"Clinch" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... any consequence for our youth, but because, if we did, the temptations in a world where every man is free to grab for himself would still be almost irresistible. But there are two positive arguments for the extension of legal control that clinch the matter: ...
— Problems of Conduct • Durant Drake
... to clinch the matter, for the Moor purchased the objectionable slave, ordered Peter the Great to bring him along, and ...
— The Middy and the Moors - An Algerine Story • R.M. Ballantyne
... by the prosecution that the weakness of the bomb was a blunder on the part of the socialists, just as its premature explosion, caused by Ernest's losing his nerve and dropping it, was a blunder. And to clinch the argument, there were the several Congressmen who testified to having seen Ernest fumble and drop ...
— The Iron Heel • Jack London
... few heart-beats there was only a tangle of whirling forms with the sound of fist on flesh, then the blot split up and forms plunged outward, falling heavily. Again the sailors rushed, attempting to clinch. They massed upon Dextry only to grasp empty air, for he shifted with remarkable agility, striking bitterly, as an old wolf snaps. It was baffling work, however, for in the darkness his blows fell short ...
— The Spoilers • Rex Beach
... thrashed the matter out, and I had succeeded in bringing Polson into a far more pliant frame of mind than I had ever dared to hope for. I therefore determined to clinch the matter at once, by putting my demands into black-and-white, and securing the signatures of the crew to them before the boatswain, who was evidently a man of influence among them, should find time to alter ...
— Overdue - The Story of a Missing Ship • Harry Collingwood
... Stuyvesant, "it is just right. I want the nail to go through and come out on the other side, so that I can clinch it." ...
— Stuyvesant - A Franconia Story • Jacob Abbott
... said, gravely, "is the original of the Woods Eagle—the Eagle that intimidates us all. Do you remember what Shakespeare—one always harks back to Shakespeare to clinch an argument, because not even our foremost actors have been able to conceal the fact that he was, as somebody in Dickens acutely points out, 'a dayvilish clever fellow'—do you remember. I say, what Shakespeare observes as ...
— The Eagle's Shadow • James Branch Cabell
... can whoop yo' dawg, too," said Tad, and Chad saw that he was going to have trouble with those Dillons, for Daws winked at the other boys, and the Dillon girl laughed again scornfully—at which Chad saw Melissa's eyes flash and her hands clinch as, quite unconsciously, she moved toward him to take his part; and all at once he was glad that he had ...
— The Little Shepherd of Kingdom Come • John Fox
... alarms, which might at any moment have disturbed the public peace. That Bill of Indemnity and Oblivion had to be shaped in accordance with the Declaration issued by the King from Breda. Personally, Hyde had endeavoured to restrain the impulse which tempted the King to clinch a promising bargain by over-lavish concessions. He always held that the dignity of the King could not be satisfied without vengeance on the murderers of his father, and that the security of the Crown rendered a severe example necessary. ...
— The Life of Edward Earl of Clarendon V2 • Henry Craik
... three great encampments, on Vinegar Hill, above Enniscorthy; on Carrickbyrne, on the road leading to Ross, and on the hill of Corrigrua, seven miles from Gorey. The principal leaders of the first division were Fathers Kearns and Clinch, and Messrs. Fitzgerald, Doyle, and Redmond; of the second, Bagenal Harvey, and Father Philip Roche; of the last, Anthony Perry of Inch, Esmond Kyan, and the two Fathers Murphy, Michael, and John. The general plan of operations ...
— A Popular History of Ireland - From the earliest period to the emancipation of the Catholics • Thomas D'Arcy McGee
... viewed as a Godsend rather than as a right, he had long settled down into the belief that he was to live and die in his present station, thereby losing most of the desire to rise. The name of this man was Clinch. In consequence of his long experience, within the circle of his duties, his opinion was greatly respected by his superiors, when he was sober; and as he had the precaution not to be otherwise when engaged on service, his weakness seldom brought him into any serious difficulties. ...
— The Wing-and-Wing - Le Feu-Follet • J. Fenimore Cooper
... still, his father, Amarendra Babu, had money invested in Government paper, besides a substantial brick house—qualifications which augured well for his sister's wedded happiness. The next step was to invite his own father, Kumodini Babu, to come from Benares and help him to clinch matters. The old man pleaded that he had done with the world and all its vanities; so Jadu Babu had to make a pilgrimage to the Holy City, where he induced Kumodini Babu to return home with him. Three days later the pair went to Calcutta with two friends, in order to make the suitor's ...
— Tales of Bengal • S. B. Banerjea
... were these earnest wishings that but one man had been saved. I believe I repeated the words, "O that it had been but one!" a thousand times; and my desires were so moved by it, that when I spoke the words my hands would clinch together, and my fingers would press the palms of my hands, so that if I had had any soft thing in my hand, it would have crushed it involuntarily; and the teeth in my head would strike together, and set against one another so strong, that for some time I could not part them again. Let the naturalists ...
— The Life and Adventures of Robinson Crusoe Of York, Mariner, Vol. 1 • Daniel Defoe
... school, and sparred for a round or so, But I've fought all hands in a ten-foot ring each night in a travelling show; They earned a pound if they stayed three rounds, and they tried for it every night — In a ten-foot ring! Oh, that's the game that teaches a bloke to fight, For they'd rush and clinch, it was Dublin Rules, and we drew no colour line; And they all tried hard for to earn the pound, but they got no pound of mine: If I saw no chance in the opening round I'd slog at their wind, and wait Till an opening came — and it ALWAYS came — and I settled 'em, sure as fate; ...
— Rio Grande's Last Race and Other Verses • Andrew Barton 'Banjo' Paterson
... of the eight apprentices were unable to swim. The senior apprentice, a boy named Robert Clinch, seventeen years old, swam out, and brought back two of his young companions in safety to the keel of the upturned boat. Clinch was just starting to bring in the third lad, the youngest of them all, when there was a great swirl in the water, the grey outline of a shark rose to the ...
— Here, There And Everywhere • Lord Frederic Hamilton
... And sea-birds, screaming upward either side, Wove a vast arch above the Queen of Love, Who, gazing on this multitudinous Homaging to her beauty, laughed. She laughed The soft, delicious laughter that makes mad; Low warblings in the throat, that clinch man's life Tighter than ...
— Mosaics of Grecian History • Marcius Willson and Robert Pierpont Willson
... well enough," cried Lapham; "but if I don't clinch this offer within twenty-four hours, they'll withdraw it, and go into the market; ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... fifty pounds of clean, trail-hardened muscle and repeatedly mastered him. Time and time again he got Smoke on his back, and Smoke lay complacently and rested. But each time Saltman attempted to get off him and get away, Smoke reached out a detaining, tripping hand that brought about a new clinch and wrestle. ...
— Smoke Bellew • Jack London
... to clinch his fist and shake it at Clif; and then he retired into a corner to snarl ...
— A Prisoner of Morro - In the Hands of the Enemy • Upton Sinclair
... sparred for a moment, then came in again, hitting heavily. Kennedy's counter missed its mark this time. He just stopped a round sweep of Walton's right, ducked to avoid a similar effort of his left, and they came together in a clinch. ...
— The Head of Kay's • P. G. Wodehouse
... another. The long, thin white hair, curly at the ends, the aristocratic beak of a nose, the crumpled, wide, raveling shirt front, the string tie, with the bow nearly under one ear, were almost exactly duplicated. And then, to clinch the imitation, he wore the twin to the Major's supposed to be unparalleled coat. High-collared, baggy, empire-waisted, ample-skirted, hanging a foot lower in front than behind, the garment could have been designed from no other pattern. From then on, the ...
— The Best American Humorous Short Stories • Various
... it, the farmer made her say out loud, "The Blessing of God be upon your cattle!" To clinch the matter, he compelled her to repeat the Lord's Prayer, which she was able to do, without missing one syllable. She used the form of words which are not found in the prayer book, but are in the Bible, and was very ...
— Welsh Fairy Tales • William Elliot Griffis
... bribe. They need not resort to illegal or unethical methods. The ordinary channels of advertising, of business acquaintance and patronage, of philanthropy and of social intercourse clinch their power over the ...
— The American Empire • Scott Nearing
... Six of the men, including Boon's eldest son, were slain, and the cattle scattered; and though the backwoodsmen rallied and repulsed their assailants, yet they had suffered such loss and damage that they retreated and took up their abode temporarily on the Clinch River. ...
— The Winning of the West, Volume One - From the Alleghanies to the Mississippi, 1769-1776 • Theodore Roosevelt
... you," said Moretti, as he untied some papers he had been carrying, and sat down at a table to glance over them, "Did I not tell you that when all other arguments fail, the unanswerable one of woman can be brought in to clinch every business?" ...
— The Master-Christian • Marie Corelli
... help him. We'll feed 'em up a bit for two or three days, and then starve 'em for two or three more to put it straight. Now then, sir, you stick the fork into they three bits, and you shall feed 'em, that'll clinch old Nibbler's ...
— First in the Field - A Story of New South Wales • George Manville Fenn
... and a little woman in a gray dress, with sort of illuminating hair, slides off and looks around quick. And the Boy Avenger sees her, and yells 'Mamma,' and she cries 'O!' and they meet in a clinch, and now the pesky redskins can come forth from their caves on the plains without fear any more of the rifle of Roy, the Red Wolf. Mrs. Conyers comes up and thanks me an' John Tom without the usual extremities you always look for ...
— Rolling Stones • O. Henry
... police), this treacherous friend agreed to insert into the pamphlet three or four phrases which exposed it to seizure and caused its author to be summoned before the court of assizes. Now the way to make the explanation clinch the doubt in Thuillier's mind is to let him know that the next day la Peyrade, who, as Thuillier knew, hadn't a sou, paid Dutocq precisely that very sum ...
— The Lesser Bourgeoisie • Honore de Balzac
... philanderin' after we've settled whar we are, what we're goin', and what's goin' to happen. Jest now it 'pears to me that ez these yere logs are the only thing betwixt us and 'kingdom come,' ye'd better be hustlin' round with a few spikes to clinch ...
— Mr. Jack Hamlin's Mediation and Other Stories • Bret Harte
... clinch your ladyship's determination at once. May I make use of your writing table? Have you any other ink than this rose-coloured ink, with which to be sure, your ladyship generally writes your letters, but which is a little ...
— The Poor Plutocrats • Maurus Jokai
... would have found it easy to escape from his dilemma by denying that he had either given or received the penny. In early times, before writing became a common accomplishment, and when, as now, men might be eager to clinch a bargain without loss of time, it was desirable in the interests of common honesty that such agreements should be made in the light of day and in the face of the world. This custom appears to have continued to a late date. Thus, if O'Keeffe the dramatist may be believed, ...
— The Customs of Old England • F. J. Snell
... heard his native Bells on every stile; The sound recall'd him with a pow'rful charm, The Heath wide open'd, and the day was warm; There, where a bed of tempting green he found, Increasing anguish weigh'd him to the ground; His well-grown limbs the scatter'd Daisies press'd, While his clinch'd hand fell heavy on his breast. 'Why do I go in cruel sport to say, "I love thee, Jane; appoint the happy day?" 'Why seek her sweet ingenuous reply, 'Then grasp her hand and proffer—poverty? 'Why, if I love her and adore her name, 'Why act like time ...
— Rural Tales, Ballads, and Songs • Robert Bloomfield
... on her, sir; I was afraid she was coming into the shop after me, and my arm was too sore for me to want her to clinch hold on it again. So when she started to go, I took a step nearer, and saw her move toward the curbstone and hold up her hand. But it wasn't a car she was after, for none came ...
— The Circular Study • Anna Katharine Green
... privileged to be discursive in a little book which seeks to hit the nail on the head in every paragraph, drive it home in every page, and clinch it in every chapter, and there would be no excuse, therefore, for sketching, even in brief outline, the history of the various attempts that have been made, from Brown-Sequard, with his Elixir, to Metchnikoff, with his benevolent bacteria of the intestinal tract, to extract from ...
— The Goat-gland Transplantation • Sydney B. Flower
... this, exchanged darkly significant glances with her two main supporters, and Mr. Tubbs came to the fore with an offer to clinch matters by discovering the grave of Bill Halliwell, with its marked stone, on the point above the cave within ...
— Spanish Doubloons • Camilla Kenyon
... it would be more satisfactory to go, for perhaps Ellis might give her the slip, or, if the big brother objected, she might add her persuasions to Ellis's and so clinch the matter. Yet while she stood waiting for Ellis to make his request for the boat, she had many compunctions of conscience. She had never before done so bold and desperate a thing. She had scarcely ever appeared ...
— Three Little Cousins • Amy E. Blanchard
... shame which this last thought aroused, following in the train of her bitter reasoning, that caused her to quicken her pace and clinch her hands. That same pride, which had been her ally hitherto, had come to her rescue once more. She said to herself that she had done what she knew was right, and that no force of cruel circumstances should induce her to regret that she had not acted differently. She would prove still that ...
— The Law-Breakers and Other Stories • Robert Grant
... him gifted with wonderful self-control, but when I looked up from my work all color had faded from his cheeks, the lips seemed ready to yield the little blood left there by the clinch of the white-teeth upon them, while every muscle of the face quivered with spasmodic effort to control emotion. When the eyes were opened and fixed on the ceiling, I saw no trace in them of anger, revenge, or even of wounded pride. They were full of tears, ready to gush in one last flood-tide ...
— Lippincott's Magazine Of Popular Literature And Science, No. 23, February, 1873, Vol. XI. • Various
... evidence against him, at any time. The robbery of the Hailesbury gallery at London, when the famous Whistler portrait of the Duchess of Winterton was cut from its frame, was traced almost to his door. But the scent died out before they could clinch the matter, and he escaped. It was believed that the thing was planned by him and executed by a confederate. Several other occurrences of like nature, but of less importance, have been laid against him. But, if he ...
— Ashton-Kirk, Investigator • John T. McIntyre
... away, not attempting to strike as the clinch was broken. But an instant later Dave came back, dancing all around his dazed opponent, landing on the short ribs, on the breast bone, under either ear and finally on the ...
— Dave Darrin's Second Year at Annapolis - Or, Two Midshipmen as Naval Academy "Youngsters" • H. Irving Hancock
... the two stood at arm's length and sparred. In this style of fighting, however, the young Englishman had all the better of it and after he had landed several blows upon the pirate's face and body, the latter rushed into a clinch. ...
— The Boy Allies with Uncle Sams Cruisers • Ensign Robert L. Drake
... Isaac Cutter and his wife, who had money to spend, and were not averse to showing it; there was Miss Eliza Clinch, who had spent her fifty years of life in looking for a bargain, which she had not yet found; and some others. But though the Skipper was courteous to all, he kept close to the side of Mr. Endymion Scraper; and the boy John, ...
— Nautilus • Laura E. Richards
... a clinch, meeting his antagonist's rushes with straight lefts, and following with futile swings of his right. The tough was too skilled to be caught with a solid blow. Once Roger landed full on the jaw with what he expected to be a knockout and the blow glanced harmlessly, ...
— The Plunderer • Henry Oyen
... proves that Nat must have been aboard the schooner secretly; what he told his father and his eagerness to bet with me on a proposition that seemed foolhardy on the face of it clinch the thing in my mind. The misguided fool! That, Elsa, is an example of how low a man will go who has been spoiled and brought up without the slightest idea ...
— The Harbor of Doubt • Frank Williams
... Finger and thumb Clinch his small nose, A gurgle, a gasp, And down it goes; Scowls Henry now; But mark that cheek, Sleek with the bloom Of ...
— Peacock Pie, A Book of Rhymes • Walter de la Mare
... know the moves, sir; I have been on board a guardo. Top your boom, I say, and be off, or I'll have you hauled up and riveted in a clinch—both fore-tacks over the main-yard, and no bloody knife to cut the seizing. Sheer! or I'll pitch into you like a shin of beef ...
— White Jacket - or, the World on a Man-of-War • Herman Melville
... swollen and his eyes glaring, he kept throttling the officer with one hand, while with the other clenched he began to strike him violent blows in the face. The Prussian struggled, tried to draw his sword, to clinch with his adversary, who was on top of him. But M. Dubuis crushed him with his enormous weight and kept punching him without taking breath or knowing where his blows fell. Blood flowed down the face of the German, who, choking and with a rattling in his throat, spat ...
— Maupassant Original Short Stories (180), Complete • Guy de Maupassant
... the place of execution in carts; but he denies that there is any deep significance in the cart, and he is prepared to maintain this view by a chemical analysis of the timber of which the cart was built. To clinch his argument he appeals to plain matter of fact and his own personal experience. Not a single instance, he assures us with apparent satisfaction, can be produced of a witch who escaped the axe or the fire in this fashion. "I have myself," says ...
— Balder The Beautiful, Vol. I. • Sir James George Frazer
... but he seemed a little uncomfortable under his wife's stare of amazement. "But," he added, in a tone meant to clinch the argument, ...
— The Watchers of the Plains - A Tale of the Western Prairies • Ridgewell Cullum
... chance whatever: but he did not intend to be made an exhibition of in front of Sally without doing something to hold his end up. He proposed to go down with his flag flying, and in pursuance of this object he dug Mr. Butler heavily in the lower ribs with his right, causing that expert to clinch and the two wise guys to utter sharp barking sounds expressive ...
— The Adventures of Sally • P. G. Wodehouse
... are victorious, all commanders should press forward in order to clinch the advantage gained and to use their reserves ...
— Manual of Military Training - Second, Revised Edition • James A. Moss
... the murder of their agent, General Thompson, and other acts of cruel treachery. When this alarming and unexpected intelligence reached the seat of Government, every effort appears to have been made to reenforce General Clinch, who commanded the troops then in Florida. General Eustis was dispatched with reenforcements from Charleston, troops were called out from Alabama, Tennessee, and Georgia, and General Scott was sent to take the command, ...
— State of the Union Addresses of Martin van Buren • Martin van Buren
... a vague idea of village politics, but he had more important things to think of. Most of his foul mood had disappeared with the clue he'd stumbled on, and his chief worry now was to clinch ...
— Badge of Infamy • Lester del Rey
... on the floor, stretch the arms over the head till the hands touch the floor. Clinch the fists. Take a deep breath and hold it. Now raise the arms slowly, keeping the fists clinched, and bring them down at the sides, raising the head from the floor at same time. Raise the arms and stretch them on the floor over the head at same time, letting the head sink back to the floor, ...
— What a Young Woman Ought to Know • Mary Wood-Allen
... sink under him—and I believe he is a bit particular on that point." "Good morning," I said curtly. He looked at me as though I had been an incomprehensible fool. . . . "Must be moving, Captain Robinson," he yelled suddenly into the old man's ear. "These Parsee Johnnies are waiting for us to clinch the bargain." He took his partner under the arm with a firm grip, swung him round, and, unexpectedly, leered at me over his shoulder. "I was trying to do him a kindness," he asserted, with an air and tone that made my blood boil. "Thank you for nothing—in his name," I rejoined. "Oh! you ...
— Lord Jim • Joseph Conrad
... immediately threw a bucket of water on the fire to prevent them from seeing us, made us lie on the floor, bolted and barred the door, and posted herself there with an axe and rifle: We never knew why they desisted from an attack or how father escaped. In two or three days all of us set out for Clinch Mountain to the wedding of Happy Kincaid, a clever young fellow from Holston, and Sally McClure, a fine girl of seventeen, modest and pretty, yet fearless. We knew the Shawnees were about; that our fort and household effects must be left unguarded and might be destroyed; that we incurred ...
— Woman on the American Frontier • William Worthington Fowler
... the outset that he was up against a hard fight. In his hurry to close with the red-bearded man, his foot had slipped on the slimy grass and he had been forced to clinch to save himself from falling. This placed him at a marked disadvantage. His opponent had the best of him in weight by at least twenty pounds and was heavily muscled. Moreover he possessed a certain agility on the grass-covered ...
— El Diablo • Brayton Norton
... called for jiu-jitsu work, he didn't rest satisfied with learning just enough to "get by." Every spare moment found him in a clinch with the Japanese expert, mastering every secret, perfecting himself in every hold. Same way with boxing. When no pugilists came handy, he put on the gloves with anyone willing to take chances on a black eye, keeping at it until today they have to hire professionals ...
— Laugh and Live • Douglas Fairbanks
... Not until our boat's nose grated alongside the landing was the bargain concluded, and the first runner, a bag of silver in his fist, almost tumbled upon us down the slippery stairs in his hurry to clinch it. ...
— Sir John Constantine • Prosper Paleologus Constantine
... 1756 settlements were also made on New river and on Holstein.[17] Among the daring adventurers who effected them, were Evan Shelby, William Campbell, William Preston and Daniel Boone, all of whom became distinguished characters in subsequent history. Thomas Walden,[18] who was afterwards killed on Clinch river and from whom the mountain dividing Clinch and Powel rivers derived its name, was likewise one of them. The lands taken up by them, were held as "corn rights" each acquiring a title to an hundred acres of the ...
— Chronicles of Border Warfare • Alexander Scott Withers
... together, the very thing that must be religiously stifled and hid, emanated from her like fragrance from a flower; sharply reawakening his own temptation to respond—were it only to ease her pain. And there was more in it than that—or very soon would be, if he hesitated much longer to clinch matters by telling her the truth; though every nerve shrank from the ordeal—for himself and her. Running away from oneself was plainly a futile experiment. To have so failed with her, disheartened him badly and dwarfed his proud ...
— Far to Seek - A Romance of England and India • Maud Diver
... that now that the nail was driven home, he would clinch it on the other side and make it stay forever. He moved a reconsideration of the vote by which the bill had passed. The motion was lost, of course, and the great Industrial University act was an accomplished ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... wine-shops. Carts piled up with baskets, or crowded with peasants from a distance on their way to the vineyards, jostled the low railway trucks laden with bran-new casks, and the somewhat rickety cabriolets of the agents of the big champagne houses, reduced to clinch their final bargain for a hundred or more pices of the peerless wine of ...
— Facts About Champagne and Other Sparkling Wines • Henry Vizetelly
... fist struck Murray's solid jaw, scraping the skin off his knuckles, but Murray swayed to the blow, sapping its force, and came in to clinch. They rolled on the floor. Murray twisted Sime's head painfully, bit his ear. But in the next split ...
— The Martian Cabal • Roman Frederick Starzl
... wasn't comparin' 'em; I'll leave that for you Come-Outers to do. Drat this carpet! Seems's if I never saw such long tacks; I do believe whoever put 'em down drove 'em clean through the center of the earth and let the Chinymen clinch 'em on t'other side. I haul up a chunk of the cellar floor with every one. Ah, hum!" with a sigh, "I cal'late they ain't any more anxious to leave home than I am. But, far's the minister's concerned, didn't I hear of your Uncle Eben sayin' in prayer meetin' ...
— Keziah Coffin • Joseph C. Lincoln
... and graduated with a precise symmetry, rises to an extreme altitude of 220 feet 6 inches. The extreme length is about 170 ft. The massive oaken front doors are carved handsomely, and contain the arms of the Stewart family, the Clinch family (Mrs. Stewart's maiden name), the Hilton family, and those of Bishop Littlejohn, the Episcopal head of the Long Island Diocese. The porch or tower entrance, which is the main entrance to the building, is paved with white marble. ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 488, May 9, 1885 • Various
... the effect of being sent straight forth, as if to a mark, with the last word made the telling one, and so kept well up in force and pitch. The accumulating force has the effect of sending the last word home, or of making it the one to clinch ...
— Public Speaking • Irvah Lester Winter
... so at breakfast, didn't I? Silly women always do have to have idees druv into their heads, like nails, 'fore they can clinch 'em. Eunice 'lowed that we'd ought to have a lot more small sticks chopped," answered the man who managed the estate but was presumably managed himself by Miss Maitland. He had his axe over his shoulder, ...
— The Brass Bound Box • Evelyn Raymond
... breast. When head of wing-bone is drawn down to same distance as above, from body, bend wire sharply forward to lay upon body, thus setting shoulder joint so that it is flexible. Now turn over end of wire left protruding from side of breast and clinch it into body squarely. When wings are set shake skin down ...
— Taxidermy • Leon Luther Pray
... fool! don't you see the gal's a-playing one of you off agin t'other, and maybe don't care a pin for neither? Get shet of her once for all, and be a man; can't ye?' And then I'd find I couldn't; and so it went till we come to that night, and stood there on the edge of the crick,—two on us ready to clinch and fight till one cried enough, and t'other a-laughing ...
— Outpost • J.G. Austin
... which our friends either forget us, or recollect our vices. Our virtues are best acknowledged when we are standing nigh and ready to enforce them. Like the argumentative eloquence of the Eighth Harry, they are never effectual until the halberdiers clinch their ...
— Charlemont • W. Gilmore Simms
... that the opinions of old men about life have been accepted as final. All sorts of allowances are made for the illusions of youth; and none, or almost none, for the disenchantments of age. It is held to be a good taunt, and somehow or other to clinch the question logically, when an old gentleman waggles his head and says: 'Ah, so I thought when I was your age.' It is not thought an answer at all, if the young man retorts: My venerable sir, so I shall most ...
— The Pocket R.L.S. - Being Favourite Passages from the Works of Stevenson • Robert Louis Stevenson
... referee to make them break away when they clinch." When she explained that Pleasant scratched ...
— In Happy Valley • John Fox
... added Destyn, "can be instantly switched on to a private psychical current which will clinch the only girl in the world. Engagements will be superfluous; those two simply can't get away from ...
— The Green Mouse • Robert W. Chambers
... imperial province; the title of this officer must have been propraetor." But when the critics studied a little more, they found out that Augustus put this province back under the Senate, so that Luke's title is exactly right. And to clinch the matter, old coins of this very date have been found in Cyprus, giving to the chief magistrate of the island the title of proconsul. Such evidences of the accuracy of the writer are not wanting. It is needless to insist that he never makes a mistake; doubtless he does, in some small matters, ...
— Who Wrote the Bible? • Washington Gladden
... "Mr. Clinch is one of the best foremen that ever rode the range or roped a steer," went on Melton, "and what he don't know about a ranch isn't worth knowing. I've got to go up to the house now to look over some accounts and I'm going to leave you in his care. You remember, Sandy, ...
— Bert Wilson in the Rockies • J. W. Duffield
... uncircumcised converts with the Jewish, given by their possession of the same divine Spirit, and has flung fiery questions at the Judaisers, which silenced them. Then, after the impressive hush following his eager words, Barnabas and Paul tell their story once more, and clinch the nail driven by Peter by asserting that God had already by 'signs and wonders' given His sanction to the admission of Gentiles without circumcision. Characteristically, in Jerusalem Barnabas is restored to his place above Paul, and is named ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture: The Acts • Alexander Maclaren
... I've a mighty great mind to tell her at once all I intend to do, and just clinch the matter," cried Paddy; but Paul wouldn't undertake to translate for him, and advised him to restrain his feelings for ...
— Paul Gerrard - The Cabin Boy • W.H.G. Kingston
... Extinguished with a crash,—and all was black. The brows of men by the despairing light Wore an unearthly aspect, as by fits The flashes fell upon them; some lay down And bid their eyes and wept; and some did rest Their chins upon their clinchd hands and smiled; And others hurried to and fro, and fed Their funeral piles with fuel, and looked up With mad disquietude on the dull sky, The pall of a past world; and then again With curses ...
— Ragnarok: The Age of Fire and Gravel • Ignatius Donnelly
... general roustabout had performed his part. Our little man, Garfield, too, had found employment in holding the hammer to clinch the nails and giving much advice on the coming voyage. All were busy, I say, and no one had given a thought of what we were about to encounter from the port officials farther up the coast; it was pretended ...
— Voyage of the Liberdade • Captain Joshua Slocum
... table between us, so he'd have a chance to talk. But even that didn't work. He smothered my laughing in kisses, and held me up close to him and said I was wonderful. Then we'd try to get down to earth again, and talk sensibly, and then there'd be another death-clinch. Dinky-Dunk says I'm worse than he is. "Of course it's all up with a man," he confessed, "when he sees you coming for him with that ...
— The Prairie Wife • Arthur Stringer
... associate; put together, lay together, clap together, hang together, lump together, hold together, piece together [Fr.], tack together, fix together, bind up together together; embody, reembody^; roll into one. attach, fix, affix, saddle on, fasten, bind, secure, clinch, twist, make fast &c adj.; tie, pinion, string, strap, sew, lace, tat, stitch, tack, knit, button, buckle, hitch, lash, truss, bandage, braid, splice, swathe, gird, tether, moor, picket, harness, chain; fetter &c (restrain) 751; lock, latch, belay, brace, ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... undeveloped phase of S. fusca, which, of course, it is not. It needed not the authority of Rostafinski, Mon., p. 197, to assure us this. The earlier authors describe the species in course of development to complete maturity, and clinch the story by declaring the form a constant companion of the commonly recognized amaurochete, so fixing the relationship for us by ...
— The North American Slime-Moulds • Thomas H. (Thomas Huston) MacBride
... the wagon teams brought us to the foot of Pine Mountain at the point where the road leaves the bed of Elk Fork to climb the steep ascent. We were now only nineteen miles from Jacksboro, in the valley of the Clinch, but the distance was multiplied by the cumulating difficulties of the way. We were not far from Cross Mountain, a ridge which, as its name indicates, connects the long parallel ranges of Jellico, Pine, ...
— Military Reminiscences of the Civil War V2 • Jacob Dolson Cox
... Clinch, one of the ablest seamen on board, was steering the launch, and Scott kept the run of the courses; but as long as the craft had three feet of water under her, she was all right. The conversation took place in the cabin, as the explorers called ...
— Four Young Explorers - Sight-Seeing in the Tropics • Oliver Optic
... mother's room, not from a sense of duty, but a desire to clinch the matter finally. Lady Rylton would be the last person to permit backsliding where her own interests were concerned, and perhaps—— He does not exactly say it to himself in so many words, but he feels a certain dread of the moment when ...
— The Hoyden • Mrs. Hungerford
... alarm out for him a couple of years. You kids never knew that, hey?" And by way of a pleasantry he hit Roy a rap with his bulging wallet. "We'll measure him up down yonder. The face is enough, but these specifications will clinch it." ...
— Roy Blakeley in the Haunted Camp • Percy Keese Fitzhugh
... novelty in these particulars; keeping as true to education as if you had never left the settlements. With me the case is different, and I never want to clinch an idee, that I do not feel a wish to swear about it. If you know'd all that I know consarning Judith, you'd find a justification for a little cussing. Now, the officers sometimes stray over to the lake, from the forts on the Mohawk, to fish and hunt, and then the creatur' seems ...
— The Deerslayer • James Fenimore Cooper
... his place. Bang! went an easel. "Nom de Dieu!" in French,—"Where in h—l are you goin'!" in English. Crash! a paintbox fell with brushes and all on board. "Dieu de Dieu de—" spat! A blow, a short rush, a clinch and scuffle, and the voice of the ...
— The King In Yellow • Robert W. Chambers
... like this, as can be drawn from the history of that dreadful process by which men "are deemed, sold, taken, reputed, and adjudged in law to be chattels personal?" Can all this force you to put the cap upon the climax—to clinch the nail by doing that, without which nothing in the work of slave-making would be attempted? The slaveholder is the soul of the whole system. Without him, the chattel principle is a lifeless abstraction. Without him, charters, ...
— The Anti-Slavery Examiner, Omnibus • American Anti-Slavery Society
... insisted on it. He knew his place as well as any man, but his eye fell on the rabbit and he looked very queer and nearly dropped a cup. She saw it and began to tremble and go white, and it came over me then that now or never was the time to clinch matters or she'd nearly die from shame and I couldn't soothe ...
— The Strange Cases of Dr. Stanchon • Josephine Daskam Bacon
... not to be denied. They had caught the 'Varsity "off its stride," and they fought like tigers to clinch their advantage. Every ounce of strength and determination that they possessed was called to the front by the prospect of impending victory. A daring run around the left end netted them twenty yards, and they gained fifteen more on downs. An easy forward pass was ...
— Bert Wilson on the Gridiron • J. W. Duffield
... his sad history has been so much a personal burden to yourself. I'm afraid that after the many disappointments he has inflicted upon you, you will be doubtful of my judgment. Yet I do think that the critical moment has arrived when by surprising him thus we might clinch the matter of his future behaviour once and for all. His conduct here has been so humble and patient and in every way exemplary that my heart bleeds for him. Therefore, my dear Bishop of Warwick, ...
— The Altar Steps • Compton MacKenzie
... a day behind the fair and will only hear of my death from the man behind the counter who is struggling to clinch her over a collar for ...
— Margot Asquith, An Autobiography: Volumes I & II • Margot Asquith
... his breakfast. Sometimes they had a little set-to, with beaks not more than three inches apart, the woodpecker making feints of rushing upon his vis-a-vis, and the cardinal jumping up ready to clinch, if a fight became necessary. It never went quite so far as that, though they glared at each other, and the cardinal uttered a little whispered "ha!" every time ...
— A Bird-Lover in the West • Olive Thorne Miller
... right from any flank attacks which might be hurled against it from Paris, the Germans placed a strong army under von Kluck in front of that city to hold the French left in check, as a boxer in a clinch holds back his opponent's left arm. Von Kluck fought his way to a position approximately defined by a line through Creil, Senlis, Nanteuil-le-Haudouin, and Lizy-sur-Ourg. His cavalry advanced even to Chantilly and Crecy. His army was not intended to have any part in the ...
— The Note-Book of an Attache - Seven Months in the War Zone • Eric Fisher Wood
... purpose of lightening a ship which is aground, they must be buoyed, and care is to be taken that each buoy-rope is of a proper length and strong enough to weigh the gun. The best mode of securing the buoy-rope to the gun is to form a clinch or splice an eye in the end which goes over the cascabel, and take a half-hitch with the bight around the chase of the gun, and stop ...
— Ordnance Instructions for the United States Navy. - 1866. Fourth edition. • Bureau of Ordnance, USN
... "it's time this circus was over, anyway, and if Carter will take my bid I'll clinch that deal with you. Have the pack and ...
— Alton of Somasco • Harold Bindloss
... the farmer, assisted by his relatives and friends, begins the clearing without delay. It is essential that at least a little work be done in order to clinch the bargain with the powers above, for should a delay occur the omens might go awry and necessitate a repetition of the ceremonies and even an abandonment of the farm. I heard of several cases where prospective farms were abandoned under ...
— The Manbos of Mindano - Memoirs of the National Academy of Sciences, Volume XXIII, First Memoir • John M. Garvan
... panted for release, he fumbled aimlessly for it among the blankets. Then he remembered. He slid a hand up the clerk's belt to the sheath-knife; and they drew very close to each other in that last clinch. ...
— The Son of the Wolf • Jack London
... unsettled in their opinions concerning the wonder, and got to be in that condition of mind when a man does not know what to think of any particular event. The bee-hunter, quick-witted, and managing for his life, was not slow to perceive the advantage he had gained, and he proceeded at once to clinch the nail he had so skilfully driven. Turning from Cloud to the head-chief of the party, a warrior whom he had no difficulty in recognizing, after having so long watched his movements in the earlier part of the night, he pushed the same subject ...
— Oak Openings • James Fenimore Cooper
... if thou dost know him again, thou mayst take him; but if thou dost not know him again, he shall serve another year with me."—"Good!" cried the man. So they shook hands upon it, had a good drink to clinch the bargain, and the man went back to his own home, while Oh took the son away ...
— Cossack Fairy Tales and Folk Tales • Anonymous
... enemy advanced upon Rogersville in heavy force, drove Colonel Morgan away and followed him closely. He retreated without loss, although constantly skirmishing to Kingsport, twenty-five miles from Rogersville, and crossing Clinch river at nightfall, prepared to dispute the passage of the enemy. He believed that he could do so successfully, but his force was too small to guard all of the fords, and the next morning the enemy got across, attacked and defeated him, capturing him, more than ...
— History of Morgan's Cavalry • Basil W. Duke
... passage of this Amendment will clinch the whole subject; it will bring the War, I have no doubt, rapidly to a close.'"—Arnold's Life of Lincoln, ...
— The Great Conspiracy, Complete • John Alexander Logan
... of Gold.—As if to clinch the hold on California already secured by the friends of free soil, there came in 1848 the sudden discovery of gold at Sutter's Mill in the Sacramento Valley. When this exciting news reached the East, a mighty ...
— History of the United States • Charles A. Beard and Mary R. Beard
... great facts which clinch the argument that this is a great struggle for freedom. The first is the fact that America has come in. She would not have come in otherwise. When France in the eighteenth century sent her soldiers to America to fight for the freedom and independence of that land, ...
— Winning a Cause - World War Stories • John Gilbert Thompson and Inez Bigwood
... back, but rushed into another clinch as Duval raised his revolver. Ducking, Chester drove his fist to his opponent's chin, even as the latter pressed the trigger. The bullet whistled harmlessly over ...
— The Boy Allies in the Trenches - Midst Shot and Shell Along the Aisne • Clair Wallace Hayes
... about to come out through the coroner's office, but I settled as soon as I read the first newspaper item—here it is." He handed to me a clipping which Smith had used to clinch the payment of what he ...
— Cupid's Middleman • Edward B. Lent
... he had won, and to clinch the victory said, in his forceful manner: "Louis XII will not live a year; let me carry to the king your consent, and I guarantee you his promise ...
— When Knighthood Was in Flower • Charles Major
... the day before the inquest in talking to various persons and in going over my story, testing it link by link. I could only find the one weakness which seemed to be involved in Martin's sitting up until 12.30; and since his having been instructed to do so was certainly a part of the plan, meant to clinch the alibi for Marlowe, I knew there must be an explanation somewhere. If I could not find that explanation, my theory was valueless. I must be able to show that at the time Martin went up to bed the man who had shut ...
— Trent's Last Case - The Woman in Black • E.C. (Edmund Clerihew) Bentley
... by raising his eyebrows and tilting his head sideways; a shrug with an accent, as it were. Then he allowed Sebastian to clinch his argument by saying that the Englishman seemed to be getting the better of his emotion; for here was a week, said he, and he had not once been into the shop to inquire for his relic. Sebastian was down upon the admission. ...
— The Spanish Jade • Maurice Hewlett
... clinch, and the sheriff got the better of the close fighting. Rathburn's face was bleeding, where it had been cut on a leg of the chair, when they were struggling on the floor. The feel of trickling crimson drove him mad. He threw Long off ...
— The Coyote - A Western Story • James Roberts
... boulevard brood Gyratory in convolvements militant-mad; Theatrical of faith in the Belliform, Her Og, Her Monstrous. Fled what force she had To buckle the jaw-gape, wide agog For the Preconcerted One, The Anticipated, ripe to clinch the whole; Queen-bee to hive the hither ...
— The Book of Humorous Verse • Various
... essential, is but the ground work for combining and working out the problems of the future. He was epigrammatic, terse, and gifted with a quaint humour, with which he was apt, even when in the driest philosophy, to drive in and clinch ...
— The Blind Spot • Austin Hall and Homer Eon Flint
... two was not marked by the effusion vocal, gymnastical, osculatory and catechetical that distinguishes the greetings of their unprofessional sisters in society. There was a brief clinch, two simultaneous labial dabs and they stood on the same footing of the old days. Very much like the short salutations of soldiers or of travellers in foreign wilds are the welcomes between the strollers at the corners of their ...
— The Voice of the City • O. Henry
... pile of baggage in the boat seemed to furnish sufficient testimony to clinch the argument he ...
— Down the Rhine - Young America in Germany • Oliver Optic
... some of which continue to this day. To spit for luck upon the first coin earned or gained by trading, before putting it into the pocket or purse, is a common practice. To spit in your hand before grasping the hand of a person with whom you are dealing, and whose offer you accept, is held to clinch the bargain, and make it binding on both sides. This is a very old custom. Captain Burt, in his letters, says that when in a bargain between two Highlanders, each of them wets the ball of his thumb with his mouth, and then they press their wet thumb balls ...
— Folk Lore - Superstitious Beliefs in the West of Scotland within This Century • James Napier
... tiny antlers clinch and strain as life grapples in a million avid points, and threshing things strike and die, letting their hate live on in the spreading purple of a wound... I too will make covert of a crevice in the night, and turn and watch... nose at the ...
— Sun-Up and Other Poems • Lola Ridge
... foreman, was already at work. Out at the head of the great fill a dozen men were dumping the carts as they came in an endless stream from the cutting. Suddenly there was a casting down of shovels, a shrill altercation, a clinch, a flash of steel in the August sunlight, and one of the disputants was down, his heels drumming on the soft ...
— Empire Builders • Francis Lynde
... big man who was leaning on his cane, still looking at me, "it is as bad to lie about a thing as it is to steal. I saw you pick something up, and to me it had the appearance of money." He struck his cane on the floor as he spoke, and grasped it firmer, as if to clinch his remark. ...
— The Universal Reciter - 81 Choice Pieces of Rare Poetical Gems • Various
... peace-pipe at his hearth. Long before she had reached the stature of woman she had sat on her stool beside that jovial old man, her father, grimy from his forge, and drunk the tales wide-eyed, to creep away and watch the stars, to dream of those dashing streams and to clinch her hands for that she was not ...
— The Maid of the Whispering Hills • Vingie E. Roe
... answered the earl with a stately smile, "seldom express much satisfaction with the terms of their rejection; but I cannot say that Lord Ballindine testified any strong emotion." He rose from the sofa as he said this, and then, intending to clinch the nail, added as he went to the door—"to tell the truth, Fanny, I think Lord Ballindine is much more eager for an alliance with your fair self now, than he was a few days back, when he could never find a moment's time to leave his horses, and his friend Mr Blake, either to see ...
— The Kellys and the O'Kellys • Anthony Trollope
... affection, and, maybe, over-estimating their hold upon the public interest. Excepting General Jackson, who was a fighter and not a talker, their public men, with Henry Clay and Felix Grundy in the lead, were "stump orators." He who could not relate and impersonate an anecdote to illustrate and clinch his argument, nor "make the welkin ring" with the clarion tones of his voice, was politically good for nothing. James K. Polk and James C. Jones led the van of stump orators in Tennessee, Ben Hardin, John J. Crittenden ...
— Marse Henry, Complete - An Autobiography • Henry Watterson
... quietly toward him, intending to take him unawares, failing in his eagerness to make the capture to allow Monkey to make an attack upon the case with his hatchet sufficiently to "clinch" ...
— The Boy Scouts on the Yukon • Ralph Victor
... of Cincinnati come back to the kindergarten teachers for an hour's kindergartening once each week, in order to clinch the kindergarten influence on the lives of the first graders. The first grade teachers meet the director of kindergartening once each week, for a discussion of kindergarten methods, and an initiation into the kindergarten spirit. Thus the lump of first grade abstraction is leavened ...
— The New Education - A Review of Progressive Educational Movements of the Day (1915) • Scott Nearing
... officials sought to clinch their arguments by stating, that not alone did the conclave consist of the chief members of the university, the senior doctors of theology, medicine, and law, the professors of the humanities, rhetoric, and philosophy, and all the various other dignitaries; but that the debate was ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Vol. 1 • Charles Dudley Warner
... in the shadow of the tall hickory timber the man Ump, doubled like a finger, was feeling tenderly over the coffin joints and the steel blue hoofs of the Bay Eagle, blowing away the dust from the clinch of each shoe-nail and pressing the flat calks with his thumb. No mother ever explored with more loving care the mouth of her child for evidence of a coming tooth. Ump was on his never-ending quest for the loose shoe-nail. It was the serious business ...
— Dwellers in the Hills • Melville Davisson Post
... was so impressed by his tone of quietistic mysticism that he felt sure the philosophic doctor was guided by "the inward light," and wrote, sending a godly book, and proposing to clinch his conversion in a personal interview. Such are the perils that environ the man who not only repeats a creed in sincerity, but ventures to do and to utter his ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol 6 • Various
... Odysseus, to clinch the reunion and fulfil customary law, advises Agamemnon to bring out the gifts of atonement (the gifts prepared in Book IX.), after which the right thing is for him to give a feast of reconciliation, "that Achilles ...
— Homer and His Age • Andrew Lang
... sprung to clinch Laney's arms, but Laney's fingers caught him in the throat, and I thought surely Faddo was gone, for his tongue stood out a finger-length, and he ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... plainly what he had meant to imply. If he told such a story, things would go hard with Gordon. In court it would clinch the case against him by supplying the one missing link in the chain ...
— The Yukon Trail - A Tale of the North • William MacLeod Raine
... Bishop caution. I could see he feared Harding's enormous strength and that he aimed to wind him if possible. He managed to elude the grasp of his antagonist for probably a minute, and more by luck than skill fell on top when the end of the clinch came. But Harding was not down by any means, and there then ensued a struggle which made me oblivious to ...
— John Henry Smith - A Humorous Romance of Outdoor Life • Frederick Upham Adams
... looked about him as though to choose a place. But he couldn't find one. He pointed vaguely, first at Maria, as though she was the thing to burn, and then at the landscape generally. "Then you can dance round it," he added convincingly to clinch the matter. ...
— The Extra Day • Algernon Blackwood
... have," grinned Andy, promptly. "Never could bear to let anything puzzle me long. Used to lie awake half the night trying to clinch a name that had just slipped a ...
— The Airplane Boys among the Clouds - or, Young Aviators in a Wreck • John Luther Langworthy
... powder'd critics say Damn it, this wife reform'd has spoil'd the play! The coxcombs should have drawn her more in fashion, Have gratify'd her softer inclination, Have tipt her a gallant, and clinch'd the provocation. But there our bard stops short: for 'twere uncivil T'have made a modern belle all o'er a devil! He hop'd in honor of the sex, the age Would bear one ...
— The Palmy Days of Nance Oldfield • Edward Robins
... the purpose in view it couldn't have been better done. That was what made it so touchingly absurd. He put himself in her position. He pictured himself as her, "sitting up in bed," pencil in hand, to explain away, to soothe, to clinch and bind... Yes, if he had happened to be some other man—one whom her insult might have angered without giving love its death-blow, and one who could be frightened out of not keeping his word—this ...
— Zuleika Dobson - or, An Oxford Love Story • Max Beerbohm
... spirits of the air," Professor Henderson told his friends. "That we are evil spirits. And I guess that Washington flying down upon them as he did will clinch that belief ...
— On a Torn-Away World • Roy Rockwood
... remarked to me, "There isn't much of that in the Infantry Manual. But the corporal knows his job. When you're in a scrap you haven't time to think about the rules of the game; the automatic movements come all right, but in a clinch you've got to fight like a cat with tooth and claw, use your boots, your knee, or anything that comes handy. Perhaps that's why your lithe little Cockney is such a useful man with the bayonet. Now the Hun is a hefty beggar, and he isn't hampered by any ideas of ...
— Leaves from a Field Note-Book • J. H. Morgan
... "Let us clinch it, and make 'em cry for mercy!" shouted one of the victorious army, and forward he went, and nearly all of ...
— Dave Porter and His Rivals - or, The Chums and Foes of Oak Hall • Edward Stratemeyer
... in the captain. "You are getting down-hearted, and that won't do. We've got this game and we are going to hold it; but we want to go in to clinch it right here." ...
— Frank Merriwell at Yale • Burt L. Standish |
