"Ell" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... goose!" said my Lady. "De La Pole, indeed! who be these De La Poles? Why, no more than merchants of Lombard Street, selling towelling at fivepence the ell, and coverchiefs of Cambray [Note 4] at seven shillings the piece. Truly a goodly pedigree to boast of ...
— In Convent Walls - The Story of the Despensers • Emily Sarah Holt
... Brazer's death the store was moved across the street, where it still remains, forming the ell of Gerrish's block. The post-office was in the north end of it, during Mr. Butler's term as postmaster. About this time the son, William Farwell Brazer, built a store nearly opposite to the Academy, which he kept during some years. It was made finally into a dwelling-house, and occupied by the ...
— Bay State Monthly, Volume I, No. 2, February, 1884 - A Massachusetts Magazine • Various
... for some time we could make good use of another room. We couldn't give up the parlor to her all the time. If we built another room on the ell and put the piano in there, she could give lessons all day long and it wouldn't bother us. We could build a clothes-press in it, and put in a bed-lounge and a dresser and let Anna have it for her sleeping-room. She needs ...
— Song of the Lark • Willa Cather
... saw was a long, low, rambling house, with wide, hospitable verandas embowered in half-tropical vines. It had evidently started out as a one-roomed, Spanish 'adobe,' and, as the needs of the family demanded it, an ell had been added here, a room there, like cells in a bee-hive, until now it covered a good deal of territory, still keeping ...
— Blue Bonnet's Ranch Party • C. E. Jacobs
... appear at the ensuing grand Review, as Friedrich Wilhelm understood. Whereupon Friedrich Wilhelm took his measures in private. Dressed up, namely, his Scavenger-Executioner people (what they call PROFOSSEN in Prussian regiments) in an enormous exaggeration of that costume; cocked-hats about an ell in diameter, wigs reaching to the houghs, with other fittings to match: these, when Count Rothenburg and his company appeared upon the ground, Friedrich Wilhelm summoned out, with some trumpet-peal or burst of field-music; and they solemnly crossed Count Rothenburg's field ...
— History Of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Volume IV. (of XXI.) - Frederick The Great—Friedrich's Apprenticeship, First Stage—1713-1728 • Thomas Carlyle
... so. This brought her into a wilderness of tangled grasses where free stepping was difficult. As she groped her way along, she had ample opportunity to hear again the intermittent sounds of the hammer, and to note that they reached their maximum at a point where the ell of the ...
— Dark Hollow • Anna Katharine Green
... real or feigned, to see P. Sybarite take the seat by his side. "What t'ell? Who's payin' you to be ...
— The Day of Days - An Extravaganza • Louis Joseph Vance
... hour ago, on a wooden frame with tent over it, by a team of eight horses; tent curtaining it, guarded by Cadets; now the tent is struck and off;—saw mortals ever the like? It is fourteen ells (KLEINE ELLEN) long, by six broad; and at the centre half an ell thick. Baked by machinery; how otherwise could peel or roller act on such a Cake? There are five thousand eggs in it; thirty-six bushels (Berlin measure) of sound flour; one tun of milk, one tun of yeast, one ditto of butter; crackers, gingerbread-nuts, for fillet or trimming, ...
— History of Friedrich II of Prussia V 7 • Thomas Carlyle
... him. It was good for sore eyes—who'd a-thought of his turning up there!" Splendidly inflated Martin was when he spoke of "his servants." This thing was entertaining until he grew presumptuous. If you are polite to some people they are familiar, and want to take an ell for every inch you have conceded. And then you have to tell them to keep their place. But Martin, with the instincts of his race, saw in time when it was coming to that. What a misery it must be for a coloured ...
— Romantic Spain - A Record of Personal Experiences (Vol. II) • John Augustus O'Shea
... 'We-ell, ye-es,' he returned, thinking about it, not quite satisfied with the phrase: 'or perhaps I might say, if it was in him. Supposing, for instance, that a man wanted to be always marching, he would find your mother an inestimable companion. But if he had any ...
— Our Mutual Friend • Charles Dickens
... vs, euery man sticked downe his dart vpon the shoare, and the Captaines had stooles brought them, and they sate downe, and sent a young man aboord of vs, which brought a measure with him of an ell, and one fourth part, and one sixteenth part, and he would haue that foure times for a waight of one Angell and twelue graines: I offered him two elles, as I had done before for two Angels weight, which he esteemed nothing, but still stucke at his foure measures aforesaide: yet in the ende, when ...
— The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques, and Discoveries of - The English Nation, Vol. 11 • Richard Hakluyt
... minit. For 'E is callin' yer to come an' be saved an' find salvation, as 'E called me many years ago. I was then like yerselves, full of wickedness, an gloryin' in sin. But I 'eard the voice of 'Im Who died on the Cross, an' saw I was rushin' 'eadlong to 'ell. An' 'Is blood washed all my sins away, an' made me whiter than snow. Whiter than snow, friends—whiter than snow! An' 'E'll do the same fer you if yer will only come an' be saved. Oh, can't yer 'ear the voice of Jesus callin' to yer to come an' live with 'Im in ...
— Jonah • Louis Stone
... "Oh 'ell," he said, wiping his eyes. "Oh, stroike me pink! That's good, that is. You wait, young gent, you wait till you've growed up and see what yer pa says to ...
— More William • Richmal Crompton
... bloomin' well looted 'em—go to 'ell!" said Henry Withers of the Sick Horse Depot, and left the lower deck of the Osiris in a ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... "We-ell, I s'pose then you might stay out just this once," Mrs. Hunt said, slowly, being fully alive to the advantages to Jimmy of such a friendly feeling on Theo's part. She recognized Theodore's business ability, and would ...
— The Bishop's Shadow • I. T. Thurston
... we that now make merry on the Green They left, and Summer dresses in new sheen, Ourselves must we beneath the springing Turf Add our Ell ...
— The Golfer's Rubaiyat • H. W. Boynton
... "I know not who is to pay the penalty. But whoever may object or disapprove, I intend to lie upon this bed and repose there at my ease." Then he at once disrobed in the bed, which was long and raised half an ell above the other two, and was covered with a yellow cloth of silk and a coverlet with gilded stars. The furs were not of skinned vair but of sable; the covering he had on him would have been fitting for ...
— Four Arthurian Romances - "Erec et Enide", "Cliges", "Yvain", and "Lancelot" • Chretien de Troyes
... the fact is, I stayed because I couldn't go away. Of course, it was an abominable position, but I assure you it felt like heaven when it didn't feel like 'ell." ...
— The Divine Fire • May Sinclair
... imagination, though he never became in manner, a natural man of the world; he had intuitively, as an artist, what one may call the historic consciousness. He had a relish for social subtleties and mysteries, and, in perception, when occasion offered him an inch he never failed to take an ell. A single glimpse of a social situation of the elder type enabled him to construct the whole, with all its complex chiaroscuro, and Rowland more than once assured him that he made him believe in the metempsychosis, and that he must have lived in European ...
— Roderick Hudson • Henry James
... incorrigible miscreants, Rags and Want! The confederacy is, to be sure, older than the crucified thieves; but then it has not been so undisguisedly avowed. Broad Cloth has, on the contrary, affected a sympathy with tatters, though with a constancy of purpose has refused an ell from its trailing superfluity to solace the wretchedness; the tears of Beef dropt on the lank abdomen of Starvation, are ancient as post diluvian crocodiles.—but it has spared no morsel to the object of its hypocritic sorrow. Now, however, even the decency of deceit ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 1, October 2, 1841 • Various
... you,—I'll lay you two to one, in fives or fifties if you like, that you knew before you axed, and that Thunderbolt don't win the Riddlesworth." "Really," said Mr. Jorrocks, "I'm not a betting man." "Then, wot the 'ell business have you at Newmarket?" was all the answer he got. Disgusted with such inhospitable impertinence, Mr. Jorrocks turned on his heel and walked away. Before the "White Hart" Inn was a smartish pony phaeton, in charge of a stunted stable lad. "I say, young chap," inquired Jorrocks, ...
— Jorrocks' Jaunts and Jollities • Robert Smith Surtees
... already decided, from small signs of assurance, that this Western child was bold. "Give her an inch, and she'll take an ell," she had said to herself. "I ...
— Jewel - A Chapter In Her Life • Clara Louise Burnham
... his hearty fashion. Behold, what doth he but turn round with such a look about the long lip of him as my Lord of Buckingham might have if his scullion made free with him. His aunt, the Duchess of Savoy, is a merry dame, and a wise! She and our King can talk by the ell, but as for the Emperor, he speaketh to none willingly save Queen Katharine, who is of his own stiff Spanish humour, and he hath eyes for none save Queen Mary, who would have been his empress had high folk held to their word. And with so tongue-tied ...
— The Armourer's Prentices • Charlotte Mary Yonge
... truth, though neither his profession nor his practice testify so much; he whose mind is possessed with prejudicate opinions against the truth, when convincing light is holden forth to him, looketh asquint, and therefore goeth awry; the pragmatical adiaphorist, with his span-broad faith and ell-broad conscience, doth no small harm—the poor pandect of his plagiary profession in matters of faith reckoneth little for all, and in matters of practice all for little. Shortly, if an expurgatory index were compiled of those, and all other sorts of men, who either through ...
— The Works of Mr. George Gillespie (Vol. 1 of 2) • George Gillespie
... was in a hackney cabriolet, for Jonas Chuzzlewit had said 'Spare no expense.' Mankind is evil in its thoughts and in its base constructions, and Jonas was resolved it should not have an inch to stretch into an ell against him. It never should be charged upon his father's son that he had grudged the money for his father's funeral. Hence, until the obsequies should be concluded, Jonas had taken for his motto 'Spend, ...
— Life And Adventures Of Martin Chuzzlewit • Charles Dickens
... with macron [a,] a with ogonek (tail) ['c] c with acute accent [vc] c with caron [-e] e with macron [ve] e with caron [e,] e with ogonek [)e] e with breve [-i] i with macron [)i] i with breve [/l] ell with stroke ['m] m with acute accent ['n] n with acute accent [vn] n with caron [-o] o with macron [vr] r with caron [.r] r with dot over ['s] s with acute accent [vs] s with caron [-u] u with macron ['z] z with acute accent [.Z] Z with dot over ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Vol. 7. - Poetry • George Gordon Byron
... discontent. Inter delicias semper aliquid saevi nos strangulat, for a pint of honey thou shalt here likely find a gallon of gall, for a dram of pleasure a pound of pain, for an inch of mirth an ell of moan; as ivy doth an oak, these miseries encompass our life. And it is most absurd and ridiculous for any mortal man to look for a perpetual tenure of happiness in his life. Nothing so prosperous and pleasant, but it hath [935]some bitterness in it, some ...
— The Anatomy of Melancholy • Democritus Junior
... piece of Genoa velvet Dame Margery looked out yesterday for her mistress's wedding-suit? I do bethink me it is a good ell too long at ...
— Traditions of Lancashire, Volume 1 (of 2) • John Roby
... his back, sir, was six yards and an ell, And it was sent to Derby to toll the market bell, The bell, the bell, the bell, And it was sent to Derby to toll ...
— The Only True Mother Goose Melodies - Without Addition or Abridgement • Munroe and Francis
... fairly large one, situated in an ell at the rear of the building. Of its two windows, one, as has already been pointed out, overlooked the court between the apartment building and the house next door. The other faced toward the rear. Duvall placed his kit of tools upon the floor, and began an examination of the room. After ...
— The Film of Fear • Arnold Fredericks
... proverb that if you give some men an inch they will take an ell, I induced the Governor to let me pursue my study of Italian. First he allowed me a Grammar, then a Conversation Book, then a Dictionary, then a Prose Reading Book, and then a Poetical Anthology. These ...
— Prisoner for Blasphemy • G. W. [George William] Foote
... legs were but a finger lang, And thick and nimble was his knee; Between his brows there was a span, Between his shoulders ell-es three. ...
— A Bundle of Ballads • Various
... to the Israelites, "Go and sweep and clean our houses, our courtyards, and our streets," He changed the dust of the air into lice, so that the vermin lay piled up in heaps an ell high, and when the Egyptians put on fresh garments, they were at once infested ...
— The Legends of the Jews Volume 1 • Louis Ginzberg
... great, immutable law of love and service, and that then becomes supremely self-centred,—supremely self-centred that it may become all the more supremely unself-centred; in other words, the life that looks v/ell to self, that there may be the ever greater self, in order that there may be the ...
— What All The World's A-Seeking • Ralph Waldo Trine
... all kinds of words,—short ones and long ones. Some were very long. This one—we-ell, maybe it wasn't so long, for when you're nine you don't of course mind three-story words, and this one looked like a three-story one. But this one ...
— The Very Small Person • Annie Hamilton Donnell
... I can't stand it! Blow you to 'ell they do! Look at me! I'm slathered in blood! I can't stand it! They ain't no man ...
— Kitchener's Mob - Adventures of an American in the British Army • James Norman Hall
... perspiration from his forehead. He pushed his way past the drooping branches of an overgrown syringa, tripped over a box-bush, and passed around the left of the house, following the remains of a path which led him to a door in an ell. Back here there were gnarled apple and pear and cherry trees, a tropical clump of rhubarb, and traces of what had evidently been at one time a kitchen garden. Old-fashioned perennials blossomed here ...
— The Lilac Girl • Ralph Henry Barbour
... does. And where Irene seems hard and cruel, as in the Bois de Boulogne, or the Goupenor Gallery, she is but wisely realistic—knowing that the least concession is the inch which precedes the impossible, the repulsive ell. ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... his Horns peeping out of his Shell, Came from a great Distance, the Length of an Ell. A Mushroom their Table, and on it was laid A Water-dock Leaf, ...
— The Butterfly's Ball and the Grasshopper's Feast • Mr. Roscoe
... so unsightly as the Moors; and the women as having "handsome limbs, slender arms, pretty hands, and when they sing they have a pleasant tange in their voices. The men shaved their hair on the right side, the women acting as barbers, and left the hair full length on the left side, with a lock an ell long." A Puritan divine—"New England's Plantation, 1630"—says of the Indians about him, "their hair is generally black, and cut before like our gentlewomen, and one lock longer than the rest, much like to our gentlemen, ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... of a hymn the music came to a sudden stop. There was a solemn pause, and then the clerk was seen to make his way to the front of the singing gallery, and was heard addressing the vicar in a loud tone, saying, "Please, sor, an-ell 'as coom off." The handle had come off the instrument. At another church, in Huntingdonshire, the organ was hidden from view by drawn curtains, behind which the clerk used to retire when he had given out the Psalm. On one occasion, however, no ...
— The Parish Clerk (1907) • Peter Hampson Ditchfield
... could remember, she had lived with her family in the roomy, rambling, white-painted house on Locust Avenue. She knew intimately every detail of its being. She had, at various points in her childhood, personally supervised the addition of the ell and of the broad porch which ran round three sides of the house, the transformation of an upstairs bedroom into a regular bathroom with all the pleasing luxuries of modern plumbing, the installation of hardwood ...
— Missy • Dana Gatlin
... chamber, crossed the sitting room, and went into the ell-kitchen with his shoes in his hand. When he opened the back door he faced the west, but even the sky at that point of the compass showed the glow of the false dawn. Down in the cove the night mist wrapped the shipping about in an almost opaque veil. ...
— Sheila of Big Wreck Cove - A Story of Cape Cod • James A. Cooper
... give them whatever there was in the country for their money, and they settled to give for the bahar of cloves fourteen ells of yellow cloth of seventy-seven tem, which are worth in Castile a ducat the ell; of red cloth of the same kind ten ells; they also gave thirty ells of Britanny linen cloth, and for each of these quantities they received a bahar of cloves; likewise for thirty knives, eight bahars. Having thus settled all the above mentioned prices, the inhabitants of the country gave ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 9 • Various
... to measure, either at hand: and the practiser, to be by the thing Measured: and so, by due applying of Cumpase, Rule, Squire, Yarde, Ell, Perch, Pole, Line, Gaging rod, (or such like instrument) to the ...
— The Mathematicall Praeface to Elements of Geometrie of Euclid of Megara • John Dee
... inch, and you'll take an ell; I will not put my finger in a hole, I warrant ye: what, man! ne'er crow so fast, for a blind man may kill a hare; I have known when a plain fellow hath hurt a fencer, so I have: what! a man may be as slow as a snail, but as fierce as a lion, and he be moved; indeed, ...
— A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. VII (4th edition) • Various
... quid in his cheek, and slyly drawled out, "W-ell, if ye must, ye must! I a'n't a-goin' ter stand in ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. I, No. 1, Nov. 1857 • Various
... the violence that had characterized the year 1917 continued through 1918 and 1919. In the one state of Tennessee, within less than a year and on separate occasions, three Negroes were burned at the stake. On May 22, 1917, near Memphis, Ell T. Person, nearly fifty years of age, was burned for the alleged assault and murder of a young woman; and in this case the word "alleged" is used advisedly, for the whole matter of the fixing of the blame ...
— A Social History of the American Negro • Benjamin Brawley
... then 'tis twenty to one he should not have broken my line by running to the rod's end, as you suffered him. I would have held him within the bent of my rod, unless he had been fellow to the great Trout that is near an ell long, which was of such a length and depth, that he had his picture drawn, and now is to be seen at mine host Rickabie's, at the George in Ware, and it may be, by giving that very great Trout the rod, that is, by casting it to him into the water, ...
— The Complete Angler • Izaak Walton
... wood-merchant, and Masson picked up 'Agobardus' at the shop of a binder, who was going to use the MS. to patch his books withal." Rossi, who may have seen Naude at work, tells us how he would enter a shop with a yard-measure in his hand, buying books, we are sorry to say, by the ell. "The stalls where he had passed were like the towns through which Attila or the Tartars had swept, with ruin in their train,—ut non hominis unius sedulitas, sed calamitas quaedam per omnes bibliopolarum tabernas pervasisse ...
— Books and Bookmen • Andrew Lang
... so that there cannot be any thing more erroneous than the magnificent ideas formed of "the roast beef of old England." We must entertain as mean an idea of its cleanliness. Only seventy ells of linen, at eightpence an ell, are annually allowed for this great family. No sheets were used. This linen was made into eight table-cloths for my lord's table, and one table-cloth for the knights, (p.16.) This last, I suppose, was washed only once ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part C. - From Henry VII. to Mary • David Hume
... Haughty, nor Ambitious. They are parsimonious in their Diet, as the Holy Fathers were in their frugal life in the Desert, known by the name of Eremites. They go naked, having no other Covering but what conceals their Pudends from publick sight. An hairy Plad, or loose Coat, about an Ell, or a coarse woven Cloth at most Two Ells long serves them for the warmest Winter Garment. They lye on a coarse Rug or Matt, and those that have the most plentiful Estate or Fortunes, the better sort, use Net-work, knotted at the four corners in lieu of Beds, which ...
— A Brief Account of the Destruction of the Indies • Bartolome de las Casas
... of paper Damnified[7] 2 peeces of haire cloath ell wide a small baile of 2 small p'ces of small canvas 1 p'ce ell wide fine canvas in a bundall 1 p'ce Lockram } halfe a peece fine ...
— Privateering and Piracy in the Colonial Period - Illustrative Documents • Various
... Sturleson.—"The old Norwegian ell was less than the present ell; and Thorlasius reckons, in a note on this chapter, that Harold's stature would be about four Danish ells; viz. about eight feet."—Laing's note to the text. Allowing for the exaggeration of the chronicler, it seems probable, at least, ...
— Harold, Complete - The Last Of The Saxon Kings • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... a house on Cap'tol 'ell (Capitol Hill)—seex t'ousand tollars it costet. Eef I got id feeften 'undret—could haf borrowed dot much—I vould haf bought id, but I couldn't get dot feeften 'undret, and now I am glat. It vould have costet seexty fife tollars a mont to leeve ...
— Tales of the Road • Charles N. Crewdson
... body and life, and a hundred thousand necks if I had them.' Therefore no one shall turn me from the word which God teaches me, and that must I know as certainly as that two and three make five, that an ell is longer than a half. That is certain, and though all the world speak to the contrary, still I know that it is not otherwise. Who decides me there? No man, but only the Truth which is so perfectly certain that nobody can deny it." And Calvin took the same ground: "As ...
— Some Christian Convictions - A Practical Restatement in Terms of Present-Day Thinking • Henry Sloane Coffin
... "What 'n 'ell do you want to butt in for while the show's on? Go round front." She caught a glimpse of disordered scenery, and before he could slam the door in her face thrust a silver dollar into his hand, at the same time wedging herself into the opening. He pocketed ...
— The Spoilers • Rex Beach
... put young Bassett back instead of him. Sey-mour's. Buck up, Seymour's. We-ell played! There, did you ever see anything like it?" he broke ...
— The Gold Bat • P. G. Wodehouse
... so felt the charm of her room as on this morning; never had it seemed so set apart from the world and so personal. It was the breadth of the ell and the size of her father's library and bedroom combined. The windows could hardly be called windows in a Northern sense, for there was no glass. It was unnecessary to seal up the source of light and air in a dry climate, where a blanket at night supplied all the extra ...
— Over the Pass • Frederick Palmer
... the end of the sixteenth century. But Ibn Batuta, in the 14th, states it at 11 spans, or more than the modern report. [Ibn Khordadhbeh at 70 cubits.—H.C.] Marignolli, on the other hand, says that he measured it and found it to be 2-1/2 palms, or about half a Prague ell, which corresponds in a general way with Hardy's tradition. Valentyn calls it 1-1/2 ell in length; Knox says 2 feet; Herman Bree (De Bry ?), quoted by Fabricius, 8-1/2 spans; a Chinese account, quoted below, 8 feet. These discrepancies ...
— The Travels of Marco Polo, Volume 2 • Marco Polo and Rustichello of Pisa
... "I can't travel another ell over the atrocities they call roads here," Mrs. Winscombe declared. "I expect to die returning to England as it is, and I won't put up with any more preliminary torment. You'll ...
— The Three Black Pennys - A Novel • Joseph Hergesheimer
... in this country, in any degree of perfection, are stupidity and canting. Prose they only know in graces, prayers, etc., and the value of these they estimate, as they do their plaiding webs, by the ell! As for the muses, they have as much an idea of a rhinoceros as of a poet. For my old, capricious, but ...
— The Letters of Robert Burns • Robert Burns
... right, Cress; but I'm afraid I shan't be as easy with them as Ponty. My opinion is, that if you give them an inch they'll take an ell. By the way, that was a queer thing about Pledge. ...
— Follow My leader - The Boys of Templeton • Talbot Baines Reed
... I was very small, When my whole frame was but an ell in height; Sweetly, as I recall it, tears do fall, And therefore I recall ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow • Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
... aftertones had lost themselves in the night, Caroline was out of the window. She stole lightly along the tin roof, warm yet with the first intense heat of June, dropped easily to the level of the kitchen-ell, and, slipping down onto the massive trunk of the old wistaria, fitted accustomed feet into its curled niches and clambered down among the warm, fragrant clusters. Steeped in the full moon, it sent out its cloying perfume like a visible cloud; her white ...
— While Caroline Was Growing • Josephine Daskam Bacon
... Vega, in their very interesting account of this temple say, "what we called the altar was on the east side of the temple. There were many doors to the temple, all of which were plated with gold, and the four walls the whole way round were crowned with a rich golden garland, more than an ell in width. Round the temple were five square pavilions, whose tops were in the form of pyramids. The fifth was lined entirely with gold, and was for the use of the Royal High-Priest of sacrifices, and in which all the deliberations concerning the temple were held. ...
— Diary in America, Series Two • Frederick Marryat (AKA Captain Marryat)
... at least to that degree of levity as to turn into all their shapes without discrimination; so as when the freak takes our Monsieurs to appear like so many farces or Jack Puddings on the stage, all the world should alter shape and play the pantomimes with them. Methinks a French tailor, with an ell in his hand, looks like the enchantress Circe over the companions of Ulysses, and changes them into as many forms.... Something I would indulge to youth; something to age and humor. But what have we to do with ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 27, January, 1860 • Various
... whole sheet, besides seventeen etched pieces, eight quarter- sheets, and ten wood-cuts, seven of the bad woodcuts, two books, and ten small wood "Passions," the whole for 8 florins. Also I exchanged three large books for one ounce [ell of?] camlet. I changed a Philip's florin for expenses and my ...
— Memoirs of Journeys to Venice and the Low Countries - [This is our volunteer's translation of the title] • Albrecht Durer
... old lady. "She come round to our place one day a-collectin' for somethin' or other, and Jack, in 'is free-'anded way, 'e give 'er a five-pun' note. Next week she come agen for somethin' else, and stopped and talked to 'im about 'is soul in the passage. She told 'im as 'e was a-goin' straight to 'ell, and that 'e oughter give up the bookmakin' and settle down to a respec'ble, God-fearin' business. At fust 'e only laughed, but she lammed in tracts at 'im full of the most awful language; and one day she fetched 'im round to one of them ...
— Sketches in Lavender, Blue and Green • Jerome K. Jerome
... Scotch and larch take the lead. Firs, &c., have also been planted in the wet and bad parts of most of the other enclosures, and succeed. The nurseries we have in cultivation are the Bourts, 161 acres; Yew-tree Brake, about 5 acres; Ell Wood, 11 acres; and about 26 in the Vallets, or middle, and Sallow Vallets Nurseries, previously occupied by Mr. Driver. In these there are now about four millions of young oaks, three, two, and one year old, and about 600,000 firs and other trees of different sorts. The ...
— The Forest of Dean - An Historical and Descriptive Account • H. G. Nicholls
... Fadden were asked to translate the letters P. D., he would undoubtedly answer, "What 'ell?" and it must be acknowledged that this answer does credit to Chames's insight; but at the same time we feel sure that Chames would not be offended if he were informed that his favorite expression is not nearly such an appropriate definition of P. D. as it is of the play of ...
— The Brochure Series of Architectural Illustration, Volume 01, No. 08, August 1895 - Fragments of Greek Detail • Various
... inoffensive-looking youth who was sweeping the floor of the room. "They were a bit 'ot, but nothin' much to write 'ome about. Not like a picture in the papers, none of them wasn't. Not much stickin' of men. You just ops out of your trench and rush and roar, like 'ell. The Germans fire and then run off, ...
— The Red Horizon • Patrick MacGill
... caused it all," he half sobbed, half screamed. "'E told me to let Tim Donnelly go into the trade-room, and it was Donnelly who upset the lamp and set the ship afire. 'E sent Donnelly to 'ell, and 'e's sending me there, too, curse 'im! But I'm goin' to make a clean breast of it all, I am, so help me Gawd. 'E made me give the young lady and the girl the drugged coffee, 'e did, curse 'im! I'll put you ...
— Tessa - 1901 • Louis Becke
... swung forward his body. The end of the race came sooner than any one expected. A police barge nosed round an ell; by the time Pompeo was off again, the ferrule of the pursuing gondola scraped past Pompeo's blade. Pompeo called and Achille answered. There was a war of words, figure of a dog, name of a pig. Achille was in the wrong, but ten lire were ten ...
— The Lure of the Mask • Harold MacGrath
... desired. We used to live there so quietly—I and an old landlady who is now dead. How my heart aches to remember her, for she was a good woman, and never overcharged for her rooms. Her whole time was spent in making patchwork quilts with knitting-needles that were an arshin [An ell.] long. Oftentimes we shared the same candle and board. Also she had a granddaughter, Masha—a girl who was then a mere baby, but must now be a girl of thirteen. This little piece of mischief, how she used to make us laugh the day long! We lived together, a happy family of three. ...
— Poor Folk • Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... promptly forbade continuance of her instruction; telling her, in the first place, that the thing itself was unlawful; that it was also unsafe, and could only lead to mischief. To use{114} his own words, further, he said, "if you give a nigger an inch, he will take an ell;" "he should know nothing but the will of his master, and learn to obey it." "if you teach that nigger—speaking of myself—how to read the bible, there will be no keeping him;" "it would forever unfit him for the duties of a slave;" ...
— My Bondage and My Freedom • Frederick Douglass
... it is certainly as much worth their while as making an act that I should never have more than six dishes of meat at my dinner, or that I should not be buried in linen above twenty shillings Scots value per ell, although I wished it particularly, and could well afford to pay for it. There was, however, one restrictive act, which had sense in it; and the husbands of the present day would, I dare say, give their ears that it were still in force, whatever the dressmakers ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 12, - Issue 345, December 6, 1828 • Various
... little girls. One day the youngest child was sent to drive the sparrows away from her grandfather's pease. While she was thus engaged the forest began to roar, and out from it came Verlioka, "of vast stature, one-eyed, crook-nosed, bristly-headed, with tangled beard and moustaches half an ell long, and with a wooden boot on his one foot, supporting himself on a crutch, and giving vent to a terrible laughter." And Verlioka caught sight of the little girl and immediately killed her with his crutch. And afterwards he killed her sister ...
— Russian Fairy Tales - A Choice Collection of Muscovite Folk-lore • W. R. S. Ralston
... "We-ell," Little drawled, lazily lighting a cheroot, "anything you say suits me, but I'll tell you my idea right now: That Goring woman came here in ...
— Gold Out of Celebes • Aylward Edward Dingle
... promised that evening to lay by their sting. Then the shy little Dormouse peeped out of his hole, And led to the feast his blind cousin, the Mole; And the Snail, with her horns peeping out of her shell, Came, fatigued with the distance, the length of an ell. A mushroom the table; and on it was spread A water-dock leaf, which their table-d'hote made. The viands were various, to each of their taste, And the Bee brought the honey to sweeten the feast. Then close on his haunches, so solemn and wise, The ...
— Chatterbox, 1906 • Various
... cried Will Scarlett; 'we will call a feast, and henceforth, because he is full seven feet tall and round the waist at least an ell, he ...
— The Book of Romance • Various
... lads," shouted Erling, who was gasping by this time, "come back and jump in! Push off an ell or so. Steady!" ...
— Erling the Bold • R.M. Ballantyne
... "We-e-ell," Miss Sessions deemed it necessary to qualify her statement to this fiery and exact young questioner. "You have to want the right thing, of course, John. You have ...
— The Power and the Glory • Grace MacGowan Cooke
... together—virtuously; and one bitter winter's night a cousin Mary—she's married now and gone—gave what they call a candy-pulling in those days in the West, and they took the saucers of hot candy outside of the house into the snow, under a sort of old bower that came from the eaves—it was a sort of an ell then, all covered with vines—to cool this hot candy in the snow, and they were all sitting there. In the mean time we were gone to bed. We were not invited to attend this ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... delicate, that henceforth I will wear no more CLOTH STOCKINGS'—and from that time unto her death the queene never wore any more cloth hose, but only silke stockings; for you shall understand that King Henry the Eight did weare onely cloath hose, or hose cut out of ell-broade taffety, or that by great chance there came a pair of Spanish silk stockings from Spain. King Edward the Sixt had a payre of long Spanish silk stockings sent him for a great present.—Dukes' daughters then ...
— Curiosities of Literature, Vol. 1 (of 3) • Isaac D'Israeli
... "We-ell?" she drawled in her most pronounced accent, "if I've got to think of 'em, I might as well talk of 'em, and I'm bound to think of 'em!" She relaxed the grasp of her knees, and lay back against the trunk of a tree, chuckling softly in retrospective triumph. "I've had such ...
— Flaming June • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... the second was cut into bedrooms which had housed the young men of the family so that they could come and go at will without disturbing the more sedate members of the household. These small rooms were now in use as the offices of Mr. LeFleur. From the balcony, running along the ell, onto which each room opened, one could look down into the courtyard. It was on this balcony that the lawyer met them with outstretched hands after they had given their names to ...
— Ralestone Luck • Andre Norton
... letter with his ground-sheet under him in the mud. The sissified one blurted out: "Holy gee! but I'm perspiring profusely." The kid writing the letter looked up and sarcastically answered, "Wouldn't sweatin' like 'ell be more to the point." Later in my military career I had a chat with the commander of the company to which the "sissy" belonged, and he incidentally remarked that the lad had turned out to be one of the most reliable and ...
— Through St. Dunstan's to Light • James H. Rawlinson
... melancholy blinded him even to the good qualities of his neighbours. The only things he saw in perfection were stupidity and canting. 'Prose they only know in graces, prayers, etc., and the value of these they estimate, as they do their plaiding webs, by the ell. As for the Muses, they have as much an idea of a rhinoceros as of a poet.' He was, in fact, ungracious towards his neighbours, not that they were boorish or uninformed folk, but simply because, though living at Ellisland ...
— Robert Burns - Famous Scots Series • Gabriel Setoun
... this ain't a go! 'Ere I be, innercent as a lamb, an' 'ere you be, lost all o' your top 'amper an' out o' your reckonin', run me foul an' goin' to rake me into 'ell-fire. You bloomin' old ...
— The God of His Fathers • Jack London
... and the numberless mock suns that appeared in different places, or of that strange rain, when a sulphureous matter, like starch in appearance, fell from the air (item, a snow-white pike was caught at Colzow in Wellin, seven quarters long, and half an ell broad, with red round eyes, and red fins), a stranger wonder than all was seen at Wolgast; for suddenly, during a review held there, one of the soldier's muskets went off without a finger being laid on it, and ...
— Sidonia The Sorceress V2 • William Mienhold
... Welsh poney; it bears a great deal, and trots a great way; but it will tire at the long run. Before its long, perhaps I may shew Matt, that I was not born to be the household drudge to my dying day — Gwyn rites from Crickhowel, that the price of flannel is fallen three- farthings an ell; and that's another good penny out of my pocket. When I go to market to sell, my commodity stinks; but when I want to buy the commonest thing, the owner pricks it up under my nose; and it can't be had for love nor money — I think everything runs cross at Brambleton-hall ...
— The Expedition of Humphry Clinker • Tobias Smollett
... still at her task. Then she rose, holding a bulb in her hands, and said: "It's a funny kind of relation. Her father and mother egging her on—and you know that kind of a man; give him an inch and he'll take an ell. I wonder how far he has got." She took the bulb to a pile near the rear of the house. "Those are the nice big yellow ones I'm saving for Mrs. Barclay. But I'm sure of one thing, Molly has no notion of marrying Brownwell." She continued: "Molly is still in love with ...
— A Certain Rich Man • William Allen White
... Venetia are nothing more than an outspread sheet of deep Alpine mud. Well, there is nothing so good for incredulity, don't you know, as capping the climax. If a man will not swallow an inch of fact, the best remedy is to make him gulp down an ell of it. And, indeed, the Lombard plain is but an insignificant mud flat compared with the vast alluvial plains of Asiatic and American rivers. The alluvium of the Euphrates, of the Mississippi, of the Hoang Ho, of the Amazons would ...
— Science in Arcady • Grant Allen
... party looked with dread and loathing on this system of corruption and exclusion. To their remonstrances Cosimo replied in four memorable sayings: 'Better the State spoiled than the State not ours.' 'Governments cannot be carried on with paternosters.' 'An ell of scarlet makes a burgher.' 'I aim at finite ends.' These maxims represent the whole man,—first, in his egotism, eager to gain Florence for his family, at any risk of her ruin; secondly, in his cynical acceptance ...
— Sketches and Studies in Italy and Greece, Complete - Series I, II, and III • John Symonds
... une maison, Ou la bonn' femm' chantait, Ou la bonn' femm' chantait; Dans son joli chant ell' disait: "Dodo, dodo, dodo, dodo," Et moi qui croyais qu'elle disait, "Cass'-lui les os, cass'-lui les os," Et moi de m'en cour', cour', cour', Et ...
— The Baby's Bouquet - A Fresh Bunch of Rhymes and Tunes • Walter Crane
... places, but no one else. Everyone is at the front. The houses generally have wounded soldiers in them, and these play croquet with a nurse on the lawn, or smoke in the sun. None of them want to go back to fight. They seem tired, and talk of the trenches as "proper 'ell." ...
— My War Experiences in Two Continents • Sarah Macnaughtan
... flute some Fritzie was a-playin' of. An' you ought to 'ave 'eard 'em a-singin'! Doleful as 'ell!" ...
— Kitchener's Mob - Adventures of an American in the British Army • James Norman Hall
... her husband observed: 'I've been thinking of what you said, Ell: that I have gone about a good deal and left you without much to amuse you. Perhaps it's true. To-day, as there's not much sea, I'll take you with me on board ...
— Wessex Tales • Thomas Hardy
... thyself by God's ell-wand of the Fifth Commandment, and judge if it were honouring thine ...
— Joyce Morrell's Harvest - The Annals of Selwick Hall • Emily Sarah Holt
... spent thirty sequins in what I considered necessary, but then I noticed that there was no English point on her mask, and burst out again. The father brought in a milliner, who adorned the mask with an ell of lace for which I paid twelve sequins. Irene was in great delight, but her father and mother would have preferred to have the money in their pockets, and at bottom ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... of bells (Glockenspiel) fastened there; which, especially in sudden whirls, and the other accidents of walking, has a grateful effect. Observe too how fond they are of peaks, and Gothic-arch intersections. The male world wears peaked caps, an ell long, which hang bobbing over the side (schief): their shoes are peaked in front, also to the length of an ell, and laced on the side with tags; even the wooden shoes have their ell-long noses: some also clap bells on the peak. Further, according to my authority, the ...
— Sartor Resartus, and On Heroes, Hero-Worship, and the Heroic in History • Thomas Carlyle
... each stray word, you for each inch take an ell. Lightly all laws and ties trammel me, I am ...
— Poems • Adam Lindsay Gordon
... "vaward" and "bilboes" are old words; "ding" in the sense used here has long been forgotten; of "archery" except as a sport we know nothing; "Spanish yew" is no longer valuable for bows, and few can tell how long a "clothyard" (the English ell, 45 inches long) is, or whether it differs from any other "yard" as ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 10 - The Guide • Charles Herbert Sylvester
... I lay with my bouncing Nell, I gave her an Inch, and she took an Ell: But I think in this Case it was damnable hard, When I gave her an Inch, she'd want more than ...
— The Merry-Thought: or the Glass-Window and Bog-House Miscellany - Parts 2, 3 and 4 • Hurlo Thrumbo (pseudonym)
... somewhat stale, Twin Doric minstrels, drunk with Doric ale! Hark to those notes, narcotically soft! The Cobbler-Laureats [69] sing to Capel Lofft! [70] Till, lo! that modern Midas, as he hears, [xciv] Adds an ell growth to his egregious ears! [xcv] There lives one Druid, who prepares in time [71] 'Gainst future feuds his poor revenge of rhyme; Racks his dull Memory, and his duller Muse, To publish faults which Friendship should excuse. ...
— Byron's Poetical Works, Vol. 1 • Byron
... crocodiles, meta-collinarum, cametennus, ten-sevetes, wild asses, white and red lions, white bears, white merules, crickets, griffins, tigers, lamias, hyenas, wild horses, wild oxen and wild men, men with horns, one-eyed, men with eyes before and behind, centaurs, fauns, satyrs, pygmies, forty-ell-high giants, Cyclopses, and similar women; it is the home, too, of the phoenix, and of nearly all living animals. We have some people subject to us who feed on the flesh of men and of prematurely born ...
— Legends That Every Child Should Know • Hamilton Wright Mabie
... Louise was invaluable to everybody; she had counsel and contrivance for everybody; besides all this, she was unwearied in shopping, and never disheartened in buying. She made very few compliments—would let them in a shop open all they had, if she wanted only an ell of cloth; and would go to twelve places in order to get a piece of ribbon cheaper or of better quality—she paid great regard to quality. According to her own opinion, as well as that of her family, she was an excellent hand at getting ...
— The Home • Fredrika Bremer
... fiddler, barber, or any soldier varlet should be clad like a prince, in velvet, cloth of silk, and rings of gold.—That these vanities are hateful to God.—That we, who are gentlemen, content ourselves with a doublet of cloth at sixteen sols the ell, of Paris.—That messieurs the camp-followers can very well come down to that, also.—Command and ordain.—To Monsieur ...
— Notre-Dame de Paris - The Hunchback of Notre Dame • Victor Hugo
... and circling round and round, one fold upon another, which gradually increased to the size of my wrist in the middle, and then as gradually decreased till it terminated in a point again at the contrary extreme; all which spiral, if it were fairly extended in length, might be a yard or an ell long. I surveyed this strange vegetable very attentively; it had a rind, or crust, which I could not break with my hand, but taking my knife and making an opening therewith in the shell, there issued out a sort of milky liquor in great quantity, to at least a pint and half, which having ...
— Life And Adventures Of Peter Wilkins, Vol. I. (of II.) • Robert Paltock
... doubt this people came originally from Asia, as the Chipewyans did before them and the Crees before that, the more newly arrived in each case pressing their predecessors farther away from the food-yielding ocean. The Anglo-Saxon estimates all habitable land by his ell-measure, fertility of the soil, its ability to yield turnips, potatoes, and flax, and forty-bushel wheat. The measure of desirability of range of northern tribes has another unit—blood, and flesh, and fish. Your Eskimo and Chipewyan and Cree cares ...
— The New North • Agnes Deans Cameron
... farmhouse, nestling among the apple trees, the front to the west and facing on the lane that led up to a farm above. The house had a one-story ell on the end toward him, containing the kitchen and pantry—this ell projected back almost to the smokehouse. On the opposite side, but hidden from his view, there was a wide porch running the full length of house and ell, and in the angle formed by the porch, ...
— Hidden Treasure • John Thomas Simpson
... an inch, mate, or he'll soon gain an ell," said old Mat. "He is doing Satan's work, and that's what Satan is always trying to do—trying to make us do a little wrong—just to get in the sharp edge of the wedge; he knows that he shall soon be ...
— Taking Tales - Instructive and Entertaining Reading • W.H.G. Kingston
... home ten days or a fortnight after our arrest, bringing with him his precious silks, velvets, and laces to the last ell. As he had predicted, they were quadrupled in value, and their increase made the good burgher a ...
— Yolanda: Maid of Burgundy • Charles Major
... who took me by both hands and looked earnestly in my face. I feared that she would kiss me before the others and durst not look at her. "Yes," I heard her say, in a low voice, "it is Edmund's own boy." She led the way into the house, through the long wood-shed and ell. Supper was waiting; and after a hasty wash at a long sink in the wood-shed, I followed grandfather through the kitchen to the room beyond it, where the large round table was spread. The family all came in and sat down. I still felt very strange to the place; but a glance into grandmother's kind ...
— When Life Was Young - At the Old Farm in Maine • C. A. Stephens
... hit. W'ell said, Helen—well said, I say. Crusoe, you villain, hold up your head, and thank ...
— Willy Reilly - The Works of William Carleton, Volume One • William Carleton
... dear sir, these pushing, vulgar, rich people take advantage of every opening. Give them an inch, and they will take an ell," said Mrs. Lennox. "Now, if I go, they will be claiming acquaintance with me in Newport next summer. Well, I ...
— Pink and White Tyranny - A Society Novel • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... Ortega was a very long adobe house one story in height and one room deep, except in an ell where a number of rooms were bunched together. The Senora had it whitewashed every year, and the red tiles on the roof renewed when necessary; therefore it had none of the pathetic look of old age peculiar to the adobe ...
— The Bell in the Fog and Other Stories • Gertrude Atherton
... captive home; Willing to enter dark abodes, secure In its own tale of light. As once of old, Bearing all heaven in words of promising, The Angel of the Annunciation came, It carried all the spring into that house; A pot of mould its only tie to Earth, Its heaven an ell of blue 'twixt chimney-tops, Its world henceforth that little, low-ceiled room, Symbol and child of spring, it took its place 'Midst all those types, to be a type with them, Of what so many feel, not knowing it; The hidden springtime that is drawing nigh. And henceforth, when ...
— A Hidden Life and Other Poems • George MacDonald
... being to the youth, "what the 'ell time did I tell you to have that car cleaned by, and you ...
— The Lion's Share • E. Arnold Bennett
... of the minster spire, and sat in what is called the neck, under the nob or crown, for a quarter of an hour, before I would venture to step out again into the open air, where, standing upon a platform scarce an ell square, without any particular holding, one sees the boundless prospect before; while the nearest objects and ornaments conceal the church, and every thing upon and above which one stands. It is exactly as if one saw one's ...
— Autobiography • Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
... it probably that the expression "Flemish Account" may have been derived from the fact that the Flemish ell measures only three quarters of our yard, while the English ell measures five quarters, and that thence the epithet Flemish was ...
— Notes & Queries 1849.12.01 • Various
... an ell in Polish. King Wladyslaw was of the family Piasts, but he was called Lokietek on account of ...
— The Knights of the Cross • Henryk Sienkiewicz
... for the boy choir. I regret to see you do such tradesmen's work without adequate reward. Why, even if her Majesty would give you a fat living or appoint you to the imperial council which directs musical affairs in the Netherlands! Pardon me, Sir Wolf! But give people an inch, and they take an ell, and your ever ready obligingness will injure you, for the harder it is to win a thing the higher its value becomes. You made yourself too cheap at court here people will surely know how to put a higher value upon a man who ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... Cam'ell's drawers as lang she had use for ony; but what for ye sud say puir till her, I dinna ken, 'cep' it be 'at she's gane whaur they haena muckle 'at needs layin' in drawers. That's neither here nor there.—Div ye tell me 'at Jean was intromittin' wi thae ...
— Malcolm • George MacDonald
... PE ELL is a town of 1,000 people on the South Bend branch of the Northern Pacific railway, chiefly engaged ...
— A Review of the Resources and Industries of the State of Washington, 1909 • Ithamar Howell
... do any such thing," replied Polly; "and I think that quite enough has been settled for one morning. It's give an inch and take an ell with ...
— Ralph the Heir • Anthony Trollope
... matter to me a d—n, if you say so! I was jus' askin' myself what a man would look for if he los' it here. Since I strike this 'ell of a place the very groun' been chewed up and spit out reg'lar, one hundred times a year. 'T'is ...
— The Desert and The Sown • Mary Hallock Foote
... thus. Common sense gave the inch of admitting some parts of the body to be less living than others, and philosophy took the ell of declaring the body to be almost all of it stone dead. This is serious; still if it were all, for a quiet life, we might put up with it. Unfortunately we know only too well that it will not be all. Our bodies, which seemed so living and now prove so dead, have served us such a ...
— Luck or Cunning? • Samuel Butler
... plaster had never been renewed. With the attrition of time and the elements, it had worn away in spots, through which the brown adobe bricks showed, like the bones in a decaying corpse. The main building faced down the valley; from each end out, an ell extended to form a patio in the rear, while a seven-foot adobe wall, topped with short tile, connected with the ell ...
— The Pride of Palomar • Peter B. Kyne
... promised that he would do so, and never again be summoned for a similar offence. He left the Court and returned to his cure, and as soon as he came there, he called the draper and the tailor, and he had a gown made which trailed three quarters of an ell on the ground; for he told the tailor how he had been reproved for wearing a short gown, and ordered to ...
— One Hundred Merrie And Delightsome Stories - Les Cent Nouvelles Nouvelles • Various
... the Blacksmith, "I was trying to do what a better man than I did, and where he hit the mark I missed it by an ell. Twas a pretty scrape I was ...
— Twilight Land • Howard Pyle
... This fruit comes of the *bicched bones two,* *two cursed bones (dice)* Forswearing, ire, falseness, and homicide. Now, for the love of Christ that for us died, Leave your oathes, bothe great and smale. But, Sirs, now will I ell you forth ...
— The Canterbury Tales and Other Poems • Geoffrey Chaucer
... cave in the mountains of Cashmeer there is an image of ice, which makes its appearance thus: Two days before the new moon there appears a bubble of ice, which increases in size every day till the fifteenth, by which time it is an ell or more in height;—then as the moon wanes, the image decreases till it ...
— Literary Remains (1) • Coleridge
... shipmate was talking again. "Hi 'eard 'im sy in the Knitting Swede's 'ow 'e was shipping in this ship just to ryse 'ell." ...
— The Blood Ship • Norman Springer
... the American game of poker, in which the Swedish songstress had the advantage of the policy or the luck of her companions. Out of this inch of cloth Field manufactured something better than the proverbial ell of very interesting gossip. The reconstructed item reached San Francisco as soon as Madame Nilsson, and was copied from the Tribune into the coast papers on the eve of her opening concert. Now, the madame thought that the American ...
— Eugene Field, A Study In Heredity And Contradictions - Vol. I • Slason Thompson
... own house at Amesbury is a plain white painted wooden house, consisting of an upright and ell, like many old-fashioned farm-houses, and surrounded by a picket-fence. It is roomy and comfortable, and the study is a very cosey and attractive place, with its open wood-fire and its well-filled book-shelves. One familiar with ...
— Home Life of Great Authors • Hattie Tyng Griswold
... morning, on their playground. Each of the riders is furnished with one or two djerids, straight white sticks, a little thinner than an umbrella-stick, less at one end than at the other and about an ell in length, together with a thin cane crooked at the head. The horsemen, perhaps a hundred in number, gallop about in as narrow a space as possible, throwing the djerids at each other and shouting. Each man then selects an opponent who has darted his djerid or is for the moment ...
— The Life of Lord Byron • John Galt
... red-hot dottel of his pipe on the back of the hairy fist. 'They say 'Ell's 'otter than that,' said he, as Mulvaney swore aloud. 'You be warned so. Look yonder!'—he pointed across the river to a ruined temple—'Me an' you an' 'im'—he indicated me by a jerk of his head—'was there one day when Hi made a bloomin' show o' myself. ...
— Soldiers Three • Rudyard Kipling
... the return of the State to the old title of South African Republic. The Home Government feebly remonstrated—it was too sunk in the slough of "magnanimity" to do more. As a natural result the Boers snapped their fingers at such remonstrances. After taking an inch they helped themselves to an ell! They had engaged to respect boundaries, but soon they began to lap over into ...
— South Africa and the Transvaal War, Vol. 1 (of 6) - From the Foundation of Cape Colony to the Boer Ultimatum - of 9th Oct. 1899 • Louis Creswicke
... house need not be so expensive; one big dining-room, with turn-up tables like those ironing-board seat-tables, you know—then they can dance there. Small reception room and office, hall, kitchen and laundry, and thirty bedrooms, forty by thirty, with an "ell" for the laundry, ought ...
— The Forerunner, Volume 1 (1909-1910) • Charlotte Perkins Gilman
... "Aw, t'ell with your Kodak!" Bob snorted. "Can't yuh carry this layout in your head? I've got a picture gallery in mine that I wouldn't trade for a farm; I don't need no Kodak in mine, thankye. You just let this here ...
— The Lure of the Dim Trails • by (AKA B. M. Sinclair) B. M. Bower
... thought that winter was coming on, and that soon we must sleep without a roof, in the snow. We might well be silent, as we were, save the quartermaster Poitevin. He was a veteran,—sallow, wrinkled, with hollow cheeks, mustaches an ell long, and a red nose, like all brandy drinkers. He had a lofty way of speaking, which he interspersed with barrack slang. When the rain came down faster than ever, he cried, with a strange burst of laughter: "Ay, ay, Poitevin, this will teach you to hiss!" ...
— The Conscript - A Story of the French war of 1813 • Emile Erckmann
... argued. But the fact is, I stayed because I couldn't go away. Of course, it was an abominable position, but I assure you it felt like heaven when it didn't feel like 'ell." ...
— The Divine Fire • May Sinclair
... class of men, Who, though they bow to fashion and frivolity, No fancied claims or woes fictitious pen, But wrongs ell-wide, and ...
— The Poetical Works of Thomas Hood • Thomas Hood
... Gardeur, poor boy, overlook his fault—pity him, forgive him. He is not so much to blame, Pierre, as those plundering thieves of the Friponne, who shall find that La Corne St. Luc's sword is longer by half an ell than is good for some of ...
— The Golden Dog - Le Chien d'Or • William Kirby
... you've been reading out," he said. "Oh! don't talk to me! I ain't littery and that, but I know fairy-tales when I hear 'em. I got a bit stumped in some of the philosophical bits and felt inclined to go out for a B. and S. But we're living in West 'Ampstead and not in 'Ell; and the long and the short of it is that some things 'appen and some things don't 'appen. Those are the things ...
— Manalive • G. K. Chesterton
... Barante. Those magnificent silks and velvets, that cloth of gold and damask, that Flanders lace, and those carpets from Arras which were found heaped up in chests, were cut in pieces and distributed by the ell, like common canvas in a village shop. The duke's large diamond which he wore round his neck, and which had once upon a time glittered in the crown of the Great Mogul, was found on the road, inside a little box set with fine pearls. The man who ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume III. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot
... back, and fix'd him to the ground. He falls, and mourns his fate with human cries: Through the wide wound the vital spirit flies. I drew, and casting on the river's side The bloody spear, his gather'd feet I tied With twining osiers which the bank supplied. An ell in length the pliant wisp I weaved, And the huge body on my shoulders heaved: Then leaning on my spear with both my hands, Upbore my load, and press'd the sinking sands With weighty steps, till at the ship I threw The welcome burden, and bespoke ...
— The Odyssey of Homer • Homer, translated by Alexander Pope
... al principio abitare Queste montagne, benche sieno oscure Come tu vedi, pur si potea stare Sanza sospetto, ch' ell' eran sicure: Sol da le fiere t'avevi a guardare: Fernoci spesso di brutte paure; Or ci bisogna, se vogliamo starci, ...
— Stories from the Italian Poets: With Lives of the Writers, Volume 1 • Leigh Hunt |
