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Midge   Listen
noun
Midge  n.  (Zool.)
1.
Any one of many small, delicate, long-legged flies of the Chironomus, and allied genera, which do not bite. Their larvae are usually aquatic.
2.
A very small fly, abundant in many parts of the United States and Canada, noted for the irritating quality of its bite. Note: The name is also applied to various other small flies. See Wheat midge, under Wheat.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Midge" Quotes from Famous Books



... yet. Tied, Jerry—at the half. Then Muff Bowling on the South High made two spliffy baskets—they were great, even if she made 'em! Our girls acted as though they were just dummies, but didn't they wake up? You should have seen their passing then. Why, honest, Midge Fielding was everywhere! Caught a high ball and passed it under—before you could wink! And, oh, Ginny—she was possessed. She could make that basket anywhere. And, listen, Jerry, with only two minutes ...
— Highacres • Jane Abbott

... too, appealed to men. At times the "fury of creation" was upon him. During the first winter in Baltimore he wrote a midge dance, the origin of which he thus gives in a letter to his wife: "I am copying off — in order to try the publishers therewith — a 'Danse des Moucherons' (midge dance), which I have written for flute and piano, and which I think enough of to let ...
— Sidney Lanier • Edwin Mims

... that a good woman's means of showing a proper resentment are so straitened and circumscribed by her conscience that she is obliged, from actual want of material, to resort occasionally to little acts of domestic tyranny, small in themselves as midge bites, but, fortunately for the cause of virtue, equally exasperating. Indeed, it is improbable that any really good woman would ever so far forget herself as to lose her temper, if she were once thoroughly aware how much more irritating in the long-run a judicious ...
— The Danvers Jewels, and Sir Charles Danvers • Mary Cholmondeley

... God because I have never seen Him;—the Universe is certainly very majestic, and somewhat startling to me in its exact mathematical proportions; but I have no more to do with it than has a grain of sand;—my lot is no more important than that of the midge in the sunbeam;—I live,—I breed— I die;—and it matters to no one but myself how I do these three things, provided I satisfy my nature.' This is the Philosophy of the Beast, and it is just now very fashionable. It is 'la haute mode' both in France, and England, Italy, and Spain. Only young ...
— The Master-Christian • Marie Corelli

... arrogated merely a superiority in social standing, but it made her recoil from it the more. He was so immeasurably her superior that the poor little advantage on her side vanished like a candle in the sunlight, and she laughed herself to scorn. "Fancy," she laughed, "a midge, on the strength of having wings, condescending to offer marriage to a horse!" It would argue the assumption of equality in other and more important things than rank, or at least the confidence that her social superiority ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, Vol. 20, August 1877 • Various

... clear, Toward the sky's image, hangs the imaged bridge; So still the air that I can hear The slender clarion of the unseen midge; Out of the stillness, with a gathering creep, Like rising wind in leaves, which now decreases, Now lulls, now swells, and all the while increases, The huddling trample of a drove of sheep Tilts the loose planks, and then as gradually ceases In dust on the other side; life's emblem deep, 10 A confused ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of James Russell Lowell • James Lowell

... more gray have presented a different conception. In the glare of a million million of suns they have sent the earth spinning like a midge. Beyond the uttermost horizon they have strewn other systems, other worlds; beyond the latter, more. Wherever imagination in its weariness would set a limit, ...
— The Lords of the Ghostland - A History of the Ideal • Edgar Saltus

... uncommon weapons, Urinus spiritus of capons; Or mite-horn shavings, filings, scrapings, Distill'd per se; Sal-alkali o' midge-tail clippings, And ...
— The Complete Works of Robert Burns: Containing his Poems, Songs, and Correspondence. • Robert Burns and Allan Cunningham

... least, show degeneration that has been caused by quiescence. One of these coccids, called the red orange scale, is very abundant in Florida and California and in other fruit-growing regions. The male is a beautiful, tiny, two-winged midge, but the female is a wingless, footless, little sack, without eyes or other organs of special sense, which lies motionless under a flat, thin, circular, reddish scale composed of wax and two or three cast skins of the insect itself. The insect ...
— Composition-Rhetoric • Stratton D. Brooks

... these. Were it simply a friend to pursue 'Mid my million or two, Who could pay me in person or pelf What he owes me himself! 30 No; I could not but smile through my chafe; For the fellow lay safe As his mates do, the midge and the ...
— Selections from the Poems and Plays of Robert Browning • Robert Browning

... no place For the glow-worm to lie, Where there is no space For receipt of a fly, Where the midge dares not venture, Lest herself fast she lay, If Love come, he will enter, ...
— The Home Book of Verse, Vol. 2 (of 4) • Various

... Little John, And Midge, the miller's son; Which made the young man bend his bow, When ...
— The Book of Old English Ballads • George Wharton Edwards

... wired to the admiral at Shanghai, and next day all the available help at that port came down the river to our assistance; besides the "Vigilant," "Eyera," "Midge," and "Growler," there were two American war vessels, the "Monocasy" and "Palos," also a ...
— In Eastern Seas - The Commission of H.M.S. 'Iron Duke,' flag-ship in China, 1878-83 • J. J. Smith

... were so little an' young-like an' afeard, and I telled her that night—I telled her when she whispered that she were a goin' to have a baby, and said as how she couldn't stand bein' hurt—I says, 'Midge darlin', do it hurt the grass to grow jest 'cause the winds bend it double? Do it hurt the little birds to bust out of their shells in the springtime?' And she knowed what I meant, that not even what she ...
— From the Valley of the Missing • Grace Miller White

... made, as it took me sixteen days to make two hundred and fifty miles. I think if the pay was a guinea an hour I should not care about again crossing the Channel during an equinoxial gale, especially to be skipper and crew of such a midge ...
— Jethou - or Crusoe Life in the Channel Isles • E. R. Suffling

... midge's wing, A toad in form and feature; Together verses it can string, Though scarce ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, • Editor-in-Chief: Kuno Francke

... for Saidee's sister, the child he remembered, who had been foolish enough and irritating enough to find her way to Oued Tolga, he felt towards her, in listening to the story of her coming, as an ardent student might feel towards a persistent midge which disturbed his studies. If the girl could be used as a pawn in his great game, she had a certain importance, otherwise none—except that her midge-like buzzings must not annoy him, or reach ears ...
— The Golden Silence • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson

... me, wishing anew to be told if I had lost my wits and directing me to fetch the stuff. Again I was conscious of that within me which no gentleman's man should confess to. I mean to say, I felt like shaking him. But I hastened back to fetch the rod, the creel, the luncheon hamper, the midge ointment, the camera, and other articles which the woods fellow ...
— Ruggles of Red Gap • Harry Leon Wilson

... well-studied and proven scheme; when we see how far our allowance for "chances" has fallen below what is needed to cover the contingencies of late springs, dry summers, early frosts, grasshoppers, wire-worms, Colorado beetles, midge, weevil, pip, murrain, garget, milk-fever, potato-rot, oats-rust, winter-killing, and all the rest; when we learn the degree of vigilance needed to keep every minute of hired labor and team-work effectively employed; and when we ...
— Village Improvements and Farm Villages • George E. Waring

... being whose influence is feared by all, and who receives from every family some measure of propitiatory sacrifice. We read in the li chao chuan,[6] or Divine Panorama, that "every living being, no matter whether it be a man or an animal, a bird or a quadruped, a gnat or a midge, a worm or an insect, having legs or not, few or many, all are called gwei ...
— The Fulfilment of a Dream of Pastor Hsi's - The Story of the Work in Hwochow • A. Mildred Cable

... phantom shape, Her dream of size she saw, agape. Midway the vast round-raying beard A desiccated midge appeared; Whose body pricked the name of meal, Whose hair had growth in earth's unreal; Provocative of dread and wrath, Contempt and horror, in one froth, Inextricable, insensible, His poison presence there would dwell, Declaring him her dream fulfilled, A catch to compliment the skilled; And she ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith

... no place For the glow-worm to lie; When there is no space For receipt of a fly; When the midge dares not venture Lest herself fast she lay; If Love come, he will enter And will ...
— The Golden Treasury - Of the Best Songs and Lyrical Poems in the English Language • Various

... Crusoe. Arabian Nights. Decameron. Wilhelm Meister. Vathek. Corinne. Minister's Wooing. Undine. Sintram. Thisdolf. Peter Schlemihl. Sense and Sensibility. Pride and Prejudice. Anastasius. Amber Witch. Mary Powell. Household of Sir T. More. Cruise of the Midge. Guy Mannering. Antiquary. Bride of Lammermoor. Legend of Montrose. Rob Roy. Woodstock. Ivanhoe. Talisman. Fortunes of Nigel. Old Mortality. Quentin Durward. Heart of Midlothian. Kenilworth. Fair Maid ...
— How to Form a Library, 2nd ed • H. B. Wheatley

... greater number of the Crioceris-larvae we find, adhering firmly to the skin, certain white specks, very small and of a china-white. Can these be the sowing of a bandit, the spawn of a Midge? ...
— The Glow-Worm and Other Beetles • Jean Henri Fabre

... Great electric cars Sing through, and each with a floor-light racing along at its side. Far off, oh, midge after midge Drifts over the gulf that bars The night with ...
— New Poems • D. H. Lawrence

... him now on a breast-high scent, But he leaves us standing still; When we swing round by Westland Pound He's far up Challacombe Hill. The pack are a string of struggling ants, The quarry's a dancing midge, They're trying their reins on the edge of the Chains While he's ...
— Poems: New and Old • Henry Newbolt

... can a bachelor do with the poor things? Wonder who Maria Plum is? Midge will like a look at them before we send them along;" and into the young man's pocket they went, trembling with fear of the dog, but very grateful for ...
— Aunt Jo's Scrap-Bag VI - An Old-Fashioned Thanksgiving, Etc. • Louisa M. Alcott

... KIT MIDGE was thought in the family to be a wonderful little cat. She enjoyed sitting in the sunshine; she liked to feast upon the dainty little mice; and, oh, dear me! now and then, she liked ...
— The Nursery, July 1873, Vol. XIV. No. 1 • Various

... As some entranced child's a puppet show. Darkness gave birth to the all-trembling stars, And a far roar of long-drawn cataracts, Flooding immeasurable night with sound. He sat so still, his very thoughts took wing, And, lightest Ariels, the stillness haunted With midge-like measures; but, at last, even they Sank 'neath the influences of his night. The sweet dust shed faint perfume in the gloom; Through all wild space the stars' bright arrows fell On the lone Prince—the troubled son ...
— Collected Poems 1901-1918 in Two Volumes - Volume I. • Walter de la Mare

... watched the long grass swirled By the May breeze, murmurous with wasp and midge, For though the summer oozed into their veins Like the injected drug for their bones' pains, Sharp on their souls hung the imminent line of grass, Fearfully flashed the ...
— Poems • Wilfred Owen

... side by side, Ay, side by side Through the Great Forest, Blackmoor wide, And where the Parret ran. We'd faced the gusts on Mendip ridge, Had crossed the Yeo unhelped by bridge, Been stung by every Marshwood midge, I and my ...
— A Cluster of Grapes - A Book of Twentieth Century Poetry • Various

... what starvation is. Look here! you can almost see the fire through my hand, and if I do but lift up my head, the whole room is in a merry-go-round. And that is nothing but weakness; there is nothing else on earth the matter with me, except that I am starved down to the strength of a midge!" ...
— Henrietta's Wish • Charlotte M. Yonge

... She entered enough into the state of affairs to see that the troublesome child could hardly be expelled, and she was too happy and too much amused to care much about the annoyance. There was magnanimity enough about her not to mind midge bites, and certainly this summer was exceptionally delightful with all the pleasures of wealth, and very few ...
— Magnum Bonum • Charlotte M. Yonge

... first philosopher Before the Grand Duke, trying to tear down And argue the new planets out of heaven, Now by his own weird logic and closed eyes And now by magic spells." How could he help Despising them a little? It's an error Even for a giant to despise a midge; For, when the giant reels beneath some stroke Of fate, the buzzing clouds will swoop upon him, Cluster and feed upon his bleeding wounds, And do what midges can to sting him blind. These human midges have not missed their chance. They ...
— Watchers of the Sky • Alfred Noyes

... lice, "when the population is mature, the gall is ripe also, so fully do the calendars of the shrub and the animal coincide"; and the mortal enemy of the Halictus, the sinister midge of the springtime, is hatched at the very moment when the bee begins to wander in search of a location ...
— Fabre, Poet of Science • Dr. G.V. (C.V.) Legros

... "Oh, pshaw, Midge; it isn't so bad after you get started. Only holidays make you so jolly that it's hard to sit ...
— Marjorie's New Friend • Carolyn Wells

... proper) are several that destroy our enemies. Hence the very common error that birds which destroy insects are beneficial to us, as they are more likely to destroy our insect friends than the fewer enemies. Those known as flycatchers may do neither harm nor good; so far as they eat the wheat-midge and Hessian fly they confer a positive benefit; in other instances they destroy both friends and enemies. Birds that are only partly insectivorous, and which eat grain and fruit, may need further inquiry. Prof. S. had examined the stomachs of many such birds, and particularly of the American robin, ...
— Scientific American Supplement No. 275 • Various

... such a venturesome midge that it may be well to have so devoted an attendant. Yet I remember he left thee alone and ill and hungry ...
— A Little Girl in Old Quebec • Amanda Millie Douglas

... done by the green-bug comes just as the wheat begins to ripen, the tiny green creatures attaching themselves in great numbers to the heads of the wheat. Other insects which prey on the wheat crop are grasshoppers, the wheat midge, ...
— Checking the Waste - A Study in Conservation • Mary Huston Gregory

... When we are both a hundred we shall remember all this very peaceably; and the "sanguine flower" will not look back at us less beautifully because in just one spot it was inscribed with woe. And if we with all our aids cannot have patience, where in this midge-bitten world is that virtue ...
— An Englishwoman's Love-Letters • Anonymous

... all, you long - That I should smite you with a stinging song. This dreadful honour you both fear and hope - Both all in vain: you fall below my scope. The Lybian lion tears the roaring bull, He does not harm the midge along ...
— New Poems • Robert Louis Stevenson

... the foot-board and humming a tune,—touching now and then the stuffed breast-pocket of his coat with an inward chuckle of mystery. And when little Ann Mipps, at the toll-gate, came out with her chubby cheeks burning, and her shy eyes down, he took no notice at all. Nice little midge of a thing; but what did she know of the thrilling "Personals" of the "Ledger" and their mysterious meaning, beginning at the matrimonial advertisements last May? or of these letters in his breast-pocket from the widow of an affectionate and ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 12, No. 74, December, 1863 • Various

... more at Youth and Warmth. Ah, well! but it was real enough! And, in one of those moments when a man stands outside himself, seems to be lifted away and see his own life twirling, Lennan had a vision of a shadow driven here and there; a straw going round and round; a midge in the grip of a mad wind. Where was the home of this mighty secret feeling that sprang so suddenly out of the dark, and caught you by the throat? Why did it come now and not then, for this one and not that other? What did man know of it, save that it made him ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy



Words linked to "Midge" :   Chironomidae, biting midge



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