"Gesture" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... that all her bonds and bands served but little to check or retard the growth of her rich nature. Do what they might they could not make a Morgan of her. Her every step was a dance, her every word and gesture full of a grace and virility that filled the old folks with uneasy wonder. She seemed to them charged with dangerous tendencies all the more potent from repression. She was sweet-tempered and sunny, truthful and modest, but she was as little like the trim, simple Spring ...
— Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1905 to 1906 • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... of a girl standing at a door and evidently hesitating whether to open the door or not: a very young girl, very thin, with long legs in black stockings, and short, white, untidy frock; thin bare arms; the head thrown on one side, and the hands raised, and one foot raised, in a wonderful childish gesture—the gesture of an undecided fox-terrier. The face was an infant's face, utterly innocent; and yet Simon Fuge had somehow caught in that face a glimpse of all the future of the woman that the girl was to be, he had ...
— The Grim Smile of the Five Towns • Arnold Bennett
... no move to obey the order, and Glavour with an oath stepped toward her, his one good arm outstretched in a grasping gesture. Lura did not move until his hand almost closed on her arm and then she sprang back. Her hand sought the bosom of her robe and the Viceroy recoiled as a glittering dagger ...
— Giants on the Earth • Sterner St. Paul Meek
... accompanying his smile with a disdainful gesture, "we'll simply fall on them when they least expect it; that's all there is to it, see? We've done it before all right, lots of times! Haven't you ever seen the squirrels stick their heads out of their holes when you poured in water? Well, that's how these lousy soldiers ...
— The Underdogs • Mariano Azuela
... was his first experience of working aboard a ship, and he expected to find a scrupulous neatness, and hammocks in place of beds. Instead he looked on a double row of bunks heaped with swarthy quilts, and the boatswain with a silent gesture indicated that one of these belonged to Harrigan. He went to it without a word and sat down cross-legged to survey his new quarters. It was more like the bunkhouse of a western ranch than anything else he had been in, but all reduced to a miniature, ...
— Harrigan • Max Brand
... this time assistance came from the inn (I think the Crown), kept at that time by a person of the name of Goddard. Amongst the number of those who flocked to witness this distressing scene was a young man, who exclaimed, in a frantic agony of voice and gesture, "it is my father!" and he instantly seized the apparently drowned man by the heels, and held him upright, with his head upon the ground, his feet in the air, as he said, to let the water run out of him; an old, vulgar, ...
— Memoirs of Henry Hunt, Esq. Volume 2 • Henry Hunt
... and made a quick, graceful gesture with his hand. "Perhaps the young gentleman like to see my cargo," he said. "Do me the favor!" and he led the way down to ...
— Nautilus • Laura E. Richards
... loud voice in Spanish, asked, "Are ye Christians?" We answered, "We were;" fearing the less, because of the cross we had seen in the subscription. At which answer the said person lift up his right hand towards heaven, and drew it softly to his mouth (which is the gesture they use, when they thank God), and then said: "If ye will swear, all of you, by the merits of the Saviour, that ye are no pirates; nor have shed blood, lawfully nor unlawfully, within forty days past; you may have license to come on land." We said, "We were all ready to take that oath." Whereupon ...
— Ideal Commonwealths • Various
... up his horses before the castle gateway, where their hoofs beat a sort of fanfare on the stone pavement; and the footman, letting himself smartly down, pulled, with a peremptory gesture that was just not quite a swagger, the bronze hand at the end of the ...
— My Friend Prospero • Henry Harland
... dramatic gesture, pointed to the glittering ornament that lay on the table between him and the New York crook. The stones glittered in the electric lights of police headquarters, for it was there, in the distant city, that this ...
— The Diamond Cross Mystery - Being a Somewhat Different Detective Story • Chester K. Steele
... through a man's heart. Intemperance was the cause of his crime. He, the one I loved better than my own self, infinitely better, was made a murderer by it. I have lost him," says she, a throwin' out her arms with a wild gesture that skairt me. "I ...
— Sweet Cicely - Or Josiah Allen as a Politician • Josiah Allen's Wife (Marietta Holley)
... one could watch Them day after day, and never see Them do a single kind or good thing, or be moved by a single virtuous impulse. They have no gesture for the expression of admiration, love, reverence or ecstasy. They have but one method of expressing content, and They reserve that for moments of physical repletion. The tail, which is in all ...
— On Nothing & Kindred Subjects • Hilaire Belloc
... of the name the Canadian could not restrain a gesture that expressed disappointment. There was nothing in the name to recall the slightest souvenir. He had ...
— Wood Rangers - The Trappers of Sonora • Mayne Reid
... gesture Bar Shalmon stopped the captain, but he was sorely troubled. He recalled now that his father had often spoken mysteriously of foreign lands, and he wondered, indeed, whether Mar Shalmon could have been in his proper senses not to have ...
— Jewish Fairy Tales and Legends • Gertrude Landa
... dried her eyes, and went on down the street, the dog trotting contentedly behind her. As she came to a point beyond which the trees cut off the view of the house, she stood still, gazing back at it for a long time. Finally, with a gesture of renunciation, she turned and passed swiftly out ...
— Miss Ludington's Sister • Edward Bellamy
... that too; only do show him in, my good woman," said I, with a gesture of impatience that caused the excellent (though obstinate) old ...
— The Gorilla Hunters • R.M. Ballantyne
... examined it carefully, reducing the heat a little as he glanced at the thermometer. Then he walked over to a row of phials on one of the shelves and handled them almost caressingly. One of them he pressed with an almost rapturous gesture to his breast, at the same time breaking out in a strain of mingled eulogy and denunciation. The eulogy seemed to be for the phial, the denunciation for the "accursed Americans," which phrase Frank heard him repeat ...
— Army Boys on German Soil • Homer Randall
... is still on its object, on character as seen in characteristics, through those details, which make character a sensible fact, the changes of colour in the face as of tone in the voice, the gestures, the really physiognomic value, or the mere tricks, of gesture and glance and speech. What is visibly expressive in, or upon, persons; those flashes of temper which check yet give [131] renewed interest to the course of a conversation; the delicate touches of intercourse, which ...
— Plato and Platonism • Walter Horatio Pater
... Erythrina indica or coral tree, which grows abundantly near the anchorage. This interview lasted two hours, at the end of which we parted mutually satisfied with each other. Mr. Cunningham saw a kangaroo in one of his walks, but on mentioning the name of the animal, accompanied by a gesture descriptive of its leap, the natives did not appear to understand what was meant, although it was from these very people that Captain Cook obtained the name;* it was therefore thought to be possible, that in the space of time ...
— Narrative of a Survey of the Intertropical and Western Coasts of Australia - Performed between the years 1818 and 1822 • Phillip Parker King
... courteous gesture of good-by and slowly descended the slope, disappearing among the bushes in the gorge, whence came a fierce and ...
— The Masters of the Peaks - A Story of the Great North Woods • Joseph A. Altsheler
... individual limitations will allow, the way in which the poet's work impresses the world. When Wordsworth says "poetry is the breath and finer spirit of all knowledge," he is, exactly, in one intuitive word, telling us how poetry comes into being, directing us with an inspired gesture to its source, and not strictly telling us what it is; and so Shelley tells us in his fiery eloquence of the divine functions of poetry. But poetry is, in its naked being and apart from its cause and effect, a certain ...
— The Lyric - An Essay • John Drinkwater
... shot an arm and rifle were thrust up above the rock in a convulsive gesture, then suddenly disappeared. No more bullets ...
— Bloom of Cactus • Robert Ames Bennet
... maimed and antic, Gesture and shape distort, Like mockery of a demon dumb Out of the hell-din whence they come That dogs them ...
— A Treasury of War Poetry - British and American Poems of the World War 1914-1917 • Edited, with Introduction and Notes, by George Herbert Clarke
... rose like the genius liberated from the chest of the fisherman, and refused to return to the prison-house they had quitted. His brows contracted, his lips quivered, and turning aside with a spasmodic gesture, he covered his face ...
— Ernest Linwood - or, The Inner Life of the Author • Caroline Lee Hentz
... old crone had behaved like one who sympathised fully with his trouble, and felt all that he felt, and like a mirror reflected every movement and gesture which the pain wrung from him. "Tonino," she now began in a tearful voice, "my dear Tonino, do you mean to tell me that you let your courage sink because the remembrance of some glorious moment in your life has perished out of your mind? You foolish child! ...
— Weird Tales, Vol. II. • E. T. A. Hoffmann
... could see the Colonel and the Doctor at the landing, waving and beckoning to him, as he darted along with the current. Intent upon carrying his fight through to a finish, he gave only a passing glance to what he thought was their friendly gesture of encouragement, took his right hand from the reel for a second to wave a greeting, and passed on, with determination written in every line of his chin, following the ...
— Days Off - And Other Digressions • Henry Van Dyke
... never used to point a direction. Instead, the head is extended in the direction indicated — not with a nod, but with a thrusting forward of the face and a protruding of the open lips; it is a true lip gesture. I have seen it practically everywhere in the Islands, among pagans, ...
— The Bontoc Igorot • Albert Ernest Jenks
... his head slowly—a distressful gesture. Yet all the time he had somehow the air of a man ...
— The Vanished Messenger • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... up and approached her with a supplicating gesture, but as soon as he was within reach she gave him a good hearty box on the ear. I expected to see a fight, in which I should not have interfered, but nothing of the kind. The humble abbe gently turned away to the window, and casting his eyes ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... There could not have been less than fifteen hundred people congregated in that street—all, or nearly all, emancipated slaves. Yet, amidst all the excitements and competitions of trade, their conduct toward each other was polite and kind. Not a word, or look, or gesture of insolence or indecency did we observe. Smiling countenances and friendly voices greeted us on every side, and we felt no fears either of having our pockets picked or ...
— The Anti-Slavery Examiner, Omnibus • American Anti-Slavery Society
... the anchor-chains, demurred; but a word and a gesture from the Sahib who had turned the hose on a drunken man convinced them that the two would not be in the way. A clatter of steel against steel presently followed, the windlass whined and rattled, and Elsa saw the anchor rise slowly from the deeps, ...
— Parrot & Co. • Harold MacGrath
... won't lie," he added, in tones of boyish enthusiasm, "but if you don't believe those figures, I've got the cash right here to show for it," accompanying the words with a significant gesture. ...
— At the Time Appointed • A. Maynard Barbour
... English Review was in his hand, but he threw it on the floor with a characteristic gesture ...
— Love at Second Sight • Ada Leverson
... with you!" said the boy, accompanying his words with a gesture. "Are you a shoemaker? or ...
— Twenty-six and One and Other Stories • Maksim Gorky
... in that other crisis of my fate when she had come to me, she extended her hands towards me in a gesture of helpfulness, and, as then, I caught and held them in my own; her bosom heaved with strong emotion, and little tremors in the fingers which I clasped emphasized the depth of her feeling. In her face, pity contended in a sort of divine spite against ...
— Looking Backward - 2000-1887 • Edward Bellamy
... pent within the city wall, They throng to theatre and hall, Where gesture, look, and words conspire, To stain the mind, the passions fire; Whence sin-polluted streams abound, That whelm the country all around. Ah! Modesty, should you be here, Close up the eye and stop the ear; Oppose ...
— Cottage Poems • Patrick Bronte
... gesture also reflects the God in us. One would never imagine any rough, uncouth gesture from Christ, who is the "pattern of patterns." Grimaces are not spiritual besides they ...
— The Colored Girl Beautiful • E. Azalia Hackley
... and moral discourses." So this man would have felt about the pervasive influence of his mother. Then it dawned on him one day that he never had seen her. To be sure, he had seen the bodily instrument by which she had been able somehow to express herself through look and word and gesture, but his mother herself, her thoughts, her consciousness, her love, her spirit, he never had seen and he never would see. She was the realest force in his life, but she was invisible. When they talked together they signalled to each other out of the unseen where ...
— Christianity and Progress • Harry Emerson Fosdick
... service of the noble d'Esgrignon family. So strong was the impression that Victurnien, like Sganarelle or Mascarille in the play, like everybody else who feels a twinge of conscience at his finger-tips, made an involuntary gesture. ...
— The Jealousies of a Country Town • Honore de Balzac
... admonished Pouchskin that in this case discretion might be the better part of valour, and he yielded to the suggestion. Indeed, the two voyageurs in the canoe were already shouting to all three to run for it—warning them of the danger they were in by the most earnest speech and gesture. ...
— Bruin - The Grand Bear Hunt • Mayne Reid
... birds flying south," said the girl, with a gesture toward the cloudless sky. "Never since I lived have they gone south so soon." Again she shuddered slightly, then she spoke slowly: "I also have dreamed, and I will follow my dream. I dreamed"—she knelt down beside ...
— Northern Lights • Gilbert Parker
... bottom of the great parade ground he turned in time to see the relieving guard falling in behind the Court House. For one moment he hesitated whether to put all to the test by refusing to go; but a significant gesture with the ever ready rifle of the corporal signified that he would not be given a chance. Humiliated, he obeyed. But just beyond the last hut, waiting by the path, was a group of women loaded with the soldiers' gear; and ...
— Witch-Doctors • Charles Beadle
... of his hands—recalling to my mind the gesture with which he turned and returned his cane while my mother was telling him of the disappearance of my father—yes, the restlessness of his hands was extreme; but he had been working at the fire with the same feverish eagerness just before. Silence had fallen between ...
— Stories of Modern French Novels • Julian Hawthorne
... the manuscript before him daintily with his finger, betraying by the gesture the reverence of ...
— Paul and the Printing Press • Sara Ware Bassett
... for a moment, but the retort died upon his lips. He flung his hands out with an appealing gesture ...
— The Astonishing History of Troy Town • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... he replied, with a fierce gesture. 'You're a pretty clog to be tied to a man for life, you mewling, white-faced cat! Get out of ...
— Life And Adventures Of Martin Chuzzlewit • Charles Dickens
... wives, all deformed, because they're accustomed to see women so; and then they call us silly! My husband won't think me silly once I get command of his money, whatever else he may think me. Till then—!" she made a pretty gesture with her hands and laughed—Beth observing her the while with deep attention ...
— The Beth Book - Being a Study of the Life of Elizabeth Caldwell Maclure, a Woman of Genius • Sarah Grand
... She made a gesture of disgust, and his face fell. It came to her sharply that the rival had thrust between and was ...
— The Game • Jack London
... meaning and reward by serving some purpose higher than ourselves—a shining purpose, the illumination of a thousand points of light. It is expressed by all who know the irresistible force of a child's hand, of a friend who stands by you and stays there—a volunteer's generous gesture, an idea that ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various
... The man made a gesture of impatience. "It is the principle of the thing that is at stake, Helen. If I yield in this instance it will be only the beginning of a worse trouble. If the working class wins this time there will be no end to their demands. We might as well turn all our properties over to ...
— Helen of the Old House • Harold Bell Wright
... agitation. She read it; and when she had read it stood still, holding it in her hand for a minute or two. She had turned pale and breathed quickly. Then she signed to me with her hand to go. But she stopped me with another gesture, and—and then, sir—" ...
— The Indiscretion of the Duchess • Anthony Hope
... eight, the man, who had been busy cleaning boots, returned and made a gesture towards the sunlight, which was streaming ...
— High Noon - A New Sequel to 'Three Weeks' by Elinor Glyn • Anonymous
... pathos, poetry, diction, gesture, wit and humor, each has its place on the platform. While logic sounds the depths of thought, humor ripples its surface with laughing wavelets. While reason cultivates the cornfields of the mind, rhetoric beautifies the ...
— Wit, Humor, Reason, Rhetoric, Prose, Poetry and Story Woven into Eight Popular Lectures • George W. Bain
... Stella tried to reassure Madame Marillac by a gesture. The voice which she had heard in the next room was—as she now knew—the voice that haunted Romayne. Not the words that had pleaded hunger and called for bread—but those other words, "Assassin! assassin! where ...
— The Black Robe • Wilkie Collins
... and it was plainly Tom. It was too dreadful! He might be seen any moment! She shook her head again, in a way she meant, and he understood, to mean she dared not. He fell on his knees and laid his hands together like one praying. Her heart interpreted the gesture as indicating that he was in trouble, and that, therefore, he begged her to go to him. With sudden resolve she nodded acquiescence, ...
— Mary Marston • George MacDonald
... to think twice. She was in the very act of murmuring something about a change of mind, when he opened the door and, stepping out into the starlight, invited her with a smile and a gesture to follow. In a moment they were in the freshness of the night air. He took her arm, and they passed slowly down the steps. At the bottom she turned and looked anxiously ...
— Ronicky Doone • Max Brand
... Joel was crouched close to quarter, obeying that player's gesture. They were going to try Murdoch again. Joel heard the breathless tones of the Yates quarter as he ...
— The Half-Back • Ralph Henry Barbour
... snow, and through valleys flooded with rain, I come a fugitive." Moliere, the popular dramatic author! Happy? "No. That wretch of an actor just now recited four of my lines without the proper accent and gesture. To have the children of my brain so hung, drawn, and quartered, tortures ...
— New Tabernacle Sermons • Thomas De Witt Talmage
... laughs. GUIDO starts, half drawing his dagger. GRACIOSA turns with an instinctive gesture of seeking protection. The DUKE'S head and shoulders appear ...
— The Jewel Merchants - A Comedy In One Act • James Branch Cabell
... and wiping one hand upon the other in a gesture of solicitous meekness, emerged the tall and commanding figure of the Mongolian—or was he a Tibetan? He was attired now in the finest, the shiniest of Canton silks. His satin pants, of a gorgeous white, a courting white, ...
— Peter the Brazen - A Mystery Story of Modern China • George F. Worts
... Obedient to a gesture of Tiberius, the Bacchante was placed upon a pedestal. For a moment, she stood before them an exquisite statue Of despair—exquisite even in the excess of her bewilderment. For a moment, she stood there stunned by the suddenness of the commotion, ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - Volume 62, No. 384, October 1847 • Various
... Oriental meekness in which there is something majestic. I placed a chair for him in the study, and reseated myself at the table. The old man, who from the first had kept his eyes lowered deferentially, turned to me with a gentle gesture, as if to apologize for opening ...
— The Quest of the Sacred Slipper • Sax Rohmer
... from the wrist with his sword. The blue flame now leads him to a vault, where he sees the owner of the hand "completely armed, thrusting forwards the bloody stump of an arm, with a terrible frown and menacing gesture and brandishing a sword in the remaining hand." When attacked, the figure vanishes, leaving behind a massive, iron key which unlocks a door leading to an apartment containing a coffin, and statues of black marble, ...
— The Tale of Terror • Edith Birkhead
... astonished and frightened and curiously touched she stood up, he caught at her skirt. Susan put her hand over his with a reassuring and soothing gesture. ...
— Saturday's Child • Kathleen Norris
... away with a quick gesture of anguish and seemed to be crying, but when she looked at me again there were no signs ...
— Wings of the Wind • Credo Harris
... point. It is that the means of our education, other than the schools, are also prejudiced by prudery. Upon the stage there is permitted almost any indecency of word, or innuendo, or gesture, or situation, provided only that the treatment be not serious. Almost anything is tolerable if it be frivolously dealt with, but so soon as these intensely serious matters are dealt with seriously, prudery protests. The consequence is that a great educative influence, ...
— Woman and Womanhood - A Search for Principles • C. W. Saleeby
... voice instantly as that of Radway's scaler. His hand crisped in a gesture of disgust. The man had always been ...
— The Blazed Trail • Stewart Edward White
... Brock—emphasizing his parting words with a gesture of his hand—"why, Detroit taken, I shall return here, batter Fort Niagara—providing Prevost consents—and then by a sudden movement I could sweep the frontier from Buffalo to Fort Niagara and complete the salvation of Canada by the occupation of Sackett's Harbor. Good-night, ...
— The Story of Isaac Brock - Hero, Defender and Saviour of Upper Canada, 1812 • Walter R. Nursey
... Featherstone asked with a hopeless gesture. "He can have my son arrested if I don't agree ...
— Carmen's Messenger • Harold Bindloss
... raised her head and Muller saw that her face looked pale and haggard and that her eyes shone with an uneasy feverish light. She did not answer the old man's questions, but made a gesture of farewell and then turned and walked slowly towards the house. She realised, apparently, and feared, perhaps, that the man who was passing the gate might have, noticed her sudden change of demeanour and that he was listening ...
— The Lamp That Went Out • Augusta Groner
... of you to take this trouble. That you should have had to! But since such things have come to pass—" He made a gesture full of horror. He gave one the impression of a man whose pride was struggling against a ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... he with a gesture of caution to his companions. "Look there! We've had nothing to eat for an awful time,—nothing since breakfast on Sunday morning. I feel as if my interior had been amputated. Oh, what a jolly roast that fellow would make if ...
— Gascoyne, The Sandal Wood Trader - A Tale of the Pacific • R. M. Ballantyne
... It was the same again to-day. You and Ethne in the room, I alone upon the terrace. I wonder whether it will always be so. But you will not say—you will not say." She struck her hands together with a gesture of despair, but Durrance had no words for her. He walked silently along the garden path towards the stile, and he quickened his pace a little, so that Mrs. Adair had to walk fast to keep up with him. That quickening of the pace was a sort of answer, but Mrs. Adair was not deterred ...
— The Four Feathers • A. E. W. Mason
... still with his friends when this officer arrived, and the tall, slender figure and dark face of the man seemed familiar to him. A little thought recalled where he had first seen that eager gesture and the manner so intense that it betrayed an excessive enthusiasm. But when Harry did remember him ...
— The Star of Gettysburg - A Story of Southern High Tide • Joseph A. Altsheler
... with the intention of speaking to him. He knew that he cut a poor figure compared with Trevanion, and that to Nancy he must seem a slacker, a wastrel. Still he could not speak nor move. He felt that the girl's eyes were upon him, felt contempt in her every gesture, her every movement. She came up ...
— All for a Scrap of Paper - A Romance of the Present War • Joseph Hocking
... This element dominated his slightest action. He strode over the concert stage with the haughty step of a despot who ruled with a sway not to be contested. Tearing his gloves from his fingers and hurling them on the piano, he would seat himself with a proud gesture, run his fingers through his waving blonde locks, and then attack the piano with the vehemence of a conqueror taking his army into action. Much of this manner was probably the outcome of natural temperament, something the result of affectation; ...
— Great Violinists And Pianists • George T. Ferris
... "I'm glad. You gave me a start. Rotten fix for a man to be in. Why, I'm here under an assumed name! Fancy! But—" he waved his hand in a gesture which showed ...
— The Iron Trail • Rex Beach
... moments more of clambering, and the stranger met the two women at the gate with a gesture of benediction. ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 8, No. 46, August, 1861 • Various
... voice divine the chief with joyful mind Obey'd; and rested, on his lance reclined While like Deiphobus the martial dame (Her face, her gesture, and her arms the same), In show an aid, by hapless Hector's side Approach'd, and greets him thus with ...
— The Iliad of Homer • Homer
... gleams that flared from the torches; and she saw him deliberately go through the operation of making the projection available for the purpose of a gallows, by binding the cord to it, and suspending a running noose, which seemed to gape in grim gesture for its victim. The moment the rope was suspended, James pointed to it, and asked the warder to proceed and answer his questions. The terrified man cast a wild eye on the relentless crowd around him, and then on the engine of death that dangled before him, and, with faltering tongue, ...
— Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland, Volume III • Various
... with a quick and emphatic gesture of disapproval. "Don't! don't fetch 'em anywheres. Stay right wi' 'em as ...
— Free Joe and Other Georgian Sketches • Joel Chandler Harris
... their proper register. In our country the understanding portion of the audience think no harm in keeping the performance up to standard by dint of their own imagination. For the same reason they do not mind any harshness of voice or uncouthness of gesture in the exponent of a perfectly formed melody; on the contrary, they seem sometimes to be of opinion that such minor external defects serve better to set off the internal perfection of the composition,—as with the outward poverty of the Great Ascetic, Mahadeva, ...
— My Reminiscences • Rabindranath Tagore
... gesture as of deprecation; but Aunt Jane let her go without remonstrance, merely saying as the ...
— Beechcroft at Rockstone • Charlotte M. Yonge
... our dear heroes! My poor, brave man! A cup of tea, my dear," turning to William's thunderstruck mother. "And he may sit down, may he not?" She kept her face well turned towards the sardonic-looking Mr. Lewes. He must not miss a word or gesture. "How proud we are to do anything for our dear heroes! Wounded, perhaps? Ah, poor man!" She floated across to him with a cup of tea and plied him with bread and butter and cake. William sat down meekly on a chair, looking rather pale. Mr. Blank, whose philosophy was to take the goods the gods ...
— More William • Richmal Crompton
... tone, the gesture, of the insulted patriot, at that instant were most imposing. The voice was that of sovereign command. The burthen of seventy-five winters rolled off, and he rose above the puny things around him, who thought themselves his equals, from being ...
— Memoir of the Life of John Quincy Adams. • Josiah Quincy
... impossible to work; she felt fey, restless. She wrote a letter to Dr. Angus but tore it up, dissatisfied. Taking down the little grey book of the Edinburgh lectures, which she had not had the heart to touch, she read the last one again. Into it she read Kraill's voice, pictured his gesture, saw how his quick eyes would look friendly, interested, arresting as he talked. On the last page was a paragraph that someone had marked in pencil. In the margin was "J.R.K." written faintly. She read the paragraph hungrily. ...
— Captivity • M. Leonora Eyles
... murmured. Then as Laura made another threatening gesture toward her, added hurriedly: "All right. Don't shoot and I'll tell you everything. ...
— Billie Bradley and Her Inheritance - The Queer Homestead at Cherry Corners • Janet D. Wheeler
... half lift her hand, as in some mute gesture of protest, then she turned and walked swiftly away; up the path that led into the ghost trees, ...
— —And Devious the Line of Duty • Tom Godwin
... deceased Squire's abode. To the brooding soul of the now desolate Israel, so strange a sight roused a supernatural suspicion. His conscience morbidly reproaching him for the terrors he had bred in making his escape from the house, he seemed to see in the fixed gesture of the stranger something more than humanly significant. But somewhat of his intrepidity returned; he resolved to test the apparition. Composing itself to the same deliberate stateliness with which ...
— Israel Potter • Herman Melville
... son of my mother! we were reared in the self-same arms; Thou hast many a pleasant gesture, thy mind hath its gifts and charms; But my heart is as stern to question as mine eyes are of sorrows full: Salute the flag in its virtue, or pass ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. XI., April, 1863, No. LXVI. - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics. • Various
... little joyous cry, sprang up, and made a gesture as if to throw herself in his arms; then suddenly checked herself, blushed crimson, and moved ...
— Short Story Classics (American) Vol. 2 • Various
... life where we can escape from the suggestions of memory. The sight of any little object can bring him back, with his way of speaking, with his tricks of gesture, with all the qualities for which we loved him, and for which we mourn him now. If the intimacy was due to mere physical proximity, the loss will be only a vague sense of uneasiness through the breakdown of long-continued ...
— Friendship • Hugh Black
... scarlet, seized upon the half-emptied flask of cordial, and seemed, by her first gesture, about to hurl it at the head of her adversary; but suddenly, and as if by a strong internal effort, she checked her outrageous resentment, and, putting the bottle to its more legitimate use, filled, with wonderful composure, the two glasses, and, taking up one of them, said, with ...
— The Fortunes of Nigel • Sir Walter Scott
... them talking, the shrug of the younger woman's shoulders, the appealing gesture of the older, and then the placing of the package upon the sill, after which the two retreated into the house and ...
— Before the Dawn - A Story of the Fall of Richmond • Joseph Alexander Altsheler
... you tell us next?" said Dick, looking over his shoulder with a gesture of fear. "He ain't here now, you know," ...
— A Sailor's Lass • Emma Leslie
... yourself together. Tell me what you know—tell me this instant! Well? Sit there in that chair. Now!" She pressed the shoulders she still held with the gesture of an Arab slave driver. "Now, quick! Who is she? What do you ...
— Nell, of Shorne Mills - or, One Heart's Burden • Charles Garvice
... truth were known, I should be among the first. For I am one of the few who see clearly how wicked I was." He began to inveigh against his generation, but broke off with a discouraged gesture: ...
— Clerambault - The Story Of An Independent Spirit During The War • Rolland, Romain
... 5,000," "73 for 5,000," "72 for 5,000," seemingly expecting through sheer power of voice to crush his opponent into silence. But with the regularity of a trip-hammer Barry Conant's right hand, raised in unhurried gesture, and his clear calm "Sold" met Bob's every retreating bid. It was a battle royal—a king on one side, a Richelieu on the other. Though there was frantic buying and selling all around these two generals, the trading was gauged by the trend of their battle. ...
— Friday, the Thirteenth • Thomas W. Lawson
... used were in fact unintelligible. The extracts were from a letter addressed to the sect in Rome by one Paul, a disciple of that Jesus who was crucified. After the reading was over came an address, very wild in tone and gesture, and equally unintelligible, and then a prayer or invocation, partly to their god, but also, as it seemed, to this Jesus, who evidently ranked as a daemon, or perhaps as Divine, Charmides was quite unaffected. The whole thing appeared perfect nonsense, not worth investigation, but ...
— Catharine Furze • Mark Rutherford
... recognized Mrs. Barker, more because there was no one else in our small community who could personify a darky so perfectly, than because there was any resemblance to her in looks or gesture. The make-up was artistic, and how she managed the quick transformation from ball dress to that of the plantation, with all its black paint and rouge, Mrs. Barker alone knows, and where on this earth she got that dress and turban, she alone knows. But I imagine she sent to ...
— Army Letters from an Officer's Wife, 1871-1888 • Frances M.A. Roe
... is sick," persisted Doctor Franzi. "For a month past, she has lived without sleep, scarcely snatching a moment to change her clothing, and never once breathing any but the air of this sick- room." The nun made a deprecating gesture. "You need not deny it," continued the doctor. "Prince, when Sister Angelica was allowed by the prioress of her convent to accompany me to Vienna, she made a vow never to leave my patient until he ...
— Prince Eugene and His Times • L. Muhlbach
... as in the case of professors who year after year deliver the same written course, can have no weight against the system. The tone and gesture, the very look, must animate the whole;—and these very written lectures, read and delivered so often, are no dead stalk, but a living stem, which puts forth new leaves and blossoms ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 7, Issue 41, March, 1861 • Various
... 'ead 'e ain't. THEREfore I don't want to be 'arsh with yer. Jump inside, let me drive yer ter Stafford's Inn, pay me me legal fare and a bob ter drink yer 'ealth—and we'll say no more abaht it. If yer don't—" He made a threatening gesture towards the Poet's precariously strapped trunks—"I'll throw the blinkin' lot on ter the pivement, and yer can carry 'em ...
— Defenders of Democracy • Militia of Mercy
... rears itself in glacial arches high over the short sward and flowery patterns of the outer garden of Brandon. The unspeakable sadness of wounded pride was on her beautiful features, and there was a fondness in the gesture with which she laid her fingers on these exotics and stooped over them, which gave to her solitude ...
— Wylder's Hand • J. Sheridan Le Fanu
... advanced with as much calmness as I could assume, determined not to vary my conduct, no matter which of the brothers it should turn out to be. But, to my great surprise, the gentleman before me gave me no opportunity to test my resolution. No sooner did he perceive me than he made a hurried gesture that I did not at that moment understand; and, just lifting his hat in courteous farewell, vanished from my sight in the thick bushes which at ...
— The Mill Mystery • Anna Katharine Green
... was so unutterably amazed by this sudden outbreak that he had no power of replying by word or gesture. Without resenting her fierce accusation, or even noticing her covert threat, he stood staring at her for a ...
— Victor's Triumph - Sequel to A Beautiful Fiend • Mrs. E. D. E. N. Southworth
... Nothing of the sort! Why, the night's still young, as the poet says. Long way from here to the rectory? Nonsense! In our little twenty-horse car we do it in five minutes—don't we, Belle? Ah, you're walking, to be sure—" Stilling's indulgent gesture seemed to concede that, in such a case, allowances must be made, and that he was the last man not to make them. "Well, then, Swordsley—" He held out a thick red hand that seemed to exude beneficence, and the clergyman, pressing it, ventured to murmur ...
— The Choice - 1916 • Edith Wharton
... a gesture]. Farewell! farewell! [Stopping him, as he goes to the door on the right. If more thou dost perceive, let me know more: Set on thy wife to observe—— [He stops, suffused with shame, and crosses before Iago, without looking at him. ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 10, Number 59, September, 1862 • Various
... Saviour looked on Peter. Ay, no word, No gesture of reproach; the heavens serene, Though heavy with armed justice, did not lean Their thunders that way; the forsaken Lord Looked only on the traitor. None record What that look was; none guess; ...
— The Trial and Death of Jesus Christ - A Devotional History of our Lord's Passion • James Stalker
... on Dan's lips, and one of his hands left the wheel in an involuntary gesture of resignation. Then he shut his teeth tight and talked ...
— Dan Merrithew • Lawrence Perry
... not only be fruitless, but might probably incense his friend's irritated nature to the commission of some rash action, Thaddeus pretended to overlook the frantic gesture and voice which terminated this speech, and assuming a serene air, replied: "Let this be the subject of a future conversation. At present, I must conjure you, by the happiness of us both, to return to the Castle. You know my message to ...
— Thaddeus of Warsaw • Jane Porter
... might call forth. But more careful, and laborious, and minute, was he in the manoeuvre of a feigned retreat. Not ere the acting of some modern play, does the anxious manager more elaborately marshal each man, each look, each gesture, that are to form a picture on which the curtain shall fall amidst deafening plaudits than did the laborious captain appoint each man, and each movement, in his lure to a valiant foe:—The attack of the foot, their recoil, their affected ...
— Harold, Complete - The Last Of The Saxon Kings • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... white waistcoat or the way the curved white collar cupped his billiard-ball of a chin, or it might have been the slight frown about his eyebrows, or the patronizing smile that drifted over his freshly laundered face; or it might have been the deprecating gesture with which he consulted his watch: whatever it was, out went ...
— Forty Minutes Late - 1909 • F. Hopkinson Smith
... right, Ggaran," said the Viceroy languidly. He twitched a tentacle in a beckoning gesture. "Come closer, Earthling. I bid you welcome to my capital. I have been looking forward to your ...
— Upstarts • L. J. Stecher
... with a gesture bland, Taken her scissors into her hand, And clipt a lock of her auburn hair, And yielded it to his ardent prayer; But a pearly drop from her weeping eyes Hath fallen upon the golden prize. "Ah! blessed drop," said the knight, and smiled— "This tear was from thine ...
— Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland, Volume XXIV. • Revised by Alexander Leighton
... to say something more, but the figure of the descending detective caught his eye. Barrant made a detaining gesture, and the doctor waited in the passage for him. Barrant, with a slight glance at the motionless figure of Thalassa, led the way into the front room. He closed ...
— The Moon Rock • Arthur J. Rees
... that he had come upon her too suddenly, and he attempted to soothe her with soft murmurs of love, and to woo her to his outstretched hungry arms once more. But when she saw this motion of his, she made a gesture as though pushing him away; and with an inarticulate moan of agony she put her hands to her head once more, and turning away began to run blindly towards the ...
— Sylvia's Lovers — Complete • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
... was called by her Christian name alone. The first persons at Court had an eye to this alliance, but her mother had, perhaps, a better project. The King had a son by Madame de Vintimille, who resembled him in face, gesture, and manners. He was called the Comte du ——-. Madame de Pompadour had him brought: to Bellevue. Colin, her steward, was employed to find means to persuade his tutor to bring him thither. They took some refreshment at the house of the Swiss, and ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre
... thought of the day her maid had fallen at the foot of this very bed with her new-born child—the brother of the infant that was now causing her such terrible pain. She remembered perfectly every gesture, every look, every word of her husband as he stood beside the maid, and now she could see in his movements the same ennui, the same indifference for her suffering as he had felt for Rosalie's; it was the selfish carelessness of a man whom the ...
— The works of Guy de Maupassant, Vol. 5 (of 8) - Une Vie and Other Stories • Guy de Maupassant 1850-1893
... inquiries and expressions of sympathy were spoken, and then a gesture bade Maud follow into another room. She went, shrinking from the ordeal, yet longing to have it over, and for a few minutes mother and daughter gazed at one another in silence. The girl's face was grave and set, but self-composed in comparison ...
— A Houseful of Girls • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... admiration, and awed at the exhibition of so much calmness, address and strength, were hushed into profound silence. The next moment, the Bey arose, and, with a gesture of his hand, asked mercy ...
— St. Nicholas, Vol. 5, No. 2, December, 1877 • Various
... the stage through the door opposite the one at which the Red Rider was standing, and the road agent again raised his sombrero with a sweeping gesture worthy of D'Artagnan. ...
— Ranson's Folly • Richard Harding Davis
... have looks or tones to do with that sublime identification of his age with that of the heavens themselves, when in his reproaches to them for conniving at the injustice of his children, he reminds them that "they themselves are old"? What gesture shall we appropriate to this? What has the voice or the eye ...
— Charles Lamb • Walter Jerrold |
