...
— The Eagle's Heart • Hamlin Garland
... among the growing corn, producing a most disagreeable effect. Then, instead of the fragrant quickset hedge, there is a "worm fence"—the rudest description of barrier known in the country—which consists simply of bars, about eight or nine feet in length, laid zig-zag on each other alternately: the improvement on this, and the ne plus ultra in the idea of a west country farmer, is what is termed a "post and rail fence." This denomination of fence is to be seen sometimes in the vicinity of the larger towns, and is constructed of posts six feet in length, ...
— A Ramble of Six Thousand Miles through the United States of America • S. A. Ferrall
... for Tor Glen, and one that might well distract the whole school's attention. Two discreet ponies were picking their way down the zig-zag path, while behind walked a man. But greatest wonder! on each pony was seated a real lady. Erect and gracefully, too, did they keep their seats, as the patient beasts let themselves slip ...
— A Child of the Glens - or, Elsie's Fortune • Edward Newenham Hoare
... great hurry, and their horses were covered with foam. The fore-most portion of the advance-guard at once, therefore, wheeled round, and leaving the road took the nearest way up the hill: a steep zig-zag, and a stiff piece of work. The gun-teams strained every muscle and took short, quick steps, trying to overcome the weight of the guns. Sergeant-major Heppner, who was riding behind the last gun, growled out: "I tell ...
— 'Jena' or 'Sedan'? • Franz Beyerlein
... arched heads of doorways. A common feature was the arcade running round the walls below the windows, either in the exterior, interior, or both; the caps and arches are generally carved elaborately and richly with ornaments, the chevron or zig-zag enrichment being a characteristic feature. The windows are always ...
— Scottish Cathedrals and Abbeys • Dugald Butler and Herbert Story
... another shot from up ahead, and then a shout. As I tumbled to my feet in the dark road, Worth had started away on the jump. And I saw then, what I'd missed before, that the man who had burst from the hedge, was running zig-zag down the open roadway toward us. He was making his legs spin, and dodging from side to side as if to duck bullets. Worth headed straight for him, as though it wasn't plain that some one out of sight somewhere was making a ...
— The Million-Dollar Suitcase • Alice MacGowan
... stones; but this avenue has a smooth and level floor, as if the sand had been spread out by gently flowing waters. Through this, descending more and more, you come to a deep arch, by which you enter the Winding Way; a strangely irregular and zig-zag path, so narrow that a very stout man could not squeeze through. In some places, the rocks at the sides are on a line with your shoulders, then piled high over your head; and then again you rise above, and overlook them all, and see them ...
— The International Monthly Magazine, Volume 5, No. 1, January, 1852 • Various
... both his eyes with his hands, for the sun was glaring. About a mile off he saw two men coming slowly up by a zig-zag path toward the very point where he stood. Presently the men stopped and examined the prospect, each in his own way. The taller one took a wide survey of the low ground, and calling his companion to him appeared to point out to him some beauty ...
— It Is Never Too Late to Mend • Charles Reade
... a well beaten trail. The Indians had used it for countless generations in their search for pottery clay. It lifted zig-zag over the Coyote Range, giving at the crest this morning a superb view of distant peaks and of gold melting into blue infinities. It dropped zig-zag into canyons that were parched and cracked with late summer heat and lifted again to cross a peak whose top and sides ...
— The Forbidden Trail • Honore Willsie
... passage, which was more corridor than trench, reached higher ground and descended into the earth. We reeled through its zig-zag course, staggering from one slanting corner ...
— "And they thought we wouldn't fight" • Floyd Gibbons
... you handsome, dark fellow!" What luck! The man did not go away, but came towards Fanny, although somewhat timidly, while she went to meet him, repeating her wheedling words, so as to reassure him. She went all the quicker, as she saw that he was staggering with the zig-zag walk of a drunken man, and she thought to herself: "When once they sit down, there is no possibility of getting these beggars up again, and they want to go to sleep just where they are. I only hope I shall get to ...
— The Works of Guy de Maupassant, Volume II (of 8) • Guy de Maupassant
... The acclamations of delight and approval from the nearest troopers at seeing me enter the gate, however, determines me to advance; and I start off at a rattling pace around the square, and then take a zig-zag course through the manoeuvring bodies ...
— Around the World on a Bicycle V1 • Thomas Stevens
... I climbed. Towards the west lay Great Shunnor Fell, its vast brown-green mass being sharply defined against the clear evening sky; while further away to the north-west there were blue mountains going to sleep in the soft mistiness of the distance. Then the road made a sudden zig-zag, but went on climbing more steeply than ever, until at last I found that the stony track had brought me to the verge of a precipice. There was not sufficient light to see what dangers lay beneath me, but I could hear the angry sound of a beck falling upon ...
— Yorkshire Painted And Described • Gordon Home
... about eight miles away, there was something I did not see, although I knew it was there—a stupid, terrible, and uncouth monster that stretched in a zig-zag winding course from the North Sea to the Alps. It was strangely silent at that hour, but I was fascinated by it and thought about it harder and harder, in spite of myself. I became increasingly conscious of it and it grew ...
— Combed Out • Fritz August Voigt
... inches in diameter and about—for warp drying—5 feet long. Usually they are arranged vertically in two tiers, each tier consisting of about five cylinders, not arranged directly one above another but in a zig-zag manner, the centres of the first, third and fifth being in one line, and the centres of the others in another line. The cylinders are made to revolve by suitable driving mechanism, and into them is sent steam at about 5 lb. to 10 lb. pressure, which heats up the cylinders, whereby the warp passing ...
— The Dyeing of Cotton Fabrics - A Practical Handbook for the Dyer and Student • Franklin Beech
... train rolled over the zig-zag road out of Ithaca, we had a source of consolation in the fact that we had evaded the send-off which the Cornell men had planned in the expectation that we were to ...
— Football Days - Memories of the Game and of the Men behind the Ball • William H. Edwards
... first two and a half months of the war I was a wanderer in France, covering many hundreds of miles in zig-zag journeys between Nancy and the west coast, always on the move, backwards and forwards, between the lines of the French and British armies, and watching with a tireless though somewhat haggard interest the drama ...
— The Soul of the War • Philip Gibbs
... snipe” was nearer to the sound, and a writer compares it to the sound of Punch, in the old show of “Punch and Judy,” which I think comes nearer to my own interpretation. The body of this bird is in colour a mixture of grey and brown, but its tail and wings are most beautifully marked with dark zig-zag bars, which make it very handsome. In size it is between the blackbird and the lark. Like the woodpecker, it has a very long tongue, which is covered with a glutinous matter, and which it inserts into the grass roots or tree bark, in search of its ...
— Records of Woodhall Spa and Neighbourhood - Historical, Anecdotal, Physiographical, and Archaeological, with Other Matter • J. Conway Walter
... the foot; and then one of them, in gray—unmistakably the fisher-maiden herself—began the ascent. How she managed to obtain a footing he could not make out; for the path was no path, but merely a zig-zag track on the surface of the loose shingle—shingle so loose that he could see it yield to her every step, while the debris rolled away down to the bed of the burn. But still she fought her way upward, and at last she stood face to face with him, ...
— Prince Fortunatus • William Black
... Dr. de Closmadeuc, and his opinion should carry weight, thinks that when the Gavr'innis monument was erected the island was connected with the mainland. Three of the supports, forming the walls of the crypt, and all those of the gallery are covered with chevrons or zig-zag ornaments, circles, lozenges, and scrolls of which Fig. 68 will give some idea, and which Merimee compares to the tatooing of the inhabitants of New Zealand. Megalithic monuments of Ireland and certain stones in Northumberland are ornamented ...
— Manners and Monuments of Prehistoric Peoples • The Marquis de Nadaillac
... herself, and he remembered a mistress who had ceased to love him, and he had persecuted her for a long while with supplication. "She is at one with herself always," he said, and he tried to understand her. "She is one of those whose course through life is straight, and not zig-zag, as mine is." He liked to see her turn and look at the baby, and he said, "That love is the permanent and original element of things, it is the universal substance;" and he could trace Ellen's love of her child in her love of him; these loves were not two loves, ...
— The Untilled Field • George Moore
... advent was announced by a flash of light which illuminated the whole city. A long fiery streak marked its course, and remained visible for more than a minute. At first this streak was perfectly straight, but, after it had begun to fade, it broke into a zig-zag." ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 99., Nov. 1, 1890 • Various
... get busy at once, for the wood contains a nest of Archies. Ugly black bursts surround the bombers, who swerve and zig-zag as they run. When well away from the wood they climb back to ...
— Cavalry of the Clouds • Alan Bott
... patterns, squares, octagons, lozenges, triangles, pleasingly arranged, and painted in brown upon a ground which is of a dull grey. At the top are two rude handles, between which runs a line of zig-zag, while at the bottom is a sort of stand or base. The ...
— History of Phoenicia • George Rawlinson
... record of his life leaves but a mean impression. Unstable in his goings, without principle or plan, he flickered through existence like an ignis-fatuus; now shooting into momentary gleams of happiness and generosity, now quenched in the mephitic marshes over which his zig-zag path conducted him. He had many amiable qualities, but scarcely any moral worth. From first to last his circumstances were against him; his education was unfortunate, its fluctuating aimless wanderings enhanced its ill effects. ...
— The Life of Friedrich Schiller - Comprehending an Examination of His Works • Thomas Carlyle
... and steep vistas that lay along the zig-zag roads where ramshackle victorias clattered at crazy speed. Below him was the world's most vivid spread of sun-kissed color; the Bay of Naples curving nobly from his point of view to Ischia's misty bulwark, in a glistening ...
— Destiny • Charles Neville Buck
... will be so good!' she answered, feeling a diffidence which was new to her. At that moment the crowd carrying the senseless man began to appear over the cliff, coming up the zig-zag. The Doctor hurried towards him; she followed at a little distance, fearing lest she should hamper him. Under his orders they laid the patient on the weather side of the bonfire so that the smoke would not reach him. The Doctor ...
— The Man • Bram Stoker
... and there was that stillness in the air, that strange sense of waiting, which precedes the storm. Gray, scarf-like films were speeding across the black-purple sky, and were suddenly rent by a zig-zag quiver of blue-white fire. The trees along the walk flamed green, and then were dark again, and overhead a flight of pigeons clove the air with a rushing of swift wings. An instant later a whirling litter of straws, flapping newspapers, and dust came swishing ...
— A Melody in Silver • Keene Abbott
... far from the house, a gulch ran zig-zag up among the rugged hills. It was no mere ragged and unsightly drain for water from the higher land. Flower-brightened and vine-hung, it was deliciously cool, and gorgeous at every turn. At the bottom babbled a rivulet, a bit of summer sky melted and poured among the green-tipped ...
— The Starbucks • Opie Percival Read
... Flexuous -ose: almost zig-zag, without acute angles but more acute at angles than undulating: differs from sinuate in being alternately bent ...
— Explanation of Terms Used in Entomology • John. B. Smith
... said Quillan. "If you have the time and the money, it's also a good idea, of course, to zig a few times before you zag towards where you're really heading. Actually, I suppose, the credit for picking you up so fast should go to those ...
— Legacy • James H Schmitz
... began to blink more fiercely, a faint wild light overspread for a minute the bleak landscape, and he saw approaching from the moor a figure at a kind of swinging trot, with now and then a zig-zag hop or two, such as men accustomed to cross such places make, to avoid the patches of slob or quag that meet them here and there. This figure resembled his father's, and like him, whistled through his finger by way of signal as he approached; ...
— J.S. Le Fanu's Ghostly Tales, Volume 5 • J.S. Le Fanu
... made their charge. Enjolras, Courfeyrac, and Combeferre were among those who had taken to the Rue Bassompierre, shouting: "To the barricades!" In the Rue Lesdiguieres they had met an old man walking along. What had attracted their attention was that the goodman was walking in a zig-zag, as though he were intoxicated. Moreover, he had his hat in his hand, although it had been raining all the morning, and was raining pretty briskly at the very time. Courfeyrac had recognized Father Mabeuf. He knew him through having many times accompanied ...
— Les Miserables - Complete in Five Volumes • Victor Hugo
... 'Butcher Burke,' and is one of the most filthy and horrible places in the city. We passed under an old tumble-down doorway that seemed to have no earthly excuse for standing there, and into a dismal, dark entry, with a zig-zag wall covered with a leprous slime, our conductor crying out all the time: 'Steady, gentlemen, steady, keep to your left; place ...
— Lights and Shadows of New York Life - or, the Sights and Sensations of the Great City • James D. McCabe
... the bright Provençal sunlight and the call for a hurried departure dispelled such illusions. By noon we were far away from Carcassonne, mounting the rocky slopes of the Cevennes amid a wild and noble landscape; the towering cliffs of the “Causses,” zebraed by zig-zag paths, lay below us, disclosing glimpses of ...
— The Ways of Men • Eliot Gregory
... Baron's carriage appeared on the zig-zag road below the chateau, and Madame de Clericy's face assumed an expression of placid resignation. In due time the vehicle, with its gorgeous yellow wheels, reached the level space upon which the party stood. The Baron Giraud emerged from the satin-lined recesses of the dainty carriage ...
— Dross • Henry Seton Merriman
... gay flowers stretched the rich green of the water-meads, glowing yellow in the sunlight. The little river hardly seemed to move in its zig-zag path, though the evening breeze was strong enough to show the silver side of the willows that drooped over it. Jan wondered if he could match all these tints in the wood, and whether Master Swift would be willing ...
— Jan of the Windmill • Juliana Horatia Ewing
... however, a walk of six or eight minutes led down to the beach, and in the late afternoon the sun came with grand effect across the gilded water and through the tall pine-trunks which bordered the zig-zag path. Medora had added a sleeping porch, a dining-porch and a lean-to for the car; and she entertained there through the summer lavishly, even if ...
— Bertram Cope's Year • Henry Blake Fuller
... flashes are quick and short-lived, and the intervals of darkness also of short duration. Bolts pierce the clouds in straight, lance-like shafts, or forking and zig-zag, followed by thunder in loud unequal bursts, and dashes of ...
— The War Trail - The Hunt of the Wild Horse • Mayne Reid
... Southwater, sir—take you to the station in ten minutes,' said the fly-man, pulling in his horse. A zig-zag fugitive thought passed: why did the fly-man speak of taking them to the station? How was it that he knew where they wanted to go? They stopped and wondered. The poor horse's bones stood out in strange projections, the round-shouldered little fly-man sat grinning ...
— Vain Fortune • George Moore
... moment it looked like being real Nicholls-and-Jackson stuff, but, fortunately, a quick zig on my part, coinciding with an adroit zag on the part of the pig, enabled me to win through, and I continued my ride safe, but with the heart ...
— Right Ho, Jeeves • P. G. Wodehouse
... flourishing towns, cultivated farms, and extensive downs, so thickly covered with flocks and herds. Here the bold forests of oak, beech, maple, and bass-wood, with now and then a grove of dark pine, cover the hills, only enlivened by an occasional settlement, with its log-house and zig-zag fences of split timber: these fences are very offensive to my eye. I look in vain for the rich hedge rows of my native country. Even the stone fences in the north and west of England, cold and bare as they are, are less unsightly. The ...
— The Backwoods of Canada • Catharine Parr Traill
... obliged to reclaim on casks of mouldy mess-pork. At which Ocock ceased coddling his chin to point a straight forefinger at him, with a triumphant: "You see!"—But Purdy who, sick and tired of the discussion, had withdrawn to the window to watch the rain zig-zag in runlets down the dusty panes, and hiss and spatter on the sill; Purdy puckered his lips to ...
— Australia Felix • Henry Handel Richardson
... instantaneous. She whirled round as quickly as one could turn one's hand, requiring promptness and presence of mind in the steersman. Thus, like a bird, with smooth and equable motion, she flew with her delighted passengers, in many a zig-zag, down the Severn, until they had gone as far as desired, when round she spun, and before the breeze, houses, and men, and trees, gliding by as in a race, dashed ...
— The Lost Hunter - A Tale of Early Times • John Turvill Adams
... on. In zig-zag pursuit of Grim Hagen, they crashed through Trans-Space. The dust-cloud loomed larger now upon their screens. It was still no larger than a baseball, though it must have ...
— Hunters Out of Space • Joseph Everidge Kelleam
... sunlight which fringed them where the leafage ceased. An attempt had been made to create formal garden paths and garden beds by sticking rushes into little holes drilled in the ground, but the paths were zig-zag as a drunkard's walk, and the round and oblong beds contained no trace of plants. On either hand rose steep walls of earth, higher than a man, and crowned with prickly thorn bushes. Over them looked palm trees. At the end of the garden ...
— The Garden Of Allah • Robert Hichens
... man, laughing. "It's only a great ziggery-zag crack running right through the rock from top to bottom. There's nothing to mind, as you'd see if we'd got the lanthorn. They were so close after me that I hadn't time to get the one I left up yonder ...
— The Lost Middy - Being the Secret of the Smugglers' Gap • George Manville Fenn
... pewter plate, On the grey disk of the unrippling sea, Beneath an airless, sullen sky of slate Dazzled destroyers zig-zag restlessly, While underneath the sleek and livid tide, Blind monsters nosing through the soundless deep, Lean submarines among blind fishes glide And through primeval weedy ...
— Miscellany of Poetry - 1919 • Various
... reptile was more than green, he was a green so vivid that it put the colours of the forest to shame. A bright, glittering green and along the centre of his broad back one zig-zag ...
— Bones - Being Further Adventures in Mr. Commissioner Sanders' Country • Edgar Wallace
... flood is flowing stronger; The reigning mode in failure ends, Wait a little longer! Fashion is ever on the wing, Arch-enemy of Beauty. Now, when we get a first-rate thing, To stick to it's our duty. But no, the whirling wheel must whirl, The zig-zag go zig-zagging; The wig to-day must crisply curl, That yesterday was bagging. But good things do come "bock agen." For banishment but stronger (With bonnets or with Grand Old Men), Wait ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 99., November 8, 1890 • Various
... for himself, the officer in the launch depended wholly on those masthead signals. So the launch steamed a somewhat zig-zag course over the waves. Yet, at last, it bore ...
— Dave Darrin's Second Year at Annapolis - Or, Two Midshipmen as Naval Academy "Youngsters" • H. Irving Hancock
... dragon-fly's movements, but a hundred times more swift. Proximity-fused shells burst everywhere about it. It burst through a still-expanding puff of explosive smoke, darted down a hundred feet, and took a zig-zag course of such violent and angular changes of position that it looked more like a streak of ...
— The Invaders • William Fitzgerald Jenkins
... strange procession met their eyes unawares, coming down the zig-zag path that led from the hills to the shore of the lagoon, where their huts were situated. At its head marched two men—tall, straight, and supple—wearing huge feather masks over their faces, and beating tom-toms, decorated with long strings of shiny cowries. After them, ...
— The Great Taboo • Grant Allen
... a number of men who had been a good many hours in the trenches, and just as the shadows of evening were falling they crept along the Potijze Road towards the communication trench. An hour later Tom had taken up his post in the zig-zag cutting with a feeling that something of importance was ...
— Tommy • Joseph Hocking
... first view of the village of caves. A low bluff ran diagonally across one end of the mesa, and in the face of this bluff were the mouths of many caves. Zig-zag trails led up to them, and narrow ledges scooped from the face of the soft rock connected those upon the ...
— Pellucidar • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... off. Excellent for condoling—better still for rejoicing—she would, on hearing of a surprising good match, or an unexpected son and heir, or a pleasantly-timed legacy, go off like a mild little peal of joy-bells, and keep ringing up and down and zig-zag, and to and again, in all sorts of irregular roulades, without stopping, the whole day long, with 'Well, to be sure.' 'Upon my conscience, now, I scarce can believe it.' 'An' isn't it pleasant, though.' 'Oh! the creatures—but it was badly wanted!' 'Dear knows—but ...
— The House by the Church-Yard • J. Sheridan Le Fanu
... valleys and through pass after pass; and now and then a long zig-zag brings us out of a valley, up to a higher level. The air grows cooler, we are rapidly changing our climate, and afternoon finds us in the region of the sugar-cane and the coffee-plant. We pass immense green cane-fields, protected from the visits of passing muleteers and peasants by a ...
— Anahuac • Edward Burnett Tylor
... "Go zig-zag. You'll never get to the top this way," called Tad. "You know how a switchback railroad works? Well, go as nearly like a ...
— The Pony Rider Boys in the Grand Canyon - The Mystery of Bright Angel Gulch • Frank Gee Patchin
... the intervals of the courses, we were bored with hints to admire numerous objects of vertu: bow-legged stools of mangrove wood; zig-zag rapiers of bone; armlets of grampus-vertebrae; outlandish tureens of the callipees of terrapin; and cannakins of the ...
— Mardi: and A Voyage Thither, Vol. II (of 2) • Herman Melville
... and thicket borders we find the Zig-zag or Broad-leaved Golden-rod (S. latifolia)—its prolonged, angled stem that grows as if waveringly uncertain of the proper direction to take, strung with small clusters of yellow florets, somewhat after the manner of the preceding species. But its saw-edged leaves are ovate, sharply tapering ...
— Wild Flowers Worth Knowing • Neltje Blanchan et al |
