"Puffing" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... Will you wait a minute?" she called clearly above the puffing of the engine. "I've something for you here. Soon as I get this train out—" She saw him stop and turn back to the office, and let it go at that for ...
— Good Indian • B. M. Bower
... one of these trips through the country he could not ride on the cars as you do, for there were no railways, with puffing engines and comfortable coaches; neither could he take a carriage drawn by swift and strong horses, for they too were unknown by the Koreans. Even if he had possessed horses and carriage, there were few roads over which they could have been driven. Most of the highways were ...
— Our Little Korean Cousin • H. Lee M. Pike
... cars in long lines, some motionless, some suddenly lurching forward or back, with a grinding and screeching of wheels and a puffing and coughing from engines ahead. Sam taught me how to climb on the cars and how to swing off while they were going. He had learned from watching the brakemen that dangerous backward left-hand swing that lands you stock-still ...
— The Harbor • Ernest Poole
... face seamed with the scars of disease, the brown coat, the black worsted stockings, the gray wig with the scorched foretop, the dirty hands, the nails bitten and pared to the quick. We see the eyes and mouth moving with convulsive twitches; we see the heavy form rolling; we hear it puffing; and then comes the "Why, sir!" and the "What then, sir?" and the "No, sir!" and the "You don't see your way ...
— English Literature - Its History and Its Significance for the Life of the English Speaking World • William J. Long
... watching our exercises. With her eyeglasses to her eyes, the gentle gentlewoman sat silently contemplating our evolutions, and as we brought them to a conclusion, and stood (not like the Graces) puffing and panting round her, unwilling not to say some kindly word of commendation of our effort, she meekly observed, "It's very pretty, very graceful, very"—a pause—"ladylike." She spoke without any malicious intention whatever, dear ...
— Records of Later Life • Frances Anne Kemble
... he had forgotten it all. The dumpy accommodation train was bumping itself along at a great rate, puffing stertorously up the long grade past "Sassafras Hill," and then swinging itself around the curves that followed the river so desperately that passengers and freight alike—for it was a combination train as well as accommodation—were ...
— Stubble • George Looms
... Captain was respiring our balmy air, we really did wonder what laughing gas had imbued our atmosphere—every one we met in the streets appeared to be in such a state of jollification; but when we heard that the author of Peter Simple was actually puffing a cigar amongst us we no longer marvelled at the pleasant countenances of our citizens. He has often made them laugh when he was thousands of miles away. Surely now it is but natural that they ought to be tickled to death at the idea ...
— Peter Simple and The Three Cutters, Vol. 1-2 • Frederick Marryat
... the face and puffing from his exertion, swaggered through the car, muttering "Puppy, I'll learn him." The passengers, when he had gone, were loud in their indignation, and talked about signing a protest, but they ...
— The Gilded Age, Part 4. • Mark Twain (Samuel Clemens) and Charles Dudley Warner
... pray do not feel uneasy on that score; nothing is further from our wishes! If your health be so good, leave yourself and your wholesome fat alone. If out of health, the case is otherwise. Dropsical puffing should be prescribed for ...
— The Girl's Own Paper, Vol. VIII: No. 356, October 23, 1886. • Various
... back his head, and puffing out his cheeks as when a cigar sucker explodes a cataract of smoke from the crater of his throat; "cruel! vat cruel for kill-a de soldier! by gar, Monsieur le colonel, you make-a de king of France laugh he hear-a you talk after dat ...
— The Life of General Francis Marion • Mason Locke Weems
... little game, cap," said the scout, puffing at his pipe. "You see, they'll keep along on the edge of the desert, so't they can have grass an' water in plenty, an' if you don't pester 'em none they won't go into the Staked Plains at all; but if you push 'em hard they'll run the critters in thar an' leave 'em, hopin' that ...
— George at the Fort - Life Among the Soldiers • Harry Castlemon
... words of Iago, "I am nothing if I am not critical") over-stepped the bounds of caution, and found himself seriously embroiled with the powers that were. There appeared in No. XVI. a most bitter satire upon Sir John Leslie, in which he was compared to Falstaff, charged with puffing himself, and very prettily censured for publishing only the first volume of a class-book, and making all purchasers pay for both. Sir John Leslie took up the matter angrily, visited Carfrae the publisher, and threatened him with an action, ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. XXII (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... Black Hills Mountains about two o'clock, having climbed to the top with considerable puffing of the engine but otherwise almost imperceptibly to the passengers. When we were halted, upon the crown, at Sherman Station, to permit us to alight and see for ourselves, I scarcely might believe that we were more than eight thousand feet in air. There was nothing ...
— Desert Dust • Edwin L. Sabin
... the old woman took my hand and dragged me along a perfectly dark passage, Miss T. following. This passage was paved with stones, and had stone walls on either side. Half stifled with peat smoke, we arrived, puffing and panting, in the kitchen. Here in a corner was the big peat fire which filled the whole dwelling with its exhalations. All around was perfect blackness, until our eyes got accustomed to the dim hazy light, ...
— A Girl's Ride in Iceland • Ethel Brilliana Alec-Tweedie
... of the bench, and found Schreiber's estimate substantially correct. Then, stopping at the lodge of Stabbers's uncle, old "Spotted Horse," where that superannuated but still sagacious chief was squatted on his blanket and ostentatiously puffing a long Indian pipe, Webb demanded to know what young men remained in the village. Over a hundred strong, old men, squaws and children, they thronged about him, silent, big-eyed and attentive, Schreiber interpreting as best he could, resorting to the well-known sign language ...
— A Daughter of the Sioux - A Tale of the Indian frontier • Charles King
... I climbed half-way up the stairs, puffing and panting under my burden, when I met Nessy MacLeod coming down, and she fell on me with ...
— The Woman Thou Gavest Me - Being the Story of Mary O'Neill • Hall Caine
... protested against his own martyrlike scragginess and sallow, discontented visage. To him the markets were like the stomach of the shopkeeping classes, the stomach of all the folks of average rectitude puffing itself out, rejoicing, glistening in the sunshine, and declaring that everything was for the best, since peaceable people had never before grown so beautifully fat. As these thoughts passed through his mind Florent clenched his ...
— The Fat and the Thin • Emile Zola
... his cart's side the wagoner Is slouching slowly at his ease, Half-hidden in the windless blur Of white dust puffing to his knees. This wagon on the height above, From sky to sky on either hand, Is the sole thing that seems to move ...
— Among the Millet and Other Poems • Archibald Lampman
... again upon the Grand Canal, a little below the Rialto bridge, and again all was light and life and movement. Steamboats plied up and down with a great puffing and snorting and a swashing about of the water, gondolas and smaller craft rising and falling upon their heaving wake; heavily laden barges, propelled by long poles whose wielders walked with bare brown feet up ...
— A Venetian June • Anna Fuller
... was strange under these altered surroundings to see the old, well-known faces and figures. There was Challenger, with his smile of condescension, his drooping eyelids, his intolerant eyes, his aggressive beard, his huge chest, swelling and puffing as he laid down the law to Summerlee. And Summerlee, too, there he was with his short briar between his thin moustache and his gray goat's-beard, his worn face protruded in eager debate as he queried all Challenger's propositions. Finally, there was our host, with his ...
— The Lost World • Arthur Conan Doyle
... who seemed good for a couple of miles yet. Should Ralph send a bullet over his head to frighten him? No; that might give the poacher an excuse for sending back a bullet with a less innocent purpose. Poor Biceps, he was panting and puffing in his heavy wraps like a steamboat! He did not once open his mouth to speak; but, exerting his vaunted muscle to the utmost, kept abreast of his friend, and sometimes pushed a pace or two ahead of him. But it cost him a mighty effort! And yet the poacher was gaining upon him! They ...
— Boyhood in Norway • Hjalmar Hjorth Boyesen
... biscuit, made my way to a spot a short distance off, where I might take my food on the solitary system, according to the custom that we Englishmen most delight in. When I had lighted the fire, and put the water on to boil, I cast myself on the ground, and complacently puffing away at my pipe, gazed at the wild but picturesque scene before me. The position of the river was marked out by a semicircle of some fifty or sixty fires, before which dark and ill-defined figures were ever and anon flitting ...
— Chambers' Edinburgh Journal - Volume XVII., No 423, New Series. February 7th, 1852 • Various
... too late; for Noddy had laid hold of a wooden belaying pin, and aimed a blow with it at the head of his merciless persecutor. He did not hit him on the head, but the blow fell heavily on his shoulder, causing him to release his hold of the boy. Noddy, puffing like a grampus from the violence of the struggle, ...
— Work and Win - or, Noddy Newman on a Cruise • Oliver Optic
... girt with silver embroidered belts, their short pipes in their teeth—skipped before them, and talked nonsense. Even Korzh could not contain himself, as he gazed at the young people, from getting gay in his old age. Bandura in hand, alternately puffing at his pipe and singing, a brandy- glass upon his head, the gray-beard began the national dance amid loud shouts from the merry-makers. What will not people devise in merry mood! They even began to disguise their faces. They did not look like human beings. They are not to be compared ...
— Stories by Foreign Authors: Russian • Various
... with curl-papers or a thin wisp of ringlet. When two or three of these steamships are together down the harbor, their white volleys of smoke often present quite a lively picture of a naval engagement. The little puffing pilot-boats have a trick of getting in the way of us ferry-voyagers, like fussy custom-house officers among the newly-landed passengers from the ocean-ferries. There is generally a tug, perhaps with a slow convoy, to be waited for or circumnavigated ere the "slip" can be entered. And they ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, November 1885 • Various
... Ethan, giving Phil a nudge, and thus calling attention to the fact that by degrees the puffing Lub had actually gone ahead, fastening his eyes on the winding trail, and evidently feeling that he ...
— Phil Bradley's Mountain Boys - The Birch Bark Lodge • Silas K. Boone
... for him, but he rushed into his cage and locked the door. The combatants were puffing too hard to speak, or one of them at least would probably have vented some sarcasm. Evan eyed the proceedings approvingly; it was a relief to witness a little disorder where the orderly teller-accountant ruled. Porter, with all his boneheadedness, was a match for any man in the office, including ...
— A Canadian Bankclerk • J. P. Buschlen
... which is that noise in itself is distressing to birds, and has the effect of driving them away. To all sounds and noises which are not associated with danger to them, birds are absolutely indifferent. The rumbling of vehicles, puffing and shrieking of engines, and braying of brass bands, alarm them less than the slight popping of an air gun, where that modest weapon of destruction is frequently used against them. They have no "nerves" for noise, but the apparition ...
— Birds in Town and Village • W. H. Hudson
... make us so. Are you not, and half the painters in London, panting for an opportunity to show your genius in a great "historical picture?" O blind race! Have you wings? Not a feather: and yet you must be ever puffing, sweating up to the tops of rugged hills; and, arrived there, clapping and shaking your ragged elbows, and making as if you would fly! Come down, silly Daedalus; come down to the lowly places in which Nature ordered you to ...
— The Paris Sketch Book Of Mr. M. A. Titmarsh • William Makepeace Thackeray
... not to cause me unnecessary pain by his taunts. He apologised lamely and told me that I was to proceed on board ship. This very much surprised me, and I remarked that I had already been taken from home and hearth 500 miles. This ill-tempered creature then lent back arrogantly in his armchair, puffing at his cigar, and said: "Well, ah, you are banished, don't you know. You are to be sent to St. Helena, or as we call it, 'The Rock.' You will shortly embark. It is a large ship you are going in; it is called—ah, let me see, ...
— My Reminiscences of the Anglo-Boer War • Ben Viljoen
... the deep water, lay her enemies in smoking ruins. The privateer, her foretop in flames, was dishevelled as a virago after a street fight; while great white clouds puffing out of the frigate's quarter-gallery told ...
— The Gentleman - A Romance of the Sea • Alfred Ollivant
... that Jackson was falsifying here. Taking advantage of the public's ignorance, he was puffing up his historical importance in order to sell wallpaper. If the cognoscenti complained that he had buried the chiaroscurists after da Carpi, he always had the explanation that others did not work ...
— John Baptist Jackson - 18th-Century Master of the Color Woodcut • Jacob Kainen
... lying. As it caught Bronson's eye an expression came over his face, which, if Fotheringham had seen, would have saved him a vast amount of trouble. But the messenger, too busy to notice his visitor, paid him no attention, and in a moment Bronson was puffing his cigar with a nonchalant air, that would disarm any suspicions which the messenger might have entertained, but he had none, as it was a common practice to send new men over his run, that ...
— Jim Cummings • Frank Pinkerton
... to go," he echoed quietly, sinking back in his chair and puffing at the pipe. "It's a nice point that we have been discussing together, my flute and I, and I won't say but that I've got the worst of it. By the way, what do you mean to do now that you have a ...
— Noughts and Crosses • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... said Mr. Easterfield, slowly puffing his cigar, "that it would not be such a very bad thing if she did. So far as I have been able to judge, he is my favorite of the claimants. Du Brant and I have met frequently, and if I were a girl I would not want to marry him. ...
— The Captain's Toll-Gate • Frank R. Stockton
... more of pretence than of love. Hence the crestfallen performer seemed to be playing to a statue rather than a man, and learnt that it is vain for buffoons to assail with, their tricks a settled and weighty sternness, and that a mighty mass cannot be shaken with the idle puffing of the lips. For Starkad had set his face so firmly in his stubborn wrath, that he seemed not a whit easier to move than ever. For the inflexibility which he owed his vows was not softened either by the strain of the lute or the enticements of the palate; and he thought that more respect ...
— The Danish History, Books I-IX • Saxo Grammaticus ("Saxo the Learned")
... underlies the mirage of the poet's vision, should not always be suggested. His humor and satire are never of the destructive kind; what he does in that way is suggestive only,—not breaking bubbles with Thor's hammer, but puffing them away with the breath of a Clown, or shivering them with the light laugh of a genial cynic. Men go about to prove the existence of a God! Was it a bit of phosphorus, that brain whose creations are so real, that, mixing with them, we feel as if we ...
— Atlantic Monthly Vol. 3, No. 16, February, 1859 • Various
... had risen from his seat and was now stumping up and down, puffing at his empty tobacco-pipe as though ...
— Stolen Treasure • Howard Pyle
... engaged, an old sailor on a chest just under me was puffing out volumes of tobacco smoke. My supper finished, he brushed the stem of his sooty pipe against the sleeve of his frock, and politely waved it toward me. The attention was sailor-like; as for the nicety of the thing, ...
— Omoo: Adventures in the South Seas • Herman Melville
... small child's expressions are still in unmistakable motor terms. It is obviously through the large muscles that a baby makes his responses. And even a three-year-old can scarcely think "engine" without showing the pull of his muscles and the puff-puffing of exertion. Nor can he observe an object without making some movement towards it. He takes in through his senses; and he ...
— Here and Now Story Book - Two- to seven-year-olds • Lucy Sprague Mitchell
... The puffing, panting engine that dragged the long train of heavy cars into the busy little city of Bradford, in the State of Pennsylvania, one day last summer, witnessed through its one white, staring eye, sometimes called the head-light, many happy meetings between waiting and coming friends; but ...
— Ralph Gurney's Oil Speculation • James Otis
... Resolute, the Marblehead, and three or four large black colliers from Key West. As we rounded the long, low point on the western side of the entrance and steamed slowly into the spacious bay, a small steam-launch came puffing out to meet us, and, as soon as she was within hailing distance, an officer in the white uniform of the navy rose in the stern-sheets, put his hands to his mouth, and shouted: "Captain McCalla presents his compliments to the captain of the State of Texas, and requests that you follow ...
— Campaigning in Cuba • George Kennan
... rest, but she went so fast that they could not catch her to make her stand still. And they dared not lose sight of her big whiteness through the dark, for now they were completely lost and could never find their way out of the wilderness without her. So all night long she kept them panting and puffing and wading after her, till they were all worn out, cold and shivering with wet, scratched and bleeding from the briars, and cross ...
— The Book of Saints and Friendly Beasts • Abbie Farwell Brown
... naturally the methods she employed in Society were far more subtle than those she had formerly used upon the stage. They were scarcely less effective. She slightly changed her fashion of doing her hair, puffing it out less at the sides, wearing it a little higher at the back. The change accentuated her physical resemblance to Lady Holme. She happened to get the name of the dressmaker who made most of the latter's gowns, and happened to give her an order that was executed with remarkable ...
— The Woman With The Fan • Robert Hichens
... rhythmic. We are always irresistibly compelled to impart a rhythm to every succession of sounds, however uniform and monotonous. A familiar example of this is the rhythm we can seldom refrain from hearing in the puffing of an engine. A series of experiments, by Bolton, on thirty subjects showed that the clicks of an electric telephone connected in an induction-apparatus nearly always fell into rhythmic groups, usually of two or four, rarely of three or five, the rhythmic perception being accompanied ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 1 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis
... the second assistant engineer, hurrying along the deck to relieve the first assistant on watch, found Mr. Reardon leaning over the rail meditatively puffing his old briar pipe. In answer to the former's query as to what kept the chief up so late, the latter replied that he was burning sulphur in his room to ...
— Cappy Ricks Retires • Peter B. Kyne
... not approach each other, and apparently were quite ignorant of the fact that they were traveling by the same train. I made the necessary arrangements with the guard, and just as the train was starting we were bundled into the carriage, Quarles blowing and puffing ...
— The Master Detective - Being Some Further Investigations of Christopher Quarles • Percy James Brebner
... soup get cold," he continued. "Chevassat said a few words to his coachman, who whipped the horse, and there he was, promenading down the boulevard, turning his cane this way, puffing out big clouds of smoke, as if he had not the colic at the thought that his friend Bagnolet ...
— The Clique of Gold • Emile Gaboriau
... empty-handed; rosaries and good cheer always wind up their holy work; and my good Maximilian, as head of his Church, has scarcely feet to waddle into it. Feasting and fasting produce the same effect. In wind and food he is quite an adept—puffing, from one cause or the other, like a ...
— The Memoirs of Louis XV. and XVI., Volume 4 • Madame du Hausset, and of an Unknown English Girl and the Princess Lamballe
... books and pamphlets written by such men, though, of course, little of their correspondence has ever reached America. A man like Ludwig Ganghofer, for instance, became so much of an institution that papers even joked about him, and I remember a cartoon—in "Jugend," I think—picturing him puffing up a hill where a staff was waiting and the commanding officer saying "Ganghofer's here. ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume I (of 8) - Introductions; Special Articles; Causes of War; Diplomatic and State Papers • Various
... the Locomotive" tends to deprive Stephenson of some part of his fame as inventor. Much importance is attached to Hedley's "Puffing Billy," 1813, which is pronounced to have been a commercial success. Sinclair, however, credits Stephenson with doing most of all men to introduce the Locomotive. As the final verdict may admit Hedley and cannot expel Stephenson from the temple of fame, we pass the sentence ...
— James Watt • Andrew Carnegie
... but I know that the Vampire is coming up the river. If you listen, you will hear a hoarse puffing; and nothing but that old ark could make such a wheezy ...
— Within The Enemy's Lines - SERIES: The Blue and the Gray—Afloat • Oliver Optic
... stories, and got so excited over them that his pipe always went out; I used then to light it for him with a spill, and this formed my chief amusement. Often, again, he would give us picture-books to look at, whilst he sat silent and motionless in his easy-chair, puffing out such dense clouds of smoke that we were all as it were enveloped in mist. On such evenings mother was very sad; and directly it struck nine she said, "Come, children! off to bed! Come! The 'Sand-man' ...
— Weird Tales. Vol. I • E. T. A. Hoffmann
... occasional sounds came now. The Indians were busy and silent. Within the house it was so still that Ambrose could hear Gordon Strange puffing at ...
— The Fur Bringers - A Story of the Canadian Northwest • Hulbert Footner
... hours later, they were awakened by an exclamation from Frank, who sat up and stared at the form of a stranger, the latter being quietly squatting in their midst, calmly puffing at a cigarette, while his poncho was wrapped ...
— Frank Merriwell Down South • Burt L. Standish
... business than they had done for several days; for it was a good sign that Daniel had taken his pipe out of the square hollow in the fireside wall, where he usually kept it, and was preparing to diversify his remarks with satisfying interludes of puffing. ...
— Sylvia's Lovers, Vol. I • Elizabeth Gaskell
... "babbling about green field." But the personage that most struck my attention was a pragmatical old gentleman in clerical robes, with a remarkably large and square but bald head. He entered the room wheezing and puffing, elbowed his way through the throng with a look of sturdy self-confidence, and, having laid hands upon a thick Greek quarto, clapped it upon his head, and swept majestically away in a ...
— The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, Gent. • Washington Irving
... returned, accompanied by the local pilot (a Captain Hamilton) and the fat, puffing, master of a German barque. They wanted "to see the fun." We soon had everything in readiness; the hook, baited with the belly-portion of a freshly-killed pig (which the Manono people had commandeered ...
— By Rock and Pool on an Austral Shore, and Other Stories • Louis Becke
... well. Jones is immortal until he is found out; and then down comes the extinguisher, and the immortal is dead and buried. The idea (dies irae!) of discovery must haunt many a man, and make him uneasy, as the trumpets are puffing in his triumph. Brown, who has a higher place than he deserves, cowers before Smith, who has found him out. What is a chorus of critics shouting "Bravo?"—a public clapping hands and flinging garlands? Brown knows that Smith ...
— Roundabout Papers • William Makepeace Thackeray
... sits in a street omnibus or railroad-car and sees a young woman whose waist is pinched to a point that makes her breathing mere panting and puffing, and whose feet are squeezed into shoes with a high heel in the middle of the sole, which compels her to stump and hobble as she tries to walk, should be very wary of praising the superiority of European and American civilization to that of the East. The grade of civilization ...
— Ars Recte Vivende - Being Essays Contributed to "The Easy Chair" • George William Curtis
... find the book, while Dr. Leslie, puffing his cigar-smoke very fast, looked up through the cloud abstractedly at a new ornament which had been placed above the mantel shelf since we first knew the room. Old Captain Finch had solaced his weary and painful last years by ...
— A Country Doctor and Selected Stories and Sketches • Sarah Orne Jewett
... now. He leaned heavily toward me, puffing. Greatly excited, I held before his eyes ...
— The Agony Column • Earl Derr Biggers
... there was a hustling for warm wraps. At the quay from which the start was to be made, a great number of people had gathered regardless of the unseasonable hour and the chill air. There was a most horrible din and confusion, caused by the shouting and rush of the people, the whiz of rockets, the puffing of steamboats and the hoarse sound of speaking trumpets, all amid the glare of Bengal lights and burning pitch. The firing of the tug's gun announced the start. A black figure, like a huge porpoise, could be seen ...
— The Story of Paul Boyton - Voyages on All the Great Rivers of the World • Paul Boyton
... Carlyle's Cromwell, I. 176.—It came to be an assertion with the Presbyterians, thought I do not believe they believed it themselves, that Cromwell's military fame had been gained by systematic puffing on the part of the Independents. "The news books taught to speak no language but Cromwell and his party, and were mute on such actions as he and they could claim no share in," wrote Clement Walker a year or two after Naseby ...
— The Life of John Milton Vol. 3 1643-1649 • David Masson
... know whether our literary or professional people are more amiable than they are in other places, but certainly quarrelling is out of fashion among them. This could never be, if they were in the habit of secret anonymous puffing of each other. That is the kind of underground machinery which manufactures false reputations and genuine hatreds. On the other hand, I should like to know if we are not at liberty to have a good ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)
... first at the cards and then at Sanders, who sat puffing his cigar, and watching Schloss's proceedings with a look not unlike Jack's when anyone he did not approve of ...
— Tom Brown at Oxford • Thomas Hughes
... her ironing, waiting for him to begin. But Eddie seemed to experience a certain embarrassment in coming to the subject. While she took article after article from the clothes-basket at her side, he wandered about the room aimlessly, puffing at a pipe which ...
— The Land of Promise • D. Torbett
... in silence, puffing at a meerschaum with a huge brown bowl. A trick of the mind opened for Stephen one of the histories in his father's library in Beacon Street, across the pages of which had flitted the ancestors of this blue-eyed and great-chested Saxon. He saw them in cathedral ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... were awfully bad for him. The doctor expressly told him he must stop them, but he wouldn't pay any attention to him. And he seems to take so much more exercise. My bedroom is next to his, you know, and every morning I can hear things going on through the wall—father dancing about and puffing a good deal. And one morning I met his valet going in with a pair of Indian clubs. I believe father is really taking himself ...
— Something New • Pelham Grenville Wodehouse
... them out of sight round the curve of the drive, then sent his horse on with an oath and, dismounting heavily at Alison's toes, roared out: "What the devil's this folly, miss?" He made angry puffing noises. "I vow I heard you laughing at Finchley. Might have heard him ...
— The Highwayman • H.C. Bailey
... grandmother. At a given signal, the unwieldy animal puts himself in motion; he throws out his arms, crouches up his shoulders, and, without moving a muscle of his face, kicks out his legs, to the manifest risk of the bystanders, and goes back to the place puffing and blowing like an otter, after a half-hour's burst. Is this dancing? Shades of the filial and paternal Vestris! can this be a specimen of the art which gives elasticity to the most inert confirmation, which ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 12, - Issue 326, August 9, 1828 • Various
... cabin, puffing a most excellent cigar and sipping his whiskey and soda while, amid much shouting of seamen and screaming of windlasses, the staff boat got clear. Presently they were gliding past long low moles and black, inhospitable lighthouses, threading their ...
— Okewood of the Secret Service • Valentine Williams
... most inquisitive manner, until his long nose nearly went into my eye, and humming a bow-wow tune in my ear to ascertain if I were really napping, he turned from me with a dissatisfied grunt, flung himself into a settee, and not long after was puffing and blowing like a porpoise. I was glad of this opportunity to go on deck again, and "I left him alone in his glory." But, while I was congratulating myself on my good fortune, I found him once more ...
— Life in the Clearings versus the Bush • Susanna Moodie
... the Lancashire cotton-mills; shop assistants with polished boots, and some even with kid gloves and a silver-banded cane. Here and there was a farm-hand in corduroys and hob-nailed, cowdung-spattered boots, puffing at a broken old clay pipe, and speaking in the "Darset" dialect. At the station they had to have another "wet" in the refreshment room, and by the time the train was due to start a ...
— At Suvla Bay • John Hargrave
... Gwynn, one might have observed sundry amazing phenomena, innocent at that. Mr. Gwynn did not sit down, but stood in the middle of the room. On the careless other hand, Richard did not arise from the chair into which he had flung himself, but sat with his hat on, puffing blue wreaths and tapping his ...
— The President - A novel • Alfred Henry Lewis
... comfortable old cassock, and with a smile of ineffable peace on his face, he sat chatting with Saunders. The detective was evidently as pleased as Father Murray. He was leaning on "Old Hickory" and puffing at a cigar, with contentment in every line ...
— Charred Wood • Myles Muredach
... puffing away, "it wouldn't be exactly inconvenient for Black Michael if you disappeared. With you gone, the old game that we stopped would be played—or he'd have ...
— The Prisoner of Zenda • Anthony Hope
... Lieutenant-Colonel Abd-el-Kader, to visit the vessels that were lying a few yards astern. This was a very excellent and trustworthy officer, and he immediately started upon an examination. In the mean while the Koordi governor sat rigidly upon the sofa, puffing away at his long pipe, but evidently thinking that the affair would ...
— Ismailia • Samuel W. Baker
... his cigar, put his thumbs in his vest holes, and began slowly puffing smoke toward the ceiling. He liked to keep ...
— The Desert Fiddler • William H. Hamby
... out the skiff from the rocky landing for a last row. They pulled round under the dark cliffs that rose sheer from the water and were crowned with the wall of the old fort, the cliffs themselves seamed across with strata of white, like mortar-lines of some Titanic masonry. They gave chase to a tug puffing northward half a mile to the right, towing two or three canal-boats through the still water and the stiller night. Then a sail came ghostily out of the shadow astern, and stole on them as they drew away and waited ...
— Lippincott's Magazine. Vol. XII, No. 33. December, 1873. • Various
... minute he was down on his knee at the water's edge scooping up a handful of muddy sand and, as he termed it, scrubbing away as if he would take off all the skin, and puffing and blowing the while like a grampus, while the carpenter looked on as much amused as I. But he turned serious directly, and with an earnest look in ...
— Through Forest and Stream - The Quest of the Quetzal • George Manville Fenn
... hill behind them came the puffing and groaning of a small motor-car. They both turned their heads to watch it come into view. It was an insignificant affair of an almost extinct pattern, a single cylinder machine with a round tonneau back. The engine was ...
— The Tempting of Tavernake • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... correspond gratis for papers in Boston, Philadelphia, Washington, Cincinnati, and other large cities. Having "got his newspapers," he forms an extensive acquaintance with authors, publishers, and actors-in a word, with any one in need of puffing, the force of which he gauges according to the amount paid. Although the wise critic holds him in utter contempt, he affects a knowledge of books quite as profound, and can completely outshine him in his style of adulation. As for new books, no enterprising publisher would deign to ...
— The Life and Adventures of Maj. Roger Sherman Potter • "Pheleg Van Trusedale"
... in the back yard, taking her "white clothes" off the line, when the special came puffing slowly into town. To emphasize her disapproval of the whole system of politics, she turned her back square toward it, and laid violent hold of a sheet. There was a smudge of cinders upon its white surface, ...
— Lonesome Land • B. M. Bower
... pipe had nearly gone out, and he fell a puffing at it until the spark grew to life again, and until great clouds of smoke rolled out around his head and up through the ...
— Twilight Land • Howard Pyle
... and maids, and matrons threw.' We have seen each single contribution to this great public act put in by the Poet's selected representative of classes. 'The kitchen malkin, with her richest lockram pinned on her neck, clambering the wall to eye him,' spake for hers; 'the seld-shown flamen, puffing his way to win a vulgar station,' was hastening to record the vote of his; 'the veiled dame, exposing the war of white and damask in her nicely-gawded cheeks to the spoil of Phebus' burning kisses,' was a ...
— The Philosophy of the Plays of Shakspere Unfolded • Delia Bacon
... the top of the hill that overlooks the Green Meadows and watched her out of sight. Then he started to amble down the Lone Little Path to look for some beetles. He was ambling along in his lazy way, for you know he never hurries, when he heard some one puffing and blowing behind him. Of course he turned to see who it was, and he was greatly surprised when he discovered Old Mr. Toad. Yes, Sir, it was Old Mr. Toad, and he seemed in a great hurry. He was quite short of breath, but he was hopping along in the most determined way as if he ...
— The Adventures of Old Mr. Toad • Thornton W. Burgess
... walk and grunted, and Mr. Cameron, judging that he had about ten seconds' leeway, felt in the dazed person's right hand pocket for the revolver he knew would be there, and secured it. The sitting figure made puffing, feeble attempts to prevent him, but there was ...
— A Poor Wise Man • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... Transport Officer, who is a very important personage indeed, and he in turn hands the engineers their orders, and, half an hour after they have been landed on the soil of France, the engines go puffing off to take their places in ...
— Italy at War and the Allies in the West • E. Alexander Powell
... thoughtfully puffing at his pipe, "one weak point about my deductions is that they all hang on the question as to whether, at the time of the tragedy, Parrish actually had the silencer on his pistol or not. That is ...
— The Yellow Streak • Williams, Valentine
... over the surface of the dish in a layer, and, puffing gently but adroitly, he winnowed it with his nicotine-ladened breath till no particle of sand remained with the gold. Then he put the dish on the scales, and weighed the ...
— The Tale of Timber Town • Alfred Grace
... nearer, till he was close under the wall of the gardens. Then he noticed a small gate in the wall, sheltered by a little projecting porch. The Captain edged under the porch, took out a cigar, contrived to light it, and stood there puffing pensively. He was protected from the rain, which now fell very heavily, and he was asking himself again why only half the house was lighted up. This was the kind of trivial, yet whimsical, puzzle on which ...
— Captain Dieppe • Anthony Hope
... something of the ludicrous, to see three white Americans, and one Indian, with a disarmed British red coat under their feet, in the jolly-boat, not daring to raise his head, while about thirty boats, with above 250 seamen, and nearly as many marines, were rowing, and puffing and blowing, and firing and loading, and loading and firing at a small boat, containing three American seamen and one Indian, without any weapon or instrument, except the oars they rowed with! While the British marines were ruffling the water around the flying boat with their bullets, ...
— A Journal of a Young Man of Massachusetts, 2nd ed. • Benjamin Waterhouse
... bench. On the side that shelves down to the water are some beeches, and opposite them a row of houses from which you see one of the prettiest prospects possible—the shining river with the craft along the quays, and the busy city in the distance, the active little steamers puffing away toward Cove, the farther bank crowned with rich woods, and pleasant-looking country-houses—perhaps they are tumbling, rickety, and ruinous, as those houses close by us, but you can't see ...
— Seeing Europe with Famous Authors - Vol. II Great Britain And Ireland, Part Two • Francis W. Halsey
... short arms and the puffing of her fat little body diffused through the passage a sense of noisy gleefulness which made people say in every box, 'Here's Madame Ancelin!' On Tuesdays especially, the fashionable indifference of the house contrasted oddly with the seat where, in supreme content, ...
— The Immortal - Or, One Of The "Forty." (L'immortel) - 1877 • Alphonse Daudet
... on half-pay at the Louvre (fig. 243) wears an undress uniform of the time of Amenhotep III.; that is to say, a small wig, a close-fitting vest with short sleeves, and a kilt drawn tightly over the hips, reaching scarcely half-way down the thigh, and trimmed in front with a piece of puffing plaited longwise. His companion is a priest (fig. 244), who wears his hair in rows of little curls one above the other, and is clad in a long petticoat falling below the calf of the leg and spreading out in front in a kind of plaited apron. He holds a sacred standard consisting of a stout ...
— Manual Of Egyptian Archaeology And Guide To The Study Of Antiquities In Egypt • Gaston Camille Charles Maspero
... to New York in the smoking-car, puffing feverishly at his cigar and glaring dreamily at the smoke. He was living the day over again and, in anticipation, the day off, still to come. He rehearsed their next meeting at the station; he considered whether or not he would meet her with a huge bunch of violets or ...
— The Red Cross Girl • Richard Harding Davis
... job for Snitchey and Craggs, I suppose,' he observed, puffing slowly at his pipe. 'More witnessing for ...
— The Battle of Life • Charles Dickens
... in its motions. It swells out the membranes about the spot where its gills ought to be, so as to puff itself out like a toad when it takes water in: its colour resembles that of the common English frog, and it looks remarkably like one when it sits on a piece of weed, resting on its claws and puffing out its cheeks. There are several lines of red stripes at the ...
— Journals Of Two Expeditions Of Discovery In North-West And Western Australia, Vol. 2 (of 2) • George Grey
... the middle of the summer the doctor came home later than usual, and, wearied with his day's driving, he got out of his carriage and let himself into his grounds by the shore path. The evening wind was puffing casually across the bay; in the cottage above the lamps were being lit. The doctor walked slowly, thoughtfully, picking his way in and out of the shrubbery, thinking vaguely of the day's work, the cases ...
— The Man Who Wins • Robert Herrick
... devil. Yet is it nursed and cherished in many a soul that thinks itself devout, filling it with petty cares and disappointments, that swarm like bats in its air, and shut out the glory of God. The love of the praise of men, the desire of fame, the pride that takes offence, the puffing-up of knowledge, these and every other form of Protean self-worship—we must get rid of them all. We must be free. The man whom another enslaves may be free as God; to him who is a slave in himself, God will not enter in; he will ...
— Unspoken Sermons - Series I., II., and II. • George MacDonald
... benevolence and truth itself. She begged her daughters to take us into the salon to show us what she thought would interest us. She apologised for the cold of these rooms—and well she might; when the double doors were opened I really thought Eolus himself was puffing in our faces; we shawled ourselves well before we ventured in. At one end of the salon is a picture of M. de Lescure, and at the other, of Henri de la Rochejacquelin, by Gerard and Girardet, presents from the King. Fine military figures. In the boudoir is one of M. ...
— The Life and Letters of Maria Edgeworth, Vol. 2 • Maria Edgeworth
... Plenty of money, too. It's a great relief," said Uncle Chris, puffing vigorously. "A thundering relief." He looked over Jill's head down the room. "It's fine to think of you happily married, dear, with everything in ...
— The Little Warrior - (U.K. Title: Jill the Reckless) • P. G. Wodehouse
... hot summer days that followed were full of trials for Lovey Mary. Day after day the great unwinking sun glared savagely down upon the Cabbage Patch, upon the stagnant pond, upon the gleaming rails, upon the puffing trains that pounded by hour after hour. Each morning found Lovey Mary trudging away to the factory, where she stood all day counting and sorting and packing tiles. At night she climbed wearily to her ...
— Lovey Mary • Alice Hegan Rice
... but she was provoked beyond measure to find him acting as if Stanton were the victim rather than himself. As the sweep of the road again brought them in view of the piazza, this impression was confirmed by seeing Van Berg stroll carelessly away, complacently puffing his cigar as if he had already ...
— A Face Illumined • E. P. Roe
... get used to it," she said presently, for Nate had not tried to answer, but was puffing like a locomotive over wet rails at his stub of a pipe. "I ought to by this time, but I don't. I s'pose it's because when pa's good he's real good, and so kind it makes it hurt all the more when he's off. Oh dear!" She gave a long sigh, pitifully unyouthful in its depth ...
— Joyce's Investments - A Story for Girls • Fannie E. Newberry
... she was capable of forgetting logic, tact, sympathy for others. . . . In reply to her threats, the doctor greedily gulped a glass of cold water. Nellie fell to entreating and imploring like the very lowest beggar. . . . At last the doctor gave way. He slowly got up, puffing and panting, ...
— The Horse-Stealers and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov
... the centre of conversation, of feeling, and of interest. He was almost invariably engaged in eager conversation, pitched in a loud tone of voice, broken at intervals when he listened to the other disputants, while puffing the cigarettes which he was constantly rolling, and looking intently out ...
— A Girl Among the Anarchists • Isabel Meredith
... began to walk off, puffing. Dotty longed to run after him and call out, "Please, sir, give me back my money." But it was too late; and summoning all her pride, she managed to crush ...
— Dotty Dimple at Her Grandmother's • Sophie May
... for the guns, I put a handful of Havanas in my vest pocket, and emerging, I laid the rifles handy and proceeded to light a weed. I was watching the bright flame of the match, and puffing with gusto at the fragrant smoke, when from another direction a second squad of Martians came into view very near us. They immediately halted and gazed at us in open-mouthed wonder, which soon changed to a look of horror. Remembering ...
— Pharaoh's Broker - Being the Very Remarkable Experiences in Another World of Isidor Werner • Ellsworth Douglass
... telegram which had just come through from Durazzo. What Hacket had to tell was interesting: Spargo lingered to hear all about it, and to discuss it. Altogether it was well beyond half-past two when he went out of the office, unconsciously puffing away from him as he reached the threshold the last breath of the atmosphere in which he had spent his midnight. In Fleet Street the air was fresh, almost to sweetness, and the first grey of the coming dawn was breaking faintly around the ...
— The Middle Temple Murder • J.S. Fletcher
... the forest and hastened in the direction he had agreed upon with Isaacs. He soon met him, and together they started off toward the southwest, guided by the compass they had brought with them. They did not see any of the other men, with the exception of one whom Isaacs had heard puffing and grunting past him as they ran from camp. In the darkness he had not been able ...
— Winning a Cause - World War Stories • John Gilbert Thompson and Inez Bigwood
... besides, she is what I think it is Miss Edgeworth calls "a fetcher and carrier of bays,"—a useful member of society, who, without harming herself or others, circulates the necessary literary news, and would be invaluable where new authors want puffing, and new poems should have the pretty passages pointed out for the advantage of literary misses. Here, alas! such kindly offices are confined to comparing the rival passages in the Correiro and the ...
— Journal of a Voyage to Brazil - And Residence There During Part of the Years 1821, 1822, 1823 • Maria Graham
... with care; that is, so far as his arm was concerned, but there appeared to be a concussion of the brain. Captain Wilson looked at the cut and blood-smeared faces of the two young men, and waited with anxiety the arrival of his own surgeon, who came at last, puffing with the haste he had made, and received the report of the brothers ...
— Mr. Midshipman Easy • Frederick Marryat
... back to the dingy studio, where the man lighted a pipe and sat opposite his small daughter, puffing uneasily. They were both reserved; there was an indefinable barrier between them which each was beginning to recognize. Presently Alora asked to go to bed and he sent her to her room ...
— Mary Louise Solves a Mystery • L. Frank Baum
... rode old Yellowjacket puffing up the grade, following the wagon marks, and knew that she was nearing the end of her journey,—for which Yellowjacket, she supposed, would be thankful. She had started not more than an hour later than her father, but the team had ...
— Sawtooth Ranch • B. M. Bower
... a black tail coat and a yaller vest and lavender pants, comes puffing up. He was the manager, we found ...
— Cape Cod Stories - The Old Home House • Joseph C. Lincoln
... already announced the approach of the train, and the easy puffing of the locomotive indicated that it was now standing at the station. The colonel rose from his chair and started across the room, ...
— The Flag • Homer Greene
... with his arms crossed over the back of a chair and his feet twisted round its legs, puffing thoughtfully at his pipe and frowning at his boots. In a long experience of practice among rich and self-conscious patients who would always rather be "interesting" than normal, it was not the first time that he had watched the bloom ...
— The Education of Eric Lane • Stephen McKenna
... in a cluster in the middle of the road, the Paymaster with his black coat so tight upon his stomach it looked as if every brass button would burst with a crack like a gun; Rixa puffing and stretching himself; Major Dugald ducking his head and darting his glance about from side to side looking for the enemy; Mr. Spencer, tall, thin, with the new strapped breeches and a London hat, blowing his nose with much noise in a Barcelona silk handkerchief. All the way before them ...
— Gilian The Dreamer - His Fancy, His Love and Adventure • Neil Munro
... heaven and sea, one hundred feet above the water, on all sides were piled the immense masses of masonry, the ruins of which are all that remains of the once proud Castle of Doon. Gazing in awe down the horrid depths of the "Puffing ...
— The Reminiscences of an Irish Land Agent • S.M. Hussey
... went to work To move the stubborn lid; And presently a mighty jerk The mighty mischief did; For all at once, ah! woeful case, The snuff came puffing ...
— Cole's Funny Picture Book No. 1 • Edward William Cole
... I do not mean puffing and pretending, or putting on airs of haughtiness or arrogance; or any affectation whatever. But there are those—and some of them are persons of good sense, in many respects, who can scarcely answer properly, when addressed, or look the person with whom ...
— The Young Man's Guide • William A. Alcott
... Colonel L. upon a foraging expedition. We passed a small house, in front of which a fat little negro-girl was drawing a bucket of water from the well, the girl puffing and the ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 09, No. 51, January, 1862 • Various
... come puffing to the brow of the hillock Gordon had already passed, when a shout from the ridge apprised those below of his presence. Cut off above and below, there was nothing left for Steve but a retreat down the road. He could not possibly advance in the face ...
— A Daughter of the Dons - A Story of New Mexico Today • William MacLeod Raine
... and down the hewn log floor of the cabin, his hands deep in his pockets, puffing out voluminous clouds of smoke. It was not often that Philip Steele's face was unpleasant to look upon, but to-night it wore anything but its natural good humor. It was a strong, thin face, set off by a square ...
— Philip Steele of the Royal Northwest Mounted Police • James Oliver Curwood
... th' first thing he says to me wur?" puffing vigorously. "Why, he cooms in an' sets hissen down, an' he swells hissen out loike a frog i' trouble, an' ses he, 'My friend, I hope you cling to th' rock o' ages.' An' ses I, 'No I dunnot nowt o' th' soart, an' be dom'd ...
— That Lass O' Lowrie's - 1877 • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... them any day; I shall listen for all sorts of odd sounds. I heard the distant rumble of a farmer's waggon, and the cows lowing at Brown's farm; every now and again I heard the sound of the village blacksmith's hammer, the faint puffing of a train, a man's footsteps coming through the wood, and the voices of ...
— Woodside - or, Look, Listen, and Learn. • Caroline Hadley |
