"Sleek" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... Valentina Mihailovna said something kindly to him, but he did not quite catch what it was and did not reply. He noticed that she was very bright, and clung to her husband affectionately. He did not like Kolia's befrizzled and pomaded head, and when his eye fell on Kollomietzev, thought, "What a sleek individual." He paid no attention to the others. Sipiagin turned his head once or twice in a dignified manner, as if looking round at his worldly belongings, a pose that set off to perfection his long drooping whiskers and somewhat small round neck. ...
— Virgin Soil • Ivan S. Turgenev
... Surnames of Honour how difficult it often is to ascertain not only why, but even when, they were conferred, takes occasion in his sleek official way, to make a philosophical reflection. 'The Surname of Bien-aime (Well-beloved),' says he, 'which Louis XV. bears, will not leave posterity in the same doubt. This Prince, in the year ...
— The French Revolution • Thomas Carlyle
... doubted them, but because he had a hankering to feel their smoothness of operation. Bud loved a good car just as he had loved a good horse in the years behind him. Just as he used to walk around a good horse and pat its sleek shoulder and feel the hard muscles of its trim legs, so now he made love to this big car. Let that old hen of Foster's crab the trip ...
— Cabin Fever • B. M. Bower
... faces in it, except one, she perceived intent expressions. A sleek and plump man, with hanging cheeks, a hooked nose, and hair slightly tinged with grey and parted in the middle, was the exception. He sat in a low chair, pouting his lips, playing with his single eyeglass, and looking as sulky as an ill-conditioned school-boy. Once or twice ...
— The Woman With The Fan • Robert Hichens
... said Claudia, in a tone of deep pity, "he is thin and pale, isn't he? And Fido is so fat and sleek! I'm afraid he doesn't get enough ...
— Ishmael - In the Depths • Mrs. E. D. E. N. Southworth
... an ale-house bench, Whereon I sit so jolly; A smiling rosy country wench My saint and patron holy. I kiss her cheek so red and sleek, I press her ringlets wavy; And in her willing ear I speak A ...
— The Paris Sketch Book Of Mr. M. A. Titmarsh • William Makepeace Thackeray
... wood, the curtains of the three great windows were tremendous, and there was a cheval glass that showed the full length of him and seemed to look over his head for more,—and meditated upon this visit of his. It was more than he had been prepared for. It was going to be a great strain. The sleek young manservant in an alpaca jacket, who said "Sir" whenever you looked at him, and who had seized upon and unpacked Billy's most private Gladstone bag without even asking if he might do so, and put away and displayed Billy's things in a way that struck ...
— The Research Magnificent • H. G. Wells
... of the brule was marked out to clear after the axes. The logs, brush, and stumps had to be removed and dragged to the burning-piles. Aleck, with his active, invincible French-Canadians, Ranald with Farquhar's big, sleek blacks, and Don with his father's team, worked side by side. A contest was inevitable, and before an hour had passed Don and Aleck, while making a great show of deliberation, were striving for the first place, with Aleck easily leading. ...
— The Man From Glengarry - A Tale Of The Ottawa • Ralph Connor
... to the ground, sinuous, graceful, incessantly active flashed the marten. Along a log it raced in undulating leaps; in the middle it stopped as though frozen, to gaze intently into a bed of sedge; with three billowy bounds its sleek form reached the sedge, flashed in and out again with a mouse in its snarling jaws; a side leap now, and another squeaker was squeakless, and another. The three were slain, then thrown aside, as the brown terror scanned a flight of ducks passing over. Into a thicket of willow it disappeared ...
— Rolf In The Woods • Ernest Thompson Seton
... how slowly, and with what fantastic and ludicrous results at first; as when the anatomical sculptor Pollaiolo gives scenes of naked Roman prize-fighters as martyrdoms of St. Sebastian; or when the pious Perugino (pious at least with his brush) dresses up his sleek, hectic, beardless archangels as Roman warriors, and makes them stand, straddling beatically on thin little dapper legs, wistfully gazing from beneath their wondrously ornamented helmets on the walls of the Cambio at Perugia; when he masquerades meditative fathers ...
— Euphorion - Being Studies of the Antique and the Mediaeval in the - Renaissance - Vol. I • Vernon Lee
... much exertion to drag the limbers up the steep, slippery trail. It was curious to notice the difference between those who dwelt along the bank and the inhabitants of the upland plateau. The latter appeared distinctly more "outlandish" and less sleek and prosperous. The highlands we found veiled in mist, and as I looked back at the dim outlines of horse and man and caisson, it seemed as if I ...
— War in the Garden of Eden • Kermit Roosevelt
... never gave him a chance," she responded. "He's a sly one, too, padding around the offices like a cat, in his soft slippers; and he looks for all the world like a cat, with the sleek white whiskers of him! Excuse me, Miss Lawton, I don't mean to be disrespectful, but he's trying, the old gentleman is! I think he got suspicious of me when Margaret Hefferman made such a botch of her job ...
— The Crevice • William John Burns and Isabel Ostrander
... and chased away the shadows of the night. Birds in hot rooms, covered up close and dark, felt it was morning, and chafed and grew restless in their little cells; bright-eyed mice crept back to their tiny homes and nestled timidly together; the sleek house-cat, forgetful of her prey, sat winking at the rays of sun starting through keyhole and cranny in the door, and longed for her stealthy run and warm sleek bask outside. The nobler beasts confined in dens, stood motionless behind their bars and gazed on fluttering ...
— The Old Curiosity Shop • Charles Dickens
... of hot chocolate which seethed and sang in a tall silvery tank with a blue gas burner underneath. This she served in thick china mugs with a clot of whipped cream swimming on top. Julia would buy a box of the cheese crackers that Schulz kept in stock specially for her, and give several to the sleek little black bitch that stood pleading with her quaint turned-out fore-feet placed on Julia's slippers. Schulz, beaming serenely behind a pyramid of "intense carnation" bottles on his perfume counter, would chuckle at the antics of his pet. "Ah, he is a wise little dog!" he would exclaim ...
— Shandygaff • Christopher Morley
... Seine,[42] are busy by thousands in the manufactories,—the sound of the loom and the anvil comes up to us even here; and down by the banks of the river, away westward, as far as the eye can see, up spring clean bright houses of the wealthy manufacturers and traders of Rouen,—rich, sleek, and portly gentlemen with the thinnest boots, who never even pass down the old streets if they can help it, but whom we shall find very pleasant and hospitable; and with whom we may sit down at a cafe under the trees and play at dominoes in the open street, ...
— Normandy Picturesque • Henry Blackburn
... thee so violent, friend?" said some one behind them. And turning quickly, they perceived the sleek, clean-shaven, well-groomed figure of a Quaker, dressed in a shad-bellied brown coat, a low black silk hat with a ...
— His Lordship's Leopard - A Truthful Narration of Some Impossible Facts • David Dwight Wells
... she went on mumbling titles as she struggled along, the sun beating fiercely on her bare head. Such a quaint head, with sleek black hair parted and plaited and hung with jewels, even down the long pigtail of brown wool that was added on to the back to make ...
— The Adventures of Akbar • Flora Annie Steel
... Nymph; and bring with thee Jest and youthful Jollity, Quips and cranks and wanton wiles, Nods and becks and wreathed smiles Such as hang on HEBE's cheek And love to live in dimple sleek; Sport that wrinkled Care derides, And ...
— An English Garner - Critical Essays & Literary Fragments • Edited by Professor Arber and Thomas Seccombe
... the side—, two muscular brown hands gripped it close to my left, and a sleek, black, wet head showed its top between them. Two bright, blue eyes that held deep within them a laughing deviltry looked into mine, and a long, lithe body drew itself gently over the thwart and seated its dripping self ...
— The Moon Pool • A. Merritt
... has probably become cognisant of the match-making methods practised by other nations, and he has, therefore, abandoned that affected by his forefathers. It is still a common thing, however, to see him astride a horse with a sleek skin and noble appearance and plenty of life in it, cantering gaily towards the residence of his beloved or intended. Sometimes, too, in order, perhaps, to add more lustre to his own appearance, he is to be seen suffering untold agony under the unyielding brim ...
— The Boer in Peace and War • Arthur M. Mann
... glancing through the boles and branches of the venerable trees dotted here and there in clumps along the roadside; of the verdant hedges with their rich clusters of delicate dog-roses and trailing honeysuckle or wild convolvulus; of the groups of sleek cattle feeding in the fields, contemplatively chewing the cud under the shade of some over-hanging tree, or browsing along the roadside; of the knots of rosy, sun-tanned children playing about the village-roads or on the green, and turning to stand open-mouthed and stare at ...
— Under the Meteor Flag - Log of a Midshipman during the French Revolutionary War • Harry Collingwood
... then, you brutes! Get on with you, get on with you!" The bay and the Assessor too felt put out at not hearing themselves called "my pets" or "good lads"; while, in addition, the skewbald came in for some nasty cuts across his sleek and ample quarters. "What has put master out like this?" thought the animal as it shook its head. "Heaven knows where he does not keep beating me—across the back, and even where I am tenderer still. Yes, he keeps catching the whip ...
— Dead Souls • Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol
... thus given for MACH. to get into touch with POPE, and time for POPE and retinue to reach the slope of Fiesole. SAV., glancing down across ridge, sees these sleuth-hounds, points them out to LUC. and cries Bewray'd! LUC. By whom? SAV. I know not, but suspect | The hand of that sleek serpent Niccolo | Machiavelli.—SAV. and LUC. rush down c., but find their way barred by the footlights.—LUC. We will not be ta'en Alive. And here availeth us my lore | In what pertains to poison. Yonder herb | ...
— Seven Men • Max Beerbohm
... being a fool. There is no sharper, shrewder man in New York, and no one who estimates his customers more correctly. He puts a high price on his services, and is said to have accumulated a handsome fortune, popularly estimated at about $300,000. Fat and sleek, and smooth of tongue, he can be a very despot when he chooses. He keeps a list of the fashionable young men of the city, who find it to their interest to be on good terms with him, since they are mainly dependent upon him for their invitations. Report says that, like a certain ...
— Lights and Shadows of New York Life - or, the Sights and Sensations of the Great City • James D. McCabe
... to which he belonged never to waste any material that might come to hand. In the finely-cut face before him, with its Oriental modelling and impassivity, he read brains, refinement and endurance. Her hair was plaited in two long braids, and drawn down over her ears, showing the contour of a sleek, smooth little head. ...
— The Hippodrome • Rachel Hayward
... now I should not have stopped when I did. Another mile and that big, dust-coloured thing would have been yards and yards behind; would she not, Rollo?" And she bent forward and caressed the Norman's sleek neck. I did not contradict her statement, but contented myself by saying humbly that there could be no comparison between ...
— Orrain - A Romance • S. Levett-Yeats
... he entered the "Rising Sun" in Meek Street, there was nothing of the policeman about him. He might probably have been taken for a betting man, with whom the world had latterly gone well enough to enable him to maintain that sleek, easy, greasy appearance which seems to be the beau-ideal of a betting man's personal ambition. "Well, Mr. Howard," said the lady at the bar, "a sight of you is good for ...
— The Eustace Diamonds • Anthony Trollope
... the dry and desert-like valleys of the West! Land which under Nature's treatment supports only a scanty growth of sagebrush or greasewood, and over which a few half-starved cattle have roamed, becomes, when irrigated, covered with green fields and neat homes, while sleek, well-fed herds graze upon the rich alfalfa. Ten acres of irrigated land will in many places support a family, where without irrigation a square mile would not ...
— The Western United States - A Geographical Reader • Harold Wellman Fairbanks
... field is capable of identifying that spot—" Gregory pointed to a ten-foot circle in front of a bank of sleek-cabineted, dial-studded machines "—with any set of space-time coordinates in the universe. However, to avoid disruption of the structure of space-time, we must return you to approximately the ...
— Hunter Patrol • Henry Beam Piper and John J. McGuire
... Beneficent Spirit. For day followed day, and night followed night, and Ahtik's flesh and blood put into Neewa and Miki a strength and growth that developed marvellously. By the fourth day Neewa had become so fat and sleek that he was half again as big as on the day he fell out of the canoe. Miki had begun to fill out. His ribs could no longer be counted from a distance. His chest was broadening and his legs were losing some of their angular clumsiness. Practice on Ahtik's bones ...
— Nomads of the North - A Story of Romance and Adventure under the Open Stars • James Oliver Curwood
... than when he had arrived at the station at Lazette two weeks before, his face tanned, but still retaining the smooth, sleek manner which he had brought with him from the East, David Dowd Langford sat in a big rocking chair on the lower gallery of the Double R ranchhouse, mentally appraising Duncan, who was seated near by, ...
— The Trail to Yesterday • Charles Alden Seltzer
... has it on us, old dear," chirped Buck Ogilvy plaintively. "Well! We did our damndest, which angels can't do no more. Let us gather up our tools and go home, my son, for something tells me that if I hang around here I'll bust one of two things—this sleek scoundrel's gray head or one of my bellicose veins! ...
— The Valley of the Giants • Peter B. Kyne
... But the tan shoes were not Jerry's only concession to the social amenities. An unwonted attention was given to grimy knuckles and finger-nails. More than once he made his appearance with his usually frowsy hair as sleek as the coat of a water rat, and dripping, in further likeness to the animal mentioned. Peggy, whose original interest in Jerry had been intensified by the favorable impression he had made on Graham, hailed these signs of awakening ...
— Peggy Raymond's Vacation - or Friendly Terrace Transplanted • Harriet L. (Harriet Lummis) Smith
... sleek and fat, and his days were long in the land. He consented indeed to partake of our hospitality for over a year, won many hearts, but kept his own intact, until the following spring, when a young man's fancy lightly turns to ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 156, March 19, 1919 • Various
... was palpitant with life. Every pair of birds that had flocked to it in the spring was now multiplied by from two to ten. The young were tame from Freckles' tri-parenthood, and so plump and sleek that they were quite as beautiful as their elders, even if in many cases they lacked their brilliant plumage. It was the same story of increase everywhere. There were chubby little ground-hogs scudding on the trail. There were cunning baby coons and opossums peeping from hollow logs and ...
— Freckles • Gene Stratton-Porter
... world,—perhaps the quotations of the cattle market. They came up to me, and eagerly licked my hand, clothes, and gun. Salt was what they were after, and they were ready to swallow anything that contained the smallest percentage of it. They were mostly yearlings and as sleek as moles. They had a very gamy look. We were afterwards told that, in the spring, the farmers round about turn into these woods their young cattle, which do not come out again till fall. They are then in good condition,—not fat, like grass-fed cattle, but trim and supple, like deer. Once ...
— Wake-Robin • John Burroughs
... been holding her down, she gave a little shriek. It was a small spotted cow in a red flannel petticoat. She wore stout button boots on her hind feet, and she now reared herself upon these to flourish two angry hoofs over the sleek head of a little man in a white linen coat who held a tiny mirror in one hand and a pair of pincers in the other. Ann took a great dislike to this little man at once, and felt more afraid of him than of the Cow or of the handsome Indian Chief in full ...
— The Wonderful Bed • Gertrude Knevels
... Philadelphia to Savannah, or from Richmond to Augusta; but John Wesley had made many such rides in the Odyssey of his wonder years. Some of them had been made in haste. But there was no haste now. Sam Bass, his corn-fed sorrel, was hardly less sleek and sturdy than at the start, though a third of the way was behind him. Pringle rode by easy stages, and where he found himself pleased, there ...
— The Desire of the Moth; and The Come On • Eugene Manlove Rhodes
... sleek and in high spirits, owing to a good night's rest and a plentiful supply of his favorite provender, Mr. Jinks remained for a moment irresolute before the door of the hostelry, revolving in his mind various and conflicting thoughts ...
— The Last of the Foresters • John Esten Cooke
... exchanged reminiscences. McHenry drank steadily. The future governor of the Marquesas added a galon to his sleeves, marking his advance to a first lieutenancy in the French colonial army. He was a very soft, sleek man, a little worn already, his black hair a trifle thin, but he was plump, his skin white as milk, and his jetty beard and mustache elaborately cared for. He was much before the mirror, combing and brushing and ...
— White Shadows in the South Seas • Frederick O'Brien
... naturally during the London Season that the life of the Hurlingham Girl is at its fullest and best. On week-day mornings she is a frequent attendant in the Row, the means of her father being apparently sufficient to provide her with a sleek and showy Park hack and an irreproachable groom. Thence she hastens home to rest and dawdle until the hour arrives for luncheon, to which meal she has invited the youth who happens to be temporarily dancing attendance upon her, for it is understood in many houses that luncheon ...
— Punch, Vol. 99., July 26, 1890. • Various
... returning on a slow walk, having run far beyond the mark, and heard that the long, bony one had come in head and shoulders before the other. The riders were light-built men; had handkerchiefs tied round their heads; and were bare-armed and bare-legged. The horses were noble-looking beasts, not so sleek and combed as our Boston stable-horses, but with fine limbs, and spirited eyes. After this had been settled, and fully talked over, the crowd scattered again and flocked ...
— Two Years Before the Mast • Richard Henry Dana
... into a small fortune, which I squandered. My mother helped me; then she died. My brothers cut me, condemning me as a Bohemian and a vagabond. I confess that I did take a malicious pleasure in rubbing their sleek fur the wrong way. Then I crossed the Atlantic as the guest of an American millionaire. He took me on in his own car to California. I started a studio in San Francisco—and a life class. That undid me, I found myself bankrupt. Then I fell desperately ill. Each ...
— Bunch Grass - A Chronicle of Life on a Cattle Ranch • Horace Annesley Vachell
... preparing to retire, a sleek and dapper fellow, though with clothes rather the worse for wear, came trudging along the road toward Marietta. Seeing our camp, he asked for a drink. Being apparently disposed to tarry, the Doctor, to get him started, offered to walk a piece with him. Our comrade staid out ...
— Afloat on the Ohio - An Historical Pilgrimage of a Thousand Miles in a Skiff, from Redstone to Cairo • Reuben Gold Thwaites
... skeptical life lead a man? Friend Arthur was a Sadducee, and the Baptist might be in the Wilderness shouting to the poor, who were listening with all their might and faith to the preacher's awful accents and denunciations of wrath or woe or salvation; and our friend the Sadducee would turn his sleek mule with a shrug and a smile from the crowd, and go home to the shade of his terrace, and muse over preacher and audience, and turn to his roll of Plato, or his pleasant Greek song-book babbling of honey and Hybla, ...
— The History of Pendennis, Vol. 2 - His Fortunes and Misfortunes, His Friends and His Greatest Enemy • William Makepeace Thackeray
... castle, on the contrary, in spite of its bullying look, is completely under petticoat government. Every corner and nook is built up into some snug, cozy nestling place, some "procreant cradle," not tenanted by meager expectants or whiskered warriors, but by sleek placemen; knowing realizers of present pay and present pudding; who seem placed there not to kill and destroy, but to breed and multiply. Nursery maids and children shine with rosy faces at the windows, and swarm about the courts and terraces. The very soldiers ...
— The Crayon Papers • Washington Irving
... the markets you may see whole dogs dressed for food, or cut up into pieces ready for cooking. These are not common yellow dogs, such as you saw in the capital of the Turkish empire; but they are the peculiar Chinese breed, sleek and hairless, which are carefully fatted, and prepared for market. I have no doubt that your stomachs revolt at the very idea of eating dog; but I cannot see that it is any worse than eating pork and ...
— Four Young Explorers - Sight-Seeing in the Tropics • Oliver Optic
... The sleek jailer, whose attempt to be cordial provokes a certain distrust, comes to our corridor to "turn us over" to our next keeper-the warden of Occoquan. ...
— Jailed for Freedom • Doris Stevens
... himself the poor luxury of a centime light. Possibly it was a little shopman, as the abbe had suggested, struggling with fortune—not scrupulous in honesty, and shunning observation; or it might be (who could tell) a sleek-faced villain, stealing about in the dusk, and far into the night, making the dim chamber his home only when more honest lodgers were ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII. No. 3. March 1848 • Various
... do as the son said, and then the lad turned himself into a greyhound, and he was so sleek and handsome that the man could not admire him enough; but about his neck was an old, worn leash that did not look as though it were worth a penny. It seemed a pity to leave it on the neck ...
— Tales of Folk and Fairies • Katharine Pyle
... especial charge. In all its arrangements his house was a model of order and comfort; and the whole establishment partook of the genial physiognomy of the master. From the master and mistress to the cook, and from the cook to the torn cat, there was about the inhabitants of the vicarage a sleek and purring rotundity of face and figure that denoted community of feelings, habits, and diet; each in its kind, of course, for the doctor had his port, the cook her ale, and the cat his milk, in sufficiently liberal allowance. ...
— Gryll Grange • Thomas Love Peacock
... McSwiggins, but the rest of them were silent, gazing at this transformed and glorified Sweetheart, while Mary laid her head against the sleek neck and murmured love names to her dear ...
— Judy • Temple Bailey
... fear went to Craig; Craig to Maxwell Hunt; Hunt wired Mottly; Mottly, cold and sleek in his ...
— The Younger Set • Robert W. Chambers
... the South, where the passion for fine horses is universal, of the choicest parentage. He was blooded, and of Arabian, through English, stocks. You might detect his blood at a glance, even as you did that of his rider. The beast was large, high, broad-chested, sleek of skin, wiry of limb, with no excess of fat, and no straggling hair; small ears, a glorious mane, and a great lively eye. At once docile and full of life, he trod the earth with the firm pace of an elephant, yet with the ease ...
— Guy Rivers: A Tale of Georgia • William Gilmore Simms
... smoothen^; plane; file; mow, shave; level, roll; macadamize; polish, burnish, calender^, glaze; iron, hot-press, mangle; lubricate &c (oil) 332. Adj. smooth; polished &c v.; leiodermatous^, slick, velutinous^; even; level &c 213; plane &c (flat) 251; sleek, glossy; silken, silky; lanate^, downy, velvety; glabrous, slippery, glassy, lubricous, oily, soft, unwrinkled^; smooth as glass, smooth as ice, smooth as monumental alabaster, smooth as velvet, smooth as oil; slippery as an eel; woolly &c (feathery) 256. Phr. smooth ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... given lifts to tramping harvesters and even hoboes along the road; had enjoyed the sight of their duffle-bags stuck up between the sleek fenders and the hood, and their talk about people and crops along the road, as they hung on the running-board. In the country of long hillslopes and sentinel buttes between the Dakota Bad Lands and Miles City she stopped to shout to a man ...
— Free Air • Sinclair Lewis
... ships that have sailed the seven seas has been built up at Quincy—a dramatic history and one instinct with the beauty which is part of gliding canoe and white sails, and part, too, of the huge smooth-slipping monsters of a modern day, sleek and swift as leviathans. But all the while the building of these ships has been going on, there has been slowly rising within the selfsame radius another ship, vaster, more inspiring, calling forth initiative even more intense, idealism even more ...
— The Old Coast Road - From Boston to Plymouth • Agnes Rothery
... painted. His powerful, loosely clad figure stepped nervously back and forward, his brush now poised trembling in the air, now dabbing and swishing on the long-suffering canvas. His mop of brown hair had started the day brushed back and comparatively sleek; it was now a mere tousel. His butterfly tie had been a thing of some esthetic pretensions; it was become a tangle of silk. His smile had been bland and his manner courteous; he now resembled a buffalo with ...
— The Prodigal Father • J. Storer Clouston
... excitement, as he pointed to the animal nearest to them, which happened to be a black, sleek, fat young bull, with slender ...
— The Fugitives - The Tyrant Queen of Madagascar • R.M. Ballantyne
... one, Pale sot of the Maldive sea, The sleek little pilot-fish, azure and slim, How alert in attendance be. From his saw-pit of mouth, from his charnel of maw They have nothing of harm to dread, But liquidly glide on his ghastly flank Or before his Gorgonian head: Or lurk in the port ...
— John Marr and Other Poems • Herman Melville
... which to lubricate the machinery of his great enterprise. She had heard, at various times, the embittered details of the disappearance of this money, little by little. Nearly a quarter of it, all told, had been appropriated by a sleek old braggart of a company-promoter, who had cozened Joel into the belief that London could be best approached through him. When at last this wretch was kicked downstairs, the effect had been only to make room for a fresh lot of bloodsuckers. There were so-called ...
— The Market-Place • Harold Frederic
... being taken on the regimental strength, our canteen was the paradise of a battalion of mice, from whose nightly raids nothing was sacred. But from the day "Skilly" enlisted the marauders became less and less obtrusive. And "Skilly" grew sleek. ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 153, Aug 15, 1917 • Various
... appointed our hero made his appearance at the door, and, having given his name, was asked into the counting-house of the establishment, where sat Mr Small and his factotum, Mr Sleek. It may be as well here to describe the persons and ...
— The Poacher - Joseph Rushbrook • Frederick Marryat
... the literary and refined tastes of the inhabitants, which have earned for their city the name of the "American Athens." There is an air of repose about Boston; here, if anywhere, one would suppose that large fortunes were realised and enjoyed. The sleek horses do not appear to be hurried over the pavements; there are few placards, and fewer puffs; the very carts are built rather to carry weight than for speed. Yet no place which I visited looked more thriving than Boston. Its streets are literally crammed with vehicles, and the side walks are ...
— The Englishwoman in America • Isabella Lucy Bird
... Frenchman's teeth gleamed. In the big cook-stove the fire snapped and crackled and popped. Marie opened the stove door to put in more wood and her face shone rosy and her teeth were like milk in the fire-flash. Thoreau went to her and laid his big, heavy hand fondly on her sleek head, and said something in soft Cree that brought another giggle into Marie's throat, like the curious note of ...
— The Courage of Marge O'Doone • James Oliver Curwood
... King, the Royal Family, and all the Nobility; and the nonchalance with which he hurries over the more uncomfortable portions of the service, the seventh commandment for instance, with a studied regard for the taste and feeling of his auditors, only to be equalled by that displayed by the sleek divine who succeeds him, who murmurs, in a voice kept down by rich feeding, most comfortable doctrines for exactly twelve minutes, and then arrives at the anxiously expected 'Now to God,' which is the signal for the dismissal ...
— Sunday Under Three Heads • Charles Dickens
... a world of gnomes and hob-goblins, of ghouls and of laughing angels. The realist of the Thackeray School finds nothing but monstrous exaggeration here—and fantastic mummery. If he were right, par-dieu! If his sleek "reality" were all that there was—"alarum!" We were indeed "betrayed"! But no; the children are right. Dickens is right. Neither "realist" or "psychologist" hits the mark, when it comes to the true diablerie of living people. There is something more whimsical, ...
— Visions and Revisions - A Book of Literary Devotions • John Cowper Powys
... the fresh-sprinkled straw, The young pettitoes scampered away; And they rooted and burrowed and hid, Then all quiet a minute they lay: Soon their pink-pointed, noses peeped out; Then their bodies, so plump and so sleek. Oh the glad little piggies, the mad little piggies— How they snuffle ...
— The Nursery, June 1873, Vol. XIII. - A Monthly Magazine for Youngest People • Various
... horseback, without making more show than needful, each man, however, being well-armed with sword and arquebuse, so that, should they be attacked by robbers, they might defend themselves. No robbers appeared, but soon after they left London two persons, on sleek, well-fed steeds, were seen riding at a distance behind them. They wore long cloaks; their features concealed greatly by their wide-topped hats and the coifs they wore beneath. When the travellers stopped these men stopped also, and when they reached a hostel the ...
— The Golden Grasshopper - A story of the days of Sir Thomas Gresham • W.H.G. Kingston
... clipping. Winter was at hand, and Jap Malee put Kitty's cage out in the yard, protected only from the rain and the direct wind, and fed her with all the oil-cake and fish-heads she could eat. In a week a change began to show. She was rapidly getting fat and sleek—she had nothing to do but get fat and dress her fur. Her cage was kept clean, and nature responded to the chill weather and the oily food by making Kitty's coat thicker and glossier every day, so ...
— Animal Heroes • Ernest Thompson Seton
... one hand lifting a door panel, came in. His ragged uniform was gone, and he wore only breeches of a sleek green material and his own ...
— Storm Over Warlock • Andre Norton
... small and sleek, smooth and sly. When Travis had done with him, he showed him out. "Call day after to-morrow," he said, "and when you come, ask for me. Mr. Loeb never bothers with these ...
— The Fortune Hunter • David Graham Phillips
... sleek, well-groomed fellow, tall and slim, and, in the matter of years, somewhere in his forties. Duff always dressed well—with a foundation of the late styles of the east, with something of the swagger of the plains added to ...
— The Young Engineers in Arizona - Laying Tracks on the Man-killer Quicksand • H. Irving Hancock
... Dona Emilia would be gone "up to the mountain" in a day or two, and her sleek carriage mules would have an easy time of it for another long spell. She had watched the erection of the first frame-house put up on the lower mesa for an office and Don Pepe's quarters; she heard with a ...
— Nostromo: A Tale of the Seaboard • Joseph Conrad
... financier and diplomat on a small, obtrusive, self- important scale, sat in his favoured cafe in the world-wise Habsburg capital, confronted with the Neue Freie Presse and the cup of cream- topped coffee and attendant glass of water that a sleek-headed piccolo had just brought him. For years longer than a dog's lifetime sleek-headed piccolos had placed the Neue Freie Presse and a cup of cream-topped coffee on his table; for years he had sat at the same spot, ...
— The Toys of Peace • Saki
... approached the Witch's door, a young fur seal, who had been basking in a little pool left along the beach by the tide, hastened out of his puddle, and running swiftly toward him on his flappers, nuzzled his hand with his sleek, wet head, ...
— The Firelight Fairy Book • Henry Beston
... the governor and anybody coming from Government House. The grand-stand bears a minor importance to the betting ring, for the latter holds a surging, throbbing medley of humanity—society folk from India's innermost official set, sleek Parsees wearing gold rimmed eye-glasses, rajahs from all parts, wealthy merchants and bankers, fez-wearing Mohammedans from the world of Islam, men from the Persian Gulf in astrachan head-gear, Pathans from beyond the Himalayas, Sikhs from the Punjab—as can be ...
— East of Suez - Ceylon, India, China and Japan • Frederic Courtland Penfield
... In me Jenny saw a well-set-up and personable party, inclined a thought to a full body, but smart and active, clean-shaven and spotlessly clean every way, with brown eyes and a serious disposition, yet a nice taste for a seemly bit of fun. My hair was black and kept sleek and short, of course, and my voice was slow and deep, and my natural way of approaching all women most dignified, whether they belonged to the kitchen or the drawing-room. And, of course, she well ...
— The Torch and Other Tales • Eden Phillpotts
... shoulder your two, and off. Good morning, Mr. Boldwood." The shepherd lifted the sixteen large legs and four small bodies he had himself brought, and vanished with them in the direction of the lambing field hard by—their frames being now in a sleek and hopeful state, pleasantly contrasting with their death's-door plight of ...
— Far from the Madding Crowd • Thomas Hardy
... heart the mouth speaks. "They should have made me Prime Minister, and have let him be Chancellor of the Exchequer. I begin to see the ways of Government now. I could have done all the dirty work. I could have given away garters and ribbons, and made my bargains while giving them. I could select sleek, easy bishops who wouldn't be troublesome. I could give pensions or withhold them, and make the stupid men peers. I could have the big noblemen at my feet, praying to be Lieutenants of Counties. I could dole out secretaryships ...
— The Prime Minister • Anthony Trollope
... so still that a squirrel came tiptoeing across the moss, and struck tail momentarily to observe her. He looked critically at her, first with one round eye, and then, turning his sleek head, with the other, and decided that ...
— Red Pottage • Mary Cholmondeley
... plump Bess, And all across the green Came scampering in, on wing and claw, Chicken fat and lean: Dorking, Spaniard, Cochin China, Bantams sleek and small, Like feathers blown in a great wind, ...
— Peacock Pie, A Book of Rhymes • Walter de la Mare
... with His people's faults, and who has all the authority of God in doing so. This is the second group that actually has not one good thing to be commended. There is no false teaching, no compromise with evil; they are simply asleep. Rich, influential, self-satisfied, grown fat and sleek,—so they seem to their neighbours and themselves. Wretched, poor, blind, naked,—so they are. And the chastening threatened will be of the severe radical sort ...
— Quiet Talks on the Crowned Christ of Revelation • S. D. Gordon
... rubbed his sleek head against Michael's knee as he sat down in the black elbow-chair; but Mr. O'Brien still stood on the rug, shaking ...
— Lover or Friend • Rosa Nouchette Carey
... door, with a succulent tuber at the root of it which one could EAT. Think of the joy, the wonder, of that momentous discovery! Did he hide it away, lest others should be as happy as himself? Were ditectives set to watch him, to spy out the cause of a habit of sleek rotundity that was growing upon him at last visibly? We shall never know. Or did he call in his neighbors at once and annouce it? Did someone ask: 'What shall we name this God-given thing?'—and did another reply: 'It looks to me like a potato; let's call it that!'? ...
— The Crest-Wave of Evolution • Kenneth Morris
... a constant resort and loafing-place of Indians. From the superannuated chiefs, who revelled lazily during the sunny hours in the shady peacefulness of the broad porches; the young men of the tribe, who gazed with covetous eyes upon the sleek-skinned, blooded colts sporting in the spacious corrals; the squaws, fascinated by the gaudy calicoes, bright ribbons, and glittering strings of beads on the counters or shelves of the large store, to the half-naked, chubby little pappooses ...
— The Old Santa Fe Trail - The Story of a Great Highway • Henry Inman
... the farmer to Rhoda, and Rhoda went by her and took her hands, and by dint of pushing from behind and dragging in front, Mrs. Sumfit, as near on a shriek as one so fat and sleek could be, was ejected. The farmer and Robert heard her struggles and exclamations along the passage, but her resistance ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... new snow; While the warm shadows blow in softest gales Fair hawthorn flowers and cherry blossoms white Against your kirtles, like the froth from pails O'er brimmed with milk at night, When lowing heifers bury their sleek flanks In winrows of sweet hay, or clover banks— Come near and hear, I pray, My plained roundelay: Where creeping vines o'errun the sunny leas, Sadly, sweet souls, I watch your shining bands Filling with stained hands Your leafy cups with lush red strawberries; Or deep in ...
— The International Monthly, Volume 3, No. 2, May, 1851 • Various
... were theirs for the asking, and soon Ming-li regained all his strength, but, I fear, at the same time grew somewhat lazy, for it was no longer necessary for him to work. As for the two animals, they became fat and sleek and their hair grew long ...
— A Chinese Wonder Book • Norman Hinsdale Pitman
... I heard a pleasant voice wishing me "Good-morning." I looked round. Naomi Colebrook was standing at one of the lower windows of the farm. She had her working apron on, and she was industriously brightening the knives for the breakfast-table on an old-fashioned board. A sleek black cat balanced himself on her shoulder, watching the flashing motion of the knife as she passed it rapidly to and fro on the ...
— The Dead Alive • Wilkie Collins
... drops stood on his brow from haste and toil, but his cheek was still pale and tallow-coloured as before; nay, what seemed stranger, his very hair, when he raised his head, hung down on either cheek as straight and sleek and undisturbed as it was when we first introduced him to our readers, seated at his quiet and ...
— The Fortunes of Nigel • Sir Walter Scott
... doomed this gentle swain? And questioned every gust of rugged wings That blows from off each beaked promontory: They knew not of his story, And sage Hippotades their answer brings, That not a blast was from his dungeon strayed: The air was calm, and on the level brine Sleek Panope with all her sisters played. It was that fatal and perfidious bark, Built in the eclipse and rigged with curses dark, That sunk so low that sacred head of thine. Next, Camus, reverend sire, went footing slow, His mantle hairy, and his bonnet sedge, Inwrought with ...
— Lyra Heroica - A Book of Verse for Boys • Various
... stir, my mate," said Finn's low whine. And then he entered the cave and gazed down upon the miracle the night had brought. Five sleek-sided puppies nestled in a row within the Lady Desdemona's carefully curved flank. They were so new to the world as to be no more than a few hours' old; they were blind and helpless as stranded jellyfish. But they were vigorously breakfasting, none the less; and as Finn gazed down upon them from ...
— Jan - A Dog and a Romance • A. J. Dawson
... she saw something white waving. Next moment a big splash. She could see, through a little gap, a white blazer thrown down on the bank—a pair of sprawling brown boots; in the water a sleek wet round head, an arm in a blue shirt sleeve swimming a strong side stroke. It was the lunatic; of course it was. And she had called to him, and he was coming. She pushed back to the boat, leaped in, and was fumbling with the chain when she heard ...
— The Incomplete Amorist • E. Nesbit
... she sang with full voice once more the old song which Daisy loved. Of late her voice had been very low, and the song scarcely reached beyond Daisy's sleek sides, but to-day it came back, and the farmyard was filled with ...
— Garthowen - A Story of a Welsh Homestead • Allen Raine
... sparkled. The Vicomte D'Haberville, a French d'Argentenaye, took us to a reception—not too proud of us I daresay, for the gloss of his shoes and the magnificence of his cravat outshone us as the sleek skin of a race-horse does a country filly. Especially did he eye Quinet a little coldly, so that I could scarcely persuade the proud ...
— The Young Seigneur - Or, Nation-Making • Wilfrid Chateauclair
... were best kept secret in her own soul. While Lady Catharine was hoping, and praying, and dreaming and believing, even as the roses left her cheek and the hollows fell beneath her eyes, she saw about her in the daily walks of life Mary Connynge, sleek and rounded as ever. They sat at table together, and neither did the one make sign to the other of her own anxiety, nor did that other give sign of her own treachery. Mary Connynge, false guest, false friend, false woman, deceived so perfectly that she left no indication of deceit. She herself ...
— The Mississippi Bubble • Emerson Hough
... minutes the sleek avenger remained perfectly quiet. Then, uncoiling warily but not releasing the hold with his teeth, he worked his body aside. Last of all he dropped the head and drew suspiciously back as if alert for a sign of life. ...
— Wings of the Wind • Credo Harris
... more or less distasteful. The birds aided her effort with a variety of foreign music. Woodpigeon, bobolink, bluebird, oriole, cooed and trilled and warbled from the bush all around. The black squirrel, fat, sleek, jolly with good living of summer fruits, scampered about the boughs with erect shaggy tail, looking a very caricature upon care, as he stowed away hazel-nuts for the frosty future. Already the trees had donned their autumn ...
— Cedar Creek - From the Shanty to the Settlement • Elizabeth Hely Walshe
... the public and half starved, he presented a pitiable contrast to his wife, neat little lady, who, after her husband had lost his situation, left him and joined a respectable circle of cows and spent her time with them, fat, sleek, eminently respectable, and as regular as clockwork in taking them out to pasture and bringing them home. The moral point that I wish to make is this—if you give a woman half a chance she will be a lady; if you give a man ...
— Observations of a Retired Veteran • Henry C. Tinsley
... indifferent to them, and spent most of his time, when at home, in the lower chamber, which was now dry and clean enough for his luxurious tastes. Their small mother, however, was assiduous in her care; and in an exceedingly short time the youngsters, very sleek and dark in their first fur, were investigating the wonderful, great world beyond their water-gate. They had prodigious appetites, and they grew prodigiously. One, on their very first outing, got snapped up by a greedy black ...
— The Watchers of the Trails - A Book of Animal Life • Charles G. D. Roberts
... hard work. But I was happy in it. In an odd way I felt as I wrote all day on the smooth white paper that I was stroking the sleek breasts of doves. Tonight the steady patter of ...
— The Forgotten Threshold • Arthur Middleton
... not think over harshly," answered Gretchen. "If ever there was a sleek hypocrite, that man is one." Time showed that Gretchen was right, although Wenlock escaped the consequences of his machinations. Wenlock, however, could not remain long at Chester, having to proceed ...
— A True Hero - A Story of the Days of William Penn • W.H.G. Kingston
... salute,—almost with a quality of concession,—gracious as well as graceful; he would do as much for any puppy of a cadet who might drop in on the Sahib. On the other hand, lowly louteth the Baboo, with eyes downcast and palm applied reverentially to his sleek forehead. ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. I., No. 3, January 1858 - A Magazine of Literature, Art, and Politics • Various
... against the eastern sky, it sparkled and glistened. Impassive it stood, graceful, seeming to strain into the sky, anxious to be off and gone. The loading gantry was a dark, spidery framework beside The Ship, leaning against it, drawing strength from its sleek beauty. ...
— Sound of Terror • Don Berry
... And every guest be sure to ply: Let never at your board be known An empty plate, except your own. Be these thy arts;[34] nor higher aim Than what befits a rural dame. "But Cloacina, goddess bright, Sleek——claims her as his right; And Smedley,[35] flower of all divines, Shall sing the ...
— Poems (Volume II.) • Jonathan Swift
... sleek native missionary was an unknown quantity in the Tokelaus and Kingsmills, and the local white trader answered all requirements. He was generally a rough character—a runaway from some Australian or American whaler, or a wandering Ishmael, who, for reasons ...
— By Reef and Palm • Louis Becke
... of Hilary's study sat Miranda. The little person answered his caress by a shiver of her sleek skin, then curled herself down again on the spot she had ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... day to the study of the Chinese language, under the direction of Chim-jung-tsee, a young Chinaman who spoke pigeon-English very well, and had been highly recommended by one of the waiters at the hotel. He was a very sleek, smooth-spoken fellow: the top of his shaved head shone like a billiard ball, and his tail hung four feet and a half from his shoulders. I didn't altogether like the expression of his eyes; for although they were usually turned up at the outside corners, like other Chinese eyes, sometimes ...
— John Whopper - The Newsboy • Thomas March Clark
... brick—a filigree and a scrollwork—put forth claims. The lords of the city stand girthed in ornaments. Knight and satrap have changed somewhat. Moat and battlement grimace but faintly from behind their ornaments. The tick-tock sounds through the carouse. Sleek, suave men and languorous, desirable women sit amid elaborations, sleep and breed in ornamental beds. Power wears new masks. Leadership has improved its table manners, its plumbing, and ...
— Erik Dorn • Ben Hecht |
