"Soft" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... being a formula of dismissal, as if her next words would be that I might take myself off now that she had had the amusement of looking on the face of such a monster of indiscretion. Therefore I was all the more surprised when she added, with her soft, venerable quaver, "You may have as many rooms as you like—if you will pay a good ...
— The Aspern Papers • Henry James
... little. The coldness of the air was soft and heavy. Hannah and Hughie held the lanterns high and with a startling attack that made the dirt ...
— Kenny • Leona Dalrymple
... that of the fixed stars. The first gate says Celsus, was that of Saturn, and of lead, by the heavy nature whereof his dull slow progress was symbolized. The second, of tin, was that of Venus, symbolizing her soft splendor and easy flexibility. The third, of brass, was that of Jupiter, emblem of his solidity and dry nature. The fourth, of iron, was that of Mercury, expressing his indefatigable activity and sagacity. The fifth, of copper, was that of Mars, expressive of his inequalities and ...
— Morals and Dogma of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite of Freemasonry • Albert Pike
... experienced Kaffir campaigners. It was rough going; we were unable to see our way, now splashing through the little dongas that ran down into the belly of the vlei, now working round them, through bush and soft bottoms. At the far end, in a clump of thick bush, we dismounted, and Wilson sent off Captain Napier, with a man of his called Robinson, and the Victoria scout, Bayne, to go back along the wagon-track to the column, ...
— The Red True Story Book • Various
... took this as a sign that he should lie down too, and so he did, grateful for the rest. He ate some of his cake, and drank from a clear spring beside him, and feasted on wild strawberries which grew in abundance all round him. He then stretched himself on his back among soft moss, and looked up through the branches of the gigantic tree, and saw with delight the sunlight speckling the emerald green leaves and brown bark with touches of silver, and, far up, the deep blue sky with white ...
— The Gold Thread - A Story for the Young • Norman MacLeod
... say this in the little girl's hearing, and I saw her pitiful strained eyes fixed upon Sylvia. Perhaps this lovely, soft-voiced lady was a fairy god-mother, come to free her sisters from an evil spell and to punish the wicked criminal! I saw Sylvia turn her head away, and search for her handkerchief; as we groped our way down the dark ...
— Sylvia's Marriage • Upton Sinclair
... good-humor, having done her errand quite to her satisfaction. The bell rings and they gather slowly. Madame Lepelletier is more enchanting still in some soft black fabric, with dull gold in relief. Floyd has washed and brushed and freshened, but still wears his travelling suit for a very good reason. Cecil is in white, with pale blue ribbons, which give her a sort of ...
— Floyd Grandon's Honor • Amanda Minnie Douglas
... may be compared with Clarendon's other character of Manchester, vol. i, pp. 242-3, and with the character in Warwick's Memoires, pp. 246-7. Burnet, speaking of him in his later years, describes him as 'A man of a soft and obliging temper, of no great depth, but universally beloved, being both a vertuous and ...
— Characters from 17th Century Histories and Chronicles • Various
... sloping pasture alps, dotted with picturesquely carved chalets, weatherworn by sun and rain to a rich, warm brown; higher up, the sehn hutte—the summer farmsteads of the peasants, round and about which graze gentle, soft-faced cows, each bearing its sweet-toned, musical bell. Again, higher still, grey crag and lightning-blasted granite, bare, repellant, and strange; upward still, and in nook and cranny patches of a dingy white, like the sweepings ...
— Witness to the Deed • George Manville Fenn
... Eve, the celestial blonde; whose satiny skin is like a silk paper applied to the flesh, shuddering at the winter of a cold look, expanding in the sunshine of a loving glance,—teaching the hand to be jealous of the eye. Beneath her hair, which was soft and feathery and worn in many curls, the brow, which might have been traced by a compass so pure was its modelling, shone forth discreet, calm to placidity, and yet luminous with thought: when and where could another be found so transparently clear or more exquisitely smooth? ...
— Modeste Mignon • Honore de Balzac
... who did and those who did not understand it. Undeniably shy, he yet, when warmed to a subject, spoke with nerve and confidence. In days of jabber, more or less impolite, this appearance of an articulate mortal, with soft manners and totally unaffected, could not but excite curiosity. Lady Teasdale, eager for the uncommon, chanced to observe him one evening as he conversed with his neighbour at the dinner-table; later, in the drawing-room, she encouraged him with flattery of rapt attention ...
— The House of Cobwebs and Other Stories • George Gissing
... of the order are thus defined by botanists: Cactuses are either herbs, shrubs, or trees, with soft flesh and copious watery juice. Root woody, branching, with soft bark. Stem branching or simple, round, angular, channelled, winged, flattened, or cylindrical; sometimes clothed with numerous tufts of spines which vary in texture, size, and form very considerably; or, when spineless, the stems ...
— Cactus Culture For Amateurs • W. Watson
... picture's beauty notwithstanding the somewhat revolting peculiarity of the sitter's appearance. With Ruskin, Burne-Jones, and Watts, he had put aside his bowler hat and the neat blue tie with white spots which he had worn on coming to Paris; and now disported himself in a soft, broad-brimmed hat, a flowing black cravat, and a cape of romantic cut. He walked along the Boulevard du Montparnasse as though he had known it all his life, and by virtuous perseverance he had learnt to drink absinthe without distaste. He was letting his hair ...
— Of Human Bondage • W. Somerset Maugham
... setting had faded a good deal by the time they got quite out of the town; but light enough was left still to delight Ellen with the pleasant look of the country. It was a lovely evening, and quiet as summer; not a breath stirring. The leaves were all off the trees; the hills were brown; but the soft, warm light that still lingered upon them forbade any look of harshness or dreariness. These hills lay towards the west, and at Thirlwall were not more than two miles distant, but sloping off more to the west as the range extended in a southerly direction. Between, the ...
— The Wide, Wide World • Elizabeth Wetherell
... threw out the observation, loud enough, from the top of the table, 'Hah, Walrave, I see you are making yourself acquainted with the RAVENS in time, that they may not be strange to you at last,'"—when they come to eat you on the gibbet! (not a soft tongue, the Old Dessauer's). "Another day, seeing Walrave seated between two Jesuit Guests, the Prince said: 'Ah, there you are right, Walrave; there you sit safe; the Devil can't get you there!' As the ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XIII. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle
... the talking and eating lasted two days. At the end of that time I had a footing for our Iroquois in the Wisconsin portion of the Illinois Territory; and the savages who granted it danced a war dance in our honor. Every brave shook over his head the scalps he had taken. I saw one cap of soft long ...
— Lazarre • Mary Hartwell Catherwood
... the woods, but he always found the trail. His sharp eyes saw what the girls had left for him to see. One had dug her heels into the soft mud. Another had left bits of ...
— Daniel Boone - Taming the Wilds • Katharine E. Wilkie
... his hands into the soft stuff of the seat and gaped at a small tri-dee on the wall facing him, a miniature scene of life on some other planet wherein a creature enveloped in short black and white striped fur crept belly flat, to ...
— Star Hunter • Andre Alice Norton
... her dispassionately, to understand the nature of the charm on which dramatic critics had wasted a wealth of adjectives, and of which he himself was humanly and personally conscious. She wore a high-necked gown of some soft, black material, with a little lace at her throat fastened by her only article of jewellery, a pearl pin. Her hair was arranged in coils, with a simplicity and a precision which to a more experienced observer would have indicated the possession of a maid ...
— The Cinema Murder • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... hands touched and patted Dr. Towne as if with intent to make this experiment but gave it up, and Peters announced that they were at work around him. It could not have been more than a minute later when I felt something soft thrown in my lap. I did not know what this was, and did not care to break the circle at the moment to find out, and the information was volunteered by the psychic that the 'spirits' had removed his ...
— The Shadow World • Hamlin Garland
... I shall die: It's dark. And it has rained. But you can no longer detect the imprint of the clouds Which up there cover the sky in soft silk. All streets are flowing, black mirrors, Over the piled up houses, where streetlights, Strings of pearls, hang shining. And high above thousands of stars are flying, Silver insects, around the world— I am among them. Somewhere. And ...
— The Verse of Alfred Lichtenstein • Alfred Lichtenstein
... expect to find on the plains of the Euphrates the rock-cut tombs, the mastabas or pyramids, of Egypt. No mountain chain ran on either side of the river, formed of rock soft enough to be cut and hollowed easily into chambers or sepulchral halls, and at the same time sufficiently hard to prevent the tunnels once ...
— History Of Egypt, Chaldaea, Syria, Babylonia, and Assyria, Volume 3 (of 12) • G. Maspero
... returned Edna sympathetically, for Bessie's eyes had grown soft and misty as she touched this chord of sadness; "it must be terrible to lose any one whom one loves." And then she added, with a smile, "I did not mean to hurt your feelings by calling your brother a boy, but he seemed very young to me. You see, I am engaged, and Mr. Sinclair (that ...
— Our Bessie • Rosa Nouchette Carey
... one fault. As a rule, the cooks are expected to help get up the anchor and sails, but he will not put a hand to sailors' work. He says that a cook must not have a rough hand, but that it should be as soft as a woman's. Personally, I believe that is all nonsense. However, as we have a fairly strong crew, I do not press him on the subject; though sometimes, when I tail on to a rope myself, and see him leaning quietly against his galley ...
— No Surrender! - A Tale of the Rising in La Vendee • G. A. Henty
... ridicule and reproof with a touch of satire, as he had begun to guess that Bobbs had not been long attending to his present work. "You'll find," said Bobbs, "that young men in our air do not need the restraints which are necessary to you English. Their fathers and mothers were not soft and flabby before them, as was the case with yours, I think." Lord Marylebone looked across the table, I am told, at Sir Kennington Oval, and nothing afterwards was said ...
— The Fixed Period • Anthony Trollope
... in its approach expressed a profound, arrogant indifference to Adeline and Anne. Only as it turned towards Colin its grey-black eyes lowered and were soft dark under the black ...
— Anne Severn and the Fieldings • May Sinclair
... large, dark-gray eyes, full of sadness and perplexity; a beautifully shaped head, coiled round and round with heavy twists of golden hair, that glittered in its high lights like burnished metal; and a figure at once full and lithe in its proportions, clad in a neat-fitting dress of some soft, dark material, set off with a tiny white collar and bright ribbon. It was easy to see why she was the "White Rose" to the rough old mountain man. She was looking up at him with an eager, questioning gaze, that meant, O, ever so ...
— The New Penelope and Other Stories and Poems • Frances Fuller Victor
... and our feet not well shod for the long journey," she said, almost with a smile on her pure face, "the sky may be sunless and moonless, and thick clouds may hide even the stars—but there are soft green meadows beyond, and glorious sunshine. If I am not to meet him here, I shall be gathered lovingly into his arms there, and God ...
— The Hand But Not the Heart - or, The Life-Trials of Jessie Loring • T. S. Arthur
... she determined that she would love him more fervently and devotedly than ever, that she would! Her love should atone for all the poor fellow suffered. And "poor Mr. Westcott" was not slow in finding out that "feelin' sorry for a feller was Katy's soft side, by George! he! he!" and having made this discovery he affected to be greatly afflicted at the treatment he received from Albert and from Miss Marlay; nor did he hesitate to impress Katy with the fact that he endured all these ...
— The Mystery of Metropolisville • Edward Eggleston
... soothing balm, Or life's choice arts; to live—unknown the calm, Of soft domestic ease; those sweets of life, The duteous offspring, and th' endearing wife? To live—to property and rights unknown, Not e'en the common benefits my own! No arm to guard me from Oppression's rod, My will subservient to a ...
— The History of the Rise, Progress and Accomplishment of the - Abolition of the African Slave-Trade, by the British Parliament (1839) • Thomas Clarkson
... sir, I pray? I seek him for my father!" He soft replied, "The gracious God into His fold doth gather The best of poor folks' doctors now, to his eternal rest; They bear the body forth, 'tis true: his spirit's ...
— Jasmin: Barber, Poet, Philanthropist • Samuel Smiles
... the desk was waiting—waiting. And he thought he was prepared, nerves steeled, for the expected. But he jerked back, to fall with the overturned chair upon the soft, thick-padded rug, at the ripping, crackling hiss that ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science January 1931 • Various
... the dead silence of the peaceful night, When others' cares are hushed in soft repose, The sad account of my neglected woes To conscious Heaven and Chloris I recite. And when the sun, with his returning light, Forth from the east his radiant journey goes, With accents such ...
— Wit and Wisdom of Don Quixote • Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
... only to play and you could make him come to you. He would get up and leave Dan in the smoking-room; he would leave Mamma in the garden. When you played the soft Schubert Impromptu he would sit near you, very quiet; when you played the Appassionata he would get up and stand close beside you. When you played the loud, joyful Chopin Polonaise he would walk up and down; up ...
— Mary Olivier: A Life • May Sinclair
... at Mac, and he looked at me. He whispered something about predestination. Then Billy lifted his horn and made ready to give a little soft grunt, to see if the moose wouldn't move along a bit, just to oblige us. But as Billy drew in his breath, one of those tiny fool flies that are always blundering around a man's face flew straight down his throat. Instead of a call he burst out with a furious, strangling fit of coughing. ...
— Days Off - And Other Digressions • Henry Van Dyke
... the dying woman just as the setting sun was gilding the lace-work on the roofs of the chateau of Azay. All was calm and pure. A soft light lit the bed on which my Henriette was lying, wrapped in opium. The body was, as it were, annihilated; the soul alone reigned on that face, serene as the skies when the tempest is over. Blanche ...
— The Lily of the Valley • Honore de Balzac
... who are able to afford it, always keep a flapper in their family, as one of their domestics; nor ever walk about, or make visits without him. This flapper is likewise employed diligently to attend his master in his walks; and, upon occasion, to give a soft flap upon his eyes, because he is always so wrapped up in cogitation, that he is in manifest danger of falling down every precipice, and bouncing his head against every post, and, in the streets, of jostling others, or being jostled into the kennel himself. If CHRISTIAN will undertake this province ...
— The PG Edition of Chesterfield's Letters to His Son • The Earl of Chesterfield
... clearly lettered signpost pointing men to the Master. All true service begins in personal contact with Jesus. One cannot know Him personally without catching the warm contagion of His spirit for others. And there is a fine fragrance, a gentle, soft warmth, about the service that grows ...
— Quiet Talks on Service • S. D. Gordon
... fifty, but as active apparently as though not more than twenty five; he was of low stature, but of admirable make; his hair was just becoming grizzled, but was short and crisp and well cared for; his face was prepossessing, having a look of good humour added to courtesy, and there was a pleasant, soft smile round his mouth which ingratiated one at the first sight. But it was his dress rather than his person which attracted attention. He wore the ordinary Andalucian cap—of which such hideous parodies are now making themselves common in England—but was not contented ...
— John Bull on the Guadalquivir from Tales from all Countries • Anthony Trollope
... pleasant sound that you never tire in listening. Sometimes the sky is full of golden stars, and then the scene is so beautiful—oh! so very beautiful! Many a time have I stolen from my bed, far away in the night, while all the rest were in deep repose, to gaze upon the soft moonlight flashing over the meadows until they looked like acres of green velvet, and gathering upon the dark foliage until it almost seemed as if it were sprinkled with umber dust, or to gaze at the deep blue cerulean, studded with ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII No. 6 June 1848 • Various
... curious markings, like the play of light and shadow through the leaves, hid the little owners perfectly so long as they held themselves still and let the sunbeams dance over them. Their beautiful heads were a study for an artist,—delicate, graceful, exquisitely colored. And their great soft eyes had a questioning innocence, as they met yours, which went straight to your heart and made you claim the beautiful creatures for your own instantly. Indeed, there is nothing in all the woods that so takes your heart by storm as the face of ...
— Wood Folk at School • William J. Long
... to Urbani, who was highly pleased with it, and begged me to make soft verses for it; but I had no idea of giving myself any trouble on the subject, till the accidental recollection of that glorious struggle for freedom, associated with the glowing ideas of some other struggles of the same nature, not quite so ancient, roused my rhyming ...
— The Letters of Robert Burns • Robert Burns
... this time. "Say, something spoke to me," he said. "Or else I'm a nut. Or else I have had the most vivid dream I've ever had." Evidently he did not believe that it was a dream. He sat up and listened; the others listened, too. There was no sound in the soft, still night, however. They talked for a little while, a strangely subdued quintette. It was as though they were all trying to comment on these experiences without ...
— Angel Island • Inez Haynes Gillmore
... kyngdome can alwaies assure his state, or glory? What strength can alwaies last? What [Sidenote: Okes. Cedars.] power maie alwaies stande? The mightie O- kes are somtyme caste from roote, the Ceadars high by tempestes falle, so bitter stormes dooe force their strength. Soft waters pearseth Rockes, and ruste the massie Iron doeth bryng to naught. So nothyng can by stre[n]gth so stande, but strength maie ones decaie: yea, mightie kingdoms in time decaie haue felt. Kingdomes weake haue rose to ...
— A booke called the Foundacion of Rhetorike • Richard Rainolde
... were attended by great numbers: at these meetings they raised large fires, and continued dancing till midnight. They first began their movement round the pyre, with slow steps and soft tunes: as they advanced more quickly, their voices became more sharp and loud: they closed in upon the fire, and leaping close to the flame appeared in considerable peril. These movements they continued; shrieking and whooping until thoroughly exhausted. It is hardly possible ...
— The History of Tasmania , Volume II (of 2) • John West
... a plenteous day; When fruitful Summer loads the teeming plain, She crops the harvest, and she stores the grain. How long shall sloth usurp thy useless hours, Unnerve thy vigour, and enchain thy powers? While artful shades thy downy couch enclose, And soft solicitation courts repose, Amidst the drowsy charms of dull delight, Year chases year with unremitted flight, Till Want now following, fraudulent and slow, Shall spring to seize thee, like ...
— English Critical Essays - Nineteenth Century • Various
... like a citizen of a free state, and he got the reputation of being a leader who, though attached to the aristocratical party, still regarded the interests of the people; besides this, he was from his youth fond of mirth, and so soft to pity as to be easily moved to tears. It was not without reason, then, that his subsequent conduct fixed on the possession of great power the imputation that it does not let men's tempers abide by their original habits, but makes them violent, vain, and ...
— Plutarch's Lives, Volume II • Aubrey Stewart & George Long
... he diligently reproduced the sedgy banks, the low-lying distances the poplars and clumps of trees lining the shore, and reflected in the waters. He painted the "Springtime," now in the Louvre, with lush grass growing thick around the apple trees in blossom; with tender greens, soft, fleecy clouds, and the moist, humid atmosphere of France; without preoccupation of rich color, of "brown sauce," of "low tone," of the thousand and one conventions which have enfeebled the work of men stronger than he. Thus he fills a middle place between the men who made an honest effort at painting ...
— McClure's Magazine, Vol. 6, No. 5, April, 1896 • Various
... again; but vividly, as she must have been when she was sitting to the artist. The hair was naturally crisped, waving thrice over the forehead and brushed clean from the temples, showing the small ears, and tied in a knot loosely behind. Her eyebrows were thick and dark, but soft; flowing eyebrows; far lovelier, to my thinking, than any pencilled arch. Dark eyes, and full, not prominent. I find little expression of inward sentiment in very prominent eyes. On the contrary they seem to have a fish-like dependency of gaze on what is without, ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... out of the room, and crossed the hall in her delicate, soft-stepping way. She seemed to Lydia astonishingly brave. Lydia could hear her voice from the other room, such a kind voice but steadied with a ...
— The Prisoner • Alice Brown
... hard, and Mrs. Worden's gray eyes grew soft. Admirable women were these, staunch and loyal, the helpmates of men through lonely years that had passed in St. Marys. But too often the men did not realize this till ...
— The Rapids • Alan Sullivan
... to an interview with a lawyer upon business. The afternoon light was almost over, and already streams of greenish and yellowish artificial light were being poured into an atmosphere which, in country lanes, would now have been soft with the smoke of wood fires; and on both sides of the road the shop windows were full of sparkling chains and highly polished leather cases, which stood upon shelves made of thick plate-glass. None of these different ...
— Night and Day • Virginia Woolf
... decided by virtue of his stolen glances, about twenty-five years old, although her poise of manner indicated a composure beyond her years. And she was tall and slender, with a straight, regular profile, and dark hair which fell back from her face in soft natural waves, and was very simply arranged. She had, in fact, a simplicity, almost an austerity of what one might call personal effect, which formed a contrast, certainly interesting and to Hayden at least as certainly fascinating, ...
— The Silver Butterfly • Mrs. Wilson Woodrow
... The request Of Juno hath prevail'd; now, wo to Troy! So charged, the Dream departed. At the ships Well-built arriving of Achaia's host, He Agamemnon, son of Atreus, sought. 20 Him sleeping in his tent he found, immersed In soft repose ambrosial. At his head The shadow stood, similitude exact Of Nestor, son of Neleus; sage, with whom In Agamemnon's thought might none compare. 25 His form assumed, the sacred Dream began. Oh son of Atreus the renown'd in arms And in the race! Sleep'st thou? ...
— The Iliad of Homer - Translated into English Blank Verse • Homer
... as could intoxicate Elizabeth. As the boys stood making arrangements for their early morning drive to Cheemaun, she leaned over the gate and looked down the long ghostly white line of Champlain's Road, hearing only the soft splash of the mill water-fall coming up through the scented dusk. She scarcely noticed Charles Stuart's farewell; nor his lingering hand-clasp. When he was gone she went upstairs to her room, and ...
— 'Lizbeth of the Dale • Marian Keith
... walked, Pinocchio noticed a tiny insect glimmering on the trunk of a tree, a small being that glowed with a pale, soft light. ...
— The Adventures of Pinocchio • C. Collodi—Pseudonym of Carlo Lorenzini
... and disclosed a little motor, some long tubes of rubber fitting into a small rubber cap, forceps, and other paraphernalia. The student quickly attached one tube to the little tank, while Kennedy grasped the tongue of the dead man with the forceps, pulled it up off the soft palate, and fitted the rubber cap snugly over his ...
— Master Tales of Mystery, Volume 3 • Collected and Arranged by Francis J. Reynolds
... name?" asked Molly, who had secured a chocolate-cream, and was now burying her little white teeth in its soft lusciousness. "Oh, how sweet! and it melts while you're tasting. Is Vanity ...
— Sara, a Princess • Fannie E. Newberry
... neglected to provide for the security of his present conquest; and, without bestowing a thought on the government of his new dominions, resigned himself to the licentious and effeminate pleasures so congenial with the soft voluptuousness of the climate, ...
— The History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella The Catholic, V2 • William H. Prescott
... flowers looked bright, and their perfume had recovered its sweetness. Once more the singing of the birds and the hum of the insect-world fell soothingly upon my ears; and there, as before, sat the pretty doves, still repeating their soft "co-co-a"—the endearing ...
— The Quadroon - Adventures in the Far West • Mayne Reid
... flies, and it will immediately seize its prey, with little twitterings of complacency; but if you tender it a wasp or a bee, at once its note becomes harsh, and expressive of disapprobation and a sense of danger. When a pullet is ready to lay she intimates the event by a joyous and easy soft note. Of all the occurrences of their life, that of laying seems to be the most important; for no sooner has a hen disburdened herself, than she rushes forth with a clamorous kind of joy, which the cock and the rest of his mistresses immediately adopt. The tumult ...
— The Natural History of Selborne, Vol. 2 • Gilbert White
... There was a soft knocking at the door. He went and opened it a very little. "He is conscious, Rosalie," he whispered. ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... her scales were certain; every interval was taken without hesitation by her. Nor has any woman ever more thoroughly commanded every gradation of force than she—in those early days especially; not using the contrast of loud and soft too violently, but capable of any required violence, of any advisable delicacy. In the singing of certain slow movements pianissimo, such as the girl's prayer on the road to execution, in 'La Gazza,' or as the cantabile in the last scene of 'Anna Bolena' (which we know as 'Home, Sweet Home'), ...
— Great Singers, Second Series - Malibran To Titiens • George T. Ferris
... with the green leaflets and the white blossoms at the ends of the branches. The buds opened and the odors of the rejuvenated earth mounted subtly into the soft air. ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... standing together and Frank was near to them, Richard laid his hand upon Ethelyn's shoulder which the cut of the wedding dress left bare. It was a very beautiful neck—white, and plump, and soft—and Richard's hand pressed somewhat heavily; but with a shiver Ethelyn drew herself away, and Frank, who was watching her, fancied he saw the flesh creep backward from the touch. Perhaps it was a feeling of pity, and perhaps it was a mean desire to test his own influence over her, which ...
— Ethelyn's Mistake • Mary Jane Holmes
... these wanderings through Paris, Hortense also lived in her memories only. She showed the marquis the dwelling she had once occupied, and which had for her a single happy association: her sons had been born there. With a soft smile she looked up at the proud facade of this building, the windows of which were brilliantly illumined, and in whose parlors some banker or ennobled provision-dealer was now perhaps giving a ball; pointing to these windows with her slender white hand, she said: "I ...
— Queen Hortense - A Life Picture of the Napoleonic Era • L. Muhlbach
... on Louisiana Avenue, next to the Unitarian Church. His dining-room was in the basement story, and it was seldom that he had not friends at his hospitable table. Monica, the old colored woman, continued to be his favorite cook, and her soft-shell crabs, terrapin, fried oysters, and roasted canvas-back ducks have never been surpassed at Washington, while she could make a regal Cape Cod chowder, or roast a Rhode Island turkey, or prepare the old-fashioned ...
— Perley's Reminiscences, Vol. 1-2 - of Sixty Years in the National Metropolis • Benjamin Perley Poore
... to me. But there,' the corpulent shrug was almost audible, 'we all know what old Bethany is. A sterling old chap, mind you, so far as mere character is concerned; the right man in the right place; but as gullible and as soft-hearted as a tom-tit. I've said all this before, I know, Mrs Lawford, and been properly snubbed for my pains. But if I had been Bethany I'd have sifted the whole story at the beginning, the moment he put his foot into ...
— The Return • Walter de la Mare
... native house that used to stand here was the mark of his height cut with a knife on the central trunk that supported the roof—and he was made like a Greek god, broad in the shoulders and thin in the flanks; he was like Apollo, with just that soft roundness which Praxiteles gave him, and that suave, feminine grace which has in it something troubling and mysterious. His skin was dazzling white, milky, like satin; his skin was like ...
— The Trembling of a Leaf - Little Stories of the South Sea Islands • William Somerset Maugham
... determined; and suspect the man who would advise to more moderation and longer forbearance. Let two or three men who can feel as well as write be appointed to draw up your last remonstrance; for I would no longer give it the suing, soft, unsuccessful epithet of memorial. Let it be represented in language that will neither dishonor you by its rudeness nor betray you by its fears, what has been promised by Congress and what has been performed; how long and how patiently you have suffered; how little ...
— Life And Times Of Washington, Volume 2 • John Frederick Schroeder and Benson John Lossing
... as the boys at the Cross-roads spoke. His voice had a clear, soft ring, and his mode of pronunciation was one Tom had spent much time in endeavouring to impress upon herself as being more desirable than that she had heard most commonly used around her. Up to this time she had frequently wondered why she must speak differently from Mornin ...
— In Connection with the De Willoughby Claim • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... imagine a much greater war, a universal one, to which all young men are called, and where the survivors are pointed out as absolutely exceptional. Therefore you are educating your sons for death. What, then, is the use of troubling so much about them? Is it not useless to take care of their soft hair, and their rosy nails, and the fresh and bewitching beauty of their vigorous little bodies, if they ...
— Spontaneous Activity in Education • Maria Montessori
... the soft rise and fall of responsive voices murmured through the church a little ...
— The Moon out of Reach • Margaret Pedler
... man," she said, her voice soft and slow, a labored effort in it to speak without the harsh dialect so apparent in ...
— The Flockmaster of Poison Creek • George W. Ogden
... exhilarating sensation to Sara (that means the way you feel when you shoot the chutes at the Park) to go bounding through the sunny air on the back of the Gahoppigas. The soft wind whistled through her hair, and blew past her so strongly that she was not even conscious of the Snoodle's drawback, though he sat so close to her. At the end of every leap the Gahoppigas rested for an instant upon a daisy head, and Sara saw that the heads of ...
— The Garden of the Plynck • Karle Wilson Baker
... hand wrapped up in a soft leaf, like a woolly mullein. All the way home he had been obliged to conceal it, and disguise the pain he felt, lest Fire and Water should discover his secret. For he dared not let his people know that the Soul of all dead parrots had ...
— The Great Taboo • Grant Allen
... which has left its impress upon almost every product of industry, from the toy of a child to the heirloom of a prince;—which has peopled the solitudes with statues, and chiselled the wayside rocks with texts of sutras! Who can forget the soft enchantment of this Buddhist atmosphere?—the deep music of the great bells?—the [460] green peace of gardens haunted by fearless things, doves that flutter down at call, fishes rising to be fed? ... Despite our incapacity to enter into the soul-life of this ancient East, —despite the certainty ...
— Japan: An Attempt at Interpretation • Lafcadio Hearn
... appointments were perfect, and at his bidding I plied the lady of the house with innumerable questions about plate, linen, and garden produce, the servants she offered to leave behind her, and so forth. She was a tall and stately dame, with silver hair and a soft musical voice—a perfect type of the old marquise, such as one sees portrayed at times on the boards of the Comedie Francaise, and after I had acted as interpreter for a quarter of an hour or so, she suddenly turned upon the master and, to the surprise of all ...
— With Zola in England • Ernest Alfred Vizetelly
... fatal blemish in the tale—is the slaughter of the old king. Shabbar did right well to dash into the smallest pieces the wicked vazir and the foul witch and all who aided and abetted them, but "to kill a king!" and a well-meaning if soft-headed king, who was, like many better men, led astray ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 3 • Richard F. Burton
... which the buildings encrease at Leamington, it is evident that there is a superabundance of money, and as soft water is a scarce article within the town, could not a portion of that superfluous money be advantageously employed in conveying that useful and necessary article to the respective houses, by means of a steam engine, ...
— A Description of Modern Birmingham • Charles Pye
... forward movement overtakes them, set in motion by some eager leaders that remember enough of what lies ahead to make them oblivious to what they pass. They press ahead. The flock draws on. The momentum of travel grows. The bells clang soft and hurriedly; the sheep forget to feed; they neglect the tender pastures; they will not stay to drink. Under an unwise or indolent herder the sheep going on an unaccustomed trail will overtravel and underfeed, until in the midst of good pasture they starve ...
— Introduction to the Science of Sociology • Robert E. Park
... She nestled down, pressing her soft, cool cheek close to his; her eyes drooped; her lips parted. So they ...
— Lorraine - A romance • Robert W. Chambers
... line of the tree when it is bare appearing harsh and severe, it is luxuriantly indefinable to an unusual degree; the fringe of the forest melts away like a vignette. The tops of two or three high trees when they are leafless are so soft that they seem like the gigantic brooms of that fabulous lady who was sweeping the cobwebs off the sky. The outline of a leafy forest is in comparison hard, gross and blotchy; the clouds of night do not more certainly obscure the moon than those green and ...
— The Defendant • G.K. Chesterton
... but there came a long crescendo hoot, rising into a shrill wail. The shell hummed over the soldiers like a great bee, and sloshed into soft earth behind them. Then another—and yet another—and yet another. But there was no time to heed them, for there was the hillside and there the enemy. So at it again with the good old murderous obsolete ...
— The Great Boer War • Arthur Conan Doyle
... John Lansing Birch, in his oldest clothes and wearing a rather disreputable soft hat pulled down over his forehead, with his hands and face excessively dirty and a lunch-pail on his arm, pushed open the kitchen door. "Phew-w! Something's burning!" he shouted. "Celia—Charlotte—where are you all? Great ...
— The Second Violin • Grace S. Richmond
... he was to death. Yet surprisingly, after the first start, he showed little fear. Zarwell had thought the man a bit soft, too adjusted to a life of ease and some prestige to meet danger calmly. Curiosity restrained ...
— Monkey On His Back • Charles V. De Vet
... And of course the police heard all about it from the servants and keepers, and it fitted in only too well with all the rest about the footmarks and his absence from the house at the time, and the rifle and everything. By the by, the bullet was a soft-nosed one which fitted David's rifle; but for that matter it fitted mine—which is a .355 Mannlicher like his—or a dozen others on the loch side. It's a very common weapon on a Scotch forest. But taking one thing ...
— The Ashiel mystery - A Detective Story • Mrs. Charles Bryce
... filled his pocket he straightened up and started toward the shore. As he waded through the last shallow wash of the wave, his foot caught in something soft, and he fell. He rose, and then on second thought stooped to feel what had tripped him. His hand touched a mass of wet, tangled hair. He jerked it back hurriedly and screamed. The strain he had been under was telling. Nerving himself, he reached ...
— Claire - The Blind Love of a Blind Hero, By a Blind Author • Leslie Burton Blades
... blankets; at noonday it is necessary to wear a pith helmet or carry an umbrella to protect the head from the sun, and as people do their traveling in the dry season chiefly, the dust is dreadful. Everything in the car wears a soft gray coating before the train has been in motion half ...
— Modern India • William Eleroy Curtis
... Boupari, being a small and remote island, too insignificant to be visited by European ships, retained still all its aboriginal heathen manners and customs. The sight was, indeed, a curious and picturesque one. The girls, large-limbed, soft-skinned, and with delicately rounded figures, sat on the ground, laughing and talking, with their knees crossed under them; their wrists were encinctured with girdles of dark-red dracaena leaves, their swelling bosoms half concealed, half accentuated by hanging necklets ...
— The Great Taboo • Grant Allen
... Soft Gingerbread.—Melt one ounce of butter, (cost two cents,) add it to half a pint of molasses, (cost five cents,) with one level teaspoonful each of ground cloves, cinnamon, and ginger, (cost one cent;) dissolve one level teaspoonful of soda ...
— Twenty-Five Cent Dinners for Families of Six • Juliet Corson
... patron) soon brewed more trouble in St. Paul's for the proud bishop. The great reformer being summoned to an ecclesiastical council at St. Paul's, was accompanied by his friends, John of Gaunt and the Earl Marshal, Lord Percy. When in the lady chapel Percy demanded a soft seat for Wycliffe. The bishop said it was law and reason that a cited man should stand before the ordinary. Angry words ensued, and the Duke of Lancaster taunted Courtenay with his pride. The bishop answered, "I trust not in man, but in God alone, who will give me boldness to ...
— Old and New London - Volume I • Walter Thornbury
... of peace and innocence, quiet home joys, and calm delights. My own mind brought before me the image of the house where I had lived, with the shadow of great trees around, and gorgeous flowers every where, where the sultry air breathed soft, and beneath the hot noon all men sank to ...
— Cord and Creese • James de Mille
... most delectable circumstances? And what circumstance is more delightful than sitting in a great shadowy bedroom, watching the logs burning, shedding their grateful heat through the room, for the logs that were brought to us, as we soon discovered, were not the soft wood grown for consumption in Parisian hotels; the logs that warmed our toes in Orelay were dense and hard as iron, and burned like coal, only more fragrantly, and very soon the bareness of the room disappeared; a petticoat, as Doris had said, thrown over a chair gives an inhabited ...
— Memoirs of My Dead Life • George Moore
... time—about seven of them— fellows scarcely too big to take on my knee, and talk to about God, and Heaven, and Jesus Christ; and I feel almost as if I had a kind of instinct of love towards them, as they look up wonderingly with their deep deep eyes, and smooth and glossy skins, and warm soft cheeks, and ask their simple questions. I wish you could have seen the twenty Banks Islanders as I told them that most excellent of all tales—the story of Joseph. How their eyes glistened! and they pushed out their heads to hear the sequel of his making ...
— Life of John Coleridge Patteson • Charlotte M. Yonge
... necessity; grin and abide, grin and bear it, shrug the shoulders, resign oneself; submit with a good grace &c (bear with) 826. Adj. surrendering &c v.; submissive, resigned, crouching; downtrodden; down on one's marrow bones; on one's bended knee; unresistant, unresisting, nonresisting; pliant &c (soft) 324; undefended. untenable, indefensible; humble &c 879. Phr. have it your own way; it can't be helped; amen &c (assent) 488; da locum ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... Church-town, sackbut, psaltery, dulcimer, and all kinds of music; for Frank has put down the old choir band at Aberalva,—another of his mistakes,—and there is but one fiddle and a clarionet now left in all the town. So the said town waits all the day on tiptoe, ready to worship, till out of the soft brown haze the stately Waterwitch comes sliding in, like a white ghost, to fold her wings ...
— Two Years Ago, Volume II. • Charles Kingsley
... occasions, for I have seen few places where nature and art so harmonize and unite in producing scenes of enchanting beauty and creating feelings of ecstatic delight, as here on Champs Elysees. The atmosphere of Paris, too, is preeminently soft and balmy, and the temperature so even that ladies may sit in the most brilliant attire all evening in the open air under the trees of this pleasure-garden without the least danger of contracting a cold. One of the first evenings that I enjoyed these ...
— The Youthful Wanderer - An Account of a Tour through England, France, Belgium, Holland, Germany • George H. Heffner
... to see that the light of dawn was creeping into her tent, that low, soft light which is so beautiful in Southern Africa. Rachel was disturbed, she felt the need of action, of anything that would change the current of her thoughts. No one was about yet. What should she do? She knew; the sea was not more than a mile away, she would go down to it ...
— The Ghost Kings • H. Rider Haggard
... General Grant, was inspecting the Dutch Gap Canal at City Point. "Grant, do you know what this reminds me of? Out in Springfield, Ill., there was a blacksmith who, not having much to do, took a piece of soft iron and attempted to weld it into an agricultural implement, but discovered that the iron would not hold out; then he concluded it would make a claw hammer; but having too much iron, attempted to make an ax, but decided after working awhile ...
— Lincoln's Yarns and Stories • Alexander K. McClure |
