"Lean" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... picked up a shovelful of coals, which I lifted so near my mouth that I scorched my hair and burnt my face, and, worse than all, singed the faint suggestion of a mustache that was visible by the aid of a microscope, on my upper lip. While I was engaged in lighting my cigar, a large dog—a tall, lean, much-ribbed, lank and hungry-looking hound—went out to the sleigh, and my friend induced him to accept passage with us; so when I got back to my seat it was proposed that the hound should accompany ...
— Fifteen Years in Hell • Luther Benson
... rude Scotland Virgil's page, Than that beneath his rule he held The bishopric of fair Dunkeld. 335 Beside him ancient Angus stood, Doff'd his furr'd gown, and sable hood: O'er his huge form and visage pale, He wore a cap and shirt of mail; And lean'd his large and wrinkled hand 340 Upon the huge and sweeping brand Which wont of yore, in battle fray, His foeman's limbs to shred away, As wood-knife lops the sapling spray. He seem'd as, from the tombs ...
— Marmion • Sir Walter Scott
... working in his front garden. It was a Saturday afternoon, and a blazingly hot one. Every now and then he paused to lean on his spade, and look out to where the blue sea lay shining and glistening in ...
— Antony Gray,—Gardener • Leslie Moore
... period, sitting one day in his warehouse, he saw in the streets wretchedly habited, lean, and with eyes sunken and dim, his old companion Abou Neeuteen, begging alms of passengers with the importunate cry of distress. Abou Neeut compassionating his miserable situation, ordered a servant to ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments vol. 4 • Anon.
... farther on, and the pair stepped out of the shallow gully in which they had been walking. Immediately they were exposed to a very strong and exceedingly cold wind, such as seemed to surprise them in no way, but compelled both to actually lean against its force. Moreover, although this pressure was all from the left, it proved exceedingly difficult to go on. Their legs seemed made of lead, and their breathing was strangely labored. This, also, appeared to be just what they ...
— The Devolutionist and The Emancipatrix • Homer Eon Flint
... connivance at the murder of Agrippina (59 A.D.) was the death-blow to his influence for good, and the death of Burrus (63 A.D.) was, as Tacitus says (Ann. xiv. 52), 'ablow to Seneca's power, for virtue had not the same strength when one of its champions, so to speak, was removed, and Nero began to lean on worse advisers.' Seneca resolved to retire, and entreated Nero to receive back the wealth he had so lavishly bestowed. The Emperor, bent on vengeance, refused the proffered gift, and Seneca knew that his doom was sealed. In the year 65, on the pretext ...
— Helps to Latin Translation at Sight • Edmund Luce
... "Well, lean years may be coming. We shall all have to draw in our horns. Remember me, Miss Fielding, if you decide to produce with some other firm. I like to work with you, and I have a more or less elastic ...
— Ruth Fielding on the St. Lawrence - The Queer Old Man of the Thousand Islands • Alice B. Emerson
... Johnson, of New Bedford, Massachusetts, because he had just been reading about the virtuous Douglass in the works of Sir Walter Scott. How wonderful then, in the light of a few years, that a fugitive slave from America, bearing one of the most powerful names in Scotland should lean against the pillars of the Free Church of Scotland, and meet and vanquish its brightest and ablest teachers (the friends of slavery, unfortunately), ...
— History of the Negro Race in America from 1619 to 1880. Vol. 2 (of 2) - Negroes as Slaves, as Soldiers, and as Citizens • George Washington Williams
... Tom Swiggs again!" exclaims a lean, parchment-faced prisoner, pressing eagerly his way through the circle of bystanders, and raising his hands as he beholds ...
— Justice in the By-Ways - A Tale of Life • F. Colburn Adams
... it? We question and listen; We lean from the mountain, or mast, And see but dull earth, or the glisten Of seas inconceivably vast: The dust of the one blurs our vision, The glare of the other our brain, Nor city nor island Elysian In all of the land ...
— Afterwhiles • James Whitcomb Riley
... this denial on lean people?" asked Mr. Hayden, more seriously, for until now he had been inclined to regard this as a little 'far fetched,' as ...
— The Right Knock - A Story • Helen Van-Anderson
... corner of one of the houses a girl stood—a tall, lean-flanked, but deep-bosomed creature, as graceful as a well-grown sapling. Her calico frock clung to the lines of her matured figure as though she had just stepped up out of the sea itself. Around her head she had banded a crimson bandanna, but it allowed the escape of glossy black hair that waved ...
— Sheila of Big Wreck Cove - A Story of Cape Cod • James A. Cooper
... year long at the villa, nothing to see though you linger, Except yon cypress that points like death's lean lifted forefinger. Some think fireflies pretty when they mix i' the corn and mingle, Or thrid the stinking hemp till the stalks of it seem a-tingle. Late August or early September, the stunning cicala is 35 shrill, ...
— Selections from the Poems and Plays of Robert Browning • Robert Browning
... wholesome laugh. Believe me, Uncle Sam, there sat round a table ten of the most solemn-looking fellows, with faces as dreary as a wet moon in November. Some of this unique body looked as if they had seen hard usage and lean pay. Others were grey with thinking, instead of moving. Be not surprised either when I say that the gravity of their countenance left no visible room for anything else. Hard at it were they, straining their antiquated imaginations over a secret game of thimble-rig, which seemed of momentous ...
— The Adventures of My Cousin Smooth • Timothy Templeton
... wide-spreading Sarcocephalus trees, whose grateful shade offered us a shelter from the scorching sun. But, as the sun got low, the shades of the oval crown of the trees drew rapidly off, and we had to lean against the shady side of the butt to obtain relief from the heat, which had so enervating an effect upon us that the slightest exertion was painful. After sunset, however, in the comparative coolness of the evening, our animal spirits revived; and it was only during ...
— Journal of an Overland Expedition in Australia • Ludwig Leichhardt
... humming a merry song turned to go home. At that moment a traveller, poorly clad, with hair and beard white as the wings of a dove, spoke to him, saying, "Have pity on a feeble old man, obliged to lean on his stick, hungry and ragged. I beg you, in Heaven's name, to give me either money or bread. The sun will soon set, and I who have eaten nothing to-day shall have to pass the night fasting, with the bare ...
— Fairy Tales of the Slav Peasants and Herdsmen • Alexander Chodsko
... while it was not then by any means up to expectation or representation, at least presented facilities and opportunities for living. When the great valleys of Utah were reached, men who a few months before had been strong and hardy, but who now were lank and lean, fell on their knees and offered up thanksgiving for their deliverance, while the exhausted women and children sought repose and rest, which had been denied them for so many long, ...
— My Native Land • James Cox
... great many stories, too, and sometimes, on Saturday afternoon, when the children had plenty of time, and would surely not have to hurry away in the most interesting part of the story, she would lean back in her big rocking-chair, and with the little girls sitting on ottomans, one each side of her, she would tell them delightful stories about when she was a little girl and went to school. Ruby and Agnes were ...
— Ruby at School • Minnie E. Paull
... all the tribe, also, were astonished to see him again. As proof that he had been visited by the medicine spirit, he made the medicine shield, of a new design, and the apote, or sacred forked stick. He took the name Pa-ta-dal, or Lean Bull. After that the keepers of the medicine stick ...
— Boys' Book of Indian Warriors - and Heroic Indian Women • Edwin L. Sabin
... mezzanine floor; ground floor, rez-de-chaussee; basement, kitchen, pantry, bawarchi-khana, scullery, offices; storeroom &c. (depository) 636; lumber room; dairy, laundry. coach house; garage; hangar; outhouse; penthouse; lean-to. portico, porch, stoop, stope, veranda, patio, lanai, terrace, deck; lobby, court, courtyard, hall, vestibule, corridor, passage, breezeway; ante room, ante chamber; lounge; piazza [veranda, U.S.]. conservatory, greenhouse, bower, arbor, summerhouse, ...
— Roget's Thesaurus • Peter Mark Roget
... nothing but dumb sorrow, everywhere a sort of funeral disposition; and people glided along silently to the market, and read the long placard placed on the door of the Town Hall. It was dismal weather; yet the lean tailor, Kilian, stood in his nankeen jacket which he usually wore only in the house, and his blue worsted stockings hung down so that his naked legs peeped out mournfully, and his thin lips trembled while he muttered the announcement to himself. And an old soldier read ...
— The Essays of "George Eliot" - Complete • George Eliot
... nothing, except the uniforms and arms of the Honorable East India Company, as issued in this year of Our Lord, 1857—a cooking-pot or two, a kettle, a little money and a butcher-knife. Their supper bleated miserably some twenty yards away, tied to a tree, and a lean. Punjabi squatted near it in readiness to buy the skin. It was a big goat, but it was mangy, so he held only two annas in his hand. The other anna (in case that Brown should prove adamant) was twisted in the folds of his pugree, but he was prepared to perjure himself a dozen times, and take ...
— Told in the East • Talbot Mundy
... Marquess Otto, some made round like a rubbing brush, others with a pique de vant (O! fine fashion!), or now and then suffered to grow long, the barbers being grown to be so cunning in this behalf as the tailors. And therefore if a man have a lean and straight face, a Marquess Otton's cut will make it broad and large; if it be platter-like, a long, slender beard will make it seem the narrower; if he be weasel-becked, then much hair left on the cheeks will make the owner look big like a bowdled ...
— Chronicle and Romance (The Harvard Classics Series) • Jean Froissart, Thomas Malory, Raphael Holinshed
... rush out into the sunshine to roll hoop, skip rope, swing in the long-suffering hammocks under the apple trees, and romp to their hearts' content. Freshmen hurrying by to their Livy exam, turn green with envy, and sophomores and juniors "cramming" history and logic indoors lean out of their windows to laugh and applaud, finally come down to watch the fun for "just a minute," and forget to go ...
— Betty Wales Senior • Margaret Warde
... only on roots and bitter grass, grubbed from the war-scarred ground, they perished in hundreds every night, they died by the chance missiles of one side or the other, they went mad and hurled themselves into the watch-fires of the English. From the walls above, a priest sometimes would lean down with a blessing, or draw up an infant newly born into all this misery, baptise it, and lower it again to die; but never a crumb of bread came out of starving Rouen. The Canon de Livet, whose stout heart no horror of the siege could break, was almost ...
— The Story of Rouen • Sir Theodore Andrea Cook
... There were elephants of every type, of all ages. Some were very old, as he could tell from their lean, fleshless skulls, their sunken temples and hollow eyes, emaciated bodies and straight, thin legs. And the clearest proof of their age was their ears, which lapped over very much at the top and were torn and ragged ...
— The Elephant God • Gordon Casserly
... know very well that I owe you money. I know very well that unless I can raise two hundred pounds, and that pretty smart, I shall have to mortgage my little bit of land to you. I don't forget that. But I daresay you'd rather have the money down than my poor little bit of lean and ribby take out o' the common. You shall have the money if you'll help me to get it. If I can't get that money into my fingers—I'm a done man. But it's not only that as troubles me. It is that the Rocliffes, ...
— The Broom-Squire • S. (Sabine) Baring-Gould
... and lean, Are lurking at every curve; But the Driver plays with the throttle-bar; He has the ...
— Behind the Arras - A Book of the Unseen • Bliss Carman
... Alpine thunders of thy voice, As if across the billows unenthralled Thy Alps unto the Alleghanies called, Bid Liberty rejoice! Proclaim upon this trans-Atlantic strand The deeds which, more than their own awful mien, Make every crag of Switzerland sublime! And say to those whose feeble souls would lean, Not on themselves, but on some outstretched hand, That once a single mind sufficed to quell The malice of a tyrant; let them know That each may crowd in every well-aimed blow, Not the poor strength alone of arm and brand, But the whole spirit ...
— Poems of Henry Timrod • Henry Timrod
... the battle-field Where the warrior is to fight? On the field of Kalena, At Manini, at Hanini, Where was poured the water of the god, By your work at Malamanui, At the heights of Kapapa, at Paupauwela, Where they lean and rest. ...
— The Hawaiian Romance Of Laieikawai • Anonymous
... before her, with the one wholly absorbing love of his life glowing in his face. She dared not meet the gaze that thrilled her with an exquisite happiness, and involuntarily rose. Had she not strangled the impulse, her fluttering heart would have prompted her to lean forward, rest her head against his arm, and tell him all; but close as they stood, and realizing that she reigned supreme in his affection, one seemed to rise reproachfully between them; that generous, gentle woman to whom his faith was pledged. No matter at what cost, she must guard Leo's peace ...
— At the Mercy of Tiberius • August Evans Wilson
... to all government. The announcement that the fundamental principles to which all Americans were attached would guide the new Administration had a meaning which it would not have had if uttered by a Federalist President. So far did Jefferson lean in holding out the olive branch that he ran the risk of minimizing the revolution of 1800. To say that "every difference of opinion is not a difference of principle. We are all Republicans, we are all Federalists," was to contradict ...
— Union and Democracy • Allen Johnson
... at luncheon four carters came in—long-limbed, muscular Ayrshire Scots, with lean, intelligent faces. Four quarts of stout were ordered; they kept filling the tumbler with the other hand as they drank; and in less time than it takes me to write these words the four quarts were finished—another round was proposed, ...
— Essays of Travel • Robert Louis Stevenson
... should proceed by a circuit of some miles to a bridge that crossed it, and that the young men should place themselves on their knees along the planks, their hands locked in each other, thus forming a support on one side, upon which such as had courage to venture across might lean, in case of accident or megrim. Indeed, anybody that had able nerves might have crossed the planks without this precaution, had they been dry; but, in consequence of the rain, and the frequent attrition of feet, ...
— The Ned M'Keown Stories - Traits And Stories Of The Irish Peasantry, The Works of - William Carleton, Volume Three • William Carleton
... utterly inert, and he knew now that he had been very ill. The cabin had been a small and lonely one, with snow-peaks not far above it, and it had been very cold. During the day a woman kept up the fire. Her name was Maggie, and she moved about the cabin like a thin ghost. At night she slept in a lean-to shed and David kept the fire going. A man who seemed to know him well—John Donaldson, he learned, was his name—was Maggie's husband, and every so often he came, about dawn, and brought food ...
— The Breaking Point • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... farmer, quickly. "And if so be yuh'll come along with me right now, we'll take a look at the contraptions, which, of course, yuh understand, are only meant for night-times, and tuh help out when Jerry wouldn't be around for me to sorter lean on." ...
— At Whispering Pine Lodge • Lawrence J. Leslie
... you get a wife Bear gently with her follies, but guard her with your life; Crowd full her heart with loving, yet hold a guarded rein, Lest ye two now that rate as one, again be counted twain. And if she come from Outside Camp, remember all is new And give her time to find herself, teach her to lean on you. And should homesickness grip her, and you find your wife in tears Forget the jest and love her, remember ...
— Rhymes of a Roughneck • Pat O'Cotter
... He snuggled my hand as I gathered the rein, and I laughed when they talked of defeat. To the call of the bugle I swung to his back—like a rock was the strength of his quarters. At sight of the people he arched his lean neck, and they, cheered for ...
— Thoroughbreds • W. A. Fraser
... it reluctantly. I took it into my hand, only just in time. The door at last had burst away from its hinges. With perfect self-possession I saw one of the two men who had been engaged in its demolition calmly lean it up against the wall. The other stared at me as though I had been ...
— The Great Secret • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... orchestra is the continuous noise of grinding ice from the river. There is a sign at the edge of the birch swamp which says: "Positively no trespassing allowed here"—but it is not necessary now, for the river has overflowed the swamp and big masses of ice lean up against the trunks of the birches. Out in the main channel the river is swiftly flowing, packed with ice floes, from the little clear fragments which shine like crystals, to the great masses as big as the side of a house, bearing upon them the accumulated dust and dirt and uncleanness of ...
— Some Winter Days in Iowa • Frederick John Lazell
... a close, he had fallen back on Geneva; he had broken his fall at the Pension Beaurepas. Geneva was, after all, more like Paris, and at a Genevese boarding-house there was sure to be plenty of Americans with whom one could talk about the French metropolis. M. Pigeonneau was a little lean man, with a large narrow nose, who sat a great deal in the garden, reading with the aid of a large magnifying glass a volume from the cabinet ...
— The Pension Beaurepas • Henry James
... But, the tale runs, the Governor looked——He certainly did establish a precedent at that dinner. Mockers say that Judge Pat McCarran ran a close second, because his Excellency is lean and lank, while Judge McCarran would make two of him one way, and almost half of him the other, and because what happened to Governor Boyle had also happened to Judge ...
— Reno - A Book of Short Stories and Information • Lilyan Stratton
... then stop and rest," cried he; "but why will you not lean upon me? surely this is no time for scruples, and for idle and unnecessary scruples, Miss Beverley can never ...
— Cecilia vol. 2 - Memoirs of an Heiress • Frances (Fanny) Burney (Madame d'Arblay)
... not give you a landlord the less nor a persecutor the less; while ever the land is liable to the rent there will be found men willing to hazard their lives to get it, and you but arm them with fresh powers, with the sympathy of the public and the increased force of law and government, to lean ...
— Thomas Davis, Selections from his Prose and Poetry • Thomas Davis
... next morning, when she pushed back her windows, she felt joy bubble up in her soul as unrestrainedly as though she had never said a word to Gifford which could make his heart ache. The resistance and spring of the climbing roses made her lean out to fasten her lattices back, and a shower of dew sprinkled her hair and bosom; and at the sudden clear song of the robin under the eaves, she stood breathless a moment to listen, with that simple gladness of living which is perhaps a supreme unselfishness in ...
— John Ward, Preacher • Margaret Deland
... God," he said, "your master would not come, and that you would make up your mind to stop with me; you would lose nothing by the change, believe me. The hostler who has just quitted me came here eight months ago all in tatters, and as lean as a shotten herring, and now he has two very good suits of clothes, and is as fat as a dormouse; for you must know, my son, that in this house there are excellent vails to be got ...
— The Exemplary Novels of Cervantes • Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
... in every limb and was obliged to lean against the chimney-piece, as he said, in a hardly ...
— Cinq Mars, Complete • Alfred de Vigny
... little specimen, very thin and sharp-featured. Her homespun dress was short enough to show how fragile were the long lean legs that supported her. The curtain of her sun-bonnet, which was evidently made for a much larger person, hung down nearly to the hem of her skirt; as she turned and glanced anxiously down the road, evidently suspecting a pursuer, she looked like an ...
— The Riddle Of The Rocks - 1895 • Charles Egbert Craddock (AKA Mary Noailles Murfree)
... that Mr. Wharton was a hale man, with some terribly vexatious term of life before him. But now, now that he was seen more closely, he appeared to be very old. He would sit half bent in the arm-chair in Stone Buildings, and look as though he were near a hundred. And from day to day he seemed to lean more upon his son-in-law, whose visits to him were continued, and always well taken. The constant subject of discourse between them was Everett Wharton, who had not yet seen his father since the ...
— The Prime Minister • Anthony Trollope
... horrid place, there was no help for it: so I took up my portmanteau and followed the landlady to a small room, if it deserved the appellation, which had been built after the cottage, and a door broken through the wall into it. Ceiling there was none, it had only lean-to rafters, with tiles over head. I took a seat on the only stool that was in the room, and leant my elbow on the table in no very pleasant humour, when I heard the girl say, "And why don't you let him go on to the castle? ...
— Japhet, In Search Of A Father • Frederick Marryat
... addition to this, the people are so foolish as to build their houses in among the bushes and under thick trees, instead of in open, airy, and sunny places. Villages are frequently passed, and scarcely a house is to be seen. The men are remarkably idle and stupid; they are tawny and lean. The natives seldom reach the age of sixty; and it is said that the climate is even more ...
— A Woman's Journey Round the World • Ida Pfeiffer
... at a party the night before. Presently came two jaded women, a mother and a grandmother, that appeared, when they crawled out of their beds, to have put on only so much clothing as the law compelled. They abandoned themselves upon the green stuff, whatever it was, and, with their lean hands clasped outside their knees, sat and stared, silent and hopeless, at the eastern sky, at the heart of the terrible furnace, into which in those days the world seemed cast to be burnt up, while the child which the younger woman had brought with ...
— Composition-Rhetoric • Stratton D. Brooks
... Polly thought to herself that she had never seen any one so pale, so thin, with such funny light-coloured hair, brushed very smoothly across the top of a very obviously bald crown. He looked so timid and nervous as he fidgeted incessantly with a piece of string; his long, lean, and trembling fingers tying and untying it into knots of ...
— The Old Man in the Corner • Baroness Orczy
... place. We dismounted, and tied our horses at the gate. As we approached the cabin an immense cat dozing on the stoop sprang up hurriedly and darted into the vines. We knocked repeatedly at the door without response. Finally, some one was heard approaching, so we walked to the lean-to at the rear, and there saw, coming up from the spring at the foot of the enclosure, a young and astonishingly pretty girl. She was not at all startled by seeing us; in fact, led us to believe from her manner that we were rather expected ...
— The Statesmen Snowbound • Robert Fitzgerald
... more loudly the fire roars along the city, and the burning tides roll nearer. "Up then, beloved father, and lean on my neck; these shoulders of mine will sustain thee, nor will so dear a burden weigh me down. Howsoever fortune fall, one and undivided shall be our peril, one the escape of us twain. Little Iuelus shall ...
— The Aeneid of Virgil • Virgil
... and the old lady rose, and, as usual, gave us a salute. As she had no paint, I could put up with it; but when she approached your cousin I could think of nothing but Death taking hold of Hebe. The duchess is near eighty, very tall and lean. She was dressed in a silk chemise, with very large sleeves, coming half-way down her arm, a large cape, no stays, a black-velvet girdle round her waist, some very rich lace in her chemise, round her neck, and in her sleeves; but ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Vol. 1 • Charles Dudley Warner
... numb with the cold, stirred a little and complained drowsily that he was hungry. His father paused for a moment and pressed his lean, bearded face against the child's rosy cheeks. "Be patient, little one," he comforted him, "for soon we shall find a lodging for the night. Surely, no one would turn even a Jew away in ...
— The New Land - Stories of Jews Who Had a Part in the Making of Our Country • Elma Ehrlich Levinger
... "Oh, a tall, lean man," said Ste. Marie. "A tall man with blue eyes and a heavy, old-fashioned mustache. I ...
— Jason • Justus Miles Forman
... spirit seems to bend and lean Out of thine eyes, and oh, the words thou speakest! They quiver in the air, because the heart So quivers, whence they come. Weep not, I can Not bear it, for I love thee so. O let Me see as last of all thine eyes. We ...
— The German Classics, v. 20 - Masterpieces of German Literature • Various
... extended a lean and trembling finger toward an archway. Prince Marvel strode forward, followed by Nerle, and passing under the arch he threw open a door at the far end and boldly entered the throne-room ...
— The Enchanted Island of Yew • L. Frank Baum
... Great that the Papacy acquired its great supremacy over the Provincial Churches. As the power of the Church grew after the death of Charlemagne, partly from the inclination of weak kings to lean on ecclesiastical support, the Papal claims to authority developed and began to be maintained by the ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol XI. • Edited by Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton
... is made from lean pork ham meat chopped very fine. The flavoring is delicious, the careful blending of spices giving ...
— Armour's Monthly Cook Book, Volume 2, No. 12, October 1913 - A Monthly Magazine of Household Interest • Various
... prevent it from having a certain fragmentary effect. This, in the production of a composer so masterly in musical treatment as Mr. MacDowell, is rather curious, and I have never been able fully to account for it. The disposition to lean on poetic suggestion is very evident in the books of studies already mentioned. For instance, in the opus 46 there are such titles as "Wild Chase," "Elfin Dance," "March Wind"; and in the former book the "Dance of the Gnomes," "The Shadow Dance," "In the Forest"; in the opus 37, "By the Light of ...
— The Masters and their Music - A series of illustrative programs with biographical, - esthetical, and critical annotations • W. S. B. Mathews
... spoke briskly, "just lean your head against my shoulder, shut your eyes, and try to rest for a little; I know that sand with a rain coat covering doesn't make the most comfortable couch in the world, but I think I can hold you so that you may be able to take ...
— Revelations of a Wife - The Story of a Honeymoon • Adele Garrison
... hastily forth of a mighty wone; It hath stricken the Earl Douglas in at the breastbone. Through liver and lung-es both the sharp arrow is gone, That never after in all his life-days he spake mo word-es but one, That was, "Fight ye, my merry men, whilis ye may, for my life-days ben gone!" The Percy lean-ed on his brand and saw the Douglas dee; He took the dead man by the hand, and said, "Wo is me for thee! To have saved thy life I would have parted with my lands for years three, For a better man of heart nor of hand was not in all the north countree." Of all that see, a Scottish ...
— A Bundle of Ballads • Various
... say, appears to me a sore affliction, that we should look upon the one set as good men, and yet be forced to lean upon ...
— Hiero • Xenophon
... conventional inquiry as to whether she had any clubs. HER MAJESTY uttered in reply the one dreadful word, "Treason," thus avoiding with true statesmanship any direct answer to the question, and indicating clearly her opinion of his two-diamond call. The Keeper of the Privy Purse shot out a lean hand ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 158, March 3rd, 1920 • Various
... usually deem'd an Actor of the first Rank, yet the Characters allotted him were such, that none besides, then, or since, ever topp'd; for his Figure, which was diminutive and mean, (being Round-shoulder'd, Meagre-fac'd, Spindle-shank'd, Splay-footed, with a sour Countenance and long lean Arms) render'd him a proper Person to discharge Jago, Foresight and Ma'lignij, in the Villain.—This Person acted strongly with his Face,—and (as King Charles said) was the best Villain in the World.' The performance of an actor with such a marked personality and unpleasantly ...
— The Works of Aphra Behn - Volume IV. • Aphra Behn
... boat, whence his father with the rest had been bringing up her lading. Who could have recognised in the energetic, high-spirited backwoodsman Philip had become, the refined and somewhat sedate and stiff young student of a year ago. By-the-bye, the kitchen of which he spoke was a lean-to of birch-bark, under which a camp stove had been placed; near it was a shed prepared for the reception of the stores, among which Peter proposed to take up his abode. Philip's plan of fitting up the cottage ...
— The Log House by the Lake - A Tale of Canada • William H. G. Kingston
... overrated her strength. After a short and vain struggle in silence she got up and went slowly out of the room, resting her hand for an instant on my little knick-knack table by the door as she went out—the only time I ever saw her lean upon anything. ...
— A Great Emergency and Other Tales - A Great Emergency; A Very Ill-Tempered Family; Our Field; Madam Liberality • Juliana Horatia Gatty Ewing
... instead of my own clothes, I found another very costly suit, which I did not esteem so much for its richness as because it made me look worthy to be in her company. We sat down on a sofa covered with rich tapestry, with cushions to lean upon of the rarest Indian brocade; and soon after she covered a table with several dishes of delicate meats. We ate together, and passed the remaining part of the ...
— Fairy Tales From The Arabian Nights • E. Dixon
... has come to me; one of those unexpected gifts which life loves to bestow after we have learnt to loose our grip of her. I am back in my own place very near my road—the white gate lies within my distant vision; near the lean grey Downs which keep watch and ward between the country and the sea; very near, nay, in the lap of Mother Earth, for as I write I am lying on a green carpet, powdered yellow and white with the sun's own flowers; overhead a great sycamore where the bees toil and sing; ...
— The Roadmender • Michael Fairless
... Delacour and his coronet: I have done her injustice," thought Lady Delacour, and instantly she despatched Sir Philip out of the room, for a catalogue of the pictures, begged Mr. Rochfort to get her something else, and, drawing Miss Portman's arm within hers, she said, in a low voice, "Lean upon me, my dearest Belinda: depend upon it, Clarence will never be such a fool as to marry the girl—Virginia ...
— Tales and Novels, Vol. III - Belinda • Maria Edgeworth
... arms akimbo. Breathe slowly and deeply. Advance left foot eight inches in front of right. Lean head slowly as far back as possible. Hold it while you count five. Straighten, and repeat ...
— What a Young Woman Ought to Know • Mary Wood-Allen
... fer a cowboy I've knowed to lean toward fightin' at the drop of a hat. I tell you, speak out an' I'll do right by you.... I ain't forgettin' thet White Slides gave you a hard knock. An' I was young once an' had ...
— The Mysterious Rider • Zane Grey
... and ripple on the polished stones. The squirrel chatters from his seat: the bag-pipe beetle hums and drones. The pink and gold in blooming wold,—the green hills mirrored in the lake! The deep, blue waters, zephyr-rolled, along the murmuring pebbles break. The maples screen the ferns, and lean the leafy lindens o'er the deep; The sapphire, set in emerald green, lies like an Orient gem asleep. The crimsoned west glows like the breast of Rhuddin [a] when he pipes in May, As downward droops the sun to rest, and shadows ...
— Legends of the Northwest • Hanford Lennox Gordon
... His long lean hands went searching in his dressing-gown, and presently produced an old brown bag, held together at the ...
— The Danvers Jewels, and Sir Charles Danvers • Mary Cholmondeley
... and will not, for all the states, and churches, and revenues, and personal reputations of Europe, overstate the dry fact, as I see it; I will rather mumble and prose about what I certainly know,—my house and barns; my father, my wife, and my tenants; my old lean bald pate; my knives and forks; what meats I eat, and what drinks I prefer; and a hundred straws just as ridiculous,—than I will write, with a fine crow-quill, a fine romance. I like gray days, and autumn and winter weather. I ...
— Representative Men • Ralph Waldo Emerson
... defeated Americans took refuge from the fire of their enemies, the vista is almost unique for a certain scenic squalor and gypsy luxury of color: sag-roofed barns and stables, and weak-backed, sunken-chested workshops of every sort lounge along in tumble-down succession, and lean up against the cliff in every imaginable posture of worthlessness and decrepitude; light wooden galleries cross to them from the second stories of the houses which back upon the alley; and over these galleries ...
— A Chance Acquaintance • W. D. Howells
... the queen is an offence punishable by death. I had not been many minutes at work, nevertheless, before I heard the sliding window gently move. I knew what was coming, and tried to screen the sketch with my body, so as to compel the observer, whoever it was, to lean well out of the window if he wished to see it. A little way off were hundreds of soldiers, walking or squatting on the ground, and on the wall of the King's house and smaller trees the fat and repulsive eunuchs had perched themselves in order ...
— Corea or Cho-sen • A (Arnold) Henry Savage-Landor
... meanwhile, Frederick the Great of Prussia learned how to use cannon in the campaigns of the Seven Years' War (1756-63). The education was forced upon him as gradual destruction of his veteran infantry made him lean more heavily on artillery. To keep pace with cavalry movements, he developed a horse artillery that moved rapidly along with the cavalry. His field artillery had only light guns and howitzers. With these improvements he could establish small ...
— Artillery Through the Ages - A Short Illustrated History of Cannon, Emphasizing Types Used in America • Albert Manucy
... Orthodox Church; Russian-Chechen Friendship Society other: ecology groups; human rights groups; nationalist pragmatists (no foreign influence over Central Eurasia); neo-Eurasianists (against Western influence for the area); religious groups; westernizers (lean towards the West) ...
— The 2008 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency.
... answered Mary. "Why, he offered me his brains to help out mine, and his strong right arm for me to lean upon! And he swears to goodness that he never offered marriage before—because he never found the woman worthy of it—and so on; and all to me! Me—a spinster from my youth up and never a thought of a man! And now, of course, I'll ...
— The Torch and Other Tales • Eden Phillpotts
... woman's sex, what was once her glory, reveals itself to her as an all-containing loss. I realized myself fully only when I was with you; and now I can't undo it.—You gone, I lean against a shadow, and feel myself forever falling, drifting to no end, a Francesca without a Paolo. Well, it must be some comfort that I do not drag you with me. I never believed myself a "strong" woman; your lightest wish shaped ...
— An Englishwoman's Love-Letters • Anonymous
... suffering. He must have suffered. Men will sacrifice anything for their passions. But no, Ralph had always been nice with her, she owed him a great deal; they had had pleasant times together—in this very gallery. She could remember almost every word he said. She had liked him to lean over her shoulder, and correct her drawing. He would ...
— Celibates • George Moore
... object that it is selfish to consider his own comfort when he has work to do for others. But expending too freely of our nervous energies, even in a good cause, is like giving to charity so much of our substance that we in turn are obliged to lean on others for support. ...
— Why Worry? • George Lincoln Walton, M.D.
... up straight on his platform. There was actually something military in the bearing of his lean body. His voice lost its squeak and its sharpness ...
— The Lost Prince • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... 'I am very lean and small now,' he said, 'hardly worth the trouble of cooking; but if you were to keep me two days, and gave me plenty of food, I should get big and fat. As it is, your friends the water-demons would think you meant ...
— The Brown Fairy Book • Andrew Lang
... Canadians, four hundred regulars, and as many Indians should leave Quebec in November, ascend the Chaudiere, then descend the Kennebec, approach Boston under cover of the forest, and carry it by a night attack. Apparently he did not know that but for its lean neck—then but a few yards wide—Boston was an island, and that all around for many leagues the forest that was to have covered his approach had already been devoured by numerous busy settlements. He offers to lead the expedition, and declares that if he is honored with the ...
— A Half Century of Conflict - Volume I - France and England in North America • Francis Parkman
... of those admiring glances and saw jealously for whom they were meant. She hastened to lean forward and greet Marcia, her spiteful tongue all ready ...
— Marcia Schuyler • Grace Livingston Hill Lutz
... black, spare, and lean-visaged, about 5 feet 10 inches high, has lost some of his front teeth, leans ...
— The Underground Railroad • William Still
... died there—natives) come here, now and then, and inquire about our world, and when they find out it is so little that a streak of lightning can flash clear around it in the eighth of a second, they have to lean up against something to laugh. Then they screw a glass into their eye and go to examining us, as if we were a curious kind of foreign bug, or something of that sort. One of them asked me how long our day was; and when I told him it was twelve hours long, as a general thing, he asked ...
— Captain Stormfield's Visit to Heaven • Mark Twain
... means that all share more or less in them, and in a period of hard times all feel the stress to a greater or less degree. It surely ought not to be necessary to enter into any proof of this statement; the memory of the lean years which began in 1893 is still vivid, and we can contrast them with the conditions in this very year which is now closing. Disaster to great business enterprises can never have its effects limited to the ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various
... faces of some resembled those of porcupines. Indeed, some had frightful and some very agreeable faces; some had snakes for their clothes. The faces as also the noses of some resembled those of cows. Some had large limbs protruding stomachs but other limbs very lean; some had large limbs but lean stomachs. The necks of some were very short and the ears of some were very large. Some had diverse kinds of snakes for their ornaments. Some were clad in skins of large elephants, and some in black ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 3 - Books 8, 9, 10, 11 and 12 • Unknown
... it were possible to believe that, then the most miserable creature on the earth would be man, for he would know of his greatness, and know also that his greatness is a mockery and a sham. In hours of doubt, let us lean hard upon the question, "Is it possible that those with whom we have walked and worked, conversed and communed, and by whom we have been helped and blessed, should forever cease to be, while the houses in which they live, and the tools with ...
— The Ascent of the Soul • Amory H. Bradford
... prospect, and not feel His soul refresh'd with foretaste of the joy? Rivers of gladness water all the Earth, And clothe all climes with beauty. The reproach Of barrenness is past. The fruitful field Laughs with abundance; and the land, once lean, Or fertile only in its own disgrace, Exults to see its thistly curse repeal'd. The various seasons woven into one, And that one season an eternal spring, The garden fears no blight, and needs no fence; For there is none to covet: all are full. The lion, ...
— A Brief Commentary on the Apocalypse • Sylvester Bliss
... said Burney, shrugging his shoulders. And he turned half-away as if to go and lean against the fence, but really to hide his face as he muttered to himself, "Oh, shouldn't I like to see ...
— Glyn Severn's Schooldays • George Manville Fenn
... The better sort of fish are out of season. The trout are lean and haggard: it is no trick to catch them and no treat to eat them. The salmon, all except the silly kelts, have run out to sea, and the place of their habitation no man knoweth. There is nothing for the angler to do but wait for the return of spring, and meanwhile encourage ...
— Fisherman's Luck • Henry van Dyke
... miles farther down Powell's Valley, authorizing Mayhall Wells to form a company to guard the Gap and to protect the property of Confederate citizens in the valley; and a commission of captaincy in the said company for the said Mayhall Wells. Mayhall's mouth widened to the full stretch of his lean jaws, and, when Bill was through reading, he silently reached for the paper and looked it up and down and over and ...
— Christmas Eve on Lonesome and Other Stories • John Fox, Jr.
... of the clock he was brought by the Lieutenant out of the Tower, his beard being long, which fashion he had never before used, his face pale and lean, carrying in his hands a red cross, casting his eyes often towards heaven." He had been unpopular as a judge, and one or two persons in the crowd were insolent to him; but the distance was short and soon over, as all ...
— History of England from the Fall of Wolsey to the Death of Elizabeth. Vol. II. • James Anthony Froude
... to show signs of distress. Her face grew ashen, the breath came harshly from her open lips, and once or twice she stumbled. With the first pang of fear at his heart, Grom closed up beside her, made her lean heavily on his rigid forearm, and cheered her with words of praise. He pointed to a spur of broken mountains now close ahead, with a narrow ...
— In the Morning of Time • Charles G. D. Roberts
... boot-black, to-morrow, I would, I am certain, lean to the delusion that the polishing of pedal integuments was the noblest sphere ...
— She and I, Volume 2 - A Love Story. A Life History. • John Conroy Hutcheson
... yet reached the highest point they are likely to attain. Imports have been restricted, prices have gone up and taxation has increased. Time may not be on the side of our enemies, but is it on ours? It is a fickle ally at best, and to rely on its support is to lean on a ...
— England and Germany • Emile Joseph Dillon
... carriage was empty. I threw my coat into a corner and settled myself in the seat opposite. Just as the train started to move, the door was flung open and a tall lean body hurled itself into the compartment and dropped on my coat. He was followed instantaneously by a leather bag which crashed ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 158, June 9, 1920 • Various
... one at last who speaks a Christian tongue. I must have a very charitable aspect, since they ask alms of me in the present lean condition of my purse. My friend," and he turned towards the blind man, "I sold my last shirt last week; that is to say, since you understand only the language of Cicero: Vendidi hebdomade nuper ...
— Notre-Dame de Paris - The Hunchback of Notre Dame • Victor Hugo
... considers himself sound and entire, or the contrary, as long as his wife, children, and so on are sound and entire or not. Attributes of the body are superimposed on the Self, if a man thinks of himself (his Self) as stout, lean, fair, as standing, walking, or jumping. Attributes of the sense-organs, if he thinks 'I am mute, or deaf, or one-eyed, or blind.' Attributes of the internal organ when he considers himself subject to desire, intention, doubt, determination, and so on. Thus ...
— The Vedanta-Sutras with the Commentary by Sankaracarya - Sacred Books of the East, Volume 1 • George Thibaut
... look, the picture shows How lank and lean Augustus grows! Yet, though he feels so weak and ill, The naughty fellow cries out still "Not any soup for me, I say: O take the nasty soup away! I won't ...
— Struwwelpeter: Merry Tales and Funny Pictures • Heinrich Hoffman
... her!" cried somebody aboard the destroyer, in a deep American voice full of the exultation of battle. The lean rifles swung, lowered. "Point one, lower." They were about to hear "Fire!" when the Stars and Stripes and sundry other signals burst from the ...
— World's War Events, Volume III • Various
... love with that filthiest of filthy slaves. But this only showeth that they all do it[FN8] and that there is no woman but who cuckoldeth her husband, then the curse of Allah upon one and all and upon the fools who lean against them for support or who place the reins of conduct in their hands." So he put away his melancholy and despondency, regret and repine, and allayed his sorrow by constantly repeating those words, adding, " ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 1 • Richard F. Burton
... know,' says I. 'Me and Pierpont ain't met for ever so long. Don't lean over and point so; you're ...
— The Depot Master • Joseph C. Lincoln
... exist the decrepit frame houses yonder had turned the same pauper faces to the square in Sevier, and that their grandfathers in homespun had lounged just as they did on this very broken trough, and watched their lean cows chew the cud, and leisurely abused the Federalists for the ruin of the country. Twice a year the judge and Lawyer Grayson rode down to court and crossed the old track of Sherman and his raiders, and coming back would tell ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, Vol. 22, September, 1878 • Various
... forbidding because of them. She bade the dragons go, and they flew through the air with the empty car. Then she hid in her dress the phial with the liquid she had brewed and, the apples that had grown upon the withered branch. She picked up a stick to lean upon, and with the gait of an ancient woman she went hobbling upon the ...
— The Golden Fleece and the Heroes who Lived Before Achilles • Padraic Colum
... the benefit of posterity. There you might see the sheep-like lion, and the pig-like bear; leopards like short-legged zebras, and monkeys most unpleasantly like human beings. Indeed, ill-natured persons had been heard to declare one picture of a very lean ancient ourang-outang bore a strong resemblance to Mr Blewcome. But, then, some people see ...
— Wilton School - or, Harry Campbell's Revenge • Fred E. Weatherly
... 'Nintynine'] Ninety-nine may say no, the [Transcriber's Note: The original text reads 'hundreth'] hundredth, yes: take off your coat: roll up your sleeves, don't be afraid of manual labor! America is large enough for all—strike out for the west. The best letter of introduction is your own energy. Lean on yourself when you walk. Keep good company. Keep out of politics unless you are sure to win—you are never sure to win, so ...
— Burroughs' Encyclopaedia of Astounding Facts and Useful Information, 1889 • Barkham Burroughs
... Tamar; she had the same mother with Absalom. Now Amnon, David's eldest son, fell in love with her, and being not able to obtain his desires, on account of her virginity, and the custody she was under, was so much out of order, nay, his grief so eat up his body, that he grew lean, and his color was changed. Now there was one Jenadab, a kinsman and friend of his, who discovered this his passion, for he was an extraordinary wise man, and of great sagacity of mind. When, therefore, he saw that every morning ...
— The Antiquities of the Jews • Flavius Josephus
... For us beyond the shining gate? Though lovely gifts behind you left, We want yourselves; we are bereft. From your new mansion glorious Will you lean out to look for us? Shut is the far-off, shining gate— Are we ...
— Making the Most of Life • J. R. Miller
... midnight hair and your piquant chin, Your lips whose odours of violet Drive men to madness and saints to sin,— I see you over the footlights' glare Down in the pit 'mid the common mob,— Your throat is burning, and brown, and bare, You lean, and listen, and pulse, and throb; The viols are dreaming between us two, And my gilded crown is no make-believe, I am more than an actor, dear, to you, For you called me your king but yester eve, And your heart is ...
— Flint and Feather • E. Pauline Johnson
... guess where I have been? By a brook where willows lean; With a book whereon to look, In some little shady nook, If that I should weary grow Of that lovelier book I know Whose sweet leaves the wind is turning— Full of lessons for my learning. There are little songs to hear If you bend a listening ear; And no printed book can be Half so ...
— A Jolly Jingle-Book • Various
... stolen them away; in which event she would gnash her teeth, and stamp her feet, in powerless rage, and only Laura could bring peace by banishing her tormentors. But no matter what happened, Laura seemed a rock upon which to lean, and if, in adjusting a grievance, she sometimes failed to use tact, and the remedy proved worse than the disease, they knew in their hearts she was acting in good faith, trying to do ...
— Peggy-Alone • Mary Agnes Byrne
... as she cried it, Thorkel the Tall dared to lean forward and give the royal shoulder a rallying slap. "Amleth himself never played a game better," he said; "but is it worth while to continue at it when no Englishmen are watching?" And his words seemed to open a door against ...
— The Ward of King Canute • Ottilie A. Liljencrantz
... on my pacing steed, And nothing else saw all day long; For sideways would she lean and sing ...
— The Children's Garland from the Best Poets • Various
... Spring when the camissal foamed all white with bloom and the welter of yellow violets ran in the grass under it like fire, Greenhow built a lean-to to his house and made the discovery that the oak which jutted out from the barranca behind it was of just the right height from the ground to make a swing for a child, which caused him a ...
— Defenders of Democracy • Militia of Mercy
... I would put this string through a pulley fastened to the ceiling; the other end of this string should be fastened to the middle of another thread, which should be strained between two posts set upright on each side of the candle, so as that the latter string might lean against the candle at any distance you want below the flame. When the candle burns down to this string, it will burn it in two, and the extinguisher will drop upon ...
— Practical Education, Volume II • Maria Edgeworth
... after that, and William Sutherland was asked to preach his funeral sermon. He chose as his text those words from the book of Proverbs: 'Trust in the Lord with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding. In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall ...
— A Hive of Busy Bees • Effie M. Williams |
