"Lap" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... unsuccessful attempt at its imitation always reminds me of Pilpay's fable of the Donkey and the Lapdog:—The poor donkey, who had been going on very usefully in its own drudging way, began to envy the lap-dog the caresses it received, and fancied that it would receive the same if it jumped upon its master as the lap-dog did: how awkwardly and unnaturally its attempts at playfulness were executed, how unwelcome they proved, ...
— The Young Lady's Mentor - A Guide to the Formation of Character. In a Series of Letters to Her Unknown Friends • A Lady
... but at Jerusalem; every saint shall be here, every grace shall be here, the precious stones of the sanctuary, the precious sons of Zion shall not then, as now, lie scattered, some in the world, and some in mistress Babylon's lap; neither shall any thing pertaining to the church's privileges be found in her at all for ever. There shall be heard no more at all in her any harpers, trumpeters, pipers, or any other heavenly music in her; neither shall there be any more the ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... prevailing tone here, and who was specially remarkable by the possession of an eagle-beaked nose, a peculiarity that I had not before observed among these people, began to frown as Jack brusquely approached him. But I could not interfere before Jack had thrown a handful of coin in his lap, and, reaching up, had put his hand upon one ...
— A Columbus of Space • Garrett P. Serviss
... but Kitty stopped him just in time by lifting him on to her lap and giving him her watch to look at. A marvellous watch that was gold and blue and bordered with a ...
— The Immortal Moment - The Story of Kitty Tailleur • May Sinclair
... grandfather to him written from Dublin, which lovingly conjures up a picture of the interior at Sloane Street, with 'Cousin' (Miss Folkard) stirring the fire, 'Charley-boy' settling down his head on his mother's lap, and 'grandmamma' (his mother's mother, Mrs. Chatfield) ...
— The Life of the Rt. Hon. Sir Charles W. Dilke V1 • Stephen Gwynn
... fearful of rejection, would still tell her how much she was beloved. "It is no sudden fancy," said he, "but was conceived years ago, on that dreary afternoon, when in your little room at the poor-house, you laid your head in my lap and wept, as you told me how lonely you were. Do you remember it, Mary? I do; and never now does your image come before me, but I think of you as you were then, when the wild wish that you should one day be mine first entered my heart. ...
— The English Orphans • Mary Jane Holmes
... may be attached so that, in the case of a breakage between the front roll and the calender roll, the electric machine acts; in the case of a lap upon one of the rolls or one end of the roll, or in case of breakage of the sliver at the back of the machine, in either case a ...
— Scientific American Suppl. No. 299 • Various
... having only been completed the night before. The closing laps of that flight, extending as they did into the growing of the dusk, made a breathlessly eerie experience for such of the spectators as stayed on to watch—and these were many. Night came on steadily and Farman covered lap after lap just as steadily, a buzzing, circling mechanism with something ...
— A History of Aeronautics • E. Charles Vivian
... in the window seat, looking out at the lights and the stream of hurrying vehicles in the avenue. The younger one cuddled down with her head in her sister's lap. ...
— The Four Million • O. Henry
... chimney-place, a lad of twenty-four years, no other than Claudet, called by the friendly nickname of the grand chasserot, kept company with the notary, while he toyed, in an absent fashion, with the silky ears of a spaniel, whose fluffy little head lay in his lap. Behind him, Manette Sejournant stood putting away her shawl and prayerbook in a closet. A mass had been said in the morning at the church, for the repose of the soul of the late Claude de Buxieres, and mother and son had donned their Sunday ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... her talked loudly about the procession, with special reference to a personage whom she called 'Prince of Wiles.' This enthusiast declared with pride that she had stood at a certain street corner for seven hours, accompanied by a child of five years old, the same who now sat on her lap, nodding in utter weariness; together they were going to see the illuminations, and walk about, with intervals devoted to refreshments, for several hours more. Beyond sat a working-man, overtaken with liquor, who railed vehemently at the Jubilee, ...
— In the Year of Jubilee • George Gissing
... a chap remains On sentry-go, to chase monotony He exercises of his brains, That is, assuming that he's got any. Though never nurtured in the lap Of luxury, yet I admonish you, I am an intellectual chap, And think of things that would astonish you. I often think it's comical How Nature always does contrive That every boy and every gal, That's born into the world alive, Is either a little Liberal, ...
— Songs of a Savoyard • W. S. Gilbert
... And weak, reluctant surges lap And rustle round and down the strand. No other sound . . . If it should hap, The ship that sails from fairy-land! The silken shrouds with spells are manned, The hull is magically scrolled, The squat mast lives, and in the sand The ...
— Poems by William Ernest Henley • William Ernest Henley
... friend has a cat that is devoted to blue. When she puts on a particularly pretty blue gown, the cat hastens to get into her lap, put her face down to the material, purr, and manifest the greatest delight; but let the same lady put on a black dress, and the cat will not ...
— Concerning Cats - My Own and Some Others • Helen M. Winslow
... the half-mile, as they were expected to do. Milligan led from the start, increased his lead at the end of the first lap, doubled it half-way through the second, and finally, with a dazzling sprint in the last seventy yards, lowered the Eckleton record by a second and three-fifths, and gave his house three points. Kennedy, who stuck gamely to his ...
— The Head of Kay's • P. G. Wodehouse
... said the woman. Helen gave the direction to the cabman and, closing the doors of the hansom, sat looking down at the watch and the ring, as they lay in her lap. The thought that they had been his most valued possessions, which he had abandoned forever, and that they were now entirely hers, to do with as she liked, filled her with most intense delight and pleasure. She took up the heavy gold ...
— The Exiles and Other Stories • Richard Harding Davis
... Landscape, with a pond, on the bank of which sits a woman with a child in her lap; a shepherd stands behind her. ...
— Rembrandt and His Works • John Burnet
... foremost swan Broad-spread to glide upon the free blue road, So that it fell, the bitter arrow fixed, Bright scarlet blood-gouts staining the pure plumes. Which seeing, Prince Siddartha took the bird Tenderly up, rested it in his lap,— Sitting with knees crossed, as Lord Buddha sits,— And, soothing with a touch the wild thing's fright, Composed its ruffled vans, calmed its quick heart, Caressed it into peace with light kind palms ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol. 2 • Charles Dudley Warner
... the subject of their remarks. The girl sat in the front of the box, slim and elegant, her hands clasped loosely in her lap. She was watching the brilliant scene with a certain air of detachment, as if thinking of other things. Her usual lightness and gay banter seemed for the moment to have deserted her, leaving a soft brooding wistfulness that was ...
— The Secret House • Edgar Wallace
... might take a spark any day, and blow up nobody knows whose peace or prospects. What I dreaded most was one of those miserable matrimonial misalliances where a young fellow who does not know himself as yet flings his magnificent future into the checked apron-lap of some fresh-faced, half-bred country-girl, no more fit to be mated with him than her father's horse to go in double harness with Flora Temple. To think of the eagle's wings, being clipped so that he shall never lift himself over the ...
— Elsie Venner • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... ask questions. I love this game—it's just like clumps. (She crosses her hands on her lap and ...
— Belinda • A. A. Milne
... grace, and dexterity of her performance, forthwith engaged her for the entire season at a salary which when named to the amazed child, seemed like a veritable shower of gold tumbling by rare chance out of the lap of Dame Fortune. The manager was a curt, cold business man, and she was afraid to ask him any questions, for when the words—"I am sure a kind friend has spoken to you of me—" came timidly from her lips, he had shut up her confidence at ...
— Temporal Power • Marie Corelli
... the securest Play, and chiefest Mistery in the Art of Fencing, wherefore to do it after you have presented your Sword, either within or without your Adversaries, on a sudden over-lap six or seven Inches of his with eight or ten of yours; and this is sufficient to secure it; but this must be always done with the Edg of the Sword, whether you present it within or without, and immediately after ...
— The School of Recreation (1696 edition) • Robert Howlett
... be Used. Depth of Mortises. Rule for Mortises. True Mortise Work. Steps in Cutting Mortises. Things to Avoid in Mortising. Lap-and-Butt Joints. Scarfing. The Tongue and Groove. Beading. Ornamental Bead Finish. The Bead and Rabbet. ...
— Carpentry for Boys • J. S. Zerbe
... a deck-hand, of a piece of punk on the night before the Fourth of July; this same deck-hand being nearly blown up early the very next morning by a bunch of fire-crackers which went off—by themselves—in his lap. He did not know, for a second or two, whether the barge had burst her boiler or had been ...
— A Boy I Knew and Four Dogs • Laurence Hutton
... she did, had not a look of her husband silenced her. Madame Louis Bonaparte was still more condescending, and recalled to my memory what I had not forgotten how often she had been seated, when a child, on my lap, and played on my knees with her doll. Thus they behaved to me when I saw them for the first time in their present elevation; I found them afterwards, in their drawing-rooms or at their routs and parties, ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre
... Girl's fingers were idly threading the Harvester's hair. His head lightly touched her knee, and she shifted her position to afford him a comfortable resting place. With a thrill of delight that shook him, the man laid his head in her lap and looked into the fire, his face ...
— The Harvester • Gene Stratton Porter
... nothing of the kind, Lizzie," and Mrs. Webb laid her sewing in her lap. "Yorkburg is like all the rest of the world, as we would know if we went about more. The trouble is, we think ...
— Miss Gibbie Gault • Kate Langley Bosher
... adopted this boy under very sad circumstances. She was at the time thirty-six years old. She was deformed, having in her infancy slipped off her nurse's lap into the fireplace, and getting her face so shockingly burned that it ever afterwards presented a frightful appearance. This deformity had made her resolve not to marry, for she did not want any man to ...
— The Works of Guy de Maupassant, Volume VIII. • Guy de Maupassant
... "Allez-vous en—va!" and I said it, not once, but again and again, each time more emphatically than before. Nobody paid the slightest attention, however, except, perhaps to find an extra spice of pleasure in tormenting me. If I had been a yapping miniature lap-dog, with teeth only pour faire rire, I could not have been treated with greater disdain by the crowd. I glanced hastily round to see if Sir Samuel had not taken alarm; but, sitting beside his wife in the ...
— The Motor Maid • Alice Muriel Williamson and Charles Norris Williamson
... cotton or woolen mills come in pieces from a quarter to a half-yard in length and the usual width of the cloth. These can be sewed together on the sewing machine, lapping and basting them before sewing. They should lap from a quarter to a half inch and have two sewings, one at either edge of the lap. If sewed in this way they can afterward be torn into strips, using the scissors to cut across seams. It can be performed very speedily when one is accustomed to it, and is absolutely secure, ...
— How to make rugs • Candace Wheeler
... of frills." She shook her lap a little, and yards and yards of white frills leapt on to the floor ...
— The Happy Foreigner • Enid Bagnold
... had, however briefly, alienated, and over what they had, however durably, gained. They had preserved and consecrated, and she now—her part of it was shameless—appropriated and enjoyed. Palazzo Leporelli held its history still in its great lap, even like a painted idol, a solemn puppet hung about with decorations. Hung about with pictures and relics, the rich Venetian past, the ineffaceable character, was here the presence revered and served: ...
— The Wings of the Dove, Volume II • Henry James
... everywhere comic distortions of nature. Goldsmith's Dr. Primrose tells us that he chose his wife for the same qualities for which she chose her wedding gown. That is humour, but it is also pure, literal, exact truth to nature. David Copperfield's little wife is called a lap-dog, acts like a lap-dog, and dies like a lap-dog; the lap-dog simile is so much overdone that we are glad to get rid of her, and instead of weeping with Copperfield, we feel disposed to ...
— Studies in Early Victorian Literature • Frederic Harrison
... to Timon's poverty, nothing but a little smoke and lukewarm water, fit feast for this knot of mouth-friends, whose professions were indeed smoke, and their hearts lukewarm and slippery as the water with which Timon welcomed his astonished guests, bidding them, "Uncover, dogs, and lap;" and before they could recover their surprise, sprinkling it in their faces, that they might have enough, and throwing dishes and all after them, who now ran huddling out, lords, ladies, with their caps snatched ...
— Tales from Shakespeare • Charles Lamb and Mary Lamb
... he reappeared, carrying his youngest in his arms, its cheeks polished and its wet hair turning over in rings, decked in its chief finery, a blue quilted cloak. The mother came along to hold her cherub in her lap. She was a long, raw-boned woman, immature in face under all her crust of care and tan, evidently distressed in her free waist by the tightness of her calico dress and in her unfenced ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, Vol. 26, August, 1880 - of Popular Literature and Science • Various
... manner himself again, and he fixed them upon Hilda as if they could never alter. She leaned nearer him and made a sign of inquiry toward the sleeping Sister, with the farewells, the commendations of poor mortality speeding itself forth, lying upon her lap. Arnold comprehended, and she was amazed to see the mask of his face change itself with a faint smile as he shook his head. He made a little movement; she saw what he wanted and took his hand in hers. The smile was still in his eyes as he looked at her and then ...
— Hilda - A Story of Calcutta • Sara Jeannette Duncan
... roofs of the town seemed to have been cut out from a picture book of fairy tales. The narrow streets in sight from the deck seemed steep and not too straight. The buildings seemed to lap over on each other. To the west, standing straight up in the sky, as it seemed, loomed the pile of Oyama mountain. To the north showed the roofs ...
— Boy Scouts in the Philippines - Or, The Key to the Treaty Box • G. Harvey Ralphson
... time or exertion. Free! I stood in a vacuum; no rush of air, no tempest or whirlpool stirred its infinite profundity. At length I was at peace,—a peace which seemed likely to last as long as my slim purse held out; for employment was not easy to obtain. Did I enjoy it? Did I lap myself in the long-desired repose in thankful quiescence of spirit? Perhaps,—I cannot tell; restlessness had become a chronic disease with me. I felt like a ship drifted from its moorings: the winds and the tides were pleasant; the ocean was at lull; but the ship rocked aimless and unsteady ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. XI., February, 1863, No. LXIV. • Various
... music of which I have been speaking was never cradled, so to say, in the lap of science; although, in its strangely-fascinating sweetness, soulfulness, and perfect rhythmic flow, it has often quite disarmed the scientific critic. It is a kind of natural music. Until quite recently no attempt was made to write it out, and place its melodies upon the printed music-page. ...
— Music and Some Highly Musical People • James M. Trotter
... succeeded in expressing a desire that he might be permitted to die without interruption. After it became impossible to get any thing down his throat, he undressed himself and went to bed, there to die. To his friend and physician, Doctor Craik, who sat on his bed, and took his head in his lap, he said with difficulty, "Doctor, I am dying, and have been dying for a long time, but I ...
— The Life of George Washington, Vol. 5 (of 5) • John Marshall
... the sea looked grey and frowning, the wind sighed and moaned among the rocks. Oscar lay perfectly still and motionless; the girls had turned him over, and Inna sat with his head on her lap, his face covered with her handkerchief—it was so terrible to look upon: that was all the change since Dick had left. Jenny sat holding a hand of each of ...
— The Heiress of Wyvern Court • Emilie Searchfield
... gentleman, when carving a tough goose, had the misfortune to send it entirely out of the dish, and into the lap of the lady next to him; on which he very coolly looked her full in the face, and with admirable gravity and calmness, said, "Madam, may I trouble you for that goose." In a case like this, a person must, necessarily, ...
— The Book of Three Hundred Anecdotes - Historical, Literary, and Humorous—A New Selection • Various
... a low chair, framed and haloed by the window behind her, an image in pale gold. The baby curled in her lap, his head on her arm, listening with gravity while she sang ...
— Main Street • Sinclair Lewis
... ventures stowed As full as ship can be, The good ship "Author" holds her way Over the fickle sea; Now sings the wind, and, all serene, The ripples forth and back Lap lightly round her gleaming sides ...
— Punchinello, Vol. II., No. 33, November 12, 1870 • Various
... fulfilled, the presage of the war Launched on my son, by will of Zeus! I deemed our doom afar In lap of time; but, if a king push forward to his fate, The god himself allures to death that man infatuate! So now the very fount of woe streams out on those I loved, And mine own son, unwisely bold, the ...
— Suppliant Maidens and Other Plays • AEschylus
... bawling loud and deep. The oxen drawing the wagon held their chains taut, and the commissary moved forward as if drawn by a fresh team. There was no attempt to hold the herd compactly, and within an hour after starting on our last lap the herd was strung out three miles. The rear was finally abandoned, and when half the distance was covered, the drag cattle to the number of fully five hundred turned out of the trail and struck direct for the river. They had scented the water over five ...
— Reed Anthony, Cowman • Andy Adams
... white road; she was grasping, as though her life depended upon her keeping them safely, a sort of family fagot of umbrellas in one hand, whilst with the other she kept a leather-covered dressing-case steady on her lap. In the fourth corner was my cousin, in full Highland kilt, such as I had hitherto seen only in toy-books of the costumes of all nations or other pictures, and which inspired me with a wonderful amount of curiosity. Lastly, myself ...
— The Story of the White-Rock Cove • Anonymous
... sheep, or the birds who haunted about the springs, drinking and shrilly piping. So, when she had once passed the Slap, Kirstie was received into seclusion. She looked back a last time at the farm. It still lay deserted except for the figure of Dandie, who was now seen to be scribbling in his lap, the hour of expected inspiration having come to him at last. Thence she passed rapidly through the morass, and came to the farther end of it, where a sluggish burn discharges, and the path for Hermiston accompanies it on the beginning of its downward path. From this corner a wide view was opened ...
— Weir of Hermiston • Robert Louis Stevenson
... spectacles, lifted the dripping head into her lap, wiped the face of it with her apron, and gazed into its fishy eyes with tender curiosity. "John," said she, ...
— The Fiend's Delight • Dod Grile
... be ready to put themselves into communication with the members of his council, in order that they might treat with each other roundly and without reserve. He should always deal with the Netherlanders as with his own people, keeping no back-door open, but pouring out everything as into the lap of his ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... thought she must take the boys' place in this. But before she had discovered any, Bruce Meredith came to Ingleside one twilight with his hands full of delicate pink sprays. He stalked up the steps of the veranda and laid them on Mrs. Blythe's lap. ...
— Rilla of Ingleside • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... the evening. Swathed father in a hay-rope. Father reclining on the hay with his head in my lap. Said he was dreaming "of a far-off future day, when thou and I shall looke back on this hour, and this hay-field, and my head ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol VI. • Various
... balm to my spirit; she was now a veritable daughter of repose. One arm in its long white sheath lay quiet in her lap; her right hand held the golden butterflies against the soft curve of her cheek. A collar of pearls clasped her throat and accented the clear girlish lines of her profile. I felt the appeal of her youth and purity. It was like a cry in my heart, and I forgot the dreary ...
— The House of a Thousand Candles • Meredith Nicholson
... manner implored him to leave the room. My extreme sorrow seemed to awake him from his trance; and I led him gently, and he followed involuntarily, out of the chamber. Having seated him in his armed chair, I knelt before him, and threw my head in his lap, there I gave a loose to my grief, and mingled my tears with those which were now flowing in streams down his manly cheeks. To endeavour to describe what I felt, upon this melancholy event, would be puerile in the extreme; none but those who have been placed in a similar situation are capable ...
— Memoirs of Henry Hunt, Esq. Volume 1 • Henry Hunt
... than to the Ring; trot him thus about, on one side and the other successively, as aforesaid. After some time stop, and make him advance twice or more, and retire in an even Line; then stop and cherish him. To it again, after the same manner, making him lap his outmost Leg above a foot over his Inner. And thus the Terra a Terra, Incavalere & Chambletta, are all taught together. Perfect your Horse in the large Ring, and the ...
— The School of Recreation (1696 edition) • Robert Howlett
... night nursery Mary sat in the nurse's low chair. Her year-old baby sprawled naked in her lap. The elder infant stood whining under the ...
— The Three Sisters • May Sinclair
... up at the sound of Margaret's step. The younger woman's face was pale, but still radiant with a complete joy. She patted the old lady's cheek and glanced down at the magazine in her lap. Between these two there was a depth of ...
— Together • Robert Herrick (1868-1938)
... and lapses, on violent outbreaks of energy which rage and pass and are expressly designed to bewilder. It is not for the poor wounded to oblige us by making us showy, but for us to let them count on our open arms and open lap as troubled children count on those of their mother. It is now to be said, moreover, that our opportunity of service threatens inordinately to grow; such things may any day begin to occur at the front as will make what we have up to now been able to ...
— New York Times Current History; The European War, Vol 2, No. 2, May, 1915 - April-September, 1915 • Various
... respect. He drew his chair close to mine, as if it were a privilege to be near me. He took my hand and lifted my glove to his lips, as if that glove were the most delicious luxury the world could produce. "Dear Mrs. Woodville," he said, as he softly laid my hand back on my lap, "bear with an old fellow who worships your enchanting sex. You really brighten this dull house. It is such a pleasure to ...
— The Law and the Lady • Wilkie Collins
... rapidly now. It would not be long before the conductor would reach them. The man leaned over, and clasped the little gloved hand that lay in the girl's lap; and Elizabeth felt the great joy that had tantalized her for these three years in dreams and visions settle down about her in beautiful reality. She was his now forever. She need ...
— The Girl from Montana • Grace Livingston Hill
... that Mrs. Hableton pushed towards him; he could not help thinking it had been stuffed with stones, it felt so cold and hard. The lady herself sat opposite to him in another hard chair, and having taken the handkerchief off her head, folded it carefully, laid it on her lap, and then looked straight at her ...
— The Mystery of a Hansom Cab • Fergus Hume
... and scraping of kettles and sauce-pans! And what a relief it was for Corydon and Thyrsis to be able to go off for a walk together, without first having to carry the baby up to the farm-house! And how very poetical it was to come back and discover Dorothea with the baby in her lap, feeding it a supper of butter-brod with a ...
— Love's Pilgrimage • Upton Sinclair
... of "Martha Washington," as painted by Gilbert Stuart. The snowy kerchief folded across her bosom and the big mob cap on her head are precisely like those in the portraits of the colonial lady. The child purses her lips together primly and folds her hands in a demure attitude in her lap, as if to play her part well, but she is far too shy to look us directly in the face, and glances ...
— Sir Joshua Reynolds - A Collection of Fifteen Pictures and a Portrait of the - Painter with Introduction and Interpretation • Estelle M. Hurll
... saw, or fancied, such a glow As when, in summer-evening skies, Some say, 'It lightens,' some say, 'No.' 'Honoria,' I began—No more. The Dean, by ill or happy hap, Came home; and Wolf burst in before, And put his nose upon her lap. ...
— The Angel in the House • Coventry Patmore
... room, with a part-emptied glass before her, and several articles in her lap, which she hastily pocketed on the entrance of the doctor, sat the plague-nurse, Mother Malmayns; and Leonard thought her, if possible, more villainous-looking than her companions. She was a rough, raw-boned woman, with sandy hair and light brows, a sallow, freckled complexion, a nose with ...
— Old Saint Paul's - A Tale of the Plague and the Fire • William Harrison Ainsworth
... creation. I may here remark that the fact whether one species will or will not breed with another is far less important than the sterility of the offspring when produced; for even some domestic races differ so greatly in size (as the great stag-greyhound and lap-dog, or cart-horse and Burmese ponies) that union is nearly impossible; and what is less generally known is, that in plants Koelreuter has shown by hundreds of experiments that the pollen of one species will fecundate the germen of another species, whereas the pollen of this latter will ...
— The Foundations of the Origin of Species - Two Essays written in 1842 and 1844 • Charles Darwin
... Maria waiting for the stage; his mouth was puckered to a whistle, and his fingers were held above the board in act to drub it. Miss Maria turned the pease out on the table, and took the pan into her lap. She shelled at the pease in silence, till the sound of their pelting, as they were dropped on the tin, was lost in their multitude; then she said, with a sharp, querulous, pathetic impatience, "Well, father, I suppose you're thinkin' ...
— The Lady of the Aroostook • W. D. Howells
... the year, like the child, struggles into the warmth of life. The old year—say what the chronologists will—lingers upon the very lap of spring, and is only fairly gone when the blossoms of April have strown their pall of glory upon his tomb, and the bluebirds have ...
— Dream Life - A Fable Of The Seasons • Donald G. Mitchell
... for him; I'm too wise for that. I don't care for him now. I detest the poor, simple-minded fool. I—HATE him." So she fought with herself, drowning the persistent piping of that other voice. Then her eyes dropped to that fatal paper in her lap and suddenly venom fled from her. She wondered if Cavendish would tell Pierce that he had given her the pink ticket. Probably not. The Mounted Police were usually close-mouthed about such things, and yet—Laure crushed the paper into a crumpled ball and furtively ...
— The Winds of Chance • Rex Beach
... lie lulled to their portioned sleep By the deep murmuring stream of passing things, Tear thou that gloomy shroud.—Spirit, behold Thy glorious destiny! The Spirit saw 325 The vast frame of the renovated world Smile in the lap of Chaos, and the sense Of hope thro' her fine texture did suffuse Such varying glow, as summer evening casts On undulating clouds and deepening lakes. 330 Like the vague sighings of a wind at even, ...
— The Daemon of the World • Percy Bysshe Shelley
... and the sound of Helen's voice as she sang some song like a lullaby was like a blessing. My mother did not speak to me; only smiled gently in my face and kissed me on my forehead. Her tenderness touched my heart, and my head drooped to her shoulder, then to her lap, and I lay there like a boy comforted by his mother's touch, just as I was. A kind of peaceful stupor came over me. Helen went on singing some quiet German piece of which her father was fond, with many verses and a sweet, moving ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, December 1878 • Various
... go rapidly down the hill toward the place. As I came near, I saw both horses prick their ears. Jones was sitting on the ground, with his gun in his lap, alert toward the west; I was in his rear. Suddenly he, too, saw the movement of the horses; he sprang quickly to a tree, from behind which I could now see the muzzle of his gun ten paces off. I whistled. The gun dropped, and ...
— Who Goes There? • Blackwood Ketcham Benson
... looked up to see Jefferson Worth's outfit approaching. The dust-covered, nearly-exhausted team staggered weakly through the gate. On the driver's seat sat a haggard, begrimed figure holding the reins in his right hand; and in his lap, supported by his free arm, a little girl lay fast asleep. Then as one of the mules lay down, the men ...
— The Winning of Barbara Worth • Harold B Wright
... possess 'the grace.' Grace is love exercising itself to inferiors, and to those who deserve something sadder and darker. The gifts of that one grace are manifold. They comprise all blessings that man can need or receive. This angel comes with her hands and her lap full of good. Her name is shorthand for all that God can bestow or man can ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren
... masseter muscles are very feebly developed. At the Museum of Natural History, among skulls of dogs there is one which, though unnamed, is shown by its small size and by its teeth, to have belonged to one variety or other of lap-dogs, and which has the same traits in an equal degree with the skull just described. Here, then, we have two if not three kinds of dogs which, similarly leading protected and pampered lives, show that in the course of generations ...
— Essays: Scientific, Political, & Speculative, Vol. I • Herbert Spencer
... big gilt chair, one leg cocked over the other, his fingers lightly crossed above his head; James with his open brow, his snub nose, his charming expression; and Arthur, who had coaxed Lady Coryston's spaniel on to his lap and was pulling his ears. He looked, she thought, bored and only half attentive. And yet she was tolerably certain that he knew no more than she did what Was going ...
— The Coryston Family • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... Indeed, at no time, as she told Shere, would it have been of any use. She pushed through the group to where Dennis Shere lay on the ground, his face white and shiny and tortured with pain. She knelt down on the ground and took his head in her hands as though she would raise it on to her lap, but one man stopped her, saying, "It is his back, senora." Shere opened his eyes and saw who it was that bent over him, and Christina, reading their look, was appalled. It was surely impossible that human eyes could carry ...
— Ensign Knightley and Other Stories • A. E. W. Mason
... moment she debated with herself whether or not to open it. The handwriting was that of her father, and it seemed as though something stayed her. But she broke the string at last and there tumbled into her lap some photographs of herself, taken at different ages, a number of them—in fact, most of them—amateur attempts, some snapped by her mother and some by her father, as Viola knew from seeing them. She recalled some very well—especially ...
— The Golf Course Mystery • Chester K. Steele
... in motion, and I mounted my camel, keeping to the highest parts I could find. I made a circuit, after seeing the British and Egyptian forces far back by the river, and the dervishes in one long, white wave sweeping steadily along as if to lap round and drive ...
— In the Mahdi's Grasp • George Manville Fenn
... pride would have revolted at the menaces of the foolish father, he would have been stung in his self-esteem, and he would have disputed with him for his treasure. But where was his pride? Where was his dignity? He had left all that on the lap of ...
— The Grip of Desire • Hector France
... was a vacant space beside her, and made his precarious way toward it, circling the dancers who swung close to the benches and trod upon the toes of the wall flowers in their enthusiasm. He reached the vacant space and sat down just in time to receive Bill Kennedy in his lap. But Bill was too happy just then to observe whose lap he landed in, and bounced up with a bellowing laugh to resume ...
— Rim o' the World • B. M. Bower
... at his best in this vein when he was alone with Serena in the kitchen—she with a piece of sewing in her lap, sitting beside the lamp; he in the corner by the stove, with the brown violin tucked under his chin, wandering on from one air to another, and perfectly content if she looked up now and then from her work and told him ...
— The Ruling Passion • Henry van Dyke
... you call dying is simply the last pain—there is really no such thing as dying. Suppose, for illustration, that I attempt to escape. You lift the revolver that you are courteously concealing in your lap, and—" ...
— The Collected Works of Ambrose Bierce, Vol. II: In the Midst of Life: Tales of Soldiers and Civilians • Ambrose Bierce
... around her, and drew her to his lap. As she sat there, his great bulk made her seem smaller than she really was. With her hair down and her little red slippers dangling half a yard from the floor, she seemed a child. McEachern, looking at her, found it hard to realize ...
— The Intrusion of Jimmy • P. G. Wodehouse
... brow, as thus to bring back connected thought once more. What had he said? She must appear against Stanley—she must speak his doom? Why did those fatal words which must condemn him, ring in her ears, as only that moment spoken? Her embroidery fell from her lap, and there was no movement to replace it. How long she thus sat she knew not; but, roused by the Queen's voice uttering her name, she started, and looked round her. She was alone with Isabella; who was gazing on ...
— The Vale of Cedars • Grace Aguilar
... high On shoulders of his brother Otos waved For the bull-bellowings given to grand good news, Compact, complexioned in his gleeful roar While Otos aped the prisoner's wrists and knees, With doleful sniffs between recurrent howls; Till Gaea's lap receiving them, they stretched, And both upon her bosom shaken to speech, Burst the hot story out of throats of both, Like rocky head-founts, baffling in their glut The hurried spout. And as when drifting storm Disburdened loses clasp of here and yon A peak, a forest mound, a ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... his bow-kail runt, Was brunt wi' primsie Mallie; An' Mallie, nae doubt, took the drunt, To be compar'd to Willie; Mall's nit lap out wi' pridefu' fling, An' her ain fit it brunt it; While Willie lap, and swoor, by jing, 'Twas just the way he ...
— The Complete Works of Robert Burns: Containing his Poems, Songs, and Correspondence. • Robert Burns and Allan Cunningham
... under the ground to above it, and heartily wished him bad luck; but he troubled himself little about that. In the whole valley the noble abbey alone showed fight to this demon, for it has always been a doctrine of the Church to take into her lap the weak and suffering, and use every effort to protect the oppressed, especially those whose rights ...
— Droll Stories, Volume 3 • Honore de Balzac
... myself with dreams! These dreams that softly lap me round Through trance-like hours in which meseems That I am swallowed up and drowned; Drowned in your love, which flows o'er me As o'er ...
— The World's Best Poetry Volume IV. • Bliss Carman
... in a dreamy, musing state, with a book lying upon her lap. She had been trying to read, but found it impossible to take any interest in the pages over which her eyes passed, while her mind scarcely apprehended the sense. Some one opened the door; but she did not look around. The person, ...
— Lessons in Life, For All Who Will Read Them • T. S. Arthur
... not easy. Watching him from the fireside corner where I was sitting on a low stool with an open story-book upon my lap, I saw him begin and tear up three separate attempts. The fourth, however, seemed to be more successful. Once written, he read it over, copied it carefully, called to me for a light, sealed his letter, and addressed it to "His Excellency ...
— Monsieur Maurice • Amelia B. Edwards
... Rinkitink, who was acting as the queen's butler and had just brought in her coffee, was so startled at seeing the young Prince punished that he tipped over the urn and the hot coffee streamed across the lap of ...
— Rinkitink in Oz • L. Frank Baum
... towards her new-found friend with a kind of tenderness she had never before felt. It was as though she for once experienced a mother's solicitude for her in her sorrows, and she longed to throw herself on her knees, hide her face in her friend's lap, and confess it all. Had she been alone with her she would have done so; but there sat Louey in the same room, and though her conduct to Feemy had been everything that was kind, she felt that it was not as if she had been absolutely ...
— The Macdermots of Ballycloran • Anthony Trollope
... the lazy Southern spring, The way she melts around a chap And lets the great magnolias fling Their languid petals in his lap. ...
— More Songs From Vagabondia • Bliss Carman and Richard Hovey
... "Tuck the lap-robe around you well," she called. "If I had known it was so cold, I'd have gotten out your hoods instead of those sunbonnets. It really begins to feel as if winter ...
— Mildred's Inheritance - Just Her Way; Ann's Own Way • Annie Fellows Johnston
... uncompelled by pedagogues and unallured by prizes, first achieved a whole chapter in the Bible. Cook and laundress and chambermaid were out for the evening; the table had been cleared and covered with the fresh white cloth; and I, perched on Aunt Judy's lap at the end next the fireplace, glided featly over the short words, plunged pluckily through the long, (braced, as it were, against the superior education and the spectacles behind me,) of the first ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 18, No. 105, July 1866 • Various
... height of twelve thousand feet we came upon the Petit Plateau, a comparatively horizontal lap of snow which is frequently swept clear across with avalanches of ice descending from the enormous seracs that hang like cornices upon the precipices above. The frosty splinters of a recent downfall sparkled and crunched under our feet. It is ...
— McClure's Magazine, Vol. VI., No. 6, May, 1896 • Various
... steps and approached a group of people sitting under a large copper-beech tree. A still, hot summer morning does not incline the mind or the body to activity, and all of them had sunk into attitudes of ease. Mrs. Lane's work was reposing in her lap; her sister, Miss Jane Chambers, had ceased the pretense of reading; the Rector was enjoying what he kept assuring himself was only just five minutes' peace before he crossed over to his parsonage and his sermon; Lady Claudia ...
— Father Stafford • Anthony Hope
... of living would prevent. Our associates of the animal kingdom do not escape the influence of such causes: the mountain shepherd and his dog are equally hardy, and form an instructive contrast between a delicate lady and her lap-dog; the extreme point of degeneracy and imbecility of which each race is susceptible. In the early ages of society man enjoyed long life, his manner of living was simple, his food, habitation, and pursuits, were all calculated to fortify the ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 20, - Issue 572, October 20, 1832 • Various
... sat down, and he lay with his head in her lap, whilst she fingered his hair. She knew that "he was not there," as she put it. Often, when she had him with her, she looked for him, and could not find him. But this afternoon she was ...
— Sons and Lovers • David Herbert Lawrence
... secured the control deck, closing the many switches and circuits on the master panel, Tom opened the air lock. Almost immediately, special-trained crews swarmed into the ship to refuel her and prepare her for the next lap of the race. Tom and Sticoon stepped out onto the spaceport of the tiny moon of Mars and gazed up at the red planet that loomed large over the horizon. As a transfer point for the great passenger liners ...
— Treachery in Outer Space • Carey Rockwell and Louis Glanzman
... recall and the amnesty of the Martyrs of the Conspiracy and the Insurrection of December, 1825. Pestel, Ryleieff, Bestujeff-Rumin, and the other leaders, had been strung up on the gallows. Many of those transported to Siberia had died a miserable felon's death in the lead-mines. Brought up in the lap of luxury, they ended like galley-slaves, because they had loved freedom more than wealth and ease. It is reported of one of the political prisoners, a nobleman, that he died in Kamtschatka with ...
— The Contemporary Review, Volume 36, September 1879 • Various
... last to speake she began, And meekly she unto the sergeant pray'd, So as he was a worthy gentle man, That she might kiss her child, ere that it died: And in her barme* this little child she laid, *lap, bosom With full sad face, and gan the child to bless,* *cross And lulled it, and ...
— The Canterbury Tales and Other Poems • Geoffrey Chaucer
... inverted so that the stone is beneath and a stout copper wire attached to the holder is then clamped firmly in a sort of movable vise. The latter is then placed on the bench in such a position that the diamond rests upon the surface of a rapidly revolving horizontal iron wheel or "lap" as it is called. The surface of the latter is "charged" with diamond dust, that is, diamond dust has been pushed into the metal surface which thus acts as a support to the dust. The latter wears away the diamond, producing a flat facet. ...
— A Text-Book of Precious Stones for Jewelers and the Gem-Loving Public • Frank Bertram Wade
... struck the quarter past. The dog Balthasar stretched and looked up at his master. The thistledown no longer moved. The dog placed his chin over the sunlit foot. It did not stir. The dog withdrew his chin quickly, rose, and leaped on old Jolyon's lap, looked in his face, whined; then, leaping down, sat on his haunches, gazing up. And suddenly he uttered a long, ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... to the front part of the house and down the stairs. The door of the sitting-room was open. She knocked and entered, to find Mr. Clancy, who looked rougher and more foolish than ever, standing by the table. Miss Loach, with a pack of cards on her lap, was talking, and Susan heard the concluding sentence ...
— The Secret Passage • Fergus Hume
... but he was far too earnest in his work to spare a moment for a reply. By and by, the squire put down his pipe, and sat watching with his hands upon his knees. And a stray child crept up to Charlotte, and climbed upon her lap, and went to sleep there, and the wind flecked these four representatives of four generations all over with wavering shadows; and Ducie came backwards and forwards, and finally carried the sleeping child into the house; and Stephen, busy as he was, saw every thing that ...
— The Squire of Sandal-Side - A Pastoral Romance • Amelia Edith Huddleston Barr
... inquiry he found that, although he had not been missed, no one could recall having seen him later than three or four days agone. The last he could hear of him was that about a week before a boy had spied him sitting on a rock in the Baillies' Barn with his pipes in his lap. Searching the cottage, he found that his broadsword and dirk, with all his poor finery, ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science Vol. XV., No. 85. January, 1875. • Various
... very early on the first of May to behold this amazing Change, and when he came near the Statue he saw a Number of People, who all ran away from him in the utmost Consternation, hating never before seen a Lion follow a Man like a Lap-dog. Being thus left alone, he fixed his Eyes on the Sun, then rising with resplendent Majesty, and afterwards turned to the Statue, but could see no Change in the Stone.—Surely, says he to himself, there is some mystical Meaning in this! This Inscription must be an AEnigma, ...
— Goody Two-Shoes - A Facsimile Reproduction Of The Edition Of 1766 • Anonymous
... mind in dream now moved, Still seemed her gaze to rest— From out beneath her fast-sealed lids, Above her moving breast— On Ann; as quite, quite still she stood; Yet slumber lay so deep Even her hands upon her lap Seemed saturate with sleep. And as Ann peeped, a cloudlike dread Stole over her, and then, On stealthy, mouselike feet she ...
— Collected Poems 1901-1918 in Two Volumes - Volume I. • Walter de la Mare
... outer side, by a Venetian blind. I stood behind the blind, and peeped in. (Duty! oh, dear me, painful, but necessary duty!) Dubourg was sitting with his back to the window. Lucilla faced me opposite to him. Her cheeks were flushed with pleasure. She held in her lap a pretty little golden vase. Her clever fingers were passing over it rapidly, exactly as they had passed, the previous evening, over ...
— Poor Miss Finch • Wilkie Collins
... whom she derives her revenue, and "revenue" is one of the main perquisites of the Catholic Church, as this Romish institution is run for the sole purpose of making serfs of men and controlling the destiny of nations, so that the inhabitants may be forced to disgorge their sustenance in her lap of greed, and it matters not how low she brings her followers, nor what may be the hardships they have to endure, just so she ...
— Thirty Years In Hell - Or, From Darkness to Light • Bernard Fresenborg
... are my wife, and I forbid you. I cannot understand this passion. I thought you suffered the company of that empty-headed fop as you suffered your lap-dogs—the trivial appendage of a fine lady's state. Had I supposed that there was anything serious in your liking—that you could think him worth anger or tears—should have ordered your life differently, and he would have had ...
— London Pride - Or When the World Was Younger • M. E. Braddon
... Hills to see bout grandmammy cause she been took down wid de fever en was bad off. Pa Cudjo tell her de river been mighty high, but dat he would risk to take us. Say, Ma, she get in de boat wid Pa Cudjo en take me in her lap en dey start cross de river. De wind, it begin gettin higher en higher en de boat, it go dis way en den it go de other way. Cose I never recollect nothin bout dat day cause I won' nothin, so to speak, but a sucklin child ...
— Slave Narratives Vol. XIV. South Carolina, Part 2 • Works Projects Administration
... jumps of it up the boulder, bearing a stick in his hand. Presently his face, preternaturally solemn and gnomish behind the goggles, protruded over the rim. The girl was sitting with her hands folded in her lap, contemplating the scenery as if she'd never had another interest in her life. Apparently she ...
— The Unspeakable Perk • Samuel Hopkins Adams
... of which no story was too strange, of which all miracles seemed true. There, her hands folded on her lap, her head bowed—there sat she whose voice was the echo of all sweet voices, she whose shape was the mirror of all fair forms, she whose changeful beauty, so they said, was the child of the ...
— The World's Desire • H. Rider Haggard and Andrew Lang
... voice of church-bells. Their tone was so faint and far away that at the first stroke of the bow they seemed to die, and the lovely strain rose upon the air pure and unmingled with another sound. Rachel ceased her emphatic noddings and her mincing whisper, and sat with her hands folded in her lap to listen. Ezra, with his gaunt hands folded behind him, stood with his habitual stoop more marked than common, and stared at the grass at his feet. Ruth, from her old station by the apple-tree, looked from one to the ...
— Aunt Rachel • David Christie Murray
... neither of us spoke. She sat pensive, with signs of distress—storm signals—still displayed; she was very nervous, looking at her fingers at play in her lap. I stood up beside her, not knowing, in truth, what in the world she wanted with me. The silence, as it became oppressive, made Aurelia ...
— The Fool Errant • Maurice Hewlett
... a shallow bowl of milky soup. Brett looked at the array of spoons, forks, knives, glanced sideways at the diners at the next table. It was important to follow the correct ritual. He put his napkin in his lap, careful to shake out all the folds. He looked at the spoons again, picked a large one, glanced at the waiter. So ...
— It Could Be Anything • John Keith Laumer |
