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Bracing   /brˈeɪsɪŋ/   Listen
Bracing

adjective
1.
Imparting vitality and energy.  Synonyms: brisk, fresh, refreshful, refreshing, tonic.






WordNet 3.0 © 2010 Princeton University








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"Bracing" Quotes from Famous Books



... sun of great brilliancy was shining, and over him arched the high skies of the great west. The air was thin and cool, easy to breathe and uplifting, and in the bracing morning he did not feel the loneliness and immensity of the wilderness. Boyd had already built a little fire among the bushes, and was warming some strips of ...
— The Great Sioux Trail - A Story of Mountain and Plain • Joseph Altsheler

... Horatio," answered Corny, bracing himself up, as though he realized that he was not presenting a demeanor such as he thought the occasion required ...
— Within The Enemy's Lines - SERIES: The Blue and the Gray—Afloat • Oliver Optic

... party (December 9th, 1815), and the Admiral hoped that their complaints would cease. The new abode contained five rooms for Napoleon's use, three for the Montholons, two for the Las Cases, and one for Gourgaud: it was situated on a plateau 1,730 feet above the sea: the air there was bracing, and on the farther side of the plain dotted with gum trees stretched the race-course, a mile and a half of excellent turf. The only obvious drawbacks were the occasional mists, and the barren precipitous ravines that flank the plateau on all sides. ...
— The Life of Napoleon I (Volumes, 1 and 2) • John Holland Rose

... has been a long uphill struggle, but now at last we begin to see definite improvement. The doctors are confident that it will be a complete cure if we are very careful during the next two or three years. The great thing is to live in pure bracing air, and to keep her happy and cheerful. Anything that caused agitation or worry of any kind, would have a deleterious effect. She has a very sensitive nature, and things go deeply with her,—more ...
— Betty Trevor • Mrs. G. de Horne Vaizey

... point I should like to touch upon. To-day we have enjoyed a veritable symposium—for me, I assure you, a high intellectual treat. But, speaking to you as to one who does not know Hollingford, I would suggest to you that our Liberal electors are perhaps hardly ripe for such a new and bracing political philosophy—" ...
— Our Friend the Charlatan • George Gissing

... for winning that great battle. Wellington, however, had his eye on the football and cricket grounds when he spoke these words, and no doubt intended to convey the idea that these games went a long way in bracing up the nerve which served so well on the battle-field. Close adhesion to the practice of any game really and sincerely creates fresh possibilities of that perfection and discipline. And why should this not be ...
— Scottish Football Reminiscences and Sketches • David Drummond Bone

... feet by thirteen feet, the front wall being nine feet six inches high, sloping to seven feet six inches at the back. All the timbers were of oregon and deal, and particular attention was paid to bracing and strengthening the building, which rested on piles just clear of the sandy surface. The inside was lined and ceiled, and the roof of galvanized iron was set flush with the front wall, fascia boards along the front and sides being designed to keep the fine snow from blowing under ...
— The Home of the Blizzard • Douglas Mawson

... already wriggling his way down between the smooth rock walls, bracing himself with back and knees. Within a few seconds he had reached the bottom, some ten feet below. It was a sloping, uneven floor of earth, lighted dimly from above and from the south, where the ledge shelved off down the hillside. The dirt was black and damp, undisturbed for years ...
— The Black Buccaneer • Stephen W. Meader

... mother-of-pearl; silvery blues, soft purples, evanescent greens and rose-shades, all melting into fleeces of white cloud, pure as azury snow, allured the eye with a remote glimpse of heaven's foundations. The air blowing on the brow was fresh and sweet and bracing. ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol 6 • Various

... the inner bolt melted and the lock inoperative; and, placing his forearms on either side of the middle crack of the door, he stood bracing it. ...
— The Affair of the Brains • Anthony Gilmore

... rose gallantly to the days' demands. She learned the economical value of soups and salads, and schooled herself, at least every other day, to leave the boys for an hour or two with Elite, and walk out for a little bracing solitude. Bert watched her in admiring amazement. ...
— Undertow • Kathleen Norris

... begun to feel the bracing effect upon our economic system of a restored agriculture. The hundreds of millions of additional income that farmers are receiving are finding their way into the channels of trade. The farmers' share of the national income is slowly rising. The economic facts ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various

... a lovely June morning and the bracing air of Colorado made me feel as wild as the young animals that were fast wheeling me over the dangerous trail and possibly into a camp of hostile Indians. I gave no thought to danger for I was too busy keeping the fiery little beasts ...
— Dangers of the Trail in 1865 - A Narrative of Actual Events • Charles E Young

... Several shops were already opened, and there were a few carts and other vehicles tracking their way through the broad and yet grass-grown street. It was a clear, frosty morning, and there was a healthful feel in the bracing atmosphere that produced an exhilarating effect on the spirits. The grocer pursued his course through the middle of the street, carefully avoiding all contact with such persons as he encountered, though he cordially returned their greetings, and wandered ...
— Old Saint Paul's - A Tale of the Plague and the Fire • William Harrison Ainsworth

... ancestral piety, were a part of her blood; as was the infinitely fainter infusion of Buddhism; yet in her intellectual brooding it was to the Tao-teh-king that she returned. She paused to recall that, the brace at last removed, she was practically completely recovered; but the bent, the bracing, given her ...
— Java Head • Joseph Hergesheimer

... swearing-in of the jury was completed Mr. Loram rose to introduce the case; whereupon his lordship leaned back in his chair and closed his eyes, as if bracing ...
— The Vanishing Man • R. Austin Freeman

... the fair object whose sudden appearance had so impressed him.' With all her love of excitement, of change, of variety, one cannot but feel, as I have said, that there was also in Amelia Alderson's cheerful life a vein of deep and very serious feeling, and the bracing influence of the upright and high-minded people among whom she had been brought up did not count for nothing in her nature. She could show her genuine respect for what was generous and good and true, even though she did not always find strength to carry out the dream of ...
— A Book of Sibyls - Miss Barbauld, Miss Edgeworth, Mrs Opie, Miss Austen • Anne Thackeray (Mrs. Richmond Ritchie)

... of weak muscles. Eye-strain is another; ptosis, or falling of the organs, is another. In a majority of cases the best treatment for any of these troubles is an understanding attempt to go to the root of the matter by bracing up the whole mental tone. The most scientific oculists do not try to correct eye trouble due to muscular insufficiency by any special prisms or glasses. They know that the eyes will right themselves when the general health ...
— Outwitting Our Nerves - A Primer of Psychotherapy • Josephine A. Jackson and Helen M. Salisbury

... bracing himself for a serious situation. He had a keen eye for a man, a feeling for style; in his judgment Urquhart was momentous, so much so that he could not afford to be irritated. Jealousy to him was a weakness, only pardonable when the cause was trivial. It had been trivial with poor ...
— Love and Lucy • Maurice Henry Hewlett

... said the American imperturbably, "it's the most natural thing in the world that Mr. Theydon should want to show his friend, Mr. Handyside of Chicago, England's most bracing and attractive seaside resort, if that's the ...
— Number Seventeen • Louis Tracy

... was the bracing effect of the fresh sea air, or the sight of his men's most obvious improvement, I know not, but from that day his strength increased with ...
— At the Point of the Sword • Herbert Hayens

... learned objection I, however, kept to myself and, bracing up my courage, awaited the course of events—little aware of how adventurous yet were to be the incidents ...
— A Journey to the Centre of the Earth • Jules Verne

... waving her muff in farewell, Kathleen hastened off through the grounds in the direction of Pennsylvania Avenue. She found the cold invigorating air a bracing tonic after the steam-heated atmosphere of the Capitol, and was thoroughly enjoying her walk when she became conscious that a figure was keeping pace with her. Looking up, she ...
— I Spy • Natalie Sumner Lincoln

... your apartment for you to enjoy, and I can think of nothing that would give me more happiness than to bring the West and its people to others who could not otherwise enjoy them. If I could only take them from whatever is worrying them and give them this bracing mountain air, glimpses of the scenery, a smell of the pines and the sage,—if I could only make them feel the free, ready sympathy and hospitality of these frontier people, I am sure their worries would diminish and ...
— Letters of a Woman Homesteader • Elinore Pruitt Stewart

... blessings, is what I never truly enjoyed until I saw Fair Canada. The change it has wrought, I am convinced, is truly wonderful." This happy result had been due, in part at least, to surroundings that told favorably upon his sensitive nervous system, and not to the bracing climate alone. He had been actively occupied afloat, and had fallen desperately in love with a fair Canadian, around whom his ardent imagination threw that glamour of exaggerated charm in which he saw all who ...
— The Life of Nelson, Vol. I (of 2) - The Embodiment of the Sea Power of Great Britain • A. T. (Alfred Thayer) Mahan

... pecuniary foundation, must have faded and shrivelled indeed, after another year or two of anything but hospitality as generous as that of New York. Well-nourished and undimmed, however, it concealed for them admirably the fact that it was the hospitality they were after, and not the bracing climate or the desire to see the fascinating Americans of London and Paris at home. New York found them agreeable specimens of high-spirited young English people, and played with them indefinitely. Miss Forde, when she sat imperturbably on a cushion in the middle of the floor after dinner ...
— The Pool in the Desert • Sara Jeannette Duncan

... and began to wane, it was obvious even to Mr. Prohack that the domestic climate grew sunnier and more bracing. A weight seemed to have been lifted from the hearts of all Mr. Prohack's entourage. The theft of the twenty thousand pound necklace was a grave event, but it could not impair the beauty of the great fact ...
— Mr. Prohack • E. Arnold Bennett

... draught that swept the gap between the cars was bracing and cool. There was a moon, he saw water shine and dark pines stream past. The snorting of the locomotive broke in a measured beat through the roll of wheels; the rocks threw back confused echoes about the ...
— Lister's Great Adventure • Harold Bindloss

... distinct. The chaise was still upright. The horse, beginning to falter in his pace, took more kindly to the accustomed control of the rein. It was then Susannah found that she had been clinging to Halsey for support, and that he, by bracing himself with one arm to the side of the chaise and holding her with the other, had prevented her from ...
— The Mormon Prophet • Lily Dougall

... than coffee and a roll in the morning," he continued, after the second omelette, the ham, the waffles, and more coffee had been consumed. "I fancy it's your bracing air." ...
— The Boss of Little Arcady • Harry Leon Wilson

... and carpenter work on "The Curlew" at Portland made a bill of a hundred and nine dollars; seamen's wages to Gloucester, with car-fare back, nineteen dollars; bracing and strengthening the schooner, sixty-seven dollars; cost of getting in fuel and water, thirty-three dollars; and other bills to the amount of forty-nine dollars: in all, two hundred and seventy-seven ...
— Left on Labrador - or, The cruise of the Schooner-yacht 'Curlew.' as Recorded by 'Wash.' • Charles Asbury Stephens

... the tarring, greasing, oiling, varnishing, painting, scraping, and scrubbing which is required in the course of a long voyage, and also remember this is all to be done in addition to watching at night, steering, reefing, furling, bracing, making and setting sail, and pulling, hauling, and climbing in every direction, one will hardly ask, "What can a sailor find to ...
— Two Years Before the Mast • Richard Henry Dana

... a horizon that was hazy in the glow of the southern ocean. He was standing on the deck of a ship and by his side stood a brother. They were sailing southward to the Land of Promise that was shining there in all its golden glory! The sails pressed forward in the bracing wind, and the clipper ship raced along with its burden of the wildest dreamers ever borne in a vessel's hull! Up over long blue ocean ridges, down into long blue ocean gullies; on to lands so new, and yet so old, where above the sunny glow of the southern ...
— While the Billy Boils • Henry Lawson

... bright day at the end of March, the pay-box with the wind howling round it did indeed look a bracing place to spend the day in, nor was it by any means an object which any would be likely to watch for five minutes at a stretch in a strong north-easter. But that was exactly what a palish girl with freckles ...
— The Privet Hedge • J. E. Buckrose

... course acquainted with the vigorous and bracing pages of Sir John (2 vols., London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme and Brown). Sir John, who plays but a tooth-comb in the orchestra of this historical romance, blows in his own book the big bassoon. His character is there drawn at large; and the sympathy of Landor has countersigned ...
— Prince Otto • Robert Louis Stevenson

... again in the direction of the hills when, almost without warning, and with a great whistle and roar, a gale of wind swept down upon them. They stood still and looked at each other with startled faces, bracing with their feet ...
— The Girl in the Golden Atom • Raymond King Cummings

... was a shock to her—naturally. It's been a succession of obstacles all through—a perpetual struggle against odds. Well, it's over. At least we know what we're up against now. There will be no more illusions of any sort from to-day on." He paused, stood a moment as if bracing himself, then turned. "Well, I'm going, sir. Come if you really must, but—I ...
— The Obstacle Race • Ethel M. Dell

... darting hand a thought flashed through my brain. In a few seconds the paso would be moving on; the bearers were bracing themselves for a new effort. That bouquet! if it should hold the threatened bomb? This was the moment for such an attempt at wrecking the royal box, for the King was a member of the next brotherhood that must pass; and ...
— The Car of Destiny • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson

... his hand. "Throttled him, lads! I would! Give me the chance and I'll do it now! I tell you, the mere look of such a man as that is a desecration to my child,—liar and hypocrite as he is! may the gods confound him!" He paused—then suddenly bracing himself up, added. "I'll away to Bosekop at once—they've been afraid of me there for no reason—I'll teach them to be afraid of me in ...
— Thelma • Marie Corelli

... matter what a man believes, provided he is sincere," muttered Jack, bracing his conscience against the godly conversation of his relatives; "I'll fix 'em now," he said to himself, with a decided nod ...
— Tiger and Tom and Other Stories for Boys • Various

... joined Thurston, and both men broke into a smart trot. They were heading for the bush until Geoffrey, halting near it, ran back at full speed towards the gorge. All who watched him were astonished, for they were already bracing themselves to face the ...
— Thurston of Orchard Valley • Harold Bindloss

... think it may be your nerves, darling," he remarked. "You had a great strain placed upon you by the London season. All those entertainments of yours must have run you down. You must go to Monplaisir. The bracing air there will benefit you, no doubt. Here, in Devon, ...
— The White Lie • William Le Queux

... it came on to blow very hard," replied Pelham, seating himself on a stool, and bracing his feet against the front of the berth ...
— Outward Bound - Or, Young America Afloat • Oliver Optic

... rearing of sheep; but the island is totally destitute of mineral wealth. It is highly favoured in climate. The intense heat of a North American summer is here tempered by a cool sea-breeze; fogs are almost unknown, and the air is dry and bracing. Instances of longevity are very common; fever and consumption are seldom met with, and the cholera has never visited its shores. Wages are high, and employment abundant; land is cheap and tolerably productive; but though a competence may always be obtained, I never heard of ...
— The Englishwoman in America • Isabella Lucy Bird

... our eyes met for an instant; then she turned towards her questioner, bracing herself for ...
— The Seven Secrets • William Le Queux

... by W. H. H. Murray, in both which appears John Norton, the trapper, a character that promises to become as much of a favorite as is the hero of the Leather Stocking novels. These stories have a bracing outdoor freshness and a delightfully crisp realism: are vigorous in tone, and strong and picturesque in the relation. Taken altogether, they may be pronounced in the most artistic of Mr. Murray's excursions into the realms of ...
— The Busted Ex-Texan and Other Stories • W. H. H. Murray

... it pass, caring too much for Leonard to set him up as a mark for Tom's satire, which was as different from Aubrey's as quinine from orange-peel, though properly used, it was a bracing tonic, such as she often found wholesome. A cynical younger brother is a most valuable possession to a woman who has taken a certain position in her ...
— The Trial - or, More Links of the Daisy Chain • Charlotte M. Yonge

... bracing up and smiling sweet as he could for the ache in his back. 'I'll 'elp you out. You trust your Uncle George. Not on account of what you're going to give me, you understand,' says he. 'It would be a pity if THAT was the reason for 'elpin' a feller creat—Sparrow, if you touch ...
— Cape Cod Stories - The Old Home House • Joseph C. Lincoln

... before or followed him, always ready to hold him up or keep him back, if his six-year-old arms grew feeble during those exercises. All that benefited little Jack, whom sickness had made somewhat pale; but his color soon came back on board the "Pilgrim," thanks to this gymnastic, and to the bracing sea-breezes. ...
— Dick Sand - A Captain at Fifteen • Jules Verne

... existed for their hushing every apprehension in instant and serious exertions. Although his alarming communication was not received without much secret terror by the listeners, his earnest and impressive manner, aided perhaps by the nature of the danger, succeeded in bracing their nerves to undergo some unlooked-for and unusual trial. Silently, and without a moment's delay, they permitted him to assist them from their saddles, and when they descended quickly to the water's edge, where the scout had ...
— The Last of the Mohicans • James Fenimore Cooper

... the archipelago lie in the region of the typhoon, and have three seasons,—the cold, the hot, and the wet. The first extends from November to February or March, when the atmosphere is bracing rather than cold. The hot season lasts from March to June, and the heat becomes very oppressive before the beginning of the southerly monsoon. Thunder-storms of terrific violence occur during May and June. The wet season begins ...
— The Boys of '98 • James Otis

... force a door—that is, an ordinary door—and at the same time make very little noise. It is done—if the door opens inward—by seizing the knob firmly with both hands, having turned it, and then by bracing the body with one knee pressed firmly against the door directly under the knob. In this position, if it is assumed by a strong man, every effort may be centred upon one sudden impulse forward, which, while there is no visible or perceptible impact, will ...
— A Woman at Bay - A Fiend in Skirts • Nicholas Carter

... one for the crowd. Did you ever see Officer Whalen practice firing at a mark? Well, I have. The man couldn't hit a barn door thirty feet off. Can't you come over, Frank? I've got something to propose to you. The afternoon is too fine and bracing to stay cooped up in the house. We'll soon have to hibernate, you ...
— The Boys of Columbia High on the Gridiron • Graham B. Forbes

... perspiration streaming down our faces, we reach the top at last; and thank Heaven, that after two hours' absence deep down among those terrible "diggins," we are permitted once more to feel the bracing air, and to look upon the glorious light ...
— A Tramp's Wallet - stored by an English goldsmith during his wanderings in Germany and France • William Duthie

... them yoking on Bess and Ben and men and animals bracing their energies for the start. David drove the horses, walking beside them, the reins held loose in hands that made upward, urging gestures as the team breasted the ascent. It was a savage pull. The valiant little mules bent their necks, the ...
— The Emigrant Trail • Geraldine Bonner

... Christian in these extracts, startlingly Christian. Any reader who bears in mind Whitman's own advice and "dismisses whatever insults his own soul" will find plenty that is bracing, brightening, and chastening to reward him for a little patience at first. It seems hardly possible that any being should get evil from so healthy a book as the LEAVES OF GRASS, which is simply comical wherever it falls ...
— Familiar Studies of Men & Books • Robert Louis Stevenson

... went off to the seaside. The bracing air did for Clemence what the doctor's medicine had failed to accomplish. In spite of the languid interest she took in everything, hope grew stronger each day in the care of her watchful friend. And at last the roses came back to her cheeks, and when they went ...
— Clemence - The Schoolmistress of Waveland • Retta Babcock

... watches Brother Pope, must do it on the run. One of the fairest spots on the Cumberland Plateau is Grand View. Here the American Missionary Association holds a strategic position. The wild, magnificent scenery and the cool, bracing air, tingling with ozone, make it an ideal spot for a great religious and educational centre. Already eyes are turning upward from the surrounding valleys to this mountain school. The first words I heard on landing at Spring City, six miles away, were in its praise: "They've got a mighty good school ...
— The American Missionary, Vol. 43, No. 7, July, 1889 • Various

... We are on our way to Mulberry Bend, or the Bowery, or Farrish's Chop House. I see her brow begin to pucker. "Do you feel as though it is going to be unhealthy?" I ask anxiously. If she does, there is nothing for it but to clutch at the nearest subway station and hurry up to Grant's Tomb. In that bracing ether her spirits revive. ...
— Shandygaff • Christopher Morley

... yesterday—thrilling, romantic rides by night, when the same sound of sleigh-bells scared the silence of sleeping forests and filled the boy's soul with pictures of midnight attacks, romantic murders, and strange devilish phantoms. In the dazzling brilliance of the snowy fields, breathing in the pure, bracing air, mere existence became unspeakable bliss. Sitting there in that dainty sleigh Frederick was inclined to look on ...
— Atlantis • Gerhart Hauptmann

... curious, and sad at the same time, to behold with what distinction Chopin treats the bassoon, and how he is repaid with mocking ingratitude. But enough of the orchestral rabble. The Adagio is very fine in its way, but such is its cloying sweetness that one longs for something bracing and active. This desire the composer satisfies only partially in the last movement (Rondo vivace, 2-4, E major). Nevertheless, he succeeds in putting us in good humour by his gaiety, pretty ways, and tricksy surprises (for instance, the modulations from E major to E flat major, ...
— Frederick Chopin as a Man and Musician - Volume 1-2, Complete • Frederick Niecks

... rest, had ventured recklessly into the zone of danger. Among them were Ruth Clinton and Madame Olga Obosky, who, disregarding the command of Mr. Mott, were the only women to venture beyond the protecting corner of the deck building. They stood side by side, bracing themselves against the downward slope of the deck. Half-way forward were Trigger and the armed gunners, and beyond them the dense, irresolute mass of humanity. Percival, in rounding the corner to go to the assistance of Captain Trigger, observed with dismay ...
— West Wind Drift • George Barr McCutcheon

... no actual shopping, for there was nowhere else to go," was an oft-heard remark at Scott that summer. But breathes there a woman who cannot find excuse for shopping? And shopping was hungry work and the drive was long, the air keen, bracing, appetizing. What more natural than that Mr. Courtenay and Mr. Fowler of the bank, Mr. Willett or Mr. Burtis of the Cattle Club,—such charming dancers these,—should sometimes, indeed frequently, suggest just a little bite, just a hot bird and a cold bottle at Cresswell's? Such delicious salads ...
— Under Fire • Charles King

... fresh, and striking into a canter the two men made for the open country. The excitement and motion combined with the bracing air drove the fumes of the liquor from Cook's head, and before many miles had been passed he was comparatively free from the terrible malady which ...
— Jim Cummings • Frank Pinkerton

... from Dr. Haran's meteorological sheets. During the calms immediately succeeding wet the heat was disagreeable, and mosquitoes appeared, but not numerously. The nights were invariably cool. The weather for the remaining seasons of the year may be termed enjoyable. A fresh bracing breeze from the south east blows almost continually, the thermometer averaging during the day from 80 to 85 degrees. This temperature, with the cool nights, (sufficiently so to render a blanket welcome) and delightful sea bathing, prevent any of the lassitude ...
— The Overland Expedition of The Messrs. Jardine • Frank Jardine and Alexander Jardine

... right. He then commenced to ascend the cliffs and on reaching their top the force of the gale almost blew him off his feet. He struck a signal light. This is a light made of chemicals which burns with intense brilliancy. Bracing himself against a rock he held it above his head. The flare lit up the surrounding cliffs. While it was still burning he turned to windward and looked down on the huge breakers that made the cliff on which he stood tremble as they dashed in against it. While gazing down ...
— The Story of Paul Boyton - Voyages on All the Great Rivers of the World • Paul Boyton

... towards the door, and took the step unsteadily. He stopped for a second, bracing his shoulders; then he walked firmly across the room. While his hand was on the handle, he heard Mr. Le ...
— The Philanderers • A.E.W. Mason

... Abroad', the irreverence and iconoclasm of that Yankee intruder into the hallowed confines of Camelot. All may rejoice in the spontaneity and refreshment of truth; spiritually co-operate in forthright condemnation of fraud, peculation, and sham; and breathe gladly the fresh and bracing air of sincerity, sanity, and wisdom. The stevedore on the dock, the motor-man on the street car, the newsboy on the street, the riverman on the Mississippi—all speak with exuberant affection in memory of that quaint figure in his white suit, his ruddy face shining through wreaths ...
— Mark Twain • Archibald Henderson

... stage-coach. An hour and a half had elapsed when I perceived that the horses were dragging the vehicle slowly up a steep hill. The full-leaved trees are arching for us, overhead, a verdant canopy; the air becomes more bracing and elastic: and even I feel its invigorating influence, and cease to drop slily the gravelly dirt I had collected from my shoes, down the neck and back of a very pretty girl, who sat blushing furiously on my left. Now the summit is gained and, in another moment, the coach thunders down the other ...
— Rattlin the Reefer • Edward Howard

... character to subject themselves to. Lastly, I would have you consider especially the moral atmosphere in which they have habitually breathed: according to the nature of this the mental health varies as certainly as the physical strength varies in a bracing or relaxing air. A strong bodily constitution may resist longer, and finally be less affected by a deleterious atmosphere than a weak or diseased frame; and so it is with the mental constitution. Minds insensibly imbibe the tone of the atmosphere in ...
— The Young Lady's Mentor - A Guide to the Formation of Character. In a Series of Letters to Her Unknown Friends • A Lady

... You cannot bear your surroundings here. The mountains crush you, and weigh upon your heart. Nothing is open enough for you here. The heavens above you are not spacious enough. The air is not strong and bracing enough. ...
— The Lady From The Sea • Henrik Ibsen

... well on that bracing morning air, and quite a crowd of boys and not a few girls followed the students over the first of the hills back of Putnam Hall. But here the crowd dropped gradually away, until the young soldiers had the country road ...
— The Rover Boys in Camp - or, The Rivals of Pine Island • Edward Stratemeyer

... them a season of greater joy and festivity than with any other people on earth, of whom it has been my lot to hear. In the glorious November nights of our beneficent clime, after the first frosts had given a bracing sharpness and a ringing clearness to the air, and lent that transparent blue to the heavens through which the stars gleam like globes of sapphire, when I have seen a hundred or more of them around the swelling piles of corn, ...
— Southern Literature From 1579-1895 • Louise Manly

... to play a little at Monte Carlo and cruise a little in the Mediterranean—to kill time through the detestable winter, which made itself felt wherever he was; and she went to London to see about Francie's gown, and up north to bracing Scotland, and down to Wellwood for Christmas, and back to the racket of London in the spring; and neither of them had spent a lonelier time in all their lives. Quite a fresh and peculiar sense of homelessness and uncomforted old age took possession ...
— Sisters • Ada Cambridge

... embarrassment to any one; to be as completely a part of it as if I had been born there; to be helpful without being intrusive; to show no surprise whatever happened; above all to be cheerful, strong and bracing, ...
— The Girl and the Kingdom - Learning to Teach • Kate Douglas Wiggin

... from the river, obscuring all objects, when the bordermen rolled out of their snug bed of leaves. The air was cool and bracing, faintly fragrant with dying foliage and the damp, dewy luxuriance of the ripened season. Wetzel pulled from under the protecting ledge a bundle of bark and sticks he had put there to keep dry, and built a fire, while Jonathan fashioned a cup from a green fruit resembling ...
— The Last Trail • Zane Grey

... Cienfuegos. It was hot and dusty. Notwithstanding the ceaseless novelty of the scene, one became a little fatigued, a little weary; but as we approached Matanzas, the refreshing air from off the Gulf of Mexico suddenly came to our relief, full of a bracing tonic, and rendering all things tolerable. The sight of the broad harbor, lying with its flickering surface under the afternoon sun, ...
— Due South or Cuba Past and Present • Maturin M. Ballou

... than half an hour high, when we pushed off from the shore of the islet, and rowed over towards the mainland. The morning was fine and clear, and either the fresh, bracing sea-air, or the stir and excitement of setting out upon our expedition, had an exhilarating influence, for we gradually became quite cheerful, and even animated; and the faces of my companions began to brighten up with more of the old familiar expression, ...
— The Island Home • Richard Archer

... that day had turned rosy at the close and then white with the lesser light of night, so did the summer now fade away in a blaze of colour, giving one last display of what life could do before leaving the land to the shroud of the winter's snow. Cool bracing winds, of which there had already been foretaste, now swept the land. The sun seemed brighter because the air was clearer. The college boys had returned, and were heard daily shouting at their games. A few days made all this outward difference. No other difference ...
— What Necessity Knows • Lily Dougall

... was inspirited by perceiving any door of escape. Any vivid sensation was welcome in the irksome vacancy that pursued her in the absence of immediate excitement. Devoid of the interest of opposition, and of the bracing changes to the Holt, her intercourse with the Charterises had become a weariness and vexation of spirit. Idle foreign life deteriorated them, and her principle and delicacy suffered frequent offences; but like all living wilfully in temptation, she seemed under ...
— Hopes and Fears - scenes from the life of a spinster • Charlotte M. Yonge

... gave this last order with coat thrown open,—thumbs in his vest,—back to the fire,—an attitude never indulged in except on rare occasions, and then only when the very weight of the problem necessitated a corresponding bracing ...
— Colonel Carter of Cartersville • F. Hopkinson Smith

... piece of the blanket rope he tied her wrists together, and placed her arms about his shoulders, grasping a rope that sagged away to the wrecked balloon on the road far below. He placed a leg over the ledge, wrapped it around the rope and bracing the other foot against the rock wall, started joyously ...
— The Perils of Pauline • Charles Goddard

... that early ride would have been vastly exhilarating to Hugh, who enjoyed the bracing air, but there was too much now upon his mind to admit of his enjoying anything. Thoughts of Adah, and the increased expense her presence would necessarily bring, flitted across his mind, while Barney's bill, put over once, and due again ere long, sat like a nightmare on ...
— Bad Hugh • Mary Jane Holmes

... from the poop, and Wilbur, his arm around the boy, followed. Kitchell was already out of hearing, and Wilbur was bracing himself upon the rolling deck, steadying the young fellow at his side, when the latter heaved a deep breath. His throat and breast swelled. Wilbur stared ...
— Moran of the Lady Letty • Frank Norris

... are looking very badly indeed for us, Christy," said the captain, bracing himself up as if for a renewed effort. "The Belle is almost up with the boat, and she will take Major Pierson and his party on board; and she is nearer ...
— Taken by the Enemy • Oliver Optic

... with sensibilities originally too exquisite for such a warfare. But at nine or ten the masculine energies of the character are beginning to develop themselves; or, if not, no discipline will better aid in their development than the bracing intercourse of a great English classical school. Even the selfish are there forced into accommodating themselves to a public standard of generosity, and the effeminate in conforming to a rule of manliness. I was myself at two public schools, and I think with gratitude of the benefits which I ...
— Autobiographic Sketches • Thomas de Quincey

... snugly at the foot of, and leans her back up against, high hills that shelter her from the north, and the breeze that blows up from the sea is fresh and mildly bracing. From a height to the north overlooking the city a bird's-eye view can be had of the entire surroundings, and of ...
— The Sunny Side of Ireland - How to see it by the Great Southern and Western Railway • John O'Mahony and R. Lloyd Praeger

... granting the manhood, the future of Athabasca is more assured than that of Manitoba seemed to be to the doubters of thirty years ago. In a word, there is fruitful land there, and a bracing climate fit for industrial man, and therefore its settlement is certain. It will take time. Vast forests must be cleared, and not, perhaps, until railways are built will that day dawn upon Athabasca. Yet it will come; and it is well to know that, when it does, there is ample room for ...
— Through the Mackenzie Basin - A Narrative of the Athabasca and Peace River Treaty Expedition of 1899 • Charles Mair

... are upon toasts," says he, bracing immediately, "I give you the immortal Miss Manners! Her beauty has dwelt unfaded in my memory since I last beheld her, aboard the Betsy." Remarking the pain in my face, he added, with a concern which may have been comical: ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill

... slept, and, though this was more difficult, got upon their feet again when morning came, for of all the hard things the wanderer in rain-swept bush or frozen wilderness must bear there is none that tests his powers more than the bracing himself for another day of effort in the early dawn. Comfortless as the night's lair has been, the jaded body craves for such faint warmth as it afforded, and further rest, the brain is dull and heavy, and the aching limbs appear incapable of supporting ...
— Hawtrey's Deputy • Harold Bindloss

... long arm. And as she looked, a lusty bass—heavy, full of fight—took the hook, and she saw the man stand motionless, intent, alert, at the instant he first felt the fish. Then she caught the skillful turn of his wrist as he struck—quick and sure; watched, with breathless interest as—bracing himself—the fisherman's powerful figure became instinct with life. With the boiling water grasping his legs, clinging to him like a tireless wrestler seeking the first unguarded moment; and with the plunging, tugging, rushing giant at the other ...
— The Calling Of Dan Matthews • Harold Bell Wright

... soon learns to make many deft applications of ingrafting. Sometimes a piece of bark may be used as a patch. In the bracing of crotches in young trees, the two trunks may be joined by uniting a small branch from either one, twisting them together to form a bridge like a bolt; they can be made to grow together, forming a solid union. ...
— The Apple-Tree - The Open Country Books—No. 1 • L. H. Bailey

... Then, bracing his feet against one lump, he pushed against its neighbor, and under that steady pressure the enormous masses moved apart and kept on moving, grinding among their fellows. Over and around them Stevens ...
— Spacehounds of IPC • Edward Elmer Smith

... above the high wind. Martin Hallowell was coming ashore in the boat that was to carry Alan away. Beyond them, the lights of the Huntress showed where she was getting up sail. Martin made the landing with some difficulty, climbed the ladder to the wharf, and stood bracing himself against the ...
— The Windy Hill • Cornelia Meigs

... down in health while attending the high school in Boston, despite the fact that he was one of the best athletes in the institution; but he readily persuaded his wealthy father that a few months' experience in the bracing northwest would do him more good than anything and everything ...
— Cowmen and Rustlers • Edward S. Ellis

... as strong as most of them," Reuben said, smiling too. "Four years' mill-wright's work, and four years on horseback in this bracing air, ought to make one strong, if there's anything in one to begin with. I think I ...
— A Final Reckoning - A Tale of Bush Life in Australia • G. A. Henty

... a few paces and leaned for support against the gnarled trunk of a scrub pine, watching him with a fascinated gaze as he stood bracing himself against the inward storm under which his own world and hers ...
— The Tyranny of Weakness • Charles Neville Buck

... encouraging slap as he trotted back to his place. The next play was an ordinary formation with the ends back, and the ball passed to left end for a run back of quarter and through the line outside of guard. It worked like a charm, and left end sped through with Joel bracing him at the turn and the left half going ahead. Four yards were netted, Meach, the substitute left half, being tackled by Post. In the mix-up that followed Joel found himself sprawling over the runner, with Cloud ...
— The Half-Back • Ralph Henry Barbour

... our party at the Vallejo-street wharf, and we were soon steaming on our way. Passing under the guns of Fort Alcatraz, past Angel Island—why so called I know not, as in early days it was inhabited not by angels but goats only—all of us felt the exhilaration of the California sunshine, and the bracing November air, as we stood upon the guards, watching the play of the lazy-looking porpoises, that seemed to roll along, keeping up with the swift motion of the boat in such a leisurely way. The porpoise is a deceiver. As he rolls up to the surface of the water, in his lumbering way, he looks ...
— California Sketches, Second Series • O. P. Fitzgerald

... creek under an old hemlock tree. My dogs kept me awake nearly all night with their barks and growls, once I was awakened by a twig falling in my face, in the morning I was at once attracted by a sliding noise which I soon discovered to be a Lynx bracing to leap, I slung my gun to my shoulder and the lynx was past danger instantly, I afterward learned this Lynx had killed a boy in the neighborhood by the name ...
— Black Beaver - The Trapper • James Campbell Lewis

... tried the door, or the bars in the window; now that he thought of it, the grate in the south window had appeared to be a little shaky. Inspired by a wild, alluring hope, he sprang over to the window and gripped the thin iron bars; with all his might and main he jerked, bracing his feet against the wall. No use! It would come just so far and no farther. He tried the other window, with even less encouraging results. In eight or ten minutes now, the crowd would be,—he leaped to the barred ...
— Viola Gwyn • George Barr McCutcheon

... him there. She could not go at once on account of her health. While she had been so unhappy, she had neglected to take that care of herself which her condition necessitated, and she was suffering the consequences. Once her mind was at rest, she made what amends she could by exercise in the bracing winter air, in defiance of dirt and intense cold, and by social relaxation, at least such as could be had while the guillotine was executing daily tasks to the tune of Ca ira, and women were madly turning ...
— Mary Wollstonecraft • Elizabeth Robins Pennell

... question was very large, and differed very little from the modern monoplane; the materials were to be spars of bamboo and hollow wood, with diagonal wire bracing. The surface of the planes was to amount to 4,500 square feet, and the tail, triangular in form (here modern practice diverges) was to be 1,500 square feet. The inventor estimated that there would be a sustaining power of half a pound per square foot, and the driving ...
— A History of Aeronautics • E. Charles Vivian

... poop he could see Black Duncan, and the seaman's histories, the seaman's fables all came into his mind again, and the sea was the very highway of content. The ship was all alone upon the water, not even the tan of a fisher's lug-sail broke the blue. A bracing heartening air blew from French Foreland And as he was looking spellbound upon the little vessel coming into the mouth of the river, he was startled by a strain of music. It floated, a rumour angelic, upon the air, coming whence he ...
— Gilian The Dreamer - His Fancy, His Love and Adventure • Neil Munro

... if you don't get off of your own accord," roared the Polar Bear, bracing up, and removing the icicle from his nose he shook it angrily ...
— Andiron Tales • John Kendrick Bangs



Words linked to "Bracing" :   tie, guy rope, strut, guy cable, sleeper, stay, guy wire, structural member, reinforcement, crosspiece, framework, guy, stringer, gusset plate, strengthener, railroad tie, crosstie, gusset, invigorating



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