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Set-to   Listen
noun
Set-to  n.  A contest in boxing, in an argument, or the like. (Colloq.)






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Set-to" Quotes from Famous Books



... boxing gloves. Over a desk in a corner was hung the photograph of a football team, of which Arthur was the captain. There was another photograph representing him with gloves on, about to have a set-to with a boy friend. ...
— Chester Rand - or The New Path to Fortune • Horatio Alger, Jr

... set-to one day in blowing iridescent soap bubbles from a mixture of soap and glycerine. Some of the bubbles were of about fifteen inches diameter. By carefully covering them with a bell glass, we kept them for about thirty-six hours, while they went through their changes of brilliant colour, ...
— James Nasmyth's Autobiography • James Nasmyth

... up this procedure by giving his antagonist fuge, or a blow. The combatants, after either of the above formalities, retired with their respective friends to some unfrequented spot as the Barnhill or Longman, and there had a fair open set-to. No unfair advantage was permitted, and after a few rounds the affair was over, and the parties became friends again, or the trial of strength was adjourned to be renewed at some future period. Unfortunately, however, for some of us boys if our then teacher got a hint of what was going ...
— The Celtic Magazine, Vol. 1, No. 2, December 1875 • Various

... for a woman to kill herself for her children, but I don't think it's so much the fashion now. As you say, a mother has no business to die; it's the part of intelligence to live. So you just have a set-to with your old-fashioned mother-in-law if ...
— The Precipice • Elia Wilkinson Peattie

... time here, Merry," declared Bruce. "Hodge has just told me of the men who wore the wolf masks. There must have been three of them. While you were having that set-to with two of them the ...
— Frank Merriwell's Pursuit - How to Win • Burt L. Standish

... could not quite hitch on—always he was too busy, too uncertain, confused. Wavering, he began to study modelling. To his surprise he found he could do it. Modelling in clay, in plaster, he produced beautiful reproductions, really beautiful. Then he set-to to make a head of Ursula, in high relief, in the Donatello manner. In his first passion, he got a beautiful suggestion of his desire. But the pitch of concentration would not come. With a little ash in his mouth he ...
— The Rainbow • D. H. (David Herbert) Lawrence

... "a rattling set-to between Nobby Buffer and Hammer Sykes," for which Tintinnabulum's Life is ...
— The Adventures of Mr. Verdant Green • Cuthbert Bede

... was enjoying the set-to of words immensely. They now looked to Parky for something hot. But the man of card-skill had little ...
— Bruvver Jim's Baby • Philip Verrill Mighels

... for me, I'll wager! Come and watch the new men training with the caestus; I will listen to your plan for ruling me and Rome while the sight of a good set-to stirs my genius to resist ...
— Caesar Dies • Talbot Mundy

... Willis, "we fell in with a Yankee cruiser, were taken on board, and carried into the latitude of the Bahamas, where we fell in with Old Flyblow, who, after a tough set-to, sent the Yankee a prize to Bermuda, and took us ...
— Willis the Pilot • Paul Adrien

... with the foils had always been a duel. It has been indicated, we believe, that he was of a romantic disposition and much given to daydreaming; his imagination had thus made every set-to in the fencing room a veritable mortal combat to him. Therefore, this was not his first duel; he had fought hundreds of them. And he fought always on a settled plan, adapting it, of course, to the idiosyncrasies of his adversary. It was his custom to vary the system of his ...
— The Cruise of the Jasper B. • Don Marquis

... "A bargain is a bargain, Blunt. I won this set-to in a couple of straight falls. Now, tell me what you know about ...
— Frank Merriwell, Junior's, Golden Trail - or, The Fugitive Professor • Burt L. Standish

... impress their subjects with a convenient conception of their divine right to rule. Ivan the Terrible did undoubtedly make his subjects feel very serious indeed; and stupid people are apt to believe that this sort of terror-stiffened seriousness is virtue. It is not. Any person who should set-to deliberately to contrive artificial earthquakes, scuttle liners, and start epidemics with a view to the moral elevation of his countrymen, would very soon find himself in the dock. Those who plan ...
— New York Times, Current History, Vol 1, Issue 1 - From the Beginning to March, 1915 With Index • Various

... menagerie—good old BLONDIN—but side-shows second-rate. Shakspearian Pantaloon in one of the latter seemed to be enjoying Christmas in the old-fashioned manner. (3.) Panorama of Waterloo, not only patriotic, but artistic. Regular good set-to between the Highlanders and French Cuirassiers. Skull in the Relics Department—pretty ornament for the Annual ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 98 January 11, 1890 • Various

... heartily; then she said, "What a constitutional liar that Stiles must be, and as for the Professor, I would like to have a set-to with him myself." ...
— Quincy Adams Sawyer and Mason's Corner Folks - A Picture of New England Home Life • Charles Felton Pidgin

... sort of town Saskatchewan was and he had retorted by inquiring if she was fond of Yonkers, whereupon she'd looked puzzled and acknowledged that she'd never eaten one. For Peter and Lady Allie, it seems, had had a set-to about American map-names, which her ladyship had described as both silly and unsayable, especially the Indian ones, while Peter had grimly proclaimed that any people who called Seven-Oaks Snooks and Belvoir Beever and Ruthven Rivven and Wrottesley ...
— The Prairie Mother • Arthur Stringer

... if I have led you to suspect that I want to be looked upon as a hero. Far from patting myself on the back or holding my chin a little higher because of the set-to in my baronial halls, I confess to a feeling of shame. In my study, where the efficient Blatchford put arnica and bandages on my swollen knuckles, I solemnly declared in the presence of those who ...
— A Fool and His Money • George Barr McCutcheon

... a hard wrench and a tingling pain shot through his arm. The man who had hailed him was of medium height and stocky build, and well muscled. Clancy was in no physical condition to keep up his end in such a set-to, and the result would probably have been disastrous had not Katz leaped over the side and taken ...
— Owen Clancy's Happy Trail - or, The Motor Wizard in California • Burt L. Standish

... Prosper, "and I have found us the shadow of a shade, but as yet we lack the substance." Then he set-to, pounding at the door again, and crying to those within to open for the sake of all the saints he ...
— The Forest Lovers • Maurice Hewlett

... expected, our friends had another set-to with the French-Canadian. Tony Duval wanted to take sides with Werner and Glutts, but the others ...
— The Rover Boys on a Hunt - or The Mysterious House in the Woods • Arthur M. Winfield (Edward Stratemeyer)

... Laythe!" said the major, casting upon the man a look of hate, "you might find a better business than scenting tumblers for temperance folks. You're a pretty Christian, surrendering yourself to such meanness!" It was evident that the major's choler was raised, and that he rather courted a set-to with the spy, who had no great admiration for heroes of any kind. Indeed, the major declared that if such a thing had happened when he was with his regiment in Mexico, his sword had not long remained in ...
— The Life and Adventures of Maj. Roger Sherman Potter • "Pheleg Van Trusedale"

... matador, ORION (not the "Gold Beater,") with his club and his lion's skin, a la Hercules. You observe how "unreservedly and unconditionally" he pitches into the Bull, and how superb is the attitude and ardor of his opponent. It is a splendid set-to, full of alarming possibilities. Every moment you expect to see those enormous horns engaged with the bowels of ORION, or, in default of this, to behold that truculent Club come down, ...
— Punchinello, Vol. 1, No. 11, June 11, 1870 • Various

... dinner came off in my painting-room, with Jerusalem towering up behind us as a background. Wordsworth was in fine cue, and we had a glorious set-to,—on Homer, Shakespeare, Milton and Virgil. Lamb got exceedingly merry and exquisitely witty; and his fun in the midst of Wordsworth's solemn intonations of oratory was like the sarcasm and wit of the fool in the intervals of Lear's passion. ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb, Vol. 5 • Edited by E. V. Lucas

... all been smooth sailing for Charley, any more than it is for any man in authority. After his first set-to with the surly laborer, he had not had any open trouble with his men. But more than one of his crew did not always do an honest day's work, and any failure on the men's part put Charley behind with the amount of work he was expected to get done. This difficulty Charley ...
— The Young Wireless Operator—As a Fire Patrol - The Story of a Young Wireless Amateur Who Made Good as a Fire Patrol • Lewis E. Theiss

... morally your own again. Carew is delighted with you, not so much because you saved his stags as because you fought such a good battle with him by the Decoy Pond. He has been consulting me professionally as to whether it would be contrary to the tables of affinity to have another set-to with you. I am sorry my reply was in the negative, for, now I look at you, I do believe you would have thrashed him; but I was so afraid of his getting the better of you, which might have ...
— Bred in the Bone • James Payn

... up, but burning inside, and sending out smoke at every crack, enough to stifle a horse. General Government and State Government every now and then square off and sparr, and the first blow given will bring a genuine set-to. Surplus Revenue is another bone of contention; like a shin of beef thrown among a pack of dogs, it will set the whole on ...
— The Clockmaker • Thomas Chandler Haliburton

... Sedan—when Merry Andrew, who had three legs and one lung, so the story went, won for him by two lengths; and thirty years later Cannibal's still more astounding victory in the same race, when Monkey Brand out-jockeyed Chukkers Childers, the American crack, in one of the most desperate set-to's in ...
— Boy Woodburn - A Story of the Sussex Downs • Alfred Ollivant

... your practice to talk about me; it is your constant habit to make public complaint of the treatment you receive at my hands. You have gone and told it far and near that I give you low wages and knock you about like a dog. I wish you were a dog! I'd set-to this minute, and never stir from the spot till I'd cut every strip of flesh from your ...
— The Professor • (AKA Charlotte Bronte) Currer Bell

... of clashing swords; and that through the roar of this outburst of fierce sounds there ran an undertone of groans and sobs from the poor wretches who had fallen wounded to the ground. The one thing that I remember clearly is a set-to with swords that I had with a big fellow, just as we had come close to the Citadel, that ended in a way (that would have surprised him mightily had he lived long enough to comprehend it) by my finishing him by means of a stop-thrust followed by a beautiful draw-cut that ...
— The Aztec Treasure-House • Thomas Allibone Janvier

... the poem the gods have a set-to among themselves. Minerva sends Mars sprawling, Venus comes to his assistance, but Minerva knocks her down and leaves her. Neptune challenges Apollo, but Apollo says it is not proper for a god to fight ...
— The Humour of Homer and Other Essays • Samuel Butler

... simple as a barney between two old bush mates that threatens to end in a bloody fist-fight and separation for life, but chances to end in a beer. This quarrel threatened to end in the death of either Brutus or Cassius or a set-to between their two armies, just at the moment when they all should have been knit together against the forces of Mark Antony and Octavius Caesar; but it ended in a beer, or its equivalent, a ...
— The Rising of the Court • Henry Lawson

... very glad to get your letter this morning. We, I say, as both Papa and Emily were anxious to hear of the safe arrival of yourself and the little varmint. {159} As you conjecture, Emily and I set-to to shirt-making the very day after you left, and we have stuck to it pretty closely ever since. We miss your society at least as much as you miss ours, depend upon it; would that you were within calling distance. Be sure you write to me. I shall expect another ...
— Charlotte Bronte and Her Circle • Clement K. Shorter

... I feel all over of a tingle. I should like a set-to. Come on out, and then I should like you ...
— The Peril Finders • George Manville Fenn

... person introduced himself into my room (for any one who asked was instantly admitted), and, after behaving in a very improper manner, he placed himself in a boxing attitude, and commanded me to defend myself, or he should floor me. I had no inclination to have a set-to with a perfect stranger, and was about to request his immediate departure, when he struck me a smart blow upon the chin, and then affected to apologise for the insult, or rather assault, by saying, that ...
— Memoirs of Henry Hunt, Esq. Volume 3 • Henry Hunt

... no mean waterman. The exercise of a favourite art, combining skill with muscular effort, is conducive to peace of mind. A swim, a row, a gallop over a country, a fencing-bout or a rattling set-to with "the gloves" bring a man to his senses more effectually than whole hours of quiescent reflection. Ere the perspiration stood on Dick Stanmore's brow, he suspected he had been hasty and unjust; by the time he caught ...
— M. or N. "Similia similibus curantur." • G.J. Whyte-Melville

... man John is still, as he says, "in fustrate fettle." I saw him spar, not long since, at a private exhibition, and do himself great credit in a set-to with Henry Finnegass, Esq., a professional gentleman of celebrity. I am pleased to say that he has been promoted to an upper clerkship, and, in consequence of his rise in office, has taken an apartment somewhat ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)

... to be polite crossing of swords before duel to the death, a shaking of hands before deadly set-to without gloves. SEXTON suddenly dashed in, and, with back-handed stroke at WOLMER, went for the Times who had adopted and improved upon the Viscount's genial remarks. Assault admirably planned; carried on with irresistible ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 104, February 25, 1893 • Various

... introduced the combatants with a short history of their achievements. A Hindu boy was matched against a white one, a couple of wrestlers came next, and then two English sailors, with more spirit than skill, had a set-to which warmed the audience into enthusiasm and ended amid shouts, whistles, shrill cat-calls, and thunders of applause. Meanwhile the heat grew more and more intense, the faces shinier, the air more and more ...
— The Broken Road • A. E. W. Mason

... treat Boxers to "Max," at the One Tun in Jermyn Street; —I say, could I borrow these Gentlemen's Muses, More skill'd than my meek one in "fibbings" and "bruises," I'd describe now to you As "prime a Set-to," And "regular turn-up," as ever you knew; Not inferior in "bottom" to aught you have read of Since Cribb, years ago, half knock'd Molyneux's head off. But my dainty Urania says, "Such things are shocking!" Lace mittens ...
— The Humourous Poetry of the English Language • James Parton

... in the same way, so as to make it serviceable, for I was very much afraid of breaking my knives in cutting down the brushwood, and I knew how much more rapidly it could be done with an axe. I picked out a large stone, suitable for the purpose, and with a kid of water at hand, I set-to to sharpen the axe. It was a long job, but in a day or two I had succeeded admirably, and the axe was in good order. I then thought how I could leave my birds for so many days, as they would require food. At last, I considered that if I caught two large fish and cut them up, they would be sufficient ...
— The Little Savage • Captain Marryat

... argument. By publicly making an onset in your own names, in a widely-circulated periodical, upon a doctrine cherished as the apple of their eye (I don't say really believed) by nine tenths of the church and the world; what was it but a formal challenge to the whole community for a regular set-to?" ...
— The Grimke Sisters - Sarah and Angelina Grimke: The First American Women Advocates of - Abolition and Woman's Rights • Catherine H. Birney

... with. The infantry captain did me up all right. Wonderful the way the scoundrel cut the cards! It didn't take more than a quarter of an hour for him to clean me out of my last penny. And yet I would give anything to have another set-to with him. Only I never will have the chance.—What a rotten town this is! You can't get anything on credit in the grocery shops here. It's deucedly mean, it is. [He whistles, first an air from Robert le Diable, then a popular song, then a blend of ...
— The Inspector-General • Nicolay Gogol

... leaning back in his chair, "this time we score one. He has not done us brown; we have at least detected him. To detect him in time is half-way to catching him. Only the remoteness of our position at Seldon Castle saved him from capture. Next set-to, I feel sure, we will not merely spot him, we will also nab him. I only wish he would try on such a ...
— An African Millionaire - Episodes in the Life of the Illustrious Colonel Clay • Grant Allen

... whole town. Your intelackshal natur, respected Barnet, is not fizzickly adapted, so to speak, for encounters of this sort. You must not indulge in combats with us course bullies of the press: you have not the STAMINY for a reglar set-to. What, then, is your plan? In the midst of the mob to pass as quiet as you can: you won't be undistubbed. Who is? Some stray kix and buffits will fall to you—mortial man is subjick to such; but if you begin to wins and cry out, and set up for a ...
— Memoirs of Mr. Charles J. Yellowplush - The Yellowplush Papers • William Makepeace Thackeray

... There and then, I set-to, at repairing the door—working hard and anxiously. First, I went down to the basement, and, rummaging 'round, found several pieces of heavy oak planking. With these, I returned to the study, and, having removed the props, ...
— The House on the Borderland • William Hope Hodgson

... more so than Jorrocks, who stood listening to their offers with the utmost sang-froid, until he closed with one to take them to Streatham Church for two shillings, and deliver them within the half-hour, which was a signal for all the rest to set-to and abuse them, their coachman, and his horse, which they swore had been carrying "stiff-uns" [14] all night, and "could not go not none at all". Nor were they far wrong; for the horse, after scrambling a hundred yards or two, gradually relaxed into something ...
— Jorrocks' Jaunts and Jollities • Robert Smith Surtees

... this, an' sprang at me like a tiger. But I was ready for him. We had a regular set-to then an' there. By good luck there was no weapons of any kind in the room, not even a table knife, for I'd had to pawn a'most everything to pay my rent, and the clasp-knife I'd eat my breakfast with was in my pocket. But we was both handy with our fists. We kep' ...
— Twice Bought • R.M. Ballantyne

... a quick, sharp set-to. Every man was lined up with a jerk, and when the line was tallied up and tallied down and Towle had consented to the last raise in price of votes and given away to the final squeeze, the word went up and down the ranks ...
— Frenzied Finance - Vol. 1: The Crime of Amalgamated • Thomas W. Lawson

... a rather lively set-to with a number of Hadendowas," he explained in response to a question from Mr. Fenshawe. "It was brief but strenuous, and I assure you it is a marvel that I came out of it practically without a scratch. At any rate, it does not call for a detailed description ...
— The Wheel O' Fortune • Louis Tracy

... the twanging of bow-strings, the whizzing of arrows, the screams of women, the shouts of the warriors, and the vociferations of the peasantry, who had been assembled to the intended nuptials, and who, seeing a fair set-to, contrived to pick a quarrel among themselves on the occasion, and proceeded, with staff and cudgel, to crack each other's skulls for the good of the king and the earl. One tall friar alone was untouched ...
— Maid Marian • Thomas Love Peacock

... need of exercise of some sort. The doctor recommended Indian clubs; but the boys in the office liked boxing, and it seemed to me to have some advantages. So we clubbed together, and got a set of gloves, and when we were not busy would put them on and have a friendly set-to. It was inevitable that our youthful spirits should rise at these meetings, and with them occasionally certain lumps, which afterward shaded off into various tints bordering more or less on black until we learned to keep a leech on hand for emergencies. You ...
— Children of the Tenements • Jacob A. Riis

... it up very long, Kit," he said. "With Jim trailing Bella all over the house, and the old lady keener every day, it's bound to come out somehow. And that isn't all. Jim and Harbison had a set-to ...
— When a Man Marries • Mary Roberts Rinehart

... set-to with her ladyship," put in Tom. "And the biplane floored us on the first round." And then he told his younger ...
— The Rover Boys in the Air - From College Campus to the Clouds • Edward Stratemeyer

... of an all-around sport was Larry, and a boxer of no mean ability. I remember a set-to that he had one night in the old club house with Hugh Nichols, in which he all but knocked Hughy out, greatly to that gentleman's surprise, as he had fancied up to that time that he was Corcoran's master in the art ...
— A Ball Player's Career - Being the Personal Experiences and Reminiscensces of Adrian C. Anson • Adrian C. Anson

... to tell you before, because I knew you would laugh at me and tell me it was all nonsense for being such a coward. D'ye see, that bullet made a hole in my back and let all the pluck out of me. But your set-to with that chap seemed to tell me that it hadn't all gone, for I felt ready for anything again, and that there was nothing the matter with me, only being ...
— !Tention - A Story of Boy-Life during the Peninsular War • George Manville Fenn

... After a stare at the mild little figure with the fitfully dead-levelled large grey eyes in front of him, the pork-butcher resumed: 'Take you for the man you say you be, you're just the man for my friend Jam and me. He dearly loves to see a set-to, self the same. What prettier? And if you would be so obliging some day as to favour us with a display, we'd head a cap conformably, whether you'd the best of it, according to your expectations, or t' other way:—For there never ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith

... combatants were equally matched and very much in earnest. I am ashamed to say how many times since I have speculated as to which boy got licked. Maybe both the small rascals are dead now (not in consequence of the set-to, let us hope), or maybe they are married, and have pugnacious urchins of their own; yet to this day I sometimes find myself wondering how that ...
— The Story of a Bad Boy • Thomas Bailey Aldrich

... doubt whether even the old Romans, with all their large experience, ever beheld so strange and grotesque a "set-to" (I'm pretty sure none of our American boys ever did) as the writer once stumbled upon, on the shores of one of our Northern Maine lakes—Lake Pennesseewassee, if you can pronounce that; it ...
— Happy Days for Boys and Girls • Various

... galleries were filled with spectators, workingmen mostly, absolutely quiet, and all ears, as if they were drinking in every word of the old republican! In the reserved seats, just previously packed with curiosity-seekers interested in the set-to scheduled for the opening of the session, only a few foreign tourists were left. They were taking in everything—even the fantastic uniforms of the mace-bearers; and they were determined not to leave ...
— The Torrent - Entre Naranjos • Vicente Blasco Ibanez

... "contracting" at Leavenworth on the corner of Fifth and Shawnee Streets. Out there at Fort Zara, Bill enjoyed himself as only Irishmen can, but his stumbling block was Captain Conkey, who was the biggest crank on earth, "take it from me," for he and I had a little "set-to." Daugherty always sent his "red, white and blue regards to the old merchant" by whosoever went ...
— The Second William Penn - A true account of incidents that happened along the - old Santa Fe Trail • William H. Ryus

... about the details. Ruth sat over her sewing, fancying how all had taken place; and as soon as she had arranged the events which were going on among people and places once so familiar to her, she found some discrepancy, and set-to afresh to picture the declaration of love, and the yielding, blushing acceptance; for Mr Farquhar had told little beyond the mere fact that there was an engagement between himself and Jemima which had existed for some time, but which had been kept secret until now, when it was acknowledged, ...
— Ruth • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell

... not always pleasant, that good Brigitte," said Flavie; "she and I have just had a little set-to." ...
— The Lesser Bourgeoisie • Honore de Balzac

... quickly finds, or may at the moment hold in his hand, the money ventured by some one else on the other cock, and apprises you of the arrangement. But should your cock chance to be a favourite, and the broker be unable to arrange an equal bet against the other, he tells you so before the set-to begins, and returns your money if you are not disposed to ...
— Recollections of Manilla and the Philippines - During 1848, 1849 and 1850 • Robert Mac Micking

... resigned," said Plain Smith. "One time when I was school-teaching I had a set-to with a school committee of farmers about teaching the kids a little botany. They said the three R's were enough. I won out, but I swore I'd stand up for any teacher that tried to be honest the way he seen it. ...
— The Trail of the Hawk - A Comedy of the Seriousness of Life • Sinclair Lewis

... the blackbirds. In two minutes up came another one from out of the bramble bushes at the corner, and away they went chattering at each other. Presently the starlings on the chimney began to quarrel, and had a terrible set-to. Then a wren came by, and though he was so small, his boast was worse than the blackbird's, for he said he was the sharpest and the cleverest of all the birds, and knew more than all ...
— Wood Magic - A Fable • Richard Jefferies

... world old and outworn, and toppling down towards a final crash? The days of Chu Hia were gone, its future all in the long past; no one dared dream of a time when there should be something better than Yen diddling Lu, or Ts'u beating Ts'i at a good set-to with these new sixty-warrior-holding chariots. Who should think of the Phoenix—and of a new age to come when there should be no more Yen and Lu and Chow and Tsin and Ts'in, but one broad and mighty realm, a Middle, a Celestial Kingdom,—such ...
— The Crest-Wave of Evolution • Kenneth Morris

... indeed, to see two letters-of-marque set-to as coolly, and as scientifically as were the facts with the Crisis and la Dame de Nantes; for so, as we afterwards ascertained, was our antagonist called. Neither party aimed at any great advantage by manoeuvring; but we came up alongside of "The Lady," as our men subsequently ...
— Afloat And Ashore • James Fenimore Cooper

... stout sets-to between the other candidates for the new hat, and at last come the shepherd and Willum Smith. This is the crack set-to of the day. They are both in famous wind, and there is no crying "hold." The shepherd is an old hand, and up to all the dodges. He tries them one after another, and very nearly gets at Willum's ...
— Tom Brown's Schooldays • Thomas Hughes

... fourchette over, a siesta and cigar would be indulged in till five o'clock, when a ride or rattling set-to at lawn tennis, followed by a refreshing bath, prepared one for dinner—the more enjoyable for the violent exercise that had preceded it. Such was our daily life in Kuching, and one that I shall ever look back upon ...
— On the Equator • Harry de Windt

... I have some great set-to's. He's a regular old-line party-member. Too dogmatic. Expects to reform everything from deforestration to nosebleed by saying phrases like 'surplus value.' Like reading the prayer-book. But same time, he's a Plato J. Aristotle compared with people ...
— Main Street • Sinclair Lewis

... "Rather a sharp set-to, Miss Dane," the artist remarked, in his lazy voice. "Miss Oleander is a clever woman, but she is matched at last. I wonder why it is? You two ought to ...
— The Unseen Bridgegroom - or, Wedded For a Week • May Agnes Fleming

... collar, twitches his neckcloth, sets his hat awry, and with a mad humorous look in his eyes, is soon in the thickest of the crowd of rustic revellers. He jests, gambols, dances, soon to quarrel and fight. He roughly handles a brawny waggoner, a practised boxer, in a regular scientific set-to; gives his defeated antagonist half a guinea, rearranges his toilet, and retires with his friends amidst the cheers of the crowd. It is quite a Tom-and-Jerry scene. Gentlemen delighted to fight coal-heavers in those days. Somehow we always hear of the gentlemen being victorious; perhaps if the coal-heavers ...
— Art in England - Notes and Studies • Dutton Cook

... cruise was up, and we were paid off, about a dozen of us went to lodge with old Peter Hardheart, at the sign of the Foul Anchor; and as we had plenty of money, we thought we would have a regular blow-out. So Peter got a fiddler and some other unmentionable requisites for a jig, and we had a set-to in firstrate style. Why, our great frolic at Santa Martha, when Paddy Chips, the Irish carpenter, danced away his watch, and jacket, and tarpaulin, and nearly all his toggery, you know, and next morning came scudding along the ...
— Select Temperance Tracts • American Tract Society

... the boy began to notice that the more he was beaten the stronger he grew. Still he could not understand what the man in the moon meant. So he came again, and they had another regular set-to, and the boy had another good sound thrashing. He asked him what was the meaning of his beating him thus. The man in the moon now spoke to him, but his words were so much like a puzzle that at first the boy did ...
— Algonquin Indian Tales • Egerton R. Young

... sort of man he had to meet, and this being his own first appearance in a duelling field, he might well have been excused for feeling some anxiety as to the result. It was so slight, however, as not to betray itself, either in his looks or gestures. Confiding in his skill, gained by many a set-to with buttoned foils, and supported, as he was, by the gallant young Kentuckian, he knew nothing that could be called fear. Instead, as his antagonist advanced towards the spot where he was standing, and he looked at the handsome, yet sinister face—his ...
— The Free Lances - A Romance of the Mexican Valley • Mayne Reid

... few days after the opening of the school year when Billie had her first little set-to with Miss Cora Dill. The latter had just finished calling the roll and had pushed the book from her. Then she looked ...
— Billie Bradley at Three Towers Hall - or, Leading a Needed Rebellion • Janet D. Wheeler

... I felt any thing of the last, I am sure I did him injustice; and (I hope) myself. Be it as it may, I thought it better just to exchange a shot now and then,—sometimes it was a red-hot shot too on both sides,—as we passed and repassed, in the current of conversation, than come to a regular set-to, yard-arm to yard-arm. From whatever cause, he gave me abundant opportunity of recurring to the subject, for he was perpetually, and I believe unconsciously, leading the conversation towards it; not, I think, from confidence in his logical prowess, but from ...
— The Eclipse of Faith - Or, A Visit To A Religious Sceptic • Henry Rogers

... I rather think the people would be shy," answered Griffin, with a little hesitation of manner, and yet with the directness and simplicity of a truly brave man. "We must let them get over the last brush before they are depended on much for any new set-to of that sort." ...
— The Wing-and-Wing - Le Feu-Follet • J. Fenimore Cooper

... have a good chance of landing third place," the manager exulted when they started West. They were to play Chicago in their home town, then work their way to New York for a final set-to with the Giants, and end the season ...
— Baseball Joe in the Big League - or, A Young Pitcher's Hardest Struggles • Lester Chadwick

... talking and listened. Then they deliberated whether Bernard Shaw ought to go into Parliament. And that brought them to vegetarianism and teetotalism, and the young man in the orange tie and Mrs. Goopes had a great set-to about the sincerity of Chesterton and Belloc that was ended by Goopes showing signs of resuming the ...
— Ann Veronica • H. G. Wells

... won't be no set-to about such small potaters," said Mrs. Pike, with dignity. Her broad back had been unrecognized by the herald, careless in her haste. "Hattie's ready an' willin' to divide the premium, if't comes to her, an' I guess Mary'd be, put her in the ...
— Meadow Grass - Tales of New England Life • Alice Brown

... Jove, my wife will certainly be delighted to have me home—loving each other as we do! Especially now that we have been successful, and the enemy, that every one thought invincible, beaten, beaten at the first set-to under my auspices and leadership. Ah yes, my arrival will surely be a ...
— Amphitryo, Asinaria, Aulularia, Bacchides, Captivi • Plautus Titus Maccius

... set-to with Barney Hedge," answered Whopper. "He said some things I didn't like and I rolled him over in the snow and put some down his back to help ...
— Guns And Snowshoes • Captain Ralph Bonehill

... undoubtedly true,)—and that he wished he didn't, either. The truth is, that Charley, with his honest, boyish face, must have been singularly out of place among that brutal circle; and there is little doubt that he retired from the company before the set-to was fairly begun, and that respectable old Morris went with him. But, at any rate, they are a noble-looking family, and well brought up. Charley, with all his pugilism, stands fair for a part at Commencement, they say; and if you could have seen little Kate teaching ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 3, No. 18, April, 1859 - [Date last updated: August 7, 2005] • Various

... sedulously provided by the government. The time-honoured institutions of the bull-bait, the cockpit, and the ring, are in daily operation, under the most distinguished patronage. Hyde Park has been converted into a gigantic arena, where criminals from Newgate "set-to" with the animals from the Zoological Gardens. Every fortnight there is a Derby Day, and the whole population pour into the Downs with frantic excitement, leaving the city to the slaves. And then the moral ...
— The Roman and the Teuton - A Series of Lectures delivered before the University of Cambridge • Charles Kingsley

... Tuesday.—Regular set-to of Irish Members on Prince ARTHUR. MADDEN gallantly threw himself across body of his chief, but got such fearful pummelling retired into silence for rest of sitting. What made it worse for ARTHUR was Chairman's ruling; ...
— Punch, Vol. 99., July 26, 1890. • Various

... be going all to pieces. The day commenced badly. Two of the boys inaugurated it by a violent set-to before breakfast—an old grudge broke out afresh, or perhaps the life here has demoralized them. I have lamed my foot. Tide too high for abalone fishing. Eggs growing scarce, and the rabbits seem to have deserted the accessible parts of the island. Everybody is disgusted. We are forgetting ...
— In the Footprints of the Padres • Charles Warren Stoddard

... when a drawling nasal voice spoke from the opposite corner: "Ah! you're right; take him away; don't show his white feather till you're druv to it." That turned the wavering scale. The Big 'un ground his teeth with blasphemy, and set-to. ...
— Guy Livingstone; - or, 'Thorough' • George A. Lawrence



Words linked to "Set-to" :   scrap, fighting, combat



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