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Back down   /bæk daʊn/   Listen
Back down

verb
1.
Move backwards from a certain position.  Synonyms: back off, back up.
2.
Remove oneself from an obligation.  Synonyms: back off, bow out, chicken out, pull out.






WordNet 3.0 © 2010 Princeton University








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"Back down" Quotes from Famous Books



... worthy man. And in my heart to wonder I began What that he was, till that I understood How that his cloak was sewed to his hood; For which, when I had long advised* me, *considered I deemed him some Canon for to be. His hat hung at his back down by a lace,* *cord For he had ridden more than trot or pace; He hadde pricked like as he were wood.* *mad A clote-leaf* he had laid under his hood, * burdock-leaf For sweat, and for to keep his head from heat. But it was joye for to see him sweat; His forehead dropped ...
— The Canterbury Tales and Other Poems • Geoffrey Chaucer

... had finished speaking—Maurice had turned on his heel and was speeding back down the narrow street. Tired and weak as he was, his one idea was to see Crystal, to hear her voice, to see the love-light in her eyes. He felt that at sight of her all fatigue would be gone, all recollections of the horrors of this day wiped out with the first look of joy and relief ...
— The Bronze Eagle - A Story of the Hundred Days • Emmuska Orczy, Baroness Orczy

... if awakening from a dream, reaches out and shakes the bars—aloud to himself, wonderingly.] Steel. Dis is de Zoo, huh? [A burst of hard, barking laughter comes from the unseen occupants of the cells, runs back down the ...
— The Hairy Ape • Eugene O'Neill

... back down the long hill, so silent and deserted that gray morning when we were driving together, but now dark with the solid masses of marching troops. It was a stirring scene to soldier eyes, knowing these men were pressing sternly on to battle. They seemed like a confused, disorganized mob, filling ...
— Love Under Fire • Randall Parrish

... advancing from the river, "Aha, I see," he exclaimed. Then he galloped up to us and shouted, "Boys, keep them back ten minutes and I'll have men enough here to eat them up—without salt!" So saying, he whirled his horse, and tore off back down the road. ...
— From the Rapidan to Richmond and the Spottsylvania Campaign - A Sketch in Personal Narration of the Scenes a Soldier Saw • William Meade Dame

... incapable of walking calmly down upon a barking revolver and shooting as he went. "You're bound to learn all about saddles and what they're made for," he went on. "So long as yuh don't get swell-headed the first time yuh stick on a horse that side-steps a little, or back down from a few hard knocks, you'll ...
— The Lure of the Dim Trails • by (AKA B. M. Sinclair) B. M. Bower

... looked back down the hill. A few hundred yards away a hole yawned in the hard crusted snow. Twenty yards from this was a cone of black earth twice the height of a man. This was their pile of pay dirt. For five days now, they had been working ...
— Panther Eye • Roy J. Snell

... main hatch were opened, and the boatswain should call all hands—how many of us do you suppose would be left? There are a dozen of your chickens that would back down so quick it would make your eyes smart," added the champion of the intense party, pointing to the group which had collected around Hyde, who appeared to be forming a party of his own. "And the next time ...
— Down the Rhine - Young America in Germany • Oliver Optic

... transport officer. He was found coming out of a basement in the dusk with two bottles of white wine in each arm, the sport, like a nurse with two pairs of twins. When he was spotted, they made him go back down to the wine-cellar, and serve out bottles for everybody. But Corporal Bertrand, who is a man of scruples, wouldn't have any. Ah, you remember ...
— Under Fire - The Story of a Squad • Henri Barbusse

... the swaller An' blackbird an' catbird beat us holler? Does the leetle, chatterin', sassy wren, No bigger'n my thumb, know more than men Jest show me that! Er prove't the bat Has got more brains than's in my hat, An' I'll back down, an' not ...
— The Elson Readers, Book 5 • William H. Elson and Christine M. Keck

... ain't sayin' I can't run a garage," Casey interrupted. "I don't back down from runnin' anything. But if you'd grubstake me for a year, instead of settin' up this here garage at Patmos, I'd feel like I had a better chance of makin' us both a piece uh money. There's a lost gold mine I been wantin' fer years to get out and look for. ...
— Casey Ryan • B. M. Bower

... lot like a guy I murdered five years back down Los Alamos way. Same silver monkey suit and almost as tall. Nice chap too—was trying to give me something for a fever I'd faked. That his gun melted? My man didn't smoke after I gave him his quietus, but then it turned out he didn't have any metal ...
— The Night of the Long Knives • Fritz Reuter Leiber

... just outside of the doorway, struck Cunningham in the face—a blow that had in it all the gathered hate of five months of brutal treatment. He fell back, stumbling on the broad upper step. I caught him a second full in the neck, as I followed. With an oath, he rolled back down the high steps, as I, leaping over him, ran across Walnut street. One of the outside guards fired wildly, but might as well have killed ...
— Hugh Wynne, Free Quaker • S. Weir Mitchell

... S. You can place my letter in Some of the Defender Colums but done use my name in print, for it might get back down here. ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Volume 4, 1919 • Various

... work; my work!" cried Hartledon to himself, almost gnashing his teeth as he went back down the street. "What right had I to upset the happiness of that family? I wish it had pleased God to take me first! My father used to say that some men seem born into the world only to be a blight to it; it's what I have been, ...
— Elster's Folly • Mrs. Henry Wood

... will!" screamed the gulls in chorus. "Guide us to the place, mother Deer." And without another word they rose on their great, strong wings, and followed where she led. Back down the hill she took the path, over the moor and up the lane to a little white cottage under the rosebushes. "Here is the place," said the Deer, and ...
— The Book of Saints and Friendly Beasts • Abbie Farwell Brown

... but she laughed over the remembrance of the indignation of the girls at Jim's remark about their lack of it. "He did look so plucky, facing us all that day, didn't he!" she said. "And he was scared too at the rumpus he had raised; but all the same he didn't back down." ...
— The Torch Bearer - A Camp Fire Girls' Story • I. T. Thurston

... midday, and as though by common understanding we all separated to get something to eat. Our head-dancers formed up and resumed their slow march back down the hill; only this time, Cootes and I borrowed instruments and joined the band, partly to see how it felt to walk in so incredibly slow a procession, and partly for me, at least, to try the music. A little of it went a ...
— The Head Hunters of Northern Luzon From Ifugao to Kalinga • Cornelis De Witt Willcox

... island swiftly receded, came a monstrous wave, and no wonder, which raised the surface of the sea to a level with the topmost cliff of the Calling Place. Queen Mab, who had flown to a pine-tree there, saw the salt water fall back down the steeps like a cataract, and heard a voice say, 'The blooming reef has bolted.' Another voice remarked something about 'submarine volcanic action.' These words came from a level with her head, where the Queen saw, stranded in a huge tree, a boat with a funnel that poured ...
— 'That Very Mab' • May Kendall and Andrew Lang

... have no end, and no beginning; they rise, linger a moment, and are gone, leaving behind them an indescribable loneliness of soul, and a longing to stretch one's hand back down the centuries to pluck their meaning from ...
— Desert Love • Joan Conquest

... to ride near to Rajmahal to find a ford, sir. He will cross there, and ride back down the river some five coss before he ...
— In Clive's Command - A Story of the Fight for India • Herbert Strang

... our feeble cry was heard; and a hearty cheer was borne back down on the breeze to us, in response, the men in the boat pulling for us as soon as they caught ...
— On Board the Esmeralda - Martin Leigh's Log - A Sea Story • John Conroy Hutcheson

... had scarcely halted, when they were seen to retire suddenly from the cover, and rising erect, run at full speed back down the hill—at the same time making signals to us to conceal ourselves ...
— The War Trail - The Hunt of the Wild Horse • Mayne Reid

... fact that, steaming three miles to our one, the launch could very well afford to take the outside course to start with. Then they could take a good look for us in the open water next morning, and, failing to find us, steam all around Ukerewe, come back down the inside passage, and catch us between ...
— The Ivory Trail • Talbot Mundy

... your word, Corbett," said Vidac. He turned and started back down the companionway, then stopped and whirled around to face them again. "Incidentally, something happened while you were away. Jeff Marshall was found experimenting with a homemade communicator. Do you know anything ...
— The Space Pioneers • Carey Rockwell

... we've got to land! We're sunk if we don't go outside and move around! We'll spoil our story-line. This is the greatest adventure-serial anybody on Earth ever tuned in to follow! If we back down on exploration, our audience will be disgusted and resentful and they'll take it out ...
— Operation: Outer Space • William Fitzgerald Jenkins

... worker. "The whole industry will be wiped out overnight. Nobody will have anything trucked any more. Cargo'll be loaded into a projectile and shot off into space to a passing freighter. Then the freighter carries it to its destination and shoots it back down to ...
— Sabotage in Space • Carey Rockwell

... be able to show itself to the world by proofs that none will be able to challenge or to deny; and He in His coming will give the rule over the sixth Root Race to the two Kings, of whom you read in the Kalki Purana. As we look back down the past stream of time we find over and over again two great figures standing side by side—the ideal King and the ideal Priest. They work together; the one rules, the other teaches; the one governs the nation, the other instructs ...
— Avataras • Annie Besant

... and turning the crank clockwise, will advance the forward section of shaft through the medium of a pair of inclined collars. With the bevel gears now engaged the engine may be cranked. When ignition begins, the inclined collars slide back down each other's surfaces, the shaft is again shortened, and its bevel gear springs free of the one on ...
— The 1893 Duryea Automobile In the Museum of History and Technology • Don H. Berkebile

... priest with great respect, saying constantly: "That priest suits me, he does not back down." And he went to confession and communion, setting a fine example. He now went to the Fourvilles' nearly every day, gunning with the husband, who was never happy without him, and riding with the comtesse, in spite of rain and storm. The comte said: "They are ...
— Une Vie, A Piece of String and Other Stories • Guy de Maupassant

... one long, terrible roll. Men dropped by dozens and scores. Some fell where they lay, others rolled helplessly back down the steep slope to the beach. But those left never paused or hesitated. They scrambled desperately upwards through the pelting storm of lead, guided by the flashes from the muzzles ...
— On Land And Sea At The Dardanelles • Thomas Charles Bridges

... their parents. Then we talked about the exposition—she said the Spanish show was very good—told me to look at the tapestries and embroideries, which were quite wonderful—gold and silver threads worked in with the tapestries. The interview was pleasant and easy. When I took leave, she let me back down the whole length of the room, not half turning away as so many princesses do after the first few steps, so as to curtail that very inconvenient exit. However, a day dress is never so long and cumbersome as an evening ...
— My First Years As A Frenchwoman, 1876-1879 • Mary King Waddington

... her long to pack, and to dress in a tunic and trousers for travel. When she came back down to the lobby, Nuwell was waiting, and they took a groundcar from the chateau ...
— Rebels of the Red Planet • Charles Louis Fontenay

... when Dane dismissed the taxi at the false address, a mile from the entrance to the cemetery. He watched it turn back down the road, then picked up the valise with his camera and folding shovel. He shivered as he moved reluctantly ahead. War had proved that he would never be a brave man and the old fears of darkness and graveyards were still strong in him. But he ...
— Dead Ringer • Lester del Rey

... gone different directions. Two young ladies had gone back to their boarding places across the campus, and I had suggested to the young fellow with me that we go along with them. However, he objected, and we walked back down the railroad track. Now, it had occurred to me that he probably thought I was not within my bounds as a married man when I wanted to walk back with these young ladies; something of the same idea had come to me that day when some one had said ...
— The Journal of Abnormal Psychology - Volume 10

... ran back down the village and found Mr. Lambert and his car at the other end of it. He accepted his destiny with a beautiful transatlantic calm and dashed off to Lokeren. I do not think he took his ...
— A Journal of Impressions in Belgium • May Sinclair

... the plot that downed Mr. Obadiah Strout, when he was an enemy of mine. Say, Ellis, drive up by the Poor House, through the Willows, and then back down the Centre Road to Mason Street. That will carry us by some of ...
— The Further Adventures of Quincy Adams Sawyer and Mason's Corner Folks • Charles Felton Pidgin

... have, sir, before long," replied the sailor, and going back down the gap, they picked up the buckets, Syd stopping to ...
— Syd Belton - The Boy who would not go to Sea • George Manville Fenn

... the handcuffs, and brought me away Right back down to Maitland, before Mr. Day. When I said I was free, why the J.P. replied, “I must send you down to be i—dentified.” Oh dear, lackaday, oh, So to Sydney once more ...
— The Old Bush Songs • A. B. Paterson

... water-barrel, justifying his name at every step; for he smiled at the clods of earth, the weeds which had sprung up, at the poles, and then at the horse in the shafts of the water-barrel cart, before refilling his buckets and starting back down a fresh row of hops, between which the sun came glinting and sending shafts of silver arrows to the rich soil, out of which peeped wool clippings, shoddy, greasy rags, and other indescribable rubbish used by the farmer to fertilise ...
— The Queen's Scarlet - The Adventures and Misadventures of Sir Richard Frayne • George Manville Fenn

... poor foolish woman, thought I; why take it to heart like that! and I was sorry and laughed a little as I went back down the street. It was beginning to wake up now! A man in his shirt sleeves and without a hat, a big angry man, was furiously hunting a rebellious pig all round a small field adjoining a cottage, trying to corner it; he swore ...
— A Traveller in Little Things • W. H. Hudson

... expected to have to fight the Japanese on his outward voyage, and he knew that there was a still greater chance of meeting them on his way back down the bay. He had a few white officers with him. On board his flagship, the armour-clad "Ting-yuen" was a German artillery officer, Major von Hanneken. On the other battleship was Commander McGiffen, formerly of the United States ...
— Famous Sea Fights - From Salamis to Tsu-Shima • John Richard Hale

... now, all his enthusiasm gone, Madeira's welled up again strong within him. They went back to their horses without loss of time, and, waving adieux to Throcker and some of his men who had gathered about, they were soon journeying back down the white road toward Joplin. Miss Madeira's hands were in bad condition for driving, Steering thought, but she had taken the reins just ...
— Sally of Missouri • R. E. Young

... encouraging, and the mud-plastered figure saluted the English officer at my side with a flick of the wrist that would have passed on the parade-ground at Wellington Barracks. Two guns of his battery, he reported, were three or four miles back down the road; the men were dead-beat, but the worst was that they had had nothing to eat for thirty-six hours, owing to the tractor that had their rations on board catching fire and burning them; they had picked up scraps of bread that other troops had dropped, ...
— World's War Events, Volume III • Various

... Europe. In most of these cases even when he wanted peace he bluffed with threats of war. Then came the Agadir incident in 1911 when once more the Kaiser bluffed. But Great Britain called his bluff that time and the great War Lord had to back down with great loss of prestige not only with his own people but with the whole of Europe. It hurt the Kaiser to think that any nation in Europe should move in any direction without his consent. Agadir taught him that he must quit bluffing or make up ...
— The Major • Ralph Connor

... faint idea of his purpose. He let the horse step along at top speed going up the road and when we turned about he was breathing heavily. We jogged him back down the road a mile or so, and when I saw the blazed face of Dean's mare, in the distance, we pulled up and shortly stopped him. Dean came along ...
— Eben Holden - A Tale of the North Country • Irving Bacheller

... took one foot from its stirrup and turned in his saddle, pulling the leg up to a restful position. Then he spat, musingly, and looked back down the canon aimlessly, throwing his eyes from side to side where the grey granite ledges showed through the tall ...
— The Spenders - A Tale of the Third Generation • Harry Leon Wilson

... with his hands, and back down the road they had come. He ran and they ran till they reached their dwelling, and entered, and stood at the north window, looking over toward the dim house from which they had escaped. Out from the still ...
— Young Hilda at the Wars • Arthur Gleason

... lodge & covered with bushes. in this Lodge I observed a Cedar bush Sticking up on the opposit side of the lodge fronting the dore, on one side was a Buffalow head, and on the other Several Sticks bent and Stuck in the ground. a Stuffed Buffalow skin was Suspended from the Center with the back down. the top of those poles were deckerated with feathers of the Eagle & Calumet Eagle also Several Curious pieces of wood bent in Circleler form with sticks across them in form of a Griddle hung on tops of the lodge poles others ...
— The Journals of Lewis and Clark • Meriwether Lewis et al

... namely, that those men and women, who do not even approximately fulfil the conditions of their elevated rank, who will not endeavour after the great human-divine idea, striving to ascend, are sent away back down to that stage of development, say of fish or insect or reptile, beyond which their moral nature has refused to advance. Who has not seen or known men who appeared not to have passed, or indeed in some things to have approached the development of the more human of the lower animals! Let those ...
— Hope of the Gospel • George MacDonald

... within proper distance, and stole away into the woods, and we passed on. As we rounded the point just below the lake there, and looked out upon the broad water, I saw the moose I spoke of, feeding. We sat perfectly still, and permitted the boat to drift back down the stream until we were out of sight. We then landed, and I crept carefully and silently to that clump of fir trees. I had my own and my companion's rifle both properly loaded. Having got a right position, I sighted for a vital ...
— Wild Northern Scenes - Sporting Adventures with the Rifle and the Rod • S. H. Hammond

... "Then she went back down the street and me after her wishin' I could go up and help her. But I was afraid she wouldn't want me to know, and I just couldn't go ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1920 - and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various

... her shoulder: "Your room's all ready, Palla—" and suddenly remembered something else and stood aside on the landing until the young man with the trunk had passed her; then waited for him to return and get himself out of the house. Then, when he had gone out, banging the door, she came slowly back down the ...
— The Crimson Tide • Robert W. Chambers

... but were sent reeling back down the slope in confusion and disorder. Again and again they renewed the charge from under cover of the woods which skirted the base of the slope. They would start across the open space, charging our batteries with wild yells, but the heavy fire of our guns ...
— Three Years in the Sixth Corps • George T. Stevens

... hoped that it might be arranged that he keep it on his desk, an ever-present reminder of the love of his city. To this the Chancellor observed that it would be arranged, and the affair was over. To obviate the difficulty of having the delegation back down the long room, it was the Crown Prince who departed first, ...
— Long Live the King • Mary Roberts Rinehart

... carefully back down the arroyo, keeping as much as possible in the shade. Behind him stole Annie-Many-Ponies, noiseless as the shadow of a cloud. Bill Holmes, she reflected angrily, had seen the day, not so far in the past, when he was happy if the "squaw" but smiled upon him. It was because ...
— The Heritage of the Sioux • B.M. Bower

... Movaine, and he sent me and a half dozen other boys back up here with riot guns to see what we could do for him. Which was nothin', of course." Baldy gulped again. "We finally cut this end of him off with a beam and took it back down." ...
— Lion Loose • James H. Schmitz

... eagerly. "Well, anyhow, old boy," he added, "in such a case to back down is braver than to fight; but to apologize to the devil—that is not hard; on the contrary, to keep from apologizing to the devil—ah! I wish I could always do that!—I wonder where ...
— The Cavalier • George Washington Cable

... his vengeful cousin? But here he paused, rejecting the idea as quickly as it came. No! his partners were right! He was a trespasser on his cousin's heritage—there was no luck in it—he was wrong, and this was his punishment! Instead of yielding gracefully as he might, he must back down now, and she would never know his first real feelings. Even now he would make over the property to her as a free gift. But his partners had advanced him money from their scanty means to plant and work it. He believed that an appeal to their feelings would persuade ...
— Openings in the Old Trail • Bret Harte

... no reply. His rifle was already slung, and after one glance up the gulch towards the valley, without seeing a sign of the enemy, he began to back down the slope, creeping and crawling till it was safe to rise, and then hurrying after Bourne and Ned, overtaking them long before they could reach the entrance to the steep slope ...
— The Peril Finders • George Manville Fenn

... in the door for convenience' sake, they will carry it down to the office and give it to the clerk. They do this under the vile pretense of trying to protect your property from thieves; but actually they do it because they want to make you tramp back down-stairs after it when you come home tired, or put you to the trouble of sending a waiter for it, which waiter will expect you to pay him something. In which case I suppose ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain

... thuddier as they tramped back down the hall. "It's a good thing there's going to be a Her here to send that common boy kiting!" she was thinking. Yet his patches were all Ellen—so far—had seen in Jolly to find fault with. Though, for that matter, in a house beautiful like this patches were, goodness knew, ...
— The Very Small Person • Annie Hamilton Donnell

... of her early years would be an absolutely foreign country to us, if by some magic touch we were to be transplanted back down the line of years. It was different in thought, feeling, and outlook. The extraordinary changes in the modes of travelling, by means of which numbers of people who had never even thought of any other country beside their own, were enabled ...
— Queen Victoria • E. Gordon Browne

... up ten thousand, twenty thousand miles. He waves to the pilot, takes off his hat to the passengers, then rides back down." ...
— Sjambak • John Holbrook Vance

... any words whatever on the subject. He held the horse until she had mounted, made sure that she was all right, chilled by his perfect politeness her nervous overture toward a more friendly parting, lifted his hat and turned immediately to go back down ...
— Rim o' the World • B. M. Bower

... when me mother would slip away for a visit to some of de neighbors homes, she would raise up the old plank floor to de log cabin and make pallets on de ground and put us to bed and put the floor back down so dat we couldn't be seen or found by the patrollers on their stroll ...
— Slave Narratives, Oklahoma - A Folk History of Slavery in the United States From - Interviews with Former Slaves • Various

... or rather crawled on their bellies until they were well away, before they got to their feet and pelted back down the strand. However, the guards were of sterner stuff. They were withdrawing all right, but slowly backing away, their swords held up before them as men might retreat ...
— Key Out of Time • Andre Alice Norton

... make trouble between his enemies - the boatmen, his task-master, and the cycler, an intruder on his exclusive domain, the Erie tow-path. A span of mules will pretend to scare, whirl around, and jerk loose from the driver, and go "scooting" back down the tow-path in a manner indicating that nothing less than a stone wall would stop them; but, exactly in the nick of time to prevent the tow-line jerking them sidewise into the canal, they stop. Trust a mule for never losing his head when ...
— Around the World on a Bicycle V1 • Thomas Stevens

... again joined them, and accompanied them back down the river, as he says, about eighty leagues. But as we have before remarked, we cannot place much reliance upon his estimate of distances. The discomforts of this voyage must have been innumerable. The crowded canoes, the loathsome personal habits of the savages, elevated but ...
— The Adventures of the Chevalier De La Salle and His Companions, in Their Explorations of the Prairies, Forests, Lakes, and Rivers, of the New World, and Their Interviews with the Savage Tribes, Two Hu • John S. C. Abbott

... all, you feel sure, as you go back down the "old Lime-Kiln road," that the motto of the school will be fulfilled in the life of each of its students: "So enter that daily thou mayst become more thoughtful and more learned. So depart that daily thou mayst become more ...
— How To Write Special Feature Articles • Willard Grosvenor Bleyer

... where I stood half across the bench and drove me back down beside Jack, who was yet too dazed to stir. Next instant with a rush and a roar we plunged into the tempest, and ...
— Parkhurst Boys - And Other Stories of School Life • Talbot Baines Reed

... only roar as they dash on the ground; have you never noticed how they seem to scream as they draw back down ...
— The Fairy-Land of Science • Arabella B. Buckley

... Charing Cross Station, Sheard took a quick and anxious look back down the Strand. A taxi standing near the gates attracted his attention, for, although he could not see the Stetson inside, he noted that the cab was engaged, and, therefore, possibly occupied. It was sufficient, in these days of constant ...
— The Sins of Severac Bablon • Sax Rohmer

... with me, Dr. Whiskers?" he asked eagerly. "Jimmie and Johnnie have the whooping cough; Janie ate some candy and it made her tooth ache, and Baby Judy has the croup. Worst of all, Polly went into Mrs. Giant's pantry and it is a wonder she ever got back down cellar. She is all rolled up in sticky fly-paper. And me with four sick ...
— Grand-Daddy Whiskers, M.D. • Nellie M. Leonard

... the rogue! from having read of him; he was the yellow-breasted chat. It was well, indeed, that I happened to be looking at that very spot, and that I was quick in my observation; for in a moment he saw the blunder he had made, and slipped back down the stem, too late for his secret—I had him ...
— A Bird-Lover in the West • Olive Thorne Miller

... clear up to the southernmost tip of the sandbar point. They could hear someone, perhaps a chorus of voices, singing on the whiskey boat at the Upper Landing. They could see the light of the boat's windows. There they turned and started back down the sandbar, reaching the two boats moored side ...
— The River Prophet • Raymond S. Spears

... that having a beau was harder work than she had bargained for. She privately resolved never never to have one again, even if she never grew up to be like Rosamond Clifford. But she hated to back down on any part of her program before Grace. She didn't like Grace very ...
— Chicken Little Jane • Lily Munsell Ritchie

... Brigade had disappeared. I went back down the track and found the General and his staff, fuming, half-way up the hill. The German guns could not be found, and the German guns were holding ...
— Adventures of a Despatch Rider • W. H. L. Watson

... starfish, or "five-fingers." The hake head stuck on the bait-spear in the center was almost gone; Jim replaced it with a fresh head from the bait-tub. Then he seized a mottled, purplish crab that had been aimlessly scuttling to and fro across the bottom of the pot, and impaled him, back down, on the barb of the spear. Shutting and buttoning the door, he slid the trap overboard, started his engine, and headed for ...
— Jim Spurling, Fisherman - or Making Good • Albert Walter Tolman

... back down when they, see that you've caught him foul," stated the skipper, consolingly. "I've got a lot of confidence in your grit, sir. But I must say it's a terrible tricky gang we're up against, so it seems ...
— Blow The Man Down - A Romance Of The Coast - 1916 • Holman Day

... pushed forward to these rooms. As they went they stumbled over an unconscious form in the passage. The men behind Grant—Dooley, Hogan, Casper Herdicker, Williams, Davis, Chopini—joined him. Their work was done. They had been in all the rooms. They picked up the limp form, and staggered slowly back down the passage. The smoke gripped Grant about the belly like a vise. He could not breathe. He stopped, then crawled a few feet, then leaned against a timber. Finally he rose and came upon the swaying ...
— In the Heart of a Fool • William Allen White

... the woods!" said Esther, as they reached the summit of the ridge, and turned to look back down the winding trail. "Father said this morning that the spring was early, and ...
— A Little Maid of Ticonderoga • Alice Turner Curtis

... the story that gossips tell Of Burns of Gettysburg?—No? Ah, well, Brief is the glory that hero earns, Briefer the story of poor John Burns: He was the fellow who won renown,— The only man who didn't back down When the rebels rode through his native town; But held his own in the fight next day, When all his townsfolk ran away. That was in July, Sixty-three, The very day that General Lee, Flower of Southern chivalry, Baffled and beaten, backward reeled ...
— Poems of American Patriotism • Brander Matthews (Editor)

... latter case he occasionally breaks away for a more or less extended period, and either goes fishing in Canada, shooting in Scotland, or automobiling in France, with perhaps a rush over a Swiss pass or two, and a dash around the Italian lakes, and back down the Rhine for a little ...
— The Automobilist Abroad • M. F. (Milburg Francisco) Mansfield

... his feet off the tail of the girl's coat, and an oldish lady that looked upon life as immoral and unnecessary. 'How perfectly delightful,' they says, 'to sup in a slosh.' Up the stairs they go; and in half a minute back down comes the girl, her skirts swishing like the waves on the beach. She stops on the landing and looks our ...
— Roads of Destiny • O. Henry

... it, but both aliens brushed by him and pattered back down the corridor, the discoverer pouring forth a volume of words to which the officer listened with great intentness. And the Terran pilot had to hurry to keep up ...
— Star Born • Andre Norton

... saddles and mule-packs, our blankets and buffalo-robes. It was not their intrinsic value that tempted us to take this trouble with our impedimenta: our object was to make with them a rampart upon the rock. We had just time for a second trip; and, flinging our first loads up to the table, we rushed back down the declivity. Each seized upon such objects as offered themselves—valises, the soldiers' knapsacks, joints of the antelope lately killed, and the noted meal-bag—all articles likely to avail us in building ...
— The Wild Huntress - Love in the Wilderness • Mayne Reid

... the boat were quite different from Garman. I knew they would take a bluff, or I'd never have let you pull your gun. If you had done the same here there would have been shooting or else you'd have had to put your gun away and back down. It's one thing to pull a gun on a bunch of river rats, and another on a man like Garman. I don't want any shooting ...
— The Plunderer • Henry Oyen

... just to give their oxygen tanks a chance to conk out on them; then they barge around up there a while. The advanced trainees shoot off a jato at top speed. It's gauged to build them up to the speed they'll give the Platform. And then if they come out of that and get back down to ground safely, they uncross their fingers. A merry life those guys lead! When a man's made ten complete flights he retires. One flight a week thereafter to keep in practice only, until the big day for the Platform's take-off. ...
— Space Platform • Murray Leinster

... the assemblage Honey Tone could not back down. He mounted the mule. To his surprise the animal walked slowly and with all the peculiar dignity that a mule can summon. The uplifter looked down at the Wildcat. "Line 'em up fo' ...
— Lady Luck • Hugh Wiley

... a dozen yards over the rough ground when a hoarse shout of surprise came from Lynch, followed by the clatter of rolling stones as he plunged back down the hill. But she did not turn her head; there was no time or need. Running as she had never run before, she rounded the spur and with a gasp of dismay saw that the cliffs curved back abruptly, forming an intervening open ...
— Shoe-Bar Stratton • Joseph Bushnell Ames

... retorted Tom, unwilling to back down. "But I refuse to believe this will work automatically without ever a hitch. An air pilot's life hangs in the balance, and if it fails to make connections it's good-night ...
— Air Service Boys Flying for Victory - or, Bombing the Last German Stronghold • Charles Amory Beach

... forward to get a drink of water. She passed the group of her future schoolmates slowly, hoping that some of them would speak to her. But none did, and when she came back down the aisle, the tall girl ...
— A Little Miss Nobody - Or, With the Girls of Pinewood Hall • Amy Bell Marlowe

... advance of them. His voice was the loudest and his head oftenest at the window. But I noticed that when he had kept the position too long, the others evidently made it uncomfortable in his rear, and after "fidgeting" about awhile he would be compelled to "back down." But retaliation was then easy, and I fear his mates spent few easy moments at the outlook. They would close their eyes and slide back into the cavity as if the world had suddenly lost ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Vol. 7 • Various

... surges came mighty near going right over the left of our Regiment, as they were lying down behind their little rail piles. But the boys clubbed their guns and the officers used their revolvers and swords and drove them back down the hill. ...
— Andersonville, complete • John McElroy

... to guess that in this statement it was his intention to screen his partner in iniquity. To be sure, he had been forced to take the position by Stumpy himself, but once having taken it, I was morally certain he would not back down. ...
— True to Himself • Edward Stratemeyer

... subject to "fits of ungovernable rage"; but, when seen, he appears rather to be rejoicing in his strength. He acts as a bull sometimes does when he gores the earth with his horns. The rhinoceros, in addition to this, stands on a clump of bushes, bends his back down, and scrapes the ground with his feet, throwing it out backward, as if to stretch and clean his toes, in the same way that a dog may be seen to do on a little grass: this ...
— Missionary Travels and Researches in South Africa - Journeys and Researches in South Africa • David Livingstone

... Captain Smith and his men rowed back down the river; but when they reached Jamestown they found that some Indians had made an attack upon the place. No doubt but that Powhatan had sent them as soon as he knew that Smith was not there. One of the settlers had been killed by an ...
— The New McGuffey Fourth Reader • William H. McGuffey

... her, and dropping his head, went back down the street. He hit upon Lemm, who was also walking along, with his hat pulled down on his nose, and staring at ...
— A Nobleman's Nest • Ivan Turgenieff

... herself at Dick's solution as she stole back down the spiral on her way to the music room. She was depressed, but not by the Harvest Group situation. Ever since her marriage there had always been trouble in the working of the Mexican mines Dick had inherited. Her depression was due to her having missed her morning greeting ...
— The Little Lady of the Big House • Jack London

... was fat and fresh; she shied back very frightened and kicked out till her hoofs rattled against the walls. Grettir fell off, but picked himself up and tried to mount her again. There was a sharp struggle, which ended in his shaving all the skin on her back down to her flank. Then he drove the horses out to the meadow. Keingala would not take a bite except off her back, and soon after noon she bolted off to the stables. Grettir locked the door and went home. Asmund asked him where the horses were; he said he had looked after ...
— Grettir The Strong - Grettir's Saga • Unknown

... he'll show 'em a real jump. He backs off a little to get a run and lands right on the log. Then he wished he hadn't. Old Kate worked so quick I couldn't hardly follow it. In about three seconds this leader lands on his back down in the bunch, squealing like one of these Italian sopranos when the flute follows her up. He crawls off on his stomach, still howling, and I see he's had a couple of wipes over the eye, and one of his ...
— Somewhere in Red Gap • Harry Leon Wilson

... see," was the reply, and when Sammie looked, with his little body half out of the hole he had made, he saw a great animal, with long horns, coming straight at him. He tried to run back down the hole, but he found he had not made it large enough to ...
— Sammie and Susie Littletail • Howard R. Garis

... cry, Mr. Chambers turned and ran. Back down the street he raced, coat streaming after him in the wind, bowler hat bouncing ...
— The Street That Wasn't There • Clifford Donald Simak

... canoe fast to keep it from being swept back down the rapids, one of the foremost swung himself in, took his paddle, and began to use it with all his might. Then another sprang in on the other side, and paddled hard to keep the canoe stationary, two still holding ...
— To The West • George Manville Fenn

... Sharp and his wife, Miss Annie, owned us and, Child, dey was grand folks. Deir old home was 'way up in Jackson County 'twixt Athens and Jefferson. Dat big old plantation run plumb back down to de Oconee River. Yes, mam, all dem rich river bottoms ...
— Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves - Georgia Narratives, Part 3 • Works Projects Administration

... Juliet came back down the lawn with Rachel, who presented Mr. Huntington; and presently, without a word of leave-taking to any one else, the two ...
— The Indifference of Juliet • Grace S. Richmond

... her womanly figure came into dim view. My heart leaped. I was in a flutter of mixed anxiety and joyous anticipation. "Oh, she'll back down," ...
— The Rise of David Levinsky • Abraham Cahan

... the Jupiter-light poured normally around him, the valley hushed and seemingly empty once more. He put through his call to Friday and Ban, giving them simple directions how to find him. And twenty-five minutes after that, he saw, looking back down the ridge, their two giant metallic figures come twisting and turning in noiseless flight through the top lanes of the jungle below, and they ...
— The Passing of Ku Sui • Anthony Gilmore

... your money back down with you and put it into farm lands, or anything else that takes your fancy. After you look it over, if you don't want to go in on it, Mr. Harris, perhaps Riles and I can raise enough ourselves to swing the deal, but ...
— The Homesteaders - A Novel of the Canadian West • Robert J. C. Stead

... thought she heard Monsieur Wachner coming back down the passage. So she suddenly took the pearls out of the other woman's hand and clasped the string about ...
— The Chink in the Armour • Marie Belloc Lowndes

... whistle and looked back down the road for the gray figure of his inseparable friend and companion: not a monk as the name indicated, but a Great Dane. A distant cloud of dust proclaimed that the whistle had been heard. "Poor Sant Antonio!" he called as soon as the dog had caught up, "Where have you been? ...
— The Title Market • Emily Post

... as they were in the right place, the Irishmen came and helped Tom load the cart full, which was very quickly done; and then Buck and Bright pulled away with all their strength till they were out on the level ground. This time they did not carry the gravel far, and so were ready to back down again ...
— Berties Home - or, the Way to be Happy • Madeline Leslie

... corners and steering past carts, and every time she went out she gained fresh confidence. She was not at all nervous, and kept her head admirably in several small emergencies, managing so well that Aunt Harriet finally allowed her to bring the car back down the High Street, which, as it was the most crowded portion of the town, was considered the motorist's ordeal in Seaton. She acquitted herself with great credit, passed a tramcar successfully, and understood the signals of the policeman who waved his hand at the corner. Aunt Harriet had taken ...
— The Luckiest Girl in the School • Angela Brazil

... their chief died, and the distressed father, believing that an evil one had come out of the sipapu with them and caused this death, tossed up a ball of meal and declared that the unlucky person upon whose head it descended should be thus discovered to be the guilty party and thrown back down into the underworld. The person thus discovered begged the father not to do this but to take a look down through the sipapu into the old realm and see there his son, quite alive and well. This he did, and so ...
— The Unwritten Literature of the Hopi • Hattie Greene Lockett

... instant the children stood still, not quite daring to go nearer, but Bello, dear friendly old Bello, had no such fears. He ran forward barking joyfully; the two dogs smelled each other, and then trotted back down the path together as if they had been friends since they ...
— The Swiss Twins • Lucy Fitch Perkins

... after another sigh. "Such old friends as you and he—I will go and see," said she, and turned bravely back down the path that led to his door while I waited ...
— A Village of Vagabonds • F. Berkeley Smith

... Woodpecker family have stiff tail feathers and use them to brace themselves when they are climbing a tree. They have become so dependent on them that they don't dare move about on the trunk of a tree without using them. If they want to come down a tree they have to back down. ...
— The Burgess Bird Book for Children • Thornton W. Burgess

... climbed the steps with a bucket in one hand and a brush in the other. There stood McTee leaning against the wheelhouse and staring straight ahead across the bows. He seemed quite oblivious of his presence until, having finished his job, Harrigan started back down the steps. ...
— Harrigan • Max Brand

... upstairs into their adjoining rooms. For a few minutes Rick tinkered with his camera equipment, then he went back down to the library and searched the shelves for something to read. He finally settled on W. Grey Walter's The Living Brain and carried it back up to ...
— The Electronic Mind Reader • John Blaine

... up and inserted in the frame, driving it home with a few sharp blows. Then, he bent the iron bars back down until each fitted nicely over its stump. Whimsically, he imagined old Michael's amazement and superstitious fear when he should find the animal gone, but the ...
— The Wilderness Trail • Frank Williams

... at Arnemuiden, near Middleburg, although the Protestants in that place exerted themselves to raise an insurrection in their favor. Thoulouse, therefore, without having accomplished anything, put about his ships and sailed back down the Scheldt as far as Osterweel, a quarter of a mile from Antwerp, where he disembarked his people and encamped on the shore, with the hope of getting men from Antwerp, and also in order to revive by his presence the courage of his party, which had been cast ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller

... then to cheat her. It wasn't humanly possible to marry her and then to let her go. He thought of those warm, soft arms round his neck, the absolute trust of that embrace. Molly's girl. No, he could not do it. He would have to back down, tell her he could not put the bargain through, ...
— The Drums Of Jeopardy • Harold MacGrath

... also. Suddenly the loud bang of a musket, followed instantly by the sharp crack of a rifle, echoed down the mountain side. The rebel behind the cedar sprang to his feet, dropping his gun, and throwing up his hands, and rushed back down the ridge, screaming, "I'm hit! I'm hit!" while the man next him also attempted to rise, but fell again, Pomp having discreetly ...
— Cudjo's Cave • J. T. Trowbridge

... Back down the hill and across the moor went the company speedily, for they feared a rescue. And as they went the stragglers joined them. Here a man got up feebly out of the ditch and rubbed his pate and fell ...
— Robin Hood • J. Walker McSpadden

... deg.129 And high rocks throw mildly 130 On the blanch'd sands a gloom; Up the still, glistening beaches, Up the creeks we will hie, Over banks of bright seaweed The ebb-tide leaves dry. 135 We will gaze, from the sand-hills, At the white, sleeping town; At the church on the hill-side— And then come back down. Singing: "There dwells a loved one, 140 But cruel is she! She left lonely for ever The ...
— Matthew Arnold's Sohrab and Rustum and Other Poems • Matthew Arnold

... Angel-child, it ain't," he snapped. "And you fellows can back up and snort all yuh darn please, and make idiots of yourselves. But yuh can't do any business making me out a hot-air peddler on this deal. I stand pat, just where I stood at first, and it'll take a lot uh cackling to make me back down. That old devil did lie about Dan, and he did take a ...
— The Happy Family • Bertha Muzzy Bower

... old woman she is," said Lily, as they rode back down the avenue. "I beg your pardon, Bernard; for, of course, she ...
— The Small House at Allington • Anthony Trollope

... tables were turned, it was the thugs' turn to "march." The boys herded them warily back down the hillside toward the road, where Bud had parked his red convertible. Sandy ...
— Tom Swift and the Electronic Hydrolung • Victor Appleton

... Amy looked back down the railroad track, and Grace, noticing this, in the intervals of eating chocolate, ...
— The Outdoor Girls of Deepdale • Laura Lee Hope

... branches of fruit, and a huge, fronded tuft of the giant fern-trees that abounded there, he came back down the beach to the sleeping girl, who still lay unconscious in her tiger-skin, her heavy hair spread drying on the sands, her face buried in the warm, soft hollow of ...
— Darkness and Dawn • George Allan England

... a fortune; his son, being born in the days of little things and bred in the school of thrift, holds it together; but his sons in turn, surrounded from their childhood with wealth and luxury, have lost the old stern fibre and they slip quickly back down the steep path which their grandfather climbed with so much toil. But no less often will you hear the ...
— The Twentieth Century American - Being a Comparative Study of the Peoples of the Two Great - Anglo-Saxon Nations • H. Perry Robinson

... the prancin' and steppin'; but I did t'ink it would make mo' of a man of you, an' it ain't. Yo' pappy was a po' man, ha'd wo'kin', an' he wasn't high-toned neither, but from the time I first see him to the day of his death, I nevah seen him back down because he was afeared of anything," and ...
— The Upward Path - A Reader For Colored Children • Various

... few moments this uncertainty lasted, and then back down the chasm came a noise that caused the listener to start in his saddle. It resembled the worrying of dogs, and for a moment Carlos fancied that Cibolo had made his attack upon a bear! Only a moment did this illusion last, for his quick ear soon detected the voices of more dogs ...
— The White Chief - A Legend of Northern Mexico • Mayne Reid

... him," said Mr. Harper, looking back down the street. "There he is, talking to a knot of people at the market-hall—farmers, no doubt, whom he will try to make Free-traders of, and who would listen to him affectionately, even if he ...
— Agatha's Husband - A Novel • Dinah Maria Craik (AKA: Dinah Maria Mulock)

... at the star hyacinth for an instant, then picked it up. It was slightly larger than the one Graylock had carried out of the Antares with him, perfectly cut. He found four others of similar quality within the next minute, started back down to the lock compartment with what might amount to two million credits in honest money, around half that in the Hub's underworld gem trade, in one ...
— The Star Hyacinths • James H. Schmitz

... apparently could not see him, though he waved his hand. The next instant Jim Fay strolled into the "park" from the direction of Lawton's cabin. Bennington saw her spring to meet him, holding out both hands, and then the two strolled back down the gulch talking earnestly, their ...
— The Claim Jumpers • Stewart Edward White

... device that controlled the water, and wrenched it free. Kirk ran back down the path to listen, breathless, at the edge of the pool. There came first the rustle of water through long unused channels, then the shallow splash against the empty basin. Little by little the sound became ...
— The Happy Venture • Edith Ballinger Price

... know you ain't lookin' for no mama. Jus' come back down here to show your shape and fan around awhile. (BOOTSIE and TEETS going into ...
— The Mule-Bone: - A Comedy of Negro Life in Three Acts • Zora Hurston and Langston Hughes

... then pointed. "Strings!" he said. "Or rather a black thread. It runs from the top of the model, through a tiny loop in the ceiling, and back down to my hand—tied to this ring on my finger. When I back up—the model rises. It's as ...
— Toy Shop • Henry Maxwell Dempsey

... back down the stairs he could not help asking himself the question, "Does Jimmy Grayson know? Could he have consented to such an arrangement?" and at once came ...
— The Candidate - A Political Romance • Joseph Alexander Altsheler

... She looked back down the trail she had followed. Wherever the wind had a clean sweep her tracks were filling already with snow. If she did not wait, and if Jack got away now, they couldn't track him at all. She really owed him that much of a chance to beat ...
— The Lookout Man • B. M. Bower



Words linked to "Back down" :   resile, recede, move back, chicken out, withdraw, pull out, back up, retreat, retire, draw back, back off, pull away, bow out, pull back, backdown, get out



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