"Stiffness" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... of all, both ponies and mules stepped briskly and well, the pasture upon which they had been busy having had a wonderfully good effect. The hardy beasts seemed now to need no water, and made light of their loads, while as the stiffness suffered by the riders passed off with movement in the warm bracing air, the difficulties and perils of the past seemed to ...
— The Peril Finders • George Manville Fenn
... reigned in the salon while the three took their coffee, a silence rather annoying to Adam, who was incapable of imagining the cause of it. Clementine no longer tried to draw out Thaddeus. The captain, on the other hand, retreated within his military stiffness and came out of it no more, neither on the way to the Opera nor in the box, where ...
— Paz - (La Fausse Maitresse) • Honore de Balzac
... they come aboard the Molly. If you can obey orders and handle a rope, this is the place for you to make your fortune. Go aft, and Derry Duck our first-mate will find something for you to do in short order. He knows how to take the stiffness out of ...
— The Boy Patriot • Edward Sylvester Ellis
... way, saying heartily, as she passed out of ear-shot: "I always feel perfectly secure when I can fall back on Nan to help me out with shy, sensitive people. She has such a great, warm heart that it seems to thaw their stiffness right out of them." ...
— The Governess • Julie M. Lippmann
... of mind. Anger and fierce hatred of the Franks overcame him whenever he recalled what had happened in the Mission garden, and the recurring smart of his wounds prevented his forgetting it for more than a minute at a time. But in the morning, when pain had given place to a bruised stiffness, he recovered the resignation which had been his before the preacher Ward came with the tidings of his Emir's great danger. For the first time since his return from the search for Wady 'l Muluk he took out his paints and sketch-book, and ...
— The Valley of the Kings • Marmaduke Pickthall
... Vase, No. 173 in the same collection. Morelli accepts as a genuine example of the master the Portrait of a Lady in a Red Dress also in the Dresden Gallery, where it bears the number 176. If the picture is his, as the technical execution would lead the observer to believe, it constitutes in its stiffness and unambitious naivete a curious exception in his long series ...
— The Later works of Titian • Claude Phillips
... the Resurrection, and not worth looking at, except for the sake of making more sure our conclusions from the first fresco). The Madonna is fixed in Byzantine stiffness, without ...
— Mornings in Florence • John Ruskin
... shortness of breath, by their haggard faces. The road continued to ascend, between gently sloping hills on either side that were gradually drawing closer together. The condition of the men necessitated a halt, but the only effect of their brief repose was to increase the stiffness of their benumbed limbs, and when the order was given to march the state of affairs was worse than it had been before; the regiments made no progress, men were everywhere falling in the ranks. Jean, noticing Maurice's pallid face and ...
— The Downfall • Emile Zola
... fairly reveling in Twichell's discomfiture in his efforts to divert the hostler's blasphemy. There was also a mellow inebriate there who recommended kerosene for Clemens's lameness, and offered as testimony the fact that he himself had frequently used it for stiffness in his joints after lying out all night in cold weather, drunk: altogether it was ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine
... o'clock on Monday morning, the 5th of September, when the delegates assembled at their rendezvous, the city tavern, and marched together through the streets to Carpenters' Hall, for most of them the stiffness of a first introduction was already broken, and they could greet one another that morning with something of the freedom and good fellowship of boon companions. Moreover, they were then ready to proceed ...
— Patrick Henry • Moses Coit Tyler
... a large room with two great mahogany four-post beds, hung with brown damask, the rest of the heavy old-fashioned furniture being to match. All over the house there was a delicious odour of fresh air and lavender, everything shone resplendent, and all was orderly to the point of stiffness; nothing looked as if ...
— The Beth Book - Being a Study of the Life of Elizabeth Caldwell Maclure, a Woman of Genius • Sarah Grand
... "Odyssey," as we already have the whole of the "Iliad." The first volume of Mr. Bryant's translation of the "Odyssey" (J.R. Osgood & Co.) fully sustains the reputation of the writer. It is so admirably done, that, if we did not know to the contrary, we should think we were reading an original poem. The stiffness which generally inheres in translations is wanting; nowhere is there any sense of restraint, but everywhere a delightful sense of ease—the freedom of one great poet shining through the freedom of another great poet, as the sun shines through ...
— The Aldine, Vol. 5, No. 1., January, 1872 - A Typographic Art Journal • Various
... strong and elastic, allowing of movement. The same strengthening fibres are seen in the stalk when it is broken across. In the stalk these fibres are arranged in a tubular form, as this gives greatest strength, the centre being soft and weak. The stalks are largest near the base, where the greatest stiffness is required. The nodes are also closer together here for strength. The stem is made much stronger by the bases of the leaves being wrapped so firmly around for a distance above the point of attachment at the node. Notice the close-fitting sheath or rain-guard, where the blade of the leaf leaves ...
— Ontario Teachers' Manuals: Nature Study • Ontario Ministry of Education
... at the sound of that dear name, suddenly expanded and stifled him. The stiffness went out of ...
— The Goose Girl • Harold MacGrath
... you said," insisted Mr. Smith. He stirred, seemed to detach himself from the rail with difficulty. His long, slender figure straightened into stiffness, as if hostile to the enveloping soft peace of air and sea and sky, emitted into the night a weak murmur which Mr. Powell fancied was the word, "Abominable" repeated three times, but which passed into the faintly louder declaration: "The moment has come—to go to bed," followed ...
— Chance • Joseph Conrad
... was silence and stiffness among the lady-grasses as each feared to lose her chance to be given a title, and waited for the others. At last two slender grass-maidens advanced with glowing faces but reluctant step. They were not as beautiful as some of their sisters. Their ribbons ...
— Tell Me Another Story - The Book of Story Programs • Carolyn Sherwin Bailey
... good of you to come—though I thought you would," Miss Gibson said impulsively, as we shook hands. "You have been so sympathetic and human—both you and Dr. Thorndyke—so free from professional stiffness. My aunt went off to see Mr. Lawley directly ...
— The Red Thumb Mark • R. Austin Freeman
... hotel where I found the Hungarian waiting to see Henriette. He did not know that she would that morning receive us in the attire of her sex. The door was thrown open, and a beautiful, charming woman met us with a courtesy full of grace, which no longer reminded us of the stiffness or of the too great freedom which belong to the military costume. Her sudden appearance certainly astonished us, and we did not know what to say or what to do. She invited us to be seated, looked at the captain in a friendly manner, and pressed my hand with the warmest affection, but without ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... you can't imagine the stiffness of my neck and legs. Let me see, how long is it since we relieved ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 1, August 14, 1841 • Various
... sculpture. Single parts of the armor, embroideries, and patterns of dresses, hair, and beards of men, the manes of animals, etc., are indicated by means of dark red lines. This variety of color was required particularly for the draperies, which are stiff and clumsily attached to the body. The same stiffness is shown in the treatment of faces and other nude parts of the body, as also in the rendering of movements. The faces are always in profile, the nose and chin pointed and protruding, and the lips of the compressed mouth indicated only by a line. ...
— Museum of Antiquity - A Description of Ancient Life • L. W. Yaggy
... not think he made out your features, and do not think he looked for them. He had no time for it, after the onset, and you were well enough disguised before. If he had made out anything, he would have shown it to-night; but, saving a little stiffness, which belongs to all these young men from Carolina, I saw nothing in his manner that looked at all ...
— Guy Rivers: A Tale of Georgia • William Gilmore Simms
... bedraggled state, the whirlwind lack of ceremony with which she had propelled herself into his presence. Suddenly words failed her, she was conscious that an arm stretched toward her as she swayed. Next she lay upon a couch in an inner chamber, the commander, in his blue-and-gold-braid stiffness ...
— Port O' Gold • Louis John Stellman
... see, as distinctly as though I were there, the church of my boyhood and the tall dyspeptic preacher looming above the pulpit, the peculiar way the light came through the coarse colour of the windows, the barrenness and stiffness of the great empty room, the raw girders overhead, the prim choir. There was something in that preacher, gaunt, worn, sodden though he appeared: a spark somewhere, a little flame, mostly smothered by the gray dreariness of his surroundings, ...
— Adventures In Contentment • David Grayson
... against the light background of the draperies. A monumental chimney-piece, decorated with a fine marble group, "The Seasons" by Sebastien Ruys, about which long green stalks, with lacelike edges, or of the stiffness of carved bronze, bent toward the mirror as toward a stream of limpid water. On the low chairs groups of women crowded together, blending the vaporous hues of their dresses, forming an immense nosegay of living flowers, above which gleamed ...
— The Nabob, Volume 1 (of 2) • Alphonse Daudet
... will do as I did. And yet, unfortunately for him, that woman is consummately plausible. She was wonderfully nice last evening; she was really irresistible. Such frankness and freedom, and yet something so soft and womanly; such graceful gaiety, so much of the brightness, without any of the stiffness, of good breeding, and over it all something so picturesquely simple and southern. She is a perfect Italian. But she comes honestly by it. After the talk I have just jotted down she changed her place, and the conversation for half an hour was ...
— The Diary of a Man of Fifty • Henry James
... throwing the paper down on the bed. "It contains the second instalment of your adventures." Then he paused and looked at me with that curious smile that seemed to begin and end with his lips. "Well," he added, "and how are the stiffness and the sore throat ...
— A Rogue by Compulsion • Victor Bridges
... soft piano I had tried to free this from the original coarseness with which Devrient had heard it rendered in Berlin—presumably with traditional fidelity. My most innocent device, and one which I frequently adopted, for disguising the irritating stiffness or the orchestral movement in the original, was a careful modification of the Basso-continuo, which was taken uninterruptedly in common time. This I felt obliged to remedy, partly by legato ...
— My Life, Volume I • Richard Wagner
... Wilton soon found means to soothe and quiet her. His conversation had all that ease and grace which, combined with carefulness of proprieties, is only to be gained by long and early association with persons of high minds and manners. There was no restraint, no stiffness—for to avoid all that could give pain or offence to any one was habitual to him—and yet, at the same time, there was joined to the high tone of demeanour a sort of freshness of ideas, a picturesqueness of language and ...
— The King's Highway • G. P. R. James
... present moment to reduce the number of words in which this more vigorous scheme of expressing degrees is allowed, we must recognize an evidence that the energy which the language had in its youth is in some measure abating, and the stiffness of age overtaking it. Still it is with us here only as it is with all languages, in which at a certain time of their life auxiliary words, leaving the main word unaltered, are preferred to inflections of this last. ...
— English Past and Present • Richard Chenevix Trench
... you could notice it, except May, and she looked, "I told you so!" even in the back. She had a way of doing that very thing as I never saw any one else. From the set of her head, how she carried her shoulders, the stiffness of her spine, and her manner of walking, if you knew her well, you could tell what she thought, the same as if you saw ...
— Laddie • Gene Stratton Porter
... bashfulness forbade him to be natural either in attitude or speech. He felt his dependence in a way he had not foreseen; the very clothes he wore, then fresh from the tailor's, seemed to be the gift of charity, and their stiffness shamed him. A man of the world, Sir Job could make allowance for these defects. He understood that the truest kindness would be to leave a youth such as this to the forming influences of the College. So Godwin barely had a glimpse of Lady Whitelaw ...
— Born in Exile • George Gissing
... alleyway. Behind him he could hear the soft pattering of feet; the two Chinese were not far in the rear. Determined to waste no time in escaping, he dashed down the alley and came into a dark street; he ran faster and faster as the stiffness in his legs lessened, turning into one street after another, and he did not stop until he was breathing hard and had left the place of his captivity several hundred yards behind. He looked back then and listened. Apparently he had distanced pursuit, for no sounds of pattering feet came to ...
— The Mark of the Knife • Clayton H. Ernst
... her Aunt, "that may be easily remedied. I'll just dip them into a little weak liquid coffee and that will give them a creamy tint, and take out the stiffness." ...
— Mary at the Farm and Book of Recipes Compiled during Her Visit - among the "Pennsylvania Germans" • Edith M. Thomas
... welcome the idea. There had been a sort of stiffness in the talk, and Gavan Blake felt that a walk in the moonlight might give him a chance to make himself a little more at home with Mary Grant, while Ellen Harriott had her own reasons for wanting to get him outside. With laughter and haste they ...
— An Outback Marriage • Andrew Barton Paterson
... where we found her father and mother waiting to receive her. A first glance satisfied me that they were swelled with pride at the change in their fortunes. Caroline was not received with great cordiality. There was a stiffness on the part of her parents which would have checked any feelings of affection on her part, had she been inclined to show them, which I was sorry to perceive she did not; indeed, her feelings appeared rather those of resentment for the conduct they had shown to her aunt. After the salutation of ...
— Valerie • Frederick Marryat
... of hers had never become acquainted with the former; and there was as little stiffness as ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 9, No. 52, February, 1862 • Various
... White and black poplar, as well as willow, linden, and the agnus castus, containing an abundance of fire and air, a moderate amount of moisture, and only a small amount of the earthy, are composed of a mixture which is proportionately rather light, and so they are of great service from their stiffness. Although on account of the mixture of the earthy in them they are not hard, yet their loose texture makes them gleaming white, and they are a convenient material to use ...
— Ten Books on Architecture • Vitruvius
... drama of the earlier part of the preceding century. Yet her style in rhyme is often admirable, chaste, tender, and vigorous, and entirely free from sparkle, antithesis, and that overculture, which reminds one, by its broad glare, its stiffness, and heaviness, of the double daisies of the garden, compared with their modest and sensitive kindred of the fields. Perhaps I am mistaken, but I think there is a good deal of resemblance in her style and versification ...
— The Prose Works of William Wordsworth • William Wordsworth
... change at all at first, but before the end of the drive got used to him in his new aspect—all the more readily that he seemed to have cast off much of his stiffness and ...
— Dusty Diamonds Cut and Polished - A Tale of City Arab Life and Adventure • R.M. Ballantyne
... water, destroys the original nature of anything whatsoever. Indeed, all that is sprinkled with the breath of its vapour is changed into the hardness of stone. It remains a doubt whether it be more marvellous or more perilous, that soft and flowing water should be invested with such a stiffness, as by a sudden change to transmute into the nature of stone whatsoever is put to it and drenched with its reeking fume, nought but the shape surviving. Here also are said to be other springs, which now are fed with floods of rising water, ...
— The Danish History, Books I-IX • Saxo Grammaticus ("Saxo the Learned")
... an assistant butler in Madame du Barry's hotel at Versailles, was a sharp, sour-natured old fellow, truculent and avaricious. The spine of this man was a sort of social barometer; by its exact degree of curvature or stiffness in the presence of a guest the stable-boys and housemaids knew whether his rank was great or small, and whether, to please their cantankerous master, they were to fly or walk at his beck, or in the case of a mere bourgeois, to drink his wine on ...
— The False Chevalier - or, The Lifeguard of Marie Antoinette • William Douw Lighthall
... on that night, and the next day, when the tent was set up, Joe indulged in light practice. He found the soreness almost gone, and as he worked alone, and with the Lascalla Brothers, his stiffness also disappeared. ...
— Joe Strong on the Trapeze - or The Daring Feats of a Young Circus Performer • Vance Barnum
... pass from red through green to a dull blue, with a freedom of handling and a skill in the manipulation of colour which do honour to the artist. It was not his fault if there is still an element of stiffness in the appearance of the pectoral as a whole, for the form which religious tradition had imposed upon the jewel was so rigid that no artifice could completely get over this defect. It is a type which arose out of the same mental concepts as had given birth to ...
— History Of Egypt, Chaldaea, Syria, Babylonia, and Assyria, Volume 5 (of 12) • G. Maspero
... that the messenger takes some refreshment. No, no answer." And I walked into the garden, Up and down the patterned paths, In my stiff, correct brocade. The blue and yellow flowers stood up proudly in the sun, Each one. I stood upright too, Held rigid to the pattern By the stiffness of my gown. Up and down I ...
— The Home Book of Verse, Vol. 2 (of 4) • Various
... one Fourth of July afternoon in the middle eighties. The sawdust streets and high board sidewalks of the lumber town were filled to the brim with people. The permanent population, dressed in the stiffness of its Sunday best, escorted gingham wives or sweethearts; a dozen outsiders like myself tried not to be too conspicuous in a city smartness; but the great multitude was composed of the men of the woods. I ...
— Americans All - Stories of American Life of To-Day • Various
... excluding light from the inside and causing bare branches there. Cutting back more irregularly with a knife allows the growth of interior foliage, and gives more breadth to the hedge. The sheared hedge presents an unnatural stiffness in ornamental grounds; but skillfully cut back with the knife it has more of the beauty of natural form. The manner of pruning is very important, both as regards utility and beauty. For farm barriers hedges do not require so elaborate ...
— The Prairie Farmer, Vol. 56, No. 2, January 12, 1884 - A Weekly Journal for the Farm, Orchard and Fireside • Various
... handiworks; and a man shall ever see, that when ages grow to civility and elegance, men come to build stately sooner than to garden finely, as if gardening were the greater perfection." And, indeed, in spite of their stiffness and unnaturalness, there must have been a great charm in those gardens, and though it would be antiquarian affectation to attempt or wish to restore them, yet there must have been a stateliness about them which ...
— The plant-lore & garden-craft of Shakespeare • Henry Nicholson Ellacombe
... his fury and amazement the Duchess alone with his page Guiscard. But the descendant of Robert the Wiseacre well knew how to temper vengeance with dissimulation. Dreading the scandal that would follow an open exposure, the Prince, in spite of his years and the stiffness of his joints, contrived to quit the chamber unperceived by means of a convenient window. That very night the unsuspecting Guiscard was seized by his sovereign's orders and thrust into a foul dungeon of the palace, whither Tancred himself descended to question his prisoner and to reprove ...
— The Naples Riviera • Herbert M. Vaughan
... had arrived. All being so thoroughly acquainted, nearly all related, there was an entire absence of stiffness and constraint, and much lively chat had been carried on; but a sudden hush fell upon them, and every eye turned toward the doors opening into the hall, ...
— Elsie's Motherhood • Martha Finley
... a small hill, Willet rose to his feet and the others, with intense relief, did likewise. Robert's and Grosvenor's joints were young and elastic, and the stiffness quickly left them, but both had done enough creeping and crawling for one night. All stood listening for a minute or two. They heard no more shots fired at the rocks, but the two owls began to call again ...
— The Lords of the Wild - A Story of the Old New York Border • Joseph A. Altsheler
... planned that we should all pair off, each lady having her cavalier, as she said, in the good old-fashioned way. She planned very ably, as we had one of the pleasantest evenings imaginable, without any stiffness or formality or being forced to make a toil of enjoyment, in the customary manner of most fashionable reunions: we were not "fashionable," thank goodness. But we had "a good time" of it, as young America says, all ...
— She and I, Volume 1 • John Conroy Hutcheson
... execution its due beauty. The least negligence, in any of these points, is immediately felt, and detracts from the merit of the performance. Every step or motion that is not natural, or has any thing of stiffness, constraint, or affectation, is instinctively perceived by the spectator. The body must constantly preserve its proper position, without the least contortion, well adjusted to the steps; while the motion of the arms, must ...
— A Treatise on the Art of Dancing • Giovanni-Andrea Gallini
... struck by the number of soldiers in the streets, and with the neatness, and indeed almost stiffness, of their uniform and bearing. Each man walked as if on parade, and the eye of the strictest martinet could not have detected a speck of dust on their equipment, or ...
— With Frederick the Great - A Story of the Seven Years' War • G. A. Henty
... all parties, there was a little stiffness, but this was soon broken by Tom asking in ...
— The Rover Boys on the Farm - or Last Days at Putnam Hall • Arthur M. Winfield (AKA Edward Stratemeyer)
... Thus we see the men and women of the Renaissance in the works of all its painters; heavy in Ghirlandajo, vulgarly jaunty in Fillipino, preposterously starched and prim in Mantegna, ludicrously undignified in Signorelli; and mediaeval stiffness, awkwardness, and absurdity reach their acme perhaps in the little boys, companions of the Medici children, introduced into ...
— The Contemporary Review, Volume 36, September 1879 • Various
... repeated the magistrate, in the same dry inacquiescent tone of voice and manner. He proceeded with decency and politeness, but with a stiffness which argued his continued suspicion, to ask many questions concerning the behaviour of the mob, the manners and dress of the ringleaders; and when he conceived that the caution of Butler, if he was deceiving him, must ...
— The Heart of Mid-Lothian, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott
... sat there, Dr. Richard came to hunt for us. "Everybody is going in to supper," he said. He seemed surprised to find us there together, and there was a sort of stiffness in his manner. "Mother ...
— Mistress Anne • Temple Bailey
... the morning came! The night had seemed endless. When I tried to raise the blanket in order to sit up, it seemed of an extraordinary weight and stiffness. No wonder! It was frozen hard, and as rigid as cardboard, covered over with a foot of snow. The thermometer during the night had gone down to 24 deg.. I called my men. They were hard to wake, and they, ...
— In the Forbidden Land • Arnold Henry Savage Landor
... in improving the taste and judgment of its contemporaries. The poems of West, indeed, had the merit of chaste and manly diction; but they were cold, and, if I may so express it, only dead-coloured; while in the best of Warton's there is a stiffness, which too often gives them the appearance of imitations from the Greek. Whatever relation, therefore, of cause or impulse Percy's collection of Ballads may bear to the most popular poems of the present day; yet in ...
— Biographia Literaria • Samuel Taylor Coleridge
... seen. If in such case Truth's never-ceasing pull at the heart begins to be felt, allowed, considered; if conscience begin, like a thing weary with very sleep, to rouse itself in motions of pain from the stiffness of its repose, then is ...
— St. George and St. Michael • George MacDonald
... little, thickset man, with a civil but blunt electioneering manner. He started when he heard Lord Vargrave's name, and bowed with great stiffness. Vargrave saw at a glance that there was some cause of grudge in the mind of the worthy man; nor did Mr. Winsley long hesitate before he cleansed his bosom ...
— Alice, or The Mysteries, Book VII • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... as his handwriting; and indeed I seem to see in the handwriting of Edmond de Goncourt just the characteristics of his style. Every letter is formed carefully, separately, with a certain elegant stiffness; it is beautiful, formal, too regular in the 'continual slight novelty' of its form to be quite clear at a glance: very ...
— Figures of Several Centuries • Arthur Symons
... Geordie agreed, cordially. "It's worth four shullings to have your mind at ease, man. I'll just go up to the lodge and get a warm bath ready, to tak' the stiffness out of his muscles, and brew a tea from an herb that wee wild creatures know all about and aye hunt ...
— Greyfriars Bobby • Eleanor Atkinson
... a glow of triumph, as it were, and in the consciousness of the freedom and life in a lively society and in new and sympathetic friendship, she anticipated pleasure in an attempt to break up the stiffness and levelness of the society at home, and infusing into it something of the motion and sparkle which were so agreeable at Fallkill. She expected visits from her new friends, she would have company, the new books and the periodicals about which all the world was talking, and, in ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... one. I report at the Palais Royal at eight, and I've an empty stomach to attend to. Be lively, lad. Duty, duty, always duty," snatching the towels. "I have been in the saddle since morning; I am still dead with stiffness; yet duty calls. Bah! I had rather be fighting the Spaniard with Turenne than idle away at the Louvre. Never any fighting save in pothouses; nothing but ride, ride, ride, here, there, everywhere, bearing despatches not worth the paper written on, but worth a man's ...
— The Grey Cloak • Harold MacGrath
... and left me to my mysterious fate," said the Count, with a slight degree of stiffness. "I conclude that you did not receive my letter requesting you to meet me at Amsterdam, and stating the reasons for my not rejoining you sooner; however, I am very glad to ...
— Voyages and Travels of Count Funnibos and Baron Stilkin • William H. G. Kingston
... to reach the fence, the hitching strap had given away under the unusual strain, sending old Bess to her knees. But with no trace of the stiffness of age, she was up in an instant and galloping across the pasture, a number of enraged hornets in hot pursuit. At the crucial moment Amy's finger pressed the button, thus preserving a record of a fact which needed to be substantiated ...
— Peggy Raymond's Vacation - or Friendly Terrace Transplanted • Harriet L. (Harriet Lummis) Smith
... was bold enough to suggest that he could not move because he was too frightened; and this angered poor Sancho into a frantic attempt to take a step in the direction of the invading army. But this step was a fatal one, for the Governor fell in his undignified stiffness flat on his back with such a crash that he thought he had broken every bone in ...
— The Story of Don Quixote • Arvid Paulson, Clayton Edwards, and Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
... arms were about his neck—I felt no stiffness nor soreness now. He folded me to his breast, and cried, as I did. After a long ...
— Stories Worth Rereading • Various
... she heard her name so called that she awoke with a start. Papalier was himself again, and was demanding where he was, and what had been the matter. He felt the blister on his head; he complained of the soreness and stiffness of his mouth and tongue; he tried to raise himself, and could not; and, on the full discovery of his state, he ...
— The Hour and the Man - An Historical Romance • Harriet Martineau
... is something to be thankful for, at least," and so saying and shaking the stiffness out of his knees and elbows, he started off for the white walls and the ...
— Twilight Land • Howard Pyle
... Tish said. "Take some of the stiffness out of her liver, for one thing. But you might keep an eye on her. It's ...
— Tish, The Chronicle of Her Escapades and Excursions • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... his decorator to provide him with a chamber wherein stiffness and formality would be impossible unless one stood erect. The decorator had spent money with a lavish hand upon Spanish leathers and silken stuffs from the near East and the Orient and he had laid these trappings over the softest of swan's down. Once you sank upon them you could not help a ...
— Officer 666 • Barton W. Currie
... A certain stiffness of demeanour, which we had noticed, but ascribed to pride, worked an unspeakable change in the mage. As we looked at him he ...
— HE • Andrew Lang
... wouldn't be exactly official and proper in me to approve your judgment in that matter of the Italians; but as a man—plain man, now, you understand,—I know grit when I see it and—" he dropped his bluff stiffness got out of his chair and came along and squeezed Parker's muscular arm, "you've got a brand of it that I admire. Yes, I do. No mistake! But that is just between you and me. That is simply my own personal opinion. I don't believe ...
— The Rainy Day Railroad War • Holman Day
... eyes," or "Still to be neat, still to be dressed"? Beautiful in form, deft and graceful in expression, with not a word too much or one that bears not its part in the total effect, there is yet about the lyrics of Jonson a certain stiffness and formality, a suspicion that they were not quite spontaneous and unbidden, but that they were carved, so to speak, with disproportionate labour by a potent man of letters whose habitual thought ...
— The Poetaster - Or, His Arraignment • Ben Jonson
... the curve bends at every point by a certain fixed but infinitesimal amount, just enough to make the adjacent points to be equally near the centre. Or, to take another example, every point of the elastic curve, that is, of the curve in which a spring of uniform stiffness can be bent by a force applied at the ends of the spring, is subject to this very simple law, that the curve bends in exact proportion to its distance from a certain straight line. Now a straight line, or a plane, is by this definition a curve, since every point in it is subject to one and the ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 30, April, 1860 • Various
... I found the last day of the voyage to Liverpool dull enough. Mr. Hethcote did not seem to feel it in the same way: on the contrary, he grew more familiar and confidential in his talk with me. He has some of the English stiffness, you see, and your American pace was a little too fast for him. On our last night on board, we had some more conversation about the Farnabys. You were not interested enough in the subject to attend to what he said about ...
— The Fallen Leaves • Wilkie Collins
... accompanied by Aristo, he set out in his litter to the lodging where she was in custody; not, however, without much misgiving when it came to the point, some shame, and a consequent visible awkwardness and stiffness in his manner. All the perfumes he had about him could not hinder the disgust of such a visit rising up into ...
— Callista • John Henry Cardinal Newman
... America discovers that only in the U. States, of all the continent, is safe investment; and money gravitates therefore to New York. The Southern naphtha, too, comes in as an ingredient, and lubricates manners and tastes to that degree, that Boston is hated for stiffness, and excellence in luxury is rapidly attained. Of course, dining, dancing, equipaging, etc. are the exclusive beatitudes,—and Thackeray will not cure us of this distemper. Have you a physician that can? Are you a physician, and ...
— The Correspondence of Thomas Carlyle and Ralph Waldo Emerson, 1834-1872, Vol II. • Thomas Carlyle and Ralph Waldo Emerson
... soon on the road again, Rusher kicking up his heels livelier than before, for the run down to the lake had merely enabled him to get the stiffness ...
— The Bobbsey Twins - Or, Merry Days Indoors and Out • Laura Lee Hope
... in conversation with my recent travelling companion, whom I now knew to be Lady Fitzgraham. She hardly acknowledged my look of recognition, and out of the tail of my eye I saw Connie Stapleton glance quickly at each of us in turn, as though Lady Fitzgraham's unmistakable stiffness ...
— The Four Faces - A Mystery • William le Queux
... Luff was taken very lame, being seized with severe pain and stiffness in the right leg; he was quite unable to walk, so we burned the other two round tents to ...
— Voyage Of H.M.S. Rattlesnake, Vol. 2 (of 2) • John MacGillivray
... the stiffness melted. Under his eyes the wooden folds of cloth became rich silk, embroidery gleamed in its reality upon the coat, and oh! the face! The wooden grin loosened, the large eyes turned, the hand holding the hard bouquet of carved flowers moved, and let the bouquet fall. The feet of the boy twitched ...
— Mr. Wicker's Window • Carley Dawson
... not regular. She had the fairest skin imaginable. Her figure was perfect for her height; and there was a simplicity, a retired modesty, about her, which was very characteristic, and formed a happy contrast to the cold, artificial formality and studied stiffness which ...
— The Works of Lord Byron: Letters and Journals, Volume 2. • Lord Byron
... shape after adding marshmallow cream, it may be again placed over hot water, and folded gently over and over, until it becomes slightly granular around the edges. Remove from hot water, and continue folding over gently until of the desired stiffness. ...
— For Luncheon and Supper Guests • Alice Bradley
... and women look at these things differently," she remarked, and from the stiffness of her tone I divined that the idea of moral qualities lurking in the nature of Lola Brandt ...
— Simon the Jester • William J. Locke
... exhaust their vigour. The flower stalk pushes up from a fresh sheaf of them—up and up twelve or fourteen feet—and expands into a candelabra of golden blossom, and not a droop comes in the plant below. But as the seed forms, we see that life is working death, slowly and surely; the swords lose their stiffness and colour and begin to hang helplessly, and by the time it is ripe, every vestige of vitality is drained away from them, and they have gone to limp, greyish-brown streamers. The seed has possessed ...
— Parables of the Christ-life • I. Lilias Trotter
... tact enough to make herself and her father's house very agreeable to Mrs Bold. There was with them all an absence of stiffness and formality which was peculiarly agreeable to Eleanor after the great dose of clerical arrogance which she had lately been constrained to take. She played chess with them, walked with them, and drank tea with them; studied or ...
— Barchester Towers • Anthony Trollope
... The light of the sunrise was strong on his face, set in the suffering of great weariness; the stiffness of his long and burdened ride was in his limbs. He turned his dusty horse, with its head low-drooping, and rode out the way that he had come. No hand was lifted to stop him, no voice raised in either ...
— The Rustler of Wind River • G. W. Ogden
... conqueror, surrounded by his four brothers on foot. They are all attired in Roman fashion, and are turned seaward, to the west, as if to symbolise the emigration of this family to subdue Europe. There is something ludicrous and forlorn in the stiffness of the group—something even pathetic, when we think how Napoleon gazed seaward from another island, no longer on horseback, no longer laurel-crowned, an unthroned, unseated conqueror, on S. Helena. His father's house stands close by. An old Italian waiting-woman, who had been long in ...
— Sketches and Studies in Italy and Greece, Complete - Series I, II, and III • John Symonds
... seen of our client, Mr. Carless," observed Methley, with some stiffness of manner, "there is no ...
— The Middle of Things • J. S. Fletcher
... much honoured in placing myself at the disposal of so far-sighted a commander," said Gerrard, a little stiffly, as he saluted. Charteris laughed, and clapped him on the back with a friendly force no stiffness could survive. ...
— The Path to Honour • Sydney C. Grier
... looked a graceful creature, and she felt very good and very elegant indeed. Miss Ophelia stood at her side, a perfect contrast. It was not that she had not as handsome a silk dress and shawl, and as fine a pocket-handkerchief; but stiffness and squareness, and bolt-uprightness, enveloped her with as indefinite yet appreciable a presence as did grace her elegant neighbor; not the grace of God, ...
— Uncle Tom's Cabin • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... blood, that has never crossed me, and of whom I have reason to be proud? Yes, Harry, it gratifies me to hear you admired and to learn your success. All I want now is to see you in Parliament. A man should be in Parliament early. There is a sort of stiffness about every man, no matter what may be his talents, who enters Parliament late in life; and now, fortunately, the occasion offers. You will go down on Friday; feed the notabilities well; speak out; praise Peel; abuse O'Connell and the ladies of the Bed-chamber; anathematise all waverers; say a ...
— Coningsby • Benjamin Disraeli
... entered the city of Bleiberg. He went directly to his hotel, where a bath and a change of clothes took the stiffness from his limbs. He was in no great hurry to go to the Grand Hotel; there was plenty of time. Happily there was no mail for him; he was not needed ...
— The Puppet Crown • Harold MacGrath
... the other. The elder clergyman had a genial, hearty countenance and manner, and he dressed very much like other gentlemen. The young curate might have breakfasted on his poker, to judge from the stiffness of his back, and appeared to be afraid of suffering from cold in the knees and chest, to judge from the length of his surtout and the height of ...
— The Iron Horse • R.M. Ballantyne
... plain, in order to have a pretence against me, taxed my behaviour to him with stiffness and distance. You, at one time, thought me guilty of some degree of prudery. Difficult situations should be allowed for: which often make seeming occasions for censure unavoidable. I deserved not blame from him who made mine difficult. And you, my dear, had I any other man to deal with, or had ...
— Clarissa, Or The History Of A Young Lady, Volume 8 • Samuel Richardson
... discourse with wit and pleasantry, never descending to vulgar humour; refined, and polished, without a tincture of scurrility. He preserved the true Latin idiom; in his selection of words accurate, with apparent facility; no stiffness, no affectation appeared; in his train of reasoning always clear and methodical; and, when the cause hinged upon a question of law, or the moral distinctions of good and evil, no man possessed such a fund of argument, and happy illustration. Crasso nihil statuo ...
— A Dialogue Concerning Oratory, Or The Causes Of Corrupt Eloquence • Cornelius Tacitus
... before that table writing incessantly, conversing, pen in hand, with his Augusta and all the family in Cassel. Better that this good man should carry off his stuff than those other domineering officers with cutting voices and insolent stiffness. ...
— The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... If stiffness of the neck, headache or similar pains are felt after its use, the moist linen should not be extended to the back part of the neck but only the front ...
— Valere Aude - Dare to Be Healthy, Or, The Light of Physical Regeneration • Louis Dechmann
... important naval business," we learn through his confidential secretary at this period, "he preferred a turn on the quarter-deck with his captains, whom he led by his own frankness to express themselves freely, to all the stiffness and formality of a council of war."[63] An interesting instance of these occasional counsels has been transmitted to us by one of his captains, then little more than a youth, but the last to survive of those ...
— The Life of Nelson, Vol. II. (of 2) - The Embodiment of the Sea Power of Great Britain • A. T. (Alfred Thayer) Mahan
... more important than on the wet fly. The floating qualities of a dry fly depend entirely upon stiff neck hackle of the proper size. (Use Hackle Chart.) Sometimes two hackles are used, these are laid together, and both butts tied in at the same time. One hackle of the proper size and stiffness is usually enough, so we will use one tied in as Fig. 13 and explained in Fig. 6, Diagram 4, page 21. Clip the hackle pliers to the tip of hackle (F) and wind about two turns edgewise in front of the wings, wind ...
— How to Tie Flies • E. C. Gregg
... born of healthy parents—he was their first child—about four weeks too soon. His whole body had something of stiffness and awkwardness. The legs were worse off in this respect than the arms; they showed, as they continued to show up to the time of his death, a tendency to become crossed. The boy was never able to ...
— The Mind of the Child, Part II • W. Preyer
... if I am wrong," I said, with a certain stiffness, "but I assumed that you were apologizing for your foul conduct in looping back the last ring that night in the Drones, causing me to plunge into the swimming b. in ...
— Right Ho, Jeeves • P. G. Wodehouse
... her usual social chatter was as foreign here as a strange tongue would be. But no type is quicker to grasp upon amusement, and to appreciate the amuser, than Leslie's, unable to amuse itself, and skilled in seeking for entertainment. She was too shy to ask Norma to imitate her aunt again, but her stiffness relaxed, and she asked Norma if it was not great "fun" to sell things—especially at Christmas, for instance. Norma asked in turn if Mr. Liggett was not Leslie's uncle, and said that she had sold him hundreds of beautiful books for his wife, and had even had a note from Leslie's Aunt ...
— The Beloved Woman • Kathleen Norris
... though it sits out the sermon on cushions, and rarely is called upon to lend its ears for one-third of the time which he was expected to do. Dr Thorpe was not far wrong in the conclusion at which he arrived:—that "my Lord Mayor's heart passed his legs for stiffness." ...
— Robin Tremain - A Story of the Marian Persecution • Emily Sarah Holt
... chains was a serious obstacle to obtaining any large amount of power. The whole apparatus was mounted on a heavy wooden scaffold, which proved an impediment to the flow of the river. Again, the resistance due to the surface of the returning blades and to their stiffness was found to ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 455, September 20, 1884 • Various
... correspondence is almost incredible. Even those epistles which remain number more than eight hundred. In them we find the eloquence of the heart, not of the rhetorical school. They are models of pure Latinity, elegant without stiffness, the natural outpourings of a mind which could not give birth to an ungraceful idea. In his letters to Atticus he lays bare the secret of his heart; he trusts his life in his hands; he is not only ...
— Handbook of Universal Literature - From The Best and Latest Authorities • Anne C. Lynch Botta
... was in himself both weapon and wielder of weapon. He was a concentrated force. His white body was knotted with nerves and muscles. The chances were good if—Gordon pictured it to himself—and again the horror and doubt were over him. He himself had acquired a certain stiffness and lassitude from years, and long drives in one position. He would stand no chance unarmed against a bullet. But the dog—that was another matter. The dog would make a spring like the spring of death itself, and that white leap of attack might easily cause the aim to go wrong. It would ...
— 'Doc.' Gordon • Mary E. Wilkins-Freeman
... marshy bank to the north of the buildings; then having lifted it out of the water, he stood to his full height and stretched himself, for he had been travelling in the canoe eleven days and was conscious of body stiffness owing to the cramped position he ...
— A Mating in the Wilds • Ottwell Binns
... then replied sharply: "That woman, do y' say, Pierre, she that nursed me when the Honourable and meself were taken out o' Sandy Drift, more dead than livin'; she that brought me back to life as good as ever, barrin' this scar on me forehead and a stiffness at me elbow, and the Honourable as right as the sun, more luck to him! which he doesn't need at all, with the wind of fortune in his back and shiftin' neither to right nor left. —That woman! faith, y'd better not cut the words so sharp betune yer ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... wide open, the limbs straight and rigid. He sprang forward, and lifted her into a more favourable posture, hastily asking for simple remedies likely to be at hand, and producing a certain amount of revival for a few moments, though the stiffness was not passing—nor was ...
— The Trial - or, More Links of the Daisy Chain • Charlotte M. Yonge
... into the room with his usual air of ceremony, amounting almost to stiffness. Then, as he realised that his hostess was alone, his face lighted up and he came ...
— The Arbiter - A Novel • Lady F. E. E. Bell
... the brother of Professor John Playfair, the mathematician, says, "Those persons who have ever had the pleasure to be in his company may recollect that even in his common conversation the order and method he pursued without the smallest degree of formality or stiffness were beautiful, and gave a sort of pleasure to all who ...
— Life of Adam Smith • John Rae
... the Kellogg and the Dean in-tune ringers, on account of the comparative stiffness of the armature springs and on account of the normal position of the armature with maximum air gaps and consequent minimum magnetic pull, the armature will practically not be affected unless the energizing current is accurately attuned to its own natural ...
— Cyclopedia of Telephony & Telegraphy Vol. 1 - A General Reference Work on Telephony, etc. etc. • Kempster Miller
... of the master failed him, but a look of heart felt satisfaction gleamed across his rough visage, as its muscles suddenly contracted, when the faded lineaments slowly settled into the appalling stiffness of death. ...
— The Pilot • J. Fenimore Cooper
... my lad; a force shall be ready to start in an hour. I suppose you will want to go with them. I advise you to go back to Colonel Harper's tent, get into a bath, and get a couple of natives to shampoo you. That will take away all your stiffness. By the time that's over, and you have had some breakfast, the troops will ...
— In Times of Peril • G. A. Henty
... to see Venice, Florence, Rome, and Naples. I am, as you know, not a great traveler; it appears to me a useless and fatiguing business. Nights spent in a train, the disturbed slumbers of the railway carriage, with the attendant headache, and stiffness in every limb, the sudden waking in that rolling box, the unwashed feeling with your eyes and hair full of dust, the smell of the coal on which one's lungs feed, those bad dinners in the draughty refreshment rooms are, according to my ideas, a horrible ...
— The Works of Guy de Maupassant, Vol. 1 (of 8) - Boule de Suif and Other Stories • Guy de Maupassant
... country, walks in the woods,—a perpetual animation, where ceremony was banished. The brilliancy of her parties excited the jealousy of Richelieu. Hither resorted those who did not wish to be bound by the stiffness of the court. At that period this famous hotel had its pedantries, but it was severely intellectual. Hither came Mademoiselle de Scuderi; Mademoiselle de Montpensier, granddaughter of Henry IV.; Vaugelas, and others of ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume VII • John Lord
... account, and feeling at every step as if she was getting further into the Wreath of Beauty. Across a great drawing-room,—such a beautiful grand room,—a folding door is opened; "Miss Arundel" is announced, and there she stands in all her stiffness. ...
— The Two Guardians • Charlotte Mary Yonge
... singularly inappreciative and uncritical in such matters, and which certainly has not left any evidence of a genius for realism, for its highest conception of romance-writing does not rise above the stiffness of the Clementines or the extravagance of the Protevangelium—if he could have done this, he would at least have advanced his argument a step [15:2]. Why again, when he is emphasizing the differences between the ...
— Essays on "Supernatural Religion" • Joseph B. Lightfoot
... of feeling. It seems as if with English writers poetic sentiment naturally sought expression in poetic forms, while the Frenchmen of nearly corresponding temperament were restrained within the limits of prose by reason of the vigorously prescribed stateliness and stiffness of their verse at that time. A man in this country with the quality of Vauvenargues, with his delicacy, tenderness, elevation, would have composed lyrics. We have undoubtedly lost much by the laxity and irregularity of our verse, but as undoubtedly we ...
— Critical Miscellanies (Vol 2 of 3) - Essay 1: Vauvenargues • John Morley
... whose belief in his own wisdom was infinite, to risk not only being set down as a dreamer, but the King's displeasure, and the ruin of being given over to the will of his enemies, this Bacon had not the fibre or the stiffness or the self-assertion to do. He did not do what a man of firm will and strength of purpose, a man of high integrity, of habitual resolution, would have done. Such men insist when they are responsible, and when they know that they are right; and they prevail, or accept the consequences. ...
— Bacon - English Men Of Letters, Edited By John Morley • Richard William Church
... of her regard, Mr. Juniper indeed excepted. Once they went to a quilting at Squire Dennison's; the house was spotlessly neat and well ordered; the people all kind; but Ellen thought they did not seem to know how to be pleasant. Dan Dennison alone had no stiffness about him. Miss Fortune remarked with pride that even in this family of pretension, as she thought it, the refreshments could bear no comparison with hers. Once they were invited to tea at the Lawsons'; but Ellen told Alice, with much ...
— The Wide, Wide World • Susan Warner
... of her eyes was a challenge. For a moment, before he caught sight of the initials, he was puzzled at her stiffness. Then his heart lost a beat and hammered wildly. His brain was in a fog and he could ...
— The Sheriff's Son • William MacLeod Raine
... bleak September Mr. Grundy again visited Haworth. He sent to the Vicarage for Branwell, and ordered dinner and a fire to welcome him; the room looked cosy and warm. While Mr. Grundy sat waiting for his guest, the Vicar was shown in. He, too, was strangely altered; much of his old stiffness of manner gone; and it was with genuine affection that he spoke of Branwell, and almost with despair that he touched on his increasing miseries. When Mr. Grundy's message had come, the poor, self-distraught sufferer had been ...
— Emily Bront • A. Mary F. (Agnes Mary Frances) Robinson
... had purchased in so depressed a market that the present moderate stiffness of prices was sufficient to pile for him a large heap of gold where a little one ...
— The Mayor of Casterbridge • Thomas Hardy
... of the first splendour of their coming faded—faded imperceptibly day after day; Denton's eloquence became fitful, and lacked fresh topics of inspiration; the fatigue of their long march from London told in a certain stiffness of the limbs, and each suffered from a slight unaccountable cold. Moreover, Denton became aware of unoccupied time. In one place among the carelessly heaped lumber of the old times he found a rust-eaten spade, and with this he made a fitful attack on the razed ...
— Tales of Space and Time • Herbert George Wells
... the palace of the boy king, her brother, the revels were grander and showier; but to the young Elizabeth, not yet skilled in all the stiffness of the royal court, the Yule-tide feast at Hatfield House brought pleasure enough; and so, seated at her holly-trimmed virginal—that great-great-grandfather of the piano of to-day,—she, whose rare skill as a musician has come down to us, would—when wearied with her "prankes and ...
— Historic Girls • E. S. Brooks
... horse-sickness broke out. In spite of every precaution, my horses died. The disease commenced by an appearance of languor, rapid action of the heart, scantiness of urine, costiveness, swelling of the forehead above the eyes, which extended rapidly to the whole head; stiffness and swelling of the neck, eyes prominent and bloodshot, running at the nose of foul greenish matter in ...
— Ismailia • Samuel W. Baker
... Galatian horse to fall upon their flank, and beat down their lances with their swords. The only defense of these horsemen-at-arms are their lances; they have nothing else that they can use to protect themselves, or annoy their enemy, on account of the weight and stiffness of their armor, with which they are, as it were, built up. He himself, with two cohorts, made to the mountain, the soldiers briskly following, when they saw him in arms afoot first toiling and climbing up. Being on the top and standing in an open place, with a ...
— Plutarch's Lives • A.H. Clough
... also called by the commentators [Greek], or, "Above the Clouds," has a great deal of easy wit and humour in it, without the least degree of stiffness or obscurity; it is equally severe on the gods and philosophers; and paints, in the warmest colours, the glaring absurdity of ...
— Trips to the Moon • Lucian
... of simple biscuit and cakes, offered by another, is all the further repast. The teacups and cake-basket are a real addition to the scene, because they cause a little lively social bustle, a little chatter and motion,—always of advantage in breaking up stiffness, and giving occasion for those graceful, airy nothings that answer so good a ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 18, No. 106, August, 1866 • Various
... Since their last meeting he had sacrificed his brown moustache to the frost, and his smooth face, smitten with health and vigor, looked uncommonly boyish; and yet, withal, the naked upper lip advertised a stiffness and resolution hitherto concealed. Furthermore, his features portrayed a growth, and his eyes, which had been softly firm, were now firm with the added harshness or hardness which is bred of coping with things and coping quickly,—the ...
— A Daughter of the Snows • Jack London
... that you have got your yacht here, and are so very kind as to ask us to become your guests for a time," said the Professor, with a suspicion of stiffness. "It is more than generous of you, ...
— The Mummy and Miss Nitocris - A Phantasy of the Fourth Dimension • George Griffith
... again been mentioned between them. She, for her part, had striven to maintain her usual gentle, cheerful demeanor, and it is probable that Dr. Deane made a similar attempt; but he could not conceal a certain coldness and stiffness, which made an uncomfortable atmosphere in ...
— The Story Of Kennett • Bayard Taylor
... took me down to the ships, and he sent Thrand for sword Foe's Bane when the night had fallen. Most kindly did the Dane treat me, but I cared for little. I could not move for stiffness and bruising after I had slept for twelve hours on end, but that was nought compared with the sorrow for what ...
— King Olaf's Kinsman - A Story of the Last Saxon Struggle against the Danes in - the Days of Ironside and Cnut • Charles Whistler
... thing at a glance. That it would be quite a mistake to settle a plan of action. That is sometimes a great advantage in dealing with the unguarded. But it creates a stiffness. Here all must be supple and fitted with watchful tact to the situation as it rose. Everything would have to ...
— A Perilous Secret • Charles Reade
... away the bride? He never even asked himself the question. He took it for granted as a matter of course. Besides, was not he the greatest man present? And should not he do just as he thought fit? So in utter ignorance of any offense given to any one, the Iron King unbent his stiffness for once, and was very genial to every one, especially to the chief justice, who, secretly offended as he was, could not but ...
— For Woman's Love • Mrs. E. D. E. N. Southworth
... quantities of boiled fish, plum-cake and sweets; and Mrs. Kettering, perceiving that he didn't do justice to the fare, enumerated to him other things that were in the larder, with the suggestion that he might perhaps prefer a choice of them. Some of the stiffness that had characterised the former meal had vanished—Morgan could see now that had been due to shyness at his presence—and, though Mark still showed little willingness to converse, the girls were evidently beginning to find themselves again, occasional gigglings ...
— Cleo The Magnificent - The Muse of the Real • Louis Zangwill
... thought of it the more perplexed I became. The night was very dark and I could see nothing about me in any direction, so I concluded that the only thing to do was to remain standing just where I was until daybreak. It was a long and tedious wait and I suffered much from stiffness and cold, but at last dawn appeared and I anxiously strained my eyes, looking about in every direction. Then my head nearly burst with a feeling of joyousness, for within two hundred yards of me I discerned the outline of what appeared to be a hill of ...
— Born Again • Alfred Lawson
... obliging an air as I could assume, I paid my compliments to her. She received them with great stiffness; swelling at Sir Harry: who sidled to the door, in a moody and sullen manner, ...
— The History of Sir Charles Grandison, Volume 4 (of 7) • Samuel Richardson
... tabooed in the front room of the house. The "damp dignity" of the best-room has been well described: "Musty smells, stiffness, angles, absence of sunlight. What is there to talk about in a room dark as the Domdaniel, except where one crack in a reluctant shutter reveals a stand of wax flowers under glass, and a dimly descried hostess who evidently waits only your departure to extinguish that ...
— Adopting An Abandoned Farm • Kate Sanborn |
