"Soft" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... recommended that the French force sent to assist him should threaten or secure the Dutch possessions at the Cape of Good Hope, and in Java and Ceylon. "There," it continued, "you would meet only with men enervated by luxury, soft beings that would tremble before the soldiers of liberty." The French conquest of Holland and the capture of the Dutch fleet in the winter of 1794-5 brought these schemes within measurable distance of fulfilment. Failing to save a single Dutch fortress or warship, Pitt and his colleagues ...
— William Pitt and the Great War • John Holland Rose
... the wooded country to clear the land of its native trees and immediately replant saplings of certain introduced varieties about the farmyard or along the streets. In this way a forest growth of oak, elm, beech, butternut, hemlock, basswood, and birch is cleared off to give room for saplings of soft maple, cottonwood, and brittle willow. It is felt that the inexpensiveness of leaving the forest trees standing would derogate from the dignity that should invest an article which is intended to serve a decorative ...
— The Theory of the Leisure Class • Thorstein Veblen
... life hold to be good, Yet to forget wives, maids, they ne'er succeed! Who speak of grateful love while lives their lord, And dead their lord, another they pursue. All men spiritual life know to be good, But sons and grandsons to forget never succeed! From old till now of parents soft many, But filial sons and ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book I • Cao Xueqin
... the finish of the count, and the referee's awarding words, Dick Prescott's voice broke in, as soft and cool ...
— Dick Prescott's Second Year at West Point - Finding the Glory of the Soldier's Life • H. Irving Hancock
... loud," replied Rebecca evasively, yet with an answering gleam of ready response to the other's curiosity in the quick lift of her soft ...
— The Wind in the Rose-bush and Other Stories of the Supernatural • Mary Eleanor Wilkins Freeman
... three bones, and from them constructing an animal now extinct; or, think of knowing from an impress on a stone, made years ago, what animal had walked over its then soft surface. ...
— Sara, a Princess • Fannie E. Newberry
... John Storm was seized with a weird feeling of dread. The soft air seemed to be filled with Glory's presence and her very breath to live in it. On the side-table a lamp was burning under a warm red shade. A heap of petty vanities lay about—articles of silver, little trinkets, fans, feathers, and flowers. His footsteps on the ...
— The Christian - A Story • Hall Caine
... suspected there was any load to be found near. I also saw them secrete a lump of spar, in which they had reason to guess there were Cornish diamonds, as they call them, and they carefully hid the bits of kellus[Footnote: 2 Kellus is the miner's name for a substance like a white soft stone, which lies above the floor or spar, near to a vein.], which they had picked out, lest the viewer should notice them and suspect ...
— Tales & Novels, Vol. 2 • Maria Edgeworth
... sometimes provokes me. Because she has by her laborious profession made herself independent, he jestingly talks about her bank stock, and about her being a good speculation for some needy old gentleman. And because that beautiful, soft grey hair of hers will curl about her pale face, it is hinted that she makes the most of her remaining attractions, and would be nothing loth. ...
— Janet's Love and Service • Margaret M Robertson
... not, yet comprehended, Is the spirit's voiceless prayer. Soft rebukes, in blessings ended. Breathing from her lips ...
— Great Men and Famous Women, Vol. 7 of 8 • Charles F. (Charles Francis) Horne
... the hole the rats had a good time, I can tell you! Yes, all of them; for the old gray rat, when he got safe home, laid the end of his tail on a bit of soft wool, so that it did not hurt him much, and then he gave the rat-boy Nip, who had bit it off, a kiss, and said he did not mean to take away his tea now, as he was so sad. Then the rat-boy said: "Oh! I am so glad, I will jump up to the moon for joy." And so they all ...
— The First Little Pet Book with Ten Short Stories in Words of Three and Four Letters • Frances Elizabeth Barrow
... the fast, which is the subject matter of this communication, having been commenced on the Friday six weeks before that day, the last food having been taken on the Thursday at 5 P.M. I saw him, therefore, on the forty-fifth day of the fast. His pulse was 59, soft, steady, regular. Temp. 96.8 degrees, about 11 A.M. He was able to be up, and walked actively, all his bodily movements being active and his mind quite clear and rational. His weight on the day after I first saw him was, in the same clothes as when weighed ...
— The Healthy Life, Vol. V, Nos. 24-28 - The Independent Health Magazine • Various
... music quite so sweet As patter of a baby's feet. Who never hears along the hall The sound of tiny feet that fall Upon the floor so soft and low As eagerly they come or go, Has missed, no matter who he be, Life's ...
— All That Matters • Edgar A. Guest
... me. Now, I think that such editors as Thackeray and myself,—if I may, for the moment, be allowed to couple men so unequal,—will always be liable to commit such faults, but that the natures of publishers and proprietors will be less soft. ...
— Autobiography of Anthony Trollope • Anthony Trollope
... unfolding it and reading out, with his back to the boy, "'Three months after date I promise to pay George Cripps thirty-five pounds, value received. Signed, E. Loman.' That's about it, eh, young gentleman? Well, blessed if I ain't a soft-hearted chap after the doing you've given me over this here ...
— The Fifth Form at Saint Dominic's - A School Story • Talbot Baines Reed
... middle of the month of November, and the weather was exceedingly soft and balmy for the time of year. The sky was blue, the few remaining leaves rustled on the trees, and an occasional bird whistled in the hedgerows. Diana de Laurebourg was walking slowly along the path leading to ...
— The Champdoce Mystery • Emile Gaboriau
... in one of the most peaceful and secluded churchyards in Kent, where wild flowers mingle with the grass, and the soft landscape around forms the fairest spot in the garden of England, lie the bones of the young mother and her gentle child. But the ashes of the father do not mingle with theirs; nor, from that night forward, ...
— The Pickwick Papers • Charles Dickens
... this letter and first mastered its contents, the language which he used would have done honour to a Toulon coal-heaver. He cursed St. Genis' stupidity in allowing himself to be caught; but above all he cursed himself for his soft-heartedness which had prompted him to part ...
— The Bronze Eagle - A Story of the Hundred Days • Emmuska Orczy, Baroness Orczy
... up the staircase with a furtive, soft-footed tread was quite unknown to Tommy. He was obviously of the very dregs of society. The low beetling brows, and the criminal jaw, the bestiality of the whole countenance were new to the young man, though he was a type that Scotland Yard would ...
— The Secret Adversary • Agatha Christie
... aboard. Mr. Marlin touched the starter and the engine began to chug. He let in his clutch but the car would not move. The car happened to be standing on a moist spot and its great weight had pressed the wheels far down into the soft new road. Mr. Marlin threw on the power. The truck jumped, something snapped sharply and a banging noise followed as the car moved ...
— The Young Wireless Operator—As a Fire Patrol - The Story of a Young Wireless Amateur Who Made Good as a Fire Patrol • Lewis E. Theiss
... part into dice, about 3 tablespoons; boil gently in salted water until soft, drain and reserve for soup. Cut remainder cucumber into pieces, cut onions small. Make Crisco hot in stewpan, fry onions and cucumber 5 minutes, add parsley with stock, let it simmer 20 minutes. Mix cornstarch with milk, stir in soup until it boils, let ...
— The Story of Crisco • Marion Harris Neil
... vanity, who would mind it? All was, alas, worse than vanity—injustice, punishment, exaction, death. The wife of Angel Clare put her hand to her brow, and felt its curve, and the edges of her eye-sockets perceptible under the soft skin, and thought as she did so that a time would come when that bone would be bare. "I wish it ...
— Tess of the d'Urbervilles - A Pure Woman • Thomas Hardy
... is over a soft rock, which produces, when worn, a white glaring trail. The country through which we passed was fertile. Everywhere were fields of grain, wheat, oats, and, as we were descending into the lower land, corn. The little watch-houses ...
— In Indian Mexico (1908) • Frederick Starr
... laughed Eric. "I waited for such words from thee. Thrice have we striven together—once out yonder in the snow, once on Horse-Head Heights, and once by Westman Isles—and still we live to tell the tale. Come down, Ospakar: come down from that soft seat of thine and here and now let us put it to the proof who is the better man. When we met before, the stake was Whitefire set against my eye. Now the stake is our lives and fair Gudruda's hand. Talk no more, Ospakar, but ...
— Eric Brighteyes • H. Rider Haggard
... later teased me by spreading the report that I used rouge and white paint! I was not as yet "filled out," but held myself straightly, and was fairly proportioned. I wore a cap a l'etudiant, very much over my left ear, and had very long, soft, straight, dark-brown hair; my dream and ideal being the German student. I was extremely shy of strangers, but when once acquainted soon became very friendly, and in most cases made a favourable impression. I was ...
— Memoirs • Charles Godfrey Leland
... mellows and that glorifies Bends o'er it ever from the tender skies, As o'er some Blessed Isle; E'en like the soft and spiritual glow, Kindling rich woods, whereon th' ethereal bow ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 20, - Issue 566, September 15, 1832 • Various
... the middle, steering N.W. and by W. from S.E. and by E. having 11 fathoms all through. It is all clean in every place, without flats, shoals, or any other obstruction, so that it may be passed on either side or in the middle. The whole ground is a soft coral rock, with hardly any sand. Being far within the channel, and going to seek the road or haven for shelter from the east winds which are here very strong, the depth somewhat diminishes, but is ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume VI - Early English Voyages Of Discovery To America • Robert Kerr
... much as the fire had invaded, and the deep ashes fell in; and, weeping, they collected the white bones of their mild companion into a golden vessel, and a double [layer of] fat; then, laying them in the tent, they covered them with soft[742] linen. Next they marked out the area for the tomb, and laid the foundations around the pile; and immediately upraised a mound of earth; and, heaping up the tomb, returned. But Achilles detained the people there, and made the wide assembly sit down; but from the ...
— The Iliad of Homer (1873) • Homer
... group of the Corps d'Afrique, who lounged outside, guarding the entrance from the square, and unsuspicious that any assassin was trying to get out. I could see the gleam of the lamps on their bayonets and hear their soft tread. Ask them to let me out? How nimbly they would have scaled the fence and transfixed me! They like to do such things. No, no—whatever I do, I must keep away from the clutches of these ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... experience nearly every conceivable kind of biting bug infests the Congo. One of the most tenacious and troublesome of the little visitors is the jigger, which has an uncomfortable habit of seeking a soft spot under the toe-nail. Once lodged it is extremely difficult to get him out. These pests are mainly found in sandy soil and give the Negroes who walk about ...
— An African Adventure • Isaac F. Marcosson
... gracious than his language; but when Mamie had turned upon him the soft fire of her eyes, and informed him that he was the first sea-captain she had ever met, "except captains of steamers, of course"—she so qualified the statement—and had expressed a lively sense ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 13 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... and as irresponsible as George. He was enchanted. He had never seen Lucy so tender and so gay; there was a new brilliancy in her eyes; and, without quite knowing what it was that differed, he found a soft mellowness in her laughter which filled him with an uncomprehended delight. Neither did Lucy know why the world on a sudden seemed fuller than it had ever done before, nor why the future smiled so kindly: it never occurred to her that she ...
— The Explorer • W. Somerset Maugham
... sat, smiling, holding the paper against her, seeing a vision of the faraway, beloved child who wrote it. She saw the dancing, happy brown eyes and the shining, cropped head of pale golden brown, and the straight, strong little figure; she heard the merry, ready giggle and the soft, slow tones that were always full of love to her. Robina, her sister's child, her own god-daughter had been her close friend from babyhood, and between them there was a bond of understanding which made nothing of the difference in years. Darling little Robina! ...
— Joy in the Morning • Mary Raymond Shipman Andrews
... flowers and variegated with landscapes of beauty and fertility, but is for the most part, with here and there a patch of verdure, a land of utter barrenness and dreariness, and, as Hamilton paints it, "a great and terrible wilderness, where no soft features mitigated the unbroken horror, but dark and brown ridges, red peaks like pyramids of fire; no rounded hillocks or soft mountain curves, but monstrous and misshapen cliffs, rising tier above tier, and serrated for miles into ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume II • John Lord
... you," she answered brightly, as she stepped to the floor; then catching sight of her husband's face, and seeing something unusual there, "What is it, Edward?" she asked, gliding swiftly to his side and laying her hand upon his arm, while the soft eyes met his with a ...
— Elsie's Motherhood • Martha Finley
... thee, young one? what? why pull so at thy cord? Is it not well with thee? well both for bed and board? Thy plot of grass is soft, and green as grass can be; Rest, little young one, rest; what is't that ...
— Phebe, The Blackberry Girl • Edward Livermore
... lying very weary and silent on a pile of soft buffalo robes within their teepee, when Simon Sprott entered, accompanied by several ...
— Kiddie the Scout • Robert Leighton
... men, and, in the main, honest men; and I could not see why their being aboriginals of the flat, dull soil should serve as a pretext for treating them with perpetual severity and contempt. This idea, of injustice somewhat poisoned the pleasure I might otherwise have derived from Pelet's soft affable manner to myself. Certainly it was agreeable, when the day's work was over, to find one's employer an intelligent and cheerful companion; and if he was sometimes a little sarcastic and sometimes a little too insinuating, and if ...
— The Professor • (AKA Charlotte Bronte) Currer Bell
... "Thy soft-breathed hopes with magic might Have chased from my soul the shades of night. Console the dear ones I part from now, Who hang o'er my couch with pallid brow; Tell them, we'll meet in yon shining sky, And, Angel ...
— The Poetical Works of Mrs. Leprohon (Mrs. R.E. Mullins) • Rosanna Eleanor Leprohon
... word, however, to be added. Your bedside friends should be dressed in soft leather and printed on thin paper. Then you can talk to them quite snugly. It is a great nuisance if you have to stick your arms out of bed and hold ...
— Pebbles on the Shore • Alpha of the Plough (Alfred George Gardiner)
... Angelica, with head gently inclined and a soft, intellectual melancholy pervading the countenance, evinces higher genius, even if, in point of artistic skill, the preference should be given ...
— Women in the fine arts, from the Seventh Century B.C. to the Twentieth Century A.D. • Clara Erskine Clement
... all I could get from mamma that evening. She lay down on a sofa and buried her face in pillows. I sat in the darkening room and mused. The windows were open; a soft warm air blew the curtains gently in and out; from the street below came the murmur of business and voices and clatter of feet and sound of wheels; not with the earnestness of alarm or the droop of depression, ...
— Daisy in the Field • Elizabeth Wetherell
... be particular in its occasion; not an abstraction of the mind, but a definite feeling, special to some certain set of circumstances. Rising from out the surface of daily experience, like the watery issuings of a fountain, it throws itself upward for a moment, then descends in a soft, glittering shower to the level whence it rose. Herein resides the chief defect of Bayly's songs; that they are too general and vague—a species of pattern songs—being embodiments of some general feeling, or reflection, but lacking that sufficient reference ...
— Poems • George P. Morris
... immediately confided to Dickens's servants, among other personal grievances, the fact that he was made to do everything, even cooking, in crimson breeches; which in a hot climate, he protested, was "a grinding of him down." "He is a poor soft country fellow; and his master locks him up at night, in a basement room with iron bars to the window. Between which our servants poke wine in, at midnight. His master and mistress buy old boxes at the curiosity shops, and pass their lives in lining 'em with bits of parti-coloured velvet. A droll ...
— The Life of Charles Dickens, Vol. I-III, Complete • John Forster
... morning, soon after daybreak, the mate put his hand into an open locker, at a corner of the round-house, for a piece of canvas, when it came in contact with a soft, clammy substance, which, to his consternation and horror, began to move! He drew back, uttering an exclamation, in a voice so loud and startling as to alarm the captain and all hands, who hastened on deck in time to see an enormous serpent crawl sluggishly ...
— Jack in the Forecastle • John Sherburne Sleeper
... no moon. The soft glow of a few misty, somnolent stars gave no light among the trees, no light shone from the house. Mackenzie recalled the night he had first approached that door and come suddenly around the corner into the pale beam of Hertha Carlson's lantern. Now the kitchen door might be shut, ...
— The Flockmaster of Poison Creek • George W. Ogden
... been such as to draw her on irresistibly, until their positions had become reversed; she was now fascinated beyond self-control, and without a thought of the future, while he was merely agreeable, but inwardly cool and self-possessed. Still at times the strange thrills returned as the soft light of her eyes fell upon him, and the intoxication he felt at his first meeting with her again drowned his ...
— Atlantic Monthly Vol. 3, No. 16, February, 1859 • Various
... soft a snap," returned Horace Williams, on the brink of tears—"as soft a snap as anybody ever had in this town. And he's monkeyed ...
— The Imperialist • (a.k.a. Mrs. Everard Cotes) Sara Jeannette Duncan
... Bobbsey did it. When he got home he found a can of turpentine which had been left by the painter. Turpentine will soften varnish or paint and make it thin, just as water will make paste soft. Mr. Bobbsey laid a board on the floor from the door-sill over close to where poor Snoop was held fast. Then he poured a little turpentine around each of the four feet of the cat, where her paws were ...
— The Bobbsey Twins at Home • Laura Lee Hope
... but which they had very nearly missed, thanks to the fact that Governments so often find it impossible to do what they ought to do, and, indeed, want to do. Official efforts at politeness, instead of being the soft answers which turn away wrath, too often ...
— The Adventure of Living • John St. Loe Strachey
... was the youthful Earth, And lightly tripped along To music from a starry choir, Whose sweet celestial song Through Nature's temple echoed wild, And soft as streamlets flow, Where sister spheres replied with ...
— A Brief Commentary on the Apocalypse • Sylvester Bliss
... appeares All the faire hopes of what he undertakes, And when he's angry, then a setled valour (Not tainted with extreames) runs through his body, And guides his arme to brave things: Feare he cannot, He shewes no such soft temper; his head's yellow, Hard hayr'd, and curld, thicke twind like Ivy tods, Not to undoe with thunder; In his face The liverie of the warlike Maide appeares, Pure red, and white, for yet no beard has blest him. And in his rowling eyes sits victory, As ...
— The Two Noble Kinsmen • William Shakespeare and John Fletcher [Apocrypha]
... the rocky floor, Of withered oak and beech-leaves, that the wind Had tossed about till weary, covered o'er With skins of bears which feathery mosses lined, And last of lambs, with wool long, soft, and hoar, Received the old man's bended limbs reclined. Gently the maiden did herself unclothe, And lay beside ...
— A Hidden Life and Other Poems • George MacDonald
... Hugh Munro was sitting beneath the dark shadows of the alder trees, which grew under the window of the little chamber where May MacLeod was weeping bitterly over the sad fate from which she could see no way of escape. As she sat thus the soft cry of the cushat fell upon her ears. Intently she listened for a few moments, and when it was repeated stepped to the window and opened it cautiously, leaning forth upon the sill. Again the sound stole from ...
— The Celtic Magazine, Vol. 1, No. 2, December 1875 • Various
... Osborne, seeing her succeeding, had become a sort of satellite. Little Osborne could never of herself amount to anything. She seemed to realise it in a sort of pussy-like way and instinctively concluded to cling with her soft ...
— Sister Carrie • Theodore Dreiser
... season was Lent, and the colouring of the decorations was therefore grave, but all the richer, and the light coming strongly in from the west window immediately over the children's heads, made the contrast of the bright sunlight and of the soft depths of mystery more striking, and, to an eye to which everything ecclesiastical was absolutely new, the effect was almost overwhelming. That solemnity and sanctity of long centuries, the peaceful hush, the grave beauty and grandeur, almost made him afraid to breathe, and Cherry sat by ...
— The Pillars of the House, V1 • Charlotte M. Yonge
... The soft layers which enshroud the hard machinery of the human frame seem to arrive in a merely incidental or accidental sort of way. Yet once they have arrived they exert a mysterious influence over careers. Because of a mere change in contour, many a queen has lost her throne. It is a terrifying ...
— The Slim Princess • George Ade
... amphitheatre of mountains. The nearest of them was some thirty miles away, yet ordinarily, in this clear, dry, Western atmosphere they were always imminent. Over their eastern ramparts the sun rose to look upon a chill and frosty world; behind their western barriers the sun withdrew, leaving soft air, purple shadows, and the flight of dim, far wildfowl across a saffron sky. To the north was only distance and the fading of the blue of the heavens to the pearl gray of ...
— The Killer • Stewart Edward White
... 6th, 1862. I am afraid I repeat myself in talking about the beauty of the climate here, but to-day is so lovely that I cannot refrain from recurring to the subject. While you are shivering under the blasts of winter, we have a genuine June morning: the air soft and pure, the atmosphere clear, innumerable birds chirping in the trees opposite the windows, (for the Arabs never interfere with birds,) and the aspect of things from our balcony overlooking the Esbekieh, or public square, ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. XI., April, 1863, No. LXVI. - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics. • Various
... quiet speech flowed on. Suffering was life, full of suffering was the world, but salvation from suffering had been found: salvation was obtained by him who would walk the path of the Buddha. With a soft, yet firm voice the exalted one spoke, taught the four main doctrines, taught the eightfold path, patiently he went the usual path of the teachings, of the examples, of the repetitions, brightly and quietly his voice hovered ...
— Siddhartha • Herman Hesse
... her pretty little feet still. They moved restlessly under her chair. Pauline saw the movement, and a wave of sympathy flashed between the sisters. Pauline's eyes spoke volumes as they encountered the soft ...
— Girls of the Forest • L. T. Meade
... The likeness is excellent in the portrait which Horace Vernet drew in his picture called "A Review of the First Consul on the Place du Carrousel." His forehead was very high, and bare; his hair thin, especially on the temples, but very fine and soft, and a rich brown color; his eyes deep blue, expressing in an almost incredible manner the various emotions by which he was affected, sometimes extremely gentle and caressing, sometimes severe, and even inflexible. His ...
— The Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte • Bourrienne, Constant, and Stewarton
... deceptive is the half-darkness, that he had several heads, round and brownish, which move back and forward, even as low as his chest. It is a horrible illusion. Is it nothing more? There! something drops off the bed with a soft plump, like a kitten, and is out of the window in a flash; another—four—and after that there ...
— Ghost Stories of an Antiquary • Montague Rhodes James
... walked, Pinocchio noticed a tiny insect glimmering on the trunk of a tree, a small being that glowed with a pale, soft light. ...
— The Adventures of Pinocchio • C. Collodi—Pseudonym of Carlo Lorenzini
... there she said his name to herself, "Bertie," as she had heard his sister call him. And she knew well that it was pleasant to her to be thrilled by Bertie's eyes and lips, pleasant to feel Bertie's soft palms and slim strong fingers pressing those hands of hers, on which she had just been trying experiments with a new wash. Lydia looked thoughtfully into her looking-glass and took her reflection into her confidence. "Ain't you a silly?" ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, Vol. 22, September, 1878 • Various
... a withered tuft of grass. A lonely jay flits from one tree to another; a cardinal speeds by my window, a line of color across a dark background; and one by one the dry leaves drop noiselessly down, making thicker the soft covering which Nature is spreading over the breast of ...
— The Love Story of Abner Stone • Edwin Carlile Litsey
... moral or religious quality of love. So pure is this emotion to the poet, "so perfect in whiteness, that it will not take pollution; but, ermine-like, is armed from dishonour by its own soft snow." In the corruptest hearts, amidst the worst sensuality, love is still a power divine, making for all goodness. Even when it is kindled into flame by an illicit touch, and wars against the life of the family, which is its own product, its worth is supreme. He who has learned ...
— Browning as a Philosophical and Religious Teacher • Henry Jones
... little old woman sat down in the chair of the Great, Huge Bear, and that was too hard for her. And then she sat down in the chair of the Middle Bear, and that was too soft for her. And then she sat down in the chair of the Little Small, Wee Bear, and that was neither too hard nor too soft, but just right. So she seated herself in it, and there she sat till the bottom of the chair came out, and down came she, plump upon the ground. And the naughty old woman said ...
— The Junior Classics, Volume 1 • Willam Patten
... little solicitous to know whence proceeded the faults of that which it condemns, yet it may gratify curiosity to inform it, that the English Dictionary was written with little assistance of the learned, and without any patronage of the great; not in the soft obscurities of retirement, or under the shelter of academic bowers, but amid inconvenience and distraction, in sickness and in sorrow. It may repress the triumph of malignant criticism to observe, that if our language is not here fully displayed, ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to Prose, Vol. IV (of X)—Great Britain and Ireland II • Various
... imagination, that can induce the enlightened or the good to regret, that the knowledge they possess of it is chiefly from the report of others, or from the tumultuous murmur, which from a distance invades the tranquillity of their retreat, and operates as a discord in a soft sonata. These are the moments which affect us more than all the harmony of Italy, or all the melody of Scotland—moments, in which we appear almost to ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 10, No. - 287, December 15, 1827 • Various
... that of her mother, and the strong man would carry her up and down his little yard in the cool night air by the hour, or rock her to sleep on his breast when the sun was high. No touch was so gentle as his, or so soothing. He would hush his great, mellow voice into soft, melodious tones as he sung her favorite hymns, and often her feeble treble would blend with his rich baritone. He yearned over her with inexpressible tenderness, counting the minutes when on duty till the hour came which permitted ...
— The Earth Trembled • E.P. Roe
... a sputtering return fire to show he was still alive and prepared to exchange compliments. Between intervals of a vain search for something smooth and soft he expressed his feelings by a blind banging into the trees. At last he carefully wiped over the floor, settled himself against the entrance to the tender, and began to doze. A bullet ...
— The Return of Blue Pete • Luke Allan
... city where the trains run through the streets. With Tolstoy, one feels that civilization is a crime and a mistake, when one sees nerve-wrecking machines running through the streets, poisoning the atmosphere with soft coal smoke. ...
— Mother Earth, Vol. 1 No. 2, April 1906 - Monthly Magazine Devoted to Social Science and Literature • Various
... boldly. Scientists saw that wonderful developments were possible, and we have reason to believe that experiments were made in England, France, Germany and all civilized countries about this time, for the production of the instrument which we call, in this day, a Pianoforte. (Piano e forte: soft and loud.) ...
— Piano Tuning - A Simple and Accurate Method for Amateurs • J. Cree Fischer
... higher and the sapling bent and cracked. Jim fell on his feet and ran. The dog swooped on the cartridge and followed. It all took but a very few moments. Jim ran to a digger's hole, about ten feet deep, and dropped down into it—landing on soft mud—and was safe. The dog grinned sardonically down on him, over the edge, for a moment, as if he thought it would be a good lark to drop the ...
— Joe Wilson and His Mates • Henry Lawson
... short. No; he wasn't a bit angry now; he felt as good-humored and gay as ever he did when a boy. Instead of pulling Mrs. Yoop's hair, he perched on her shoulder and smoothed her soft cheek with his hairy paw. In return, she smiled at the funny green ...
— The Tin Woodman of Oz • L. Frank Baum
... home to take her to drive. It is such a soft, Indian-summery day, with the air full of scents and sounds, but all the pleasure has gone out of it now ...
— Floyd Grandon's Honor • Amanda Minnie Douglas
... of few men, however worthy, to inspire one woman with such a devotion as Wanaha yielded to him. Besides, she was a wonderful picture of beauty, colored it is true, but none the less fair for that. Her long black, braided hair, her delicate, high-bred face so delightfully gentle, and her great, soft black eyes which had almost, but not quite, lost that last latent glimmer of the old savage. Surely, she was worth ...
— The Watchers of the Plains - A Tale of the Western Prairies • Ridgewell Cullum
... to the long, soft ears of his motionless bunny, the timid little game-bearer sat there alone, big-eyed and dumb with wonder and childish alarm. He could see not far, unless it might be up the hill, for the sage-brush grew above his head and circumscribed his ...
— Bruvver Jim's Baby • Philip Verrill Mighels
... to exhort weak young men; for neither is it easy to hold (soft) cheese with a hook. But those who have a good natural disposition, even if you try to turn them aside, cling ...
— A Selection from the Discourses of Epictetus With the Encheiridion • Epictetus
... wood, Bloomed crimson with the summer's heavy kiss, But autumn's dim feet left it in the dust, And like tired reapers my lorn thoughts went down To the gloom-harvest of a hopeless love, For past all thought I loved thee: Listening close From the soft hour when twilight's rosy hedge Sprang from the fires of sunset, till deep night Swept with her cloud of stars the face of heaven, For the quick music, from the pavement rung Where beat the impatient hoof-strokes of the steed, Whose mane of silver, like a wave of light, ...
— International Weekly Miscellany, Vol. 1, No. 5, July 29, 1850 • Various
... golden mist, or haze, which proved to be, not a transient phenomenon, but a permanent one, for never in that country has the sun been seen, nor is there any night. The haze seems to be self-luminous, giving a soft, yellow light, so diffused that shadows are unknown. The land is abundantly supplied with pools and rivulets, whose water is of a beautiful orange color and has a pleasing perfume somewhat like attar of rose. I observed all this without surprise and with little apprehension, and went forward, ...
— The Collected Works of Ambrose Bierce • Ambrose Bierce
... can spare that is for sale.' The passengers fairly jumped with laughter. Nicodemus paid me $27 for this last sale, and threw the whole out of the door in the rear of the car. These men were from the South, and I have always retained a soft spot in my heart for a ...
— Edison, His Life and Inventions • Frank Lewis Dyer and Thomas Commerford Martin
... least, and their sides the same mysterious and riven aspect. In addition, however, to their other charms, they have one that is wanting in most of Switzerland, though traces of it are to be found in Savoy and on the southern side of the Alps; they have that strange admixture of the soft and the severe, of the sublime and beautiful, that so peculiarly characterize the witchery of Italian nature. Such was now the aspect of all visible from the deck of le Feu-Follet. The sea, with its dark-blue tint, was losing every trace of the western wind, and was becoming glassy ...
— The Wing-and-Wing - Le Feu-Follet • J. Fenimore Cooper
... in there. I guess I'd better take a few very soft steps inside, and see if I can discover where the rogues are. That is, unless they have already bagged their booty, and have gotten ...
— The High School Captain of the Team - Dick & Co. Leading the Athletic Vanguard • H. Irving Hancock
... shape of that common to the atlantic states which produces the berry commonly called Solloman's seal berry. this berry also is attatched to the top of the stem in the same manner; and is of a globelar form, consisting of a thin soft pellecle which encloses a soft pulp inveloping from three to four seeds, white, firm, smothe, and in the form of a third or quarter of a globe, and large in proportion to the fruit or about the size of the seed of the common ...
— The Journals of Lewis and Clark • Meriwether Lewis et al
... she smile on thee, sad-eyed, and set it to thy lip, and woo thee soft-voiced, so shalt thou ...
— Beltane The Smith • Jeffery Farnol
... that might have heartened him. But after being hurled from what he accounted the pinnacle of success, he mistrusted now the crafty Lieutenant, saw that he had been played with as a mouse by this Imperial cat with the soft, deadly paws. ...
— The Strolling Saint • Raphael Sabatini
... was a short jacket of rich green silk, embroidered in front with green of the same color, and over all a pure white robe falling from the shoulders. The turban was a Mecca turban made of many yards of soft white silk, embroidered in white silk. It was difficult to believe that this gorgeous Mussulman, in the odor of double sanctity, with his scornful face and superb air, could so far demean himself as to wait on "dogs of infidels" at dinner, or appear in ...
— The Golden Chersonese and the Way Thither • Isabella L. Bird (Mrs. Bishop)
... and the trees were just beginning to moan with the evening wind. Tommy stood in the middle of the bridge, and looked—looked into the dark depths of the water, and then let his eye trace the silver path of the river where it vanished in the soft purple tints of the wood. He said, "If I was to drop over here now, Mr. Musgrave, do you think God would ...
— The Romance of the Coast • James Runciman
... obediently and continued down the slope. When she reached the soft, spongy green of the meadow, the cows regarded her wonderingly. Pete began mowing the long grass on the edge, working so slowly that the sound did not mar the hush of the place; and sometimes he sank down at ease and pulled apart a jointed ...
— In Apple-Blossom Time - A Fairy-Tale to Date • Clara Louise Burnham
... the ends. She has a good forehead, arched a little, not without a look of habitation, though whence that comes it might be hard to say. There are no great clouds on that sky of the face, but there is a soft dimness that might turn to rain. She has a straight nose, not too large for the imperfect yet decidedly Greek contour; a doubtful, rather straight, thin-lipped mouth, which seems to dissolve into ...
— What's Mine's Mine • George MacDonald
... the kitchen fire with the great family Bible in her lap; but, instead of reading it, she was winding round it some white soft wicking. ...
— Little Grandmother • Sophie May
... brought face to face with so much sorrow and so much beauty. She let him make them, while her left hand gently stroked and caressed his right hand which held hers; yet all the time resolutely turning her face and her soft breast away, as though she dreaded to be kissed, to lose will and identity in the mere delight of his touch. And he felt, too, in some strange way, as though the blow that had fallen upon her had placed her at a distance from him; not ...
— The Testing of Diana Mallory • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... But feeds on mallows, and such bitter herbs; Nor like the merchant, who hath filled his vaults With Romagnia, and rich Candian wines, Yet drinks the lees of Lombard's vinegar: You will lie not in straw, whilst moths and worms {561} Feed on your sumptuous hangings and soft beds; You know the use ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 215, December 10, 1853 • Various
... of your looks then, and of your ways now. You used to be so rough to me, and so masterful, and would have your own way, like the little man that you were. I can see you now with your touzled brown hair and your mischievous eyes. And now you are so gentle and quiet and soft-spoken." ...
— The Great Shadow and Other Napoleonic Tales • Arthur Conan Doyle
... after year beheld the silent toil That spread his lustrous coil; Still, as the spiral grew, He left the past year's dwelling for the new, Stole with soft step its shining archway through, Built up its idle door, Stretched in his last-found home, and knew the old ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 1, No. 4, February, 1858 • Various
... at every other word; ignorant on every point off parade, except the merits of a bottle and the looks of a woman; not of high birth, yet absurdly proud of his no-ancestry; brave as a bulldog; savage, lustful, prodigal, generous; gentle in soft moods; easy of love and laughter; dull of wit; utterly unread; believing his country the first in the world, and he as good a gentleman as any in it. "Yes, he is mighty well for a provincial, upon my word. He was beat at Fort What-d'ye-call-um last year, down by the Thingamy river. What's ...
— The Virginians • William Makepeace Thackeray
... December 17th, was broken by copies of a correspondence between Lord Spencer and Lord Salisbury, the latter writing 'with much sound and fury' on the question of another Conservative Boundary Commissioner for Ireland. 'Lord Salisbury had always been so extremely soft and sweet to me that it was a revelation to find him writing to Spencer in the style of Harcourt or of Chamberlain when in ...
— The Life of the Rt. Hon. Sir Charles W. Dilke, Vol. 2 • Stephen Gwynn
... "Hath not the potter a right over the clay, from the same lump to make one part a vessel unto honor, and another unto dishonor?" Wisdom xv. 7: "For the potter, tempering soft earth, fashioneth every vessel with much labor for our service; yea, of the same clay he maketh both the vessels that serve for clean uses, and likewise also such as serve to the contrary: but what is the use of either sort, the potter himself ...
— Who Wrote the Bible? • Washington Gladden
... gold and myrrh and jewels, Rich table and soft bed, To them who of man's seed are born, Whom woman's milk have fed. Thou wast not made for lucre, For pleasure, nor for rest; Thou, that art sprung from the War-god's loins, And hast tugged at ...
— Lays of Ancient Rome • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... she had drunken, had sent to tell Tancred everything, and he, fearing that which came to pass, came quickly down into his daughter's chamber, where he arrived what time she laid herself on her bed and addressed himself too late to comfort her with soft words; but, seeing the extremity wherein she was, he fell a-weeping grievously; whereupon quoth the lady to him, 'Tancred, keep these tears against a less desired fate than this of mine and give them not to me, who desire them not. Who ever saw any, other than thou, lament ...
— The Decameron of Giovanni Boccaccio • Giovanni Boccaccio
... divides Western Assyria into two plains, a northern and a southern, is a solitary limestone ridge, rising up abruptly from the flat country, which it commands to a vast distance on both sides. The limestone of which it is composed is white, soft, and fossiliferous; it detaches itself in enormous flakes from the mountain-sides, which are sometimes broken into a succession of gigantic steps, while occasionally they present the columnar appearance of basalt. The flanks of the Sinjar are seamed with innumerable ravines, ...
— The Seven Great Monarchies Of The Ancient Eastern World, Vol 2. (of 7): Assyria • George Rawlinson
... days when he would have been the glove upon that hand, that he might touch that cheek. He recalled his first meeting with the fascinating young beauty in her first season, at a moonlight dance on a lawn dangerously flanked with lonely sheltered avenues and whispering trees; and the soft rose-laden air of a dawn that broke on tired musicians and unexhausted dissipation, and his headlong reckless surrender to her irresistible intoxication; and, to say the truth, the Juliet-like acknowledgment it met with. He would have been better pleased, with the world as it was now, if less ...
— When Ghost Meets Ghost • William Frend De Morgan
... pleasant story of Borrow in a drawing-room. His great and stately stature, his bright "very black" or "soft brown" eyes, thick white hair, and smooth oval face, his "loud rich voice" that could be menacing with nervousness when he was roused, his "bold heroic air," {313} ever encased in black raiment to complete the likeness to a "colossal clergyman," never seemed to go with ...
— George Borrow - The Man and His Books • Edward Thomas
... have seen her." And then, in a moment, with a sudden soft smile—"E bella!" said the little girl. She was beautiful herself ...
— The Diary of a Man of Fifty • Henry James
... the evening. I had seen no captain yet, and the first lieutenant had gone on shore one morning to stretch his legs. I was commanding officer; the people were all at their dinner; it was a drizzling soft rain, and I was walking the quarter-deck by myself, when a shore-boat came alongside with a person in plain clothes. I paid him no attention, supposing him to be a wine merchant, or a slop-seller, come to ask permission to serve the ship. The stranger ...
— Frank Mildmay • Captain Frederick Marryat
... creatures," thought Popopo, "to place upon the woman's hats. Their fur is almost as soft as the plumage of the birds, and it strikes me the mice are remarkably pretty and graceful animals. Moreover, they now pass their lives in stealing, and were they obliged to remain always upon women's hats their ...
— American Fairy Tales • L. Frank Baum
... sweet faces, and their mimic shores steal down in quiet evenings to bathe themselves in the transparent waters—far into the depths of the great forest speeds the glad message of returning glory, and graceful fern-and soft velvet moss, and-white wax-like lily peep forth to cover rock and fallen tree and wreck of last year's autumn in one great sea of foliage. There are many landscapes which can never be painted, photographed, or described, but which the mind ...
— The Great Lone Land - A Narrative of Travel and Adventure in the North-West of America • W. F. Butler
... Wonderingly the soft, large eyes of the child looked up to his. Something in their expression riveted the doctor's gaze as by a spell. There were tears in the baby's eyes, and the pretty lip began to quiver at the harsh indignity. The doctor's finer feelings, if he had any, were touched, and muttering ...
— Bad Hugh • Mary Jane Holmes
... three steps at a time. He knocked on Ingigerd's door loudly. No one said "Come in." Nevertheless he opened the door and entered and saw the gypsy painter sitting at Ingigerd's side. On the table under the electric bulbs, lay a large sheet of paper, on which Franck was sketching with a soft pencil what Frederick on stepping nearer saw to be hasty ...
— Atlantis • Gerhart Hauptmann
... the last half hour been somewhat thinned; the three younger girls had gone to bed, the Rector of Beechcroft, Mr. Robert Devereux, had been called home to attend some parish business, and there remained Emily and Lilias—tall graceful girls, with soft hazel eyes, clear dark complexions, and a quantity of long brown curls. The latter was busily completing a guard for the watch, which Mr. Hawkesworth had presented to Reginald, a fine handsome boy of eleven, who, with his elbows on the table, sat contemplating her progress, and sometimes ...
— Scenes and Characters • Charlotte M. Yonge
... was the great soft, sweet-smelling darkness, roofed in by the far-off sky alight with stars; and beneath him in the valley he could catch the glimmer of the big lake and the blotted masses of pine and ...
— None Other Gods • Robert Hugh Benson
... size and weight of the lords. Just as well might the gnat dispute with the foot of an elephant. One day I saw a hippopotamus tread upon a molehill; he crushed it utterly. He was innocent. The great soft-headed fool of a mastodon did not even know of the existence of moles. My son, the moles that are trodden on are the human race. To crush is a law. And do you think that the mole himself crushes nothing? Why, it is the mastodon of the fleshworm, ...
— The Man Who Laughs • Victor Hugo
... period. Maeterlinck's lovely story of the bee interested him; he wrote about that. Somebody proposed a Martyrs' Day; he wrote a paper ridiculing the suggestion. In his note-book, too, there is a memorandum for a love-story of the Quarternary Epoch which would begin, "On a soft October afternoon 2,000,000 years ago." John Fiske's Discovery of America, Volume I, he said, was to furnish the animals and scenery, civilization and conversation to be the same as to-day; but apparently ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine
... the controls of the port-lock quickly, and swung inner and outer doors open. He glided through, and then, a giant, clumsy figure, poised far out in the air, a soft breeze washing his face as he gazed down at the hill five miles below, judging his descent. As he did not use the infra-red instrument hanging from his neck, the asteroid might not ...
— The Passing of Ku Sui • Anthony Gilmore
... see him now, as he went limping up and down the vestibule, with his gray hair sticking up in scrubbing-brush fashion, his shrivelled yellow face, and his large dark eyes, that were as keen as any hawk's, and yet soft as a buck's. The whole room was hung with trophies of his numerous hunting expeditions, and he had some story about every one of them, if only he could be got to tell it. Generally he would not, for he was not very fond of narrating his own adventures, but to-night the port wine made ...
— Stories by English Authors: Africa • Various
... water resources in some areas; policies of the former communist regime promoting rapid urbanization and industrial growth have raised concerns about their negative effects on the environment; the burning of soft coal in power plants and the lack of enforcement of environmental laws have severely polluted the air in Ulaanbaatar; deforestation, overgrazing, the converting of virgin land to agricultural production have increased soil erosion from wind and rain; desertification and mining activities have ...
— The 2001 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency.
... the ceiling were fashioned to carry out and supplement the ancient carvings. If this were a small room, there would be a sense of unrest in so lavish a use of broken surface, but in one large enough to have it felt as a whole, and not in detail, it simply gives a quality of preciousness. The soft browns of the wood spread a mystery of surface, from the edge of the polished floor until it meets a frieze of painted canvas filled with large reclining figures clad in draperies of red, and blue, and yellow—separating the ...
— Principles of Home Decoration - With Practical Examples • Candace Wheeler
... "churchyards at midnight, ruins of convents and baronial castles; in fact, all the things which we are now apt to call romantic, are the favourite haunts of Tieck's muse. . . . Tieck was excessively fond of moonlight and literally flooded his tales with its soft, dim splendour; therefore moonlight is now romantic. . . . He never allows a hero to make a declaration of love without a near or distant accompaniment of a bugle (Schalmei or Waldhorn); accordingly the bugle is called ...
— A History of English Romanticism in the Nineteenth Century • Henry A. Beers
... pencil was in his hand, and, before he was aware, his fingers clasped it. His hand instinctively took the position for writing, and somehow or other, there came to his mind, just at that instant, the memory of Amy Kelly, and of how she had held her soft, plump hand over his, as she taught him to hold ...
— The Evolution of Dodd • William Hawley Smith
... conquest she found she had so unconsciously made, immediately accepted him. There never was a less romantic attachment, or more business-like engagement, nor was there ever a more fortunate choice or a happier union. Mild, gentle, and amiable, full of devotion to, and admiration of her husband, her soft and feminine qualities were harmoniously blended with his vivacity and animal spirits, and produced together results not more felicitous for themselves than agreeable to all who belonged to their society. Soon after his marriage, Ellis, who had ...
— The Greville Memoirs - A Journal of the Reigns of King George IV and King William IV, Vol. III • Charles C. F. Greville
... extraordinary prophecy made one night, suddenly and dramatically, at a gathering of New Yorkers, brought together for hilarious purposes, including a little supper, in the Washington Square apartment of Bobby Vallis—her full name was Roberta. There were soft lights and low divans and the strumming of a painted ukulele that sang its little twisted soul out under the caress of Penelope's white fingers. I can still see the big black opal in its quaint setting that had replaced her wedding ring and the yellow serpent of pliant gold coiled ...
— Possessed • Cleveland Moffett
... very fair girl, with soft, shining eyes, and a wonderful mane of yellow hair came up and put her arm round Polly's neck. She did not smile, her face was grave, her voice ...
— Polly - A New-Fashioned Girl • L. T. Meade
... winter day; every little crystal sparkling away on a pine tree, where it had to melt away, seemed to come out and wink at them, as the stately horses bore them along. All the fields sleeping under their soft, white blankets, were new to the Peppers gliding by. That surely was not Deacon Brown's field, where they used to race across lots, on a summer day! And as for that being Mr. Blodgett's meadow—why! no one need ever tell ...
— The Adventures of Joel Pepper • Margaret Sidney
... cried the group laughing. The little old woman paid no attention and her soft grey eyes were fixed on the Prince, ...
— The Little Lame Prince - Rewritten for Young Readers by Margaret Waters • Dinah Maria Mulock
... sleepy, and I was heartily glad of the Proposal, as were also the Cacklogallinians, when I mention'd it to them. They, as well as my self, were provided each of them with a Bed, in very handsome and commodious Rooms. These Beds were so very soft, that I seem'd to lye on a Couch of Air. When we awak'd, the Selenites came into my Chamber, and told me it was time to take some Nourishment; that they had provided Corn for my Companions, and desir'd I would sit down to Supper with them, ...
— A Voyage to Cacklogallinia - With a Description of the Religion, Policy, Customs and Manners of That Country • Captain Samuel Brunt
... There was nothing soft about Houck. He was a hard and callous citizen, and he lived largely outside the law and other people's standards of conduct. But he knew when he had run up against a brick wall. Mrs. Larson had only to lift her voice and half ...
— The Fighting Edge • William MacLeod Raine
... his carriage majestical, his nature haughty, and his purse plentiful and heavy: but contrarily, the stature of my body is small, myself not so well spoken, my voice low, my carriage lawyer-like, and of the common fashion, my nature soft and bashful, my purse thin, light, and never yet plentiful. If Demosthenes, being so learned and eloquent as he was, one whom none surpassed, trembled to speak before Phocion at Athens, how much more shall I, being unlearned and unskilful to supply the place of dignity, charge, ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part D. - From Elizabeth to James I. • David Hume
... if each tree were trying to strangle the others in a fight for life, while the weakest, deprived of their ground, clung frantically to the shore and would soon be pushed far out over the smooth, shining sea. There the last dense crowns formed the beautiful fringe of the green carpet stretched soft ...
— Two Years with the Natives in the Western Pacific • Felix Speiser
... one of those calm evenings at the waterside, full of color yet soft, one of those peaceful evenings which produces a sensation of pleasure. No breath of air stirred the branches, no shiver of wind ruffled the smooth clear surface of the Seine. It was not too warm, it was mild—good weather to ...
— Yvette • Henri Rene Guy de Maupassant
... a long mountain walk. She wears a "Rosalind" costume, brown, with soft boots, gauntlet gloves and light fur about the neck; carries a pair of snow-shoes, which she has taken off and from ...
— The Naturewoman • Upton Sinclair
... congratulate you on the going away of Madame. Coming and going bring very various associations in this life of ours. Why, if you were to come we should appreciate our fortune, and you should have my particular chair, which Robert calls mine because I like sitting in a cloud; it's so sybaritically soft a chair. Now I love you for the kind words you say of him, who deserves the best words of the best women and men, wherever spoken! Yes, indeed, I am happy. Otherwise, I should have a stone where the heart is, and sink by the weight of it. ...
— The Letters of Elizabeth Barrett Browning (1 of 2) • Frederic G. Kenyon |
