"Whiff" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... and the start of lightning. Merely the colour of a hill at sunset was enough to flash back her thoughts to an hour when she was looking for Evan; or a certain sort of starlight night would recall a particular walk along the meadow fence; or a gust and whiff of the wind would bring with it the thrill that belonged to one certain stormy September night that never faded in her remembrance. Or the smell of coffee sometimes, when it was just at a certain stage of preparation, would turn her heart-sick. These associations ...
— Diana • Susan Warner
... find it difficult to believe that she had won, or could possibly win the love of a lover at her age;—she might even resent it,—no one could tell. And so the days of April paced softly on, in bloom and sunlight, till May came in with a blaze of colour and radiance, and the last whiff of cold wind blew itself away across the sea. The "biting nor'easter," concerning which the comic press gives itself up to senseless parrot-talk with each recurrence of the May month, no matter how warm and beautiful that month may be, was a "thing foregone and clean forgotten,"—and ...
— The Treasure of Heaven - A Romance of Riches • Marie Corelli
... Surtee man grinned; the winch began again, and the voices that called: 'Lower away! Stop her!' were as familiar as the friendly whiff from the lascars' galley or the slap of bare feet along the deck. But for the passage of a few impertinent years, I should have gone without hesitation to share their rice. Serangs used to be very kind to little white children below the age of caste. Most familiar of all ...
— Letters of Travel (1892-1913) • Rudyard Kipling
... him; but now her despairing look frightened him. To the neighbors, who looked inquisitively as he sat by the mill-door, smoking, he complained of the quality of his tobacco, vowing that it made his eyes so tender that they watered upon the slightest whiff. ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 2, Issue 12, October, 1858 • Various
... a down east voyage! I remember of sailing by Nantucket many years ago, on my return from Liverpool, (he did not add that he had worked his passage) and though some twenty miles distant, we fancied that we got a whiff of the hump-backs. Our captain was a jolly sort of fellow, and would have us land-lubbers believe that his experienced eye could see half across the ocean, but he found we were too smart for him, when he told us he could see a church-steeple looming ...
— Natalie - A Gem Among the Sea-Weeds • Ferna Vale
... sat conversing as usual over the brasero, a shabby looking fellow in an old rusty cloak walked into the room: he came straight up to the place where we were sitting, produced a paper cigar, which he lighted at a coal, and taking a whiff or two, looked at me: "Carracho," said he, ...
— The Bible in Spain • George Borrow
... Apparently he had interrupted the scrubbing of the kitchen floor, for the tiles were wet three quarters of the way over, and on a dry oasis stood a pail, a scrubbing brush, and a morsel of soap. Among less honourable odours he was glad to distinguish a good strong whiff of carbolic. ...
— Nightfall • Anthony Pryde
... the town, or Boers from outlying farms, and not a man there but was waiting a certain signal to clear out and leave Gueldersdorp to her fate, or remain in the place on a salary paid by the Republics as a spy. The English customer who came in knew at one whiff of the thick atmosphere that it was unhealthy, and if the man happened to be alone, he ordered, and paid, and drank, and went out quickly. If he happened to be with friends, he pointedly addressed his conversation to his countrymen, and left with a certain degree ...
— The Dop Doctor • Clotilde Inez Mary Graves
... moreover, was a rather sophisticated young lady. One would never have seen her, in the mornings, munching a hunk of bread-and-butter "as long as from here to Easter." No; Jeannette has fulfilled her part, providing a whiff of marjoram and cottage flowers for the castle chambers. She has read, written and said her prayers. She has the firm outline, the rosy cheeks, the simplicity of a Watteau peasant-girl—nothing of the Greuze languish, with its hint of a cruche cassee. She is as fresh as a March wind. Let ...
— In a Green Shade - A Country Commentary • Maurice Hewlett
... read in the papers that the Thames in London is most horrible. I have to cross Waterloo or London Bridge to get to the railroad when I come down here, and I can certify that the offensive smells, even in that short whiff, have been of a most head-and-stomach-distending nature. Nobody knows what is to be done; at least everybody knows a plan, and everybody else knows it won't do; in the meantime cartloads of chloride of lime ...
— The Letters of Charles Dickens - Vol. 2 (of 3), 1857-1870 • Charles Dickens
... asked for delay, which was grudgingly granted him. Then he and his mother and friend fled over seas: he feverishly determined to get well and cheat the fates. But, after a halcyon time in Palestine and Constantinople, a whiff of poisoned air at Cannes, on their way home, acting on a low constitutional state, settled matters. Robert was laid up for weeks with malarious fever, and when he struggled out again into the hot Riviera sunshine it was clear to himself ...
— Robert Elsmere • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... think so, Governor Hamilton," Helm responded, "but I should imagine that I ought to know the crack of a Kentucky rifle. I've heard one occasionally in my life. Besides, I got a whiff ...
— Alice of Old Vincennes • Maurice Thompson
... lighted and brought to Bent Horn. Solemnly he pointed the stem to the north, the south, the east, and the west. Last of all, he lifted it towards the sun. Then he spoke. "How—how—how," he said slowly. Then in silence he smoked it, but only to take one long whiff, after which he held it in turn to the mouths of the other chiefs, that ...
— Timid Hare • Mary Hazelton Wade
... great poles in leathern sockets slung from the shoulders, and their acolytes before and behind who kept the banner upright by straining at crimson halyards, sweated most of all. Every foot was grey with dust, and the dark trousers of boys and men showed dust. The steamy whiff of humanity struck Edwin's nostrils. Up hill and down dale the procession had already walked over two miles. Yet it was alert, joyous, and expectant: a chattering procession. From the lorry rose a continuous faint shriek of infantile voices. Edwin was saddened as by pathos. I believe ...
— Clayhanger • Arnold Bennett
... them? The answer was supplied a little later, for as the Flying Fish, with stopped engines, slowly drifted to within about a quarter of a mile of her, the party of curious gazers suddenly caught a whiff of horrible odour that told the whole story. She was a ship with a ...
— With Airship and Submarine - A Tale of Adventure • Harry Collingwood
... white-capped mountains beyond, and on the handsome promenade the best-gowned of Europe, all in the brilliant sunshine of a soft spring day—what could be more charming? And then, suddenly, your unwilling nostrils breathe in a strong whiff of sewage. Have you been mistaken? Surely you are dreaming. The Casino dances on the water. A bevy of girls come out of the Hotel Ruhl to join the Lenten noon-day throng. Nothing disagreeable like sewage—but there it is again! ...
— Riviera Towns • Herbert Adams Gibbons
... of bright conceit; And those old Saxe vases, out of the heat On that lowest shelf beside the door, Have a sort of Ideal, "couleur d'or". Every castle of the air Sleeps in the fine black grains, and there Are seeds for every romance, or light Whiff of a dream for a summer night. I supply to every want and taste." 'Twas slowly said, in no great haste He seemed to push his wares, but I Dumfounded listened. By and by A log on the fire broke in two. He looked up quickly, "Sir, and you?" I ...
— Sword Blades and Poppy Seed • Amy Lowell
... remained the possibility that Bower was really a traveler that day by idle chance; but Spencer blew aside this alternative with the first whiff of smoke from the cigar he lit mechanically as soon as ...
— The Silent Barrier • Louis Tracy
... quitted St Helena that a strange sail was reported on the starboard bow; and as they neared her, it was evident that her foremast was gone, and that she was otherwise in a disabled state. When the Indiaman was within a mile, the stranger threw out neutral colours, and hoisted a whiff, half-mast down, as a signal that she was in distress. Newton ordered the ship to be kept away, and when alongside of the vessel, lowered down a boat, and sent the third mate to ascertain what assistance could be afforded. With sailors, thank God! distress ...
— Newton Forster • Frederick Marryat
... graceful and vigorous, but yet in his walk there was something just perceptible which betrayed in him a being already touched by decay, weak, and on the road to ruin. And all at once there was a whiff of spirits in the wood. Marya Vassilyevna was filled with dread and pity for this man going to his ruin for no visible cause or reason, and it came into her mind that if she had been his wife or sister she ...
— The Schoolmistress and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov
... heard nothing of his lost draft at Alexandria, and was much relieved thereby, became incorrigible when he smelt the whiff of the trenches brought by these heroes. He would invite our subscriptions to the daily sweepstake with the words: "Come along, fork out. Last few sweeps of your life." And he would take me aside and say: "I suppose I shall be ...
— Tell England - A Study in a Generation • Ernest Raymond
... finished the steaming and freezing and was resting. A maid brought a tray of cigarettes, those dainty little thin ones with gilt tips. There seemed to be several kinds. I managed to try some of them. One at least I know was doped, although I only had a whiff of it. I think after they got to know you they'd serve anything from a cocktail in a teacup to the latest fads. I am sure that I saw one woman taking ...
— The Ear in the Wall • Arthur B. Reeve
... seas with Jonadab Kilroot, master of the stolid barque, "Merchant of London," I say nothing, or as good as nothing. Master Kilroot was a noisy, bulky man, with a whiff of the tar-barrel ever about him and a heart as stout as a ship's biscuit. He feared God always, and drubbed his men whenever it was necessary; in his estimation the office of sea-captain was the most important ...
— The Yeoman Adventurer • George W. Gough
... why every one is fond of Auger. It is because he is reassuring. Seeing him and listening to him one opines that suffering is not such a horrible thing after all. Those who live far from the battle-field, and visit hospitals to get a whiff of the war, look at Auger and go away well satisfied with everything: current events, him, and themselves. They are persuaded that the country is well defended, that our soldiers are brave, and that wounds and mutilations, though they may be serious ...
— The New Book Of Martyrs • Georges Duhamel
... apt to feel the depression of such circumstances; and when you add to the other discomforts, that of a steady, pouring rain, with a sound of fall in every whiff of wind, you will understand that Marion was to have comparatively little help from outside influences. She felt the gloom in her heart deepen as the day went on. She was astonished and mortified at herself to find that the old feelings ...
— The Chautauqua Girls At Home • Pansy, AKA Isabella M. Alden
... whiff, then." She leaned forward, holding the tip of her cigarette to his. As she did so, he noted, with a purely impersonal enjoyment, how evenly the black lashes were set in her smooth white lids, and how the purplish shade beneath them ...
— House of Mirth • Edith Wharton
... Ellis,' she said brightly, shaking hands with me when Andy and I were going to turn in. 'And don't forget your pipe. Here it is! I know that Bushmen like to have a whiff or two when they turn in. Walter smokes in bed. I don't mind. You can smoke all ...
— Joe Wilson and His Mates • Henry Lawson
... he was not alarmed about you; that you had other fish to fry, eh! Well, it's too late for explanations to-night. What's that? Very odd, I thought I saw some one going out at the door—just a whiff of the coat-tails. I think my digestion must be out of order. I'll go into the study and get my pills, and then I think I'll go ...
— Phoebe, Junior • Mrs [Margaret] Oliphant
... Still, was it not worth while to have invented it? However the idea was evoluted, just consider the glamour it throws over thorns and thistles, as we dig through life's long day of toil. As Trollope's stout widow says, when choosing her second: "It's a whiff of the rocks and the valleys." (So she had her marriage settlements tightly drawn up, to enjoy her romance comfortably.) Consider this epitaph—a ...
— The Idler, Volume III., Issue XIII., February 1893 - An Illustrated Monthly. Edited By Jerome K. Jerome & Robert Barr • Various
... have given to either Phorenice or myself little enough of concern, as they are the trivial and common incidents of every siege; but the mammoth on which we rode had not been so properly schooled. When the first blue whiff of smoke came to us down the windings of the street, the huge red beast hoisted its trunk, and began to sway its head uneasily. When the smoke drifts grew more dense, and here and there a tongue of flame showed pale beneath ...
— The Lost Continent • C. J. Cutcliffe Hyne
... pipe. He drew a whiff, and when the fire glowed, he turned the pipestem toward the seam of the skins above the doorway. He looked up towards the sky, saying, "Ho, friend, here is the pipe. We must smoke with you this last time. And then we must separate. ...
— Myths and Legends of the Great Plains • Unknown
... but a weary sigh followed the last symmetrical whiff of a Sullivan which he flung into my fire before ...
— A Thief in the Night • E. W. Hornung
... unspeakable loveliness and grandeur of the prospect; the thousand varied incidents of the too-brief journey; the short, sharp excitement of the landing; the awe and curiosity of the impromptu crowd invariably on the ground before the balloon, and reluctantly leaving it only when the last whiff of gas is rolled out of it and the last rope thrown into the wagon; the moonlight ride to the station with the gas-bag for a pillow and the brain too busy with the strangeness of the day for much talk,—all this and more, in endless diversity of circumstance ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, Vol. 26, August, 1880 - of Popular Literature and Science • Various
... entered, both from the whiff he emanated as he shook out of his overcoat, and from a great sense of his weariness. Loading ...
— The Vertical City • Fannie Hurst
... bung of which they often applied to their mouths with great perseverance and satisfaction. At some distance from them I perceived another person in the same garb, sitting in a pensive solitary manner, entertaining himself with a whiff of tobacco, from the stump of a pipe as black as jet. The appearance of distress never failed to attract my regard and compassion. I approached this forlorn tar with a view to offer him my assistance, and, ...
— The Adventures of Roderick Random • Tobias Smollett
... really love the woods never pass through city streets, and get a whiff of hard-wood smoke, but what they draw in a big breath, and immediately picture the camp fire burning, with good chums seated around enjoying a tempting meal; and the boardinghouse spread looks less appetizing than ever after ...
— Chums of the Camp Fire • Lawrence J. Leslie
... in and out of Ann's bedroom like a child tentatively trying to inveigle a grown-up person into playing hide-and-seek. With every puff a big cluster of roses, which had climbed to the sill, swayed forward and peeped inside, sending a whiff of delicate perfume across to where Ann was kneeling, surrounded by trunks and suitcases, unpacking her belongings. Pleasant little sounds of life floated up from outdoors—the clucking of a hen, the stamping of the bay cob as Billy Brewster groomed him, whistling softly through ...
— The Vision of Desire • Margaret Pedler
... it is afterwards made up into small pills, about the size of a pea, for smoking. One of these being put into the small tube that projects from the side of the opium pipe, that tube is applied to a lamp, and the pill being lighted is consumed at one whiff or inflation of the lungs, attended with a whistling noise. The smoke is never emitted by the mouth, but usually receives vent through the nostrils, and sometimes, by adepts, through the passage of the ears and eyes. This preparation of the ...
— The History of Sumatra - Containing An Account Of The Government, Laws, Customs And - Manners Of The Native Inhabitants • William Marsden
... scented the first whiff of the quarrel-laden atmosphere of the embassy than he expressed in his usual self-satisfied, impetuous, and defiant way his purpose to be rigidly impartial. But he was a natural fault-finder, and by no means a natural ...
— Benjamin Franklin • John Torrey Morse, Jr.
... flowed into the chamber, and the lights began to go out one by one. We scrambled back at once for our lives, and once past the pool were safe; the water effectually blocked the passage of the poisonous gas. I got but one whiff of it; but it gave me a painful sensation at the bridge of the nose which lasted acutely for some days. In all, our expedition had not lasted an hour; but it had proved to demonstration the impossibility of saving a ...
— The Making Of A Novelist - An Experiment In Autobiography • David Christie Murray
... was in this mood, I was unfortunate enough, simply perhaps, but, I could not help thinking, undeservedly, to come within 'the whiff and wind of his fell sword'. I asked him, if he had ever been accustomed to wear a night-cap. He said 'No.' I asked, if it was best not to wear one. JOHNSON. 'Sir, I had this custom by chance, and perhaps no man shall ever know ...
— The Journal of a Tour to the Hebrides with Samuel Johnson, LL.D. • James Boswell
... when his cool, calculating mind refused to believe his eyes, which saw shapes; his flesh, which felt creeps; his ears, which heard voices; and his nostrils, which caught a whiff of a faint, sweet perfume more exquisite than any which he remembered. He knew that when he had kissed the river goddess whose eyes were blue, whose flesh was fair, whose grace was lovely, he had tasted that nectar and sniffed that ambrosia. ...
— The River Prophet • Raymond S. Spears
... property of ladies of distinction, that is to say, the sweet fragrance that comes of being always among perfumes and flowers. For I must tell thee, Sancho, that when I approached to put Dulcinea upon her hackney (as thou sayest it was, though to me it appeared a she-ass), she gave me a whiff of raw garlic that made my head reel, and poisoned my ...
— Don Quixote • Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
... up their pipes, which had been forgotten in the excitement, and refilled them with the intention of having a last quiet whiff before ...
— The Wild Man of the West - A Tale of the Rocky Mountains • R.M. Ballantyne
... was heavily charged with whisky, and the Government got a whiff of it. Word went to Washington, and there was much writing and consulting by mail, and some telegraphing. The officials—marshal, deputy-marshals, and collector—were mostly men from a distance, ...
— Mingo - And Other Sketches in Black and White • Joel Chandler Harris
... they hot with you? Here they are heavenly. When the windows are open, the sweet warm air blows up from the river and across the White Lot, and we get a whiff of roses from the gardens back of the President's house; and when I reach home at night, the fragrance of the roses in our own garden meets me long before I can see the house. We have wonderful roses this year, and the hundred-leaved ...
— Contrary Mary • Temple Bailey
... himself. The nurses and physicians in the hospital where he lay learned to like and admire him, and other patients, convalescents or newcomers who were able to move about, sought his cheerful rooms and brought into them a whiff of the outside world. Through it all, winding in and out of the neutral-colored weeks like a scarlet thread of life and hope, came the childish letters from Russia, and each week a thick letter went back, artfully designed to keep alive the love and interest ...
— Many Kingdoms • Elizabeth Jordan
... own futility. Or you may fall back upon the simple and general promptings that are smoothly current in the minds of us all. My own notion, however, is this: he never would have married at home; only an insidious whiff of romance, encountered in France or Italy, could have ...
— On the Stairs • Henry B. Fuller
... Whiff! Though Pete tried, too late, to dodge the stone, it landed against his sombrero, carrying that away without ...
— The Young Engineers in Colorado • H. Irving Hancock
... man," he would say, "what's ever seed anybody wi' them kind er eyes settled down an' married. No, sirs! Hit's the vittles Tuck Peevy's atter. Why, bless your soul an' body! he thes natchally dribbles at the mouth when he gits a whiff from the dinner-pot." ...
— Free Joe and Other Georgian Sketches • Joel Chandler Harris
... said Walter, lighting his pipe for a hurried whiff, "ten brace of white grouse, four rabbits, six red foxes and a black one, and two wolves. We can't eat ...
— Silver Lake • R.M. Ballantyne
... smoke, but such as it is it is there," he said; and Le Marchant tried a whiff or two, but laid the pipe aside with ...
— Carette of Sark • John Oxenham
... itself,—there came a whiff of wind from the south and a feeling of thaw. The sled-runners began to cut through to the frozen ground, and about the tree-trunks, where thin crusts of ice were sparkling, came a faint musical sound of trickling drops. The sun was regnant, and little brown ...
— Tiverton Tales • Alice Brown
... first is in rat, but not in mouse. My second is in pheasant, but not in grouse. My third is in limp, but not in stiff. My fourth is in smoke, but not in whiff. My fifth is in waistcoat, but not in vest. My sixth is in eager, but not in zest. My seventh is in high, but not in low. My whole was a courtier of long ago, An author who travelled in foreign lands, And died ...
— Harper's Young People, June 1, 1880 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various
... the aspirate h precedes w in pronunciation: as in what, whiff, whale; pronounced hwat, hwiff, hwale, w having precisely the sound of oo, French ou. In the following words w is silent:—-who, whom, whose, ...
— The Handy Cyclopedia of Things Worth Knowing - A Manual of Ready Reference • Joseph Triemens
... the house. Everything alarmed him now. He was afraid of the old woman who smelled of snuff, and who, when she dressed him in the morning, looked at him with a pitying air; he was afraid of the doctor, who climbed the five flights of stairs twice a day now, and left a whiff of perfume behind him; afraid of his father, who did not go to his office any more, whose beard was often three days old, and who feverishly paced the little parlor, tossing back with a distracted gesture the lock of hair behind his ...
— A Romance of Youth, Complete • Francois Coppee
... two hours, I sat there without hearing a sound from upstairs. I was drowsy and remembering that I had missed my evening smoke I lighted my pipe, silently opened the front door and stepped out upon the porch to get a whiff of fresh air. It was a still dark night, and I tiptoed down to the end that overlooked the city and stood looking at the lights and listening to the music of the switch engines in the yards below the hill. The porch was in darkness except the broad beam of light ...
— Danger Signals • John A. Hill and Jasper Ewing Brady
... remembered the humourist in all his departed glory, and still venerated him as a temple where the deity yet breathed, though the altar was overthrown, made to this extraordinary remonstrance no other reply than a long whiff, and a "Well, Russelton, dash my wig (a favourite oath of Sir W.'s) but you're a ...
— Pelham, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... Warne, "that merely to catch a whiff now and then of a fragrance which is singularly pleasant to me, but which I am denied producing for myself, would add to the things that give me comfort. If you wouldn't mind smoking in the hall now and then, or, better yet, by my ...
— Under the Country Sky • Grace S. Richmond
... Resident, Monsieur de Haan, was as glad to see me as a banker away from home is to see a copy of The Wall Street Journal. I brought him a whiff of that great outside world from which he was an exile, with whose doings he kept in touch only through the meager despatches in the papers brought by the fortnightly mail-boat from Java, or through occasional travelers like myself. ...
— Where the Strange Trails Go Down • E. Alexander Powell
... whiff of strong air, blue and cleansing, from hilltops and primrose valleys, try "The Story of My Heart," ...
— The Haunted Bookshop • Christopher Morley
... Moffatt himself, as he came forward, gave Ralph the impression of having been done over by the same hand: he was smoother, broader, more supremely tailored, and his whole person exhaled the faintest whiff of an expensive scent. He installed his visitor in one of the blue arm-chairs, and sitting opposite, an elbow on his impressive "Washington" desk, listened attentively while Ralph ...
— The Custom of the Country • Edith Wharton
... Peter was a bachelor. He had two brothers, and each brother had bred three sons. Four of these sons had left their boats and gear to go overseas. Two of them would never come back. The other two were home,—one after a whiff of gas at Ypres, the other with a leg shorter by two inches than when he went away. These two made nothing of their disabilities, however; they were home and they were nearly as good as ever. That was enough for them. And with ...
— Poor Man's Rock • Bertrand W. Sinclair
... paper—so. It leaves no mark. But it has the remarkable property of becoming red in vapor of sulpho-cyanide. Here is a long-necked flask of the gas, made by sulphuric acid acting on potassium sulpho-cyanide. Keep back, Dr. Waterworth, for it would be very dangerous for you to get even a whiff of this in your condition. Ah! See—the scratches I made ...
— Master Tales of Mystery, Volume 3 • Collected and Arranged by Francis J. Reynolds
... library, and after a few minutes Mr. Townsend joined him. The detective was sitting in an easy-chair drawn up to the table, smoking as coolly and calmly as though taking a last whiff just before ...
— Two Wonderful Detectives - Jack and Gil's Marvelous Skill • Harlan Page Halsey
... Napoleon Bonaparte. Barras had the foresight to bring up as much artillery as possible, as his men were few. Napoleon saw that these guns were placed so as to enfilade the principal streets. His experience at Toulon, as well as his natural genius for strategy, stood him in good stead. The "whiff of grape-shot" which he fired on that October day, in 1795, cleared the streets of the opposition—and likewise cleared the pathway for him leading eventually to ...
— Boys' Book of Famous Soldiers • J. Walker McSpadden
... the pulse of memory is stirred Out of a chronic state of coma By just a poignant tune, a rhythmic word, A whiff of some refined aroma, And lo! the brain is made aware Of records which ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 158, June 2, 1920 • Various
... and teachers, according to the first institution of the Lord Jesus, are yet restored or extant." It was while he was in this stage of his mental history that Williams came over on his flying visit to England in the matter of the new charter for the Rhode Island plantations. Some whiff of his strange opinions may have preceded him; but it must have been mainly by his intercourse with leading Londoners during his stay in England, which extended over more than a year (June 1643—Sept. 1644), that he diffused the interest ...
— The Life of John Milton Vol. 3 1643-1649 • David Masson
... that if it caught a whiff from earth to its liking, the beetle might descend from the highest ...
— The Eleven Comedies - Vol. I • Aristophanes et al
... triumphant exhibition when the cousins came home—Eustace delighted; Harold, half-stifled by London, insisting on walking home from the station to stretch his legs, and going all the way round over Kalydon Moor for a whiff of air! ...
— My Young Alcides - A Faded Photograph • Charlotte M. Yonge
... we have no further use for it," he was told, "and there's always a small chance that some soldier would be sent this way on an errand, when he might get a whiff of the smoke, and take a notion to investigate. For one I'm not hankering to be sent a prisoner of war to some ...
— The Boy Scouts on Belgian Battlefields • Lieut. Howard Payson
... I have read every word with the utmost pleasure. We might agree to differ about Cazotte. [618] I think you are applying to 1750 the moralities of 1890. Arbuthnot's visit has quite set me up, like a whiff of London in the Pontine marshes of Trieste. He goes to-day, d—— the luck! but leaves us hopes of meeting during the summer in Switzerland or thereabouts. He is looking the picture of health and we shall return him to town undamaged. Best of ...
— The Life of Sir Richard Burton • Thomas Wright
... tell how I have discovered all this. It was last night, shortly before midnight, when I came up on the poop to enjoy a whiff of the south- east trades in which we are now bowling along, close-hauled in order to weather Cape San Roque. Mr. Pike had the watch, and I paced up and down with him while he told me old pages of his life. He has often done this, when not "sea-grouched," and often he has mentioned with pride—yes, ...
— The Mutiny of the Elsinore • Jack London
... this air freely, I sought the conduit pipe, which conveyed to us the beneficial whiff, and I was not long in finding it. Above the door was a ventilator, through which volumes of fresh air renewed the impoverished ...
— Twenty Thousand Leagues under the Sea • Jules Verne
... revolution devours its own children, and the scum rises to the top of the boiling pot. Then comes, in the language of the picturesque historian of the French Revolution, the type of them all—then comes at the end 'the whiff of grapeshot' and the despot. First the government of a mob, and then the tyranny of an emperor, crush the people that shake off the yoke of reasonable law. That ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Isaiah and Jeremiah • Alexander Maclaren
... in from either side en echelon, and the boat must pass between them. Soon she has some of them abeam, with others on the bows. It is running the gauntlet, with apparently a very poor chance of running it safely. The failure of an oar-stroke, a retarding whiff of wind, may bring death to those in the gig, or capture, which is the same. Yet they see life beyond, if they can but reach it,—life in a breeze, the "sough" on the water, of which Seagriff spoke. It is scarcely two cables' ...
— The Land of Fire - A Tale of Adventure • Mayne Reid
... shrugged his shoulders, restored his pipe to his mouth, and took a long whiff. It was a whiff eloquent, though cynical—a whiff peculiar to your philosophical smoker—a whiff that implied the most absolute but the most placid incredulity as to the effect of the Parson's ...
— International Miscellany of Literature, Art and Science, Vol. 1, - No. 3, Oct. 1, 1850 • Various
... so cluster that, like shot in a barrel, we are rounded and polished by mere attrition. Formerly, characteristics had more chance to emphasize themselves and throw out angles, as I believe they still do in long polar seclusions. Withal, there came from him from time to time a whiff of the naval atmosphere of the past, like that from a drawer where lavender has been. Going ashore once with him for a constitutional, he caught sight of a necktie which my fond mother had given me. It was black, yes; but with variations. "Humph!" he ejaculated; "don't wear a thing like ...
— From Sail to Steam, Recollections of Naval Life • Captain A. T. Mahan
... will salute one for an old acquaintance that he never saw in his life before. He usurps upon cheats, quarrels, and robberies, which he never did, only to get him a name. His chief exercises are, taking the whiff, squiring a cockatrice, and making ...
— Every Man Out Of His Humour • Ben Jonson
... silent group, leaning upon their rude weapons and looking up at the fire, which had spread so rapidly as to involve one whole side of the castle. Already Alleyne could hear the crackling and roaring of the flames, while the air was heavy with heat and full of the pungent whiff of ...
— The White Company • Arthur Conan Doyle
... away, I say, Fitz, and surprise yo' nostrils with a whiff of this. Virginia tobacco, suh,—raised at Cartersville,—cured by my own servants. No? Well, you will, Major. Here, try that; every breath of it is a nosegay," said the colonel, ...
— Colonel Carter of Cartersville • F. Hopkinson Smith
... cover, and a whiff of the freshest fragrance regaled the seven eager noses bent to inhale it, as a general murmur of pleasure greeted the nest of great, rosy mayflowers that lay ...
— Jack and Jill • Louisa May Alcott
... A whiff of this sesame opened like magic the three immense iron doors through anterooms in charge of trusties, in prison garb of the material of blue overalls and caps shaped like a low fez. Inside, a ...
— Tramping Through Mexico, Guatemala and Honduras - Being the Random Notes of an Incurable Vagabond • Harry A. Franck
... object to this small "Early Closing," I wish they could know what it is to chop, chop, When your feet are one ache and your eyes drawn to dozing And you're sick of the sight and the smell of the shop! When a whiff from the meadows appears to come stealing Above all our washes, and powders, and soaps; And the whirr of the brush which revolves near the ceiling Seems pain to our ears and ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 101, August 29, 1891 • Various
... quick. The whole herd's on its toes waiting for the signal; an' the wink of an eye'll send 'em off. God only knows what'll happen between now and daylight! If the wind should change an' blow down from the north, they'll be off as shore as shooting. One whiff of Bennett's Creek is ...
— Bar-20 Days • Clarence E. Mulford
... verve that brings a whiff of burning powder to one's nostrils.... In some way he blazons the scene before our eyes, and makes us feel the very impetus of bloody war."—Chicago ...
— Admiral Farragut • A. T. Mahan
... nonsense. I tell you I'm a madman, a lunatic, an idiot, any thing else. I don't quite need a strait-jacket as yet, but I tell you I do need the seclusion of a comfortable lunatic asylum. I only stipulate for an occasional drop of beer, and a whiff or two at odd times. Don't you think I ...
— The Lady of the Ice - A Novel • James De Mille
... grandly abhorring waste, as the poor vulgar cannot do), "not avaricious," says Pollnitz once; "he made munificent gifts, and never thought of them more." This of Trakehnen,—perhaps there might be a whiff of coming Fate concerned in it withal: "I shall soon be dead, not able to give thee anything, poor Fritz!" To the Prince and us it is very beautiful; a fine effulgence of the inner man of Friedrich Wilhelm. The Prince returned to Trakehnen, on this glad errand; settled the ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. X. (of XXI.) - Frederick The Great—At Reinsberg—1736-1740 • Thomas Carlyle
... Rome will be poorly represented, but that may come the day after at Bath. And the next day too I want to show you something of our old River Severn. We will come right up to the present if we go through Bristol. There we shall have a whiff of America, our new find, from which the tobacco comes, and we shall be reminded of how we set sail thither—was it yesterday or the day before? You will understand at Bristol how it is that the energy has gone out ...
— The Secret Places of the Heart • H. G. Wells
... the truth. But I really thought you above the fear of village gossip, Gabriella. Why, it is more idle than the passing wind, lighter than the down of the gossamer. I thought you had a noble independence of character, incapable of being moved by a whiff of breath, a ...
— Ernest Linwood - or, The Inner Life of the Author • Caroline Lee Hentz
... tired and his knees are stiff, His breath comes low in a wheezy whiff. He'll now "lay up," like a worn-out wherry. 'Tis yours to ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari Volume 98, January 4, 1890 • Various
... right in the busiest, most bustling part of the town, its fresco and bronze and iron quaintly suggestive of mediaeval times. Within, all was cool and dim and restful, with the faintest whiff of lingering incense rising and pervading the gray arches. Yes, the Virgin would know and have pity; the sweet, white-robed Virgin at the pretty flower-decked altar, or the one away up in the niche, far above the ...
— The Goodness of St. Rocque and Other Stories • Alice Dunbar
... cat, methinks." "It was a beast," said Henry slowly, in a trembling voice—"a beast about the bigness of a goat. I never saw the like—yet I did not see it clear; I but felt the air blow, and caught a whiff of it—it was salt like the sea, but with a kind of dead smell behind." "Was that all you saw?" said Father Thomas; "belike you were tired and faint, and the air swam round you suddenly—I have known the like myself when weary." "Nay, nay," said Henry, "this was ...
— Paul the Minstrel and Other Stories - Reprinted from The Hill of Trouble and The Isles of Sunset • Arthur Christopher Benson
... of tobacco, was carved with rare skill, and its long stem was curiously inlaid with shell-work, besides being ornamented with quills and feathers. After each member of the council, white as well as red, beginning with Gladwyn, had slowly drawn a whiff from this mighty calumet, and it came again to Pontiac, ...
— At War with Pontiac - The Totem of the Bear • Kirk Munroe and J. Finnemore
... commission, and to raise new forces. On his way to the town Bacon is attacked by an ambush of soldiers, whom he beats off with the help of one of his lieutenants, Fearless, backed by Lieutenant Daring and a troop of his own men, who capture Whimsey and Whiff, two very prominent justices, instigators of the plot. He accordingly appears before the Council with a couple of prisoners. The populace, who are all for their hero, realizing the treachery, raise a riot, and throw the Councillors into a state ...
— The Works of Aphra Behn - Volume IV. • Aphra Behn
... young Jewess, a draggled prostitute—no crimson flower for her hair, poor girl!—regards us with a momentary speculation, and we get a whiff of foul language from ...
— A Modern Utopia • H. G. Wells
... the look o' things," said Joe, blowing a whiff of smoke slowly from his lips, and watching it as it ascended into the still air. "That blackguard Mahtawa is determined not to let us off till he gits all our goods; an' if he gits them, he may as well take ...
— The Dog Crusoe and His Master - A Story of Adventure in the Western Prairies • Robert Michael Ballantyne
... of them as a bridal wreath, purer than the purest orange-blossom that ever decked a bride. Once, too—this was when she was nearing the end of the voyage—there came to her a magic whiff of wet bog-myrtle that made her fancy that she ...
— The Tidal Wave and Other Stories • Ethel May Dell
... Women toiled over the fires, smoke-curing the meat, on their backs infants that stared round-eyed and sucked at lumps of tallow. Dogs, full-kin to wolves, bristled up to Smoke to endure the menace of the short club he carried and to whiff the odor of this newcomer whom they must accept ...
— Smoke Bellew • Jack London
... reared straight up like a maddened horse. Full-throated angry barks, interspersed with sharp, querulous yaps, filled his roaring, swaying prison. How long since he had got so much as a whiff of untainted air, or a glimpse of wild fields and woods! Out there oceans of such air filled all the space between the gliding earth and the sky. Out there miles on miles of freedom were rushing forever out of his life. He began ...
— Frank of Freedom Hill • Samuel A. Derieux
... from his cigar, took another whiff or two, then laid it down, and turned to his host, who was ...
— Mona • Mrs. Georgie Sheldon
... any sensation arising from sight more delightful than the odours which filter through sun-warmed, wind-tossed branches, or the tide of scents which swells, subsides, rises again wave on wave, filling the wide world with invisible sweetness. A whiff of the universe makes us dream of worlds we have never seen, recalls in a flash entire epochs of our dearest experience. I never smell daisies without living over again the ecstatic mornings that my teacher and I spent wandering in the ...
— The World I Live In • Helen Keller
... an occasional glimpse of snow, only a very far-off view, for it lay away up on the top of a mountain, but it made his heart long for just one breath of good dry Canadian air, just one whiff of the keen, ...
— The Black-Bearded Barbarian (George Leslie Mackay) • Mary Esther Miller MacGregor, AKA Marion Keith
... spilling out that intense vitality, that sheen and luster of living light. The boy had it. Life poured out of him almost in an effulgence. His skin glowed with it. It burned in his eyes. I swear I could almost hear it crackle from him. Looking at him, it was as if a whiff of ozone came to one's nostrils—so fresh and young was he, so resplendent with health, ...
— The Night-Born • Jack London
... the idea. He talked about it to his clerks at the store. He looked into restaurant windows, humming a tune in the excess of his delight. He looked into bakers' windows and confectionery shops, and a whiff of frying bacon from a little blind court he passed almost set him dancing. Indeed, Mr. Grapewine was a man of juvenile impulse. In figure as well as character he seemed rather to have expanded into a larger sort of babyhood than to have left that ...
— In the Yule-Log Glow, Book II - Christmas Tales from 'Round the World • Various
... the four men studied the scene in nervous silence. Each knew that the others were looking for the same thing—some sign of life. A little spot of green, or possibly something in motion—a single whiff of smoke would have been enough to cause ...
— The Lord of Death and the Queen of Life • Homer Eon Flint
... same I was more than a bit down myself, for there were days when death was very near, and one night it really broke me up to hear a big strapping chap saying to the man who shared his two-man sack, "I shouldn't care a whiff if it wasn't for the ...
— The Woman Thou Gavest Me - Being the Story of Mary O'Neill • Hall Caine
... tea-leaves, brought up the rear. Two tin pots and a tumbler performed outpost duty, and were soon smoking full of warm tea. We made an excellent supper, after which the Indians proceeded to solace themselves with a whiff, while I lay on my blanket enjoying the warmth of the fire, and admiring the apparently extreme felicity of the men, as they sat, with half-closed eyes, watching the smoke curling in snowy wreaths from their pipes, and varying their employment now and then with a pull at ...
— Hudson Bay • R.M. Ballantyne
... industry, and as they mounted the wooden steps to the open outside door, an inner door swung ajar for a moment, and let out a roar mingled of the hum and whirl and clash of machinery and fragments of voice, borne to them on a whiff of warm, greasy air. "Of course it doesn't smell very ...
— Annie Kilburn - A Novel • W. D. Howells
... I fancy they were all sitting on the ends of kegs or leaning up against the pile; but could not see, and was still much troubled with the torch smoke, though now and then I caught through it a whiff of tobacco, which showed ...
— Moonfleet • J. Meade Falkner
... feeling against individuals. I felt as if we were going to be punished for an audacious attempt, instead of rewarded for what might otherwise have been considered a brave one. When the capstan disappeared, it was just as if some great river-god, with a whiff of his breath, or a snap of his fingers, had tossed it contemptuously aside. So we turned back defeated. But there was a great deal to enjoy, when we came to think of it afterwards, and were safely out of it. We had seen nothing so bold and rugged before. An old ...
— Life at Puget Sound: With Sketches of Travel in Washington Territory, British Columbia, Oregon and California • Caroline C. Leighton
... A whiff of pipe smoke drifted over his shoulder, and he looked around. The dog's master stood just behind him; regarding him with that quizzing, half pathetic, half ...
— The Eyes of the World • Harold Bell Wright
... whiff of him," said the other lugubriously. "The devil's to pay. In the name of God, how many were ...
— Green Fancy • George Barr McCutcheon
... daroga, I couldn't carry HIM up like that, at once. ... He was a hostage ... But I could not keep him in the house on the lake, either, because of Christine; so I locked him up comfortably, I chained him up nicely—a whiff of the Mazenderan scent had left him as limp as a rag—in the Communists' dungeon, which is in the most deserted and remote part of the Opera, below the fifth cellar, where no one ever comes, and where no one ever hears you. Then I came back to Christine, ...
— The Phantom of the Opera • Gaston Leroux
... is by the pipe, or calumet of peace. Of this Pere Henepin has given a long account in his voyage, and the pipe is as follows: they fill a pipe of tobacco, larger and bigger than any common pipe, light it, and then the chief of them takes a whiff, gives it to the stranger, and if he smoke of it, it is peace; if not, war; if peace, the pipe is handed ...
— The Surprising Adventures of Bampfylde Moore Carew • Unknown
... A whiff of smoke swept upward past her face, and for one moment terror seized her and she cried out, "Water! Give me holy water!" but the next moment her fears were gone, and they came no more ...
— Personal Recollections of Joan of Arc Volume 2 • Mark Twain
... coming down from Marysville to take a hand.' I inquired if my friend had cured any or smoked any. He pointed to a Manyanita pipe split open on the ground, and said. 'Before it was real strong, some three weeks ago, I tried a leaf in that pipe. Observe the result—busted it the second whiff, and knocked me off the log I was sitting on.' Such was the first experiment in tobacco raising in California. But now they have learned the trick. They have searched the State for the poorest and most barren soil, and, having found it are cultivating a splendid article of genuine Havana leaf ...
— Tobacco; Its History, Varieties, Culture, Manufacture and Commerce • E. R. Billings
... occasionally passed among them, all drinking from the same vessel. Another group close by these had a lighted cigarette which they were handing from one to another, men and women alike, each taking a long whiff, which was swallowed to be slowly emitted at the nostrils. It was a gala day, a church festival, of which there are something less than three hundred and sixty-five in the year. These idlers had nothing to do and plenty of time to do it in. Puebla has always ...
— Aztec Land • Maturin M. Ballou
... scents from afar. You know you are abreast Grape Island now far you scent the wild roses on the point. Another breeze brings faint odors of the charnel house from Bradley's. A stronger chases it away and you have a whiff of an early breakfast, brown toast, fried fish and coffee, at Rose Cliff. The chuckle of oars in rowlocks tells you that the old fisherman is astir at Fort Point and the man with the new motor boat over at Hough's Neck is giving it a little run before breakfast, with the muffler ...
— Old Plymouth Trails • Winthrop Packard
... out to sea, but found the waves still running extremely high, and boisterous. There my uncle, laying himself down upon a sail-cloth, which was spread for him, called twice for some cold water, which he drank, when immediately the flames, preceded by a strong whiff of sulfur, dispersed the rest of the party, and obliged him to rise. He raised himself up with the assistance of two of his servants, and instantly fell down dead; suffocated, as I conjecture, by some gross and noxious ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to prose. Volume II (of X) - Rome • Various
... such a bundle of nerves as I am now, that I couldn't have done it," he said. "But when I'm doing the doctor job I'm a different being; I lose myself. I just gave him another whiff of A.C.E., called to the nurses to fetch candles and got on with it. He's walking about London to-day—as right ...
— Captivity • M. Leonora Eyles
... (through which issues a whiff of hot air charged with a combination of greasy smells that might knock down a rhinoceros), our hero enters the long, low, dingy room, and is instantly relieved of his coat and cap by half a dozen ready hands, while as many voices greet him with the ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, Vol. 20, August 1877 • Various
... more sensitive to the sufferings of his fellow-creatures, if nothing else, and the forces of the Revolution probably would have swamped him from the very first moment of his emergence at Toulon, when the whiff of grape-shot, symptom of an inexorable, merciless intellect and will, started him upon the road that led to the Napoleonic Era. Destiny is always ironic. For the deficiency of the internal secretions which made him eligible for glory was responsible as well ...
— The Glands Regulating Personality • Louis Berman, M.D.
... WHIFF. The Rhombus cardina, a passable fish of the pleuronect genus. Also, a slight fitful breeze or transient puff ...
— The Sailor's Word-Book • William Henry Smyth
... the night was very dark, and the sharp fresh air almost took away his breath, yet it was infinitely welcome to him after the heavy atmosphere of his cell, and he inhaled it with keen pleasure, thinking that each whiff was almost the last. He was led into a large, faintly-lighted room, where officers of various grades were smoking around a large table. It was only the committee of investigation, for hitherto his examinations had not ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 15, - No. 87, March, 1875 • Various
... taking her two hands while keeping his pipe in one of his own so that the whiff of the coarse 'Store-cut' tobacco made her wrinkle her nose and stemmed the tide of emotion. But he did not seem ...
— Lady Bridget in the Never-Never Land • Rosa Praed
... an artificially graded path strewn with roses that invites us in this part, but, let me hope, something better, a rugged trail through the woods or along the beach where we shall now and then get a whiff of natural air, or a glimpse ...
— Birds and Poets • John Burroughs
... hall, while her hostess fumbled at the door. It opened and let in a whiff of cool air and sounds ...
— Ainslee's, Vol. 15, No. 6, July 1905 • Various
... the lesson the fire began to smoke, and Mr Gordon told Owen to open the window for a moment. No sooner was this done than the mischievous whiff of sea-air which entered the room began to trifle and coquet with the pendulous half-sheet pinned in front of the desk, causing thereby an unwonted little pattering crepitation. In alarm, Duncan thoughtlessly pulled out the pin, and immediately the paper ...
— Eric, or Little by Little • Frederic W. Farrar
... fair-haired girls carrying pitchers and baskets, bullies, bravoes, and well-to-do burgesses, we passed from one ambush to another, by dark gullies, stinking traps, and twisted stairways, to the Via Deliziosa, without ever a hint of the broad sunshine or whiff of the balmy air which we had left outside on the plain. In a little mildewed court, where one patch of light did indeed slope upon a lemon-tree loaded with fruit and flowers, I found my man in a droll pass with his young wife. He was, in fact, tiring her hair in the open: ...
— Earthwork Out Of Tuscany • Maurice Hewlett
... me, gentlemen," said the egregious Northover, with his radiant smile, "if I continue to work until Mr Hopson is ready. I have some books that must be cleared up before I get away on my holiday tomorrow. And we all like a whiff of the country, ...
— The Club of Queer Trades • G. K. Chesterton
... of the Rabbi's study as something that touched genius in its magnificent disorderliness, and Carmichael was so proud of it that he took me to see it as to a shrine. One whiff of its atmosphere as you entered the door gave an appetite and raised the highest expectations. For any bookman can estimate a library by scent—if an expert he could even write out a catalogue of the books and sketch the appearance of the owner. Heavy odour ...
— Kate Carnegie and Those Ministers • Ian Maclaren
... a golden ring, And to-night no moon we see!" The skipper, he blew a whiff from his pipe, And ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow • Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
... behind her. There do not seem to be any regular sailors, and in their stead a collection of individuals remarkably greasy in their appearance, who may be cooks or stokers, or possibly both. Then you cannot go on the poop without being saluted by a whiff of hot air from the grim furnaces below; men are always shovelling in coal, or throwing cinders overboard; and the rig does not seem to belong to any ship in particular. The masts are low and small, and the canvas, which is always spread in fair weather, looks ...
— The Englishwoman in America • Isabella Lucy Bird
... the void of space, from where it showed a reddish grey behind the pines to where it showed a glossy blue-black between the stars. As if to be more like a pedlar, I wear a silver ring. This I could see faintly shining as I raised or lowered the cigarette; and at each whiff the inside of my hand was illuminated, and became for a second the ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition - Vol. 1 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... and a steady-eyed, white-haired capitalist, rolling on his rolling-stock, leans back against the upholstery and gazes with eyes tight closed upon a steady-eyed, brown-haired youngster herding in at eventide. The whiff of violets from a vender's tray, and a young man dreams above his ledger. The reek of a passing brewer's wagon, and white faces look after, ...
— Every Soul Hath Its Song • Fannie Hurst
... any thought or thing, whether it be verily so, yea or nay? and to have answer, and to rely on that? All the debt which such a man could contract to other wit, would never disturb his consciousness of originality: for the ministrations of books, and of other minds, are a whiff of smoke to that most private reality ...
— Representative Men • Ralph Waldo Emerson
... great antlers, the admiration and desire of every hunter in the Little Vermilion country, showed a spread of almost six feet from tip to tip. As if carved from the rock the big moose stood, his eyes on the distant waters, only his ears moving slightly to test the wind. Then, as some vagrant whiff from the gently moving air assailed the sensitive nostrils, or some faint sound reached his ears, the great beast turned and vanished into the forest, as light and soundless as thistledown for all his twelve hundred pounds of bulk. Not even a twig ...
— Followers of the Trail • Zoe Meyer
... into her mind like a whiff of miasma off an evil swamp. As she recognized the word she felt the same horror and repugnance one senses upon being unexpectedly confronted by a cobra. Internationalism. The scum of the world boiling to the top. A half-blind viper ...
— The Drums Of Jeopardy • Harold MacGrath
... of seed beds and gardens, it is different. We wish present visible growth, and so we must be willing to lend aid, and first aid to such seeds is to give them a whiff of moist heat to soften what has become more hard than desirable through man's intervention. For in wild nature the seed is sown as soon as it ripens, and falls to the care of the ground before the vitality of the parent plant has quite passed from it. ...
— The Garden, You, and I • Mabel Osgood Wright
... respect that is paid among nations to the law of good faith. If there are cases in this enlightened period when it is violated, there are none when it is decried. It is the philosophy of politics, the religion of governments. It is observed by barbarians—a whiff of tobacco smoke, or a string of beads, gives not merely binding force but sanctity to treaties. Even in Algiers, a truce may be bought for money, but when ratified, even Algiers is too wise, or too just, to disown and annul its obligation. Thus we see, neither the ...
— American Eloquence, Volume I. (of 4) - Studies In American Political History (1896) • Various |
