"Ebony" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... partially covered by three good-sized mats. There was a writing-table on one side of the room with an ebony-and-gold crucifix standing upon it. Opposite to it, on the other side of the room near the fireplace, was a bookcase. On the shelves were volumes of Shakespeare, Dante, Emerson, Wordsworth, Browning, ...
— In the Wilderness • Robert Hichens
... merchandise. They of the house of Togarmah traded for thy wares with horses and war-horses and mules. The men of Dedan were thy traffickers: many isles were the mart of thine hand: they brought thee in exchange horns of ivory and ebony. Syria was thy merchant by reason of the multitude of thy handyworks: they traded for thy wares with emeralds, purple, and broidered work, and fine linen, and coral, and rubies. Judah, and the land of Israel, they were thy traffickers: they traded for thy merchandise ...
— Select Masterpieces of Biblical Literature • Various
... ebony bird beguiling my sad fancy into smiling By the grave and stern decorum of the countenance it wore,— "Though thy crest be shorn and shaven, thou," I said, "art sure no craven, 45 Ghastly grim and ancient Raven wandering from the Nightly shore: Tell me what thy lordly name is on the Night's Plutonian ...
— Selections From Poe • J. Montgomery Gambrill
... yellowish like old coke ashes and grey as the fuzz on a new broom, with little white tufts like the fleece which flies up from the burnt-out faggot. It was a genuine gutter cat, long-legged, with a wild-beast head. It was regularly striped with waving lines of ebony, its paws were encircled by black bracelets and its eyes lengthened by two great zigzags ...
— La-bas • J. K. Huysmans
... the shadowy space, star-studded above, ebony below. Far across the depths shone a pinpoint of steady light. The Indian grunted again, August vented his "ha!" and then Jack saw the light blink like a star, go out for a second, ...
— The Heritage of the Desert • Zane Grey
... a clock in the room behind him he turned as though a voice had spoken, and left the stone balcony on which he had been waiting. His spurs rang as he stepped into the room behind it. The floor was uncarpeted, and shone like ebony. ...
— The Swindler and Other Stories • Ethel M. Dell
... quarrel with Blackwood in consequence of some critical remarks of his on the end of the Black Dwarf,—remarks certainly not inexcusable,—and of Scott's famous letter in reply, will doubtless receive further elucidation in the forthcoming chronicle of the House of 'Ebony'; but it is told with fair detail, in the second edition of Lockhart, from the ...
— Sir Walter Scott - Famous Scots Series • George Saintsbury
... the description of the Black Rood of St. Margaret which, as Lord Hailes says, "was of gold, about the length of a palm; the figure of ebony, studded and inlaid with gold. A piece of the true ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 67, February 8, 1851 • Various
... of the Isocarpous sympetalae has but a single common representative in the United States; viz., the persimmon (Diospyros) (Fig. 117, E). This belongs to the family Ebenaceae, to which also belongs the ebony a member of the same genus as the persimmon, and found in Africa ...
— Elements of Structural and Systematic Botany - For High Schools and Elementary College Courses • Douglas Houghton Campbell
... come up from the village, and her ebony suitor was expected. With that and their delight at Miss Elsie's improvement, the whole staff was in ...
— A Noble Woman • Ann S. Stephens
... looked, almost expecting to see a literal fulfilment of the prophecy. A form of imposing stature appeared. It was that of a negro upwards of six feet in height, magnificently proportioned, straight as a pillar, and black as ebony. He wore a dress of skins, carried a gun in his hand, and had an opossum slung over ...
— Cudjo's Cave • J. T. Trowbridge
... collector of pictures and curiosities,—mostly sold by executors at his death, aged eighty-nine, though a full gallery remains at Albury; a carver too, and a constructor of cabinets,—whereof two fine specimens (inlaid with brecciated jaspers, and made of ebony and cedar from his own turning-lathe) decorate our large drawing-room; and the oldest folk in our village still remember the good old gentleman who always had gingerbread in his pockets for them as children, and who was known by them as the "man mushroom," seeing ...
— My Life as an Author • Martin Farquhar Tupper
... dark face watching her so jealously, and so hardening toward her as he saw how pale she grew, and heard her exclamation of surprise when she first recognized the note, and remembered that in turning over the contents of the ebony box she must have dropped it ...
— Ethelyn's Mistake • Mary Jane Holmes
... He was as ebony as a negro can get and as nattily dressed as only Savile Row can turn out a man. He said, "My name is Loo Motlamelle." He looked at ...
— Combat • Dallas McCord Reynolds
... waving at him her ebony crook, "do not run away, young gentleman. I see that you admire my garden. Pray step inside and look more closely ...
— The Altar Steps • Compton MacKenzie
... with a pressing note to his representatives who, after some demur, paid up, English-fashion, in full. Then a noteworthy change came over the faces of men. Everybody beamed upon me in the streets, and there arrived multitudinous little gifts at my house—choice wines, tie-pins, game, cigars, ebony walking-sticks, confectionery, baskets of red mullets, old prints, Capodimonte ware, candied fruits, amber mouthpieces, maraschino—all from donors who plainly desired to remain anonymous. Such things were dropped from the clouds, so to speak, ...
— Alone • Norman Douglas
... table and the Marquise a tall, beautiful girl sat at her tapestry frame; sometimes she drew back from her work, sometimes she bent over it, and her hair, picturesque in its ebony smoothness and darkness, caught the light of the lamp. Helene was a picture in herself. In her beauty there was a rare distinctive character of power and refinement. Though her hair was gathered up and drawn back from her face, so as to trace ...
— A Woman of Thirty • Honore de Balzac
... They knew she collected ferns on the sly, but never before had they seen her bring home such a prize. Usually she found only crumpled things like old bits of wrinkled brown paper which she called "specimens." This one was marvellously beautiful. It had a dainty, slender stalk of ebony black, and its hundred tiny leaves quivered like a shower of green water-drops in the air. There was actual joy in every ...
— The Extra Day • Algernon Blackwood
... walls the lords of the castle were accustomed to reside. The apartments were either hung with heavy tapestry, which displayed, in gigantic proportions, the combats of the Scots and Danes, or panelled with polished oak, rivalling ebony in its glossy blackness, inlaid with solid silver. Heavy draperies of damask fell from the ceiling to the floor at every window, a pleasant guard, indeed, from the constant winds which found entrance through many creaks and corners of the Gothic casements, but ...
— The Days of Bruce Vol 1 - A Story from Scottish History • Grace Aguilar
... could not imagine how any human being could sleep in such a catafalque. Under the baldachin hovered a gilded Cupid, spotted and faded, with his arrow aimed at the bed. In the corners stood carved cupboards, damascened with ebony and mother-of-pearl. Veroshka opened a press and put her little face inside, and a musty, dusty smell came from the shelves, laden with old-fashioned caftans and embroidered uniforms with ...
— The Precipice • Ivan Goncharov
... into the sea. To the west, after a mile of cultivation, fall and recede in succession the sea-beach of old in lengthy parallel waves, overgrown densely with forest grass and marsh reeds. On the spines of these land-swells flourish ebony, calabash, ...
— How I Found Livingstone • Sir Henry M. Stanley
... had gathered itself together, and came into full view in all its magnificence. There were pagodas in teakwood inlaid with gold; and resting on ebony poles, and behind them, on a very tame Rosinante decked with leopard skins and gold bullion fringes, a Chinese maiden dressed to represent a queen of Celestial mythology. Then came more pagodas, and companies of standard-bearers ...
— Marm Lisa • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... fleet touched at Java the Less "in compass about two thousand miles, with abundance of treasure and spices, ebony, and brazil, and so far to the south that the North Star cannot be seen, and none of the stars of the Great Bear." Here they were in great fear of "those brutish man eaters," with whom they traded for victuals and camphire and spices and precious stones, being forced ...
— Prince Henry the Navigator, the Hero of Portugal and of Modern Discovery, 1394-1460 A.D. • C. Raymond Beazley
... threw off his felt hat, adorned with an old red plume, in order to rub his hand over his bald head. Again he looked at his daughter, who, beneath the brown rafters of that leather-hung room, with its ebony furniture and portieres of silken damask, and its tall chimney-piece, the whole so softly lighted, was still his very own. The poor father felt the tears in his eyes and hastened to wipe them. A father who loves ...
— The Hated Son • Honore de Balzac
... was represented by massive furniture in calamander, ebony, and satinwood, carved with the most elaborate devices, dainty laces made by the nimble fingers of village women, beautiful productions on tortoise shell and gold, heavily embroidered cloths of gold, and a large collection ...
— Final Report of the Louisiana Purchase Exposition Commission • Louisiana Purchase Exposition Commission
... genuine enthusiasm of loyalty into contempt. There is too much of the Dollalolla in such an exhibition. When his majesty squats uneasily, as if he considered his chair an inconvenience, and the queen wipes her ebony nose with her illustrious white satin play bill. When the royal party entered, the people seemed unable to contain their rapture, and God save the King was called for. This is the established custom: whenever we look upon the king of another country, we always stand up and ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 14, - Issue 386, August 22, 1829 • Various
... liquid notes of the cowbirds, like the pouring of mingled molasses and olive oil. Three handsome fellows in ebony and dark brown sit on the branch of a tall elm and just beneath them sit three brownish gray females, all in a row. Cowbird No. 1 comes nearer the end of the branch, ruffles out his head as if he were about to have a sick spell and then emits that famous molasses and oil kind of whistle, sufficient ...
— Some Spring Days in Iowa • Frederick John Lazell
... of two-penny, which is a thin, yeasty beverage, made of malt; not quite so strong as the table-beer of England, — This is brought in a pewter stoop, shaped like a skittle, from whence it is emptied into a quaff; that is, a curious cup made of different pieces of wood, such as box and ebony, cut into little staves, joined alternately, and secured with delicate hoops, having two cars or handles — It holds about a gill, is sometimes tipt round the mouth with silver, and has a plate of ...
— The Expedition of Humphry Clinker • Tobias Smollett
... classes, who thus, although they remained at home, would have just as good a claim to their share of the public funds as those who were serving at sea, in garrison, or in the field. The different materials used, such as stone, brass, ivory, gold, ebony, cypress-wood, and so forth, would require special artisans for each, such as carpenters, modelers, smiths, stone-masons, dyers, melters and moulders of gold, and ivory painters, embroiderers, workers in relief; and also men to bring them to the ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 2 • Various
... and the Territories, and thus, by confining him to the South, give him political preponderance over the white man in many of the States of the Union? Imagine the pure crystal pillars of this temple of freedom turned to ebony; the radiant eyes of Freedom's Goddess shocked at the gloomy spectacle of symbolic night, and suffused with tears at such ...
— The Right of American Slavery • True Worthy Hoit
... from its den,) but the rays of the gas-lamps, feeble at first in their struggle with the dying day, had now at length gained ascendancy, and threw over every thing a fitful and garish lustre. All was dark yet splendid—as that ebony to which has been ...
— The Works of Edgar Allan Poe - Volume 5 (of 5) of the Raven Edition • Edgar Allan Poe
... and round men; the others are apt to escape in salt rheum, sal-volatile, and a white pocket-handkerchief. An odd thought strikes me: when I die will the Journal of these days be taken out of the ebony cabinet at Abbotsford, and read as the transient pout of a man worth L60,000, with wonder that the well-seeming Baronet should ever have experienced such a hitch? Or will it be found in some obscure lodging-house, where the decayed son of chivalry has hung up his scutcheon for ...
— The Journal of Sir Walter Scott - From the Original Manuscript at Abbotsford • Walter Scott
... our arrival, left their play to welcome and kiss their father. A lovely vision of youth and beauty also made its appearance—one of those slender girls of the South, a woman of fifteen years old, with her dark eyelashes and her streaming ebony hair; slaves of all ages—mulattoes and quadroon girls, old negroes and boy negroes, all calling together—"Eh! Massa Courtenay, kill plenty bear, dare say; now plenty grease for black family, good ...
— Travels and Adventures of Monsieur Violet • Captain Marryat
... Algerian and Moorish tilings, when my attention was attracted by a sort of charm or pendant that hung in a glass case. It was not particularly beautiful, but its appearance was quaint and curious, and took my fancy. It consisted of an oblong block of ebony in which was set a single pear-shaped pearl more than three-quarters of an inch long. The sides of the ebony block were lacquered—probably to conceal a joint—and bore a number of Chinese characters, and at the top was a little gold image with ...
— John Thorndyke's Cases • R. Austin Freeman
... centuries, which were produced with similar veneers. The process of inlaying is of the most remote antiquity, and the student may see in the cases of the British Museum, at the Louvre, and in other museums, examples of both Assyrian and Egyptian inlaid patterns of metal and ivory, or ebony or vitreous pastes, upon both wood and ivory, dating from the 8th and 10th centuries before the Christian Era, or earlier. The Greeks and Romans also made use of it for costly furniture and ornamental sculpture; in Book 23 of the "Odyssey," Ulysses, describing to Penelope the bride-bed ...
— Intarsia and Marquetry • F. Hamilton Jackson
... leading to a "small vaulted room," and eventually to a "subterraneous communication between your apartment and the chapel of St. Anthony scarcely two miles off." Arrived at the abbey, she is disappointed at the modern appearance of her room, but contrives to find a secret drawer in an ancient ebony cabinet, and in this a roll of yellow manuscript which, on being deciphered, proves to be a washing bill. She is convinced, notwithstanding, that a mysterious door at the end of a certain gallery conducts to a series of isolated chambers where General ...
— A History of English Romanticism in the Eighteenth Century • Henry A. Beers
... took his seat, he planted his big gold-headed ebony cane between his knees, put his hat on the head of his cane, gave it a twirl, and looking over sidewise at her, smiled with an equal mixture of ...
— The Mettle of the Pasture • James Lane Allen
... to them in that unhallowed spot, and by the depth and dignity of her wild prayer, the two watchers had eyes for her alone. Therefore it happened that not until his arm was about to drag her away, did either of them perceive a huge man, black as ebony in colour, clad in a cloak of leopard skins and carrying in his right hand a broad-bladed spear who, following the shadow of the trees, had crept upon the priestess from the farther ...
— Elissa • H. Rider Haggard
... had something of the character of a woman's. One detail alone gave it or rather would give it at certain moments a touch of singular firmness. Beneath the beautiful fair hair waving on his brow and temples, as was the fashion at that period, eyebrows, eyes and lashes were black as ebony. The rest of the face was, as we have said, almost feminine. There were two little ears of which only the tips could be seen beneath the tufts of hair to which the Incroyables of the day had given the name of "dog's-ears"; a straight, perfectly proportioned nose, ...
— The Companions of Jehu • Alexandre Dumas
... and pressed against one another on the thorax, open to their full extent, forming a cross with the body, and exhibiting the axillae ornamented with rows of pearls, and a black spot with a central point of white. These two eyes, faintly recalling those of the peacock's tail, and the fine ebony embossments, are part of the blazonry of conflict, concealed upon ordinary occasions. Their jewels are only assumed when they make themselves terrible and superb ...
— Social Life in the Insect World • J. H. Fabre
... ample head, which was again surmounted by a peaked hat, having a band and buckle above its brim, and a black rose in front. He looked an elderly and well-ordered gentleman, mighty spruce, and full of courtesy; and his cane was black as ebony, with a yellow knob that glittered like gold. He had a huge beaked nose, and a little black ferrety eye, which almost pierced what it gazed upon. Every one made way for the stranger, who sat down, not ...
— Traditions of Lancashire, Volume 2 (of 2) • John Roby
... above the ancient sentry at the gate was an open casement with some homely flowers in the window, from behind which good-humoured girls' faces were peeping. They were watching the young traveller dressed in black as he walked up gazing towards the castle, and the ebony attendant who followed the gentleman's steps also accoutred in mourning. So was he at the gate in mourning, and the girls when they ...
— The Virginians • William Makepeace Thackeray
... tribute to the Spaniards in gold, the latter have not as yet—that is in the year 1600—been able to ascertain where they get it, notwithstanding their efforts. They are commencing to sow wheat there. Flour was formerly brought from Japon. The islands also supplied quantities of ebony and bamboo. ...
— History of the Philippine Islands Vols 1 and 2 • Antonio de Morga
... spotless white "camiza" is decorated with beautiful pillow lace, her own handiwork. Her skirt of stiffly starched cotton is red and purple in colour. A crimson flowered folded shawl hangs over her right shoulder and great strings of beads ornament the ebony of her neck and arms. To sit at the feet of Theresa, the ama, is to enter the gate of ...
— Fairy Tales from Brazil - How and Why Tales from Brazilian Folk-Lore • Elsie Spicer Eells
... and put off into the slow current. A haggard, eerie fragment of moon slinked westward. Stars glinted in the flawless chilly blue. The surface of the river was like polished ebony—a dream-path wrought of gloom and gleam. The banks were lines of dusk, except where some lone cottonwood loomed skyward like a giant ghost clothed with a mantle that glistered and darkled in ...
— The River and I • John G. Neihardt
... was a verandah, like two outstretched arms. An Entrance Hall stood in the centre, in the middle of which was a door-screen of Ta Li marble, set in an ebony frame. On the other side of this screen were three very small halls. At the back of these came at once an extensive courtyard, belonging ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book I • Cao Xueqin
... night gathers sleep, and spreads it over the darkened Earth. There is no door in the whole dwelling, to make a noise by the turning of the hinges; no porter at the entrance. But in the middle is a couch, raised high upon black ebony, stuffed with feathers, of a dark colour, concealed by a dark coverlet; on which the God himself lies, his limbs dissolved in sloth. Around him lie, in every direction, imitating divers shapes, unsubstantial dreams as many as the harvest ...
— The Metamorphoses of Ovid - Literally Translated into English Prose, with Copious Notes - and Explanations • Publius Ovidius Naso
... with her foot, leaps up, and pulls the bell-rope. In answer to its sound three young, slender negresses enter; they are as if carved of ebony, and are dressed from head to foot in red satin; each one has a rope ...
— Venus in Furs • Leopold von Sacher-Masoch
... befallen thereof. There is without this hall a car that three white harts have drawn hither, and lightly may you send to see how rich it is. I tell you that the traces are of silk and the axletrees of gold, and the timber of the car is ebony. The car is covered above with a black samite, and below is a cross of gold the whole length, and under the coverlid of the car are the heads of an hundred and fifty knights whereof some be sealed ...
— High History of the Holy Graal • Unknown
... ebony face shone with delight, too, as she related how peacefully her charge had slumbered, without a single disturbing dream, ...
— Dainty's Cruel Rivals - The Fatal Birthday • Mrs. Alex McVeigh Miller
... piece on to the number 10, using a rake of her own which Dick Carleton had given her. It was a glorified rake, which he had ordered specially for her, made of ebony with the initials "M. G." set into it in little sapphires, her ...
— The Guests Of Hercules • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... them across the water, out of the blackness that brooded upon the harbor, did any of the four give sign of excitement. The Babu started, and rose to his feet shivering; the others still squatted, mute and motionless as statues of ebony, neither by gesture nor murmur betraying their consciousness that at any moment, by tocsin from the fort, a thousand fierce and relentless warriors might be launched like sleuth ...
— In Clive's Command - A Story of the Fight for India • Herbert Strang
... all ebony or marble," said Hetty, putting on a bewildered air, "but I will count them up if you like. There are six in the drawing-room," she continued, holding up all the fingers of her left hand, and ...
— Hetty Gray - Nobody's Bairn • Rosa Mulholland
... her eyes full of tears, took a poniard from one of the two ebony pieces of furniture, and presented it to Henri with a gesture of submission which ...
— The Thirteen • Honore de Balzac
... proves satisfactorily that it is possible to be frisky without being lively; its vulgarity is so pronounced that it offends you like low conversation. Another concerto follows—ten folio pages! whew!!——Oh, ye ebony and ivory devils! oh, for an exorcist to put you to flight! Cramped fingers are crossing each other at a great rate; we really tremble for the glue, and the pegs, and the wires, and the whole economy of the instrument, at that critical juncture when the ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 62, Number 361, November, 1845. • Various
... cocoanut tree—and the heap thus formed is subjected, at every new increase, to a moderate beating, with a sort of wooden mallet, leisurely applied. The mallet is made of a hard heavy wood resembling ebony, is about twelve inches in length, and perhaps two in breadth, with a rounded handle at one end, and in shape is the exact counterpart of one of our four-sided razor-strops. The flat surfaces of the implement are marked with shallow parallel indentations, varying ...
— Typee - A Romance of the South Sea • Herman Melville
... appearance abruptly, in successive shocks, standing out from the darkness like pictures of scarlet above a background of ebony. ...
— The Temptation of St. Antony - or A Revelation of the Soul • Gustave Flaubert
... were of satin, priceless rugs, which hung without a quiver in the breathless gloom. Massive furniture, chairs, tables, settees, of teak, of ebony and dark mahogany, with deep carvings, glaring gargoyles and hideous masks, were arranged with an ...
— Peter the Brazen - A Mystery Story of Modern China • George F. Worts
... Antony's hands the wife and children of Seleucus to be put to death. She had caused to be built, joining to the temple of Isis, several tombs and monuments of wonderful height, and very remarkable for the workmanship; thither she removed her treasure, her gold, silver, emeralds, pearls, ebony, ivory, cinnamon, and, after all, a great quantity of torchwood and tow. Upon which Caesar began to fear lest she should, in a desperate fit, set all these riches on fire; and, therefore, while he was marching ...
— Plutarch's Lives • A.H. Clough
... possession except a few guns they had procured from the Moors and Hollanders, which they knew not how to use, and were even fearful of handling. They have excellent amber[5], white sandal, tortoises, ebony, sweet woods of various kinds, and abundance of slaves, with plenty of cattle of all kinds, the flesh of their goats being as sweet as mutton. The island likewise produces abundance of sea cows, sea-horses, monkeys, and some say tigers, with a great many snakes which are not ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume VII • Robert Kerr
... bordering Victoria Nyanza the flora resembles that of Uganda (q.v.). The characteristic trees of the coast regions are the mangrove and coco-nut palm. Ebony grows in the scrub-jungle. Vast forests of olives and junipers are found on the Mau escarpment; the cotton, fig and bamboo on the Kikuyu escarpment; and in several regions are dense forests of great trees whose lowest branches ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 4, Part 3 - "Brescia" to "Bulgaria" • Various
... idly watching the terns and kingfishers busily seeking their suppers over the glassy water; and at night we sat on deck while the moon rose higher in the quiet sky, and the dark river banks assumed a clearer ebony as she rose above the lofty fringe of trees, until the towing-path lay a track of pure silver reaching away to the dim belt of ...
— A Holiday in the Happy Valley with Pen and Pencil • T. R. Swinburne
... drawing-room is a boudoir upholstered in light gray silk damask, with bouquets of flowers. This is Madame Desvarennes's favorite room. A splendid Erard piano occupies one side of the apartment. Facing it is a sideboard in sculptured ebony, enriched with bronze, by Gouthieres. There are only two pictures on the walls: "The Departure of the Newly Married Couple," exquisitely painted by Lancret; and "The Prediction," an adorable work by Watteau, bought at an incredible price at the Pourtales sale. Over the chimney-piece is a miniature ...
— Serge Panine, Complete • Georges Ohnet
... concerning Maga's Icon in America. I wondered you should ask me for a description, when it was so easy to have ordered out the thing itself; and so resolved to save myself the trouble of writing a long story, by duly exporting a specimen of the American Ebony, from which you might form your own conclusions as to its counterfeit merits, and its supposed relations to the great question of international copyright. Segnius irritant—you know! What disciple of old Plunkett's will ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - Volume 62, No. 384, October 1847 • Various
... who made SUMNER is not to blame for this. In the first place, Mr. SUMNER'S Measures are very difficult to take. In the second place, the best Cabinet-makers have failed to make Mr. SUMNER appear very large. In the third and last place, Ebony, which is the only wood with which Mr. SUMNER has any affinity, is a mighty hard material to work, even when treated with the application ...
— Punchinello, Vol.1, No. 4, April 23, 1870 • Various
... away with or lessen any of the petty inconveniences of life. Waggons and waggons of the richest furniture had passed through the village between lines of staring villagers. Costly skins, glossy carpets, rich rugs, ivory, and ebony, and metal; every glimpse into these storehouses of treasure had given rise to some new legend. And finally, when all had been arranged, there had come a staff of forty servants, who heralded the approach of the owner, Mr. ...
— The Doings Of Raffles Haw • Arthur Conan Doyle
... with tide, wind, and engines carrying us up the James. Dancing Point reached sharply out as if to intercept us. But the owner of those strong dark hands that happened to be at the wheel knew the story of Dancing Point—of how many an ebony Tam O'Shanter had seen ghostly revelry there; and Gadabout was held well out in ...
— Virginia: The Old Dominion • Frank W. Hutchins and Cortelle Hutchins
... the dullest blockhead in Holkar's army. Seizing, then, a bottle of Burgess's walnut catsup, I dyed my face and my hands, and, with the simple aid of a flask of Warren's jet, I made my hair and beard as black as ebony. The Indian's helmet and chain hood covered likewise a great part of my face and I hoped thus, with luck, impudence, and a complete command of all the Eastern dialects and languages, from Burmah to Afghanistan, to pass scot-free ...
— Burlesques • William Makepeace Thackeray
... Austrian ambassador at Berlin, the young Baron van Swieten. Meanwhile, Kaunitz was busy with a brush of peacock's feathers, dusting the expensive trifles that covered his escritoire, or polishing its ebony surface with a fine silk handkerchief which he kept for the purpose. This furbishing of trinkets and furniture was a private pastime with the all-powerful minister; and many a personage of rank was made to wait in the anteroom, while he ...
— Joseph II. and His Court • L. Muhlbach
... door to the left of the main entrance, and leading upstairs, opened. After a few words with the moon-faced attendant, the light was switched on and the three ascended to a small room, brilliant with gaudy Oriental colors and heavy with ebony furnishings. A group of three or four Chinamen sat at a small table soberly drinking their tea with the exaggerated innocence of those who have a deck of cards up their sleeves. The proprietor himself, fat as a butter ball, toddled up to Saul with a grin ...
— The Seventh Noon • Frederick Orin Bartlett
... ain' much to look at, dat's sho'," replied Big Abel, his face shining like polished ebony, "en I ain' much to look at needer, but dey'll have ter recollect de way we all wuz befo' we runned away; dey'll have ter recollect you in yo' fine shuts en fancy waistcoats, en dey'll have ter recollect me in yo' ole uns. Sakes alive! I kin see dat one er yourn wid ...
— The Battle Ground • Ellen Glasgow
... stood the palace, built of yellow mottled Numidian marble, broad courses supporting its four terraced stories. With its large, straight, ebony staircase, bearing the prow of a vanquished galley at the corners of every step, its red doors quartered with black crosses, its brass gratings protecting it from scorpions below, and its trellises of gilded rods closing the apertures above, it seemed to the soldiers ...
— Salammbo • Gustave Flaubert
... [Delta]. DC.—A small tree of Jamaica, where the wood is known as green ebony, and is used for making various small articles. It is imported into this country under the name of cocus wood, and is used with us for making flutes and other wind instruments. Mr. Worthington Smith considers that the wood equals ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 497, July 11, 1885 • Various
... Charley, with a glance at the grinning ebony face, the very picture of health. "He never had a real ...
— The Boy Chums in the Forest - or Hunting for Plume Birds in the Florida Everglades • Wilmer M. Ely
... of glade haunters were those who came strictly on business,—plasterers and sculptors, who found wet clay ready to their needs. Great golden and rufous bees blundered down and gouged out bucketsful of mud; while slender-bodied, dainty, ebony wasps, after much fastidious picking of place, would detach a tiny bit of the whitest clay, place it in their snuff-box holder, clean their feet and antennae, run their rapier in and out and delicately ...
— Edge of the Jungle • William Beebe
... gallery. His savings enabled him to renovate the whole gallery, which up to this time had been neglected and shabby. The floor was carefully waxed, the ceiling whitened, the wood-work painted to resemble the grain and knots of oak. A long table in ebony and two cabinets by Boulle completed the decoration, and gave to this gallery a certain air that was full of character. In the course of two years the liberality of devout persons, and legacies, though small ones, from pious ...
— The Vicar of Tours • Honore de Balzac
... his watch, which hung within a beautiful little ebony temple, supported by four Ionic columns. He then laid his hand on the golden locks of little Alice, whose head had sunk down upon the arm of our ...
— Grandfather's Chair • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... she saw among the trees something silver-bright. She watched it rise slowly from behind the trees, now hidden, now white through rifts in the foliage, until it soared lovely and grand above the black horizon. The ebony shadows of night seemed to lift, as might a sable mantle moved by invisible hands. But dark shadows, safe from the moon-rays, lay under the trees, and a pale, misty vapor hung below the brow of ...
— The Last Trail • Zane Grey
... precedes the Esquire-Bedells, carrying an ebony mace, tipped with silver; his gown, as well as those of the Marshal and School-Keeper, is made of black prince's stuff, with square collar, ...
— A Collection of College Words and Customs • Benjamin Homer Hall
... Vendome during the Empire. Mme. de Merret declared to her husband that she had purchased of this merchant an ebony crucifix encrusted with silver; but in truth she had obtained it of her lover, Bagos de Feredia. She swore falsely on this very ...
— Repertory Of The Comedie Humaine, Complete, A — Z • Anatole Cerfberr and Jules Franois Christophe
... function Meynell went into the Cathedral with Mary just as the lengthening March afternoon was beginning to wane. They stepped through the western doors set open to the breeze and the sunshine into a building all opal and ebony, faintly flooded with rose from the sky without; a building of infinite height and majesty, where clustered columns of black marble, incredibly light, upheld the richness of the bossed roof, where every wall was broidered history, where every ...
— The Case of Richard Meynell • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... of the head of Queen Mary, in a charger, taken the day after the execution. Many other interesting portraits grace the walls of this room. But by far the finest apartment in the building is the Drawing-room, with a lofty ceiling, and furnished with antique ebony furniture. After passing through the Library, with its twenty thousand volumes, we found ourselves in the Study, and I sat down in the same chair where once sat the Poet; while before me was the table upon which was written the "Lady ...
— Three Years in Europe - Places I Have Seen and People I Have Met • William Wells Brown
... found in all Damascus and Bagdad. From the roofs of these palaces there hung myriads of gems, liked diamonds, but larger than men; and in among the streets of towers and pyramids and temples, there flowed immense rivers as black as ebony, and swarming with fish that had ...
— The Works of Edgar Allan Poe - Volume 2 (of 5) of the Raven Edition • Edgar Allan Poe
... five and six o'clock, made his coffee, and then went through his devotions, a black ebony crucifix, with the figure of our Lord in brass, on the table before him. Wherever he went he had this carried with him. [Footnote: This particular crucifix, however, was only used by Mr. Hope-Scott after his first wife's death. It was the one which she held in her hands when dying.] His ...
— Memoirs of James Robert Hope-Scott, Volume 2 • Robert Ornsby
... castanets to be had. Instantly she seized the old woman's only earthenware plate, smashed it up, and there she was dancing the Romalis, and making the bits of broken crockery rattle as well as if they had been ebony and ivory castanets. That girl was good company, I can tell you! Evening fell, and I ...
— Carmen • Prosper Merimee
... one could tell. He remained on the bridge night and day, clad from head to foot in oil-skin garments, facing the furious blast as if it were his native air, watching every motion of his vessel, and gazing intently into the world of ebony ahead as if trying ...
— Under the Waves - Diving in Deep Waters • R M Ballantyne
... instead of the eternal labyrinth of mangrove-trees, with their complicated roots snarled into formidable coils under the water, as if to waylay and entangle the voyager, the low margin of the sea was covered with a stately growth of ebony, and with a species of mahogany, and other hard woods that take the most brilliant and variegated polish. The sandal-wood, and many balsamic trees of unknown names, scattered their sweet odors far and wide, not in an atmosphere tainted with vegetable corruption, ...
— The History Of The Conquest Of Peru • William H. Prescott
... replied. "I do not know. It is something in the wine. In another hour Aziz will be again as you saw him. But see." And, opening a little ebony box, she produced a phial half filled with the ...
— The Insidious Dr. Fu-Manchu • Sax Rohmer
... my dealer in bric-a-brac was a veritable Capharnauem; all ages and all countries seemed to have arranged a rendezvous there; an Etruscan terra cotta lamp stood upon a Boule cabinet, with ebony panels decorated with simple filaments of inlaid copper: a duchess of the reign of Louis XV stretched nonchalantly her graceful feet under a massive Louis XIII table with heavy, spiral oaken legs, and carvings of intermingled ...
— Humorous Ghost Stories • Dorothy Scarborough
... looked behind me. She had reached the first landing, where the stairway curved. She saw me, and peered forward, holding the candle above her head. The loose sleeve of her dress fell back with the motion, and the bare symmetry of her rounded forearm gleamed upon the blackness like ivory upon ebony. I waved my hand; she waved hers, then ...
— The Love Story of Abner Stone • Edwin Carlile Litsey
... known to the English and American hunters. But it is like neither the otter nor beaver, though its habits are akin to both. Its nearest relative is probably the fur seal. Like the seal, its pelt has an ebony shimmer, showing silver when blown open, soft black tipped with white, when examined hair by hair. Six feet, the full-grown sea-otter measures from nose to stumpy tail, with a {66} beaver-shaped face, teeth like a cat, and short webbed ...
— Vikings of the Pacific - The Adventures of the Explorers who Came from the West, Eastward • Agnes C. Laut
... shot across the moon-filled night, so large a meteor that it made light even against that silver. A mass within Ian made a slow turn, with effort, with thrilling, changed its inclination. He saw that disdain, that it was shallow and streaked with ebony. He moved with a kind of groan. "Was there—is there—wickedness?... ...
— Foes • Mary Johnston
... times enfolding the whole abode, drags his black and sluggish length around. Charon, the slovenly old ferryman, plies his noiseless boat to and fro laden with shadowy passengers. Far away in the centre grim Pluto sits on his ebony throne and surveys the sad subjects of his dreadful domain. By his side sits his stolen and shrinking bride, Proserpine, her glimmering brows encircled with a wreath of poppies. Above the subterranean monarch's head a sable rainbow ...
— The Destiny of the Soul - A Critical History of the Doctrine of a Future Life • William Rounseville Alger
... watchful as the red squirrel is, he is frequently caught by the cat. My Nig, as black as ebony, knows well the taste of his flesh. I have known him to be caught by the black snake and successfully swallowed. The snake, no doubt, lay ...
— Squirrels and Other Fur-Bearers • John Burroughs
... Are there not causes enough to which the apparent inferiority of an African may be ascribed, without limiting the goodness of God, and supposing he forbore to stamp understanding on certainly his own image, because "carved in ebony." Might it not naturally be ascribed to their situation? When they come among Europeans, they are ignorant of their language, religion, manners, and customs. Are any pains taken to teach them these? Are they treated as men? Does not slavery itself depress the ...
— The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, Or Gustavus Vassa, The African - Written By Himself • Olaudah Equiano
... Ten years ago an Old Wrykinian, suddenly reflecting that it would not be a bad idea to do something for the school in a small way, hied him to the nearest jeweller's and purchased another silver cup, vast withal and cunningly decorated with filigree work, and standing on a massive ebony plinth, round which were little silver lozenges just big enough to hold the name of the winning house and the year of grace. This he presented with his blessing to be competed for by the dozen houses that made up the school of Wrykyn, ...
— The Gold Bat • P. G. Wodehouse
... merchants gave packages of Philadelphia groceries; some of the aristo-cratic families parted with heirlooms that had been laboriously brought over the mountains—a cup and saucer of Sevres, a pair of tall brass candlesticks, and a Venus -mirror framed in ebony. It was about three o'clock in the afternoon when John Gray jumped on the back of a strong trusty horse at the stable of the Indian Queen, leaned over to shake the hands of the friends who had met there to see him off, and turned his horse's head in the direction of the path that ...
— The Choir Invisible • James Lane Allen
... to be loose and away scouring the plains in search of game. Everything on board was taut and trim and neat: not a yard out of the square, not a rope out of place, the decks as white as old ivory, the polished woodwork glittering like glass, the brass all gold apparently, the guns like ebony, and the very lanyards pipeclayed till they looked like ...
— As We Sweep Through The Deep • Gordon Stables
... gladden the heart. And thus though my palate be dulled by age, With joy I partake of thy dear beverage. How glad I prepare me thy nectar most precious, No soul shall usurp me a rite so delicious; On the ambient flame when the black charcoal burns, The gold of thy bean to rare ebony turns, I alone, 'gainst the cone, wrought with fierce iron teeth. Make thy fruitage cry out with its bitter-sweet breath; Till charmed with such perfume, with care I entrust To the pot on my hearth the rare spice-laden dust: ...
— All About Coffee • William H. Ukers
... like glassy streams, Her teeth are pearl, the breasts are ivory Of fair Samela; Her cheeks like rose and lily yield forth gleams; Her brows bright arches framed of ebony: ...
— The Home Book of Verse, Vol. 2 (of 4) • Various
... stop at the old woman's after this. I half-doubted the rascal's story, though I let him have the provender. Sure enough, as I came along just now, who should I see but the preacher sitting before the door of old Nancy's log-hut, as much at home as if his skin were the colour of ebony. These are rather queer doings, friend Martin; I don't ...
— Off-Hand Sketches - a Little Dashed with Humor • T. S. Arthur
... her breast that splendid necklace of emeralds which Guatemoc had given to me in the treasure chamber, and which she had preserved safely through all our evil fortune, and a golden girdle about her waist. In her hand also she took a little sceptre of ebony tipped with gold, that was in the palace, with other ornaments and emblems of rank, and thus attired, though she was worn with travel and suffering, and grief had dimmed her beauty for a while, she seemed the queenliest woman that my eyes have seen. ...
— Montezuma's Daughter • H. Rider Haggard
... little fish carefully and regarded it with huge satisfaction before returning it to the river. Then, having accomplished the task set by sudden desire,—to catch a Teign trout again, feel it, smell it, see the ebony and crimson, the silver belly warming to gold on its sides and darkening to brown and olive above,—having by this act renewed sensations that had slept for fifteen years, he put up his rod and returned to his temporary quarters at the dwelling of ...
— Children of the Mist • Eden Phillpotts
... from the live ivory of a female elephant. A short Wand, twenty-one inches long, tipped with gold at the largest end and silver or copper at the other, is very powerful. Next to these costly articles are Wands with a gold or copper core, a wire, in fact, cased with ebony, boxwood, rosewood, cedar or sandalwood. English yew also serves the purpose; so does almond wood. Simpler, less expensive, and almost as effective, are Wands made of witch-hazel. In fact, apart from the Wands of live ivory, I consider that witch-hazel ...
— The Light of Egypt, Volume II • Henry O. Wagner/Belle M. Wagner/Thomas H. Burgoyne
... floating mines packed with explosives. The nerve of the French sailors, fortunately for the British, failed them, and they fired the ships too soon. But the spectacle of these flaming monsters as they drifted towards the British fleet was appalling. The river showed ebony-black under the white flames. The glare lit up the river cliffs, the roofs of the city, the tents of Montcalm, the slopes of the distant hills, the black hulls of the British ships. It was one of the ...
— Deeds that Won the Empire - Historic Battle Scenes • W. H. Fitchett
... images in yellow wood or bronze or ebony are serious of mien, uneasy, and taciturn. Their faces have the disquieting and secret look of the snare suddenly discovered. The others laugh with a laugh that jangles like fantastic foreign instruments of music, a ...
— Under Fire - The Story of a Squad • Henri Barbusse
... of a November sky that this morning burst through the lattice for me, on my bed? According to terrestrial calculations, above the horizon, in the east, there rose one rod of rainbow [20] hues, crowned with an acre of eldritch ebony. Little by little this topmost pall, drooping over a deeply daz- zling sunlight, softened, grew gray, then gay, and glided into a glory of mottled marvels. Fleecy, faint, fairy blue and golden flecks came out on a background of [25] cerulean hue; while the lower lines of light kindled into ...
— Miscellaneous Writings, 1883-1896 • Mary Baker Eddy
... seen are very pleasing. They are gentle and simple, and naturally well-bred. Some of the Malay women are very handsome, and the little children are darlings. A little parti-coloured group of every shade, from ebony to golden hair and blue eyes, were at play in the street yesterday, and the majority were pretty, especially the half-castes. Most of the Caffres I have seen look like the perfection of human physical nature, and seem to have no diseases. Two days ...
— Letters from the Cape • Lady Duff Gordon
... a chariot of ebony drawn by two plunging, coal-black horses. A robust Egyptian, who shifted from one foot to the other and talked to his horses continually, drove therein alone. As he approached, the Hebrew woman raised herself so suddenly ...
— The Yoke - A Romance of the Days when the Lord Redeemed the Children - of Israel from the Bondage of Egypt • Elizabeth Miller
... near the border of the Canon. As we drove up to it, the situation seemed enchanting in its peace and beauty; for it is located in a grove of noble pines, through which the moon that night looked down in full-orbed splendor, paving the turf with inlaid ebony and silver, and laying a mantle of white velvet on the tents in which we were to sleep. Hance's log cabin serves as a kitchen and dining-room for travelers, and a few guests can even find lodging there; but, until a hotel is built, the principal dormitories ...
— John L. Stoddard's Lectures, Vol. 10 (of 10) - Southern California; Grand Canon of the Colorado River; Yellowstone National Park • John L. Stoddard
... beautiful bulbs; how smooth they are, how well formed; there is that air of melancholy about them which promises to produce a flower of the colour of ebony. On their skin you cannot even distinguish the circulating veins with the naked eye. Certainly, certainly, not a light spot will disfigure the tulip which I have called into existence. And by what name shall we call this offspring of ...
— The Black Tulip • Alexandre Dumas (Pere)
... doubt, makes it harder to recover a fugitive chattel; but the existence of human nature in a man here and there is surely one of those accidents to be counted on at least as often as fire, shipwreck, or the cattle-disease; and the man who chooses to put his money into these images of his Maker cut in ebony should be content to take the incident risks along with the advantages. We should be very sorry to deem this risk capable of diminution; for we think that the claims of a common manhood upon us should be at least as strong as those of Freemasonry, ...
— The Writings of James Russell Lowell in Prose and Poetry, Volume V - Political Essays • James Russell Lowell
... Turkish tobacco-pipes had nothing particular in them, they were fitted up and ornamented as usual, with flexible tubes of Morocco leather and gold wire, and mounted at their ends, the one of them with ivory,—the other with black ebony, ...
— The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman • Laurence Sterne
... girl gave him, and unrolling it, he found the board within. Like the pieces it was large, rich, and inlaid with ebony and ivory. Putting the whole in conjunction the hunter, though not without many misgivings, slowly came over to Judith's opinion, and finally admitted that the fancied idols must be merely the curiously carved men of some unknown game. Judith ...
— The Deerslayer • James Fenimore Cooper
... which his master paid to the panther. He growled hoarsely, and, raising his head, showed the under-part of his redoubtable triangular jaw, and his broad chest of a dirty white, with which blended the copper color, streaked with black, of his sides; his tail, like a huge red serpent, with rings of ebony, now clung to his flanks, now lashed them with a slow and continuous movement: his eyes, of a transparent, brilliant green, were fixed ...
— The Wandering Jew, Complete • Eugene Sue
... process, did his companion, an extremely tall, thin man, throw various pieces of money upon certain stakes, which were deposited by the bystanders on different parts of the table; or, which was more often the case, with a silver rake with a long ebony handle, sweep into a large inclosure near him the scattered sums. This inclosure was called the bank, and the mysterious ceremony in which these persons were assisting was the celebrated game of rouge-et-noir. A deep silence ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol 4 • Charles Dudley Warner
... out under the trees. The lorgnette which had said to her "it is strange he does not find some nice girl to marry," left a disquieting effect. Ann had only that day suggested the same idea, and Bob had laughed to her about it the previous evening. Even Aunt Timmie, the ebony font of wisdom, had but recently looked slyly at her, remarking: "'Foh long we's gwine to have a weddin' in a private cyar!" (Aunt Timmie had never seen a private car, but it typified her idea ...
— Sunlight Patch • Credo Fitch Harris
... finally the price of dinner went up to one dollar and a half, with nothing to eat. The table was protected from flies by a series of paper fans, pendant from the ceiling and connected by a cord, which an ebony boy pulled, at the foot of the room to keep them in motion. This boy being worked day and night, often fell asleep upon his stool, when the yellow man boxed his ears, or knocked him down; and then he would fan with such vigor that a perfect gale swept down ...
— Campaigns of a Non-Combatant, - and His Romaunt Abroad During the War • George Alfred Townsend
... the air of finest conventional library, picture-gallery or parlor, with ladies and gentlemen in them, and plush and rosewood, and ground-glass lamps, and mahogany and ebony furniture, and a silver inkstand and scented satin paper to ...
— Complete Prose Works - Specimen Days and Collect, November Boughs and Goodbye My Fancy • Walt Whitman
... late one night I went up to the promenade deck to smoke a cigar before turning in. It was a warm moonlight night. The broad low waves of ebony water that went seething past below, foamed luminous and were streaked and starred with phosphorescence. The recumbent moon, past its full and sinking westward, seemed bigger than I had ever seen it before, and the roundness of the watery globe was manifest ...
— The Passionate Friends • Herbert George Wells
... Blanc, and right over our heads—but she couldn't manage to climb high enough toward heaven to get entirely above them. She would show the glittering arch of her upper third, occasionally, and scrape it along behind the comblike row; sometimes a pinnacle stood straight up, like a statuette of ebony, against that glittering white shield, then seemed to glide out of it by its own volition and power, and become a dim specter, while the next pinnacle glided into its place and blotted the spotless disk with the black exclamation-point of its presence. The top of one pinnacle took ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... ship. There we found an immense number of extraordinary things and unknown animals. In the place where in other ships the rowers sat were great apes; on high on the mast sat an eagle; in the inner rooms were many large and small cages of smooth ebony with thick gold bars, behind which moved a ...
— Eastern Tales by Many Story Tellers • Various
... and flowers. There was the old-fashioned square piano in its carven case, and cabinets from China or East India; also a lacquered Japanese screen, marble-topped tables of filigreed teek, brackets of inlaid ebony. Curios there were galore. Some paintings there were, and these rocked softly upon the gently-heaving walls. As for the velvet carpet, it was a bed of gigantic roses that might easily put to the blush the prime of summer ...
— In the Footprints of the Padres • Charles Warren Stoddard
... that we could not plunder them carefully. Quantities of gold ornaments were burned, considered as brass. It was wretchedly demoralizing for an army: everybody was wild for plunder . . . The throne and room were lined with ebony, carved in a wonderful manner. There were huge mirrors of all shapes and sizes, clocks, watches, musical boxes with puppets on them, magnificent china of every description, heaps and heaps of silks of all colours, ...
— General Gordon - Saint and Soldier • J. Wardle
... but pallid and remorseful, gained the casement. Softly raising his head, he peeped within. The room was full of music; he seemed to grow blind for a moment, when lo! upon the kitchen-table sat the mysterious songster, an ebony-hued negress, scouring the tinware, and singing away. Just as he was peering through the window, the ebony songster discovered him. The soldier's limbs sank beneath him, and the ...
— Incidents of the War: Humorous, Pathetic, and Descriptive • Alf Burnett
... monastery of Montserrate, at eight leagues from Barcelona, where is preserved the ebony statue of the Virgin carrying the Infant Jesus, which is traditionally said to have been carved by St. Luke, and to have been brought to Spain by St. Peter.—See Libro de la historia y milagros hechos a invocation de Nuestra Seilora de ...
— The Tales Of The Heptameron, Vol. III. (of V.) • Margaret, Queen Of Navarre
... tambourine. Little children may be seen snapping their fingers or clicking two bits of slate together, in imitation of the castanet player; but the continuous roll, or succession of quick taps, is an art to be learned only by practice. The castanets are made of ebony, and are generally decorated with bunches of smart ribbons, which play a great ...
— Spanish Life in Town and Country • L. Higgin and Eugene E. Street
... black gouts of blood Wrung from the awful forehead of the Night The first drops fell and ceased. Then, suddenly, Out of the darkness, earth with all her seas, Her little ships at anchor in the bay (Five ebony ships upon a sheet of silver, Drake saw not that, indeed, Drake saw not that!), Her woods, her boughs, her leaves, her tiniest twigs. Leapt like a hunted stag through one immense Lightning of revelation ...
— Collected Poems - Volume One (of 2) • Alfred Noyes
... him, I discovered that he was not so entirely without occupation as I had at first supposed. Placed amid the other rare and beautiful objects on a large round table near him, was a dwarf cabinet in ebony and silver, containing coins of all shapes and sizes, set out in little drawers lined with dark purple velvet. One of these drawers lay on the small table attached to his chair; and near it were some tiny jeweller's brushes, a wash-leather "stump," and a little bottle of liquid, all waiting ...
— The Woman in White • Wilkie Collins
... worth 400,000 crusados. She brought two great crosses and a jewel of diamonds, presents from the Viceroy to the King. She had 537 tons of spices. The pepper alone was represented by Burleigh as worth L102,000. It fell to the Crown's share. She carried fifteen tons of ebony, beside tapestries, silks, ...
— Sir Walter Ralegh - A Biography • William Stebbing
... Her hair sweeping against her cheek was ebony on snow, so white she was; while under her blue eyes were dark rings, like the smears of an inky finger. M. Etienne let fall the bracelet he was holding, staring at her oblivious of aught else, his brows knotted in distress, his face afire with love and ...
— Helmet of Navarre • Bertha Runkle
... uncle, living in London, had mailed to her. More particulars had come in a letter from James Muldoon, one of the grooms at Oakdale, who gave a most pitiful and graphic account of the way the London dealers crowded about the old porcelains in the ebony cabinets, and of the prices paid by the Earl of Brinsmore, who bought most of the pictures, half of the old Spanish furniture, as well as the largest but one of the great tapestries, to enrich the new mansion he was then building in London and ...
— Felix O'Day • F. Hopkinson Smith
... Tari Barl—"Tarry Barrel," his master invariably dubbed him—smiling all over his ebony features as he stood, clad in active service kit and holding ...
— Wilmshurst of the Frontier Force • Percy F. Westerman
... he soon came in sight of tall cliffs which overlooked the sea, and which formed a natural harbour, wherein lay a vessel richly beseen. Its sails were of spun silk, and each plank and mast was fashioned of ebony. Dismounting, Gugemar made his way to the shore, and with much labour climbed upon the ship. Neither mariner nor merchant was therein. A large pavilion of silk covered part of the deck, and within this was a rich bed, the work of the cunning artificers of the days of King Solomon. ...
— Legends & Romances of Brittany • Lewis Spence
... Marie de Medicis, for thirteen hundred and fifty francs—a unique bargain!—and he could sell them again at a profit of thousands of francs if he wished to. Perhaps he would consent to part with the commode, but he intended to keep the writing desk and place it between two ebony wardrobes which he already possessed, and it would cost him nothing, because the sale of the other piece, the commode, would cover the entire cost! And although in his letters to Mme. Hanska he defended himself against the ...
— Honor de Balzac • Albert Keim and Louis Lumet
... my knees are trembling! I find a box, the first resembling, Within my press! Of ebony,— And things, all splendid to behold, And richer far than ...
— Faust • Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe
... the whole face might be read in his small, dark, cunning eyes, which no man of any penetration could look upon without feeling that they were significant of duplicity, cruelty, and fraud. His hair, though long, and falling over his neck, was black as ebony; for although Time had left his impress upon the general features of his face, it had not discolored a single hair upon his head; whilst his whiskers, on the contrary, were like snow—a circumstance which, in connection with his sinister look, gave him a remarkable and startling ...
— The Black Baronet; or, The Chronicles Of Ballytrain - The Works of William Carleton, Volume One • William Carleton
... at a great price." That story too, as we shall see, illustrates the spirit of the age. For their sculpture they used the white marble of Paros, being workers in marble especially, though they worked also in ebony and in ivory, and made use of gilding. "Figures of cedar-wood, partly incrusted with gold"—kedrou zodia chryso dienthismena—Pausanias says exquisitely, describing a certain work of their pupil, Dontas of Lacedaemon. It is to that that we have ...
— Greek Studies: A Series of Essays • Walter Horatio Pater
... of my bric-a-brac dealer was a veritable Capharnaum. All ages and all nations seemed to have made their rendezvous there. An Etruscan lamp of red clay stood upon a Boule cabinet, with ebony panels, brightly striped by lines of inlaid brass; a duchess of the court of Louis xv. nonchalantly extended her fawn-like feet under a massive table of the time of Louis xiii., with heavy spiral supports of oak, and carven designs ...
— The Mummy's Foot • Theophile Gautier
... the white statues, or the pictures; that was the mistress and queen of all this magnificence, Philippa L'Estrange. She was reclining on a couch that had been sent from Paris—a couch made of finest ebony, and covered with pale, rose-colored velvet. If Titian or Velasquez had seen her as she lay there, the world would have been the richer by an immortal work of art; Titian alone could have reproduced those rich, marvelous colors; ...
— Wife in Name Only • Charlotte M. Braeme (Bertha M. Clay)
... thundering among our tall trees and ivied chimneys—a very dark night, and a very cheerful fire blazing, a pleasant mixture of good round coal and spluttering dry wood, in a genuine old fireplace, in a sombre old room. Black wainscoting glimmered up to the ceiling, in small ebony panels; a cheerful clump of wax candles on the tea-table; many old portraits, some grim and pale, others pretty, and some very graceful and charming, hanging from the walls. Few pictures, except portraits long and short, were there. On the whole, I think you would have taken ...
— Uncle Silas - A Tale of Bartram-Haugh • J.S. Le Fanu
... good-sized cupboard, and was illuminated in the day-time by a window commanding a pleasant prospect of coal-shed and dead wall. The paper on the walls was dark and greasy with age; and every bit of clumsy, bulging deal furniture in the room had been transformed into a kind of ebony by the action of time and dirt, the greasy backs and elbows of idle loungers, the tobacco-smoke and ...
— Run to Earth - A Novel • M. E. Braddon
... by something unusual in the room which he had not noticed till now. On a writing-table of ebony near one of the windows he saw a large photograph in a curious frame of ruddy arbutus wood. He had never before seen a photograph in any room lived in by Mrs. Clarke, and he had heard her say that ...
— In the Wilderness • Robert Hichens
... dreams passed. Dawn lifted the ebony gloom out of the canyon and sunlight far up on the ramparts renewed Shefford's spirit. He rose and awoke the others. Fay's wistful smile still held its faith. They ate of the gritty, water-soaked food. Then ...
— The Rainbow Trail • Zane Grey
... by side on couches in the vestibule, which was a lofty chamber, panelled in ivory and ebony, with inset opals of enormous size and a ceiling of dull silver. The Duchess was a short, spare, grey-haired and rather homely-looking woman in a black demi-toilette with priceless old lace. Lady Muscombe was about twenty-six, ...
— In Brief Authority • F. Anstey
... into the darkness. They could see nothing strange. The great trunks of the trees, with the long silvery moss of whitish hue, were glistening in the light of the still blazing fire. All the space between was gloomy and black as ebony. They could hear nothing that sounded strange. There was not a breath of air stirring, so that the trees were still and silent, as if asleep. Only up among their leaves and high tops, the tree-frogs (Hyloidea) ...
— The Boy Hunters • Captain Mayne Reid
... of the Melliston Company became instantly more distracted when Tom Reade began an account of the capture of Evarts, and his jailing, and the escape of Mr. Sambo Ebony. ...
— The Young Engineers on the Gulf - The Dread Mystery of the Million Dollar Breakwater • H. Irving Hancock
... that all the discourse hitherto made by me imports little to them, and that it serves their turn; that they have demonstrated in one instance, and in such manner and figure as pleases them best—namely, in a board and in a ball of ebony—that one when put into the water sinks to the bottom, and that the other stays to swim on the top; and the matter being the same, and the two bodies differing in nothing but in figure, they affirm that with all perspicuity ...
— A History of Science, Volume 2(of 5) • Henry Smith Williams
... sleep. But no sooner had he shut his eyes than Parmetella arose, took a steel which she had provided, and lighting the tinder applied a match; then taking the candle, she raised the coverlet, and beheld the ebony turned to ivory, and the coal to chalk. And whilst she stood gazing with open mouth, and contemplating the most beautiful pencilling that Nature had ever given upon the canvas of Wonder, the youth awoke, and began to reproach Parmetella, saying, "Ah, woe is me! for your prying curiosity I ...
— Stories from Pentamerone • Giambattista Basile
... be seen with tolerable distinctness, the outline of the hull and of the lofty canvas showing black as ebony against the dark background of sea and sky; and any doubts which Captain Leicester might have still entertained concerning her, were completely set at rest as he glanced at the cut of her canvas. It ...
— The Voyage of the Aurora • Harry Collingwood
... said to have written that novel on a diet of oatmeal and cold water, to that of the luxurious author whose seances with the Muses are decorously conducted in irreproachable interiors, with much garnishing, old rose and ivory, ebony carvings, and inlaid desks, at which the marvelous being who now and then condescends to "dictate" a "best seller," is apt to be surprised by a local photographer. But as a noted educator defined a University as "a log,—with Mark Hopkins sitting on the other end," so the "real thing" in ...
— The Brownings - Their Life and Art • Lilian Whiting
... forgot their own fears of what might come in their interest at the reply which the famous diplomatist might make to a suggestion which everybody knew to be so true. He stood, leaning upon his black ebony stick, with his bulky shoulders stooping forward, and an amused smile upon his face, as if the most innocent of compliments had been addressed to him. One of his few titles to respect is that he always met Napoleon upon equal terms, and never condescended to fawn ...
— Uncle Bernac - A Memory of the Empire • Arthur Conan Doyle
... roof of the cavern sank so low that they had to stoop to pass under it, and again it rose sharply like the roof of a cathedral, and the rays of the far-away, but ever-increasing light, shone upon glistening stalactites that hung from the darkness above them like daggers of diamonds set in ebony. ...
— The Land of the Changing Sun • William N. Harben
... we were sitting in the silence of the heart that needs no language, little Jeffy, my ebony-beauty boy, darted his black head in, and reposing it for one instant against the scarcely lighter-hued mahogany of the door, jingled out, in shells ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 10, No. 61, November, 1862 • Various |
