"Silhouette" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... second horse appeared against the sky, following the man, topping the ridge, passing on. In silhouette it appeared no normal animal but some weird monstrosity, a misshapen body covered everywhere with odd wart-like excrescences. Close by, these unique growths resolved themselves into at least a score of canteens and water-bottles of many shapes and sizes, strung together with bits of rope. Undoubtedly ...
— The Desert Valley • Jackson Gregory
... for fear was strained to its utmost; that he could support nothing more, yet a new horror was in store for him; for, as he watched that gray patch, in it, as in a frame, a black silhouette appeared—the silhouette of a human head... ...
— The Yellow Claw • Sax Rohmer
... silence, broken only by his own sobbing breathing, and a sound like licking. Everything was black except the parallelogram of the blue skylight with the luminous dust of stars, against which the end of the telescope now appeared in silhouette. He waited, as it seemed, an interminable time. Was the thing coming on again? He felt in his trouser-pocket for some matches, and found one remaining. He tried to strike this, but the floor was wet, and it spat and went out. He cursed. He could not see where the door was situated. In ...
— The Stolen Bacillus and Other Incidents • H. G. (Herbert George) Wells
... near in silhouette against the rising moon, was the outline of the little hamlet of Hankey, comforting, though it showed never a light, and he cracked his whip and spoke again, and then in a flash ...
— The Food of the Gods and How It Came to Earth • H.G. Wells
... which the issues are in question. [Footnote: The following is an extract, given by Margry, from a letter of the aged Madeleine Cavelier, dated 21 Fevrier, 1756, and addressed to her nephew M. Le Baillif, who had applied for the papers in behalf of the minister, Silhouette: "J'ay cherche une occasion sure pour vous anvoye les papiers de M. de la Salle. Il y a des cartes que j'ay jointe a ces papiers, qui doivent prouver que, en 1675, M. de Lasalle avet deja fet deux voyages en ces decouverte, puisqu'il y avet une carte, que je vous envoye, par laquelle il est fait ...
— France and England in North America, a Series of Historical Narratives, Part Third • Francis Parkman
... I think, myself, that this is an exaggeration, as their line of observation must be at least seven or eight miles removed and at that distance, even with a very strong glass, it would be almost impossible to distinguish a human silhouette. ...
— New York Times Current History: The European War from the Beginning to March 1915, Vol 1, No. 2 - Who Began the War, and Why? • Various
... the general effect was admirable, especially that of the great circular library, with its conical roof. In addition to the Legislative Chambers proper, two flanking buildings in the same style housed various Administrative departments. Seen from Rideau Hall in dark silhouette against the sunset sky, the bold outline of the conical roof of the library and the three tall towers flanking it gave a sort of picturesque Nuremberg effect to the distant view of Ottawa, The Parliament buildings proper were destroyed by an incendiary during the war, but the library ...
— The Days Before Yesterday • Lord Frederick Hamilton
... the deepening gloom and stood erect in the moonlight, her figure throwing upon the whitewashed wall a distorted, specterlike silhouette. ...
— The Wall Between • Sara Ware Bassett
... untold ocean tragedy, she lay black and forbidding in the ordered procession of waves. Half a mile to the east of the derelict hovered a ship's cutter, the turn of her crew's heads speaking expectancy. As far again beyond, the United States cruiser Wolverine outlined her severe and trim silhouette against the horizon. In all the spread of wave and sky no other thing was visible. For this was one of the desert parts of the Pacific, three hundred miles north of the steamship route from Yokohama to Honolulu, five hundred ...
— The Mystery • Stewart Edward White and Samuel Hopkins Adams
... Britain. There is nothing quite so good either in England or Scotland. The proof of this is that the Automobile Club de France have given it distinctive marks in its "Annuaire de l'Etranger." There is the tiny silhouette of a knife and fork, and four-poster bed, indicating that the tables and beds are of an agreeable excellence. This is a great deal more satisfying as ...
— The Automobilist Abroad • M. F. (Milburg Francisco) Mansfield
... Holman, of the War Trade Board. Mrs. Holman's stories were always long, and people were always interrupting them because they had to or stay mute all night. Davidge was glad of her clatter, because it gave him a chance to revel in Mamise. She was presented to his eyes in a kind of mitigated silhouette against a bright-hued lamp-shade. She was seated sidewise on a black Chinese chair. On the back of it her upraised arm rested. Davidge's eyes followed the strange and marvelous outline described by the lines of that arm, running into the sharp rise of a shoulder, ...
— The Cup of Fury - A Novel of Cities and Shipyards • Rupert Hughes
... was seized with a keen desire to see Holmes again, and to know how he was employing his extraordinary powers. His rooms were brilliantly lighted, and even as I looked up, I saw his tall, spare figure pass twice in a dark silhouette against the blind. He was pacing the room swiftly, eagerly, with his head sunk upon his chest, and his hands clasped behind him. To me, who knew his every mood and habit, his attitude and manner told ...
— The Lock And Key Library - Classic Mystery And Detective Stories, Modern English • Various
... noise from the direction of Brineweald announced the usual morning visit of young Stephen Fearwell, and sure enough, up the main drive, at top speed, there appeared the familiar silhouette of the youth on his motor-cycle. This time, however, he did not seem to be alone, fair arms seemed to be clinging to him, and the flutter of a dress and a sun-bonnet seemed ...
— Too Old for Dolls - A Novel • Anthony Mario Ludovici
... fisherman singing not far off came to them like the voice of Fate, issuing from the ocean to tell them of the sadness that was the doom of men. Behind them Naples sank away into the vaporous distance. Vesuvius was almost blotted out, Capri an ethereal silhouette. And their little island, even when they approached it, did not look like the solid land on which they had made a home, but like the vague shell of some substance that had been destroyed, leaving its former ...
— A Spirit in Prison • Robert Hichens
... corner, and then another. The moment was terrible for her. She could only distinguish in the room the blur of a man's shape against the light-coloured wall-paper, and the whiteness of the counterpane, and the dark square of the window broken by the black silhouette of the mirror. She slipped off the bed, and going in the direction of the dressing-table groped for a match-box and lit the gas. Dazzled by the glare of the gas, she turned to look at the corner where ...
— Hilda Lessways • Arnold Bennett
... its simplicity suits the Psalmist's point of view. He is looking to the hills. It is on that high line he sees his Helper appearing. Now we all know how a figure looks upon a skyline. We see just the outline of it—a silhouette, as it were: no details, expression, voice nor colour, but only an attitude. This is all the Psalmist sees of God on that high threshold against the light—His attitude. The attitude is that of a sentinel. The Lord is thy Keeper—thy watchman. The figure is familiar ...
— Four Psalms • George Adam Smith
... condition, enjoy the warmth of the coals covered with ashes on the hearth, and listened. He was a tall, straight negro of powerful build, and although his features were African, they were not gross in character. The candle on the mantel near him brought out his profile in fine silhouette, while his quiet steady eyes indicated a nature ...
— The Earth Trembled • E.P. Roe
... appeared neither in a hurry nor yet anxious. He did not pause in order to glance to right or left, but started to walk quite leisurely up the street. The two sleuth-hounds quietly followed him. Through the darkness they could only vaguely see his silhouette, with the great bundle under his arm. Whatever may have been Rateau's fears of being shadowed awhile ago, he certainly seemed free of them now. He sauntered along, whistling a tune, down the Montagne ...
— The League of the Scarlet Pimpernel • Baroness Orczy
... every inch was covered by a boot. The whole superstructure was coated with brown uniforms; they clung to the boat davits, the winches, the railings and ventilators, like bees in a swarm. Just as the vessel was backing out, a breeze sprang up and cleared the air. Blue sky broke overhead, and the pale silhouette of buildings on the long island grew sharp and hard. Windows flashed flame-coloured in their grey sides, the gold and bronze tops of towers began to gleam where the sunlight struggled through. The transport ...
— One of Ours • Willa Cather
... smoked-chimney lamps, and candles, set on pedestals, signalizing other centers. The walls of the tent store-buildings glowed spectral from the lights to be glimpsed through doorways and windows, and grotesque, gigantic figures flitted in silhouette. While through the interstices between the buildings I might see other structures, ranging from those of tolerable size to simple wall tents and makeshift ...
— Desert Dust • Edwin L. Sabin
... the head of the staircase he heard footsteps, and in the rectangle of light that entered through the open door there bulked the silhouette of a corpulent man. At the same time there rang out the shrill shriek of a female voice, trembling ...
— Luna Benamor • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... cape," said I. "But where is her hat? She wore one. Let me see if I can describe it." Closing my eyes I endeavored to recall the dim silhouette of her figure as she stood passing up the change to the driver; and was so far successful that I was ready to announce at the next moment that her hat presented the effect of a soft felt with one feather or one bow of ribbon standing upright from ...
— That Affair Next Door • Anna Katharine Green
... scarcely stirred by her faint respiration, gazing over the schooner's stern at the sinking sun. The golden disk was turning to red and across its darkened face the cliff and Point stood out in sharp silhouette, which grew larger as the great glowing sun was distorted and enlarged by the refraction near the horizon. The breeze had changed, and now blew with gentle strength out of the west, a fair wind for their homeward ...
— The Pirate Woman • Aylward Edward Dingle
... in Gibraltar. It is a large place and there does not seem to be room in this letter, in which to express my feelings about Moors in bare legs and six thousand Red-coats and to hear Englishmen speak again. When I woke up Gibraltar was a black silhouette against the sky, but toward the south there was a low line of mountains with a red sky behind them, dim and mysterious and old, and that was Africa. Then Spain turned up all amethyst and green, and the Mediterranean as blue as they tell you it is. They wouldn't ...
— Adventures and Letters • Richard Harding Davis
... the sun drops to the sea. The phantom ship approaches him,—touches the curve of his glowing face, sails right athwart it! Oh, the spectral splendor of that vision! The whole great ship in full sail instantly makes an acute silhouette against the monstrous disk,—rests there in the very middle of the vermilion sun. His face crimsons high above her top-masts,—broadens far beyond helm and bowsprit. Against this weird magnificence, her whole shape ...
— Two Years in the French West Indies • Lafcadio Hearn
... grava. Signify (to make known) sciigi. Silence silento. Silence silentigi. Silence, to keep silentigi. Silent silenta. Silent, to be silenti. Silent, to become silentigxi. Silex siliko. Silhouette profilo. Silk silko. Silkworm silkvermo. Silken silka. Silky silkeca. Sill sojlo. Silliness malsagxeco. Silly naivega. Silver argxento. Silver plate argxenti. Silver-fir pinio. Similar simila. Similarity simileco. Similitude komparajxo. Simile simileco. ...
— English-Esperanto Dictionary • John Charles O'Connor and Charles Frederic Hayes
... whose dark silhouette appeared suddenly upon his blind. He was pacing swiftly up ...
— The Return of Sherlock Holmes - Magazine Edition • Arthur Conan Doyle
... walls threw long and dense shadows, but the silhouette of the man would be clearly outlined if he made any attempt at climbing over them. Mr. Howard felt quite sure that the thief was bent on recovering the stolen goods, which, no doubt, he had hidden in the rear of one of the houses. He would be caught in flagrante delicto, ...
— The Old Man in the Corner • Baroness Orczy
... violently apart for a length of some ten or twelve degrees of arc, while the rent was filled with a strong yet misty glare of coppery-yellow light, in the very centre of which the brig stood out sharply-defined, and as black as a shape cut out of silhouette paper. ...
— The Pirate Slaver - A Story of the West African Coast • Harry Collingwood
... the outline is important because this is seen against the background of wall, or sky, and frequently in silhouette. Any fault in its contour as a mass is therefore emphasized. This consideration applies pictorially to groups which are complete in themselves and have no incorporation with backgrounds, such for instance as the photographic group of a number of people. Here personality is the first ...
— Pictorial Composition and the Critical Judgment of Pictures • Henry Rankin Poore
... a couple of wraps from the house for them both, as the air had a touch of chill in it. She came down the lichened steps, crossed the lawn, and passed into the unlighted hall. As she entered, the door opposite opened, and for a moment she saw the silhouette of a man's figure against the bright passage beyond. Her heart suddenly ...
— By What Authority? • Robert Hugh Benson
... manner brooked no delay, and her ladyship thinking that even now Katherine was Cantemir's wife, spoke out with a semblance of injured dignity that melted under Sir Julian's scathing contempt to silly simpering. The noble character of Sir Julian seemed to silhouette that of her ladyship ...
— Mistress Penwick • Dutton Payne
... kernel in the woman; a warmth of love, strong dogmatic religious feeling, and a considerable, but not authoritative, sense of the proprieties. Of what biographers refer to daintily as "her somewhat voluptuous style of beauty," judging from the silhouette in Mr. Scott Douglas's invaluable edition, the reader will be fastidious if he does not approve. Take her for all in all, I believe she was the best woman Burns encountered. The pair took a fancy for each other on the spot; Mrs. M'Lehose, in her turn, invited him to tea; but the poet, ...
— Familiar Studies of Men & Books • Robert Louis Stevenson
... of violet dusk at the bottom of the small ravine Naginlta's eyes regarded him knowingly. Travis signaled with his hand and thought out what would be the coyotes' part in this surprise attack. The prick-eared silhouette vanished. Uphill the chitter of a fluff-fur sounded twice—Tsoay was ...
— The Defiant Agents • Andre Alice Norton
... one another in their fruitless bombardment of the smooth shelving sand, are filling the air with a ceaseless thunder. The sun, shining from a sky of burnished gold, throws into silhouette the twin lighthouses at the entrance to Whitby Harbour, and turns the foaming wave-tops into a dazzling white, accentuated by the long shadows of early day. Away to the north-west is Sandsend Ness, a bold headland full of purple and blue shadows, ...
— Yorkshire—Coast & Moorland Scenes • Gordon Home
... form of the harai is very simple. Each Shinto parish-temple furnishes to all its Ujiko, or parishioners, small paper-cuttings called hitogata ("mankind-shapes"), representing figures of men, women, and children as in silhouette,—only that the paper is white, and folded curiously. Each household receives a number of hitogata corresponding to the number of its members,—"men-shapes" for the men and boys, ...
— Japan: An Attempt at Interpretation • Lafcadio Hearn
... came out by the water-basins. Here was a scene of some bustle and disorder, but it was farther on that the spectators were engaged in a knot, for the caisson was drifting round, and a handsome vessel was floating in, her funnel backed against the grey darkness and her spars in a ghostly silhouette. The name I heard on several sides roused in me a faint curiosity. It was the stranger I had observed, the Sea Queen, the subject ...
— Hurricane Island • H. B. Marriott Watson
... sunset sky turned lemon-yellow, orange, and deep crimson, the bay went into peacock blues and purples, with here and there a current of bottle-glass green, and Imbros Island stood clear cut against the sunset-colour a violet-black silhouette. ...
— At Suvla Bay • John Hargrave
... fingers and his eyes seeming to start with the strain of gazing along the shelf at the brilliant stars before him, his nerves literally jerked and he felt perfectly paralysed and unable to stir, for here, not six feet away, he could make out against the starry sky the dimly-marked silhouette of a heavily-built man. ...
— The Kopje Garrison - A Story of the Boer War • George Manville Fenn
... northward, we reached the entrance to the Midway Plaisance, directly east of which stood, encompassed by luxuriant shrubs and beds of fragrant flowers, like a white silhouette against the background of old and stately oaks, the daintily ...
— By Water to the Columbian Exposition • Johanna S. Wisthaler
... as upon one string. At the door of the summer-house stood the blurred figure of a man, bareheaded and tall. The light being chiefly behind him, he showed only in thin silhouette, undistinguishable as to age, character, and personal pulchritude. Stares passed ...
— V. V.'s Eyes • Henry Sydnor Harrison
... like the rushing harmony of the world's swift winds. Then the curtain of fog before us lighted up from behind; shadows moved on the misty screen, outlines of trees and grassy shores, and tiny birds flying. Thrown on the vapory curtain, in silhouette, a man and a woman passed under the lovely trees, arms about each other's necks; near them the shadows of five mules grazed peacefully; a dingue ...
— In Search of the Unknown • Robert W. Chambers
... night air, wistful with the fragrance of unseen flowers. His eyes were dazed for the moment by the sudden change of light. He made out the blurred silhouette of the taxi and faltered, thinking he might have a chance to hire it; then he saw that its shadowy occupants were climbing back into its deeper darkness. It seemed that Sir Tobias had been right; it had stopped at ...
— The Kingdom Round the Corner - A Novel • Coningsby Dawson
... went into the desert and walked straight toward it, as though intending to reach it. Always he walked directly toward the sun, and those who tried to follow him and find out what he did at night in the desert had indelibly imprinted upon their mind's vision the black silhouette of a tall, stout man against the red background of an immense disk. The horrors of the night drove them away, and so they never found out what Lazarus did in the desert; but the image of the black form against the red was burned forever into their ...
— Best Russian Short Stories • Various
... see the Time Machine itself?' asked the Time Traveller. And therewith, taking the lamp in his hand, he led the way down the long, draughty corridor to his laboratory. I remember vividly the flickering light, his queer, broad head in silhouette, the dance of the shadows, how we all followed him, puzzled but incredulous, and how there in the laboratory we beheld a larger edition of the little mechanism which we had seen vanish from before our eyes. Parts were of nickel, ...
— The Time Machine • H. G. (Herbert George) Wells
... officer walked back to the portable warning light and rolled it on its four wheels to the rear plate of the jalopy where another magnalock secured it to the car. Beulah's two big rear warning lights still shone above the low silhouette of the passenger car, along with the mobile lamp on the jalopy. Martin walked back to the patrol car ...
— Code Three • Rick Raphael
... west, over the housetops, she could see the stately spire of the cathedral, a brown silhouette against a pale, lemon sky. Down below, through the dull, yellow dusk, faint lights were already defining the crisscross of streets. The whispers of the waking city came up to her, eager, expectant, like the subdued murmur of a vast audience just before the curtain ascends. Then suddenly, ...
— Calvary Alley • Alice Hegan Rice
... French called 'celadon' from a personage of this name, of a feeble and fade tenderness, who figures in Astree, a popular romance of the seventeenth century. An unpopular minister of finance, M. de Silhouette, unpopular because he sought to cut down unnecessary expenses in the State, saw his name transferred to the slight and thus cheap black outline portrait called a 'silhouette' (Sismondi, Hist, des Francais, vol. xix, pp. ...
— On the Study of Words • Richard C Trench
... instant, in black silhouette, the figure of Peabody blocked the entrance to this vault, and then, turning to the right, again vanished. Monica felt an untimely desire to laugh. Now that they were on the track of Peabody she no longer feared the outcome of the adventure. ...
— The Lost Road • Richard Harding Davis
... shadow its boundaries are a little hazy and gradually you lose the impression of the lines that bound it and see only a book. A tree has no sharp outline except when it stands on a horizon and looks like a silhouette against the light. Ordinarily it is a mass of moving light and shade, of color. The leaves are not separately limited by lines and yet we know that leaves are there. If the artist drew each leaf separately and ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 10 - The Guide • Charles Herbert Sylvester
... went upstairs to dress for dinner, but Brett rejoined Powers on the piazza. He sat down without looking at Powers or speaking to him, and his eyes, crossing the darkening bay, rested once more on the lordly silhouette of the Sappho. In the failing light she had lost something of her emphatic outline, and was beginning to melt, as it were, ...
— The Spread Eagle and Other Stories • Gouverneur Morris
... "Not on your silhouette," decided Reddy. "You see 'em rallyin' round The Pump? They're friends of Bill's. Bill won't stand for nothin' of this kind in his district since he got that bid ...
— Sixes and Sevens • O. Henry
... This is an excellent example for study, as is also the portrait by Raffaelli, Fig. 22. The textures in the latter drawing are wonderfully well conveved,—the hard, bony face, the stubby beard, and the woolen cap with its tassel in silhouette. For the expression of texture with the least effort the drawings of Vierge are incomparable. The architectural drawing by Mr. Gregg in Fig. 50 is well worth careful study in this connection, as are all of Herbert Railton's admirable drawings ...
— Pen Drawing - An Illustrated Treatise • Charles Maginnis
... her chief ambitions seems to have been the winning over of the father and the sister. The visit home was to be in November, 1782, but the weather grew very cold, and the wife's condition forbade. Mozart writes to his father that his wife "carries about a little silhouette of you, which she kisses twenty times a day at least." His letters are full of little domestic joys, such as a ball lasting from six o'clock in the evening until seven in the morning,—a game of skittles of which Constanze was especially fond,—a concert where Aloysia ...
— The Love Affairs of Great Musicians, Volume 1 • Rupert Hughes
... this petty Bagdad of the petty wise, the voice of the street corner lifted itself above the inarticulate din of the thoroughfare. A youth, thewed like an ox, surmounted on a stack of three self-provided canned-goods boxes, his in-at-the-waist silhouette thrown out against a sky that was almost ready to break out in stars; a ...
— Americans All - Stories of American Life of To-Day • Various
... from one of them that when the other students used to go out into the court of the hospital after lectures were over, they would invariably catch sight of young Huxley's dark head at a certain window bent over a microscope while they amused themselves outside. The constant silhouette framed in the outlines of the window tickled the fancy of the young fellows, and a wag amongst them dubbed it with a name that stuck, "The Sign of the ...
— The Life and Letters of Thomas Henry Huxley Volume 1 • Leonard Huxley
... round and round in a dull self-set routine. And now, just when the spirit had come for rebellion, the mood for a harmless truancy, there had fallen with them too this hideous enigma. He sat there with the dusky silhouette of the face that was now drenched with sunlight in his mind's eye. He set off again up the ...
— The Return • Walter de la Mare
... artistic creative reaction will be the cutting of free silhouette pictures. The child should attempt this with the simplest of the stories which are suited for drawing, painting, or crayon-sketching. He loves to represent the animals he sees every day; and the art work should direct this impulse and show him how to do it so that he may draw or cut out a dog, ...
— A Study of Fairy Tales • Laura F. Kready
... breath, nor power Has any blast old Corbus to defeat, It still has strength their onslaughts worst to meet. Thus, spite of briers and thistles, the old tower Remains triumphant through the darkest hour; Superb as pontiff, in the forest shown, Its rows of battlements make triple crown; At eve, its silhouette is finely traced Immense and black—showing the Keep is placed On rocky throne, sublime and high; east, west, And north and south, at corners four, there rest Four mounts; Aptar, where flourishes the pine, And Toxis, where the elms grow green and fine; Crobius ...
— Poems • Victor Hugo
... which I had not visited before, I ask the way to the cathedral, for it is no longer visible; its silhouette which, seen from a distance, so completely dominates everything, as a giant's castle might dominate the dwellings of dwarfs, its high gray silhouette seems to have bent down to hide itself. "The cathedral," the people reply, ...
— New York Times Current History; The European War, Vol 2, No. 5, August, 1915 • Various
... men, careless and elate, Join battle with a burly world Or come to wrestling grips with fate, And not for any good nor gain Nor any fame that may befall— But, thrilling in the clutch of life, Heed the loud challenge and the call;— And grown to symbols at the last, Stand in heroic silhouette Against horizons ultimate, As towers that ...
— Dreams and Dust • Don Marquis
... dazzling light; in a second of time I saw with almost supernatural distinctness every rope and spar, every brace and shroud of the ship; I saw the illimitable black expanse of water on the port side, and the Ellen, a mile distant on the starboard bow, her outlines as sharply defined as in a silhouette; I saw the figures of men ascending her shrouds, and with utter amazement I saw that her topsails were set. But as I glanced away from her I saw a dark wall of water on our starboard beam, crested with glittering foam and twenty feet or more ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 15, - No. 90, June, 1875 • Various
... forever. His instinct was all to protect her. But how? To slap at the insect with his cap or his hand was unthinkable. He found himself blushing at the very thought! Yet how to warn her without acknowledging that his attention had been concentrated on the lower graceful silhouette? He might offend her irreparably. Even if he exclaimed, "Look out, there's a 'skeeter,'" what would he answer if she in her innocence ...
— Skippy Bedelle - His Sentimental Progress From the Urchin to the Complete - Man of the World • Owen Johnson
... and feasts like our own, but differ greatly in the comparatively insignificant part played by the contracting parties. Whereas, in an American wedding, the whole object of calling all these people together seems to be a desire to silhouette the bride and groom against the festive background, one comes away from a Filipino celebration with a feeling that an excuse was needed for assembling a multitude and permitting them to enjoy themselves, ...
— A Woman's Impression of the Philippines • Mary Helen Fee
... as the cab turned across a triangular square, Pierre, on raising his eyes, was delighted to perceive a sort of aerial garden high above him—a garden which was upheld by a lofty smooth wall, and whence the elegant and vigorous silhouette of a parasol pine, many centuries old, rose aloft into the limpid heavens. At this sight he realised all the pride and ...
— The Three Cities Trilogy, Complete - Lourdes, Rome and Paris • Emile Zola
... particular pleasure, only the transition from the unearthly phantasmagoria of bitter night fighting to the practical fierce hand-to-hand struggling of day. The paling sky figured the sky-line and the Turkish heads in definite silhouette, and many of the large shrubs of the night where Turks might lurk revealed themselves as small tufts of grass. Vigilance increased. If rifles did not sweep that crest continually the old Turk would leave his head and shoulders above the edge long enough to take aim, instead ...
— The Tale of a Trooper • Clutha N. Mackenzie
... endless chains of V's. But not once could he catch up with the wheels that printed them. A week later, just at sunset as he passed below Round Hill, he saw the stranger on top of it. On the skyline, in silhouette against the sinking sun, he was as conspicuous as a flagstaff. But to approach him was impossible. For acres Round Hill offered no other cover than stubble. It was as bald as a skull. Until the stranger chose to descend, Jimmie must wait. And the stranger was in no haste. The sun sank and ...
— The Red Cross Girl • Richard Harding Davis
... here and watch him awhile," he told his executive officer. "Pretty soon he'll be close enough for us to get a line on his silhouette." ...
— The Brighton Boys with the Submarine Fleet • James R. Driscoll
... and the distant highlands were limned in silhouette against the twilight sky. A tiny, sparkling lamp glimmered from Signal Hill its warm farewell. From the swaying poop we flashed back, "Good-bye, all ...
— The Home of the Blizzard • Douglas Mawson
... overloaded with its experience, the trick of an eye that cannot master a profuse and ever-changing world? Shall these diagrams drawn in fancy, this system of signals in thought, be the Absolute Truth dwelling within us? Do we attain reality by making a silhouette of our dreams? If the scientific world be a product of human faculties, the metaphysical world must be doubly so; for the material there given to human understanding is here worked over again by human art. This constitutes the ...
— The Life of Reason • George Santayana
... the door of Cara's room opened and closed, and the slender figure of the girl stood out in the silhouette of her black evening gown against the white woodwork. Her eyes widened and she paled perceptibly. For an instant, she caught her lower lip between her teeth; but she did not, by start or other overt manifestation, give sign of surprise. She only inclined ...
— The Lighted Match • Charles Neville Buck
... could judge, the person in concealment was within the wood about ten yards from me, separated by an impenetrable thicket. As, however, I stood out against the sky, my silhouette was, I knew, a well-defined mark for ...
— The Czar's Spy - The Mystery of a Silent Love • William Le Queux
... could make another movement I fired once, twice, three times. There was a scramble and scuffle in the passageway, and the smoke rolled thick in front, blotting out the scene that had stood in silhouette ...
— Blindfolded • Earle Ashley Walcott
... lull having occurred in the icy blast which was blinding him, he perceived, at a short distance in front of him, a cluster of gables and of chimneys shown in relief by the snow. The reverse of a silhouette—a city painted in white on a black horizon, something like what we call nowadays a negative proof. Roofs—dwellings—shelter! He had arrived somewhere at last. He felt the ineffable encouragement of hope. The watch of a ship which has wandered from her course feels some such emotion ...
— The Man Who Laughs • Victor Hugo
... stood where he could look at her,—an unfair advantage, for his dark face, strong in its immobility, was in silhouette against the flush of twilight which illumined hers, so transparent in ...
— A Touch Of Sun And Other Stories • Mary Hallock Foote
... in the direction he pointed. Each bush was sending a phenomenally long shadow from its intersection with the ground. There was no butte or hummock to break the expanse between them and the faint, far silhouette of mountains. Her heart sank, a sinking that fatigue and dread of thirst had never ...
— The Emigrant Trail • Geraldine Bonner
... anything really new, really whole. Of what Mahler might have achieved had he not been the divided personality, his symphonies, even as they stand, leave no doubt. If Mahler is not a great man, he is at least the silhouette of one. The need of expression that drove him to composition was indubitably mighty. The passion with which he addressed himself to his labor despite all discouragement and lack of success, the loftiness and nobleness of the task which he set for ...
— Musical Portraits - Interpretations of Twenty Modern Composers • Paul Rosenfeld
... Lida remained motionless in the same place, and Sanine's curious gaze was riveted on her white silhouette in the moonlight. Sarudine now came from the lighted drawing-room on to the veranda. Sanine distinctly heard the faint jingling of his-spurs. In the drawing-room Tanaroff was playing an old-fashioned, mournful waltz whose languorous cadences floated on the air. Approaching Lida, Sarudine ...
— Sanine • Michael Artzibashef
... lights flashing at night, the view of the city from a cable car, the wonder of great trucks bearing down upon us like fiery-eyed dragons, a bunch of poppies growing close to the roots of a billboard in the heart of the city, and the silhouette of a young girl, wind-blown, so that her straight slender figure shows more beautiful than the statue that tops Union Square. Up Kearny street the glimpse of eucalyptus trees on the top of Telegraph Hill standing out against the pink sunset sky, the postman with his pack of human messages on ...
— Vignettes of San Francisco • Almira Bailey
... picture springs into consciousness, and we wonder by what strange wizard craft was accomplished the marvellous pattern on the black curtain that drops past the engraving on the wall. We muse on the extraordinary beauty of that grey wall, on the black silhouette sitting so tranquilly, on the large feet on a foot-stool, on the hands crossed, on the long black dress that fills the picture with such solemn harmony. Then mark the transition from grey to white, and how le ton local is carried through the entire picture, ...
— Modern Painting • George Moore
... step or two, then returned to the door, which was still open. The shadow of the door trembled, a silhouette appeared and took shape. A little black-gloved hand grasped the knob, and a woman stole into the room, with ...
— The Inferno • Henri Barbusse
... appeared like a bright spot above the horizon and dark brown smoke became visible. The foremast of the Satsuma with its multicolored signal-flags appeared in the field of vision.... A final quick correction for elevation ... a slight pressure of the electric trigger. Fire! The gray silhouette of the Satsuma, across which quivered the flash from the gun, rose quickly in the round field; then came foaming, plunging waves, and columns of water that rose up as the shells ...
— Banzai! • Ferdinand Heinrich Grautoff
... onto the platform. The hazy silhouette of Pelusium was outlined three miles to the south. A torrent had carried us from one sea to the other. But although that tunnel was easy to descend, going back ...
— 20000 Leagues Under the Seas • Jules Verne
... back till he turned onto another street, and then he saw the man in black standing quite still where they had parted. The reddish glow of the sunset was behind the man, on which his black figure stood out like a silhouette, the cloak and cape making him slightly resemble a ...
— Frank Merriwell's Chums • Burt L. Standish
... a morning that made the waters of the river sparkle and the breezes rustle in the bending bamboo on its banks, there she goes with her white silhouette throwing out great clouds of smoke—the Ship of State, so the joke runs, also has the vice of smoking! The whistle shrieks at every moment, hoarse and commanding like a tyrant who would rule by ...
— The Reign of Greed - Complete English Version of 'El Filibusterismo' • Jose Rizal
... sharp rattle of a lock, the two great doors of the adjoining room were thrown wide open, and a broad and brilliant light flooded the apartment. Niccolas, the King's majordomo, stood between the doors, a black silhouette against the glare ...
— The King's Jackal • Richard Harding Davis
... those in the tropics. One cannot send a photograph of it home any more than I could photograph the view from my hotel window here on Pera Hill of Stamboul and the Golden Horn. You would have the silhouette, but you could not see the sunshine blazing on white mosques and minarets, the white mosques blazing against terra-cotta roofs and dusty green cedars and cypresses, the cypresses lifting dark and pensive shafts against the ...
— Antwerp to Gallipoli - A Year of the War on Many Fronts—and Behind Them • Arthur Ruhl
... town, where nothing lighted the fronts of the houses, save the hanging-lamps of the streets and the pink and green bottles of the pharmacy Bezuquet, which projected their reflections on the pavement, together with a silhouette of the apothecary himself resting his elbows on his desk and sound asleep on the Codex;—a little nap, which he took every evening from nine to ten, to make himself, so he said, the fresher at night for those who might need his services. That, between ourselves, was a mere tarasconade, for ...
— Tartarin On The Alps • Alphonse Daudet
... was wet, not from my embrace only, but from the splashing of the storm. The candles had guttered out; we were in darkness. I could scarce see anything but the shining of her eyes in the dark room. To her I must have appeared as a silhouette, haloed by rain and the spouting of the ancient Gothic gutter above ...
— St Ives • Robert Louis Stevenson
... outwardly Frenchified, but inwardly German enough. At the time of the commencement of the armistice and the German retirement "Simplicimus" published a picture of a "Farewell to Strasbourg." It was a stormy sunset and late evening, and the black silhouette of the very memorable cathedral, the stark and ragged grandeur of that cathedral and its spire which looks as if nothing exists in Strasbourg but it, stood for the significance of the city. Some German horse-soldier symbolized the last to go, and lifting his hat, took one last look at the ...
— Europe—Whither Bound? - Being Letters of Travel from the Capitals of Europe in the Year 1921 • Stephen Graham
... up then, a vivid italicized prototype, on slim tall heels that clicked and a very small red hat set just at the angle of sauciness. They moved off together after a bickering over luggage, the slim silhouette with the chin sharply flung up and the accentuated sway-back figure of the little mother, her skirt sagging over run-down heels, and, for want of a free hand, blowing up the loose strands of hair from out ...
— Star-Dust • Fannie Hurst
... gliding; the mists rolled away; the world rocked and swayed and settled firmly into a solid, visible reality; Mrs. Talcott's face and her round black straw hat and her black caped shoulders, hoisting themselves up to the window-sill. Never in her life was she to forget the silhouette on the sky and the branching tree, nor Mrs. Talcott's resolute, large, old, face, nor the gaze that Mrs. Talcott's eyes fixed on her as ...
— Tante • Anne Douglas Sedgwick
... foothills (these "foothills" themselves perhaps as high as the highest Alps or Rockies) we looked to where, thousands of feet higher yet, there began the eternal snow-line of Kinchinjunga, above which its further bulk of 11,000 additional feet formed a dazzling silhouette against the northern sky. Stand at the foot of Pike's Peak and imagine another Pike's Peak piled on top; stand at the foot of Mount Mitchell and imagine four other Mount Mitchells on top of one another above its highest point—the massive bulk in either case stretching thousands and thousands ...
— Where Half The World Is Waking Up • Clarence Poe
... A black silhouette had appeared on the crest of a hill in the very eye of the sun, and Dick Salter, shading his brow with his hand, gazed long ...
— The Forest Runners - A Story of the Great War Trail in Early Kentucky • Joseph A. Altsheler
... the committee-man harshly, bringing his dirty fist down on the other's knee. "Did you ever hear of Frank Pixley weakenin'? Did you ever see the man that said Frank Pixley wasn't game?" He rose to his feet, a ragged and sinister silhouette against the sputtering electric light at the alley mouth. "Didn't you ever hear that Frank Pixley had a barrel of schemes to any other man's bucket o' wind? What's Frank Pixley's repitation, lemme ...
— In the Arena - Stories of Political Life • Booth Tarkington
... slowly forward, wading in the stream and stumbling over rough blocks of stone, she made toward the light. Midway the passage, the side wall of the culvert had fallen or been torn down and there in a little damp clay nook, sitting hunched upon a rock was the silhouette of the ...
— In the Clutch of the War-God • Milo Hastings
... don't suppose you can make much of it; it is merely blocked in, and seems quite mad. You see my idea was to make her leaning against a wall—there was one hung with yellow that seemed almost brown—so as to bring out the silhouette. ...
— Hauntings • Vernon Lee
... uncertain glimmer that seemed not so much to shine through the air as to be part of it, took all colour out of the woods and fields and the high slopes above me, leaving them planes of grey and deeper grey. The woods near me were a silhouette, black and motionless, emphasizing the east beyond. The river was white and dead, not even a steam rose from it, but out of the further pastures a gentle mist had lifted up and lay all even along the flanks of the hills, so that they rose out of it, indistinct at their bases, clear-cut above ...
— The Path to Rome • Hilaire Belloc
... paralysed him, and he remained perfectly motionless, gazing at the black silhouette of the man at the helm seen against the dull, soft light shed by ...
— The Black Bar • George Manville Fenn
... I might." He turned to call toward twin disks of light at the curb, "Be out in a minute, Billy"; and the silhouette of a chauffeur standing beside a car could be seen to salute in response, as the old gentleman stepped into the hall. "You don't suppose your daddy's receiving callers yet, ...
— Alice Adams • Booth Tarkington
... grow up for, young man," said the Butcher, profoundly. "Now tell me about that uncle of yours. I don't fancy his silhouette." ...
— The Boy Scouts Book of Stories • Various
... at the open door, and the religious in his black habit was like a cut paper silhouette against the long ...
— Joanna Godden • Sheila Kaye-Smith
... complexion he was so dark as to have earned in some quarters the familiar nickname of "The Moor." His underlip was thick and hanging, his jaw massive. "The mouth and chin are Philistine," wrote Lavater under his silhouette, noting, at the same time, "something out of the common in the eyes and the nose." The eyes were dark gray. They are described as "beaming with benevolence," and he used to say himself: "Anyone can see by the look of me that I am a good-natured sort ...
— Haydn • J. Cuthbert Hadden
... turkey, after all," gasped Dona Teresa. Just then there was a loud crow from the roof, and they saw the silhouette of the red rooster making all haste to reach the ridge-pole and fly down on the ...
— The Mexican Twins • Lucy Fitch Perkins
... her atmosphere, in consequence of its refractive action upon the sunlight that strikes into it near the edge of the planet's globe. This illumination of Venus's atmosphere is witnessed both when she is nearly between the sun and the earth, and when, being exactly between them, she appears in silhouette against the solar disk. During a transit of this kind, in 1882, many observers, and the present writer was one, saw a bright atmospheric bow edging a part of the circumference of Venus when the planet was moving ...
— Other Worlds - Their Nature, Possibilities and Habitability in the Light of the Latest Discoveries • Garrett P. Serviss
... a copper-colored silhouette of the island (the name Cyprus is derived from the Greek word for copper) above two green crossed olive branches in the center of the flag; the branches symbolize the hope for peace and reconciliation between the Greek and Turkish ...
— The 1998 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency.
... regularly fringed by coral-reefs. A portion of the S.E. part of CURIEUSE Island, the N., and part of the S.W. shore of PRASLIN Island, and the whole west side of DIGUE Island, appear fringed. From a MS. account of these islands by Captain F. Moresby, in the Admiralty, it appears that SILHOUETTE is also fringed; he states that all these islands are formed of granite and quartz, that they rise abruptly from the sea, and that "coral-reefs have grown round them, and project for some distance." Dr. Allan, of Forres, who visited these islands, informs me ...
— Coral Reefs • Charles Darwin
... on a rock on the backbone of a ridge when he drew in sight of her—a dark picturesque silhouette against the sky. The sheep fed below, and her horse, with a bedroll across its back, ...
— The Fighting Shepherdess • Caroline Lockhart
... apparently in the heart of the wooded crest of the little promontory. Then the fringing woods on the opposite shore became a dark level line across the landscape, and the color seemed to fade out of the moist shining gravel before his cabin. Presently the silhouette of his dark face disappeared from the window, and Mr. McGee might have been gratified to know that he had slipped to his knees before the chair whereon he had been sitting, and that his head was bowed before it on his clasped hands. In a little ...
— The Bell-Ringer of Angel's and Other Stories • Bret Harte
... nothing away, and yet he appeared to himself just like a thief as he looked round, first at the main building lighted up by the moon, and then at the Gaul's dwelling-house, which, veiled in darkness, stood up as a vague silhouette, and threw a broad dark shadow on the granite flags of the pavement, which was trodden to shining smoothness. There was not a soul to be seen, and the reek of the roast sheep told him that Petrus and his ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... the darkness came the rhythmic dipping of a paddle. They all heard it now. Doctor Joe arose, and closely followed by the boys, stepped down beyond the fire glow. In dim outline they could see the silhouette of a canoe containing the lone figure of a man paddling with the short, quick stroke of ...
— Troop One of the Labrador • Dillon Wallace
... lacked. Each man was indicated by the alternately glowing and waning lozenge of his cigarette fire. Occasionally someone struck a match, revealing for a moment high-lights on bronzed countenances, and the silhouette of a shading hand. Voices spoke disembodied. As the conversation developed, we gradually recognised the membership of our own roomful. I had forgotten to state that the ranch house included four chambers. Outside, the rain ...
— Arizona Nights • Stewart Edward White
... in the hallway of her home, called back a last happy good-by to her mother, and passed with him into the silver and crystal morning light. She was simply dressed in a dark tailor suit, with a little hat and sensible shoes—a very different silhouette from that of the girl who left her room only in time to keep her luncheon appointments. He looked at her with ...
— Out of the Ashes • Ethel Watts Mumford
... The room was a large one, low-ceilinged, and lighted only upon the side of the street; so that a visitor, entering from the staircase, looked as from the bottom of a well of shadow across the tables where the month-old American newspapers were set forth to the silhouette of the vice-consul at his roll-top desk against his background ...
— Those Who Smiled - And Eleven Other Stories • Perceval Gibbon
... a woman—a woman with a little child in hand. I did not see her face, for she was just on the point of turning away from the dizzy verge, but nothing could have been plainer than the silhouette which these two made against the flush of that early evening sky. I see it yet in troubled dreams and desperate musings. I shall see it always; for hard upon its view, fear entered my soul, horrible, belittling fear, torturing me not with a sense of guilt but of its consequences. ...
— Dark Hollow • Anna Katharine Green
... jealous of Ollendon, who was then supposed to be the favoured lover. In the evening of this day, M. de Formigny went to Mme. de Vaubadon's. He was told that she was not at home, but as he saw a light on the ground floor, and thought he could distinguish the silhouette of a man against the curtains, he watched the house and ascertained that its mistress was having an animated conversation with a visitor whose back only could be seen, and whom he believed to be his ...
— The House of the Combrays • G. le Notre
... half the great hoop before we came upon the trail of our man, and were directed to a near-by tepee, upon the glowing walls of which many heads were outlined in silhouette, and from which came the ...
— Laughing Bill Hyde and Other Stories • Rex Beach
... he was a useless burden. The slowly advancing clouds had not yet mounted high enough to obscure the moon, but hung densely massed across half the sky, low thunder echoing among the rocks, and jagged streaks of lightning tearing the gloom asunder. The burly Puritan lay, a black silhouette against the silvered rocks, leaning far over, staring down into the void. As I touched him, he turned his face toward me, pointing ...
— Prisoners of Chance - The Story of What Befell Geoffrey Benteen, Borderman, - through His Love for a Lady of France • Randall Parrish
... of giving back which has proved a keen pleasure and a stimulus to growth is a kind of "seat-work." The children are allowed to make original illustrations of the stories by cutting silhouette pictures. ...
— How to Tell Stories to Children - And Some Stories to Tell • Sara Cone Bryant
... deep, contented sighing came from the cows in the barnyard. She took the path past the house and down to the corral, where she paused, her ear arrested by the steady drone of milking. A lantern sitting on the black earth, cast a little circle of light, and threw a docile cow in dreadful silhouette against the barn. And by that dim light Beulah discerned the bent ...
— The Homesteaders - A Novel of the Canadian West • Robert J. C. Stead
... exceedingly well-modeled horse and youth and those two smaller-scaled figures on his shoulders - I feel that the very clever hand of a most talented artist has not been well supported by a logical idea. Their decorative effect is very marked, taken mainly as a silhouette from a distance. They are no doubt effective in carrying upwards a vertical movement which is to some extent interfered with by the outstretched arms of the youth. Mr. Calder has given us so very many excellent ...
— The Art of the Exposition • Eugen Neuhaus
... is it a most admirable position for the instrument acoustically, but also that its presence here does not detract from the general effect of the interior. From the west end of the nave, as a dark silhouette against the eastern apsidal windows, or as an object in the middle distance, it helps the spectator to realise the length of the cathedral. A certain sense of mystery and something undiscerned adds to the charm of an interior, ...
— Bell's Cathedrals: The Cathedral Church of Norwich - A Description of Its Fabric and A Brief History of the Episcopal See • C. H. B. Quennell
... star superimposed on the gray silhouette of a latte stone (a traditional foundation stone used in building) in the ...
— The 2008 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency.
... the line curved, came the view of the city beneath its delicate canopy of mist. The city was built on escarpments, on ridges, on hills, and sagged here and there into great hollows. The serrated silhouette of it wrote romance upon the sky, and the contours of the naked earth beyond lost themselves grandly in the mystery of the north. The jutting custom-house was a fine piece of architecture. From the eighteen-forties ...
— The Roll-Call • Arnold Bennett
... chimneys; drown it in profound night and watch the odd play of lights and shadows in that sombre labyrinth of edifices; cast upon it a ray of light which shall vaguely outline it and cause to emerge from the fog the great heads of the towers; or take that black silhouette again, enliven with shadow the thousand acute angles of the spires and gables, and make it start out more toothed than a shark's jaw against a copper-colored ...
— Notre-Dame de Paris - The Hunchback of Notre Dame • Victor Hugo
... already nearly the middle of night and the village was black; whatever life waked at that hour had been drawn into the vortex of Pedro's. And Pedro's was a place of silence. Terry and Denver skirted down the back of the town and saw the broad windows of Pedro's, against which passed a moving silhouette now and again, but never a voice floated out ...
— Black Jack • Max Brand
... o'clock and midnight—she had no way of telling accurately—Cora McBride stumbled into the Lyons clearing. No one would have recognized in the staggering, bedraggled apparition that emerged from the silhouette of the timber the figure that had started so confidently from the Harrison ...
— O. Henry Memorial Award Prize Stories of 1920 • Various
... the north gable, he gazed with love in his eyes as he made his every round. He was a good soldier, was Mullins, but glad this night to get off post. Through the gap between the second and third quarters he saw the lights at the guard-house and could faintly see the black silhouette of armed men in front of them. The relief was forming sharp on time, and presently Corporal Donovan would be bringing Trooper Schultz, of "C" Troop, straight across the parade in search of him. The major so allowed his sentry on No. ...
— An Apache Princess - A Tale of the Indian Frontier • Charles King
... mountains, and islands, and trees. Unluckily, however, the mountains happened to be invisible; the islands looked like gray masses in the fog, and all that we could see for some time was the gray silhouette of the boat ahead of us, in which a passenger was engaged in a witty conversation with some boat still farther in ...
— Seeing Europe with Famous Authors - Vol. II Great Britain And Ireland, Part Two • Francis W. Halsey
... a full clear note, another and another. The after-humming of the ninth had scarcely died when the blackness that lay beneath the fanlight of 506 was split by a thin rod of yellow light. Instantly this widened, served for a moment to silhouette a tall figure, then vanished as the door slammed. The tall figure stepped on to the pavement; a cat at its feet trod sedately across the road. The tall figure turned; in a moment was meditatively pacing the pavement opposite where ...
— Once Aboard The Lugger • Arthur Stuart-Menteth Hutchinson |
