"Floating" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... Many a summer day I have lain down and rested on these flat and fluffy forest rugs, while between the tangled tops of the pines I looked at the blue of the sky or watched the white clouds so serenely floating there. Many a summer night upon these elastic spreads I have lain and gazed at the thick-sown stars, or watched the ebbing, fading camp-fire, at last to fall asleep and to rest as sweetly and serenely ...
— Wild Life on the Rockies • Enos A. Mills
... has been made in protecting our coasts by adequate fortifications with sufficient guns. We should, however, pay much more heed than at present to the development of an extensive system of floating mines for use in all our more important harbors. These mines have been proved to be a most formidable ...
— State of the Union Addresses of Theodore Roosevelt • Theodore Roosevelt
... Thee: I shall for ever confess unto Thee. In the morning I shall stand in Thy presence, and shall see the health of my countenance, my God, who also shall quicken our mortal bodies, by the Spirit that dwelleth in us, because He hath in mercy been borne over our inner darksome and floating deep: from Whom we have in this pilgrimage received an earnest, that we should now be light: whilst we are saved by hope, and are the children of light, and the children of the day, not the children of the night, nor of the darkness, which yet sometimes ...
— The Confessions of Saint Augustine • Saint Augustine
... days together, to see what success at the lake; till at length she grew very impatient, for fear, as she afterwards told me, I should either think she had not done what she said, or had done it in an ineffectual manner. But one day, walking by the lake, I thought I saw something floating in the water at a very great distance. "Youwarkee," says I, "I spy a sail!" Then running to my boat* and taking her in, away we went, plying my oars with all my might; for I longed to see what it was. At nearer view I perceived it to be one of my wife's fleet. But what added to ...
— Life And Adventures Of Peter Wilkins, Vol. I. (of II.) • Robert Paltock
... Atlas On his giant shoulders; flutt'ring In the breeze far, far above him Thousand flags are gaily floating, Bearing witness ...
— The Poems of Goethe • Goethe
... band trooping down the line this soft June evening. Her mother, worn with watching, is resting on the lounge. It is Miriam Stanley who hovers at the bedside. Presently the bugles peal the retreat; the sunset gun booms across the plain; the ringing voice of the young adjutant comes floating on the southerly breeze, and, as she listens, Nannie follows every detail of the well-known ceremony, wondering how it could go on day after day with no Mr. Pennock to read the orders; with no ...
— Starlight Ranch - and Other Stories of Army Life on the Frontier • Charles King
... wet with dew have a different brown from those that are dry, and the upper surface of the green growing leaf is different from the under surface. The yellow butterfly, if you meet one in October, has so toned down his spring yellow that you might fancy him a pale green leaf floating along the road. There is a shining, quivering, gleaming; there is a changing, fluttering, shifting; there is a mixing, weaving—varnished wings, translucent wings, wings with dots and veins, all playing over the purple heath; a very tangle of many-toned lights and ...
— Field and Hedgerow • Richard Jefferies
... in fact as completely unacquainted with civilized life as the Indians of the Rocky Mountains, or the savages of Central Africa—yet a steamship, that highest triumph of human ingenuity, with its little floating epitome of European civilization, touches monthly at Cajeli, twenty miles off; while at Amboyna, only sixty miles distant, a European population and government have been established for more ...
— The Malay Archipelago - Volume II. (of II.) • Alfred Russel Wallace
... the wood; the flash of the sickle and the scythe hard by; the fields of the little narrow farm running back from the St. Lawrence like a riband; and, out on the wide stream, the great rafts with their riverine population floating ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... level ray Of dying sunlight on their plumes, Give them a beauty not their own; Their hoarse notes fail and faint away; A rustling murmur floating down Blends sweetly with the thickening glooms; They touch with grace the fading day, ...
— Pike County Ballads and Other Poems • John Hay
... decided resolution, that patriotic faith, which has also produced its enthusiasts and its miracles. All will be achieved when, by your care, that sincere love of liberty which sanctified the dawn of the revolution, again animates the heart of every Frenchman. The banners of liberty floating on every house, and the republican device written on every door, doubtless form an interesting sight. Obtain more; hasten the day when the sacred name of the republic shall be graven voluntarily on ...
— History of the French Revolution from 1789 to 1814 • F. A. M. Mignet
... crack was heard. There was a quick rush towards the bank, a wild scream from the ladies, and a shout from Mr. Tupman. A large mass of ice disappeared; the water bubbled up over it; Mr. Pickwick's hat, gloves, and handkerchief were floating on the surface; and this was all of Mr. ...
— The Pickwick Papers • Charles Dickens
... than my assistants, myself, and the whole crowd of workmen from the Halls of Justice, were almost horrified at the sight before us. Gazing at the skeleton through the veil of the clear water, we saw the skull covered, as it were, with long masses of brown hair, which were floating in the liquid crystal. The comments made by the simple and excited crowd by which we were surrounded were almost as interesting as the discovery itself. The news concerning the prodigious hair spread like wild-fire among the populace of the district; and so the exhumation ...
— Pagan and Christian Rome • Rodolfo Lanciani
... I passed a barrel-buoy adrift, floating light on the water. It was painted red, and rigged with a signal-staff about six feet high. A sudden change in the weather coming on, I got no more turtle or fish of any sort before reaching port. July 31 a gale sprang up suddenly from the north, with heavy seas, ...
— Sailing Alone Around The World • Joshua Slocum
... follow it. The chief value of the ballot is the educational power. He who feels an interest in men and measures will soon feel a responsibility. Everybody knows that women are no better than men. They are no angels floating in an ethereal atmosphere. It is the fashion sometimes to call them "angels," but I observe they are no longer angels when they get aged. I don't know a more unpleasant role to play than that of an aged angel. If it is said that woman can't know enough to vote, I can ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume II • Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and Matilda Joslyn Gage
... without thorough repair. Maria Prima 74, Ordered for floating battery—not fitted. Vasco de Gama 74,[21] Under repair, nearly ready. Princesa de Beira 64, Ordered for ...
— Journal of a Voyage to Brazil - And Residence There During Part of the Years 1821, 1822, 1823 • Maria Graham
... felt something wet on his cheek, and looked up. A snowflake, big and floating lazily down, had ...
— Ted Strong in Montana - With Lariat and Spur • Edward C. Taylor
... hand across his forehead, and pressing the sides of his horse with his knees, made him bound several paces forward. La Valliere, leaning back in her carriage, with her eyes half closed, gazed fixedly upon the king, whose plumes were floating in the air; she could not but admire his graceful carriage, his delicate and nervous limbs which pressed his horse's sides, and the regular outline of his features, which his beautiful curling hair set off ...
— Louise de la Valliere • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... queer way of showing your gladness," commented the other drily, shrugging her shapely shoulders. "Why, I can hardly keep still. La-la-la-la! La-la-la-la! La-la-la!" She hummed the air of a Viennese waltz song, meanwhile whirling gracefully about with extended arms, her dress floating about her balloonwise. ...
— The Moving Picture Girls - First Appearances in Photo Dramas • Laura Lee Hope
... through Patrick in his youth, but we shall only relate a few out of many of them. One time Patrick was in his nurse's house, in winter time, when a great flood and rain filled his nurse's residence, so that the vessels and furniture of the house were floating about, and the fire was extinguished. Patrick then cried to his nurse, as usual with children when desiring food. Then his nurse said to him: "That is not what troubles us; there is something else we would rather do than to prepare food for thee; even the fire is extinguished." ...
— The Most Ancient Lives of Saint Patrick - Including the Life by Jocelin, Hitherto Unpublished in America, and His Extant Writings • Various
... are floated to their berths, and are then secured at the desired spot by the protrusion, hydraulically, of four legs, which bear upon the bottom, and thus, until they are withdrawn, convert the pontoon from a floating ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 488, May 9, 1885 • Various
... themselves to his recovered senses... There would stand Helen by her dressing table, stooping down to the mirror's level as she popped her thick braids under her pink boudoir cap... In a few minutes the first whiffs of coffee would come floating in from the kitchenette. Then he would crawl slowly out from the warm bedclothes and stretch himself comfortably and give a sudden dash for the bathroom and his cold plunge. There would follow breakfast and the walk over the hill down to the office of Ford, ...
— Broken to the Plow • Charles Caldwell Dobie
... companion that enjoyed them with a gravity that I can never hope to [v]emulate, but with a soulfulness that was touching. As I came back in the boat, the breezes singing through the [v]cordage, music floating from the fore-deck, and the sun lighting with its dying rays the shipping that covered the river, there was sitting in front of me a very pale but very happy bit of a boy, open-eyed with wonder, but sober and self-contained, clasping tightly in his little fingers a short, ...
— The Literary World Seventh Reader • Various
... supposed it was so, and began to fancy that he was actually becoming rich. It had ever been a common saying in his mouth, that "the world owed him a living," and he now verily believed that he had taken the wave of fortune at its flood, and was floating along triumphantly upon the spring-tide of wealth. Nor was he undeceived until the disclosure was too late for the salvation of his credit. His notes began to come round too fast to be promptly "lifted;" and just at the moment when a portion of his increased ...
— Ups and Downs in the Life of a Distressed Gentleman • William L. Stone
... and I awoke. It was daylight. I stood on my feet and looked around me. I found myself floating on the deep sea, far from the shore, the outline of which was tinged with the golden hues of morn. The rope and stick to which the boat had been made fast towed through the water, as the land-breeze, driving me gently, increased ...
— Travels and Adventures of Monsieur Violet • Captain Marryat
... of myself diverted me at the time, but I fully believe it has served me in good stead since. For it set me on my guard as perhaps nothing else would have done, against accepting for true all floating rumour and village gossip, so that now I am by second nature a true sceptic and scarcely believe anything unless the evidence for it is conclusive. Indeed I could never have got to the bottom of ...
— Lady Into Fox • David Garnett
... lo! floating light upon the wind And murm'ing o'er ocean crest, Come the thoughts of those I left behind, Bringing comfort and love and rest. Only a word—aye, only a thought! Each speeds like a heav'n-sent dart; Who can measure the gladness and ...
— Writings in the United Amateur, 1915-1922 • Howard Phillips Lovecraft
... salute to Vancouver. The next morning, a Spanish friar and {282} ensign came aboard the Discovery for breakfast, pointing out to Vancouver the best anchorage for both wood and water. While the sailors went shooting quail on the hills, or amused themselves watching the Indians floating over the harbor on rafts made of dry rushes and grass, the good Spanish padre conducted Vancouver ashore to the presidio, or house of the commandant, back from the landing on a little knoll surrounded by hills. The fort was ...
— Vikings of the Pacific - The Adventures of the Explorers who Came from the West, Eastward • Agnes C. Laut
... promising that the parties concerned in the affair would be taken in and duly deal with. He then entered the house with four of his men, leaving the rest to wait. Vincent entered with the constables, saying that he was staying at the house. The fumes of gunpowder were still floating about the hall, three bodies were lying on the floor, and several men were binding up their wounds. The police-officer inquired into the origin of the broil, and all present concurred in saying that it ...
— With Lee in Virginia - A Story of the American Civil War • G. A. Henty
... "on the whole. Most men, if they are not actually bad, are at best indifferent—'sacs merely, floating with open mouths for food ...
— The Meaning of Good—A Dialogue • G. Lowes Dickinson
... go flying from the bridge.... Well! ... I ran down at once the way of the current for I knew he had fallen into mid-stream and it would carry him under the bridge and there ... talk of the devil! ... I looked: something like a fur cap was floating and it was his head. Well, quick as thought, I was in the water and caught hold of him.... It didn't need much cleverness ...
— Knock, Knock, Knock and Other Stories • Ivan Turgenev
... flew right over the vessel, the surprised onlookers saw that floating beneath their wings was a wonderful chair, all white and gold, more dazzling even than the one they had dreamed the Emperor himself sat in on the Dragon Throne. Around each snow-white neck was fastened a long streamer of pure gold, and these ...
— A Chinese Wonder Book • Norman Hinsdale Pitman
... difficulty that would have staggered him yesterday. There is no mistaking this process; and no matter what the subject of study, the intellectual development what it gives, is worth infinitely more than all that vague, floating kind of knowledge sometimes sought after, which seems to be imbibed somehow from the atmosphere of the school-room, as it certainly evaporates the moment a boy enters the atmosphere of men and ...
— In the School-Room - Chapters in the Philosophy of Education • John S. Hart
... have written; they seem not to come from myself, but are the signs of another language which thou hast taught my heart, and which my hand traces rapidly, as at thy dictation. Sometimes, while I write or muse, I could fancy that I heard light wings hovering around me, and saw dim shapes of beauty floating round, and vanishing as they smiled upon me. No unquiet and fearful dream ever comes to me now in sleep, yet sleep and waking are alike but as one dream. In sleep I wander with thee, not through the paths of earth, but through impalpable air—an air which seems a music—upward ...
— Zanoni • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... passes before the eye. Little Pearl at first clapped her hands, but then lost, for an instant, the restless agitation that had kept her in a continual effervescence throughout the morning; she gazed silently, and seemed to be borne upward, like a floating sea-bird, on the long heaves and swells of sound. But she was brought back to her former mood by the shimmer of the sunshine on the weapons and bright armor of the military company, which followed after the music, and formed the honorary escort of the procession. ...
— The Scarlet Letter • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... yacht has been turned into a cargo boat. Reports that the Sacred White Elephant has been commandeered for use as a floating dock are still unconfirmed. ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 153, Oct. 17, 1917 • Various
... iron-makers in Pennsylvania. We have learned that the $400,000,000 annually received from our cotton crop will make us rich, when the supplies that make it are homeraised. We have reduced the commercial rate of interest from twenty-four to six per cent., and are floating four per cent. bonds. We have learned that one Northern immigrant is worth fifty foreigners, and have smoothed the path to southward, wiped out the place where Mason and Dixon's line used to be, and hung our latch-string out, to ...
— America First - Patriotic Readings • Various
... universally respected North country ship-owner, I believe. James Westoll! What better name could an honourable hard-working ship have? To me the very grouping of the letters is alive with the romantic feeling of her reality as I saw her floating motionless and borrowing an ideal grace from the austere ...
— A Personal Record • Joseph Conrad
... gaiety, do not let one of your fits of negligence steal upon you. "Hoc age," is the great rule, whether you are serious or merry; whether you are stating the expenses of your family, learning science, or duty, from a folio, or floating on the Thames in a fancied dress. Of the whole entertainment, let me not hear so copious, nor so true an account, from any body as from you. I am, dearest ...
— Dr. Johnson's Works: Life, Poems, and Tales, Volume 1 - The Works Of Samuel Johnson, Ll.D., In Nine Volumes • Samuel Johnson
... strength. He gathered his legs up under him, and he stood. The water was only half-way up his thigh, and he stood. "Now for you, my friend!" he cried. Paul came by, quite inanimate now to all appearance, floating broadside to the current. Leaning forward, the Captain caught him by the leg, throwing his own body back in an intense strain of exertion. He lost his footing and fell. "I must let him go," he thought, "or we shall both be done for." But the ...
— Captain Dieppe • Anthony Hope
... four years in this manner, between music, magestry, projects, and journeys, floating incessantly from one object to another, and wishing to fix though I knew not on what, but insensibly inclining towards study. I was acquainted with men of letters, I had heard them speak of literature, ...
— The Confessions of J. J. Rousseau, Complete • Jean Jacques Rousseau
... shadowy undefined idea is at work within me, that I could connect a great battle-field somehow with my little Christmas story. Shapeless visions of the repose and peace pervading it in after-time; with the corn and grass growing over the slain, and people singing at the plough; are so perpetually floating before me, that I cannot but think there may turn out to be something good in them when I see them more plainly. . . . I want to get Four Numbers of the monthly book done here, and the Christmas book. ...
— The Life of Charles Dickens, Vol. I-III, Complete • John Forster
... brings all Heaven about me, and reconciles the sadness of the world with the peace of God. A boy's perfect treble—that sweetest of all created sounds, because so unconscious of its pathos and beauty—floating on the top of the music, and singing as an angel might sing among the stars of heaven, came to my thirsty spirit like a draught of clear spring water. And, at the end of all, Mendelssohn's great G major fugue gave the note of courage and endurance that I needed, the strong notes marching ...
— The Upton Letters • Arthur Christopher Benson
... shower of party-colored lights that told the watchers far down the river that danger was to be expected. Then the signal-lights went out, and all was dark and silent save where the lurid glare of the great mass of fire could be seen floating in the great curves of the tortuous river toward the crowded ships. It was a time of intense suspense. The little flotilla of fire-boats, organized by Commander Porter that day, was on the alert; and the blue-jackets bent ...
— The Naval History of the United States - Volume 2 (of 2) • Willis J. Abbot
... little slope on which it stood, meaning, if we were seen, to come down as if we had not been near the place. And from the top of that slope we could see the walls of the palace, with the white horse banner of Mercia floating over them. From the roof of his villa the Roman captain could have seen his camp, and maybe that deadly passage into its midst was for his use. It led ...
— A King's Comrade - A Story of Old Hereford • Charles Whistler
... and near the river St. Lawrence. On this side, therefore, the city might well be deemed inaccessible. On the other, it was protected by the river St. Charles, in which were several armed vessels, and floating batteries, deriving additional security from a strong boom drawn across its mouth. The channel of this river is rough and broken, and its borders intersected with ravines. On its left, or eastern bank, was encamped a French ...
— The Life of George Washington, Vol. 1 (of 5) • John Marshall
... Stoneborough Minster were ringing gladsome peals, and the sunshine had newly touched the lime trees, whose last bright yellow leaves were gently floating down, as the carriage, from the Grange, drew up ...
— The Daisy Chain, or Aspirations • Charlotte Yonge
... soft-footed, through the twilight gloom of the back avenue, while a disjointed, travelling clamour of hounds came nearer and nearer through the woods. The motor-car was within a hundred yards of the back lodge, when out of the rhododendron-bush burst a spectral black-and-white dog, with floating fringes of ragged wool and hideous bald patches on ...
— All on the Irish Shore - Irish Sketches • E. Somerville and Martin Ross
... articles would necessarily, little by little, diminish the weight to be sustained, for it must be remembered that the equilibrium of a balloon floating in the atmosphere is extremely sensitive. The loss of an almost insignificant weight suffices to produce a ...
— Five Weeks in a Balloon • Jules Verne
... his constancy to the first Napoleon, it was obstinacy riveted and made firm by some concurring respect. I do not know that Hazlitt had the more affectionate nature of the two; but assuredly he was less tossed about and his sight less obscured by floating fancies and vast changing projects (muscae volitantes) than the other. To the one are ascribed fierce and envious passions; coarse thoughts and habits—(he has indeed been crowned by defamation); whilst to Coleridge have been awarded reputation ...
— Charles Lamb • Barry Cornwall
... the ropes in his hands. These things were no longer vague generalities floating in his mind, as rosy clouds might be backed by thunder-heads on the horizon. They were growing definite. He began to know who were the evil-workers and how they did it. He had the art of making friends, and he made friends among publicans and sinners as well as—well, there weren't any saints ...
— Jewel Weed • Alice Ames Winter
... was "sport" in the full sense of the word; for although "Long Tom" is as greedy as a pike, and can be very easily caught by a floating bait when he is hungry, it is not every one who can whip him out of the water in ...
— The Colonial Mortuary Bard; "'Reo," The Fisherman; and The Black Bream Of Australia - 1901 • Louis Becke
... at the Shinto shrines; but his duties are few, and he is chiefly occupied in perpetually embellishing his house and garden. His mother, a venerable old lady, and his sister, the sweetest and most graceful Japanese woman but one that I have seen, live with him. She moves about the house like a floating fairy, and her voice has music in its tones. A half- witted servant-man and the sister's boy and girl complete the family. Kanaya is the chief man in the village, and is very intelligent and apparently well educated. He has divorced his wife, and his sister has practically divorced her husband. ...
— Unbeaten Tracks in Japan • Isabella L. Bird
... grows, though my country and my parents are unknown to me. All I remember is sailing in a great ship, when a storm arose, and it was wrecked, and not one soul escaped drowning but me. I was then a little child, and a brave sailor had bound me to a floating plank before he was washed away. Here the sea-people came round me like great fishes, and I went down with them to this rich and weary country. Sometimes, as a great favour, they take me up with them ...
— Granny's Wonderful Chair • Frances Browne
... whom you would have noticed anywhere because of her luminous, strangely-quiet, gray eyes and because of the ethereal look given to her face by a floating mass of hair, pale-gold and tendrilly. And yet I think you would have known that she was a sick little girl at the first glance. When she moved, it was with a great slowness as if everything tired her. She was so thin that her hands ...
— Maida's Little Shop • Inez Haynes Irwin
... National Assembly was steadily and strongly increasing. Every day brought new rumors of the preparation of the emigrants to invade France, aided by the armies of monarchical Europe, and to desolate the rebellious empire with fire and sword. Tidings were floating upon every breeze, grossly exaggerated, of the designs of the king and queen to escape, to join the avenging army, and to wreak a terrible vengeance upon their country. Furious speeches were made in the Assembly and in the streets, to rouse to madness the people, now destitute of work and of ...
— Maria Antoinette - Makers of History • John S. C. (John Stevens Cabot) Abbott
... take a pair of glasses and watch the top of that hill,—there is a bare knob up there, you see,—you will know long before we come back whether this island is inhabited or not. I am taking an American flag with me. If we do not see another flag floating anywhere on this island, I intend to plant the Stars and Stripes on that ...
— West Wind Drift • George Barr McCutcheon
... the balconies of the residences and in the shop windows; the street cars arrived gently, as if they were vessels floating in, with their yellow, green and red lanterns; their bells rang and they traced graceful circles around the Puerta del Sol. Carriages, horses, carts came rattling by; the itinerant hawkers cried their wares from their sidewalk stands; there was a deafening din.... ...
— The Quest • Pio Baroja
... wind enabled him to attack the Danish fleet, if fleet it may be called. At the north end of the Danish position stood the only permanent battery, the Trekroner, with two hulks or blockships; the rest consisted of seven blockships and eleven floating batteries, drawn up along the shore. An attack on the south end of the line was also exposed to batteries on the island of Amager. Nelson's intention was to close with the whole Danish fleet, but three of his ships of the line were stranded and he was obliged to leave ...
— The Political History of England - Vol XI - From Addington's Administration to the close of William - IV.'s Reign (1801-1837) • George Brodrick
... in a small trattoria with a rough terrace above the sea, overlooking a strip of sand where a few boats lie. As Hermione came to the steps that lead down to the terrace she stood still and looked over the wall on her left. The boat from the island was at anchor there, floating motionless on the still water. Gaspare was not in it, but was lying stretched on his back on the sand, with his white linen ...
— A Spirit in Prison • Robert Hichens
... very fair; whose eyes were very bright, and whose little feet made merry music on the smooth pavement. Girls have a strong intuitive love of the beautiful, and Johnny with his liquid eyes, and dimpled cheeks, and floating ringlets of gold was the favorite of all the girls at school, often wished that I had roses to place upon his brow, and the waters of paradise to sprinkle on his cheeks, that I might preserve their bloom forever. But, ...
— Jemmy Stubbins, or The Nailer Boy - Illustrations Of The Law Of Kindness • Unknown Author
... days the icy waters of a polar sea covered the city of Theni; and in tears we witnessed the great dome of the temple of our gods sink beneath its surface. The next week great icebergs were floating across the plain and above the site of Theni. It grew intensely cold and the inner walls of our great upper hall ...
— Chit-Chat; Nirvana; The Searchlight • Mathew Joseph Holt
... with his glass. And how that scene is imprinted in my mind; the beautiful fringe of green trees, where we stood in the shade, and before us the broad plain bright in the fresh morning sunshine, and wreaths of mist still floating over it, but being rapidly dispelled by the sun, though the distance still looked hazy and of a delicious blue. There on the right was the village or town, dotted with the figures of the white-robed Hindus, whose arms flashed now and then, as ...
— Gil the Gunner - The Youngest Officer in the East • George Manville Fenn
... good news," it ran. "We have piled up beams and stringers ahead of contract, and sold a number of logs a snow-slide brought us at a good profit, ready for floating down to a new sawmill in the valley. That, however, is by the way. As you know, Johnston has quartz reefs on the brain, and now fancies he is really on the track of one. There have been rumors of rich gold west of the Fraser, ...
— Lorimer of the Northwest • Harold Bindloss
... that partially covered their armour,—and so they called them Coats-of-Arms: they bore these same ensigns on their shields,—and they called them Shields-of-Arms: and in their Armorial Banners and Pennons they again displayed the very same insignia, floating in the wind high above their heads, from the shafts of ...
— The Handbook to English Heraldry • Charles Boutell
... and that he must have it immediately or break. The desire was a touch of madness in his blood, a thing which he was holding back by sheer force of will. He tried to shut out the vision of a pale face floating in the sea; he fought to keep a grip on the dispassionate calmness which was a part of him. But the ship itself was battering down his stoic resistance. In an hour—since he had heard the scream of the woman—he had come to hate it. ...
— The Alaskan • James Oliver Curwood
... sailing away reminds me that the Rob Roy ought to be moving too,—that she was not built to dabble about on rivers, but to charge the crested wave; and, indeed, there was always a sensation of being pent up when she was merely floating near the inland cornfields, and so far from the salt green sea; and this, too, even though pleasant parties of ladies were on board, and boys got jaunts and cruises from me, which I am certain pleased them much; still the reef-points on her sails rattled ...
— The Voyage Alone in the Yawl "Rob Roy" • John MacGregor
... "Floating about. At first I didn't dare to come back. It was a year at least before I heard that aunt had paid up the sum I got away with. When I did hear it ...
— Luke Walton • Horatio Alger
... the harbour. It is enormous, long jetties and breakwaters stretching far out, almost closing it in. There was every description of craft—big Atlantic liners, yachts, fishing boats, ironclads, torpedoes, and once we very nearly ran over a curious dark object floating on the surface of the water, which they told us was a submarine. It did not look comfortable as a means of transportation, but the young officers told ...
— Chateau and Country Life in France • Mary King Waddington
... sordid matters: any place suits it for getting rid of that difficulty. But what will the other do with its waste matter, cooped up as it is in a tiny cell stuffed full of provisions? A most unpleasant mixture seems inevitable. Picture the honey-eating grub floating on liquid provisions and fouling them at intervals with its excretions! The least movement of the hinder-part would cause the whole to amalgamate; and what a broth that would make for the delicate nursling! No, it cannot be; those dainty epicures ...
— Bramble-bees and Others • J. Henri Fabre
... stay by stream and tree Something still of what was He,— Plainly put, his More or Less Immaterial Consciousness,— Very fine and very large, Floating o'er his College barge: Always while the world continues Bards shall sing his thews and sinews,— Here he rowed and here he ran, Being rather more than man;— Thus as ages onward go Still he'll great and greater grow, Larger still in prose or rhyme Looming ...
— The Casual Ward - academic and other oddments • A. D. Godley
... repelled the good, and kept aloof the prudent. The contemned inferior, in moral standing, of those that surrounded him, it was difficult to be honest, and impossible to be independent. By a sort of law of nature, too, his tarred repute attracted to it every floating feather of suspicion, no less than of guilt, as to its natural seat; and thus it happened that the lofty genius of Mirabeau, under the "grand hests" of a hateful necessity, like the "too delicate spirit," Ariel, ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 3, August, 1850. • Various
... on moonlight nights, I could watch the silvery foam, marking the spot beneath where he lay hid; and I would stand on tip- toe, peering out, until at length I would come to fancy I could see his hideous form floating below the waters. Then, as the little white-sailed boats stole by him, tremblingly, I used to tremble too, lest he should suddenly open his grim jaws and gulp them down; and when they had all safely reached the dark, soft sea beyond, I would steal back to the bedside, ...
— John Ingerfield and Other Stories • Jerome K. Jerome
... was wintry midnight, and the sky blazed with its undying watch- fires. This starry page was the first her childish intellect had puzzled over. She had, from early years, gazed up into the glittering temple of night, and asked: "Whence came yon silent worlds, floating in solemn grandeur along the blue, waveless ocean of space? Since the universe sprang phoenix-like from that dim chaos, which may have been but the charnel-house of dead worlds, those unfading lights have burned on, bright as when they sang together at the creation. And I have stretched ...
— Beulah • Augusta J. Evans
... way of looking at the question, what constitutes the power of a fleet, is to consider the warship as merely a floating gun-platform. Even though this floating platform is the most complex piece of mechanism that was ever contrived by man, nevertheless its general function is simple. The war has given us enough experience to convince ...
— The Journal of Submarine Commander von Forstner • Georg-Guenther von Forstner
... picked up, all that night and all the next day; the cold of the water struck right through me, and I was senseless, like a dead man, when at last, thirty hours afterwards, one of our destroyers found me floating there, picked me up, and carried me into Dover. I was in hospital for six weeks, crippled with rheumatic fever, and my heart went wrong. It is much better now, and I hope soon to get back to flying again. I am still ...
— The Lost Naval Papers • Bennet Copplestone
... But when Commercial and Colonial expansion became a definite and avowed object of the former's policy, she found, whereso she might look, that Britain was there, in the way—"everywhere British colonies, British coaling stations, and floating over a fifth of the globe the British flag." Could anything be more exasperating? And these "absent-minded beggars" the English, without any forethought or science or design, without Prussian organization or Prussian bureaucracy and statecraft, had simply ...
— The Healing of Nations and the Hidden Sources of Their Strife • Edward Carpenter
... were men of all classes nearly; but they were not desirable, as I saw it then, or as I see it now. It is true that I was young, and pretty, perhaps, and that women were in a minority. But then, too, the men who were floating about on the surface of pioneer society were not likely to be the kind of men that make true lovers and good husbands. Some of them have settled down into steady-going benedicts, and have money and position. The worst ...
— The New Penelope and Other Stories and Poems • Frances Fuller Victor
... by many a stream, Where the half-shut lilies gleam. Napping out the sultry days In the quiet secluded bays; Where the tasseled rushes tower, O'er the purple pickerel-flower. And the floating dragon-fly— Azure glint and crystal gleam— Watches o'er the burnished stream With his eye of ebony; Where the bull-frog lolls at rest On his float of lily-leaves, That the swaying water weaves, And distends ...
— Lyrics of Earth • Archibald Lampman
... keyed up to concert pitch. The opening night was eagerly awaited by the critics, the literary and the artistic worlds. When the curtain rose on the first act there was the emotion of a great event floating in the air.” Here Coquelin’s face assumed an intense expression I had rarely seen there before. He was back on the stage, living over again the glorious hours of that night’s triumph. His breath was coming quick and his eyes aglow with the memory of that evening. “Never, never ...
— The Ways of Men • Eliot Gregory
... of a rough and ready surgeon and doctor, and a small box of medicines had been brought along in case of emergencies. With the Red Cloud now lazily floating in the air, for, once the falling motion had been checked by the engine, the motor had been stopped again, Mr. Sharp set about restoring Mr. Damon ...
— Tom Swift and his Airship • Victor Appleton
... they surveyed us stolidly, making sure that we were as our passes described us. Long lines of marching men turned out to let us pass. As darkness settled down, the location of the German line, as it encircled Ypres, was plainly shown by floating fusees. In every hamlet reserves were lining up for the trenches, dark masses of men, with here and there a face thrown into relief as a match was held to light a cigarette. Open doors showed warm, lamp-lit interiors and ...
— Kings, Queens And Pawns - An American Woman at the Front • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... Yes, it was hair floating in the current—the hair of a woman. I touched with a shrinking hand a human head, then almost suffocated, I rose to the surface ...
— Border Ghost Stories • Howard Pease
... storm. The new lifeboat had gone forth, amid cheers, about six o'clock to a schooner in distress near Rhos, and at eight o'clock a second lifeboat (an old one which the new one had replaced and which had been bought for a floating warehouse by an aged fisherman) had departed to the rescue of a Norwegian barque, the Hjalmar, round the ...
— The Card, A Story Of Adventure In The Five Towns • Arnold Bennett
... accomplished between the beginning of 1906 and the close of 1908 may be briefly described as the elaboration of a proper system of taxation; the organization of a staff to administer annual budgets; the re-assessment of taxable property; the floating of public loans for productive enterprises; the reform of the currency; the establishment of banks of various kinds, including agricultural and commercial; the creation of associations for putting bank-notes into circulation; the introduction of a ...
— A History of the Japanese People - From the Earliest Times to the End of the Meiji Era • Frank Brinkley and Dairoku Kikuchi
... exhausting to the salmon. When the fish first run up the rivers, they are fat and in fine order. The struggle against impetuous streams and frequent rapids gradually renders them thin and weak, and great numbers are seen floating down the rivers on their backs. As the season advances and the water becomes chilled, they are flung in myriads on the shores, where the wolves and bears assemble to banquet on them. Often they rot in such quantities along the ...
— The Adventures of Captain Bonneville - Digested From His Journal • Washington Irving
... a voice like honey, with learning like to that of the god Thoth, with wit like a razor's edge, with teeth like pearls, with majesty of bearing like to that of the king himself, with fingers like rosebuds set in pink seashells, with motion like that of an antelope, with grace like that of a swan floating upon water, and—I don't ...
— The Ancient Allan • H. Rider Haggard
... birds—their mottled brown and olive bodies raised on stilt-like legs thin as a straw—claimed her notice. So bewitched was she by their quaint and pretty ways, that she could not but follow them as they chased one another in and out of the rippling waves, ran quickly and bowed catching something eatable floating upon the tide, scattered and then joined up into a joyous chorus of association with gentle twittering cries. Watching them, dreaming, standing now and again looking out over the sweet wonder of ...
— Deadham Hard • Lucas Malet
... spy-glasses. On the heights of Chaillot are many-coloured undulating groups; round and far on, over all the circling heights that embosom Paris, it is as one more or less peopled Amphitheatre; which the eye grows dim with measuring. Nay heights, as was before hinted, have cannon; and a floating-battery of cannon is on the Seine. When eye fails, ear shall serve; and all France properly is but one Amphitheatre: for in paved town and unpaved hamlet, men walk listening; till the muffled thunder sound audible on their horizon, ...
— The French Revolution • Thomas Carlyle
... description of Brunai in 1521. Elephants. Reception by the King. Use of spirituous liquors. Population. Floating Market. Spoons. Ladies appearing in public. Obeisance. Modes of addressing nobles. The use of yellow confined to the Royal Family. Umbrellas closed when passing the Palace. Nobles only can sit in the stern of a boat. Ceremonies at a ...
— British Borneo - Sketches of Brunai, Sarawak, Labuan, and North Borneo • W. H. Treacher
... could have been chosen for the introduction of the European civilization. However, in spite of their abhorrence of the Western people, the Western ideas and customs, in spite of all their efforts to shut them out, the appearance of some formidable men-of-war, floating the flags of different nations, compelled Japan to enter into the terms of treaty with them. Twenty years have passed since then, and within that short period, the nation has undergone a marvellous transformation under the ...
— The Arena - Volume 4, No. 22, September, 1891 • Various
... workhouse and the convent, obtruding itself upon the eye. It seems as if the inhabitants of the town must all of them be forced, and that at no distant date, either into religion or pauperism, just as small bodies floating in a pond are sucked into connection with one or other of the logs which lie among them. The shops in the one tortuous street block the footpaths in front of their doors with piles of empty packing-cases. The passenger is saluted, here by a buffet ...
— Hyacinth - 1906 • George A. Birmingham
... she shot into the air with Tom Swift, had a sensation as though the earth were dropping from beneath her. For a moment she felt as though she were in some vast void—floating in space—and she had a great fear. Then she calmed herself. She looked at Tom sitting in front of her. Of course, all she could see was his back, but it looked to be a very sturdy back, indeed, and he sat there ...
— Tom Swift and his Air Scout - or, Uncle Sam's Mastery of the Sky • Victor Appleton
... isthmus to Portos, four miles north of Durazzo. Our troops advancing across the southern isthmus were hindered at the beginning by the fire of the Italian artillery, but toward night numerous detachments, by wading, swimming, and floating, reached the bridge east of Durazzo, driving back the Italian rear guard. At dawn an Austrian battalion entered the ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume IV (of 8) • Francis J. (Francis Joseph) Reynolds, Allen L. (Allen Leon)
... refused. One of the partners, named Jones, and Cohen were imprisoned. Some where $269,000 was missing. Nobody knew anything about it. The books having to do with the transaction had mysteriously disappeared. Two days later an Irishman found them floating in the bay, and brought them to the court. But the crucial pages were missing. And then suddenly, while both Judge Hazen and Judge Park were out of town, application was made to the Supreme Court—of which Judge Terry was head—for the release of Jones ...
— The Gray Dawn • Stewart Edward White
... from the floating object with a shudder of horror, and was silent for some minutes, but ...
— Gil the Gunner - The Youngest Officer in the East • George Manville Fenn
... thieves, villains, and rogues of all kinds to its precincts. The Court drew to the Palace a crowd of hangers-on, attendants, artificers, work-people, etc. When the Court was migratory this great horde swept over Westminster at intervals like a wave, and made a floating population. In the days of "touching" for "King's evil," when the Court was held at Whitehall, vast crowds of diseased persons gathered to Westminster to be touched. In Charles II.'s time weekly sittings were appointed at which the number of applicants was not to exceed 200. Between ...
— Westminster - The Fascination of London • Sir Walter Besant
... been a thick, foggy morning, but had warmed and brightened into one of the balmiest and sunniest of noons. As we entered the cathedral, the long bars of sunshine were falling from its upper windows through the great interior atmosphere, and were made visible by the dust, or mist, floating about in it. It is a grand edifice, and I liked it quite as much as on my first view of it, although a sense of coldness and nakedness is felt when we compare it with Gothic churches. It is more an external ...
— Passages From the English Notebooks, Complete • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... sight of my pursuers behind, I failed to perceive a boat crossing the river ahead of me; nor was it till my boat's nose struck her full in the side that I was aware of the obstacle. The man and woman in the boat (which seemed to be a floating pedlar's shop plying among the ships), swore at me roundly, and I had much ado to persuade them that no harm was done, and that if any one had a right to complain, I had. I was rowing on, to put an end to the parley, when my eye caught ...
— Sir Ludar - A Story of the Days of the Great Queen Bess • Talbot Baines Reed
... I heard Porter give a loud "hurrah!" at finding the doors of the warehouse open, and it seemed almost instantly that the men of his troop began to fire over our heads from its roof. At the first glance it was difficult to tell from where the enemy's fire came, but I soon saw smoke floating from the cupola of the church on the corner and drifting through the barred windows of the barracks. I shouted at the men behind the benches to aim at the cupola, and directed those with me around the fountain to let loose at the barrack windows. ...
— Captain Macklin • Richard Harding Davis
... fiercely continued Hannah; "the 'Vesuvius' caught on fire and burned down to the water's edge, and was so found—a floating charcoal, and every soul on ...
— Self-Raised • Emma Dorothy Eliza Nevitte Southworth
... of the many and the problems of the universe, and step solemnly along to that dirge known as the March of Progress. And what do they get for it all? Something like this. Put down your book, I'm going to prophesy," and Mae backed resolutely up against the railing and held her floating scarfs and veils in a bunch at her throat, while she prophesied in ...
— Mae Madden • Mary Murdoch Mason
... were all whispers, floating from one side of the road to the other. The wounded men were lifted back on to the wagons. We moved off again; Semyonov, Trenchard, Marie Ivanovna and I were ...
— The Dark Forest • Hugh Walpole
... That stream upon whose bosom we have passed Floating at ease, while nations have effaced Nations, and death has gathered to his fold Long lines of mighty kings:—look forth, my soul (Nor in this vision be thou slow to trust) The living waters, less and less by guilt Stained and polluted, ...
— History of Free Thought in Reference to The Christian Religion • Adam Storey Farrar
... of Cambridge, objecting to the proposed changes regarding the Smith's Prizes—a subject in which he took much interest, and to which he ascribed great importance.—On Apr. 27th I was in correspondence with G. Herbert of the Trinity House, about floating beacons.—In July I reported to the Treasury on the Swedish Calculating Engine (I think on the occasion of Mr Farr, of the Registrar-General's Office, applying for one).—In November I had correspondence about the launch of the Great Eastern, and ...
— Autobiography of Sir George Biddell Airy • George Biddell Airy
... became more populous. The crowding sampans, houseboats, and junks stretched far out into its oily, oozy flow, making a floating city as he neared the congested life of the coast, where the ever-increasing population failed to find ground space in its maggoty swarming. As the stream widened until the farther bank disappeared in the artificial mist of rising smoke and man-stirred ...
— O Henry Memorial Award Prize Stories of 1919 • Various
... solitary a month ago. It was crowded with shipping. Great castle-like men-of-war rose with all their proud calm dignity out of the water, their dark port-holes opening in the white bands on their sides, and the tricolored flag floating as their ensign. There were thirteen ships of the line and four frigates, and, of these, three were 80-gun ships, and one, towering high above the rest, with her three decks, was L'Orient, of 120 guns. ...
— A Book of Golden Deeds • Charlotte M. Yonge
... a quest, despair. Smart of a sullen wrong. Where may they hide them yet? One hour, yet one, To find the mossgod lurking in his nest, To see the naiads' floating hair, ...
— Silverpoints • John Gray
... by a transparent glow. It enveloped the Earthmen, made crystal figurines of the most solid among them. They seemed like wraiths through which, as in a glass, more could be seen beyond. The solid ground, the rocks, were transparencies floating in an ocean of airy ...
— Slaves of Mercury • Nat Schachner
... kindness, and especially Mave's, so gently, but so sincerely expressed, touched her as they spoke. She made no reply, however, but approached Mave with a slight smile on her face, her lips compressed, and her eyes, which were fixed and brilliant, floating in something that looked like moisture, and which might as well have been occasioned by the glow of anger as the impulse of a softer emotion, or perhaps—and this might be nearer the truth—as a conflict between the two states of ...
— The Black Prophet: A Tale Of Irish Famine • William Carleton
... full of miraculous food, and probably the French writers of the romances confused this with the sacred vessel brought from the Holy Land. On account of the sins of men this relic was made invisible, but now and then it appeared, borne by angels or floating in a heavenly light. The Knights, against King Arthur's wish, made a vow to find it, and gave up their duties of redressing wrongs and keeping order, to pursue the beautiful vision. But most of them, for their sins, were unsuccessful, like Sir Lancelot, and the Round Table was scattered and the ...
— The Book of Romance • Various
... farewell:—he beast With many heads butts me away.—Nay, mother, Where is your ancient courage? you were us'd To say extremities was the trier of spirits; That common chances common men could bear; That when the sea was calm all boats alike Show'd mastership in floating; fortune's blows, When most struck home, being gentle wounded, craves A noble cunning; you were us'd to load me With precepts that would make invincible The ...
— The Tragedy of Coriolanus • William Shakespeare [Collins edition]
... dressing-room, and never before had she been so particular and careful in choosing the various articles of her costume; never before had she watched her toilet with so much attention and anxiety. At last the work was finished, and the princess looked radiantly beautiful in her crimson velvet dress, floating behind her in a long train, and fastened under her bosom, only half veiled by a clear lace collar, by means of a wide, golden sash. Her hair, framing her expansive brow in a few black ringlets a la Josephine, was tied up in a Greek knot, adorned with pearls and diamonds. ...
— LOUISA OF PRUSSIA AND HER TIMES • Louise Muhlbach |
