"Preen" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... and looking out through the vermilion doors, I used to surprise a pair of swallows dropping down from their nest in the cedar-beams to preen themselves on the fountain's edge or in the channels of the pavement, for the roof was full of birds who came and went through the broken panes of the clerestory. Usually they were my only visitors, but one morning just at daylight I was ...
— In Morocco • Edith Wharton
... he cried abruptly, his voice ringing with a new menace in it, "what are you doing here? Why don't you go on? What are you staying here for? Is the world so damned small that you've got to come and preen ...
— Wolf Breed • Jackson Gregory
... tranquil, majestic soaring of his kind. Presently, far below the soaring wings, appeared a tiny dark shape, zigzagging swiftly downward; and soon the king-bird, hastening across the river, alighted once more on his branch and began to preen himself composedly. ...
— The Watchers of the Trails - A Book of Animal Life • Charles G. D. Roberts
... determined that you shall adore me, pretty face, pretty figure, pretty ways and all." Nor yet to herself did she put things so baldly. She did, however, yield herself luxuriously to the springtime, the romance of the hour, the appeal of her latest cavalier, and preen herself like a mating bird. King saw, admired, and in his own fashion played his own part. It was not clear to him that there had been a new pleasure in his own strength when he had lifted her into her saddle, and yet her ...
— The Everlasting Whisper • Jackson Gregory
... wild creatures keep themselves clean. Birds, it seems to me, take more pains to bathe and dress themselves than any other animals. Even ducks, though living so much in water, dip and scatter cleansing showers over their backs, and shake and preen their feathers as carefully as land-birds. Watching small singers taking their morning baths is very interesting, particularly when the weather is cold. Alighting in a shallow pool, they oftentimes show a sort of dread of dipping into it, like children hesitating about taking ...
— The Story of My Boyhood and Youth • John Muir
... for me Than lodgment in that Great Menagerie Where Birds of aureate Plumage preen their Quills And Social Lions growl above ...
— The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam Jr. (The Rubiyt of Omar Khayym Jr.) • Wallace Irwin
... anything that gets something for nothing. I batten on the mangy hides of the workingmen. I don't have to gamble. I don't have to work. My father left me enough of his winnings.—Oh, don't preen yourself, my boy. Your folks were just as bad as mine. But yours lost, and mine won, and so you plow in ...
— The Valley of the Moon • Jack London
... In crystal flagons you detect the sheen of amber light (which may be sherry wine), whilst the ear is lulled with the sound of fountains dispensing perfumes as of Araby. In an alcove, chastely draped with violent violet velvet, the grey apes swing, and the peacocks preen, on fretted pillar and jewelled screen. Horologes, to chime the hours, and even the quarters, uprise from tables of ebony-and-mother-of-pearl. Cabinets from Ind and Venice, of filligree gold and silver, enclose complete ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 98, February 8, 1890 • Various
... kiss'd the kiss: And the Bride, who came from her coach a Miss, As a Countess walk'd to her carriage— Whilst Hymen preen'd his plumes like a dove, And Cupid flutter'd his wings above, In the shape of a fly—as little a Love As ever ...
— The Poetical Works of Thomas Hood • Thomas Hood |
