"Poise" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... again Until he took the stiffness out of them, And not one but hung limp, not one was left For him to conquer. He learned all there was To learn about not launching out too soon And so not carrying the tree away Clear to the ground. He always kept his poise To the top branches, climbing carefully With the same pains you use to fill a cup Up to the brim, and even above the brim. Then he flung outward, feet first, with a swish, Kicking his way down through the air to the ground. So was I once myself a swinger of birches. And so I dream of going back ...
— The Second Book of Modern Verse • Jessie B. Rittenhouse
... the baby beat across the grass The little white feet nod like white flowers in the wind, They poise and run like ripples lapping across the water; And the sight of their white play among the grass Is like a little robin's song, winsome, Or as two white butterflies settle in the cup of one flower For a moment, then away with a ...
— Amores - Poems • D. H. Lawrence
... letting this man you hate mould your character; you're letting him burn the kindness out of your soul. He's making you bitter and hard and unjust—and you're letting him. I thought you had more will—more poise. It isn't your affair what he is, even what he does, Dick—it's your affair to keep your own judgment unwarped, your own heart gentle, your own soul untainted by the poison of hatred. We are both churchmen, as you put it—loyalty is ...
— The Militants - Stories of Some Parsons, Soldiers, and Other Fighters in the World • Mary Raymond Shipman Andrews
... merriment in the open laugh, illuminated by a dazzle of well-set teeth; her complexion fresh and pure, and the whole aspect of her face kind, courageous, and inspiring, as well as thoughtful and impressive. The poise of her head and rather strongly built figure is unusually good, and suggestive of health, dignity, and leadership; yet her manners and voice are so gentle, and her whole demeanor so benevolent, that no one could ...
— The Seven Little Sisters Who Live on the Round Ball - That Floats in the Air • Jane Andrews
... clinging to the relative in the light of eternal thought, when you have risen to the Absolute and learnt to read the meaning of the "LARGER WORLD" of life. Do not pass by this lightly. In it is the key to Peace, Power and Poise. All that is Real and Permanent, is on ...
— The Doctrine and Practice of Yoga • A. P. Mukerji
... roseate creature. Always beautiful, always exquisite—flawless features, perfect poise, now she pulsated with life. A new brightness glowed in her eyes. Of late across her cheeks color was wont to come and go like the shadow of clouds on a hillside on a windy day. Even her voice, usually steady and controlled, now and again trembled and broke with sudden ...
— The Fifth Wheel - A Novel • Olive Higgins Prouty
... the rising tide breaks the surface into wrinkles of phosphorescent fire. High over head is the wide, unbroken canopy of the Pacific sky, and the gush of a larger moon than ours fills all the sphere with splendor as the huge ship stirs lazily in its Narcissus poise over its own reflection. There is a reddish glow in the western horizon over Hong-Kong, a fainter glimmer west by south over Macao, and farther west and north the reflected glories of the sacred city of Canton. The three make a semicircular ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. XII, No. 28. July, 1873. • Various
... poise of his handsome head upon those broad shoulders, and the fire of life and intelligence in those fine, clear eyes, he might readily have typified some demigod of a wild and warlike bygone ...
— Tarzan of the Apes • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... Nellie finally regained her poise of mind and remembered that she had been at the point of writing a letter to her mother (to be mailed by the first vessel bound to a port) when Nat had ...
— The Harbor of Doubt • Frank Williams
... "I can never hope to enjoy that happiness. I am assured by Zee that the safe use of wings is a hereditary gift, and it would take generations before one of my race could poise himself in the air like a bird." "Let not that thought vex you too much," replied this amiable Princess, "for, after all, there must come a day when Zee and myself must resign our wings forever. Perhaps when that day comes we might be glad if the An ...
— The Coming Race • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... impossible that I should succeed so quickly, so easily, even with the help of one so powerful as Helen Merival. It is my fate to work for what I get." And with this return of his belief that to himself alone he must look for victory, his self-poise and self-confidence ...
— The Light of the Star - A Novel • Hamlin Garland
... the window, a woman's head. The light was behind, within the room, so that Wogan could not see the face. But the shape of the head, its gracious poise upon the young shoulders, the curve of the neck, the bright hair drawn backwards from the brows,—here were marks Wogan could not mistake. They had been present before his eyes these many months. The head at the open window ...
— Clementina • A.E.W. Mason
... also guests for lunch, were just descending from a long buckboard. At sight of one of them I stopped short inside, though I mechanically continued to walk toward her. I recognized her instantly—the curve of her shoulders, the poise of her head, and her waving jet-black hair to confirm. And without the slightest warning there came tumbling and roaring up in me a torrent of longings, regrets; and I suddenly had a clear understanding of my absorption ...
— The Plum Tree • David Graham Phillips
... "always, my friend, you undervalue a little the English race. You undervalue their intelligence, their patriotism, their poise towards the serious matters of life. I know nothing of Mr. Francis Norgate save what I saw this morning. He is one of that type of Englishmen, clean-bred, well-born, full of reserve, taciturn, yet, I would swear, honourable. ...
— The Double Traitor • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... glance at Ellen Dix from under half-closed lids. The girl's big, black eyes were fixed full upon him; she was leaning forward, a suggestion of timid defiance in the poise of her head. ...
— An Alabaster Box • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman and Florence Morse Kingsley
... friend, who was likely to have a supply of nuts. He would answer to his name, follow when called, in the house, out of the house, any where, play all about the large house-dog, Tom—pat him on the ear, gently pinch his tail, poise himself on his back, and pretend to sleep by the side of him. But if any one caught him, or held him, as if he were imprisoned—alas! what a struggle ensued—and then, I grieve ...
— Stories about Animals: with Pictures to Match • Francis C. Woodworth
... fine poise with which she, Agatha, had held Rodney Lanyon and Harding Powell each by his own thread. Milly had compelled her to spin a stronger thread for Harding and, as it were, to multiply her threads, so as to hold him at all points. And because of this, because of giving more and more time to him, ...
— The Flaw in the Crystal • May Sinclair
... man, a leader less wise and less fully equipped might have blundered at this stage by leaping too hastily with his cause into the arena of debate. Sumner did nothing of the kind. His self-poise and self-control for nine months was simply admirable. "Endurance is the crowning quality," says Lowell, "And patience all the passion of great hearts." Certainly during those trying months they were Sumner's, the endurance and the patience. ...
— Charles Sumner Centenary - The American Negro Academy. Occasional Papers No. 14 • Archibald H. Grimke
... faintly suggestive of the Japanese about her face. Perhaps it was the slightly slanting eyes and the smooth olive skin. Her hair was much lighter than her eyes and quite fluffy; her features were regular and there was a graceful dignity in the poise of her head on her shoulders. Nancy concluded after a swift examination that she was, if ...
— The Motor Maids in Fair Japan • Katherine Stokes
... the sleeping form of Henry, and, almost before he had time to suspect that foul play was going on, he saw the savage glide from the bushes to the side of the sleeper, raise his spear, and poise it for one moment, as if to make sure of sending it straight ...
— Gascoyne, The Sandal Wood Trader - A Tale of the Pacific • R. M. Ballantyne
... the poor youth might be, however undecided and timid in the forest, he seemed to be a new person on the water. There was a self-reliance about him, a poise and a certain ability that he seemed to have acquired suddenly. Without a trace of hesitation he guided the boat through the winding course of the creek that flowed into ...
— The Outdoor Girls in Florida - Or, Wintering in the Sunny South • Laura Lee Hope
... hard day with his bailiff and the peasants restored Crocker's poise. He looked for the hundredth time over into Emma's valley and divined her attitude. Dreading an interview, she had left the way open to parley. She virtually pleaded for a delay. It was a new and, in a way, delightful sensation to be feared. For the first time in any human ...
— The Collectors • Frank Jewett Mather
... strike When fitness calls them on, and know, by measure Of their observant toil, the enemies' weight— Why, this hath not a finger's dignity: They call this bed-work, mapp'ry, closet-war; So that the ram that batters down the wall, For the great swinge and rudeness of his poise, They place before his hand that made the engine, Or those that with the fineness of their souls By reason ...
— The History of Troilus and Cressida • William Shakespeare [Craig edition]
... Englishwoman, as well she may, for she is a granddaughter of Queen Victoria. She is also a descendant of the Romanoffs, for one of her grandfathers was Alexander III of Russia. In her manner she is more simple and democratic than many American women that I know, her poise and simplicity being in striking contrast to the manners of two of my countrywomen who had spent the night preceding our arrival at the castle and who were manifestly much impressed by this contact with the Lord's Anointed. When luncheon was announced her second daughter, Princess Marie, ...
— The New Frontiers of Freedom from the Alps to the AEgean • Edward Alexander Powell
... famous Apollo cannot be fixed, but it is clearly a copy of a type belonging to the fourth century B.C. The poise of the figure is singular and, till its intent is grasped, unsatisfactory. Apollo is caught in swift motion but seems, as he stands delicately poised, to be about to fly rather than to run. He stands tiptoe and in a moment will have left the earth. ...
— Ancient Art and Ritual • Jane Ellen Harrison
... deck and then, by tackles on the foreyard, lowered them over the side; how we filled a number of bags which we found in the forecastle with powder; how we measured the cracks in the ice and sawed a couple of spare studding-sail booms into lengths to serve as beams whereby to poise the barrels and bags; would make but sailor's talk, half of which would be unintelligible and ...
— The Frozen Pirate • W. Clark Russell
... that he was gaining in poise. Sometimes, when the adorer is at a distance from the object of his devotion, the idolatry of love assumes fateful proportions. During his stay in Paris, Frederick had lived in a state of constant fever, and ...
— Atlantis • Gerhart Hauptmann
... is more of a conversationalist than a speaker; likes chit- chat; would be at home in a conversazione or al fresco tea party, where the attendants walk about, gossip merrily, and, whilst holding a tea cup in one hand, poise with two fingers a piece of delicately- buttered toast in the other—a continental style quite aesthetic and refined in comparison with our feeding, and gormandising, and sweating exhibitions. Mr. Newman promises to be a good minister. His commencement has been, satisfactory, and his prospects are ...
— Our Churches and Chapels • Atticus
... light which the soul needs on the nature of man. Wonderfully has Holman Hunt elaborated this truth in his picture "The Light of the World." The ideal humanity never had more beautiful expression than in that great sermon in color. The poise of the figure of Jesus indicates strength and self-control; the thorns on the brow tell their story of sorrow and pain; the hand at the door shows that one man at least is mindful of the welfare of His brother; ...
— The Ascent of the Soul • Amory H. Bradford
... power of blinding ourselves as to what is wrong in ourselves and in our actions. Part of the cure for that lies in the thought in the second clause of the text—'But the Lord weigheth the spirits.' He weighs them in a balance, or as a man might take up something and poise it on his palm, moving his hand up and down till his muscles by their resistance gave him some inkling of its weight. But what is it that God weighs? 'The spirits.' We too often content ourselves with looking at our ways; God looks at ourselves. ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren
... Ting, "but the detail is not pursued to so remote an extremity in the Classic. The delicate poise of the analogy is what is chiefly dwelt upon, the sign for a needle harmonizing with that for official, and there being a similar balance ...
— Kai Lung's Golden Hours • Ernest Bramah
... blossoms; for during the night rain had fallen after a long month of dry weather, and Nature was breathing with joy. High overhead there floated some snow-white tropic birds—those gentle, ethereal creatures which, to the toil-spent seaman who watches their mysterious poise in illimitable space, seem to denote the greater Mystery and Rest that lieth beyond all things; and lower down, and sweeping swiftly to and fro with steady, outspread wing and long, forked tail, the fierce-eyed, savage frigate birds scanned the ...
— By Rock and Pool on an Austral Shore, and Other Stories • Louis Becke
... moment, a girl came along the platform through the groups of local passengers, who respectfully made way for her. She was tall, and her long outer garment failed to conceal her grace of movement and fine poise, though in the fading light her face was almost invisible beneath a large hat. The sight of her sent a thrill of satisfaction through the man; it was seldom that Millicent Gladwyne's appearance was unwelcome to her friends. She ...
— The Long Portage • Harold Bindloss
... which now, somehow, seemed like a vanishing dream. The morning sun was blazing over the verdant landscape, filling the dewdrops on the grass with red, blue, and yellow light. An indescribable aura seemed to encircle the exquisite face of his young companion. There was a restful poise about her, a sure grasp of utterance, that soothed and thrilled him. Something new and vivifying sprang to life in his breast. The thought flashed into his consciousness that here with this embodiment of intellectual purity ...
— The Desired Woman • Will N. Harben
... Hielands. 'Nough said." Elizabeth had recovered her customary jolly poise. Wise enough, through long experience, to realize that when her father failed to throttle that vocal heritage from his forebears, war impended, she gathered up her knitting and fled to ...
— Kindred of the Dust • Peter B. Kyne
... One was a soft moaning, as of low waves on the beach; the other wild and heartlessly jubilant, as of the sea in the height of a tempest. Oh soul! thou then heardest life and death: as he who stands upon the Corinthian shore hears both the Ionian and the Aegean waves. The life-and-death poise soon passed; and then I found myself slowly ascending, and caught a ...
— White Jacket - or, the World on a Man-of-War • Herman Melville
... American citizenship entirely too cheap. We permit every creature that can poise on its hind legs and call itself a man, to sway the scepter of American Sovereignty—to become an important factor in the formation of our public polity; and then, with this venal vote on the one hand, ...
— Volume 12 of Brann The Iconoclast • William Cowper Brann
... the sky is still shining with twilight. The wild cat begins to hiss and squall in the forest, the heron to flap hastily by, the stork on the top of the tavern chimney to poise itself on one leg for sleep. To-whoo! an owl begins to wake up. Hark! the woodcutters are coming home with ...
— The Book of Were-Wolves • Sabine Baring-Gould
... while; his morning newspaper he would let lie untouched beside his plate for sufficiently long to check his natural inclination to glance hastily over the headlines of the first page. In everything he tried by self-imposed curbs to teach himself poise and patience and a quiet mind. He had been at it for years. By now he had himself well in hand; though, being exceedingly impetuous by ...
— The Cab of the Sleeping Horse • John Reed Scott
... played as if every one of her words had been made expressly for her, as, no doubt, they were. I have never seen her so perfect in detail, in the poise of her head, in her least gesture and intonation, in her swift changes of mood; never so quietly mistress of the finesse ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 158, January 14, 1920 • Various
... such a latent consciousness to impart poise to the wearer. Dainty little Ethel Danielson followed, ...
— Mrs. Christy's Bridge Party • Sara Ware Bassett
... angle is Libra, House of Marriage; that all-important relation which may make or mar a life, the Balance is so easily disturbed in its equilibrium. To preserve its harmony, equality must reign, blending love and wisdom. It is the perfect poise of body, mind, and soul, achieved by loving obedience to the higher laws of our being and the true union ...
— The Light of Egypt, Volume II • Henry O. Wagner/Belle M. Wagner/Thomas H. Burgoyne
... say so, for if the spring is rough in New England, and there is no denying it, there do nevertheless come days of bewitching, entrancing, delicious beauty, in the midst of the rest. Days when the air and sky and sunlight are in a kind of poise of delight, and earth beneath them, is, as it were, still with pleasure. I suppose the spring may be more glorious in other lands,—more positively glorious; whether relatively, I do not know. With such contrasts before and behind them,—contrasts of raw, ...
— A Red Wallflower • Susan Warner
... wondering. He was completely intrigued by her. Her performance in "The Zingara" had led him to expect a girl of much more poise and finish, and yet with all her rawness she was far from naive. His own experience recognized hers; both had lived in the world's squalid byways; he could have talked to her in their language and she would have understood. But ...
— Treasure and Trouble Therewith - A Tale of California • Geraldine Bonner
... come down every Minute; upon which those below stretch'd out their Hands in Order to pull her down, and shewed Joy, and Disappointment, in their Looks alternately, as often as she stumbled or recovered. She begg'd for a Pole to poise her, but no body wou'd lend her one; and looked about in vain for help. There appeared at some Distance a Man in a broad Hat, and short Cloak, with a swarthy Complexion, and black Whiskers, who seemed altogether unconcern'd ...
— The Theater (1720) • Sir John Falstaffe
... 70 The long line of mowers, The poise of the scythes And their sweep through the sunshine. The rhythmical ...
— Who Can Be Happy And Free In Russia? • Nicholas Nekrassov
... their farther side by one of the amateur deputies he had impressed into service, Kennedy swung the stand of the arc he had used back into the place unaided. I noticed that Doctor Blake was nervously interested in spite of his professional poise. I certainly was bursting with curiosity to know what ...
— The Film Mystery • Arthur B. Reeve
... in his slow voice. "Looking for another party." Nevertheless, his eyes had covered every inch of them— noted the drawn curtains and the breathless poise of the woman— while his ears had ...
— The Spoilers • Rex Beach
... she was on his breast again, and all their youth was in their lips. But her embrace was as fleeting as a bird's poise and before he knew it he clasped empty air, and half ...
— The Early Short Fiction of Edith Wharton, Part 2 (of 10) • Edith Wharton
... dissipated man of the night before. It was Hillars as I had seen him in the old days. But for his 19th century garb, he might have just stepped down from a frame—a gallant by Fortuny, who loved the awakened animal in man. The poise was careless, but graceful, and the smile was debonair. His eyes were holding Gretchen's. A moment ...
— Arms and the Woman • Harold MacGrath
... Pathfinder had said, three warriors were in the canoe, two holding their rifles at a poise, as they knelt in readiness to aim the deadly weapons, and the other standing erect in the stern to wield the paddle. In this manner they left the shore, having had the precaution to haul the canoe, previously to entering it, so far up the stream as to have got into the comparatively still ...
— The Pathfinder - The Inland Sea • James Fenimore Cooper
... broad foot of the male. My love for the life of women was a life within my life; and oh, how strangely secluded and veiled! A world of calm colour with phantoms moving, floating past and changing in dim light—an averted face with abundant hair, the gleam of a perfect bust or the poise of a neck turning slowly round, the gaze of deep translucid eyes. I loved women too much to give ...
— Confessions of a Young Man • George Moore
... down in a corner of the lobby, our chairs side by side, facing opposite ways. He lighted a cigar, and gave me one. In looks he was young; in behavior he had the self-possession and poise of maturity. He wore a long mackintosh which sparkled with mist. His slouch hat looked new and was carefully dinted. His dress was almost natty in an unconventional way, and his manners accorded with his garb. He acted as if for years we had casually met daily. His tone and attitude ...
— Aladdin & Co. - A Romance of Yankee Magic • Herbert Quick
... started. On the bottom step, looking about for a vacant table, was William C. Porter. Behind him, standing, with head thrown back, was Miss Katherine Porter. For a moment she looked at the shifting scene before her. Harvey noted with hungry eyes the poise of her figure. Then she turned deliberately, and bowed to Harvey with ...
— The Short Line War • Merwin-Webster
... drawing-room was a battlefield of conflicting emotions this evening. Just for a moment she had been shaken out of her usual poise, had spoken warmly, as a normal woman might have done; yet both Iris who loved her, and Anstice who had studied her, knew that this warmer manner, this apparent freedom of speech, was in reality the outward sign of some inward disturbance; and both guessed, vaguely, that the meeting ...
— Afterwards • Kathlyn Rhodes
... escaped her entirely was this, that had he not progressed, she would have retained her old poise, the old poise of which she was never again to be mistress. It is the old tale: sympathy to lift up another first steps down. And never had her sympathy gone out so quickly to any mortal. Elsa had a horror of loneliness, and this man seemed ...
— Parrot & Co. • Harold MacGrath
... impressions of it. This had happened so often that it had come to be a sort of joke between them. But now Fulkerson clearly meant business, and March had a struggle to maintain himself in a firm poise of refusal. ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... mere fraction of a second it seemed to poise itself for flight. Then it moved, slowly at first, but gathering speed with every second, until it seemed to be flying like ...
— Nan Sherwood at Palm Beach - Or Strange Adventures Among The Orange Groves • Annie Roe Carr
... every now and then to feel whether the bunch of leaves at their back is in place. They were certainly no beauties, but there was a charm in their light, soft step, in the swaying of their hips, in the dainty poise of their slim ankles and feet, and the softness and harmony of all their movements. And the light playing on their dark, velvety, shining bodies increased this charm, until one almost forgot the many defects, the dirt, the sores, the disease. ...
— Two Years with the Natives in the Western Pacific • Felix Speiser
... Palestine travelling—by the clime, and the land, and the name of the land, with all its mighty import; by the glittering freshness of the sward, and the abounding masses of flowers that furnished my sumptuous pathway; by the bracing and fragrant air that seemed to poise me in my saddle, and to lift me along as a planet ...
— Eothen • A. W. Kinglake
... down on the bed and leaned his head on his hands, pressing his fingers against his throbbing temples. Half an hour passed; still he sat there trying to recover his mental poise; the terrible anger he had felt, combined with her last thrust, had shocked him out ...
— Flamsted quarries • Mary E. Waller
... 37. The solemn providence and wonder in my life, my fall under the York coach in August 1654, when the great wheel went over my leg, so as I could feel it passing me without hurting, far less breaking my leg, as if it had been thus carried over in a just poise, to let me see how providence watched over me, &c. 38. The comfort God gave me in my children, and those extraordinary confirmations I got from God upon the death of those sweet children whom God removed ...
— Biographia Scoticana (Scots Worthies) • John Howie
... speaker or writer is a most effective tone for a large public. It gives them confidence in their man, and prevents tediousness—except to those who reflect how delicate is the poise of truth, and what steeps and pits encompass the dealer in unqualified propositions. To such persons, a writer who is trenchant in every sentence of every page, who never lapses for a line into the contingent, who marches through the intricacies of things in a blaze of ...
— Critical Miscellanies, Volume I (of 3) - Essay 4: Macaulay • John Morley
... with long hair tied in a big black bow at the cape of her neck. Her vague nose had settled into the forward-raking line that made her the dark likeness of her father. Her body was slender but solid; the strong white neck carried her head high with the poise of a runner. She looked at least seventeen in her clean-cut coat and skirt. Probably she wouldn't look much older ...
— Anne Severn and the Fieldings • May Sinclair
... milk is needed for our infant girls and boys; That it aids adult dyspeptics to regain "digestive poise"; But I've never comprehended Why its transport is attended By the maximum of ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 150, June 7, 1916 • Various
... are elastic and variable. Among living things we have in a measure escaped from the iron necessity that holds the world of dead matter in its grip. Dead matter ever tends to a static equilibrium; living matter to a dynamic poise, or a balance between the intake and the output of energy. Life is a peculiar activity in matter. If the bicyclist stops, his wheel falls down; no mechanical contrivance could be devised that could take his place on the wheel, and ...
— The Breath of Life • John Burroughs
... close-fitting plain dark net. And above them rose the head of such unsuspected loveliness of contour, which rats and puffs and pompadour had once deformed grotesquely, but which the wonderful new hair-dressing accentuated in a transfiguring degree. The poise of Mary Alice's head, the carriage of her shoulders, were fine. But she had never known, before, that those were big points of beauty. So she did took lovely, with the tiny touch of coral at her throat, the pink flush ...
— Everybody's Lonesome - A True Fairy Story • Clara E. Laughlin
... ask definitely but second reflection brought the conviction that it would be a mistake, that it would be taking an unfair advantage. Sufficient unto the day—his present concern was to help her regain a normal mental poise. And to do that he must ignore half of what her suggestions seemed to imply. He felt her breakdown acutely, he must say nothing that would add to her distress of mind. It was better to appear obtuse than to concur too heartily in fears, a recollection of which in ...
— The Shadow of the East • E. M. Hull
... palace rose in the middle of this plain, whose walls shone with such brilliancy that mortal eyes could hardly bear the sight. Astolpho guided the winged horse towards this edifice, and made him poise himself in the air while he took a leisurely survey of this favored spot and its environs. It seemed as if nature and art had striven with one another to see which could do ...
— Bulfinch's Mythology • Thomas Bulfinch
... was one of Miss Joe Hill's sternest requirements—fifteen minutes three times a day and two pints of water between meals. Then she sat down in a straight-back chair and tried to read "The Power Through Poise." Her body was doing its duty, but it did not deceive her mind. She knew that she was living a life of black deception; evidences of her guilt were on every hand. Behind the books on her little shelf was a paper of chocolate creams; in the music rack, ...
— Miss Mink's Soldier and Other Stories • Alice Hegan Rice
... arm with the thin sleeve wrinkled over it, and helped herself again to water. In every gesture there was the poise and distinction of perfect self-command, a highly wrought self-consciousness, as far removed from pose as from Nature's simplicity. Natural she could never be again. No woman is natural who has a secret experience ...
— A Touch Of Sun And Other Stories • Mary Hallock Foote
... sentinel, throwing his musket to a poise, with a rattling sound that echoed along ...
— The Pilot • J. Fenimore Cooper
... It was neither thin nor fat, but beautifully modelled in an oval outline: the lips were clean-cut, with a look of passion in their curves; the nose came down in an aquiline sweep, ending in chiselled nostrils; the chin was firm and cloven, and the poise of the whole head was strangely youthful. It was a face of great generosity and sweetness, set at an angle between defiance and humility, but ecclesiastical from ear to ear and brow to chin; the forehead ...
— Lord of the World • Robert Hugh Benson
... perfect equation: if something is added or subtracted, something is subtracted or added, so long as there is life. Judith got her poise again in time, as strong natures do after any death; with some fibres weakened past mending, gray, but calm. If his side of her nature was stunted, she seemed to blossom all the more richly in other ways. ...
— Life at High Tide - Harper's Novelettes • Various
... pausing before a shop window in which an active young man of admirably mobile countenance is holding forth in dumb show. Your progress is slackened as you edge about the throng with the intention of proceeding on your way. As it were, you poise on the wing. Then, like a warming liquor stealing through the veins, the awakening of your interest in the artful antics of this young man makes fainter and fainter your will to proceed on your course, until it dies softly away. What is this ridiculous thing he ...
— Walking-Stick Papers • Robert Cortes Holliday
... him. He treated his doubt with exceeding gentleness, as a skilful physician would deal with a dangerous wound. He was in no haste. A full week passed before he did anything. During those days the sad heart had time to react, to recover something of its self-poise. Thomas still persisted in his refusal to believe, but when a week had gone he found his way with the others to their meeting. Perhaps their belief in the Lord's resurrection made such a change in them, so brightened and transformed them, that Thomas grew less positive in ...
— Personal Friendships of Jesus • J. R. Miller
... valid for the conduct of life. By such teaching, if they have the heart to heed it, men become wise, learning how to be both brave and gentle, faithful and free; how to renounce superstition and yet retain faith; how to keep a fine poise of reason between the falsehood of extremes; how to accept the joys of life with glee, and endure its ills with patient valor; how to look upon the folly of man and not forget his nobility—in short, how to live cleanly, ...
— The Builders - A Story and Study of Masonry • Joseph Fort Newton
... spirit does not quail, nor her determination falter for an instant, her vivid fancy conjures up one terrible apprehension after another, till gradually, and most naturally in such a mind once thrown off its poise, the horror rises to frenzy—her imagination realizes its own hideous creations, and she sees her ...
— Characteristics of Women - Moral, Poetical, and Historical • Anna Jameson
... with the careless alacrity of an adventurer, who had his bread to earn. It would be thrown aside as carelessly, whenever he should choose to earn his bread by some other equally digressive means. But what was most remarkable, and, perhaps, showed a more than common poise in the young man, was the fact that, amid all these personal vicissitudes, he had never lost his identity. Homeless as he had been,—continually changing his whereabout, and, therefore, responsible neither ...
— The House of the Seven Gables • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... riding that caught Helen's fancy at once. It was the unconscious grace of the man, the ease with which he seemed to make himself a very part of the horse. He attempted no tricks, rode without any flourishes. But the perfect poise of his lithe body as it gave with the motions of the horse, proclaimed him a born rider; so finished, indeed, that his very ease seemed to discount the performance. Steamboat had a malevolent red eye that glared hatred at the oppressor man, and to-day it lived up to its reputation of being the most ...
— Wyoming, a Story of the Outdoor West • William MacLeod Raine
... life was a breathing death. Yet with a wonderful power of endurance and self-control, she moved along her destined way, and none of the people she met in society—nor even her nearest friends—had any suspicion of her real state of mind. As a wife, her sense of honor was keen. From that virtuous poise, her mind had neither variableness nor shadow of turning. No children came with silken wrappings to hide and make softer the bonds that held her to her husband in a union that only death could dissolve; the hard, icy, galling links of the chain ...
— The Hand But Not the Heart - or, The Life-Trials of Jessie Loring • T. S. Arthur
... opening up a bewildering attack of criss-crosses, line plunges, cross-bucks, and tandems, from all of which the forward pass frequently developed; they literally overwhelmed a supposedly unbeatable team. And once they got the edge, it was hard for Bannister to regain poise and to smother the fast plays that swept through or ...
— T. Haviland Hicks Senior • J. Raymond Elderdice
... figure of that type immortalised by Du Maurier—indeed, she herself may be recognised in some of his famous society sketches about the year 1870. The clear, decisive features, the tender discerning expression, the poise of the head, were irresistibly attractive to all artists with a strong sense of grace—even artificial grace—as opposed to rude vigour or homeliness. She possessed naturally that almost unreal elegance which ...
— Robert Orange - Being a Continuation of the History of Robert Orange • John Oliver Hobbes
... to a council that had been called, and Dick turned to Pennington and Warner, who were not hurt, save for slight wounds. Warner had recovered his poise, and was soon as calm and ...
— The Guns of Shiloh • Joseph A. Altsheler
... moment her poise had fled from her and she knew that he must note the high colour in her cheeks. And the colour had come not in response to his words but in quick answer to his look. A young giant of a man, he stood staring at her like some artless boy who at a bend in the ...
— Six Feet Four • Jackson Gregory
... recovered her mental poise and put the hateful memories away from her as she went steadily up the narrow stairs and along the hall with its curious slant as the house had settled, to her own room under ...
— Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1902 to 1903 • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... doing the only thing a man could do to stem her tears, I completely lost track of the order of things. I do not believe either of us was calm enough for words for some time after the meeting. It was she who regained mental poise first. ...
— Lords of the North • A. C. Laut
... amusement, watching him intently. She held the tip of a closed fan against her lips, which brought her head slightly forward in an attitude as though she listened. Somehow there was about her an air of poise, of absolute balanced repose quite different from Jane's rather awkward statics, and in direct ...
— The Riverman • Stewart Edward White
... her while she climbed the short ladder to the already curtained berth. Molly's system might be aquiver with wonder but she never showed loss of wits or poise. She might have traveled so a hundred times. Back of the curtain she curled up half-undressed but, even as Sandy registered to himself with a low chuckle: "She never ...
— Rimrock Trail • J. Allan Dunn
... Gabler had hesitated and her father's pistol hadn't been hard by, she would have recovered her poise and deceived her husband. I believe that if Emma Bovary had escaped that snag of debt she would have continued to fool Charles. And I believe Mildred Lawson married at last and fooled herself into ...
— Ivory Apes and Peacocks • James Huneker
... suddenly to flash almost to violet. Her figure was slim—she was, indeed, little more than a girl—but very shapely and elegant. She could scarcely be called tall, but there was something in her carriage which seemed to exaggerate her height. The very poise of her head indicated a somewhat contemptuous indifference to the people ...
— The Lost Ambassador - The Search For The Missing Delora • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... executive power, and is its peculiar duty? Who is he, that, generous and confiding towards power where it is most dangerous, and jealous only of those who can restrain it,—who is he, that, reversing the order of the state, and upheaving the base, would poise the pyramid of the political system upon its apex? Who is he, that, overlooking with contempt the guardianship of the representatives of the people, and with equal contempt the higher guardianship of the people themselves,—who is he that declares to us, ...
— The Great Speeches and Orations of Daniel Webster • Daniel Webster
... surprise and then slowly obeyed. She shuffled across the porch, and at the door, which Mary Louise held open for her, paused and looked about her in indecision. She was a buxom creature, of the type that the Negroes about the station would call a "High Brown," but without the poise and aplomb that conscious membership in that class ...
— Stubble • George Looms
... in the individual, death the restoration of the individual to the whole. This doubt as to a personal future life will unquestionably increase. Let traditional teachers beware how they venture to shift the moral law from its immutable basis in the will of God to a precarious poise on the selfish hope and fear of man. The sole safety, the ultimate desideratum, is perception ...
— The Destiny of the Soul - A Critical History of the Doctrine of a Future Life • William Rounseville Alger
... Fitzgerald admired her beauty he yet more admired her perfect poise and unconcern. Many another woman would have evinced some ...
— A Splendid Hazard • Harold MacGrath
... general or undecorated "horizon" blue of the Poilu. The look that I saw in his eyes, the calm, steady, utterly emotionless looking straight forward, I saw everywhere at the front and at the back of the front. It embodied for me an enduring impression of the spirit and the poise of the French soldier of the latest and most terrible of French struggles. And I confess that, more than all I saw and heard at the front and in Paris, the look of this man convinced me that Verdun would not fall, that France herself would not ...
— They Shall Not Pass • Frank H. Simonds
... Jake, Gordon instinctively knew, who threatened him most; he could easily stop the hulking shape before him. He regained his poise, and returned blow for blow with Mr. Ottinger; neither man guarded, both were solely intent upon marking, crippling, the other. A chair fell, sliding across the floor; a washstand collapsed with a splintering crash of china, a miniature flood. Em stood on the outskirts ...
— Mountain Blood - A Novel • Joseph Hergesheimer
... men in Congress come to blows at something someone said, I always notice that it shows their blood is quick and red; But if two women disagree, with very little noise, It proves, and this seems strange to me, that women have no poise. ...
— Are Women People? • Alice Duer Miller
... velvety lashes, feeling the warm strong beat of her heart against his, holding close as he did all her glowing and fragrant beauty, Warren Gregory felt it the most exquisite moment of his life. Her youth, her history, her wonderful poise and sureness so intoxicatingly linked with all a girl's unexpected shyness and adorable uncertainties, all these combined to enthrall the man who had admired her for many years and loved her for ...
— The Heart of Rachael • Kathleen Norris
... embarrassed before Ramona Wadley that morning, but he was not in the least self-conscious now. In the course of a short and turbid life he had looked too many tough characters in the eye to let any mere man disturb his poise. ...
— Oh, You Tex! • William Macleod Raine
... lamp-oil, charming to see her little white teeth as she smiled, her lustrous eyes shining in the light like large stars. It was charming to see her there at all, for she was charming altogether—in figure, in face and poise, in expression, which was that of a graceful child playing housewife; lastly, in the benevolence, curiosity and discretion which sat enthroned upon her smooth brow, like a bench of Lords Justices, or of Bishops, if you prefer it. This was none other than Dr. Porfirio's wife, as he then and there ...
— The Fool Errant • Maurice Hewlett
... pulled all the legs off me, and to this hour I cannot tell you if it is best to put your foot into a footmark—a young pond, I mean—about the size of the bottom of a Madeira work arm-chair, or whether you should poise yourself on the rim of the same, and stride forward to its other bank boldly and hopefully. The footmarks and the places where the elephants had been rolling were by now filled with water, and the mud underneath was in places hard and ...
— Travels in West Africa • Mary H. Kingsley
... of happiness; it was in her one child, Master Johnny Temple, now just passed his third year. With considerable likeness to his father, this child possessed the hereditary beauty of the St. Legers, with that peculiar, queenly poise of the head ...
— Hubert's Wife - A Story for You • Minnie Mary Lee
... who lived at a distance had already started home. It lacked but a few minutes of the closing hour when I sought out Esther for the "Home, Sweet Home" waltz, finding her in company of Oxenford, chaperoned by Mrs. Martin, of which there was need. My sweetheart excused herself with a poise that made my heart leap, and as we whirled away in the mazes of the final dance, rivals and all else passed into oblivion. Before we could realize the change in the music, the orchestra had stopped, and struck into "My Country, 'tis of Thee," in which the ...
— A Texas Matchmaker • Andy Adams
... side of my tent, though I had fancied myself well beyond their reach. These special waves are not raised by wind or tide, but by the fall of large bergs from the snout of the glacier, or sometimes by the overturning or breaking of large bergs that may have long floated in perfect poise. The highest berg-waves oftentimes travel half a dozen miles or farther before they are much spent, producing a singularly impressive uproar in the far recesses of the mountains on calm dark nights when all beside is still. Far and near they tell the news that a berg is born, repeating ...
— Travels in Alaska • John Muir
... frequently urged on grounds of health, since the wear and tear of too intense absorption in any pursuit is apt to wreck the nervous system. I urge it on the ground of mental sanity, since a man cannot maintain his mental poise if he follows the object of his devotion singly, without seeing it in relation to other objects. And I urge it also on the ground of spirituality, for a salient characteristic of spirituality is calmness, and without the mental repose which comes of detachment ...
— The Essentials of Spirituality • Felix Adler
... poise, Vic tugged at his belt and felt the weight of the holster slipping into a more convenient place, then he sauntered up the aisle, sweeping off his sombrero. Every feeling in his body, every nerve, disappeared in a crystalline ...
— The Seventh Man • Max Brand
... little sophism confounded poor George for a minute, during which Sally began to giggle violently, and flirt in her rustic fashion with the three rebels in a row. At length George, recovering his poise and clear-sightedness, resumed,— ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. I, No. 1, Nov. 1857 • Various
... needed was terrible as he went on and on, increasing his speed now, slowing then, and getting more and more over with far less effort, and giving us no end of encouragement, as he at length reached the rocks, tumbled the load off his head—the load which had never seemed once to lose its poise—and finally we could see him seated facing us wiping his hot face with the front ...
— To The West • George Manville Fenn
... Gravity sat in her eyes, hung on the warm red lips. I had known her solemn before, but not like this. The proud face looked very resolute. There was a strength about the lift of the delicate chin, a steadfast fearlessness about the poise of the well-shaped head—unworldly wonders, which I had never seen. Over the glorious temples the soft dark hair swept rich and lustrous. The exquisite column of her neck rose from her flowered silk gown with matchless elegance. Her precious hands, all rosy, lay in her lap. Crossed legs gave ...
— Berry And Co. • Dornford Yates
... rather caused general uneasiness and dislike; LINCOLN left America more beloved than ever by all the peoples of Europe. Palmerston was self-possessed and adroit in reconciling the conflicting factions of the aristocracy; LINCOLN, frank and ingenuous, knew how to poise himself on the ever-moving opinions of the masses. Palmerston was capable of insolence towards the weak, quick to the sense of ...
— Memorial Address on the Life and Character of Abraham Lincoln - Delivered at the request of both Houses of Congress of America • George Bancroft
... notion of it. Sally became secret, and her determination was made more emphatic. She began to study her face, and her body. One day her mother found her naked in front of a mirror, twisting herself so that she could see the poise of her figure. It was a pretty figure, if underdeveloped, and from that time of thorough examination onwards Sally never had the smallest doubt of her own attractiveness and its principal constituents. Only her face was wrong, she felt with bitter chagrin; her face and her hair. If ...
— Coquette • Frank Swinnerton
... wildness of the country, Buck Johnson and his foreman inclined to the belief that the stranger had undertaken a task beyond the powers of any one man. Again, remembering the stranger's cool grey eye, the poise of his demeanour, the quickness of his movements, and the two guns with tied holsters to permit of easy withdrawal, they were almost ...
— Arizona Nights • Stewart Edward White
... the house. They inquired where Eugene was, and she replied that she did not know. They did not suspect that she had taken advantage of this lack of guardianship, and yet there was something unwonted in her manner which led them to look at each other furtively when they first noticed it. The perfect poise of decision at which she had arrived affected their minds in some subtle fashion. Eugene, when he returned late in the afternoon, noticed the change in her, in spite of his own perturbation. He looked hard ...
— Madelon - A Novel • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... her. While she had been cordial enough, yet there was an underlying suggestion of reserve, not at all apparent and yet unmistakably felt. It was, he felt, as though in her life and training and experience, she had acquired a poise, a knowledge of at least certain parts of the world and its affairs, which gave her confidence, made her at home, and taught her how to deal with situations which other girls less broadly endowed would have found over-powering, or, at ...
— Prince or Chauffeur? - A Story of Newport • Lawrence Perry
... was heroic by nature, and quickly recovered her poise. When she arrived at home she sent the nurse to Charles Town on an errand, then went directly to her bedroom, which was disconnected from the other rooms, and called her three devoted maids, Rebecca, Flora, and Esther. ...
— The Conqueror • Gertrude Franklin Atherton
... girl. Hardly more than a child she seemed, not over fourteen at the outside, and with a figure that was all flatness and unlovely angles. Certainly an exceedingly ugly duckling, yet there was promise of future swanship in the clean curves of her neck and in the firm poise of the small head. Moreover, her coloring was good, a clear brown through which a scarlet flush, born of the excitement of the moment, glowed intermittently, like the flashing of distant signal-flags. And in her eyes there was a curious red glint ...
— The Doomsman • Van Tassel Sutphen
... wrong of the slain, to claim revenge. Now, hearing from this woman's mouth of mine, The tale and eke its warning, pray with me, Luck sway the scale, with no uncertain poise. For my fair hopes are changed ...
— The House of Atreus • AEschylus |
