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More "Preen" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... pleasing, pigeons ditto—in literature, and at a safe distance from one's own barn. It's a pretty sight at sunset on a summer's eve to see them poising, wheeling, swirling, round a neighbor's barn. Their rainbow hues gleam brightly in the sun as they preen their feathers or gently "coo-oo, I love oo," on the ridge pole. I always longed to own some, but now the illusion is past. They have been admired and petted for ages, consecrated as emblems of innocence and peace and sanctity, regarded as almost sacred from the earliest antiquity. They ...
— Adopting An Abandoned Farm • Kate Sanborn
... visible over their garden wall as he toiled up the hen-coop sidewalk. The Judge returned to the house; Mattie Tiffany settled herself on the piazza with the preen and flutter of a female thing ...
— The Readjustment • Will Irwin
... of roses lulls the air Wafted up the marble stair. Like warbling water clucks the talk. From room to room in splendour walk Guests, smiling in the ry sheen; Carmine and azure, white and green, They stoop and languish, pace and preen Bare shoulder, painted fan, Gemmed wrist and finger, neck of swan; And still the pluckt strings warble on; Still from the snow-bowered, link-lit street The muffled hooves of horses beat; And harness rings; and foam-fleckt bit Clanks as the slim heads ...
— Georgian Poetry 1920-22 • Various
... aboot Danyil, an' hoo he was flung in amon' the lions for no' bein' a vegabon'; an' faigs, mind ye. Sandy got on winderfu'. The laddies paid fine attention, an' ye cudda heard a preen fa'in' when ...
— My Man Sandy • J. B. Salmond
... my divan, and looking out through the vermilion doors, I used to surprise a pair of swallows dropping down from their nest in the cedar-beams to preen themselves on the fountain's edge or in the channels of the pavement, for the roof was full of birds who came and went through the broken panes of the clerestory. Usually they were my only visitors, but one morning just at daylight I was waked by a soft tramp of bare feet, and ...
— In Morocco • Edith Wharton
... murmuring in the shelter of the soft petals of the blush roses whose sweetness brings back the fragrance of days that are gone. On the old grey sundial the white-winged pigeons sleepily croon as they preen their snowy plumage, and the Madonna lilies hang their heads like a procession of white-robed nuns who dare not look up from telling their beads until the triumphal procession of an all-conquering warrior has ...
— A Book of Myths • Jean Lang
... bet with, but there wasn't—unless Mrs. Shuster herself. And she didn't yet realize what the advent of the Frenchwoman might mean for her future. She was beginning to recover from the shock of Caspian's fall, and to preen herself because she was about to meet a ...
— The Lightning Conductor Discovers America • C. N. (Charles Norris) Williamson and A. M. (Alice Muriel)
... answer of any kind, he would go on repeating the same in a whisper, as though he were seeking to justify what he had just said. And if he happened to have returned a good answer, he would begin to preen himself, and to straighten his waistcoat, frockcoat and tie, and to assume an air of conscious dignity. Indeed, on these occasions he would feel so encouraged, he would carry his daring to such a pitch, that, rising softly from his ...
— Poor Folk • Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... Associated Words: ornithology, ornithologist, ornithological, ornithotomy, ornithography, ornithoid, ornitholite, ornithon, ornithophilous, game, ornithic, aviary, avicular, aviculture, covey, neossology paleornithollogy, taxidermy, taxidermist, preen, rookery, cote, hutch, coop, cage, avian, poult, auspice, ariel, ...
— Putnam's Word Book • Louis A. Flemming
... well satisfied wi' a' thing that was done to honor him. He was a very polished prince, and when he had eaten his dinner he turned round to the lady and sought a preen to ...
— Spare Hours • John Brown
... dress. She did not observe that she herself was dancing opposite Andy, while Pendrilla Lusk dragged with drooping head in the line across from the amiably grinning Doss Provine. Finding herself suddenly in the lead and successful, Huldah began to preen her feathers a bit. She withdrew a hand from the girl on her right to arrange the small string of blue ...
— Judith of the Cumberlands • Alice MacGowan
... but merely flew to another limb and began to preen himself. For so small a bird he was attracting a great deal of notice in the world. Following Pee-wee's lead, others including Tom and Roy ventured upon the lawn, smiling and straining their eyes to follow the tantalizing movements of the ...
— Tom Slade at Temple Camp • Percy K. Fitzhugh
... an' land an' mair, He'd gie them a' to get the preen That preened the flowers in till my hair Beside the ...
— Songs of Angus and More Songs of Angus • Violet Jacob
... didn't quite know how to act. She had intended, when she left home, to do a good deal of strutting back and forth in her pen, with now and then a pause to preen herself, to make sure that she looked her best. But somehow she no longer cared to put on grand airs, as of old. She remembered that some of the other hens at the fair had been haughty and proud and had smoothed their feathers, ...
— The Tale of Henrietta Hen • Arthur Scott Bailey
... dearest birdlings in America! Preen your feathers, and stretch the Birds' nest a little, if you please, and let Uncle Jack in for the holidays. I am coming with such a trunk full of treasures that you'll have to borrow the stockings of Barnum's Giant ...
— The Birds' Christmas Carol • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... case of exciting suspicion among the servants he had still to masquerade as Betty Burke till he left the house. Mrs. Macdonald, her daughter, and Miss Flora all came up to assist at his toilet, for 'deil a preen could he put in,' as his hostess expressed herself. He laughed so heartily over his own appearance that they could hardly get his dress fastened. Before he left the room he permitted Flora Macdonald to cut off a lock of his hair, ...
— The True Story Book • Andrew Lang
... stay the whole morning with me in perfect content if they were allowed to nestle into a wool mat placed at the doorstep of the French window leading out upon the lawn; there they would plume themselves and sometimes preen each other, and I could watch the way in which the feathers were drawn through the apparently awkward bill, yet I suppose so suited for its various uses; anyway the feathers came out from its manipulations as smooth and sleek as velvet, and ...
— Wild Nature Won By Kindness • Elizabeth Brightwen
... to most in young birds," said another elderly hen, "is their appearance. Some of them do nothing all day but preen their feathers. Look at the over-studied arrangements of their wing flights, and the affected exactness of their tail feathers! One looks in vain for sweetness and simplicity in the present-day ...
— Dot and the Kangaroo • Ethel C. Pedley
... face of this expanse of waters, and perfectly secure from fowlers, lie all day long, in the winter season, vast flocks of ducks, teals, and widgeons, of various denominations; where they preen and solace, and rest themselves, till towards sunset, when they issue forth in little parties (for in their natural state they are all birds of the night) to feed in the brooks and meadows; returning again with the dawn of the morning. Had this ...
— The Natural History of Selborne • Gilbert White
... aims, and pursuits as modified by the sympathetic and understanding companionship of a woman. He pictured himself as he must seem to her in his different pursuits. The picturesqueness pleased him. The simple, direct vanity of the man—the wholesome vanity of a straightforward nature—awakened to preen its feathers before ...
— Arizona Nights • Stewart Edward White
... drumming in the forenoon. His drum was the stub of a dry limb about the size of one's wrist. The heart was decayed and gone, but the outer shell was hard and resonant. The bird would keep his position there for an hour at a time. Between his drummings he would preen his plumage and listen as if for the response of the female, or for the drum of some rival. How swift his head would go when he was delivering his blows upon the limb! His beak wore the surface perceptibly. When he wished to change the ...
— A Year in the Fields • John Burroughs
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