"Lean" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... Spenser's poem. In her girlhood, alone, heart-led, she comforts the slave in his quarters, mentally struggling with the problems his position wakes her to. Alone, not confused, but seeking something to lean on, she grasps the Church, which proves a broken reed. No whit disheartened, she turns from one sect to another, trying each by the infallible touchstone of that clear, child-like conscience. The two old, lonely Quakers ...
— The Bay State Monthly, Volume 3, No. 3 • Various
... anxiety they rush about him, sustain him, and give him marches, triumphal entries, and receptions beyond what even in the days of his highest prosperity they could have brought about in his favor. On the contrary, nobody has ever expected me to be President. In my poor, lean, lank face, nobody has ever seen that any cabbages were sprouting out. These are disadvantages all, taken together, that the Republicans labor under. We have to fight this battle upon principle, and upon principle alone. I am, in a certain sense, made the standard-bearer in behalf of the ...
— The Papers And Writings Of Abraham Lincoln, Complete - Constitutional Edition • Abraham Lincoln
... lean leg over the other, and punched down the ashes in his pipe-bowl with the square tip of his middle finger. The thermometer on the shady veranda marked eighty-seven degrees of heat, and nature wooed the soul to languor ...
— The Golden Fleece • Julian Hawthorne
... favourite of the hour, a pretty, graceful girl, who sat with the king daily, and once (when he shed tears) consoled him with caresses. I am assured that even with her his relations are platonic. In the background figured a multitude of ladies, the lean, the plump, and the elephantine, some in sacque frocks, some in the hairbreadth ridi; high-born and low, slave and mistress; from the queen to the scullion, from the favourite to the scraggy sentries at ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 18 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... no doubt whatever that we can stand it. Most of us are in pretty good condition still, and have some fat to spare. Fat persons can endure reduced allowance of food much better and longer than those who are lean. There's Gurney, now, for instance, he could afford to have his share ...
— The Red Eric • R.M. Ballantyne
... a full day to-day," he remarked, and he rubbed his hands with the joy of action. "The nets are all in place, and the drag is about to begin. We'll know before the day is out whether we have caught our big, lean-jawed pike, or whether he has ...
— Hound of the Baskervilles • Authur Conan Doyle
... "These lean college guys 'd fool the devil," he grumbled. "They're tougher 'n raw-hide. Just the same we'll wear him down. Standing, you hear me. What you've got ain't a caution to what you're going to get. You might as well come across now and save ...
— The Jacket (The Star-Rover) • Jack London
... C—-n rises, and at eight, a marine sentinel, transformed into a lady's page, whom we are taking to Mexico as porter, brings us some very delicious chocolate. He is followed by the Captain's familiar, an unhappy-looking individual, pale, lank, and lean, with the physiognomy of a methodist parson, and in general appearance like a weed that has grown up in one night. He tremblingly, and with most rueful countenance, carries a small plate of sugar-biscuits. These originals having vacated the cabin, ...
— Life in Mexico • Frances Calderon De La Barca
... burgomaster, Maria and Adrian, the Van der Does and Van Houts stood with brief intervals of rest among the throng on the citadel or the tower at the Cow-Gate; even Barbara, far more strengthened by hope than by the barley-porridge or the lean carrier-pigeon, would not stay at home, but dragged herself to the musician's look-out, for every one wanted to see the rising water, the earth softening, the moisture creeping between the blades of grass, then spreading into pools ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... whether both were fashioned by one hand. Such discrepancies as occur between them are just what we should expect in the work of a craftsman who sought first to obtain an accurate likeness of his subject, and then treated the same subject on the lines of numismatic art. The wax shows a lean and subtly moulded face—the face of a delicate old man, wiry and worn with years of deep experience. The hair on head and beard is singularly natural; one feels it to be characteristic of the person. Transferring this portrait to bronze ...
— The Life of Michelangelo Buonarroti • John Addington Symonds
... heart; For secret desire of glory vexed him, dwelling apart. Lazy and crafty he was, and loved to lie in the sun, And loved the cackle of talk and the true word uttered in fun; Lazy he was, his roof was ragged, his table was lean, And the fish swam safe in his sea, and he gathered the near and the green. He sat in his house and laughed, but he loathed the king of the land, And he uttered the grudging word under the covering hand. Treason spread from his door; and he looked for a day to come, ...
— Ballads • Robert Louis Stevenson
... night-air seemed to give him much trouble. Presently, just as they turned a corner, a severe blast of wind met them full in the face. Julian began coughing violently, and all at once became so weak that he had to lean against a palisading. Waymark, looking closer in alarm, saw that the handkerchief which the poor fellow was holding to his mouth ...
— The Unclassed • George Gissing
... treachery of another body of the same race gave him the victory eight years later at Kosovo. So little did the Osmanli state model itself on the earlier caliphial empires and so naturally did it lean towards the ...
— The Balkans - A History Of Bulgaria—Serbia—Greece—Rumania—Turkey • Nevill Forbes, Arnold J. Toynbee, D. Mitrany, D.G. Hogarth
... Gave; a big, jolly, round man, in a sedan-chair, his hands crossed over his belly, who looks on us with a paternal air, and reads his newspaper; three ladies of sufficiently ripe age, very slender, very lean, very stiff, who, for dignity's sake, set their beasts on a trot as we draw near them. The cicisbeo is a bony cartilaginous gentleman, fixt perpendicularly on his saddle like a telegraph-pole. We hear a harsh clucking, as of a choked hen, and ...
— Seeing Europe with Famous Authors, Volume 4 (of 10) • Various
... not at all like him, and his voice, too, was unwontedly harsh. "Troubles?" I almost laughed aloud again. He did not understand—I had only to lean forward to gaze into her eyes. I had only to reach out to clasp her hand. Troubles? Well, possibly so, but I smiled to myself in ...
— Wide Courses • James Brendan Connolly
... sudden conflagration. But instead of seeing smoke and flame, the people were much surprised to behold walls tottering, and all the stones moving as if they had become detached; the roofs seemed to bend downward on one side, then to lean over on the other; the bells rang of their own accord; joists, rafters and boards cracked, the earth quivered and made the stakes of the palisades dance in a manner which would appear incredible if we had not ...
— The Makers of Canada: Bishop Laval • A. Leblond de Brumath
... suspicion. When I suspect one, I do not keep the balance perfectly even between yes and no, as in the case of doubt; I lean mentally to one side, but do not go so far as to assent one way or the other. Having before me a person who excites my suspicion, I am inclined to think him guilty on certain evidence, but I fear to judge lest I should be in error, because there is evidence also of innocence. If ...
— Explanation of Catholic Morals - A Concise, Reasoned, and Popular Exposition of Catholic Morals • John H. Stapleton
... fern (Figure 496) and the Lepidodendron (Figure 495), and other species of plants, some of which, Professor Heer remarks, agree specifically with species from the lower carboniferous beds. This induces him to lean to the opinion long ago advocated by Sir Richard Griffiths, that the yellow sandstone, in spite of its fish remains, should be classed as Lower Carboniferous, an opinion which I am not yet prepared to adopt. Between the Mountain ...
— The Student's Elements of Geology • Sir Charles Lyell
... Chandra and Bhaga, which unite to form the Chenab, flow through Lahul and the few villages are situated at a height of 10,000 feet in their elevated valleys. The people are Buddhists. In summer the population is increased by "Gaddi" shepherds from Kangra, who drive lean flocks in the beginning of June over the Rotang and take them back from the Alpine pastures in the middle of September ...
— The Panjab, North-West Frontier Province, and Kashmir • Sir James McCrone Douie
... gates of hell shall not prevail against it." Now it is clear as day that no one is edified in the Church, nor withstands the gates of hell by the mere fact that he is under the external authority of the pope. For the majority of those who hold so strongly to the authority of the pope, and lean upon it, are themselves possessed by the powers of hell and are full of sins and rascality. Then, too, some of the popes were heretics themselves, and gave heretical laws; yet they remained in authority. ...
— Works of Martin Luther - With Introductions and Notes (Volume I) • Martin Luther
... wait, Till God should find for him a true "help-mate." This resolution formed, was kept intact, Nor was the strength his own, for that he lacked. He, though so young, had very clearly seen That Man, in every age, is prone to lean Upon an arm of flesh—most frail support! Which often fails us, oft makes us its sport. And yet, O strange perversity! we cling To that which never can us comfort bring. He knew 'twas better to feel flesh so weak As to be forced his strength ...
— The Emigrant Mechanic and Other Tales In Verse - Together With Numerous Songs Upon Canadian Subjects • Thomas Cowherd
... these terrible streets, they would not be tolerated long. They eat any thing and every thing that comes in their way, from melon rinds and spoiled grapes up through all the grades and species of dirt and refuse to their own dead friends and relatives—and yet they are always lean, always hungry, always despondent. The people are loath to kill them—do not kill them, in fact. The Turks have an innate antipathy to taking the life of any dumb animal, it is said. But they do worse. They hang and kick and stone and scald these wretched creatures to the very verge of ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... faint she became aware that she was lying on a couch near the window in her sitting-room. Her brow felt damp and cold and wet, some one was chafing her hands; she recognized Judkins, and then saw that his lean, hard face wore the hue ...
— Riders of the Purple Sage • Zane Grey
... custom, though less from sinful, selfish motives, than from the, I trust, laudable fear I had about becoming in a jiffy the father of a small family, every one with a mouth to fill and a back to cleid—helpless bairns, with nothing to look to or lean on, save and except the proceeds of my daily handiwork. Nothing, however, is sure in this world, as Maister Wiggie more than once took occasion to observe, when lecturing on the house built by the foolish man on the sea-sands; for months ...
— The Life of Mansie Wauch - Tailor in Dalkeith, written by himself • David Macbeth Moir
... Tabitha, half to herself. "That might be a pretty name if it belonged to anyone but a Catt man. Lynne Catt—hm! Lean cat. That's what everybody would call him. I bet that's why he used his middle name. I'd rather be nicknamed 'Manx cat' than to be called 'lean cat,' wouldn't you? 'Skinny, scrawny Tabby Catt'—that's what they call me, Tom. My name might as ...
— Tabitha at Ivy Hall • Ruth Alberta Brown
... "To lean! No, to sit bolt upright, as I will if I can," said old Mr. Palmer, entering into the pleasantry of the young people as readily as if he had been the youngest man in the company. As he looked round, his good countenance ...
— Tales and Novels, Vol. V - Tales of a Fashionable Life • Maria Edgeworth
... a moss-grown spring: They lean soft cheeks together there, Mingled the dark and sunny hair, And heard the wooing thrushes sing. Oh budding time! ...
— George Eliot; A Critical Study of Her Life, Writings & Philosophy • George Willis Cooke
... box covered with dressed skins painted; this box is open at the top, but covered in front about two-thirds of the length. The horse is fastened between the shafts. The rider wraps himself up in a buffalo robe, sits flat down, having a cushion to lean his back against. Thus accoutred with a fur cap, and so on, he may bid defiance to the wind and weather. Upon our return we found that some of the Indians had already returned from the hunting camps; also Monsieur Roussand, ...
— Little Masterpieces of Science: Explorers • Various
... as to hold himself wiser than his teachers. But whatever blemishes others might discern in William, to his friend's mind he was faultless; for Marner had one of those impressible self-doubting natures which, at an inexperienced age, admire imperativeness and lean on contradiction. The expression of trusting simplicity in Marner's face, heightened by that absence of special observation, that defenceless, deer-like gaze which belongs to large prominent eyes, was strongly contrasted by the self-complacent suppression of inward ...
— Silas Marner - The Weaver of Raveloe • George Eliot
... to the Alps, you of minds diseased not to sit down in sight of them ruminating, for bodily ease and comfort will trick the soul and set you measuring our lean humanity against yonder sublime and infinite; but mount, rack the limbs, wrestle it out among the peaks; taste danger, sweat, earn rest: learn to discover ungrudgingly that haggard fatigue is the fair vision you have run to earth, and that ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... grew more ferocious, and it was tinged with joy. The trail had suddenly grown very hot, and they knew that the quarry was just before them. Dick caught a good view of a long, lean, racing figure bounding among the trees, and he fired straight at a spot between the blazing eyes. The hound fell without a sound, and with equal ease he slew the second. The third and last drew ...
— The Rock of Chickamauga • Joseph A. Altsheler
... away for a few moments, but he soon returned to his master's grave. Three months passed. The dog came each morning to get his food, and then returned to the grave. Each day he was more sad, more lean, more feeble. He was chained up, but broke his fetters; escaped; returned to the grave, and never left it more. It was in vain that they tried to get him back. They carried him food, but he ate no longer. For hours he was seen digging up with his weakened limbs the earth that separated him from ...
— Anecdotes of Animals • Unknown
... sentinel opened the door, and the Marquis was led along the gallery to a second door, which was barred with iron bars. Whilst the soldiers were unbarring this door, the Marquis groaned, and wished he had never been born; and the poor Marchioness was obliged to lean upon Henri, or she would have fallen to the ground. When the iron-barred door was opened, the guard told the Marquis and his family to walk forward: 'For this,' said they, 'is your room.' Accordingly, the Marquis and ...
— The Fairchild Family • Mary Martha Sherwood
... and the little fellow, refreshed by sleep, sat up, and chattered gayly, feeling himself a hero, while his mother went beside him holding on to any pat of his precious little body that came handy, and never tired of hearing him say, "I knew Marmar would come," or seeing him lean down to kiss her, and put a plump berry into her mouth, "'Cause he picked 'em ...
— Little Men - Life at Plumfield With Jo's Boys • Louisa May Alcott
... help me with the love That casteth out my fear; Teach me to lean on Thee, and feel That Thou art very near: That no temptation is unseen, No childish grief too small, Since Thou, with patience infinite, Doth soothe ...
— Lives of Girls Who Became Famous • Sarah Knowles Bolton
... is tall and lean, and very ill shaped; she hath bad features, and a worse complexion; she hath a stinking breath, and twenty ill smells about her besides; which are yet more insufferable by her natural sluttishness; for she is always lousy, ...
— The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, D.D., Vol. VII - Historical and Political Tracts—Irish • Jonathan Swift
... wicket he stopped: he discovered I was quite out of breath. "Am I cruel in my love?" he said. "Delay an instant: lean on me, Jane." ...
— Jane Eyre - an Autobiography • Charlotte Bronte
... of Germain were so intense, his weakness so great, that he was obliged to lean on two of the keepers to reach the governor's room. There he became quite faint; his excoriated throat bore the livid and bloody marks of the Skeleton's iron fingers. A few seconds more, and the ...
— Mysteries of Paris, V3 • Eugene Sue
... his tall, lean form over Sylvia. She looked up surprised, L'Ami Fritz very seldom spoke to her, or for the matter ...
— The Chink in the Armour • Marie Belloc Lowndes
... apparently forlorn; He fronted headlong hate and scourging scorn, Impassively persistent. But the task Of coldly keeping up the Stoic mask O'ertaxed him at the last; it fell, and lo! Another face was bared to friend and foe. Scarce to his foes will generous judgment lean— Foes mean as merciless, and false as mean, Their poisoned pens, which even softening Death, Which hate should hush and stifle slander's breath, May not deprive of venom, prodding still The unresponsive ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 101. October 17, 1891 • Various
... he would follow me, and she said nothing about him. But he's not mangy. He hasn't enough to eat to be mangy. He's as lean ...
— A Rough Shaking • George MacDonald
... delightful Herb whose tender Green Fledges the River's Lip on which we lean— Ah, lean upon it lightly! for who knows From what once lovely Lip it ...
— Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam • Omar Khayyam
... the brakes that passed at trot Read "First past Post" and "Run or Not." The bookie's face was an angry red, His eyes seemed rolling inside his head. His clerk was a lean man, secret, spare, With thin lips knowing and damp black hair. A big black bag much weathered with rain Hung round his ...
— Right Royal • John Masefield
... enough to take in a full view of the scene, however, he found it very different from what he expected. True, there was a large camp-fire burning, such as the one he had left, and around it were gathered a number of women and children, cold, hungry and wet. A rough, lean-to tent, made of a sheet of tarpaulin, had been stretched in order to try to keep off the worst of the downpour, but no ...
— The Boy with the U. S. Weather Men • Francis William Rolt-Wheeler
... regiment, which stepped out smartly, every man looking ready and willing to commence the attack to which he was bound. These passed on and another regiment followed, the sight of the brave fellows sending a thrill through the boy, making him lean out from beneath the waggon tilt to take off his cap and ...
— A Young Hero • G Manville Fenn
... different; Kant by his critical method did for philosophy what Copernicus did for astronomy; he centralised the intelligence in the reason or soul, as the latter did the planetary system in the sun; Kant was a lean, little man, of simple habits, and was ...
— The Nuttall Encyclopaedia - Being a Concise and Comprehensive Dictionary of General Knowledge • Edited by Rev. James Wood
... me—But of that I said nothing. I kept the memory of that woman in my heart, and went night and day about the lake and the river and the marshes of Sant' Aloisa. Once or twice I saw Taddeo Marchioni, the old count—a gray, shrunken, decrepit figure of a man, old, with a lean face and a long hard jaw—but of her, for days that lengthened into weeks, I saw nothing. There are fish in the Lagherello. I got the square huge net of our country, and set it in the water as our habit is, and watched in the ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Volume 26, July 1880. • Various
... loose there voices and some there hearing—they are crouded into churches & there guarded night and day. I cant paint the horable appearance they make—it is shocking to human nature to behold them. Could I draw the curtain from before you; there expose to your view a lean Jawd mortal, hunger laid his skinny hand (upon him) and whet to keenest Edge his stomach cravings, sorounded with tattred garments, Rotten Rags, close beset with unwelcome vermin. Could I do this, I say, ...
— American Prisoners of the Revolution • Danske Dandridge
... unbounded gratification of Broadstairs. They came in from the wreck very wet and tired, and very much disconcerted by the nature of their prize—which, I suppose, after all, will have to be recommitted to the sea, when the hides and tallow are secured. One lean-faced boatman murmured, when they were all ruminative over the bodies as they lay on the pier: "Couldn't sassages be made on it?" but retired in confusion shortly afterwards, overwhelmed by the ...
— The Letters of Charles Dickens - Vol. 3 (of 3), 1836-1870 • Charles Dickens
... bellowed out with tremendous voice a stout old man, whose red face and heavy body contrasted surprisingly with the pale face, the lean, thin figure of the old Marquis, "I am damned if it isn't the young Frenchman that held the chateau with us. Lad," he cried, stepping forward and stretching out his hand, "I am glad to see you alive. I asked after you, as soon as I came back ...
— The Eagle of the Empire - A Story of Waterloo • Cyrus Townsend Brady
... true—when my dreams come true— Shall I lean from out my casement, in the starlight and the dew, To listen—smile and listen to the tinkle of the strings Of the sweet guitar my lover's fingers fondle, as he sings? And as the nude moon slowly, slowly shoulders into view, Shall I vanish from his vision—when ...
— Riley Love-Lyrics • James Whitcomb Riley
... waited for the inevitable readjustment, trusting entirely to Mic-co, but with the memory of Carl's haggard face and haunted eyes, he was unprepared for the lean, tanned, wholly vigorous young man who sprang to ...
— Diane of the Green Van • Leona Dalrymple
... slice of delicate sirloin, or nice buttock of beef, for love nor money. A pize upon them! I could get no eatables upon the ruoad, but what they called bully, which looks like the flesh of Pharaoh's lean kine stewed into rags and tatters; and then their peajohn, peajohn, rabbet them! One would think every old woman of this kingdom hatched pigeons ...
— The Adventures of Ferdinand Count Fathom, Complete • Tobias Smollett
... she knew better even than Mrs. Lorimer herself how much the latter had come to lean ...
— The Bars of Iron • Ethel May Dell
... the ground, and then climbing up again in very luxuriance of growth. Many of the rattan palms (Calamus) are of this character. They wind in and out, hanging in festoons from the branches, on which they lean in princely condescension, with stems upwards of a thousand feet ...
— Miscellanea • Juliana Horatia Ewing
... said his brother Zouave. "Never mind—I will bind it up in a moment. Do you think you can lean against that tree and keep from fainting until I run and see whether my little joker went in the ...
— Shoulder-Straps - A Novel of New York and the Army, 1862 • Henry Morford
... the lawn and through the trees, and away along all the old tracks to the farm, following Jane, who, knowing we were behind her, flew like the wind, without once looking back. We soon lost her, for we often paused to pant and lean against one another for a moment's respite in this strange memorable race. We did not speak, but I looked at Rachel, and she was like a poor lily soiled and crushed by the storm, with her white dress trailing through the dust, and her satin shoes ...
— The Late Miss Hollingford • Rosa Mulholland
... Courant, comes, too, across my recollection, and I beg you will help him largely from the said ewe-milk cheese, to enable him to digest those bedaubing paragraphs with which he is eternally larding the lean characters of certain great men in a certain great town. I grant you the periods are very well turned; so, a fresh egg is a very good thing, but when thrown at a man in a pillory, it does not at all improve his figure, not to mention the ...
— The Letters of Robert Burns • Robert Burns
... not being a piece of ground the size of a sixpenny piece level in this place, the arrangement of my box camp takes time, but at last it is done to my complete satisfaction, close to a tree trunk, and I think, as I wrap myself up in my two wet blankets and lean against my tree, what a good thing it is to know how to make one's self comfortable in a place like this. This tree stem is perfection, just the right angle to be restful to one's back, and one can rely all the time on Nature ...
— Travels in West Africa • Mary H. Kingsley
... any inadvertence, it was betrayed into its natural play of wit, so that, for a moment, it might seem to hinge upon the absorbing topic of public interest, and to favor any one side in particular, it was immediately observed to lean heavily the other way, to draw off the attention of its numerous and discriminating readers. The cause for this unusual state of things had not, as yet, transpired, but was soon to be made known to ...
— Clemence - The Schoolmistress of Waveland • Retta Babcock
... whistle. There was an avid hunger on Lablet's lean face. No more potent bribe could have been devised to entice him. But Raf, remembering the spear-torn ...
— Star Born • Andre Norton
... plowed the waves of the Indian Ocean, vast liquid plains with an area of 550,000,000 hectares, whose waters are so transparent it makes you dizzy to lean over their surface. There the Nautilus generally drifted at a depth between 100 and 200 meters. It behaved in this way for some days. To anyone without my grand passion for the sea, these hours would surely have seemed long and monotonous; but my daily ...
— 20000 Leagues Under the Seas • Jules Verne
... strength of the jaws and neck. This is ridiculous, as the height of the cow exceeds that of the tiger, therefore a portion of the body must drag upon the ground. The cattle of India are exceedingly small, and are generally lean, the weight of an ordinary cow would hardly exceed 350 or 400 lbs.; as an average male tiger weighs about the same, it can of course drag its own weight by lifting the body partially in its mouth, and thus relieving the friction upon the ground. ...
— Wild Beasts and their Ways • Sir Samuel W. Baker
... jonny-cakes, and cafe sans lait; and generally, in despite of bad cooking and occasional lee-lurches, contrive to eat an enormous meal. Breakfast being despatched, you again go on deck—promenade—gaze on the clouds—then read a little, if perchance you have books with you—lean over the gunwale, watching the waves and the motion of the vessel; but the eternal water, clouds, and sky—sky, clouds, and water, produce a listlessness that nothing can overcome. In the Atlantic, a ship in sight is an object which arouses the attention of ...
— A Ramble of Six Thousand Miles through the United States of America • S. A. Ferrall
... agreement with him. In response to this request, the Republic sent him Bishop Soderini as her ambassador. The latter arrived in Urbino on June 25 and was immediately and very cordially received by the duke. With him, in the subordinate capacity of secretary, came a lean, small-headed, tight-lipped man, with wide-set, intelligent eyes and prominent cheek-bones—one Niccolo Macchiavelli, who, in needy circumstances at present, and comparatively obscure, was destined to immortal fame. Thus did Macchiavelli meet Cesare Borgia for the first time, and, for all ...
— The Life of Cesare Borgia • Raphael Sabatini
... the clerk who is slovenly about his clothes will also be slovenly about his desk and his papers; that the man who cannot be relied upon to keep his shoes shined and his collar clean is a very weak and broken reed upon which to lean for anything requiring ...
— Analyzing Character • Katherine M. H. Blackford and Arthur Newcomb
... Buddha stand before us in striking contrast in this matter; the glory of the teaching of the one was that He caused His adoring disciple to fall upon his knees with uplifted eye and to say in filial reverence and trust, "Our Father who art in heaven." While the other taught his followers to lean only upon self, and to seek speedy relief from life itself, declaring that heaven returned only an empty, mocking echo to the helpless wail of ...
— India, Its Life and Thought • John P. Jones
... shiftless or untidy merely because his wife was too busy with the children to sew on buttons. She told a lot of interesting things about the difference between the man who holds his newspaper in one hand and the man who holds his in both. Some temperaments always lean their heads on their hands when they are weary, and others support their chins. A determined character sets her feet down firmly and decidedly at every step—though of course it needn't be thumping—while a dependent ...
— Beatrice Leigh at College - A Story for Girls • Julia Augusta Schwartz
... mixture from the vial. Her hands shook so that she could not. In despair she allowed the nurse to administer it, while Gretchen supported her, seating herself behind her in such a way that Hilda could lean against her, and still see the face of the sick man. In this position she watched while the nurse put the liquid into Lord Chetwynde's mouth, and saw him ...
— The Cryptogram - A Novel • James De Mille
... this useful sauce is good stock, to which add any remnants and bones of fowl or game. Butter the bottom of a stewpan with at least two ounces of butter, and in it put slices of lean veal, ham, bacon, cuttings of beef, fowl, or game trimmings, three peppercorns, mushroom trimmings, a tomato, a carrot and a turnip cut up, an onion stuck with two cloves, a bay leaf, a sprig of thyme, parsley and marjoram. Put ...
— The Cook's Decameron: A Study in Taste: - Containing Over Two Hundred Recipes For Italian Dishes • Mrs. W. G. Waters
... one dead, the other powerless to be born, helps nothing. Washington was a dismal school. Even before the traitors had flown, the vultures descended on it in swarms that darkened the ground, and tore the carrion of political patronage into fragments and gobbets of fat and lean, on the very steps of the White House. Not a man there knew what his task was to be, or was fitted for it; every one without exception, Northern or Southern, was to learn his business at the cost of the public. ...
— The Education of Henry Adams • Henry Adams
... and very fine, and the island would produce it in great plenty, yet most of what is consumed by the inhabitants is imported. The mutton, pork, and beef are also very good; the beef in particular, which we took on board here, was universally allowed to be scarcely inferior to our own; the lean part was very like it, both in colour and grain, though the beasts are much smaller, but the fat is as white as the fat of mutton. The town of Frunchiale derives its name from Funcho, the Portuguese name for fennel, which grows in great plenty upon the ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 12 • Robert Kerr
... log cabin with an additional "lean-to" of the same material, roofed with bark, and on the other side a larger and more ambitious "extension" built of rough, unplaned, and unpainted redwood boards, lightly shingled. The "lean-to" was evidently used as a kitchen, and the central cabin as a living-room. The barking of a dog as ...
— Colonel Starbottle's Client and Other Stories • Bret Harte
... Day of 1850 the sun shone cloudless but wrought no thaw. Even the landscapes of frost on the window-panes did not melt a flower, and the little trees still keep their silvery boughs arched high above the jeweled avenues. During the afternoon a lean hare limped twice across the lawn, and there was not a creature stirring to chase it. Now the night is bitter cold, with no sounds outside but the cracking of the porches as they freeze tighter. Even the north wind seems grown ...
— A Kentucky Cardinal • James Lane Allen
... will. (Calls behind the scenes.) Here, waiter! hostler! driver! what's your name? drive the chaise up here to the door, smart, close. Lean on my arm, madam, and we'll have you in and home in a whiff. (Exeunt Mrs. Talbot, Louisa, ...
— The Parent's Assistant • Maria Edgeworth
... wa'n't naer nigger on de plantation w'at would n' rudder take forty dan ter go 'bout dat kitchen atter dark,—dat is, 'cep'n' Tenie; she did n' 'pear ter min' de ha'nts. She useter slip 'roun' at night, en set on de kitchen steps, en lean up agin de do'-jamb, en run on ter herse'f wid some kine er foolishness w'at nobody could n' make out; fer Mars Marrabo had th'eaten' ter sen' her off'n de plantation ef she say anything ter any er de yuther niggers 'bout de pine-tree. But somehow er 'nudder de niggers foun' out all erbout it, ...
— The Conjure Woman • Charles W. Chesnutt
... companion, asking her, who knew nothing, a hundred questions, all in one little breath. "What is she? How looks she? What is her charm, her fascination, the magic of her art? Is she short, tall, fat, lean, joyous or ...
— Mistress Nell - A Merry Tale of a Merry Time • George C. Hazelton, Jr.
... getting the grain from the ground was too closely connected with grave-digging. The staff of life, naturally beautiful, oftentimes suggested the grave-digger's spade. Men and boys, and in those days even women and girls, were cut down while cutting the wheat. The fat folk grew lean and the lean leaner, while the rosy cheeks brought from Scotland and other cool countries across the sea faded to yellow like the wheat. We were all made slaves through the vice of over-industry. The same was in great part true in making hay to keep the cattle and horses through ...
— The Story of My Boyhood and Youth • John Muir
... hesitation at the wrong stage of the operation, a slip of bistoury or scalpel, a tremor of the wrist, a single instant's clumsiness of the fingers, and the Enemy—watching for every chance, intent for every momentarily opened chink or cranny wherein he could thrust his lean fingers—entered the frail tenement with a leap, a rushing, headlong spring that jarred the house of life to its foundations. Lowering close over her head Lloyd felt the shadow of his approach. He had arrived there in that commonplace little room, with ...
— A Man's Woman • Frank Norris
... saw him,—Fido, the flower, and the others. It was one day when Fido had called louder than usual. They saw a little figure in a night-dress come to an upper window and lean his arms out. They saw it was the little boy, and, oh! how pale and ill he looked. But his yellow hair was as glorious as ever, and the dimples came back with the smile that lighted his thin little ...
— A Little Book of Profitable Tales • Eugene Field
... why I take it? Well, I will tell you. Do you know what is in that room just behind this very door I lean against? It is my mother. She will never move again, never speak to me again; she is dead. Yes, she died last night but I not tell no one. If I tell, they will take her away and bury her I not know where. I have no money to bury her myself. ...
— The Alchemist's Secret • Isabel Cecilia Williams
... probably one of the Hebrews who still dwelt in great numbers around the city. His pallid skin, dry and yellow as parchment, bore the mark of the deadly fever which ravaged the marsh-lands in autumn. The chill of death was in his lean hand, and, as Artaban released it, the arm fell back inertly upon ...
— The Blue Flower, and Others • Henry van Dyke
... saw the lean dogs beneath the wall, Hold o'er the dead their carnival; Gorging and growling o'er carcass and limb, They were too busy to bark at him. From a Tartar's skull they stripped the flesh, As ye peel the fig when its fruit is fresh; And their white tusks crunched on the whiter ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 5 (of 14) • Elbert Hubbard
... failed very quickly, and he presently reached out and drew a reading-lamp towards him. The flame he kindled flickered upward, throwing weird shadows upon his lean, brown face, making the sunken hollows ...
— The Safety Curtain, and Other Stories • Ethel M. Dell
... when she looked out of her window upon this formidable force of lean-legged, gaunt-cheeked gun-fighters. They were men of the trade, cowboys who had fought their employers' battles from the Rio Grande to the Little Missouri. They were grim and silent men as they pressed round the watering troughs at the windmill with their horses, with flapping hats and ...
— The Rustler of Wind River • G. W. Ogden
... conquering race, The intenser still my wonder grew. I had beheld their First, their EVE, Born in that splendid Paradise, Which sprung there solely to receive The first light of her waking eyes. I had seen purest angels lean In worship o'er her from above; And man—oh yes, had envying seen Proud man possest of ...
— The Complete Poems of Sir Thomas Moore • Thomas Moore et al
... his gaze calmly. This was the first time Jane had had opportunity to regard Tako closely. She saw now the aspect of power which was upon him. His gigantic stature was not clumsy, for there was a lean, lithe grace in his movements. His face was handsome in a strange foreign fashion. He was smiling now; but in the set of his jaw, his wide mouth, there was an undeniable cruelty, a ruthless dominance of purpose. And suddenly she saw ...
— The White Invaders • Raymond King Cummings
... word spoken. My eyes were particularly fixed upon the taller one, because he was slightly the nearer to me, and I became certain as I watched him that he was in the last state of nervousness. His lean figure was quivering all over, and I heard a quick, thin panting like that of a tired dog. Suddenly one of them gave a short, hissing signal. The tall man bent his back and his knees like a diver about to spring, but before he could move, I had ...
— The Exploits Of Brigadier Gerard • Arthur Conan Doyle
... weeks' delayed mails in one from a casual postman, and the whole heavy bundle of newspapers, tied with a strap, he dangled as bait. At the edge of the beach, cross-legged, undressed to his sky-blue army shirt, sat a lean, ginger-haired man, on guard over a dozen heaps of clothing. His eyes followed the ...
— Traffics and Discoveries • Rudyard Kipling
... Carson: he was your image of modern power—the lean, hungry, seamed face, surmounted by a dirty-gray pall. He was clawing his way to ...
— The Web of Life • Robert Herrick
... the old man might lean on his shoulder. He put one arm about his back to steady him, and thus supported he was able to move slowly along the ...
— Two Boys and a Fortune • Matthew White, Jr.
... does his configuration materially change, there yet remaining, and boldly refusing to be disguised, that face so full of penetration, and those features so sharp. The waggishly inclined have identified them with the wizardry of dividing storm currents. Nevertheless, of this lean conformation, which is better within than the world without is in general willing to admit, is Smooth particularly proud. In manner, Smooth is piquant; and being an acknowledged member of the fast school—that is, a disciple of manifest destiny in particular and Model Republics in general—he accepts ...
— The Adventures of My Cousin Smooth • Timothy Templeton
... Lands of Montana Are the worst I ever seen, The cowboys are all tenderfeet And the dogies are too lean. ...
— Cowboy Songs - and Other Frontier Ballads • Various
... when they are resolved to abide in their sins, and yet expect to be saved by God's grace through Christ. This is as much as to say, God liketh sin as well as I do, and careth not how men live, if so be they lean upon his Son. Of this sort are they that build up Zion with blood, and Jerusalem with iniquity; that judge for reward, and teach for hire, and divine for money, and lean upon the Lord; Mic. iii. 10, 11. This is doing things with an high hand against the Lord our God, and a taking him, as it ...
— The Jerusalem Sinner Saved • John Bunyan
... changed man. He no longer sided with, but against, the people; sheltering himself from their clamours in the stronghold of privilege. Hence it was, that when he coalesced with others, he found no support on which he could lean with safety, and by which he could assist the monarch. His staff was but a reed on which, if he leant, it pierced his hand. This Chatham felt; and though he clung tenaciously to office, from the fear ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... would lean over and say, "My son, what is the expression for that in the original?" whereupon Ralph would read the passage. It was between Gilbert Peden and his Maker that sometimes he did this for pride, and not for information; but Ralph ...
— The Lilac Sunbonnet • S.R. Crockett
... lean on me. The boy can stay here and watch it till I come back and wash what is left; it ...
— Bible Stories and Religious Classics • Philip P. Wells
... a horse's back.—Begin with caps, and, by degrees, as with the drum, instead of lengthening the reins, stretch the bridle hand to the front, and raise it for the carbine to rest on, with the muzzle clear of the horse's head, a little to one side. Lean the body forward without rising in the stirrups. Avoid interfering with the horse's mouth, or exciting his fears by suddenly closing your legs either before or after firing—be quiet yourself and your horse will be quiet. The colt ...
— A New Illustrated Edition of J. S. Rarey's Art of Taming Horses • J. S. Rarey
... creation, and she is making you realize by her dependence on you, how easily wrongs are righted, and how much strength there is in that strong arm of yours, who is to answer for the consequences? Men are such one sided creatures, they either lean all over on the heart side or altogether on the other. If their extravagance is the former, you can do anything you like with them, if you only go the right way about it, whilst if the other prevail, it is a hopeless case of barrenness against all your ...
— Honor Edgeworth • Vera
... did not come any the more for that. The queen, who was a witch, discovered that her daughter had gone off with the prince, and told her husband he must leave his bed and go after them. The king got slowly up, groaning with pain, and dragged himself to the stables, where he saw the lean horse still ...
— The Violet Fairy Book • Various
... but for a ragged loin-cloth, and each man was chained to his neighbour. The hot sun beat brightly upon them, and the negroes ran up and down the gangway and lashed them with whips of hide. They stretched out their lean arms and pulled the heavy oars through the water. The salt ...
— A House of Pomegranates • Oscar Wilde
... thy passage from the Bank—where thou hast been receiving thy half-yearly dividends (supposing thou art a lean annuitant like myself)—to the Flower Pot, to secure a place for Dalston, or Shacklewell, or some other thy suburban retreat northerly,—didst thou never observe a melancholy looking, handsome, brick and stone edifice, to the ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb, Volume 2 • Charles Lamb
... up out of the very depths of my being? I cannot tell. Now that I feel nothing, it has stopped, has perhaps gone down again into its darkness, from which who can say whether it will ever rise? Ten times over I must essay the task, must lean down over the abyss. And each time the natural laziness which deters us from every difficult enterprise, every work of importance, has urged me to leave the thing alone, to drink my tea and to think ...
— Swann's Way - (vol. 1 of Remembrance of Things Past) • Marcel Proust
... and for Tanna. I then urged him to remain at the Mission House, but he replied, "O Missi, you do not know how near to death I am! I am just going, and will soon be with Jesus, and see my wife and children now. While a little strength is left, I will lean on Abraham's arm, and go down to the graves of my dear ones and fall asleep there, and Abraham will dig a quiet bed and lay me beside them. Farewell, Missi, I am very near death now; we will meet again in Jesus and ...
— The Story of John G. Paton - Or Thirty Years Among South Sea Cannibals • James Paton
... are told of bear-hunting; for Bruin is rather a humorist in his way. A friend of mine, with his surveying party, ten men in all, once treed a very large one; they immediately cut clubs, and set to work to fell the tree. Bruin seemed inclined to maintain his position, till the tree began to lean, when he slid down to about fifteen feet from the ground, and then clasped his fore-paws over his head and let himself tumble amongst them. Every club was raised, but Bruin was on the alert; he made a charge, upset the man immediately in front, and escaped with two or three thumps on the rump, ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. 20, Issue 561, August 11, 1832 • Various
... to his feet, and with his lean left arm stretched high in suppliance, said: "Bhowanee, thou hast vouchsafed to thy devotees the pilsao. We will strew thy shrine with flowers ...
— Caste • W. A. Fraser
... he's all wrong, for the one I did promise is that little dapper chap there in the window. He's been waiting on and off since eight o'clock. Never you mind; you hang about here, and I'll work it if I— Hullo! here's another one! I didn't promise you, did I? All right, old chappie. You lean up there against the wall, and I'll engineer it for you somehow. She's owing me a dance about eight down the list. You can have a quarter of it, if you like, and the other two chaps can go halves in ...
— Roger Ingleton, Minor • Talbot Baines Reed
... was a tall lean figure of a woman, of about thirty-six; the other of the same size and make, of about forty: there was no mark of wife or widow in any one part of either of them;—they seem'd to be two upright vestal sisters, unsapped by caresses, unbroke in upon by tender salutations.—I ...
— A Sentimental Journey • Laurence Sterne
... southern downs, was so big that it curled like an anchovy to get upon the plate. The sheep that bore it across the grassy moors must have out-topped the horse. The hills must have shaken beneath his tread. With what eagerness you squared your lean elbows for the feast, with knife and fork turned ...
— Chimney-Pot Papers • Charles S. Brooks
... WILDER. [Who is lean, cadaverous, and complaining, with drooping grey moustaches, stands before the fire.] I say, this fire's the devil! Can I have ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... there lookin' him over while he unwraps about four yards of fishline from around the neck of a leather money pouch. Odd old Rube he was, straight and lean, and smoked up like a ...
— Shorty McCabe on the Job • Sewell Ford
... departure. Besides bread and cheese, a bottle of water for myself, and one of brandy for my guides, we were also provided with long sticks, tipped with iron points to sound the depth of the snow, and to lean upon. ...
— Visit to Iceland - and the Scandinavian North • Ida Pfeiffer
... grey stone rudely carv'd, The statue of an armed Knight, in She lean'd [*the*] melancholy mood, [*And*] To ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge - Vol I and II • Samuel Taylor Coleridge
... not!' said Fernando. 'If he sends for me I will come.' But there his strength suddenly collapsed, and he was forced to sit down and lean back. ...
— The Pillars of the House, V1 • Charlotte M. Yonge
... studied the man. Stutsman was like a wolf, lean and cruel and vicious. He even looked like a wolf, with his long, thin face, his small, beady eyes, the thin, bloodless lips. But he was the kind of man who didn't always wait for instructions, but went ahead and used his own judgment. ...
— Empire • Clifford Donald Simak
... constitute the market-place. The fishermen row their cargoes of fish direct from the sea to the pier, and there transact sales. There is a stout iron railing along the edge of that pier—a most needful safeguard—over which the servant girls of the town lean and look down at the fishermen, who look up at them with a calm serio-comic "don't-you-wish-you-may-get-it" expression that is deeply impressive. Bargains, of course, are not easily made, and it is in attempting to make these that all the hubbub occurs. The noise ...
— Personal Reminiscences in Book Making - and Some Short Stories • R.M. Ballantyne
... they do not immediately fall to fisticuffs, will find some possible ground of compromise. They will learn each other's ways and humours, so as to know where they must go warily, and where they may lean their whole weight. The discretion of the first years becomes the settled habit of the last; and so, with wisdom and patience, two lives may grow ...
— Virginibus Puerisque • Robert Louis Stevenson
... noises,—so it has fallen into sad decay, and the moss grows on the rotten shingles of the roof, and the clapboards have turned black, and the windows rattle like teeth that chatter with fear, and the walls of the house begin to lean as if its knees were shaking,—take the man who didn't mind the real risk of the cars to that old house, on some dreary November evening, and ask him to sleep there alone,—how do you think he will like it? He doesn't ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 4, No. 21, July, 1859 • Various |
