"Lean against" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... of her warm, living fingers such a thrill passed through the boy as made him reel. It was something blind and elemental, outside of anything that he had dreamed of in his life. She went on down the hall and left him there, and he had to lean against ...
— Samuel the Seeker • Upton Sinclair
... to cry afresh; and the next thing, when she reflected how well she had got over it, was to laugh heartily. The tears once banished gave place to the smiles, and at last Dolly laughed so much that she was fain to lean against a tree, and give vent to her exultation. When she could laugh no longer, and was quite tired, she put her head-dress to rights, dried her eyes, looked back very merrily and triumphantly at the Warren chimneys, which were just visible, and ...
— Barnaby Rudge • Charles Dickens
... back, "I will repeat what I said on the day that I first met you at Bielany; let us be friends! . . . It's no use trying to deny it, man is a gregarious beast: he always needs someone near him so that his lot on this earth may be half-way bearable . . . Man does not stand alone; he must lean against and link up with others, go together with them and feel together with them to be able to accomplish anything. To be sure, one kindred soul suffices. ...
— The Comedienne • Wladyslaw Reymont
... loud voice, "What! must I be shut in a closet and sit on a shelf?" These narrow, shelf-like seats were usually hung on hinges and could be turned up against the pew-walls during the long psalm-tunes and prayers; so the members of the congregation could lean against the pew-walls for support as they stood. When the seats were let down, they fell with a heavy slam that could be heard half a mile away in the summer time, when the windows of the meeting-house were open. Lines from an old ...
— Home Life in Colonial Days • Alice Morse Earle
... sickening feeling that came over me. It was not the first man I had seen killed in my life, but it was the first whose blood and brains had spurted into my face. My knees shook and my head swam; I was obliged to lean against the wall, or ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Volume 54, No. 335, September 1843 • Various
... 'I daren't,' he whispered. 'I wouldn't go in by myself if you were to offer me a million pounds,' and he trembled so violently that he had to lean against me ...
— Werwolves • Elliott O'Donnell
... heavily that she was oppressed by a feeling almost of suffocation, and was obliged to stop and lean against a pillar for ...
— Mona • Mrs. Georgie Sheldon
... the work is completed. "There!" we say, standing back, a little flushed and out of breath with the excitement of the thing. "There! There's a place in which to live! Could any existence be more glorious?" And then we advance a step and lean against the walls to survey the surrounding prospect. It is the fatal action. The material body touches the aerial structure and down with a crash the castle comes—back we pitch into the foundations, and thwack, bump, thwack, comes the masonry ...
— Once Aboard The Lugger • Arthur Stuart-Menteth Hutchinson
... glance towards him, I suppose: there was nothing else to produce such humiliation. He made several efforts to obey, but his little strength was annihilated for the time, and he fell back again with a moan. Mr. Heathcliff advanced, and lifted him to lean against a ...
— Wuthering Heights • Emily Bronte
... scratching and eating. Overcome at last by suspense, she started up, but in doing so, she knocked her head violently against some object that stood close by her. In her madness she never heeded the pain, but stretched out her hands for something to lean against, when fortunately she laid one of them on a stumpy candlestick, in the saucer of which she found a couple of greasy matches. A cry of joy escaped her as she struck a light, as quickly as her nervous fingers and glad excitement allowed her. At least now the horrible spell of darkness and uncertainty ...
— Honor Edgeworth • Vera
... lean against him any more. There were some little improvements in the plans which had occurred to Elizabeth, especially in the arrangement ...
— Double Trouble - Or, Every Hero His Own Villain • Herbert Quick
... I loved to lean against a pillar in the entrance hall, watching the people go in and out. Groups of children hushed their chatter at the entrance, and skipped, whispering and giggling in their fists, up the grand stairway, ...
— The Promised Land • Mary Antin
... howling and rumbling through the framework, hurled the water to the very door where Hardy stood, and as it touched his face, a wild, animal exultation overcame him and he dashed out into the midst of it. God, it was good to feel the splash of rain again, to lean against the wind, and to smell the wet and mud! He wandered about through it recklessly, now bringing in his saddle and bedding, now going out to talk with his horse, at last simply standing with his hands outstretched while his whole ...
— Hidden Water • Dane Coolidge
... Not to lean against the door, not to lose her ticket, not to forget her box, or the name of the station she was going to. Finally, to be a good gal and mind her work, and remember to say her prayers, and to give Mrs Lane's dooty to her mistress. All of which she promised, and presently found herself ...
— A Pair of Clogs • Amy Walton
... behavior of the groom and the flippancy of the bride. She, above all, must not reach up and wig-wag signals while she is receiving, any more than she must wave to people as she goes up and down the aisle of the church. She must not cling to her husband, stand pigeon-toed, or lean against him or the wall, or any person, or thing. She must not run her arm through his and let her hand flop on the other side; she must not swing her arms as though they were dangling rope; she must not switch herself this ...
— Etiquette • Emily Post
... destroys justice is infamous! Just think of teaching that doctrine to little children! A little child would go out into the garden, and there would be a little tree laden with blossoms, and the little fellow would lean against it, and there would be a bird on one of the boughs, singing and swinging, and thinking about four little speckled eggs, warmed by the breast of its mate—and singing and swinging, and the music in in happy waves rippling out of the tiny throat, and the flowers blossoming, the air filled with ...
— Lectures of Col. R. G. Ingersoll, Volume I • Robert Green Ingersoll
... they used to when I could walk for weeks, instead of aching like this when I haven't had to walk, but have been riding all day. Hah!" he sighed, as he lowered himself down into the back of the chariot to lean against the side once more. "I can keep watch over him just as well sitting down as standing up. I don't see that I need watch at all when the boy's got a pillow with a set of teeth like a rat trap that will take fast hold of anyone who came to interfere ...
— Marcus: the Young Centurion • George Manville Fenn
... cried Lieutenant Lipscombe. "Back from those boats, men! I'll blow the brains out of the mutinous dog who dares to enter first. Discipline must be maintained. Here, Waters, let me lean against you." ...
— In the King's Name - The Cruise of the "Kestrel" • George Manville Fenn
... by little the hidden sense comes to her, her rosy lips slowly part and lengthen out until every snowy tooth is visible. Then Pipa covers her face with her apron, and shakes from head to foot in such a fit of laughter, that she has to lean against the wall not to fall down. "Oh hello!" is all she can say. This Pipa repeats at ...
— The Italians • Frances Elliot
... to his feet, hitched nervously at the belt of his trousers, ran his fingers around the inside of his collar, and, with a look of triumph at Parker, led the widow through the dance. She permitted her body to relax and lean against her partner, dancing with an abandon that not only fired the emotions of Old Heck to fever heat, but was as well like dippers of oil on the ...
— The Ramblin' Kid • Earl Wayland Bowman
... pace like a convict among other prisoners; no trees, no gardens, no streets, no houses; nothing but water and clouds. And the ceaseless motion of the ship beneath his feet. On stormy days he must lean against the wainscot, hold on to the doors, cling to the edge of the narrow berth to save himself from rolling out. On calm days he would hear the snorting throb of the screw, and feel the swift flight of the ship, bearing him on in its ...
— The Works of Guy de Maupassant, Volume VIII. • Guy de Maupassant
... sullen and forced acknowledgement. The church was gradually deserted—the appearance of the pastor was no longer a signal for every hat to be lifted from the head; on the contrary, boys of sixteen or seventeen years of age would lean against the church, or the walls of the churchyard, with their hands in both pockets, and a sort of leer upon their faces, as though they defied the pastor on his appearance—and there would they remain outside during the service, meeting, unquailed and without blushing, his eyes, cast upon them as he came ...
— The Poacher - Joseph Rushbrook • Frederick Marryat
... since become scattered ashes! Poor little backwoods academicians, driven in about sunrise, driven out toward dusk! Poor little tired backs with nothing to lean against! Poor little bare feet that could never reach the floor! Poor little droop-headed figures, so sleepy in the long summer days, so afraid to fall asleep! Long, long since, little children of the past, your backs have become straight enough, ...
— The Choir Invisible • James Lane Allen
... moment was when the waiters stood in a row; but even then he contrived to lean against the wall just round the corner in such a way that for that important instant the waiters thought him a gentleman, while the gentlemen thought him a waiter. The rest went like winking. If any waiter caught him away from the table, that waiter caught a languid aristocrat. ...
— The Innocence of Father Brown • G. K. Chesterton
... innocence that could be only a shocking pretence; to know her such as life had made her and at the same time to despise her secretly for every touch with which her life had fashioned her—that was neither generous nor high minded; it was positively frantic. He got up and went away to lean against the mantelpiece, there, on his elbow and with his head in his hand. You have no idea of the charm and the distinction of his pose. I couldn't help admiring him: the expression, the grace, the fatal suggestion of his immobility. Oh, yes, I am sensible to aesthetic impressions, I have been ...
— The Arrow of Gold - a story between two notes • Joseph Conrad
... Mr. Gilmore had wooed her for months without touching her heart. Then Walter Marrable had come and had conquered her almost in an hour. She had never felt herself disposed to play with Mr. Gilmore's hair, to lean against his shoulder, to be touched by his fingers,—never disposed to wait for his coming, or to regret his going. But she had hardly become acquainted with her cousin before his presence was a pleasure to her; and no sooner had he spoken to her of his love, than everything that concerned him ...
— The Vicar of Bullhampton • Anthony Trollope
... know her by the Brackenfield badge, and be sure you don't speak to anyone else. Call out of the window for a porter when you reach Rosebury. You've plenty of time to change. Well, good-bye, chicks! Be good girls. Don't forget to send me that telegram from Euston. Write as soon as you can. Don't lean against the door of the carriage. You're just ...
— A Patriotic Schoolgirl • Angela Brazil
... and steamed down toward the lake, the band whooping it up to the "Blue Danube." As the boat struck blue water, and her bow raised out about sixteen feet and began to jump, the cornet player stopped to pour water out of his horn, and lean against a post. He was as pale as death, and the tuba player stopped to see what ailed the cornet player, and to lean over the railing to see a man down stairs. The baritone had eaten something that did not agree with him, and he stopped playing ...
— Peck's Sunshine - Being a Collection of Articles Written for Peck's Sun, - Milwaukee, Wis. - 1882 • George W. Peck
... "Where do you stay?" She said "Just here." "How long have you been here?" "Since the beginning." (two months) she replied. "How do you sleep at night?" "I lay the baby on the desk in front of me, and I have this post at the back to lean against. This is a very good place. ...
— Crescent and Iron Cross • E. F. Benson
... shops occupied the ground floor. To the right of the entrance, a large, greasy hash house, and to the left, a coal dealer, a notions seller, and an umbrella merchant. The building appeared even larger than it was because it had on each side a small, low building which seemed to lean against it for support. This immense, squared-off building was outlined against the sky. Its unplastered side walls were as bare as prison walls, except for rows of roughly jutting stones which suggested jaws full ...
— L'Assommoir • Emile Zola
... him lean against her again, and she gently lowered him to the pillow. His head sank back, and he lay there with white lips and closed lids. She knelt beside him, watching his every breath. After a few minutes he opened his eyes. They were ...
— Peak and Prairie - From a Colorado Sketch-book • Anna Fuller
... ready to sink; and forced to lean against the wainscot, as I kneeled at her feet. A stream of tears at last burst from her less indignant eyes. Good heaven! said she, lifting up her lovely face, and clasped hands, what is at last to be my destiny? Deliver me from this dangerous man; ...
— Clarissa, Volume 5 (of 9) • Samuel Richardson
... hear, as Mr. Linden arranged the cushions and with gentle force made her lean against them, but either he did not feel himself able to touch directly what they were both thinking of—or else thought her not able to bear it. His tone was very quiet, the rest of his hand upon her hair hardly longer than it had been yesterday, as ...
— Say and Seal, Volume I • Susan Warner
... taught punctuality to the Canadians, but better things are in store for them. Cold to the very bone, I walked up and down the saloon to warm myself. The floor was wet, and covered with saturated rugs; there were no fires in the stoves, and my only resource was to lean against the engine-enclosure, and warm my frozen hands on the hot wood. I was joined by a very old gentleman, who, amid many complaints, informed me that he had had an attack of apoplexy during the night, and some one, finding him insensible, had opened the jugular vein. His lank white hair flowed over ...
— The Englishwoman in America • Isabella Lucy Bird
... with me all the way, not knowing why, not wishing to throw them into the briers for they were very old and full of story, and I—was very young and full of—I cannot tell, remembering what little boys are made of. And now here they lean against the hearth, that very pair. I packed them in the bottom of my trunk when I started for college; I saved them through the years when our open fire was a "base-burner," and then a gas-radiator in a city flat. Moved, preserved, "married" these many years, they stand at last where the boy must have ...
— The Hills of Hingham • Dallas Lore Sharp
... man of affairs, a business man, with the care of half a dozen fortunes on my hands. Now, what's the matter with me? I begin to tremble when I look that sober old steward in the face. If he had handed me a letter to-night, I should have had to lean against the wall for support. This will never do at all. I have not seen her face, I do not know her name; for all I know, she may be this Leddy Lightfinger.... No, that would be impossible. Leddy Lightfinger would have made an appointment. What possesses me to dwell in this realm of fancy, which is less ...
— The Lure of the Mask • Harold MacGrath
... the agonies I have been in; at last I began to wish myself and him safe in the streets of Toronto. I was not the least frightened for myself, but it was trying to see him always looking over, and about to lean against old crazy wooden balustrades that William said must have given way from sheer rottenness with any weight upon them. This is such a night, not a single cloud; the clearest possible sky and the moon shining brightly, as ...
— First Impressions of the New World - On Two Travellers from the Old in the Autumn of 1858 • Isabella Strange Trotter
... and Heroes heard, they brought The wood to Balder's ship, and built a pile, Full the deck's breadth, and lofty; then the corpse Of Balder on the highest top they laid, With Nanna on his right, and on his left Hoder, his brother, whom his own hand slew. And they set jars of wine and oil to lean Against the bodies, and stuck torches near, Splinters of pine-wood, soak'd with turpentine; And brought his arms and gold, and all his stuff, And slew the dogs who at his table fed, And his horse, Balder's horse, ...
— Poetical Works of Matthew Arnold • Matthew Arnold
... the seat of his pants—Jerusalem! if you'll excuse the expression, Miss Hands, how that feller did holler! Me and Si come hikin' out, thought he was killed and got the hives besides; when we see what was up, we sot down and laughed till, honest, we had to lean against one another or we'd rolled over an' over on the ground. Hossy held on like a good 'un till I told him to let go, and then he dropped the pants and went to work eatin' grass as if nothin' had been goin' ...
— The Wooing of Calvin Parks • Laura E. Richards
... sudden life. An awful terror takes possession of him. He struggles with himself, and presently so far succeeds in regaining some degree of composure that he can lean against the wall and wipe his forehead, and vow to himself that he will never descend until he has accomplished the object of his visit. But the result of this terrible fight with fear and conscience shows itself in the increasing ...
— The Haunted Chamber - A Novel • "The Duchess"
... Mysie, brokenly and weakly, "oh, faither, I've come back. Jist let me lie here near you. I jist want you to clap my held, to lean against you, an' gang to sleep. Are you angry wi' me, faither? Are you—" and Mysie's eyes closed in a faint, as she ...
— The Underworld - The Story of Robert Sinclair, Miner • James C. Welsh
... an old desk of mine," he said, holding it out to Baird, who took it and slightly turned away to lean against the ...
— In Connection with the De Willoughby Claim • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... lean against, sit upon, or unnecessarily shake, or even touch the bed in which a patient lies. This is invariably a painful annoyance. If you shake the chair on which he sits, he has a point by which to steady himself, in his feet. But on a bed or sofa, he is entirely at your mercy, ...
— Notes on Nursing - What It Is, and What It Is Not • Florence Nightingale
... desolate mien, had gone to lean against the pedestal of the high figure of Minerva; and never before had he been more bowed down by his needy distress, the everlasting anguish of his ill-luck. On the other hand, Duthil, in spite of everything, was perorating in the centre ...
— The Three Cities Trilogy, Complete - Lourdes, Rome and Paris • Emile Zola
... all right." He thrust an abrupt arm around her shoulders, gripping them hard to still her trembling. "Lean against me! I've got you ...
— The Obstacle Race • Ethel M. Dell
... embarrassed prince and an assailed government against even enemies who are in themselves insignificant and not free from the vices of a corrupt society and a decaying age, and it was only on such that Hienfung had in the first place to lean against his opponents. Even his own Manchus, the warlike Tartars, who, despite the smallness of their numbers, had conquered the whole of China, had lost their primitive virtue and warlike efficiency in the southern climes which they had made their home. To them the opulent cities of ...
— China • Demetrius Charles Boulger
... and invite the girls into the house to drink it, just for the mere pleasure of joining in the laughter. She never got the remotest inkling of why the two would double up with joy when one or the other got the hiccoughs in the midst of a sentence. But she would lean against the sideboard and laugh with them, the tears ...
— Lydia of the Pines • Honore Willsie Morrow
... their purchases and took their way to the place that Lester had in mind to eat their lunch. They found themselves on a high sand dune, overgrown with coarse grass. It afforded an excellent view of the sea and also furnished a comfortable place to lean against. ...
— The Rushton Boys at Treasure Cove - Or, The Missing Chest of Gold • Spencer Davenport
... young man to himself, drawing back to lean against a wooden railing on the other side of the street. He gazed, unhappy man, at the different storeys of the house, with the keen attention of a detective ...
— Ferragus • Honore de Balzac
... world is a very strong one: it is a pity that she does not always see it so. It is strongest through her natural impulse to steady herself by leaning upon the Eternal Life, the only Reality; and her weakness comes also from her inclination to lean against something,—upon an unworthy support, rather than none at all. She often lets her life get broken into fragments among the flimsy trellises of fashion and conventionality, when it might be a perfect thing in the upright beauty of its ...
— A New England Girlhood • Lucy Larcom
... pilgrims, both English and American, who will tell you grandly that they have "done"—say Rome, in two, nay in one day! All the antiquities, of course, and the Museums; and then comes a string of names of churches, and galleries, until you gasp for breath! You go away and lean against something to recover your breath, and your gravity, but the pilgrimage is an accomplished fact. They have a right to stick to the cockle-shell in their cap, so to speak, and go home saying, ...
— The Idler Magazine, Volume III, March 1893 - An Illustrated Monthly • Various
... And when both we and our children shall have been consigned to the house appointed for all living, may love of country and pride of country glow with equal fervor among those to whom our names and our blood shall have descended! And then, when honored and decrepit age shall lean against the base of this monument, and troops of ingenuous youth shall be gathered round it, and when the one shall speak to the other of its objects, the purposes of its construction, and the great and glorious events with which it is connected, there shall rise from every youthful ...
— The Great Speeches and Orations of Daniel Webster • Daniel Webster
... the miserable creature whom his villainy had destroyed, had fled away from her home, had died away from her home, and was buried away from her home; and, with that, I shut the door in his face. My agitation, and a sort of terror that I could not account for, so overpowered me that I was obliged to lean against the wall of the passage, and was unable, for some minutes, to stir a step towards going up stairs. As soon as I got a little better, and began to think about what had taken place, a doubt came across me as to whether I might not have ...
— Hide and Seek • Wilkie Collins
... he said to Flop Ear. "You take it to some street that runs down hill and you start at the top. Stand up on the board, near the box, and lean against it so you won't fall off. Take hold of the handles, and then push yourself off. Down the hilly street you will roll on the skate wheels, just ...
— Curly and Floppy Twistytail - The Funny Piggie Boys • Howard R. Garis
... knows nothing of the town may well be alarmed as he walks down its streets, for on all sides he sees walls and houses standing at every possible angle. Houses lean against each other in a way suggestive of intoxication; doorways are all awry, and pavements and roads roll ...
— The Harmsworth Magazine, v. 1, 1898-1899, No. 2 • Various
... went out, and I put on a few things and went down the great dark arches of the staircase, with a glimmering light below, and through the throne-room with the nurse. When I came in I saw Hugh sitting up in bed; they had put a chair beside him, covered with cushions, for him to lean against. He was pale and breathing very fast, with the nurse sponging his brow. Canon Sharrock was standing at the foot of the bed, with his stole on, reading the last prayers from a little book. When I entered, Hugh fixed his eyes on me with a strange smile, with something triumphant in it, and ...
— Hugh - Memoirs of a Brother • Arthur Christopher Benson
... and the pair stepped out of the shallow gully in which they had been walking. Immediately they were exposed to a very strong and exceedingly cold wind, such as seemed to surprise them in no way, but compelled both to actually lean against its force. Moreover, although this pressure was all from the left, it proved exceedingly difficult to go on. Their legs seemed made of lead, and their breathing was strangely labored. This, also, appeared to be just what ...
— The Devolutionist and The Emancipatrix • Homer Eon Flint
... along the edge a number of lumps of spawn at about one foot apart. These lumps are placed level with the manure on the edge facing the wall. This portion of the surface of the manure ought to be raised vertically, and should lean against the earthen wall of the trench. The other half of the surface ought to slope gently toward the wall, leaving a space of three or four inches between it and the side of the trench, so that it may be trimmed. The lumps of ...
— Mushrooms: how to grow them - a practical treatise on mushroom culture for profit and pleasure • William Falconer
... felt very peaceful, but so hungry and tired with standing and kneeling so long after his walk, that he was glad to lean against the wall and take out the piece of bread that Patience had ...
— Under the Storm - Steadfast's Charge • Charlotte M. Yonge
... had other pleasures than these. Previously I had regarded the City with awe, but now I felt a glow of possession come over me whenever I approached it. Often in those first two months I used to lean against the Mansion House in a familiar sort of way; once I struck a match against the Royal Exchange. And what an impression of financial acumen I could make in a drawing-room by a careless reference to my "block of Jaguars"! Even those who misunderstood me and thought I spoke of my "flock of jaguars" ...
— Once a Week • Alan Alexander Milne
... jumped, and jumped," said the man, "until I am tired out and I cannot imagine how to get into those breeches." "Oh!" said the traveller, "you might stay here as long as you wished, for you would never get into them in this way. Come down and lean against the tree." Then he took his legs and put them in the breeches, and after he had put them on, he said: "Is that right?" "Very good, bless you; for if it had not been for you, God knows how long I should have had to jump." Then the traveller said ...
— Italian Popular Tales • Thomas Frederick Crane
... reaction, Foedor felt his knees failing him, and he was obliged to lean against a wall to prevent himself from falling. At this moment, when he was about to see Vaninka again, this soul of his soul, for whom alone he had done so much, he dreaded lest he should not find her the same as when he had left her. Suddenly the dining-room door opened, ...
— CELEBRATED CRIMES, COMPLETE - VANINKA • ALEXANDRE DUMAS, PERE
... is, indeed, some fatality about that copy of Durer's 'Knight, Death, and the Devil,' which seems really ill-omened, for this is the second time it has fallen. Thank you, sir. The frame only is injured, and I will not trouble you to remove it. Let it lean against the grate, until I have ...
— Vashti - or, Until Death Us Do Part • Augusta J. Evans Wilson
... open door that led out from the vestry, and there in the fresh air Chris revived. He set her on her feet, and made her lean against him. Jack hovered in the background, but ...
— The Rocks of Valpre • Ethel May Dell
... provide. The schoolhouse in the neighborhood in which I lived was built of logs, covered with thick boards, and supplied with rude benches on its puncheon floor for the scholars to sit upon. We sat bolt upright, there being nothing to lean against. There were no desks for our books; and had desks been obtainable there were but few books to use or care for. We boys whispered to the girls at our peril; but we took ...
— Fifty Years of Public Service • Shelby M. Cullom
... got in and the cab started. A hansom cab is better than any carriage you ever rode in, with soft cushions to lean against and little looking-glasses to look at yourself in, and, somehow, you don't hear the wheels. I leaned back and looked at myself and felt like a duchess, for I had my new hat and mantle on, and I knew I looked nice by the way ...
— In Homespun • Edith Nesbit
... leave the Cornice without one word about a place which lies between Mentone and San Remo. Bordighera has a beauty which is quite distinct from both. Palms are its chief characteristics. They lean against the garden walls, and feather the wells outside the town, where women come with brazen pitchers to draw water. In some of the marshy tangles of the plain, they spring from a thick undergrowth of spiky leaves, and rear their tall aerial arms against the deep blue background ...
— Sketches and Studies in Italy and Greece • John Addington Symonds
... and partly in order to increase the intensity of the stimulus. Boys sometimes manipulate their genital organs through their trouser pockets; some even make a hole in the pocket to enable them to masturbate more effectually. In other cases, children, especially girls, lean against some article of furniture—a chair or a table—apparently in a harmless manner, but really in such a way that pressure is exercised upon the genital organs, which are stimulated by pressure or friction. In some, strong mechanical stimulation is required; in others, ...
— The Sexual Life of the Child • Albert Moll
... Rip had to lean against the acceleration. Fighting for balance, he picked up his spack and made his way to the nine enlisted Planeteers. They had braced against the ship's drive by sitting with backs against bulkheads, or by lying flat on the magnesium deck. ...
— Rip Foster Rides the Gray Planet • Blake Savage
... might call a cocktail," she confided. "The tiredest traveller wouldn't ask for crushed ice to it, not with a solid William-the-Conqueror wall to lean against." ...
— Brother Copas • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... Babbit was afraid to let Tommy go for her, and I've seen her goin' past and stoppin' every two or three steps to rest. Well, I stood it as long as I could, but one day I see her comin' with her arms full and stoppin' to lean against the Babbit fence, and I run out and took her bundles and carried them to her house. Then I went home and never spoke one word to her though she called after me dreadful kind of pitiful. Well, that night I was taken sick ...
— The Wind in the Rose-bush and Other Stories of the Supernatural • Mary Eleanor Wilkins Freeman
... his narrative Granice stood up, and went to lean against the mantel-piece, looking down at Ascham, who had not moved from his seat, or changed his attitude of rigid ...
— The Early Short Fiction of Edith Wharton, Part 1 (of 10) • Edith Wharton
... prevented herself from traveling in a circle, by remembering this aptitude of benighted travelers, and keeping her eye steadily fixed on a distant camp-fire. When she at last came to the edge of the field she had to lean against the fence for some minutes before she could recover from her fatigue sufficiently to climb upon it. While she sat for a minute there she heard some cocks, at a neighboring farm-house, crow ...
— The Red Acorn • John McElroy
... Quaker, left alone, turned to look at the dead rebel. For a moment horrible nausea and faintness made him lean against the tree for support. It was the first violent death of which he had ever been an eye-witness. He had known this man,—who was indeed the same Griffin, who had assisted the unwilling Pepperill to bring the tar-kettle to the wood-side on a certain memorable evening; ...
— Cudjo's Cave • J. T. Trowbridge
... weren't going," she said, sitting up and leaning against him as she was accustomed to lean against Ninian. "It's ...
— Changing Winds - A Novel • St. John G. Ervine
... higher it hid the leverets and the partridge chicks. Toll has been taken by rook, and sparrow, and pigeon. Enemies, too, have assailed it; the daring couch invaded it, the bindweed climbed up the stalk, the storm rushed along and beat it down. Yet it triumphed, and to-day the full sheaves lean against ...
— Nature Near London • Richard Jefferies
... slaves, they are very merry slaves, and it was amusing to see one party meet another. They would stop, pull off their straw hats, make a series of mock polite bows, and some remarks which were sure to produce roars of laughter; how they would twist and turn about, and at last lean against each other's backs, that they might more at their ease indulge in fresh cachinnations. I have never seen any but blacks twist themselves into such curious attitudes. I cannot give a more lucid account of this imperial city, because ...
— My First Cruise - and Other stories • W.H.G. Kingston
... be any rehearsal of this," Burns stated at last, stepping back. "When it's done, if you don't bungle the scene, it'll be done. You stand here, Jean, and kind of lean against the rock as if you're all in from that chase. You hear Gil coming, and you start forward and listen, and look,—how far can she turn, Pete; without showing ...
— Jean of the Lazy A • B. M. Bower
... I understood this I stopped, for I knew that the opening to these rivers would grow smaller and smaller, and that it would be of no use to go up there if I wanted to escape. So, wading along, I tried to reach the wall, to lean against it and rest before going back to the torrent, knowing as I did that this ...
— The Crystal Hunters - A Boy's Adventures in the Higher Alps • George Manville Fenn
... as he could; then finished it up quickly, keeping the door wide while he worked. At other times, he kept it tight shut. Often when old Grandpa was asleep by the stove, Johnnie would tiptoe to that door, lean against the jamb of it, and listen. And he told Cis that ...
— The Rich Little Poor Boy • Eleanor Gates
... consented, which it was certain he would not, if he had made up his mind to the contrary. The humiliation of standing an obvious prisoner, with her husband barring the door, was not to be borne any longer, and she turned away to lean against a cabinet, while Grandcourt ...
— Daniel Deronda • George Eliot
... of weakness was needed. She felt like a rag. O'Reilly took her by the hand, and with an arm round the slim waist raised the girl to her feet. Once up, she swayed as if she might fall, but he held her firmly. "Lean against me," he ...
— The Lion's Mouse • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... you'll have us in the ditch. It is very nice when you lean against me, but I can't drive. By the way, you remember my old Kleinwalde neighbour? The old man who spoilt ...
— The Benefactress • Elizabeth Beauchamp
... hundred metres of limestone which surmounted it, they arranged above it five low chambers placed exactly one above the other in order to relieve the superincumbent stress. The highest of these was protected by a pointed roof consisting of enormous blocks made to lean against each other at the top: this ingenious device served to transfer the perpendicular thrust almost entirely to the lateral faces of the blocks. Although an earthquake has to some extent dislocated the mass of masonry, not one of the stones which encase the chamber of the king has been crushed, ...
— History Of Egypt, Chaldaea, Syria, Babylonia, and Assyria, Volume 2 (of 12) • G. Maspero
... transact was not likely to prove of value to himself or to any one else. So he put on his hat and coat, called a cab, and started for home. His experiences in the cab were quite of a kind with the experiences of the morning, and attended with no little personal danger. He would lean against the cab door and put his arm out and try to touch horse-cars as they passed. Once or twice he nearly had his head knocked off by sticking it out of the windows; but by some happy chance he got interested in the cab curtains and the inviting little strings, which, when pulled, made them ...
— The Booming of Acre Hill - And Other Reminiscences of Urban and Suburban Life • John Kendrick Bangs
... emotions with which he had been battling, he missed his footing and fell, twisting his ankle, on the side of the embankment. He rose with an effort and put his foot to the ground, but a sharp pain obliged him to lean against the trunk of a neighboring ash-tree. His foot felt as heavy as lead, and every time he tried to straighten it his sufferings were intolerable. All he could do was to drag himself along from one tree to another until ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... a little at football," Jack explained to his sister. "It sort of eases it to lean against some one. The porter wanted to get me a pillow, but I'm not an old ...
— The Motor Girls on Waters Blue - Or The Strange Cruise of The Tartar • Margaret Penrose
... houses of the neighborhood are equally oblivious to modern opinion. They consent to lean against each other while jointly turning an indifferent face to the world, like a man about whose ugliness there is no dispute. No two run consecutively with the walks, and all together present a sky-line ...
— Mlle. Fouchette - A Novel of French Life • Charles Theodore Murray
... softly out of the room as soon as he could do so unobserved, and now the twins were sitting together in their favourite position on the same chair, with their arms around each other, and Angelica's dark head slanted so as to lean against ...
— The Heavenly Twins • Madame Sarah Grand
... the tears were running down her face again. He set down the glass, and with his own handkerchief he wiped them away. Then he sat upon the low tree-trunk, and drew her to lean against him. ...
— Greatheart • Ethel M. Dell
... told Macdonald, "rolling ourselves into a ball, which gives one a funny kind of warmth. I have a special pleasure in talking about some things. It is the same when the governess kisses me on saying good night or when I lean against her breast. I have that sensation, too, when I see some of the pictures in the comic papers, but only in those representing a woman, as when a young man skating trips up a girl so that her clothes are raised a little. When I read how a man saved a young girl from drowning, so that ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 5 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis
... feet out of the wreck I was so dazed that I had to lean against the wall to keep from falling. I felt something running down my face and at first wondered what it was; then I saw it was blood. One of my arms felt numb and I was afraid it was broken; and my hands were ...
— Track's End • Hayden Carruth
... to hear as well as if he were awake, and every minute or two his eyes open and he takes a look round. I would rather have an Indian sentry than half a dozen white ones, unless it is in the open, where there is no tree to lean against, and ...
— In The Heart Of The Rockies • G. A. Henty
... is, nevertheless, in every other respect a most gentlemanlike, entertaining, and intelligent person, next to its inland situation, this monstrous extent of Adelaide will turn out to be the most fruitful of complaints. You may lean against any tree in the City and exclaim, "This shadowy desert, unfrequented woods, I better brook than ...
— A Source Book Of Australian History • Compiled by Gwendolen H. Swinburne
... high seat by king Alcinous. And now they were serving out the portions and mixing the wine. Then the henchmen drew nigh leading the sweet minstrel, Demodocus, that was had in honour of the people. So he set him in the midst of the feasters, and made him lean against a tall column. Then to the henchman spake Odysseus of many counsels, for he had cut off a portion of the chine of a white-toothed boar, whereon yet more was left, with rich ...
— DONE INTO ENGLISH PROSE • S. H. BUTCHER, M.A.
... well chosen, have often been well chosen, under other forms of government than the representative one. I believe that the favourites of kings have been a superior race of men. Even a fool does not choose a fool for a favourite. He knows better than that: he must have something to lean against. But between the thinkers and the doers (if, indeed, we ought to make such a distinction), WHAT A NUMBER OF USEFUL LINKS THERE ARE IN A REPRESENTATIVE GOVERNMENT on account of the much larger number of people admitted into some share ...
— Friends in Council (First Series) • Sir Arthur Helps
... valiantly sustained. Each blow drew from us a shudder, a cry, and a prayer. We saw your horse fall, and we thought you lost, but it was not so; the brave Bussy merited his reputation. At last, surrounded, menaced on all sides, you retreated like a lion, facing your foes, and came to lean against our door; the same idea came to both of us, to go down and open to you, and we ran towards the staircase; but we had barricaded the door, and it took us some minutes to move the furniture, and as we arrived on the ...
— Chicot the Jester - [An abridged translation of "La dame de Monsoreau"] • Alexandre Dumas
... felt her lean against his shoulder wearily, her hair soft against his neck. Then he remembered ...
— Warlord of Kor • Terry Gene Carr
... company manners at the first, but all the others were at perfect ease, as they sat in the dim light. Felix on the floor by Cherry, who delighted in a chance of playing fondling tricks with his hair and fingers; the twins in Mr. Audley's big chair, where they could lean against each other; and Lance cross-legged on the hearth- rug roasting chestnuts, of which a fellow chorister had given him a pocketful, and feeding every ...
— The Pillars of the House, V1 • Charlotte M. Yonge
... the details over carefully. The porch was low and roofed; its eaves projected a foot. If, as Garrison fancied, the stricken man might have come here in weakness, to lean against the post, and had then gone down, perhaps leaving heel-marks in the earth, all signs of any such action had been obliterated, despite the fact that no rains had fallen since the date of the man's demise. Garrison scrutinized the ground closely. A piece of broken ...
— A Husband by Proxy • Jack Steele
... Grietje from her window sees the leafless poplars lean Against a windy sunset sky with streaks of golden green; The still canal is touched with light from that wild, wintry sky, And, dark and gaunt, the windmill flings its bony arms on high. "It's growing late; it's growing cold; I'm all alone," says she; "I'll put the little ...
— The Little Tea Book • Arthur Gray
... as he spoke, and started back, pale and trembling, fain to lean against the nearest tree for ...
— Outpost • J.G. Austin
... Gervase Norgate, she must have been so put about to have to go away with her husband last night. How the scamp got into the drawing-room I cannot tell; but he could do nothing but lean against the wall: he could not have bitten his fingers to save his life. She did not show her mortification unless by going away immediately. A wonderful amount of countenance has that poor young woman; but I take it she will not go out with ...
— Girlhood and Womanhood - The Story of some Fortunes and Misfortunes • Sarah Tytler
... starlit night. Jack and the driver sat on the front seat. They had taken the back seat out, and my little boy and I sat in the bottom of the wagon, with the hard cushions to lean against through the night. I suppose we were drowsy with sleep; at all events, the talk about the fork of the road and the North Star ...
— Vanished Arizona - Recollections of the Army Life by a New England Woman • Martha Summerhayes
... once. He was at the corner of Redfern Road and still unaware of her existence. He was leaning against the wall with the habituated pose of one who is frequently obliged to lean against walls for long periods of time, and he was conversing in an elucidatory manner with the elderly crossing-sweeper who still braves the motor-cars at that point. He became aware of her emergence with a start, he ceased to lean ...
— The Wife of Sir Isaac Harman • H. G. (Herbert George) Wells
... along the edge of the open tent. The floor of this, being only about a foot above ground, made a convenient seat and those who wished had cushions to sit on or lean against. ...
— Two Little Women • Carolyn Wells
... stop, with his hand to his side, and lean against a lamp-post. "I can't, of course, do the Scotch the way Harry Lauder ...
— Further Foolishness • Stephen Leacock
... water, at all risk, except of my dinner. And John Fry, who cared very little to wash, save Sabbath days in his own soap, and who had kept me from the pump by threatening loss of the dish, out he came in a satisfied manner, with a piece of quill in his hand, to lean against a door-post, and listen to the horses feeding, and have his ...
— Lorna Doone - A Romance of Exmoor • R. D. Blackmore
... sort!" snapped the gentleman addressed as Sir Henry, shifting his posture a little so as to enable the young man to lean against his shoulder. "Haven't you eyes in your head, Willsden? Cannot you see for yourself that this gentleman has merely ...
— The Shrieking Pit • Arthur J. Rees
... from the saddle, gave his horse to Ibrahim, and then lifted Annie from her seat. As he set her down on her feet, and loosed his hold of her, she slipped down on to the ground. Dick and Surajah at once raised her, and placed her so that, as she sat, she could lean against a tree. ...
— The Tiger of Mysore - A Story of the War with Tippoo Saib • G. A. Henty
... his private room. It said, 'May I come in, father?' If he was busy he answered with one knock on his desk, and I went away. If he had time to talk he called out, 'Come, Betty,' and I went to him. I used to sit upon the floor and lean against his knee. He had a beautiful way of stroking my hair or my hand as he talked. He trusted me. He told me of great things even before he had talked of them to men. He knew I would never speak of what was said between us in his room. That was part of his trust. He said once that it ...
— The Shuttle • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... summoned. When she left her room she was in the throes of uncontrolled agitation, and all down the long hallway she fought herself. At the half-open door she paused to lean against the wall. There she had the will to still her nerves, to acquire serenity; and she prayed for wisdom to make her presence and her words of infinite good to Dorn ...
— The Desert of Wheat • Zane Grey
... mind if Belle lets go and tells you things, just this once? You've changed, some, but not like the rest. Please, Lance, I want to lean against you and—and feel how ...
— Rim o' the World • B. M. Bower
... in behind his wind guard, the gusts took away his breath, and ten paces against the wind were enough to cause real danger of a frost-bitten face. To clear the anemometer vane he had to go to the other end of the hut and climb a ladder; and twice while engaged in this task he had literally to lean against the wind with head bent and face averted, and so stagger ...
— The Voyages of Captain Scott - Retold from 'The Voyage of the "Discovery"' and 'Scott's - Last Expedition' • Charles Turley
... the work, and made a drawing for the reliquary, well adapted to contain the sacred phial. Then I made a little waxen model of the cover. This was a seated Christ, supporting his great cross aloft with the left hand, while he seemed to lean against it, and with the fingers of his right hand he appeared to be opening the wound in his side. When it was finished, it pleased the Duke so much that he heaped favours on me, and gave me to understand that he would keep me in his service with such appointments as should ...
— The Autobiography of Benvenuto Cellini • Benvenuto Cellini
... she hastened to change the altar-cloth, taking the greatest care not to smudge the beading. Then she arranged the cross, the candlesticks, and the vases symmetrically. Abbe Mouret had gone to lean against the wooden screen which separated the choir from the nave, by the side of Brother Archangias. Not a word passed between them. Their eyes were fixed upon the silver crucifix, which, in the increasing gloom, still cast some glimmer of light on the feet and the left ...
— Abbe Mouret's Transgression - La Faute De L'abbe Mouret • Emile Zola
... woman's sex, what was once her glory, reveals itself to her as an all-containing loss. I realized myself fully only when I was with you; and now I can't undo it.—You gone, I lean against a shadow, and feel myself forever falling, drifting to no end, a Francesca without a Paolo. Well, it must be some comfort that I do not drag you with me. I never believed myself a "strong" woman; your lightest wish shaped me to its liking. Now you have molded me with your own ...
— An Englishwoman's Love-Letters • Anonymous
... hand to pour out some of the 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 ...
— The Cryptogram - A Novel • James De Mille
... with blue walls and sliding windows, a sort of drying-loft with a stove in the middle, and with stovepipes hanging in wires along the ceiling. The walls are decorated with a number of sketches, painted fans, and palettes; several framed pictures lean against the wainscoting. Smell of paints and tobacco smoke; brushes, tubes, overcoats which the guests had thrown aside; an old rubber shoe filled with nails and junk; on the easel in the corner a large, half-finished ...
— Shallow Soil • Knut Hamsun
... weather were beyond all description—twelve to fifteen degrees Reaumur, with a cutting wind and driving snow, with nothing to eat, as the field kitchens on these roads could not follow. During pauses in the march one could but lean against the wall of a miserable house or lie down in the burned-out ruins, without straw to lie on and no covering. Men and horses sank to their hips in the snow, and so we worked our way forward, usually only ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume V (of 12) - Neuve Chapelle, Battle of Ypres, Przemysl, Mazurian Lakes • Francis J. Reynolds, Allen L. Churchill, and Francis Trevelyan
... not shake the tiger off. He trumpeted in great pain because the tiger's claws were cutting into his flesh. He raised his trunk, swayed his body and bounded against a tree behind him; but still the tiger could not be shaken off. The nearer the tiger's paw came, the more the magistrate tried to lean against the side of the howdah. Pretty soon he moved towards the elephant's rear, and thus reached a corner of the howdah which gave him almost as much space as the length of a rifle. I saw the eye of the tiger turn first red and then yellow, ...
— Kari the Elephant • Dhan Gopal Mukerji
... Place's explanation seems the best. He thinks the slope was given merely to facilitate the work of the bricklayers. The first course of voussoirs would be sloped in this fashion, and would rest upon some mass of crude brick in the centre of the building. The bricks of the second course would lean against it, and their weight would be brought in to add cohesion and solidity to the whole structure instead of being entirely occupied in adding to the perpendicular thrust, while the ease with which they could be placed without an internal support ...
— A History of Art in Chaldaea & Assyria, v. 1 • Georges Perrot
... in the middle of the room, Sydney was between the door and me; Mr Holt was in the hall, just outside the doorway, in which he, so to speak, was framed. As Sydney advanced towards him he was seized with a kind of convulsion,—he had to lean against the side of the door to save himself from falling. Sydney paused, and watched. The spasm went as suddenly as it came,—Mr Holt became as motionless as he had just now been the other way. He stood in an attitude of febrile expectancy,—his ...
— The Beetle - A Mystery • Richard Marsh
... all day right now and never tire. You never hear me say, 'I'm tired, I'm sleepy, I'm hongry.' And out in camp you never see me lay down when I come in to camp, or set down to eat, and if I do, I set down on my foot. I always get my plate in my hand and eat standin' up, or lean against ...
— Slave Narratives: a Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves. - Texas Narratives, Part 2 • Works Projects Administration
... no more minutes to spare, made a suitable reply and turned back into the office, he observed the schoolmaster to lean against the pillar with his hat in his hand, and to pull at his neckcloth as if he were trying to tear it off. The Reverend Frank accordingly directed the notice of one of the attendants to him, by saying: 'There is a person ...
— Our Mutual Friend • Charles Dickens
... of royalty in Jerusalem, is well worthy of a visit by travellers in the Holy Land. Some of the stone coffins lean against the solid walls, others lie in massive richness of sculpture on ...
— Half Hours in Bible Lands, Volume 2 - Patriarchs, Kings, and Kingdoms • Rev. P. C. Headley
... 'Adored Citoyenne Josephine.—We have reached the goal—we have conquered! The Directory have at length listened to wise remonstrances. They have perceived that they stand in need of a strong and powerful arm to support them, and of a pillar to lean against. They will recall Bonaparte in order that he may become their pillar and arm. In a few days a courier will reach Bonaparte at Rastadt and recall him to Paris.—BOTOT.' That is all there is in the letter, General; it contains ...
— LOUISA OF PRUSSIA AND HER TIMES • Louise Muhlbach |
