"Caressing" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... the scene behind me, recalling, as it did, so many old associations, I told Tray that we must part; and that as he was now well down in years, perhaps we should never more meet again. He seemed to understand all I said to him, and, as I patted him gently upon the head, repaid my friendship by caressing my hand, and turning upon me several sympathetic looks. On telling him that he must go home, he hung his head, and drooped his tail, and moved slowly into the road, several times halting and casting reluctant looks back. Then he stretched himself down in the sand, and placing his ...
— The Life and Adventures of Maj. Roger Sherman Potter • "Pheleg Van Trusedale"
... writing, to listen with wrung hearts to the failing step, the laboured breathing, the frequent pauses, with which their sister climbed the short staircase; yet they dared not notice what they observed, with pangs of suffering even deeper than hers. They dared not notice it in words, far less by the caressing assistance of a helping arm or hand. ...
— The Life of Charlotte Bronte • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
... with the lowing of the cattle. There an armed and mounted Cossack, on leave from the cordon, rides up to a hut and, leaning towards the window, knocks. In answer to the knock the handsome head of a young woman appears at the window and you can hear caressing, laughing voices. There a tattered Nogay labourer, with prominent cheekbones, brings a load of reeds from the steppes, turns his creaking cart into the Cossack captain's broad and clean courtyard, and lifts the yoke off the oxen ...
— The Cossacks • Leo Tolstoy
... his solos are recited in flight, although he can sit quietly on a weed-stalk or a fence-post and sing as sweetly, if not as ecstatically, as if he were curveting in the air. During this aerial performance he hovers gracefully, bending his wings downward, after the bobolink's manner, as if he were caressing the earth beneath him. However, a striking difference between his intermittent song-flights and those of the bobolink is to be noted. The latter usually rises in the air, soars around in a curve, and returns to the perch from which he started, or to one near by, describing something of an ellipse. ...
— Birds of the Rockies • Leander Sylvester Keyser
... me, I know not how, it toucheth me inwardly with a caressing hand, it constraineth me. Yea, it constraineth me, so that my soul stretcheth ...
— Thus Spake Zarathustra - A Book for All and None • Friedrich Nietzsche
... been Italy for the blue of the sky and the caressing warmth of the sun. They threw open the big window and in flooded the perfume of lilacs and the twitter of sparrows, which is the nearest to a bird song one can expect in New York. But after all, this was n't New ...
— The Seventh Noon • Frederick Orin Bartlett
... well-to-do people's children, and in one another's care if they are poor people's. All over England the tenderness of the little children for the less is delightful. I remember to have seen scarcely any squabbling, and I saw abundance of caressing. Small girls, even small boys, lug babies of almost their own weight and size, and fondle them as if it were a privilege and a pleasure to lug them. This goes on in spite of a reciprocal untidiness which is indescribable; for the English poor children have the very dirtiest faces in the world, ...
— London Films • W.D. Howells
... ask for anything that you want without having to pay, the guest-houses, with their straw-coloured wine in quaint carafes, the rich stews served in grey earthenware dishes streaked with blue, the dancing, the caressing, the singular absence of all elderly women, strikes on the mind with a quite peculiar sense of boredom and vacuity, because Morris seems to have eliminated so many sources of human interest, and to have conformed every one to a type, which is refreshing enough ...
— Escape and Other Essays • Arthur Christopher Benson
... white enchantress with the golden hair Breathed all her soul through some unvalued rhyme; Some flower of song that long had lost its bloom; Lo! its dead summer kindled as she sang! The sweet contralto, like the ringdove's coo, Thrilled it with brooding, fond, caressing tones, And the pale minstrel's passion lived again, Tearful and trembling as a dewy rose The wind has shaken till it fills the air With light and fragrance. Such the wondrous charm A song can borrow when the bosom throbs That lends ...
— The Poetical Works of Oliver Wendell Holmes, Complete • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... an old woman at a fountain," said Lapo, still caressing his vest with his palms. "I shall be quite happy soon—yes, even before the Lombard league ...
— O. Henry Memorial Award Prize Stories of 1920 • Various
... arrival, she has been called upon to attend to the business of the house. The old fellow never appeared so contented as when thus employed. His pipe was laid aside, his beer forgotten, and he would only think of amusing and caressing his charge, or of lulling it to sleep. The bigger children would cluster round him, clamber over him, empty his pipe, upset his can, take all sorts of liberties with him, yet never meet with a ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 20, No. - 581, Saturday, December 15, 1832 • Various
... wander'd the fold, and I rambled the grove, And each spot it reported the kiss of my love; But I saw her caressing another—and feel 'Tis distraction to hear them, and see them so leal. What has been, ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel, Volumes I-VI. - The Songs of Scotland of the Past Half Century • Various
... of Lawler. Which means that she set seriously to work with him, while Shorty stood by, his arms folded over his huge chest, one hand caressing his chin, ...
— The Trail Horde • Charles Alden Seltzer
... across at the Turk. "Poor old fellow!" he muttered to himself. Then he made them carry him up to the bay's head, and gently took hold of the tuft of hair on his forehead, caressing him. Turk raised himself with difficulty, and rubbed his nose against his driver's leg. Then the bombardier turned himself impatiently on to the other side, and cried to the stretcher-bearers to make haste. "Now get me away quickly!" Turk gazed after the ...
— 'Jena' or 'Sedan'? • Franz Beyerlein
... meantime little Jules had been kissing his sister, and caressing her soft hair, entreating her not to refuse his little friend's request. Mlle d'Orbe was painting Anna Boleyn: she stopped her work; a struggle seemed to arise in the depth of her heart, while she ...
— Chambers' Edinburgh Journal - Volume XVII., No 423, New Series. February 7th, 1852 • Various
... Fox wrote, "The word of the Lord came to me, saying, 'My love was always to thee, and thou art in my love.' And I was ravished with the sense of the love of God." Brother Lawrence wrote, "You must know that the benevolent and caressing light of God's countenance kindles insensibly within the soul, which ardently embraces it, a divine and consuming flame of love, so rapturous that one puts curbs upon the outward ...
— An Interpretation of Friends Worship • N. Jean Toomer
... in a caressing way and clearly was regarded as a friend by the children, though his face retained its stern character and his manner to us was as rude as it could be. My guardian noticed it ...
— Bleak House • Charles Dickens
... love upon them. A man who never opens his lips but to censure or criticise, who fastens on faults as wasps do on blemished fruit, will never be surrounded by loyal love. Faithful service is most surely bought by hearty praise. A caressing hand on a horse's neck ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren
... inch, and from that day until he produced him in public, he never missed a day without spending twice a day from two to three hours with him, first rendering him helpless by gag-bit, straps and hobbles, then caressing him, then forcing him to lie down, then caressing him again, stroking every limb, talking to him in soothing tones, and now and then, if he turned vicious, taking up his helpless head, giving it a good shake, ...
— A New Illustrated Edition of J. S. Rarey's Art of Taming Horses • J. S. Rarey
... the caressing charm of a nice kitten, and now that the pressing matter of her indebtedness to Lester Kent was settled, she relapsed into her usual tranquil, happy-go-lucky self. She rubbed her ...
— The Hermit of Far End • Margaret Pedler
... guessed! I hope the rest of the birthday matched the roses. This is very beautiful." His fingers gave it a caressing touch. ...
— Polly of Lady Gay Cottage • Emma C. Dowd
... named her, and in a little while the pretty creature was "roped" and standing quietly beneath Jack's caressing hand. "Now, missus," he said—and then followed my first lesson in "handling," until the soft brown muzzle was resting contentedly in my hand. "She'll soon follow you," Jack said eagerly, "you ought to come up ...
— We of the Never-Never • Jeanie "Mrs. Aeneas" Gunn
... hands upon him, who dared address him in affectionate terms. Just once, in the early days of her being in the Farringtons' household, Cicely, moved with pity at the sight of a bruised forefinger, had ventured upon a caressing pat on Allyn's cheek. It was much the caress she would have bestowed upon Melchisedek, if she had chanced to step on his paw; but she never forgot the look of disgusted scorn with which Allyn had marched ...
— Phebe, Her Profession - A Sequel to Teddy: Her Book • Anna Chapin Ray
... said Grandcourt, in his favorite attitude, having his left forefinger and thumb in his waist-coat pocket, and with his right hand caressing his whisker, while he stood near Gwendolen and looked at her—not unlike a gentleman who has a felicitous introduction at an ...
— Daniel Deronda • George Eliot
... yet she folded her, with light caressing motions on hair and brow, calling to her with all sweet names that deep-hearted women know, in tones so like a dream that they caught the wandering consciousness and lighted it with ...
— The Royal Pawn of Venice - A Romance of Cyprus • Mrs. Lawrence Turnbull
... softly on her forehead and eyes. Suddenly, like a traveller relaxed after a bath, Minna forgot these keen emotions, already dissipated by that caressing breath which penetrated her body and filled it with balsamic essences as quickly as the breath ...
— Seraphita • Honore de Balzac
... husband, calmly, nipping the flesh of her shoulder between his thumb and finger. "Heise's waiting for me." Trina wrenched from him with a sharp intake of breath, frowning with pain, and caressing ...
— McTeague • Frank Norris
... little life of mine, oh that I might breathe it out into a soft caressing zephyr to cool his face! This little flower of youth, were it but a violet, that he might step on it, and it might die modestly beneath his feet! That would be enough for me, my father.... Not that I want him now. I renounce him for ...
— The Life and Works of Friedrich Schiller • Calvin Thomas
... at the base of a tree, the patriarch sitting calmly watching the proceedings of his progeny, while the mother was gambolling with her young one, or seeking food among the grass, or under the roots of a tree; and then she would come with her prize, and commence playing with her infant, and caressing him like any human mother, tumbling about perhaps in rather a strange fashion. As we came more in sight, the whole family would scamper off, a few remaining to the last, grinning fiercely at us, hooting and chattering hoarsely, and shaking the boughs ...
— In the Eastern Seas • W.H.G. Kingston
... down the steps the girls sprang, racing out to meet that sound of galloping hoofs which was coming ever nearer. A few minutes later they were caressing the nervous animals that had gone with them into the very shadow of death, rubbing their noses, laughing and crying over them and calling them endearing names till it's a wonder the cowboys, who stood by, grinning sympathetically, did ...
— The Outdoor Girls in the Saddle - Or, The Girl Miner of Gold Run • Laura Lee Hope
... visitant vanished and down went Take-a-Stitch beside Bo'sn and clasped the little one close and kissed and caressed it to her heart's content, which meant much to Glory, because even grandpa had objected to overmuch caressing, though this newcomer appeared to take kissing as a matter of course ...
— A Sunny Little Lass • Evelyn Raymond
... is here!" said Stein, caressing the children. "If one could only live in the enjoyment of the present, ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Vol. 7 • Various
... The house came swimming and plunging after her, like a spectral ship on big seas, and her father and mother lived and died in her breast; and now they were strong, consulting, chatting, laughing, caressing; now still and white, caught by a vapour that dived away with them either to right or left, but always with the same suddenness, leaving her to question herself whether she existed, for more of life seemed to be with their mystery than ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... ecstasy was waking within her. The pure air, the caressing warmth, the enchanted stillness and privacy of this domain touched her soul and body like the hands of a saint with power ...
— The Garden Of Allah • Robert Hichens
... proportions, alive, graceful, affable, beautiful, would come towards me to conduct me to her palace by a rapid and flying train. With sweet authority she would make me sit on a stool at her feet, and would pass her beautifully molded hand over my head, caressing my brow, my eyes, and loose curls. I read to her out of a big missal, or played the lute, and she deigned to smile, thanking me for the pleasure which my reading and songs gave her. At last romantic reminiscences overflowed in my brain, ...
— First Love (Little Blue Book #1195) - And Other Fascinating Stories of Spanish Life • Various
... back, at his fingers wandering over the keys, and for the first time she noticed how sensitive, how caressing the fingers were. Yet that two people in her intimate circle could contemplate that through which she herself had passed painfully, as through ordeal ...
— Married Life - The True Romance • May Edginton
... caressing, graceful way, Around a door knob twined one day With modest show of pride; All unaware that danger lay Just ...
— Poems - Vol. IV • Hattie Howard
... pursued Mr. Brimberly, smiling and caressing his left whisker, "'e may be on 'is way to Hafghanistan or Hasia Minor at this pre-cise moment—'e is that metehoric, lord! These millionaires is much of a muchness, sir, 'ere to-day, gone to-morrer. Noo York this week, London or Paris the next. Young Har is always upsetting my plans, 'e is, and ...
— The Definite Object - A Romance of New York • Jeffery Farnol
... the deer-hounds brought in and, when it seemed he must fly to pieces with the tension, a caressing hand laid on the animal brought him relief. These contacts with the hairy coat gave him instant easement and enabled him to play out the evening. Nor did anyone guess the while terrible struggle their host was making, ...
— The Night-Born • Jack London
... When she saw him, Therese regretted having invited so strange a companion. He walked along, throwing a hasty glance into every carriage—a glance which, little by little, became sullen and distrustful. But when he recognized Madame Martin, he smiled so sweetly and said good-morning to her in so caressing a voice that nothing was left of the ferocious old vagabond walking on the quay, nothing except the old carpet-bag, the handles of ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... might drink. How kind, how considerate was this! There are few persons of a really amiable temper, who do not cherish an attachment to animals; still we should distinguish between a proper attention to their necessities and comforts, and that excessive caressing fondness which ...
— Female Scripture Biographies, Vol. I • Francis Augustus Cox
... was to make Sneeshing resent the caressing of the intrusive paw, which twice over scraped him, and he snapped at, seized it, and ...
— Three Boys - or the Chiefs of the Clan Mackhai • George Manville Fenn
... the sea sings as she laves That sleep-bound shore with sad caressing waves, The while the dead sleep sweeter ...
— The Rose-Jar • Thomas S. (Thomas Samuel) Jones
... money in collecting. These may perhaps more appropriately be called biblio-spongers, and are of all ranks in the community, many even owning beautiful homes, and having ample resources at command; but while enjoying the congenial atmosphere of a well-furnished library, and the delights of caressing the precious and wisely selected tomes of others, they are still of such temperaments that they would no more think of buying books than would another of buying an opera-house in order to satisfy theatre-going propensities. These people should be taught that fine books, like friends, ...
— Book-Lovers, Bibliomaniacs and Book Clubs • Henry H. Harper
... facts that fit in with his preconceived or ingrafted notions. And, to my mind, the wisest way is to get into the state of mind of an old marine engineer who oils and sees that every screw and bolt of his engines is clean and well watched, and who loves them as living things, caressing and scolding them himself, defending them, with stormy language, against the aspersions of the silly, uninformed outside world, which persists in regarding them as mere machines, a thing his superior intelligence and experience knows they are ...
— Travels in West Africa • Mary H. Kingsley
... govern her sons, she had, in a certain sense, been used to govern the kingdom. By sowing dissensions among her own children, by inflaming party against party, by watching with care the oscillations of France—so than none of the great divisions should obtain preponderance—by alternately caressing and massacring the Huguenots, by cajoling or confronting Philip, by keeping, as she boasted, a spy in every family that possessed the annual income of two thousand livres, by making herself the head of an organized system of harlotry, by which ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... But all men are not cruel. I am not cruel,' he added, forgetting himself for a moment, and caressing with his huge hand the wild pale face that glimmered upon him as it were out of the infinite night—all ...
— Robert Falconer • George MacDonald
... it for impudence, auntie," said Carol, getting up and bending affectionately over the hammock, gently caressing the brown hair just beginning to silver about her forehead. "But it does amuse me so to hear a lady of your age and dignity indulge in such lavish ...
— Prudence Says So • Ethel Hueston
... intrusted too much to my love and my hopes. An accident which should sink that overloaded bark would end my life. For three years now I have not seen you, and at the thought of going to Belgirate my heart beats so wildly that I am forced to stop.—To see you, to hear that girlish caressing voice! To embrace in my gaze that ivory skin, glistening under the candlelight, and through which I can read your noble mind! To admire your fingers playing on the keys, to drink in your whole soul in a look, ...
— Albert Savarus • Honore de Balzac
... Dieu! Is it now a hundred years that we hurry to and fro in their service? A House of Rest! Ma foi! Morning, noon and night they come, these countrymen of yours. Never can we rest. Hither and thither do they drive us. No longer are our cushions soft and caressing; the cloth upon our table is stained, and see—here is ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 153, Aug 8, 1917 • Various
... heard it the strains were gentle, sweet, caressing and full of an infinite depth of feeling, but in a little while its tone changed, and it became a magnificent march, throbbing upon the air in stirring notes that set our hearts beating in ...
— Edison's Conquest of Mars • Garrett Putnam Serviss
... employed the meditation of deep thinkers, and I cannot forbear to reflect on the difference between your condition and my own. You live upon mock-turtle, and stewed rumps of beef; I dined, yesterday, upon crumpets. You sit with parish officers, caressing and caressed, the idol of the table, and the wonder of the day. I pine in the solitude of sickness, not bad enough to be pitied, and not well enough to be endured. You sleep away the night, and laugh, or scold away the day. I cough and grumble, and grumble ...
— Dr. Johnson's Works: Life, Poems, and Tales, Volume 1 - The Works Of Samuel Johnson, Ll.D., In Nine Volumes • Samuel Johnson
... till the tumbled tresses met the caressing hand; one pale cheek was so close to his he had but to bend his head to touch it with his lips. His arm slipped round her, drawing her soft, yielding form yet closer to him, and over him there swept a wave of emotion which ...
— The Rider of Waroona • Firth Scott
... the gentle dove, Listen to thy plighted love:— "Ah, how long I wait, until Sweetheart cometh back (she said) Laying his caressing hand Underneath my ...
— The Poems of Emma Lazarus - Vol. II. (of II.), Jewish Poems: Translations • Emma Lazarus
... living wedge made a furrow in the multitude—a furrow that instantly closed in behind it as it pressed forward. Undoubtedly the policemen saved Congressman Mallard from being crushed and buffeted down under the caressing hands of those who strove with his bodyguard to touch him, to embrace him, to clasp his hand. Foreign-born women, whose sons were in the draft, sought to kiss the hem of his garments when he passed them by, and as they stooped they were bowled over by the uniformed burlies and some of ...
— The Thunders of Silence • Irvin Shrewsbury Cobb
... man before his time and since, has paid tribute to the loveliness of the girls of Cork. There is a graceful charm about them before which the most inveterate bachelor succumbs. The accents of the Siren singers were never so insinuating and caressing as the Munster brogue as it slips off the tongue of a gentlewoman. Blue eyes predominate, but are excelled in lustre by what Froude has been pleased to call "the cold grey eyes of the dark Celt of the south of Ireland." ...
— The Sunny Side of Ireland - How to see it by the Great Southern and Western Railway • John O'Mahony and R. Lloyd Praeger
... in height, and belonging to his nephew Benedetto Baroni, in which is a Madonna painted in oils, from the breast upwards, and almost life-size, and, lower down, in the corner of the picture, the Child, seen from the shoulders upwards, with one arm uplifted and in the act of caressing His Mother. It is related, I say, that, when the Emperor was master of Verona, Don Alfonso of Castille and Alarcon, a very famous Captain, happened to be in that city on behalf of His Majesty and the ...
— Lives of the most Eminent Painters Sculptors and Architects - Vol. 06 (of 10) Fra Giocondo to Niccolo Soggi • Giorgio Vasari
... his very tail a mortified stump, and the whole beast a picture of meek misery, fit to touch a heart of stone. The jovial mule was a roly poly, happy-go-lucky little piece of horse-flesh, taking every thing easily, from cudgeling to caressing; strolling along with a roguish twinkle of the eye, and, if the thing were possible, would have had his hands in his pockets, and whistled as he went. If there ever chanced to be an apple core, a stray turnip, or wisp of hay, in ...
— Humorous Masterpieces from American Literature • Various
... it for her. And her woman's heart told her why. Her thoughts flew back to those days, such a little way back, yet, to her, so far, far away, when his kind serious eyes used to look into hers in their gentle caressing fashion, when his unready tongue used to halt over speaking those nice things a woman, in her simple vanity, loves to hear from a man she likes. She thought of the little presents he used to make her so awkwardly, all prompted by his great, golden, ...
— The One-Way Trail - A story of the cattle country • Ridgwell Cullum
... another took up the word: 'Sisters, I knew him because his heart sang like a bird that is happy in a silver cage.' And after that they sang together, those who were nearest rocking the cradle with long wrinkled fingers; and their voices were now tender and caressing, now like the wind blowing in the great wood, and this ...
— The Secret Rose • W. B. Yeats
... turned and twisted all her impressions during a couple of wakeful hours; and she remained full of glee. What a piece of luck. Toby! Toby, Toby, Toby! How quickly her mind worked! It was like acid, testing and comparing; and yet its action was soft and caressing when she remembered his figure and his voice—some of the little gestures, some turns of speech, his sturdy contempt for what he called "yobs," which she discovered to be the word "boys" spelt in an unfamiliar way. Those were the things she loved. The rest ...
— Coquette • Frank Swinnerton
... Spring is like the making of a new world in the dawn of time. Under the warm wind's caressing breath the grass comes forth upon the meadows and the hills, chasing dun Winter away. Every field is newly vestured in young corn or the olive greenness of wheat; the smell of the earth is full of sweetness. White daisies and ...
— Ireland, Historic and Picturesque • Charles Johnston
... Then the caressing movement of the hand ceased, and he stood listening as one who fears pursuit. He tried to mount to the ...
— The Hero of Garside School • J. Harwood Panting
... Helene who had spoken very little all the evening again turned to Boris, asking him in a tone of caressing significant command to come ...
— War and Peace • Leo Tolstoy
... His hand sought and closed upon hers in a sudden caressing clasp, and his voice became husky. "Good-bye, girlie! May not see you for ...
— Out of the Primitive • Robert Ames Bennet
... But her mother's attention is not easy to engage this evening, somehow. Her mind seems somewhere else altogether. But from where it is, it sees the vulgar child very plainly indeed, as she puts up her face to be kissed with all its animation on it. She kisses it, animation and all, caressing the rich black hair with a hand that seems thoughtful. A hand can. Then she makes a little effort to shake off something that draws her away, and comes back rather perfunctorily to her daughter's sphere of interest and ...
— Somehow Good • William de Morgan
... was a little church overlooking the sea. She saw that the door was open as she approached it, and she paused to look in. The early weekday service was in progress. A few quiet figures sat apart in the pews. The light was subdued. Something was being read aloud by a voice of caressing quality and musical. She did not attend to the words, but the tone satisfied. It seemed to her that the peace of God invited, and she slipped into the nearest pew. She found a Bible on the seat beside her, and opening it haphazard her eyes fell upon ...
— The Heavenly Twins • Madame Sarah Grand
... his little daughter, pressing Up against the old man's knee, With her childish, soft caressing, Filled his ...
— The Nursery, June 1873, Vol. XIII. - A Monthly Magazine for Youngest People • Various
... in Philadelphia, waiting on a hot street-corner for a car to Fairmount Park, overheard a quavering voice singing the same hymn and saw an emaciated hand caressing a little plant in an open window—and carried away the picture of a fading ...
— The Story of the Hymns and Tunes • Theron Brown and Hezekiah Butterworth
... of nature dared not speak of it. They felt it, although they knew not what they felt; they were embarrassed but happy. Never before had the forest sung so wonderfully over their heads, never was the wind so sweet and caressing, never at any time had the noises of the forest, the rustling of the breeze in the trees, the voices of the birds, the echoes of the woods, seemed to merge into such an angelic choir, so sweet and grand, as at this moment, full of ...
— Sielanka: An Idyll • Henryk Sienkiewicz
... or seemed to have any affection for was a little pet dog which had been hers and which they sometimes allowed to be with him after the life sentence had been passed upon him and when he was awaiting removal. He would sit for hours with the little animal in his lap, caressing it dumbly. There was a mute sorrow in the eyes of both man and dog, and they seemed to take comfort in each other's presence. There was no need of any sign between them. They had both loved her, had ...
— The Sport of the Gods • Paul Laurence Dunbar
... her bewitching glance. Her slim, girlish figure he has portrayed with amazing accuracy, also the beautiful negligent manner in which she invariably carried her hunting-crop; her left hand is lovingly caressing the head of her faithful hound, Roger, who, Raymond Waffle informs us, after his mistress's death refused to bury bones anywhere else but on her grave. Ah me! Would that some of our human friends were as unflagging in their ...
— Terribly Intimate Portraits • Noel Coward
... him a thorough shaking, and threatening to toss her overboard as a tit-bit for John Shark, he told the mate to send him forward among the sailors, and let him live there. The sailors received him with open arms; but before caressing him much, they gave him a thorough washing in the lee-scuppers, when he turned out to be quite a handsome lad, though thin and pale with the hardships he had suffered. However, by good nursing and plenty to eat, he soon improved and grew fat; and before ...
— Redburn. His First Voyage • Herman Melville
... she saw the settler from the "little bend" drive by with his wife and children. Going home, she found her father cleaning and caressing the Sharps. But in her ability to sense danger, as in her love of the gloaming, Dallas was like a wild thing. And she felt not the ...
— The Plow-Woman • Eleanor Gates
... MRS HUSHABYE [laughing and caressing his arm]. We were frightfully in love with one another, Hector. It was such an enchanting dream that I have never been able to grudge it to you or anyone else since. I have invited all sorts of pretty women to the house on the chance of giving ...
— Heartbreak House • George Bernard Shaw
... of it! for with the lady is her lord, who, having learned the story of the fateful potion, has come to unite the lovers. Then the queen, too, dies, and the remorseful king buries the lovers in a common grave, from whose caressing sod spring a rose-bush and a vine and intertwine so curiously that none may separate ...
— A Book of Operas - Their Histories, Their Plots, and Their Music • Henry Edward Krehbiel
... proverbs,—false. In wickedness there is peril, and mutual terror is the strongest of ties. At all events, the wicked can, not unoften, excite an attachment in their followers denied to virtue. Habitually courteous, caressing, and familiar, Crauford had, despite his own suspicions of Bradley, really touched the heart of one whom weakness and want, not nature, had gained to vice; and it was not till Crauford's guilt was by other witnesses undeniably proved that Bradley could be tempted to make any confession tending ...
— The Disowned, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... a bantering air: a light, half-caressing, half-ironic, shone aslant in his eye. Ah, Graham! I have given more than one solitary moment to thoughts and calculations of your estimate of Lucy Snowe: was it always kind or just? Had Lucy been intrinsically the same but possessing the additional ...
— Villette • Charlotte Bronte
... was now painfully repressed by the cold greeting of her cousins. If Brittany had been full of outward misery, at least it was full of love. The old Lorrains were the most incapable of merchants, but they were also the most loving, frank, caressing, of friends, like all who are incautious and free from calculation. Their little granddaughter had received no other education at Pen-Hoel than that of nature. Pierrette went where she liked, in a boat ...
— The Celibates - Includes: Pierrette, The Vicar of Tours, and The Two Brothers • Honore de Balzac
... lady, and falling on her knees began caressing and fondling the little creature whiles I secured the dam, and mighty joyful. The goat, for all its strangling, strove mightily, but lashing its fore and hind legs I contrived to get it upon my shoulders and thus ...
— Black Bartlemy's Treasure • Jeffrey Farnol
... "Well then," said Bellerophon, caressing the airy horse, "thou shalt be with me as long as thou wilt; and we will go together, forthwith, and tell King Iobates that the Chimaera ...
— Myths That Every Child Should Know - A Selection Of The Classic Myths Of All Times For Young People • Various
... had thrown him over after leading him on to think that she cared for him and was going to marry him. He blew out his brains in front of her, poor wretch. They say she never turned a hair. You wouldn't believe it possible, if you saw her; she is so sweet and caressing, and so young and beautiful, you'd almost believe her an angel. But there's Travers in the ...
— Cleek, the Master Detective • Thomas W. Hanshew
... has Feuillantism gone in this Corps. For indeed, are not their Officers creatures of the chief Feuillant, Lafayette? The Court too has, very naturally, been tampering with them; caressing them, ever since that dissolution of the so-called Constitutional Guard. Some Battalions are altogether 'petris, kneaded full' of Feuillantism, mere Aristocrats at bottom: for instance, the Battalion of the Filles-Saint-Thomas, made up of your Bankers, Stockbrokers, ...
— The French Revolution • Thomas Carlyle
... Mrs. Gilmore. "Why, the very thing, Mr. Hugh, the very thing! Come. First we'll take this young lady up-stairs——" As they started the Californian appeared, laying a caressing hand on Hugh. ...
— Gideon's Band - A Tale of the Mississippi • George W. Cable
... sweet bird," said Hulda, in a caressing tone, and the little bird quivered its wings and bowed its head several times; then it opened its beak ...
— Junior Classics, V6 • Various
... and therefore the wolf prefers sheep. Shepherds have told me that he comes up to them delicatamente, and then, fixing his teeth in the wool of their necks, pulls them onward, caressing their sides with his tail. The sheep are fascinated with his gentle manners, and generally allow themselves to be led up to the spot he has selected for their execution; the truth being that he is too lazy to carry them, if he can ...
— Old Calabria • Norman Douglas
... winter with their feathery branches and swinging tassels, whereas my little tree stands stark and uncompromising, with its horde of sooty sparrows cockney to the last tail feather, and a pathetic inability to look anything but black. Rain comes with strong caressing fingers, and the branches seem no whit the cleaner for her care; but then their glistening blackness mirrors back the succeeding sunlight, as a muddy pavement will sometimes lap our feet in a sea of gold. The little wet sparrows are for the moment equally ...
— The Roadmender • Michael Fairless
... tenderness of passion till there comes a psychic moment or a physical touch that suddenly enwraps them like a flame. So it was with Burrell. The sweet burden of this girl in his arms, the sense of her yielding lips, the warmth of her caressing hands, momentarily unleashed a leaping pack of mad desires, and it was she who finally drew herself away to remind him smilingly that he was ...
— The Barrier • Rex Beach
... represented the only smile of which the honorable gentleman was capable. He made it twice, and then said, caressing his primly-cut whiskers,— ...
— The Clique of Gold • Emile Gaboriau
... Our deepest love can only enable us to help her to choose wisely, to think truly, to act judiciously. So I would have the friendship of mother and daughter something very deep and true—something more than a petting and caressing, an indulging ...
— What a Young Woman Ought to Know • Mary Wood-Allen
... We were absolutely happy. And we never tried to measure our happiness in those days, or gauge it, or flay it to see if it be dead or alive, false or real. Ah, the blessedness of that supreme unconsciousness which wrapped us as a mother would her babe, warming and caressing our hearts. We did not know then that happiness was a thing to be sought. We only knew that peddling is a pleasure, that a bank account is a supreme joy, that a dish of mojadderah cooked by Im-Hanna is a royal delight, that our dour dark cellar is a palace of its kind, and that ...
— The Book of Khalid • Ameen Rihani
... of the blood-stained handkerchief about her face, and was caressing the frightened girl upon her lap in such a gentle, womanly way, that I concluded she must be her mother. On the box, with the coachman, was a police officer. What could it ...
— Little Ferns For Fanny's Little Friends • Fanny Fern
... the whole period of their intercourse he lived in dread of the knife with which she threatened him. This recollection of his youth suggested the idea of teaching the young panther, whose soft agility and grace he now admired with less terror, to answer to the caressing name. Towards evening he had grown so familiar with his perilous position that he was half in love with its dangers, and his companion was so far tamed that she had caught the habit of turning to him when he called, in ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol 3 • Various
... landscape, a garden in the foreground, forest and hills in the distance; and in the midst a lady in Eighteenth century costume caressing the head of a greyhound. It was beautifully mellow in tone, and might well have been a production of Gainsborough, though the Frosts ...
— The Inn at the Red Oak • Latta Griswold
... lord,' said the Jesuit, who looked strangely pale. 'Cats have an extraordinary instinct for caressing people who happen to be born with exactly the opposite instinct. I am like the man in Aristotle who was afraid ...
— The Disentanglers • Andrew Lang
... should comb your hair straight back and wad it into a funny little bump. Quite the contrary. Comb it back if you will, but have the coil loose and graceful. It is very bad for the hair either to be pulled back tightly or to be closely arranged. Ventilation is necessary, and, by the way, caressing and smoothing the hair with the fingers is a good tonic for its ...
— The Woman Beautiful - or, The Art of Beauty Culture • Helen Follett Stevans
... imparted a gentle and almost caressing tone to his words when Madge welcomed and accompanied him to his late supper on ...
— A Young Girl's Wooing • E. P. Roe
... but the caressing note she was wont to hear in it was absent. She shivered afresh, conscious of a chill. She could not answer him; her throat ...
— The Rocks of Valpre • Ethel May Dell
... beat as you are, I think I'd keep on the Epitaph road." He laughed his warm, friendly laugh, before the geniality of which discord seemed to melt, and again his arm went round the other's weary shoulders with a caressing ...
— Bucky O'Connor • William MacLeod Raine
... by one these were torn away, and there was a hush, a pause, and a preparation; and the soul of man broke into a new song of what it had found on earth—the magic of the tenderness of love—an air so caressing and so sweet, so calmly happy and so mournfully sane, so bereft of illusions and so naive, that it seemed to reveal in a few miraculous phrases the secret intentions of God. It was too beautiful; it told me too much about myself; it vibrated ...
— Sacred And Profane Love • E. Arnold Bennett
... of anything. However, Casey was the hardest to down. He came up to the side of the blue car, reached in with his hands all greasy black, and took the Little Woman's hand from the wheel and kissed it. The Little Woman made a caressing sound and leaned out to him—and Nolan and I felt that we mustn't look. ...
— The Trail of the White Mule • B. M. Bower
... again?" she said, as if perplexed by some doubt that awed or grieved her. After a while her arms rose slowly, and opened with a gentle caressing action—an embrace strangely offered to the empty air! "No," she said to herself, sadly, after waiting a moment. "More perhaps when to-morrow comes—no more to-day." She looked up at the clear blue sky. ...
— Little Novels • Wilkie Collins
... done! I would not have lost Vige for all the plunder of Italy. I am beholden to you, my brave young lad," said the stranger, all the time examining and caressing the hound. "What is your name? You cannot ...
— The Little Duke - Richard the Fearless • Charlotte M. Yonge
... In the caressing sunlight of ten o'clock in the morning the mother runs up and down the chosen pod, first on one side, then on the other, with a jerky, capricious, unmethodical gait. She repeatedly extrudes a short oviduct, ...
— Social Life in the Insect World • J. H. Fabre
... we had nothing left to do but to abandon ourselves to repose, which Savka, who was never exhausted and always rested, loved so much. The glow had not yet quite died away, but the summer night was already enfolding nature in its caressing, soothing embrace. ...
— The Witch and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov
... her, after they were married: 'For you are the gift of the sun I have loved so long and so well.' And my grandfather Titbottom would lay his hand so tenderly upon the golden hair of his young bride, that you could fancy him a devout Parsee, caressing sunbeams. ...
— Prue and I • George William Curtis
... her most reckless mood was alternately flouting and caressing Catharine Elsmere. She was not in the least afraid of Catharine, and it was that perhaps which had originally drawn Catharine's heart to her. Elsmere's widow was accustomed to feel herself avoided by young people who discussed a wild ...
— The Case of Richard Meynell • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... enough at the world, it was as though he saw it for the first time to-day. He ran up to the trunks that seemed to be supporting the heavens, and threw both arms round them; he pressed his face against the resinous bark. Was it not soft? Did it not cling to his glowing cheek like a caressing hand? ...
— The Son of His Mother • Clara Viebig
... girl, leaning over and caressing the faded cheek. "I'm as happy as if I were pinning on my own orange blossoms this minute. Dear, dear little Jinny with ...
— The House of the Misty Star - A Romance of Youth and Hope and Love in Old Japan • Fannie Caldwell Macaulay
... Olga, with an adorable smile that reaches him through the flickering flashes of the firelight. "The baby!" He is bending over her, and with a light caressing touch she brushes back the hair from his temples. "In a year, nay, in a month, once we are separated, you will see some other face, newer, more desirable, and forget you ever cared ...
— Rossmoyne • Unknown
... been making, my dear creature," said the Major in his most caressing voice. "We have just bound over Mr. Warrington in a promise to ...
— The History of Pendennis • William Makepeace Thackeray
... alone sat listlessly That lavish board beside; The one a fair-haired stripling, tall, Blithe-brow'd and eager-ey'd, Caressing still two hounds in leash, ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. 327 - Vol. 53, January, 1843 • Various
... sensible girl, Miss Lindal," said Mrs. Hardy, caressing her; "and so it will be. And will you come and stay with me as long as your father can spare you, at Rosendal, and help me to get ...
— A Danish Parsonage • John Fulford Vicary
... in a loud tone, particularly on the staircase, except perhaps Florrie when, in conversation with Louisa, she thought she was out of all other hearing. Hilda's voice was very clear and penetrating, but not loud. George Cannon's voice in public places such as the staircase had an almost caressing softness. The Watchetts cooed like faint doves, thereby expressing the delicate refinement of their virginal natures. The cook's voice was unknown beyond the kitchen. And nobody was more grimly self-controlled in speech than Sarah Gailey and Louisa. These two—and especially Louisa—seemed ...
— Hilda Lessways • Arnold Bennett
... Thy adorer is at hand to wait upon thee. Oh, let me tend thee, fair one, in the place Of thy dear friends; and, with broad lotus fans, Raise cooling breezes to refresh thy frame; Or shall I rather, with caressing touch, Allay the fever of thy limbs, and soothe Thy aching ...
— Hindu Literature • Epiphanius Wilson
... air. I think if any one asked me what I loved best on earth, I should say wind. I love it in all its moods—rough, caressing, tender, impetuous, calm, stormy. It is always beautiful. Listen to it now, just sighing in the branches of those tall trees. Could any music ...
— Wife in Name Only • Charlotte M. Braeme (Bertha M. Clay)
... seemed angry, but soon he smiled and said, "Never mind! some day you will come,—some day!" and away he flew. But oh! the next time he came, what a different Wind he was! no longer gentle, playful, caressing, but fierce, and rough, and stormy. He rushed at the great Tree, howling furiously. He seized the little leaves, and whirled and dashed them about, trying to tear them from the branches; and flung himself against the Tree, as ...
— Five Mice in a Mouse-trap - by the Man in the Moon. • Laura E. Richards
... as he rarely had ever done, with a caressing, glancing touch, slight and short; but the man was silent. Wych Hazel drew him along, softly walking him up and down through the room, but she too said nothing, feeling perplexed and hurt, and not well knowing why. It was nothing new for Mr. Falkirk's words to be dry, but to-night ...
— The Gold of Chickaree • Susan Warner
... Rhoda's voice, so low, tender, caressing? It thrilled him, and with a silent laugh of scorn at his own folly, he turned to her, every thought burnt up ...
— The Odd Women • George Gissing
... Never observed any great stability in my soul to resist passions Nothing tempts my tears but tears Omit, as incredible, such things as they do not understand On all occasions to contradict and oppose Only desire to become more wise, not more learned or eloquent Passion of dandling and caressing infants scarcely born Perfection: but I will not buy it so dear as it costs Plato will have nobody marry before thirty Prudent and just man may be intemperate and inconsistent Puerile simplicities of our children Shelter my own weakness under these great reputations Socrates kept a confounded ...
— Widger's Quotations from The Essays of Montaigne • David Widger
... a fortnight from the night of crisis, when Wilfred, very weak, was still in bed; when Primrose and Lily were up and about, but threatened with whooping cough. Thekla much in the same case, and very cross; and little Lena weak, caressing and dependant, but angelically good and patient, so much so that Magdalen and Angela were ...
— Modern Broods • Charlotte Mary Yonge
... has already several wives may be seen with an infant of two or three weeks on his lap, caressing and kissing it as his wife. Wives of four to six years we found occasionally (in China, Guzuate, Ceylon, and Brazil); from seven to nine years on they are no longer rare, and the years from ten to twelve are ...
— Primitive Love and Love-Stories • Henry Theophilus Finck
... said girl Ninia, going over to her, and putting her cheek against her mother's troubled face and caressing her ...
— The Ebbing Of The Tide - South Sea Stories - 1896 • Louis Becke
... each stands caressing his particular favours; then both burst into laughter, as they return them to their ...
— The Flag of Distress - A Story of the South Sea • Mayne Reid
... at. The female elephant, which was in the jungle, witnessing the distress of its mate, regardless of her own danger, immediately rushed out to his assistance, chasing away the hunters, and walked round and round her mate, constantly returning to his side, and caressing him. When the male attempted to walk, she had the sagacity to place her flank against the wounded side, so as to support him, and help him along. At last the female received a severe wound, and staggered into the ...
— The Mission • Frederick Marryat
... one arm round the child's waist, and caressing her hair with the other hand, "I knew you mother very well; she was my cousin, and the very dearest friend I ever had. I think you must come and live with me, and be my child, as there is no one else who has any ...
— My Little Lady • Eleanor Frances Poynter
... Royal Highness. I ventured to come up unannounced. Ah, sweet child." She waved a caressing ...
— Once on a Time • A. A. Milne
... the terrible vision. Had he been a common child, his reason would have given way; but one result of the overflow of his love was, that he had never yet known fear for himself. His sweet confident face, innocent eyes, and caressing ways, had almost always drawn a response more or less in kind; and that certain some should not repel him, was a fuller response from them than gifts from others. Except now and then, rarely, a street boy ...
— Sir Gibbie • George MacDonald
... to her and laid her hands, one upon the other, between his caressing palms. "The folks will be there—they are expecting the play—you must not disappoint them. It's as much your duty to go to the hall as it is mine to stay here with the books. And another thing! Think of the stories that will ...
— When Egypt Went Broke • Holman Day
... affection or love.] Endearment. — N. endearment, caress; blandishment, blandiment|; panchement, fondling, billing and cooing, dalliance, necking, petting, sporting, sparking, hanky-panky; caressing. embrace, salute, kiss, buss, smack, osculation, deosculation|; amorous glances. courtship, wooing, suit, addresses, the soft impeachment; lovemaking; serenading; caterwauling. flirting &c. v.; flirtation, gallantry; coquetry. true ...
— Roget's Thesaurus
... Perkin, for his part, wanting to himself, either in gracious or princely behavior, or in ready or apposite answers, or in contenting and caressing those that did apply themselves unto him, or in petty scorn and disdain to those that seemed to doubt of him; but in all things did notably acquit himself, insomuch as it was generally believed, as well among great persons as among the vulgar, that he was indeed ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 8 - The Later Renaissance: From Gutenberg To The Reformation • Editor-in-Chief: Rossiter Johnson
... a good match now," Miss Eudora remarked, caressing the pet spaniel which had climbed into her lap. "I think we must manage to visit Saratoga or some of those places next summer. Mr. Gardner found his wife at Newport, and they say she's worth ...
— Bad Hugh • Mary Jane Holmes
... has now come to a pause. Vetranio is awaiting his guests for the banquet; Numerian is in the chapel, preparing for the discourse that he is to deliver to his friends; Ulpius is meditating in his master's house; Antonina is stretched upon her couch, caressing the precious fragment that she had saved from the ruins of her lute. All the immediate agents of our story are, for the present, ...
— Antonina • Wilkie Collins
... to his wife, with his mouth full of beefsteak, as to the little fellow's age at such or such a time when he had said or done something memorable; and I noticed that Madame usually pooh-poohed these inquiries. She herself was not boastful in her vein, but she never had her fill of caressing the child; and she seemed to take a gentle pleasure in recalling all that was fortunate in his little existence. No schoolboy could have talked more of the holidays which were just beginning and less of the black school-time which must inevitably ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition - Vol. 1 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... affectionate regard. Even the most rabid Dissenter would hardly wish to see a structure so nearly divine attacked and destroyed by rude hands. With grave and slow and sober earnestness, with loving touches and soft caressing manipulation let the beautiful old Church be laid to its rest, as something too exquisite, too lovely, too refined for the present rough manners of the world! Such were the ideas as to Church Reform of the leading ...
— Phineas Redux • Anthony Trollope
... magnificent jaguar in the Zoological Gardens, who is as tame and gentle as a domestic cat. We have seen this fine creature walking up and down the front of his den as his keeper walked, rubbing himself against the bars, purring with manifest pleasure as his back or head was stroked, and caressing the man's hand with his huge velvet paws. There is in the collection another jaguar, just as savage as this one is tame. There was also a jaguar formerly in the Tower, which was obtained by Lord Exmouth while on the South American Station, and ...
— The International Monthly Magazine, Volume 5, No. 1, January, 1852 • Various
... to the farmhouse, and wrote to my engineers a detail of the breach in the dam, then sat down on the porch to enjoy a smoke. The day was warm and dreamy; the sun, filtering through the September haze, rested on the eyelids like a caressing hand. I was soon half asleep, peering lazily at the view which zigzags down between the knobby hills to the more cultivated farm-lands that we had left hours behind us, when the telephone rang. I got up and ...
— Shapes that Haunt the Dusk • Various
... the room a last glance (almost a caressing touch Charlotte had, a little anxious, too, because all comforts were so important) she went out, and Nan was sitting opposite Raven at the table, demure, self-contained, yet playing her wildest. It was a game she ...
— Old Crow • Alice Brown
... counted a dozen, when she bent and put her lips to the caressing hand. It patted her cheek, as it touched the owner's beautiful ...
— Little Dorrit • Charles Dickens
... her, in happy play caressing Thee, my dolorous heart awhile deliver! 10 . . . . . . . . I would joy, as of old the maid rejoiced Racing fleetly, the golden apple eyeing, Late-won loosener ...
— The Poems and Fragments of Catullus • Catullus
... was too shallow to drown them. It is said by some, that they were exposed in a cradle, which, after floating for a time, was, by the water's retiring, left on dry ground; that a wolf, descending from the mountains to drink, ran, at the cry of the children, and fed them under a fig-tree, caressing and licking them as if they had been her own young, the infants hanging on to her as if she had been their mother, until Faus'tulus, the king's shepherd, struck with so surprising a sight, conveyed them home, and delivered them to his wife, Ac'ca Lauren'tia, to nurse, who brought ...
— Pinnock's Improved Edition of Dr. Goldsmith's History of Rome • Oliver Goldsmith
... the most patient sweetness.—I might buy,—or not;—she would let me have everything at my own price: — the poor creature seem'd anxious to get a penny; and laid herself out to win me, and not so much in a manner which seem'd artful, as in one I felt simple and caressing. ...
— A Sentimental Journey • Laurence Sterne
... caressing air with which Teacher held the little hand placed so confidently within her own and he welcomed the opportunity of gratifying his still ruffled temper and his racial antagonism at the same time. He would take a rise out of this young woman about ...
— Little Citizens • Myra Kelly
... thought, and a thought of which she only is the object. He is going to see Hetty again: that is the longing which has been growing through the last three hours to a feverish thirst. Not, of course, to speak in the caressing way into which he had unguardedly fallen before dinner, but to set things right with her by a kindness which would have the air of friendly civility, and prevent her from running away with wrong notions ...
— Adam Bede • George Eliot |
