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More "Alert" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... name of Caliban as the alert and witty chroniqueur of the Figaro and as the facile rhymester of its lyre comique, has written a few serious poems of direct and vigorous expression, especially under the inspiration of the memory of the ...
— French Lyrics • Arthur Graves Canfield
... this chronicle, for, on Wednesday, the 2nd of December, the inmates of Buckingham Palace were, shortly after midnight, aroused by an alarm being given that a stranger had been discovered under the sofa in Her Majesty's dressing-room, and the officers of the household were quickly on the alert. It was soon ascertained that the alarm was not without foundation, and the daring intruder was immediately secured, and safely handed over to the tender mercies of the police. The report of the occurrence spread very rapidly, and created the most lively ...
— Gossip in the First Decade of Victoria's Reign • John Ashton
... streets, hanging their weary heads against their rifles, with their faces very white from too much sentry-go and too little sleep. There is little distinction between sailors and Legation people, for we are all in the same dilemma. On this eventful 20th of June, instead of being resolute and alert, everybody is merely tired and weakened by a couple of weeks' watchfulness against Boxers during an unofficial semi-siege, a state of affairs which has quite unfitted us for fresh strains. Yet beyond our barricades of upturned carts and stolen building-bricks ...
— Indiscreet Letters From Peking • B. L. Putman Weale
... Chippy passed each other on either side of a thick hawthorn copse and neither had the least idea that the other was near. Then there was a joyful murmur among the Wolves as Dick swung round the far end of the copse, saw Chippy, and darted after him. But the Raven was on the alert, and observed Dick almost at once, ...
— The Wolf Patrol - A Tale of Baden-Powell's Boy Scouts • John Finnemore
... abode, and, furnished with dark lantern, pistol, crowbar, and crape, joined half-a-dozen neophyte burglars—his pupils and his victims. The hostelry chosen for attack was "The Spaniards." The host and his servants were, however, on the alert; and, after a smart struggle in the passage, the housebreakers were worsted; two or three of them being killed, and the others—save and except the cautious Jemmy, who had only directed the movement from without—being fast in the clutches of the constables. Jemmy, flinging away his crape and ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 1, Complete • Various
... it? Once more alert, Sam became cautious. True, the light seemed to be off, but did that mean anything in a country-house, where people had the habit of going and strolling about the garden at all hours? Probably they were still popping about all over the place. At any rate, it was not worth risking coming ...
— Three Men and a Maid • P. G. Wodehouse
... the gentle inflection of the question, or his intent glance that made me feel, as I had felt before that day, that I was face to face with an alert antagonist? He called on me to speak, and I was loth to break my silence. If he had only left me to my own bitter thoughts,—but why should I have expected him to be tactful? Why should I have expected him to be different from the gossip ...
— The Unspeakable Gentleman • John P. Marquand
... river, but instructed to keep on either side and well out of the focus of the cameras, were two expert rivermen, each in a canoe. These men were on the alert to assist Wonota if, when the dam was broken, she should ...
— Ruth Fielding in the Great Northwest - Or, The Indian Girl Star of the Movies • Alice B. Emerson
... made no reply therefore when he declared that on the following day he would walk to Barchester and back,—with the Lord's aid; nor did she see, or ask to see the note which he sent to the bishop. When the messenger was gone, Mr Crawley was all alert, looking forward with evident glee to his encounter with the bishop,—snorting like a racehorse at the expected triumph of the coming struggle. And he read much Greek with Jane on that afternoon, pouring into her young ears, almost with joyous rapture, his appreciation of the glory ...
— The Last Chronicle of Barset • Anthony Trollope
... mind with the extraordinary events of the past quarter of an hour, his alert eyes missed few features of the abounding life of the Great White Way. As it happened, a stranger in New York could not have entered the city's main thoroughfare at any point better calculated to bewilder and astound than ...
— One Wonderful Night - A Romance of New York • Louis Tracy
... veteran, an old soldier of Napoleon, capitulating now before the witchery of genius and wit. Here the noble Russian exile forgets his sorrows in those smiles that, unlike the aurora, warm while they dazzle. And our celebrated composer is discomposed easily by alert and nimble-footed mischief. And our professor of Greek and Hebrew roots is rooted to the ground with astonishment at finding himself put through all the moods and tenses of fun in a twinkling. Ah, culpable ...
— Sunny Memories of Foreign Lands V2 • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... that tremendous throng turned at once in the direction of the stranger's voice. And before the immense audience knew what was happening, five hundred German soldiers, armed with pistols and repeating rifles, had sprung to life, alert and formidable, at vantage-points all over the Garden. Two hundred, with weapons ready, guarded the platform and the Committee of Public Safety. And, in little groups of threes and fives, back to back, around the iron columns that rose through the galleries, stood ...
— The Conquest of America - A Romance of Disaster and Victory • Cleveland Moffett
... of distinction, the one intelligence; though so many of his best words have been taken from him, it is with a fine subtlety that he says the words that remain. And the figure, with its lightness, weary grace, alert and uneasy step, solemnity, grim laughter, remains with one, after one has come away and forgotten whether he told us all that ...
— Plays, Acting and Music - A Book Of Theory • Arthur Symons
... time they were on the alert for pursuing Indians, but by degrees they were able to feel confidently that they had journeyed beyond the territory occupied by the inimical people, and Brazier began his collecting once more, and the boys ...
— Rob Harlow's Adventures - A Story of the Grand Chaco • George Manville Fenn
... Harcourt, when a moment later he entered the room. That individuality which had kept the former shopkeeper of Sidon distinct from, although perhaps not superior to, his customers—was strongly marked. He was perhaps now more nervously alert than then; he was certainly more impatient than before,—but that was pardonable in a man of large affairs and action. Grant could not deny that he seemed improved,—rather perhaps that the setting of fine clothes, cleanliness, and the absence of petty worries, made ...
— A First Family of Tasajara • Bret Harte
... treachery lurked under this friendly seeming, and the adventurers were only saved from destruction by the careful vigilance of their leader. At daybreak the following morning, the Indians made a sudden attack upon their guests; the French, however, being thoroughly on the alert, repulsed the assailants, and slew several of the bravest warriors. Infuriated by the treachery of the savages, the victors followed the customs of Indian warfare, and scalped those of the enemy who fell ...
— The Conquest of Canada (Vol. 1 of 2) • George Warburton
... to explore Thorvald's Utgard. But a small and nagging doubt inside the younger man restrained his enthusiasm over such a voyage. Fork-tail had come out of the section of ocean which they must navigate in this very crude transport. And Shann had no desire to meet an uninjured and alert fork-tail in the latter's ...
— Storm Over Warlock • Andre Norton
... which enforces in the most appealing terms the fundamental teaching of all the work of his mature years. First of all, we have the boyhood of the two friends who are afterwards to grow apart in their sympathies; the one alert of mind, imaginative, open to every intellectual influence, also impetuous and hot-blooded; the other shy and intellectually stolid, but good to the very core, and moved by the strongest of altruistic impulses. In accordance with their respective characters, the first of these youths becomes ...
— Bjoernstjerne Bjoernson • William Morton Payne
... had she felt more isolated amid that ordered beauty which gives a social quality to the very stones and mortar of Paris. All about her were evidences of an artistic sensibility pervading every form of life like the nervous structure of the huge frame—a sensibility so delicate, alert and universal that it seemed to leave no room for obtuseness or error. In such a medium the faculty of plastic expression must develop as unconsciously as any organ in its normal surroundings; to be "artistic" must cease to be an attitude and become a natural function. ...
— Crucial Instances • Edith Wharton
... the mayor of the town. Dover is on the Channel, opposite to Calais, at the narrowest point. It was, of course, especially in those days, the point where the principal intercourse between the two nations centered. The magistrates of the two towns were obliged, consequently, to be on the alert, to prevent the escape of fugitives and criminals, as well as to guard against the efforts of smugglers, or the entrance of spies or other secret enemies. The Mayor of Dover arrested our heroes. They told him that ...
— Charles I - Makers of History • Jacob Abbott
... was up early each morning; she breakfasted with the most alert residents of the Caravansary; then she took the street-car to South Chicago and reported at a dismal office. Here the telephone served to put her into communication with her superior at Settlement House. She ...
— The Precipice • Elia Wilkinson Peattie
... silent joy beheld His favorite sons the fates of nations wield. Here joyous Lincoln rose in arms again, Nelson and Knox moved ardent o'er the plain; Scammel alert with force unusual trod, Prepared to seal their victory with his blood; Cobb, Dearborn, Laurens, Tilghman, green in years But ripe in glory, tower'd amid their peers; Death-daring Hamilton with splendor shone, And claim'd each post of danger for his own, Skill'd every ...
— The Columbiad • Joel Barlow
... Quixote. He had a hook nose, and a long sharp chin; and all the lines, wrinkles, curves, and furrows of which the human visage is capable seemed to have met in his cheeks. Nevertheless, his eye was bright and keen, his look alert, and his whole bearing firm, gallant, and soldier-like. He was attired in a sort of military undress; wore a mustachio, which, though thin and gray, was carefully curled; and at the summit of a very respectable wig was perched ...
— Devereux, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... Griswold the brother-loving. That said itself. But on the other hand, to escape the consequences of his act, he must hold himself in instant readiness to be in savage earnest what a common thief would be in similar straits; a thing of duplicity and double meanings and ferocity, alert to turn and slay at any moment in the ...
— The Price • Francis Lynde
... police were upon the alert to discover the person whom they suspected of having stolen the relics for the diamonds, and not the diamonds for the relics. Among our fashionable and new saints, surprising as you may think it, Madame de Genlis holds a distinguished place; and she, too, is an amateur and collector ...
— The Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte • Bourrienne, Constant, and Stewarton
... arms and led me smiling to sleep. This scene vanishes as I speak, and I catch a vision of an old Southern home with its lofty pillars and its white pigeons fluttering down through the golden air. I see women with strained and anxious faces, and children alert yet helpless. I see night come down with its dangers and its apprehensions, and in a big homely room I feel on my tired head the touch of loving hands—now worn and wrinkled, but fairer to me yet than the hands of mortal woman, and stronger ...
— Modern Eloquence: Vol II, After-Dinner Speeches E-O • Various
... personality in her autobiographical story, 'The One I Knew Best of All.' She has pictured a little English girl in a comfortable Manchester home, leading a humdrum, well-regulated existence, with brothers and sisters, nurse and governess. But an alert imagination added interest to the life of this "Small Person," and from her nursery windows and from the quiet park where she played she watched eagerly for anything of dramatic or picturesque interest. She seized upon the Lancashire dialect often overheard, as upon ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Vol. 7 • Various
... boats were lashed into the wagon, and the retired physician, with two of his men on horseback, accompanied by Saddles and myself on foot, slowly left the clearing, and defiled along an almost undefined trail through the forest. I noticed that the men were well armed, and all on the alert. Occasionally one of the men would be sent off to the right or left to search for cattle signs, but our guide himself hung close to the wagon, seeming to consider prudence ...
— Four Months in a Sneak-Box • Nathaniel H. Bishop
... my fate. I seek not to shun it. I have walked into odium with every sense alert, fully conscious ...
— Imperium in Imperio: A Study Of The Negro Race Problem - A Novel • Sutton E. Griggs
... Livia, Antonia was the most respected personage of the imperial family in Rome. She still watched, withdrawn but alert, over the destiny of the house now virtually destroyed by death, dissensions, the cruelty of the laws, and the relentless anger of the aristocracy. It was she who scented out the plot, and quickly and courageously she informed ...
— The Women of the Caesars • Guglielmo Ferrero
... hours he worked feverishly, painting with swiftest skill and power. At times he caught his breath at the revelation in the face. He was too alert to be human. The artist forgot the woman. Faithfully, line by line, he laid bare her heart. She sat unmoved. When at last, from sheer weariness, the brush dropped from his hand, she stepped from the model-stand, and stood at his side. She looked at the canvas attentively. The inscrutable look ...
— Unfinished Portraits - Stories of Musicians and Artists • Jennette Lee
... and proportionate relationship to the things for which he has cause to be thankful. If in our daily life the phrase 'the goodness of God' is to have a deepening and cumulative significance, it must be informed and vitalized continually by an alert and responsive recognition of the forms in which that goodness is ever freshly manifested to us. Whilst the roots of the tree of praise lie deep beneath the surface, and wind their thousand ways into dim places where memory itself cannot follow them, yet surely the leaves of the tree are fresher ...
— The Threshold Grace • Percy C. Ainsworth
... very slow, and we spent the next day having baths in Souastre. On the 1st March we moved into the new front line, round the East edge of Gommecourt, while the Boche was still holding Pigeon Wood. The enemy was very alert, as General H.M. Campbell, the C.R.A., discovered; he went into the wood, thinking it unoccupied, and was chased out by a fat Boche throwing "potato mashers." In the evening the Headquarters moved into a ...
— The Fifth Leicestershire - A Record Of The 1/5th Battalion The Leicestershire Regiment, - T.F., During The War, 1914-1919. • J.D. Hills
... topographical features, but of all the numerous natural conditions which affect your progress. To provide for the needs of a small safari may be a light or delightful task; but the difficulties and requirements of a large force, moving forward against an alert, ubiquitous foe, compel you to probe into everything: the nature of the country, with its mountains and rivers, forests and deserts, for scores of miles around; its animal and human diseases; its capacity for supplies and transport; its climate and soil and rainfall. ...
— World's War Events, Volume III • Various
... would not be legitimate, however, to conclude from this that ignorance of the meaning was the rule in old times; those were the days when the nation's traditional songs, myths, and lore formed the equipment of every alert and receptive mind, chief or commoner. There was no printed page to while away the hours of idleness. The library was stored in one's memory. The language of the mele, which now has [Page 29] become antiquated, ...
— Unwritten Literature of Hawaii - The Sacred Songs of the Hula • Nathaniel Bright Emerson
... Anglais," let us turn to the dandy of "Flicoteau's" and the Pays Latin—the Paris student, whose exploits among the grisettes are so celebrated, and whose fierce republicanism keeps gendarmes for ever on the alert. The following is M. de Bernard's description ...
— The Paris Sketch Book Of Mr. M. A. Titmarsh • William Makepeace Thackeray
... coast of Australia, in warm, pleasant waters, and made for Timor, where he arrived in August. He remained in the Dutch port of Kupang till the middle of November—three whole months wasted, nearly eleven months consumed since he had sailed from France. In the meantime, the alert and vigorous captain of the Investigator was speeding south as fast as the winds would take him, too eager to lose a day, flying straight to his work like an arrow to its mark, and doing it with the thoroughness and accuracy that were part ...
— The Life of Captain Matthew Flinders • Ernest Scott
... At this discovery his alert but well-veiled glance went back to MacNutt. He saw his captor fling off his wet and draggled raincoat and then shake the water from a dripping hat-brim. This he seemed to do without ...
— Phantom Wires - A Novel • Arthur Stringer
... while the two chess-players were absorbed in their game and the other two kept watch and ward. Then, towards midnight, while Fion was alert and wakeful, he saw Chluas sink his chin on his breast, overcome by an unnatural sleep. Thrice Chluas strove to rouse himself, but thrice he ...
— Edmund Dulac's Fairy-Book - Fairy Tales of the Allied Nations • Edmund Dulac
... of a comfortable easy-chair at the foot of the bed she poured forth for Pons' delectation the gossip in which women of her class excel. With Machiavelian skill, she had contrived to make Pons think that she was indispensable to him; she coaxed and she wheedled, always uneasy, always on the alert. Mme. Fontaine's prophecy had frightened La Cibot; she vowed to herself that she would gain her ends by kindness. She would sleep secure on M. Pons' legacy, but her rascality should keep within the limits of the law. For ten years she had not suspected the value of Pons' collection; ...
— Poor Relations • Honore de Balzac
... our whole front. The intensity and volume of the enemy's reply were startling. Within a minute rifles and machine-guns were showering a hail of lead on our parapets. It almost looked as if they had been expecting an attack to develop from our sector. At any rate they had been very much on the alert and their trenches were strongly held. This strength they disclosed to an extent which at once proved the futility of any attempt on our part to rush F12. It was not a case of a sudden burst of fire dying away rapidly. The General had instructed the ...
— The Fifth Battalion Highland Light Infantry in the War 1914-1918 • F.L. Morrison
... anxiety. It was a gray afternoon, pleasant but close. There seemed to be nothing whatever to account for the feeling of nervousness which had suddenly come over Laverick. He felt himself in danger—he had no idea how, or in what way—but the conviction was there. He took every step fully alert, absolutely on his guard. ...
— Havoc • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... enough and some of it will stick. This noble maxim has been the favorite of traducers in all ages and climes. They know that the object of their malignity cannot always be on the alert to cleanse himself from the filth they fling, especially if cast behind his back; they know that lies, and especially slanderous lies, are hard to overtake, and when caught harder to strangle; and therefore they feel confident as to the ultimate fate of ...
— Arrows of Freethought • George W. Foote
... Mr. Adair whom Margaret most resembles. He is a tall and exceedingly handsome man, whose hair and moustache and pointed beard were as golden once as Margaret's soft tresses, but are now toned down by a little grey. He has the alert blue eyes that generally go with his fair complexion, and his long limbs are never still for many minutes together. His daughter's tranquillity seems to have come from her mother; certainly it cannot be inherited from ...
— A True Friend - A Novel • Adeline Sergeant
... fellows, named respectively Warriga and Bommera, and every day for a week they conducted some trial manoeuvres with their friends. There would be a kind of ambush prepared, and flights of spears would be hurled at me, only to be warded off with astonishing dexterity by my alert attendants. All I was provided with was my steel tomahawk and bow and arrows. I never really became expert with the spear and shield, and I knew only too well that if I handled these clumsily I should immediately lose prestige among ...
— The Adventures of Louis de Rougemont - as told by Himself • Louis de Rougemont
... give my horse into his charge, get into the coach and start for Staunton. Upon reaching that place, put yourself under the protection of your friends, the two old physicians, and get them to prosecute your guardian for cruelty and flagrant abuse of authority. Be cool, firm and alert, and all will ...
— Capitola's Peril - A Sequel to 'The Hidden Hand' • Mrs. E.D.E.N. Southworth
... listened to many a legend of the Old Doctor, whose memory haunted every street and by-lane and even attained to something like apotheosis in the talk of the older inhabitants. They told what an eye he had, as a naturalist, for anything uncommon in the maunds; how he taught them to be observant, alert for any strange fish, and to bring it home alive, if possible; and how he was never so happy as when seated on a bollard near the Quay-head with a drawing-board on his knee, busy—for he was a wonder with pencil and brush—transferring to paper the outline and ...
— Nicky-Nan, Reservist • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch (Q)
... While our hero stalked ahead, stroking his luxuriant whiskers ever and anon, we pursued him at an interval so great that not the most alert citizen of Little Arcady could have suspected this sinister ...
— The Boss of Little Arcady • Harry Leon Wilson
... shore thousands of miles from home, hundreds from any naval base. Without absolute command of the sea, it could not have been so much as thought of. Men, guns, food, ammunition, even water had to be conveyed in ships and disembarked under the eyes of a hostile army, warned, armed, alert, and ...
— Winning a Cause - World War Stories • John Gilbert Thompson and Inez Bigwood
... command of Tako, stayed close by Jane, and the two girls were always within sight of us. They were here now, seated on the rocks twenty feet from us. And the two guards, whom Tako had appointed at the carrier, sat near us with alert weapons, watching Jane and ...
— The White Invaders • Raymond King Cummings
... of dissimulation had enabled to model his very gait and footsteps to aid the purposes of deception, walked along the stone passage, and up the first flight of steps towards Miss Vere's apartment, with the alert, firm, and steady pace of one who is bound, indeed, upon important business, but who entertains no doubt he can terminate his affairs satisfactorily. But when out of hearing of the gentlemen whom he had left, his ...
— The Black Dwarf • Sir Walter Scott
... It was characteristic of him that his spirits should rise to the highest when the danger was greatest. The lassitude of the soul that he had felt for a few moments disappeared and once more he was alert, powerful, with all his marvelous senses attuned, and with that sixth sense which came from the perfect coordination of the others ...
— The Eyes of the Woods - A story of the Ancient Wilderness • Joseph A. Altsheler
... I have been again alarmed. I had a message from Mr. Harris on Saturday last to tell me that the performers had been so alert, and were so ready with their parts, and the many disappointments that had happened this season had been so prejudicial to him, that it would be easy and necessary to bring out your play next Saturday the 10th, and ...
— Letters of Horace Walpole, V4 • Horace Walpole
... enthroned tyranny, so that today most of this nation are slaves of the Lutaos—their want of intellect subjecting them to a thousand cheats, and their want of protection to a thousand outrages. For since the Lutaos are so alert a nation, and so sharp in their affairs, they have gradually bought the Subanos by trading with them, becoming masters of their ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898 - Volume 40 of 55 • Francisco Colin
... detection in proportion to it, she never had remained. There she was, and she could not get away again. The subtle dexterity which had served her in coming might desert her in returning. Had their senses been on the alert they might have heard her poor ...
— Elster's Folly • Mrs. Henry Wood
... with a cross questioner. Mr. Hill once said there was no use ever going into frenzies about the rights of the public. The public would just get exactly what was coming to it. If it worked for prosperity, it would get it. If it were not sufficiently alert to see opportunity, it certainly would not be sufficiently alert to grasp opportunity after you had pointed it out. Your opinion or mine does not count with the churlish questioner. You have to hurl facts back so hard they waken ...
— The Canadian Commonwealth • Agnes C. Laut
... off his forces and proceeded to make a wily advance upon the fortress under cover of carefully—contrived artifices and stratagems of war. But he contended with an alert and suspicious enemy; and so at the end of two hours it was manifest to him that he had made but little progress. Still, he had made some; he was sure ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... unshod horse with a ruck of half maddened cattle, but it was the safest plan, and there was no time to be lost, for as we rode slowly down, we sighted the herd dodging across the open to regain the shelter of the wood, and much on the alert. ...
— The Hawaiian Archipelago • Isabella L. Bird
... while her mother introduced her to the new-comers, who all looked a little taken aback, as though the resuscitated Grecian heroine were indeed among them, and stood silently alert near the tea-table, handing the cups of tea, the cakes and scones, for Jack and Sir Basil to pass round. Her arms were bare and her slender bare feet, laced with gold-clasped fastenings, showed on her white sandals. Jack saw that Sir Basil's ...
— A Fountain Sealed • Anne Douglas Sedgwick
... occupation, so agreeable to men who are hungry, the botanist, whose eye was always on the alert for matters relating to his favourite calling, remarked that the wood out of which their fire had been made burned very much like oak. On taking up one of the fagots, and cutting it with his knife, he was astonished to find that ...
— The Plant Hunters - Adventures Among the Himalaya Mountains • Mayne Reid
... grass beneath, his feet, tumbled off and gave vent to his feelings in a belated "chirr." Overhead somewhere a raven croaked dismally and cynically at intervals. Ralph's ears heard these things as he waited, with every sense on the alert, at the ...
— The Lilac Sunbonnet • S.R. Crockett
... appearance, or evolution, of any egg-destroying animals, whether reptiles or mammals, which could attack this great race at such a defenseless point would be rapidly followed by its extinction. We must accordingly be on the alert for all possible theories of extinction; and these theories themselves will fall under the universal principle of the survival of the fittest until we approximate or ...
— Dinosaurs - With Special Reference to the American Museum Collections • William Diller Matthew
... through here sooner or later, except perhaps, the law of righteousness. Here comes Horace, he's not bearing it, I am sure. How do you do, Horace?" Penfield, admirably dressed, slim, self-possessed and alert, bent over her hand, and ...
— The Silver Butterfly • Mrs. Wilson Woodrow
... watching. As alert as she was peaceful, she was prepared; and our enemies will meet on their path our valiant covering troops, who are at their post and will provide the screen behind which the mobilization of our national forces will ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume I (of 8) - Introductions; Special Articles; Causes of War; Diplomatic and State Papers • Various
... taking the whole charge of your education, Katy; and of my various specifics, I think I would recommend the training of such an elf as the 'sovereignest remedy' for first love. The luxuriant growth of your character interested, stimulated, kept me perpetually on the alert. I soon began to work con amore at this task; my spirits caught at times the contagious gayety of yours; my poor heart was refreshed by your warm childish love. In short, I began to live again. But, ah! dear Kate, it was a long, stern conflict. Many, many months, yes, years, passed ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 1, Issue 2, December, 1857 • Various
... me if you receive this; for in these gunpowder times, to be sure, the clerks of the post-office are peculiarly alert. ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole, Volume 2 • Horace Walpole
... kept on turning his eyes away from Mamma and looking at her; every time she looked she caught him looking. His dark hair sprang in two ridges from the parting. His short, high-bridged nose seemed to be looking at you, too, with its wide nostrils, alert. His face did all sorts of vivid, interesting things; you wondered every minute whether this time it would be straight and serious or crooked and gay, whether his eyes would stay as they were, black crystals, or move and show ...
— Mary Olivier: A Life • May Sinclair
... it could be kept for hours at a stretch. It was the genuine Indian dog trot, which is so effective in long distances. As the runner went along in this fashion, his thoughts were busy, and all his senses on the alert. He concluded that it was nearly midnight, and that he had, consequently, a number of hours at his command; so he aimed to get as far below the intercepting Apaches as possible, with the intention of returning to the river, before daylight, ...
— Through Apache Lands • R. H. Jayne
... and Jack?" Rhoda's voice trembled as she uttered the names. It was only with the utmost difficulty that she spoke coherently. All her nerves were on the alert for some unexpected action on the part of either Billy ...
— The Heart of the Desert - Kut-Le of the Desert • Honore Willsie Morrow
... over, and I am gone to put on my traveling-dress! The odious parting moment has come. The carriage is at the door: the maid and valet are in the dickey. What a pity that they are not bride and bridegroom too! Vick has jumped in—alert and self-respecting again now that she ...
— Nancy - A Novel • Rhoda Broughton
... him in surprise. He was well dressed, with alert eyes and strong, pleasing face. I had never seen ...
— The Holladay Case - A Tale • Burton E. Stevenson
... thrice-favoured Northern Land, Where most the Flowers of Thought expand, And all things nebulous grow clear, Through Spectacles and Lager-Beer, There lived, at Dumpelsheim the Lesser, A certain High-Dutch Herr Professor. Than GROTIUS more alert and quick, More logical than BURGERSDYCK, His Lectures both so much transcended, That far and wide his Fame extended, Proclaiming him to every clime Within a Mile of Dumpelsheim. But chief he taught, by Day and Night, The Doctrine of the Stagirite, Proving it fixed beyond ...
— Collected Poems - In Two Volumes, Vol. II • Austin Dobson
... the Jacobite judges. 'Till this moment several of them, oppressed by the heat, had sat dreaming with their heads sunk on their breasts, but now they were suddenly as wide-awake and alert as though a jet of cold water had been turned on to them, and one cried out: "And your father, young man? You have forgotten him in a hurry! What would he have said to such a disgrace to his blood as your marriage to a Melchite, the daughter of those who caused your two brothers ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... comment, but had Steve noticed the raising of his eyebrows, and the smile that flitted across his face, he might have suspected that the other entertained serious doubts concerning the wisdom of depending wholly on his continuing to be on the alert during that coming period when the rest of them would give themselves up ...
— Chums of the Camp Fire • Lawrence J. Leslie
... happened; but being accustomed from childhood to different kinds of danger, he suspected some treachery. He was also surprised to see Danveld, while talking with him, approach him closer and closer; the others began to ride to his sides, as if to surround him. Consequently he was upon the alert, especially as he did not have any weapons; he had not brought any, being in ...
— The Knights of the Cross • Henryk Sienkiewicz
... thrilling series of mystery stories for girls. Nancy Drew, ingenious, alert, is the daughter of a famous criminal lawyer and she herself is deeply interested in his mystery cases. Her interest involves her often in some ...
— The Corner House Girls at School • Grace Brooks Hill
... personal preference, to be alleged in support of this omission. Those who are no chimney-cornerers, who rejoice in the social thunderstorm, have a ground in reason for their choice. They get little rest indeed; but restfulness is a quality for cattle; the virtues are all active, life is alert, and it is in repose that men prepare themselves for evil. On the other hand, they are bruised into a knowledge of themselves and others; they have in a high degree the fencer's pleasure in dexterity displayed and proved; what they get they get upon life's terms, paying for it ...
— Memories and Portraits • Robert Louis Stevenson
... instantly on the alert. The voices, he doubted not, were those of Dick Fletcher and Larry Linton. He moved forward cautiously, and soon espied the speakers. They were sitting on the ground, under the overreaching boughs of a gigantic tree. Harry ...
— In A New World - or, Among The Gold Fields Of Australia • Horatio Alger
... eventually rescued by a Captain Sharp, of the Elizabeth, who ransomed Wilson for the value of L3 5s. in goods. Wilson was again captured by Roberts, and served with him as surgeon. At his trial for piracy at Cape Coast Castle in 1722, witnesses proved that Wilson was "very alert and cheerful at meeting with Roberts, hailed him, told him he was glad to see him, and would come on board presently, borrowing a clean Shirt and Drawers" from the witness "for his better Appearance and Reception: signed the Articles ...
— The Pirates' Who's Who - Giving Particulars Of The Lives and Deaths Of The Pirates And Buccaneers • Philip Gosse
... class, laborers, Catholics and Protestants, and summer people. It was generally inert and negative in spirit, seldom actively loyal. At its best it was willing that leaders should lead and pay the price, and be more admired than upheld. At its worst it was alert to private and blind to public interests, peevish ...
— Quaker Hill - A Sociological Study • Warren H. Wilson
... more men on their expeditions, and their sledges were entirely, or for the most part, drawn by the explorers themselves. Thus in the most energetic attempt ever made to reach high latitudes, Albert Markham's memorable march towards the north from the Alert's winter quarters, there were 33 men who had to draw the sledges, though there were plenty of dogs on board the ship. It would appear, indeed, as if dogs were not held in great ...
— Farthest North - Being the Record of a Voyage of Exploration of the Ship 'Fram' 1893-1896 • Fridtjof Nansen
... any point in the day or night to attend anybody for nothing. Most Socialists are disposed to agree with the spirit of that expectation. A practising doctor should be in lifelong perpetual war against pain and disease, just as a campaigning soldier is continually alert and serving. But existing conditions will not permit that. Existing conditions require the doctor to get his fee at any cost; if he goes about doing work for nothing, they punish him with shabbiness and incapacitating need, they forbid his marriage ...
— New Worlds For Old - A Plain Account of Modern Socialism • Herbert George Wells
... and be prepared to seize it the moment that it presented itself. Perhaps the most difficult part of my task was to preserve all through this trying time such a demeanour as would effectually conceal from Dominguez the fact that I was alert and on the watch for something; but I managed it somehow, by leading him to believe that, rather than suffer torture, I had determined to provoke Morillo into killing me outright; a plan of which Dominguez highly approved, while expressing his doubts as to ...
— A Pirate of the Caribbees • Harry Collingwood
... few herdsmen, whose huts stood a little way off. The hours of darkness were therefore the season of peril for the king. It is said that he used to pass them in constant watchfulness, prowling round his huts fully armed, peering into the blackest shadows, or himself standing silent and alert, like a sentinel on duty, in some dark corner. When at last his rival appeared, the fight would take place in grim silence, broken only by the clash of spears and shields, for it was a point of honour with the king not to call the herdsmen to ...
— The Golden Bough - A study of magic and religion • Sir James George Frazer
... face were injected, and his features were shot with heavy wrinkles. He rode with his back arched and his chin sunk upon his breast, for the old, time-rotted body was worn out, but in his bright, alert eyes there was always a trace of the gallant tenant who lived in the shattered house. Delirious, spent, and dying, he preserved his chivalrous, protecting air as he turned to the ladies, shot little scraps of advice and encouragement at them, and peered back continually ...
— The Tragedy of The Korosko • Arthur Conan Doyle
... that the Narcissus rolled into the South, Captain Michael J. Murphy's alert brain was busy every spare moment, striving to discover, in the incomprehensible charter his owners had made for him, what the French call la raison d'etre. Not having any wireless, he was unable to keep in ...
— Cappy Ricks Retires • Peter B. Kyne
... young woman who controls the sale of miscellaneous goods was alert and smiling behind her counter. Whatever Crossan might be doing she at all events was attending to her business. Godfrey took no notice of her. He led me through the shop to the yard behind it. He pushed open the door of one of ...
— The Red Hand of Ulster • George A. Birmingham
... so later, Joe surmised from the Frenchman's actions that they were approaching their destination. He seemed on the alert, and was constantly peering into the darkness ahead as though he expected to see something at any moment. Joe looked very hard, but saw only ...
— The Cruise of the Dazzler • Jack London
... amuse others. In London and Paris he is nearly as well known in the world of playwrights and actors as in the world of soldiers. He can sing a good song and tell a good story. Like Baden-Powell, the hero of another famous siege, he is certain to have kept his gallant troops alert and interested during the long period of waiting for the relief which never came. Up to the last his messages to the outside world have been full of cheery optimism and soldierly fortitude. No general was ever less to blame for a disastrous ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume V (of 8) • Francis J. (Francis Joseph) Reynolds, Allen L. (Allen Leon)
... of journalists laid any deep schemes; definite plans are not made by either; their Machiavelism lives from hand to mouth, so to speak, and consists, for the most part, in being always on the spot, always on the alert to turn everything to account, always on the watch for the moment when a man's ruling passion shall deliver him into the hands of his enemies. The young Duke had seen through Lucien at Florine's supper-party; he had just ...
— A Distinguished Provincial at Paris • Honore de Balzac
... with the same intention; and advice had been sent respecting us along the coast, both to the north and south, with orders to equip what strength there was to catch us. All night, the people of Pisco were on the alert, continually firing guns, to give us an earnest of what we were to expect if we attempted to land, but we had no ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume X • Robert Kerr
... be graceful, steady, strong; The Eye to be alert and observing; The Memory to be accurate and retentive; The Heart to ...
— The Choctaw Freedmen - and The Story of Oak Hill Industrial Academy • Robert Elliott Flickinger
... that it can see, or so that its fire will be effective. 5th, They order their platoons to open fire at the proper time. Thereafter they observe the target and make any necessary changes to keep the fire effective, i.e., fire fast or slow, according to the necessity, and are on the alert for any commands ...
— The Plattsburg Manual - A Handbook for Military Training • O.O. Ellis and E.B. Garey
... say sae, sir; and there's come down strict orders for the forces and volunteers to be alert; and there's a clever young officer to come here forthwith, to look at our means o' defenceI saw the Bailies lass cleaning his belts and white breeksI gae her a hand, for ye maun think she wasna ower clever at it, and sae I gat a' the news ...
— The Antiquary, Complete • Sir Walter Scott
... it was my business to exert all my energies to maintain it. And I know how I could restore it now; there is young Dr. Perrin! He does not find me a burden, he would tolerate any deficiencies! And I can see my husband on the alert in an instant, if I become too much absorbed in discussing your health-theories with my handsome ...
— Sylvia's Marriage • Upton Sinclair
... was, and through mismanagement thus mischievously alert, or through torpor thus unaccountably base, that actually, on the 30th of May, not having raised their standard before the 26th, the rebels had already been permitted to possess themselves of the county of Wexford in its whole southern division—Ross and Duncannon only excepted; ...
— Autobiographic Sketches • Thomas de Quincey
... them, they kept the camp so scared up all the time, they had to make up a boat party and go over and hunt them off. They used to swim this river like it was a pond, those bears! They kept the party on the alert all day and all night. They had a dozen big ...
— The Young Alaskans on the Missouri • Emerson Hough
... intended also to accomplish some work in prose at this period, but the painful condition of his health forbade it. "I am forbidden to use my poor head," he said, "so I have to get along as I can without it. The Catholic St. Leon, thee knows, walked alert as usual after his head was ...
— Authors and Friends • Annie Fields
... in the room was waiting, feverishly alert, for the pause that should allow her to begin her own ...
— The Incomplete Amorist • E. Nesbit
... still, unable to move. Every muscle in him was paralyzed by this deed which seemed to him not murder alone, but sacrilege. Of all the events of that terrible night this was the worst. But a man behind Paul, retained every faculty, alive and alert. Up rose Shif'less Sol, his honest face ablaze with wrath. His rifle flew to his shoulder, his finger pressed the trigger, and the soul of Don Francisco Alvarez, grandee of Spain, sped to judgment from the darkness and obscurity of the North ...
— The Free Rangers - A Story of the Early Days Along the Mississippi • Joseph A. Altsheler
... we can hold them in leash. Most of your leading papers know there's a twenty-four hour alert on—that was bound to leak—but I've kept them quiet. We'll have to give them something soon, though. They won't take a muzzle too long without ...
— Prologue to an Analogue • Leigh Richmond
... once in his hand, the engine-driver has only begun his experience. He goes through an apprenticeship with different varieties of engines. He must pick up what knowledge he can himself, and he must always be on the alert to benefit from the experience of others. The locomotive in its varying "moods" must be his constant study, and he must work it so that he shall not infringe more than an average share of a multiplicity of rules and regulations. The best position in ...
— Railway Adventures and Anecdotes - extending over more than fifty years • Various
... whom the slave ushered in a few minutes later was old, spare and bent, but he was alert and restless. His eyes were brilliant and over them arched eyebrows that were almost white. He made a ...
— The Yoke - A Romance of the Days when the Lord Redeemed the Children - of Israel from the Bondage of Egypt • Elizabeth Miller
... pamphlets, and innumerable articles. I wish I knew what to say about the man himself, his unwearying goodness, his loyalty, his scrupulousness, his good humor, his originality, his continual common sense, and his intellect, alert to ...
— Musical Memories • Camille Saint-Saens
... as that personage was kept puffing and tearing round the vicinity, they knew there was no fear of disturbance from the treacherous red-skins, who were so constantly on the alert to avenge themselves for the loss they had suffered in the attack; but it would hardly pay to keep an iron man as sentinel, as the wear and tear in all probability would ...
— The Huge Hunter - Or, the Steam Man of the Prairies • Edward S. Ellis
... world, obviously on the face of it well organised. Compared with our world, it is like a well-oiled engine beside a scrap-heap. It has even got this confounded visual organ swivelling about in the most alert and lively fashion. But that's by the way.... You have only to look at all these houses below. (We should be sitting on a seat on the Gutsch and looking down on the Lucerne of Utopia, a Lucerne that would, I insist, quite arbitrarily, still keep the ...
— A Modern Utopia • H. G. Wells
... stampede senselessly; and, while the Indian had not yet developed the hostility that later made a journey across the plains so dangerous, nevertheless the possibilities of theft were always near enough at hand to keep the traveler alert and interested. Then there was the sandy country of the Platte River with its buffalo—buffalo by the hundreds of thousands, as far as the eye could reach—a marvelous sight: and beyond that again the Rockies, by way of Fort ...
— The Forty-Niners - A Chronicle of the California Trail and El Dorado • Stewart Edward White
... His commercial instincts might have been put to dreamy sleep by the appearance of the purple bloom, but it is keenly aroused by the opening boll. He is influenced by no song, by no color fantastically bobbing between the rows. He is alert, determined not to be cheated. Too much music might cover a rascally trick, might put a clod in the cotton to be weighed. Sentiment is well enough, and he can get it by ...
— An Arkansas Planter • Opie Percival Read
... battle of the six enemy planes began, Jack immediately singling out one of the Huns for his own particular attention. Alert, eager, and fairly itching to get even with the Boche fliers for the fright they had given him, Morgan crouched in his seat, ready to start firing when the ...
— Air Service Boys Flying for Victory - or, Bombing the Last German Stronghold • Charles Amory Beach
... to see that all the contemplation had departed from his attitude, now as alert as that of a fox-terrier which imagines he has seen a rat. His vast ears were cocked, his huge bulk trembled, his enormous trunk ...
— The Ivory Child • H. Rider Haggard
... was eighty miles away, walking up and down the muddy platform of the principal station of Agapolis, stamping his feet at each turn in his promenade to restore the circulation. His was a fast Express train, and he stood during most of the run, on the alert to guard against accident. There was no more careful engineer on the road. Fireman and brakeman were off for supper in or near the station. He slouched as he walked, his hands thrust deep into his pockets; his overcoat was heavy and too loose even for his bulky figure. ...
— The Little Gold Miners of the Sierras and Other Stories • Various
... which elapsed before the reassembling of parliament was a very memorable one in the annals of the country. Every association and political union, tremblingly alive for the fate of the bill, was on the alert, it being conceived that it was in imminent clanger of being lost in committee. At Leeds, Birmingham, Liverpool, Manchester, Sheffield, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Paisley, Dundee, as well as throughout the south of England, meetings were held, at all of which resolutions were passed expressing ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... the somewhat imposing steps of her sister's Commonwealth Avenue home and pressed an energetic finger against the electric-bell button. From the tip of her wing-trimmed hat to the toe of her low-heeled shoe she radiated health, capability, and alert decision. Even her voice, as she greeted the maid that opened the door, vibrated with ...
— Pollyanna Grows Up • Eleanor H. Porter
... of emotion seemed to ripple through the room. The atmosphere grew tense, electric—alert as with some premonition ...
— The Hermit of Far End • Margaret Pedler
... been steadily dissipating her own authority. Hilda peered along the landing from her lair, and upstairs and downstairs; she could see nothing but senseless carpets and brass rods and steps and banisters; but she knew that the entire household—she had the sensation that the very house itself—was alert ...
— Hilda Lessways • Arnold Bennett
... likely to prove successful. He keeps a vigilant eye upon all ground-lights and by close observation is able to determine their significance. It is for this reason that no lights of any description are permitted in the advance trenches. The striking of a match may easily betray a position to the alert ...
— Aeroplanes and Dirigibles of War • Frederick A. Talbot
... hollows of the Erymanthian woods, Roused her from sleep. With listening head, Snatched bow, and quiver lightly slung, she stands, And peers across that dim and motionless glade, Beckoning about her heels the wakeful dogs; Yet Dian, thus alert, is but a dream, Making more real this brooding quietness. How strong and wonderful is night! Mankind Has yielded all to one sweet helplessness: Thought, labour, strife and all activities Have ebbed like fever. The smooth tide ...
— Among the Millet and Other Poems • Archibald Lampman
... our day the water has been burned, it cannot have been oftener than once in a way, and probably no great harm has resulted. Nor can the game be worth the candle, one could imagine, for watchers now are many and alert, in the execution of their duties much more conscientious than was common in days gone by. There are none now, we may hope, like the bailiff of Selkirk in the early part of last century, who constantly find salmon in close time mysteriously appearing on their dinner-table. ...
— Stories of the Border Marches • John Lang and Jean Lang
... he detailed one slight case where he thought my father was at fault,—-a detail so slight that I now forget what it is. In reading the Log kept by the discharged mate, Amerzeen, on the return trip in the Alert, I find that every incident there recorded, from running aground at the start at San Diego Harbor, through the perilous icebergs round the Horn, the St. Elmo's fire, the scurvy of the crew and the small matters ...
— Two Years Before the Mast • Richard Henry Dana
... child whose mother knew bad people—something which other children could "catch" like scarlet fever. From this seed other thoughts had grown. She did not remain a baby long. A fervid little brain worked for her, picked up hints and developed suggestions, set her to singularly alert reasoning which quickly became too mature for her age. The quite horrid little girl, who flouncingly announced that she could not be played with any more "because of Lord Coombe" set a spark to a train. After that time she used to ask occasional carefully considered questions of ...
— The Head of the House of Coombe • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... Stewart and Jim Shirley, with others, were sitting upright with alert faces now. Booms were making men rich all over Kansas. Why should prosperity not come to this valley as well? It was not impossible, surely. Only the unpleasant memory of Champers' holding back the supplies in the days when the grasshopper was a burden would intrude on the minds of the ...
— Winning the Wilderness • Margaret Hill McCarter
... of the projecting rock and wedging her slender body into a small fissure, peered cautiously through the cleft. So close that she could almost touch him, alert and motionless, stood the weasel-faced man. His small eyes were fixed upon the water. The hand which was nearest ...
— El Diablo • Brayton Norton
... respect. The perishable vegetables should be bought as fresh as possible. No difficulty will be experienced in determining this, for they will soon wither or rot if they are not fresh, but the point is to find out their condition before they are bought. The housewife should be ever on the alert and should examine carefully the vegetables she buys before they are accepted from the grocer or taken from the market. In the case of certain vegetables, it is possible to conceal the fact that they are stale. For instance, the outside leaves of a head of lettuce or endive are ...
— Woman's Institute Library of Cookery, Vol. 2 - Volume 2: Milk, Butter and Cheese; Eggs; Vegetables • Woman's Institute of Domestic Arts and Sciences
... in the evening. King Edward was awake all night with anxiety, expecting every moment that Philip would come suddenly upon him. He rose at midnight, and ordered the trumpets to sound in order to arouse the men. The officers were all on the alert, the young prince among them. All was movement and bustle in the camp. As soon as the day dawned they commenced their march, Gobin leading the way. He was well guarded. They were all ready to cut him to pieces if he should ...
— Richard II - Makers of History • Jacob Abbott
... they as sterling as their father and mother? I must believe they are neither giddy nor headstrong, else you would never have undertaken the care of them. Moreover, their faces contradict any such supposition. They are beautiful and very attractive; but are just at the age when every power is on the alert to have its fill of interest and enjoyment. Did you notice how their eyes sparkled as they took their seats in the carriage and looked out ...
— Barbara's Heritage - Young Americans Among the Old Italian Masters • Deristhe L. Hoyt
... whistled shrilly into his radio phone. "Attention everybody! General alert. Prepare for combat; prepare to take immediate evasive action. We must assume that the spaceport is occupied, and that the occupants are hostile. Captain Poole, will you please make ready aboard your ship? Reduce both speed ...
— The Cosmic Computer • Henry Beam Piper
... the ranch; and though the buildings below seemed deserted, in reality wide-awake men were stationed at posts within them, waiting for the clang of the alarm which the pressing of a button in any one of the lookout towers would effect. Lar Tantril's ranch was not asleep. It was as alert and wary as the beasts tracking through the jungle outside its fence, and all its defensive and offensive weapons were ...
— The Passing of Ku Sui • Anthony Gilmore
... No mortal would open his purse with a loan. Debts, bailiffs, and lawsuits, and creditors gruff, At the crack of day knocking, (Importunity shocking!) Our trio kept busy enough. The bush, ever ready and on the alert, Now caught all the people it could by the skirt:— 'Pray, sir, be so good as to tell, if you please, If you know whereabout the old villanous seas Have hid all our goods which they stole t' other night. The diver, ...
— The Fables of La Fontaine - A New Edition, With Notes • Jean de La Fontaine
... gave a dinner. It was lovely; but in the midst of it, we perceived a sort of confusion of moccasined footsteps outside the dining-room. My nerves were, by this time, always on the alert. I glanced through the large door opening out into the hall, and saw a group of Indian scouts; they laid a coffee-sack down by the corner fire-place, near the front door. The commanding officer left the table hastily; the ...
— Vanished Arizona - Recollections of the Army Life by a New England Woman • Martha Summerhayes
... then the people around her. Women were in a great majority, a man scattered forlornly amongst them once and again. She discovered at once the alert eyes of young Mr. Warlock. He was seated in the side aisle with a thin, severe-looking woman beside him. He stared straight in front of him, wriggling sometimes his broad back as though he were a dog tied by a chain. Some one else very quickly claimed Maggie's attention; this was a girl ...
— The Captives • Hugh Walpole
... place; my men then gave chase, firing off in the air, which sent them flying over the fields, and left us to do there as we liked until night, when a few of the villagers came back and took up their abode with us quietly. Next, after dark, the little village was on the alert again. The Watuta were out marching, and it was rumoured that they were bound for M'yaruwamba's. The porters who were engaged at Pongo's now gave us the slip: we were consequently detained here next ...
— The Discovery of the Source of the Nile • John Hanning Speke
... doctrines had been set forth in unveiled plainness, as witness the explicit teachings in the Sermon on the Mount. It is noticeable that the introduction of parables occurred when opposition to Jesus was strong, and when scribes, Pharisees, and rabbis were alert in maintaining a close watch upon His movements and His works, ever ready to make Him an offender for a word. The use of parables was common among Jewish teachers; and in adopting this mode of instruction Jesus was really following a custom of the time; though ...
— Jesus the Christ - A Study of the Messiah and His Mission According to Holy - Scriptures Both Ancient and Modern • James Edward Talmage
... Others might lie late abed, but there could be no such indulgence for him; for was not he the power behind the throne? What would this grand fete be should his genius fail, his powers prove unequal to the strain? King and prince, lord and lady might slumber, but Vatel must be up and alert. ...
— Historical Tales, Vol. 6 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality. French. • Charles Morris
... looked up, and instantly her intellect awoke. They were driving down the avenue—"The green leaves rustle overhead," was the first impression that formulated itself into words. "The carriage wheels roll rhythmically. Every faculty is on the alert. There is something unaccustomed in the aspect of things—things familiar—this once familiar scene. A new point of view; the change is in me. We used to ride down that lane. Blackberries. The day ...
— The Heavenly Twins • Madame Sarah Grand
... in New England there was a girl a few years back with an alert mind, an assertive personality, and a tremendous fund of energy. She was in the habit of giving constructive suggestions to the heads of the departments in which she worked, and because of her youth and manner, they resented it. "I took her into my office," the manager said. ...
— The Book of Business Etiquette • Nella Henney
... seekers of love, suffering continual frustration from the evaporation of emotional interest that defies their own needs; the many types of efficient workers, alert, hard, self-satisfied, not wholly cynical, yet with a touch of something that borders on cynicism, submitting almost with a secret repugnance to the mysterious but supreme bond which holds the sexes miserably together; and the prostitute woman of all ...
— Women's Wild Oats - Essays on the Re-fixing of Moral Standards • C. Gasquoine Hartley
... is perfectly artificial, and puts all precedent things at sixes-and-sevens. At any rate, be the cause what it may, there is seldom anything worth seeing—within the scope of a railway traveller's eye; and if there were, it requires an alert marksman to take a ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 09, No. 51, January, 1862 • Various
... not seem to await the divine message. But how superb it is, this majestic calm and solemnity; how Donatello triumphs over the lack of giving tension to what is quiescent! The Penseroso also sits and meditates, but every muscle of the reposing limbs is alert. So, too, in the Moses, with all its exaggeration and melodrama, with its aspect of frigid sensationalism, which led Thackeray to say he would not like to be left alone in the room with it, we find every motionless limb ...
— Donatello • David Lindsay, Earl of Crawford
... of the logs and the bubbling of the mysterious decoction in the pot. Suddenly Tom uttered a slight hiss,—that peculiar sound so familiar to backwoods ears, by which hunters indicate to each other that something unusual has been observed, and that they had better be on the alert. ...
— The Golden Dream - Adventures in the Far West • R.M. Ballantyne
... Jenny Man's I saw an alert young fellow that cocked his hat upon a friend of his, who entered just at the same time with myself, and accosted him after the following manner: "Well, Jack, the old prig is dead at last. Sharp's the word. Now or never, boy. Up to ...
— All About Coffee • William H. Ukers
... the alert by Mr Tidey's warnings, I continued racing up and down the portion of the camp which had been allotted to me to guard. It was the north-west angle, contained by the line of breastwork which ran along the edge of the ravine and half of that by the brink of the cliff. I frequently stopped ...
— With Axe and Rifle • W.H.G. Kingston
... visit to Perry's Bend, the rivalry of the two towns had turned to hatred and an alert and eager readiness to increase the inhabitants of each other's graveyard. A state of war existed, which for a time resulted in nothing worse than acrimonious suggestions. But the time came when the score was settled to the satisfaction of ...
— Hopalong Cassidy's Rustler Round-Up - Bar-20 • Clarence Edward Mulford
... sat David Lloyd George, with thick gray hair and snapping Celtic eyes. Alert and magnetic, he was on the edge of his chair, questioning and interrupting. Frankly ignorant of the details of continental geography and politics, naive in his inquiries, he possessed the capacity for acquiring effective information at lightning speed. Unfortunately he was not over-critical ...
— Woodrow Wilson and the World War - A Chronicle of Our Own Times. • Charles Seymour
... Bernard imparted to me his misgivings, I was quickly on the alert, and questioned him regarding the progress of old Mr. ...
— The Seven Secrets • William Le Queux
... for both of us," said Dakota, his eyes cold and alert as they watched Blanca's hand at his cartridge belt. "One of us will leave it by sundown. I ...
— The Trail to Yesterday • Charles Alden Seltzer
... the receptive side, the sensibility, the most prominent. His senses are alert. He handles and examines objects about him. He sees more, and he learns more from the seeing, than he will in later years unless his perceptive powers are definitely trained and observation made a habit. His ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 286 - June 25, 1881 • Various
... morning at length began to appear, and the heavy clouds of night were gradually rolling away before the splendour of the approaching sun, when Don Manuel de Monteblanco, who was already on the alert, received information that a party of horsemen were rapidly approaching the mansion. The old cavalier hastened to a spot whence he could descry his visitors, and form a judgment of their quality. ...
— Gomez Arias - The Moors of the Alpujarras, A Spanish Historical Romance. • Joaquin Telesforo de Trueba y Cosio
... earlier in the afternoon, engaged in heatedly describing what sounded like grievances to an official in buttons, who seemed indifferent. She stopped suddenly when the man appeared, and the official took his hands out of his pockets and became alert and attentive, and the stewardess hastily picked up a tray she had set down and began to move ...
— Christopher and Columbus • Countess Elizabeth Von Arnim
... first time in 35 years, our strategic bombers stand down. No longer are they on round-the-clock alert. Tomorrow our children will go to school and study history and how plants grow. And they won't have, as my children did, air-raid drills in which they crawl under their desks and cover their heads in case of nuclear war. My grandchildren don't have ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various
... a sickening perception, but Stead's powers were alert enough for him to exclaim, "Then ...
— Under the Storm - Steadfast's Charge • Charlotte M. Yonge
... did not strike me as unlike a dozen other reporters. His face was the face one feels he has a right to expect of a newspaper man—keen, alert, humorous; on the look-out for opportunities. But with a second glance I commenced to feel interested. I wondered where he had come from and what he had done in the past. His features were undeniably Irish; but that which chiefly awakened my curiosity, was his expression. It ...
— The Four Pools Mystery • Jean Webster
... the ones who were always on the alert for new things, and Jim made a good companion for them in this respect. The latter was the first one to actively canvass the subject of ...
— The Wonder Island Boys: Conquest of the Savages • Roger Thompson Finlay
... therefore is hardly to be compared with that deep silence of the subconscious mind, where deep thoughts, and the silent forces of high potency are evolved. It is necessary to be silent before you can speak wisely. The person that is really alert and well poised and able to speak wisely under trying circumstances, is the person that has practiced in the silence. Most people do not know what the silence is and think it is easy to go into the silence, but this is not so. In the real silence we become attached to that interior law and ...
— The Power of Concentration • Theron Q. Dumont
... again, so we were soon reduced to the greatest misery. True it is, that I now and then shear a mule, and my wife tells the bahi (fortune) to the servant-girls, but these things stand us in little stead: the people are now very much on the alert, and my wife, with all her knowledge, has been unable to perform any grand trick which would set us up at once. She wished to come to see you, brother, this night, but was ashamed, as she has no more clothes than myself. Last summer our distress was so great ...
— The Zincali - An Account of the Gypsies of Spain • George Borrow
... be alert to help serve, but use your judgment; don't go off in a group to enjoy yourselves in the business of ...
— Manners And Conduct In School And Out • Anonymous
... had commenced his lecture when this intended disturber of the peace was heard uttering noisy words at the foot of the stairs, where the fee of admission into the room was to be paid. The receiver of the money on the alert ascended the stairs and informed Coleridge of the man's insolence and his determination not to pay for his admission. In the midst of the lecture Coleridge stopped, and said loud enough to be heard by the ...
— The Life of Samuel Taylor Coleridge - 1838 • James Gillman
... a liability of finding many crude and sketchy contributions in the literature of the periodical press, its conductors are ever on the alert to reduce to a minimum the weak or unworthy offerings, and to secure a maximum of articles embodying mature thought and fit expression. The pronounced tendency toward short methods in every channel of human activity, is reflected in the constantly ...
— A Book for All Readers • Ainsworth Rand Spofford
... noble, and he was conspicuous among his fellows on account of his great seriousness and his quiet but unusually firm character. He had particularly attracted my notice on several occasions by his quick insight and extensive knowledge of music. As I recognised in him a spirit keenly alert in every direction, and unusually eager for culture, it was not long before I chose him as my companion in my regular walks—a habit I still continued to cultivate—and on which Roeckel had hitherto accompanied ...
— My Life, Volume I • Richard Wagner
... withdrawal was very slow, and we spent the next day having baths in Souastre. On the 1st March we moved into the new front line, round the East edge of Gommecourt, while the Boche was still holding Pigeon Wood. The enemy was very alert, as General H.M. Campbell, the C.R.A., discovered; he went into the wood, thinking it unoccupied, and was chased out by a fat Boche throwing "potato mashers." In the evening the Headquarters moved into a German dug-out, but the enemy still ...
— The Fifth Leicestershire - A Record Of The 1/5th Battalion The Leicestershire Regiment, - T.F., During The War, 1914-1919. • J.D. Hills
... more tempting portions of food in the yard. In the morning and afternoon they are found feeding, or chewing the cud; but at noon, when they lie down, they are difficult to approach, as they are then on the alert, employing their wonderful faculties of scent and hearing to detect the faintest taint or sound in the air, which might indicate the approach of danger. The snapping of a little twig, the least collision ...
— The Western World - Picturesque Sketches of Nature and Natural History in North - and South America • W.H.G. Kingston
... Lands is an interesting, wholesome presentation of something that a keen-eyed, alert traveler with the faculty of making contrasts with all classes of people in all sorts of places, in such a sympathetic way as to win their esteem and confidence, has been able to pick up as he has roamed over the face of the earth for a quarter ...
— Birdseye Views of Far Lands • James T. Nichols
... in his life, maybe, the alert reporter was taken off guard, and hadn't a word to say, except the very ordinary one of "Thank you"; but he said it, bending over the lady's hand, and with such an expression of delight upon his thin, intellectual face, that ...
— Jessica, the Heiress • Evelyn Raymond
... did not suffice. I worked always on Sundays,—as to which no scruple of religion made me unhappy,—and not unfrequently I was driven to work at night. In the winter when hunting was going on, I had to keep myself very much on the alert. And during the London season, when I was generally two or three days of the week in town, I found the official work to be a burden. I had determined some years previously, after due consideration with my wife, to abandon ...
— Autobiography of Anthony Trollope • Anthony Trollope
... hopeful one. Out of a million well-established Americans, taken indiscriminately from all occupations and conditions, compared to a corresponding assortment of Europeans, a larger proportion of the former will be leading alert, active, and useful lives. Within a given social area there will be a smaller amount of social wreckage and a larger amount of wholesome and profitable achievement. The mass of the American people is, on the whole, more deeply stirred, more thoroughly awake, more assertive in their ...
— The Promise Of American Life • Herbert David Croly
... in the shadow of the great square keep, they went on, soft-treading and alert of eye till, being come to the angle of the wall, the friar stayed of a sudden and raised a warning hand. Then came Beltane with Walkyn close behind, and peering over the friar's broad shoulders, they beheld a sentinel who stood with his back ...
— Beltane The Smith • Jeffery Farnol
... good couriers for the conveyance of despatches back across the Danube to Bucharest, whence everything was telegraphed to London; but they were essentially fair-weather men. The casual courier may be alert, loyal, and trustworthy; he may be relied on to try his honest best, but it is not to be expected of him that he will greatly dare and count his life but as dross when his incentive to enterprise is merely filthy lucre. But I could trust Andreas to dare and to endure—to overcome obstacles, ...
— The Idler, Volume III., Issue XIII., February 1893 - An Illustrated Monthly. Edited By Jerome K. Jerome & Robert Barr • Various
... lively affair. At the long tables in the eating room the riders gathered, lean, tanned men, young mostly, all alert, quick-eyed, swift in judgment. Their days were full and earnest enough, running Last's cattle on the Lost Valley ranges. The evenings were their own, and they made the most of them. The big house was free to them, and they made it home, smoking, playing cards on the living ...
— Tharon of Lost Valley • Vingie E. Roe
... be responsible for the design of most of the first Bessemer plants in the United States had been in England in 1859, 1860, and 1862. In view of his interest in ordnance and armor, it is unlikely that Bessemer could have escaped his alert observation. His first visit specifically in connection with the Bessemer process appears to have been in 1863, but he is said to have begun to interest financiers and ironmasters in the Bessemer process after his visit in 1862 (Engineering, 1882, ...
— The Beginnings of Cheap Steel • Philip W. Bishop
... limbs, And David moulded like a sea boy risen From caves of music where the water spins Wet sand into the shapes of flowing flowers; David with limbs all bright with the sun's tones, And ruddy locks curling with youth and light, His body all alert on steady loins, Clean spun of flesh that knew the winter snows, And mellow pools of summer, and the dews Dropping among the crocuses of dawn. His sandle-straps bound ankles as a girl's, And fluttering to his knees the sheepskin hung, Cloaking ...
— Preludes 1921-1922 • John Drinkwater
... later—she was content to stay silent and observant in the background of events. Often Joan felt as though the shrewd eyes were drawing the unwilling truth from behind her mask of indifference, and she was, in a way, afraid of the little, alert woman who seemed to be taking such an intense though silent interest ...
— To Love • Margaret Peterson
... with interest—he was so dapper, so alert, so all that an office-boy in a staid lawyer's establishment ought to be. ...
— Back To Billabong • Mary Grant Bruce
... entertain one of her two young friends for a week—a week which would have been seven days of paradise to Sempronie, had not her father embittered its joys, its diversions, its fetes, with his always threatening outbreaks, his ill-humor always armed and alert, and his constant fault-finding about trifles—a bottle of eau de Cologne that Sempronie asked for to place in her friend's room, a dish for her dinner, or a place to which she wished ...
— Germinie Lacerteux • Edmond and Jules de Goncourt
... she exercised her waking judgment as usual in thinking, without a shadow of doubt, that Miss Aldclyffe stood before her in flesh and blood. Reason was not sufficiently alert to lead Cytherea to ask herself how such a ...
— Desperate Remedies • Thomas Hardy
... learned that our ci-devant Colonel was on full retreat for Scotland, carrying off poor Julia along with him. I understand from those who conduct the heavy baggage that he takes his winter quarters at a place called Woodbourne, in —-shire in Scotland. He will be all on the alert just now, so I must let him enter his entrenchments without any new alarm. And then, my good Colonel, to whom I owe so many grateful thanks, pray look ...
— Guy Mannering, or The Astrologer, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott
... librettos, plays, romances, memoirs, pamphlets, and innumerable articles. I wish I knew what to say about the man himself, his unwearying goodness, his loyalty, his scrupulousness, his good humor, his originality, his continual common sense, and his intellect, alert to everything ...
— Musical Memories • Camille Saint-Saens
... strong contrast to the old men-of-war's men, who retained their well-drilled bearing as the crew of the schooner, eager, alert, and ready at any moment to spring to sheet and brace at the mate's orders when they went ...
— Fitz the Filibuster • George Manville Fenn
... all, with the exception that proves the rule, he detailed one slight case where he thought my father was at fault,—-a detail so slight that I now forget what it is. In reading the Log kept by the discharged mate, Amerzeen, on the return trip in the Alert, I find that every incident there recorded, from running aground at the start at San Diego Harbor, through the perilous icebergs round the Horn, the St. Elmo's fire, the scurvy of the crew and the small matters like the painting of the vessel, to the final sail up Boston Harbor, confirms my ...
— Two Years Before the Mast • Richard Henry Dana
... And hollows of the Erymanthian woods, Roused her from sleep. With listening head, Snatched bow, and quiver lightly slung, she stands, And peers across that dim and motionless glade, Beckoning about her heels the wakeful dogs; Yet Dian, thus alert, is but a dream, Making more real this brooding quietness. How strong and wonderful is night! Mankind Has yielded all to one sweet helplessness: Thought, labour, strife and all activities Have ebbed like fever. The smooth tide of sleep, Rolling across ...
— Among the Millet and Other Poems • Archibald Lampman
... save the ticking of the clock and the noise of falling cinders for ten minutes, and then he heard something which brought him to the alert, all his senses awakened and concentrated. It was the sound of a light and stealthy footstep on the terrace outside. He wondered whether it was a servant and whether he would see that one of the windows was unshuttered. He ...
— Jack O' Judgment • Edgar Wallace
... I come to think of the matter in the cool and impartial manner which is typical of me, was young Hendricks the only one. There was a chap—let's see, now. I remember his face very well; he was one of those dark, wiry, alert men, a native of Earth, and his name was—Inverness! Carlos Inverness. Old John Hanson's memory isn't quite as tricky as some of these smart young officers of the Service, so newly commissioned that the silver braid ...
— The Death-Traps of FX-31 • Sewell Peaslee Wright
... taste of cocoa nut milk; if kept some time, it becomes as strong as wine, but after some days changes to vinegar. These people give this wine, and the small quantities of amber which is thrown up on their coasts, for bits of iron, the bargains being made by signs; but they are extremely alert, and are very apt to carry off iron from the merchants without ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 1 • Robert Kerr
... In like spirit, alert and buoyant, on this bright June morning go I also to reap my harvest,—pursuing a sweet more delectable than sugar, fruit more savory than berries, and game for another palate than that tickled ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 104, June, 1866 • Various
... chores and shooing the hens away. Besides, he gave me a lot of wise advice, as if he were a full-fledged man of the world and I a little hayseed from the West who didn't know enough to get out of the way of a go-cart. He has pale blue pop eyes, and an alert little blond mustache, and his whole air seems to say, 'The gobelins'll git you, if you ...
— Mary Ware's Promised Land • Annie Fellows Johnston
... affluence of greedy and interested hearts, you will soon see revealed and diminishing; probably your eyes, which are so alert, have already remarked this diminution. The monarch no longer loves you; coolness and inconstancy are maladies of the human heart. In the midst of the most splendid health, our King has for some time ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre
... peaceable assertion to the final well-groomed detail. Compactly built and neatly, brawn and bulk were conspicuously lacking; and the thin, intellectual face was made to appear still thinner by the pointed cut of the closely trimmed brown beard. The eyes were alert and not wanting in steadfastness; but they had a trick of seeming to look beyond, rather than directly at, the visual object. A physiognomist would have classified him as a man of studious habit with the leisure to indulge it, and unconsciously ...
— The Taming of Red Butte Western • Francis Lynde
... proper to a peculiar class of men—a regular Newmarket physiognomy—compounded chiefly of cunning and assurance; not low cunning, nor vulgar assurance, but crafty sporting subtlety, careless as to results, indifferent to obstacles, ever on the alert for the main chance, game and turf all over, eager, yet easy, keen, yet quiet. He was somewhat showily dressed, in such wise that he looked half like a fine gentleman of that day, half like a jockey of our own. His nether man appeared in well-fitting, ...
— Rookwood • William Harrison Ainsworth
... proudly nicknamed by his adherents, arrived in Illinois near midsummer, after elaborate preparation and heralding, and made speeches successively at Chicago, Bloomington, and Springfield on the 9th, 16th, and 17th of July. The Republicans and their candidate were equally alert to contest every inch of ground. Mr. Lincoln made speeches in reply at Chicago on the 10th and at Springfield on the evening of Douglas's day address; and in both instances with such force and success as portended a fluctuating and ...
— Abraham Lincoln, A History, Volume 2 • John George Nicolay and John Hay
... sling for weapon, in that wild unpeopled country, the shepherd boy stands, brave and alert, ready to protect his sheep. Ah, a lion! the ...
— Ten Boys from History • Kate Dickinson Sweetser
... and alert, another thought came quickly, however. He was getting past the large black hill, but the lane turning to it he had not found. Until he now tried with all his might to see, he did not fully know ...
— What Necessity Knows • Lily Dougall
... resurrection of the Limberlost is a mighty revival. Freckles stood back and watched with awe and envy the gradual reclothing and repopulation of the swamp. Keen-eyed and alert through danger and loneliness, he noted every stage of development, from the first piping frog and unsheathing bud, to full leafage and the ...
— Freckles • Gene Stratton-Porter
... a low bush across the wide lawn a pair of eyes transferred to an alert brain these simple perceptions from which the brain deduced with Sherlockian accuracy and Raffleian purpose that the family of the president of The First National Bank of—Oh, let's call it Oakdale—was at dinner, that the servants were ...
— The Oakdale Affair • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... unusually social and inquisitive, and while the soldiers fought their battles over again the girls listened and took notes, with feminine wits on the alert to catch any personal revelations which might fall from the interesting stranger. The wrongs and sufferings of Poland were discussed so eloquently that both young ladies were moved to declare the most undying hatred of Russia, Prussia, and Austria, the most intense sympathy for "poor ...
— Kitty's Class Day And Other Stories • Louisa M. Alcott
... here to point out that this oldest and simplest account of Gautama's resolve shows two things. It makes clear that Gautama at first had no plan for the universal salvation of his race. He was alert to 'save his own soul,' nothing more. We shall show presently that this is confirmed by subsequent events in his career. The next point is that this narration in itself is a complete refutation of the opinion of those ...
— The Religions of India - Handbooks On The History Of Religions, Volume 1, Edited By Morris Jastrow • Edward Washburn Hopkins
... the Cure, and the Abbe Rossignol, an ascetic, severe man, with a face of intolerance and inflexibility. Two constables in plain clothes followed; one stolid, one alert, one English and one French, both with grim satisfaction in their faces—the successful exercise of his trade is pleasant to every craftsman. When they entered, Charley was standing with his back to the fireplace, his eye-glass adjusted, ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... publicity her father dreaded, but eventually would lead to Jim's vindication; she deplored my lack of faith in my companion; she marveled that I, too, should have fallen so easily a prey to the sharpers who were deceiving her hot-headed, obstinate father, whose senses were alert for every word or sign that would smirch, by even so much as a shadow, the man he would overthrow. If it had been possible for Gabrielle Tescheron to understand that I had read her impulsive father's character aright, and that my loyalty to Jim Hosley at the time was as firm as her own, ...
— Cupid's Middleman • Edward B. Lent
... turned toward the spot where the mules were staked out, her figure was straight, tense, alert. She appeared to be listening and watching for some agreed-upon signal from the corral. Ned moved over ...
— The Boy Scout Camera Club - The Confession of a Photograph • G. Harvey Ralphson
... arts and muses came Callandar, alert and smiling. It was hardly his fault that he stumbled over the visitor who, whether in awe or fear of these unveiled splendours, had retreated as far ...
— Up the Hill and Over • Isabel Ecclestone Mackay
... beginning to realize the situation, was sobbing softly. Blake patted her shoulder; and the passion went out of his voice. But he still held the revolver alert in his free hand. ...
— The House of Mystery • William Henry Irwin
... society it must follow, not antedate, external authority and the cultivation of public opinion, and that time is not yet come. Only the few can be trusted yet to follow their best judgment on all occasions, to be on the alert to maintain in themselves and others highest efficiency. Human nature is slowly in the making. One by one men and women rise to higher levels; social regeneration must therefore wait on individual regeneration. Seeing the need of a dynamic that will create personal worth, the individualist ...
— Society - Its Origin and Development • Henry Kalloch Rowe
... saw the lad push his sister back and come a step or two forward. He made a pretty picture in his white shirt, brown knee-breeches, and little bare legs, the yellow locks about his shoulders, the rapier in his hand, alert ...
— Mr. Kris Kringle - A Christmas Tale • S. Weir Mitchell
... met him also in consultations which took place. Since then I have crossed swords with him too, and always I must confess with keen enjoyment. His knowledge of railway matters was so remarkable, his mind so practiced, alert, and luminous, that it was rare excitement to undergo cross-examination at his hands. In his book, Forty Years at the Bar, he himself says: "I have not had many opportunities of giving evidence, but I confess that when ...
— Fifty Years of Railway Life in England, Scotland and Ireland • Joseph Tatlow
... the principal gates, while the others patrolled the streets shouting, "The city taken! Down with the Papists! A new world!" Hearing this, the Protestants in the city recognised their co-religionists, and the Catholics their opponents: but whereas the former had been warned and were on the alert, the latter were taken by surprise; consequently they offered no resistance, which, however, did not prevent bloodshed. M. de St. Andre, the governor of the town, who during his short period of office had drawn the bitter hatred of ...
— Massacres Of The South (1551-1815) - Celebrated Crimes • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... begin by making sure of old Luis; nor was his expectation disappointed. One night when he had taken his place as usual before the door, and had begun to time his guitar, perceiving that the negro was already on the alert, he put his lips to the key-hole and whispered, "Can you give me a drop of water, Luis? I am dying with ...
— The Exemplary Novels of Cervantes • Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
... by a bit of driftwood and cautiously threw in, his arm extended, his figure alert. The squint on his face took a firmer grip. Suddenly his pole gave a leap, the water splashed, his line sang in the air and a fish went up like a rocket. As we were looking into the treetops it thumped the shore beside him, quivered a moment and flopped down the bank He scrambled ...
— Eben Holden - A Tale of the North Country • Irving Bacheller
... that this weather-beaten hulk was my old messmate Jack Halyard, with whom I've soaked many a hard biscuit, and weathered many a tough gale on old Ocean? and then you used to be as trim in your rigging as the Alert herself; but now it's as full of ends as the old Wilmington brig that we used to crack so many jokes about at Barbadoes. Give me another grip, my hearty, and tell ...
— Select Temperance Tracts • American Tract Society
... Glad of any excuse to stop work, the boy stands statue-still, while Mr. Robin drags from the upturned clods the long, elastic fish-worms, and then with a brief "Chip!" flashes out of sight. Be right still now. Don't move. Here he comes again, and his wife with him. They fly down, he all eager and alert to wait upon her, she whining and scolding. She doesn't think it's much of a place for worms. And there's that boy yonder. He's up to some devilment or other, she just knows. She oughtn't to have come away and left those ...
— Back Home • Eugene Wood
... We'll use that for an advertisement," cried the ever alert showman, slapping his thighs. "Emperor, the performing elephant of the Great Sparling Combined Shows, jailed for assault. Fine, fine! How'll that look in the newspapers? Why, men, it will fill the tent when we get to the next stand, whether we ...
— The Circus Boys on the Flying Rings • Edgar B. P. Darlington
... flying over the water close to us. "Ah! have you found me out, my friends?" exclaimed Captain Bruno, leaping down from the taffrail. "All hands on deck! Swing up the long guns! We must try to wing this fellow before he contrives to clip our feathers." In an instant everybody was alert: tackles were rove, and, in a short time, two long and very heavy guns, with their carriages, were hoisted up from the hold. The guns were quickly mounted and run out, and a brisk fire kept up at the corvette. She also continued to fire, but as to do so with effect she had to yaw each time, ...
— A Voyage round the World - A book for boys • W.H.G. Kingston
... of innovation was already so keenly on the alert, when Elizabeth was surrounded with courtiers still in their first wrath at the promotion of the new 'favourite,' indignant at finding themselves so suddenly overshadowed with the growing honours of one who had risen from a rank beneath their ...
— The Philosophy of the Plays of Shakspere Unfolded • Delia Bacon
... will create, monotony, stupidity, antagonisms cannot come. Her foresight will provide occupations and amusements; her loving and alert diplomacy will fend off disputes. Unconsciously, every member of her family will be as clay in her hands. More anxiously than any statesman will she meditate on the wisdom of each measure, the bearing of each word. The least possible governing which ...
— Bits About Home Matters • Helen Hunt Jackson
... borrow trouble, therefore unqualified personally to oversee the actual management of a cow herd. In repose, Don Lovell was slow, almost dull, but in an emergency was astonishingly quick-witted and alert. He never insisted on temperance among his men, and though usually of a placid ...
— The Log of a Cowboy - A Narrative of the Old Trail Days • Andy Adams
... remember that it was a long time before I fell again into a troubled and restless sleep; and even then only the upper crust of me slept, and underneath there was something that never quite lost consciousness, but lay alert and ...
— Famous Modern Ghost Stories • Various
... upon the alert by the consequences of Major Bridgenorth's embassy, so many points of doubt and delicate discussion were started in succession, that the Lady Peveril, the only person, perhaps, who was desirous of achieving an effectual reconciliation between them, incurred, in reward for her good intentions, ...
— Peveril of the Peak • Sir Walter Scott
... betook herself eventually to T'an Ch'un's quarters, where she discovered the courtyard in perfect stillness. Not a soul was about beyond several maids, matrons and close attendants of the inner rooms, who stood outside the windows on the alert to obey any calls. P'ing Erh stepped into the hall. The two cousins and their sister-in-law were all three engaged in discussing some domestic affairs. They were talking about the feast, to which they had been invited ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book II • Cao Xueqin
... sortie of the 16th April, Sir Sidney Smith kept the besiegers constantly on the alert by landing parties from the ships' boats on the flanks of their lines of trenches. The attacks were sometimes pushed home, the earthworks were overthrown, the fascines carried off for use in the redoubts, guns spiked, and intrenching tools captured, and these attacks ...
— At Aboukir and Acre - A Story of Napoleon's Invasion of Egypt • George Alfred Henty
... had just a little too much secrecy over this business already. For my part, I should like all Europe and America to hear the rights of it." He was a small, wiry, sunburnt man, clean-shaven, with a sharp face and alert manner. ...
— The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes • Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
... air, passes, the goats scrambling ahead alert to steal a carrot or a bite of cabbage from the nearest cart. And when these have passed, the little orgue de Barbarie plays its repertoire of quadrilles and waltzes under your window. It is a very ...
— The Real Latin Quarter • F. Berkeley Smith
... with a howl of demoniacal fury, he made a desperate cut at the unsuspecting Glumm, who was taken so thoroughly by surprise that he made no movement whatever to defend himself. Fortunately. Kettle Flatnose was on the alert, but he had only time to thrust his sword awkwardly between Glumm's head and the descending weapon. The act prevented a fatal gash, but it could not altogether arrest the force of the blow, which fell on the flat of his sword, and beat it down on Glumm's skull so violently ...
— Erling the Bold • R.M. Ballantyne
... his enemies; and few visitors came into his presence, here or elsewhere, who were not to be got the better of, if possible. A life-long habit had accustomed Mr. Flint to treat all men as adversaries until they were proved otherwise. His square, close-cropped head, his large features, his alert eyes, ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... minute, Halstead! Yet I'm thinking of the great danger you'd be running. At this moment Terrero's spies must be plentiful in Rio Janeiro. Why, even every steamer that leaves New York for Brazil may carry his men aboard, alert, watchful and deadly. You don't know what a man like Terrero is like. The constant ...
— The Motor Boat Club and The Wireless - The Dot, Dash and Dare Cruise • H. Irving Hancock
... mind bent upon one subject, and could not bear to think of anything else; in camp and out, he kept his eyes on the alert for subjects suitable for striking pictures with which to embellish his account of the ...
— The Outdoor Chums - The First Tour of the Rod, Gun and Camera Club • Captain Quincy Allen
... goes the wooden Midshipman in these changed days? Why, here he still is, right leg foremost, hard at work upon the hackney coaches, and more on the alert than ever, being newly painted from his cocked hat to his buckled shoes; and up above him, in golden characters, these names shine refulgent, ...
— Dombey and Son • Charles Dickens
... in commerce, where men prey on their kind, must be alive and alert to what is going on, or while he dreams, his competitor will seize upon his birthright. And so you see why poets are poor and ...
— Love, Life & Work • Elbert Hubbard
... Justice" was very willing to do, but Clerk Jobson, alert in his office, pressed that the law should have its course, while Frank himself demanded no better than that the mystery should be cleared up once and ...
— Red Cap Tales - Stolen from the Treasure Chest of the Wizard of the North • Samuel Rutherford Crockett
... of her burden, calm and assured. Two guards, irritated by the oaths and raillery of the workingmen, examined all who entered the gate, handling them roughly and swearing at them. A policeman and a thin-legged man with a red face and alert eyes stood at one side. The mother, shifting the rod resting on her shoulders, with a pail suspended from either end of it, watched the man from the corner of her eye. She divined that ...
— Mother • Maxim Gorky
... interpreter, washerman, and confidential agent for the intercourse of races. Perhaps this very evening, if all went well, I should be introduced to the bride destined to me by mysterious fate. This thought kept my mind on the alert during the panting journey we have been making, the djin and myself, one dragging the other, under the ...
— Madame Chrysantheme • Pierre Loti
... count three, and when I say 'Three', you will open your eyes and come out of the passive state in which you are now. You will come out of it quite naturally, without feeling in the least drowsy or tired, on the contrary, you will feel strong, vigorous, alert, active, full of life; further still, you will feel very cheerful and fit in every way. 'ONE—TWO—THREE—' At the word 'three' the subject opens his eyes, always with a smile and an expression of well-being ...
— Self Mastery Through Conscious Autosuggestion • Emile Coue
... plots, new snares every day. They have sent to Corsica one of the assassins of Georges, a wretch whom the English journals themselves have pointed out to Europe as a blood-thirsty assassin; but let us be on the alert. If he misses me, I won't miss him. I shall send my grenadiers after him, and he shall be shot ...
— Memoirs of the Private Life, Return, and Reign of Napoleon in 1815, Vol. I • Pierre Antoine Edouard Fleury de Chaboulon
... hour or two with the ruddy rustics and 'cute cockneys, the Scotch elders and Anglican curates, the stodgy "Old Gents" and broad-backed, bunchy middle-class matrons, the paunchy port-swigging-buffers, and hungry but alert street-boys, the stertorous cabbies, and chatty 'bus-drivers, the "festive" diners-out and wary waiters, the Volunteers and vauriens, the Artists and 'Arries, the policemen and sportsmen, amidst ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 100, March 21, 1891 • Various
... hastening to its accomplishment Madame Bonaparte and I had contrived a little plot of a more innocent kind. We let no one into our secret, and our 16th Brumaire was crowned with complete success. We had agreed to be on the alert to prevent any fresh exchange of angry words. All succeeded to the utmost of our wishes. The conversation languished during dinner; but it was not dulness that we were afraid of. It turned on the subject of war, and in that vast field Bonaparte's superiority ...
— Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte, v3 • Louis Antoine Fauvelet de Bourrienne
... great relief to Margaret to carry her perplexities to Aunt Faith and talk them over. Mrs. Cheriton's mind and sympathies were as quick and alert as if she were still a young woman, instead of being near the rounding of the completed century. She listened with kindly interest, and her wise and tender words cleared away many of the cobwebs of anxiety that ...
— Three Margarets • Laura E. Richards
... This boy is a stripling of fifteen—slight, and tall of his years. In his face there is as little of amenity as of servility, his eye seems prepared to note any incipient attempt to control or overreach him, and the rest of his features indicate faculties alert for resistance. Wise ushers avoid unnecessary interference with that lad. To break him in by severity would be a useless attempt; to win him by flattery would be an effort worse than useless. He is best let alone. Time will educate ...
— Shirley • Charlotte Bronte
... a certain portion of mankind ever on the alert to see or hear some wonderful thing; whose minds are attuned to a marvellous key, and vibrate with extreme sensitiveness to the slightest touch; whose vital fluid is the air of romance, and whose algebraic symbol is a mark of exclamation! This sentiment, existing in some persons to a greater ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. III, No IV, April 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... sprang to their appointed stations. The long coils of rope were thrown upon the deck and seized by the groups of seamen detailed for the purpose; while the rigging shook under the quick steps of the alert topmen springing up the ratlines, swarming over the tops, and laying out on the yards, without a thought of the giddy elevation, in their intense rivalry each to ...
— For Love of Country - A Story of Land and Sea in the Days of the Revolution • Cyrus Townsend Brady
... viewing the water, the same turbid flood, as, our servant. Even as a skilful tamer will turn the wildest horse into his willing slave, so have we conquered this river and made it the bearer of our burdens. So I thought and wrote at the time; but the wise tamer is ever alert, never lulled into false security. He knows that a heedless move may turn his steed into a deadly, dangerous monster. We ...
— The Arctic Prairies • Ernest Thompson Seton
... the wind now,' said the gentlemen. Every eye was upon the alert, and the carriage within two hundred paces of ...
— Forgotten Tales of Long Ago • E. V. Lucas
... afternoon through beech forests. If the path had been bad before, it was worse now, and it was a perfect marvel how the horses kept their feet. I was somewhat unfortunate in my horse Alat, who was blind in one eye, so that I always had to guide him over difficult places. This kept me for ever on the alert, and became trying. At every hut we pulled up and asked for milk, but invariably got "Nema" (I have none) for an answer. The Montenegrins ...
— The Land of the Black Mountain - The Adventures of Two Englishmen in Montenegro • Reginald Wyon
... There was an alert silence in the Council hall. The white-bearded old man had listened to the messenger. Now he asked a ...
— The Fifth-Dimension Tube • William Fitzgerald Jenkins
... eating supper one evening when four or five coyotes slipped up out of the draw and came close to the shack. Almost one in color with the yellow grass, they stood poised, alert, ready to run at the slightest sound. Graceful little animals, their pointed noses turned upward. A great deal like a collie dog. We did not make a move, but they seemed to sense life in the once deserted cabin, and like a phantom they faded ...
— Land of the Burnt Thigh • Edith Eudora Kohl
... this absence from the crowd in the ante-rooms. In the midst of so much intrigue and continual striving for power, designing men, on the one hand, were ever on the alert for what they imagined would prove willing instruments; and on the other, the Prince's councillors kept a watchful eye on the dispositions of every one of the least consequence; so that, although but twenty-five, Felix was already down ...
— After London - Wild England • Richard Jefferies
... him ascend the steps and turn into his smoking-room. The door closed sharply and a wave of inexplicable relief rushed over her. Her hands were cold. She went to the fireplace and held them out to the blaze. Her ears were alert for sounds from above—alert with a strange fear which choked her with its persistence. She dreaded the opening of her father's door and his footsteps as they crossed to her mother's room. She waited for these sounds, minute after minute, but they did not come. The fire ...
— Jane Cable • George Barr McCutcheon
... from Carlotta's lap and idly parted the rank grass in search of the noisy intruder, and by good luck I found him. I beckoned Carlotta, who glided down, and there, with our heads together and holding our breath, we watched the queerest little love drama imaginable. Our cicada stood alert and spruce, waving his antenna with a sort of cavalier swagger, and every now and then making his corslet vibrate passionately. On the top of a blade of grass sat a brown little Juliet—a most reserved, discreet ...
— The Morals of Marcus Ordeyne • William J. Locke
... issue was causing bitterness; Austen Chamberlain with a minority following was fighting Walter Long to lead the Tories and on this troublesome sea Sir Max Aitken's barque bobbed up and down with the skipper's eyes keenly alert. He saw the possibilities in Bonar Law. When Chamberlain and Long created a deadlock, Beaverbrook advocated Bonar Law as leader of the Tory Party. To make his voice heard more distinctly he purchased the Daily Express and backed his candidate ...
— The Masques of Ottawa • Domino
... impunity; there she could hear the slightest noise through the deep silence which reigned night and day in that dreary house. Like a watch-dog, she slept with one ear open, and took her rest with a mind alert. ...
— Eugenie Grandet • Honore de Balzac
... awaken every ghost in Bramble County and then strode rapidly toward the house. Anderson Crow followed slowly and the rest straggled after, all alert for the ...
— The Daughter of Anderson Crow • George Barr McCutcheon
... straight in, but seemed to twist around more or less. All the while the two boys kept close at the heels of the guide who carried that flaring torch. They watched ahead to detect the first sign of the enemy; and had their ears on the alert with the same ...
— The Saddle Boys in the Grand Canyon - or The Hermit of the Cave • James Carson
... were shrieks from the terrified children and angry exclamations from the nuns. In a second we were all about twenty yards away from the wall, like a group of frightened sparrows flying off to land a little farther away, inquisitive, and very much on the alert. ...
— My Double Life - The Memoirs of Sarah Bernhardt • Sarah Bernhardt
... to say, sir. We shall stay here till dusk, giving the redskins a reminder now and then that we're on the alert; and at last, when we feel that they're coming on for the attack, into the saddles we jump, and steal off till we're out of hearing, and then crawl till we make sure of the trail of ...
— The Peril Finders • George Manville Fenn
... bull of India, in spite of its domestication, has an agile body and a quick, alert ...
— The Human Side of Animals • Royal Dixon
... rams and monitors were fascinating—if a naval architect may be allowed to praise his own work—and as property they were equally divided between the little girl and the small boy. The little girl looked on with alert suspicion from the bed, for she was not yet convalescent enough to be allowed down on the floor. The small boy was busily reciting the phases of the fight, which now approached its climax, and the little ...
— Theodore Roosevelt - An Autobiography by Theodore Roosevelt • Theodore Roosevelt
... Greely, United States Army, and of the party who had been engaged under his command in scientific observations at Lady Franklin Bay. The fleet consisted of the steam sealer Thetis, purchased in England; the Bear, purchased at St. Johns, Newfoundland, and the Alert, which was generously provided by the British Government. Preparations for the expedition were promptly made by the Secretary of the Navy, with the active cooperation of the Secretary of War. Commander George W. Coffin ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various
... linen and Max in striped flannels). Jean's pallor is decorated (there is no other word for it) with blue-grey eyes, black eyebrows, black eyelashes and a little black moustache. He is martial and ardent and alert. But the pallor of Max is unredeemed; it is morbid and profound. It has invaded his whole being. His eyelids and his small sensitive mouth are involved; and his round dark eyes have the queer grey look of some lamentable wonder and amazement. But neither horror nor discipline have spoiled his engaging ...
— A Journal of Impressions in Belgium • May Sinclair
... and grown people stared lazily at me as I passed, but showed no such alert and vivacious curiosity as a community of Yankees would have done. I turned up a street that led me to the castle, which looked very picturesque close at hand,—more so than at a distance, because the towers and walls have not a sufficiently broken outline ...
— Passages From the English Notebooks, Complete • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... character; the same turned-up nose, with a sprightly cleavage at the tip; the same high cheek-bones. The lines of the mouth were crooked; the lips, thick and red. The chin turned sharply upwards. There was an alert, animated look in the brown eyes, to which their pearly whites gave great brightness, and which expressed passions now subdued. His iron-gray hair, the deep wrinkles in his face, the bushy eyebrows that had grown white already, the veins on his protuberant nose, the ...
— The Country Doctor • Honore de Balzac
... was trembling with nervous excitement, a little more and hysterics would set in—they dared not disobey. They left her alone, with a watchful attendant on the alert in the dressing-room. ...
— A Terrible Secret • May Agnes Fleming
... he gallopped back to his place. He sat like a rock; it was something pretty to see. Then came an order, which I could not distinguish; and in an incredibly short time wheels were geared, guns were mounted, and the dismantled condition of everything replaced by the most alert order. The major said it was done very well, and told me how quick it could be done; I forget, but I think he said in much less than a minute; and then I know he wanted to move; but I could not. I held my place still, ...
— Daisy in the Field • Elizabeth Wetherell
... texture, that are apt to accompany red hair when it's yellow, yellow hair when it's red. Her face, with its pensive, quizzical eyes, its tip-tilted nose, its rather large mouth, and the little mocking quirks and curves the lips took, with an alert, arch, witty face; a delicate high-bred face; and withal a somewhat sensuous, emotional face; the face of a woman with a vast deal of humour in her soul; a vast deal of mischief; of a woman who would love to tease you, and mystify you, and lead ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume X (of X) • Various
... warning, in cases of emergency. The Puma of our northern forests, although by no means so terrible a foe as the Leopard, is still a blood-thirsty creature, and while he shuns the gaze of man with the utmost fear, he is nevertheless constantly on the alert to spring upon him unawares, either in an unguarded moment or during sleep. A hungry Puma, who excites suspicion by his stealthy prowling and ominous growl, may easily be led to his destruction at the muzzle of a gun, baited as ...
— Camp Life in the Woods and the Tricks of Trapping and Trap Making • William Hamilton Gibson
... as Lida to love him. He would have loved her in quite a different way, though. Sarudine did not know how to appreciate his good fortune. Lida was pale and silent, looking at no one. Sarudine was gay, and on the alert, like a wild beast that scents its prey. Sanine yawned as usual, ate, drank a good deal of brandy and apparently seemed longing to go to sleep. But when supper was over, he declared his intention of walking home with Sarudine. It was near midnight, ...
— Sanine • Michael Artzibashef
... shall find the biggest scoundrel of them all, no doubt," added mademoiselle, who was alert and cool. ...
— The Isle of Unrest • Henry Seton Merriman
... past midnight when Ann Walden stirred and opened her eyes. Cynthia was alert at once, but the light that shone on the old face revealed an expression which had not rested there for ...
— A Son of the Hills • Harriet T. Comstock
... Mr. Foxcroft was ordained at New Gloucester. We had a pleasant journey home. Mr. L. was alert and kept us all merry. A jolly ordination. ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 1, No. 4, February, 1858 • Various
... conducted in perfect silence, except for an occasional whispered command, while outside, guard was kept by an alert figure, slender and upright, the figure of the aged hostess of the spies, who, it is said, was never visible to the spies and never slept by day or night as long as these men were being sheltered ...
— The Petticoat Commando - Boer Women in Secret Service • Johanna Brandt
... The young woman who controls the sale of miscellaneous goods was alert and smiling behind her counter. Whatever Crossan might be doing she at all events was attending to her business. Godfrey took no notice of her. He led me through the shop to the yard behind it. He pushed open the door of one ...
— The Red Hand of Ulster • George A. Birmingham
... climbed up the rugged bank of the Creek, the towering trees were not the only things that watched silently. Although the happy young mortals were deaf and blind to the many alert curious eyes that followed their movements, still those eyes were there, wondering at this daring trespass over their domains. Some of these wildwood inhabitants were furtively anxious, some hostile, but all were curious to follow the movements ...
— Girl Scouts in the Adirondacks • Lillian Elizabeth Roy
... all this has to be stated here is simply that women, who could state it much better, have almost unanimously refrained from discussing such matters at all. One finds, indeed, a sort of general conspiracy, infinitely alert and jealous, against the publication of the esoteric wisdom of the sex, and even against the acknowledgment that any such body of erudition exists at all. Men, having more vanity and less discretion, area good deal less cautious. There is, in fact, a whole ...
— In Defense of Women • H. L. Mencken
... places merely because, for one reason or another, they attract me. Then, if it happens that I get close enough to the life, I may later find that I have something to write about. A man rarely writes anything convincing unless he has lived the life; not with his critical faculty alert; but whole-heartedly and because, for the time being, it is ...
— When Winter Comes to Main Street • Grant Martin Overton
... lurked under this friendly seeming, and the adventurers were only saved from destruction by the careful vigilance of their leader. At daybreak the following morning, the Indians made a sudden attack upon their guests; the French, however, being thoroughly on the alert, repulsed the assailants, and slew several of the bravest warriors. Infuriated by the treachery of the savages, the victors followed the customs of Indian warfare, and scalped those of the enemy who ...
— The Conquest of Canada (Vol. 1 of 2) • George Warburton
... easy by the intervention of the alert young woman in grey. She caught sight of the restricted adventurers—or one of them, to be quite accurate—and, after speeding a swift smile of astonishment, turned ...
— Truxton King - A Story of Graustark • George Barr McCutcheon
... who darts out upon the car, and seizes a vacant place in it. Presently all the places are taken, and before we reach Temple Street, where helpless groups of women are gathered to avail themselves of the first seats vacated, an alert citizen is stationed before each passenger who is to retire at the summons, "Please pass out forrad." When this is heard in Bowdoin Square, we rise and push forward, knuckling one another's backs in our eagerness, and perhaps glancing behind us at the tumult within. Not only are all our ...
— Suburban Sketches • W.D. Howells
... a storm of indignation and horror, might have lost all dignity and discretion if she had not been checked by reverence for the dumb anguish and misery of her favourite daughter. She had some notion of the thoughts that must pass in Rose's mind, now dull and heavy, now alert and inflicting sudden deep incisions into the quivering soul. Marriage had been to them both very sacred. They hated, beyond most good women, anything that seemed to materialise or lower the ideal. If there can be imagined a scale of standards for the ...
— Great Possessions • Mrs. Wilfrid Ward
... painter had already achieved a daringly suggestive impression in pastels of the familiar night-scene which he now described: the streaming, vivid torches, their rays struggling and drowning in the murky water, glimmering faintly in the windows of the black warehouse barely suggested at the side; the alert, swarming sailors, busy with ropes and tackle; and in the middle the dark, steep leviathan, fresh from the sea-storms, growing, as it were, out of the impenetrable chaos of the foggy background, in which the river-lights gleamed like opals set in ...
— A Comedy of Masks - A Novel • Ernest Dowson and Arthur Moore
... said De Coude; "but yet it will do no harm to be on the alert, and to know that you have made at least one enemy today who never forgets and never forgives, and in whose malignant brain there are always hatching new atrocities to perpetrate upon those who have thwarted or offended him. To say that Nikolas Rokoff is a devil would be to place a ...
— The Return of Tarzan • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... Americans were being swiftly, cozily carried to their new home in litters of oriental comfort and elegance, fanned vigorously from both sides by eager boys. First came the Brownes, eager-faced, bright-eyed, alert young people, far better looking than their new enemies could conscientiously admit under the circumstances; then the lawyer from the States; then a pert young lady in a pink shirt waist and a sailor hat; then two giggling, utterly un-English maids—and all of them lolling in luxurious ...
— The Man From Brodney's • George Barr McCutcheon
... the correct procedure, and the Yanks, watchfully alert to his every move, changed their method and signified their pleasure with the expression of "Trays ...
— "And they thought we wouldn't fight" • Floyd Gibbons
... however, he felt that there was a change in the atmosphere, and he saw by the strained looks and the compressed lips of the men that something desperate was expected. The officers gave their orders with more sternness than usual; every one was alert. ...
— Tommy • Joseph Hocking
... the village of Stony Creek, about nine miles from the British camp at Burlington Heights, with the purpose of attacking and taking the British position next day. But General Vincent was on the alert to obtain information as to the enemy's strength and movements, and dispatched Colonel (afterwards Major-General) Harvey, with two companies, to reconnoitre their camp at Stony Creek, and, from the report received, determined to attack them that ...
— The Loyalists of America and Their Times, Vol. 2 of 2 - From 1620-1816 • Edgerton Ryerson
... wit and the trances of religion. We are to dignify to each other the daily needs and offices of man's life, and embellish it by courage, wisdom and unity. It should never fall into something usual and settled, but should be alert and inventive, and add rhyme and reason ...
— Essays • Ralph Waldo Emerson
... (whether by design or accident cannot be stated) had sped continually in the direction of New Boston, and was dashing down toward that point. The pioneers were on the alert, and the instant they could distinguish pursuers from pursued, they opened on the former, with the result of tumbling several from the backs of their steeds. This so disorganized the hot pursuit that in the flurry of the ...
— In the Pecos Country • Edward Sylvester Ellis (AKA Lieutenant R.H. Jayne)
... that dance away Existence in a summer ray, These gay things, born but to quadrille, The circle of their doom fulfil— (That dancing doom whose law decrees That they should live on the alert toe A life of ups-and-downs, like keys Of Broadwood's in a long concerto:—) While thus the fiddle's spell, within, Calls up its realm of restless sprites. Without, as if some Mandarin Were holding there his Feast of Lights, ...
— The Complete Poems of Sir Thomas Moore • Thomas Moore et al
... call attention to; show; put a mark &c. (sign) 550 upon; call soldiers to "attention"; bring forward &c. (make manifest) 525. Adj. attentive, mindful, observant, regardful; alive to, awake to; observing &c. v.; alert, open-eyed; intent on, taken up with, occupied with, engaged in; engrossed in, wrapped in, absorbed, rapt, transfixed, riveted, mesmerized, hypnotized; glued to (the TV); breathless; preoccupied &c. (inattentive) 458; watchful ...
— Roget's Thesaurus • Peter Mark Roget
... easier than writing about you; which has been my employment of late, at leisure moments,—that is, moments of leisure from idleness, not work. As you partly guessed, I took in hand a Review of Teufelsdrockh—for want of a better Heuschrecke to do the work; and when I have been well enough, and alert enough, during the last fortnight, have tried to set down some notions about Tobacco, Radicalism, Christianity, Assafoetida and so forth. But a few abortive pages are all the result as yet. If my speculations should ever ...
— The Life of John Sterling • Thomas Carlyle
... the words quite clearly and as they fell from his lips the half-breed, partly concealed in the gloom behind him, straightened with the alert quickness of a cat. He leaned forward eagerly, his black eyes gleaming, and then rose softly from his seat. His moccasined feet made no sound as he came up behind Howland. It was the big huskie who first gave a sign of his presence. For a moment the upturned eyes of the young engineer met those ...
— The Danger Trail • James Oliver Curwood
... Never had she felt more isolated amid that ordered beauty which gives a social quality to the very stones and mortar of Paris. All about her were evidences of an artistic sensibility pervading every form of life like the nervous structure of the huge frame—a sensibility so delicate, alert and universal that it seemed to leave no room for obtuseness or error. In such a medium the faculty of plastic expression must develop as unconsciously as any organ in its normal surroundings; to be "artistic" ...
— Crucial Instances • Edith Wharton
... on the grass, his eyes on the glimmering fire, and his ears alert for any sound. But all was still; and he soon fell to picturing the scene at the castle,—Lady De Aldithely and Josceline, mounted for their journey, going out at the postern gate at the head of the train of sumpter mules and attended by the band of serving-men ...
— A Boy's Ride • Gulielma Zollinger
... has succeeded in attaining. The poem may be read with interest as a record of experience without attention to its inner meaning, but its full interest is only felt when this inner meaning is traced, and the moral significance of the incidents of the story apprehended by the alert intelligence. The allegory is the soul of the poem, but like the soul within the body it does not show itself in independent existence. It is, in scholastic phrase, the form of the body, giving to it its special individuality. Thus in order truly to understand and rightly appreciate the poem the ...
— The Divine Comedy, Volume 1, Hell [The Inferno] • Dante Alighieri
... one to another, as if to find answer to the question half formed in his mind, What business can these have with me? He became calm, with every sense on the alert, for the question was succeeded by another, ...
— Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ • Lew Wallace
... weed-grown, floorless room, unplastered, an ancient fireplace, vacant windows, a ruinous staircase; and here, there, and everywhere hung ragged and abandoned cobwebs. They presently entered, softly, with quickened pulses, talking in whispers, ears alert to catch the slightest sound, and muscles tense and ready ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... at him in surprise. He was well dressed, with alert eyes and strong, pleasing face. I had never ...
— The Holladay Case - A Tale • Burton E. Stevenson
... Eagle" poised at ease amid the tossed-up clouds of spray flung from the seething mass of waters, while at her prow stood a woman fair as any fabled goddess—a woman reckless of all danger, and keenly on the alert, with bright eyes searching every nook and cranny that could be discerned through the mist. Clear above the roaring torrent her voice rang like a silver trumpet as she called her instructions to the two men who, equally defying every peril, had ventured on this ...
— The Secret Power • Marie Corelli
... clear moonlight, with fog towards daybreak. A British army of twenty-five thousand men was only some six hundred yards from the American lines. A few miles from the shore lay at anchor a great British fleet with, it is to be presumed, its patrols on the alert. Yet, during that night, ten thousand American troops were marched down to boats on the strand at Brooklyn and, with all their stores, were carried across a mile of water to New York. There must have been the splash of oars and the grating of keels, orders ...
— Washington and his Comrades in Arms - A Chronicle of the War of Independence • George Wrong
... proportion to it, she never had remained. There she was, and she could not get away again. The subtle dexterity which had served her in coming might desert her in returning. Had their senses been on the alert they might have heard ...
— Elster's Folly • Mrs. Henry Wood
... Clara's alert wits perceived that so many private interviews had some signification; and Mrs. Frost found her talking it over with her brother, and conjecturing so much, that granny thought it best to supply the key, thinking, perhaps, that a little jealousy would do Jem no ...
— Dynevor Terrace (Vol. I) - or, The Clue of Life • Charlotte M. Yonge
... was entirely alert. He did not doubt, as he stood there, that he would be caught and delivered and hanged. He, himself, would take no steps to prevent such a catastrophe. He would leave the body there as it was: to-night, to-morrow they would find it,—the rest would follow. ...
— The Prelude to Adventure • Hugh Walpole
... scene that was pictured on the back of his eye. Attention, the direction of the mind to the sensation, is necessary; and it appears that it is very difficult (to some more than to others) to hold the attention alert, and to give it to the unexpected. In fact, to a very large extent we can only "see" (using the word to signify the ultimate mental condition) that which we are prepared to see or that which we expect to see. In the absence ...
— More Science From an Easy Chair • Sir E. Ray (Edwin Ray) Lankester
... as yet formed a part, my poor Mary herself, were forgotten. I thought only of the strong man there perishing; of me in my lusty manhood, in the sharp vigor of my dawning prime, with faculties illimitable, with senses all alert, battling there with physical obstacles which men like myself had brought together for my undoing. The Eternal could never have willed this thing! I could not and I would not perish thus. And I grew strong in insolence of self-trust; and I laughed aloud as I dashed ...
— The Man In The Reservoir • Charles Fenno Hoffman
... a day or two on a matter of business when Virgie's imploring epistle arrived—a circumstance for which his sister was most thankful, for it was no trifling matter for her to be always on the alert to intercept the letters that passed, through the bag at Heathdale. But she had succeeded in accomplishing this by having had an extra key made for the lock and always accompanying the carriage when it ...
— Virgie's Inheritance • Mrs. Georgie Sheldon
... saved—for other men to take care of. And what frauds these women were! All allurement and gentleness till they had entrapped their victims, then fiends of exaction, without sympathy for the big work of men, without interest in the world's problems, alert to ridiculous suspicions, reckless with accusations, incapable of equity, ...
— In a Little Town • Rupert Hughes
... his rifle to his right shoulder. "I'll walk me post in a military manner, keepin' always on the alert and observin' everything that takes place within sight or hearin', accordin' to Gin'ral Order Number Two. There won't be no war unless somebody starts somethin'. Hey, there, buddy, would ye smoke a God's-country cigarette if I ...
— The Pathless Trail • Arthur O. (Arthur Olney) Friel
... waited, muscles tense and brain alert. He even suspended the chewing operation. A dull, padding sound ...
— Dope • Sax Rohmer
... her fortunes must be very rapidly followed by that of his own. By nature bold, unscrupulous, and resourceful, he was not a man to lose the game without playing it out to the very end with all the energy and cunning of which he was capable. Keenly alert to all that passed, he had, from the time that he first heard the rumour of the king's intention, haunted the antechamber and drawn his own conclusions from what he had seen. Nothing had escaped him—the disconsolate faces of monsieur and of the dauphin, the visit ...
— The Refugees • Arthur Conan Doyle
... not so much game here, for the Indians were ever on the alert and the roving bands always on the verge of starvation. But once in a while there was a feast of fresh meat and Mere Dubray made tasty messes for ...
— A Little Girl in Old Quebec • Amanda Millie Douglas
... he could reach Tanis shortly, but once within the capital of the Pharaoh, he was near to Har-hat and within reach of the fan-bearer's potent hand. When he entered the city he must be mentally and physically alert. He had not slept since the last daybreak, and he was weary ...
— The Yoke - A Romance of the Days when the Lord Redeemed the Children - of Israel from the Bondage of Egypt • Elizabeth Miller
... that some mischief was intended against us. We took up our quarters in some buildings which consisted of large halls and inclosed courts, and orders were issued that none of the soldiers were to go out of their quarters, and that all were to be on the alert to guard against surprize. On the soldiers being dismissed to their respective quarters, the Captains Alvarado and De Oli, with some soldiers, among whom I was, went up to the top of a lofty temple, from which we had a commanding view, to observe what was going on in the neighbourhood. ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. IV. • Robert Kerr
... independence! Of course his plumage is firm, his color decided, his wit quick. He understands you at once and tells you so; so does the hawk by his scornful, defiant whir-r-r-r-r. Hardy, happy outlaws, the crows, how I love them! Alert, social, republican, always able to look out for himself, not afraid of the cold and the snow, fishing when flesh is scarce, and stealing when other resources fail, the crow is a character I would not willingly miss from the landscape. I love to see his track in the snow ...
— Winter Sunshine • John Burroughs
... at the beginning He loathed a skulker I'm for a rational Deity Loathing of artifice to raise emotion Nevertheless, inclinations are an infidelity Published Memoirs indicate the end of a man's activity The despot is alert at every issue, to every chance Things were lumpish and gloomy that day of the week We shall want a war to teach the country the value of courage You'll have to guess at half of everything he tells you You're going to be men, meaning ...
— Quotations from the Works of George Meredith • David Widger
... lean man, clad in buckskin like a savage, brown almost as a savage, as active and as alert, seemed to fit not ill with these environments, nor to lack either confidence or contentment. He walked on steadily, following the path along the bayou bank, and at length paused for a moment, throwing down his burden and stooping ...
— The Mississippi Bubble • Emerson Hough
... than the recruits of that drunken martinet to cope with, it would be no hard task to drive them into the sea; but I learned in my prison that horse are expected on the shore with the dawn; there is one they call Dillon, who is on the alert ...
— The Pilot • J. Fenimore Cooper
... their annonae without delay. Think what a life of hardship the soldier leads in those frontier forts for the general peace, thus, as at the gate of the Province, shutting out the entry of the barbarous nations. He must be ever on the alert who seeks to keep out the Barbarians. For fear alone checks these men, whom honour will not ...
— The Letters of Cassiodorus - Being A Condensed Translation Of The Variae Epistolae Of - Magnus Aurelius Cassiodorus Senator • Cassiodorus (AKA Magnus Aurelius Cassiodorus Senator)
... tail thumped the ground, then they felt it stiffen, and were again on the alert. Venning ran his fingers lightly along the jackal's back till he reached the nose, which was pointing straight up. Without a moment's delay he raised ...
— In Search of the Okapi - A Story of Adventure in Central Africa • Ernest Glanville
... and with it carry your bait can half filled with wet moss or soft moist earth. You will find, if the conditions are right, swarms of worms along the edges of beaten paths, or in the short grass alongside. Usually the worm has one end of its body in a hole, and as it is very alert, you must catch it before it has time to think, perhaps I should say, to act. For this purpose the bait gatherers will do better in pairs. One holds the can and lantern, while the other seizes the worm. Always grab the worm at the ...
— Healthful Sports for Boys • Alfred Rochefort
... think nor live; we float along through space in delicious inertia. The air which is bearing us up has made of us all beings which resemble itself, silent, joyous, irresponsible beings, intoxicated by this stupendous flight, peculiarly alert, although motionless. One is no longer conscious of one's flesh or one's bones; one's heart seems to have ceased beating; we have become something indescribable, birds who do not even have ...
— Maupassant Original Short Stories (180), Complete • Guy de Maupassant
... No, I can't say that. It seems to me you've grown more than I have-I don't mean physically, I mean mentally," he explained as he saw her smile in the defensive way a fleshy girl has, alert to ward ...
— Main-Travelled Roads • Hamlin Garland
... like spectators at a performance of a specially hazardous feat, and held their breath. But each was on the alert to rush to Ted's assistance the moment he ...
— Ted Strong's Motor Car • Edward C. Taylor
... a stinging reproof for the maitre d'hotel trembled on his tongue's tip; but that one was busily avoiding his eye on the far side of the table, drawing out a chair for "mademoiselle," while Velasco and the Weringrode were alert to read Lanyard's countenance and forestall any steps he might contemplate in ...
— The False Faces • Vance, Louis Joseph
... keep his pledge to her. He makes him stand up reluctantly. Meanwhile, he who had missed striking him comes at him as fast as he can and, raising his arm again, expects to split his head to the teeth with the axe. But the other, alert to defend himself, thrusts the knight toward him in such a way that he receives the axe just where the shoulder joins the neck, so that they are cleaved apart. Then the knight seizes the axe, wresting it quickly from him who ...
— Four Arthurian Romances - "Erec et Enide", "Cliges", "Yvain", and "Lancelot" • Chretien de Troyes
... scene grows dark as they sit. Their eyes are full of tears. Presently one looks up, listening, then another, then another. They are all alert.] ...
— Helen Redeemed and Other Poems • Maurice Hewlett
... to subject themselves to the danger, almost the certainty, of dropping off, and getting drowned; and, notwithstanding their need of sleep, increased by fatigue, and the necessity of keeping constantly on the alert,—up to that moment not one of them had obtained any. The thrill of pleasure that passed through their frames as they felt their feet upon terra firma for a moment aroused them. But the excitement could not be sustained. ...
— The Boy Slaves • Mayne Reid
... as much on the alert as her sister. She had been for the last six months her mother's pet, as Sarah Jane had been her father's darling. There was some excuse, therefore, for Maryanne when she endeavoured to get what she could in the scramble. Sarah Jane played the part of Goneril ...
— The Struggles of Brown, Jones, and Robinson - By One of the Firm • Anthony Trollope
... long," she rejoined, taking the stairs at a rate that shewed she meant what she said. Like no client at law that ever sought his lawyer's chambers, on any errand. Before Mr. Inchbald had reached the first landing, she was posted before the desired door, and had tapped there with very alert fingers. Winthrop opened ...
— Hills of the Shatemuc • Susan Warner
... father would pay you anything in reason." Her throat was parched, but her eyes were hard and bright. No lithe young panther of the forest could have been more alert than she. ...
— The Sheriff's Son • William MacLeod Raine
... gray-haired, capable-looking Irishwoman, in a dress of dark-blue duck, with a white collar and white cuffs, heard a warming, big voice, and caught a ready and infectious smile. In all the surrounding confusion Mrs. O'Connor was calm and alert; so normal in manner and speech indeed that merely watching her had the effect of suddenly cooling Susan's blood, of reducing her whirling thoughts to something like their old, sane basis. Travel was nothing to Mrs. O'Connor; farewells ...
— Saturday's Child • Kathleen Norris
... Then his natural love of adventure blazed up once more. His moment of weakness had passed. The thrill was in his blood, his nerves were tightened. He was ready for what might come, seemingly still half asleep, yet, indeed, with every sense of intuition and observation keenly alert. ...
— Peter Ruff and the Double Four • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... colours shew, he 's in a glow, Like the stubble of the barley. Onward, gallants! onward speed ye, Flower and bulwark of the Gael; Like your flag-silks be ye ruddy, Rosy-red, and do not quail. Fearless, artless, hawk-eyed, courteous, As your princely strain beseems, In your hands, alert for conflict, While the Spanish weapon gleams.— Sweet the flapping of the bratach,[143] Humming music to the gale; Stately steps the youthful gaisgeach,[144] Proud the banner staff to bear. A slashing weapon on his ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel, Volumes I-VI. - The Songs of Scotland of the Past Half Century • Various
... other places of business. Some of such places give one an air of confidence and trust; others create a feeling of suspicion and distrust; some convey an impression of active, wideawake management, while others impress one as being behind the times, and suffering from a want of alert, active management. These differing mental atmospheres are caused by the different prevailing mental attitudes of the owners of the respective establishments. The managers of business places send forth thought-waves of their own, and their employees naturally falling into ...
— Genuine Mediumship or The Invisible Powers • Bhakta Vishita
... His alert faculties of observation belied the leisurely manner of his approach to the main street. He was a keen-strung, watching, listening machine. The lighting and smoking of a cigarette was mechanical pretense—he ...
— Valley of Wild Horses • Zane Grey
... come with the coroner, had said little but had listened to all. Occasionally he would dart from the room, and return a few moments later, scribbling in his notebook. He was an alert little man, with beady black eyes and ...
— Vicky Van • Carolyn Wells
... lively, cheerful, sociable race, and on the very best of terms with the Nutcracker Grays. Young Tip Chipmunk, the oldest son, was in all respects a perfect contrast to Master Featherhead. He was always lively and cheerful, and so very alert in providing for the family, that old Mr. and Mrs. Chipmunk had very little care, but could sit sociably at the door of their hole and chat with neighbours, quite sure that Tip would bring everything out right for them, and have ...
— Queer Little Folks • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... looking towards the aperture in the roof what was our astonishment at beholding the faces of two Indians, calmly surveying us in the quiet occupation of their abode. In an instant we shouted—"The Indians!" and in a moment every one was on the alert, and each taking his arms rushed to the door—not a creature was to be seen; in vain we looked around;—no trace, save the marks of footsteps on the snow, was to be discovered, but these seemed almost innumerable. We fired about a dozen shots into the woods, and then retired to our dwelling. —— ...
— Lecture On The Aborigines Of Newfoundland • Joseph Noad
... cove, (which is of circular form) as if jealous of a descent in those parts; they appear very numerous, and may amount to about one thousand six hundred men, besides their cavalry, who are cloathed in blue, and mounted on neat horses of different colours; they seem very alert, parading and counter marching between the woods on the heights in their rear, and their breastworks, in order to make their number show to the greater advantage. The lands all around us are high and commanding, which gave the enemy an opportunity ...
— Picturesque Quebec • James MacPherson Le Moine
... two shells from our guns. Everyone was alert. I sprang to my camera. Two men were standing by me, ready to take down the screen. Boom came another shell, and at a sign the men dropped ...
— How I Filmed the War - A Record of the Extraordinary Experiences of the Man Who - Filmed the Great Somme Battles, etc. • Lieut. Geoffrey H. Malins
... felt, rather than heard, hasty, heavy footsteps on the bank above me. As soon as I knew anything clearly, I knew that the tree had been pulled away, and that Alaric was bending over me. He had, with ears alert for any sound, and with footsteps kept as near to me as they might be with obedience to my order, come rushing to my aid at the sound at my first revolver-shot. But the distance was so great that he did not arrive until my fight ...
— The Junior Classics Volume 8 - Animal and Nature Stories • Selected and arranged by William Patten
... sentiment. It is obvious now that, in the midst of all this agitation about other matters, Mr. Calhoun and the South Carolinians never lost sight of the conflict for which they were preparing, and that they were on the alert to bring nullification to the front in a more menacing and pronounced fashion than ...
— Daniel Webster • Henry Cabot Lodge
... was good to hear the rich old tongue again. I smiled, and the foreman of the leprechauns—if that's what he was—saw me smile and became stiff and alert for a moment, as though suspecting that perhaps I actually could see him. Then he shrugged and turned away, clearly deeming ...
— Houlihan's Equation • Walt Sheldon
... Clemens' used to say later that the Paige type-setter would do everything that a human being could do except drink and swear and go on a strike. He might properly have omitted the last item, but of that later. Paige was a small, bright-eyed, alert, smartly dressed man, with a crystal-clear mind, but a dreamer and a visionary. Clemens says of him: "He is a poet; a most great and genuine poet, whose sublime creations are written ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine
... brags about it. Guthrie bribed him, and I've got enough left to give Stitz and Guthrie a good shot. I'll leave Skinner and Miss Briggs out, but I'll go for Stitz and Guthrie. I'll show them that in Kilo the press is alert, wide awake, and not to be trifled with. I'll ...
— Kilo - Being the Love Story of Eliph' Hewlitt Book Agent • Ellis Parker Butler
... marriage, when a thoughtless girl, with a drunken, dissolute boy; the quarrels, brutal beatings; the haste to secure a divorce; the contamination of the crowded hotels in Heron Lake, where this slender young girl—naturally pure, alert, quick of impulse—was like a lamb among lustful wolves. His heart ached ...
— Other Main-Travelled Roads • Hamlin Garland
... the iron pot, he filled it with fresh water. All the while he moved soundlessly, and Paul's deep, peaceful slumber was not disturbed. He took on for the time many of the qualities that he had learned from his Indian captors. Every sense was alert, attuned to hear the slightest sound that might come from the forest, to feel, in fact, any alien presence as it ...
— The Forest Runners - A Story of the Great War Trail in Early Kentucky • Joseph A. Altsheler
... tremendous war whoop and from the woods on the other side of the ice came an answering whoop. He was trapped between them, and they could afford to be deliberate. His heart sank, but as usual his courage came back in an instant, stronger than ever. Alert, resourceful, the best marksman in all the West, he did not mean to be taken or slain, and he looked about for the means of defense. As it was not a lake, upon the frozen surface of which he stood, merely ...
— The Eyes of the Woods - A story of the Ancient Wilderness • Joseph A. Altsheler
... May, at that hour when Hyde Park is fullest, and the carriages move slowly in triple rank along the Lady's Mile, and the mounted constables jog up and down with a business-like air which sets every one on the alert for the advent of the Princess of Wales, just at that hour when Lesbia sat in Lady Kirkbank's barouche, and distributed gracious bows and enthralling smiles to her numerous acquaintance, Mary rode slowly down the Fell, after a rambling ride on the safest and most venerable of mountain ponies. The ...
— Phantom Fortune, A Novel • M. E. Braddon
... to help the class on the hard points not only in assigning the lesson, but also in the recitation. The alert teacher will in almost every recitation discover some points which the class have failed to understand or master fully. It is the overlooking of such half-mastered points as these that leaves weak places in the pupil's knowledge and brings trouble to him later on. These ...
— The Recitation • George Herbert Betts
... conditions that exist in our rural schools and outlines only such plans and schemes as can be carried out, even in adverse circumstances, by alert trustees, sympathetic inspectors, ...
— Ontario Teachers' Manuals: Household Science in Rural Schools • Ministry of Education Ontario
... safety. And how could he gain the open country? If he succeeded in reaching one of the gates—St. Antoine, or St. Denis, in itself a task of difficulty—it would only be to find the gate closed, and the guard on the alert. At last it flashed on him that he might cross the river; and at the notion hope awoke. It was possible that the massacre had not extended to the southern suburb; possible, that if it had, the Huguenots who lay there—Frontenay, and Montgomery, and Chartres, with the ...
— Count Hannibal - A Romance of the Court of France • Stanley J. Weyman
... cold day. We kept on our overcoats and hats. Middle-sized and spare, his eyes alert in a long, Roman-nosed countenance, X walked on his neat little feet, with short steps, and looked at my collection intelligently. I hope I looked at him intelligently, too. A snow-white moustache and imperial made his nutbrown complexion ...
— A Set of Six • Joseph Conrad
... all vigilant. It was the first time that the Sussex lads had been in face of an enemy, and the stillness of the night, the sombre forest in front of them, and the possibility of a savage and unknown foe lurking there, kept them thoroughly on the alert. Once or twice Wulf and Osgod went forward to examine some bush that had seemed to the imagination of a sentry to have moved, but in each case the alarm ...
— Wulf the Saxon - A Story of the Norman Conquest • G. A. Henty
... poisoned. What was the dwarf doing in the tree with a bow and poisoned arrow, she wondered? Suddenly a sound seemed to strike her ear, the sound of a man's footsteps walking over grass, and she perceived that the figure of the dwarf, crouched upon the bough, became tense and alert, and that his fingers tightened upon the bow-string until the blood was driven from their yellow tips. Following the glance of his wicked black eyes, she saw advancing through the shadow a tall man clad in a dark ...
— Elissa • H. Rider Haggard
... a dash for him, but the stranger was agile and alert, and ran swiftly away and out of the ...
— Patty and Azalea • Carolyn Wells
... seemed to him a good deal like playing at soldiers. Even when the distant sound of the big guns and the rattle of small arms touched his ear, the slumber of unbelief was only broken—not quite dispelled. But now, weighted with the deadly missiles, with rifle in hand, with ears alert to every sound, and eyes open to every object that might present itself on the sandy waste beyond the redoubt, and a general feeling of expectancy pervading his thoughts and feelings, he became clearly convinced that the recent past was no flight of the imagination—that he was in ...
— Blue Lights - Hot Work in the Soudan • R.M. Ballantyne
... There is something very melancholy and very ludicrous in all this, and though that great bull calf the public does not care about such things, and is content to roar when he is bid, there are those on the alert who will turn such trilling and folly to account, and convert what is half ridiculous into something all serious. Winchelsea and Newcastle after all did not vote the other night; they said they wanted no evidence, that they would have no such Bill, and would not meddle with the discussion ...
— The Greville Memoirs - A Journal of the Reigns of King George IV and King William IV, Vol. III • Charles C. F. Greville
... self-development. If he has not these three qualifications he will make but little progress; but, fortunately, any lacking quality can be evolved and if one does not possess these three necessities his first work is to create them. These three things are an ardent desire, an iron will and an alert intelligence. Why are these three qualifications essential to success and what purpose ...
— Self-Development and the Way to Power • L. W. Rogers
... to slowly ascend the hill, the sheriff close on his heels, alert, tingling, and watchful of every movement. For a few moments this strain upon his faculties seemed to invigorate him, and his gloom relaxed, but presently it became too evident that the prisoner's pinioned arms made it ...
— The Bell-Ringer of Angel's and Other Stories • Bret Harte
... hops brought it opposite to my post of observation. Here it halted as though it seemed to see me. At any rate it sat up in the alert fashion that hares have, its forepaws hanging absurdly in front of it, with one ear, on which there was a grey blotch, cocked and one dragging, and sniffed with its funny little nostrils. Then it began ...
— The Mahatma and the Hare • H. Rider Haggard
... herd of swine who surrounded them. Pamela, Harriet Byron, Clarissa, Amelia, and Sophia Western were all equally delightful, and it was not the negative charm of the innocent and colourless woman, the amiable doll of the nineteenth century, but it was a beauty of nature depending upon an alert mind, clear and strong principles, true womanly feelings, and complete feminine charm. In this respect our rival authors may claim a tie, for I could not give a preference to one set of these perfect creatures over another. The plump little printer and the worn-out ...
— Through the Magic Door • Arthur Conan Doyle
... by Mr. Gwynn," explained Richard, with an alert mendacity which would have done honor, to Senator Hanway himself, "that he will hold anything short of calling upon you once a day as barefaced ...
— The President - A novel • Alfred Henry Lewis
... picturesque group they made, as the moonlight streamed white and clear into their swarthy faces, and glittered upon the metallic ornaments about their persons and the polished blades of their long spears. Their high cheek-bones, bold, alert eyes, and straight, coal-black hair, suggested an intimate relationship with our own Indians; but the resemblance went no further. Most of their faces wore an expression of bold, frank honesty, which is not ...
— Tent Life in Siberia • George Kennan
... came to pass that in the Sunday Advocate-Times, under a picture of Dr. Drew at his earnestest, with eyes alert, jaw as granite, and rustic lock flamboyant, appeared an inscription—a wood-pulp tablet ...
— Babbitt • Sinclair Lewis
... usually gravely absorbed in himself. The excessive gravity of the American in khaki has astonished the men of the other armies who feel that, life being uncertain, it is well to make as genial a use of it as possible while it lasts. The soldier from the U.S.A. seems to stand always restless, alert, alone, listening—waiting for the call to come. He doesn't sink into the landscape the way other troops have done. His impatience picks him out—the impatience of a man in France solely for one purpose. I have seen him thus a thousand times, standing at street-corners, in the crowd but not of ...
— Out To Win - The Story of America in France • Coningsby Dawson
... forgotten and extirpated in the busy and active? I walk twenty miles in an indolent and half determined temper and am extremely fatigued. I walk twenty miles full of ardour, and with a motive that engrosses my soul, and I come in as fresh and as alert as when I began my journey. Emotion excited by some unexpected word, by a letter that is delivered to us, occasions the most extraordinary revolutions in our frame, accelerates the circulation, ...
— An Essay on the Principle of Population • Thomas Malthus
... also joined by the Margrave of Baden. The courage of the count palatine revived, and he labored assiduously to arouse his Protestant brethren. Meanwhile, the generals of the emperor were on the alert, and the rising hopes of Frederic were dissipated by the victories of Tilly. The count palatine was again driven from his hereditary dominions, and sought refuge ...
— A Modern History, From the Time of Luther to the Fall of Napoleon - For the Use of Schools and Colleges • John Lord
... whipped child, his lips muttering something indistinguishable. The Sergeant, satisfied, turned and floundered through the drifts to the bank of the stream. He was alert and fearful, yet determined. No matter what danger of discovery might threaten, he must build a fire to save Carroll's life. The raging storm was not over with; there was no apparent cessation of violence in the blasts of the icy wind, and the ...
— Molly McDonald - A Tale of the Old Frontier • Randall Parrish
... was he must have been alert, alive, for now, suddenly, he broke his moody reverie at some sound which he heard on ahead. He reined in for just an instant, then loosed the bridle and leaned forward. The horse under him sprang forward in ...
— The Magnificent Adventure - Being the Story of the World's Greatest Exploration and - the Romance of a Very Gallant Gentleman • Emerson Hough
... following day, at the appointed hour, Kai Lung was again led before the Mandarin Shan Tien. To the alert yet downcast gaze of the former person it seemed as if the usually inscrutable expression of that high official was not wholly stern as it moved in his direction. Ming-shu, on the contrary, disclosed all ...
— Kai Lung's Golden Hours • Ernest Bramah
... leading members of the Committee on Appropriations. His committee work therefore covers a wide range of subjects. Never has he been known to fail in the performance of his duties in all these connections. Moreover, he is a constant attendant upon the sessions of the Senate, and one of the most alert of its members. Apparently, often, he is impulsive and explosive, and occasionally under the excitement of debate says what seems to be a harsh thing. If, however, his manner is indicative of feeling, such a feeling, like ...
— Fifty Years of Public Service • Shelby M. Cullom
... Cul-de-Sac, where no white influence reaches. No one who knew Haitian conditions doubted that revenge would be sought for Charlemagne's death, and all through the winter of 1919-1920, the Marines were on the alert ...
— Plotting in Pirate Seas • Francis Rolt-Wheeler
... cotton becoming a prominent industry in New England at this time, the alert mind of Daniel Anthony conceived the idea of building a factory and using the waters of Tophet brook and of a rapid little stream which flowed through the Read farm. This was done, and proved a success from the beginning. A document is still in existence by ...
— The Life and Work of Susan B. Anthony (Volume 1 of 2) • Ida Husted Harper
... midnight. But he could tell nothing of the ship's course. He turned the subject over in his mind as he lay on his bunk in that peculiar state half-way between sickness and health, when the body is relaxed by a purely accidental illness and the mind is abnormally alert. He wished intensely for a bath, a shave, and a fair complement of clothes. He longed also to go up the hatchway for a breath of air, and was considering the possibility of doing this later, with a blanket and darkness for a shield, when he became conscious of ...
— The Stolen Singer • Martha Idell Fletcher Bellinger
... daybreak. They now followed the stream down the valley until they came to a small wood. Here they lay down to rest, one being planed upon the lookout. Two hours later the sentry awoke them with the news that a party of men were coming op the valley. All were at once upon the alert. ...
— Friends, though divided - A Tale of the Civil War • G. A. Henty
... was very much alert just then. It was as though some hidden monitor within me had taken control to guide me through a maze of unknown dangers. It was that inner prompting which had forbidden me to say ...
— Jacqueline of Golden River • H. M. Egbert
... ci-devant Colonel was on full retreat for Scotland, carrying off poor Julia along with him. I understand from those who conduct the heavy baggage that he takes his winter quarters at a place called Woodbourne, in —-shire in Scotland. He will be all on the alert just now, so I must let him enter his entrenchments without any new alarm. And then, my good Colonel, to whom I owe so many grateful thanks, pray ...
— Guy Mannering, or The Astrologer, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott
... please them all for the sake of the past and present friendship. But she had a doubt of Mrs. Underhill's approval. She might give in as she had to Delia; and now she had really begun to find virtues in Ben's wife. But with Jim's brilliant nature always on the alert for amusement, she, Daisy, would be worn out trying to keep up ...
— A Little Girl of Long Ago • Amanda Millie Douglas
... straightened up, tense and alert. He had no desire, very far from any desire to be caught here, or to figure publicly in any way in the case. The street door had opened and closed again. Footsteps, those of three men, his acute, trained hearing told him, sounded on the stairs. Again there came that queer, ...
— The Further Adventures of Jimmie Dale • Frank L. Packard
... of wine at dinner had been, like Mr. Poe's conversation with his soul, "serious and sober." In the cellar no drop had passed our mouths. I was alert as a lark when I entered: I came out in a ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. XII. No. 30. September, 1873 • Various
... see two or three Federal cruisers lying anchored off the outer bar, just out of reach of the guns of shore-batteries. It was a service of no little danger for the blue-jackets. The enemy were ever on the alert to break the blockade by destroying the ships with torpedoes. Iron-clad rams were built on the banks of the rivers, and sent down to sink and destroy the vessels whose watchfulness meant starvation to the Confederacy. The "Albemarle" and the "Merrimac" were ...
— The Naval History of the United States - Volume 2 (of 2) • Willis J. Abbot
... and pleasantly engaged in eating that he paid no heed to the aspect of the sky. Nor, indeed, was there anything of very serious import in its changes. But Henry Burns, alert as ever, saw certain signs of wind in some light banks of cloud that began to gather in the western sky, in the ...
— The Rival Campers Ashore - The Mystery of the Mill • Ruel Perley Smith
... energetic boy, had coal black hair and bright, black eyes which looked out upon the world with the alert glance of a squirrel ...
— Pixy's Holiday Journey • George Lang
... the Prime Minister in the British Parliament ignores the attacks of the lesser men. Gladstone could not ignore Lloyd George. He had to answer him. Sometimes he condescended to berate him, much to the enjoyment of the assembly. Lloyd George always came up unhurt, alert, ...
— Lloyd George - The Man and His Story • Frank Dilnot
... axiomatic truths, it is certain that our highest conception of truth must be taken as our only and necessary guide; but, knowing the variable part of our judgment, and knowing how very likely we are to be mistaken in our "think so's" and "feel so's," we should ever be on the alert to verify or rectify our convictions by the help of experience and facts. The question as to how much of our intellectual power is intuitive and innate, or how much is acquired and dependent upon truth learned by ...
— To Infidelity and Back • Henry F. Lutz
... be constantly on the alert, and my impatience and perplexity may be imagined as hours elapsed and there were still no signs of my approaching deliverance. The storm had long since passed over, and darkness was settling down when I again felt a pull at the rope, and continued ...
— Lippincott's Magazine Of Popular Literature And Science, April 1875, Vol. XV., No. 88 • Various
... her eyes shone with a malice I knew already. It meant that she had heard some scandal about one of her friends, and the instinct of the literary woman was all alert. ...
— The Moon and Sixpence • W. Somerset Maugham
... his full height, thin, venomous, alert, rather enjoying the encounter, which "let off the steam" of ...
— Sir George Tressady, Vol. I • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... especially in medicine. Denial may be given to this statement, nevertheless it is true, and I have had practical exemplification of it in my own experience. Observation is perhaps more powerful an organon than either experiment or empiricism. If the eye is always watching, and the mind on the alert, ultimately chance ...
— The Story of My Heart • Richard Jefferies
... hands full of business. As the mare had been deprived of an opportunity to kick him, by the suddenness with which he sprang upon her back, she concluded to try her next favorite line of strategy and shake him off. So down went her head and up went her heels, and, had he been less on the alert, he must have gone to earth; but, with his knees dug into her sides as if they were the opposite jaws of a vice, for every jerk of her head down he gave one with the reins up, and at each jerk the hoe-handle gave her a rap over the ...
— Sword and Pen - Ventures and Adventures of Willard Glazier • John Algernon Owens
... squads of six, not reckoning in either Jacob or me, and these he gave stations at different points within a mile of the settlement, cautioning every one to be on the alert, for now had come the time when it was possible for them to prove the value of the Minute Boys as soldiers. It was to be their duty, by night as well as by day, to keep careful watch lest the Indians ...
— The Minute Boys of the Mohawk Valley • James Otis
... character. I am not here concerned so much with the exact nature of these troubles as I am with the avoidable errors in the management of sick childhood. If I can make the mother more thoughtfully alert, less disposed to terror and exaggeration, less liable to be led by her emotions, I shall have fulfilled my purpose without such discussion as is out of ...
— Doctor and Patient • S. Weir Mitchell
... this door was a single sheet of plate-glass into which a man might well have walked, and I can still see Raffles in full-length silhouette upon a panel of palms and tree-ferns. I see the silhouette grow tall and straight again before my eyes, the door open, and Raffles listening with an alert lift of the head. I, too, hear something, an elfin hiss, a fairy fusillade, and then the sudden laugh with which Raffles rejoined us in ...
— Mr. Justice Raffles • E. W. Hornung
... Jackson, equally alert, but having a longer distance to march from the extreme right along the military road, arrived about eight A.M., took command, and, as was his wont, ordered an immediate advance, throwing Owens's regiment of ...
— The Campaign of Chancellorsville • Theodore A. Dodge
... during the exit, placed himself at the bottom of the great staircase. He had enlisted two of his friends. "Come," he had said to them, "I will show you the most beautiful woman in Paris." While he was speaking, two steps away from the prince was an alert young man who was attached to a morning paper, a very widely-read paper. The young man had sharp ears, he caught on the fly the phrase of the Prince Agenor, whose high social position he knew; he succeeded in keeping close to ...
— Parisian Points of View • Ludovic Halevy
... toward the communicator controls unhappily, then reached out and dialed a number. The sphere lit and an alert face looked at ...
— Indirection • Everett B. Cole
... had been sleeping he did not know, when suddenly he found himself awake and alert. Something had aroused him, and he sat up and listened. For a time he heard nothing, save the heavy breathing of Skipper Zeb and Toby, and he was about to lie down again when there came the sound of footsteps in the slightly crusted snow ...
— Left on the Labrador - A Tale of Adventure Down North • Dillon Wallace
... sent him into the trees again—into the lower terrace where he could watch the ground below and catch with ears and nose the first intimation of actual contact with his quarry. Nor was it long before the ape-man came upon Bara standing alert at the edge of a moon-bathed clearing. Noiselessly Tarzan crept through the trees until he was directly over the deer. In the ape-man's right hand was the long hunting knife of his father and in his heart the blood lust of the carnivore. Just for an instant he poised above the unsuspecting ...
— Tarzan and the Jewels of Opar • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... at every third step, the even numbers turning to the one hand, the odd to the other hand, alternately, and all stamping together as they complete the turn at each third step. The turning to right and left symbolises the alert guarding of the heads which are supposed to be carried by the ...
— The Pagan Tribes of Borneo • Charles Hose and William McDougall
... because nobody is strong and clever enough to rearrange it. Their experience of it is a satisfactory experience. On the other hand, the better off one is, the wider is one's outlook and the more alert one is to see the risks and dangers of international dissensions. Travel and talk to foreigners open one's eyes to aggressive possibilities; history and its warnings become conceivable. It is in the nature of things ...
— The Research Magnificent • H. G. Wells
... "there is not much to fear from that fellow!" and he resolutely descended, eyes alert, pistol in hand. Halfway down, he stopped in amazement, for the front door swung wide open. But at last he finished the descent ...
— The Destroyer - A Tale of International Intrigue • Burton Egbert Stevenson
... description. Few steps sufficed to conduct us to the small room, or entrance-hall, into which the debtor's door opens, and from this we saw the ladder which the criminals were to ascend, and the scaffold on which they were to die. I was on the alert to detect any sudden emotion which this spectacle might cause, but could not perceive that it had the slightest effect. The minds of the sufferers had been so prepared, that a partial view of the machine to which they were being ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction. - Volume 10, No. 271, Saturday, September 1, 1827. • Various
... so busily and pleasantly engaged in eating that he paid no heed to the aspect of the sky. Nor, indeed, was there anything of very serious import in its changes. But Henry Burns, alert as ever, saw certain signs of wind in some light banks of cloud that began to gather in the western sky, in the direction ...
— The Rival Campers Ashore - The Mystery of the Mill • Ruel Perley Smith
... interview at Ashbourne, Johnson seemed to be more uniformly social, cheerful, and alert, than I had almost ever seen him. He was prompt on great occasions and on small. Taylor, who praised every thing of his own to excess; in short, 'whose geese were all swans,' as the proverb says, expatiated on the excellence of his bull-dog, which, he told us, was 'perfectly well ...
— The Life Of Johnson, Volume 3 of 6 • Boswell
... the album and the potent invigorator that was to make a new man of Judge Penniman. His impoverished brother carried the blue jay, looking alert and lifelike in the open, the mammoth orange, gift for Mrs. Penniman—he had nearly forgotten her—and tenderly he led the dog, Frank. Not to have all his money again would he have parted with his treasures and the memory of supreme delights. Not for all his squandered ...
— The Wrong Twin • Harry Leon Wilson
... conversation, for each took his position behind the tree barricade with all senses alert for any indications ...
— The Boy Chums in the Forest - or Hunting for Plume Birds in the Florida Everglades • Wilmer M. Ely
... even noses and ears in immediate jeopardy. Mr. Carleton had contrived to procure a comfortable wrapper for Mrs. Renney, from a Yankee, who, for the sake of being a "warm man" as to his pockets, was willing to be cold otherwise for a time. The rest of the great-coats and cloaks, which were so alert and erect a little while ago, were doubled up on every side in all sorts of despondent attitudes. A dull quiet brooded over the assembly, and Mr. Carleton walked up and down the vacant space. Once he caught ...
— Queechy, Volume II • Elizabeth Wetherell
... ignorance, poverty, and vice, could not be restrained to rational action. But the world will recover from the panic of this first catastrophe. Science is progressive, and talents and enterprise on the alert. Resort may be had to the people of the country, a more governable power from their principles and subordination; and rank and birth and tinsel-aristocracy will finally shrink into insignificance, even there. This, however, we have ...
— Memoir, Correspondence, And Miscellanies, From The Papers Of Thomas Jefferson - Volume I • Thomas Jefferson
... that, According to Isidore (Etym. x), a man is said to be solicitous through being shrewd (solers) and alert (citus), in so far as a man through a certain shrewdness of mind is on the alert to do whatever has to be done. Now this belongs to prudence, whose chief act is a command about what has been already counselled and judged in matters of action. Hence the Philosopher says ...
— Summa Theologica, Part II-II (Secunda Secundae) • Thomas Aquinas
... he originally offered to the world his interpretation of dreams was as circumstantial as a legal record to be pondered over by scientists at their leisure, not to be assimilated in a few hours by the average alert reader. In those days, Freud could not leave out any detail likely to make his extremely novel thesis evidentially acceptable to those willing ...
— Dream Psychology - Psychoanalysis for Beginners • Sigmund Freud
... certain critics who had complained of the lack of dramatic power in his tragedies, I said, "Be it allowed that he has little dramatic power, and that (since the poem professed to be a tragedy) dramatic power was what you reasonably looked for. But an alert critic, considering the work of a beginner, will have an eye for the bye-strokes as well as the main ones: and if the author, while missing the main, prove effective with the bye—if Mr. Hosken, while failing ...
— Adventures in Criticism • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... question, and drove his points well home. And yet he did not seem to be in the field best adapted for his peculiar gifts. He was too judicial, too reluctant to put a good face upon a bad cause, not enough of a rhetorician, and not sufficiently alert in changing front, or able to handle topics with the lightness of touch suitable to the peculiar tastes of a parliamentary Committee. Thus, though he invariably commanded respect, he failed to show the ...
— The Life of Sir James Fitzjames Stephen, Bart., K.C.S.I. - A Judge of the High Court of Justice • Sir Leslie Stephen
... thinking what a mistake he had made in his conception of the stage directions for the short dialogue scene which he had insisted on his entourage producing.—"Empire- Builder, generous, human, alert, expansive, and full-blooded. Publicist, dry, thin-lipped, pedantic, opinionative, hard." That was what he, no doubt, expected of the cast. In a word, his attempt to fascinate lacked polish. It was clumsy, almost ...
— The Adventure of Living • John St. Loe Strachey
... Unionists would neglect no means of blowing up the Albemarle, the Confederates used every possible precaution. At the wharf in Plymouth, where she was moored, a thousand soldiers were on guard, and her crew, consisting of sixty men, were alert and vigilant. To prevent the approach of a torpedo boat, the ram was surrounded by a boom of cypress logs, placed a considerable distance from the hull, and a double line of sentries was stationed along the river. What earthly chance ...
— Dewey and Other Naval Commanders • Edward S. Ellis
... he ever preached. He was very ill indeed for several days, but still hopeful and cheerful; and as the weather mended, and the calm brightness of October set in, he rallied, and came downstairs again, not looking many degrees more wan and hectic than before, with a mind as alert as usual, and his kind heart much gratified by the many attentions of his parishioners ...
— The Pillars of the House, V1 • Charlotte M. Yonge
... introduced, and the frauds by which in most cases they were swindled out of the profits of them by the capitalists through whom their introduction was obtained. These stories seem, indeed, well-nigh incredible nowadays, when the nation is alert and eager to foster and encourage every stirring of the inventive spirit, and every one with any sort of new idea can command the offices of the administration without cost to safeguard his claim to priority and to furnish him ...
— Equality • Edward Bellamy
... father who was ready, armed against fate, alert, watchful to ward off all that might harm or distress his eldest son. Peter spoke of their exodus from London, their sojourn in the country, told them anecdotes of big deals, and was, in his big, burly, shrewd way, amusing and less ruthlessly tactless than usual. He had long ago ...
— Christopher Hibbault, Roadmaker • Marguerite Bryant
... a matter of interest to ten people out of ten. Why it was that it did not appear to interest us is as interesting a question as love itself. We were young, alert, enthusiastic, inquiring. We eagerly absorbed theories concerning any curious phenomena in nature, as intellectual cocktails to stimulate discussion. And yet we did not discuss love. I do not say that we avoided it. No; the ...
— In Search of the Unknown • Robert W. Chambers
... commanding general joined me near our most advanced position on the Franklin pike, examined the positions of the troops, approved the same, and ordered that the enemy should be vigorously pressed and unceasingly harassed by our fire. He further directed that I should be constantly on the alert for any opening for a more decisive effort, but for the time to bide events. The general plan of the battle for the preceding day—namely, to outflank and turn his left—was still to be acted on. Before leaving me, the commanding general desired me to confer with Major-General Steedman, ...
— Forty-Six Years in the Army • John M. Schofield
... Chester recovered consciousness fully alert to what was going on about him. He took in the situation at a glance, and a grim smile lighted up his face as his eyes fell upon ...
— The boy Allies at Liege • Clair W. Hayes
... Lossie one looks upon places like Portknockie and the sea-town of Cullen with different eyes. The toilers of the deep that go forth on the waters from these seaboard shires are serious and moral men. Contact with the sea and the presence of danger at all hours, have made them alert, keen, and dexterous. Most of the crews carry a box of choice books with them for their odd hours of leisure when they go to the Yarmouth fishing. Let a stranger get into conversation with one or two of these hardy heroes, and he will be surprised at their intelligence and wide interests. He will ...
— Literary Tours in The Highlands and Islands of Scotland • Daniel Turner Holmes
... long grey wolf padded beside him with a limp tongue lolling out between the ragged palings which stood him for teeth. In the middle of the Piazza was a fountain, and above the fountain a tall stone crucifix. Our friend mounted the steps of the cross in the alert way he had (like a little bird, the story says) and the wolf, after lapping apologetically in the basin, followed him up three steps at a time. Then with one arm around the shaft to steady himself, he made a fine sermon to ...
— Short Stories and Selections for Use in the Secondary Schools • Emilie Kip Baker
... from the Mexicans at Monterey, and to watch well the shore on their side of the river; for we were to fall upon the enemy during their surprise, occasioned by such an unusual display. All happened as was intended. At the first rocket, the Bonnaxes, Callapoos, and Umbiquas were on the alert; but astonishment and admiration very soon succeeded their fear of surprise, which they knew could not be attempted from their opponents in front. The bombs burst, the wheels threw their large circles of coloured sparks, and the savages gazed in silent admiration. But their astonishment ...
— Monsieur Violet • Frederick Marryat
... a line of life inferior, as her prejudices suggested, to the course held by his progenitors. Yet, with all this aristocratic prejudice, his master found the well-born youth more docile, regular, and strictly attentive to his duty, than his far more active and alert comrade. Tunstall also gratified his master by the particular attention which he seemed disposed to bestow on the abstract principles of science connected with the trade which he was bound to study, the limits of which were daily enlarged with ...
— The Fortunes of Nigel • Sir Walter Scott
... out in the barn, looking at a very new colony of kittens in an old barrel. So Aunt Nancy had about five minutes of peace and quiet, which she speedily made the most of, I can assure you—talking away so fast that Mr. Smith had to follow her pretty closely, with eyes as well as ears on the alert. ...
— Harper's Young People, June 29, 1880 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various
... any importance had been undertaken since the great repulse of the English at Ticonderoga. Skirmishes indeed occasionally took place along the border, and one expedition under Major Rogers, on the shore of Lake Champlain, kept the French on the alert. Whilst Montcalm was unable for want of a sufficiently numerous army to undertake any great offensive movement, Abercromby, disheartened by his late fruitless attempt on Ticonderoga, lay almost inactive in the neighbourhood ...
— The King's Warrant - A Story of Old and New France • Alfred H. Engelbach
... the Curator glanced earnestly at the detective, who seemed to have fallen into a kind of anxious dream. Would it do to interrupt him with questions? Would he obtain a straight answer if he did? The old man moved heavily but the now fully alert Curator could not fail to see that it was with the heaviness of absorbed thought. Dare he disturb that thought? They had both reached the broad corridor separating the two galleries at the western end before he ...
— The Mystery of the Hasty Arrow • Anna Katharine Green
... minutes a man-o-war's cutter was alongside, rowed by six alert-looking young sailors, while a coxswain held the ...
— The Submarine Boys and the Spies - Dodging the Sharks of the Deep • Victor G. Durham
... not be content to remain below—nor was that unnatural. Aside from the fear I had of the sloop's yawing and possibly turning turtle, and so imprisoning me in the cabin with no hope of escape therefrom, I felt that I should be more on the alert to seize any opportunity for escape were I at the tiller. So I carried a Mexican poncho which I wound to the stern, draped it about me over the oilskins, and with the sou'wester tied under my chin I could defy the rain, nor did the ...
— Swept Out to Sea - Clint Webb Among the Whalers • W. Bertram Foster
... stature, must be some kind of moose. In that case, of course, it became a question of antlers. Moreover, in his meetings with rival bulls it had never been his wont to depend upon a blind, irresistible charge,—thereby leaving it open to an alert opponent to slip aside and rip him along the flank,—but rather to fence warily for an advantage in the locking of antlers, and then bear down his foe by the fury and speed of his pushing. It so happened, therefore, that he, too, came not too violently against the barrier. Loudly his vast ...
— Children's Literature - A Textbook of Sources for Teachers and Teacher-Training Classes • Charles Madison Curry
... few notes on the political position of Khorasan," he said, glancing with slight apprehensiveness at the other's face. He was a small, shy man, with few social attainments but an extraordinary amount of learning—the antithesis of the alert Blessington, whom ...
— The Masquerader • Katherine Cecil Thurston
... without seeing Mamma, and had decided to kiss her at all costs, even with the certainty of being in disgrace with her for long afterwards, when she herself came up to bed. The tranquillity which followed my anguish made me extremely alert, no less than my sense of expectation, my thirst for and my fear ...
— Swann's Way - (vol. 1 of Remembrance of Things Past) • Marcel Proust
... before the house grew quiet. Then, whenever she closed her eyes, she could see those ghostly figures dancing before her in a long, white wavering line. After awhile she gave up the attempt to sleep, and lay with her eyes wide open, staring into the darkness, alert, and ...
— The Little Colonel's House Party • Annie Fellows Johnston
... they are never referred to or opened. That is a very discreditable fact, because I defy anybody to take up a single copy of the Times newspaper and not come upon something in it, upon which, if their interest in the affairs of the day were active, intelligent, and alert as it ought to be, they would consult an atlas, dictionary, or cyclopaedia ...
— Studies in Literature • John Morley
... softly and raising his head, sniffed the night air. The Indian stepped from his rock and stood alert with his eyes on the reach of the back-trail. And then softly, almost inaudibly to the ears of the girl came the sound of horses' hoofs pounding the trail ...
— The Texan - A Story of the Cattle Country • James B. Hendryx
... Napoleon's plans were known to be completed. Pitt's Continental Allies were secretly arming. The sea-dogs who guarded the safety of our shores—Nelson, Collingwood, Cornwallis, Calder—were on the alert. Yet while England's very existence as a Nation hung in the balance, in the gay world of London those who represented the ton danced and flirted, attended routs and assemblies, complaining fretfully of ...
— The Letter-Bag of Lady Elizabeth Spencer-Stanhope v. I. • A. M. W. Stirling (compiler)
... regulations, since at any moment a patrol motor-launch might come shooting down the river, or a surprise visit be paid by a detachment from the battalion of infantry quartered, for training purposes, at Emmerich. Penalties for lax discipline were severe; the guards were supposed to live on the alert both by day and by night, and the Emmerich commandant considered that the fewer distractions permitted to the sentries, the more likely they were to make their watch a thorough one. There had been too many escapes of prisoners of war across the frontier; unpleasant remarks had been made from ...
— Captain Jim • Mary Grant Bruce
... with great punctuality. For Mr. Bozzle did his work, not only with a conscience, but with a will. He was now, as he had declared more than once, altogether devoted to Mr. Trevelyan's interest; and as he was an active, enterprising man, always on the alert to be doing something, and as he loved the work of writing dispatches, Trevelyan received a great many letters from Bozzle. It is not exaggeration to say that every letter made him for the time a ...
— He Knew He Was Right • Anthony Trollope
... Wyandot, and to the swimming eyes, so close to the surface of the river, he seemed very formidable, a heavily-built man, naked to the waist, with a thick scalp lock standing up almost straight, an alert face, and the strong curved nose so often a prominent feature of the Indian. One brown, powerful hand grasped a paddle, with an occasional gentle movement of which he held the canoe stationary in the stream ...
— The Riflemen of the Ohio - A Story of the Early Days along "The Beautiful River" • Joseph A. Altsheler
... elapsed before the reassembling of parliament was a very memorable one in the annals of the country. Every association and political union, tremblingly alive for the fate of the bill, was on the alert, it being conceived that it was in imminent clanger of being lost in committee. At Leeds, Birmingham, Liverpool, Manchester, Sheffield, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Paisley, Dundee, as well as throughout the south of England, meetings ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... companions, whose insane oaths still tortured my ear, I asked myself if I was wretched or terrified. I was neither. Often in my life have I been far more so under comparatively safe circumstances. "How is this?" said I. "Methinks I am animated and alert, instead of being depressed and apprehensive?" I could not tell ...
— Villette • Charlotte Bronte
... mind misinterprets the thing seen, sometimes innocently, and again wantonly. The nature fakir is always on the alert to see wonderful phenomena in wild life, about which to write; and by preference he places the most strained and marvellous interpretation upon the animal act. Beware of the man who always sees marvellous things in animals, ...
— The Minds and Manners of Wild Animals • William T. Hornaday
... wanderers tired, so the Bumpy Man brought them some blankets in which they rolled themselves and then lay down before the fire, which their host kept alive with fuel all through the night. Trot wakened several times and found the Mountain Ear always alert and listening intently for the slightest sound. But the little girl could hear no sound at all except ...
— The Scarecrow of Oz • L. Frank Baum
... monotonous regularity for hours, while the prisoners huddled helplessly together there on the floor of the pit, awaiting the next move of the rat-men. Any thought of escape was out of the question. The sheer walls of the pit were always guarded by alert sentries who had only to call to bring the ...
— Devil Crystals of Arret • Hal K. Wells
... many. A man who is accounted brilliant and entertaining may become an insufferable bore by continuing to tell stories when the hearers have become satiated. Of all speakers, the story-teller should keep his eyes on his entire audience and be alert to detect ...
— Talks on Talking • Grenville Kleiser
... this order, and had even ventured clandestinely to direct the quarter-masters to bend on the necessary flags; and Sir Gervaise had scarcely got the words out of his mouth, before the signal was abroad. The Chloe was equally on the alert; for she too each moment expected the command, and ere her answering flag was seen, her helm was up, the mizen-stay-sail down, and her head falling off rapidly towards the enemy. This movement seemed to be expected ...
— The Two Admirals • J. Fenimore Cooper
... their platoons to open fire at the proper time. Thereafter they observe the target and make any necessary changes to keep the fire effective, i.e., fire fast or slow, according to the necessity, and are on the alert for any commands or ...
— The Plattsburg Manual - A Handbook for Military Training • O.O. Ellis and E.B. Garey
... was the era of such striking personalities as the brilliant charlatan Struensee, the great philanthropist and reformer C. D. F. Reventlow, the ultra-conservative Ove Hoegh-Guldberg, whose mission it was to repair the damage done by Struensee, and that generation of alert and progressive spirits which surrounded the young crown prince Frederick, whose first act, on taking his seat in the council of state, at the age of sixteen, on the 4th of April 1784, was ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 8, Slice 2 - "Demijohn" to "Destructor" • Various
... in the interests of decency, forced on the unwilling natives, could not conceal the beauty of her form. One could not but suspect that age would burden her with a certain corpulence, but now she was graceful and alert. Her brown skin had an exquisite translucency and her eyes were magnificent. Her black hair, very thick and rich, was coiled round her head in a massive plait. When she smiled in a greeting that was charmingly natural, she showed teeth that were ...
— The Trembling of a Leaf - Little Stories of the South Sea Islands • William Somerset Maugham
... down then. So, too, did Keith. But all the rest of the morning John was nervously alert for all sounds. And his ears were frequently turned toward the kitchen door. He began to talk again, too, bitterly, of the little tin cup for the pennies and the sign "Pity the Poor Blind." He lost all interest in Keith's books and puzzles, and when he was not railing at the tragedy of his ...
— Dawn • Eleanor H. Porter
... an observation which the surgeon apparently did not hear. He was thinking, now, his thin face set in a frown, the upper teeth biting hard over the under lip and drawing up the pointed beard. While he thought, he watched the man extended on the chair, watched him like an alert cat, to extract from him some hint as to what he should do. This absorption seemed to ignore completely the other occupants of the room, of whom he was the central, commanding figure. The head nurse held the lamp carelessly, resting her hand over one hip thrown out, her ...
— The Web of Life • Robert Herrick
... Jemmy quitted his respectable abode, and, furnished with dark lantern, pistol, crowbar, and crape, joined half-a-dozen neophyte burglars—his pupils and his victims. The hostelry chosen for attack was "The Spaniards." The host and his servants were, however, on the alert; and, after a smart struggle in the passage, the housebreakers were worsted; two or three of them being killed, and the others—save and except the cautious Jemmy, who had only directed the movement from without—being ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 1, November 27, 1841 • Various
... forward. Good alluvial and a poor man's field? And four men going there? The questions were in every mind and the answer as well. For years the gully-rakers round Boulder Creek had been living and longing to hear such things, and the hungry eyes grew more hungry and the faces more alert. If four, why not ...
— Colonial Born - A tale of the Queensland bush • G. Firth Scott
... embraces, but started instantly in pursuit of them. On reaching the same gate where the berlin had been seen, the officers described in what direction the party had driven; and the police being immediately on the alert, the criminals were discovered and arrested just as they were on the point of ...
— Tales for Young and Old • Various
... order to distinguish himself from common culprits, and to give this poor external evidence of his rank, with a hope that it might tell, to a certain extent at least, upon the feeling of the jury. When placed in the dock, a general buzz and bustle agitated the whole court His friends became alert, and whispered to each other with much earnestness, and a vast number of them bowed to him, and shook hands with him, and advised him to be cool, and keep up his spirits. His appearance, however, ...
— Willy Reilly - The Works of William Carleton, Volume One • William Carleton
... look, and his whole fashion of speech which was entirely unlike anything that I had ever seen. Jim Horscroft was a fine man, and Major Elliott was a brave one, but they both lacked something that this wanderer had. It was the quick alert look, the flash of the eye, the nameless distinction which is so hard to fix. And then we had saved him when he lay gasping upon the shingle, and one's heart always softens towards ...
— The Great Shadow and Other Napoleonic Tales • Arthur Conan Doyle
... the peril of the enterprise, and moved forward stealthily. Soon the advance guard led by Montgomery in person could discern through the driving snow the first straggling houses of the Lower Town. A barrier crossed the roadway, but no sight or sound gave evidence that the guard was on the alert. Forward they crept, silent and full of desperate purpose. Suddenly, when they were within thirty yards of the barrier and counting fully upon the surprise of the outpost, four cannon and a score of muskets pounded forth a deadly fire. Itself taken by surprise, the Continental army broke and fled. ...
— Old Quebec - The Fortress of New France • Sir Gilbert Parker and Claude Glennon Bryan
... alert just then. It was as though some hidden monitor within me had taken control to guide me through a maze of unknown dangers. It was that inner prompting which had forbidden me to say ...
— Jacqueline of Golden River • H. M. Egbert
... proceeding is peculiar. He takes from the cupboard a roll of twine, about fifty feet in length, and attaches one end of it to the neck of the bottle. Going then to one of the windows, he opens it, leans out, and whistles softly. The alert ear of Policeman Hogan on the pavement below catches the sound, and he returns it. The bottle is lowered to the end of the string, the guardian of the peace applies it to his gullet, and for some time the policeman ...
— Literary Lapses • Stephen Leacock
... by the wagons was always very securely loaded; each package had its contents plainly marked on the outside. The wagons were heavily covered and tightly closed. Every man belonging to the caravan was thoroughly armed, and ever on the alert to repulse an attack by ...
— The Old Santa Fe Trail - The Story of a Great Highway • Henry Inman
... people. Malcolm rode on at a foot pace until he was within sight of the open gate of the town. When within fifty yards of the gate he suddenly came upon Colonel Leslie, who had thus early been making a tour of the walls to see that the sentries were upon the alert, for Duke Bernhard's force was within a few ...
— The Lion of the North • G.A. Henty
... stretched out. The contempt, conceived from their appearance, they took pains to increase; sometimes falling from their horses, and making themselves objects of derision and ridicule. The consequence was, that the enemy, who at first had been alert, and ready on their posts, in case of an attack, now, for the most part, laid aside their arms, and sitting down amused themselves with looking at them. The Numidians often rode up, then galloped back, but still contrived to get nearer to the pass, as if they were unable to manage their ...
— History of Rome, Vol III • Titus Livius
... middle row of seats, with the deacons below me and the bishops just behind. Scattered among the congregation were hundreds of "Gentiles" ready to leap mentally upon any concession I might make to the Mormon faith; while the Mormons were equally on the alert for any implied criticism of them and their church. The problem of preaching a sermon which should offer some appeal to both classes, without offending either, was a perplexing one, and I solved it to the best of my ability by delivering a sermon I had once given in my own church to ...
— The Story of a Pioneer - With The Collaboration Of Elizabeth Jordan • Anna Howard Shaw
... most abject language, and the most humble tone and posture—"Please your honour; and please your honour's honour" they knew must be repeated as a charm at the beginning and end of every equivocating, exculpatory, or supplicatory sentence; and they were much more alert in doffing their caps to these new men, than to those of what they call good old families. A witty carpenter once termed ...
— Tales and Novels, Vol. IV • Maria Edgeworth
... must be remembered. The savages know of our presence here. They are now on the alert, and we are being watched with the greatest vigilance. If they think there is an opportunity for fresh victims it will stimulate them to the ...
— The Wonder Island Boys: Treasures of the Island • Roger Thompson Finlay
... belief that, being a parent, he would be able to handle this unprecedented situation. They ranged in age from three to six; they were the children of his neighbours and life-long associates; and yet Wally had the feeling that he was hemmed in by a pack of alert, curious little animals. ...
— The Cricket • Marjorie Cooke
... experience than it conjured up for her great absurd satisfying draughts of nectar, for which the waking Sarah Brown might thirst in vain. But there was no waking Sarah Brown. Her life was only a sleep-walking; only very rarely did she awake for a moment and feel ashamed to see how alert ...
— Living Alone • Stella Benson
... be dark. Mrs. Growler was asked to have the dinner ready at six. During the day Mrs. Heathcote was backward and forward in the kitchen. Then was something wrong she knew, but could not quite discern the evil. Sing Sing, the cook, was more than ordinarily alert; but Sing Sing, the cook, was not much trusted. Mrs. Growler was "as good as the Bank," as far as that went, having lived with old Mr. Daly when he was prosperous; but she was apt to be downhearted, ...
— Harry Heathcote of Gangoil • Anthony Trollope
... outwards like the spokes of a wheel. In the centre is a pink blossom. Those flowers are sold as offerings in this sacred place. Don't stumble over that dark bundle, it is a sleeping child. Step cautiously between the bright-eyed people who watch, furtively alert, like shy woodland creatures, as they crouch low over their fires, for the evening has suddenly become chilly with the loss of the sun. These are pilgrims come from afar, and they will lie down to sleep just as they are in the open. There ...
— Round the Wonderful World • G. E. Mitton
... MRS WARREN [on the alert at once] Now see here, George: what are you up to about that girl? I've been watching your way of looking at her. Remember: I know you and what your ...
— Mrs. Warren's Profession • George Bernard Shaw
... horse before. Besides, she had driven her Cousin Tom's pair of big draught horses up in the Michigan woods, and Mr. Henry Sherwood's half-wild roan ponies, as well. Her wrists were strong and supple, and she was alert. ...
— Nan Sherwood's Winter Holidays • Annie Roe Carr
... he had been in his thoughts of Lavinia, in some sub-conscious way the sound of footsteps behind him keeping pace with his own reached his ear. It was no unusual thing for foot passengers to be set upon and Vane was on the alert. His suspicions were confirmed by the sight of a man cloaked and with his slouch hat pulled over his forehead gliding into a narrow ...
— Madame Flirt - A Romance of 'The Beggar's Opera' • Charles E. Pearce
... hand to stop him, she felt a comforting glow steal up her arm as far as her shoulder. It made her feel happy. It seemed to her that she was being unfaithful to Emil. And that was quite as she wished; she wanted Emil to know that her senses were on the alert, that she was just the same as other women, and that she could accept the embraces of her nephew in just the same way as she did his.... Ah, yes, if he only knew it! That was what she ought to have written in her letter, not that humble, ...
— Bertha Garlan • Arthur Schnitzler
... the hunted? Should we not feel sorry for the imprudent Pompilus? Let a thread of the trap entangle her leg; and it is all up with her. The other will be there, stabbing her in the throat. What then is the method which she employs against the Segestria, always on the alert, ready for defence, audacious to the point of aggression? Shall I surprise the reader if I tell him that this problem filled me with the most eager interest, that it held me for weeks in contemplation before that cheerless wall? Nevertheless, my ...
— More Hunting Wasps • J. Henri Fabre
... of the dog on the scene with his fine pointed nose, alert eyes, incessantly vibrating little tail, and miniver black and white coat picked out with tan, caused May as much excitement and delight as if she did not know one Greek letter from another, and were innocent of Latin quantities. She ...
— A Houseful of Girls • Sarah Tytler
... she was funny did not blur the romantic quality of his love for her any more than this last manifestation of her funniness spoiled the clear beauty of her face, which now, in this moonlight that painted black shadows under her high cheek-bones, was candid and alert like the face of a narcissus. "I didn't mean to be rude," he repeated. "I didn't think that what I said could possibly touch you. As if I could say anything about you that wasn't...." His voice cracked ...
— The Judge • Rebecca West
... speak when they were spoken to." They were supposed to have no opinions on any subject save such as were formed for them by their parents and guardians; and—well, they were altogether different from this alert, dark-eyed maiden, who had been in the house less than an hour, yet had already ...
— The Brass Bound Box • Evelyn Raymond
... and wondered how it was possible for them to do it. But destiny, my special destiny, was at work. I was standing near, talking with affected gaiety to several young ladies, who, however, must have remarked my preoccupation; for my second sense of hearing was alert to what was being said by the group of which the girl in white was the center, when I heard her say: "I think his playing of Chopin is exquisite." And one of my friends in the group replied: "You haven't met him? Allow me——" Then turning to ...
— The Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man • James Weldon Johnson
... defense of Fort Harrison, with fifty men, half of them unfit for duty. A strong party of Indians, under the Prophet, brother of Tecumseh, made a midnight attack upon the Fort; but Taylor, though weak in his force, and without preparation, was resolute and on the alert; and after a battle, which lasted till after daylight, completely repulsed them. Soon after, he took a prominent part in the expedition under Major-General Hopkins against the Prophet's town; and on his return, found a letter from President ...
— The Life and Public Service of General Zachary Taylor: An Address • Abraham Lincoln
... Norgate replied, "the Baroness is in Italy, arranging for the mobilisation of the Italian armies, but if she's back for Thursday, we shall be delighted. She'll be quite interested to meet you. A keen, bright, alert politician of your type will simply ...
— The Double Traitor • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... for the purpose of purchasing a servant girl for his wife. As was the custom, all the negroes were brought out and placed in a line, so that the buyers could examine their good points at leisure. Major Berry was immediately attracted by the bright and alert appearance of Polly, and at once negotiated with the trader, paid the price agreed upon, and started for home to present his wife with this flesh and blood commodity, which money could so easily procure in our ...
— From the Darkness Cometh the Light, or Struggles for Freedom • Lucy A. Delaney
... Salamanca. From the 3d to the 12th of July, the French and British were in presence of each other, encamped on either side the Douro, at that season little more than a rivulet. Of course all were on the alert; there was no laxity or negligence that could tempt to surprise; but neither was there any useless skirmishing or picket firing; every thing was conducted in the most gentlemanly and correct manner. The soldiers bathed together and exchanged their rations, and the officers were on equally ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 61, No. 378, April, 1847 • Various
... quarter of an hour before anything returned to the ventilator. But at last came the same metallic interference again; the fans stopped and the face reappeared. Graham had remained all this time in the same place, alert ...
— When the Sleeper Wakes • Herbert George Wells
... people came to this clearing, in the woods, far off from the main-traveled roads of the Yumuri, and the day, as usual, passed uneventfully. Evangelina worked, with one eye upon her Rosa, the other watchfully alert for danger. When evening came she prepared their scanty meal, upbraiding Rosa, meanwhile, for her attempts to assist her. Then they sat for an hour or two on the bench outside the door, talking about Juan O'Rail-ye and the probable ...
— Rainbow's End • Rex Beach
... a good idea, he decided, to check post number four first this time. The landing pad guard had been a little less than perfectly alert tonight. ...
— The Best Made Plans • Everett B. Cole
... Then I become very alert, and I can no longer do tasks. I go to the window, where I have wonderful thoughts. But usually they occured only ...
— The Prose of Alfred Lichtenstein • Alfred Lichtenstein
... I hadn't really been paying attention because I was so sleepy, and I didn't really understand what was happening until RPG let me in on it a few moments later, but I was just alert enough to notice that we had somehow come to the Palo Alto Uncle Gaylord's ...
— The Jargon File, Version 4.0.0
... different a purpose. In the affair the British had only six men and two horses wounded, and none killed; while the enemy lost forty killed, many more wounded, and some taken prisoners. It is one of the numberless examples to be brought forward of the importance of being on the alert in the neighbourhood of an enemy. How disastrous might have been the consequences had General Whish's army not been aroused and prepared for ...
— Our Soldiers - Gallant Deeds of the British Army during Victoria's Reign • W.H.G. Kingston
... and mostly cheerful. But his face in repose had an absent, haunted look, the eyes alert but fixed on vacancy, the brow overcast and frowning. In the old days Aubrey's smile had been his best natural gift. To win a smile from him in her childhood, Beryl would have done anything—have gone on her knees ...
— Elizabeth's Campaign • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... and are hunted by the garrison as required. This island was at one period overrun with enormous rats, to destroy which somebody with good intent imported a cargo of cats, which are now become as great a plague as their predecessors, keeping the sportsmen constantly on the alert to ...
— The World of Waters - A Peaceful Progress o'er the Unpathed Sea • Mrs. David Osborne
... city is Milan! The great houses are all of stone, and stand regular and in order, along wide straight streets. There are swift cars, drawn by electricity, for such as can afford them. Men are brisk and alert even in the summer heats, and there are shops of a very good kind, though a trifle showy. There are many newspapers to help the Milanese to be better men and to cultivate charity and humility; there ...
— The Path to Rome • Hilaire Belloc
... shook the building and the windows darkened as a ship settled in the street outside. The Nyjord crew came in with guns pointed, alert for anything. ...
— Planet of the Damned • Harry Harrison
... the strange inherent power of the mind to rise to the occasion of a sudden emergency—to stretch itself long to the length of an event; I do not hesitate to say that no combination of circumstances can defeat a vigorous brain fully alert, and in possession of itself. With a quickness to which the lightning-flash is tardy, I remembered that this was a spot indicated by the symbols on the papyrus: I remembered that this same papyrus was always placed under ...
— Prince Zaleski • M.P. Shiel
... ridden through many waves of depression. Freights might drop out of sight, Seamen's Unions throw spanners and nuts at certificated masters, or stevedores combine till cargo perished on the dock-head; but the boat of many names came and went, busy, alert, and inconspicuous always. Her skipper made no complaint of hard times, and port officers observed that her crew signed and signed again with the regularity of Atlantic liner boatswains. Her name she changed ...
— The Day's Work, Volume 1 • Rudyard Kipling
... the old man the poorhouse forever receded from sight. He remembered Adelizy no more, as he looked with pride and tenderness on the boy who stood erect and alert before him, looked again and yet again, for he saw in him the Lord's deliverer, though he knew not that he had been raised up by his own kind hand.—Gulielma ...
— Stories Worth Rereading • Various
... reins and whip in his hands, sat horrified and pale; the accident was so sudden, he was so startled and so frightened that, for a moment, he could not speak a word. Mr. Buller, on the other hand, was now lively and alert. The wagon had no sooner floated away from the shore than he felt himself at home. He was upon his favorite element; water had no fears for him. He saw that his friend was nearly frightened out of his wits, and that, figuratively speaking, he must step to the helm and take charge of the ...
— The Best American Humorous Short Stories • Various
... entered upon the staircase, in the wake of my companion. Though the two men at cards did not look up as I passed them, I noticed that they were alert and ready for any signal I might choose to give them. But I was not ready to give one yet. I must see danger before I summoned help, and there was no token of ...
— The Staircase At The Hearts Delight - 1894 • Anna Katharine Green (Mrs. Charles Rohlfs)
... through the control which it enables those who compose it to exercise over the government. And where, as under the American system, control of the party does not ensure control of the government, the chief motive for an alert and unflagging interest in political questions is lacking. If the majority can not make an effective use of the party system for the attainment of political ends, they can not be expected to maintain an active interest ...
— The Spirit of American Government - A Study Of The Constitution: Its Origin, Influence And - Relation To Democracy • J. Allen Smith
... sharpshooters; red heads, faces of Mohammedan olive and the black countenances of the Sengalese, with eyes of fire, and thick, bluish blubber lips; some showing the good-nature and sedentary obesity of the middle-class man suddenly converted into a warrior; others sinewy, alert, with the aggressive profile of men born to fight, ...
— The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... do this it was necessary to pass Philadelphia, then in possession of the British. This was successfully accomplished by the State fleet early in the morning of November 16th. They were "unperceived," says the British account, until the passage had been successfully made. The enemy were more alert the following night when the Continental vessels under Barry endeavored to make the passage. Three or four succeeded. Others had to be burned to prevent capture. The success of this elusive passage up the river emboldened, as we shall see later, Captain Barry, a few months afterwards, ...
— The Story of Commodore John Barry • Martin Griffin
... goes to the creameries. The women, however, still share in the milking, and there is much of unaffected simplicity in the ways of the household. On days when work is not pushing, the men are likely to go hunting or fishing, and they are always alert to observe chances to take advantage of those little gratuities which nature in the remoter rural regions is constantly offering, both in the matter of game and in that of herbs and roots, ...
— In the Catskills • John Burroughs
... your leisure or in your active moments, if you wish to advance, you must be alert. Know for yourself the reasons for things, and you will thereby form the stepping stones that will lead you upward and contribute ...
— Carpentry for Boys • J. S. Zerbe
... Honeychurch, suddenly alert. "I don't see any difference. Fences are fences, especially when they ...
— A Room With A View • E. M. Forster
... strolled off toward the house, and a crouching figure in the hazel thicket followed them until they entered the kitchen door, when it dropped flat on the ground again and remained there alert and listening during the conference in the ...
— At the Little Brown House • Ruth Alberta Brown
... must do it, I tell you, or I disinherit you, and give her every penny; and, as I before said, myself into the bargain. But I am off to Sherman's and thence, to Miss Willoughby, where I shall expect you in an hour, so you had best be on the alert. You will not be the first young man who has been outwitted by an old one, so mind." Saying this, he left his young relative, who was not, however, very tardy in following advice so ...
— A Book For The Young • Sarah French
... afterward, but Mack Nolan lay for a long while with his eyes wide open and his ears alert for strange sounds in the gulch. He was a new man in this district, working independently of sheriff's offices. Casey Ryan was the first man he had confided in; all others were fair game for Nolan to prove honest or dishonest with the government. The very nature of his business made ...
— The Trail of the White Mule • B. M. Bower
... was approved as president by popular referendum in July 2000. Syrian troops - stationed in Lebanon since 1976 in an ostensible peacekeeping role - were withdrawn in April 2005. During the July-August 2006 conflict between Israel and Hizballah, Syria placed its military forces on alert but did not intervene directly on behalf ...
— The 2007 CIA World Factbook • United States
... hatred and they are the source of the coarsest denunciations, particularly with regard to sexual crimes. Incidentally, most of them are smart and have a diseased acuity of the senses. Hearing and smell in particular, are sometimes remarkably alert, although not always reliable, for hysterics frequently discover more than is there. On the other hand, they often are useful because of their delicate senses, and it is never necessary to show the correctness ...
— Robin Hood • J. Walker McSpadden
... are of hysterical character. I am not here concerned so much with the exact nature of these troubles as I am with the avoidable errors in the management of sick childhood. If I can make the mother more thoughtfully alert, less disposed to terror and exaggeration, less liable to be led by her emotions, I shall have fulfilled my purpose without such discussion as is out of ...
— Doctor and Patient • S. Weir Mitchell
... plan lay its hope of success; for though Ben Raana's suspicions were on the alert he would not expect the banished lover to ride brazenly up to his tent, side by side with a soldier messenger from Colonel DeLisle. There was an instant of suspense after the corporal on leave and his Arab interpreter ...
— A Soldier of the Legion • C. N. Williamson
... dissolve the fibre, as in the making of soups and stews. In the first class of operations, the process must be as rapid as may consist with the thorough cooking of all the particles. In this branch of cookery, doing quickly is doing well. The fire must be brisk, the attention, alert. The introduction of cooking-stoves offers to careless domestics facilities for gradually drying-up meats, and despoiling them of all flavor and nutriment,—facilities which appear to be very generally laid hold of. They have almost banished the genuine, ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 14, No. 86, December, 1864 • Various
... paper and trace each small a, letting them follow each other on the line, with about a quarter inch of space between each letter. During the process of tracing, the eye must be on the alert for peculiarities, notably the roundness or otherwise of the circle as a whole, the curve or angle of the arc and hook, the relative position of the toe. Note the shank, whether looped or barred, whether the top of it is above or below the body of the circle, whether ...
— The Detection of Forgery • Douglas Blackburn
... the world, and often appears under the title, "Maternal Love." Both mother and child are looking with intense interest in the direction toward which the little girl points an eager finger. The child's face is full of vivacious beauty, the sparkling eyes and parted lips perfectly representing the alert, imaginative type ...
— Child-life in Art • Estelle M. Hurll
... Merchants is the only one left, and that only in name. Messengers from newspaper offices, representatives of storage and commission houses, merchants looking for consignments of goods, residents looking for friends, and the ever alert dealers in town lots on the scent of fresh victims, were among the crowds that daily congregated at the levee whenever the arrival of one of the packet company's regular steamers was expected. At one time there was a ...
— Reminiscences of Pioneer Days in St. Paul • Frank Moore
... afterward, from four to six, in the black silk, the mantilla, and the white straw. When Aunt Eliza went she was so on the alert for the Uxbridge family carriage that she could have had little enjoyment of the ride. Rocks never were a passion with her, she said, nor promontories, chasms, or sand. She came to Newport to be washed with salt-water; ...
— Lemorne Versus Huell • Elizabeth Drew Stoddard
... the fact that the American Revolution "really began when * * * that government (of England) sent stamps for newspaper duties to the American colonies" has been alert to the possible uses of taxation as a method of suppressing objectionable publications.[187] Persons engaged in the dissemination of ideas are, to be sure, subject to ordinary forms of taxation in like manner as other persons.[188] With respect to license or privilege taxes, ...
— The Constitution of the United States of America: Analysis and Interpretation • Edward Corwin
... impressive dome of skull, which, though obviously the result of baldness, gave the effect of quite belonging to the face. There were gold-rimmed spectacles, through which shone now and again the vivid sparkle of sharp, alert eyes, and there was a nose of some sort not easy to classify, at once long and thick. The rest was thin hair and short round beard, mouse-colored where the light caught them, but losing their outlines in the shadows of the background. Theron had not heard ...
— The Damnation of Theron Ware • Harold Frederic
... point to polygyny much more than the feminine traditions point to polyandry. Although it is true that a woman can undergo a much greater amount of sexual intercourse than a man, it also remains true that the phenomena of courtship in nature have made it the duty of the male to be alert in offering his sexual attention to the female, whose part it has been to suspend her choice coyly until she is sure of her preference. Polygynic conditions have also proved advantageous, as they have permitted the most vigorous ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 6 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis
... visited all parts of the city and chiefly those where Vice grew flagrant at night. The journalists, who knew of his tours of inspection and were always on the alert for the picturesque, likened him to the great Caliph who in similar fashion investigated Baghdad, and they nicknamed him Haroun al Roosevelt. He had for his companion Jacob Riis, a remarkable Dane who migrated to this ...
— Theodore Roosevelt; An Intimate Biography, • William Roscoe Thayer
... the lantern flash in the dreadful alley, with the cry of murder ringing in my ears. Then it was lighted by the fierce fires of rage and hatred, and marked with the chagrin of baffled plans. Now it was cool, good- humored, alert for the battle of the Exchange that had already begun. But I knew it for the same, and was near crying aloud that here was ...
— Blindfolded • Earle Ashley Walcott
... very old either, not above sixty or sixty-five; and as hale and alert as at forty. A ...
— The Wide, Wide World • Susan Warner
... were all on the alert and ready for real life; but Miss Winthrop left the room ...
— Barriers Burned Away • E. P. Roe
... on the edge of a cliff, moving here and there, leaping lightly across some gully, tossing its head up for a precautionary sniff. Suddenly it gave a bound and stood still, alert. Two great clumsy "Hirsch-kuehe" had taken fright at some imaginary danger, and, uttering their peculiar half grunt, half roar, were galloping across the alm in half real, half assumed panic with their calves ...
— In the Quarter • Robert W. Chambers
... was instantly on the alert. He was not to be caught napping, as he had been once ...
— Dyke Darrel the Railroad Detective - Or, The Crime of the Midnight Express • Frank Pinkerton
... glance, as the three emerged from the inner office, Candace saw that the two elder gentlemen were much disturbed and it flitted through her mind that she had come at an inopportune moment. Then her quick eye took in the younger man and her little alert head cocked to one side with a questioning attitude. Where had she seen him before? Candace had the kind of a mind that kept people and events card-indexed even to the minutest detail, and it didn't take ...
— Exit Betty • Grace Livingston Hill
... pondered bitterly. She was the most moral of women. She had brought up her children with all rigidity. She had abused them for the least dereliction. She had upheld the grimmest standard of virtue, with "Don't!" for its watchword. Of virtue as a warm-hearted, alert, eager, glowing spirit, cultivating the best and most beautiful things in life, she had no idea. Virtue was to her a critic, a satirist, a neighborhood gossip, something scathing and ascetic. That delicate balance between failing to mind one's ...
— We Can't Have Everything • Rupert Hughes
... instant I was on the alert, for there could be no wood within that buried river that had not been man brought. Almost coincidentally with my first apprehension of the noise, my hand shot out across the boat's side, and a second later I felt my fingers gripping ...
— Warlord of Mars • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... Anhuri-Shu was also the "one and only god" at Sebennytos and at Thinis. The unity of Atumu did not interfere with that of Anhuri-Shu, but each of these gods, although the "sole" deity in his own domain, ceased to be so in the domain of the other. The feudal spirit, always alert and jealous, prevented the higher dogma which was dimly apprehended in the temples from triumphing over local religions and extending over the whole land. Egypt had as many "sole" deities as she had large cities, or even important temples; she never accepted the idea of the sole God, "beside ...
— History Of Egypt, Chaldaea, Syria, Babylonia, and Assyria, Volume 1 (of 12) • G. Maspero
... tempestuous head winds induced Drake to let intermediate points alone and make straight for Cartagena on the South American mainland. Cartagena had been warned and was on the alert. It was strong by both nature and art. The garrison was good of its kind, though the Spaniards' custom of fighting in quilted jackets instead of armor put them at a disadvantage. This custom was due to the heat and to the ...
— Elizabethan Sea Dogs • William Wood
... point-blank range. They mortally wounded one of our men and in the dusk escaped. They are as cunning as Indians. Sometimes, as in these cases, they show great coolness and daring, while at others they are easily dispersed; but they are generally pretty keen, and you have to be very much on the alert in dealing with them. ...
— With Rimington • L. March Phillipps
... nearest chair and ran a hand across his fleshy face. He was balding and jowly, but his face was creased from a smile that was almost habitual, and his eyes were active and alert. ...
— The Dueling Machine • Benjamin William Bova
... so pulled about by different alarms that, while one portion of his mind was still alert and cunning, another trembled on the brink of lunacy. One hallucination in particular took a strong hold on his credulity. The neighbor hearkening with white face beside his window, the passer-by arrested by a horrible surmise on the pavement—these ...
— Short-Stories • Various
... plan, to coffee and cigars in the drawing-room. The women smoked, and drank liqueurs as well as coffee, with the men. One of them went to the piano, and a little impromptu ball followed, the ladies dancing with their cigarettes in their mouths. Keeping my eyes and ears on the alert, I saw an innocent-looking table, with a surface of rosewood, suddenly develop a substance of green cloth. At the same time, a neat little roulette-table made its appearance from a hiding-place in a sofa. Passing near the venerable landlady, ...
— The Black Robe • Wilkie Collins
... I recall the gay transformation in my shop-mates when the whistle blew on Saturday night. The dullest and most morose showed intelligence then. The prospect of rest, be it ever so remote—even in the hereafter—roused them from their lethargy. How alert and cheerful we were on holidays, even the prolonged holiday of a strike brought its pinched joys. Quite a number of my ancient comrades of industry looked forward to the Poor House with a hopefulness born of thwarted toil. The luckiest ones out of the thousands whom I knew ...
— An Anarchist Woman • Hutchins Hapgood
... say, if you are really not an envoy from some kingdom or colony of thought and cannot cast a gem upon the heaped pile, you had better pass by upon the other side. For it is the peculiarity of Emerson's mind to be always on the alert. He eats no lotus, but for-ever quaffs the waters which engender ...
— Literary and Social Essays • George William Curtis
... sky amid the stars, through infinity. We no longer speak, think nor live; we float along through space in delicious inertia. The air which is bearing us up has made of us all beings which resemble itself, silent, joyous, irresponsible beings, intoxicated by this stupendous flight, peculiarly alert, although motionless. One is no longer conscious of one's flesh or one's bones; one's heart seems to have ceased beating; we have become something indescribable, birds who do not even have ...
— Maupassant Original Short Stories (180), Complete • Guy de Maupassant
... but our pertinacious enemies made no signs of moving. Of course they kept us on the alert all night, not knowing at what moment they might again attack us. On the second day things began to look serious; for though we had water, provisions were growing scarce. Donald began to talk of cutting our way through the enemy; but as they could assail us at ...
— In the Wilds of Africa • W.H.G. Kingston
... frontier station at Goch somewhat revived the distressed and drooping. Everyone seized the opportunity to stretch the limbs, to inhale some fresh air, and to obtain some slight refreshment. The Customs officials were unusually alert, harrying, and inflexible. There was the eternal wrangling between the passengers and the officials over articles liable to duty and it was somewhat amusing to me, even with war beating the air, to follow the frantic and useless efforts of old and experienced travellers to smuggle ...
— Sixteen Months in Four German Prisons - Wesel, Sennelager, Klingelputz, Ruhleben • Henry Charles Mahoney
... the library window, saw him pass, and observed how his light, alert step and a certain gamesome assurance of manner marked him off from a genteelly promenading middle-aged gentleman, a trudging workman, and a vigorously striding youth who were also passing by. The iron ...
— Cashel Byron's Profession • George Bernard Shaw
... clear of the stirrup, and he swung it idly. His left hand, in which he held the reins, rested lightly on the horn of his saddle, and his right gripped the cantle at his back. He hummed a ditty of the desert, but his gaze, keen and alert, continually sought the open stretches of trail above him, and at regular intervals flashed back along the way he ...
— The Coyote - A Western Story • James Roberts
... fear, and the thought of the dead changed him from an indolent fellow into a valuable aid to my chief packer in watching the animals at night. His senses became so keen as to be quite reassuring in regard to robbers at night, and from that time on he was really a valuable man, active and alert. ...
— Unknown Mexico, Volume 1 (of 2) • Carl Lumholtz
... many meannesses. But, after all, no temptation and no menace, no pains or penalties for thinking about certain subjects, and no rewards for turning to think about something else, could divert such men as Voltaire and Diderot from their alert and strenuous search after such truth as could be vouchsafed to their imperfect lights. A catastrophe followed, it is true, but the misfortunes which attended it were due more to the champions of tradition and authority than to the soldiers of emancipation. Even ...
— On Compromise • John Morley
... prevent damage, so it was difficult to detect that there was any false bottom at all. However, after this practice had been in vogue for some time it was discovered by the Revenue officers and the matter made generally known among the officials at all the ports, so that they could be on the alert ...
— King's Cutters and Smugglers 1700-1855 • E. Keble Chatterton
... very promptly put themselves to bed; thanks to which circumstance and to their having, during the previous hours, in their commodious cabin, slept the sleep of youth and health, they began to feel, toward eleven o'clock, very alert and inquisitive. They looked out of their windows across a row of small green fields, bordered with low stone walls of rude construction, and saw a deep blue ocean lying beneath a deep blue sky, and flecked now and then ...
— An International Episode • Henry James
... bow of Lawrence Croft's life action called out: "Breakers ahead!" and almost instantly its engine was stopped, and every faculty of its commander was on the alert. "I do not know," he said, "that I am entitled to your confidence. Would it be of any advantage to you to tell me ...
— The Late Mrs. Null • Frank Richard Stockton
... meanwhile, being shrewd and alert, had escaped the conflagration. She had taken alarm early, having seen a fire in the woods once before and conceived an appreciation of its powers. Instead of flying straight before it, and being inevitably overtaken, she ran at once to the river and galloped madly down the ...
— The Watchers of the Trails - A Book of Animal Life • Charles G. D. Roberts
... survival of the fittest of these various settlers in New York. While thousands fail and go back home or drop by the way, these men have made their way by superior ability, foresight, and adaptability through the fierce competitions of the great city. They are unusually keen-witted and alert. For the evening of the banquet they leave behind their business and its cares and are bent on being entertained, amused, and instructed. They are a most catholic audience, broad-minded, hospitable, and friendly ...
— My Memories of Eighty Years • Chauncey M. Depew
... the interests of particular classes or persons. But the democratic revolution and the introduction of bureaucracy has swept all that away; and governments in every civilized country are now moving towards the ideal of an expert administration controlled by an alert and intelligent public opinion. Much, it is true, has yet to be done before that ideal will be realized. In some countries, notably in the United States, the necessity of the expert has hardly made itself felt. In others, such as Germany, popular control is very inadequately provided ...
— A Modern Symposium • G. Lowes Dickinson
... mounting of the verge on a small steel pin inserted in one end of the short arm. But in spite of all the improvements he had made, Mr. Terry did not sit down with folded hands and feel there was nothing further to be done. Constantly he was alert for practical suggestions that should better his handiwork. For example, he heard that some one was making machinery according to a definite scale so that parts of it could be exchanged from one article to another. Why, thought he, should not the parts of a clock be made so they ...
— Christopher and the Clockmakers • Sara Ware Bassett
... peeped out of the windows, in perfectly proper curiosity, to watch the Bottle River jacks flounder into town. Not she! Pattie Batch was busy. Pattie Batch was so desperately employed that her swift little fingers demanded all the attention that the most alert, the brightest, the very most bewitching gray eyes in the whole wide world could bestow upon anything whatsoever. Christmas Eve, you see: Day done. Something of soft fawn-skin engaged her, it seemed, with white patches matched and arranged with marvellous exactitude: something ...
— Christmas Eve at Swamp's End • Norman Duncan
... sociable race, and on the very best of terms with the Nutcracker Grays. Young Tip Chipmunk, the oldest son, was in all respects a perfect contrast to Master Featherhead. He was always lively and cheerful, and so very alert in providing for the family, that old Mr. and Mrs. Chipmunk had very little care, but could sit sociably at the door of their hole and chat with neighbours, quite sure that Tip would bring everything out right for them, and have plenty ...
— Queer Little Folks • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... passions, the dread of detection in proportion to it, she never had remained. There she was, and she could not get away again. The subtle dexterity which had served her in coming might desert her in returning. Had their senses been on the alert they might have ...
— Elster's Folly • Mrs. Henry Wood
... military spirit, as nothing is more taking to boys when first put to drill, than to have arms; and although many requisites of discipline, such as marching, wheeling, &c. can be acquired full as well without them; yet nothing makes a young lad so alert as to have a musket put ...
— First History of New Brunswick • Peter Fisher
... sworn in hate, exerts his ruffian might Where'er young genius meditates his flight. Erewhile, when WHITE, by this fell fiend oppress'd, Felt Hope's fine fervours languish in his breast, When shrunk with scorn, and trembling to aspire, He dropp'd desponding his insulted lyre. Alert in zeal, with art benigh endued, SOUTHEY! thy hand his blasted strength renew'd, And lured him on, his labours scarce begun, To win those laurels which thyself had won. In vain! though vivified with pristine force, O'er learning's realms he shot with meteor course; To worth ...
— Poems (1828) • Thomas Gent
... have understood the difference in both position and demands, but she enjoyed the atmosphere of ease. And there was a certain aspect of luxury, a freedom from the grinding exactions of conscience that had been trained to keep continually on the alert lest ...
— A Little Girl in Old Boston • Amanda Millie Douglas
... death of Mr. Purnell, two years before. The town called them Easterners because their home was as far East as Michigan, but they had never been city dwellers, as Dorothy's fresh complexion and lithe, alert figure bore witness. ...
— Hidden Gold • Wilder Anthony
... only 20 miles long, but it is 20 miles of concentrated water-power energy and grandeur, the fall being about 400 feet, the walls 2700. Never for a moment does it relax its assault, and the voyager on its restless, relentless tide, especially at high water, is kept on the alert. The waters indeed come rushing down with fearful impetuosity, recalling to Powell the poem of Southey, on the Lodore he knew, hence the name. The beginning of the gorge is at the foot of Brown's Park through what is called the Gate of Lodore, an abrupt gash in the Uinta Mountains 2000 feet deep. ...
— The Romance of the Colorado River • Frederick S. Dellenbaugh
... Marna, Daughter of the fire! Marna of the deathless hope, Still alert to win new scope Where the wings of life may spread For a flight unhazarded! Dreaming of the speech to ...
— The Home Book of Verse, Vol. 3 (of 4) • Various
... the man with a man's mistakes, his fears, his heart-burnings, was gone, and in his place stood Horace Clay, the doctor, keen, alert, masterful, indomitable, with the look of battle on his face. He worked rapidly, never faltering; his eyes burning with the joy of the true physician who fights to save, to save a human life from the grim ...
— Sowing Seeds in Danny • Nellie L. McClung
... if you don't mind," he said unpleasantly, and the girl, whose every sense was alert, picked up a wrap and walked into the garden, with Marcus following ...
— The Angel of Terror • Edgar Wallace
... changed Jones; much thinner and "finer" than when, eight weeks before, he had embarked on his new career, at the newspaper owner's instance. The young man's color was less pronounced, and his eyes, though alert and eager, ...
— Average Jones • Samuel Hopkins Adams
... those lines in which Jessica and Lorenzo murmur melodious words to one another, capping each other's utterance; but passion shines bright and clear through the conceits that amuse them. He did not know what there was in the air that made his senses so strangely alert; it seemed to him that he was pure soul to enjoy the scents and the sounds and the savours of the earth. He had never felt such an exquisite capacity for beauty. He was afraid that Sally by speaking would break the spell, but she said never a word, and he wanted ...
— Of Human Bondage • W. Somerset Maugham
... isolation, is everywhere taken for granted. Man lives not to himself nor dies to himself, even though he be Richard Rolle the hermit, or Margaret Kirkby the recluse, that is the plain teaching of these plain-speaking pages. And all through them too is a tough common sense, and an unusually alert power of observation; and there is perhaps an element of that business capacity, which some of the Saints and Mystics have shewn, in his inclusion among "sins of deed" of "beginning a thing that is above our might"; for in that there ...
— The Form of Perfect Living and Other Prose Treatises • Richard Rolle of Hampole
... all on the alert, and the moment "Away aloft!" reached our ears we flew up the rigging. The boatswain's pipe sounded shrill, the topsails came down smartly with a loud whirr. The ship was rounded to, the men lay out on the yards and briskly handed the canvas, and the anchor was let ...
— Paddy Finn • W. H. G. Kingston
... scene in the ring of a circus. The horse, proud, dignified, began to pace slowly to the time of the accompanying music, executing difficult steps that must have tried the patience of both animal and trainer during the teaching period; the rider, lithe, alert, proud also, smiling ...
— 'Firebrand' Trevison • Charles Alden Seltzer
... suddenly and he made a sharp movement to catch it up. Wang was unable to see the reason of this because of the table, and leaped away from what seemed to him a threatening symptom. When Heyst looked up, the Chinaman was already at the door facing the room, not frightened, but alert. ...
— Victory • Joseph Conrad
... few people came to this clearing, in the woods, far off from the main-traveled roads of the Yumuri, and the day, as usual, passed uneventfully. Evangelina worked, with one eye upon her Rosa, the other watchfully alert for danger. When evening came she prepared their scanty meal, upbraiding Rosa, meanwhile, for her attempts to assist her. Then they sat for an hour or two on the bench outside the door, talking about Juan O'Rail-ye and the probable ...
— Rainbow's End • Rex Beach
... lies in its artificial stiffness and its narrow respectabilities, which produce an emptiness in woman's soul that will not let her drink from the fountain of life. I once remarked that there seemed to be a deeper relationship between the old-fashioned mother and hostess, ever on the alert for the happiness of her little ones and the comfort of those she loved, and the truly new woman, than between the latter and her average emancipated sister. The disciples of emancipation pure and simple declared me a heathen, fit only ...
— Anarchism and Other Essays • Emma Goldman
... spoke in her look, her attitude, and the silent gesture of one outspread hand, but it was the Keep back! of love, not of fear, the command of an outraged soul, conscious of its rights and instinctively alert to maintain them. ...
— Room Number 3 - and Other Detective Stories • Anna Katharine Green
... attentive to the study of the Vedas, that are devoted to the service of their preceptors, that are observant of penances and excellent vows, that are firm in truth, that never utter anything that smacks of disobedience or enmity to their preceptors, that are always alert, and ever ready in service of seniors and preceptors,—they repair, O great Rishi, to such regions, they that are pure (of mind and body), that are endued with cleansed souls, that are of restrained speech, ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 4 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... swain recollected the snake, which was as slender, and supple, and quick, and sparkling as the girl who lay there on the hill-side, and wept and made fun at the same time and looked oddly alert and wary. ...
— Weird Tales from Northern Seas • Jonas Lie
... 22nd both Diggins and Lowther got M.C.'s. If it was the former's elan which carried our wave into the enemy's guns, the latter's judgement played a great part in extricating us without disaster. Hasted, the alert and watchful, had already been gazetted after the fall of Baghdad as D.S.O. He left us shortly after, returning to his own regiment, the Durham Light Infantry, in India. In Rawal Pindi he delivered a lecture on the action in which he had ...
— The Leicestershires beyond Baghdad • Edward John Thompson
... grand conspiracy was hastening to its accomplishment Madame Bonaparte and I had contrived a little plot of a more innocent kind. We let no one into our secret, and our 16th Brumaire was crowned with complete success. We had agreed to be on the alert to prevent any fresh exchange of angry words. All succeeded to the utmost of our wishes. The conversation languished during dinner; but it was not dulness that we were afraid of. It turned on the subject of war, and in that vast field Bonaparte's ...
— Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte, Complete • Louis Antoine Fauvelet de Bourrienne
... other members of the group. These latter two were members of the Black Bear Patrol of New York. All the lads appeared to be about eighteen years old. Their tidy uniforms, their well-knit frames and their alert attitudes bespoke the ...
— Boy Scouts in the North Sea - The Mystery of a Sub • G. Harvey Ralphson
... of such a thing. My father, at the age of 63, was one of the most healthy, vigorous, active men in the kingdom, and had scarcely ever had a day's serious illness in his life. To see him walk, ride, mount his horse, or in fact do any thing; he was so active, so alert, that his motions were more like a youth of eighteen or twenty than those of an old man; and to look upon him, no one would guess his age to be much above forty, though his hair lead been as white as the ...
— Memoirs of Henry Hunt, Esq. Volume 1 • Henry Hunt
... correct. The dull rabbits, the sleepy Persian cats, and the silly sheep had died outright of lethodyne; the cunning, inquisitive raccoon, the quick hawk, and the active, intense-natured weasels, all most eager, wary, and alert animals, full of keenness ...
— Hilda Wade - A Woman With Tenacity Of Purpose • Grant Allen
... subjected to brutal violation, and then turned out naked, with their children, to starve on the barren heaths. One whole family was enclosed in a barn, and consumed to ashes. Those ministers of vengeance were so alert in the execution of their office, that in a few days there was neither house, cottage, man, nor beast, to be seen within the compass of fifty miles; all was ...
— The Writings Of Thomas Paine, Complete - With Index to Volumes I - IV • Thomas Paine
... stole quietly up to the tent and looked in, the beating of his own heart nearly choking him. Dr. MacTavish slept on the lounge, the peaceful sleep of a child, or of a man who has done good work. Beside the bed sat Dr. Clay, watching, alert, hopeful. From the tent door where he stood he could see the little white face on the pillow and he knew from the way the child breathed that she was sleeping easily. The eastern wall of the tent was rosy with the dawn. Then he went back to the stable, hitched up his team, and drove home ...
— The Second Chance • Nellie L. McClung
... grew and developed, Abel, on his part, taught him to be keenly alert, patient, self-reliant and resourceful—qualities that every successful hunter and ...
— Bobby of the Labrador • Dillon Wallace
... only by the operation of an enlightened public sentiment. It is obvious now that, in the midst of all this agitation about other matters, Mr. Calhoun and the South Carolinians never lost sight of the conflict for which they were preparing, and that they were on the alert to bring nullification to the front in a more menacing and pronounced fashion than had ...
— Daniel Webster • Henry Cabot Lodge
... and now every man in the room was sitting up, alert, with gloomy eyes fixed upon Pierre: "Patterson is the first, but he ain't the last. He's just the start. Who's next?" He ...
— Riders of the Silences • John Frederick
... dusky tide. I fought as a man who gives his life for his brother's life, who knows that his time is short, that Death's doom above him hangs. But know ye, if 'Abdallah be dead, and his place a void, no weakling unsure of hand, and no holder-back was he! Alert, keen, his loins well girt, his leg to the middle bare, unblemished and clean of limb, a climber to all things high; No wailer before ill-luck; one mindful in all he did to think how his work to-day would live in to-morrow's ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol. 2 • Charles Dudley Warner
... weeks slipped by. It was an unusually mild winter, with so little snow that Anne and Diana could go to school nearly every day by way of the Birch Path. On Anne's birthday they were tripping lightly down it, keeping eyes and ears alert amid all their chatter, for Miss Stacy had told them that they must soon write a composition on "A Winter's Walk in the Woods," and it behooved ...
— Anne Of Green Gables • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... some blankets in which they rolled themselves and then lay down before the fire, which their host kept alive with fuel all through the night. Trot wakened several times and found the Mountain Ear always alert and listening intently for the slightest sound. But the little girl could hear no sound at all except the ...
— The Scarecrow of Oz • L. Frank Baum
... reckoned as good as dead, Charley stepped outside the wigwam and cast a quick look around. A smile of satisfaction parted his lips as he noted the distant figures of his companions behind the tree barricade, each at his post, gun in hand, nervously alert. From them, his glance went on to the point, where the battle was still going on. To even an unobserving person, it was clear that the firing from the canoes was slackening rapidly, and with a sigh of regret and anxiety, the lad turned back ...
— The Boy Chums in the Forest - or Hunting for Plume Birds in the Florida Everglades • Wilmer M. Ely
... our people had been on the alert, on account of a feud between them and the Ghawarineh Arabs. On coming up to the print of a human footstep, this was carefully examined as to its size, direction of the tread, etc. The circumstances were not, however, exactly parallel ...
— Byeways in Palestine • James Finn
... Some inward standard Marius seemed to detect there (though wholly unable to estimate its nature) of distinction, selection, refusal, amid the various elements of the fervid and corrupt life across which they were moving together:—some secret, constraining motive, ever on the alert at eye and ear, which carried him through Rome as under a charm, so that Marius could not but think of that figure of the white bird in the market-place as undoubtedly made true of him. And Marius was still full of admiration for this companion, who ...
— Marius the Epicurean, Volume One • Walter Horatio Pater
... itself, fell into their hands. The Eastern Empire, the last survival of the Empire of the Romans, perished beneath the sword of Mahomet. Then the pathway by land to Asia, to the fabled empires of Cathay and Cipango, was blocked by the Turkish conquest. Commerce, however, remained alert and enterprising, and men's minds soon turned to the hopes of a western passage which should provide a new route to ...
— The Dawn of Canadian History: A Chronicle of Aboriginal Canada • Stephen Leacock
... the day he had been deeply concerned for her comfort, sorry for her disappointment, under Brother Sam's indignant ironies patient, and at all times gentle and considerate. Now, in the light from the onrushing cars, she noted his alert, laughing eyes, the broad shoulders bent across the wheel, the lips smiling with excitement and in the joy of controlling, with a turn of the wrist, a power equal to sixty galloping horses. She found in his face much comfort. And in the fact that for the moment her safety ...
— The Scarlet Car • Richard Harding Davis
... prone to abuse it. His fine constitution, than which perhaps there was hardly ever a better, gave him great opportunities of indulging himself in these excesses; and his good spirits enabled him to pursue his pleasures of every kind in so alert and sprightly a manner, that multitudes envied him, and called him, by a dreadful kind of compliment, ...
— The Life of Col. James Gardiner - Who Was Slain at the Battle of Prestonpans, September 21, 1745 • P. Doddridge
... the deAngelis flared to a 98.4 then started inching down again. The young reporter sat up, alert, from where he had been dozing. The loud clang of a bell had brought ...
— The Circuit Riders • R. C. FitzPatrick
... "Here," says the alert young officer who is acting as instructor, unrolling a chart, "is a picture of an action in a little village south of Mons. A company of our fellows were holding the village. There are, you see, only two roads ...
— Italy at War and the Allies in the West • E. Alexander Powell
... his first connection with the office, been under the control of Mr. Fairbanks, and he feels a just pride in the perfection to which these details have been brought. His heart is in his profession, and it is his constant study. No improvement in it escapes his observation, and he is ever on the alert to avail himself of everything promising to increase the efficiency of his establishment. It is a noticeable fact, that the Herald has never missed a daily issue, although at times during the war the scarcity of paper was so great that the issue of the Morning ...
— Cleveland Past and Present - Its Representative Men, etc. • Maurice Joblin
... fat, exhibited fewer effects of his battle with the wasps. His one outstanding defect was an entirely closed eye. With the other, wide open and alert, he looked about him. In spite of his one bad eye and his stiff legs he was inspired with the optimism of one who at last sees fortune turning his way. He was rid of the man-beast, who had killed his mother; the forests were before him again, open and ...
— Nomads of the North - A Story of Romance and Adventure under the Open Stars • James Oliver Curwood
... one at all; but that was chiefly because he did not want to meet any one. He went with his ears and his eyes alert, and was not above hiding behind a clump of stunted bushes when two horsemen rode down a canyon trail just below him. Also he searched for roads and then avoided them. It would be a fat morsel for Marie and her mother to roll under their tongues, ...
— Cabin Fever • B. M. Bower
... two appeared Mrs. Frothingham; alert, lightsome, much improved in health since the first year of her widowhood. She had been visiting here for a fortnight, and tomorrow would return to her home in the south. Movement, variety, intimate gossip, supported her under the affliction which still seemed to be working ...
— The Whirlpool • George Gissing
... to be up and doing early on the following morning, but my slumbers proved so profound, that I did not wake until about eight; on arising, I again found myself the sole occupant of the apartment, my more alert companion having probably risen at a much earlier hour. Having dressed myself, I descended, and going to the stable, found my horse under the hands of my friend the ostler, who was carefully rubbing him down. "There a'n't a better horse in the fair," ...
— The Romany Rye • George Borrow
... Achilles around the walls of Troy. And when they met there would be a duel of giants. Twice Whistling Dan was sighted. Once Jim Silent fought a running duel with a posse fresh from Elkhead. The man hunters were alert, but it was their secret hope that the two famous outlaws would destroy each other, but how the wild chase would end no one could know. At last Buck Daniels rode to tell ...
— The Untamed • Max Brand
... month had passed since the incident of the false Dionysius had led to the two men meeting. It was now December. Whatever Mr. Carlyle's step might indicate to the inner eye it betokened to the casual observer the manner of a crisp, alert, self-possessed man of business. Carlyle, in truth, betrayed nothing of the pessimism and despondency that had marked ...
— Four Max Carrados Detective Stories • Ernest Bramah
... syllable Fawkes sprang into an attitude of alert and fearful attention, listened as to the pronouncement of a foreman juror, and replied, "No, sir," with the relieved air of a man surprised to find himself still living. "I see Flamby Duveen, I did," he continued, ...
— The Orchard of Tears • Sax Rohmer
... Crosbie, within two miles of the town. Here arms were distributed and orders given by their leader, named Roche. Silently and quickly they reached the town they hoped to surprise. But the regular troops, of which the garrison was chiefly composed, were on the alert, though their preparations were made full as silently. When the peasantry emerged from Tullow Street, into an exposed space, a deadly fire was opened upon them from the houses on all sides. The regulars, in perfect security themselves, and abundantly ...
— A Popular History of Ireland - From the earliest period to the emancipation of the Catholics • Thomas D'Arcy McGee
... Mansoul is reduced to the greatest straits and sadness. In this extremity, prayers are incessantly offered up to Emmanuel; but, for a long time, they can obtain no satisfactory answers. Both parties are on the alert; but Diabolus finds it impossible, either by treachery or by storming with his legion of doubts, to gain possession of Heart-castle. Being worsted in a general engagement, the doubters are slain, and are buried with their armour; yea, all that did but ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... lost his arm by one stroke of Manlius' short Roman sword; the next was by main strength hurled backwards over the precipice, and Manlius stood along on the top, for a few moments, ready to strike the next who should struggle up. The whole of the garrison were in a few moments on the alert, and the attack was entirely repulsed; the sleeping sentry was cast headlong down the rock; and Manlius was brought, by each grateful soldier, that which was then most valuable to all, a little meal and a small measure of wine. Still, ...
— A Book of Golden Deeds • Charlotte M. Yonge
... months, during all of which time, consumed by organic disease, and worn out by long and uninterrupted service, his dauntless resolution never wholly failed him. For weeks and weeks his eagle eye, ever on the alert to spy out a vulnerable point in that seemingly immaculate coat-of-mail, scanned the redoubts from Cape Rouge to the Montmorenci. There was no fool-hardiness—no wilful throwing away of life—but ...
— Canadian Notabilities, Volume 1 • John Charles Dent
... Sunday our intention was, after taking bearings from the summit of Luxmore Head, to delay our further proceeding until the next morning, but the circumstance that occurred kept us so much on the alert that it was anything but a day of rest. Having landed at the foot of the hill we ascended its summit, but found it so thickly wooded as to deprive us of the view we had anticipated; but, as there were some openings in the trees through which a few distant objects could be ...
— Narrative of a Survey of the Intertropical and Western Coasts of Australia - Performed between the years 1818 and 1822 • Phillip Parker King
... know the loss we have sustained in our departed sister. She was ever alert and kindly, ever bountiful though without extravagance. To the last she preserved her characteristics. On the fatal morning of her removal from among us, she rose as usual and came to the family breakfast-table. ...
— The Reminiscences of an Irish Land Agent • S.M. Hussey
... strangely, the cloud of terror seemed to roll away. Her faculties cleared. Her mind was all alert and quickened. She thought of things she had heard of years before, and long forgotten. That a wet cloth about the face would defend from smoke. That down low, close to the floor, was always a current ...
— Faith Gartney's Girlhood • Mrs. A. D. T. Whitney
... Tommy and the twins at the Rat Hole—the skipper established in comfort by the stove, a cup of tea at his hand, his stockinged feet put up to warm: the twins sitting close, both grinning broadly, each finely alert to anticipate the old man's wants, who now had acquired a pampered air, which sat curiously upon him. "Seems t' me, Davy," he said, in a solemn whisper, at the end of the tale, new told for me, ...
— Doctor Luke of the Labrador • Norman Duncan
... the main question which had previously agitated the Emperor and his advisers, and particularly his stage-manager, Fouche, whom he now restored to his old office, came up once more. "What next?" and it was harder to answer than ever, for Bonaparte's mind was no longer alert. He was listless and given to delay, and, worst of all, invariably sleepy. It was evident that Elba had not proved as restful as ...
— Mr. Bonaparte of Corsica • John Kendrick Bangs
... noiselessly behind her. I saw her face: she was my old friend Suzanne. When her eyes fell on me, she started in surprise, as well she might; but the caution and fear, which had made her knock almost noiseless, her tread silent, and her face all astrain with alert alarm, held ...
— The Indiscretion of the Duchess • Anthony Hope
... the laughing, romping girl, but the woman with alert eye and tightly closed lips. "What are you ...
— They of the High Trails • Hamlin Garland
... in charge of the work, whom we found in a little office in front partitioned off by ground glass, was an old man with an alert, vigorous mind on whom the effects of plain living and high thinking showed plainly. He was looking over some new blanks with a young woman who seemed to be working with him, directing the force of clerks ...
— The War Terror • Arthur B. Reeve
... as his word, and Willa found that he had spoken truly. His sister proved to be a thin, pleasant-faced woman with a humorous curve to her lips and alert twinkling brown eyes. She was ready and willing to take Dan's employer as a lodger and the terms were ...
— The Fifth Ace • Douglas Grant
... making three, in our first-class compartment in the all-day express train from Cologne to Berlin after it left Hanover. He was a naval officer of about forty-five, clean-cut, alert, clearly an intelligent man. His manner was proud, ...
— The Land of Deepening Shadow - Germany-at-War • D. Thomas Curtin
... At last he decided on a ruse. He would head for the main gate, get out, and use his electronic key without waiting for the guard to admit him. At the same time, he would press a secret warning bell to alert the ...
— Tom Swift and The Visitor from Planet X • Victor Appleton
... the appointed hour, Kai Lung was again led before the Mandarin Shan Tien. To the alert yet downcast gaze of the former person it seemed as if the usually inscrutable expression of that high official was not wholly stern as it moved in his direction. Ming-shu, on the contrary, disclosed all his ...
— Kai Lung's Golden Hours • Ernest Bramah
... world with the noise of their business—spiders, butterflies, and centipedes, ants, beetles, and flies, and mysterious entities that crawl nameless under foot. A pea-hen shrieks in the grass, and a kite whistles aloft. A remote speck in the sky denotes a watchful vulture, alert for any mishap to the citizens of the woods, and a crash of twigs may mean anything from a buck to a rhinoceros. There is a hectic ...
— The Second Class Passenger • Perceval Gibbon
... was cold and rainy, and the irresolute Italian railroads were interrupted by the floods. A tawny deluge rolled down from the mountains through the bed of the Arno, and kept the Florentine fire-department on the alert night and day. "It is a curious thing about this country," said Mr. Hinkle, encountering Baron Belsky on the Ponte Trinita, "that the only thing they ever have here for a fire company to put out is a freshet. If they had a real conflagration ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... the realization that he was not to be permitted to round out his fourth successful season at first base. But if Jimmy was momentarily stunned he gave no outward indication of the fact, and in the brief interval of silence following the president's ultimatum his alert mind functioned with the rapidity which it had often shown upon the gridiron, the ...
— The Efficiency Expert • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... the shot John stopped, and listened for some sound, and the natives, usually so alert ...
— The Wonder Island Boys: Adventures on Strange Islands • Roger Thompson Finlay
... moments passed, and the men in the arbor gave no sign of suspicion he gained confidence, all his professional instincts aroused at the import of this secrecy and the magnificence of the impending revelations. He was England, waiting, alert, on guard, for the safety and peace of Europe. He did not dare to look at Marishka, for fear of the slightest motion or sound which might betray them. Only their hands clasped, though by this time neither of them was conscious ...
— The Secret Witness • George Gibbs
... can keep a good man down, if you've got enough headstart, are alert and persistent ... so long as he limits himself to acting like ...
— Instinct • George Oliver Smith
... hours. Old Jack Rabbit hopped before him, Then sat up, to watch him pass, Dusky horned-toads scurried nimbly Through the withered buffalo grass. Here and there the buzzing rattler Whirred a warning, head alert, Then retreated from the snapping, Stinging strokes of Billy's quirt. Day by day the wild breeze flying, With'ring in its scorching heat, Hummed a tune to labored beating Of the plodding ...
— Nancy MacIntyre • Lester Shepard Parker
... could they have peeped into the girl's mind. She liked being alone, being still. There had been considerable strain to keeping up a reputation as a school terror. It had meant being constantly on the alert for an opportunity to misbehave; it meant thinking up plots, living up to an exacting standard of wickedness. The reaction had come with these idle days and she ...
— The Cricket • Marjorie Cooke
... Longman's apartments, where he found all on the alert—the governess and her nieces recounting their experiences of February, which convinced them that there was more danger in returning than in remaining. Miss Longman was urgent to keep Isabel and Lord Fitzjocelyn for ...
— Dynevor Terrace (Vol. I) - or, The Clue of Life • Charlotte M. Yonge
... belt, there came to him a thought of the way in which Mukee had avenged Cummins' wife, and he turned again upon the trail. He no longer touched the low- hanging bushes. He was no more than a shadow, appearing and disappearing without warning, trailing as the white ermine follows its prey, noiseless, alert, his body responding sinuously and without apparent effort to the working commands of ...
— The Honor of the Big Snows • James Oliver Curwood
... tender mercies—his instructions did not include any such extreme measures as Maillot had suggested—confident that he was the proper person to relieve me of this unwelcome intrusion. It has always been hard for me to talk to these sharp-eyed, alert young chaps of the press, without saying something I had no business to say. Even if I did n't say it, some one of them would be sure to make a pretty shrewd guess, sometimes causing me no end of trouble. Stodger ...
— The Paternoster Ruby • Charles Edmonds Walk
... many a hold-up. And to-day, at his age, he simply must not be robbed. It would break his heart. In sheer desperation he drew his six-shooter, examined it carefully, glanced at his fellow-passengers and sat silent, alert and grim. ...
— Forty-one Thieves - A Tale of California • Angelo Hall
... Mex was constantly dartling, and her ear was alert to catch every syllable Pierce uttered. She paid no attention to Sheldrake, who responded guardedly to ...
— A Dream of Empire - Or, The House of Blennerhassett • William Henry Venable
... An alert young officer of the guard raised his hand in salute as Stuyvesant addressed him. No, there were no ambulances, no soldiers from the Presidio. They might be waiting across ...
— Ray's Daughter - A Story of Manila • Charles King
... Jones. First blood was drawn by David Porter, illustrious scion of a family which gave five generations to brilliant service in the navy. On August 13, 1812, Porter, with the Essex, engaged in a sharp battle with the British ship Alert, which, after an action of eight minutes, surrendered in a sinking condition. He had seen hard service before that, had been twice impressed by British vessels and twice escaped, had fought French and pirates, and spent some time ...
— American Men of Action • Burton E. Stevenson
... lips of the dying man bent the ear of Dyke Darrel, every nerve on the alert to catch the ...
— Dyke Darrel the Railroad Detective - Or, The Crime of the Midnight Express • Frank Pinkerton
... answered, "that though her master was a deal on the wrong side of seventy, and though, to look at him, you'd think he was glued to his chair, and would fall to pieces if he should stir out of it, yet he was as alert, and thought no more of going about, than if he was as young as the gentleman who was now speaking to her. It was old Mr. Reynolds' delight to come down and surprise his people at his different places, and see that they ...
— Tales and Novels, Vol. 6 • Maria Edgeworth
... going to bring your account back to us, Mrs. Salisbury," said the alert salesman who waited upon them. "We are always sorry to ...
— The Treasure • Kathleen Norris
... and indifference and look a little more closely upon the play of wild life about him to realize how much interesting natural history is being enacted every day before his very eyes—in his own garden and dooryard and apple-orchard and vineyard. If one's mind were only alert and sensitive enough to take it all in! Whether one rides or walks or sits under the trees, or loiters about the fields or woods, the play of wild life is going on about him, and, if he happens to be blessed with the seeing eye and the hearing ...
— Under the Maples • John Burroughs
... He was thinking, now, his thin face set in a frown, the upper teeth biting hard over the under lip and drawing up the pointed beard. While he thought, he watched the man extended on the chair, watched him like an alert cat, to extract from him some hint as to what he should do. This absorption seemed to ignore completely the other occupants of the room, of whom he was the central, commanding figure. The head nurse held the lamp carelessly, resting her hand over one hip ...
— The Web of Life • Robert Herrick
... camp like two Indians, silent and alert, looking out for dead bodies and live Indians, for really we more expected to find the camp devastated by those rascals than to find that it still contained our friends. To the east we could plainly see what seemed to be a large salt lake ...
— Death Valley in '49 • William Lewis Manly
... town, past the head-quarters, where Roberts reviewed us and the 38th. He was standing with a large Staff at the foot of the steps. The order "eyes right" gave us a good view of him, and very small, fit, and alert he looked. ...
— In the Ranks of the C.I.V. • Erskine Childers
... were always alert. And they at once negatived any unauthorized wireless so that German spies could only snap out a signal or two at any time. They could ...
— The Sleuth of St. James's Square • Melville Davisson Post
... the streets shouting, "The city taken! Down with the Papists! A new world!" Hearing this, the Protestants in the city recognised their co-religionists, and the Catholics their opponents: but whereas the former had been warned and were on the alert, the latter were taken by surprise; consequently they offered no resistance, which, however, did not prevent bloodshed. M. de St. Andre, the governor of the town, who during his short period of office had drawn the bitter hatred of the ...
— Massacres Of The South (1551-1815) - Celebrated Crimes • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... appeared, and soon there were fourteen or fifteen. Slip and Buck glided about among them quietly, their eyes alert, their hats drawn down over their eyes, taking a hand here, throwing bones there, poking up the coal fire, putting on coffee, making sandwiches, every moment on the qui vive, communicating with each other by jerks of the hand, lifting ...
— The River Prophet • Raymond S. Spears
... green grass-hoppers—who need not be further indicated—that he had already begun a well-simulated note of challenge to those around clad in brown, and to leap upwards in a preparatory essay, when the ever-alert Sir Philip took him affectionately by the arm, on the plea that the seclusion of a neighbouring pavilion afforded ...
— The Mirror of Kong Ho • Ernest Bramah
... She was on her feet, with bright, wild eyes glancing here and there. There was no suggestion of childishness in her, but a certain willingness to flee from a great danger or attack a weaker force. She stood alert, rather than frightened, with her head back as if she scented the wind to learn what approached. The ball of gray fur straightened into the sharp ears and the flashing teeth of a coyote puppy. Buck Daniels' foot slipped on a pebble and at the sound the coyote darted to ...
— The Seventh Man • Max Brand
... part in this conversation, but had wandered about the top of the mesa rather aimlessly, from time to time looking sharply at the surroundings beneath him in the alert manner of one whose life has been passed ...
— The Border Boys Across the Frontier • Fremont B. Deering
... charge of the ponderous knights, amongst the reedy pools. William decided on constructing a causeway, and employed workmen to cut trenches to drain off the water, and raise the bank of stones and turf, under the superintendence of Ivo Taillebois. However, Hereward was on the alert, harassing them perpetually, breaking on them sometimes on one side, sometimes on the other, in such strange, unexpected ways, that at last the viscount came to the conclusion that he must have magic arts to aid him, and persuaded ...
— Cameos from English History, from Rollo to Edward II • Charlotte Mary Yonge
... congregations opened this morning in a similar manner, and songs of praise were heard from the marching multitudes wending their way to the State House Park. There was shooting from a hotel window. Two of the suspected men were taken to Libby Prison. With the soldiers on the alert, and an increased force of policemen, ...
— A Woman's Life-Work - Labors and Experiences • Laura S. Haviland
... half-past six, having conveyed her baggage to the station and left it in charge of an amiable porter, she paid a last visit to the Casino Municipale. She disliked the thought of leaving Ginger without having uplifted him. Like so many alert and active-minded girls, she possessed in a great degree the quality of interesting herself in—or, as her brother Fillmore preferred to put it, messing about with—the private affairs of others. Ginger had impressed her as a man ...
— The Adventures of Sally • P. G. Wodehouse
... come up to her, a pretty little white goat, alert, wide-awake, glossy, with gilded horns, gilded hoofs, and gilded collar, which he had not hitherto perceived, and which had remained lying curled up on one corner of the carpet watching his ...
— Notre-Dame de Paris - The Hunchback of Notre Dame • Victor Hugo
... the others are on the alert, and not wasting their time in thinking about me; and that, if this troop make along the river, they will ride to warn the queen in time. Hearing nothing, she will assume that the road is clear, and that she can go ...
— Saint Bartholomew's Eve - A Tale of the Huguenot WarS • G. A. Henty
... or fourth time, moved cautiously towards the window. His expression suddenly changed. He glanced downwards, frowning slightly. An alert light flashed ...
— The Black Box • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... instantly alive, and Woods was wakened. A faint click went away on the night breeze, and a moment later three jets of flame carried warning to the up-creeping foe that the whites were both alive and on the alert. ...
— Last of the Great Scouts - The Life Story of William F. Cody ["Buffalo Bill"] • Helen Cody Wetmore
... backwards as if in reference to the two children, and then at Hake, after which he flung his club with such violence and precision at Karlsefin's head that the stout Norseman would certainly have measured his length on the sand, if he had not been very much on the alert. As it was, he received the missile on his shield, from which it glanced with a loud clang, and went ...
— The Norsemen in the West • R.M. Ballantyne
... rose up in their course, and at length these became so numerous that they were completely bewildered among them. After a time they emerged again into a more open space, when Archy, whose quick eyes were ever on the alert, cried out that he saw three objects ...
— Archibald Hughson - An Arctic Story • W.H.G. Kingston
... It struck his alert wit that Agatha would trust his sister rather than himself, whom the Egyptian had several times abused as a criminal; and seeing the old woman of Polybius's household making her way up to Melissa, out of breath, indeed, and with disordered hair, he felt light dawn ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... getting lower and lower. The last three words would have been almost inaudible to ears less sensitively alert than were Alice Greggory's. For a moment after the words were uttered, only the clock's ticking broke the silence; then, with an obvious effort, the man roused himself, as if breaking away from some benumbing ...
— Miss Billy Married • Eleanor H. Porter
... readers in general, know nothing whatever. There is, for one, that fine, old, standard publication, Barrel and Box, devoted to the subjects and the interests of the coopering industry; there is, too, The Dried Fruit Packer and Western Canner, as alert a magazine as one could wish—in its kind; and from the home of classic American literature comes The New England Tradesman and Grocer. And so on. At the place alone where we went to press twenty-seven trade journals were printed ...
— Walking-Stick Papers • Robert Cortes Holliday
... military idea underlying it. What will become of an army if the sentries go to sleep? And what chance will a Christian man have of doing his devoir against his enemy, unless he keeps himself awake, and keeps himself alert? Watchfulness, in the sense of always having eyes open for the possible rush down upon us of temptation and evil, is no small part of the discipline and the duty of the Christian life. One part of that watchfulness consists in exercising a very rigid and a very constant and comprehensive ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture: Romans Corinthians (To II Corinthians, Chap. V) • Alexander Maclaren
... to keep on the alert to take him. He came to the cabin last night. If he does to-night we can ...
— Deadwood Dick, The Prince of the Road - or, The Black Rider of the Black Hills • Edward L. Wheeler
... hastily of sunken mines, of soldiers crouching behind the barriers, behind the houses at the next corner, of Mausers covering us from the latticed balconies overhead. Until at last, when the silence had become alert and menacing, a lonely man dashed into the middle of the street, hurled a white flag in front of us, and then dived headlong under the porch of a house. The next instant, as though at a signal, a hundred citizens, each with a white flag in both hands, ran from cover, waving ...
— Notes of a War Correspondent • Richard Harding Davis
... husband, and soon after supper came in, and I ate moderately, and we spent the remainder of the evening, for the clock had then tolled nine, very cheerfully; for my Quaker was so rejoiced at my good fortune, as she called it, that she was very alert, and exceeding good company; and her wit, and she had no small share of it, I thought was better played off than ever I ...
— The Fortunate Mistress (Parts 1 and 2) • Daniel Defoe
... respect for the marvels of Arthurian romance. And his admiration is at least as frank as his contempt. What poet has felt and avowed a deeper reverence for the great Latins? What poet has been so alert to recognize the master-spirits of his own time and his father's? De Meung and Granson among the French—Dante, Petrarch and Boccaccio of the Italians—each comes in for his share of praise from Chaucer, or of the princely borrowings which are still ...
— English literary criticism • Various
... vague rustle of movement. And presently another, this time closer. Every sense in him was alert, keyed up to closest attention. He knew that some one, for some sinister purpose, had come into this apartment and been trapped ...
— Tangled Trails - A Western Detective Story • William MacLeod Raine
... Pullman car with expectant eyes. Judy Kean in a black velvet suit and a big picture hat headed the delegation. Only two passengers descended from the sleeper: a middle-aged, worn-looking woman in shabby black and a young man whose alert brown eyes took in at once the crowd of college girls and Judy, resplendent in velvet ...
— Molly Brown's Senior Days • Nell Speed
... fashion, and she has at all events had a fairly warm place to sleep in. When she enters her situation, she finds herself placed in a bare chill garret; she has not a scrap of carpet on the floor, and very likely she is bitterly cold at nights. She is expected to be astir and alert from six in the morning until ten or later at night; she is required to show almost preternatural activity and intelligence, and she is not supposed to have any of the ordinary human being's desire for recreation ...
— Side Lights • James Runciman
... the walls to find where the gold is masoned in. By the time this cautious search is over, a stout iron-bound bucket, precisely like a well-bucket, has been attached to one end of the whip; while the other end, being stretched across the deck, is there held by two or three alert hands. These last now hoist the bucket within grasp of the Indian, to whom another person has reached up a very long pole. Inserting this pole into the bucket, Tashtego downward guides the bucket into the Tun, till it entirely ...
— Moby Dick; or The Whale • Herman Melville
... mercantile attack on England were to have even a chance of success. With Austria he had employed all the diplomatic arts of Talleyrand and Andreossy to no avail: the Polish campaign had made Francis alert, that of Russia was reviving the bellicose spirit of the Austrian army. Negotiation with Frederick William had failed because based on the concept of a new Prussia eastward of the Elbe, a menace alike to Russia and Austria, ...
— The Life of Napoleon Bonaparte - Vol. III. (of IV.) • William Milligan Sloane
... hands in his pockets, but a very alert gleam in his usually vacuous face, stood in the windowed doorway. From behind him, two exceedingly formidable-looking men slipped into the room. There was no fight, not even a struggle. Seaman, who had never recovered from the shock of his surprise, and was now completely unnerved, was ...
— The Great Impersonation • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... men hastened to the rock—the ladder was lowered, and all was on the alert for embarkation—Lady Barclay and Lilly flew into his arms, while Wilhelmina hung on Ramsay; but they allowed but a short time for endearment—time was too precious. The luggage had all been prepared and the chests of specie were lowered, the bundles thrown down, and, in a quarter of ...
— Snarley-yow - or The Dog Fiend • Frederick Marryat
... darkness were therefore the season of peril for the king. It is said that he used to pass them in constant watchfulness, prowling round his huts fully armed, peering into the blackest shadows, or himself standing silent and alert, like a sentinel on duty, in some dark corner. When at last his rival appeared, the fight would take place in grim silence, broken only by the clash of spears and shields, for it was a point of honour with the king not to call ...
— The Golden Bough - A study of magic and religion • Sir James George Frazer
... crime. The first resource of the superannuated or discharged police detective is to start an agency. Of course, he may be first class in spite of these disqualifications, but the presumption in the first instance is that he is no longer alert or effective, and in the second that in one way or another he is not honest. Agencies recruited from deposed and other ex-policemen usually have all the faults of the police without any of their virtues. There ...
— Courts and Criminals • Arthur Train
... upon again, after the illustrations of it which have been incidentally furnished in these pages. More especially with regard to the manners and ways of women, which often, while seeming so natural to women themselves, appear so odd to male observers, Chaucer's eye was ever on the alert. But his works likewise contain passages displaying a penetrating insight into the minds of men, as well as a keen eye for their manners, together with a power of generalising, which, when kept within due bonds, lies at the root of the wise knowledge of humankind so admirable to us in our ...
— Chaucer • Adolphus William Ward
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