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Gingerly   /dʒˈɪndʒərli/   Listen
Gingerly

adverb
1.
In a gingerly manner.






WordNet 3.0 © 2010 Princeton University








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"Gingerly" Quotes from Famous Books



... Gingerly. He wrinkled his nose at the faint smell of explosive still inside. Another man ...
— The Pirates of Ersatz • Murray Leinster

... began to undress gingerly. "You can stand up to make your toilet," he said, "which is more ...
— Still Jim • Honore Willsie Morrow

... light flickered in through the doorway. It made the ascent of the first flight of creaking stairs quite easy. At least Rose-Marie could step aside from the piles of rubbish and avoid the rickety places. She wondered, as she went up, her fingers gingerly touching the dirty hand-rail, how people could exist under such ...
— The Island of Faith • Margaret E. Sangster

... his thoughts, the young Indian rode up close beside him, at the same time thrusting something into Tad's hand. "What is it?" asked the boy. "Eat. Good meat," answered the Indian. The boy nibbled at it gingerly. It was meat of some kind, and it was tough. But most anything in the nature of food was acceptable to him then, so he helped himself more liberally and enjoyed his lunch. The dried meat was excellent, even if it was ...
— The Pony Rider Boys in Montana • Frank Gee Patchin

... with mingled amusement, pity, and astonishment. At last, when poor Charlie fairly thrust me into his hands, that he might see with his own eyes the calamity which had befallen the watch that had been destined to minister such consolation to his time- inquiring mind, he took me gingerly, and stared at me as if I had been a toad or a ...
— The Adventures of a Three-Guinea Watch • Talbot Baines Reed

... attired, loud-voiced, and cheerful—who called upon Hannah three or four times a week and whiled away many hours in her stimulating society. Occasionally her husband found him there, but if the fact annoyed him he gave no evidence of it. It was observed, too, that the manner of the visitor was gingerly deferential toward his host; he evidently desired no trouble with "Mistah Breckenridge." Occasionally he took Hannah for a walk; several times he brought her simple offerings of chickens and melons, heartening her to their consumption by participating in the same. One evening he presented ...
— Many Kingdoms • Elizabeth Jordan

... chill smote him. Cursing the simple life, he crawled gingerly out of bed, suffered acutely while hunting for a match, lighted the kerosene lamp with stiffened fingers, and looked about him, shivering. Then, with a suppressed anathema, he stepped into his folding tub and emptied the arctic contents of the water ...
— Blue-Bird Weather • Robert W. Chambers

... Nayland Smith, stepping gingerly, disappeared into the darkness. I rapidly followed. Last of all came our mysterious friend, a gold band about one of her ankles gleaming in the rays of the lantern which she carried. We stood in a ...
— The Insidious Dr. Fu-Manchu • Sax Rohmer

... was nonplussed. An inside room remained, but Scott had said there was no bed within it. He felt his way toward the inner door. This was where he expected to find it, and it was closed. He laid a hand gingerly on the latch. "Where are you, Shike?" he demanded again, this time with an impatient expletive summoned for the occasion. A second fearful snore answered him. De Spain, relieved, almost laughed as ...
— Nan of Music Mountain • Frank H. Spearman

... They descended gingerly, holding up their skirts just as if they would be wanting them another time and had not in all probability finished with skirts ...
— The Enchanted April • Elizabeth von Arnim

... boast the larger freedom no less than the finer discrimination. The larger freedom, it seemed at times, was all of it that she was ever to attain, for, venturing a little too boldly once or twice with a light head, she had at last found herself skating gingerly over a veritable sleet of scandal. She got herself rumoured about so persistently that from being merely improbable, she had become, in Gerty's words again, "one of the very last of the impossibilities." And of late Adams' friends had begun to ask themselves ...
— The Wheel of Life • Ellen Anderson Gholson Glasgow

... got back to his room after the swimming lesson that afternoon, he found Tom nursing a very red and enlarged nose. He had a wet towel in his hand and was gingerly applying it to ...
— Left End Edwards • Ralph Henry Barbour

... cards, and Alice sat in one corner sewing. Danny was "acting the goat" round the fireplace; as ill-luck would have it, his attention was drawn to a basket of clean linen which stood on the side table, and from it, with sundry winks and grimaces, he gingerly lifted a certain garment of ladies' underwear—to put the matter decently. He held it up between his forefingers and thumbs, and cracked a rough, foolish joke—no matter what it was. The laugh didn't last long. Alice sprang to her feet, flinging ...
— Over the Sliprails • Henry Lawson

... Patapouf was busy with a game of make-believe—pretending that the longish grass was a jungle, and himself a tiger, stalking I know not what visionary prey: now gingerly, with slow calculated liftings and down-puttings of his feet, stealing a silent march; now, flat on his belly, rapidly creeping forward; now halting, recoiling, masking himself behind some inequality of the ground, peering warily ...
— The Lady Paramount • Henry Harland

... Member. Taking two or three steps back, he hissed at me, with a livid face, a series of offensive epithets too coarse for publication. Having exhausted his vocabulary of vulgarity, a happy thought seemed to strike him. 'I want to assault you,' he said, and forthwith he nervously and gingerly tapped me as if he were playing with a hot coal. He then danced off to Members who were looking on, crying, 'This is the scoundrel who has caricatured me; witness, I assault him!' and he recommenced ...
— The Confessions of a Caricaturist, Vol. 1 (of 2) • Harry Furniss

... before throwing himself into one of its inviting corners, manlike he placed one of the large sofa pillows rather gingerly on the floor against a table-leg. Behind ...
— The Fifth Wheel - A Novel • Olive Higgins Prouty

... to observe in passing that no gingerly nicety of regard in calling those who served by any other name than servant, was shown or heeded in olden times. They believed with St. Paul, "Art thou called being a servant? Care not for it." All hired workers in the house, hired laborers in the field, those ...
— Customs and Fashions in Old New England • Alice Morse Earle

... in favour, however, next evening, but for a different cause. He appeared with a great prickly porcupine held gingerly in his mouth and laid it ...
— The Adventures of Akbar • Flora Annie Steel

... said, extending his hand, which was taken rather gingerly by the surprised youth, who recognized him as Motoza, the vagrant Sioux, with whom he had had the singular experience some nights before, when encamped in ...
— Two Boys in Wyoming - A Tale of Adventure (Northwest Series, No. 3) • Edward S. Ellis

... limp, toward the beach, I looked in vain for any of those light and elegant attentions toward Miss Pray at which he had hinted. But when we arrived in view of the "Eliza Rodgers" and saw that the tide had so far receded that we must pick our way gingerly thither over the mud flats, by stepping on the sparsely scattered stones, Captain Pharo looked at me and ...
— Vesty of the Basins • Sarah P. McLean Greene

... pressure there was rose a point or two with happy thoughts. If his idea worked, he would be free of the old cars, yet not destroy a single one. Squatting behind the station wagon, to watch the engine, Solomon gingerly pulled the twine to eliminate slack. As it tightened, he tensed, braced himself with a free hand on the wagon's bumper, and taking a deep breath, jerked the cord. Tired legs failed and Solomon slipped backward when the hub cap ...
— Solomon's Orbit • William Carroll

... on his thick coat and heavy boots; Harry ran towards their large boat. The sails and oars were on shore. "No, no,—the canoe!" cried Philip. An Indian hunter, a friend of D'Arcy's, had left his canoe on the beach in the morning. The paddles were in her. To launch her and step gingerly in was the work of an instant; and fast as Philip and Harry could ply their paddles, the light canoe ...
— The Log House by the Lake - A Tale of Canada • William H. G. Kingston

... was all too great a puzzle. Benson finally decided to stop guessing until some future time. He went on with his dressing. Finally, with his blouse buttoned as exactly as ever, and his cap placed gingerly on his aching head, he opened the stateroom door, stepping out into ...
— The Submarine Boys and the Middies • Victor G. Durham

... bodies, and had apparently no fear of the contagion. There were very few people abroad in the streets, and such as were sound kept their faces covered with cloths steeped in vinegar or some other pungent mixture, and walked gingerly in the middle of the road, as if afraid to approach either the houses on each side or the other persons walking ...
— In the Days of Chivalry • Evelyn Everett-Green

... despairingly steps out, picking gingerly for some firm foothold; down goes one foot an immeasurable depth,—he tries to pull it up, loses his balance, and tumbles over into the mud, and is fished out, in a ...
— Uncle Tom's Cabin • Harriet Beecher Stowe

... help but to sidle against the door and walk in. Chia Cheng and madame Wang were, in fact, both in the inner rooms, and dame Chou raised the portire. Pao-y stepped in gingerly and perceived Chia Cheng and madame Wang sitting opposite to each other, on the stove-couch, engaged in conversation; while below on a row of chairs sat Ying Ch'un, T'an Ch'un, Hsi Ch'un and Chia Huan; but though all four of them were seated in there only T'an Ch'un, Hsi Ch'un and Chia Huan rose ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book I • Cao Xueqin

... small mammal skins for mounting is to leave the membrane of skin-muscles on the body skin. This holds a flabby skin in shape and lends strength to a frail one. In spite of this the legs of most wild rabbits must be handled very gingerly, as they have no lining membrane like the body. For finishing mouth, nose, and eyelids of mounted mammals, melt a little refined beeswax in a metal vessel. While the wax is hot (don't allow it to smoke), stir in a little ...
— Taxidermy • Leon Luther Pray

... heap of the same small packages of tobacco, and alongside them a pile of small kegs. Gard lit another of his torches, and stepped gingerly over to them. He sounded one or two, but found them empty. Time had shrunk their stout timbers and tapped ...
— A Maid of the Silver Sea • John Oxenham

... delicacy, made a pretense of reading a little, they then handed him back the Republican sheets, which they handled gingerly, as though they ...
— Maupassant Original Short Stories (180), Complete • Guy de Maupassant

... too bad to step on such clean roads," said Polly, getting up on her tiptoes, and stepping gingerly off. When Phronsie saw Polly do that, she got up on her tiptoes too, and tried to get over the ground ...
— Five Little Peppers Abroad • Margaret Sidney

... councils of the older church were not above giving these conditions their calm and deliberate consideration, which resulted in the foundation of the present physical considerations in relation to divorce laws, such studies or considerations are at present only touched upon gingerly and with apologies for doing so, as if the "study of man" was of any less importance to-day from what it was in the days of Moses, the elder church, or when Pope formulated his oft-quoted but little-followed maxim, that "the proper study of mankind is man." ...
— History of Circumcision from the Earliest Times to the Present - Moral and Physical Reasons for its Performance • Peter Charles Remondino

... with the others. Stepped out gingerly, caps in hand. A corridor full of women. A corridor a-flutter with girls. Talk. Laughter. Animation. In another moment the two would have turned and fled, terrified. But in that half-moment of hesitation and bewilderment they ...
— Cheerful—By Request • Edna Ferber

... this flaying heat Miss Becker stepped gingerly, almost immediately rejoined by Mr. Leon Kessler, crowningly touched with the ...
— Humoresque - A Laugh On Life With A Tear Behind It • Fannie Hurst

... PUNCH! who is that tall, fair-haired, somewhat parrot-faced gentleman, smiling like a schoolboy over a mess of treacle, and now kissing the tips of his five fingers as gingerly as if he were ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 1, July 24, 1841 • Various

... my readings with a fearful adventure which Mr. Whymper once had on the Matterhorn when he was prowling around alone, five thousand feet above the town of Breil. He was edging his way gingerly around the corner of a precipice where the upper edge of a sharp declivity of ice-glazed snow joined it. This declivity swept down a couple of hundred feet, into a gully which curved around and ended at a precipice eight hundred feet high, overlooking ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain

... to cry. The astute Charley brought out some new trade. Tirau's eye here displayed a faint interest. Charley threw her, with the air of a prince, a whole piece of turkey twill, 12 yards—value three dollars, cost about 2s. 3d. Tirau put out a little hand and drew it gingerly toward her. Tibakwa gave us ...
— By Reef and Palm • Louis Becke

... evidence of having been where moths break through and steal, lumbered into the Club garden, and the Professor, imploring the jehu not to let the pony "die on him" in the Hibernian sense of the expression, gingerly entered. ...
— Driftwood Spars - The Stories of a Man, a Boy, a Woman, and Certain Other People Who - Strangely Met Upon the Sea of Life • Percival Christopher Wren

... said Hendrick, smiling indulgently. Norma turned willingly from Chris and two or three other men and women; it was a privilege to be sufficiently at home in this magnificent place to follow her host up to the nursery upstairs, and be gingerly hugged by ...
— The Beloved Woman • Kathleen Norris

... carefully wiping [Transcriber: original 'wipping'] it out before depositing it among the empties; four more seized the heavy shell and lifted it to a cradle opposite the breech; a seventh rammed it home; number eight gingerly inserted the brass cartridge, half filled with a vaseline-like explosive; the breech was closed, and the gun pointer rapidly cranked the gun again into position. In less than thirty seconds the men sprang back from the gun, again loaded and aimed. ...
— The New York Times Current History of the European War, Vol 1, Issue 4, January 23, 1915 • Various

... had seen the Dead Rat, the Abbey, the Bal Tabarin the Red Mill, Maxim's, and the rest of the lot to the total number of perhaps ten or twelve. We had listened to bad singing, looked on bad dancing, sipped gingerly at bad drinks, and nibbled daintily at bad food; and the taste of it all was as grit and ashes in our mouths. We had learned for ourselves that the much-vaunted gay life of Paris was just as sad and sordid and sloppy and unsavory as the so-called gay life of any other city with a lesser ...
— Europe Revised • Irvin S. Cobb

... the wall so I didn't for the moment have the problem of reaching across my body. I took the same sidewise steps she had and using just two fingers, very gingerly—disarmingly, I hoped—I lifted my antique firearm from its holster and laid it on the concrete and drew back my hand from it all the way. Now it was up to her again, or should be. Her hook was going to be quite a problem, I realized, but ...
— The Night of the Long Knives • Fritz Reuter Leiber

... legs beneath him in a gingerly fashion and sank with something like a sigh upon the green, grassy carpet. It was only with a great effort that he managed at last to roll all the way over; and then he couldn't roll back again. Clumsily he flung his fore feet in front of ...
— The Tale of Pony Twinkleheels • Arthur Scott Bailey

... snow by a dozen ready hands, until the rallying host of his compatriots advanced vigorously to the rescue. The normal alliance of us middle-men was with the Southenders, though a good deal rougher than ourselves; and in times of truce a solitary boy would walk a little gingerly through their quarter, as errands or family occasions led him that way. But the principal commercial interests centered in those parts of the town, and if, upon the breaking out of determined warfare, we could secure, in the capacity of leader, the services ...
— Old New England Traits • Anonymous

... gaze caused him to stop short. On each side of the low room men and boys were drawn up in lines, and the division was as clean cut as though chosen for a tug of war. The doors at the far end of the gymnasium swung back, and a stranger, stripped to the waist, stepped gingerly into the room. Sim Hicks met the man, and began to tie a pair of boxing gloves to his hands. While the Captain looked on in utter amazement, the doors again swung back, and Mack McGowan entered. He did not appear surprised ...
— Captain Pott's Minister • Francis L. Cooper

... trusting you with a funeral or a christening," Filmer felt his way gingerly, "I wouldn't care a durn. You can't hurt the dead and the kid might outgrow it; but when it comes to tying folks together tight, it's a blamed lot like trusting something brittle in a baby's hand. It mustn't be broke, you see, or there'll be ...
— Joyce of the North Woods • Harriet T. Comstock

... as she set for him a chair, toward which he trod gingerly, and picking every step, for his own sake as well as of the garniture. For the black oak floor was so oiled and polished, to set off the pattern of the sea-flowers on it (which really were laid with no mean taste and no small sense ...
— Mary Anerley • R. D. Blackmore

... having had a good view of her hull, we all thought, from her conduct, that she was conscious of force. We were, therefore, doubly on the alert in seeing everything in the very best order for fighting. The bulk-heads of the captain's cabin were knocked down, and the sheep, pigs, and poultry, gingerly ushered into the hold, preparatory to the demolition of their several pens, styes, and coops, on the main deck. All this I found very amusing, but I must confess to a little anxiety, and, younker as I was, I knew, if we came to action, that the eighty or ninety ...
— Rattlin the Reefer • Edward Howard

... bridge built on a bracket composed of rough logs, branches, and reeds, tied together and surmounted by a few inches of earth and pebbles to make it seem sufficiently safe to the cautious cargo mules who picked their way gingerly across it. No wonder "the machine" rested where it did and gave its name to that part ...
— Inca Land - Explorations in the Highlands of Peru • Hiram Bingham

... saw her host's shoes: he had left them lying on the sofa. Rickie was slightly deformed, and so the shoes were not the same size, and one of them had a thick heel to help him towards an even walk. "Ugh!" she exclaimed, and removed them gingerly to the bedroom. There she saw other shoes and boots and pumps, a whole row of them, all deformed. "Ugh! Poor boy! It is too bad. Why shouldn't he be like other people? This hereditary business is too awful." She shut the door with a sigh. ...
— The Longest Journey • E. M. Forster

... that the doorkeeper would come upstairs. After listening intently for a minute or two, he put his head round the curtain. The passage was deserted. Tommy bent down and removed his shoes, then, leaving them behind the curtain, he walked gingerly out on his stockinged feet, and kneeling down by the closed door he laid his ear cautiously to the crack. To his intense annoyance he could distinguish little more; just a chance word here and there if a voice was raised, which merely served to whet ...
— The Secret Adversary • Agatha Christie

... and again into a low growl, or the sharp snap of powerful jaws and a whine of rage as a couple or more hounds scuffled together over some private disagreement. At Nan's appearance, drawn by curiosity, some of them approached her gingerly, half-suspicious, half as though anxious to make friends, and, knowing no fear of animals, she thrust her hand through the bars and stroked the ...
— The Moon out of Reach • Margaret Pedler

... move on," someone shouted, and I walked back toward the clearing squinting in the sun. It hurt, and I touched my face gingerly, suddenly realizing what had happened. Yesterday, riding in the uncovered truck, and this morning, un-used to the fierce sun of these latitudes, I had neglected to take the proper precautions against ...
— The Planet Savers • Marion Zimmer Bradley

... along the wall, his revolver extended. In the gloom he felt rather than saw the bulky figure of the doctor and reached out his hand gingerly. ...
— The Secret House • Edgar Wallace

... gingerly, be it said, but did show up his own work, and from Corker to Merishall all the beaks were civil to him. Gus's reputation as a prophet was established, for Corker himself seemed pleased with the Cottonian version ...
— Acton's Feud - A Public School Story • Frederick Swainson

... Dad spoke, the old gentleman set his right foot gingerly on the pavement in front of us, his left following a second later, when the veteran signalised his reaching a sound anchorage with a final blast from his nasal trumpet and a fine flourish of his ...
— Crown and Anchor - Under the Pen'ant • John Conroy Hutcheson

... had "an indescribable horror of slavery"—it was, in fact, so indescribable that (until it was evident that the North would conquer) none of them ever succeeded in giving anybody the faintest conception of it, or any idea that it existed. I can still recall how gingerly and cautiously—"paw by paw into the water"—these dough faces became hard- baked Abolitionists, far surpassing us of the Old Guard in zeal. I lived to see men who had voted against Grant and reviled him become his most intimate friends. But enough ...
— Memoirs • Charles Godfrey Leland

... are not very good; none, indeed, save such as suited his eclectic and fastidious taste; and to hold (on high aesthetic grounds, of course) toads and spiders in as much abhorrence as does any boarding-school girl. However, finding some rock ledges which formed a natural ladder, down he scrambled, gingerly enough, for he was neither an active nor a courageous man. But, once down, I will do him the justice to say, that for five whole minutes he forgot all about Fra Dolcino, and, what was ...
— Two Years Ago, Volume I • Charles Kingsley

... moved gingerly up to the hatchway that led down to the forecastle. If disease had smitten the Minnie B they hoped to get some clew from the taint of the sailors' quarters. Greer stuck a nose down the ladder first. Beyond the usual close ship smells there seemed to be ...
— The Cruise of the Dry Dock • T. S. Stribling

... that Mrs. Joyce and the young ladies will repair to the dining-room, and be ready to set Mrs. Peckover and her little charge quite at their ease the moment they come in. Mrs. Joyce consents to this proposal at last, and takes his offered arm; touching it, however, very gingerly, and looking straight before her, while he talks, with an air of matronly dignity and virtuous reserve. She is still convinced that Mr. Blyth's principles are extremely loose, and treats him as she might have treated Don Juan himself under ...
— Hide and Seek • Wilkie Collins

... plaint. All the delights of the flesh had forsaken him. "Me no like 'm Mary. Me no like 'm kai-kai. Me too much sick fella. Me close up finish." A long, sad pause, in which his face expressed unutterable concern for his stomach, which he patted gingerly and with an assumption of pain. "Belly belong me too much sick." Another pause, which was an invitation to Denby to make suggestions. Then followed a long, weary, final sigh, and a "Me ...
— A Son Of The Sun • Jack London

... I stepped very gingerly and cautiously on the mud, for shore there was none; and I had the satisfaction of descending at once, mid-leg deep in the odious slime; but this being endured the worst was over, and, at the head of my sticking and floundering party, I waded on, putting ...
— Journals Of Two Expeditions Of Discovery In North-West And Western Australia, Vol. 1 (of 2) • George Grey

... the traveling bag into the hand of Martin Brophy, who was on the porch of the tavern, his eye cocked to see what guests the train had delivered into his net. Mr. Brophy handled the bag gingerly and was greatly flustered when the self-possessed young lady demanded ...
— Joan of Arc of the North Woods • Holman Day

... said the philosophic Wyatt, gingerly pressing his head with his fingertips, "but what there is a gen'ral impression 'stablished by this time that you three hombres from the Three Star are right obstinate ...
— Rimrock Trail • J. Allan Dunn

... The detective took it gingerly and suspiciously, with a growl. "I'll have the point of this analyzed. It may be—well—we won't say what may be. But I can tell you what is. You, Doctor Karatoff, or whatever your name is, and you, Mr. Errol, are under arrest. It's a ...
— The Treasure-Train • Arthur B. Reeve

... was gone, she picked up the shining weapon and gingerly dropped it out on the adjoining roof. Then her knees felt suddenly wobbly, and she sat down. What if she had been a minute later and Mr. Snawdor had pulled the trigger? She shivered as her quick imagination pictured ...
— Calvary Alley • Alice Hegan Rice

... his steps and polished his boots on the mat outside the door. Then he re-entered, walking gingerly on the tips of his toes, and casting about in his mind for a suitable topic with which to inaugurate the conversation. Margaret's spare angular figure and sharp-featured face did not look encouraging; but surely never before was ...
— North, South and Over the Sea • M.E. Francis (Mrs. Francis Blundell)

... crept gingerly, but halfway paused with a cry, then cringed back to the head of the ladder, yellow face blanched, slant eyes piteous with fear, as he exhibited an end of stout mooring line whose other end was made fast to a ring bolt in one ...
— Red Masquerade • Louis Joseph Vance

... very gingerly, for the feat was like walking on a yard-arm, but each in turn reached the farther tree. After a little, as they went on, now walking, now swinging, they all were able to pick up the singular track by the notches, by the lay of the lateral branches, and by the absence ...
— In Search of the Okapi - A Story of Adventure in Central Africa • Ernest Glanville

... gaily. And indeed it was a pretty picture when we were all seated: a pleasant breeze stirred the leaves over our head, the rooks cawed and circled round us, Nap laid himself at his master's feet, and a little gray kitten came gingerly over the grass, followed ...
— Uncle Max • Rosa Nouchette Carey

... builds there builds safely. And there should be a correspondence, whether there is or no, between the faithfulness of the Speaker and the faith of the hearer. A man who is doubtful about the solidity of the parapet which keeps him from toppling over into the abyss will lean gingerly upon it, until he has found out that it is firm. The man that knows how strong is the stay on which he rests ought to lean hard upon it. Lean hard upon God, put all your weight upon Him. You cannot ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren

... at him. Never saw one before," said the Baron; and he took two steps. Then gingerly ...
— The Dragon of Wantley - His Tale • Owen Wister

... grand simplicity, either spoke of what interested himself, or maintained an unaffected silence. The son turned in his head for some topic that should be quite safe, that would spare him fresh evidences either of my lord's inherent grossness or of the innocence of his inhumanity; treading gingerly the ways of intercourse, like a lady gathering up her skirts in a by-path. If he made a mistake, and my lord began to abound in matter of offence, Archie drew himself up, his brow grew dark, his share of the talk expired; but my lord ...
— Weir of Hermiston • Robert Louis Stevenson

... I saw him step off the bottom rung of the ladder and gingerly lower himself to the surface of the oyster bed, having reached which he gave a single tug of his signal line to indicate that he was all right. Then, after pausing for a moment, apparently to take a good look round, he cast off the shovel from the end of the line ...
— Turned Adrift • Harry Collingwood

... the general so gingerly referred were the passage of Forts Jackson and St. Philip by Farragut's fleet, the annihilation of the Confederate gunboats and the capture of New Orleans; and these "slight reverses" were almost immediately followed by the defeat ...
— Rodney The Partisan • Harry Castlemon

... white breed, with broad-spreading horns a yard long. These are followed in endless rows by carefully stepping pack animals, small and large horses, mules and donkeys. On the wooden packsaddles on their backs are the carefully weighed bales of hay or ammunition boxes or other war materials. Walking gingerly by the edges of the mountain ridges they avoid pitfalls and rocks and walk round the stiff, distended bodies of their comrades that have broken down on the way. At times there ambles along a long row of working animals a colt, curious and restlessly sniffing. In ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume III (of VIII) - History of the European War from Official Sources • Various

... beachmen of Kent fear no storm. They run out in all weathers to succour ships in distress, and much good service do they accomplish, but their powers are limited. Like the steam-tugs, they can hover around the sands in heavy gales, and venture gingerly near to them; but thus far, and no farther, may they go. They cannot, like the noble lifeboats, dash right into the caldron of surf, and dare the sands and seas to do ...
— The Floating Light of the Goodwin Sands • R.M. Ballantyne

... Virginia, entranced, and gingerly possessing herself of James McCarthy, "however did ...
— Hepsey Burke • Frank Noyes Westcott

... which had sought to claim him forever; he felt only the surge of excitement that can come with new surroundings, new country, new life. Out there before him, as the train rattled over culverts spanning the dry arroyos, or puffed gingerly up the grades toward the higher levels of the plains, were the hills, gray and brown in the foreground, blue as the blue sea farther on, then fringing into the sun-pinked radiance of the snowy range, forming the last barrier against a turquoise sky. ...
— The Cross-Cut • Courtney Ryley Cooper

... said Pyecroft, and paddled gingerly. "Feel well out in front of you, Alf. Remember your fat fist is our only Marconi installation." ...
— Traffics and Discoveries • Rudyard Kipling

... the moon itself a great moth with nile-green wings fell flopping on the grass at the girl's feet. And Clive, wondering, lifted it gingerly ...
— Athalie • Robert W. Chambers

... there, staring down at the spatter of mud on the steps, dismay and wrath in her heart. Then, because she didn't know anything else to do and because Johnny's screams had redoubled, she stooped, and with gingerly care picked up the lump of black mud and went over to the boy. Mud couldn't hurt him, she thought, put on outside; it certainly couldn't hurt him, but ...
— The Camerons of Highboro • Beth B. Gilchrist

... rope! Half way down the thought struck me that in case of accident those above might not be strong enough to pull me up again. But it was too late to think of that, and in another second my feet touched the beam. I breathed again. Softly, very gingerly, I made good my footing on the slender bridge, and, disengaging the rope, let it go. Then, not without another qualm, I sat down astride of the beam, and whistled in token of success. ...
— The House of the Wolf - A Romance • Stanley Weyman

... scene I hurried to the end of the trench and again crossed "No Man's Land." The sight here was not so bad as in the trenches. To obtain a good view of the spot I got up very gingerly on top of the parapet, fixed the machine, and filmed the scene. But this enterprise nearly put an end to my adventure, and also to the other members of the party. I had finished taking, and had got my camera down on the stand, ...
— How I Filmed the War - A Record of the Extraordinary Experiences of the Man Who - Filmed the Great Somme Battles, etc. • Lieut. Geoffrey H. Malins

... rose, with a shut mouth, and went across to the bathroom. There he started. The quaint figure of Gwen stood at the bowl, her back was towards him; she was sponging her face gingerly. Her hair, all blowsed from the pillow, was tied in a stiff little pigtail, standing out from her slender, childish neck. Her arms were bare to the shoulder. She wore a bodiced petticoat of pink flannelette, which hardly reached her knees. Siegmund felt slightly ...
— The Trespasser • D.H. Lawrence

... they went through the warm noontide, and little he cared for the heat that wilted the fat mullein leaves and made the barefoot boy, who passed by, skip gingerly through the burning dust with anguished mouth and watery eye. Little he knew of the locust that suddenly whirred his mills of shrillness in the maple-tree, and sounded so hot, hot, hot; or those others that railed at the country quiet ...
— The Gentleman From Indiana • Booth Tarkington

... gave me a cigar, which I smelt gingerly and stuck in Turnbull's bundle. They got into their car and were out of sight in ...
— The Thirty-nine Steps • John Buchan

... themselves. For, however severely they do it, they may stop when they like and the pain is cured. There is all the difference in the world between pulling one's own tooth out, and even the best and kindest of dentists doing it for one. How gingerly one goes to work, and how often it strikes one that the tooth is a good tooth, that it has been a fast friend to us for ever so many years and never 'fallen out' before, and that after all it had better stop where ...
— Some Private Views • James Payn

... was the broad-shouldered lackey I had seen riding behind the coach: and now stood over the saucepan with a twisted flask in his hand, from which he pour'd a red syrup very gingerly, drop by drop, with the tail of his eye turn'd on his master's face, that he might know ...
— The Splendid Spur • Arthur T. Quiller Couch

... of all this?" I demanded petulantly, as he came near, gingerly stepping from stone ...
— A Trip to Venus • John Munro

... note as he spoke. The man stared at it for a moment, then crouching almost like a dog, took it gingerly ...
— Adrien Leroy • Charles Garvice

... forward over the table in a gingerly and horrified manner, let him run on. The hospital porter and another man turned down the corners of the cloth, and stepped aside. The Chief Inspector's eyes searched the gruesome detail of that heap of mixed things, which seemed to ...
— The Secret Agent - A Simple Tale • Joseph Conrad

... without argument. As each cotta-clad figure advanced, eyes were directed toward doors, and hands mutely signed what tongues feared to utter. One boy came to the sofa and gingerly smoothed a velvet pillow; whispering and pointing, the others scattered—to look up at a painting of a bishop of the Anglican Church, which hung above the mantel, to open the Bible on the small mahogany table that held the center of the room, to touch the ...
— Apron-Strings • Eleanor Gates

... his stomach and pushed two shrunken little legs out from the covers. Putting them gingerly to the floor, he stood up, holding fast to the bed; then working his way from bed to bed, he reached the table at last, spurred ...
— The Primrose Ring • Ruth Sawyer

... Dalzell received the envelope and its enclosure rather gingerly. Dan didn't like to be caught "biting" at a "sell," and he still expected ...
— Dave Darrin's Third Year at Annapolis - Leaders of the Second Class Midshipmen • H. Irving Hancock

... Ah saw of it was in dis heah draw' in de writin'-desk. [This speech takes her across to desk; she opens the drawer, fumbles among a lot of old papers, letters, &c., and finally produces a small thirty-two calibre, and gingerly crosses to LAURA.] Is ...
— The Easiest Way - Representative Plays by American Dramatists: 1856-1911 • Eugene Walter

... emerge from their vicinity. Their behavior simply confirms what I have previously understood of their character; that while they will invariably extend hospitable treatment to a stranger visiting their camps, like unreliable explosives, they require to be handled quite "gingerly" when encountered on the road, to prevent ...
— Around the World on a Bicycle V1 • Thomas Stevens

... the swamps, makes any residence upon its lovely-seeming hillsides a constant menace. But where will not people stay if prompted by self-interest? The dwellers on the sides of Vesuvius do not lie awake to wait for its eruption, and the dwellers on Elephanta do not step any more gingerly in their bare feet because at any moment a sting may ...
— All Aboard - A Story for Girls • Fannie E. Newberry

... power in the land. All was gone, gifts an' graces, the greatest, the least, Were hidden beneath the broad mark o' the beast— Stamped on, I may say, frae the head to the feet, All lost of the man but his pride an' conceit; Varnished ower wi' the airs o' the shabby genteel, He was gingerly steppin' his way to the diel. But now he is gaun to greet me on the way Comin' forrid as ane that has something to say. Takin' off wi' a flourish the bit o' a hat, He booed wi' an air maist genteel ower that; "Excuse me, sir, stoppin' ...
— Verses and Rhymes by the way • Nora Pembroke

... Tommy obeyed gingerly, and then Pym gaped, for what the open door revealed to him was a tiny roped box with a girl of twelve sitting on it. She was dressed in some dull-coloured wincey, and looked cold and patient and lonely, ...
— Tommy and Grizel • J.M. Barrie

... now?" asked Clowes, pushing her away: "you look very smart. I like that cotton dress. It is cotton, isn't it?" he rubbed the fabric gingerly between his finger and thumb. "Did Catherine make it? That girl is a jewel. I like that gipsy hat too, it's a pretty shape and it shades your eyes. I call that sensible, which can't often be said for a woman's clothes. You have ...
— Nightfall • Anthony Pryde

... fear religious questions, lest offence be given to this sect or that. So let such denominations as are in the habit of cooperating, themselves take over this medium, not gingerly, but whole-heartedly, as in mediaeval time the hierarchy strengthened its hold on the people with the marvels of Romanesque and Gothic architecture. This matter is further discussed in the seventeenth chapter, ...
— The Art Of The Moving Picture • Vachel Lindsay

... smiling through his tears; and stepping gingerly out of bed on the tips of his toes, lest he should meet a black cricket unawares, he skipped to the ...
— The Adventures of Joel Pepper • Margaret Sidney

... red-braided swallowtail coats and cocked hats, those carabinieres —namely, who are soldiers in war and policemen in times of peace. Any spectator from a foreign land would have thought it the business of such an officer of the law to press in and stop the fighting; but he did not so interpret his duty. He gingerly touched the shoulders next him with the tips of his fingers, and now and then lifted himself on the tips of his toes to look if the fight had ...
— Roman Holidays and Others • W. D. Howells

... Kolin saw no way, but then the network of vines clinging to the rugged trunk suggested a route. He tried his weight gingerly, then ...
— The Talkative Tree • Horace Brown Fyfe

... began to take off her shoes and stockings. She would do what Edith did! ... It was a tremor of aspiration!—an effort to develop in herself a quality he liked in Edith. She went, barefooted, with wincing cautiousness, and with Bingo stepping gingerly along beside her, across the mowed grass; then, haltingly, down the bank to the sandy edge of the river; there, while the little dog looked up at her anxiously, she dipped a white, uncertain foot into the water—and as she hesitated to essay the yielding mud, and the slimy ...
— The Vehement Flame • Margaret Wade Campbell Deland

... the doorway of the outhouse, holding the body of Eustace gingerly by the tail. It was a solemn moment. There was no room for doubt as to the completeness of the extinction ...
— Uneasy Money • P.G. Wodehouse

... before any one was stirring, save Inga in the kitchen, found a Bible and took it over to the window-seat, where she opened it gingerly. ...
— The Wide Awake Girls in Winsted • Katharine Ellis Barrett

... twitched the corners of her mouth. "Well, she can't stop the money for a new cloth out of this quarter's allowance, because I've just got it. That's luck, anyhow. I'll give it to Bob to keep, in case she goes through my desk again." She poured some ammonia upon the stain, and rubbed gingerly, surveying the result with a tilted nose. It was not successful. "Shall I try petrol? But petrol's an awful price, and I've only got the little bottle I use for my gloves. Anyhow, the horrible old cloth is ...
— Back To Billabong • Mary Grant Bruce

... way they went forward, yard by yard, until they reached a thick clump of trees. There, after listening intently for several minutes without hearing a dangerous sound, they spread out their coats, tent-like, while Lieutenant Mackinson, with gingerly flashes of his light, examined the map again, to make ...
— The Brighton Boys in the Radio Service • James R. Driscoll

... official manner underwent a change; such a look of sudden human interest showed on his fat clammy face that I thought he must have found some quite new kind of sausage. But instead he drew out very gingerly a curious square black box with a sloping front, two round holes at one side, and a handle at the other. He put it down on the ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 146, April 15, 1914 • Various

... time, then putting them on the broiler, he held them over the live wood coals. "Squeeze a little of that lemon juice over them, Shawn, and season 'em up—now try one." Shawn took one of them and nibbled it gingerly ...
— Shawn of Skarrow • James Tandy Ellis

... coiled in the bottom of my own craft. Very softly I gathered it up, and making one end fast to the bronze ring in the prow I stepped gingerly into the boat beside me. In one hand I grasped the rope, in the other my ...
— Warlord of Mars • Edgar Rice Burroughs

... mouth, jumping from one foot to another in apprehensive uncertainty. From within every helmet choking bursts of laughter sounded muffled on the air. The unfortunate lad held his breath until black in the face, gasped in a frenzied intake of air, and gingerly felt himself. Ultimately instructed to change into the P.H. helmet, he did so nervously, succeeded, and sat down, ...
— Norman Ten Hundred - A Record of the 1st (Service) Bn. Royal Guernsey Light Infantry • A. Stanley Blicq

... them. Indeed, wherever this moving nursery of young life passes, it awakens tenderness. The man who drove the gig so rapidly a little way off suddenly slows down, and, with a sympathetic word, walks his horse gingerly by. Every pedestrian stops and smiles, and on every face comes a transforming tenderness, a touch of almost motherly sweetness. So dear is young life to the eye and heart ...
— Prose Fancies • Richard Le Gallienne

... sentry's head was poked round. Disregarding him, I raised the bottle to my chattering teeth. Then the lance-corporal appeared. With a sudden thought I offered him the bottle. A strange look crept across his face. Gingerly he took the bottle. Then there was a comfortable sound. He drew a hand across ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 150, February 23, 1916 • Various

... I climbed gingerly down and edged out upon the glacier, testing each foothold. I peeped into the crevasses, and dropped stones or chunks of ice into them to sound their depths. I ventured into a shallow crack and followed it until it pinched beneath a ...
— A Mountain Boyhood • Joe Mills

... forward and kissed him, in a shy, perfunctory manner; and then good-natured Tom shook his hand, and Philip followed suit; after which Mrs. Faringfield embraced him somewhat stiffly, and I gingerly held his fingers a moment, and my mother hoped ...
— Philip Winwood • Robert Neilson Stephens

... went this evening to present my billet on a respectable looking house, the door was opened by the lady of it, wearing a most gingerly aspect. She told me, with an equivocal sort of look, that she had two spare beds in the house, and that either of them were at my service; and, by way of illustration, shewed me into a sort of servant's room, off the kitchen, half full of apples, onions, potatoes, and various ...
— Adventures in the Rifle Brigade, in the Peninsula, France, and the Netherlands - from 1809 to 1815 • Captain J. Kincaid

... did for quite a long time, till at last the absurdity of the position and, I will admit, my own curiosity overcame me, especially as I was very tired and wanted to go to sleep. So advancing most gingerly, I turned down the kaross from over the head of the sleeping woman, much wondering whom I should see, for what man is there that a veiled woman does not interest? Indeed, does not half the interest ...
— Finished • H. Rider Haggard

... man who bought a thousand-dollar fur coat and a full-dress suit before he had learned to use a handkerchief. He always had one in his pocket, but he would handle it gingerly, as if he had not the heart to soil it, and then he would carefully fold it again. The effect money had on this man was of quite another nature than it was in the ...
— The Rise of David Levinsky • Abraham Cahan

... was in a train of cars and they ran off the track," said Teddy, struggling to his feet and rubbing his shins gingerly. "Did ...
— The Circus Boys on the Flying Rings • Edgar B. P. Darlington

... flight into a spacious hall, which seemed to occupy the whole area of the keep. From this apartment a corridor floored with black oak led to the more modern wing, where light and air were treated in a less gingerly fashion. ...
— A Laodicean • Thomas Hardy

... she cautioned as he came gingerly down the tree. "It is what we call 'Espiritu Santa,' the 'Holy Spirit' flower. See, it is like a ...
— The Ne'er-Do-Well • Rex Beach

... her husband. "And now, stand back, please, everybody. I want to do a little stock-taking." With that, from every pocket he produced French notes of all denominations, in all stages of decay, and heaped them upon the table. "Now, this one," he added, gingerly extracting a filthy and dilapidated rag, "is a particularly interesting specimen. Apparently, upon close inspection, merely a valuable security, worth, to be exact, a shade under twopence-half-penny, it is in reality a talisman. Whosoever touches it, cannot fail to contract at ...
— Jonah and Co. • Dornford Yates

... fingers rebelled against the roughness of husks, he began work, touching the frosty ears gingerly; then as he warmed to the task, stopping at nothing. The frost, dense, all-covering, shook from the stalks as he moved, coloring the rusty blue of his overalls white, and melting ice-cold, wet him through to the skin on arms and ...
— A Breath of Prairie and other stories • Will Lillibridge

... wreaths, with woodland flowers, and was altogether bright and beautiful in the bare woods. They showed us a shell by the cave—a gas shell that had come over during the morning and had hit on the oblique and had not exploded. It was gently leaking chlorine gas, which we sniffed—but gingerly. Other shells were popping into the place and fairly near us with some regularity and enthusiasm, and it seemed to Henry and me that we had no desire to stare grim war's wrinkled front out of countenance, and we hoped that the Major and ...
— The Martial Adventures of Henry and Me • William Allen White

... murmured. "Poor little chap!" As she gingerly touched the bony hands, she was seized with a happy inspiration, and bidding the children sit down till she returned, she entered a little inner office, and Peace heard her at ...
— The Lilac Lady • Ruth Alberta Brown

... gingerly, and looked down into her upturned face. Her eyes were blue, and very bright and eager, with scarcely a hint of age in them. For a brief moment they gazed steadily into his, searching, appraising, ...
— Shoe-Bar Stratton • Joseph Bushnell Ames

... language of the Sahibs, and presented on the golden salver a string of gold mohurs, the last relics of his broken fortune. The old family servant Ganesh, with an expression of awe bordering on terror, stood behind with the scent-sprinkler, drenching the Lord Sahib, touching him gingerly from time to time with the otto-of-roses from ...
— The Hungry Stones And Other Stories • Rabindranath Tagore

... which certainly did not make it run any easier. By hard work he managed to cut across two of the wide boards, and through them again, adjoining the next joist. When he was ready to lift out I pumped a new supply of smoke into the holes, then rather gingerly we pried up ...
— Dwellers in Arcady - The Story of an Abandoned Farm • Albert Bigelow Paine

... every one of the characters who came to the Mayor's ball; Red Riding-hood looked round, with big, frightened eyes, all ready to spy the wolf, and carried her little pat of butter and pot of honey gingerly in her basket; Bo Peep's eyes looked red with weeping for the loss of her sheep; and the princesses swept about so grandly in their splendid brocaded trains, and held their crowned heads so high that people half believed them to be ...
— The Pot of Gold - And Other Stories • Mary E. Wilkins



Words linked to "Gingerly" :   cautious



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