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Sweeping   Listen
adjective
Sweeping  adj.  Cleaning off surfaces, or cleaning away dust, dirt, or litter, as a broom does; moving with swiftness and force; carrying everything before it; including in its scope many persons or things; as, a sweeping flood; a sweeping majority; a sweeping accusation.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Sweeping" Quotes from Famous Books



... ocean-floor ecosystems. drift-net fishing - done with a net, miles in extent, that is generally anchored to a boat and left to float with the tide; often results in an over harvesting and waste of large populations of non-commercial marine species (by-catch) by its effect of "sweeping the ocean clean". ecosystems - ecological units comprised of complex communities of organisms and their specific environments. effluents - waste materials, such as smoke, sewage, or industrial waste which are released into the environment, subsequently polluting it. endangered species ...
— The 2005 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency

... sweeping current of everyday life, living their days in a back eddy, so to speak. But they were aware of events, of the common enemy, of the straining effort of war, and they were proud of their nephew in the King's uniform. They twittered ...
— Burned Bridges • Bertrand W. Sinclair

... a youth and a maiden lie nightly dreaming the same dreams: one of them a spirit already bonded to the service of mind under the whip of circumstance: destined to storm rocky heights, from which hard-won eminences he shall command great views of sweeping plains and far-off mountain ranges; the other a pretty chrysalis on the eve of her change into a butterfly of butterflies; who is, nevertheless, to attempt flights overhigh and overfar for her frail wings; ...
— The Genius • Margaret Horton Potter

... 31st of May, the 30th of October, and the 9th Thermidor; I can understand the egregious torch of civil wars, which inflames instead of soothing the blood; I can understand the tidal wave of revolution, sweeping on with its flux, that nothing can arrest, and its reflux, which carries with it the ruins of the institution which it has itself shattered. I can understand all that, but lance against lance, sword against sword, men against men, a people against a people! I can understand the deadly rage of the ...
— The Companions of Jehu • Alexandre Dumas

... twain of days, this of blessing that of bane * And holdeth Life a twain of halves, this of pleasure that of pain. See'st not when blows the hurricane, sweeping stark and striking strong * None save the forest giant feels the suffering of the strain? How many trees earth nourisheth of the dry and of the green * Yet none but those which bear the fruits for cast of stone complain. ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 1 • Richard F. Burton

... tailless Amphibia and to Birds (Huxley himself had been led to found his two fundamental divisions on the distribution of the Gallinaceous birds), the combination of South America with Australia was gradually found to be too sweeping a measure. The obvious and satisfactory solution was provided by W.T. Blanford (Anniversary address (Geological Society, 1889), "Proc. Geol. Soc." 1889-90, page 67; "Quart. Journ." XLVI 1890.), who in 1890 recognised ...
— Darwin and Modern Science • A.C. Seward and Others

... a blast of air came sweeping across the lake. It caught the sail of the iceboat and tilted the craft ...
— The Mystery at Putnam Hall - The School Chums' Strange Discovery • Arthur M. Winfield

... is so drear and chill Whilst making leafless branch and tree, Whilst sweeping over vale and hill With all her doleful minstrelsy. November wails the summer's death In such a melancholy voice, She has a withering, blighting breath; She does not ...
— The Mountain Spring And Other Poems • Nannie R. Glass

... further explanation. Two glasses of the old Governor Bowdoin white port had been left untasted on the dinner-table the night before,—the one, that meant for Mr. James Bowdoin, who had himself swept out of the room as he made that last remark about sweeping out the office; the other, that of his son, Mr. James, who had instantly gone out by the other door, and betaken himself for sympathy to the home of Miss Abigail Dowse, which stood on Fort Hill, close by, where the sea breezes blew fresh through the ...
— Pirate Gold • Frederic Jesup Stimson

... had told him tales. Some talked of gray, bewhiskered hordes who were advancing with relentless curses and chewing tobacco with unspeakable valor; tremendous bodies of fierce soldiery who were sweeping along like the Huns. Others spoke of tattered and eternally hungry men who fired despondent powders. "They'll charge through hell's fire an' brimstone t' git a holt on a haversack, an' sech stomachs ...
— The Red Badge of Courage - An Episode of the American Civil War • Stephen Crane

... to his comfort. His heart was full of grateful feelings. Then a change came suddenly. He stood the spectator of a widely-spread ruin which had fallen upon the excellent Mr. Gray and his family. A fierce tempest was sweeping over his fields, and levelling all-houses, trees, and grain—in ruin to the earth. A word spoken by him would have saved all; he felt this: but he did not speak the word. The look of reproach suddenly cast upon him by the farmer so stung him that ...
— Lessons in Life, For All Who Will Read Them • T. S. Arthur

... bad country-roads ahead;—and has struck straight SOUTHeastward, if Daun were noting him. And, in the afternoon of Wednesday, Daun is astonished to learn that this wily Enemy is arrived in Reichenbach vicinity; sweeping in our poor posts thereabouts; immovably astride of the Silesian Highway, after all! An astonished Daun hastens out, what he can, to take survey of the sudden Phenomenon. Tries it, next day and next, with his best Loudons and appliances; finds ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XVIII. (of XXI.) - Frederick The Great—Seven-Years War Rises to a Height.—1757-1759. • Thomas Carlyle

... are, indeed, a man of the world; you resemble those young men who offer themselves as volunteers, and are eagerly desirous for fire, balls, and blows, but care not for working in the trenches, or for sweeping out the tents. There is some resource left yet, Henri; so much the ...
— The Forty-Five Guardsmen • Alexandre Dumas

... gold the wheat field lies, A marvel of yellow and russet and green, That ripples and runs, that floats and flies, With the subtle shadows, the change, the sheen, That play in the golden hair of a girl,— A ripple of amber—a flare Of light sweeping after—a curl In the hollows like swirling feet Of fairy waltzers, the colors run To the western sun Through the deeps of ...
— Poems Teachers Ask For, Book Two • Various

... kept at her work, sweeping round the long bends where the river was hollowing out one bank and building new shore on the opposite one, so as gradually to shift its channel; by clipper-shaped islands, sharp at the bows looking up stream, sharp too at the stern, looking ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)

... Ned lay upon his pallet. Obed flattened himself against the wall beside the door. Their plan fully arranged, neither now spoke. Overhead they heard the slow roll of the sea, lashed by the waves sweeping in from the gulf. But inside the cell ...
— The Texan Star - The Story of a Great Fight for Liberty • Joseph A. Altsheler

... himself in his allotted field—unhappy, miserable, distracted Spain. Gomez, the Carlist leader, had been sweeping through Estremadura like a pestilence, and Borrow fully expected to find Seville occupied by his banditti; but Carlists possessed no terrors for him. Unless he could do something to heal the spiritual wounds of the wretched country, he assured ...
— The Life of George Borrow • Herbert Jenkins

... of broom corn is rapidly extending, and corn brooms are driving broom sedge, as an article for sweeping floors, out of every humble dwelling in the United States. There are about 1,000 acres of it under culture in one county (Montgomery) alone, and it brings 30 dollars per acre in ...
— The Commercial Products of the Vegetable Kingdom • P. L. Simmonds

... at once," was all her mistress said, with one sweeping glance round. "I shall wear that little blue Liberty gown and a single row ...
— Winding Paths • Gertrude Page

... entrusted to the gallant Theodo'sius, and the event proved that Valentinian could not have made a better choice. In the course of two campaigns, the invaders were driven back to their forests, and a Roman fleet sweeping the coasts of Britain, made them tremble for the safety of their ...
— Pinnock's Improved Edition of Dr. Goldsmith's History of Rome • Oliver Goldsmith

... did," she told him, gaining happiness from the mere assurance. They were alone in the drawing-room, and he rose, sweeping her up into his arms. Yet the expected joy evaded her desire and the sudden determination to lose utterly her reserve. It was evident that he as well was conscious of this, for he released her and stood frowning, his protruding lower lip uglier ...
— Linda Condon • Joseph Hergesheimer

... the great Awakening Day, the resurrection day of the woods. Many new birds arrived. Many new flowers appeared. Sleepers woke from underground, as Mother Carey's silent trumpeters went bugling ahead of her, and her winged horse, the Warm Wind, came sweeping across the meadows, with the white world greening ...
— Woodland Tales • Ernest Seton-Thompson

... rule; for long a change may pass unnoticed, until one day it is discovered that a step forward has been taken. Those changes that appear so new and are bringing fear to many to-day, are but the last consequences of causes that for long have been operating slowly. The extraordinary enthusiasm now sweeping through womanhood reveals behind its immediate feverish expression a great power of emotional and spiritual initiative. Wide and radically sweeping are the changes in women's outlook. So much stronger is the promise of a vital force when they have refound their ...
— The Position of Woman in Primitive Society - A Study of the Matriarchy • C. Gasquoine Hartley

... beyond. But the good Sisters abominate these pigeons, who, it appears, are messy little creatures, and they complain that, were it not that the Reverend Director likes a pigeon in his pot on a holiday, they could not stand the bother of perpetually sweeping the chapel steps and the kitchen threshold all along of those ...
— Hauntings • Vernon Lee

... have no feeling of mercy for your leaders, none for Murrell himself. Put down your guns!—you can only kill us after we have killed Murrell—but you can't kill the law! If the arch conspirator dies in this room and hour, on whose head will the punishment fall?" He swung round his ponderous arm in a sweeping gesture and shook a fat but expressive forefinger in the faces of those nearest ...
— The Prodigal Judge • Vaughan Kester

... English claims. "This was enough. The outrage on Don Pacifico's bedstead remained the head and front of Greek offending, but Lord Palmerston included all the other slight blunders and delays of justice in one sweeping indictment; made the private claims into a national demand, and peremptorily informed the Greek Government that they must pay what was demanded of them within a given time. The Government hesitated, and the British fleet was ordered ...
— The Grand Old Man • Richard B. Cook

... flash that I had seen a great secret. I had seen, I knew, very little of the great land yet—and indeed I had been but in the lowest place of all: and I thought how base and dull our ideas had been upon earth of God and His care of men. We had thought of Him dimly as sweeping into His place of torment and despair all poisoned and diseased lives, all lives that had clung to the body and to the pleasures of the body, all who had sinned idly, or wilfully, or proudly; and I saw now that He used men far more wisely and lovingly ...
— The Child of the Dawn • Arthur Christopher Benson

... seized a sword; its sweeping edge soon laid the Hero low, But not before his sinking arm was felt upon his foe: "Thanks, youthful friend!" the Hero said; "now Odin's hall is won, Its rays already greet my soul, ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 62, Number 361, November, 1845. • Various

... except the few that had gone to the barn and the outhouses. The morning room had been fitted up with a typewriter at which the military clerk sat tapping. The Colonel's personal luggage had been placed in his bedroom. A soldier was even sweeping up all traces of the invasion of armed men and making everything tidy. It all seemed like a horrid dream that was going to end up happily after all. Presently Vivie would wake up completely and there would even be ...
— Mrs. Warren's Daughter - A Story of the Woman's Movement • Sir Harry Johnston

... the same. The Protestants had a majority in the Assembly of the States, and demanded from the duke concessions in favour of their religion, as the price of their subsidies. In Transylvania, the House of Austria was unable to prevent the Diet from confiscating, by one sweeping decree, the estates of the Church. In Austria Proper it was generally said that only one-thirtieth part of the population could be counted on as good Catholics. In Belgium the adherents of the new opinions were ...
— Critical and Historical Essays Volume 2 • Thomas Babington Macaulay

... Eastnor all right as regards sand; the very streets were full of it, and as I stood on the Esplanade at low tide, and leaned up against a strong south-west breeze, and saw the dry sand sweeping like smoke along the flats and piling knee-deep to windward of the groins, and got my mouth and eyes and ears full of it, I decided, from the taste and smell and feel of it, that—from a sand point of view, at all ...
— The Harmsworth Magazine, v. 1, 1898-1899, No. 2 • Various

... and was unseen; her hair Fell in long tresses like the weeping willow, Sweeping the marble underneath her chair, Or rather sofa (for it was all pillow, A low soft ottoman), and black despair Stirr'd up and down her bosom like a billow, Which rushes to some shore whose shingles check Its farther course, but ...
— Don Juan • Lord Byron

... holy hour, and silence now Is brooding, like a gentle spirit o'er The still and pulseless world. Hark! on the winds The bell's deep tones are swelling; 'tis the knell Of the departed year. No funeral train Is sweeping past; yet, on the stream and wood, With melancholy light, the moonbeams rest Like a pale, spotless shroud; the air is stirred, As by a mourner's sigh; and, on yon cloud, That floats so still and placidly through heaven, The spirits of the Seasons seem to stand. Young ...
— Songs from the Southland • Various

... forever when the broad river could bring up unwelcome ships; Russia was only the place where the linseed came from,—the more the better,—making grist for the great vertical millstones with their scythe-like arms, roaring and grinding and carefully sweeping as if an informing soul were in them. The Catholics, bad harvests, and the mysterious fluctuations of trade were the three evils mankind had to fear; even the floods had not been great of late years. The mind of St. Ogg's did not look extensively before or after. It inherited ...
— The Mill on the Floss • George Eliot

... the heart Of Rustum; and his tears broke forth: he cast His arms round his son's neck, and wept aloud, And kiss'd him; and awe fell on both the hosts When they saw Rustum's grief; and Ruksh, the horse, With his head bowing to the ground and mane Sweeping the dust, came near, and in mute woe First to the one, then to the other mov'd His head, as if enquiring what their grief Might mean; and from his dark compassionate eyes The big warm tears roll'd down and caked ...
— Froude's Essays in Literature and History - With Introduction by Hilaire Belloc • James Froude

... which went like wine to her head, "To-night I shall be with Baroudi!" She did not just then go beyond that thought. She did not ask herself what sort of reception he would give her. That wine from the mind brought a carelessness, almost a recklessness, with it, preventing analysis, sweeping away fears. A sort of spasm—was it the very last?—of youth seemed to leap up in her, like a brilliant flame from a heap of ashes. And she let the ...
— Bella Donna - A Novel • Robert Hichens

... there was no little prattler that was taken from his life and became a saddened, hallowed memory to him. Oh, no! The little Smiths were not that kind of prattler. The whole nine grew up into tall, lank boys with massive mouths and great sweeping ears like their father's, and no ...
— Literary Lapses • Stephen Leacock

... as we have now discovered, the existence of a wholly different ideal in the Germanic mind from that which lies at the base of the Latin, Anglo-Saxon, Dutch, or Scandinavian nations. Such a statement as this is sweeping; it can be illustrated by a trivial tale. In 1912 an international scientific congress met at Berlin; I was a member. Although the conventional language was German, in compliment to our hosts, it turned out that in the long run all discussions were conducted in ...
— New York Times Current History: The European War, Vol 2, No. 1, April, 1915 - April-September, 1915 • Various

... came of long practise, drew five straight lines across the faint violet face of the bank-note. Within these lines she made little dots at the top and bottom of stubby perpendicular strokes, and strange interlineal hieroglyphics, and sweeping curves, all of which would have puzzled an Egyptologist if he were unused to the ways of musicians. Carefully she dried the composition, and then put the note away. Some day she would confound him ...
— The Place of Honeymoons • Harold MacGrath

... into the game again," he declared, "but I felt that I couldn't stand by and hear the Johnson coterie putting over their sweeping challenges. It was all right to challenge the crowd, but when all the soldiers of the A. E. F. were included I figured it was up to me to register a kerplunk for the Q.M. Johnson would have been champion yet if he hadn't ...
— The Stars & Stripes, Vol 1, No 1, February 8, 1918, - The American Soldiers' Newspaper of World War I, 1918-1919 • American Expeditionary Forces

... its clamor until, after many reappearances with the tenor, Kronborg came before the curtain alone. The house met her with a roar, a greeting that was almost savage in its fierceness. The singer's eyes, sweeping the house, rested for a moment on Harsanyi, and she waved her ...
— Song of the Lark • Willa Cather

... with wide verandahs on each floor, which gave extensive views of country and sea, a house with a high circular slated tower at one end, and many gables with black oaken beams. Around was a plantation of dark pines, protecting the house from the fierce, sweeping winter winds of the Channel, and pretty, sheltered flower-gardens, the whole enclosed with railings of white ...
— The White Lie • William Le Queux

... sweeping around between it and the public road, was a far-reaching extent of woodland; and through this, for the distance of half a mile, wound the shaded lane which led from the highway to the ...
— The Squirrel Inn • Frank R. Stockton

... lighter and gayer barges of the patricians, a gondola of more than usual size, but of an exterior so plain as to denote vulgar uses, came sweeping down the great canal. Its movement was leisurely, and the action of the gondoliers that of men either fatigued or little pressed for time. He who steered, guided the boat with consummate skill, but with a single hand, while his three fellows, from time to time, suffered ...
— The Bravo • J. Fenimore Cooper

... added a general claim to right of property in all mankind and the universe. He did this in the name and on behalf of the church universal, but there was self-assertion in the quiet air with which he pointed out the nature of his title, and then, after sweeping all human thought and will into his strong-box, shut down the lid with a sharp click, ...
— Esther • Henry Adams

... Conference of 1874. The words italicised were added to it in 1907, to show that it applies to the action of aeronefs as well as to that of land batteries. It clearly prohibits any wanton bombardment, undertaken with no distinctly military object in view, and the prohibition is much more sweeping, for reasons not far to seek, than that imposed by Convention No. ix. of 1907 upon the treatment of coast ...
— Letters To "The Times" Upon War And Neutrality (1881-1920) • Thomas Erskine Holland

... arrival of some one. But that street—the main one in Osterode, in which city the royal couple had spent the last few days—remained silent and deserted. Large snow-flakes were falling from the cheerless, lead-colored sky, and the November storm was now sweeping them into little mounds, and again dispersing them in clouds of white dust. The queen beheld nothing but this winter scene; she sighed and returned to her room to pace it as rapidly ...
— Napoleon and the Queen of Prussia • L. Muhlbach

... Sweeping on through Northern France, the German Army of the North was breaking up all resistance in its path, such as was attempted by the British at St. Quentin on Aug. 28, and was tearing with it all fortresses, such as Longwy, La Fere, Maubeuge, and others; but it was failing in its principal ...
— New York Times Current History; The European War, Vol 2, No. 5, August, 1915 • Various

... them, but with the State of which they are members; and such act of resistance by a State binds the conscience and allegiance of the citizen. But there appears to be a general misapprehension as to the extent to which the State has acted under this part of the ordinance. Instead of sweeping every officer by a general proscription of the minority, as has been represented in debate, as far as my knowledge extends, not a single individual has been removed. The State has, in fact, acted with the greatest tenderness, all circumstances considered, toward citizens ...
— Remarks of Mr. Calhoun of South Carolina on the bill to prevent the interference of certain federal officers in elections: delivered in the Senate of the United States February 22, 1839 • John C. Calhoun

... bills. Do your own laying. No wrinkles. No crowded corners. No sore knees. No pounded fingers. No broken backs. Stand up and lay your carpet with the Perfect Automatic. Easy as sweeping. Smooth as putting paper on the wall. You hold the handle, and the Perfect Automatic does the rest. ...
— The Hills of Hingham • Dallas Lore Sharp

... place to get lost in! That had been her husband's phrase. And now, with the whole machinery of official investigation sweeping its flash-lights from shore to shore, and across the dividing straits; now, with Boyne's name blazing from the walls of every town and village, his portrait (how that wrung her!) hawked up and down the country like the image ...
— Tales Of Men And Ghosts • Edith Wharton

... happily—or unhappily—Bill had a smattering of many trades, and eventually there came an opening as handy-man at a mine. It was a lowly position, and Bill had little pride in it, for he was put to helping the cook, waiting on table, washing dishes, sweeping cabins, making beds, and the like. He had been assured that the work was light, and so it was, but it was also continuous. He could summon not the slightest interest in it until he discovered that this was the very claim which rightfully belonged to Ponatah. Then, indeed, he pricked ...
— Laughing Bill Hyde and Other Stories • Rex Beach

... they waited, until the roll of wheels was heard and the clergyman appeared in the chancel. Then seven hundred tired heads turned simultaneously toward the door through which the party came, the rich robes of the bride trailing upon the carpet and sweeping from side to side as she moved up the middle aisle. But not upon her did a single eye in all that vast assemblage linger, nor yet upon the bridegroom, nor yet upon the bridesmaid, filing in one behind the other, but upon the stooping figure ...
— Darkness and Daylight • Mary J. Holmes

... should have been in the uncommon-tall young woman of buxom stateliness and prepossessing features, attired (to the mere masculine eye) in quite elegant black raiment—a thing called, I think, a picture hat, broad-brimmed with a sweeping ostrich feather, tickled my especial fancy, but was afterwards reviled by my wife as being entirely unsuited to fresh widowhood—what there should have been in this remarkable Junoesque young person who followed ...
— Jaffery • William J. Locke

... through the pasture where I lie Beating the grass into long waves. My kite is above the wind, Though now and then it wobbles, Like a man shaking his shoulders; And the tail streams out momentarily, Then sinks to rest. And the buzzards wheel and wheel, Sweeping the zenith with wide circles Above my kite. And the hills sleep. And a farm house, white as snow, Peeps from green trees—far away. And I watch my kite, For the thin moon will kindle herself ere long, Then she will swing ...
— Spoon River Anthology • Edgar Lee Masters

... Helen together. The three made their way to the hall whose windows opened to the north and east. The current from the river was sweeping about the corner of the building with a tremendous force. Logs and square timbers, uprooted trees and driftwood were being borne ...
— Hester's Counterpart - A Story of Boarding School Life • Jean K. Baird

... rim formed a golden sickle behind a blunt shoulder of rock; while over the eastward levels the topaz-yellow of an Indian dawn rushed at one stride to the zenith of heaven. In the clear light the girl's beauty took on a new distinctness, a new living charm. The upward-sweeping mass of her hair showed the softness of bronze, save where the sun burnished it to copper. Breadth of brow, and the strong moulding of her nose and chin, suggested powers rather befitting a man than a woman. But in the eyes and lips the woman triumphed—eyes blue-grey under ...
— Captain Desmond, V.C. • Maud Diver

... the speaker that it was evident they were sisters. A band of gold gleamed on her wedding finger and her short skirt and loose calico jacket made no attempt to hide the fact that another baby was soon to be added to the already well-supplied train. She smiled a placid greeting and her eye, lazily sweeping Susan, showed a healthy curiosity tempered by the self-engrossed indifference of the married woman to whom the outsider, even in the heart of the wilderness, ...
— The Emigrant Trail • Geraldine Bonner

... was in November, 1527. In November, 1530, but three brief years after, Wolsey lay dying in misery, a disgraced man, at Leicester Abbey; "the Pope's Holiness" was fast becoming in English eyes plain Bishop of Rome, held guilty towards this realm of unnumbered enormities, and all England was sweeping with immeasurable velocity towards the heretic Luther. So history repeats the lesson to us, not to boast ourselves of the morrow, for we know not what a day ...
— The Reign of Henry the Eighth, Volume 1 (of 3) • James Anthony Froude

... his presence, as they hoped that he would assist in establishing their authority and would render the masses less insolent. Returning to a people in this condition, he at once began alterations and reforms on a sweeping scale, considering that it was useless and unprofitable to do such work by halves, but that, as in the case of a diseased body, the original cause of the disorder must be burned out or purged away, and the patient ...
— Plutarch's Lives, Volume I (of 4) • Plutarch

... the characteristic features we have just noted in a Central Asiatic region, and then almost immediately they divided into two great groups. Each of these evolved along certain lines of its own, one sweeping northward to develop into what are now called the Northern Mongols, the other working its way eastward and southward to produce the peoples of China proper, Indo-China, and many parts of Malaysia. Considering first the peoples of the Northern ...
— The Doctrine of Evolution - Its Basis and Its Scope • Henry Edward Crampton

... of our institutions, and ought to be corrected. It is so contrary to our time-honored Constitution that either it or the Constitution must be sacrificed. In order to save the policy it was found necessary during the past year to amend the Constitution by a clause so sweeping, that if the circumstances of a Missionary Classis require it, "all the ordinary requirements of the Constitution" may be dispensed with by the General Synod. Can it be that a policy which requires ...
— History and Ecclesiastical Relations of the Churches of the Presbyterial Order at Amoy, China • J. V. N. Talmage

... as that." Southey himself would only smile, (he had probably heard Wordsworth express himself to the same effect a hundred times); but some insidious hearer catches at the phrase, and reports it as Wordsworth's sweeping denunciation of all the poetry that his friend has ever written, in defiance of all the evidence to the contrary to be met with, not only in Wordsworth's every-day conversation, but in his published works. There is no man for whose ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - April 1843 • Various

... here in Rome. Over Alps a voice is sweeping— "England's cruel, save us some Of these victims ...
— The Poetical Works of Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Volume IV • Elizabeth Barrett Browning

... silence, in an apartment on the ground floor, very sparely furnished. In the centre of the room, close to where Mrs. Vulpes sat, there was a common round mahogany table. If I had come for the purpose of sweeping her chimney, the woman could not have looked more indifferent to my appearance. There was no attempt to inspire the visitor with any awe. Everything bore a simple and practical aspect. This intercourse with the spiritual world was evidently as familiar an occupation with Mrs. ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. I., No. 3, January 1858 - A Magazine of Literature, Art, and Politics • Various

... goat, it was so distant from them as not to appear bigger than a kid. It was en profile, however, to their eyes; and against the blue sky they could trace the outlines of the animal with perfect distinctness, and note the grand sweeping curvature of its horns. ...
— The Cliff Climbers - A Sequel to "The Plant Hunters" • Captain Mayne Reid

... unremitting and practically unbroken surveillance of the coast was tremendously effective. Like Van Tromp, the vessels and gangs engaged in it rode the seas with a broom at their masthead, sweeping into the service, not every man, it is true, but enormous numbers of them. As for their quality, "One man out of a merchant ship is better than three the lieutenants get in town." [Footnote: Admiralty Records 1. 2379—Capt. Roberts, 27 June 1732.] This was the general opinion early in the century; ...
— The Press-Gang Afloat and Ashore • John R. Hutchinson

... clad in flannel and warm furs? He wraps his garments close about him; a wreath of holly binds his bald head; he seeks the warm hearth and the blazing fire; he expands his hands: they are thin and shrivelled with age. The snow fast descends; the sweeping blast howls over the dreary heath, and shakes the cottage of the aged man—he is the father of the year, and his name ...
— Forgotten Tales of Long Ago • E. V. Lucas

... Tony's and John's sailing boats; was sweeping them down the beach. We rushed, one to each boat, and hung on. Another sea swept the pebbles from under our feet—it felt as if the ...
— A Poor Man's House • Stephen Sydney Reynolds

... Castlereagh were misled; and they were confirmed in their suspicion by Napoleon's crafty assumption that our embargo or non-intercourse policy was meant to act, as it confessedly did, favorably to France. Napoleon's confiscation of our vessels, at one time sweeping, he advertised as a friendly proceeding in aid of our embargo. Yet all this did not, as Castlereagh captiously pretended, prove our neutrality to be other than strict and honest. At this time it certainly was both. So villainously had Napoleon treated us that all Americans now hated ...
— History of the United States, Volume 2 (of 6) • E. Benjamin Andrews

... horses. All surplus men in the employ of Major Mabry had been previously sent home until there remained at the close of the season only the drover, seven men, and myself. We averaged forty miles a day returning, sweeping down the plains like a north wind until Red River Station was reached. There our ways parted, and cutting separate my horses, we bade each other farewell, the main outfit heading for Fort Worth, while I bore to the westward for Palo Pinto. Major Seth was anxious to secure my ...
— Reed Anthony, Cowman • Andy Adams

... darkness. The thundering of hoofs told him that the red devils were close after him. Turning abruptly to one side he rode at right angles to his former course, and suddenly drawing up his horse he stood still. The sound of the chase neared him, and presently he heard them sweeping past, the darkness completely shrouding himself and his horse from ...
— Jim Cummings • Frank Pinkerton

... not contradict this sweeping statement. He was studying Mr. Brady's weapon with some interest. "Your uncle's," he commented, pleased. "Why, I didn't know you still ...
— The Wishing Moon • Louise Elizabeth Dutton

... them, rather than the immediate death they were very sure would pounce upon them if they went up against the master. That he never slept, they knew. That he could not be conjured to death, they were equally sure—they had tried it. And even the sickness that was sweeping them ...
— Adventure • Jack London

... completely one day while he was sitting moodily on a tree watching the Peacock and his cousin sweeping proudly over the velvet lawn of the King's garden. For nowadays the Pheasant moved in the most courtly circles, as he had promised himself. As they passed under the Crow two beautiful feathers fell behind them and lay on the grass shining in the sunlight ...
— The Curious Book of Birds • Abbie Farwell Brown

... was evidently not prepared for such a sweeping answer. "You know what he did, then?" she asserted ...
— The Law-Breakers and Other Stories • Robert Grant

... not a vessel appeared in sight. The weather had remained fine for some time, but at length it gave signs of changing. One evening, as the commander, with several of the officers, were taking a quarter-deck walk on a piece of level ground near the flagstaff, occasionally sweeping the horizon with their glasses, now to the eastward, and now on the west side of the island, the commander, who had turned his in the latter direction, exclaimed, "There is a sail at last. Judging from her appearance she is a large craft; we shall soon ascertain ...
— The Missing Ship - The Log of the "Ouzel" Galley • W. H. G. Kingston

... became loose and slippery, and the horses could scarcely keep their feet. They slipped and staggered along in a zigzag fashion, the men leading them, and as the rain continued to fall, there were shreds and patches of mist sweeping round the hill, which made it more awkward to pick a safe road and at the same time keep the direction they desired. With their attention mostly given to their horses—for if one fell it would be almost impossible to save it from serious if not fatal injury—and with their tempers still ruffled ...
— Colonial Born - A tale of the Queensland bush • G. Firth Scott

... as to the reasons Cicero had for omitting all mention of Lucretius when speaking of these Roman Epicureans. The most probable elucidation is, that he found it impossible to include the great poet in his sweeping condemnation, and being unwilling to allow that anything good could come from the school of Epicurus, preferred to keep silence, which nothing compelled him to break, since Lucretius was an obscure man and only slowly won his way to ...
— Academica • Marcus Tullius Cicero

... most beautiful motion-masters I ever beheld, sweeping through his green bath in harmonious curves, now turning his black glistening back to me, now exhibiting his fair white chest, in every movement active and graceful, turned out to be our old homely friend the flounder, whom we have ...
— The Virginians • William Makepeace Thackeray

... desolation—crowded thoroughfares—sounds in our ears, jarring or harmonious—the voices of friends, calling, warning, encouraging—of preachers preaching—of people in the street below, complaining, and asking our pity! What long processions of human beings are passing before us! What trains of thought go sweeping through our brains! Man seems a strange and ill-kept record of many and bewildering experiences. Looking at oneself—not as oneself, but as an abstract human being—one is lost in wonder at the vast complexities which have been brought to bear upon it; lost in wonder, and in disappointment ...
— A Book of Sibyls - Miss Barbauld, Miss Edgeworth, Mrs Opie, Miss Austen • Anne Thackeray (Mrs. Richmond Ritchie)

... an ancient and decayed trunk, or the tread of animals as they prowl over the mouldering branches with which the ground is strown; the fluttering of unseen birds brushing through the foliage, or the moaning of the wind sweeping over the topmost boughs,—these all tend to excite the imagination and solemnize the mind. But the stillness of a forest is more startling and awe-inspiring than its sounds. Its silence is so deep as itself to become audible to the inner soul. It is not surprising that wooded countries ...
— Salem Witchcraft, Volumes I and II • Charles Upham

... ordered up country to Dinapore, a cantonment near Patna, on the Ganges, that had been founded by Warren Hastings. It was an unhealthy station, especially for youngsters fresh from England. A burning sun by day; hot stifling nights; and no breath of wind sweeping across the parched ghats. Within a few weeks the dreaded cholera made its appearance; the melancholy roll of muffled drums was heard every evening at sunset; and Ensign Gilbert was one of the ...
— The Magnificent Montez - From Courtesan to Convert • Horace Wyndham

... articles for issue or receipt, and such other duties as they were called on to perform. There was an old janitor named McGee, a veteran of the Civil War, whose business it was to look after the sweeping and keep ...
— The Gatlings at Santiago • John H. Parker

... church door the two girls shook hands and exchanged greetings. Janet wore a long fur coat, and a toque of dark Russian sable, with a sweeping feather at one side. The price of these two garments alone would equal the whole of Claire's yearly salary, but it had the effect of making the wearer look clumsy and middle-aged compared with the graceful simplicity of the other's French-cut costume. Janet Willoughby was ...
— The Independence of Claire • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey

... "Cumulative!" he breathed. He let his breath out slowly, and made a sweeping gesture that seemed to encompass all the latent delight, all the unleashed ...
— We're Friends, Now • Henry Hasse

... at last; a flurry of sweeping skirts; ranks of black and white in escort to the passage ...
— The Younger Set • Robert W. Chambers

... Stairs with Paint Brush.—My mother uses a paint brush with long bristles for sweeping her stairs. With its use the work is more quickly and thoroughly done than by the old way, because the bristles reach every corner and crack as a cloth ...
— Mother's Remedies - Over One Thousand Tried and Tested Remedies from Mothers - of the United States and Canada • T. J. Ritter

... one day, when discussing Dubois' merits with Mr. Wallis; "I saw a bit to-day as bangs everything. A cadger sweeping a crossing fell out with a dustman. Wasn't there some spicy jaw betwixt 'em. Well, nothing would suit, but the dustman must have a go, and pitch ...
— The Sketches of Seymour (Illustrated), Complete • Robert Seymour

... previous to the important one arrived. Hitherto, all hands had contributed to make every thing in and about the house look "dacent"—scouring, washing, sweeping, pairing, and repairing, had been all disposed of. The boys got their hair cut to the quick with the tailor's scissors; and such of the girls as were not full grown, not only that which grew on the upper part ...
— The Station; The Party Fight And Funeral; The Lough Derg Pilgrim • William Carleton

... by any one who knows Mirza Ali Beg's book, was a sweeping statement. The papers did not look specially valuable; but McIntosh handled them as if they ...
— The Works of Rudyard Kipling One Volume Edition • Rudyard Kipling

... diminished considerably when I perceived in the spacious room only a crowd of cleanly attired maids and serving-men, who were sweeping merrily about with one another. They were so busied with dancing as scarcely to observe us. Bear then conducted me to the upper end of the apartment; and there, on a high seat, I saw a tall and strong lady of about fifty, ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol 6 • Various

... recover some portion of its imprisoned essence. This is seldom a necessity with Byron. His words tell us all that he means to say, and do not merely hint nor suggest. The matter with which he deals is gigantic, and he paints with violent colours and sweeping pencil. ...
— Critical Miscellanies, Vol. I - Essay 3: Byron • John Morley

... come again; and I returned, thinking of that company going up Libberton Brae, then along Roslin Muir, the morning light touching the Pentlands, and making them like onlooking ghosts; then down the hill through Auchindinny woods, past "haunted Woodhouselee"; and as daybreak came sweeping up the bleak Lammermuirs, and fell on his own door, the company would stop, and James would take the key, and lift Ailie up again, laying her on her own bed, and, having put Jess up, would return with Rab and shut ...
— The Great English Short-Story Writers, Vol. 1 • Various

... asserting itself, though all the aldermen alive say 'No,' as he has learnt from the agony of his own child; and that the truth is Trustfulness in them, not doubt, nor putting down, nor filing them away. And when at last a great sea rises, and this sea of Time comes sweeping down, bearing the alderman and such mudworms of the earth away to nothing, dashing them to fragments in its fury—Toby will climb a rock and hear the bells (now faded from his sight) pealing out upon the waters. And as he hears them, and ...
— The Life of Charles Dickens, Vol. I-III, Complete • John Forster

... first, and again the long box was gently put aboard. On the wind-swept platform Annie's mother and I shook hands without a word, and in another minute the long train was sweeping swiftly across the white prairie. I watched it idly, thinking of Annie and her sad home-going. Just then the first pale beams of the morning sun glinted on the last coach, and touched with fine gold the long white smoke plume, which the wind carried far over the field. ...
— The Black Creek Stopping-House • Nellie McClung

... Virginia were from three-quarters of a mile to a mile and a half back from, and substantially parallel to, the river. Rifle-pits commanded every available crossing, which, being few and difficult, were easily guarded. Continuous lines of infantry parapets, broken by battery epaulements located for sweeping the wide approaches from the river, extended the whole distance; while abattis strengthened every place which the nature of the ground allowed an ...
— The Campaign of Chancellorsville • Theodore A. Dodge

... The old sweeping-women were going downstairs with their brooms. It was almost twelve o'clock, and like the old dray-horses in the mill yard they slackened work in good season for the noonday bell. Three gay young French girls ran downstairs past them; they were ...
— A Country Doctor and Selected Stories and Sketches • Sarah Orne Jewett

... Margaret to it; she always puts her heart into what she has to do. Well, you look sorely disappointed, child: I am sorry for it, but I cannot help it. I have no fancy for such vanities, but I dare say you like better sticking bits of gold leaf upon vellum than scrubbing and sweeping." ...
— In Convent Walls - The Story of the Despensers • Emily Sarah Holt

... their dress liveries stood at the porch of Laughton as the postilions drove rapidly along the road, sweeping through venerable groves, tinged with the hues of autumn, up to that stately pile. From the window of the large, cumbrous vehicle which Percival, mindful of Madame Dalibard's infirmity, had hired for her special accommodation, ...
— Lucretia, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... words, but very confusedly, because each separate leaf of the tree seemed to be a tongue, and the whole myriad of tongues were babbling at once. But the noise waxed broader and deeper, until it resembled a tornado sweeping through the oak, and making one great utterance out of the thousand and thousand of little murmurs which each leafy tongue had caused by its rustling. And now, though it still had the tone of a mighty wind roaring among the branches, ...
— Tanglewood Tales • Nathaniel Hawthorne

... pessimistic tendency grows greater and greater. It seems as if the writer had gone through a sort of moral crisis, brought on by the conflict of his old despair and his new hopes. At this time, Russian society itself began to shake off its apathy, and this awakening, sweeping like a vivifying wave into the soul of the sad artist, opened for him, at the same ...
— Contemporary Russian Novelists • Serge Persky

... yellow reptile with horns and hoofs, that winked up at me from it, was decidedly unpleasant and out of place, and I at once concluded that the soil was sufficiently mellow for my purposes, and smoothed it off directly. Then, with delighted fingers, in sweeping circles, and fantastic whirls, and exact triangles, I planted my seeds in generous profusion, determined, that, if my wilderness did not blossom, it should not be from niggardliness of seed. But even then my box was full before my basket was ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 9, No. 55, May, 1862 • Various

... have materials for a sweeping innovation which might, if it spread, not only simplify life but reinforce the language. For why confine such terms to domestic servants? If all parlourmaids are to be called "Palmer," why not, for example, call all editors ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 156, May 28, 1919. • Various

... absent. For one brief moment a hope arose in the soul of Samuel Block that this man might have fallen overboard and floated under the ice, but he was not allowed to entertain this pleasant thought. Mr. Marcy had seized a glass, and with it was sweeping the icy ...
— The Great Stone of Sardis • Frank R. Stockton

... waiting to question further, and as the trumpet gave out the "Forward—gallop!" the Hussar troop went sweeping through the gate, leaving the guard-sergeant and his men in a state of great mystification and no little chagrin; he, their chief spokesman, ...
— The Free Lances - A Romance of the Mexican Valley • Mayne Reid

... yet send no minister to remonstrate or to threaten. Our citizens had claims on that government to the amount of twelve or thirteen millions. Ten or a dozen of our citizens—of our own native citizens—were in degrading bondage in the mines of Mexico, or sweeping its streets; and yet a minister to Mexico was opposed because the President and a party in this country wished to annex Texas to the Union. It was not only the duty of this government to demand the liquidation of our claims and the liberation of our ...
— Memoir of the Life of John Quincy Adams. • Josiah Quincy

... Thomas," replied Manuello with a sweeping bow, "the coffee I make is very soothing. It will give you a long, soft sleep." There was an undertone of subtle irony that was entirely lost upon the ...
— Frontier Boys on the Coast - or in the Pirate's Power • Capt. Wyn Roosevelt

... to work in the terrible heat of summer and in the bitter cold of the winter. He set to work with a will, and the frozen ground yielded quickly to the strokes of his trusty spade, and surely the faint moon, glimmering from between the drifting clouds sweeping across the dark face of the black heavens overhead, never looked upon a ...
— Mischievous Maid Faynie • Laura Jean Libbey

... assimilated rapidly, and with an accuracy which delighted the old scholar. Sometimes, of an evening, he would keep her with him long after school hours, and one winter he took it into his head that she must learn to dance. He tied an inky tablecloth to her shoulders to serve as a sweeping garment. It was infinitely droll to see the two, mincing, bowing, and pirouetting in front of the mirror. 'You must see yourself curtsey,' he said, 'if you would learn the real movement.' He taught her the gavotte, the pavane, and many other ...
— A German Pompadour - Being the Extraordinary History of Wilhelmine van Graevenitz, - Landhofmeisterin of Wirtemberg • Marie Hay

... also, we discover a chaotic medley, a sudden overthrow of all potency, a seeming indifference towards all human weal and woe, a blind groping in the dark; we discover gloomy possibilities constantly sweeping as dark clouds over man and occasionally descending as a crashing tempest."[24] Hundreds of similar examples may be found in Eucken's books, and all point to the insufficiency of the natural process for satisfying the deepest needs of our being. But in spite of the fact that the natural process ...
— An Interpretation of Rudolf Eucken's Philosophy • W. Tudor Jones

... over my head the vapours curl From the bowl of the soothing clay, In the misty forms that eddy and whirl My thoughts are flitting away; Yes, the preacher's right, 'tis vanity all, But the sweeping rebuke he showers On vanities all may heaviest fall On vanities ...
— Poems • Adam Lindsay Gordon

... near the door that we readily take in, in our first sweeping glance round the room. Mrs. Mountainhead, a lady prodigiously inclined to embonpoint, looking exceedingly warm and uncomfortable, is the central figure. Her two daughters and their attendant cavaliers are also there. But it is plain to see that Mrs. Mountainhead ...
— Honor Edgeworth • Vera

... unexpected attack, got together a poor 7,000 el-moran, and suffered utter defeat in two sanguinary engagements. More than a thousand of their warriors fell, and the swarms of the victors poured continuously over the whole country between the Lakes Baringo and Naivasha, sweeping all the Masai before them, and getting an immense booty in women, children, and cattle. This was at the beginning of May; and the Masai, who knew not how to escape from their exasperated foes except by our aid, sent couriers who ...
— Freeland - A Social Anticipation • Theodor Hertzka

... impact, as of a fist or a club; a stroke is a sweeping movement; as, the stroke of a sword, of an oar, of the arm in swimming. A shock is the sudden encounter with some heavy body; as, colliding railway-trains meet with a shock; the shock of battle. A slap is given with ...
— English Synonyms and Antonyms - With Notes on the Correct Use of Prepositions • James Champlin Fernald

... She had dismounted and was sitting on the heather, while Colonel George with his field-glass laid across his horse's saddle conned the moor anxiously in every direction. The mist was only just gone, and he seemed to have much to look at, for a long line of horsemen was sweeping before him over the moor, searching for the children. At last he set down the glass and rubbed his eyes, for he had been in the saddle for nearly twenty-four hours, and taking a flask from his pocket poured out a little for Lady Eleanor. She shook her head as he brought it, but he only said ...
— The Drummer's Coat • J. W. Fortescue

... the bridge the ice had become blocked, and the large, flat floes sweeping down on the current were pushing, hustling, and climbing on each other with grunts and squeaks as if they had been endowed with some low form of animal life. The rain did not cease at midnight, but the clouds lifted a ...
— The Vultures • Henry Seton Merriman

... Brilliant sunlight beat down on the yellow sand, but its heat was very different from the torrid rays that had kept them running to the ocean to cool off all that summer. There was a clear and sparkling appearance to the air and sky, and the wind that came sweeping over the level sands had a nip in it that made even Jimmy walk ...
— The Radio Boys at the Sending Station - Making Good in the Wireless Room • Allen Chapman

... the direction and let it rest upon a star, and we have only a point of light, more or less brilliant. The glass reveals to us the fact that the star-dust which we call the Milky Way is an aggregation of innumerable single suns. Sweeping the arching blue with the telescope, we find some stars are golden, some green, others purple, many silvery-white, and some are twins. Probably there is no such thing as stars of the first and second magnitude, as the common expression names them. It is most ...
— Due South or Cuba Past and Present • Maturin M. Ballou

... recruiting itself from the intermediate ranks, till there be none left to enlist on either side. Those Dandiacal Manicheans, with the host of Dandyising Christians, will form one body: the Drudges, gathering round them whosoever is Drudgical, be he Christian or Infidel Pagan; sweeping-up likewise all manner of Utilitarians, Radicals, refractory Potwallopers, and so forth, into their general mass, will form another. I could liken Dandyism and Drudgism to two bottomless boiling Whirlpools that had broken-out on opposite quarters ...
— Sartor Resartus, and On Heroes, Hero-Worship, and the Heroic in History • Thomas Carlyle

... and politics who has not predicted the "Great European War." Indeed, it required no special powers of prophecy to foresee that this constantly smoldering, and sometimes blazing corner of Europe, would one day burst into a sweeping conflagration. The chief cause of this constant turmoil and conflict in the Balkans lay in its geographical relation to the expansion plan of Austria and Germany and all the other European states, the Balkans being the gate and roadway to the Orient. The first essential ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume I (of 8) - Introductions; Special Articles; Causes of War; Diplomatic and State Papers • Various

... Its occupation is gone. This school of theologians, which numbers in its ranks some of the most respectable names in Germany, and which traces its origin to Schleiermacher, can scarcely be said now to make head against the sweeping current of Pharisaical orthodoxy. Some of its older representatives have been withdrawn from the scene either by age or death; others have followed the multitude, and conformed to the reigning 'churchmanship.' It is the old story enacted in the Catholic ...
— History of Rationalism Embracing a Survey of the Present State of Protestant Theology • John F. Hurst

... white finger rapturously, noted that it was sweeping from the Arctic Circle to the Tropic Zone. "That's Love Harbor, reached through the thoroughfare ...
— Blow The Man Down - A Romance Of The Coast - 1916 • Holman Day

... dropping, poppling, splashing, trickling, dripping from leaves to earth, falling from bank to rills below, gurgling under gate-paths, lapping against the tree-trunks and little ridge piles in the brooks, and at last sweeping with a hushed content into the bosom of Thames. And the river himself was good for something more than a "stree-um." He was bank-full and sweeping on, taking to himself on this side and on that the tributes of his children, from which the waters poured so fast that they ...
— The Naturalist on the Thames • C. J. Cornish

... in hand; but I saw a thing that bade me forget him, and set me running at full speed toward the Welshmen. Erpwald had ridden well ahead of his comrades, and as his spear crossed those of the foe one of them stepped forward before his chief and made a sweeping blow at the legs of the horse with a long pole-axe. Down the horse came, and Erpwald flew over its head into the midst of the enemy, overthrowing one or two of them as if he had been a stone from ...
— A Prince of Cornwall - A Story of Glastonbury and the West in the Days of Ina of Wessex • Charles W. Whistler

... Nevertheless this ethereal art may be enticed to earth and married with what is mortal. Music interests humanity most when it is wedded to human events. The alliance comes about through the emotions which music and life arouse in common. For sound, in sweeping through the body and making felt there its kinetic and potential stress, provokes no less interest than does any other physical event or premonition. Music can produce emotion as directly as can fighting or love. If in the latter instances ...
— The Life of Reason • George Santayana

... south-east. The ground seems precisely formed for it. I rode fifty yards up the lane, between the church and the house, in order to look about me; and saw how it might all be. Nothing can be easier. The meadows beyond what will be the garden, as well as what now is, sweeping round from the lane I stood in to the north-east, that is, to the principal road through the village, must be all laid together, of course; very pretty meadows they are, finely sprinkled with timber. They belong to the living, I suppose; if not, you must purchase ...
— Persuasion • Jane Austen

... looked around together at the dimly burning gas-lights, the creaking scenery being drawn back from the stage, the woman with a brush and mop sweeping, and at that dismal perspective of holland-shrouded auditorium beyond, ...
— Berenice • E. Phillips Oppenheim

... took the instrument, protesting that his voice was a very bad one; then, sweeping the strings, began that fine old Spanish ...
— The Purple Land • W. H. Hudson

... of old knew that his almighty Lawgiver might at any moment thunder to him from the whirlwind, or appear before his very eyes, the visible embodiment of power or wrath, so the Rugby schoolboy walked in a holy dread of some sudden manifestation of the sweeping gown, the majestic tone, the piercing glance, of Dr. Arnold. Among the lower forms of the school his appearances were rare and transitory, and upon these young children 'the chief impression', we are told, 'was of extreme fear'. The older ...
— Eminent Victorians • Lytton Strachey

... cow as long as he dared, and went back to the house only when he knew he couldn't postpone his tasks any longer. Jean was sweeping the doorstep as he came ...
— The Scotch Twins • Lucy Fitch Perkins

... though the room was very light with the burning candles; and I found myself glancing behind me, constantly, and then all 'round the room. It was nervy work waiting for that thing to come. Then, suddenly, I was aware of a little, cold wind sweeping over me, coming from behind. I gave one great nerve-thrill, and a prickly feeling went all over the back of my head. Then I hove myself 'round with a sort of stiff jerk, and stared straight against that ...
— Carnacki, The Ghost Finder • William Hope Hodgson

... the waters lie still and fathomless. On the left hand, you just catch a peep of the widening mouth of the bay, the break in the reef by which ships enter, and, beyond, the sea. To the right, the inlet, sweeping boldly round the promontory, runs far away into the land; where, save in one direction, the hills close in on every side, knee-deep in verdure and shooting aloft in grotesque peaks. The open space lies at the head of the bay; in the distance it ...
— Omoo: Adventures in the South Seas • Herman Melville

... hearth, whose leaping, crackling, fragrant blaze lighted the sombre little person sitting beside it, and sparkled on the half-bending form of that strange dark-haired girl, with her aquamarine eyes bent full on his. He was wrapped, from head to foot, in a great sweeping brigand's cloak, and a black, wide-brimmed hat, that had for an instant slouched its shadow down his face, hung now in his gloved hand. Dropping cloak and hat upon a chair with an invisible motion, he advanced, an air of surprise lifting the ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 13, No. 79, May, 1864 • Various

... Holston one hundred rifle-men. He had already been at Boonesborough—therefore his delay. From Boonesborough he had advanced for Logan's Station, sweeping the timber. The Shawnees had ambushed six of his advance scouts, and killed two. But here he was, just in nick of time, with his hardy Long Knives, whose rifles were as much feared as the rifles ...
— Boys' Book of Frontier Fighters • Edwin L. Sabin

... 'that is quite in your unjust sweeping style of censuring. You do not mean to say that Lucy, or the Major, or ...
— Abbeychurch - or, Self-Control and Self-Conceit • Charlotte M. Yonge



Words linked to "Sweeping" :   cleansing, cleaning, indiscriminate, sweep



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