"Contour" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... The academic has its charm. There are moods in which I could imagine myself in love with an academic person. That regularity of line; that reasoned strictness of contour; that neatness of pose; that slightly conventional but harmonious grouping of the emotions and morals—you can see how it would have its charm, the Wedgwood in human nature? I wonder where Mrs. Mandel keeps ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... elles God forbidde, Sir," quoth she; And forth she went, as jolly as a pie, And bade the cookes that they should them hie,* *make haste So that men mighte dine, and that anon. Up to her husband is this wife gone, And knocked at his contour boldely. *"Qui est la?"* quoth he. "Peter! it am I," *who is there?* Quoth she; "What, Sir, how longe all will ye fast? How longe time will ye reckon and cast Your summes, and your bookes, and your things? ...
— The Canterbury Tales and Other Poems • Geoffrey Chaucer
... view than from his own place near the stage, and his attention was caught and fixed by the masked lady, whom he had not seen before, as his back was always turned to her box. Although her head and figure were much enveloped and disguised in a profusion of black laces, the attitude and general contour of this mysterious beauty seemed strangely familiar to him, and there was something about her that reminded him forcibly of the marquise, his own wife. "Bah!" said he to himself, "how foolish I am; she must be all safe at the Chateau ...
— Captain Fracasse • Theophile Gautier
... the Mocenigo hand, severe and even stiff in its articulations, has its veins finely drawn, its sculptor having justly felt that the delicacy of the veining expresses alike dignity and age and birth. The Vendramin hand is far more laboriously cut, but its blunt and clumsy contour at once makes us feel that all the care has been thrown away, and well it may be, for it has been entirely bestowed in cutting gouty wrinkles about the joints. Such as the hand is, I looked for its fellow. At first I thought it ...
— Stones of Venice [introductions] • John Ruskin
... full-grown and rather large negro, as black as charcoal, with a splendid tier of "ivories;" and with eyeballs, pupil and irides excepted, as white as his teeth. But it was not these that had tickled my fancy. It was the peculiar contour of his head, and the set and size of his ears. The former was as round as a globe, and thickly covered with small kinky curlets of black wool, so closely set that they seemed to root at both ends, and form a "nap!" From the sides of this sable sphere stood out ...
— The Quadroon - Adventures in the Far West • Mayne Reid
... feast between them, and the girl leaned over to turn him a cup of tea from a pot that was already made and waiting. Her lovely head was near him, and he stared with hungry adoration at the thick, shining braids, and the soft white contour of her cheek and neck. She leaned back suddenly, and caught him. The words that were on her lips remained unspoken. The laughter went from her eyes. In a hot wave the blood flushed ...
— God's Country—And the Woman • James Oliver Curwood
... down in a contour-chair with an eight-inch mattress of foam rubber. The stewardess adjusted straps. He thought bitter, ironic ...
— Operation: Outer Space • William Fitzgerald Jenkins
... sindetenemo. Continent (geog.) kontinento. Contingent (milit.) kontingento. Contiguity apudeco. Contiguous apuda. Continue (to last) dauxri. Continue (go on) dauxrigi. Contortion (of face) grimaco. Contour konturo. Contraband kontrabando. Contract kontrakto. Contract, make a kontrakti. Contract kuntirigxi. Contractor entreprenisto. Contradict kontrauxdiri. Contrariwise kontrauxe. Contrary kontrauxa. Contrary, on the male, kontrauxe. ...
— English-Esperanto Dictionary • John Charles O'Connor and Charles Frederic Hayes
... to another fact: "When we try to mark in memory the contour of a very well-known coin, we deceive ourselves, unbelievably—when we see the coin the size we imagine it to be, ...
— Robin Hood • J. Walker McSpadden
... snowflake. Moreover, he was now a little bit behind her, so that he could with impunity regard the appearance of this newly-found companion—her lithe and agile form, the proud set of her neck and head, the beautiful close masses of her curly, golden-brown hair, and the fine contour of her sun-tanned cheek. Then the vigorous exercise in which she was engaged revealed all the suppleness and harmonious proportions of her figure; for here was no pretty wrist-work of trout-fishing, but the wielding of a double-handed salmon-rod; and she had taught herself ...
— Prince Fortunatus • William Black
... as an artist, I have observed that which leads me to desire a—a memorandum—let us say of the pose and contour of a certain head," replied Mueller, recovering his self-possession, "it is not likely that I shall be disposed to part from ...
— In the Days of My Youth • Amelia Ann Blandford Edwards
... observed upon the tongue. It grows upon a broad, spreading base, becoming very hard. It is almost lacking in blood vessels, although the few that are present are plainly in view, and in consequence is poorly supplied with fluids. It is of a smooth contour, white or whitish yellow in color, is sharply limited from the normal substance of the tongue, may be covered with mucous membrane, on which prominent papillae are located, or only by a thin, delicate layer of epithelium, and is usually found in the middle part of the tongue, where ...
— Special Report on Diseases of Cattle • U.S. Department of Agriculture
... do either to see or not to see! The exhibition is eminently splendid. There is contour, and keeping, and grace, and expression, and all the varieties of artificial excellence. The apartments were truly very noble. The pictures, for the sake of a skylight, are at the top of the house; there we dined, and I sat over ...
— Dr. Johnson's Works: Life, Poems, and Tales, Volume 1 - The Works Of Samuel Johnson, Ll.D., In Nine Volumes • Samuel Johnson
... swelling breast heaves tumultuously against his, face to face they whirl on, his limbs interwoven with hers, his strong right arm around her yielding form, he presses her to him until every curve in the contour of her body thrills with the amorous contact. Her eyes look into his, but she sees nothing; the soft music fills the room, but she hears it not; he bends her body to and fro, but she knows it not; his hot breath, tainted with strong drink, is on her hair and cheek, his lips almost touch her forehead, ...
— From the Ball-Room to Hell • T. A. Faulkner
... His yellowish-and-white body was all but shapeless. His coat was thick and heavy enough, but it showed a tendency to curl—almost to kink—instead of waving crisply, as a collie's ought. The head was coarse and blurred in line. The body was gaunt, in spite of its incessant feedings. As for contour or style— ...
— Bruce • Albert Payson Terhune
... in Roman architectural works are steeper than those made by the Greeks, varying in inclination from eighteen to twenty-five degrees, instead of fourteen. The mouldings are the same as the Grecian in general form, although they differ from them in contour; they are less delicate and graceful, but were used in great profusion. Roman architecture is overdone with ornament, every moulding carved, and every straight surface sculptured with foliage or historical subjects in relief. The ornaments of the frieze ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume III • John Lord
... Dawson lay down to sleep and Vose Adams assumed his place as sentinel, the moon was near the zenith, but the contour of the canyon shut out its beams. While Vose was striving to pierce the gloom, over and about the four animals, he noted a flickering tremor against the vast wall which formed the other side of the canyon. A faint, fleecy veil of moonlight having been lifted over the mountain crests, ...
— A Waif of the Mountains • Edward S. Ellis
... to make a thin woman look anything but thin. Often by accentuating her thinness, a woman can make an effect as type, which gives her distinction. If she were foolish enough to try to look fatter, her lines would be lost without attaining the contour of the rounded type. There are of course fashions in types; pale ash blonds, red-haired types (auburn or golden red with shell pink complexions), dark haired types with pale white skin, etc., and fashions in figures are ...
— Woman as Decoration • Emily Burbank
... down the road a few paces, then turned to look back at the spot where they had come through the bushes. He examined carefully the shrubbery, and stood a short time examining the outline of the trees and larger growth, carefully noting the contour. ...
— Boy Scouts Mysterious Signal - or Perils of the Black Bear Patrol • G. Harvey Ralphson
... heaven knows what, from the window, led me to it, and the air revived me a little. Mademoiselle (for I cannot call her by her new name) is altered a good deal—more, however, in the character than in the contour of her face and figure. Certainly, however, she has grown a good deal fuller, and her color is higher; and whether it is fancy or not, I cannot say, but certainly to me it seems that the expression of her face has acquired something habitually lowering and malicious, and which, ...
— The Evil Guest • J. Sheridan Le Fanu
... below it, which meet in such a sharp, unmitigated angle. Look at the Venus yonder,—she is naked to the hips,—and see how utterly these lines misrepresent those of Nature. You will find no instance of such a contour as is formed by the meeting of these lines among all living creatures, except, perhaps, when a turtle thrusts his head and his ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 4, No. 24, Oct. 1859 • Various
... the contour of the cylinder head was changed slightly. This improved the combustion efficiency to the extent that the stroke of the fuel pumps could be decreased about 15 percent. The specific fuel consumption then decreased about 10 percent. In ...
— The First Airplane Diesel Engine: Packard Model DR-980 of 1928 • Robert B. Meyer
... lady. "The feminine star is in the ascendant. How much more illustrious the triumph! How greater the difficulty to express in visible types, the soft, subduing, humanizing graces of the female disposition, than to imprint the coarse outline of masculine strength! How rough the contour of an Irish hodman to the sweet flexibilities of the Venus ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXLII. Vol. LV. April, 1844 • Various
... the oasis of Vitor is the contour line along which the irrigating canal runs. There is no gradual petering out of foliage. The desert begins with a stunning crash. On one side is the bright, luxurious green of fig trees and vineyards; on the other ...
— Inca Land - Explorations in the Highlands of Peru • Hiram Bingham
... that he was a handsome individual. Perhaps slightly less than average in height, and very slender, he had the close-knit build of an athlete. The contour of his head and the perfect regularity of rather large features made him an ideal type for the screen at any angle; in close-ups and foregrounds as well as full shots. In actual life there were little things covered by make-up in his work, such as the ...
— The Film Mystery • Arthur B. Reeve
... show. For his part, Green had seen only the man's side face, and that casually and at a fleeting glance; but before the young lady was through with her description, he knew the other's deportment and contour as though he had passed him a hundred times and each time had closely ...
— From Place to Place • Irvin S. Cobb
... outline, circumference; perimeter, periphery, ambit, circuit, lines tournure[obs3], contour, profile, silhouette; bounds; coast line. zone, belt, girth, band, baldric, zodiac, girdle, tyre[Brit], cingle[obs3], clasp, girt; cordon &c. (inclosure) 232; ...
— Roget's Thesaurus
... warm night, and she wore nothing over her white dress. I could see her tall, shapely figure and shining eyes, and the firm contour of her beautiful face, which, if any fault might be found with it, erred in being too regular. She looked like a woman formed by nature to meet dangers and difficulties, and to play a great part; even here, at midnight, in the midst of these desperate men, she did not seem ...
— Under the Red Robe • Stanley Weyman
... indignant look was fixed on the heavy wheelruts ahead, while his handsome though fleshy figure inclined slightly forward in the saddle after a foreign fashion. Seen close at hand his face, which was impressive at a distance, lost a certain distinction of contour, as though the marks of experience had blurred, rather than accentuated, the original type. The bones of forehead and nose still showed classic in outline, but in moulding the mouth and chin nature had not adhered closely to the aristocratic ...
— The Miller Of Old Church • Ellen Glasgow
... involved in the remaining journey. So it came to pass that at dusk on that same evening, Alec Trenholme, having put his friend to bed, joined the loungers on the railway platform in front of the inn, and watched lightning vibrate above the horizon, and saw its sheet-like flames light up the contour of Chellaston Mountain. He did not know what hill it was; he did not know precisely where he was in relation to his brother's home; but he soon overheard the name of the hill from two men who were talking about ...
— What Necessity Knows • Lily Dougall
... porcelain powder, which are repeatedly fused until the whole exactly fills the matrix. After cooling, the matrix is stripped away and the porcelain is cemented into the cavity. When the cement has hardened, the surface of the porcelain is ground and polished to proper contour. If successfully made, porcelain fillings are scarcely noticeable. Their durability remains to ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 8, Slice 2 - "Demijohn" to "Destructor" • Various
... ground, detaching from it as much as possible all foreign and accidental accessories, that the eye may rest wholly on the essential objects, the figures themselves. These figures the sculptor works out with their whole body and contour, and as he rejects the illusion of colours, announces by the solidity and uniformity of the mass in which they are constructed, a creation of no perishable existence, but endowed, with a higher power ...
— Lectures on Dramatic Art and Literature • August Wilhelm Schlegel
... Ordnance Maps published by the Eidg. Landestopographie at Bern. The mountain districts are produced at a scale of 1 centimetre in 50,000 centimetres or 2 centimetres in one kilometre, and large or small sheets can be bought almost everywhere. The gradients are clearly shown by contour lines. The equidistance being 30 metres, or roughly 100 feet, the dotted contour lines when height is marked some every 8 or 10 ordinary contour lines. This differs according to the edition. Cliff and rock are shown grey, while glacier ...
— Ski-running • Katharine Symonds Furse
... outlines of a reclining figure. A handful of Japan lilies burned against the pure drapery, and another handful of tea violets lay crushed in the fleecy handkerchief on the floor. Against the cushions the exquisite contour of the sleeping face showed plainly. Coolest quiet sphered the whole figure; not a suggestion of anything but slowest calm grace disturbed its repose. But with the hushing rustle of leaves with the summer murmur ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol 6, No 5, November 1864 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... await her arrival. My person had been set off to the best advantage. I had put on a new wig, a splendid velvet cloak, silk doublet and hose; and as I surveyed myself for a second or two in the mirror, I felt the impossibility of recognition, mingled with pride at my handsome contour. The door opened, and Donna Celia came in, trembling with anxiety. I threw myself on my knees, and in a voice apparently choked with emotion, demanded her blessing. She tottered to the sofa overpowered by her feelings; and still remaining on my knees, I seized ...
— The Pacha of Many Tales • Captain Frederick Marryat
... to be irregular in contour, and to have jutting out from it two sets of minute fibres, one set relatively short, indefinitely numerous, and branching in every direction; the other set limited in number, sometimes even single, and starting out directly from the cell as if bent on a longer journey. ...
— A History of Science, Volume 4(of 5) • Henry Smith Williams
... of weariness which she did not remember in his sunburned face. On the whole, however, it was a reposeful face, with something in it that suggested a steadfast disposition. His gray eyes met one calmly and directly; his brown hair was short and stiff; the set of his lips and the contour of his jaw were firm. George had entered on his thirtieth year. Though he was strongly made, his appearance was in no way striking, and it was seldom that his conversation was characterized by brilliancy. But his ...
— Ranching for Sylvia • Harold Bindloss
... barometers, and their reaction to passing showers was invariable. The clay surface held water, and after each downfall the pools would be higher, and the contour of the little region altered. At the first few drops, all the ants would hasten, the throbbing corpuscles speeding up. Then, as the rain came down heavier, the column melted away, those near each end hurrying to shelter and those in the center crawling beneath fallen leaves and ...
— Edge of the Jungle • William Beebe
... a railroad crossing and military depot, but now also historically, on account of the operations centring around it, is at a height of 3,300. Beyond it the country, though often rough in detail, is gently rolling in general contour till near Glencoe, where the road climbs eight hundred feet in ten miles. From Glencoe a branch runs five miles east to Dundee, the site of extensive collieries, upon which Natal ...
— Story of the War in South Africa - 1899-1900 • Alfred T. Mahan
... place accursed, and to purify the air, as a safeguard against pestilence, the offal was consumed by bonfires that were constantly renewed and never extinguished. At its extremity was an elevation, a hilly contour which to the popular fancy suggested a skull. To the west it fell steeply away. It was ...
— Mary Magdalen • Edgar Saltus
... but one place where a bluff of high and dry land faces, not indeed land equally dry immediately upon the farther bank, but at least a spur of dry land which approaches fairly near to the main stream. If the modern contour lines be taken and laid out upon a map of London this spur will be found to project from Southwark northward directly towards the river, and immediately opposite it is the dry hill, surrounded upon three sides by river or by marsh, upon which grew up the settlement ...
— The Historic Thames • Hilaire Belloc
... buffalo-grass, prickly pears, and sagebrush stretched before us to the north and east; and on the west the filmy blue contour of the Highwoods Mountains lifted like sun-smitten thunder clouds in the July swelter. One squinting far look, however, told you that these were not rain clouds. The very thought of rain came to you with the vagueness of some birth-surviving memory of a ...
— The River and I • John G. Neihardt
... should be left for mass drawing. You seldom see any shadows in Holbein's drawings; he seems to have put his sitters near a wide window, close against which he worked. Select also a background as near the tone of the highest light on the object to be drawn as possible. This will show up clearly the contour. In the case of a portrait drawing, a newspaper hung behind the head answers very well and is always easily obtained. The tone of it can be varied by the distance at which it is placed from the head, and by the angle at which it is turned away from ...
— The Practice and Science Of Drawing • Harold Speed
... northerly cottonwoods two miles away we found other men with scrapers throwing up the irrigation checks along the predetermined contour lines. By means of these irregular meandering earthworks the water, admitted from the ditch to the upper end of the field, would work its way slowly from level to level instead of running off or making channels ...
— The Killer • Stewart Edward White
... brings out this fact clearly. On a white sheet of paper is placed a card equally white; with a fine point, but without touching the paper, the contour of the card is followed while the idea of a line traced in black is suggested to the subject. The subject, when awakened, is asked to fold the paper according to these imaginary lines. He holds the paper at the distance at which it was at the moment of suggestion, and folds it in the form of ...
— Buchanan's Journal of Man, July 1887 - Volume 1, Number 6 • Various
... watched over her with the tenderest care and solicitude. At this period Mary was near sixteen years of age, and rather striking in her appearance, though by no means what would be strictly termed beautiful. Indeed, the contour of her features, as a whole, was rather commonplace than otherwise; but a soul beamed out through her flashing black eye, and lit up her countenance with a sweetness, a loveliness, which was strange, and sometimes startling, from ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII No. 6 June 1848 • Various
... portrait is that of Lucrezia Petrani the small head indicates a person below the middle height; the attributes are those of a Roman matron in her pride; her high complexion, graceful contour, straight nose, black eyebrows, and expression at the same time imperious and voluptuous indicate this character to the life; a smile still seems to linger an the charming dimpled cheeks and perfect mouth mentioned ...
— Celebrated Crimes, Complete • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... much-bedaubed, long-sleeved aprons, and working away at a portrait head, they had little thought for anything but the task in hand. The one vital matter for the moment was the mixing and applying of their colours, and, in their eagerness to reproduce the exact contour of a cheek, or the precise shadow of an unbeautiful nose, they would hardly have transferred their attention from the most ill-favoured model to the last ...
— A Bookful of Girls • Anna Fuller
... in design to the form of the hill. These consist of two lower terraces which are square in form; four galleries (or passages, with sculptures on either side), which are still rectangular in form, but have twenty angles to admit of their following the rounded contour of the hill; and four terraces, of which the first has twelve angles, while the remaining three are circular, adorned with cupolas, each containing a statue of Buddha; and finally the whole is surmounted by a huge cupola, ...
— A Visit to Java - With an Account of the Founding of Singapore • W. Basil Worsfold
... see it in any other way. Restraint galls them, and their inclination is not to resist but to evade it. These are kitten-like children in the beginning, and they appear charming. But when the kitten in them is overgrown, its playful evasiveness takes an ugly contour and shows itself as want of principle. The tendency to snatch at enjoyment hardens into a grasping sense of market values, and conscience, instead of growing inexorable, learns to be pliant to circumstances. Debts weigh lightly, and duties scarcely weigh at all. Concealment ...
— The Education of Catholic Girls • Janet Erskine Stuart
... fastidiousness of earlier days caused him to shrug his shoulders. Yet underneath the tan there was the glow of perfect young health; the eyes were frank, brave, unflinching; while the rounded chin held a world of character in its firm contour. Somehow the sight of this brought back to him that abiding faith in her "dead gameness" which had first awakened his admiration. "She's got it in her," he thought, silently, "and, by thunder! I 'm here to help ...
— Bob Hampton of Placer • Randall Parrish
... expression of the deepest and most intense interest. His personal appearance was indeed peculiar and remarkable. He was about the middle size, somewhat straggling and bony in his figure; his forehead was neither good nor bad, but the general contour of his face contained not within it a single feature with the expression of which the heart of the spectator could harmonize. He was beetle-browed, his mouth diabolically sensual, and his eyes, which were scarcely an inch asunder, were sharp and piercing, and reminded one that the deep-seated ...
— The Black Baronet; or, The Chronicles Of Ballytrain - The Works of William Carleton, Volume One • William Carleton
... faultless in form, and perfectly inexpressive. She had a nose equally straight, but perhaps a little too coarse in dimensions. She had a mouth not over large, with two thin lips and small whitish teeth; and she had a chin equal in contour to the rest of her face, but on which Venus had not deigned to set a dimple. Nature might have defied a French passport officer to give a description of her, by which even her own mother or a detective ...
— The Three Clerks • Anthony Trollope
... more abundant than usual—in fact, it felt confoundedly like library paste, a pot of which, in an ornamental holder, was among the fittings of the escritoire. On the desk pad of blotting paper, too, Victor detected marks of fresh paste defining the contour of ...
— Red Masquerade • Louis Joseph Vance
... while rowing out of the cut-off behind an island, I caught sight of a flatboat floating in the contour of a distant bend. There was something familiar in her appearance, and, as I drew nearer, I recognized the pile of nets, the rusty stove, and the civil but silent crew. She was the same flat which had left Hickman, Kentucky, ...
— Four Months in a Sneak-Box • Nathaniel H. Bishop
... man there were other things which gave him the look of the great Napoleon. The contour of feature was the same: and on his brow, broad and massive, there might be seen those grand shadows with which French artists love to glorify the Emperor. Yet in addition to this he had that same serene immobility of countenance which characterized the other, which could serve as an impenetrable ...
— Cord and Creese • James de Mille
... size and length, from ten to twenty-five feet. Others are not so large but are brilliant. We created a flood of artificial light with dozens of candles and lamps; and then and not until then, could we see the slope and contour of the roof. A few bats were flitting about, disturbed for the first time. To the left, a vast white pillar extended from floor to roof. It was pure white and about five feet in diameter all the way up. It was fluted, fretted, draped and spangled. I ...
— Cave Regions of the Ozarks and Black Hills • Luella Agnes Owen
... he might veil in this way. There is, to me, a peculiar and possibly rather a childish fascination in watching my more intimate friends unobserved, and, curiously enough, I had never before studied the avuncular back view. I found something singularly entertaining in the study of the graceful contour of his new frock coat, and in the cheerful carriage of his cane. He paraded, a dignified procession of one, some way down the Arcade, hesitated for a moment outside a jeweller's shop, and then entered it. I strolled on as far as Piccadilly, returned to the shop, and ...
— Select Conversations with an Uncle • H. G. Wells
... herself. "Queer things for breakfast!" Khudabakhsh and his mate mentally reflect, exchanging glances, but without moving a muscle. Breakfast is served, and my friend sees before her just what she meant to order. On one dish reeks the bony contour of a chicken, grinning thankfulness for extinction at every joint, and on a second dish towers a pile of things like small wooden trenchers pressed flat. Of course she has been puzzled, she self-flatteringly concludes, by ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 15, - No. 87, March, 1875 • Various
... not time their fuses right and most of the damage was done to the trees behind us, or they were on too high ground to get the range. The line gradually advanced, creeping forward little by little until it reached a partial shelter afforded by the contour of the ground where it sloped sharply into a sort of ditch that was cut through the field parallel with the line of battle. Here it halted and the battle went on in this manner for a long time, possibly for hours. In the meantime, Chapman's brigade, of ...
— Personal Recollections of a Cavalryman - With Custer's Michigan Cavalry Brigade in the Civil War • J. H. (James Harvey) Kidd
... we could not see where we were going, as the sand had covered up the track. We were among a lot of confused sand hills, and the high mountains stood directly in front like a formidable black barrier, their contour line just distinguishable ...
— Across Coveted Lands - or a Journey from Flushing (Holland) to Calcutta Overland • Arnold Henry Savage Landor
... suffering in others it was exceedingly difficult to evoke; while his partner was the very reverse, by constitution weak and ailing, but withal a woman of whom any man might and ought to have been proud. Her elegant form, her fair transparent skin, the classical contour of her refined and expressive face, might have led a Canova to have selected her as a model of feminine beauty. But alas! she was weak; she could not work like other women; her husband could not boast ...
— Friends and Neighbors - or Two Ways of Living in the World • Anonymous
... face of plastic contour, rich full lips, soft interfused outlines, intense purple eyes, and heavy waving hair, dark indeed, but harmonized curiously with the narrow gold fillet that bound it. "It is no pain to die for love," said the low, deep voice, with an echo of ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. II, No. 8, June 1858 • Various
... this was a surprise. It was somewhat as if Providence had taken note of his case and sent out a Sister of Charity; and one who had the charming advantage of being also a dimpled Daughter of the Regiment. Once his eye had taken in the regular contour of her nose and rested on that dimple, his gaze did not wander. He did not even wink—it would have been a complete loss of looking. When she removed the lid from the saucepan a spicy aroma spread itself abroad. Dog and herder sniffed the evening air, sampling ...
— The Wrong Woman • Charles D. Stewart
... the whole, one is inclined to suppose that the general resemblance in facial appearance, bodily contour, and interests which we observe in children of the two sexes, indicates that deeper distinctions are latent rather than active. This is much more than an academic question, for if our subject in the present volume were the care of childhood, it is plain that we should have to base ...
— Woman and Womanhood - A Search for Principles • C. W. Saleeby
... not count the shifting, crossing, restless shapes I saw down there. Presently, without call or signal, as if by one consent, the Oreads joined hands and enclosed the whole circuit in their ring. The effect in the dusk was of a pale glow, as of the softest fire, defining the contour of the valley; and soon they were moving, circling round and round. Shriller and louder swelled the hidden music, and faster span the ring. It whirled and wavered, lifted and fell, but so smoothly, with such inherent ...
— Lore of Proserpine • Maurice Hewlett
... young chemist pushed his hair back, looked out of the window, and then turned to Average Jones. The rather flabby lines of his face had abruptly hardened over the firm contour below. ...
— Average Jones • Samuel Hopkins Adams
... Gardens. It is Madame France wearing a poilu's helmet. There is a look of triumph in her upturned face. France in her has become younger. Most figures of France are Diana-like, but here apparently is one the tender contour of whose limbs is not official but intimate. A policeman is in charge, but it verges on the indiscreet to ask him any questions. One dare be certain that Paris will not accept this statue, for though it expresses something of the new spirit of France, it is not in perfect ...
— Europe—Whither Bound? - Being Letters of Travel from the Capitals of Europe in the Year 1921 • Stephen Graham
... affected; and I shall never forget her heartfelt delight and thankfulness when she saw him notice and laugh at the ludicrous incident of a neighbour's tame magpie hopping upon his bed. The effect of this fever was to alter the contour of his features permanently, to a longer shape, giving him a more striking resemblance to his mother's family than to mine. His utterance, also, which had been voluble, became slow and ...
— Successful Exploration Through the Interior of Australia • William John Wills
... eyes of the two met, and Joan saw a worn, kindly face, endowed with a quiet charm of expression and delicacy of contour that offered a marked contrast to the man's unprepossessing features. Both women were too well bred to stare, and Joan instantly brought her wits to bear on Poluski's quip; but that fleeting glimpse ...
— A Son of the Immortals • Louis Tracy
... with a countenance, grave, cold, calm in the consciousness of its originality: nay, the whole deep brims and swims with one can't count how many eccentric faces, and gills, and teeth, and eyes astart from their sockets, and every other kind of striking contour: but every monster there floats his own way quietly and peaceably, without having his sleeve twitcht or any other annoyance. Man alone is so absurd as to laugh and ...
— The Old Man of the Mountain, The Lovecharm and Pietro of Abano - Tales from the German of Tieck • Ludwig Tieck
... the wondering Diotti, and proceeded to open the case. Taking the instrument out the old man fondled it with loving and tender solicitude, pointing out its many beauties—the exquisite blending of the curves, the evenness of the grain, the peculiar coloring, the lovely contour of the neck, the graceful outlines of the body, the scroll, rivaling the creations of the ancient sculptors, the solidity of the bridge and its elegantly carved heart, and, waxing exceedingly enthusiastic, holding up the instrument and looking at it as one does at a cluster ...
— The Fifth String, The Conspirators • John Philip Sousa
... the Grand River Valley as far as Gull Island Lake, the whole forming one grand glacial record. From Lake Melville to Gull Island the bed was being gradually filled in by the deposits of the river, but the contour of the basin is the same here as below. The bed of the country here is Archaean rock, and many beautiful specimens of labradorite dot the shores. In the distance the grim peaks of the Mealy Mountains stand out in bold relief against ...
— Scientific American Supplement No. 822 - Volume XXXII, Number 822. Issue Date October 3, 1891 • Various
... by unconscious transition fell to contemplating her own face. It interested her. She looked at it critically, as at some face other than her own, some portrait, appraising and studying it. It was young and fresh, surely, as the morn—in its softness of contour and fine clear bloom; yet grave to the verge of austerity, owing partly to the brown hair which, parted in the middle and drawn down in a plain full sweep over the ears, hung thence in thick loose plait on either ...
— Deadham Hard • Lucas Malet
... close to the river, over rocks and along narrow ledges, was hard work; the climb out was even more so. The contour maps which we carried credited these walls with 1300 feet height. If we had any doubt concerning the accuracy of this, it disappeared before we finally reached the top. What we saw, however, was worth all the ...
— Through the Grand Canyon from Wyoming to Mexico • E. L. Kolb
... under water, could not easily be destroyed by gunfire from the southern bank. Above this was a heavy chevaux-de-frise and barbed-wire entanglement, partly sunk and concealed from view; in many places pitted and covered with brushwood. Above this, following approximately a thirty-foot contour, came a line of trenches for infantry, and fifty yards behind a second line of trenches, commanding a further elevation of fifty feet. Two-thirds of the way up the hill came the trench-living quarters, the kitchens, the bakeries, the dormitories, and so forth, and the crest of the ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume II (of VIII) - History of the European War from Official Sources • Various
... killed, would be made good in a very few years but for the destruction of capital and credit which the war has caused. If we study the vital statistics of a country like Germany, which has engaged in several severe wars since births and deaths began to be registered, we shall find that the contour-line representing the fluctuations of the birth-rate indicates a steep ravine in the year or years while the war lasted, followed by a hump or high table-land for several years after. In a short time, as far as numbers are concerned, the war is as if it had never been. When we remember that ...
— Outspoken Essays • William Ralph Inge
... from the hill top ceased. All gathered to marvel at the lion's immense size. He measured three feet nine inches at the shoulder, and nine feet eleven inches between stakes, or ten feet eleven inches along contour. This is only five inches under record. We weighed him piecemeal, after a fashion, and put him between ...
— African Camp Fires • Stewart Edward White
... they are more, indeed, than this. For if we look closer we shall perceive, as in a glass, darkly, the contour of a subtle, even ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre
... familiar devil. Now and then he would give me a glance and make the hairs of his stiff little moustache stir quaintly. His eyes were green and every cat I see to this day reminds me of the exact contour of his face. What he was travelling for or what was his business in life he never confided to me. Truth to say the only passenger on board that schooner who could have talked openly about his activities ...
— Notes on My Books • Joseph Conrad
... phrenology! he never believed in a single bump, and cites his own contracted forehead as the very strongest proof against the theory. Indeed, there is nothing remarkable in our host's countenance, if we except its floridness; but a blunt nose protruding over a wide mouth and flat chin gives the contour of his face an expression not the most prepossessing. He has been heard to say, "A man who didn't love himself wasn't worth loving:" and, to show his belief in this principle of nature, he adorns his face with thick red whiskers, ...
— Our World, or, The Slaveholders Daughter • F. Colburn Adams
... Aldonza's beautiful and peculiar contour of head and face rose among the round chubby English faces like a jessamine among daisies, and at that moment she was undertaking, with an exquisite smile, the care of the gown that Giles laid at her feet, ere ...
— The Armourer's Prentices • Charlotte Mary Yonge
... closely curtained, the silent forces of physical life, in her deep tranquillity, were doing an artist's work. The hollow cheeks were gradually rounded and given the faintest possible bloom. Her form was gaining a contour that ...
— His Sombre Rivals • E. P. Roe
... the billowing fields sailed away the gray steamer, cutting a path that sprayed and sang after. Sunlight danced and lay whitely as far as the eye could reach. It prolonged for those on shore the contour of the line of faces above each deck; it picked points of light from off everywhere—off smokestacks and polished railings, off plate-glass and brass-bound port-holes and even down the ship's flank, to where gilt letters spelled ...
— Humoresque - A Laugh On Life With A Tear Behind It • Fannie Hurst
... Marmora, and the Aegean; on the S. by the Mediterranean; on the W. by the Ionian Sea and the Adriatic. With the exception of the Black Sea coast and the Albanian littoral, its shores are considerably indented and flanked by groups of islands. The Peninsula in its general contour resembles an inverted pyramid or triangle, terminating at its apex in a subsidiary peninsula, the Peloponnesus or Morea. Its surface is almost entirely mountainous, the only extensive plains being those formed by the valleys of the Danube and Maritza, and ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 3, Part 1, Slice 2 - "Baconthorpe" to "Bankruptcy" • Various
... fingerprint patterns, and it is easily distinguished. Figures 107 to 118 are examples of the plain arch. It will be noted that there may be various ridge formations such as ending ridges, bifurcations, dots and islands involved in this type of pattern, but they all tend to follow the general ridge contour; i.e., they enter on one side, make a rise or wave in the center, and flow or tend to flow out the ...
— The Science of Fingerprints - Classification and Uses • Federal Bureau of Investigation
... and elegant in manner. Even then he stooped a little, so that his shoulders inclined forward, which gave something of flatness to his chest. His face was thin and elongated; but what a forehead! What eyes! What beauty in the contour of his intellectual visage! In repose, its habitual expression was reflective and concentrated, with a strong tinge ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 2, No. 12, May, 1851. • Various
... came suddenly upon the gray stone. It startled her, for its rude contour, standing up in the pale moonlight, put on the appearance of a woman. She thought she was discovered, and she heard a noise; but another glance reassured her. She recognized the stone, and the noise she had heard was only the scurrying of a hare ...
— The Golden Dog - Le Chien d'Or • William Kirby
... that it was her husband) from an artist's standpoint only. It had occurred to him that here was a remarkable model for a picture. He furtively studied the lines of her figure, which was clad in a long, tight-fighting cloak, trimmed with fur, and the contour and color of the knot of brown hair, whose living lustre shone richly between the dull fur that bordered her collar and her hat. Every moment the study fascinated him more, as he followed and turned, as they turned. Suddenly it struck him that perhaps ...
— A Beautiful Alien • Julia Magruder
... to him that she was married to another man. He felt secure in his own attractions. He had ever been able to while away the time with whom he chose, why should a simple village maiden resist him? And this was an unusual one, the contour of her head was like ...
— Marcia Schuyler • Grace Livingston Hill Lutz
... further attention, for above her right shoe-heel a white scrap of Joan was visible. Her hands were a little large, but well shaped; her pose was free and fine, though the field-glasses spoiled the picture and the sun-bonnet hid the contour of her head. ...
— Lying Prophets • Eden Phillpotts
... quelle nuit! la, rien n'a de contour ni d'age; Et le nuage est spectre, et le spectre est nuage. Et c'etait le clairon ...
— La Legende des Siecles • Victor Hugo
... years of age, whose complexion denoted Indian parentage, but whose countenance had something in the highest degree interesting, even noble, in its expression. Her forehead was well formed, her black eyes had an arch, almost a roguish, glance, her finely cut lips, and the whole contour of her physiognomy, betrayed a frank and joyous disposition, whilst the slight curve of her Roman nose gave her an air of decision and self-reliance, with which her bearing and costume corresponded. This costume was far superior to the usual dress of Indian girls, and as remarkable for ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 367, May 1846 • Various
... entered on the gay world, a song, "Jenny of Monreith," was composed in her honour, which her son, the Duke of Gordon, used to sing, long after the charms, which were thus celebrated, had vanished. Her features were regular; the contour of her face was truly noble; her hair was dark, as well as her eyes and eyebrows; her face long and beautifully oval; the chin somewhat too long; the upper lip was short, and the mouth, notwithstanding ...
— Beaux and Belles of England • Mary Robinson
... picture painted in an infinite variety of delicate purple tones of shadow, through which, with the aid of the glass, could be made out the several declivities, gorges, precipices, and ravines that went to make up the contour of the country. It was thickly wooded everywhere, seemingly from the water's edge to within some eighty feet or so of the summit, the latter rising naked into the clear air. But attractive as it looked under the soft, subdued light of the ...
— The Castaways • Harry Collingwood
... Hungarian. She was then twenty, very ignorant of life, her great Oriental eyes seeing nothing of stern reality; but, with all her gentleness, there was a species of Muscovite firmness which was betrayed in the contour of her red lips. It was in vain that sorrow had early made her a woman; Marsa remained ignorant of the world, without any other guide than Vogotzine; suffering and languid, she was fatally at the mercy of the first lie which should caress her ear and stir her heart. From ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... the more than Chinese delicacy of their extremities, until gradually they have trampled upon my better self, they have run away with all my possibilities of moral usefulness! Yes, but this very moment, as I stood admiring their contour at yonder window, the pernicious thought crossed my mind that their appearance would be yet more enhanced if ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 100., February 7, 1891 • Various
... formed upon insufficient observations, even if erroneous, were slow to die. Thus it used to be stated that an upper cloud floor adapted itself to the contour of the land over which it rested, giving what Mr. Monck Mason has called a "phrenological estimate" of the character of the earth below; the clouds, "even when under the influence of rapid motion, seeming to accommodate themselves to all variations of form ...
— The Dominion of the Air • J. M. Bacon
... conversation out of a body and depresses him. Not so with a Bermuda house. There is something exhilarating, even hilarious, about its vivid whiteness when the sun plays upon it. If it be of picturesque shape and graceful contour—and many of the Bermudian dwellings are—it will so fascinate you that you will keep your eyes on it until they ache. One of those clean-cut, fanciful chimneys—too pure and white for this world —with one side glowing in the sun and the other touched with a soft shadow, is an object ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... advanced slowly toward him. From a distance to the lay observer this mass would have looked like an ordinary cloud-bank, but the experienced eyes of a fisherman would have discerned its ghastly gray hue and its flat contour. ...
— The Harbor of Doubt • Frank Williams
... simple, inclusive one is of course face itself. If, however, we are thinking of the face as its look or expression reveals thoughts, emotions, or state of mind, our term is countenance. If we are thinking of it as distinguished or individualized by the contour, lines, etc., we speak of the features. If we are thinking of its external appearance or aspect, we call it the visage. If, finally, we are thinking of it as indicative of mind, disposition, or fundamental character, ...
— The Century Vocabulary Builder • Creever & Bachelor
... terminal whorl of the lupin sends up its blossom stalk, not holding any constant blue, but paling and purpling to guide the friendly bee to virginal honey sips, or away from the perfected and depleted flower. The length of the blossom stalk conforms to the rounded contour of the plant, and of these there will be a million moving indescribably in the airy current that flows down the swale ...
— The Land of Little Rain • Mary Austin
... Revolution in his Exteriors, which will easily discover it self to an Adept in the Theory of the Phiz. Hence it is, that the intrinsick Worth and Merit of a Son of Alma Mater is ordinarily calculated from the Cast of his Visage, the Contour of his Person, the Mechanism of his Dress, the Disposition of his Limbs, the Manner of his Gate and Air, with a number of Circumstances of equal Consequence and Information: The Practitioners in this Art often make use of a Gentleman's Eyes to give 'em Light into the Posture of his Brains; ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele
... Gave the Jews Religious Liberty. GENERAL QUESTIONS: 1. Describe the characteristics that fitted Judas to be a great political leader. 2. The odds against which he and the Jews contended. 3. The physical contour of western Palestine. 4. The defeat of Apollonius. 5. Of the Syrian army under Seron. 6. The details of the battle of Emmaus. 7. The significance of the victory at Bethsura. 8. The restoration of the temple service. 9. ...
— The Makers and Teachers of Judaism • Charles Foster Kent
... malicious companions followed her example, and kept poking the cloth with their fingers, so that there were as many mysterious signals as there were girls beneath the canopy. The square head-dresses upheld the cloth so evenly that it was impossible to discern the contour of a brow outlined ...
— The Devil's Pool • George Sand
... of the side of another gigantic spur. At last we reached the top, to find a new deep, steep valley below us, and just across, only a few parasangs away, Andangle. But it was far more than a few parasangs by the trail, for we had to go completely around the head of the valley, mostly on the same contour. Andangle itself is barely more than a name, but we found here a house of bamboo and palm fresh built for us, tastefully adorned with greens and plants, and protected by anitos, resembling those of Kiangan. ...
— The Head Hunters of Northern Luzon From Ifugao to Kalinga • Cornelis De Witt Willcox
... circumference; perimeter, periphery, ambit, circuit, lines tournure^, contour, profile, silhouette; bounds; coast line. zone, belt, girth, band, baldric, zodiac, girdle, tyre [Brit.], cingle^, clasp, girt; cordon &c (inclosure) 232; circlet, ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... between the bottom of the parapet slope and the ditch was cut away so as to leave no level standing-place at the top of the scarp. This was the work which Longstreet afterward assaulted. Its chief defect was due to the situation and the contour of the ground around, which made its position so prominent a salient in the lines that the flanking fire was necessarily imperfect, leaving a considerable sector without fire beyond the angle of the northwest bastion. The point of the bastion was truncated, and a single gun put in the pan coupe. ...
— Military Reminiscences of the Civil War V2 • Jacob Dolson Cox
... being the one referred to in the Scriptures, and in reply to an inquiry, a lady at the English Orphanage, who has spent twenty years in Nazareth, said she thought it was some place on that side of the town, but the contour of the hill had probably changed. She also mentioned that the relics taken out in excavations were all found on that side, indicating that the old city had been built there. When Brother McGarvey visited Palestine, he found two ...
— A Trip Abroad • Don Carlos Janes
... Germanic spirit considers events rather in their evolution, in their complex becoming, the Italian spirit takes them at a given moment, overlooks the shadows, the clouds, the mists, everything that makes the line indistinct, brings out the contour sharply, and thus constructs a very lucid story, which is a delight to the eyes, but which is little more than a symbol ...
— Life of St. Francis of Assisi • Paul Sabatier
... notice. He knows nothing of pictures,—'Of the colouring of Titian, the grace of Raphael, the purity of Domenichino, the corregioscity of Correggio, the learning of Poussin, the airs of Guido, the taste of the Caracci, or the grand contour of Michael Angelo,'—of all those glories of the Italian and miracles of the Flemish school, which have filled the eyes of mankind with delight, and to the study and imitation of which thousands have in vain devoted their lives. These are to him ...
— Table-Talk - Essays on Men and Manners • William Hazlitt
... [115] peeping sideways in half-reassured terror, as a mighty griffin with batlike wings, one of Leonardo's finest inventions, descends suddenly from the air to snatch up a great wild beast wandering near them. But note in these, as that which especially belongs to art, the contour of the young man's hair, the poise of the slave's arm above his head, and the curves of the head of the child, following the little skull within, thin and fine as some sea-shell ...
— The Renaissance: Studies in Art and Poetry • Walter Horatio Pater
... and thence through Summerland and Cowlitz Park, and westward to a junction with the existing road in Paradise. Its elevation would range between four and seven thousand feet above the sea. The route, as indicated on the contour map, suggests very plainly the engineering feats involved in hanging roads on these steep and ...
— The Mountain that was 'God' • John H. Williams
... clamour, colour, contour, demeanour, dolour, enamour, endeavour, favour, fervour, flavour, glamour, harbour, honour, humour, labour, neighbour, odour, parlour, rancour, rigour, rumour, saviour, splendour, succour, tabour, tambour, ...
— The Art Of Writing & Speaking The English Language - Word-Study and Composition & Rhetoric • Sherwin Cody
... powder; the sweet, almost childlike mouth, the straight chiselled nose, round chin, and delicate throat, all seemed set off by the picturesque costume of the period. The rich blue velvet robe moulded in its every line the graceful contour of the figure, whilst one tiny hand held, with a dignity all its own, the tall stick adorned with a large bunch of ribbons which fashionable ladies of the period had taken to ...
— The Scarlet Pimpernel • Baroness Orczy
... rift came when Zanetti let Jackson have for a few weeks a drawing by Parmigianino, the Venus and Cupid with a Bow, to be executed in four blocks. The print was done "intirely in Hugo's [da Carpi's] manner, with this Difference, that no Oscuro block has a Contour to resemble the original Drawing it was done from, which is seldom seen in Hugo's works...." Zanetti, surprised by the fine quality of the first proof, proposed to pass it off on Mariette in Paris as an original ...
— John Baptist Jackson - 18th-Century Master of the Color Woodcut • Jacob Kainen
... and contour of the ground in the region over which the British Army fought at the Battle of the Aisne are ...
— 1914 • John French, Viscount of Ypres
... to awe than anything else, Sim Gage bent over, looking down at the clear oval face, the piled dark hair, the tender contour of cheek and chin of Mary Warren, as beautiful a young lady as any man is apt ever to see; so beautiful that this man's inexperienced heart stopped in his bosom. This picture once had been buttoned in the tunic of an aviator who ...
— The Sagebrusher - A Story of the West • Emerson Hough
... located in the center of a hollow bowl perhaps a hundred and fifty or two hundred feet across and that an horizon of upsurging vegetation cut off our view of anything except the sky itself. I could have sworn we had landed on a flat plateau, if indeed the contour had not sloped upward to a cap. How, then, did we come to find ourselves in a depression? Did the grass shift like the sea it resembled? Or—incredible thought—had our weight caused us to sink imperceptibly into a ...
— Greener Than You Think • Ward Moore
... full in view. And if there is character in faces, so there is in arms; and everybody knows there is in hands. These arms were after the model of the typical woman's arm; not chubby and round and fat, but moulded with beautiful contour, showing muscular form and power, with the blue veins here and there marking the clear delicate skin. Only look at the arm, without even seeing the face, and you would feel there was nervous energy and power of will; no weak, flabby, undecided action would ever ...
— Diana • Susan Warner
... country shoes could not conceal the slender contour of her ankles; her rough gloves served only to reveal the patrician beauty of her hands.' Look at that, my love—there's contour for you! There's patrician beauty! What rubbish those books do talk, ...
— The Fortunes of the Farrells • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... blemish of acute physical suffering had vanished; the clear pallor of her complexion, the full white throat, the rounded contour of the graceful form, bespoke complete restoration of all the vital forces; and never had she ...
— At the Mercy of Tiberius • August Evans Wilson
... hands, which were covered with kid gloves, so tightly drawn on, that the points of the finger nails were visible through them. His face was mild and almost womanly in its beauty, his eyes soft and full, his brow open and ample, his features well defined, and approaching to the ideal Greek in contour; the lines about his mouth were exquisitely sweet, and yet resolute in expression; his hair was short—his having no mustaches gave him nothing of the look of a Frenchman; and I was not a little surprised ...
— Three Years in Europe - Places I Have Seen and People I Have Met • William Wells Brown
... more pleasing expression, but the timid furtive look, the ungainly gait, and the ungraceful contour of their abak skirts, detract from the moderate beauty that they possess in their youth. After marriage their beauty ...
— The Manbos of Mindano - Memoirs of the National Academy of Sciences, Volume XXIII, First Memoir • John M. Garvan
... any place pointed out upon a map, without either any previous knowledge of the spot or any object to establish a connection with it. He can also readily rise high into the air so as to gain a bird's-eye view of the country which he is examining, so as to observe its extent, the contour of its coast-line, or its general character. Indeed, in every way his power and freedom are far greater when he uses this method than they have been in any ...
— Clairvoyance • Charles Webster Leadbeater
... raise one into the first rank. Some of the meanest men I have ever known had at the end of their name D.D., LL.D., and F.R.S. Truth, honor, charity, heroism, self-sacrifice, should win highest favor; but inordinate fashion says—"Count not a woman's virtues; count her rings;" "Look not at the contour of the head, but see the way she combs her hair;" "Ask not what noble deeds have been accomplished by that man's hand; but is it white and soft?" Ask not what good sense was in her conversation, but "in what was she dressed." Ask not whether there was hospitality ...
— The Abominations of Modern Society • Rev. T. De Witt Talmage
... characteristic, as Lavater says, "of genius;" his nose was slightly arched in the centre and slightly fleshy near the nostrils; his face oval, with a well defined chin and a mouth plain, but full of energy and expression, and similar to Sterne's, the contour, of whose face I always thought my brother's much resembled. I have thus given, to please the lover of physiognomy, "a shadow portrait," not "a Myall's photograph," which I hope will not only satisfy the physiognomist, but which I think they, who but even slightly remember Henry ...
— A Sketch of the Life of the late Henry Cooper - Barrister-at-Law, of the Norfolk Circuit; as also, of his Father • William Cooper
... behind at his library bureau, where it was his practice to spend most mornings from half-past nine to eleven or even twelve, was observed to be of a shape to throw no small light upon his class and character. Its contour was almost national. Bulging at the back, and sloping rapidly to a thin and wiry neck, narrow between the ears and across the brow, prominent in the jaw, the length of a line drawn from the back headland to the promontory at the chin would have been extreme. Upon the observer there was ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... long, limp, formless house-shawl which in certain phases of Anglo-Saxon spinster and widowhood assumes the functions of the recluse's veil and announces the renunciation of worldly vanities and a resigned indifference to external feminine contour. The most audacious masculine arm would shrink from clasping that shapeless void in which the flatness of asceticism or the heavings of passion might alike lie buried. She had also in some mysterious way imported into the fresh and pleasant room a certain ...
— The Heritage of Dedlow Marsh and Other Tales • Bret Harte
... eyes blinked as the bright sunlight poured into the shadowy hut, darker than usual, even, as dense clouds of smoke rose from the stove. After a few minutes, she began to make out the contour of the various objects inside, and recognized the wounded man's stretcher, which lay in one corner, close to the ashy-gray ...
— The Underdogs • Mariano Azuela
... be remembered that horseback riding was the chief method of travel in California for over a hundred years. Their carved leather work is still the wonder of the world. In the striking character of their designs, in the remarkable adaptation of the design, in its general shape and contour, to the peculiar form of the object to be decorated,—a stirrup, a saddle, a belt, etc.,—and in the digital and manual dexterity demanded by its execution, nothing is left to be desired. Equally skilful were they in taking the horn of an ox or mountain sheep, heating it, and then shaping ...
— The Old Franciscan Missions Of California • George Wharton James
... Wanderers upon the Downs and in the highways and byways at their feet will find Bartholomew's "half-inch" map, sheet 32, the most useful. This scale is much to be preferred to the "one inch" parent which lacks the contour colouring. ...
— Seaward Sussex - The South Downs from End to End • Edric Holmes
... tufty—having that appearance usually termed shaggy—that of the American black bear is of uniform length, and all lying, or rather standing, in one direction, presenting a smooth surface corresponding to the contour of his body. In this respect he is far more akin to the bears of the Asiatic islands, than to the ursus arctos. In shape, too, he differs essentially from the latter. His body is more slender, his muzzle longer and sharper, and his profile is a curve with its convexity ...
— Bruin - The Grand Bear Hunt • Mayne Reid
... bloom again. Her cheeks were taking on their old rounded contour and occasionally dimples of delight flashed into them. She was a young person who lived in the present. Already the marks of her six-weeks misery among the submerged derelicts of the city was beginning to be wiped from her mind like the memory of a bad ...
— The Big-Town Round-Up • William MacLeod Raine
... ever go to the Himalaya. Much in a scientific point of view has interested me, especially all about those wonderful moraines. I certainly think I quite realise the valleys, more vividly perhaps from having seen the valleys of Tahiti. I cannot doubt that the Himalaya owe almost all their contour to running water, and that they have been subjected to such action longer than any mountains (as yet described) in the world. What ...
— The Life and Letters of Charles Darwin, Volume I • Francis Darwin
... drooping lids and long lashes; and, in harmony with all, a flood of golden hair, in the style permitted to Jewish brides, fell unconfined down her back to the pillion on which she sat. The throat and neck had the downy softness sometimes seen which leaves the artist in doubt whether it is an effect of contour or color. To these charms of feature and person were added others more—an indefinable air of purity which only the soul can impart, and of abstraction natural to such as think much of things impalpable. Often, with trembling lips, she raised her eyes to heaven, itself not more deeply blue; ...
— Composition-Rhetoric • Stratton D. Brooks
... sky or the landscape, the uncommon, especially the amusing, details of personality—and of connecting these trifles in unexpected ways with the large aspects of things. He saw the mystery of the universe in the contour of a leaf; he saw the secret of a professor's character in the way he had built out his whiskers to hide an absolute lack of chin and to give the impression that a formidable chin was there. He told her stories of life ...
— The Cost • David Graham Phillips
... receive company." As she lay on the sofa there seemed an advance toward recovery. Much sweet coquetry was expended in trying to look her best for her father; and her best was very well, for though the brilliant bloom of health was gone, her cheeks had not lost their pretty rounded contour, and still had some rosiness, while her large bright blue eyes smiled and sparkled. A screen shut out the rest of the room, making a sort of little parlour round the fire, where sundry of the family were visiting her after coming home from ...
— The Daisy Chain, or Aspirations • Charlotte Yonge
... white neck, her clear skin, the refined contour of shoulders and bust, seemed to have aroused the deadliest lust of hate in these wretched creatures, rendered bestial by famine ...
— I Will Repay • Baroness Emmuska Orczy
... ignorant of nature. "This country life will make me young again," he sighed. They reached the top of the hill towards the first hour of evening; the sun was descending heaven, the colour had all drawn into the west; the hills were modelled in their least contour by the soft, slanting shine; and the wide moorlands, veined with glens and hazelwoods, ran west and north in a hazy glory of light. Then the painter awakened ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson, Volume XXI • Robert Louis Stevenson
... little friend?" and Mr. Travilla looked fondly into the sweet face so bright and happy, where the beauties of rare intellect and moral worth were as conspicuous as the lesser ones of exquisite contour ...
— Elsie's Womanhood • Martha Finley
... Plant Industry Station farm is now known to be low in available magnesium and potassium. Tree crops, including peaches, pears, and apples, have shown deficiencies of one or both of these elements. The trees were planted 20 feet apart on the contour in pairs, one of each variety in a plot, with six plots in a row. The 36 two-tree plots were in six rows. Thus, the experiment was arranged in a 6 by 6 Latin square and six fertilizer treatments were used. After ...
— Northern Nut Growers Association Report of the Proceedings at the Forty-Second Annual Meeting • Northern Nut Growers Association
... in which this is conceivable? We cannot completely express to sense Niagara Falls or the Jungfrau, for they are infinitely beyond the possibilities of imitation. Yet the particular contour of the Jungfrau is never mistaken in the smallest picture. In making a model of Niagara we should have to reproduce the relation between body of water, width of stream, and height of fall, and we might succeed in getting the peculiar effect of ...
— The Psychology of Beauty • Ethel D. Puffer
... because we had already a number of acquaintances in that part of the ship, Mr. Jones and I paid it a late visit. Steerage No. 1 is shaped like an isosceles triangle, the sides opposite the equal angles bulging outward with the contour of the ship. It is lined with eight pens of sixteen bunks apiece, four bunks below and four above on either side. At night the place is lit with two lanterns, one to each table. As the steamer beat on her way among the rough ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition - Vol. 2 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... It is rare, however, that such a cliff as that represented in Fig. 12 can maintain itself long in such a contour. Usually it moulders gradually away into a steep mound or bank; and the larger number of bold cliffs are composed of far more solid rock, which in its general make is quite unshattered and flawless; apparently ...
— Modern Painters, Volume IV (of V) • John Ruskin
... strange emotions; outwardly he smiled as he thought of what Van Horn would say if he knew the circumstances. He looked down at his companion; saw the sheen of her hair as it rippled out from under her fur turban, studied the soft contour of her cheek and chin, without himself being observed, and noticed, incidentally, that the top of the bewitching head beside him came just about to a level with his cigar which he was smoking. He wondered ...
— The Danger Trail • James Oliver Curwood
... was irreparably injured, and 200 yards of the wall were then replaced by an open viaduct, with the piers placed edgeways to the sea, the openings between them being spanned by ten cast-iron girders each 42 feet long. This accident induced the engineer to alter the contour of the sea wall, so that it should present a diminished resistance to the force of the waves. But the sea repeated its assaults, and made further havoc with the work; entailing heavy expenses and a complete reorganisation ...
— Lives of the Engineers - The Locomotive. George and Robert Stephenson • Samuel Smiles
... When first seen it is apt to be mistaken for a small bear, or rather heavy-looking wolf. The sensuous neck and head bespeak the wolf and weasel nature, the sly persistency the fox, and the savage stubbornness that of the bear; while a resemblance to all four can be seen in the general contour, appearance and habits ...
— Adrift in the Wilds - or, The Adventures of Two Shipwrecked Boys • Edward S. Ellis
... and the distance to the highest point of the arch of the skull be measured perpendicularly from this line, it will be found to be 4.75 inches. Viewed from above, Fig. 24, A, the forehead presents an evenly rounded curve, and passes into the contour of the sides and back of the skull, which describes a ...
— On Some Fossil Remains of Man • Thomas H. Huxley
... growing very earnest and his eyes were aglow with the fire of enthusiastic purpose. As he dropped his head on one side, it looked too heavy for the stemlike neck, but it conveyed an impression of immense intellectual power. Its imposing contour lent force to ...
— The Second Deluge • Garrett P. Serviss
... billiard-table without pockets. On this absolute level, covered with coarse grass, Aigues-Mortes presents quite the appearance of the walled town that a school-boy draws upon his slate, or that we see in the background of early Flemish pictures—a simple parallelogram, of a contour almost absurdly bare, broken at intervals by ...
— Seeing Europe with Famous Authors, Volume 3 • Various
... with a jerking motion, as if his limbs were worked by a string like a child's toy, with dun-coloured hair lying thin and soft at the back and sides of his head; his forehead was so large it seemed to overbalance the rest of his face, which had, indeed, lost its natural contour by the absence of all the teeth. The eyes absolutely gleamed with intelligence; so keen, so observant, you felt as if they were almost wizard-like. Indeed, the whole room looked not unlike a wizard's dwelling. Instead of pictures were hung rude wooden frames ...
— Mary Barton • Elizabeth Gaskell
... marvellously young-looking for her age. The quiet country life she had led had bestowed that advantage upon her; and her beauty, fair as she was, had always been less dependent on colouring than upon the exquisite delicacy of her features and general contour. But now a heaviness beneath the blue eyes,—a little fading of her brightness—a little droop of the beautifully shaped mouth,—almost betrayed her seven and thirty years; and the soft, abundant, brown ...
— Peter's Mother • Mrs. Henry De La Pasture
... fair share of learning, as well as steady application, greatly as he sacrificed to the graces of life, and especially of "good society." His face was not perhaps much more impressive in its contour than his diminutive figure. His eyes, however, were dark and fine; his forehead bony, and with what a phrenologist would recognize as large bumps of wit; the mouth pleasingly dimpled. His manner and talk were bright, abounding rather in lively anecdote and point than in wit and humor, ...
— The Complete Poems of Sir Thomas Moore • Thomas Moore et al |
