"Descending" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... of 1856, I met with Mr. Christy accidentally in an omnibus at Havana. He had been in Cuba for some months, leading an adventurous life, visiting sugar-plantations, copper-mines, and coffee-estates, descending into caves, and botanizing in tropical jungles, cruising for a fortnight in an open boat among the coral-reefs, hunting turtles and manatis, and visiting all sorts of people from whom information was to be had, from foreign consuls and ...
— Anahuac • Edward Burnett Tylor
... the dark swarming crowds of the citizens. Her white banner waving, her white armour shining, it was little wonder that the throng that filled the streets received the Maid "as if they had seen God descending among them." "And they had good reason," says the Chronicle, "for they had suffered many disturbances, labours, and pains, and, what is worse, great doubt whether they ever should be delivered. But now all were comforted, as if the siege were over, by the divine ...
— Jeanne d'Arc - Her Life And Death • Mrs.(Margaret) Oliphant
... rough. O, shun me not, but hear me ere you go! God knows, I cannot force love as you do: My words shall be as spotless as my youth, Full of simplicity and naked truth. This sacrifice, whose sweet perfume descending From Venus' altar, to your footsteps bending, Doth testify that you exceed her far, To whom you offer, and whose nun you are. Why should you worship her? her you surpass As much as sparkling diamons flaring glass. A diamond set in lead his worth retains; ...
— Hero and Leander and Other Poems • Christopher Marlowe and George Chapman
... appeared to pour over her soul; wildly she cast around her eyes, and then more piercing became her shrieks, as she found herself gradually descending into what seemed to be a pit or well—only that it ...
— Wagner, the Wehr-Wolf • George W. M. Reynolds
... his feet enthusiastically, bringing his feet down on the floor with a force that seemed to jar the whole house. Fortunately there was a substantial rug between his descending number ...
— The Radio Boys in the Thousand Islands • J. W. Duffield
... to have had three great purposes in descending from his glory, and dwelling amongst men. The first, to teach them true virtue, both by his example and precepts: the second, to give them the most forcible motives to the practice of it, by "bringing life and immortality to light;" by shewing ...
— The Young Gentleman and Lady's Monitor, and English Teacher's Assistant • John Hamilton Moore
... lower entablature is gone, but enough is left to show that the upper order was Ionic and very short, and that the towers were to rise behind buttress-like curves descending from the central part to two obelisks placed above the coupled ...
— Portuguese Architecture • Walter Crum Watson
... but a gentleman is always considerate, quiet, respectful; and he expects consideration, quietness, and respect from those who wait upon him. The light-footed, cheerful young women who serve in hotels and private houses are nearly always charmingly kind and obliging without ever descending to familiarity; in fact, I believe that, if England be taken all round, it will be found that female post-office clerks are the only servants who are positively offensive. They are spoiled by the hurried, captious, tiresome persons who haunt post-offices ...
— The Ethics of Drink and Other Social Questions - Joints In Our Social Armour • James Runciman
... was sad and heavy thus, with discord, doubt, and death itself gathering and descending, like the clouds of long night, upon Flamborough. But far away, among the mountains and the dreary moorland, the "intake" of the coming winter was a great deal worse to see. For here no blink of the sea came ...
— Mary Anerley • R. D. Blackmore
... knee inside of his; her arms slid around him like lightning; he felt himself rising into the air, descending—there came a crash, a magnificent display of ocular fireworks, and nothing further concerned him until he discovered himself lying flat on the floor and heard ...
— The Gay Rebellion • Robert W. Chambers
... fear lest it should do her harm. Scholastica, on the other hand, took such a fancy to this agreeable fluid, which she tasted for the first time, that she drank deeply, and was amazed to find it mounting to her head instead of descending to her stomach. In this pleasant state, she felt it was her duty to reconcile Armelline and myself, and to assure us that we might be as tender as we liked without minding ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... Henry Douglass, descending the staircase slowly and thoughtfully at eight o'clock, asked Rutley whether Miss Higham was in the drawing-room. Rutley answered that the young lady and Mr. Mills had gone. Walked to Cholsey to catch the evening train to town. One of the ...
— Love at Paddington • W. Pett Ridge
... this the maid descending, Sank upon the tossing billows, On the open ocean's surface, On the ...
— Kalevala, Volume I (of 2) - The Land of the Heroes • Anonymous
... be recollected as the largest sheet of artificial water in the kingdom, with the exception of that at Blenheim. Near the high Southampton road it forms the above cascade, descending into a glen romantically shaded with plantations of birch, willow, ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 19, No. 533, Saturday, February 11, 1832. • Various
... his descending footsteps on the staircase, until they could be heard no longer, and then exclaimed to Jerningham, who entered, "Victoria! victoria! magna est veritas et praevalebit!—Had I told the villain a word of a lie, he is so familiar with all the regions of falsehood—his ...
— Peveril of the Peak • Sir Walter Scott
... in the stream, and the winter was descending so rapidly that they despaired of taking their boat down to the old landing, and permitting it to await their return, as they would be almost certain to find it frozen in, and be obliged to leave it there until spring. They were compelled, therefore, to make the complete journey on foot, ...
— Sevenoaks • J. G. Holland
... stone mullions, were much overgrown with ivy, throwing a cool green shadowiness into the room. One of them, however, had been altered to a more modern taste, and opened with folding-doors upon a few steps, descending into an old-fashioned, terraced garden. To approach this window he had to pass a table, lying on which he saw a paper with verses on it, evidently in a woman's hand, and apparently just written, for the ink of the corrective scores still glittered. Just as he reached the window, which stood open, ...
— David Elginbrod • George MacDonald
... rapid that he could tell nothing of the objects he passed nor how long he was in descending, the only thing that was definite being the fact that the creek lay below and he might or might ...
— The Hilltop Boys - A Story of School Life • Cyril Burleigh
... "Descending the stairs, you rushed from the house, closing the front door behind you and regaining your own without being seen. But here you found yourself baffled in your attempted escape, by two things. First, by the pistol you still held in your hand, and secondly, by the fact that the key upon ...
— The Golden Slipper • Anna Katharine Green
... participating in this more of her father than of her mother, who was of an inferior alloy, plausible, or, as the French hath it, more DEBONAIRE and affable: virtues which might well suit with majesty, and which, descending as hereditary to the daughter, did render her of a sweeter temper, and endeared her more to the love and liking of the people, who gave her the name and fame of a ...
— Travels in England and Fragmenta Regalia • Paul Hentzner and Sir Robert Naunton
... little chamfered doorway in the corner, which opened into a descending turret; and Somerset went down. When he had unfastened the door at the bottom, and stepped into the lower corridor, she asked, 'Are you down?' And on receiving an affirmative reply she ...
— A Laodicean • Thomas Hardy
... walk alone, When feather'd rain came softly down, As Jove descending from his Tower To court her in a silver shower: The wanton snow flew to her breast, Like pretty birds into their nest, But, overcome with whiteness there, For grief it thaw'd into a tear: Thence falling on her garments' hem, To deck her, ...
— Book of English Verse • Bulchevy
... this roofing-paper black; and Thyrsis, by way of compensation, agreed that the weather-boards should have some "natural finish", instead of common paint. There was to be a six-foot piazza in front, and a little platform in back, with steps descending to the spring. ...
— Love's Pilgrimage • Upton Sinclair
... see in the lamplight, Descending the broad hall stair, Grave Alice, and laughing Allegra, And Edith ...
— The Home Book of Verse, Vol. 1 (of 4) • Various
... watercourses, of fertile fields and wooded hills; amongst which nestled the rich villages, and the flocks and herds were feeding in peace. She saw it not. She saw not the smiling land, the taunting crowd, the cruel executioner: she saw only the face of her Lord. Descending the hill, she knelt to pray; and so praying she was speared. No common honour descended upon her that day: she was the first martyr of Christ's church in the island of Madagascar. "Strange is it," said the executioner, "there is a charm about these ...
— Fruits of Toil in the London Missionary Society • Various
... this visit. Men who have elected to govern their lives by principles of abstract right and reason, which happen, perhaps, to be at variance with what society considers equally right and reasonable, should, for fear of complications, be careful about descending from the lofty heights of logic to the common level of impulse and affection. Many years before, Warwick, when a lad of eighteen, had shaken the dust of the town from his feet, and with it, he fondly thought, the blight of his inheritance, and had achieved elsewhere a worthy career. But ...
— The House Behind the Cedars • Charles W. Chesnutt
... son of h—," yelled the Colonel, as he sprang on the overseer, bore him to the ground, and wrenched the shot-gun from his hand. Clubbing the weapon, he raised it to brain him. The movement occupied but a second; the gun was descending, and in another instant Moye would have met Sam in eternity, had not a brawny arm caught the Colonel's, and, winding itself around his body, pinned his limbs to his side so that motion was impossible. The woman, half frantic with excitement, thrust open the door when her ...
— Among the Pines - or, South in Secession Time • James R. Gilmore
... the day and, as soon as the sun set, were again on their feet. The journey was a toilsome one. The country was so broken that they were continually either climbing the steep hills or descending into the valleys. After the moon had set they were forced to come to a halt, for some hours, finding it impossible to climb the steep hills in the darkness. With the first light of day they were again in motion, and ...
— By Right of Conquest - Or, With Cortez in Mexico • G. A. Henty
... Child is set for the rise' or for the fall of all who hear His name. He leaves no man at the level at which He found him, but either lifts him up nearer to God, and purity and joy, or sinks him into an ever-descending pit of darkening separation from all these. Which is He to you? Something He must be—your strength or your ruin. If you commit your souls to Him in humble faith, He will be your peace, your life, your Heaven. If you turn from His offered grace, He will be your pain, your death, your torture. 'What ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren
... are the lines of the life beyond in its simplest expression, for it is not all simple, and we catch dim glimpses of endless circles below descending into gloom and endless circles above, ascending into glory, all improving, all purposeful, all intensely alive. All are agreed that no religion upon earth has any advantage over another, but that character and refinement ...
— The New Revelation • Arthur Conan Doyle
... and in another minute they were descending the steps of 27 Carshalton Terrace with their ...
— The Secret Adversary • Agatha Christie
... foretold by the Lord in the Gospels: And that this New or Second Christian Church, which will be the Crown of all Churches, and will stand forever, is what was representatively seen by John, when he beheld the holy city, New Jerusalem, descending from GOD out of heaven, prepared as a ...
— The Book of Religions • John Hayward
... with the cold. The storm lasted until November twenty-second. On the morning of that day, while the ship was in the trough of the waves, and with topmasts shipped, it was struck by a squall of rain and hail, accompanied by great darkness. A thunderbolt, descending the mainmast, struck the vessel amidships. It killed three men besides wounding and maiming eight others; it had entered the hatches, and torn open the mainhatch, with a blaze of light, so that the ...
— History of the Philippine Islands Vols 1 and 2 • Antonio de Morga
... brief space in Paris. He must have taken the lecture-rooms of Germany on his way to Switzerland. Passing into that country he saw Schaffhausen frozen. Geneva was his resting-place in Switzerland, but he visited Basle and Berne. Descending into Piedmont, he saw Milan, Verona, Mantua, and Florence, and at Padua is supposed to have stayed some six months, and, it has been asserted, received his degree. "Sir," said Johnson to Boswell, "he disputed his passage ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol IX. • Edited by Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton
... be the Earl of Warwick than all the kings he ever made! Jeffrey and Gifford I take to be the monarch-makers in poetry and prose. The 'British Critic', in their Rokeby Review, have presupposed a comparison which I am sure my friends never thought of, and W. Scott's subjects are injudicious in descending to. I like the man—and admire his works to what Mr. Braham calls Entusymusy. All such stuff can only vex him, and do me no good. Many hate his politics—(I hate all politics); and, here, a man's politics are like the Greek soul—an [Greek: eidolon], besides God knows what other soul; ...
— The Works of Lord Byron: Letters and Journals, Volume 2. • Lord Byron
... came thundering into the room no less a personage than the giant clergyman, straight from those haunted rooms. Pallor hung about his face, but there was a light radiating through it—a high, luminous whiteness—that made the secretary think of his childhood's pictures of the Hebrew prophet descending from Mount Sinai, the glory of internal spheres still reflected upon the skin and eyes. Skale, like a flame and a wind, came pouring into the room. The thing he had remained upstairs to complete had clearly proved successful. ...
— The Human Chord • Algernon Blackwood
... from this meditation the afternoon was waning. He would fulfill his destiny! He could live only on the heights, although it might be as a proud mendicant. All descending paths he found barred. Farewell to happiness which might be found by retrocession to a natural and primitive life! Since the dead did not wish him to be a man, he would be ...
— The Dead Command - From the Spanish Los Muertos Mandan • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... Werve!" she repeated, descending the hill and approaching me as nearly as she could on the opposite side of the ditch. "What is your business at the Castle, sir?" she inquired, in quite another tone, no longer speaking like a "somebody" to ...
— Major Frank • A. L. G. Bosboom-Toussaint
... Fathom, finding himself descending the hill of fortune with an acquired gravitation, strove to catch at every twig, in order to stop or retard his descent. He now regretted the opportunities he had neglected, of marrying one of several women of moderate fortune, who had made advances to him in the zenith ...
— The Adventures of Ferdinand Count Fathom, Complete • Tobias Smollett
... he found the butler, and was about to send him in search of his mistress, when he discovered Sally, descending the stairway. ...
— The Last Woman • Ross Beeckman
... In one of the Parl. Debates of 1742 Johnson makes Pitt say that 'it is probable that we shall detect bribery descending through a long subordination of wretches combined against the public happiness, from the prime minister surrounded by peers and officers of state to the exciseman dictating politics amidst a company of mechanics whom he debauches at the public ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 1 • Boswell
... on such decisive success in the north, filled the heart of the Pharaoh with pride, and the view taken of it by those who surrounded him is evident even in the brief sentences of the narrative. He is described as descending the river on the royal galley, elated in spirit and flushed by his triumph in Nubia, which had followed so closely on the deliverance of the Delta. But scarcely had he reached Thebes, when an unforeseen catastrophe turned his confidence ...
— History Of Egypt, Chaldaea, Syria, Babylonia, and Assyria, Volume 4 (of 12) • G. Maspero
... have reached camp," thought La Salle, and he fired his gun to let his people know he was approaching. Echoes rolled through the woods. Without waiting for a shot in reply he hurried to the fire. No person was near it. The descending snow hissed, caught in the flames. Here was a home hearth prepared in the wilderness, and no welcome to it but silence. La Salle called out in every Indian language he knew. Dead branches grated, ...
— Heroes of the Middle West - The French • Mary Hartwell Catherwood
... a severe one for men who had been on the road all night, and the men were glad when we bivouacked a little before dark, in a beautiful oak grove near Drainsville. Very early next morning, descending into the lovely valley of the Potomac, we reached Edwards' Ferry, where troops were crossing; after a delay of one or two hours, waiting for troops of another corps to cross the pontoon bridge, we followed, and were in Maryland again. All day long ...
— Three Years in the Sixth Corps • George T. Stevens
... Ottawas, had light complexions; his arms and hands were finely formed; his limbs straight; he always stood very erect and walked with a brisk, elastic, vigorous step; invariably dressed in Indian tanned buckskin; a perfectly well fitting hunting frock descending to the knee, and over his under clothes of the same material; the usual cape and finish of yellow fringe about the neck; cape, edges of the front opening and bottom of the frock; a belt of the same material in which were his side arms (an elegant ...
— The Land of the Miamis • Elmore Barce
... he comes from western woods, Descending slow, with gentle floods, The pioneer of a mighty train, Which commerce brings to ...
— American Merchant Ships and Sailors • Willis J. Abbot
... imagination; the unfortunate family handing round in dismay those exquisite French boots, vainly striving, one after another, to insert their toes into them, but finding among their number no Cinderella whom the wonderful shoe would fit. I figured them at last descending to a little fellow six years old, or thereabouts, whose poor little feet might possibly be planted in the centre of the boots, and thus, in default of any other protection, be saved for a time from frost and snow. My mind was divided between amusement at the ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. I, No. V, May, 1862 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... fool dashes in at once. He does not calculate the dangers of his enterprise. He does not study the map of the country he has to traverse. He does not measure the bias of the ground, the rising knolls and the descending slopes that are before him. He obeys a ...
— Thoughts on Man - His Nature, Productions and Discoveries, Interspersed with - Some Particulars Respecting the Author • William Godwin
... up the steps, passing Mrs. Halliwell slowly, and descending into the area surrounded by the beasts. Clare went up, and laid his money on the little white table. The good woman took it with a smile, threw it in her wooden bowl, and handed him, as if it had been his change, ...
— A Rough Shaking • George MacDonald
... led up the banks of the lake to the place occupied by the council; and, as he walked up, a loud whirring sound was heard above, as if caused by some rushing current of air. Instantly, the eyes of all were directed upward to the sky, where was seen a dark spot, something like a small cloud, descending rapidly, and as it approached, enlarging in its size and increasing in velocity. Terror and alarm filled the minds of the multitude and they scattered in confusion. But as soon as he had gained the eminence, ...
— Legends That Every Child Should Know • Hamilton Wright Mabie
... a tortuous stairway at the back of the house, descending mysteriously into cavernous gloom. "Let's go down here," she continued. "I ...
— At the Sign of the Jack O'Lantern • Myrtle Reed
... and talked to her, and Caleb; and even Miss Sarah, passing through the room, stopped to urge her again to go to bed. But she met them all with the same wordless refusal; she was waiting for him when the doctor, descending in the morning, tried to combine, diplomatically, praise for what she had done with ...
— Then I'll Come Back to You • Larry Evans
... the Valley City proceeded two miles up the river to tug the Chicopee off, which had got transversely across the river, preventing the fleet behind her from descending. The Valley City returned and anchored off Jamesville at 10 o'clock a.m. The fleet is all now anchored off Jamesville, and is engaged in destroying the wreck of the Otsego. During this expedition I never had ...
— Reminiscences of Two Years in the United States Navy • John M. Batten
... fade away into nothingness, but ended in something dark and glittering. Then, as he came nearer and nearer to this glittering thing, Clewe saw that it was his automatic shell, lying on its side; only a part of it was visible through the opening of the shaft which he was descending. In an instant, as it seemed to him, the car emerged from the shaft, and he seemed to be hanging in the air—at least there was nothing he could see except that great shell, lying some forty feet below him. But it was impossible ...
— The Literary World Seventh Reader • Various
... thus defeated, were ready still for war. Uther would have pursued them; but his illness had by now so grown, that his knights and barons kept him from the adventure. Whereat the enemy took courage, and left nothing undone to destroy the land; until, descending to the vilest treachery, they resolved to kill ...
— The Legends Of King Arthur And His Knights • James Knowles
... it would have to be brought back and Mr. Coxwell's assistant was commendably careful of his employer's purse. On approaching Highwood the balloon passed over a dense wood, in which there was some idea of descending. But finally the open ground was preferred, and, the wood being left behind, a ploughed field was selected as the place to drop, and the gas was allowed to escape by wholesale. The balloon swooped downward at a somewhat alarming pace, and if Barker had had all his wits ...
— Faces and Places • Henry William Lucy
... Ethiopian north-south trending highlands, descending on the east to a coastal desert plain, on the northwest to hilly terrain and on the southwest to ...
— The 2002 CIA World Factbook • US Government
... his chest crushed in. His fearful eyes had not rightly calculated the distance from the stump to the top of the pine, nor rightly weighed the power of the massed branches, and so, standing spell-bound, watching the descending trunk as one might watch his Nemesis, the rebound came and left him ...
— A Mountain Woman and Others • (AKA Elia Wilkinson) Elia W. Peattie
... presence and care were absolutely unnecessary was the one great aim and object which now filled them all, and as a means to this end their first idea was to dress, act, and talk as correctly and unblamably as boys and girls could. So, by the time the worthy lady was heard descending, they were all in the drawing-room, seated primly on the stiffest chairs they could find, and apparently absorbed in the books they gazed at with serious faces and furrowed brows. To the trained eye the "high-water marks" around faces and wrists ...
— Kitty Trenire • Mabel Quiller-Couch
... missionary whom he intended to appoint. He then went to his own room, and, according to Indian habit after exertion, went out in order to bathe. The bath was in a separate building. It was fifteen feet long, eight broad, and with stone steps descending into it to a depth of seven feet, and it was perfectly full of water. The servant sitting outside wondered at the length of time and unbroken silence, and at last looked in; but Reginald Heber had, by that time, long been ...
— Pioneers and Founders - or, Recent Workers in the Mission field • Charlotte Mary Yonge
... roamed from one sacred edifice to another, thoroughly destroying as they went. Before morning they had sacked thirty churches within the city walls. They entered the monasteries, burned their invaluable libraries, destroyed their altars, statues, pictures, and descending into the cellars, broached every cask which they found there, pouring out in one great flood all the ancient wine and ale with which those holy men had been wont to solace their retirement from generation to generation. They invaded the nunneries, ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... under which the village crowds assemble, the thatched roof of the peasant's hut, the rich tracery of the mosque where the imaum prays with his face to Mecca, the drums, and banners, and gaudy idols, the devotee swinging in the air, the graceful maiden, with the pitcher on her head, descending the steps to the riverside, the black faces, the long beards, the yellow streaks of sect, the turbans and the flowing robes, the spears and the silver maces, the elephants with their canopies of state, the gorgeous palanquin of the prince, and the close litter ...
— Critical and Historical Essays Volume 1 • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... farmhouse, before noon, where he usually sang at intervals till eight o'clock in the evening. I studied his song carefully. It consisted of but one clause, composed of a single emphasized note followed by two triplets on a descending scale. But while retaining the relative position of these few notes he varied the effect almost infinitely, by changing both the key and the pitch constantly, with such skill that I was astonished to discover the remarkable simplicity of the song. A striking quality of it was an ...
— Upon The Tree-Tops • Olive Thorne Miller
... who adds, "His descriptions are always accurate, clear, and expressed with eloquence; the causes of events and their consequences are enumerated with rare acuteness; and his personages are delineated in their true characters, the historian descending into the deepest penetralia of their hearts: but the most eminent merit of this History consists in the moral and political considerations with which it abounds; it is like Tacitus." In like manner, Machiavelli ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 6, Issue 35, September, 1860 • Various
... Accordingly, descending from the Burg, Adrian went to the best inn in Leyden, and, seating himself at a table under the trees that grew outside of it, bade the waiting-man bring him food and beer. Unconsciously, for he was thinking of other things, in speaking to him, Adrian had assumed the haughty, Spanish hidalgo ...
— Lysbeth - A Tale Of The Dutch • H. Rider Haggard
... so he heard some one descending and Dick Livingstone appeared in the hall. He called to him, and Dick entered the room. Before he sat down he lighted a cigarette and in the flare of the match Leslie got an impression of fatigue and of something new, of trouble. But ...
— The Breaking Point • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... the comparatively level land above, however, there was more open space, and the hunter threaded his way among the tree stems more rapidly, making a detour occasionally to avoid a swamp or piece of broken ground; sometimes descending a deep gorge formed by a small tributary of the stream they were ascending, and which to an unpractised eye would have appeared almost impassable, even without the encumbrance of a canoe. But the ...
— The Young Fur Traders • R.M. Ballantyne
... came foremost battailous and bold, Late led by Hugo, brother to their King, From France the isle that rivers four infold With rolling streams descending from their spring, But Hugo dead, the lily fair of gold, Their wonted ensign they tofore them bring, Under Clotharius great, a captain good, And hardy knight ysprong of ...
— Jerusalem Delivered • Torquato Tasso
... A man was descending the broad staircase which I had lately mounted—a slim man, who stepped gently. He did not turn, but continued his way, disappearing in the gloom of the large entrance hall. I gathered a quick impression of litheness and a noiseless footfall, of a sleek, black ...
— Dross • Henry Seton Merriman
... rock-pigeon. In the Bagadotten the upper mandible is remarkably arched, and the premaxillary bones are proportionally broader. In the short-faced tumbler the skull is more globular; all the bones of the face are much shortened, and the front of the skull and descending nasal bones are almost perpendicular; the maxillo-jugal arch and premaxillary bones form an almost straight line; the space between the prominent edges of the eye-orbits is depressed. In the barb the premaxillary bones are much shortened, and their anterior portion is thicker than in the ...
— The Variation of Animals and Plants Under Domestication, Vol. I. • Charles Darwin
... other, over these areas, of the carbonate of lime, which forms probably about 98 per cent. of the material of the Globigerina ooze. We can trace, indeed, every successive stage in the removal of the carbonate of lime in descending the slope of the ridge or plateau where the Globigerina ooze is forming, to the region of the clay. We find, first, that the shells of pteropods and other surface Mollusca which are constantly falling on the bottom, ...
— Discourses - Biological and Geological Essays • Thomas H. Huxley
... he came, pursued, as he afterwards learned, by the Indians, who would have murdered himself and party had they got a favorable opportunity. Thus it was not until 1850 that he could establish, what he says he all along believed, 'that the Pelly and Yukon were identical.' This he did by descending the river to where the Porcupine joins it, and where in 1847 Fort Yukon was established by Mr. A.H. Murray for the ...
— Klondyke Nuggets - A Brief Description of the Great Gold Regions in the Northwest • Joseph Ladue
... walked and walked innumerable miles, until at last he came to a great forest. As he arrived at its gloomy borders night fell, and he considered it safest to climb a tree, from which, to his great satisfaction, he beheld a light shining in the distance. Descending, he walked in the direction of the light, and found a tiny hut made of the branches of trees, in which sat a little old man with a long ...
— Legends & Romances of Brittany • Lewis Spence
... franchises, France got her States-General, and England her Parliament out of the alternate phases of the contest; and as long as it lasted it prevented the rise of divine right. A disposition existed to regard the crown as an estate descending under the law of real property in the family that possessed it. But the authority of religion, and especially of the papacy, was thrown on the side that denied the indefeasible title of kings. In France what was afterwards called the Gallican theory maintained that the reigning ...
— The History of Freedom • John Emerich Edward Dalberg-Acton
... Scarce hadst thou left me, when a dream of night Came o'er my spirit so distinct and bright, That, while I yet can vividly recall Its witching wonders, thou shall hear them all. Methought I saw, upon the lunar beam, Two winged boys, such as thy muse might dream, Descending from above, at that still hour, And gliding, with smooth step, into my bower. Fair as the beauteous spirits that, all day. In Amatha's warm founts imprisoned stay, But rise at midnight, from the enchanted rill, To cool their ...
— The Complete Poems of Sir Thomas Moore • Thomas Moore et al
... Christmas Eve, shortly before twilight. The heath lay deep in snow, and from the leaden sky fresh masses of flakes were descending. Then Paul saw that his sisters secretly took their hats and cloaks, and tried to make their escape by ...
— Dame Care • Hermann Sudermann
... in which the Fates Had given him birth and dwelling-place— And so, descending through estates Of gentle vassalage, his race Had come to those of ...
— The Mistress of the Manse • J. G. Holland
... even if, in its suggested moral freedom, it does seem to conflict with that other theory—the inevitable sequence of cause and effect, descending from the primal atom. There is seeming irrelevance in introducing this matter here; but it has a chronological relation, and it presents a mental aspect of the time. Clemens was forty-eight, and becoming more and more the philosopher; ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine
... Whereupon the brides and the other ladies and the servants with one accord fell a sobbing and shrieking, insomuch that a confused din and lamentation filled the whole place. Cimon, Lysimachus and their band, none withstanding, but all giving way before them, gained the stairs, which they were already descending when they encountered Pasimondas, who, carrying a great staff in his hand, was making in the direction of the noise; but one doughty stroke of Cimon's sword sufficed to cleave his skull in twain, and lay him dead at Cimon's ...
— The Decameron, Vol. II. • Giovanni Boccaccio
... leaned on his hoe, and, looking up at the sun, wondered whether, as in the Biblical story, it had not been stationary for several hours. He was sure it was never so long in descending to the horizon. ...
— The Jungle Fugitives • Edward S. Ellis
... which Jesus ascended and descended when brought into the presence of the Roman governor. They are held in the greatest veneration at Rome: it is sacrilegious to walk upon them. The knees of the faithful must alone touch them in ascending or descending, and that only after ...
— Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions - Vol. I • Charles Mackay
... and Plataea was many stadia away. Knowledge of how much remained made him reckless. He ran on without his former caution. The plain was again changing to undulating foothills. He had passed Erythrae now,—another village burned and deserted. He mounted a slope, was descending to mount another, when lo! over the hill before came eight riders at full speed. What must be done, must be done quickly. To plunge into the fallow field again were madness, the horsemen had surely seen him, and their sure-footed beasts ...
— A Victor of Salamis • William Stearns Davis
... weather on the river and along the docks, for the deep fog-horns sounded persistently over the city, and the haunted warning of the sirens filled the leaden sky lowering through the white veil descending in flakes ...
— The Younger Set • Robert W. Chambers
... Ridley spoke to Grisell, and assured her that mischief would ensue if the silly wench were not checked in her habit of loitering and chattering whenever she could escape from her lady's presence in the solar, which Grisell used as her bower, only descending to the ...
— Grisly Grisell • Charlotte M. Yonge
... after the glass. She adjusted it and raised it to her eyes. She had only one glimpse, however, before the descending riders were again hidden by an ...
— Golden Days for Boys and Girls, Vol. XII, Jan. 3, 1891 • Various
... sweeps upward. Consequently every progression from lower to higher tones, whether played or sung, demands a crescendo unless some plainly denoted characteristic of the music calls for different treatment. A descending passage, as a return to tranquillity, ...
— For Every Music Lover - A Series of Practical Essays on Music • Aubertine Woodward Moore
... still eve descending, And soothe a mind with sorrow rending; Ne'er may I see the blush of morrow, But close this ...
— Poems • Sir John Carr
... not go to a shop to buy anything without going to every other shop in the bazaar to ask whether he can get a similar article better and cheaper. Such a convenience as fixed prices, alike for all, does not exist in the Persian bazaar, and prices are generally on the ascending or descending scale, according to the merchant's estimate of his customer's wealth. It is looked upon as a right and a duty to extort from a rich man the maximum of profit, whereas from a poor fellow a few shais benefit ...
— Across Coveted Lands - or a Journey from Flushing (Holland) to Calcutta Overland • Arnold Henry Savage Landor
... raised its dolmens and tumuli upon the surrounding knolls. The passage was wide enough for us to walk on the margin of the stream, or where the water was very shallow; but had much rain fallen, the expedition would have been perilous, for the descending torrent would then have been strong enough to carry a man off ...
— Wanderings by southern waters, eastern Aquitaine • Edward Harrison Barker
... before Octavius had been spoken of as a boy, whom it would be easy to manage and control. He was feeble and sickly,—so much so, indeed, that just at this time his death was reported in Rome. But the "boy" was ambitious, astute, and far-seeing, and Marc Antony was descending to ruin with every step he took in his career of ...
— Historic Tales, Volume 11 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris
... Hungary, and spread disaffection among his former subjects in Austria and Styria. In June he quitted Prague, effected a junction with his allies, directing his march toward the frontiers of Austria, carried Drosendorf, after a short siege, by storm, and, descending along the banks of the Taya, ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume VI. • Various
... sunset, he climbed a high tree, from the topmost branches of which he took a melancholy survey of the barren wilderness. A dismal uniformity of shrubs and sand every-where presented itself, and the horizon was as level and uninterrupted as that of the sea. Descending from the tree, Mr. Park found his horse devouring the stubble and brushwood with groat avidity. Being too faint to attempt walking, and his horse too much fatigued to carry him, Mr. Park thought it was the last act of humanity he should ever be able to perform, to take off his bridle and let him ...
— Lander's Travels - The Travels of Richard Lander into the Interior of Africa • Robert Huish
... useful works ascend by the road of the fathers, and again return to the earth when they have fully enjoyed the fruit of their works, 'having dwelt there yvat samptam, they return by the same way' (Ch. Up. V, 10, 5). The question here arises whether the descending soul carries a certain remainder (anusaya) of its works or not.—It does not, since it has enjoyed the fruit of all its works. For by 'anusaya' we have to understand that part of the karman which remains over and above the part retributively enjoyed; but when the ...
— The Vedanta-Sutras with the Commentary by Ramanuja - Sacred Books of the East, Volume 48 • Trans. George Thibaut
... attacking convoys: Through woods defile. Over hedges. Sharp bends. Ascending or descending slopes. Farming corral, watering. Whenever conditions are such that escort cannot ...
— Military Instructors Manual • James P. Cole and Oliver Schoonmaker
... imagined for a time that he had discovered Uncle Peter's true reason for descending upon them. Higbee would have regaled him with wild tales of the New York dissipations, and Uncle Peter had come promptly on to pull him up. Percival could hear the story as Higbee would word it, with ...
— The Spenders - A Tale of the Third Generation • Harry Leon Wilson
... answer to carry it on. It would have been too much trouble for Mr Verloc. It would not have been convenient for his other business. What his business was he did not say; but after his engagement to Winnie he took the trouble to get up before noon, and descending the basement stairs, make himself pleasant to Winnie's mother in the breakfast-room downstairs where she had her motionless being. He stroked the cat, poked the fire, had his lunch served to him there. He left its slightly stuffy cosiness with evident reluctance, but, all ...
— The Secret Agent - A Simple Tale • Joseph Conrad
... wild horses stampede in all directions. The boiler, minus the water and boiler-head perhaps, goes through ceiling, roof, and brick walls, as if they were cobwebs, and, surrounded with fragments of men and things, is seen descending like a ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. II, No. 8, June 1858 • Various
... tread descending the stairs announced the approach of his host, whose sullen face was by no means engaging as he entered. ...
— The Tyranny of the Dark • Hamlin Garland
... The sun was rapidly descending in the west. The tall pines and spruce threw their shadows over the fortification. The roar of the cannon, the sighing of the shot, the groans of the wounded, the dark shades of approaching evening, all conspired to render the scene one of intense gloom. They longed ...
— Autographs for Freedom, Volume 2 (of 2) (1854) • Various
... was heard in a dark crevice toward which the boy was descending. Ned dropped down faster then, and ...
— The Boy Scout Camera Club - The Confession of a Photograph • G. Harvey Ralphson
... on the descending stairs caused him to break off with a low note of warning, and hardly had he resumed his seat before she was sitting on the arm of the chair and rumpling his wavy hair, as naturally as a child, or ...
— 'Smiles' - A Rose of the Cumberlands • Eliot H. Robinson
... on the ground, failed to reach the top of the parapet by four or five feet. It was a ticklish business to drop down on the upper round, but one by one they accomplished it, and, descending to the ground, were speedily seized and relieved of everything ...
— The River of Darkness - Under Africa • William Murray Graydon
... secret of their dire poverty; and he turned silently and cautiously to descend the stair. There was only just time enough to get away, for Edie was even then opening the door of the nursery. Noiselessly, with cat-like tread, he crept down the steps once more, and heard Edie descending, and singing as she came down to Dot. It was a plaintive little song, in a sad key—a plaintive little song of his own—but not wholly distressful, Arthur thought; she could still sing, then, to her baby! With the hot tears rising a second time to his eyes, ...
— Philistia • Grant Allen
... mortal veins Sing, with the Spring's descending rains? While in this hour, and momently, Forth of myself I look, and see Torn treasure of my heart's Desire; And human glories in the mire, That should make glad some paradise!— The childhood strewn in foulest place, The ...
— The Singing Man • Josephine Preston Peabody
... knew citizen Jean Picot. They replied that not only did they know him, but in fact he was then dining at the table d'hote. I went in. You can imagine what they were talking about—the stoppage of the diligence. Conceive the sensation my apparition caused. The god of antiquity descending from the machine produced a no more unexpected finale than I. I asked which one of the guests was called Jean Picot. The owner of this distinguished and melodious name stood forth. I placed the two hundred louis before ...
— The Companions of Jehu • Alexandre Dumas, pere
... done this just before he stood in the streak of sunlight, debating in which of the several ways he should slide down the banisters. They all seemed silly, and in a sudden languor he began descending the steps one by one. During that descent he could remember his father quite distinctly—the short grey beard, the deep eyes twinkling, the furrow between them, the funny smile, the thin figure which always seemed so tall to little Jon; but his mother he couldn't see. All that represented ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... with her, and travelled away and away before him until he reached the hill which she had told him of. And when he came there, he saw a great cloud that shot out of the sky, descending on the hill, and when it came down on the hill and melted away, there it left the Beggarman of the King of Sweden standing, and between his legs the Amadan saw the whole world and ...
— Tales of Wonder Every Child Should Know • Various
... Quickly descending to the next landing, where there was an alcove window looking out upon the driveway, Kate could see a closed carriage standing before the entrance, and Walcott, holding the door partially open, talking with some one inside. The colloquy was brief, and, as Walcott stepped back from the ...
— At the Time Appointed • A. Maynard Barbour
... spent day after day on the margin of Pirene, waiting for his friend to come back; but when he perceived Bellerophon descending through the clouds, mounted on the winged horse, he had shrunk back into the shrubbery. He was a delicate and tender child, and dreaded lest the old man and the country fellow should see the tears ...
— Myths That Every Child Should Know - A Selection Of The Classic Myths Of All Times For Young People • Various
... these heated receptacles for 12 hours or more, and on removal it is generally found to be very nicely cooked. Each of the pi-gummi ovens illustrated above is provided with a tube-like orifice 3 or 4 inches in diameter, descending obliquely from the ground level into the cavity. Through this opening the fire is arranged and kept in order, and in this respect it seems to be the counterpart of the smaller hole of the Zuni dome-shaped ovens. When the principal opening, by which the vessel containing ...
— Eighth Annual Report • Various
... earth is bath'd in the effulgence giv'n To dissipate the darkness of the night. The eastern shepherds, 'biding in the fields, O'erlook the flocks till now their constant care, And light divine to mortal sense reveals A seraph bright descending ...
— Christmas: Its Origin and Associations - Together with Its Historical Events and Festive Celebrations During Nineteen Centuries • William Francis Dawson
... stood wide open, the slide was pushed right back. The half-turn of the staircase cut off the view of the lobby. A low humming ascended from below, but it stopped abruptly at the sound of my descending footsteps. ...
— The Shadow-Line - A Confession • Joseph Conrad
... set out for the foot of the falls, first of all by a steep winding path, and then by a flight of very rough and uneven steps which had been formed by placing stones in places on and between the rocks. When descending, we often paused to view the constantly changing scene, for, as we got lower and lower, the rainbow hues across each fall, which were at first widely broken by the masses of cliff stretching between the falls, came closer and closer, ...
— Gold, Sport, And Coffee Planting In Mysore • Robert H. Elliot
... for Fergus McKay had much of the bone, muscle, and sinew, that is characteristic of his race, but a blow from an unseen weapon stunned him, and when his senses returned he found himself bound hand and foot lying in the bottom of a canoe. He could tell from its motion, that it was descending ...
— The Buffalo Runners - A Tale of the Red River Plains • R.M. Ballantyne
... Descending from this temple, we pass through a sort of wild garden, with here and there an olive-tree or dark carruba; on the left are the ruins of the ancient rock-wall, huge fragments of which in places have fallen down the precipice; other parts are perforated as with windows or loop-holes, ...
— Knickerbocker, or New-York Monthly Magazine, March 1844 - Volume 23, Number 3 • Various
... little frame cottage, standing on high pillars just inside a tall, close fence, and reached by a narrow out-door stair from the green batten gate. It was well surrounded by crape myrtles, and communicated behind by a descending stair and a plank-walk with the rear entrance of the chapel over whose worshippers he daily spread his hands in benediction. The name of the street—ah! there is where light is wanting. Save the Cathedral and the Ursulines, there is very little of record concerning churches at ...
— Old Creole Days • George Washington Cable
... two Generals afford each a striking illustration of this. We take first Buonaparte in his famous enterprise against Bluecher's Army in February 1814, when it was separated from the Grand Army, and descending the Marne. It would not be easy to find a two days' march to surprise the enemy productive of greater results than this; Bluecher's Army, extended over a distance of three days' march, was beaten in detail, and suffered a loss nearly equal to that of defeat in a great battle. This was ...
— On War • Carl von Clausewitz
... the major led straight on again, slowly descending the easy slope of this hillside. Finally they reached a gaping hole. Ruth knew it must have been made by a shell. It was thirty feet or more across, and when they descended into it she found it to be fully ...
— Ruth Fielding at the War Front - or, The Hunt for the Lost Soldier • Alice B. Emerson
... toiled up the mountain. Plainly in the dust could be made out the trail of the express ascending and descending. Plain also were the signs where the driver had dumped out the gold bags and turned around. From that point the tracks of a man and a horse led to the sheet of rock. Beyond ...
— The Killer • Stewart Edward White
... neck to tell which way the wind blew. To see him striding along the profile of a hill on a windy day, with his clothes bagging and fluttering about him, one might have mistaken him for the genius of famine descending upon the earth, or some scarecrow eloped ...
— The Legend of Sleepy Hollow • Washington Irving
... try to make our way by these forts to the head-waters of the Saint John River, by descending which we might return to Castle Kearney. Our skipper advised us, however, not to make the attempt. He warned us that the difficulties in the way—cedar swamps, rivers, lakes, marshes, wild beasts, and savage Indians—would prove insuperable, and that we should probably never again ...
— In the Wilds of Florida - A Tale of Warfare and Hunting • W.H.G. Kingston
... of Plato, Metropolitan of Moscow, puts it very clearly: "Through this holy Ordinance the Holy Ghost descendeth upon the person Baptized, and confirmeth him in the grace which he received in his Baptism according to the example of His descending upon the disciples of Jesus Christ, and in imitation of the disciples themselves, who after Baptism laid their hands upon the believers; by which laying on of hands ...
— The Church: Her Books and Her Sacraments • E. E. Holmes
... into flame. Here, too, was power—here, too, the signs of it! Palaces of granite and marble, arid towering apartment-hotels; an endless vista of carriages and automobiles, with rich women lolling in them, or descending into shops whose windows blazed with jewels and silver and gold. Here were the masters of the metropolis, the masters of life; the dispensers of patronage—that "public" which he had to please. He would bring his vision and lay it at their feet, and they ...
— Love's Pilgrimage • Upton Sinclair |
