"Unbend" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... we must be to each other, and then wake and find me bending over thee. Come, Sweet, come!" He sought her elusive fingers and tried to draw her to him with a tenderness she could hardly withstand; but she would not unbend, drawing from him, sinking further into ...
— Mistress Penwick • Dutton Payne
... more worthily employed, sir, but we did unbend at times. Billy, do you remember—' ...
— Echoes of the War • J. M. Barrie
... a deep breath. "It's things like that we're interested in," he said, and spent the next twenty minutes slowly approaching his subject. Sir Lewis, apparently fascinated, was perfectly willing to unbend in any direction, and jotted down notes on some of Malone's more interesting cases, murmuring: "Most unusual, most unusual," as ...
— Supermind • Gordon Randall Garrett
... outward manifestations, was Solomon. He ran and barked and wheeled about, jumping against his master as if to impart some of his own enthusiasm. His joy, while less contagious than he himself desired, produced one good result in causing the lady to unbend a little. At first she merely watched him with amusement, then talked and played with him, but not freely and with abandon, only so far as was proper with a dog whose master had become a suspicious character. As the life-boat disappeared toward the ...
— The Pines of Lory • John Ames Mitchell
... her. At night, at night, she would unbend, she would be tender and passionate, she would touch him with quick, hurrying caresses, she would put her arms round him and draw him to her, kissing and kissing. And with her young, beautiful body pressed tight to him, with her mouth on his and her eyes shining close and big in ...
— Anne Severn and the Fieldings • May Sinclair
... not only a profound scholar, but he had likewise a striking personality which shone through his features. Full of fire as he was in his public life, he could also unbend graciously so as to talk on the most difficult subjects to a stripling like myself without any trace of a patronising tone. I even took advantage of his condescension to the extent of getting a contribution, Yama's Dog, from him for the Bharabi. There were other great contemporaries of ...
— My Reminiscences • Rabindranath Tagore
... mutual worth to praise and to admire; And though the one too early left his wine, The other still exclaim'd—"My boy will shine: Yes, I perceive that he will soon improve, And I shall form the very guide I love; Decent abroad, he will my name defend, And when at home, be social and unbend." The plan was specious, for the mind of James Accorded duly with his uncle's schemes; He then aspired not to a higher name Than sober clerks of moderate talents claim; Gravely to pray, and rev'rendly to preach, Was all he saw, good youth! within his reach: Thus may a mass of sulphur ...
— Tales • George Crabbe
... "Then, to unbend my mind, I'll roam Amid the cloister's silent gloom; Or, where ranged oaks their shades diffuse, Hold dalliance with my darling Muse, Recalling oft some heaven-born strain That warbled in Augustan reign; Or turn, well pleased, ...
— A History of English Romanticism in the Eighteenth Century • Henry A. Beers
... men as well as women, and men of the greatest and best qualities other ways, yet have found themselves weak in this part, and have not been able to bear the weight of a secret joy or of a secret sorrow, but have been obliged to disclose it, even for the mere giving vent to themselves, and to unbend the mind oppressed with the load and weights which attended it. Nor was this any token of folly or thoughtlessness at all, but a natural consequence of the thing; and such people, had they struggled longer ...
— The Fortunes and Misfortunes of the Famous Moll Flanders &c. • Daniel Defoe
... to the barbarous braying forth of his asinine reflections! Lysia! what, Lysia! ... dost thou frown at me? Frown not, sweet queen, but rather laugh! ... thy laughter kills, 'tis true, but thy frown doth torture spirits after death! Unbend thy brows! Night looms between them like a chaos! ... we will have no more night, I say, but only noon! ... a long, languorous, lovely noon, flower-girdled ...
— Ardath - The Story of a Dead Self • Marie Corelli
... went to breakfast; and when the men again turned to, upon the conclusion of their meal, their first act was to swarm aloft and unbend the whole of the canvas, from the royals down—a proceeding which seemed to confirm my previous surmise that they intended their sojourn upon the island to be of some duration. This task occupied them the entire morning; but when they knocked off at eight bells for dinner, ...
— The Castaways • Harry Collingwood
... and laid her hands upon his and looked up in his face to bring all her plea; the plea of most winning sweetness of entreaty in features yet flushed and trembling. His own did not unbend as he gazed at her, but he gave her a silent answer in a pressure of the hands that went straight from his heart to hers. Fleda's eye turned to ...
— Queechy • Susan Warner
... garbs she wears; a thousand ways She wheels her giddy empire.—Lo! thus far 70 With bold adventure, to the Mantuan lyre I sing of Nature's charms, and touch well pleased A stricter note: now haply must my song Unbend her serious measure, and reveal In lighter strains, how Folly's awkward arts [Endnote Y] Excite impetuous Laughter's gay rebuke; The sportive province ...
— Poetical Works of Akenside - [Edited by George Gilfillan] • Mark Akenside
... love's soft food was sown, What wonder if at once my bosom glow'd? Graceful she moved, with more than mortal mien, In form an angel: and her accents won Upon the ear with more than human sound. A spirit heavenly pure, a living sun, Was what I saw; and if no more 'twere seen, T' unbend the bow ...
— The Sonnets, Triumphs, and Other Poems of Petrarch • Petrarch
... sustained on the wall by the feet of a gentleman sitting in the Yankee way, his head below and out of sight. I then gratify my memory with remembrance of 'good old colony times when we were roguish chaps.'" And here is another part of a letter which illustrates that even dignitaries like to unbend and become like boys again. This letter was written by the minister of foreign affairs to the minister of the United States at ...
— Stories of Authors, British and American • Edwin Watts Chubb
... reflected that he had only seen him in his leisure moments, when he might naturally be expected to unbend and be full of the milk of human kindness. Probably in business hours he was quite different. After all, pleasure is one ...
— Mike • P. G. Wodehouse
... for life is a wrestle with the devil, and only the frivolous think to throw him without taking off their coats. Yet, though Gavin's zeal was what the congregation reverenced, many loved him privately for his boyishness. He could unbend at marriages, of which he had six on the last day of the year, and at every one of them he joked (the same joke) like a layman. Some did not approve of his playing at the teetotum for ten minutes with Kitty Dundas's ...
— The Little Minister • J.M. Barrie
... accompanied by Dyer, had gone ashore and very carefully inspected the place, it was decided at once to unbend the ship's sails, carry them ashore, and temporarily convert them into tents for the accommodation of all hands, which would afford the sick an opportunity to recover their health and strength while the operation of careening and scraping the ship ...
— The Cruise of the Nonsuch Buccaneer • Harry Collingwood
... pass some of my time in reading, and the rest in the company of people of sense and learning, and chiefly those above me; and I would frequent the mixed companies of men and women of fashion, which, though often frivolous, yet they unbend and refresh the mind, not uselessly, because they certainly polish ...
— The PG Edition of Chesterfield's Letters to His Son • The Earl of Chesterfield
... in your joy: let me have a friend's part In the warmth of your welcome of hand and of heart,— On your play-ground of boyhood unbend the brow's care, And shift the old burdens our shoulders ...
— The Complete Works of Whittier - The Standard Library Edition with a linked Index • John Greenleaf Whittier
... tried to interest her, as of yore, in following his lead in break-neck forest gallops after rabbits or in gloriously exhilarating swims in the fire-blue lake at the foot of the lawn. To the pityingly on-looking Mistress and Master, he seemed like some general or statesman seeking to unbend in the games and chatter of a party of high school boys ...
— Further Adventures of Lad • Albert Payson Terhune
... telling of a kindly winter with external chimneys that care not for the hoarding of heat. It is a bit of the island peopled by some of the islanders. They are colonized here, from commissioner in charge down to private, in a cheek-by-jowl fashion that shows their ability to unbend and republicanize on occasion. Great Britain's head-quarters are made particularly attractive, not more by the picturesqueness of the buildings than by the extent and completeness of her exhibit. In ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. XVII. No. 101. May, 1876. • Various
... of trial for poor Ellen Arthur. Madeline Payne, after studiously ignoring the two men for some days, began to unbend. She commenced by conversing with Percy, listening to his slow and stately sentences, smiling her approval, and completely captivating that susceptible gentleman. Then, by degrees, she drew Lucian into the conversation, and smiled upon ...
— Madeline Payne, the Detective's Daughter • Lawrence L. Lynch
... professional vocations wear down their energies, and they stand in need of relaxation. Where do they seek it? Not in the quiet and happy circle of their own families—for they have none, nor among their neighbours, who may esteem and respect, but will scarce unbend before men who are become masters of their most secret thoughts. They therefore betake themselves to the pot-house, and in drinking and ribald conversation, look for that amusement which, under a better state of things, ...
— Germany, Bohemia, and Hungary, Visited in 1837. Vol. II • G. R. Gleig
... owe to them. The man must have no mirth in him if he fail to be tickled by the best of Labiche's comedies, aye and the worst too, if such a term can be applied to any of the enchanting series; if he refuse to unbend over "A Day's Journey and a Life's Romance," if he cannot let himself go and enjoy himself over Gilbert Gurney's river adventure. If the revival of the Whartons' book were to serve no other purpose than to send some laughter loving souls to the heady well-spring ...
— The Wits and Beaux of Society - Volume 1 • Grace Wharton and Philip Wharton
... perhaps, an exaggeration: but when people resort to a theatre to unbend, or relax, they will hardly think their pleasure tastelesly diversified by a fine pantomime execution of a dramatic composition, to the perfection of which, poetry, music, painting, decoration, and machinery will have all contributed ...
— A Treatise on the Art of Dancing • Giovanni-Andrea Gallini
... and did not unbend even when the station master, who had known him from his boyhood, felt at liberty to offer ...
— The Shuttle • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... did not unbend much before the tumult, permitted a gleam of satisfaction to show itself ...
— Uncle Sam's Boys with Pershing's Troops - Dick Prescott at Grips with the Boche • H. Irving Hancock
... though she is so well suited, from her superior abilities and strength of mind, and all that, to be the wife of a great political leader, yet in some respects she is the most unfit person upon earth for the situation; for, though she feels the necessity of conciliating, she cannot unbend with her inferiors, that is, with half the world. As Catalani said of singing, it is much more difficult to descend than to ascend well. Shockingly mamma shows in her manner sometimes how tired she is of the stupid, and how she despises the mean; and all the underlings think she can undo them ...
— Helen • Maria Edgeworth
... anniversary of his triumphal entry into New Amsterdam, after the conquest of New Sweden. This was always a kind of saturnalia among the domestics, when they considered themselves at liberty, in some measure, to say and do what they pleased, for on this day their master was always observed to unbend and become exceedingly pleasant and jocose, sending the old gray-headed negroes on April-fool's errands for pigeons' milk; not one of whom but allowed himself to be taken in, and humored his old master's jokes, ...
— Knickerbocker's History of New York, Complete • Washington Irving
... severe Canons of literal Criticism, &c. &c.' p. xiv. Yet further on he says, 'These, such as they are, were amongst my younger amusements, when, many years ago I used to turn over these sort of Writers to unbend myself from more ...
— The Works of William Shakespeare [Cambridge Edition] [9 vols.] - Introduction and Publisher's Advertising • William Shakespeare
... rather dye, howbeit I will not cease my vengeance, to her must I have recourse for helpe, and to none other (I meane to Sobriety), who may correct thee sharpely, take away thy quiver, deprive thee of thy arrowes, unbend thy bow, quench thy fire, and which is more subdue thy body with punishment: and when that I have rased and cut off this thy haire, which I have dressed with myne owne hands, and made to glitter like gold, and when I have clipped ...
— The Golden Asse • Lucius Apuleius
... party at all was a compliment. He helped Miss Priscilla and me unpack the suppers out on Tilting Rock, and acted only a little more grown-up than Tony and Pink, I don't know whether I quite liked to have him unbend so far as to throw a biscuit back at Tony. He is too great a man for that, and I was relieved when he took the Colonel's horse and started back to town, because he said he had something to attend to. It is more comfortable for me to have him on the pedestal I keep for him, than down ...
— Phyllis • Maria Thompson Daviess
... deportment made the back of his jacket hang quite far away from his legs; and so small and sloping were his shoulders that the jacket seemed ever so likely to slip right off. I became aware, too, that when he bowed he did not unbend his back, but only his neck—the length of the neck accounting for the depth of the bow. His hands were tiny, even for his size, and they ...
— And Even Now - Essays • Max Beerbohm
... was to tender profuse apologies for its homeliness, on the plea that it is refreshing at times to lay aside ceremonial magnificence and unbend in rural simplicity, though it is not humanly possible to unbend oneself upon the thorny bosoms of chairs and couches severely upholstered with the prickling hairs of ...
— Baboo Jabberjee, B.A. • F. Anstey
... the subtle something of mystery and charm? Why could she not unbend and tell him the meaning in those fathomless, dark eyes?—What could they look like, if filled with love ...
— The Reason Why • Elinor Glyn
... fallen. What there was of it was fair, and the sea was almost as smooth as a mill-pond. Had it been rough we could scarcely have attempted the work. We had first to unreeve all the ropes, and unbend all the sails. We then selected two much stouter spars than before for fresh masts, got the standing rigging over their heads, and by means of tackles got them set up to the stumps of the fore and main masts, next securing them much more effectually we hoped than the former jury-masts ...
— Peter Trawl - The Adventures of a Whaler • W. H. G. Kingston
... landscape scenery through which the coach was lumbering along,—these things, together with an indescribable magnetic something, drew us before long into one of those short-lived traveller's intimacies, in which we unbend with the more complacency because the intercourse is by its very nature transient, and makes no implicit demands ...
— The Message • Honore de Balzac
... in her mother's laugh nor unbend in the least. "As there is no dancing," she said, "and everybody is going, I thought you would prefer to ...
— The Marriage of Elinor • Margaret Oliphant
... himself had seemed hitherto at an immeasurable distance from Cecil, and had generally appeared to expect to be treated with the same sort of respect as would have been shown to a school 'senior;' but now, wonderful to relate, a change came over him, and he condescended to unbend not only a little, but a very great deal. It actually seemed as if he had begun to respect Cecil! No one but a schoolboy, with an admired and venerated elder brother rather given to snubbing, can quite realize how astonishing this change appeared to the person most concerned. For Percy ...
— Holiday Tales • Florence Wilford
... that can't be a boy with his children deserves to have none. Now the reason I am a bachelor is that I feared I could never unbend, being ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 3, Issue 17, March, 1859 • Various
... all very well in their way, but a seamanlike job aloft, on a bright morning, is something stirring to begin the day with. A clear head to find one's way, and a sharp hand to unbend the gear and get the yard canted for lowering; then, with a glance at the fore (where fumblers are in difficulties with their lifts), the prideful hail to the deck, "All ...
— The Brassbounder - A Tale of the Sea • David W. Bone
... even attempting once or twice to tease Diana, in a boy's offhand manner. That small person, however, had become conscious of the fact that Enoch was not interested in her, and she had withdrawn into herself with a pride and self-control that was highly amusing to her father. Nor did she unbend during ...
— The Enchanted Canyon • Honore Willsie Morrow
... easily formed to religious discipline. When persons are twenty years of age, or older, their minds and characters are less pliable; it is harder to unbend and remould them: "A young man, according to his way, even when he is old, lie will not depart ...
— Vocations Explained - Matrimony, Virginity, The Religious State and The Priesthood • Anonymous
... the delegates came on board, and, abusing our men for allowing the Clyde to escape without firing into her, ordered them to bring the Saint Fiorenzo in and place her between the Inflexible and Director, to unbend our sails, and to send our gunpowder on board the Sandwich, the flag-ship of the so-called Admiral Parker. So enraged were our people with these orders, that one of the quarter-masters, John Aynsley, came aft, and in the name of the ship's company, begged ...
— The Ferryman of Brill - and other stories • William H. G. Kingston
... an English garden's shadiest spot, A structure stands, and welcomes many a breeze; Lonely, and simple as a Ploughman's cot, Where Monarchs may unbend, who ...
— Broad Grins • George Colman, the Younger
... creature at most times that for long his home life escaped our observation, but at last a few paragraphs, if not a chapter of it, have been secured, and we find that this shy creature, in ill odour among cattlemen as noted, is a rare and lovely character when permitted to unbend in a congenial group. Sturdy, strong and dogged, and brave to the last ditch, the more we know of the Badger the more ...
— Wild Animals at Home • Ernest Thompson Seton
... serious this evening, but that did not interfere with her comeliness or her pleasant manners. I found her warmth gratifying, and prepared to unbend more than usual. ...
— Uncle Max • Rosa Nouchette Carey
... they bind, they circumcise Charles Fox. Fair Schwellenbergen smiles the sport to see, And all the maids of honour cry 'Te! He!' Be these the rural pastimes that attend Great Brunswick's leisure: these shall best unbend His royal mind, whene'er from state withdrawn, He treads the velvet of his Richmond lawn; These shall prolong his Asiatic dream, Though Europe's balance trembles on its beam. And thou, Sir William! while thy plastic hand Creates each wonder ...
— Specimens with Memoirs of the Less-known British Poets, Complete • George Gilfillan
... pipe? Tobacco, whatever its enemies may have said, or may yet say, is the friend of peace, the foe of strife, and the promoter of geniality and good fellowship. Mrs. Battle, whose serious energies were all given to the great game of whist, unbent her mind, we are told, over a book. Most men unbend over a pipe, even if the book ...
— The Social History of Smoking • G. L. Apperson
... my lad," said the knight, "there is something too much of bravery and pomp in the accidents of royalty. What! Can a king unbend—be merry—a good fellow with his equals? No! And would you or I barter this freedom for a crown?" He shook his head. "Which think you passed the merrier night—or the Queen (God's blessing on ...
— The Panchronicon • Harold Steele Mackaye
... thoroughly aroused by his mulishness, "do you deliberately choose to sacrifice the life of this lady to your bull-headed fanaticism? Do you refuse to unbend your miserable Connecticut sectarianism, your Puritan cant, although by so doing you might keep your comrades from the horrors of the stake? If this is what you mean, I denounce you as unworthy to be called a man, ...
— Prisoners of Chance - The Story of What Befell Geoffrey Benteen, Borderman, - through His Love for a Lady of France • Randall Parrish
... went at once to Dickson's, and found him at home, busy swinging the poker, in deep thought, before the fireplace in his inner office. He was a small man, with an impenetrable, expressionless face, who never was known to unbend himself to a human being. Only two facts were known about him. One was that he was the best swimmer in Exeter, and had saved several lives from drowning, and the other was, that he gave away (for him) large ...
— The Recollections of Geoffrey Hamlyn • Henry Kingsley
... rustic rejoicing. Tables were spread under the trees in the park, where all the peasantry of the neighbourhood were regaled with roast-beef and plum-pudding and oceans of ale. Ready-Money Jack presided at one of the tables, and became so full of good cheer, as to unbend from his usual gravity, to sing a song out of all tune, and give two or three shouts of laughter, that almost electrified his neighbours, like so many peals of thunder. The schoolmaster and the apothecary vied with each other in making speeches over their liquor; and there were ...
— Bracebridge Hall, or The Humorists • Washington Irving
... tried the more extremely. For she being so much left to solitude, she came to greet my return with an increasing fervour that came nigh to overmaster me. These friendly offers I must barbarously cast back; and my rejection sometimes wounded her so cruelly that I must unbend and seek to make it up to her in kindness. So that our time passed in ups and downs, tiffs and disappointments, upon the which I could almost say (if it may be said with ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 11 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... condescend A little with their subjects to unbend! An instance take:—A king of this great land, In days of yore, we understand, Did visit Salisbury's old church so fair: An Earl of Pembroke was the Monarch's guide; Incog. they traveled, shuffling side by side; And into the ...
— The Humourous Poetry of the English Language • James Parton
... that of his fore-legs, it is very difficult to unroll him. An attempt being made to force his coil, he sticks his fore-claws into the scales of his head, and holds on with a death-like grip. At night, however, or when all is quiet, he vouchsafes to unbend himself, and waddles awkwardly about on his short legs, in pursuit of cockroaches, weevils and spiders. [Footnote: The above-described ant-eater is properly the long-tailed Manis, being an African species of the Pangolin. His scaly armor will turn a musket-ball. This animal, with a few other natural ...
— Journal of an African Cruiser • Horatio Bridge
... the gods and thou will have it so, Go; (Can I live once more to bid thee?) go, Where thy misfortunes call thee, and thy fate; Go, guiltless victim of a guilty state! In war, my champion to defend, In peaceful hours, when souls unbend, My brother, and, what's more, my friend! Borne where the foamy billows roar, On seas less dangerous than the shore; Go, where the gods thy refuge have assigned, Go from my sight; ...
— The Works Of John Dryden, Vol. 7 (of 18) - The Duke of Guise; Albion and Albanius; Don Sebastian • John Dryden
... exquisitely illuminated. I have examined, in various parts of Europe, beautiful specimens of the best periods of mediaeval art; but in no one of them have I found anything in the way of illumination more perfect than this which he brought from his monkish brethren. In nothing did he seem to unbend more than in his unfeigned love for religious art as it exists in Russia. He discussed with me one evening sundry photographs of the new religious paintings in the cathedral of Kieff in a spirit which revealed this feeling for religious art as one of ...
— Autobiography of Andrew Dickson White Volume II • Andrew Dickson White
... any degree of urgency. In fine weather, it is usual to place the studding-sails in the rigging, with all their gear bent, in readiness to be whipped up to the yard-arm at a moment's warning; but when a breeze such as we are now considering is on the rise, it is thought best to unbend the tacks and haulyards, and to stow the sails in some convenient place, either on the booms, between the boats, or in the hammock-nettings. For the same reason, the small sails are sent on deck, together with as much top hamper as can readily be moved. These things ...
— The Lieutenant and Commander - Being Autobigraphical Sketches of His Own Career, from - Fragments of Voyages and Travels • Basil Hall
... Dominico very difficult to describe, but very impressive to a stranger. All these peculiarities were developed the first or second day of our acquaintance. About the third he seemed to grow impatient, hummed over a few gems from unknown operas, and was less disposed than usual to unbend himself. There was evidently a coolness growing up between us. I suspected it originated in my hat, which was really very shabby; and fancied I detected a supercilious expression in his eye as it ranged over my coat and down to my boots. At length he said, "Monsieur, you appear ...
— The Land of Thor • J. Ross Browne
... made her brother unbend his brows, for he longed to get at his books again, and the idea of being tutor to his "man-servant" did not ...
— St. Nicholas Magazine for Boys and Girls, Vol. 5, July 1878, No. 9 • Various
... table because 'twas not ripe enough, though but a few weeks before she had been drinking penny ale with a relish, and that as sour as verjuice. And, indeed, she did carry it mighty high and artificial, wherever respect and humility were to be commanded. But it was pretty to see how she would unbend and become her natural self where her heart was touched by some tender sentiment. How she would empty her pockets to give to any one with a piteous tale, how she would get from her horse to pluck wild-flowers by the roadside, and how, ...
— A Set of Rogues • Frank Barrett
... individual man surrounded with his individual hopes and sufferings, but of these she knew nothing. They had talked of all things, but it seemed to her that of the real man she had never had a glimpse. Never did he unbend, never did he lift the mask he wore. He was interesting, but very unhuman, and he paraded his ideas and his sneers as the lay figures did the mail-armour on the castle stairway. She did not know if he were a good or a bad man; she fancied he was not very good, and then she ...
— Muslin • George Moore
... authority glanced at one another, and began to unbend;—if this shabby, untidy being knew Sir Roger de Launay, he was perhaps someone of importance. After a brief consultation together, they asked him to wait while a messenger was ...
— Temporal Power • Marie Corelli
... are reserved and undemonstrative, like most North-country people, he says, but are very tender-hearted at bottom. That means, I suppose, that they would be stiff and polite all the time I was there, and begin slowly to unbend just as I was coming away. Frederica, the girl, goes in for higher education, and doesn't care a bit about going about with other girls. I know they will be disappointed with me. Ned is so silly, and he is sure to tell them."— She stopped, sweetly simpering, and the hearers ...
— A Houseful of Girls • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... a period in the evening, or more generally towards the still small hours of the morning, in which we so far unbend as to take a single glass of hot whisky and water. We will neither defend the practice nor excuse it. We state it as a fact which must be borne in mind by the readers of this article; for we know not how, ...
— The Note-Books of Samuel Butler • Samuel Butler
... exhibited a completed spray for Mrs. Toomey's approval and commented upon the swiftness with which time sped in congenial company. A delightful afternoon was especially appreciated in a community where there were so few with whom one could really unbend and talk freely—to all of which Mrs. Toomey agreed thoroughly, understanding, as she did, ...
— The Fighting Shepherdess • Caroline Lockhart
... the lustrous piles of silks and velvets which covered the white and gold tables, they appeared to float through an atmosphere of eternal enchantment. Watching them, Gabriella wondered idly if they could ever unbend at the waist, if they could ever let down those elaborate and intricate piles of hair. Then she overheard the tallest and most arrogant of them remark, "I'm just crazy about him, but he's dead broke," ...
— Life and Gabriella - The Story of a Woman's Courage • Ellen Glasgow
... him, and no place for a bride in the humble Dutch house at New Windsor where Washington had gone into winter quarters. But the distance was not great, and he could hope for flying leaves of absence. Washington was not unsympathetic to lovers; he had been known to unbend and advise his aides when complications threatened or a siege seemed hopeless; and he had given Hamilton the longest leave possible. Nevertheless, the bridegroom set forth, one harsh January morning, on ...
— The Conqueror • Gertrude Franklin Atherton
... himself to have any warmth of feeling for Donald. He met him almost every evening either at the Hamiltons' or down at the corner and, while he could find no fault in the young man's conduct, he never quite forgave the prank he had played and did not unbend to him as he did to the others. Donald's honest heart was filled with remorse for the mischief he had unwittingly caused and in his straightforward fashion he went to the minister to make an explanation and, if need be, offer an apology. But his friendly advances were ...
— Duncan Polite - The Watchman of Glenoro • Marian Keith
... K.C.B., I'll teach you how we rule the sea, And terrify the simple Gauls; And how the Saxon and the Celt Their Europe-shaking blows have dealt With Maxim gun and Nordenfelt (Or will when the occasion calls). If sailor-like you'd play your cards, Unbend your sails and lower your yards, Unstep your masts—you'll never want 'em more. Though we're no longer hearts of oak, Yet we can steer and we can stoke, And thanks to coal, and thanks to coke, We never ...
— The Complete Plays of Gilbert and Sullivan - The 14 Gilbert And Sullivan Plays • William Schwenk Gilbert and Arthur Sullivan
... found it necessary to unbend a little more. He unbuttoned, so to speak, the two bottom buttons of the waistcoat ...
— The Island Mystery • George A. Birmingham
... mean face. There are looks that paint upon the human countenance the whole of a life, as a flash of lightning paints upon the blackness of the night miles on miles of landscape. That look of Mrs. Ellersly's—stern disapproval at her daughter, stern command that she be more civil, that she unbend—showed me the old woman's soul. And I say that no old harpy presiding over a dive is more full of the venom of the hideous calculations of the market for flesh and blood than is a woman whose life is wrapped up ...
— The Deluge • David Graham Phillips
... dulness? I say an Englishman of the genteel classes. An honest groom jokes and hobs-and-nobs and makes his way with the kitchen-maids, for there is good social nature in the man; his master dare not unbend. Look at him, how he scowls at you on your entering an inn-room; think how you scowl yourself to meet his scowl. To-day, as we were walking and staring about the place, a worthy old gentleman in a carriage, seeing a pair of strangers, took off his hat and bowed very gravely ...
— Little Travels and Roadside Sketches • William Makepeace Thackeray
... his soul, that often required to emerge from its deep reflections, unbend itself, and alternately disport or repose in utter self-abandonment. It dismissed thought, as it were, in order to become a child again; to deliver itself over to all the caprices of those myriad changeful ...
— My Recollections of Lord Byron • Teresa Guiccioli
... enable an hour to pass agreeably that has no better employment, I am content, and gratified with the attainment of all I ever hoped or designed by an unpretending publication, which I cheerfully dedicate to all who love to unbend their minds from a critical attitude, and can lounge goodnaturedly over leaves written by a traveller as idle and careless as themselves, and who assures them that no one can think more humbly of his production ...
— A Visit to the Monastery of La Trappe in 1817 • W.D. Fellowes
... monarchs may at times unbend, And sink the dull superior in the friend. The jaded scholar his lov'd closet quits, To chat with folks below, and save his wits: Peeps at the world awhile, with curious look. Then flies again with pleasure to his book. The tradesman hastes ...
— Real Life In London, Volumes I. and II. • Pierce Egan
... silent, but Robert saw that he did not unbend, and de Galisonniere, feeling that it was unwise to pursue the topic, turned his attention to the mighty river and its lofty ...
— The Hunters of the Hills • Joseph Altsheler
... whose fidelity he had indubitable proofs; he therefore gave him the charge of everything, when he went to a country house of his, a small distance from Paris, where he sometimes stayed for a week or so to unbend his mind and enjoy the benefit of ...
— Lives Of The Most Remarkable Criminals Who have been Condemned and Executed for Murder, the Highway, Housebreaking, Street Robberies, Coining or other offences • Arthur L. Hayward
... soft voice with his friend and French to us. He asked a few questions as to our nationality, and made some other commonplace remarks. When I told him I was an American he seemed to unbend a little, and said, "I like the Americans; they are an honorable, ...
— In the Courts of Memory 1858-1875. • L. de Hegermann-Lindencrone
... was hardly less affectionate to my aunt than to me, and often told her of the time when she was afraid she was 'a cross old thing'. I never saw my aunt unbend more systematically to anyone. She courted Jip, though Jip never responded; listened, day after day, to the guitar, though I am afraid she had no taste for music; never attacked the Incapables, though ...
— David Copperfield • Charles Dickens
... heard her request he good-humoredly agreed, for he found it hard to deny his pretty young wife anything, and so the order was issued. Imagine the horror of the grown-up courtiers when they heard the command! Unbend sufficiently to dress as goblins and nymphs? Never! The saucy young Queen and her friends must be taught a lesson. As soon as she knew of their disapproval she would of ...
— Historic Boyhoods • Rupert Sargent Holland
... prolong their sittings in his honour. Nor was Burns, if he found them honest and hearty fellows, the man to say them nay. He was eminently a social and sociable being, and in company such as theirs he could unbend himself as he might not do in the houses of punctilious society. The etiquette of that howff of the Crochallan Fencibles in the Anchor Close or of Johnnie Dowie's tavern in Libberton's Wynd was not the etiquette of drawing-rooms; and the poet was free to ...
— Robert Burns - Famous Scots Series • Gabriel Setoun
... with more than ordinary attention to my studies, it is my usual custom to relax and unbend it in the conversation of such as are rather easy than shining companions. This I find particularly necessary for me before I retire, to rest, in order to draw my slumbers upon me by degrees, and fall asleep insensibly. ...
— Isaac Bickerstaff • Richard Steele
... air of a high priest who condescends for once to unbend and frolic with lesser mortals). Ah! it'll be your turn ...
— Love Among the Chickens - A Story of the Haps and Mishaps on an English Chicken Farm • P. G. Wodehouse
... the way to the Sylph, and getting on board of her by the aid of one of the boats, they proceeded to unbend ...
— All Aboard; or, Life on the Lake - A Sequel to "The Boat Club" • Oliver Optic
... qualifications of politeness and good sense are of more useful currency in the commerce of life. By many, conversation is esteemed as a theatre or a school: but, after the morning has been occupied by the labours of the library, I wish to unbend rather than to exercise my mind; and in the interval between tea and supper I am far from disdaining the innocent amusement of a game at cards. Lausanne is peopled by a numerous gentry, whose companionable idleness ...
— Memoirs of My Life and Writings • Edward Gibbon
... He said he had been afraid he would never get the chance of speaking to me, I was always so surrounded. I told him I had only come now because of the cramp. I am quite determined, Mamma, not to unbend to him at all. I was not once agreeable, or anything but stiff and snubbing, and I am sure he has never been treated like that before, but it is awfully hard work keeping it up all the time, and when we got in to lunch I ...
— The Visits of Elizabeth • Elinor Glyn
... mother's position. He sympathized with her and pitied her. Dolores, all blushes, lifted her eyelids and looked at him. Her grandfather drew her towards him with a smile of real tenderness, and, unbending as none had seen him unbend before since Alan's death, told her all the sad history as he himself envisaged it. Dolores listened and shuddered. The old man was vanquished. He would have taken her once to himself, he said, if Herminia had ...
— The Woman Who Did • Grant Allen
... superior when his grandmother brought them together after the meeting was over. If Helen noticed the superiority, she was certainly not over-awed by it, for she was so simple and natural and pleasant that he was obliged to unbend and be natural too. In fact, at their third meeting he himself spoke of the interview in the lumber office and again expressed his thanks for warning him of ...
— The Portygee • Joseph Crosby Lincoln
... grown strangely silent, and reticent, and self-absorbed. Old Laborde had made advances which had been coldly repelled. Cazeneau, also, had tried to draw him out, but without success. To the lieutenant only was he at all inclined to unbend. Yet this strange reserve did not last long, and at length Pere Michel regained his old manner, and received the advances of Laborde with sufficient courtesy, while to Mimi he showed that paternal gentleness which ...
— The Lily and the Cross - A Tale of Acadia • James De Mille
... settled determination to unbend to him in no way and to have no dealings with him, were stronger than her impulse; and the struggling ...
— Children of the Whirlwind • Leroy Scott
... with him, knowing that the transgressions of the parents are visited on their offspring, and that there was an angry mark upon him at his birth. I have sat with him and his father, seeing the weakness of his father yearning to unbend to him; and forcing it back, that the child might work out his release in bondage and hardship. I have seen him, with his mother's face, looking up at me in awe from his little books, and trying to soften me with his mother's ...
— Little Dorrit • Charles Dickens
... down her head in silence. "There is a Judge above who knows the circumstances, gives me now His hand, and will judge me in the balance of truth and mercy, when my enemies are at my feet," flashes through her thoughts, and strengthens the inner nature. But her tongue has lost its power; her feelings unbend to the thought that she is in a criminal court, arraigned before a Judge. She has no answer to make to the Judge's questions, but gives way to her emotions, and breaks out into loud sobs. Several minutes, during which a sympathizing silence is manifest, pass, when ...
— Justice in the By-Ways - A Tale of Life • F. Colburn Adams
... the Literary Society and their keener but less noble contentions in the Senate Hall, the Glasgow professors used to unbend their bows again in the simple convivialities of "Mr. Robin Simson's Club." Mr. Robin Simson was the venerable Professor of Mathematics, equally celebrated and beloved, known through all the world for his rediscovery of the porisms of Euclid, but in Glasgow ...
— Life of Adam Smith • John Rae
... always allowed to pass without any further remark than what politeness requires—as: 'Shall I send you some more of this blanquette?' or, 'With pleasure, sir;' and so forth. When dessert-time approached, however, he generally began to unbend, to take part in the general conversation, and throw in here and there a piquant anecdote. He did this with so much grace, that had it not been for the diamond ring, I should have been disposed to consider him as a ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 435 - Volume 17, New Series, May 1, 1852 • Various
... blamed the custom of some who eat too much, and afterwards use violent exercises; but he approved of eating till nature be satisfied, and of a moderate exercise after it, believing that method to be an advantage to health, and proper to unbend and divert the mind. In his clothes he was neither nice nor costly; and what I say of his clothes ought likewise to be understood of his whole way of living. Never any of his friends became covetous in his conversation, and he reclaimed them from that sordid ...
— The Memorable Thoughts of Socrates • Xenophon
... at this meeting, and marked the fact that the intercourse between Arnest and Marston was official only—that they did not unbend to each other in the least. He was grieved to see it, for he knew the good qualities of both, and he had a ...
— Lessons in Life, For All Who Will Read Them • T. S. Arthur
... Agni! Spread out against all foes! Burn down the foes, O god with the sharp weapon! When kindled, O Agni, burn down like dry brushwood, the man who exercises malice against us. Stand upright, strike the foes away from us! Make manifest thy divine powers, O Agni! Unbend the strong bows of those who incite demons against us. Crush all enemies, be they relations or strangers. He knows thy favor, O youngest one, who makes a way for a sacred speech like this. Mayest thou ...
— Sacred Books of the East • Various
... not help wishing more than once that evening, that Mr. Jaggers had had an Aged in Gerrard Street, or a Stinger, or a Something, or a Somebody, to unbend his brows a little. It was an uncomfortable consideration on a twenty-first birthday, that coming of age at all seemed hardly worth while in such a guarded and suspicious world as he made of it. He was a ...
— Great Expectations • Charles Dickens
... Mr. Heatherbloom continued to linger in his last position. It promised to be a record-making situation from the standpoint of longevity; he had never "lasted" at any one task so long before. Miss Van Rolsen, to his consternation, seemed to unbend somewhat before him, as if she were beginning—actually!—to be more prepossessed in his favor. These evidences that he was rising in the stern lady's good graces filled Mr. Heatherbloom with new dismay; destiny certainly seemed to be making ...
— A Man and His Money • Frederic Stewart Isham
... graduate is too mild a phrase! Come, unbend, Phoebe. You don't expect me to call you Miss Metz or to kiss ...
— Patchwork - A Story of 'The Plain People' • Anna Balmer Myers
... Satanstoe, and Mr. Worden was present. Jason had a liberal supply of puritanical notions, which were bred in-and-in in his moral, and I had almost said, in his physical system; nevertheless, he could unbend; and I did not fail to observe that very evening, a gleam of covert enjoyment on his sombre countenance, as the hot-stuff, the cards, and the pipes were produced, an hour or two before supper,—a meal we always had hot and comfortable. This covert satisfaction, however, was not exhibited ...
— Satanstoe • James Fenimore Cooper
... we did after mooring the ship, was to unbend all the sails; there not being one but what wanted repair. Indeed, both our sails and rigging had sustained much damage in beating ...
— A Voyage Towards the South Pole and Round the World, Volume 1 • James Cook
... illustration on page 215 "Rip" has but very slightly exaggerated the effect of the sinuous curves into which Ranji's body resolves itself before he makes a stroke. That he can unbend faster than any other cricketer past or present is an incontestable fact. The yarn of how in a match at Cambridge he once brought off a catch with such amazing rapidity that the batsman, under the impression that the ball had travelled near the boundary, continued running till ...
— The Harmsworth Magazine, v. 1, 1898-1899, No. 2 • Various
... out into the friendliest and most intimate of smiles. Wherever we went we were accompanied by a retinue straight out of the Arabian Nights, patiently awaiting the moment when we should tire; should seek out the table of a sidewalk cafe; and should, in our relaxed mood, be ready to unbend ...
— African Camp Fires • Stewart Edward White
... day of her execution, her husband, Lord Guildford, desired permission to see her; but she refused her consent, and informed him by a message, that the tenderness of their parting would overcome the fortitude of both, and would too much unbend their minds from that constancy which their approaching end required of them: their separation, she said, would be only for a moment; and they would soon rejoin each other in a scene where their affections would be forever united, and where death, disappointment, and misfortunes, ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part C. - From Henry VII. to Mary • David Hume
... courtesy of a Southern gentleman to refuse. After she should be his wife he might of course confess to her that he was too poor to marry, for in that relation even a Southern gentleman of the highest tone must sometimes unbend. But he didn't in the least long for this arrangement, and was conscious that the most pertinent sequel to her conjecture would be for him to take up ...
— The Bostonians, Vol. I (of II) • Henry James
... never, no never, ascend To the mountain-pass glories, shall I, In the cheer of the chase to unbend; Enough, it is ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel, Volume III - The Songs of Scotland of the Past Half Century • Various
... schoolfellow [1] of his who followed him to Cambridge in 1792, "was very studious, but his reading was desultory and capricious. He took little exercise merely for the sake of exercise: but he was ready at any time to unbend his mind in conversation; and, for the sake of this, his room, (the ground-floor room on the right hand of the staircase facing the great gate,) was a constant rendezvous of conversation-loving friends. I will not call them loungers, for they did not call to kill ...
— Biographia Epistolaris, Volume 1. • Coleridge, ed. Turnbull |
