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Shift   Listen
verb
Shift  v. i.  
1.
To divide; to distribute. (Obs.) "Some this, some that, as that him liketh shift."
2.
To make a change or changes; to change position; to move; to veer; to substitute one thing for another; used in the various senses of the transitive verb. "The sixth age shifts Into the lean and slippered pantaloon." "Here the Baillie shifted and fidgeted about in his seat."
3.
To resort to expedients for accomplishing a purpose; to contrive; to manage. "Men in distress will look to themselves, and leave their companions to shift as well as they can."
4.
To practice indirect or evasive methods. "All those schoolmen, though they were exceeding witty, yet better teach all their followers to shift, than to resolve by their distinctions."
5.
(Naut.) To slip to one side of a ship, so as to destroy the equilibrum; said of ballast or cargo; as, the cargo shifted.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Shift" Quotes from Famous Books



... of itself receive, no influence Can reach us. Tempest none, shower, hail or snow, Hoar frost or dewy moistness, higher falls Than that brief scale of threefold steps: thick clouds Nor scudding rack are ever seen: swift glance Ne'er lightens, nor Thaumantian Iris gleams, That yonder often shift on each side heav'n. Vapour adust doth never mount above The highest of the trinal stairs, whereon Peter's vicegerent stands. Lower perchance, With various motion rock'd, trembles the soil: But here, through wind in earth's deep hollow pent, I know ...
— The Divine Comedy • Dante

... three were off, their chorusing farewells coming back to him over their shoulders. When they were out of sight he went back to the place on the hilltop where he had stood beside Roberta, and thought it all over. In that way only could he make shift to prolong the ...
— The Twenty-Fourth of June • Grace S. Richmond

... any sail off her." Then, on the point of disappearing down the companion-way, he would add curtly: "Don't carry anything away." I am glad to say that I never did; one night, however, I was caught, not quite prepared, by a sudden shift of wind. ...
— The Mirror of the Sea • Joseph Conrad

... his consort, she of the sunbonnet. Restored to some extent by her tarrying in the shade, she began to shift and hitch about uneasily upon the board-pile. At length she leaned a bit to one side, reached into a pocket and taking out a snuff-stick and a parcel of its attendant compound, began to take a "dip" of snuff, after ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume VIII (of X) • Various

... a dizzy weakness seemed to have overcome Gavin. For after a single attempt at resistance. he swayed and hung heavy on Standish's supporting arm. He made shift to mumble a dazed good night to Claire. Then he suffered Milo to support him up the stairs and along the wide upper hall to the ...
— Black Caesar's Clan • Albert Payson Terhune

... of a steel bar between it and its pinion. Aside from this accident, practically not a dollar was spent for repairs, and the machinery, including the pipe, was in about as good order when the tunnel was finished as when it was first erected. One man, on a twelve hour shift, operated the machinery at each shaft, besides dumping the cars; two men kept the 18 pumps on the line in order, the principal work being in keeping the suction-pipes for the down-grade headings tight; thus a force of 18 men was only required for the eight shafts. The cost ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 455, September 20, 1884 • Various

... charged, was employed to defeat the most unconstitutional and indefensible measure ever brought forward by a corrupt and unprincipled coalition—the India Bill, which endeavoured to secure for Fox and North personally the power and patronage of our Oriental Empire. The King could not shift the responsibility of administration upon ministers who owed office and Parliamentary support to himself. The American war was not his work. The Stamp Act was brought in during his first illness by the minister he most hated. The Tea Duty was the madness of Townshend; and the step, which gave ...
— The Quarterly Review, Volume 162, No. 324, April, 1886 • Various

... which its remains are found, and whose massive cuirass and weapons of defense are well matched with its teeth and claws. The momentum of its huge body involved a seemingly slow and lumbering action, an inertia of its movements, difficult to start and difficult to shift or to stop. Such movements are widely different from the agile swiftness which we naturally associate with a beast of prey. But an animal which exceeds an average elephant in bulk, no matter what its habits, is compelled by ...
— Dinosaurs - With Special Reference to the American Museum Collections • William Diller Matthew

... they walked their sorry looking horses on, "while we'd like to find some sort of respectable beds to-night, if the worst comes, we can always make shift with a haystack. It wouldn't be the first time we've curled up in the hay and snatched a few winks ...
— The Boy Scouts on Belgian Battlefields • Lieut. Howard Payson

... o' things in the world that you don't see, boy. It's a big world and things shift around a good deal and some of our opinions are apt to move ...
— A Man for the Ages - A Story of the Builders of Democracy • Irving Bacheller

... increased from the almost impassable condition of the flats in Lake St. Clair. Here steamboats and vessels are daily compelled in all weather to lie fast aground, and shift their cargoes, passengers, and luggage into lighters, exposing life, health, and property to great hazard, and then by extraordinary heaving and hauling are enabled to get over. Indeed, so bad has this passage become, that one of the largest steamboats, after ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 7, Issue 41, March, 1861 • Various

... in claiming that there was no engagement of any kind. So far, we have kept you in grub; but we're not bound to do so, and if you leave us, you must shift for yourself." ...
— The Intriguers • Harold Bindloss

... had made shift to strip the cords from his hands, and when my brother entered into the dark place where the prisoners lay, they flew at him to fell him. But even on the threshold Herdegen saw through their purpose, and had no sooner shut the door than he drew his hunting knife. ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers

... Oriental marches of the spectacle of Lalla Rookh. Assuredly this fact is evidence that the women in New York, like so many women in all quarters of the land, are unwilling to do the work which properly belongs to them to do, and prefer any shift, even the degrading one mentioned above, to honest household labor. There are thousands of ladies to whom the following description, written by a lady herself, may well ...
— Public School Education • Michael Mueller

... added to the horror of it. We had nearly reached the point of being unable to control the movements of the ship amidst the fury of the waves; parts of the rigging were broken with every manoeuvre; and despite all our efforts we could scarcely shift our sails. For a long time our commandant had had no rest. It was absolutely necessary to get out of these stormy seas at the extremity of the southern continent, and hasten on our course for Port Jackson. ...
— Terre Napoleon - A history of French explorations and projects in Australia • Ernest Scott

... ancient and affluent families on James River (for by this trivial name Virginians are content to designate the noble Powhatan), was the eldest of three brothers, of whom the two younger, as was often the case under the ancien regime in Virginia, were left, at the death of their parent, to shift for themselves; while the eldest son inherited the undivided princely estate of his ancestors. This was at the period when that contest of principle with power, which finally resulted in the separation of the American Colonies from ...
— Nick of the Woods • Robert M. Bird

... with the spade as well as she could; but she found this was not sufficient. The current ran westerly, and she was drifting out of her course. Then she remembered Hazel's lessons, and made shift to fasten the spade to the helm, and then lashed the helm. Even this did not quite do; so she took her little oar, kissed it, cried over it a little, and then pulled manfully with it so as to keep the true course. It was a muggy ...
— Foul Play • Charles Reade

... "there weren't no work for us in 'Murrica. Mos' o' the places 'ad closed down ter a shift or two at the mos' per wik. And fer fellers wats used to livin' purty well there weren't enough ter pay board alone. We gotter come or we'd a starved." Of course this was not true ...
— The Luck of Thirteen - Wanderings and Flight through Montenegro and Serbia • Jan Gordon

... "Look, sir," said Harry, "if that cruel creature has not almost killed this poor chicken; see how he bleeds, and hangs his wings! I will put him into my bosom to recover him, and carry him home; and he shall have part of my dinner every day till he is well, and able to shift ...
— The History of Sandford and Merton • Thomas Day

... "we must keep under cover all day and hide till night comes on. You can't have any fires. Get into sheltered spots and huddle together to keep warm, and shift round now and then to give every one ...
— Ben Comee - A Tale of Rogers's Rangers, 1758-59 • M. J. (Michael Joseph) Canavan

... hearth, and presently the old silver tea-pot and kettle, and the yellow cups and saucers, were shining in the cheery firelight. The old butler put a sirloin and a game-pie on the sideboard, and then left the little party to shift for themselves, ...
— Vixen, Volume I. • M. E. Braddon

... I like not this baffling of the wind. It comes fresher at moments, but it is in puffs, and fear there will be a shift It is now ...
— Homeward Bound - or, The Chase • James Fenimore Cooper

... to see if she waked; forsooth the witch's coming had waked her; but even so she was wary, and lay still, nor changed her breathing. So the witch turned away, but even therewith Birdalone made a shift to get a glimpse of her, and this she saw thereby, that the semblance of her was changed, and that she bore the self-same skin wherewith she had come to Utterhay, and which she had worn twice or thrice afterwards when ...
— The Water of the Wondrous Isles • William Morris

... as you say," answered Charles, "modern music did not come into existence till after the powers of the violin became known. Corelli himself, who wrote not two hundred years ago, hardly ventures on the shift. The piano, again, I have heard, has almost given birth ...
— Loss and Gain - The Story of a Convert • John Henry Newman

... vbique? Then wee'l shift for grownd, [Sidenote: shift our] Come hither Gentlemen, And lay your hands againe vpon my sword, Neuer to speake of this that you haue heard:[6] ...
— The Tragedie of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark - A Study with the Text of the Folio of 1623 • George MacDonald

... cares what you think, child. Why, just look!—tuns and tuns of Gascon wine are sent to Woodstock for her: and here must I make shift with small ale and thin mead that's half sour. She's ...
— One Snowy Night - Long ago at Oxford • Emily Sarah Holt

... are always to be robbed in this manner," observed Chowles, "we had better shift our quarters, ...
— Old Saint Paul's - A Tale of the Plague and the Fire • William Harrison Ainsworth

... puffs like he was goin' to blow a cylinder head. But that's just what Hickory Ellins don't do at a time like this. When you think he's nearest to goin' up with a bang, that's the time when he's apt to calm down sudden and shift tactics. He does now. Motionin' me to come to the front, he takes the envelope I hands over, glances at it thoughtful a ...
— On With Torchy • Sewell Ford

... and Roderick was slight and superficial. The fact that the tale is written in the first person also helps the autobiographic theory: that method of story-making always lends a certain credence to the narrative. The scenes shift from western Scotland to the streets of London, thence to the West Indies: and the interest (the remark applies to all Smollett's work) lies in just three things—adventure, diversity of character, and the realistic picture of contemporary life—especially that of the navy on ...
— Masters of the English Novel - A Study Of Principles And Personalities • Richard Burton

... feeling of cold and abject soul-nausea he shut the book, put it away on a bookshelf in which he saw a gap, and went to turn out the lamp. As the flame flickered and died out he heard Jimmy's foot shift on the terrace. ...
— In the Wilderness • Robert Hichens

... victorious bird, draggled and woebegone, with great patches of red flesh showing through its wet plumage, with the membrane of its face, and its short gills and comb swollen and bloody, with one eye put out, and the other only kept open by the thread attached to its eyelid, yet makes shift to strut, with staggering gait, across the cock-pit, and to notify its victory, by giving vent to a lamentable ghost of a crow. Then it is carried off followed by an admiring, gesticulating, vociferous crowd, to be elaborately ...
— In Court and Kampong - Being Tales and Sketches of Native Life in the Malay Peninsula • Hugh Clifford

... Muhammadans and Hindoos. If they obtained the offices they would be educated for, the evil to Government and to society would be very great; and if they did not get them, the evil would be great to themselves, since they would be encouraged to entertain hopes that could not be realized. Better let them shift for themselves and quietly sink among the crowd. They would only become rallying points for the dissatisfaction and multiplied sources of disaffection; everywhere doing mischief, and nowhere doing good. Let loose upon society, ...
— Rambles and Recollections of an Indian Official • William Sleeman

... scaffold to his death, he said jokingly to the Lieutenant of the Tower, observing that they were weak and shook beneath his tread, 'I pray you, master Lieutenant, see me safe up; and, for my coming down, I can shift for myself.' Also he said to the executioner, after he had laid his head upon the block, 'Let me put my beard out of the way; for that, at least, has never committed any treason.' Then his head was struck off at ...
— A Child's History of England • Charles Dickens

... is nothing so secret but it winneth, had recalled it to the memory of the enamoured lady, who, that none should get wind of the matter, had laboured sore many days with such tools as she might command, ere she could make shift to open the door; then, going down alone thereby into the grotto and seeing the tunnel, she sent to bid Guiscardo study to come to her thereby and acquainted him with the height which herseemed should be from the mouth thereof to ...
— The Decameron of Giovanni Boccaccio • Giovanni Boccaccio

... was admirably equipped for my own concerts as far as the orchestra was concerned, yet I had much trouble in procuring the requisite singers. The soprano was very passably represented by Mlle. Bianchi; but for the tenor parts I had to make shift with a M. Setoff, who, although possessing plenty of courage, had very little voice. But he managed to help me through the 'Schmiede-Lieder' in Siegfried, for his presence at least gave an appearance of song, while the orchestra alone undertookthe effective ...
— My Life, Volume II • Richard Wagner

... sailed well. There was just enough wind, and no more, to suit her, and the dhow apparently was not so fast a sailer as some of her class. Still she kept well ahead of the boat. Should the wind shift back to its old quarter, however, there was a fair probability that the boat ...
— Ned Garth - Made Prisoner in Africa. A Tale of the Slave Trade • W. H. G. Kingston

... the coast. With some difficulty they succeeded in rigging up a jury-mast, and managed by that means to keep up a little closer in the wind. But their only chance was that the wind might go down, or shift a little to the southward, or in the current, which generally takes a northerly direction here, unless it should set them in too much ...
— The Pilot and his Wife • Jonas Lie

... Another shift in our course rapidly carried us out of the shadow of the earth and into that all pervading sunshine. Then the great planet beneath us hung unspeakable in its beauty. The outlines of several of the continents were clearly discernible on its surface, ...
— Edison's Conquest of Mars • Garrett Putnam Serviss

... the old man, regretfully. "My old woman's waitin'! Bad news! It's good news I bring. Dan's had a raise. He's foreman of the gang now. And I stepped 'round to tell ye the good news and that Dan'll be a-workin' tonight with an extry shift and'll not be comin' home to dinner, worse luck for him!" sniffing appreciatively at the pleasant ...
— Red-Robin • Jane Abbott

... finished. Now what?—more books?—lectures?—some kind of old woman's make-shift? Sit here and watch my red blood dry up? Sit here like a plant shrivelling away in the darkness? Be looked after and fussed over and have things made as easy for me as possible? ...
— The Glory Of The Conquered • Susan Glaspell

... rainy night. No wonder, then, that Czech made straight for [vR]ip, climbed to the top, looked around him, approved of what he saw, and decided to stay. He did, so did his friends and relatives and those that came after them, and no power on earth was able to shift them. The descendants of Czech are there still. One of these told me that the best and sturdiest type of Czech is bred round about [vR]ip; he was born thereabouts himself, and should know. I am prepared to believe it anyway, as my ...
— From a Terrace in Prague • Lieut.-Col. B. Granville Baker

... you may be sure the dinner was a good one, for Miss Aglonby was one of a generation of women whose knowledge of housewifely arts was such that, shut up in a lighthouse or wrecked on a desert island, they would have made shift to get a nice meal somehow, even if they could not have served it, as she did, off old china and graced it with old silver,—after dinner, then, a long and pleasant evening set in, with no thought or talk of business-matters. Sir Robert was charmed ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, September, 1885 • Various

... at work on the new place; we divided up into gangs and were merry enough. But the work would barely last over a week; after that we should have to shift again. ...
— Wanderers • Knut Hamsun

... stretching 10 m. along the E. coast of Kent, about 51/2 m. from the shore; with the flowing of the tidal current the hidden sands are apt to shift and change their outline, and when storms of great violence sweep over them, despite their being well marked by four lightships and nine buoys, they have often been the occasion of a long series of melancholy shipwrecks; the shoal forms a splendid ...
— The Nuttall Encyclopaedia - Being a Concise and Comprehensive Dictionary of General Knowledge • Edited by Rev. James Wood

... to shift for themselves. Sweeting, who was the least embarrassed of the three, took refuge beside Mrs. Sykes, who, he knew, was almost as fond of him as if he had been her son. Donne, after making his general bow with a grace all his own, and saying in a high, pragmatical voice, ...
— Shirley • Charlotte Bronte

... withered grass, very much resembles a shower of rain. When a tree is shaken or struck, it is astonishing to see what a cloud of them will fly off. In their flight they yield to the current of the wind, which at this season of the year is always from the north-east. Should the wind shift, it is difficult to conceive where they could collect food, as the whole of their course was marked ...
— Life and Travels of Mungo Park in Central Africa • Mungo Park

... of Kew or of Windsor. London must have been a splendid place in those days—full of life and colour and wrong and revelry. There was no absurd press nor vestry to protect the poor at the expense of the rich and see that everything should be neatly adjusted. Every man had to shift for himself and, consequently, men were, as Mr. Clement Scott would say, manly, and women, as Mr. Clement Scott would say, womanly. In those days, a young man of wealth and family found open to him a vista of such licence as had been unknown to any since the barbatuli of the Roman Empire. To ...
— The Works of Max Beerbohm • Max Beerbohm

... town in the month of March; he had learnt that our opponents intended to shift the scene of operations to the Chats, (where the greater number of the Indians pass on their way going to or returning from their hunting grounds,) and were making preparations of a very extensive nature for the spring competition. The ...
— Service in the Hudson's Bay Territory • John M'lean

... Upon the trees little wheels of cedar twigs have been hung; these the dancers now take, and each dances toward the fire in the centre of the circle and back four times. As the gods dance back and forth the people assembled in the encircling line shift their positions, so that all the women are on the north side and all the men on the south; then the entire body dances, with brief intervals of rest, while twelve songs are sung. The maskers next form in single file on the east, march around the fire, through ...
— The North American Indian • Edward S. Curtis

... Oldbuck, "the sword which my father wore in the year forty-fiveit hath no belt or baldrickbut we'll make shift." ...
— The Antiquary, Complete • Sir Walter Scott

... to tell me that you and Betty Sheridan have quarreled! Such a desirable match from every point of view, family and all! It goes to show what a rattle-pated bunch of women they are! Any really clever girl with an eye to her future, anti or pro, could shift her politics when it came ...
— The Sturdy Oak - A Composite Novel of American Politics by Fourteen American Authors • Samuel Merwin, et al.

... Why does London enjoy such an evil pre-eminence in this matter? In my opinion it often arises from the fact that house-accommodation is so expensive in the metropolis. In London, it is a habit with many parents, owing to the want of room at home, to make growing lads shift for themselves at a very early age. These boys earn just enough to enable them to secure a bare existence; out of their scanty wages it is impossible to hire a room for themselves; they have to be contented with the common ...
— Crime and Its Causes • William Douglas Morrison

... pursuing their voyage, the Spaniards left the enemy with the intention of running upon the coast of an island of the strait, called Ybabao. Our Lord guided them to a port, where a ship was never known to have entered. There they anchored, and fearing that the wind with which they entered might shift to that which generally prevails in that season and with greater fury, they determined to run the said ship into the mud, and to cut away the mainmast, in order to render them less liable to drag, and to leave the port again and encounter the enemy. Accordingly, all possible haste was displayed ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898 • Emma Helen Blair

... searched the woman's face for some hint, some sign that this extraordinary shift-about was recognized and understood; but Miss Maggie, with a countenance serenely expressing only cheerful interest, was over by the little stand, rearranging the pile of ...
— Oh, Money! Money! • Eleanor Hodgman Porter

... and rend whom most I love. I've made all fast now. 'Tis a hideous death. I thought to plunge me in the deep, still pool That skirts the forest—to avoid it; but I thought that for the suicide's poor shift I would not throw away my chance of heaven, And meeting one who made earth heaven to me. So I came home and forged these chains about me: Full well I know no human hand can rend them, And now am safe from harming those ...
— Successful Recitations • Various

... man to stand firm in the midst of a rabble of wild Mohammedans, all howling and flourishing their knives at once under his very nose. To tell the plain truth, he was frightened out of his wits; and the only thing he thought of was how to shift the responsibility on to somebody else's shoulders as fast as possible. So he said (and it was very lucky he did, as it turned out) that Latour, being in government employ, must be tried by military law; and he packed them all off to the commandant, who, as I've told you, was no other ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, December 1878 • Various

... called "Jim's Terrace" if the road is not "James's" Road, because no bills ever seem to be paid there as they are in our street—and for other reasons. There are four houses, but seldom more than two of them occupied at one time—often only one. Tenants never shift in, or at least are never seen to, but they get there. The sign is a furtive candle light behind an old table cloth, a skirt, or any rag of dark stuff tacked across the front bedroom window, upstairs, and a shadow suggestive of a woman ...
— The Rising of the Court • Henry Lawson

... "Fiddlesticks!" Then she went to my grandmother, who prescribed senna tea, which she brewed and stood by till I had drunk. I resolved to wear my heart a little less on my sleeve, and always after that assured my grandmother that I was feeling very well indeed. Also I made shift to eat a little, even in public, contriving it so, however, that the effort to appear brave and gay ought to have been evident even to ...
— The Dew of Their Youth • S. R. Crockett

... far out of the low casement. "It is awkward shooting, Master Guy," he said quietly, "but I daresay I can make a shift to manage it." Disregarding the furious yells of the crowd, he sent arrow after arrow among the men using the sledges and axes. Many of them had steel caps with projecting rims which sheltered the ...
— At Agincourt • G. A. Henty

... rather a strange shift from a marked cordiality, and spoke of the circumstance to my aunt, who was highly amused. 'Why, my dear,' said she, 'that was Mr. Allen, of the bicycle company. ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill

... master and mistress thenceforth transact their affairs by deputy. They are sovereigns, and responsible for nothing. The garons are the cabinet, and responsible for every thing; but they, like superior personages, shift their responsibility upon any one inclined to take it up; and all is naturally discontent, disturbance, and discomfort. We wonder that the Marquis has not mentioned the German table-d'hte among his annoyances; for he dined at it. Nothing, ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. 327 - Vol. 53, January, 1843 • Various

... was the only one in the apartment, which consisted of an antechamber and a bedroom. Planchet slept in the antechamber upon a coverlet taken from the bed of d'Artagnan, and which d'Artagnan from that time made shift to do without. ...
— The Three Musketeers • Alexandre Dumas, Pere

... her, sir, widout a shift to her back, and a betther husband never breathed the breath of life than I have been to her;" and then he paused, and pulling out his handkerchief, shed bitter tears. "I would love her still, if I could, sir; but, then, the ...
— The Evil Eye; Or, The Black Spector - The Works of William Carleton, Volume One • William Carleton

... shipmen and hinder them; and withal he said to himself: What matter whether I go down to the bottom of the sea, or come back to Langton, since either way my life or my death will take away from me the fulfilment of desire? Yet soothly if there hath been a shift of wind, that is not so ill; for then shall we be driven to other lands, and so at the least our home-coming shall be delayed, and other tidings may hap amidst of our tarrying. So let all be ...
— The Wood Beyond the World • William Morris

... right, and defending the cause of the poor against the wealthy. Yet this well-meant meddling probably did far more harm than all the explosions of his evil passions during the whole of his long reign. We could make shift to live under a debauchee or a tyrant; but to be ruled by a busybody is more than ...
— Critical and Historical Essays Volume 2 • Thomas Babington Macaulay

... livin' a year in the woods jest to have 'im with me for a fortnight. I never charged 'im a red cent fur nothin', and I've got some of his old tackle now that he give me. Him an' me was like brothers, and he used to talk about religion, and tell me I ought to shift over, but I never could see 'zactly what I ought to shift over from, or shift over to; but I let 'im talk, 'cause he liked to. He used to go out behind the trees nights, and I hearn him sayin' somethin'—somethin' very low, as I am talkin' to ye now. Well, he was prayin'; that's ...
— Sevenoaks • J. G. Holland

... all well filled—but what is this shift made for, at the last moment, when we thought we were off? Another car to be attached, carrying to the Pacific coast Rarus and Sweetzer, the fastest trotter and pacer, respectively, in the world. How we advance! Shades of Flora Temple and "2.40 on the plank road!" ...
— Round the World • Andrew Carnegie

... knives were already reflecting the flames, and fingers were nervously twitching about the locks of their guns. And all the time Thunder-maker was dancing about in a frenzy of passion. He was not brave enough to strike a blow, but he hoped to shift the responsibility upon the shoulders ...
— The Fiery Totem - A Tale of Adventure in the Canadian North-West • Argyll Saxby

... chronometer. It was two-thirty in the morning, Greenwich time. Jeffers held the bridge from midnight till noon, while Black Bart had the noon to midnight shift. ...
— Unwise Child • Gordon Randall Garrett

... Department (and even by an occasional general or surgeon at the front) for the management of the army would have been comic if they had not possessed such tragic possibilities. Thus, at one period it was proposed that we should shift camp every two or three days. Now, our transportation, as I have pointed out before, was utterly inadequate. In theory, under the regulations of the War Department, each regiment should have had at least twenty-five wagons. As a matter of fact our regiment ...
— Rough Riders • Theodore Roosevelt

... so," said Van der Kemp in a dubious tone; "but the sounds, though faint, seem to me a good deal nearer. I can't help thinking that the craters which have so recently opened up in Krakatoa are still active, and that it may be necessary for me to shift my quarters, for my cave is little more, I suspect, than the ...
— Blown to Bits - or, The Lonely Man of Rakata • Robert Michael Ballantyne

... obvious lack of interest. Aunt Caroline need have no fear. He was a plain young man with pale, vague eyes, and he did not know whether to offer one of his nervous hands at the end of over-long arms, or to make shift with an awkward bow. She settled the matter for him, feeling very much a ...
— THE MISSES MALLETT • E. H. YOUNG

... believed not, and being eager to shift the responsibility of speech to other shoulders, suggested that perhaps the master had better inquire further from ...
— Tales and Fantasies • Robert Louis Stevenson

... now feel myself to sink into a gulph, as an house whose foundation is destroyed; I did liken myself in this condition, unto the case of some child that was fallen into a mill- pit, who though it could make some shift to scramble and sprawl in the water, yet because it could find neither hold for hand nor foot, therefore at last it must die in that condition. So soon as this fresh assault had fastened on my soul, that scripture came into my heart, This for many days. ...
— Grace Abounding to the Chief of Sinners • John Bunyan

... making observations to determine if possible the parallax of some of the fixed stars. Parallax means the apparent relative shift of bodies due to a change in the observer's position. It is parallax which we observe when travelling by rail and looking out of window at the distant landscape. Things at different distances are left behind at different apparent rates, and accordingly they seem ...
— Pioneers of Science • Oliver Lodge

... and the result in the case of a chorus like "Lift up your Heads" was ridiculous. Bach, however, does not arrange old work merely to please a court where it was already admired. He never leaves it in a state of mere make-shift, though he cannot always attain his evident aim of a new originality. His methods of orchestration and the profoundly significant identity of certain forms of chorus with certain concerto forms may better be described under their proper headings (see articles INSTRUMENTATION and CONCERTO). ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 3, Part 1, Slice 1 - "Austria, Lower" to "Bacon" • Various

... caulking, bolting, trinnelling, &c. This alone only called for one pump to be set going every two hours, but the heavy buffeting made her strain and leak so badly that it ultimately necessitated the continuous use of both pumps. The sea was running cross and heavy, which caused the cargo to shift, and the water to come on the ceiling, that is, the inner planking of the hull. A portion of the crew that could be spared from the pumps was ordered to take some forecastle bulkhead planks down, and make their way into the hold for the ...
— Windjammers and Sea Tramps • Walter Runciman

... from Mullins's bedside at the hospital and breathing hard. Dour indeed was the look he gave the groaning agent, now gulping at a gourd held to his pale lips by one of the men. The policy of Daly's predecessor had been to feather his own nest and let the Indian shift for himself, and this had led to his final overthrow. Daly, however, had come direct from the care of a tribe of the Pueblo persuasion, peace-loving and tillers of the soil, meek as the Pimas and Maricopas, natives who fawned when ...
— An Apache Princess - A Tale of the Indian Frontier • Charles King

... payments, into a perpetual embarrassment. Where it still received nothing but the customary shilling, it had to pay out three for material and wages, whose price had risen and was rising. In this embarrassment, in spite of every subterfuge and shift, the Crown was in perpetual, urgent, and increasing need. Rigid and novel taxes were imposed, loans were raised and not repaid, but something far more was needed to save the situation, with prices still rising as the years advanced. Ready ...
— The Historic Thames • Hilaire Belloc

... build a large raft of oars and timber; also to make ready the boat which the galley carried. Before all was done she struck beak first, and was lifted on to a great flat rock, where she wallowed, with the water seething round her. Then, knowing that their hour was come, the crew made shift to launch the boat and raft on the lee side, and began to clamber into them. Now Nehushta came out of the cabin and prayed the captain to save them also, whereon he answered her with an oath that this bad luck was because of them, and that if either she or her mistress tried ...
— Pearl-Maiden • H. Rider Haggard

... introduce a higher shaft; or it may be better to place a shaft of alabaster, if otherwise too short for our purpose, on a pedestal, than to use a larger shaft of coarser material; but the pedestal is in each case a make-shift, not an additional perfection. It may, in the like manner, be sometimes convenient for men to walk on stilts, but not to keep their stilts on as ornamental parts of dress. The bases of the Nelson Column, the Monument, and the column of the Place Vendome, are to the shafts, exactly what ...
— The Stones of Venice, Volume I (of 3) • John Ruskin

... indifferent to his weal or woe, to his wants or his warfare. His father's brow got blacker and blacker from day to day, as the old man looked at his hopeless son. And as for Madeline—poor Madeline, whom of all of them he liked the best—she had enough to do to shift for herself. No; come what might, he must cling to his sister and obey her behests, let them be ever so stern—or at the very least seem to obey them. Could not some happy deceit bring him through in this matter, ...
— Barchester Towers • Anthony Trollope

... two pound of beef, and pour this gravy over the venison; take three quarters of a pound of beef suet, well picked from the skins, wet a coarse cloth, lay your suet on it, and cover it over, and beat it with a rolling-pin, till it is as fine as butter; as your cloth dries, wet it, and shift your suet, and put it over the top of the venison; make a paste of flour and water, and cover the pan, and send it to the oven to bake; it is best baked with a batch of bread; when it comes from the ...
— The Cook and Housekeeper's Complete and Universal Dictionary; Including a System of Modern Cookery, in all Its Various Branches, • Mary Eaton

... not want to vote. Suppose they do not, gentlemen; that is no excuse for you, for it is a matter out of their jurisdiction—a thing which you control, and as they have no power, they have no responsibility, and you can not shift it thus from your shoulders. But they do want it; the best, most intelligent, thoughtful women—those of whom we are proud—do want it, and it is only those who are either ignorant or selfish who say, "I have all the ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume II • Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and Matilda Joslyn Gage

... walk round the garden, as with a design to listen if he could hear anybody, and to choose the most convenient place to enter: the palisades were very high and double, in order to prevent people from coming in, so that it was very difficult for the Duke to get over, however he made a shift to do it. He was no sooner in the garden but he discovered where Madam de Cleves was; he saw a great light in the bower, all the windows of it were open; upon this, slipping along by the side of the palisades, he came up close to it, and one may easily judge what were the emotions of his ...
— The Princess of Cleves • Madame de La Fayette

... places, the Popes have never found any difficulty, when the proper moment came, of following out a new and daring line of policy (as their astonished foes have called it), of leaving the old world to shift for itself and to disappear from the scene in its due season, and of fastening on and establishing ...
— The Education of Catholic Girls • Janet Erskine Stuart

... Nine-and-ninety flew ope at our touch, should the hundredth appal? In the least things have faith, yet distrust in the greatest of all? Do I find love so full in my nature, God's ultimate gift, That I doubt his own love can compete with it? Here the parts shift? Here, the creature surpass the creator,—the end, what began? Would I fain in my impotent yearning do all for this man, {270} And dare doubt he alone shall not help him, who yet alone can? Would it ever have entered my ...
— Introduction to Robert Browning • Hiram Corson

... have taken place in Auckland Creek and the Calliope River, and it has been found necessary to shift the leading lights to enable vessels to enter the creek in safety. Considerable expense has been incurred through the renewals of buoys and beacons occasioned by the floods in February last, almost every buoy being displaced. All the marks are now, however, in position again. The light on Gatcombe ...
— Report on the Department of Ports and Harbours for the Year 1890-1891 • Department of Ports and Harbours

... in his opinion will tend to put men into a position where their souls will be less their own. He believes that the man who has been costered by the Government into a mediocre state of life will be less of a man than one who has been left unbothered by officials, and has had to shift for himself. ...
— G. K. Chesterton, A Critical Study • Julius West

... filling in its old water bed and making New York and Brooklyn one. They talked of this scheme in a hard-headed Yankee way that made me forget for the moment its boldness, until some cool remark opened my eyes to the fact that this change would shift vast populations, plant millions of people this ...
— The Harbor • Ernest Poole

... Law, with the small force and the artillery which he could muster, bravely fought the English themselves, and for some time he made a shift to withstand their superiority. Their auxiliaries consisted of large bodies of natives, commanded by Ramnarain and Raj Balav, but the engagement was decided by the English, who fell with so much effect upon the enemy that their onset could not be ...
— Three Frenchmen in Bengal - The Commercial Ruin of the French Settlements in 1757 • S.C. Hill

... came out of the darkness. "Hurry up and get afloat, or we'll cut the rope and leave you to shift for yourselves." ...
— The Campaign of the Jungle - or, Under Lawton through Luzon • Edward Stratemeyer

... made shift to do without Folker," said the king's wife. "Hagen I esteem; he is a good knight. I am right glad that wee shall see ...
— The Fall of the Niebelungs • Unknown

... "Old Welborne is charging you too high interest. You ought to shift the mortgage to somebody more human—somebody with at least a thimbleful of soul. That man is the hardest taskmaster on earth. He'd skin a flea ...
— Dixie Hart • Will N. Harben

... affair, patched up with wicker-work and bits of board. It was piled up with baskets of vegetables, eggs, and chickens, and on a broken bench in the middle sat the driver, a woman. You could not help laughing, when you looked at the whole turn-out, it had such a make-shift look altogether. The reins were twisted rope, the wheels uneven. It went jolting along in such a careless, jolly way, as if it would not care in the least, should it go to pieces any minute just there in the road. The donkey that drew it was bony and blind of one eye; but he winked the other ...
— Margret Howth, A Story of To-day • Rebecca Harding Davis

... shift the burden of war from the shoulders of the infantryman. "Despite the enormous development of mechanical invention in every phase of warfare, the place which the infantryman has always held as the main substance and foundation of an ...
— Lectures on Land Warfare; A tactical Manual for the Use of Infantry Officers • Anonymous

... in. The first shift consisted of the cove we had met and nine others almost exactly like him in every respect. They all looked deuced keen and businesslike, as if from youth up they had been working in the office and catching the boss's eye and what-not. They shook ...
— My Man Jeeves • P. G. Wodehouse

... armed retinue. Its outward condition corresponded to this inward disorganization, and seemed a keen satire on the aristocratic government. Nothing was done for the regulation of the stream of the Tiber; excepting that they caused the only bridge, with which they still made shift,(47) to be constructed of stone at least as far as the Tiber-island. As little was anything done toward the levelling of the city of the Seven Hills, except where perhaps the accumulation of rubbish had effected some improvement. The ...
— The History of Rome (Volumes 1-5) • Theodor Mommsen

... as bad. The girl was a waitress or something like that in a restaurant. She's very common; her father died in prison. You can imagine the blow to old Jeffries. He turned the boy adrift and left him to shift for himself." ...
— The Third Degree - A Narrative of Metropolitan Life • Charles Klein and Arthur Hornblow

... wind had changed right round and was blowing now from the mountains. Here in the shelter of the cliffs they scarcely felt it but the shift had raised an appalling cross sea. Right away to the islands there was nothing but tumbling foam, waves standing up and fighting waves in a battle that spread ...
— The Beach of Dreams • H. De Vere Stacpoole

... look which leaped into the eyes of the stranger her own began to waver, to shift from one to the other, ...
— The Maid of the Whispering Hills • Vingie E. Roe

... horseman will make shift with any bit. Sir Tatton Sykes and Sir Charles Knightley, in their prime, could hold any horse with a plain snaffle; but a lady, or a weak-wristed horseman, should be provided with a bit that can stop the horse on an emergency; and ...
— A New Illustrated Edition of J. S. Rarey's Art of Taming Horses • J. S. Rarey

... being his "first and only rails," they certainly were the most famous ones he or anybody else ever split. This was the last work he did for his father, for in the summer of that year (1830) he exercised the right of majority and started out to shift for himself. When he left his home to start life for himself, he went empty-handed. He was already some months over twenty-one years of age, but he had nothing in the world, not even a suit of respectable clothes; and one of the first pieces of work he did was "to split four hundred ...
— McClure's Magazine December, 1895 • Edited by Ida M. Tarbell

... "We'll shift about here a bit," Driggs proposed, nodding to the engineer to stand by ready to stop or start the engine ...
— The High School Boys' Canoe Club • H. Irving Hancock

... however, frequently intimated to them both that Cowperwood was merely building up the Chicago Trust Company at the expense of the Lake City National, in order to make the former strong enough to do without any aid, at which time Addison would resign and the Lake City would be allowed to shift for itself. Hand had never acted on this suggestion ...
— The Titan • Theodore Dreiser

... forced to flee, made shift, and got ouer into Gallia, where after he had sued to this prince, at length he [Sidenote: Seguinus or Seginus duke of the Allobrogs, now the Delphinat of Sauoy.] abode, and was well receiued of one Seguinus or Seginus duke of the people called then ...
— Chronicles (1 of 6): The Historie of England (3 of 8) • Raphael Holinshed

... taught to come at his call, would doubtless suffer the first passing stranger to mount him and ride him away, despite any call from his lifelong master. He knew that his presence, to the cattle and sheep, meant only food or a shift of quarters; and that an outsider could drive or tend them as readily as could he on whose farm they had been born. Their possible affection for him was a hazy thing, based solely on what he fed them and on their occasional mild interest ...
— His Dog • Albert Payson Terhune

... one of which is a stick about eight or nine inches long, while the other piece is flat. The stick they shape into an obtuse point at one end, and pressing it upon the flat wood, turn it nimbly by holding it between both their hands. In doing this, they often shift their hands up, and then move them down, with a view of increasing the pressure as much as possible. By this process they obtain fire in less than two minutes, and from the smallest spark they carry it to any height or extent with great speed ...
— Narrative of the Voyages Round The World, • A. Kippis

... arm about the sorrowing priest. Don Jorge's muscles knotted, and a muttered imprecation rose from his tight lips. Strangely had the shift and coil of the human mind thrown together these three men, so different in character, yet standing now in united protest against the misery which men heap upon their fellow-men in the name of Christ. Jose, the apostate agent of Holy Church, his hands bound, and his heart bursting with ...
— Carmen Ariza • Charles Francis Stocking

... shipwreck. Marlborough, however, with that patriotic spirit which ever distinguished him, and not less than his splendid abilities formed so honourable a feature in his character, refused to leave the seat of war, and left his political friends to shift for themselves as they best could. Having obtained a promise from Eugene that he would join him before the month expired he joined the army at Ghent on the 9th May 1708, and on the same day reviewed the British ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 364, February 1846 • Various

... of escape was possible. If the wind were to shift to the northward and hold there long enough it would probably drive the ice back into the bay and then it would quickly freeze and they could reach the mainland. This their only hope, at this season of the year, for March was nearly spent, ...
— Ungava Bob - A Winter's Tale • Dillon Wallace

... this book; or that even if he had read it, he should have taken one hint from it. Here the incidents are, 1st that the wilful Pilgrim stops in a village crowd to see some juggler's tricks at a fair, and certain vermin in consequence shift their quarters from some of the rabble close to her, to her person. 2nd. That by following a cow's track instead of keeping the high road, she falls into a ditch. And 3rd. That going up a hill at the end of their journey, from whence Jerusalem ...
— Reminiscences of Samuel Taylor Coleridge and Robert Southey • Joseph Cottle

... to produce at least 1-1/2 tons per hour of ground shell products will cost upwards of $60,000. A well-engineered plant of such size will require three to five men per shift. Among other factors, the working capacity of a grinding plant depends upon the quantity of shells available and the ability of the organization to merchandize its products. The plant should be located in an area in which at least 5,000 tons of nut shells ...
— Northern Nut Growers Association Report of the Proceedings at the 43rd Annual Meeting - Rockport, Indiana, August 25, 26 and 27, 1952 • Various

... a sharp attack of gout. On recovering, he determined to start off once more on his travels, making as a plea his desire to purchase a stud of horses in England, his equestrian propensities having returned with violence. He accordingly left his tragedies, both published and unpublished, to shift for themselves, and proceeded to England, where, in a few weeks, he bought no less than fourteen horses. That being the exact number of the tragedies he had written, he used to amuse himself by saying, "For each tragedy you have got a horse," in reference to the punishment inflicted on ...
— The International Monthly, Volume 3, No. 2, May, 1851 • Various

... qualities of the vessel in chase. How much longer his mast or his mainyard would stand he did not know, but as he was fast gaining he determined to make hay while the sun shone, and get far enough ahead, if possible, before the breeze grew fresh, to enable him to shift his sails and fish his spars without being again brought within the reach of visitors as rude as those who had so lately come hurtling into his thin hamper. The proper precautions were not neglected in the mean time. Men were sent aloft to do what they could, under ...
— The Wing-and-Wing - Le Feu-Follet • J. Fenimore Cooper

... old controversies. In Philadelphia two starveling congregations representing the two competing sects occupied the same rude meeting-place each by itself on alternate Sundays. The Lutherans made shift without a pastor, for the only Lutheran minister in Pennsylvania lived at Lancaster, sixty ...
— A History of American Christianity • Leonard Woolsey Bacon

... seriously inconvenienced, for they could shift to their other house, the Blackfriars, in the city. The owners of the building, however, suffered a not inconsiderable pecuniary loss. For a time they hesitated about rebuilding, one cause of their hesitation being the short term that their lease of the ground had to run. ...
— Shakespearean Playhouses - A History of English Theatres from the Beginnings to the Restoration • Joseph Quincy Adams

... as possible he replaced the second dial cover, and resumed his place on guard. To all intents and purposes the compass was as efficient as before; but, as a matter of fact, the moving of the pointers upon the dials resulted now in no corresponding shift of the mechanism beneath—and the device was set, immovably, upon a destination ...
— Thuvia, Maid of Mars • Edgar Rice Burroughs

... The catastrophe of Antelope Springs brought matters to a climax. Half the men in the troop heard Major Warren's orders to Devers, and all knew he had slighted if not disobeyed them. This, if proved, meant ruin to the ring, and the plan to shift the blame on Davies's shoulders,—to make the investigating officer believe the troop had marched right down along the ridge within supporting distance, and that Davies had become terror-stricken and had hidden instead of instantly communicating ...
— Under Fire • Charles King

... the County Mayo; he was hunted up from the country of the brothons' (thick bed-coverings, then made in Mayo) 'without any for the night, nor any shift for bedding, but with an old yellow blanket with a thousand patches; he had a black trouser down to the ground with two hundred holes and forty pieces; he had long legs like the shank of a pipe, and a long ...
— Poets and Dreamers - Studies and translations from the Irish • Lady Augusta Gregory and Others

... ordering that all dead bodies shall be interred in woollen and no other material, is so worded as to give the idea that there might be interments without coffins. The statute forbids that any person be put in, wrapt, or wound up, or buried in any shirt, shift, sheet, or shroud, unless made of sheep's wool only; or in any coffin lined or faced with any material but sheep's wool; as if the person might be buried either in a garment, or in a coffin, so long as the former was made of, or ...
— Notes & Queries, No. 45, Saturday, September 7, 1850 • Various

... Who set my bed elsewhere? A hard task that would be for one, however skilled,—unless a god should come and by his will set it with ease upon some other spot; but among men no living being, even in his prime, could lightly shift it; for a great token is inwrought into its curious frame. I built it; no one else. There grew a thick-leaved olive shrub inside the yard, full-grown and vigorous, in girth much like a pillar. Round this I formed my chamber, and I worked ...
— The Children's Hour, Volume 3 (of 10) • Various

... oblong is made of bamboo, with a good roof that kept out a heavy shower last night. There is a fresh stream of water within fifteen yards, where I bathed at 9 P.M. yesterday; and as I managed to get rid of strangers by 8.30, it was not so difficult to manage a shift into a clean and dry sleeping shirt, and then, lying down on Aunt William's cork-bed (my old travelling companion), I slept ...
— Life of John Coleridge Patteson • Charlotte M. Yonge

... seems) endeavored to exonerate Trajan from the responsibility of having contrived the deed, and to throw the blame of it on Exedares, the ex-king of Armenia and brother of Parthamasiris. But Trajan had not sunk so low as to shift his fault on another. He declared openly that the act was his own, and that Exedares had had ...
— The Seven Great Monarchies Of The Ancient Eastern World, Vol 6. (of 7): Parthia • George Rawlinson

... in the laws of history, to the sudden and chance turn of affairs; to the quick shift of the wheels of fortune; to the incidents, the accidents, the mis-judgments of rulers and the slips of the diplomats? Are wars after all a product of the logic of life, or are they mere fortuitous syntheses of events ...
— The Psychology of Nations - A Contribution to the Philosophy of History • G.E. Partridge

... home the Rio Grande in a seven-days' gale, Seven days and seven nights, the same as JONAH'S whale, Standard compass gone to bits, steering all adrift, Courses split and mainmast sprung, cargo on the shift ... Not a chart in all the ship left to steer her by, Not a glimpse of star or sun in the bloomin' sky ... Two men at the jury wheel, kickin' like a mule, Bringin' home the Rio Grande up ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 156, Jan. 15, 1919 • Various

... native village in Scotland is to get it; and not Kennet any more in this world, but Green ever henceforth is to be our Book Carrier. There is a history. Green, it seems, addresses also to Munroe; but the thing, I suppose, will now shift for itself without watching. ...
— The Correspondence of Thomas Carlyle and Ralph Waldo Emerson, - 1834-1872, Vol. I • Thomas Carlyle and Ralph Waldo Emerson

... pioneer knight-errant inspires Henderson's words: "In this situation, some few, of genuine courage and undaunted resolution, served to inspire the rest; by the help of whose example, assisted by a little pride and some ostentation, we made a shift to march on with all the appearance of gallantry, and, cavalier like, treated every insinuation of danger with the ...
— The Conquest of the Old Southwest • Archibald Henderson

... no oder suits?" queried the woodsman. "Den go 'long, boys, and rig yerselves up in yer blankets. Ye can pertend to be Injuns fer to-night. Like enough dis ain't de worst shift ye'll have to make 'fore ye get out ...
— Camp and Trail - A Story of the Maine Woods • Isabel Hornibrook

... fifty (half at least) fine mats, by Mataafa's daughter, Kalala. Here I reposed alone; and on the other side of the tapa, Majesty and his household. Armed guards and a drummer patrolled about the house all night; they had no shift, poor devils; but stood to arms from sun-down ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 25 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... 4th the wind blew strong from the south; but although the air was cooled, no rain fell, nor indeed was there any likelihood of rain with the wind in that quarter. Still as this was the first decided shift from the points to which it had kept so steadily, we augured good from it. On the 7th a very bright meteor was seen to burst in the south-east quarter of the heavens; crossing the sky with a long train of light, and in exploding ...
— Expedition into Central Australia • Charles Sturt

... flight of stairs, performing each elementary movement by a distinct volitional impulse. Pause on the first step to secure perfect balance on one foot; raise the other foot, bending the leg at the knee, then place this foot carefully on the next higher step. Now gradually shift the weight of the body from the lower to the higher foot; as the body inclines forward, exert the muscles of the back and sides to preserve your balance; then contract the leg muscles so as to raise the body to the higher step, with the weight supported on that foot. ...
— The Psychology of Singing - A Rational Method of Voice Culture Based on a Scientific Analysis of All Systems, Ancient and Modern • David C. Taylor

... treating Elizabeth fair. Still, I married her according to Saints' law, and I consider myself bound by my pledge to provide for her. She's a good girl. She has no one to look to but me. And I'm not going to turn her off to shift for herself if the whole United States ...
— The King Of Beaver, and Beaver Lights - From "Mackinac And Lake Stories", 1899 • Mary Hartwell Catherwood

... surface, supposed himself here by virtue of his growing importance in the business world, and was fain to acknowledge the attention by the recital of a number of appropriate "stories." During the slight delay thus occasioned, the ladies made shift, as usual, to entertain one another. Preciosa, relieved temporarily of the pressing attentions of Morrell, sat with Medora Joyce on the drawing-room sofa, proud and flattered to have the undivided regards of the most charming ...
— Under the Skylights • Henry Blake Fuller

... most superstitious man in the crew, made, one day, the strange observation that the dog, when on the poop, would always walk on the windward side; and afterwards, when the brig was at sea and under sail, this singular animal would shift his position to the other side after every tack, so as to be windward, as the captain of the ...
— The Voyages and Adventures of Captain Hatteras • Jules Verne

... day, the rain promising still to detain us prisoners, Moidel, fearing that her important services must be missed at the Hof, bravely defied wet and mud and tramped resolutely home. In the afternoon, utterly tired out, we too determined to shift our quarters to Edelsheim, and, engaging a large jolting vehicle, were borne through mire, rain and mist from ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. XII. No. 30. September, 1873 • Various

... the steel and cement town which composed the factory of the Pullmore Tractor Company of Zenith was running on night shift to fill an order of tractors for the Polish army. It hummed like a million bees, glared through its wide windows like a volcano. Along the high wire fences, searchlights played on cinder-lined yards, switch-tracks, ...
— Babbitt • Sinclair Lewis

... displeasure did not remove immediately from Joel's brow, his mood underwent an instant change. His sister had not been guilty of leaving him to shift for himself. The opportune appearance of Susan Fitzgerald indicated a proper regard for the masculine helplessness, which is also, by some obscure process of reasoning, the badge of masculine superiority. Moreover Susan's presence furnished the opportunity of setting forth in detail ...
— Other People's Business - The Romantic Career of the Practical Miss Dale • Harriet L. Smith

... see first whether he breathes yet," he mumbled to himself, stepping out from behind his tree. This was immediately perceived by the resourceful General D'Hubert. He concluded it to be another shift. When he lost the boots out of the field of the mirror, he became uneasy. General Feraud had only stepped a little out of the line, but his adversary could not possibly have supposed him walking up with perfect unconcern. General D'Hubert, beginning ...
— The Point Of Honor - A Military Tale • Joseph Conrad

... I aided him. "You can see it from all over the harbor. And you remember that little island on the right-hand side coming into the harbor?" I guess there must have been one there (I was prepared to shift it over to the left-hand side), for he nodded. "Gone," I said. "Seven fathoms ...
— The Road • Jack London

... did not try to keep Brian Luttrell in England. I knew that I ought to make a row about it. I knew that I was bound in honour to write to Colquhoun, to you, to Mrs. Luttrell, to any of the people concerned. And I didn't do it. I didn't precisely mean not to do it, but I wanted to shift the responsibility. I thought it was other people's business to keep him in England: not mine. As a matter of fact, I suppose it was ...
— Under False Pretences - A Novel • Adeline Sergeant

... there, and the soldiers had pillaged the people of all they had, who could not yet recover their former happy and plentiful condition; which was not helpful to Whitelocke and his people, who must take things as they were, and make the best shift they could. His officers had provided meat sufficient for them; he caused fresh straw enough to be laid all over the room, which was the more tolerable in this hot season. He himself lay in one of his coaches, his sons and some of his servants ...
— A Journal of the Swedish Embassy in the Years 1653 and 1654, Vol II. • Bulstrode Whitelocke

... however, would not throw its beams to the point of interest, and he decided to return to the Sea Lion, rest for the remainder of the night, and shift ...
— Boy Scouts in a Submarine • G. Harvey Ralphson

... in his teeth at the time, and once on the way (he's told me this often) a great strip of oarweed came flying through the darkness and fetched him a slap on the cheek like a cold hand. But he made shift pretty well till he got to Lowland, and then had to drop upon hands and knees and crawl, digging his fingers every now and then into the shingle to hold on, for he declared to me that the stones, some of them as big as a man's head, kept rolling and driving past till it seemed ...
— The Roll-Call Of The Reef • A. T. Quiller-Couch (AKA "Q.")

... lewd woman, or one that plays with her tail; also an impotent man, or an eunuch. Tag, rag, and bobtail; a mob of all sorts of low people. To shift one's bob; to move off, or go away. To bear a bob; to join in chorus with any singers. Also a term used by the sellers of game, for ...
— 1811 Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue • Captain Grose et al.

... a lord in his household Hath not every vessel all of gold; Some are of tree, and do their lord service. God calleth folk to him in sundry wise, And each one hath of God a proper gift, Some this, some that, as liketh him to shift.* *appoint, distribute Virginity is great perfection, And continence eke with devotion: But Christ, that of perfection is the well,* *fountain Bade not every wight he should go sell All that he had, and give it to the poor, And in such wise ...
— The Canterbury Tales and Other Poems • Geoffrey Chaucer

... march of events tended to shift the blame of ravaged chicken-coops from the supposed culprit who had already paid full forfeit; the young chicks were still carried off, and it seemed highly probable that the cat had only haunted the chicken-run to prey on the rats which harboured there. Through the ...
— The Toys of Peace • Saki

... mind to locomotion in this new body in which he found himself. For a time he was unable to shift himself from his attachment to his earthly carcass. For a time this new strange cloud body of his simply swayed, contracted, expanded, coiled, and writhed with his efforts to free himself, and then quite suddenly the link that bound him snapped. For a moment everything ...
— Twelve Stories and a Dream • H. G. Wells

... each case subsuming the judgments represented by the four end modes under one average. In all, sixty judgments were made by E on each half the line. Letter E represents the first thirty-six; E squared the full number. A comparison of the two shows how easily averages shift; how suddenly judgments may concentrate in one region after having been for months fairly uniformly distributed. The introduction of one more subject might have varied the total averages by several points. Table I. shows the various averages ...
— Harvard Psychological Studies, Volume 1 • Various

... ten-shilling bit out of the unwilling store-keeper. This was changed by the lady who sold us the fowl, an Englishwoman. On our return there was harness-cleaning, interrupted by a sudden order to move, but only to shift camp about a mile. This is always annoying, because at halts you always collect things such as fuel and meal and pots, which are impossible to carry with you. Of course this is no matter, if regular marching and fighting are on hand, but just for shifting ...
— In the Ranks of the C.I.V. • Erskine Childers

... thunder upon the beach for many hours, while Emerson looked on with hopeless, sullen eyes. When at last they did set out—a week, to a day, from their arrival at Katmai—it was to find such a heavy sea running outside the capes that they had hard shift to make it back to the village, drenched, dispirited, and well-nigh dead from the cold and fatigue. Although Fraser had fully recovered from his collapse, he nevertheless complained upon every occasion, and whined loudly at every ache. He voiced his tortures eloquently, ...
— The Silver Horde • Rex Beach

... he's a wind bag," decided Jo. "Well, we'll befriend him to the grade, anyway, and I guess that then he'll be obliged to shift for himself. If freight were moving freely, and every day, I might manage to use him—but that won't be the case at first. So we'll have to bid him good-by at the camps. I have an idea he can take ...
— The She Boss - A Western Story • Arthur Preston Hankins

... but it dropped from the blue zenith to the yellow horizon through every imaginable shade of emerald and topaz until all other shades lost themselves in one vivid blaze of burnt orange. It had been a day of intense heat. Already, however, the falling twilight and the inevitable eastward shift of the wind had brought the first hint ...
— On the Firing Line • Anna Chapin Ray and Hamilton Brock Fuller

... made a shift to raise himself on his feet, and was at once lugged along the streets by the jacket-collar, at a rapid pace. The gentleman walked on with them by the officer's side; and as many of the crowd as could achieve the feat, got a little ahead, and stared back at Oliver from time to time. ...
— Oliver Twist • Charles Dickens

... problems include: high interest rates; increased foreign competition; the weak financial condition of business in general resulting in receiverships or closures and downsizings of companies; the shift in investment portfolios to non-productive, short-term high yield instruments; a pressured, sometimes sliding, exchange rate; a widening merchandise trade deficit; and a growing internal debt for ...
— The 2001 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency.

... of men's gifts of intellect or sentiment being dependent on a balance in their use so delicate that men hardly maintain it always. Something also must be conceded to influences merely physical, to the complexion of the heavens, the skyey influences, shifting as the stars shift; as something also to the mere caprice of men exercised over each other in the dispensations of social or political order, to the chance which makes the life or death of Claudio dependent on ...
— Appreciations, with an Essay on Style • Walter Horatio Pater

... the disappearance of his wardrobe and his watch; but ebbs under a new temptation. He buys some odd volumes of Dryden for three-and-sixpence, and on coming home tears his only coat, which he manages to patch tolerably with a borrowed needle and thread, pretending, with a pathetic shift, that they are required to stitch together manuscripts instead of broadcloth. And so for a year the wolf creeps nearer the door, whilst Crabbe gallantly keeps up appearances and spirits, and yet he ...
— Hours in a Library - New Edition, with Additions. Vol. II (of 3) • Leslie Stephen

... not be got out before the Dutch come and block us up, we shall have a happy pretext to get out our ships under pretence of attending the Embassadors and Commissioners, which is a very good, but yet a poor shift. ...
— Diary of Samuel Pepys, Complete • Samuel Pepys

... pages reference was made to certain acts of benevolence done to Cardan by the family of Archinto. It is not impossible that the promises and persuasions of his young patron Filippo may have had some weight in inducing Jerome to shift his home once more. Whatever befell he could hardly make his case worse; but whether Filippo had promised help or not, he showed himself now a true and valuable friend. There was in Milan a public lectureship in geometry and astronomy supported by a small ...
— Jerome Cardan - A Biographical Study • William George Waters

... Other people, too, besides Captain Lamberton, complained that she was not only badly built, but badly loaded, with the light goods of the cargo below and the heavy above, and some old seamen predicted that the grain would shift in rough weather and make trouble. These were mostly rumors, however, and few paid attention to them at the time; but long afterward, when people talked over the strange fate of the "Great Shippe," Captain Lamberton's words, "This ...
— Once Upon A Time In Connecticut • Caroline Clifford Newton

... tranquillity of soul would be bought at the price, not only of his implicit faith in her, but of his happiness. Therefore, whatever pangs of remorse it was destined for her to suffer, he must never know; she being the offender, it was not meet that she should shift the burden of pain from her shoulders to his. Her sufferings were her punishment ...
— Sparrows - The Story of an Unprotected Girl • Horace W. C. Newte

... wanted it at all. At any rate, that's what I always said. I shall have to ask you to sit on this side," he added, loosening the sheet and preparing to shift the sail. "The wind has backed round a little more to the south, and it's ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells

... much; it is large and well-built, and abounds with provisions of all kinds. While we lay here a circumstance happened which I thought extremely singular:—One day a malefactor was to be executed on a gallows; but with a condition that if any woman, having nothing on but her shift, married the man under the gallows, his life was to be saved. This extraordinary privilege was claimed; a woman presented herself; and the marriage ceremony was performed. Our ship having got laden we returned to London ...
— The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, Or Gustavus Vassa, The African - Written By Himself • Olaudah Equiano

... putting in to shore there?" said Duncan. "It's only two miles to Starhaven, and I daresay we could make shift to take them in for that distance. If Jim says anything ...
— Eric, or Little by Little • Frederic W. Farrar

... thro' the kail, Their stocks[32] maun a' be sought ance; They steek their een, an' graip an' wale, For muckle anes an' straught anes. Poor hav'rel Will fell aff the drift, An' wander'd through the bow-kail, An' pou't, for want o' better shift, A runt was like a sow-tail, ...
— The Complete Works of Robert Burns: Containing his Poems, Songs, and Correspondence. • Robert Burns and Allan Cunningham

... Witt. But the simplicity of Sebastian van Storck was something different from that, and certainly nothing democratic. His mother thought him like one disembarrassing himself carefully, and little by little, of all impediments, habituating himself gradually to make shift with as little as possible, in ...
— Imaginary Portraits • Walter Pater

... empty and drowsy. The chopping of cutlets for dinner can be heard from the kitchen. Liubka, one of the girls, barefooted, in her shift, with bare arms, not good-looking, freckled, but strong and fresh of body, has come out into the inner court. Yesterday she had had but six guests on time, but no one had remained for the night with her, and ...
— Yama (The Pit) • Alexandra Kuprin

... needlework, taken up by any clever fingers that happened to be at liberty. It stretched across the front room picturesquely enough, Mrs. Meyrick bending over it on one corner, Mab in the middle, and Amy at the other end. Mirah, whose performances in point of sewing were on the make-shift level of the tailor-bird's, her education in that branch having been much neglected, was acting as reader to the party, seated on a camp-stool; in which position she also served Kate as model for a title-page vignette, symbolizing a fair public absorbed in the successive ...
— Daniel Deronda • George Eliot

... I, nor even both together, but we mustn't set a bad example to other atoms. As long as there's a preponderance of right in the world, things are clear, but, shift the ...
— Master of the Vineyard • Myrtle Reed

... in his left shoulder was more serious. The bullet had gone entirely through, for which he was glad, but the hurt was still bleeding. He made shift to bandage it with strips torn from his underclothing, and, after a long rest, he undertook to walk back to the camp. He was not sure of the way, and after two or three hundred yards he grew dizzy and sat down again. Then he shouted ...
— The Tree of Appomattox • Joseph A. Altsheler



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