"Couple" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... kid me that. Why the bloomin' thing's in Yourope, an' it'll be all over in a couple ...
— The Tale of a Trooper • Clutha N. Mackenzie
... and the two heads were together over a list they were making and they were chattering like a couple of magpies. ...
— Patty and Azalea • Carolyn Wells
... subject. Often they wrote of each other—squibs and burlesques, which gratified the Comstock far more than mere news.—[The indifference to 'news' was noble—none the less so because it was so blissfully unconscious. Editors Mark or Dan would dismiss a murder with a couple of inches and sit down and fill up a column with a fancy sketch: "Arthur McEwen"]—It was the proper class-room for Mark Twain, an encouraging audience and free utterance: fortune could have devised nothing better for ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine
... enough to keep him some little time. If he had been a couple of years older I should say that he would probably enlist at once, as you had both made up your minds to go into the army. But although lads do enlist under the proper age, no recruiting officer or doctor would pass him as being eighteen. The first thing to do will be to advertise ...
— The Dash for Khartoum - A Tale of Nile Expedition • George Alfred Henty
... dispersed. But Harley waited, and he saw Plover and his wife meet. He saw, too, the look of surprise and then joy on the man's face, and he saw them throw their arms around each other's neck and kiss in the dark. They were only a poor, prosaic, and middle-aged couple, but he knew they were now happy and that ...
— The Candidate - A Political Romance • Joseph Alexander Altsheler
... face in endeavouring to bite him through his muzzle. The star of Ursa Major was no longer in the ascendant, and he was bartered away, with the master of the first merchant vessel we met, for a couple of game-cocks; and the bear-leader was turned back into the waist, and flogged the next day for impertinence, whilst, two days before, the vagabond was too proud to say "sir" to ...
— Rattlin the Reefer • Edward Howard
... pitiful and meek, and sot demute for a couple of minutes. I see that I had convinced him about the Equinomical Counsel; he see that it wouldn't do, and he wouldn't make no ...
— Samantha at the World's Fair • Marietta Holley
... explorers. I have a good blacksmith, Shields, and Bill Bratton is another blacksmith—either can tinker a gun if need be. Then I have John Coalter, an active, strapping chap, and the two Fields boys, whom I know to be good men; and Charlie Floyd, Nate Pryor, and a couple of others—Warner and Whitehouse. We should get the rest at the forts around St. Louis. I want to take my boy York along—a negro is always good-natured under hardship, and a laugh now and then will not hurt any ...
— The Magnificent Adventure - Being the Story of the World's Greatest Exploration and - the Romance of a Very Gallant Gentleman • Emerson Hough
... adjustments had to be made to the motor, and they took him a couple of hours to complete. It was nearly noon when he finished, and leaving the sky racer in the open space in front of the shed, he went in the house to wash up, for his face and hands were ...
— Tom Swift in the City of Gold, or, Marvelous Adventures Underground • Victor Appleton
... all simple enough. A fracas between two ladies, the gentlemen interposing, a few words of angry expostulation, then the inevitable suggestion of Belgium or of some other country where the childish and barbarous custom of settling such matters with a couple of swords had not been as yet systematically ...
— The Elusive Pimpernel • Baroness Emmuska Orczy
... far the neatest-looking fazenda we had yet seen since leaving Araguary, but on entering the house the floor was a mass of dirt. Fowls were running to and fro all over the rooms. A rough table of Portuguese origin, a couple of benches so dirty that one did not dare to sit on them, some roughly made bedsteads, miserable and filthy—but no washstands or basins, no articles of necessity were anywhere to be observed or found. The mattresses—if one can elevate them to the dignity of such a name: ...
— Across Unknown South America • Arnold Henry Savage Landor
... quite forgot to tell you, I sent out a servant some time ago to England to bring a couple of Horses. He will deliver some Packets to you; which I beg you will send, with Lord Marischal's compliments, to their respective Addresses. There is also a china cup for Mr. Macnamara, Lawyer, in the Temple or Lincoln's Inn, from the same person [lively old gentleman, age ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XXI. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle
... to do, for it was of course necessary to shut up the house, and the packing of her trunk had to be finished, and the trunk locked and corded, and a label found; and there was breakfast to cook. Mrs. Lessways would have easily passed a couple of days in preparing the house for closure. Nevertheless, time, instead of flying, lagged. At seven-thirty Hilda, in the partially dismantled parlour, and Florrie in the kitchen, were sitting down to breakfast. "In a quarter of an hour," said ...
— Hilda Lessways • Arnold Bennett
... furniture and disgrace her house, and bade the fellow carry us into the kitchen to take off our cloaks and change our boots for slip-shoes, adding that if we had any respect for ourselves, we should trim our hair and wash the grime off our faces. So we enter the kitchen, nothing loath, where a couple of pullets browning on the spit, kettles bubbling on the fire, and a pasty drawing from the oven, filled the air with delicious odours that nearly drove us mad for envy; and to think that these good things were to tempt the appetite of some one who never hungered, while ...
— A Set of Rogues • Frank Barrett
... wishing to see comradeship follow upon passion, to see rapture give way to security. If we are one day to be the mother of the child, are we not first of all the mother of love? Are we not at the same time the cradle and the tabernacle of that god? In any happy couple, is love not cast in the woman's image much more than in the man's? The man has a thousand things that attract and retain him elsewhere; his temperament is more prodigal and less considerate than ours. It is in the woman that love dwells; her sensitive nature leads her to a higher ...
— The Choice of Life • Georgette Leblanc
... daughters and servant. "Deborah, set the blue chamber in order; Rose, take the key of the oak press, Eleanor will help you to take out the holland sheets. Lucy, run down to old Margery, and bid her kill a couple of fowls for supper." ...
— The Pigeon Pie • Charlotte M. Yonge
... an old mulberry-tree near the gate, in the kitchen garden, but when I said this Polly jumped up and tried to run away. I caught her hand to detain her, and we were standing very much in the attitude of the couple in a certain sentimental print entitled "The Last Appeal," when the gate close by us opened, and my father put his head into the garden, shouting "James! James!" I dropped Polly's hand, and struck by the same idea, we both ...
— A Flat Iron for a Farthing - or Some Passages in the Life of an only Son • Juliana Horatia Ewing
... and fiercer driving snow, in spite of earnest remonstrance from innkeepers and spectators, with "toot-toot" of horn away into the white smother, spectral-like, glided the silent coach. A mile from the inn she was blocked by a huge drift. That safely won through, a couple of miles farther she plodded on, slowly and ever more slow; and finally, in a mighty wreath, stuck fast; "all the King's horses" might not have brought her through that. MacGeorge was urged to turn now, ...
— Stories of the Border Marches • John Lang and Jean Lang
... all started laughing and giving me the merry ha! ha! Well, I just got my grip packed and didn't say a thing and when the train slowed up for Midgeville, out I slid. "Give my love to old man Jones," one of the boys called after me, "and get yourself a couple of porous plasters and a pair of splints before you tackle him!"—and then they all gave me the ha! ha! again, out of the window as the ...
— Further Foolishness • Stephen Leacock
... write your name plainly so that the professor will read it, you see—Placido Penitente, three pesos. Ah, listen! In a couple of weeks comes the nameday of the professor of natural history. You know that he's a good fellow, never marks absences or asks about the lesson. Man, ...
— The Reign of Greed - Complete English Version of 'El Filibusterismo' • Jose Rizal
... the announcement with pleasure; but Hermon, who only the day before had spoken of the old couple with great affection, seemed disturbed by the arrival of the unexpected guests. To avoid them entirely appeared impossible even to him, but he declared in an embarrassed tone, and without giving any reason, that he should scarcely be able to devote the entire evening ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... the letter, I certainly did feel ashamed of my lack of faith. In writing our acknowledgment, I told how wonderfully opportune the gift had been. A couple of months or so later came a reply, telling us that the invalid mother passed away soon after my letter reached them; and that the story of how God had used her in this matter greatly strengthened her faith, blessing and helping her during the closing ...
— How I Know God Answers Prayer - The Personal Testimony of One Life-Time • Rosalind Goforth
... little hazy, in spots. But I'm not worrying. Time enough to think of that part. Roughly, my plan is this now. There'll be two letters of instructions: one to open in six months, the other to be opened in, say, a couple of years, or so. (I want to give myself plenty of time for my observations, you see.) The second letter will really give you final instructions as to the settling of my estate—my will. I'll have to make some sort of one, ...
— Oh, Money! Money! • Eleanor Hodgman Porter
... we had "a married sister and a new brother." Women hurried through noon chores to meet outside, and some in their eagerness forgot to roll down their sleeves before they began to talk. One triumphantly repeated to each newcomer the motherly advice which she gave the young couple when she "first noticed his affection for that sorrowing girl, who is too pretty to be in this new country without a protector." They also recalled how Perry McCoon's launch had brought supplies up the river for the Second Relief to take over the mountains; ...
— The Expedition of the Donner Party and its Tragic Fate • Eliza Poor Donner Houghton
... old door, supported by a couple of benches, had been placed in the chamber for a table. He hammered at the worm-eaten wood and knocked off a strip which he split in half. One of these substitutes for rapiers he gave to Trenck, retaining the other himself, and ...
— International Short Stories: French • Various
... on the lower floor were faces watching the two men that had thus met under a flag of truce. From the ridge on the right, and the undulating ground to the left, peered the rustlers, intensely interested in the actions of the couple, whose words were spoken in tones too low to reach the ears of any on either side. No actors ever had a more attentive audience ...
— Cowmen and Rustlers • Edward S. Ellis
... merriest and most energetic of the party—disappear during the breakfast, don their costumes, and return, escorted by the musicians, dogs, children, and pistol-shots. They represent a couple of beggars, husband and wife, covered with the vilest rags. The husband is the dirtier of the two: it is vice that has degraded him; the woman is unhappy simply and debased ...
— The Devil's Pool • George Sand
... "There's a couple of nails gone from the sole," I said. "I'll put 'em in if I can find any hobnails, and it'll save the sole," and I rooted in the bag and found a good long nail, and shoved it right through the sole on the sly. He'd been a bit of a sprinter in his time, and I thought it might be better ...
— While the Billy Boils • Henry Lawson
... than you think," panted the conqueror. "I've got a scheme better than yours, if there's time to put it through. Wait till I get a couple of horses." ...
— Laramie Holds the Range • Frank H. Spearman
... made to fit the open part of the trench, and so arranged in an inclined position, and connected by triggers with the two flaps, that any attempt to open the latter released the upper end of the heavy cover and allowed it to fall down in the trench. A couple of goats were tied at the far end of the pen as a bait, and were kept there constantly, food being taken to them by a convict coolie. After the trap had been set for some time, the coolie who fed the goats came running to the house one day ...
— Prisoners Their Own Warders - A Record of the Convict Prison at Singapore in the Straits - Settlements Established 1825 • J. F. A. McNair
... Marie Louise, she no longer heeded the Prussic acid of his speech. She was as used to it as to his other little mannerisms. She did not think of the old couple as fat and awkward. She did not analyze their attributes or think of their features in detail. She thought of them simply as them. But Easton was new; he brought in a subtle whiff of the hated Germany that had done ...
— The Cup of Fury - A Novel of Cities and Shipyards • Rupert Hughes
... a very humorous satire on the fairy superstition, called "The Fairies' Farewell, a proper new ballad to be sung or whistled to the tune of Meadow Brow." Perhaps I cannot better take leave of these very curious imaginary people, than to employ a couple of stanzas ...
— Wreaths of Friendship - A Gift for the Young • T. S. Arthur and F. C. Woodworth
... So the old couple sat alone before the sitting-room fire. It was not often used, this room,—scarcely ever now, except upon Sunday, or on those two grave holidays that the Newells kept,—Thanksgiving- and Fast-Day. This was Thanksgiving-Day. The snow without was falling thick and fast. It came in great ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 8, No. 50, December, 1861 • Various
... lived his bachelor life quite alone but for the occasional sight of the old negro couple that were waiting on him—Aunt Nancy, who did all his housework, and Uncle Ned, who worked in ...
— Victor's Triumph - Sequel to A Beautiful Fiend • Mrs. E. D. E. N. Southworth
... a couple of times and turned over in a dying fashion for a few revolutions and then ...
— The Boy Scouts of the Eagle Patrol • Howard Payson
... but when he proposed to dig up some more of the gold, and go to market for some more wine and some more blue velvet waistcoats, she remonstrated very strongly. Such was the change that had come over this loving couple, that they presently began to quarrel, and from words the woodman soon got to blows, and, after beating his little wife, lay down on the floor and fell fast asleep, while she sat ...
— Wonder-Box Tales • Jean Ingelow
... produced in Ladakh and larger quantities are imported across the frontier from Tibet. In the early summer one frequently meets herds of sheep being driven southwards across the Himalayan passes, each sheep carrying a couple of small saddle-bags laden with borax or salt, which is bartered in the Panjab bazars for Indian and foreign stores for the winter requirements of the snow-blocked valleys beyond ...
— The Panjab, North-West Frontier Province, and Kashmir • Sir James McCrone Douie
... morning when we left the choza and pursued our way to Corcuvion. I satisfied our host by presenting him with a couple of pesetas, and he requested as a favour, that if on our return we passed that way, and were overtaken by the night, we would again take up our abode beneath his roof. This I promised, at the same time determining to do my best to guard against the contingency; as sleeping ...
— The Bible in Spain • George Borrow
... orange or lemon juice, then the oil, then more juice. Open the mouth wide and put the oil far back. Have more juice at hand to swallow immediately after. Chilling the mouth by holding a piece of ice in it for a few minutes also helps to disguise the taste. A couple of tablespoonfuls of lemon or orange juice with a quarter of a teaspoonful of soda mixed thoroughly with the oil will make it effervesce so that it is ...
— Scouting For Girls, Official Handbook of the Girl Scouts • Girl Scouts
... stuff's off. You can bust your spine in four different places and wreck your machine, and mebby get a four- or five-line notice down in a corner next the dentist ads. It's worse, too, since the war begun. There ain't no more chance, hardly, of getting front-page publicity. Say, a couple of 'em took your picture. D' yuh ...
— The Thunder Bird • B. M. Bower
... and boxes and set them down upon the pavement, while her aunt haggled with the driver in a spirited manner; the man went off, grumbling at the meanness of a "couple o' Hirishers," but Eily, not understanding the English manner of using the aspirate, was blissfully unconscious ...
— The Empire Annual for Girls, 1911 • Various
... because the physic he took did him no good. So familiar did the Devil become that Luther, hearing him walk overhead at night, would say "Oh, is it you?" and go to sleep again. Once, when he was marrying-an aristocratic couple, the wedding ring slipped out of his fingers at a critical moment. He was frightened, but, recovering himself, he exclaimed, "Listen, Devil, it is not your business, you are wasting your time." The famous scene in which Luther threw an inkstand ...
— Flowers of Freethought - (First Series) • George W. Foote
... his lips together, puffed out something between a whistle and the blowing out of a candle, and ventured to suggest to Furlong he had better wait even a couple of hours, till he had got his allowance of claret. "Remember the adage, sir, 'In vino veritas,' and we'll tell you all our electioneering secrets ...
— Handy Andy, Volume One - A Tale of Irish Life, in Two Volumes • Samuel Lover
... the ruined distillery, which overlooks the beach on which the fishing boats are drawn up, he saw a couple of duck flying seaward. He quickened his pace, and walked on until he turned the bend of the road, at which on the right-hand side a path leads up to a gate in the old wall, which still guards the ragged domains of Clifden Castle. A few hundred yards away there ...
— The World Peril of 1910 • George Griffith
... and so they call me: I give them my counsel, and assist them with my purse. I cannot see a pretty sinner hurried to prison by the land-pirates, but nature works, and I must bail her; or want a supper, but I have a couple of crammed chickens, a cream tart, and a bottle of wine to ...
— The Works of John Dryden, Vol. 6 (of 18) - Limberham; Oedipus; Troilus and Cressida; The Spanish Friar • John Dryden
... a fair labyrinth. Between the two other towers were the tennis and fives courts. Toward the tower Criere stood the orchard full of all fruit-trees, set and ranged in a quincunx. At the end of that was the great park, abounding with all sort of game. Betwixt the third couple of towers were the butts for arquebus, crossbow, and arbalist. The stables were beyond the offices, and before them stood the falconry, managed by falconers very expert in the art; and it was yearly supplied by the Candians, Venetians, Sarmatians, ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to Prose, Vol. VII (of X)—Continental Europe I • Various
... of spirit and activity managed to keep within sight of two large horses, ridden by Mr. Thompson, and a very handsome young lady riding "cavalier fashion," who convoyed me out. Borrowed saddle- bags, and a couple of shingles for carrying ferns formed my outfit, and were carried behind my saddle. It is a magnificent ride here. The track crosses the deep, still, Wailuku River on a wooden bridge, and then after winding up a steep hill, among native houses fantastically situated, hangs ...
— The Hawaiian Archipelago • Isabella L. Bird
... the steamer. The Sylvania was anchored on the other side of the main channel, which was near the line of wharves, but not more than a quarter of a mile distant. In a few minutes I was on board. The mate was at supper; and as I had dined within a couple of hours, I did not disturb him. I went to the steward, and gave him directions in regard to the lunch and dinner for the next day. Cornwood was smoking his cigar on the forecastle. I took the precaution to tell him that I wanted ...
— Down South - or, Yacht Adventure in Florida • Oliver Optic
... was grand. Grahame Lowe played Stonewall Jackson. They had improvised a pretty bit of scenery at the back, with a few sticks, some paint, brown carpet-paper, and a couple of mosquito-bars;—a Dutch gable with a lattice window, vines trained up over it, and bushes below. It was a moving tableau, enacted to the reading of Whittier's glorious ballad. "Only an old woman in a cap and kerchief, putting her head out at a garret window,"—that was all; but the fire ...
— Junior Classics, V6 • Various
... A couple of hours after Gering had thrown his hat and cloak into the blood of the coureur du bois, and slid down the anchor-chain, Iberville knew that his quarry was flown. The watch had thought that Iberville had gone below, and ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... paused beside the gate. Marcia knew the voices and again slid behind the shrubbery that bordered all the way to the house, and not even a gleam of her light frock was visible. They trooped in, three or four girl friends of Kate's and a couple of young men. ...
— Marcia Schuyler • Grace Livingston Hill Lutz
... from St. Paul, where I spent a couple of days with Teddy Worthington. Teddy and Bud Hathaway of Chicago were going on a shooting trip in the Big Woods of Minnesota, and they asked me to go with them. It was new deal for me, so of course I was for it. I hired a hammerless breech-loader ...
— Billy Baxter's Letters • William J. Kountz, Jr.
... pet, run to the house and bring out a couple of pairs. You will find them in George's room, I think; and tell Robert I want him ...
— Thankful Rest • Annie S. Swan
... Fischelowitz, from South Russia," enjoys a very considerable reputation. Within the high, narrow shop there is good store of rare tobaccos, from the mild Kir to the Imperial Samson, the aromatic Dubec and the pungent Swary. The dusty window beside the narrow door exhibits, it is true, only a couple of tall, dried tobacco plants set in flower-pots, a carelessly arranged collection of cedar and pasteboard boxes for cigars and cigarettes, and a fantastically constructed Swiss cottage, built entirely of cigarettes and fine cut yellow ...
— A Cigarette-Maker's Romance • F. Marion Crawford
... where more activities were taking place. Information having been received that the Boers in great numbers were gathered at Kaffir's Kop, a hill some 500 feet high east of Belmont, a reconnaissance was made in that direction on the 10th of November. The reconnoitring force was composed of a couple of squadrons of the 9th Lancers and detachments of the Munster Fusiliers, the Northumberland Fusiliers, and the Loyal North Lancashires. With these were a handy lot of mounted infantry and a half battery of field-artillery. They ...
— South Africa and the Transvaal War, Vol. 2 (of 6) - From the Commencement of the War to the Battle of Colenso, - 15th Dec. 1899 • Louis Creswicke
... severed bough without loss of time. But just when they were in the act of lifting out the honeycomb, four stalwart savages rose softly from the bushes behind, and springing nimbly forward, seized them both before they could make any resistance. The surprised couple yelled and struggled to no purpose. Their hands were soon bound behind them, and they were driven forward hastily in a ...
— Wild Western Scenes • John Beauchamp Jones
... come to Glasgow and surrender himself, where he could assure him of protection. This billet, hastily written, he intrusted to Gibbie, whom he saw feeding his herd beside the bridge, and backed with a couple of dollars his desire that it might instantly be delivered into the hand to ...
— Old Mortality, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott
... Madonna, veiled in ample folds of lace and crowned with a coronet of natural flowers; vases of flowers were at her feet, and lighted tapers flickered on either hand. The apartment occupied by the young ladies was at the other corner of the bungalow; the servants, a good old couple, retainers in Alf's family, slept in a cottage adjoining. We retired manfully; we had smoked our last smoke, and were not a little fatigued; hence this readiness on our part to lay down the burdens and cares of the day. When the lights were extinguished the moon, streaming in at the seaward windows, ...
— In the Footprints of the Padres • Charles Warren Stoddard
... happy half-hour that the couple spent there on the settee caressing each other; it was the old days come again—days that had begun with their courtship and lasted without a break till the stranger brought the deadly money. By-and-by the ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... garden. They were standing together on the far side of one of the fixed seats. There was the policeman who had blown the whistle, and a small but motley crew who had answered to the call. Conspicuous units were a gentleman in dressing-gown and pyjamas, a couple of chimneysweeps, and a labouring cyclist on his way to work. They had formed a circle about some hidden object on the ground; and long before the new-comers could run round and join them, the schoolboy had steeled himself to look upon another murdered man. He was in no hurry to look; apart ...
— The Camera Fiend • E.W. Hornung
... agency—we cannot guess. First as a diminutive scrubby shrub, with numerous iron-hard stems, with few and small leaves but many thorns, it keeps its poor flowerless frustrate life for perhaps half a century or longer, without growing more than a couple of feet high; and then, as by a miracle, it will spring up until its top shoots are out of reach of the browsing sheep, and in the end it becomes a tree with spreading branches and fully developed leaves, and flowers and fruit in ...
— Dead Man's Plack and an Old Thorn • William Henry Hudson
... our arrival at the Landing, news, true or false, reached us that the ice was still fast on Lesser Slave Lake. At any rate, the boat's crew expected from there did not turn up, and a couple of days were spent in anxious waiting. Some freight was delayed as well, and a thunderstorm and a night of rain set the camp in a swim. The non-arrival of our trackers was serious, as we had two scows and a York boat, with a party all ...
— Through the Mackenzie Basin - A Narrative of the Athabasca and Peace River Treaty Expedition of 1899 • Charles Mair
... in their turn by some other father. So the two gentlemen went to see Lucy, who was then in a very humble frame of mind, just recovered from her passion—one of them rather congratulating himself on the obstacles which lay before the young couple, the other tossing his youthful head a little in the first impulses of self-will, feeling the reins lie loose upon him, and making up his mind to have ...
— The Perpetual Curate • Mrs [Margaret] Oliphant
... depend, in part, upon his present at Christmas; but that money had long been allotted beforehand. He must have some new trousers, and pay a debt of long standing to the shoemaker for putting new tops to his old boots, and he must order three shirts from the seamstress, and a couple of pieces of linen. In short, all his money must be spent; and even if the director should be so kind as to order him to receive forty-five rubles instead of forty, or even fifty, it would be a mere nothing, a mere drop in the ocean towards the funds necessary for a cloak: although he knew that ...
— Taras Bulba and Other Tales • Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol
... got up, and without going through the formality of saying good-bye to the hard-featured Mrs. Gorman, put on his cap and went out. Over a couple of half-pints taken as a sedative, he realized the growing seriousness ...
— Deep Waters, The Entire Collection • W.W. Jacobs
... end of the Chedputter racecourse, just before the turn into the straight, the track passes close to a couple of old brick-mounds enclosing a funnel-shaped hollow. The big end of the funnel is not six feet from the railings on the off-side. The astounding peculiarity of the course is that, if you stand at one particular ...
— Indian Tales • Rudyard Kipling
... basin, a bucket and a jug; next door in the dining-room, the carpenters camp on the floor, which is covered with their mosquito nets. Before the sun rises, at 5.45 or 5.50, Paul brings me tea, bread, and a couple of eggs; and by about six I am at work. I work in bed - my bed is of mats, no mattress, sheets, or filth - mats, a pillow, and a blanket - and put in some three hours. It was 9.5 this morning when I set off to the stream-side to my weeding; ...
— Vailima Letters • Robert Louis Stevenson
... the guides, "The Palace Hotel of the Chinese quarter," and in which a hundred Americans would find difficulty in existing, over a thousand Chinamen live, sleep and eat, all of the cooking being done on a couple of giant ranges in the basement, which is divided up into shops, ...
— A Ball Player's Career - Being the Personal Experiences and Reminiscensces of Adrian C. Anson • Adrian C. Anson
... wedding tour abroad, the couple returned to create a decided ripple in the calm cistern (so placid and cool and sunless it is) of the best society. They entertained at their red brick mausoleum of ancient greatness in an old square that is a cemetery of crumbled glory. And Robert ...
— The Voice of the City • O. Henry
... was the great battle-field only about three miles from Keedysville, and it was impossible to go without seeing that. James Grayden's directions were peremptory, but it was a case for the higher law. I must make a good offer for an extra couple of hours, such as would satisfy the owners of the wagon, and enforce it by a personal motive. I did this handsomely, and succeeded without difficulty. To add brilliancy to my enterprise, I invited the Chaplain and the Philanthropist ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)
... natives did; and accordingly, instead of mounting our horses and setting forth alone, with our rifles slung over our shoulders, and a few handfuls of parched corn and dried flesh in our hunting pouches, we journeyed Mexican fashion, with a whole string of mules, a topith or guide, a couple of arrieros or muleteers, a cook, and one or two other attendants. While the latter were slinging our hammocks to the lowermost branches of a tree—for in that part of Mexico it is not very safe to sleep upon the ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXLII. Vol. LV. April, 1844 • Various
... Avoid a jerking series of inhalations, and strive to attain a steady, continuous action. Practice will soon overcome the tendency to divide the inhalation into three movements, and will result in a uniform continuous breath. You will be able to complete the inhalation in a couple of seconds after a little practice. (2) Retain the breath a few seconds. (3) Exhale quite slowly, holding the chest in a firm position, and drawing the abdomen in a little and lifting it upward slowly as the air leaves the lungs. When the air is entirely exhaled, relax the chest and abdomen. A ...
— The Religion of the Samurai • Kaiten Nukariya
... of May arrived. Thinking a religious ceremony unnecessary, as they had issued no invitations, the couple were married at a magistrate's and took the six o'clock ...
— Bel Ami • Henri Rene Guy de Maupassant
... interesting experiences more or less corroborative of the phenomena which the members had witnessed either individually or as a body. These additional experiments I proceeded at once to lay before my friends as we met at the club one quiet afternoon a couple of ...
— The Shadow World • Hamlin Garland
... Prussia and the Emperor decided that they must do something to save their good brother and sister. They were very busy just then dividing the kingdom of Poland, where rival political factions had caused such a state of disorder that the country was at the mercy of anybody who wanted to take a couple of provinces. But they managed to send an army to invade France ...
— The Story of Mankind • Hendrik van Loon
... the doorstep early the next morning, a couple of ponies dashed up to the gate, in whose riders she instantly recognized Elsie Travilla ...
— Elsie's children • Martha Finley
... extant a couple of Norwegian Histories of good Authentic Credit; which explains a great many particulars relating to the Exploits of the Danish Kings in Great Britain, which our own Historians have either wholly omitted or very darkly recorded. ...
— Forty Centuries of Ink • David N. Carvalho
... of a couple of days, the advanced guard of the royalists came suddenly on the outposts of the insurgents, from whom they had been concealed by a thick mist, and a slight skirmish took place between them. At length, on the morning of the eighth of April, the royal army, turning the crest of the lofty range ...
— The History Of The Conquest Of Peru • William H. Prescott
... their property by officers and agents acting under authority of the Government of France. During the past year His Majesty's ministers had consented to enter upon the consideration of these claims, but they proposed to couple with it another subject having no connection with those claims, either in its nature, its origin, or the principles on which it depended—a question of the disputed construction of one of the articles of the treaty of cession of Louisiana, by ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Section 1 (of 3) of Volume 2: James Monroe • James D. Richardson
... Curly Parson said. "Most likely Carmack's been carrying a couple of silver dollars along in the same sack. And what's more, if there's anything in it, why ain't Bob Henderson smoking along ...
— Burning Daylight • Jack London
... moste communely are appareilled ylike. The men weare vpon their heades shallowe copin tackes, comming but behinde with a taile of a handefull and a haulfe long, and as muche in breadth: whiche thei fasten vnder their chinnes, for falling or blowing of, with a couple of strynges of ribbande lace, as we doe our nighte cappes. Their married women wear on their heades, fine wickre Basquettes of a foote and a haulf long: rounde, and flatte on the toppe like a barrelle. Whiche are either garnished with chaungeable silkes, ...
— The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques, and Discoveries - Vol. II • Richard Hakluyt
... the table together,— The customers "staring their eyes out," to see Who this queer-looking couple could possibly be,— Asking each other in whispers, whether, It wasn't the likeliest thing that she, Was a Western Actress, and he an Editor; And some were terribly frightened, because They couldn't help thinking there certainly was, The Old Nick to pay, and ...
— Nothing to Say - A Slight Slap at Mobocratic Snobbery, Which Has 'Nothing - to Do' with 'Nothing to Wear' • QK Philander Doesticks
... it appears it was all a mistake. The government by the Berlin General Act is no more than a mask, and a very expensive one, for government by the Consular Triumvirate. Samoa pays (or tries to pay) L2,200 a year to a couple of helpers; and they dare not call their souls their own. They take their walks abroad with an anxious eye on the three Consuls, like two well-behaved children with three nurses; and the Consuls, smiling superior, allow them to amuse themselves with the routine of business. But let trouble come, ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 18 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... Cumberland or the Captain, as if they pressed him to play, and he refused (which he certainly should do), something disagreeable might occur, which it was quite as well to avoid. In this I quite agreed, and willingly undertook the commission. While we were talking Thomas came into the room with a couple of letters, one of which he gave to Oaklands, saying, it had just come by the post, while he handed the other to Cumberland, informing him that the gentleman who brought it was waiting for an answer. I fancied that Cumberland changed colour slightly ...
— Frank Fairlegh - Scenes From The Life Of A Private Pupil • Frank E. Smedley
... in passing to exchange a couple of words with Katerina Ivanovna, poor woman. That was sufficient to enable me to ascertain that she is in a position—preternatural, if one may ...
— Crime and Punishment • Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... them, sugar, is heated so highly by the concentrated beam of the electric lamp, that it first smokes and then violently inflames, while the other substance, salt, is barely warmed at the focus. Placing two perfectly transparent liquids in test-tubes at the focus, one of them boils in a couple of seconds, while the other, in a similar position, is hardly warmed. The boiling-point of the first liquid is 78 deg.C, which is speedily reached; that of the second liquid is only 48 deg.C, which is never reached ...
— Fragments of science, V. 1-2 • John Tyndall
... course of events, that they had a son named Featherhead, who was destined to bring them a great deal of anxiety. Nobody knows what the reason is, but the fact was, that Master Featherhead was as different from all the former children of this worthy couple as if he had been dropped out of the moon into their nest, instead of coming into it in the general way. Young Featherhead was a squirrel of good parts and a lively disposition, but he was sulky and contrary ...
— Queer Little Folks • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... he drew me along toward what was clearly a tavern door, outside which men were sitting on a couple of benches and drinking meditatively from curiously shaped earthen pots glazed green and yellow, some ...
— A Dream of John Ball, A King's Lesson • William Morris
... we sat, about a couple of feet above the water, and rose up at the end to about ten feet above. But as I hoped, when we were some distance along, it began to bend more and more, and the thinner branch we now reached bent so rapidly ...
— Mass' George - A Boy's Adventures in the Old Savannah • George Manville Fenn
... was, as the experienced eye of Wayland had descried at a distance. For the valiant mercer's horse, which was a beast of mettle, feeling himself put to his speed, and discerning a couple of horses riding fast at some hundred yards' distance before him, betook himself to the road with such alacrity as totally deranged the seat of his rider, who not only came up with, but passed at full gallop, those whom he had been pursuing, pulling the reins with all his might, ...
— Kenilworth • Sir Walter Scott
... to administer the Grand Duchy of Berg, Cambaceres said to him, "My dear Beugnot, the Emperor arranges crowns as he chooses; here is the Grand Duke of Berg (Murat) going to Naples; he is welcome, I have no objection, but every year the Grand Duke sent me a couple of dozen hams from his Grand Duchy, and I warn you I do not intend to lose them, so you must make your preparations.". . . . I never once omitted to acquit myself of the obligation, and if there were any delay, ...
— The Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte • Bourrienne, Constant, and Stewarton
... this? Why is the room growing wider?... Ah, yes ... It's the marriage, the wedding ... yes, of course. Here are the guests, here are the young couple sitting, and the merry crowd and ... Where is the wise governor of the feast? But who is this? Who? Again the walls are receding.... Who is getting up there from the great table? What!... He here, too? But he's in the coffin ... but ...
— The Brothers Karamazov • Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... not thought of that. We say: "All the world loves a lover," but to have a couple of million people watching one's courtship—and that a difficult ...
— Herland • Charlotte Perkins Stetson Gilman
... world and got an ax, a saw, more ammunition, salt, a heavy sleeping robe, a few other possibles. He brought them through and piled them in the other world, covering them with a scrap of old tarp. He cut a couple of poles, peeled them, and stuck them in the ground to mark the hole ...
— Cat and Mouse • Ralph Williams
... tower and a couple of wings, and furnished all the habitable rooms, intending to have his little Adele and Herbert spend their childhood there. But while Adele was yet almost a baby, her kind father died. Then she ...
— Eric - or, Under the Sea • Mrs. S. B. C. Samuels
... work, I have been struck with that defect, or rather excess, which we find in almost all the books of a hundred or a couple of hundred years ago, and which prevails still among the Germans—I mean with that quantity of useless erudition with which they intentionally swell out their works, and the result of which is that their subject is overlaid ...
— Selections from Previous Works - and Remarks on Romanes' Mental Evolution in Animals • Samuel Butler
... say good-by to my friends at Vailima, I met Mrs. Stevenson in her Panama hat, and went over the estate with her. Men were at work clearing the land, and to one of them she gave an order to cut a couple of bamboo-trees for the Spray from a clump she had planted four years before, and which had grown to the height of sixty feet. I used them for spare spars, and the butt of one made a serviceable jib-boom on the homeward voyage. I had then only to take ava with the family ...
— Sailing Alone Around The World • Joshua Slocum
... naturally desired to see her once at least before he carried her off to a distant settlement, English or colonial; and as no opinion of theirs was to be allowed to change his intention, he judged that a couple of months' life with him in lodgings whilst seeking for an advantageous opening would be of some social assistance to her at what she might feel to be a trying ordeal—her presentation to his ...
— Tess of the d'Urbervilles - A Pure Woman • Thomas Hardy
... remembered it well; it was Michaelmas-tide, the Michaelmas before the Michaelmas before the Michaelmas—but, ga, ga! What does the date matter? It was autumn, harvest-time, and everybody was so busy prophesying and praying about the crops, that the young couple wandered through the lanes, and got blackberries for Miss Jessamine's celebrated crab and blackberry jam, and made guys of themselves with bryony wreaths, and not a soul troubled his head about them, except the children and the Postman. The ...
— Children's Literature - A Textbook of Sources for Teachers and Teacher-Training Classes • Charles Madison Curry
... on an ingenious device by which he could get to the floor whenever he wanted, which was simply to put the British Encyclopaedia (tenth edition) on the top of his open shelves. He just pulled out a couple of volumes and held on, and down he came. And we agreed there must be iron staples along the skirting, so that he could cling to those whenever he wanted to get about the room ...
— Twelve Stories and a Dream • H. G. Wells
... some folks being learned thus, but I'd fain see other some have a holiday. What shall I dress for supper, Mistress? There's a pheasant and a couple of puffins, and a platter of curds and whey, and there's a sea-pie in the larder, and a bushel ...
— All's Well - Alice's Victory • Emily Sarah Holt
... others the clash of a full orchestra, a few to which nought but the refined and exquisite sadness of a violin could do justice. Many might be likened unto common pianos, jangling and out of tune, and some to the feeble piping of a penny whistle, and mine could be told with a couple of ...
— My Brilliant Career • Miles Franklin
... that these two people who lived in such strange form were once a poor old couple, and their home was a wretched house in the valley. Simple, honest, and quiet, they had little to do with ...
— Classic Myths • Retold by Mary Catherine Judd
... imagined that a couple of the village young men noticed me very closely, but I paid no attention and went on my way, never dreaming of what was ...
— True to Himself • Edward Stratemeyer
... of McWade & Stoner these were busy days, what with a couple of new wildcat promotions and a well going down on semiproven ground—that lease which cornered into the Nelson holdings, and to which Stoner had called attention. It had been easy to sell stock in the latter enterprise, and now the deeper went the hole, the higher rose the hopes of the promoters. ...
— Flowing Gold • Rex Beach
... a couple more days of misery, I woke one morning to find that the ship was gliding along easily, and in the sweet, fresh air and warm sunshine we soon forgot the troubles of ...
— To The West • George Manville Fenn
... their brother spake To this sicke couple there: "The keeping of your little ones, ...
— R. Caldecott's First Collection of Pictures and Songs • Various
... soon began to meet here and there, at intervals, person going to the market with fruits and provisions. The number continually increased, and at the end of an hour, they could be seen trudging over the fields, and along the by-paths and roads, on every hand. Some had a couple of stunted donkeys yoked to a ricketty cart,—others had mules with pack-saddles—but the many loaded their own heads, instead of the donkeys and mules. Most of them were well dressed, and all civil and respectful ...
— The Anti-Slavery Examiner, Omnibus • American Anti-Slavery Society
... around long and all of a sudden a bird from the Colonel's staff found me in the parlor and says I was wanted right away and when I got to this room there was the Col. and the two Frenchmans and my captain Capt. Seeley and a couple others so I saluted and I can't tell you exactly what come off because I can't remember all what the Colonel said but it was something ...
— The Real Dope • Ring Lardner
... M. de Tregars took a couple of twenty-franc-notes out of his pocket, and slipped them into ...
— Other People's Money • Emile Gaboriau
... captain was thus active it was not likely that the officers and crew would neglect their duty. Lord Claymore took a long steady look at the stranger through his telescope, and returning on deck ordered the ship's course to be altered a couple of points, and all sail to be made ...
— Ronald Morton, or the Fire Ships - A Story of the Last Naval War • W.H.G. Kingston
... old to share his perils, as the rest of his family did. Having prepared a kindly welcome for them, perhaps on the strength of the blood of Ruth the Moabitess in Jesse's veins, he returned to Bethlehem, brought the old couple away, and guarded them safely to their refuge. It is surely most natural to suppose that the psalm is the lyrical echo of that event, and most pathetic to conceive of the psalmist as thinking of the happy home at Bethlehem now deserted, his brothers lurking with ...
— The Life of David - As Reflected in His Psalms • Alexander Maclaren
... endured as his predecessor left it. The Revolution and Consulate used the chateau as their fancy willed, and rather harshly, but in 1806 its restoration was begun and Charles IV of Spain, upon his dethronement by Napoleon, was installed therein a couple of years later. ...
— Royal Palaces and Parks of France • Milburg Francisco Mansfield
... host of Heauen! Oh Earth; what els? And shall I couple Hell? Oh fie: hold my heart; And you my sinnewes, grow not instant Old; But beare me stiffely vp: Remember thee? I, thou poore Ghost, while memory holds a seate In this distracted Globe: Remember thee? Yea, from the Table of my Memory, Ile wipe away all triuiall fond Records, ...
— The First Folio [35 Plays] • William Shakespeare
... and son- in-law, understood each other! What a confession of a foregone conclusion, evidence or no evidence, in shackling Jesus as a malefactor! And it was all done in the name of religion! and perhaps the couple of priests did not know that they were hypocrites, but really thought that they were ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture: St. John Chaps. XV to XXI • Alexander Maclaren
... devil's own headache, but he hasn't blacked out yet. Looks like his immunity holds in part. I've sent him bunkside for a while with a couple of pain ...
— Plague Ship • Andre Norton
... seventy. Gert must be thought a man of about sixty, while Christine must be about twenty. The action of the play lasts from 1524 to 1540, but Strindberg has contracted the general perspective, so to speak, giving us the impression that the entire action takes place within a couple of years. I have tried to work out a complete chronology, and think it fairly safe to date the several parts of ...
— Master Olof - A Drama in Five Acts • August Strindberg
... She appeared very lovely in her dress, but in her face there was nothing to be seen but poignant grief. The cause was easy to be guessed at, when she had by her side a bridegroom so very deformed, and so unworthy of her love. The throne of that ill-matched couple was in the midst of a sofa. The ladies of the emirs, viziers, those of the sultan's bed-chamber, and several other ladies of the court and city, were placed on each side, a little lower, every one according to rank, and all of them so fine and richly dressed, ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments Volume 1 • Anonymous
... shepherd, asked Mr. Calvert for the loan of arms, and he taught his wife and daughter the use of old Tower muskets. He said, "If ever that Parson comes to the hut again, put a couple of bullets through him." ...
— The Book of the Bush • George Dunderdale
... the hour found by the astrologers as auspicious for the march of the troops; not a chief stirred from his house. The officers and punchayets of the troops, regular and irregular, to the number of a couple of thousand, crowded to the Durbar and demanded the reason; the Ranee tried to soothe them, saying, that the fortunate hour being passed, the march could not be undertaken till the astrologers found another. The crowd demanded that this should be instantly done, and the court ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 367, May 1846 • Various
... broken; and he spent in a sick-room the remainder of the only holiday worth the name which, (as far as can be traced in the family records,) he ever took during his married life. Owing to this accident the young couple were detained at Rothley into the winter; and the child was baptised in the private chapel which formed part of the house, on the 26th November 1800, by the names of Thomas Babington;—the Rev. Aulay Macaulay, and Mr. and Mrs. ...
— Life and Letters of Lord Macaulay • George Otto Trevelyan
... Next day we had sight of another sail; and this day died Mr Wood one of our company. The 23d we spoke the Dragon belonging to my Lord Cumberland, of which master Ivie was maister[320]. The 2d October we met a ship belonging to Newcastle coming from Newfoundland, out of which we got 300 couple of Newland fish. The 13th we put into Dartmouth, where we staid till the 12th December, when we sailed with a west wind, and by the blessing of God we anchored on the 18th December 1591, at Limehouse in the river Thames, where we discharged ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume VII • Robert Kerr
... in for their outer shirts and coats, however, and then trooped in to the end of the cook shed where the meals were served. Tom turned away to look over his horses and see that they were all ready for the day's work. Rafe put up the roan ponies in a couple of empty stalls and gave ...
— Nan Sherwood at Pine Camp - or, The Old Lumberman's Secret • Annie Roe Carr
... them grow into the shape of bottles with necks. Then they are hung up to dry; and the inside being cleaned out through a small hole near the stalk, they are ready for use, holding two or three pints of water. A couple of inches of a corn-cob (the inside of a ear of Indian corn) makes a capital cork; and the bottle is hung by a loop of string to the pummel of the saddle, where it swings about without fear of breaking. One may see gourds, prepared in just the ...
— Anahuac • Edward Burnett Tylor
... right. Here's a couple of letters for her. She's been asking me for letters all week, and I didn't have any for her. Now here ...
— Bunny Brown and His Sister Sue Keeping Store • Laura Lee Hope
... hotel where I stayed in Ghent the proprietor, after a couple of days, believing me to be one more neutral American, told me he was a German. He went on to say what a mistake the Belgians made to oppose the Germans, who were irresistible. That was his return to the city and country that had given him his livelihood. A few hours later a gendarme friend of mine ...
— Golden Lads • Arthur Gleason and Helen Hayes Gleason
... that cot The good old couple grieve and yearn For one, though absent, ne'er forgot: "Don't bolt the door, ...
— The Death of Saul and other Eisteddfod Prize Poems and Miscellaneous Verses • J. C. Manning
... note of yours back, Miss Helen. Father Elliston was gone. Here has been an Indian killed on Sandy Hill this evening, Alaska's own son as it turns out, and such a hubbub as they are making about it you never heard. I met a couple of squaws myself, yelling like mad creatures, and the woods are all alive with them. The priest has gone down to their village to pacify them if it may be,—so I brought the note back, Miss Helen, for there was no one there but a little ...
— The Bride of Fort Edward • Delia Bacon
... suggestion with regard to the women and the wounded was adopted. The Moquis seemed to urge it; so at least they were understood. Within a couple of hours after the halt a procession of the feebler folk commenced climbing the bluff, accompanied by a crowd of the hospitable Indians. The winding and difficult path swarmed for a quarter of a mile with people in the gayest of blankets, some ascending with the strangers and some coming ...
— Overland • John William De Forest
... the funeral of Mrs. Havill, news of whose death had been so unexpectedly brought to her husband at the moment of his exit from Stancy Castle. The minister, as was his custom, improved the occasion by a couple of sermons on the uncertainty of life. One was preached in the morning in the old chapel of Markton; the second at evening service in the rural chapel near Stancy Castle, built by Paula's father, which bore to the ...
— A Laodicean • Thomas Hardy
... concerned about the horses themselves—he would have felt just as much pain if it had been a question of a couple of dogs—Kohlhaas foamed with rage when he received this letter. As often as he heard a noise in the courtyard he looked toward the gateway with the most revolting feelings of anticipation that had ever agitated his breast, to see whether the servants of the Squire had come to restore to him, ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. IV • Editor-in-Chief: Kuno Francke |
