Pestle

“ The pestle is straight, rather slender, and cylindrical in form, and is grasped by both hands. I venture the suggestion that the circle of dots with the little oval in the center, indicates that the pestle is to be turned or whirled round, and the changed direction of the curves denotes to the right and left, or first one way and then the other. ”

“ In short, a frontal pouch, with deep pulsations, momentarily renewed, becomes the instrument of deliverance, the pestle wherewith the newly-hatched Dipteron bruises the sand and causes it to crumble. Gradually, the legs push the rubbish back and the insect advances so much towards the surface. ”

“ This sculpture also seems to represent an animal head, the ears being indicated by the short nipples and the nose by the long one. The top of the pestle shown in Fig. 34 apparently represents an animal head, the mouth being indicated by the groove, each eye by a pit and there are four incisions across the top or back of the head. A sculptured animal head, with wide open mouth, pits for eyes, and projections for ears on what may be a pestle top, has been found in the Nez Perce region to the east [398] and pestles with heads [Pg 134] are found in the Thompson River area to the north. ”

“ The pestle is a pole, preferably and usually of heavy hardwood, about 1.5 meters long and 20 centimeters in circumference. It is a marked exception to find pestles decorated in any way. On the Umaíam River I saw one the end of which had been carved in open fretwork with a round loose piece of wood within the fretwork, a device that was as useful as it was ornamental, for the wooden ball by its rattling within the fretwork cage served to animate the holder and her companions to vigorous and constant strokes. ”

“ When thus pounding, the young girls keep perfect time with one another, the poles never clash, and each girl brushes back, first with one foot, then with the other, the grains she jostles out, so that when they pound fast the motion becomes almost a dance. Not infrequently the pestles are ornamented at their upper end with several sliding rings or a sliding block that jingles when the pestle strikes ”

“ The same; that is a great nabobess, just returned from the banks of the Ganges; her husband, a journeyman druggist in Spitalfields, fell in love with her as she used to carry beer from her father’s, at the sign of the Pewter Pot, and they married; an uncle of Mr. Pestle having become a great merchant at Calcutta, sent for his nephew, who accepted the invitation; went out; was taken into the business; in a short time the uncle died, Pestle got his fortune, became a great man, sent for his wife, who obeyed the summons, and became as great a woman ”

“ The motion that they adopt is exceedingly graceful; they stand with the heels together, and lift the pole or pestle perpendicularly above their heads as high as they can reach, then, bending the body at the hips and swinging the [8] arms down, they jam the pestle into the rice pit; as they raise the pestle again for another stroke they put one foot forward to push back into the pit the grains that may have jumped out on the flat surface of the mortar. ”

“ The pestles used in them were more properly rubbing-stones; the end is slightly flattened, more often they are round at either end. Great numbers of short oval pestles occur in the New England States, and the South. Fig. 504, from Mr. Holmes’s collection, illustrates three stone pestles; the one to the left may have come from any one of a dozen states, as the form is the same everywhere; to the right, the typical bell-shaped pestles of the Ohio Valley. In the centre, the pestle is bell-shaped, short, and has been highly polished, and there is a prominent depression in the centre. ”

“ The winnowing and sifting is often done by old women, while the younger women continue the severer task of plying the pestle. In the Kayan houses the mortars are in many cases double, that is to say, there are two pits in the one block of timber, and two pairs of women work simultaneously. In the middle of the afternoon the whole house resounds with the vigorous blows of the pestles, for throughout the length of the gallery two or more women are at work beside each room, husking the day's supply of rice for each family. ”

“ For the harsh work of its two gouges, or curved chisels, the larva of the Capricorn concentrates its muscular strength in the front of its body, which swells into a pestle-head. The Buprestis-grubs, those other industrious carpenters, adopt a similar form; they even exaggerate their pestle. The part that toils and carves hard wood requires a robust structure; the rest of the body, which has but to follow after, continues slim. The essential thing is that the implement of the jaws should possess a solid support and a powerful motor. ”

“ By far the greater number of pestles, about forty, are of the type shown in Fig. 21, and of these two thirds come from the vicinity of Priest Rapids. They are merely natural pebbles, all more or less of suitable size, shape and material, which have been used as pestles until one end has become flattened. Some of them are also flattened on the top, the battered ends often giving the only indication that they were used. Such as were not of exactly the right form for grasping have had their excrescences or the more projecting surfaces removed by pecking. ”

“ Pestle stopped in mortar; the doctor’s face seemed to narrow over the midnight thicket of his beard and a soft pink tongue came out to run a circlet round his lips. “I’ll mix that bitch a draft will burn her guts out. Give me the tale.”
Rodvard told it all plainly, with the hiding on the rooftop and the household of the Amorosian woman, over which last Remigorius’ eye held some anxiety. “The one who came here? ”

“ Hide thou in the forest till she is gone and I will show thee a way by which, perchance, thou mayest overcome her. Only promise truly that if thou dost succeed, thou wilt take me back with thee to the white world whence she carried me away."
Little Bear's-Son gave the maiden this promise, and concealed himself in the forest, and after a while he felt the ground rumble and saw the trees shiver and bow down, and out of the hut came the Baba-Yaga, riding away in her great iron mortar, driving with the pestle and sweeping out her trail behind her with her kitchen broom. ”

“ Peson and porpoise, good potage, 50/720.
325
Pessene, 166/23, peason, pease-broth?
Pestelles, 164/11, 28, legs.
Pestle is a hock, Fr. Faucille (in a horse) , the bought or pestle of the thigh. Cot.
Pestilence, silk and skins not to be worn during, p. 139.
Petipetes, or pety-pettys, p. 32, note 2; l. 499, note 3.
‘Petipetes, are Pies made of Carps and Eels first roasted, and then minced, and with Spices made up in Pies.’ R. Holme.
Petycote, 60/872; 61/891; 168/22, 30.
Randle Holme, Bk III., chap. ii. §xxvii., p. 19, col. 1, says, ‘He beareth Argent, a Semeare, Gules ”

“ The story in its origin does appear to have been simply that of a Greek expedition bent on military commerce in the Black Sea, the first organized fur trading voyage in recorded history.
From the ancient Greeks, too, comes the English word which describes the fur skin of an animal. Pelt, a contraction of peltry from the old Anglo-French pelterie, is derived from the Greek pelta. A pelta was a half shield made of the skin of an animal. It was carried by the warriors of Greece and later by the Romans. A foot soldier armed with a pelta and a short spear or javelin was called a peltast. ”

“ The gray of the dawning had just streaked the east, when Pelistes took lance in hand, hung his shield about his neck, and, mounting his steed, issued quietly forth from a postern of the convent. He paced slowly through the vacant streets, and the tramp of his steed echoed afar in that silent hour; but no one suspected a warrior, moving thus singly and tranquilly in an armed city, to be an enemy. He arrived at the gate just at the hour of opening; a foraging party was entering with cattle and with beasts of burthen, and he passed unheeded through the throng. ”

“ The appearance of the Petchary, when he erects the feathers of his crest, or opens those of his forehead, and shews glimpses of his fiery crown is fierce, vindictive, and desperate. His eye is deeply dark, and his bill, although it greatly resembles, in its robust make, that of the Raven, is even of sturdier proportions than that bird’s; the bristles are black, and amazingly strong. ”

“ I think of him, I shall always see him as I saw him swinging down the road with the lieutenant, bound for the open field, head up and chin out, leaning slightly forward as he took the long and easy stride of the trained athlete—a soldier and a Christian, under higher orders than any that man ever gave or refused, facing death to be merciful, risking his own life to salvage the life of his enemy.
And Pest is more than one man; he is a type. ”

“ As the last snowy petal left its stem, leaving it looking so bare and pitiful nestling in among the leaves as though ashamed of its nakedness, a hard sob of anguish escaped his lips, for it seemed as if each petal contained a part of the soul of his loved one, and leaning his face against the sash, he [380] gave himself up to the crushing sorrow that submerged his soul and plunged him once more into black despair. ”

“ William Perry Peters, of the town of Muscatel, Whose fate is full of meaning, if correctly understood— Admonition to the haughty, consolation to the good. It happened in the hot snap which we recently incurred, When 'twas warm enough to carbonize the feathers of a bird, And men exclaimed: "By Hunky!" who were bad enough to swear, And pious persons supervised their adjectives with care. Mr. Peters was a pedagogue of honor and repute, His learning comprehensive, multifarious, minute. ”

“ Men of high position draped these colorful pelts over their shoulders, tying the paws in the back with ribbons. The tail of the lion was appended animal-fashion by pharaohs to impart the beast’s qualities to the wearer, and warriors stretched their frame-wood shields with leopard skins. Extant today is a wall painting on a tomb of the eighteenth dynasty which shows tax-paying Ethiopians bearing their tribute of pelts to an Egyptian king. ”

“ Mariners with an experienced eye for marketable pelts came to Virginia in increasing numbers—hardy, courageous men who were prepared to take incredible risks in the pursuit of beaver, otter, bear and the big Virginia muskrat. By 1620 there were nearly one hundred fur traders operating in and about the Chesapeake Bay, according to an official of the colony. They plied their shallops and pinnaces up unexplored tidewater streams and rivers to find the villages of the unpredictable savages, hazarding their very lives to learn the ways and language of the aborigines, and to trade with them. ”

“ It may have been there, as the Norsemen told it, that swarthy, ill-looking men with broad cheeks and ugly hair on their heads, came in canoes and stared at them in amazement. Later, these same men came back with “fur-skins and all-grey skins” wanting swords and spears in trade. Evidently there was no milk in this camp, wherever it was, but fortunately the natives finally agreed to take red cloth in exchange for their pelts.
“In return for unblemished skins, the savages would accept a span length of red cloth and bind it around their heads. Thus the trading continued. ”

“ Fur is made up of short, barbed hairs that are downy and inclined to curl. Matting or felting, which would expose a live animal to cold and storm, is prevented in most animal coats by relatively stiffer guard hairs lying alongside the fur filaments and keeping them separated. But, the ancients had learned that by first plucking the coarser guard hairs from a pelt, the downy fur that remained could easily be removed from the hide, processed, pressed into felt mats and blocked into any shape. ”

“ They are then hunted for the hide, though all prime furs are taken off in the middle of the winter. Pelts are judged by the thickness of their skin and fur. In the warm months all animals shed their hair. A little observation enables a person to determine to a certainty in what month the animal has been killed. ”

“ He might lose his trading sense to the advantage of the white men who purposely plied him with aqua vitae during the feasting that always preceded barter, but when he realized he had been cheated he was apt to reach for another jug and his tomahawk at the same time. No doubt many a trader suffered a slow and bestial death while looking into the bloodshot eyes of savages galled by stomach fires that he himself had kindled. ”

“ The Englishmen were to fight among themselves, often with piratical and bloody fury, over the fur trade of the Chesapeake tidewater and for possession of the Susquehanna and Potomac River routes to the lush lake country of the north where the Frenchmen bartered for pelts. ”

“ In any case, the brothers-in-law took along a particularly fine supply of merchandise on this expedition into what is now northwestern Ontario—knives, hatchets and swords, ivory combs and tin looking-glasses, awls, and needles—all those things designed to send the red men in breathless pursuit of beaver. And, when they returned home, they had the greatest single cargo of pelts ever before seen in America. Their convoy included a great fleet of fur-laden canoes, requiring hundreds of Indians to paddle them. ”