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Purl   Listen
noun
Purl  n.  
1.
An embroidered and puckered border; a hem or fringe, often of gold or silver twist; also, a pleat or fold, as of a band. "A triumphant chariot made of carnation velvet, enriched withpurl and pearl."
2.
An inversion of stitches in knitting, which gives to the work a ribbed or waved appearance.
Purl stitch. Same as Purl, n., 2.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Purl" Quotes from Famous Books



... drays, choked turnpikes, and a whirl Of wheels, and roar of voices, and confusion; Here taverns wooing to a pint of 'purl,' There mails fast flying off like a delusion; There barbers' blocks with periwigs in curl In windows; here the lamplighter's infusion Slowly distill'd into the glimmering glass (For in those days we ...
— Don Juan • Lord Byron

... for the boom of the fairy bassoon, And the oboes and horns as they strike up a tune, And the twang of the harps and the sigh of the lutes, And the clash of the cymbals, the purl of the flutes; And the fiddles sail in To the musical din, While the chief all on fire, with a flame for a hand, Rattles on the gay measure and ...
— The Vagabond and Other Poems from Punch • R. C. Lehmann

... of nights in lustrous June, She walks with him alone; Through silver glidings of the moon The runnels purl a dreamy tune; His arm is round her thrown: But looks and sounds far lovelier Thrill on his tranced ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 4, No. 23, September, 1859 • Various

... him. He went back to the sloping granite slab, over it, down among the alders, and out of sight. For a moment she heard him among the bushes; then as all sound made by him died away there was only the purl of the creek and the eternal murmur of the pines. Now it seemed to her more silent than before, even when King had sat wordlessly near her. And yet, incongruously, whereas the silence was deepened ...
— The Everlasting Whisper • Jackson Gregory

... time that she heard the purl and whisper of running water, a sound dear to the hearts of all travelers. She veered to the left and found the little grove of trees with a thick shrubbery growing between, fed by the water of that diminutive brook. She dismounted ...
— Riders of the Silences • Max Brand

... is a charming composition somewhat in the same style as the "Campanella," but instead of describing silver-toned chimes of bells, reproducing the purl of a bosky spring. One hears the clear rippling water and sees its sparkling jets in glints of sunlight, as it dashes against the stones, and its shimmering spray. The work is the forerunner and ...
— The Pianolist - A Guide for Pianola Players • Gustav Kobb

... each other nowadays over the knitted helmets, "It's extraordinary how dark London is at night." They then drop two and purl two, and add, "Particularly as the evenings are drawing in so." But while they prattle of it thus lightly we (their husbands) are outside in it all, marching ... and wheeling ... and tripping over each other. At what risk to ourselves I will ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 147, October 28, 1914 • Various

... a hasty barricade in case of need, many of the rioters had straggled, not only that night, but for two or three nights before. It was now broad day, but the morning being cold, a group of them were gathered round a fire in a public-house, drinking hot purl, and smoking pipes, and planning new ...
— Barnaby Rudge • Charles Dickens

... sun forsook the eastern main The pealing thunder shook the heav'nly plain; Majestic grandeur! From the zephyr's wing, Exhales the incense of the blooming spring. Soft purl the streams, the birds renew their notes, And through the air their mingled music floats, Through all the heav'ns what beauteous dyes are spread! But the west glories in the deepest red; So may our breasts with every virtue glow The living temples of our God below! Filled with the ...
— The Upward Path - A Reader For Colored Children • Various

... floods from high, to bless his bowers, And feed with pregnant streams the plants and flowers: Soon as he clears whate'er their passage stay'd, And marks the future current with his spade, Swift o'er the rolling pebbles, down the hills, Louder and louder purl the falling rills; Before him scattering, they prevent his pains, And shine in ...
— The Iliad of Homer • Homer

... and drowsed upon a commanding eminence fronted by a splendid terraced lawn which one beheld through clumps of flowering shrubs and well-tended trees. Here and there among the foliage gleamed statuary, and the musical purl of a fountain fell ...
— The Net • Rex Beach

... though alas, what a little of her Shows in its cold white look! Not her glance, glide, or smile; not a tittle of her Voice like the purl of a brook; Not her thoughts, that ...
— Late Lyrics and Earlier • Thomas Hardy

... grave Nestor stand, As't were encouraging the Greeks to fight; Making such sober action with his hand That it beguiled attention, charm'd the sight: In speech, it seem'd, his beard, all silver white, Wagg'd up and down, and from his lips did fly Thin winding breath, which purl'd up to ...
— The Rape of Lucrece • William Shakespeare [Collins edition]

... the season, were either of cloth of gold with silver edging, of red satin covered with gold purl, of taffeta, white, blue, black, or tawny, of silk serge, silk camblet, velvet, cloth of silver, silver tissue, cloth of gold, or ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to Prose, Vol. VII (of X)—Continental Europe I • Various

... nearly midnight—he caught once more the flashings of a shallow river and the dim outlines of shrubbery beside the bank—again the Asopus. He must take care or he would wander straight into Mardonius's camp. Therefore he stopped awhile, drank the cool water, and let the stream purl around his burning foot. Then he set his face to the south, for there lay Plataea. There he would ...
— A Victor of Salamis • William Stearns Davis

... recent literary competition in EVE, the subject was "Bores, and how to make the best of them." Well, personally, I could suffer them—if not more gladly, at least with a greater resignation—if I were allowed to recite, "Two plain; one purl" so long as their infliction lasted. As it is, I am left with nothing else to do except furtively to watch the clock, and secretly to ring up "OO Heaven" to send down a ...
— Over the Fireside with Silent Friends • Richard King

... proud of its latest resident. For a little space, at any rate, he would be the hero of fashionable circles, and go to his death with all the glamour of romance. He would leave a memory behind him that the turnkeys might presently make stirring tales of, as they drank their purl at night round the fire in ...
— The Brown Mask • Percy J. Brebner

... primrose-hued slashes through a cloud low down in the awakening sky. From the trees came the sound of steady dripping upon the drifted leaves under them, and from the direction of the church she could hear another noise—peculiar, and not intermittent like the rest, the purl of water ...
— Far from the Madding Crowd • Thomas Hardy

... Bought a new Head to my Cane, and a Tongue to my Buckle. Drank a Glass of Purl to ...
— The Spectator, Volume 2. • Addison and Steele

... I was in the City. I learnt afterwards that Marjorie (my wife) was crooning to her needles the unmetrical jumper lullaby, "Six purl, eight plain; then the same all over again." Anyhow she was knitting, when she suddenly found herself looking into the wistful eyes of a tortoiseshell cat ...
— Punch or the London Charivari, October 20, 1920 • Various

... this thick brush displays its emerald tent, I stretch my wearied frame, for solitude To steal within my heart. How hushed the scene At first, and then, to the accustomed ear, How full of sounds, so tuned to harmony They seemed but silence; the monotonous purl Of yon small water-break—the transient hum Swung past me by the bee—the low meek burst Of bubbles, as the trout leaps up to seize The skipping spider—the light lashing sound Of cattle, mid-leg in the shady pool, Whisking the flies away—the ceaseless chirp ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII. No. 3. March 1848 • Various



Words linked to "Purl" :   handicraft, course, sough, whirlpool, broider, swirl, run, purl stitch, yarn, knitting stitch, eddy



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