Mile

Mile

A mile is a unit of length, most commonly 5,280 feet (1,760 yards, or about 1,609 meters). The mile of 5,280 feet is sometimes called the statute mile or land mile to distinguish it from the nautical mile (1,852 metres, about 6,076.1 feet). There have also been many historical miles and similar units in other systems that may be translated into English as miles; they have varied in length from 1 to 15 kilometres.

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Famous quotes containing the word mile:

    For half a mile from the shore it was one mass of white breakers, which, with the wind, made such a din that we could hardly hear ourselves speak.... This was the stormiest sea that we witnessed,—more tumultuous, my companion affirmed, than the rapids of Niagara, and, of course, on a far greater scale. It was the ocean in a gale, a clear, cold day, with only one sail in sight, which labored much, as if it were anxiously seeking a harbor.... It was the roaring sea, thalassa exeessa.
    Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)

    A man is murdered a mile away. And do you know what killed him? My name. The very name of Frankenstein burst his heart. And now the happy little villagers are clamoring for my blood.
    Willis Cooper, and Rowland V. Lee. Wolf von Frankenstein (Basil Rathbone)

    For now the moon with friendless light carouses
    On hill and housetop, street and marketplace,
    Men will plunge, mile after mile of men,
    To crush this lucent madness of the face....
    Allen Tate (1899–1979)