"Pirouette" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... dressed; she made little fancy steps, and three separate pirouettes which would have delighted the heart of a terpsichorean mistress. One pirouette greeted the effect of the white dress; the second, that of the wide straw hat, with its appropriate garland of blossom; the third was partly in celebration of the combined effect, and partly out of sheer inability ...
— A College Girl • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... and, seeing the chaplain passing out of the gate, thought it safe to begin an elaborate skirt dance, in his cassock, and making many fancy steps, with much high kicking, while the skirt of his cassock waved in the air. In the midst of his final pirouette, he caught the chaplain's stern glance fixed on him. Instantly Ignatius appeared to turn to stone, and the vision of a switch, wielded by Mrs. McGillicuddy's robust arm, passed before his eyes. He was immensely relieved ...
— Betty at Fort Blizzard • Molly Elliot Seawell
... long razor talons, heavy hind legs, and a whiplash tail with a needle at the end. For a moment the creature floated upside down, legs thrashing. Then the head and body joined, executed a horizontal pirouette, and settled gently to the floor like an ...
— PRoblem • Alan Edward Nourse
... yards or so the shot, when it entered the savage leader, was well scattered, so that horse and man were peppered all over. The latter dropped his lance and almost fell off, while the former, getting on its hind-legs, executed a pirouette which brought its tail to the rear and sent it charging wildly back upon its friends. The second in command, receiving the other barrel, at even shorter range, went through the same performance with greater impetuosity. At the same moment the old musket was prevailed on to go off, ...
— The Rover of the Andes - A Tale of Adventure on South America • R.M. Ballantyne
... springs. From early dawn to dewy eve, and then a few gratuitous hours into the night, he will dig energetic holes in the water with his long, narrow blade. And every stroke counts. The water boils out in a splotch of white air-bubbles, the little suction holes pirouette like dancing-girls, the fabric of the craft itself trembles under the power of the stroke. Jim and I used, in the lake stretches, to amuse ourselves—and probably the Indians—by paddling in furious rivalry ...
— The Forest • Stewart Edward White
... sprightly and deftly did this charmer pirouette, she could not deny herself the luxury of appearing as a regular actress. Her first venture in this direction was as the Eunuch of "Valentinian," wherein she donned boy's attire, and was much more successful in masculine ...
— The Palmy Days of Nance Oldfield • Edward Robins
... well as diligence of investigation, are, perhaps, not despised as authority. Some superior weight may even be attached to the later and maturer views. But man changes them every other day; if they rise and fall with the barometer; if his whole life has been one rapid pirouette, it is impossible with gravity to discuss the question, whether at some point he may not have been right. Whoever be in the right, he cannot well be who has never long been any thing; and to take such a man for a guide would be almost ...
— The Eclipse of Faith - Or, A Visit To A Religious Sceptic • Henry Rogers
... went Brownie and attached himself firmly to Madam Anderson's train, and beginning a swift rotary movement, so bewildered the old lady that she lost both oar and enemy, and looked more like a pirouette dancer than a decorous upholder of the cause of ...
— The Gentle Art of Cooking Wives • Elizabeth Strong Worthington
... the end. The little imps danced and leaped; and then one separated itself from the crowd, to grow bigger than, the rest, to pirouette more energetically. He rose. His mind was made up. ...
— The Man Upstairs and Other Stories • P. G. Wodehouse
... on such occasions, let the steering gear go in order to give more force to his words by waving his hands in the air, regardless of the danger which was in front of us, with the result that the canoe turned a pirouette upon herself and down the rapid we ...
— Across Unknown South America • Arnold Henry Savage Landor
... in dancing, which should be wilful yet airily composed, thoughtless yet inducing. Circumspection! —in nothing else hath Mary shown it where she should. 'Tis like this Queen perversely to make a psalm of dancing, and then pirouette with sacred duty. But you have spoken the truth, and I am well content. So get ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... we've either of us got any money, but," she looked about the handsomely furnished house, "you'll have lots, and Paul'll soon be making it hand over fist—and I'll be marrying it!" She ended with a triumphant pirouette her vision of the future, and encountered Madame Boyle, entering with a white and gold evening wrap which sent her into another paroxysm of admiration. The dressmaker had just begun to say that she thought another ...
— The Squirrel-Cage • Dorothy Canfield
... merits, and see how far they may gain me the love and esteem of others when unsupported by the claims of wealth. Let me see, Hetty, I must have some employment aside from helping you to milk the cows and feed the pigs. Ah, I have it!" she cried, springing up and turning a pirouette—"listen—I will be a milliner! you know, aunt thinks I have a great knack at cap-making—O excellent idea—I will turn milliner for all the farmer's wives and daughters far and near." And catching up her embroidered mouchoir she began folding it into a turban, ...
— Graham's Magazine, Vol. XXXII No. 4, April 1848 • Various
... popular ideas of education, and if he wears his clothes with a gentlemanly air, he is allowed to meet the young lady, whose mother has ordered her to guard her tongue, to let no sign of her heart or soul appear on her face, which must wear the smile of a danseuse finishing a pirouette. These commands are coupled with instructions as to the danger of revealing her real character, and the additional advice of not seeming alarmingly well educated. If the settlements have all been agreed ...
— Modeste Mignon • Honore de Balzac
... told her, making Paddy pirouette by pressing a heel against his short-ribs. She meant, of course, riding astride, which must have struck her as the final word ...
— The Prairie Mother • Arthur Stringer
... position to attack in case they attempt a descent, I think it my duty to say that in that case we must make up our mind to have to fight them in the end; for if they have really sought an action, they will have been able to fight, seeing that it is impossible to pirouette so long near a fleet without coming to grips."[20] This is as much as to say that a sure point of temporary retreat is necessary to "a fleet in being," and this was an essential part ...
— Some Principles of Maritime Strategy • Julian Stafford Corbett
... and certainly quite novel—I think it will do. Portray her delicate little feet, peeping out, pointing downwards, the force of the elements raising her on her tip toes, now touching, now disdaining the earth. Her dress expanded wide like that of Herbele in her last and best pirouette— round, round she goes—her white arms are tossed frantically in the air. Corinne never threw herself into more graceful attitudes. Now is seen her diminishing ankle—now the rounded symmetry—mustn't go too high up though—the wind increases—her distance from the edge of the ...
— Olla Podrida • Frederick Marryat (AKA Captain Marryat)
... as the centre of the whole broad panoramic effect of that afternoon. The stiff square lace of Victorian Gothic with its Dutch clock of a tower came upon me suddenly and stared and whirled past in a slow half pirouette and became still, I know, behind me as if watching me recede. "Aren't you going to respect me, then?" it seemed ...
— Tono Bungay • H. G. Wells
... ran down, and Amy, flying up to her brother, made a splendid sweeping curtsey, and twirled round in a pirouette. ...
— The Heir of Redclyffe • Charlotte M. Yonge
... circle.] Rotation. — N. rotation, revolution, spinning, gyration, turning about an axis, turning aound an axis, circulation, roll; circumrotation[obs3], circumvolution, circumgyration[obs3]; volutation[obs3], circination|, turbination[obs3], pirouette, convolution. verticity|, whir, whirl, eddy, vortex, whirlpool, gurge[obs3]; countercurrent; Maelstrom, Charybdis; Ixion. [rotating air] cyclone; tornado, whirlwind; dust devil. [rotation of an automobile] ...
— Roget's Thesaurus
... extending his hand, 'you must allow me to express my admiration! I wish other young ladies were so thoughtful and prudent. But if they were, it would not make your conduct less remarkable.' And Mr. Morton departed, while Wych Hazel, turning a sharp pirouette on one toe, dropped into her chair like a thistle down. But all that appeared to the eyes of Mr. Dell was a somewhat extensive flutter of muslin. He had no time to remark upon it nor upon anything else, as there immediately succeeded ...
— Wych Hazel • Susan and Anna Warner
... moving impatiently under the table as though seized by a dancing frenzy. And in effect, dinner over, when they had returned to the studio, Constance began to walk backward and forward, now and then half executing a step, a pirouette, while continuing to talk, interrupting herself to hum some ballad air of which she would keep the rhythm with a movement of the head; then suddenly she bent herself double, and with a bound was at the other end of ...
— The Nabob • Alphonse Daudet |
