"Gracefulness" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... tastes, abstemious, and therefore enjoying evenly good health in spite of her delicate constitution—this is the secret of her accomplishing so much. Yet all this foundation of exactness and diligence was so "rounded with leafy gracefulness" that she never ...
— The Life and Letters of Elizabeth Prentiss • George L. Prentiss
... all you can—do not argue, that would be useless—and then take the first opportunity of studying those who are noted for combining an easy, natural seat with grace—that is, if you are built for gracefulness—some people are not. In Nolan's words, "Let a man have a roomy saddle, and sit close to the horse's back; let the leg be supported by the stirrup in a natural position, without being so short as to throw back the thigh, and the nearer the whole leg is brought to the ...
— A New Illustrated Edition of J. S. Rarey's Art of Taming Horses • J. S. Rarey
... pride Of her familiar sphere, the daily joy Of all who on her gracefulness might gaze, And in the light and music of her way Have ...
— Elsie's Womanhood • Martha Finley
... beauty. How the bright green of the body gleams and glistens in the sunlight. Each imperceptible stroke of those tiny wings conforms to the mechanical laws of flight in all their subtle complications with an ease and gracefulness that seems spiritual. Who can fail to note that fine adjustment of the organs of flight to aerial elasticity and gravitation, by which that astonishing bit of nervous energy can rise and fall almost on the perpendicular, dart from side to side, as if by magic, or, assuming the horizontal position, ...
— Birds Illustrated by Color Photography [December, 1897], Vol 2. No 6. • Various
... seldom, I detected a certain gracefulness among the younger women that was altogether new to my observation. It was a charm proper to the lowest class. One girl I particularly remember, in a garb none of the cleanest and nowise smart, and ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. XII. July, 1863, No. LXIX. - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... once to hold his tongue; and could only smile impatiently at what perhaps he thought an old man's astonishing garrulity. But if a young and pretty woman talked to him, it was not his great age that he vaunted, nor yet the 'pleasures of memory' - one envied the adroitness of his flattery, and the gracefulness of ...
— Tracks of a Rolling Stone • Henry J. Coke
... the queen, whose manners were in the highest degree affable and royal, played the hostess with a gracefulness and attention which conciliated every one present, and Macbeth discoursed freely with his thanes and nobles, saying that all that was honorable in the country was under his roof, if he had but his good friend Banquo present, whom yet he hoped he should rather have ...
— Tales from Shakespeare • Charles and Mary Lamb
... these four girls since I had last her. And these little beings surprised me as much as their mother. They were part of her; they were big girls, and already had a place in life. Whereas she no longer counted, she, that marvel of dainty and charming gracefulness. It seemed to me that I had seen her but yesterday, and this is how I found her again! Was it possible? A poignant grief seized my heart; and also a revolt against nature herself, an unreasoning indignation against this brutal, infarious ...
— Maupassant Original Short Stories (180), Complete • Guy de Maupassant
... was not the friend of America; and it is both justice and gratitude to say, that it was the Queen of France who gave the cause of America a fashion at the French Court. Count Vergennes was the personal and social friend of Dr. Franklin; and the Doctor had obtained, by his sensible gracefulness, a sort of influence over him; but with respect to principles Count Vergennes was ...
— The Writings Of Thomas Paine, Complete - With Index to Volumes I - IV • Thomas Paine
... neighbouring ministers, one of the most celebrated at that time was the Rev. Edward Walford, then of Yarmouth, who afterwards became tutor of Homerton College, and who, after the death of a favourite and accomplished daughter—I can still remember the gracefulness of her person—sank into a state of profound melancholy, which led him to shut himself from his friends, to give up all public preaching and tutorial work, and to consider himself as hopelessly lost. It is a curious fact that he dated his return to reason and happiness ...
— East Anglia - Personal Recollections and Historical Associations • J. Ewing Ritchie
... at this time at the forges of the Pont-aux-Change, a goldsmith whose daughter was talked about in Paris on account of her great beauty, and renowned above all things for her exceeding gracefulness. There were those who sought her favours by the usual tricks of love and, but others offered large sums of money to the father to give them his daughter in lawful wedlock, the which ...
— Droll Stories, Complete - Collected From The Abbeys Of Touraine • Honore de Balzac
... the meanwhile he went out to put up his team. When he came back there was a cloth on the table, and Sally was busy about the stove. He sat down and watched her attentively. In some respects, he thought, she compared favourably with Agatha. She had a nicely moulded figure, and a curious lithe gracefulness of carriage which was suggestive of a strong vitality, while Agatha's bearing was usually characterised by a certain rather frigid repose. This and the latter's general manner had a somewhat inciting effect on him when he was in her presence, but he now and then remembered it afterwards with ...
— Hawtrey's Deputy • Harold Bindloss
... sight to behold this creature cutting the thin air. His flight was the beau ideal of ease and gracefulness—for in this no bird can equal the kite. Not a stroke of his long pointed wings betrayed that he needed their assistance; and he seemed to glory that he could navigate the air without them. Besides, the motion of these, had he used them, might have caught the eye of his intended victim, and ...
— The Boy Hunters • Captain Mayne Reid
... said Montaigne in the 16th century, "has a simplicity and gracefulness which surpass the beauty of poetry according to art." Jasmin united the naive artlessness of poetry with the perfection of art. He retained the simplicity of youth throughout his career, and his domestic life was the ...
— Jasmin: Barber, Poet, Philanthropist • Samuel Smiles
... no less manifest preeminence in the character of trees. It is possible among plains, in the species of trees which properly belong to them, the poplars of Amiens, for instance, to obtain a serene simplicity of grace, which, as I said, is a better help to the study of gracefulness, as such, than any of the wilder groupings of the hills; so also, there are certain conditions of symmetrical luxuriance developed in the park and avenue, rarely rivalled in their way among mountains; and yet the mountain superiority in foliage is, on the whole, nearly as complete ...
— Modern Painters, Volume IV (of V) • John Ruskin
... mould of grandeur, inspired with equal strength and sweetness, antiphonal notes in dual harmony. Praxiteles leans to the female, Lysippus to the male; and so, through all the gamut of the figurative craftsmen, we discover more or less affinity for man or woman. One is swayed by woman and her gracefulness, the other by man and his vigour. Few have realised the Pheidian ...
— The Life of Michelangelo Buonarroti • John Addington Symonds
... Elegance. — N. elegance, purity, grace, ease; gracefulness, readiness &c. adj.; concinnity[obs3], euphony, numerosity[obs3]; Atticism[obs3], classicalism[obs3], classicism. well rounded periods, well turned periods, flowing periods; the right word in the right place; ...
— Roget's Thesaurus
... bear with them. Thou knowest not what she was, Cornelia; for I wrote to thee about her while she seemed but human. In my hours of sadness, not only her beautiful form, but her very voice bent over me. How girlish in the gracefulness of her lofty form! how pliable in her majesty! what composure at my petulance and reproaches! what pity in her reproofs! Like the air that angels breathe in the metropolitan temple of the Christian world, her soul at every season preserved one temperature. But it was when she ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. 327 - Vol. 53, January, 1843 • Various
... down the pathway, her skirts skimming the ground with a swinging motion that charmed me, I saw her at full length, quite erect, in her proud and happy gracefulness. She had no idea I was there behind the willows; she walked with a light step, she ran without giving a thought to the wind, which slightly raised her gown. I could distinguish her feet, trotting along quickly, quickly, and a piece ...
— International Short Stories: French • Various
... Solicitor and Mrs. Blair, his lady, Dr. Hill, Miss Anne Ker of Nisbet, and a variety of ladies. All joined in praising them highly. The penserosa figure caught the highest admiration of any, from the gracefulness of the figure and attitude, and the boldness and propriety of the scenery. The two morning and evening views—one of Lochness, and the other of Elcho Castle—which make fine companions, and which I always placed together, were also highly admired. Each ...
— Personal Recollections, from Early Life to Old Age, of Mary Somerville • Mary Somerville
... had eluded, and nervously, his long supple fingers a little unsteady, lighted a cigarette. At that moment he did not look like a spider, but like a lover who has been hurt. Betty could see in the mirror a distorted image of his dejected gracefulness, but, entirely unmoved, she put up her thin, brown hands and began to take the ...
— The Branding Iron • Katharine Newlin Burt
... the sound of the horses' footfalls brought figures flying to the open doors; most welcome of these in the eyes of the two men, the small one of Jessica herself, her head stretched forth as she peered into the night, and the lamplight behind her making a radiance about her golden head and slender gracefulness. But she poised there on the threshold only for an instant, till she was sure what animals these were, then darted toward them with uplifted hands ...
— Jessica, the Heiress • Evelyn Raymond
... that the gracefulness of the Scissor-tailed Flycatcher should well entitle him to the admiration of bird-lovers, and he is certain to be noticed wherever he goes. The long outer tail feathers he can open and close at will. His appearance is most pleasing to the eye when ...
— Birds Illustrated by Color Photography [May, 1897] - A Monthly Serial designed to Promote Knowledge of Bird-Life • Various
... him what he had written, carefully examining, changing, improving, indefatigably fashioning and refashioning, never weary even of repeatedly transcribing voluminous works—this gave to his productions the delicacy, the gracefulness, the clearness, the natural elegance which can be bestowed on a work already completed, not by effort, but by unruffled, ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. II • Editor-in-Chief: Kuno Francke
... the Grimaldis, father and son, Mr. Ellar as Harlequin, and Mr. Barnes as Pantaloon, were hailed, on their appearance, with the warmth of greeting to which their excellence in their several parts fully entitles them, and displayed their wonted drollery, gracefulness, and agility: and Miss Brissak, who, for the first time, appeared as Columbine, acquitted herself with tolerable credit, ...
— A History of Pantomime • R. J. Broadbent
... and turning partly round she straightened herself with a slow sinuous gracefulness, and stood drawn up to her full height looking at the newcomer. He stood still a moment with veiled admiration in his eyes, and this was not altogether surprising in one who had dwelt for the most part far remote from civilization in the lonely bush. Alice Deringham had been considered ...
— Alton of Somasco • Harold Bindloss
... the dress, which, in the eye of chivalry and gallantry, is so well adapted to womanly gracefulness and womanly helplessness, and to put on a dress that would leave her free to work her own way through the world, I see not but that chivalry and gallantry would nearly or quite die out. No longer would she present herself to man, now ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume I • Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and Matilda Joslyn Gage
... form, especially in female figures. His most famous work was an undraped statue of Venus, for his native town of Cnidus, which was so remarkable that people flocked from all parts of Greece to see it. He did not aim at ideal majesty so much as ideal gracefulness, and his works were imitated from the most beautiful living models, and hence expressed only the ideal of sensual charms. It is probable that the Venus de Medici of Cleomenes was a mere copy of the Aphrodite of Praxiteles, which was so highly extolled by the ancient authors. ...
— The Old Roman World • John Lord
... than curious to look upon the face of my companion. Her conversation had won me: a woman who could talk so, I fancied, could not be ill-looking. Such an enchanting spirit could not be hidden behind a plain face; besides, there was the gracefulness of form, the small gloved hand, the dainty foot and ankle demonstrated in the dance, a voice that rang like music, and the flash of a superb eye, which I could perceive even through the mask. Beyond a doubt, she ...
— The War Trail - The Hunt of the Wild Horse • Mayne Reid
... disdainful haughtiness the whole body of wooers. Meanwhile she hunted the stag and the board, and performed squire's service for her gradually declining parent. This manner of life was so entirely to the taste of the maiden, notwithstanding that in delicacy of frame, and in bewitching gracefulness of figure, she gave place to none of her sex, that when at length her father died, she took upon herself the management of the castle, and lived aloof in pride and independence, in the very fashion of an Amazon. Maugre the many refusals ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXLV. July, 1844. Vol. LVI. • Various
... write his very interesting Character of Mrs. Johnson, from which passages have already been quoted. He there calls her "the truest, most virtuous and valuable friend that I, or perhaps any other person, was ever blessed with." Combined with excellent gifts of the mind, "she had a gracefulness, somewhat more than human, in every motion, word, and action. Never was so happy a conjunction of civility, freedom, easiness, and sincerity." Everyone treated her with marked respect, yet everyone was at ease in her society. She preserved her wit, judgment, ...
— The Journal to Stella • Jonathan Swift
... when Phidias bought her of a poor goatherd in Phelle. The child was sitting upon a rock, caressing a kid, when the sculptor first saw her, and the gracefulness of her attitude attracted his attention, while her innocent beauty touched his heart. She and her nurse had been stolen from the Ionian coast, by Greek pirates. The nurse was sold into slavery, and the babe delivered by one of the pirates to the care of his mother. The little creature, ...
— Philothea - A Grecian Romance • Lydia Maria Child
... suggestion of frenzy restrained, of passion lulled, which emanates from the barely perceptible heave of a slumbering summer sea. It was dreamy to a charm; it was graceful to the point at which the eye begins to sicken of gracefulness; it was monotonous with the force of a necromantic spell. It was soothing; it also threw a hint of melancholy into a gathering intended to be gay. It was as though all that was most sentimentally lovely in the essence of the nineteenth ...
— The Side Of The Angels - A Novel • Basil King
... to pastoral labors. This visit was a blessed one; and the growth of his soul in holiness was visible to many. During the days of his visit to Mr. Hamilton, he read through the Song of Solomon at the time of family worship, commenting briefly on it with rare gracefulness and poetic taste, and yet rarer manifestation of soul-filling love to the Saviour's person. The sanctified affections of his soul, and his insight into the mind of Jesus, seemed to have much affected ...
— The Biography of Robert Murray M'Cheyne • Andrew A. Bonar
... for some girls, who suddenly shoot up, become ugly, sallow and frail, like plants before their due season. For those, however, who, like Miette, are healthy and live in the open air, it is a time of delightful gracefulness which once passed ...
— The Fortune of the Rougons • Emile Zola
... in her sad and somewhat constrained gracefulness, with her tired features, interesting rather than beautiful, her air of a matron rather than a Virgin, her German and bourgeoise frankness, her tight garments and her symmetrically broken folds, almost always accompanied by a rabbit, an owl, or an ape, through some ...
— Great Pictures, As Seen and Described by Famous Writers • Esther Singleton
... overflowings of that cup of excitement have reached our shores. I do not say that these works contain anything coarse or gross—better if it were so: evil which comes in a form of grossness is not nearly so dangerous as that which comes veiled in gracefulness and sentiment. Subjects which are better not touched upon at all are discussed, examined, and exhibited in all the most seductive forms of imagery. You would be shocked at seeing your son in a fit of intoxication; yet, I say it solemnly, better that ...
— Sermons Preached at Brighton - Third Series • Frederick W. Robertson
... companions. The important point about him is that he is not a natural product at all, but the outcome of an artificial drilling of the mind. In a word, he is the embodiment of the education system, uncorrected by fortuitous influences and conditions. Everybody knows that gracefulness is not acquired by means of stilted lessons in deportment, but that it consists of natural muscular movement untrammelled by self-consciousness or artifice. The same law of nature applies to the working of the brain. Stuffing a boy's head with so much knowledge ...
— The Curse of Education • Harold E. Gorst
... her. I remember how happy and easy the folds of her drapery were, and how I noticed her graceful slow movements, Surely grace is a natural attribute of power, even though power be not always graceful; at least any uncertainty of meaning or manner is fatal to gracefulness. There was no uncertainty about mamma ever, unless the uncertainty of carelessness; and that itself belonged to power. There was no uncertainty in any fold of her cashmere that morning; in any movement of her person, slow and reposeful as every movement was. I knew by a ...
— Daisy in the Field • Elizabeth Wetherell
... praise, sweet critic, makes thee doubly dear. But what of thy fair self—thy form, thy face, The flower of flowers, the gracefulness of grace?" ...
— Fringilla: Some Tales In Verse • Richard Doddridge Blackmore
... doubt in her best attire, as she was to be seen in public, and she knew that her whole capital lay in her appearance. I judged her to be an educated lady. Though a stranger to my mother, yet she accosted her so politely, and in a voice so musical, that the gracefulness of her manner and the softness of her tones still linger in my memory. Looking down to me, then less than ten years old, and ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 87, January, 1865 • Various
... Queen received the Address of the Commons. She conducts herself with surprising dignity: the dignity which proceeds from self-possession and deliberation. The smallness of her stature is quite forgotten in the majesty and gracefulness of her demeanour. ...
— The Greville Memoirs (Second Part) - A Journal of the Reign of Queen Victoria from 1837 to 1852 - (Volume 1 of 3) • Charles C. F. Greville
... which her expanding mind required, and she was sent to pass her thirteenth year with her paternal grandmother and her aunt Angelieu. Her grandmother was a dignified lady of much refinement of mind and gracefulness of demeanor, who laid great stress upon all the courtesies of life and the elegances of manners and address. Her aunt was gentle and warm-hearted, and her spirit was deeply imbued with that humble and docile piety, which has so often shone out with pure luster ...
— Madame Roland, Makers of History • John S. C. Abbott
... The eyes of the French court were directed by curiosity towards that man who had enjoyed the unlimited favor of two successive monarchs, and who, from a private station, had mounted, in the earliest youth, to the absolute government of three kingdoms. The beauty of his person, the gracefulness of his air, the splendor of his equipage, his fine taste in dress, festivals, and carousals, corresponded to the prepossessions entertained in his favor: the affability of his behavior, the gayety of his manners, the magnificence of his expense, increased still further the ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part E. - From Charles I. to Cromwell • David Hume
... is so particular to the stage of that country, that it would be quite fruitless to attempt to describe a style of acting unknown to the people of Britain; and of that style Mademoiselle Mars is the model. Every thing that can result from the truest elegance and gracefulness of manners—from the most genuine and lively abandon of feeling,—from the most winning sweetness of expression, and the greatest imaginable gaiety and benevolence, displayed in one of the most beautiful women ever seen, and endowed with the most delightful ...
— Travels in France during the years 1814-1815 • Archibald Alison
... self-denying Abigail, and heroic Deborah, and dazzling Miriam, and pious Esther, and glorious Ruth, and Mary, who hugged to her heart the blessed Lord, were only magnificent specimens. The midnight folded in their hair, the lakes of liquid beauty in their eye, the gracefulness of spring morning in their posture and gait, were only typical of the greater brilliance and glory of their soul. Likewise excuseless is any man in our time who makes lifelong alliance with any one who, because of her disposition, or heredity, or habits, or intellectual vanity, or moral twistification, ...
— The Wedding Ring - A Series of Discourses for Husbands and Wives and Those - Contemplating Matrimony • T. De Witt Talmage
... turn, the child had darted away, evidently to prevent the possibility of reward: a refined instinct for which we should scarcely have given her credit. She may have been a Bretonne, but not a true Bretonne; her gracefulness and intelligence almost forbade it. Yet there are exceptions to every rule, and Nature herself ...
— The Argosy - Vol. 51, No. 5, May, 1891 • Various
... valleys of North Italy, although sometimes a passage is effected from one projecting portion of a house to another by means of an exterior gallery. These are very delightful objects; and when shaded by luxuriant vines, which is frequently the case, impart a gracefulness to ...
— The Poetry of Architecture • John Ruskin
... books, and of rare specimens of art, and the superb furniture, which gives such peculiar dignity and splendour to the interior of his residence, speak at once the immensity of his means, and attest the propriety and gracefulness ...
— Real Life In London, Volumes I. and II. • Pierce Egan
... surprising to see the perfect time that is kept in this way, and the admirable manner in which the motions of the dancers accord with the music. There is no confusion, irregularity, or mistake. Each person is conversant with his part; and all exhibit a degree of elasticity and gracefulness in their movements which, in some of the dances, is ...
— Journals Of Expeditions Of Discovery Into Central • Edward John Eyre
... vibrant voice, and the young, young girl with the ruddy hair, and the little, round form! She seemed taller now, and there was more of maturity in the figure; but it was the same lissome waist and petite gracefulness which had so fully explained to me the avid eyes of her lover on that day when I had fled from the report of the Committee on Permanent Organization. It was the Empress Josephine, I had ...
— Aladdin & Co. - A Romance of Yankee Magic • Herbert Quick
... strongly-built, yet active person, some six feet in height, square and broad-shouldered—exhibiting an outline, wanting, perhaps, in some of the more rounded graces of form, yet at the same time far from symmetrical deficiency. There was, also, not a little of ease and agility, together with a rude gracefulness in his action, the result equally of the well-combined organization of his animal man and of the hardy habits of his woodland life. His appearance was youthful, and the passing glance would perhaps ...
— Guy Rivers: A Tale of Georgia • William Gilmore Simms
... large size and is generally healthy. Its shape is good and the foliage attractive in summer. The leaves drop early and they are not especially attractive in autumn coloring. Black walnuts are strong in appearance. They lack the gracefulness of the elm and if I were making a list of trees in the order of their appearance, placing the most beautiful first and the least attractive last, I should place several trees ahead of the black walnut, among them sugar maples, elms and ...
— Northern Nut Growers Association Report of the Proceedings at the Sixth Annual Meeting. Rochester, New York, September 1 and 2, 1915 • Various
... tend to become mere impersonations of some one quality or "humour," as he called it. Thus he is the herald, though a magnificent one, of decadence. He painted in general with a powerful, but heavy hand; in his masques, however, he often shows a singular gracefulness, especially in the lyrics which he introduces. His character, as given by Drummond, is not a particularly attractive one, "a great lover and praiser of himself, a contemner and scorner of others, given rather to lose a friend than a jest, jealous of every ...
— A Short Biographical Dictionary of English Literature • John W. Cousin
... much struck, to speak the truth, as some travellers seem to have been with the beauty and gracefulness of the Corsican women; but these really were two very pretty girls, of the age of fifteen or sixteen, brunettes, bright eyed, slightly formed, and with pleasing and expressive features. They were lightly clad, and one of them carried a small bundle. Accosted by Filippi, we learnt ...
— Rambles in the Islands of Corsica and Sardinia - with Notices of their History, Antiquities, and Present Condition. • Thomas Forester
... I was standing in the door of my house, when I marked a person passing close to the edge of the bank that was in front. His pace was a careless and lingering one, and had none of that gracefulness and ease which distinguish a person with certain advantages of education from a clown. His gait was rustic and aukward. His form was ungainly and disproportioned. Shoulders broad and square, breast sunken, his head drooping, his body of uniform ...
— Wieland; or The Transformation - An American Tale • Charles Brockden Brown
... developed both in those parts of it which are deemed to indicate imaginative and idealistic power, and those that denote strongly marked perceptive and artistic faculties. The latter perhaps were the more prominently marked. The Indian strain showed itself in the perfect gracefulness of a very slender and elastic figure, and in the exquisite elegance and beauty of the modelling of ...
— What I Remember, Volume 2 • Thomas Adolphus Trollope
... often involves all the parties of an action in one common ruin. And yet the beauty of proportion, the agreeable flow of the outline, are not lost in this violent struggle; and a representation, the most appalling to the senses, is yet managed with forbearance, while a mild breath of gracefulness is diffused over ...
— Lectures on Dramatic Art - and Literature • August Wilhelm Schlegel trans John Black
... murmured Alfred. He spoke in a low, almost reverential tone; for the spell of moonlight was on him, and the clear, soft voice of the singer, the novelty of her peculiar beauty, and the surpassing gracefulness of her motions, as she swayed gently to the music of the tones she produced, inspired him with a feeling of poetic deference. Through the partially open window came the lulling sound of a little trickling fountain in the garden, and the ...
— A Romance of the Republic • Lydia Maria Francis Child
... paid to ornament in either his dress, arms, or equipments; and yet there is a gracefulness in the hang of his tunic-like shirt; a stylishness about the fringing of the cape and leggings; and a jauntiness in the set of that coon-skin cap that shows the wearer to be not altogether unmindful of his personal appearance. A small pouch or ...
— The Scalp Hunters • Mayne Reid
... learned inhabitants of Mars in saying that their figure and movements reminded me of crickets: for I never have watched the black field-crickets in New England, standing on tiptoe to reach a blade of grass, without a feeling of admiration at their gentlemanly figure and the gracefulness of their air. But what is more important, I am told that Articulates breathe through spiracles in the sides of their bodies; and I know that these planetary men breathe through six mouths, three on either side of the body, entirely different ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 102, April, 1866 • Various
... painted drabs called "ladies of the stage",—and above all, when he thought of the peace and refinement of the home he had, for a mere freak, forsaken,—the high tone of thought and feeling maintained there, the exquisite gracefulness and charm of womanhood, of which his mother had been, and was still a perfect embodiment, some new and far stronger spirit rose up within him, crying—"What is this folly? Am I to sink to the level of those whom I know and see are beneath me? With what I have of brain and heart ...
— The Master-Christian • Marie Corelli
... dark eye rested on the young girl with a searching, anxious expression, as Clinton approached and paid the compliments of the morning with more than his wonted gracefulness of manner. He apologized for the freedom he had taken so sportively and naturally, that Helen felt it would be ridiculous in her to assume a resentment she did not feel, and yielding to her passionate admiration for flowers, she wreathed them ...
— Helen and Arthur - or, Miss Thusa's Spinning Wheel • Caroline Lee Hentz
... instinctively that the soul which looked out through them never lost itself in girlish dreams of brave heroes and suppliant lovers. The bearing and appearance was haughty and reserved, yet in form and gesture she was gracefulness itself. ...
— The Northern Light • E. Werner
... culprit being set at liberty, the people were going away, when Towha called them back and addressed them, recapitulating what had been said to Otoo, condemning their present bad habits, and advising a reformation in future. The gracefulness of action and the attention with which he was heard showed that he was no mean orator. After this the marines went through their exercises and loaded and fired in volleys, to the utter amazement of the natives, especially to those who had seen ...
— Captain Cook - His Life, Voyages, and Discoveries • W.H.G. Kingston
... of Practical Divinity. I no sooner saw this venerable Man in the Pulpit, but I very much approved of my Friend's insisting upon the Qualifications of a good Aspect and a clear Voice; for I was so charmed with the Gracefulness of his Figure and Delivery, as well as with the Discourses he pronounced, that I think I never passed any Time more to my Satisfaction. A Sermon repeated after this Manner, is like the Composition of a Poet in the ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Vol. 1 • Charles Dudley Warner
... nature study is felt by all to offer abundant scope to the exercise of the esthetic faculty. There is great variety of beauty and gracefulness in natural forms in plant and animal; the rich or delicate coloring of the clouds, of birds, of insects, and of plants, gives constant pleasure. Then there are grand and impressive scenery and phenomena in nature, and melody and harmony ...
— The Elements of General Method - Based on the Principles of Herbart • Charles A. McMurry
... reminded those who saw it of something which cannot be mentioned except in a medical treatise. Her body, through the inconceivable irony of nature, was at the same time thin and flabby, wooden and chubby, without having either the elegance of slimness or the rounded gracefulness of stoutness. It might have been taken for a body which had formerly been adipose, but which had now grown thin, while the covering had remained floating ...
— The Works of Guy de Maupassant, Volume III (of 8) • Guy de Maupassant
... difficulty the traveller makes his way through the tangle. The taro, which is carefully cultivated, averages two or three feet high, and has fine large leaves and tubers like those of the potato, but not so good when roasted. There is much gracefulness in the appearance of the plantain, or banana, which varies from twelve to fifteen feet in height, and has leaves like those of the palm, but a brittle reed-like stem, about eight inches in diameter. It attains its full growth in the first year, bears ...
— The Story of Ida Pfeiffer - and Her Travels in Many Lands • Anonymous
... refined, and intellectual; hands white and slender as a lady's, and a foot equally shapely and feminine. He wears a monster green turban, takes his turn regularly at the kalian, and passes it on to the next with the easy gracefulness that comes of good breeding; and by his manners and appearance he creates an impression of being a person rather superior ...
— Around the World on a Bicycle Volume II. - From Teheran To Yokohama • Thomas Stevens
... grown under precisely the same conditions as the Florists' or Show Cinerarias, and this type of flower is highly valued for its singular gracefulness and beautiful decorative effect. In the conservatory and on the table it is an indispensable plant. The sprays admit of most charming arrangements in vases with any kind of ornamental foliage, and maintain their beauty for ...
— The Culture of Vegetables and Flowers From Seeds and Roots, 16th Edition • Sutton and Sons
... a multitude of men; not to dare to do what so many sorts of souls, what a whole people dare, is for a heart that is poor and mean beyond all measure: company encourages even children. If others excel you in knowledge, in gracefulness, in strength, or fortune, you have alternative resources at your disposal; but to give place to them in stability of mind, you can blame no one for that but yourself. Death is more abject, more languishing ...
— The Essays of Montaigne, Complete • Michel de Montaigne
... life-education of the mass of young men. It is the Education of circumstances, custom, society, etc. Young women live, think, and act just as society dictates. They wear what fashion says shall be worn; they say what etiquette say is proper; they do what custom dictates; their ideas of gracefulness, propriety, and life are molded in the common mint of popular sentiment. They float on the stream of society mere automatons in the great hand of the world. They do not direct their own Education as though they had any object in life. They seem to lay helpless in the ...
— Aims and Aids for Girls and Young Women • George Sumner Weaver
... may full-sail'd verse express, How may measured words adore The full-flowing harmony Of thy swan-like stateliness, Eleaenore? The luxuriant symmetry Of thy floating gracefulness, Eleaenore? Every turn and glance of thine, Every lineament divine, Eleaenore, And the steady sunset glow, That stays upon thee? For in thee Is nothing sudden, nothing single; Like two streams of incense ...
— The Early Poems of Alfred Lord Tennyson • Tennyson
... have "assumed desert" as the latter prince did, and received the fool's head for his pains. Then they came to the beautiful "casket scene." The doctor had somehow from the beginning left Portia in Mr. Linden's hands; and now gave with great truth and gracefulness the very graceful words of her successful suitor. He could put truth into these, and did, and accordingly read beautifully; well heard, for the play of Faith's varying face shewed she went along thoroughly with all the fine turns of thought and feeling; here and elsewhere. But ...
— Say and Seal, Volume II • Susan Warner
... brought tears to my old eyes, and called up painful memories to my heart. In appearance she had greatly improved; her slight figure had rounded into more womanly proportions, and her motions were full of the wild, unstudied gracefulness that had always characterized her. There was about her a fascination I cannot explain, a something independent of externals—a witchery to be felt but not defined. Perhaps it was the visible influence of mental gifts, the reflection of that purity of heart and mind which impressed ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII. No. 5. May 1848 • Various
... to me to give children so much becoming confidence and behavior as dancing, I think they should be taught to dance as soon as they are capable of learning it. For though this consists only in outward gracefulness of motion, ... yet it gives children manly thoughts and ...
— Social Life - or, The Manners and Customs of Polite Society • Maud C. Cooke
... That is still far from perfect. If we all, parents, children, boys and girls, schoolmasters and schoolmistresses, had some of the Greek feeling of high admiration of physical perfection of form and grace and activity, we should not see so many boys and girls of very imperfect gracefulness, nor should we see fashions of dress so ruinous to all ideals of perfection and grace. We cannot make up for the want of this national artistic ideal of beauty of figure by artificial gymnastics, scientific posturings, and ladders and bars. They are better than nothing, they are a protest, they ...
— Three Addresses to Girls at School • James Maurice Wilson
... generally, had received more invitations than he had requested audiences. In many houses the presence of the surintendant had been significant of fortune; in many hearts, of love. Fouquet entered the apartment with a manner full of respect, presenting himself with that ease and gracefulness of manner which was the distinctive characteristic of the men of eminence of that period, and which at the present day seems no longer to be understood, even in the portraits of the period in which the painter has endeavored to recall them into being. La ...
— The Vicomte de Bragelonne - Or Ten Years Later being the completion of "The Three - Musketeers" And "Twenty Years After" • Alexandre Dumas
... it him," said Aramis, bowing with a gracefulness full of respect, and advancing towards the door as if to leave the room: but a gesture of the Franciscan accompanied by a cry for ...
— Ten Years Later • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... stiffly. "I didnt think youd have any difficulty in reading my handwriting." And in fact the whole business was absurd, for if there's anything I pride myself on it's the gracefulness and legibility of my penmanship. Typewriters might well be mandatory for the ephemeral news item, but I had been hired as a special correspondent and someday my manuscript ...
— Greener Than You Think • Ward Moore
... too unyielding to wave even in the heaviest gales. They only shake in quick, short vibrations. The Hemlock Spruce, however, and the Mountain Pine, and some of the tallest thickets of the Two-leaved species bow in storms with considerable scope and gracefulness. But it is only in the lower and middle zones that the meeting of winds and woods is to be seen in ...
— The Mountains of California • John Muir
... statue of marble, he would undoubtedly immediately say, "Sure, there have been men here formerly; I perceive the workmanship of a skilful statuary; I admire with what niceness he has proportioned all the limbs of this body, in order to give them so much beauty, gracefulness, majesty, life, tenderness, motion, ...
— The Existence of God • Francois de Salignac de La Mothe- Fenelon
... Those performance, too, are not only essentially and intensely feminine; but they are, in our judgment, decidedly more perfect than any masculine productions with which they can be brought into comparison. They accomplish more completely all the ends at which they aim; and are worked out with a gracefulness and felicity of execution which excludes all idea of failure, and entirely satisfies the expectations they may have raised. We might easily have added to these instances. There are many parts of Miss Edgeworth's earlier stories, and of Miss Mitford's ...
— The Young Lady's Mentor - A Guide to the Formation of Character. In a Series of Letters to Her Unknown Friends • A Lady
... any accomplishment in which it becomes a gentleman to excel: he practised in great perfection the arts of drawing and painting, he was an eminent performer in both vocal and instrumental musick, he danced with uncommon gracefulness, and, on the day after his disputation at Paris, exhibited his skill in horsemanship before the court of France, where at a publick match of tilting, he bore away the ring upon his lance ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson - Volume IV [The Rambler and The Adventurer] • Samuel Johnson
... for one who, though he lecture me with such gravity and gracefulness, can scarcely be entitled to play the part of Mentor by the weight of years?" said the Baroness, with a smile: "for one who, I trust, who I should think, as little deserved, and was as little inured to, ...
— Vivian Grey • The Earl of Beaconsfield
... qualities in addition to its fine appearance and generous shade. From the kernel a valuable oil may be obtained for use in cookery and in lamps. Bread has also been made from the kernels. The spongy husk of the nuts is used as dyestuff. It thus unites almost all the qualities desirable in a tree—beauty, gracefulness and richness of foliage in every period of its growth; bark and husks which may be employed in an important art; fruit valuable as food; wood unsurpassed ...
— Among the Trees at Elmridge • Ella Rodman Church
... Marguerite as she is portrayed, with the greatest luxuriance of colouring, by these authors. To her personal charms were added readiness of wit, ease and gracefulness of speech, and great affability and courtesy of manners. This description of Queen Marguerite cannot be dismissed without observing, if only for the sake of keeping the fashion of the present times with her sex in countenance, that, though she had hair, as has been already ...
— Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois, Complete • Marguerite de Valois, Queen of Navarre
... ceremonies of an attractive, sensual religion; "temples of splendid architecture, statues of exquisite sculpture, priests and victims superbly adorned, attendant beauteous youth of both sexes, performing all the sacred rites with gracefulness; religious dances, illuminations, concerts of the sweetest music, perfumes of the rarest fragrance," and other more licentious enjoyments, inseparable from heathen worship. How did they persuade them to exchange all this for ...
— Fables of Infidelity and Facts of Faith - Being an Examination of the Evidences of Infidelity • Robert Patterson
... would only warn you of the evils of susceptibility, and point out how you may avoid them. Beware, my love, I conjure you, of that self-delusion, which has been fatal to the peace of so many persons; beware of priding yourself on the gracefulness of sensibility; if you yield to this vanity, your happiness is lost for ever. Always remember how much more valuable is the strength of fortitude, than the grace of sensibility. Do not, however, confound fortitude with apathy; apathy cannot know the virtue. Remember, too, that one act ...
— The Mysteries of Udolpho • Ann Radcliffe
... relation. He would be able to assign a clear reason why the close similarity of the fruit in two varieties of pine-apple, and of the so-called root in the common and Swedish turnips, and why the similar gracefulness of form in the greyhound and racehorse, are characters of little value in classification; namely, because they are the result, not of community of descent, but either of selection for a common end, or of the effects ...
— The Foundations of the Origin of Species - Two Essays written in 1842 and 1844 • Charles Darwin
... fat gentleman found much to interest them as the coach rolled over the smooth prairie road, now and then crossing a slough. Not that Mr. Minorkey or his fat friend had any particular interest in the beautiful outline of the grassy knolls, the gracefulness of the water-willows that grew along the river edge, and whose paler green was the prominent feature of the landscape, or in the sweet contrast at the horizon where grass-green earth met the light blue northern sky. But the scenery none the less suggested fruitful themes for talk to the two ...
— The Mystery of Metropolisville • Edward Eggleston
... written in Latin and neatly, and was daily practised in speaking, he acquired a certain eloquence, which proved the more pleasing and seductive because under the guidance of a good wit, and with a kind of natural gracefulness. Is it not thus, as I recall it, O Lord my God, Thou judge of my conscience? before Thee is my heart, and my remembrance, Who didst at that time direct me by the hidden mystery of Thy providence, and didst set those shameful ...
— The Confessions of Saint Augustine • Saint Augustine
... about the formation of the touch, giving dementi's Preludes at first. "Is that a dog barking?" was his sudden exclamation at a rough attack. He taught the scales staccato and legato beginning with E major. Ductility, ease, gracefulness were his aim; stiffness, harshness annoyed him. He gave Clementi, Moscheles and Bach. Before playing in concert he shut himself up and played, not Chopin but Bach, always Bach. Absolute finger independence and touch discrimination ...
— Chopin: The Man and His Music • James Huneker
... a very ambitious young cavalier of high rank and wealthy connections, fell so passionately in love with the beautiful daughter of a Cacique that he deserted from the army to remain with her. She was but eighteen years of age, of very amiable spirit, and of unusual gracefulness of form and loveliness of feature. Moscoso sent an embassy to the Cacique, demanding the return of Guzman as a deserter, and threatening, in case of refusal, to lay waste his territory with fire and sword. The chief sent back the ...
— Ferdinand De Soto, The Discoverer of the Mississippi - American Pioneers and Patriots • John S. C. Abbott
... into what mankind calls legs, and you will feel great pain, as if a sword were passing through you. But all who see you will say that you are the prettiest little human being they ever saw. You will still have the same floating gracefulness of movement, and no dancer will ever tread so lightly; but at every step you take it will feel as if you were treading upon sharp knives, and that the blood must flow. If you will bear all this, I ...
— Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen • Hans Christian Andersen
... they had neither of them attempted to learn each other's language; but the husband having taken kindly to the language of signs, they conversed together by that means with great contentment. It is also often resorted to in mere laziness, one gesture saving many words. The gracefulness, ingenuity, and apparent spontaneity of the greater part of the signs can never be realized until actually witnessed, and their beauty is much heightened by the free play to which the arms of these people are accustomed, and the ...
— Sign Language Among North American Indians Compared With That Among Other Peoples And Deaf-Mutes • Garrick Mallery
... the horseshoe. His notions are given as follows, ipsissimis verbis. "There is not in the whole world, a nobler animal than that splendid fellow, the horse. He is the embodiment of all that is magnificent, possessing strength, swiftness, courage, sagacity, and gracefulness. He never drinks more than he needs, or says more than he ought. If he were an opposition M.P.—and a horse was once a consul—his speech against Government bills, would be only a dignified neigh. Base ...
— The True Legend of St. Dunstan and the Devil • Edward G. Flight
... dress, which just brushed the doors as they passed, cooled their faces. She flung back her head; he curved his arms. The gracefulness of the one, the playful air of the other, excited general admiration; and, without waiting for the rout cakes, Pecuchet took himself off, amazed ...
— Bouvard and Pecuchet - A Tragi-comic Novel of Bourgeois Life • Gustave Flaubert
... the common size, his frame was robust, and his constitution vigorous—capable of enduring great fatigue, and requiring a considerable degree of exercise for the preservation of his health. His exterior created in the beholder the idea of strength, united with manly gracefulness. ...
— The Life of George Washington, Vol. 5 (of 5) • John Marshall
... almost always in conversation. There are few things inexhaustible in a lover: goodness, gracefulness and delicacy. To feel everything, to divine everything, to anticipate everything; to reproach without bringing affliction upon a tender heart; to make a present without pride; to double the value of a certain action by the way in which it is done; to flatter rather by actions than by words; to ...
— Analytical Studies • Honore de Balzac
... beguilingly. At last he settled down to sober climbing. Sheila looked back and waved her hand. The two tall, lean men were gazing after her. They took off their hats and waved. She felt a warmth that was almost loving for their gracefulness and gravity and kindness. Here was another breed of man than that produced by Millings. A few minutes later she came to the top of The Pass and ...
— Hidden Creek • Katharine Newlin Burt
... popular applause; and should the passion for running become general, we may soon expect to behold an exhibition, unparalleled even at the Olympic games formerly celebrated in Greece. The art of running is, like that of dancing, acquirable from a master; but gracefulness of motion is not essential to the perfection of the runner, swiftness being the principal requisite. Hence, whether the performer display his agility by bounding along on the light fantastic toe, or waddling with the zig-zag respectability of a corpulent alderman, if he can first reach the ...
— The Mirror of Taste, and Dramatic Censor - Vol. I. No. 3. March 1810 • Various
... particularly partial to an aerial acrobatic performance, unsurpassed for gracefulness and skill, and significant of the joy of life and liberty and the delirious passion of the moment. With a mighty effort, a chattering scream and a preliminary downward cast, he impels himself with the ardour of flight—almost vertically—up above ...
— The Confessions of a Beachcomber • E J Banfield
... the smaller. Her legs were more slender and handsome, and there was a kind of rough, heavy gracefulness in the curves of her neck. The male was fierce and stiff; his left wing did not fold properly; he had injured it at the time he had fought ...
— Tales of the Wilderness • Boris Pilniak
... In the more chaste and refined delineation of classic fable, Poussin was without a rival. Rubens, who was a match for him in the wild and picturesque, could not pretend to vie with the elegance and purity of thought in his picture of Apollo giving a poet a cup of water to drink, nor with the gracefulness of design in the figure of a nymph squeezing the juice of a bunch of grapes from her fingers (a rosy wine-press) which falls into the mouth of a chubby infant below. But, above all, who shall celebrate, in terms of fit praise, his picture of the shepherds in the Vale of Tempe going out in a fine ...
— Table-Talk - Essays on Men and Manners • William Hazlitt
... peculiarity of her situation, yet not wanting in courage when, it was to be called forth) an object well worthy of gaze and admiration. Her features thrown into broad light and shade by the candle which at times was half extinguished by the wind—her symmetry of form and the gracefulness and singularity of her attire—were matter of astonishment to Philip. Her head was without covering, and her long hair fell in plaits behind her shoulders; her stature was rather under the middle size, but her form perfect; her dress was simple but ...
— The Phantom Ship • Captain Frederick Marryat
... between the King and Don Caesar when they meet; the love-duet between Don Caesar and Maritana ("This Heart with Bliss o'erflowing"); and Don Caesar's song, "There is a Flower that bloometh," which is in the sentimental ballad style. The freshness, brightness, and gracefulness of the music of this little opera, combined with the unusual interest and delicate humor of the story, have always commended it to ...
— The Standard Operas (12th edition) • George P. Upton
... step and say that beauty appears to be a quality in objects which is not sharply differentiated from other and allied qualities. If we look at the usages of speech we shall find that beauty has its kindred conceptions, such as gracefulness, prettiness and others. Writers on aesthetics have spent much time on these "Modifications of the Beautiful.'' The point emphasized here is the difficulty of drawing the line between them. Even an expert may hesitate long before saying whether a human ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia
... pulling, the trumpeter had lost so much ground that he was not two hundred yards in the advance, and "dead ahead." His body was no longer carried with the same gracefulness, and the majestic curving of his neck had disappeared. His bill protruded forward, and his thighs began to drag the water in his wake. He was evidently on the threshold of flight. Both Francois and Basil saw this, as they stood with ...
— Popular Adventure Tales • Mayne Reid
... discourses of practical divinity. I no sooner saw this venerable man in the pulpit, but I very much approved of my friend's insisting upon the qualifications of a good aspect and a clear voice; for I was so charmed with the gracefulness of his figure and delivery, as well as with the discourses he pronounced, that I think I never passed any time more to my satisfaction. A sermon repeated after this manner, is like the composition of a poet in the mouth of ...
— The De Coverley Papers - From 'The Spectator' • Joseph Addison and Others
... whole nation were fixed upon their king, who, for nobleness of mien, and gracefulness of person, had no equal; but it was not then known that he was possessed of those superior abilities, which, filling his subjects with admiration, in the end made him so formidable to Europe. Love and ambition, the invisible springs of the intrigues and cabals of all courts, attentively ...
— The Memoirs of Count Grammont, Complete • Anthony Hamilton
... it. I went into company as he had bidden me; I studied and improved myself; I grew handsomer, too. All who saw me noticed and approved the alteration in my appearance. I was no longer awkward and stooping; my manner had acquired something of ease and gracefulness; a faint bloom tinged my cheek and made my dark eyes brighter. I was truly happy in the change; it seemed to render me a little more suited to him, who was so ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 3, Issue 15, January, 1859 • Various
... be what goodness really is," replied Miss Farringdon, "and is an attitude rather than an action. Fine breeding is not the mere learning of any code of manners, any more than gracefulness is the mere learning of any kind of physical exercise. The gentleman apparently, as the Christian really, looks not on his own things, but on the things of others; and the selfish person is ...
— The Farringdons • Ellen Thorneycroft Fowler
... all custom, an Englishman instantly acknowledges, and at first sight, the superiority of the turban to the hat, or of the plaid to the coat, that whatever the dictates of immediate fashion may compel, the superior gracefulness of the Greek or middle age costumes is invariably felt, and that, respecting what has been asserted of negro nations looking with disgust on the white face, no importance whatever is to be attached to the opinions of races who have never received ...
— Modern Painters Volume II (of V) • John Ruskin
... to the appearance of her father's wife, founded on that Letter of his that had so positively indicated her beauty, Arethusa had never been able to paint such a picture as she actually saw. For Elinor's young brown eyes, under her white hair, the lovely glow of her skin, and her slender gracefulness clothed in that clinging, fascinatingly smoky-colored gown she wore (a color she much affected), seemed to the beauty worshipper who regarded her to make her the most Altogether Beautiful Human Being that she, ...
— The Heart of Arethusa • Francis Barton Fox
... a little softening, sir. Who knows now, but that flexile gracefulness, however questionable at the time of that thirtieth boy of yours, might have been the silky husk of the most solid qualities of maturity. It might have been with him as with the ...
— The Confidence-Man • Herman Melville
... ruefully at her own short, stubby, unintelligent hands, that so perfectly reflected her character in that marvellous way hands have. "Mine are stupid-looking. I'll bet you'll get on." She sagged to the other hip with a weary gracefulness. "I ain't got no ...
— Cheerful—By Request • Edna Ferber
... her hands to him, and bounded up the mountain-path with the speed and gracefulness of ...
— Andreas Hofer • Lousia Muhlbach
... exceedingly attractive, though artistically less perfect than her figure, which approached unusually near to the standard of faultlessness. But even this feature of hers yielded the palm to the gracefulness of her movement, which was fascinating and delightful to an ...
— Desperate Remedies • Thomas Hardy
... blasts, a band on board began to play the National Anthem. When this was ended, the scouts, crowding the bow, gave three cheers and a "tiger." Flags were flying fore and aft, and as the river was like a mirror, the River Queen presented a perfect picture of majestic gracefulness as if proud of the ...
— Rod of the Lone Patrol • H. A. Cody
... passive subjects of transient dalliance and casual enjoyment. The pleasure which he took in the youthful beauty of ALMEIDA, was now endeared, exalted, and refined, by the tender sensibility of her heart, and by the reflexion of his own felicity from her eyes: when he admired the gracefulness of her motion, the elegance of her figure, the symmetry of her features, and the bloom of her complexion, he considered them as the decorations only of a mind, capable of mixing with his own in the most exquisite delight, of reciprocating ...
— Almoran and Hamet • John Hawkesworth
... these qualities. But he was, first of all, the most powerful prince in Europe, and consequently held the highest rank among kings; and then, says his historian, 'he surpassed all his courtiers in the gracefulness of his shape, and the majestic beauty of his features. The sound of his voice noble and affecting, gained those hearts which his presence intimidated. He had a step and a deportment, which could suit only him and his rank, and which would have been ridiculous in any other person. The ...
— A Vindication of the Rights of Woman - Title: Vindication of the Rights of Women • Mary Wollstonecraft [Godwin]
... once more, what we mean by a womanly girl. Exact attention to points of etiquette, gracefulness, accomplishments, proper subservience to the will of others, do not of themselves make womanliness; many more than these characteristics, and greater, are needful. First of all, a girl must feel ...
— Hold Up Your Heads, Girls! • Annie H. Ryder
... that she is bored to death. She writes memoirs, or rather a journal, of all that falls under her observation. She is so clever, has so much imagination and penetration, that they must be very entertaining. She writes as well as talks with extraordinary ease and gracefulness, and both her letters and her conversation are full of point; yet she is not liked, and has made hardly any friends. Her manners are stately and reserved, and so little bonhomie penetrates through her dignity that few ...
— The Greville Memoirs - A Journal of the Reigns of King George IV and King William - IV, Volume 1 (of 3) • Charles C. F. Greville
... anything they said in answer to her questions, which poured as from a quick-firing gun, that became at last intolerable." Comment on this passage would be entirely superfluous; but I cannot help drawing attention to the supreme touch of gracefulness added by the three words ...
— The Land of Contrasts - A Briton's View of His American Kin • James Fullarton Muirhead
... age, daily exercised in recitation of poetry, by his mother, who shone in private theatricals; and having been afterwards prepared for the stage, and hourly tutored by Mr. Hough, an excellent preceptor. By his father too, who is one of the best fencers in Europe, he was improved in gracefulness of attitude—and nature had uncommonly endowed him for the reception of those instructions. Of such means of improvement Master Payne was wholly destitute, for there was not a man that we could hear of ...
— The Mirror of Taste, and Dramatic Censor - Vol I, No. 2, February 1810 • Samuel James Arnold
... or hart was slain they had to "brittle," or break him up, with all precision, and during the banquet they had frequently to carve the haunch or chine, and to do it with some gracefulness. ...
— The Rival Heirs being the Third and Last Chronicle of Aescendune • A. D. Crake
... go round the room holding a brimming glass of champagne without spilling a drop. This evenness in waltzing is very graceful, and can only be reached by long practice, a good ear for music, and a natural gracefulness. Young Americans, who, as a rule, are the best dancers in the world, achieve this step to admiration. It is the gentleman's duty in any round dance to guide his fair companion gracefully; he must not risk a collision ...
— Manners and Social Usages • Mrs. John M. E. W. Sherwood
... close. The most diverse opinions have been uttered on the subject. The critics trip up each other with charming independency. To Jeffrey they seemed to be "all composed as exercises and for display." Carlyle declared that they were written "for the most part with singular force and even gracefulness," and that when Burns wrote "to trusted friends on real interests, his style became simple, vigorous, expressive, sometimes even beautiful." Dr. Waddell prefers him to Cowper and Byron as a letter-writer. Scott, ...
— The Letters of Robert Burns • Robert Burns
... the gracefulness and slimness of his daughter's stockinged legs, and thought what a real little man his son seemed already, so sturdy on his pins. In his blue overalls he looked like a miniature ploughman in a smock-frock. Dale laughed when ...
— The Devil's Garden • W. B. Maxwell
... drawing-room, almost forgetting that she had any cause of complaint against them. And this appeared when in the course of the evening it came in her way to perform some little office of politeness for Marianne. It was done with the gracefulness that could only come from a spirit entirely free from ungrateful feelings. The children felt it, and for the time were shamed into better behaviour. The evening passed pleasantly, and Ellen went to bed ...
— The Wide, Wide World • Susan Warner
... modern Tamulic version of the story, translated by Mr. Kindersley, are substituted, "Milk white Aunnays, descending from the skies, like an undulating garland of pearls." The Aunnays are supposed to be a sort of birds of paradise. They are represented as milk white; remarkable for the gracefulness of their walk; and endowed with considerable gifts. Mr. Wilson, in his Meghaduta, has given me a precedent for the change of geese into swans; see p. 27, v. 71, with the note. And Mr. Ellis, Asiatic ...
— Nala and Damayanti and Other Poems • Henry Hart Milman
... she was shown into Mrs. Clayton's parlors, where, in a moment or two, she was met by the lady upon whom she had called, and received with an air of easy gracefulness, that at once charmed her. A brief conversation convinced her that Mrs. Clayton was, in intelligence and moral worth, as far above Mrs. Marygold, as that personage imagined herself to be above her. Her daughters, who came in while she sat conversing with their mother, showed themselves ...
— Home Lights and Shadows • T. S. Arthur
... acquitted her. Out of the abundance of her heart her mouth had spoken. By her words she was justified. By those few words she proved her utter faith in our Lord's power and goodness—perhaps her faith in His godhead. By those words she proved the gentleness and humility, the graciousness and gracefulness of her own character. By those words she proved, too,—and oh, you that are mothers, is that nothing?—the perfect disinterestedness of her mother's love. And so she conquered—as the blessed Lord loves to be conquered— as all noble souls who are like their blessed Lord, love to be conquered- ...
— All Saints' Day and Other Sermons • Charles Kingsley
... him presents, and among them an annual gift of 50 pounds from an anonymous hand, the first instalment being accompanied by a pretty snuff-box ornamented with a picture of the three hares. From the gracefulness of the gift, Southey infers that it came from a woman, and he conjectures that the ...
— Cowper • Goldwin Smith
... and gracefulness to retirement. It fills a public station with suitable abilities, and adds a lustre to those who are in possession ...
— The Young Gentleman and Lady's Monitor, and English Teacher's Assistant • John Hamilton Moore
... demi-god of the ancient Greeks. He was not built like Hercules, however; he was tall, but beautifully proportioned, and there was nothing in his form that betrayed his powerful muscles. He performed prodigies of strength with so much gracefulness and ease as to astonish ...
— St. Nicholas, Vol. 5, No. 2, December, 1877 • Various
... movement, and play of limbs distinguishing each species. The slow and measured walk of the ox, the short step, meditative ears, and ironical mouth of the ass, the calm strength of the lion at rest, the grimaces of the monkeys, the slender gracefulness of the gazelle and antelope, are invariably presented with a consummate skill in drawing and expression. The human figure is the least perfect: every one is acquainted with those strange figures, whose heads in profile, with the eye drawn in full face, ...
— History Of Egypt, Chaldaea, Syria, Babylonia, and Assyria, Volume 2 (of 12) • G. Maspero
... prey, stretch, between one bush and the next, great vertical sheets of meshes, resembling those of the fowler. The most remarkable in my district is the Banded Epeira (Epeira fasciata, WALCK.), so prettily belted with yellow, black and silvery white. Her nest, a marvel of gracefulness, is a satin bag, shaped like a tiny pear. Its neck ends in a concave mouthpiece closed with a lid, also of satin. Brown ribbons, in fanciful meridian waves, adorn the object from ...
— The Life of the Spider • J. Henri Fabre
... us in large numbers, are a source of pleasure. These are not the sacred birds of the Ancient Mariner, but are of the same species. They excel all other birds, I think, in power and gracefulness of flight. It is rather a glide than a fly, as they appear scarcely ever to flap their wings, but sail on as it were "by the sole act of their unlorded will." No wonder such woe befell the Ancient ...
— Round the World • Andrew Carnegie
... channels of the law; the chirping sparrows, bred in Temple chinks and crannies, might have held their peace to listen to imaginary skylarks as so fresh a little creature passed; the dingy boughs, unused to droop, otherwise than in their puny growth, might have bent down in a kindred gracefulness to shed their benedictions on her graceful head; old love-letters, shut up in iron boxes in the neighbouring offices, and made of no account among the heaps of family papers into which they had strayed, and of which in their degeneracy they formed a part, might have stirred and fluttered with a ...
— Old and New London - Volume I • Walter Thornbury
... which accompanies the bite of this reptile, its activity when excited, the singularity of its form, and the gracefulness of its action, combine to render it one of the most remarkable animals of the class to which it belongs. When in its ordinary state of repose the neck is of the same diameter as the head; but when surprised or irritated, ...
— The Illustrated London Reading Book • Various
... necessity; and, anyhow, the gracefulness needs some explanation in a case like this. Still I always fancied he was going to marry another girl, a daughter of a friend of ...
— Tristram of Blent - An Episode in the Story of an Ancient House • Anthony Hope |
