Rab and His Friends |
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Common terms and phrases
aboot afore Ailie Ailie's asleep bairn beautiful blankets Bob Ainslie boys brain breast breathing bright brindled buried called Candlemaker Row carefully carrier clean crowd curtsied darkness dead delirium doctor dogs fighting door dowg Duke of Wellington eager EDINBURGH fall of snow friends Game Chicken gate gave gently granite grey hand happed HARVARD COLLEGE LIBRARY head heavy shoes Homer Howgate huge Jess keen knife leather lifted little fellow look at James Maister John master mastiff mouth mutch muzzle never moved pale face pause pinch of snuff pitiful plaid Psalms quick quiet Rab looked Rab's ragged rapid roar round saunter shut her eyes slunk solemn sombre soon sort spoke little stairs strange Street sudden surgeon tail taking teeth tenderly thing thinkin took turned wafers walked wee Mysie words Yarrow Yarrow's
Popular passages
Page 20 - James; then, turning to the surgeon and the students, she curtsies, and in a low, clear voice, begs their pardon if she has behaved ill. The students — all of us — wept like children; the surgeon happed her up carefully, and, resting on James and me, Ailie went to her room, Rab following. We put her to bed. James took off his heavy shoes, crammed with tackets, heel-capt and toe-capt, and put them carefully under the table, saying, 'Maister John, I'm for nane o' yer strynge nurse bodies for Ailie....
Page 9 - Shakespearian dewlaps shaking as he goes. The Chicken makes straight at him, and fastens on his throat. To our astonishment, the great creature does nothing but stand still, hold himself up, and roar — yes, roar; a long, serious, remonstrative roar. How is this? Bob and I are up to them. He is muzzled!
Page 15 - I was sayin', she's got a kind o* trouble in her breest, doctor ; wull ye tak' a look at it ? " We walked into the consulting-room, all four; Rab grim and comic, willing to be happy and confidential if cause could be shown, willing also to be the reverse, on the same terms. Ailie sat down, undid her open gown and her lawn handkerchief round her neck, and without a word showed me her right breast. I looked at and examined it carefully, — she and James watching me, and Rab eyeing all three. What...
Page 25 - ... were comforting her. One night she had fallen quiet, and, as we hoped, asleep; her eyes were shut. We put down the gas, and sat watching her. Suddenly she sat up in bed, and, taking a bed-gown which was lying on it rolled up, she held it eagerly to her breast, — to the right side.
Page 7 - I are up, and find it is not over: a small thoroughbred, white bull-terrier is busy throttling a large shepherd's dog, unaccustomed to war, but not to be trifled with. They are hard at it; the scientific little fellow doing his work in great style, his pastoral enemy fighting wildly, but with the sharpest of teeth and a great courage. Science and breeding, however, soon...
Page 31 - I had to brain him wi' a rack-pin ; there was nae doin' wi' him. He lay in the treviss wi' the mear, and wadna come oot. I tempit him wi' kail and meat, but he wad tak naething, and keepit me frae feedin' the beast, and he was aye gur gurrin', and grup gruppin' me by the legs. I was laith to mak' awa wi' the auld dowg, his like wasna atween this and Thornhill, — but, 'deed, sir, I could do naething else.
Page 23 - Ailie got worse ; began to wander in her mind, gently ; was more demonstrative in her ways to James, rapid in her questions, and sharp at times. He was vexed, and said, 'She was never that way afore, no, never.
Page 19 - Don't think them heartless; they are neither better nor worse than you or I; they get over their professional horrors, and into their proper work — and in them pity — as an emotion, ending in itself or at best in tears and a longdrawn breath, lessens, while pity as a motive, is quickened, and gains power and purpose. It is well for poor human nature that it is so.
Page 12 - Six years have passed,—a long time for a boy and a dog: Bob Ainslie is off to the wars; I am a medical student, and clerk at Minto House Hospital. Rab I saw almost every week, on the Wednesday, and we had much pleasant intimacy. I found the way to his heart by frequent scratching of his huge head, and an occasional bone. When I did not notice him he would plant himself straight before me, and stand wagging that bud of a tail, and looking up, with his head a little to the one side. His master I...
Page 17 - ... very funny and surprising, and its expressive twinklings and winkings, the intercommunications between the eye, the ear, and it, were of the oddest and swiftest. Rab had the dignity and simplicity of great size ; and having fought his way all along the road to absolute supremacy, he was as mighty in his own line as Julius Caesar or the Duke of Wellington, and had the gravity 1 of all great fighters.