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strait
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  • Chile's Strait of Magellan is the most important natural passage between the Atlantic and Pacific oceans.
  • First in rank was Commander Arthur Maher, who had survived the sinking of his ship, the Houston, in Indonesia's Sunda Strait.   (source)
    strait = narrow water passage
  • Sunlight glinted off the water as we chugged up the Strait of Georgia.   (source)
    strait = a narrow channel of the sea joining two larger bodies of water
  • That whirlpool was of course the reason Scylla had chosen these straits.   (source)
    straits = narrow water passages
  • If he sold just one of his sheep, he'd have enough to get to the other shore of the strait.   (source)
    strait = narrow water passage
  • The Turk's rotund body was now resting at the bottom of the Sea of Marmara, feeding the blue manna crabs that migrated in through the Bosporus Strait.   (source)
  • BLACKETT STRAIT, SOLOMON ISLANDS 2:00 A.M.   (source)
  • But from what we hear, the strait is now guarded.   (source)
  • The mesa was like a ship becalmed in a strait of lion-coloured dust.   (source)
  • Passed Gibraltar and out through Straits.   (source)
    straits = narrow water passages
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  • Alone in his canoe, he paddled off to a distant strait, which he knew the ship must pass through when she quitted the island.   (source)
    strait = narrow water passage
  • The ship drew on and had safely passed the strait, which some volcanic shock has made between the Calasareigne and Jaros islands; had doubled Pomegue, and approached the harbor under topsails, jib, and spanker, but so slowly and sedately that the idlers, with that instinct which is the forerunner of evil, asked one another what misfortune could have happened on board.   (source)
  • It matters not how strait the gate, How charged with punishments the scroll, I am the master of my fate: I am the captain of my soul.†   (source)
  • We sailed from Madras across the Bay of Bengal, down through the Strait of Malacca, around Singapore and up to Manila.†   (source)
  • Every inch of his body was covered in icy sweat; his bed covers were twisted all around him like a strait-jacket; he felt as though a whitehot poker were being applied to his forehead.†   (source)
  • He would plant a disease in my brain that would leave me wearing a strait-jacket in a rubber room for the rest of my life.†   (source)
  • I was subject to the dictates of my mind, which gave me the maneuverability of a strait jacket.†   (source)
  • Mr. Turner concluded: " 'It matters not how strait the gate, how charged with punishments the scroll, I am the master of my fate: I am the captain of my soul.†   (source)
  • Why does civilized man see fit to torture his body by cramming it into the strait-jacket of gentlemanly dress?†   (source)
  • On the eighth day, the boat navigated with great difficulty through a turbulent strait squeezed between marble cliffs, and after lunch it anchored in Puerto Nare.†   (source)
  • Kabuo left his radio on; he wanted to hear about it if a freighter came down the strait and put in a call to the lighthouse.†   (source)
  • They had sailed the beautiful but not very dramatic route from Bullandö up through Furusund Strait at barely 9 knots, but the new girlfriend was instantly seasick.†   (source)
  • "For strait is the gate," Momma said grimly in the taxi, and at home she had sent Carrie to the closet for six hours.†   (source)
  • Off the starboard wing of the plane Hema had a beautiful view of Bab al-Mandab—the Gate of Tears—so named because of the innumerable ships that had wrecked in that narrow strait that separated Yemen and the rest of Arabia from Africa.†   (source)
  • Even if it lands you in a strait jacket or a padded cell.†   (source)
  • When he returned, he said his favorites were George Strait, Brad Paisley, and Kenny Chesney.†   (source)
  • Now he was like a man in a strait jacket.†   (source)
  • Let him go free on strait promise of fair dealing in the future.†   (source)
  • We've come to a narrow strait bordered by mossy rocks.†   (source)
  • I am a strait out Union and Constitution man I am not for freeing the negroes.†   (source)
  • Matters must have reached a desperate strait out there if they need a dwarf to lead them, so you might as well take off your mask.†   (source)
  • The woman was known to have visited an unnamed island in the Luzon Strait that is off limits to international travellers for reasons of a rampant disease transmitted by unclean eating utensils.†   (source)
  • But the fierce strait-jacketed tension remained in the muscles of the cheek and neck and also the sweat poured forth: it stood out on his brow in droplets, matching in appearance—I noted irrelevantly—the mosaic of cool dewdrops on the bottle of Chablis.†   (source)
  • There was that air burst, way back in the strait.†   (source)
  • On the prow of that stone ship in the centre of the strait, and seemingly a part of it, a shaped and geometrical outcrop of the naked rock, stood the pueblo of Malpais.   (source)
  • Mate says we must be past Straits of Dover, as in a moment of fog lifting he saw North Foreland, just as he heard the man cry out.   (source)
    straits = narrow water passages
  • The channel ended in a narrow V. "We're not in a strait," Jason said.†   (source)
  • He'd discovered that two days ago when he had strangled a sea monster in the Carquinez Strait.†   (source)
  • We had best keep these top dwellers in strait prison till her homecoming.†   (source)
  • Until some gang succeeds in putting the world in a strait jacket, its definition is possibility.†   (source)
  • I'm taking my ship out in Bass Strait to sink her.†   (source)
  • If we can't get through the strait, maybe I could make it overland.†   (source)
  • I used all of my willpower to keep the ship from capsizing, but we were still spinning out of control, hurtling toward the cliffs on the opposite side of the strait.†   (source)
  • Who do you mean, Grace, she said, compose yourself or it's the cold baths and the strait-waistcoat for you, and she gave the other matron a glance: There.†   (source)
  • She'd come down the strait plotting soundings as she went, but the pilot would not put his faith in this, and at 0126 hours that morning, in heavy fog, had radioed the lighthouse for assistance.†   (source)
  • She defended herself with a pair of gardening shears that she had hidden in her bodice, and six men were needed to put her in the strait jacket while the crowd jammed into the Plaza of the Customhouse applauded and whistled with glee in the belief that the bloody capture was one of many Carnival farces.†   (source)
  • If Andhra Pradesh, just north of us, was alien, if Sri Lanka, a monkey's hop across a strait, was the dark side of the moon, imagine what Canada was.†   (source)
  • I did not cry even when I stood watching him being lowered into his family's strait-laced burial ground outside of Boston.†   (source)
  • Kabuo, his radio on, checked his barometer; it still held steady despite talk of rough weather, cold squalls of sleet reported to the north, out of the Strait of Georgia.†   (source)
  • …the chilblains and the shivering at night under the thin blanket, and the whipping if you complained, he is in raptures; and if I add the improper behaviour of Dr. Bannerling towards me, and the cold baths naked and wrapped in a sheet, and the strait-waistcoat in the darkened room, he is almost in ecstasies; but his favourite part of the story is when poor James McDermott was hauling me all around the house at Mr. Kinnear's, looking for a bed fit for his wicked purposes, with Nancy and…†   (source)
  • It seemed more sedate than I remembered it, more perpendicular and strait-laced, with narrower windows and shinier woodwork, as though a coat of varnish had been put over everything for better preservation.†   (source)
  • My maid of honor, dear Penelope Strait, has gone off to inspect the route of my descent to the front door and the team of two black geldings who shall deliver me to the church in royal fashion.†   (source)
  • Usually he walked around threatening the men with a strait jacket which he always carried over his arm, and usually they were quiet and submissive in his presence.†   (source)
  • Our present-day drug culture had not seen, that year, even the glimmerings of dawn, and my notion of addiction (if I had ever really thought of such a thing) was connected with the idea of "dope fiends"—goggle-eyed madmen in strait jackets immured in backwater asylums, slavering molesters of children, zombies stalking the back streets of Chicago, comatose Chinese in their smoky dens, and so on.†   (source)
  • In the late afternoon they were off Cape Borda on Kangaroo Island, and set course up the strait at periscope depth towards Port Adelaide.†   (source)
  • I told the admiral I'd like to take a little cruise in Bass Strait as a shakedown, and come back maybe on Friday and report operational readiness.†   (source)
  • They passed the Heads at the entrance to Sydney Harbour soon after dawn next day and went on southwards into the Bass Strait.†   (source)
  • He went to breakfast and then stood smoking at the chart table, studying the minefield chart that he already knew so well, and the well-remembered entrance to the Juan de Fuca Strait.†   (source)
  • They had left Port Darwin as they had left Cairns and Port Moresby; they had gone back through the Torres Strait and headed southwards down the Queensland coast, submerged.†   (source)
  • With no lights he could depend upon he did not dare to risk the navigation through the minefields of the Juan de Fuca Strait during the hours of darkness.†   (source)
  • All morning they made their way southeastwards down the strait between Canada and the United States, taking continuous bearings through the periscope, keeping a running plot at the chart table and altering course many times.†   (source)
  • But now, even the most strait laced felt that patriotism called upon them to be more broad minded.†   (source)
  • They unlocked the cell and grabbed the yelling man, laced him in a strait-jacket, flung him onto the stretcher and carted him away.†   (source)
  • Any time she wanted to fill her house with guests, she could do so and these guests would be far more entertaining, far more handsomely dressed than those prissy, strait-laced old fools who disapproved of her.†   (source)
  • Philip, strait-laced in matters of truth, was a little shocked by this airy attitude.†   (source)
  • —The horror of this strait and dark prison is increased by its awful stench.†   (source)
  • She cleared the Strait, crossed the bay, continued on her way through the 'One-degree' passage.†   (source)
  • I'm not strait-laced, but I tell you we got to have decent women in our schools.†   (source)
  • Tell them to take off the strait waistcoat.†   (source)
  • I sometimes think we must be all mad and that we shall wake to sanity in strait waistcoats.†   (source)
  • Pray do not put me in a strait waistcoat.†   (source)
  • I simply tell you that I am in a strait.†   (source)
  • Such strait-waistcoating as you treat me to is not becoming in you at so early a date.†   (source)
  • We shall do well to trust to Jasper in this strait.†   (source)
  • Has Uncas no counsel to offer in such a strait?†   (source)
  • It may be in a great strait, and not know what to do: I cannot help that.†   (source)
  • It seemed to me that the strait was getting narrower and narrower.†   (source)
  • The detective was therefore in a sore strait.†   (source)
  • In this strait, therefore, he was as useless as the mariner, and had no reply to make.†   (source)
  • The Nautilus entered the Strait of Jubal, which leads to the Gulf of Suez.†   (source)
  • In a strait-jacket, he swung to the mad rockings of the gales.†   (source)
  • Just the northernmost seas, equally in the Bering Strait and the Davis Strait.†   (source)
  • Indeed, were we likely to encounter the narwhale in such a cramped strait?†   (source)
  • Then she could always plead moods and nerves, and the right not to be held too strictly to account; and even in the most strait-laced societies the laugh was always against the husband.†   (source)
  • I supposed he must have swum the strait; though what should bring any creature to Earraid, was more than I could fancy.†   (source)
  • The fire in the grate looked impish—demoniacally funny, as if it did not care in the least about her strait.†   (source)
  • I always thought him sane enough until to-day, but you can take it from me that either he or I ought to be in a strait-jacket.†   (source)
  • Joe was faithful to a love for Fay Larkin, noble in friendship to Shefford, desperate in a bitter strait with his own manliness, but the power of that creed by which he had been raised struck his lips mute.†   (source)
  • And an arrangement was ultimately come to under which a bed was to be thrown down in Jude's lumber-room, to make it comfortable for Arabella till she could get out of the strait she was in—not by her own fault, as she declared—and return to her father's again.†   (source)
  • …the inner bodice follow, in complete independence, controlled only by the fancy of their designer or the rigidity of their material, the line which led them to the knots of ribbon, falls of lace, fringes of vertically hanging jet, or carried them along the bust, but nowhere attached themselves to the living creature, who, according as the architecture of their fripperies drew them towards or away from her own, found herself either strait-laced to suffocation or else completely buried.†   (source)
  • He invoked the favour of the Most High upon that journey, implored His blessing on men's toil and on the secret purposes of their hearts; the steamer pounded in the dusk the calm water of the Strait; and far astern of the pilgrim ship a screw-pile lighthouse, planted by unbelievers on a treacherous shoal, seemed to wink at her its eye of flame, as if in derision of her errand of faith.†   (source)
  • But the creek, or strait, that cut off the isle from the main-land of the Ross, opened out on the north into a bay, and the bay again opened into the Sound of Iona; and it was the neighbourhood of this place that I chose to be my home; though if I had thought upon the very name of home in such a spot, I must have burst out weeping.†   (source)
  • Hell is a strait and dark and foul-smelling prison, an abode of demons and lost souls, filled with fire and smoke.†   (source)
  • Jack Sheppard himself couldn't get free from the strait waistcoat that keeps him restrained, and he's chained to the wall in the padded room.†   (source)
  • At first he was silent in his fighting, but as we began to master him, and the attendants were putting a strait waistcoat on him, he began to shout, 'I'll frustrate them!†   (source)
  • I mistrust these quiet moods of his, so I have given the attendant a hint to look closely after him, and to have a strait waistcoat ready in case of need.†   (source)
  • Send me away how you will and where you will, send keepers with me with whips and chains, let them take me in a strait waistcoat, manacled and leg-ironed, even to gaol, but let me go out of this.†   (source)
  • He was still in the strait waistcoat and in the padded room, but the suffused look had gone from his face, and his eyes had something of their old pleading.†   (source)
  • So it is put into a long, narrow cage in which it cannot turn around, a horn spoon is then introduced, and the perfume, a thick, oily stuff something like butter, is coolly scraped from the pouch, the plundered civet being then released from strait durance, until the supply is re-formed.'†   (source)
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  • Coming down from the summit, I passed other climbers who were clearly in dire straits.
    straits = a bad situation
  • But my father has always been a romantic rather than a businessman and in the meantime he and Hidayatullah were in such desperate straits that they ran out of credit with the local shopkeeper and could not even buy tea or sugar.   (source)
    straits = a bad or difficult situation
  • Oh, John, my friend, we are in awful straits.   (source)
  • You know, too, that I can't go without putting things in such a strait as you wouldn't get out of I can't tell when.   (source)
    strait = bad or difficult situation
  • Seeing him, I felt that I was in a dangerous strait indeed, and I kept my eyes upon him.   (source)
  • Once a vagabond on his own canal, I have received good turns from one of these Canallers; I thank him heartily; would fain be not ungrateful; but it is often one of the prime redeeming qualities of your man of violence, that at times he has as stiff an arm to back a poor stranger in a strait, as to plunder a wealthy one.   (source)
    strait = difficult situation
  • Remember that we are in terrible straits.   (source)
    straits = a bad or difficult situation
  • Miss Bray has wealthy friends who would coin their very hearts to save her in such a strait as this.   (source)
    strait = bad or difficult situation
  • I am, I know, either being deceived, like a baby, by my own fears, or else I am in desperate straits, and if the latter be so, I need, and shall need, all my brains to get through.   (source)
    straits = a bad or difficult situation
  • The allusion served as a timely reminder to Darnay that this disagreeable companion had, of his own free will, assisted him in the strait of the day.   (source)
    strait = bad or difficult situation
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  • Still England has been some weeks in the dismal strait of having no pilot (as was well observed by Sir Leicester Dedlock) to weather the storm; and the marvellous part of the matter is that England has not appeared to care very much about it, but has gone on eating and drinking and marrying and giving in marriage as the old world did in the days before the flood.   (source)
  • It is observable that when people upon the stage are in any strait involving the very last extremity of weakness and exhaustion, they invariably perform feats of strength requiring great ingenuity and muscular power.   (source)
    strait = difficult situation
  • The strait she was in through pride and shrewishness could not be disguised longer: she burst out crying bitterly; they all saw it; and she attempted no further concealment.   (source)
  • The short boy had gained a great advantage over the tall boy, who was reduced to mortal strait, and both were overlooked by a large heavy man, perched against the corner of a table, who emphatically adjured them to strike a little more fire out of the swords, and they couldn't fail to bring the house down, on the very first night.   (source)
    strait = bad situation
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  • An anchor on CNN described the scene, 'Here we see China's first, and so far only, aircraft carrier, the Liaoning, ringed by a pack of angrylooking Lanzhou-class destroyers as they face off with the USS George Washington just outside the Straits of Luton in the South China Sea."†   (source)
  • But for a hopeful young man trying to impress a serious young woman, the menu of the Piazza was as perilous as the Straits of Messina.†   (source)
  • You watch as teenagers find themselves in dire straits, sometimes of their own making and sometimes not.†   (source)
  • Three hidden keys open three secret gates
    Wherein the errant will be tested for worthy traits
    And those with the skill to survive these straits
    Will reach The End where the prize awaits
    At first, this seemed to be the only direct reference to the contest in the entire almanac.†   (source)
  • I tell you, if you were in such dire straits as I was, you too would elevate your thoughts.†   (source)
  • Africa was only a few hours from Tarifa; one had only to cross the narrow straits by boat.†   (source)
  • Mrs. Abel, eighty-seven years old, blind now in both eyes and all alone; if you can see it in your heart to spare a few hours a week it would be greatly appreciated …. a family of seven, the Grotes, in dire straits; the father out of work, four young children and another born prematurely a month ago, now sickly, the mother unable to get out of bed ….†   (source)
  • The thought never entered my crippled mind that Andy might in fact be in terrible straits-that a guide might urgently need help from me.†   (source)
  • In desperate straits she can make us laugh, with her main talent being radio commercials oozed out in a fabulous fashion-model voice: "Medically tested Odoro-no, stops underarm odor and moisture at the source!"†   (source)
  • If two male magicians were desperate enough to stop for directions, we were in dire straits.†   (source)
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  • To have others see royalty in such straits—it set a bad precedent.†   (source)
  • They had met at an underground concert, more a jam session really, with perhaps fifty or sixty people crammed into the soundproofed premises of a recording studio that specialized increasingly in audio work for television—the local music business being, for reasons of both security and piracy, in rather difficult straits.†   (source)
  • Sandi's father looked down at his plate, grateful, but also embarrassed to be in such straits and to be so beholden.†   (source)
  • This Alfa-class attack sub was named for the chief engineering officer of the Russian fleet who had sailed all the way around the world to meet his appointment with destiny in the Tsushima Straits.†   (source)
  • I was in pretty dire straits that night.†   (source)
  • Seeds of these longings had been planted in me years ago, seeds which came to bitter flower as our ship passed through the Straits of Gibraltar and into the waters of the Mediterranean Sea.†   (source)
  • 'Can't you just picture him in that yellow raft, paddling through the Straits of Gibraltar at night with that tiny little blue oar —'†   (source)
  • That makes me dead or in dire straits.†   (source)
  • It was a reporter's nirvana, a place where smash-and-grab robbers stalked tourists with chunks of concrete, where whole skyscrapers stood on foundations of drug money, where the Ton-tons Macoute of Haiti reached across the Florida Straits to kill political enemies, and old men with hatred infusing every cell of their bodies played soldier in the Glades, dreaming of the day they could kill Castro.†   (source)
  • "We signed our agreement with Henrik when we were in financial straits," Berger said.†   (source)
  • He made no mention of his worsening financial straits and said not a word ever on the subject of Sally Hemings and her children.†   (source)
  • Four fresh bodies are floating in the Straits of Florida.†   (source)
  • Galleys guard the Redwyne Straits.†   (source)
  • After a couple of hundred miles or so you come to the Straits of Newf.†   (source)
  • "He's got troopships sailing in the straits," she said.†   (source)
  • Not even the terrible demon Mad'raast had been able to penetrate Toby's disguise when they'd sailed Ormenheid through the Straits that previous spring.†   (source)
  • It took us two hundred-plus years to get into the straits we now occupy, and it may take us as long again to get out, but there must be a beginning.†   (source)
  • England was cautioned that impact north of Dover Straits opposite London Estuary would cause disturbances far up Thames; Sovunion was given warning for Sea of Azov and had own grid defined; Great China was assigned grid in Siberia, Gobi Desert, and her far west—with offsets to avoid her historic Great Wall noted in loving detail.†   (source)
  • Up and down the straits.†   (source)
  • For three hundred years the Russians have tried to pry open the Straits and debouch into the Mediterranean.†   (source)
  • What must a nation like Germany do when—deprived of the colonies which might have served as its own Straits Settlements, divested of the equivalent of its own Sumatra, its own Borneo—it faces a hostile world rimmed about at the edge by international pirates and profiteers?†   (source)
  • But he had seen a ship of war sail down the straits yesterday and seen it signalling, as he supposed, to its consorts.†   (source)
  • To get out of Odessa on to the high seas the traffic has to pass two narrow straits both commanded by NATO in time of war—the Bosporus and Gibraltar.†   (source)
  • Cutting between them was a narrow line of sea—the Straits of Corinth.†   (source)
  • As soon as the Argo II had passed into the straits, Anion broke off his harassment.†   (source)
  • They raced through icy straits, past blue fjords and cliffs with waterfalls spilling into the sea.†   (source)
  • She could just make out Morocco in the haze on the other side of the straits.†   (source)
  • The Redwyne Straits were swarming with long-ships, as they had been warned in Tyrosh.†   (source)
  • The entrance to the straits was still a quarter mile ahead.†   (source)
  • Now he had a choice to make: should he risk the straits, or take the Iron Fleet around the island?†   (source)
  • Directly ahead of them, in the middle of the straits, an island had shimmered into existence.†   (source)
  • Lord Redwyne's ships have passed through the Straits of Tarth and are moving swiftly up the coast.†   (source)
  • When he and his friends had encountered Hercules at the Straits of Gibraltar, it hadn't gone well.†   (source)
  • got a five-million-kilo turtle carcass blocking the entrance to the straits.†   (source)
  • It was Gordon, whose father had been lost in a heavy sea in the Queen Charlotte Straits.†   (source)
  • We have lived before without a Reverend Mother, but it is not good for people to seek a new home in such straits.†   (source)
  • As the keys continue to spin, Anorak recites a piece of verse, and as he speaks each line, it appears briefly in flaming subtitles across the bottom of screen: Three hidden keys open three secret gates
    Wherein the errant will be tested for worthy traits
    And those with the skill to survive these straits
    Will reach The End where the prize awaits
    As he finishes, the jade and crystal keys vanish, leaving only the copper key, which now hangs on a chain around Anorak's neck.†   (source)
  • Radio calls my teammate Stuart Hutchison had been monitoring from Rob Hall on the South Summit made clear that our leader was in desperate straits and that Doug Hansen was dead.†   (source)
  • I would be in the direst of dire straits, facing a bleak future, when some small thing, some detail, would transform itself and appear in my mind in a new light.†   (source)
  • So when I discovered that Mom was in dire straits, I didn't mutter insults under my breath and hang up the phone.†   (source)
  • In my head, I recited the words of Halliday's first riddle, the one in Anorak's Invitation: Three hidden keys open three secret gates
    Wherein the errant will be tested for worthy traits
    And those with the skill to survive these straits
    Will reach The End where the prize awaits
    I'd reached the end.†   (source)
  • We sail the straits.†   (source)
  • Descendants of the ancient kings and queens of Qarth, the Pureborn commanded the Civic Guard and the fleet of ornate galleys that ruled the straits between the seas.†   (source)
  • "I think he's guarding these straits.†   (source)
  • "The most direct route," Eurymachus said, "would be due east from here, across the Straits of Corinth.†   (source)
  • One of the Myrish galleys had foundered in the Straits of Tarth, and a storm had overtaken them as they were entering the Gullet, scattering the fleet across half the narrow sea.†   (source)
  • She showered and sat on the balcony wrapped up in a bath towel, looking out over the Straits of Gibraltar.†   (source)
  • As the Straits widen out you keep the coast of Newf to port and call in at Lark for fresh water — and provisions, too, if the Newf people will let you have any.†   (source)
  • With Yunkai so near, shipping in the straits was like to be heavy, but he did not expect to encounter Yunkish warships until they were closer to Meereen.†   (source)
  • But Salander thought that the Spaniards should keep their mouths shut on that score so long as they occupied the enclave of Ceuta on Moroccan territory across the straits.†   (source)
  • He remembered what Hercules had said to him at the Straits of Gibraltar: It's not easy being a son of Zeus.†   (source)
  • The demigods would either have to risk the straits, which are impossible, or sail around the entire Peloponnese, which is hardly much safer.†   (source)
  • When the Cinnamon Wind left Oldtown, she would need to cross the Redwyne Straits again, and this time she might not be so fortunate.†   (source)
  • The turtle stopped at the entrance to the straits and glared at them balefully, but it made no attempt to follow.†   (source)
  • The way they rose and fell as the ship departed Oldtown had made Sam hold his breath …. but that was the last good memory he had of the Redwyne Straits.†   (source)
  • Warhorns would echo across the waters, from Greenshield and Greyshield, Oakenshield and Southshield, and their longships would come sliding out from moss-covered stone pens along the shores, oars flashing as they swarmed across the straits to seal the Mander and hound and harry the raiders upriver to their doom.†   (source)
  • Can you get us to those straits?†   (source)
  • On the one hand, Stingo, I am sorry about this since it puts you in financial straits and I am in no position to be of much help, beset as I am already by the seemingly endless troubles and debts of your two aunts down in N.C. who I fear are prematurely senile and in a pathetic way.†   (source)
  • Egypt claimed its ships, bound from the Black Sea to Alexandria, were being delayed in the Straits, and charged Turkey with a breach of the Montreaux Convention.†   (source)
  • Then we rowed through the straits and came about sundown into Redhaven on the isle of Brenn, where we were very lovingly feasted and had victuals and water at will.†   (source)
  • He knew the pass where the porpoise was, and if he were blindfolded, surely he would know the place in the Johnstone Straits where the sea begins to roughen when the wind is against the tide.†   (source)
  • Then Mark covered the body with a blanket and returned to the boat to catch the first weather report, which promised that by noon the straits might be navigable.†   (source)
  • While Mark built the fire, Jim sent out an emergency on the radio-telephone, but the hospital ship was too far away to come and the gale warnings were out and the straits too rough to cross.†   (source)
  • I have peeled spuds up the Johnstone Straits," and Mark said he could stay as long as he wished and not a spud in sight Again the kitchen was turned into a clinic.†   (source)
  • A young logger, long in the woods, reached the beer parlour at a float store, drank too much, too fast, stole a small motor boat, and headed happily for the straits, despite gale warnings, and predictions of a storm by nightfall.†   (source)
  • When they had delivered the patient safely to the hospital and started back to the village, they found the straits shrouded in a thick fog, and the boat rolling heavily in the swell that came down Queen Charlotte Sound.†   (source)
  • I am sure nobody would grudge Kay a war memorial, if they knew his desperate straits.†   (source)
  • Oh, men are so conceited they'll believe anything that flatters them…… I must never let him dream what straits we're in, not till I've got him.†   (source)
  • They had come, crated on ships, from the Black Sea through the Straits of Marmora, through the Dardanelles, through the Mediterranean and to here, unloaded lovingly at Alicante, assembled ably, tested and found perfect and now flown in lovely hammering precision, the V's tight and pure as they came now high and silver in the morning sun to blast those ridges across there and blow them roaring high so that we can go through.†   (source)
  • The result was that poor families were in great straits, while the rich went short of practically nothing.†   (source)
  • Brown related to me in detail their passage down the Straits of Macassar.†   (source)
  • He had got into the habit of seeing himself always in desperate straits.†   (source)
  • By the straits of Sunda, chiefly, vessels bound to China from the west, emerge into the China seas.†   (source)
  • She started up and bounded towards him in an instant: he was evidently in great straits for breath.†   (source)
  • Jean Valjean had been in worse straits than this.†   (source)
  • He could not go on like that: Lawson would help him when he knew what straits he was in; it was absurd to let his pride prevent him from asking for assistance.†   (source)
  • But no matter in what straits the Pennsylvanian or Virginian found himself, he would not let his daughters go out into service.†   (source)
  • What with holding the reins as best she could, and constant heed to brake and distance, and worry lest she would damage a wheel, she was in grievous straits most of that day.†   (source)
  • The whites were often in great straits.†   (source)
  • He began to worry about the necessity of a new connection and to see impending serious financial straits unless something turned up.†   (source)
  • I've got six and I'd give you the lot, only I must keep a little money to buy some fruit and vegetables for the crew from native boats as we go through Sunda Straits."†   (source)
  • So he had to abandon the horse—a circumstance that only such sore straits could have driven him to.†   (source)
  • If he could on'y know what straits she's put to, and what's hovering round, he might come to take care of his own."†   (source)
  • The son of a poor farmer's widow, he had seen his mother put to such straits to make ends meet that by the time he reached the age of twelve he had surrendered nearly all of the pleasures of youth in order to assist her.†   (source)
  • Mrs. Manson Mingott had long since succeeded in untying her husband's fortune, and had lived in affluence for half a century; but memories of her early straits had made her excessively thrifty, and though, when she bought a dress or a piece of furniture, she took care that it should be of the best, she could not bring herself to spend much on the transient pleasures of the table.†   (source)
  • But allowed as a verity, how significant would it be of England's straits at the time, confronted by those wars which like a flight of harpies rose shrieking from the din and dust of the fallen Bastille.†   (source)
  • The conviction that he had been sent by Gerty, and that, whatever straits he conceived her to be in, he would never voluntarily have come to her aid, strengthened her resolve not to admit him a hair's breadth farther into her confidence.†   (source)
  • Soon we passed out of the straits and doubled the south-east corner of the island, round which, four days ago, we had towed the HISPANIOLA.†   (source)
  • It is the soundless, slender rush through the straits of the hourglass, the stern and fragile device that adorns the hermit's cell.†   (source)
  • In the second place, the ebb was now making—a strong rippling current running westward through the basin, and then south'ard and seaward down the straits by which we had entered in the morning.†   (source)
  • When I had him in my cabin--he stood by the door looking at me as if I had the halter round my neck already--I asked him right away to leave my cabin door unlocked at night while the ship was going through Sunda Straits.†   (source)
  • Elsewhere it has been said that in the lack of frigates (of course better sailers than line-of-battle ships) in the English squadron up the Straits at that period, the Indomitable was occasionally employed not only as an available substitute for a scout, but at times on detached service of more important kind.†   (source)
  • A few days of calm would have brought unmentionable horrors on board that schooner, but with the help of land and sea breezes, in less than a week after clearing the Sunda Straits, he anchored off the Batu Kring mouth within a pistol-shot of the fishing village.†   (source)
  • Her immediate worries conjured, it was easy to resolve that she would never again find herself in such straits, and as the need of economy and self-denial receded from her foreground she felt herself ready to meet any other demand which life might make.†   (source)
  • He did not know what prevented him from going there sooner, except perhaps that he wanted so badly to get through on his own; for Athelny, who had been in straits as desperate, was the only person who could do anything for him.†   (source)
  • Panic seized him and, putting aside his pride, he wrote again to the Vicar of Blackstable, placing the case before him more urgently; but perhaps he did not explain himself properly and his uncle did not realise in what desperate straits he was, for he answered that he could not change his mind; Philip was twenty-five and really ought to be earning his living.†   (source)
  • At the end of the straits, I made sure we must fall into some bar of raging breakers, where all my troubles would be ended speedily; and though I could, perhaps, bear to die, I could not bear to look upon my fate as it approached.†   (source)
  • She was called Mrs. Fletcher, but everyone addressed her as "Ma'; she was really fond of the shop assistants, whom she called her boys; she never minded giving credit towards the end of the month, and it was known that now and then she had lent someone or other a few shillings when he was in straits.†   (source)
  • But before Pierre—who at that moment imagined himself to be Napoleon in person and to have just effected the dangerous crossing of the Straits of Dover and captured London—could pronounce Pitt's sentence, he saw a well-built and handsome young officer entering his room.†   (source)
  • Yet the good ship ploughed straight on, unretarded by wind or wave, towards the straits of Bab-el-Mandeb.†   (source)
  • And, woman, though dressed in silk and jewels, you are but a woman, and, in life's great straits and mighty griefs, ye feel but one sorrow!†   (source)
  • As Yefim Petrovitch had made no provision for the payment of the tyrannical old lady's legacy, which had grown from one thousand to two, it was delayed, owing to formalities inevitable in Russia, and the young man was in great straits for the first two years at the university, as he was forced to keep himself all the time he was studying.†   (source)
  • At the foot they found the Narragansetts browsing the herbage of the bushes, and having mounted, they followed the movements of a guide, who, in the most deadly straits, had so often proved himself their friend.†   (source)
  • I must admit that my uncle kept as close to me as he could; he never lost sight of me, and in many straits his arm furnished me with a powerful support.†   (source)
  • The first was just disappearing in the straits of Bonifacio; the other, following an opposite direction, was about to round the Island of Corsica.†   (source)
  • While one in straits on the townward bridge did not mind who saw him so, and kept his back to the parapet to survey the passers-by, one in straits on this never faced the road, never turned his head at coming footsteps, but, sensitive to his own condition, watched the current whenever a stranger approached, as if some strange fish interested him, though every finned thing had been poached out of the river years before.†   (source)
  • Meantime the galley entered the Straits of Messina, and, skimming past the city of that name, was after a while turned eastward, leaving the cloud over AEtna in the sky astern.†   (source)
  • …of the two, and the aptitude with which they accommodated themselves to the pewter-pot; in explanation of which seeming marvel it may be here observed, that gentlemen who, like Messrs Pyke and Pluck, live upon their wits (or not so much, perhaps, upon the presence of their own wits as upon the absence of wits in other people) are occasionally reduced to very narrow shifts and straits, and are at such periods accustomed to regale themselves in a very simple and primitive manner.†   (source)
  • This rampart is pierced by several sally-ports for the convenience of ships and whales; conspicuous among which are the straits of Sunda and Malacca.†   (source)
  • No tear dropped over that pillow; in such straits as these, the heart has no tears to give,—it drops only blood, bleeding itself away in silence.†   (source)
  • This is the mode in which the existence of Marius Pontmercy was arranged: He had passed the worst straits; the narrow pass was opening out a little in front of him.†   (source)
  • The sea was very rough in the straits, full of eddies formed by the counter-currents, and the chopping waves broke her course, whilst it became very difficult to stand on deck.†   (source)
  • Freedom, free thought and science, will lead them into such straits and will bring them face to face with such marvels and insoluble mysteries, that some of them, the fierce and rebellious, will destroy themselves, others, rebellious but weak, will destroy one another, while the rest, weak and unhappy, will crawl fawning to our feet and whine to us: "Yes, you were right, you alone possess His mystery, and we come back to you, save us from ourselves!"†   (source)
  • "My pursuits are peaceful, and my temper, I humbly trust, is greatly given to mercy and love," returned David, a little nettled at so direct an attack on his manhood; "but there are none who can say that I have ever forgotten my faith in the Lord, even in the greatest straits."†   (source)
  • The thought came into my mind to declare the whole truth to my uncle, to show him the dreadful straits to which we were reduced, and to calculate how long we might yet expect to live.†   (source)
  • Yes, Tom, we must confess it, was rather proud of his honesty, poor fellow,—not having very much else to be proud of;—if he had belonged to some of the higher walks of society, he, perhaps, would never have been reduced to such straits.†   (source)
  • As if too long lurking behind the headlands, till the Pequod should fairly have entered the straits, these rascally Asiatics were now in hot pursuit, to make up for their over-cautious delay.†   (source)
  • It now answers the purpose of a sumptuous lodge for the doorkeeper of the straits of the Sound, before which every year there pass fifteen thousand ships of all nations.†   (source)
  • The varied landscape afforded by the Andaman Islands was soon passed, however, and the Rangoon rapidly approached the Straits of Malacca, which gave access to the China seas.†   (source)
  • The Tankadere entered the Straits of Fo-Kien, which separate the island of Formosa from the Chinese coast, in the small hours of the night, and crossed the Tropic of Cancer.†   (source)
  • In a few minutes the schooner, under her mizen, brigantine, topsail, and topgallant sail, loosed from her moorings and made full sail through the straits.†   (source)
  • Was it not so, O Timor Tom! thou famed leviathan, scarred like an iceberg, who so long did'st lurk in the Oriental straits of that name, whose spout was oft seen from the palmy beach of Ombay?†   (source)
  • The shores of the Straits of Sunda are unsupplied with those domineering fortresses which guard the entrances to the Mediterranean, the Baltic, and the Propontis.†   (source)
  • If the wind only held, little doubt had they, that chased through these Straits of Sunda, the vast host would only deploy into the Oriental seas to witness the capture of not a few of their number.†   (source)
  • Time out of mind the piratical proas of the Malays, lurking among the low shaded coves and islets of Sumatra, have sallied out upon the vessels sailing through the straits, fiercely demanding tribute at the point of their spears.†   (source)
  • Because Joppa, the modern Jaffa, shipmates, is on the most easterly coast of the Mediterranean, the Syrian; and Tarshish or Cadiz more than two thousand miles to the westward from that, just outside the Straits of Gibraltar.†   (source)
  • Almost renouncing all thought of falling in with any game hereabouts, the ship had well nigh entered the straits, when the customary cheering cry was heard from aloft, and ere long a spectacle of singular magnificence saluted us.†   (source)
  • Whether owing to the almost omniscient look-outs at the mast-heads of the whaleships, now penetrating even through Behring's straits, and into the remotest secret drawers and lockers of the world; and the thousand harpoons and lances darted along all continental coasts; the moot point is, whether Leviathan can long endure so wide a chase, and so remorseless a havoc; whether he must not at last be exterminated from the waters, and the last whale, like the last man, smoke his last pipe,…†   (source)
  • With a fair, fresh wind, the Pequod was now drawing nigh to these straits; Ahab purposing to pass through them into the Javan sea, and thence, cruising northwards, over waters known to be frequented here and there by the Sperm Whale, sweep inshore by the Philippine Islands, and gain the far coast of Japan, in time for the great whaling season there.†   (source)
  • As, blind and deaf, the whale plunged forward, as if by sheer power of speed to rid himself of the iron leech that had fastened to him; as we thus tore a white gash in the sea, on all sides menaced as we flew, by the crazed creatures to and fro rushing about us; our beset boat was like a ship mobbed by ice-isles in a tempest, and striving to steer through their complicated channels and straits, knowing not at what moment it may be locked in and crushed.†   (source)
  • Now, as many Sperm Whales had been captured off the western coast of Java, in the near vicinity of the Straits of Sunda; indeed, as most of the ground, roundabout, was generally recognised by the fishermen as an excellent spot for cruising; therefore, as the Pequod gained more and more upon Java Head, the look-outs were repeatedly hailed, and admonished to keep wide awake.†   (source)
  • Those narrow straits of Sunda divide Sumatra from Java; and standing midway in that vast rampart of islands, buttressed by that bold green promontory, known to seamen as Java Head; they not a little correspond to the central gateway opening into some vast walled empire: and considering the inexhaustible wealth of spices, and silks, and jewels, and gold, and ivory, with which the thousand islands of that oriental sea are enriched, it seems a significant provision of nature, that such…†   (source)
  • As marching armies approaching an unfriendly defile in the mountains, accelerate their march, all eagerness to place that perilous passage in their rear, and once more expand in comparative security upon the plain; even so did this vast fleet of whales now seem hurrying forward through the straits; gradually contracting the wings of their semicircle, and swimming on, in one solid, but still crescentic centre.†   (source)
  • They first caught crabs and quohogs in the sand; grown bolder, they waded out with nets for mackerel; more experienced, they pushed off in boats and captured cod; and at last, launching a navy of great ships on the sea, explored this watery world; put an incessant belt of circumnavigations round it; peeped in at Behring's Straits; and in all seasons and all oceans declared everlasting war with the mightiest animated mass that has survived the flood; most monstrous and most mountainous!†   (source)
  • …which was the royalest that ever we saw, for he was served at his table with nine kings, and the noblest fellowship of other princes, lords, and knights that be in the world, and every knight approved and like a lord, and holdeth Table Round: and in his person the most manly man that liveth, and is like to conquer all the world, for unto his courage it is too little: wherefore I advise you to keep well your marches and straits in the mountains; for certainly he is a lord to be doubted.†   (source)
  • All I have in mind and devise for you
    are the very plans I'd fashion for myself
    if I were in your straits.†   (source)
  • Take it to heart, I tell you.
    Picked men of the suitors lie in ambush, grim-set
    in the straits between Ithaca and rocky Same,
    poised to kill you before you can reach home,
    but I have my doubts they will.†   (source)
  • …hoping from there to catch the first glimpse
    of Scylla, ghoul of the cliffs, swooping to kill my men.
    But nowhere could I make her out—and my eyes ached,
    scanning that mist-bound rock face top to bottom.
    Now wailing in fear, we rowed on up those straits,
    Scylla to starboard, dreaded Charybdis off to port,
    her horrible whirlpool gulping the sea-surge down, down
    but when she spewed it up—like a cauldron over a raging fire—
    all her churning depths would seethe and heave—exploding…†   (source)
  • …countless suits of brash young claimants,
    rises, the day's work done, and turns home for supper-

    that's when the timbers reared back up from Charybdis.
    I let go—I plunged with my hands and feet flailing,
    crashing into the waves beside those great beams
    and scrambling aboard them fast
    I rowed hard with my hands right through the straits ….
    And the father of men and gods did not let Scylla see me,
    else I'd have died on the spot—no escape from death.
    I drifted along nine days.†   (source)
  • …in the land and off he sails.
    And this is just the start of the trouble he can make.
    Zeus kill that brazen boy before he hits his prime!
    Quick, fetch me a swift ship and twenty men—
    I'll waylay him from ambush, board him coming back
    in the straits between Ithaca and rocky Same.
    This gallant voyage of his to find his father
    will find him wrecked at last!"
    They all roared approval, urged him on,

    rose at once and retired to Odysseus' palace.
    But not for long was Penelope…†   (source)
  • You men at the thwarts—
    lay on with your oars and strike the heaving swells,
    trusting that Zeus will pull us through these straits alive.
    You, helmsman, here's your order—burn it in your mind—
    the steering-oar of our rolling ship is in your hands.
    Keep her clear of that smoke and surging breakers,
    head for those crags or she'll catch you off guard,
    she'll yaw over there—you'll plunge us all in ruin!'
    So I shouted.†   (source)
  • Ceylon (with spicegardens supplying tea to Thomas Kernan, agent for Pulbrook, Robertson and Co, 2 Mincing Lane, London, E. C., 5 Dame street, Dublin), Jerusalem, the holy city (with mosque of Omar and gate of Damascus, goal of aspiration), the straits of Gibraltar (the unique birthplace of Marion Tweedy), the Parthenon (containing statues of nude Grecian divinities), the Wall street money market (which controlled international finance), the Plaza de Toros at La Linea, Spain (where…†   (source)
  • …up somewhere I went up Windmill hill to the flats that Sunday morning with captain Rubios that was dead spyglass like the sentry had he said hed have one or two from on board I wore that frock from the B Marche paris and the coral necklace the straits shining I could see over to Morocco almost the bay of Tangier white and the Atlas mountain with snow on it and the straits like a river so clear Harry Molly darling I was thinking of him on the sea all the time after at mass when my…†   (source)
  • I behold the sail and steamships of the world, some in clusters in port, some on their voyages, Some double the cape of Storms, some cape Verde, others capes Guardafui, Bon, or Bajadore, Others Dondra head, others pass the straits of Sunda, others cape Lopatka, others Behring's straits, Others cape Horn, others sail the gulf of Mexico or along Cuba or Hayti, others Hudson's bay or Baffin's bay, Others pass the straits of Dover, others enter the Wash, others the firth of Solway, others…†   (source)
  • …All these separations and gaps shall be taken up and hook'd and link'd together, The whole earth, this cold, impassive, voiceless earth, shall be completely Justified, Trinitas divine shall be gloriously accomplish'd and compacted by the true son of God, the poet, (He shall indeed pass the straits and conquer the mountains, He shall double the cape of Good Hope to some purpose,) Nature and Man shall be disjoin'd and diffused no more, The true son of God shall absolutely fuse them.†   (source)
  • They passed through the Straits, and entered the Mediterranean.†   (source)
  • Scarce was he gone, when to the straits, now freed From secret foes, the Trojan troops succeed.†   (source)
  • They stood out to sea, steering for the straits; we, without looking to any compass save the land we had before us, set ourselves to row with such energy that by sunset we were so near that we might easily, we thought, land before the night was far advanced.†   (source)
  • In this voyage, contrary winds beat us up and down for a considerable time among the islands in the Straits of Molucca.†   (source)
  • We then set sail, and had a good voyage till we passed the Straits of Madagascar; but having got northward of that island, and to about five degrees south latitude, the winds, which in those seas are observed to blow a constant equal gale between the north and west, from the beginning of December to the beginning of May, on the 19th of April began to blow with much greater violence, and more westerly than usual, continuing so for twenty days together: during which time, we were driven…†   (source)
  • 20:22 In the fulness of his sufficiency he shall be in straits: every hand of the wicked shall come upon him.†   (source)
  • …which was the royalest that ever we saw, for he was served at his table with nine kings, and the noblest fellowship of other princes, lords, and knights that be in the world, and every knight approved and like a lord, and holdeth Table Round: and in his person the most manly man that liveth, and is like to conquer all the world, for unto his courage it is too little: wherefore I advise you to keep well your marches and straits in the mountains; for certainly he is a lord to be doubted.†   (source)
  • If you do love Rosalind so near the heart as your gesture cries it out, when your brother marries Aliena, shall you marry her:— I know into what straits of fortune she is driven; and it is not impossible to me, if it appear not inconvenient to you, to set her before your eyes to-morrow, human as she is, and without any danger.†   (source)
  • Thy ready help we crave, Whether adown Parnassian heights descending, Or o'er the roaring straits thy swift was wending, Save us, O save!†   (source)
  • He owned, indeed, the having mentioned his marriage, and that preference which he had given to myself, but denied with many oaths the having mentioned any such matter at all on account of the straits he was in for money, arising, he said, from his having too long neglected his estate in Ireland.†   (source)
  • …up in a sail; for their purpose was to trade at some of the ports of Spain, giving themselves out as Bretons, and if they brought us alive they would be punished as soon as the robbery was discovered; but the captain (who was the one who had plundered my beloved Zoraida) said he was satisfied with the prize he had got, and that he would not touch at any Spanish port, but pass the Straits of Gibraltar by night, or as best he could, and make for La Rochelle, from which he had sailed.†   (source)
  • "The treasurer was of the same opinion: he showed to what straits his majesty's revenue was reduced, by the charge of maintaining you, which would soon grow insupportable; that the secretary's expedient of putting out your eyes, was so far from being a remedy against this evil, that it would probably increase it, as is manifest from the common practice of blinding some kind of fowls, after which they fed the faster, and grew sooner fat; that his sacred majesty and the council, who are…†   (source)
  • We then pursued our voyage: and least they should think me gone to the Straits' mouth, I kept to the southward to the truly Barbarian coast; but in the dusk of the evening, I changed my course, and steering directly S. and by E. that I might keep near the shore: and, having a fresh gale of wind, with a pleasant smooth sea, by three o'clock next day I was one hundred and fifty miles beyond the Emperor of Morocco's dominions.†   (source)
  • When, parted hence, the wind, that ready waits For Sicily, shall bear you to the straits Where proud Pelorus opes a wider way, Tack to the larboard, and stand off to sea: Veer starboard sea and land.†   (source)
  • Distinguish'd by the straits, on either hand, Now rising cities in long order stand, And fruitful fields: so much can time invade The mold'ring work that beauteous Nature made.†   (source)
  • A long time passed before I asked for them, for I would not put him to any greater straits to return them than he was in when I lent them to him; but thinking he was growing careless about payment I asked for them once and several times; and not only will he not give them back, but he denies that he owes them, and says I never lent him any such crowns; or if I did, that he repaid them; and I have no witnesses either of the loan, or the payment, for he never paid me; I want your worship…†   (source)
  • I was at first of my partner's opinion, but when I had more seriously considered of the matter, I told him, we ran a great hazard in attempting to return, being on the wrong side of the Straits of Molucca and that, if, upon alarm given, we should be taken by the Dutch at Batavia, or English elsewhere, our turning away would be a sufficient evidence to condemn us.†   (source)
  • I say this, Sancho, because thou hast seen the good cheer, the abundance we have enjoyed in this castle we are leaving; well then, amid those dainty banquets and snow-cooled beverages I felt as though I were undergoing the straits of hunger, because I did not enjoy them with the same freedom as if they had been mine own; for the sense of being under an obligation to return benefits and favours received is a restraint that checks the independence of the spirit.†   (source)
  • The poor man may retain honour, but not the vicious; poverty may cast a cloud over nobility, but cannot hide it altogether; and as virtue of itself sheds a certain light, even though it be through the straits and chinks of penury, it wins the esteem of lofty and noble spirits, and in consequence their protection.†   (source)
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