"Waist" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... threw herself on her knees by her sister's side, and, clasping her arms around Madeleine's waist, sobbed as though her heart were already broken. Had Carrington seen her then he must have admitted that she had carried out his instructions to the letter. She was quite honest, too, in it all. She meant ...
— Democracy An American Novel • Henry Adams
... body. They will kill your husbands, brothers and sons, and drive you away to the sun-setting, and will deprive the children that are coming behind, off their domain. They will drive you until you are in the great salt water up to your waist. Oh, hostess, this is the final doom of your ...
— Legends, Traditions, and Laws of the Iroquois, or Six Nations, and History of the Tuscarora Indians • Elias Johnson
... haunch to heel, seven round the waist—I give your honour leave to hang Shemus, if there's a pair of sheers in the Highlands that has a baulder sneck than her's ain at the CUMADH AN TRUAIS' (shape of ...
— Waverley • Sir Walter Scott
... Lamare appeared on the scene, his trousers were strapped down under his dainty boots of patent leather, which made his feet appear smaller. His long frock coat, tight at the waist line, was open at the bosom showing the lace of his ruffle, and a fine neckcloth wound several times round his neck obliged him to hold erect his handsome brown head, with its air of serious distinction. Jeanne, in ...
— Une Vie, A Piece of String and Other Stories • Guy de Maupassant
... outstretched, quivering as if to shed the promised balm, slowly descended below the level of the platform railing. Behind the tricolored cheesecloth which screened him from the waist down something stirred. The hands ascended again into the light. In each was a bottle. The speaker's words came now sharp, ...
— The Clarion • Samuel Hopkins Adams
... down, though my sight could not penetrate the darkness which filled the deep abyss below. We had been climbing about three hours when suddenly the ledge seemed to die out. My guide stopped, and unwinding his rope from his waist, held it out to me. I obeyed his silent gesture, and binding it around my body gave him the end. He wrapped it about him, and then taking me by the arm, as if I had been a child, he led me slowly along the narrow ledge around the face of the wall, step by step, ...
— Elsket - 1891 • Thomas Nelson Page
... Jeremiah, as was like one beside hissel', houd tight on me, for he were good for nought else; an' a bides my time, an' when a sees two arms houdin' out a little drippin' streamin' child, a clutches her by her waist-band, an' hauls her to land. She's noane t' worse for her bath, ...
— Sylvia's Lovers — Complete • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
... he felt not only for human beings, but for every living creature. As in his boyhood he angrily reproved the boys who tormented a wood turtle by putting a burning coal on its back, so, we are told, he would, when a mature man, on a journey, dismount from his buggy and wade waist-deep in mire to rescue a pig struggling in a swamp. Indeed, appeals to his compassion were so irresistible to him, and he felt it so difficult to refuse anything when his refusal could give pain, that he himself sometimes spoke of his inability to say "no" as a positive weakness. ...
— The Papers And Writings Of Abraham Lincoln, Complete - Constitutional Edition • Abraham Lincoln
... a simple tunic, cut in the style of the ancient Greek chiton, and open at one side instead of the front. Forrester turned it in his hands. At the waist and shoulder there was a golden clasp to hold it in place. The clasp wasn't figured in any special way. The material itself was odd: it was an almost fluorescent white and, though it was perfectly opaque, it was ...
— Pagan Passions • Gordon Randall Garrett
... below. Miriam broke off some lotus-buds and threw them at the stonechat, which flew away, but kept its beak still pointing towards the rushes. The girl girt up her dress, waded into the water, and now saw her mother standing, hidden up to her waist in a forest of papyrus-reeds, bending over a reed-basket with a ...
— Historical Miniatures • August Strindberg
... when the night had fallen, I put on my fighting jacket, and my Celebes drawers, and bound my kris, the "Chinese Axe," about my waist, and took my sword, the "Rising Sun," in my hand. Three or four of my boys followed at my back, and I did not forget to take with me the bottle of the white man's perfume. I made straight for the great Klang gambling house, and when I reached ...
— In Court and Kampong - Being Tales and Sketches of Native Life in the Malay Peninsula • Hugh Clifford
... desire to see Casey to compliment him for his bravery, and congratulate him upon his miraculous escape. Accordingly we visited the prison and saw Casey, with his clothes shot to shreds from the left shoulder pit down to his waist, and no wounds other than the slight creases upon his forehead and occiput, neither of these so deep as to draw blood. All of us expressed surprise that the policeman had arrested him—attacked and fighting for his life in clear self-defence, ...
— The Vigilance Committee of '56 • James O'Meara
... you going to say—rude?" laughingly asked the one who had first spoken. "Come, now, 'fess up! Weren't you?" and the shorter of the twain, a girl rather plump and pretty, with merry brown eyes, put her arm about the waist of her sister and endeavored to lead her through the maze of chairs in the whirl of a dance, whistling, meanwhile, a joyous strain from one of the latest ...
— The Moving Picture Girls - First Appearances in Photo Dramas • Laura Lee Hope
... stood and mobbed him. And amid all this a small form, with clothing disarranged from close contact, but intent upon his purpose, squirmed and wriggled in and threw his little skinny arms around the hero's waist. ...
— Tom Slade on Mystery Trail • Percy Keese Fitzhugh
... and slipped one arm around her waist. In a few minutes they cleared the point. Stella was looking away across the lake, at the deep cleft where Silver Creek split ...
— Big Timber - A Story of the Northwest • Bertrand W. Sinclair
... the whole place seethed and glowed like an inferno. This manual education had done something else, too. It had broadened his shoulders, deepened his chest, and flattened his back. Many a time the old man used to steal out and watch the young Hercules, stripped to the waist, drag rails to the cooling-room. When John entered college athletics he was not closely confined ...
— Half a Rogue • Harold MacGrath
... your bosom, then, Lay your warm cheek to mine; And let me round that lovesome waist My arms enraptured twine; That I may breathe my very soul, In ae lang lovin' vow; And a' the while in whispers low, You 'll learn me, love, ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel, Volume V. - The Songs of Scotland of the Past Half Century • Various
... saw a man, strong and hale, as it seemed, pushing a wheel chair along the road toward me. And in the chair sat a man, and I could see at once that he had lost the use of his legs—that he was paralyzed from the waist down. It was the way he called to him who was pushing him that ...
— A Minstrel In France • Harry Lauder
... requires one operator who stands between the wings, which are about up to his waist and so solid that he can lean his elbows on them and reach comfortably more than halfway across the stage. There are four openings between the wings, and thus there can be eight puppets on the stage at once, operated by eight manipulators, four on each side. This could not be done with the life-sized ...
— Diversions in Sicily • H. Festing Jones
... on my arm, but I scarcely felt its weight, except when we came upon places where the road was rough; and I wished that the way were rougher, that I might feel her dependence upon me. Once she stepped into a deep rut, and I caught her about the waist, but when I had lifted her out, she gently released herself. She said that the road was rougher than she had ever before found it, and I was ready to swear that it was the most delightful highway that my feet had trod; indeed, I did swear it, but she warned me not to use such strong language ...
— The Jucklins - A Novel • Opie Read
... the position of a soldier, only very much exaggerated—a position which after a few minutes becomes almost intolerable. Cleary and Sam were promptly taken and tied back to back to an upright stake which had escaped their observation. They were tied at the ankle, knee, waist, under the arms, and at the chin and forehead. By tightening these ropes as desired and placing pieces of wood in between, against the back, the hazers made each victim stand with the chest pushed preternaturally forward and the chin and abdomen drawn preternaturally back. Cleary found this position ...
— Captain Jinks, Hero • Ernest Crosby
... of dressed deerskin, with plaited skirt, and cape, fringed and jauntily adorned with beads and embroidery—the favourite style of the backwoods hunter, but others there are of true Indian cut—open only at the throat, and hanging loose, or fastened around the waist with a belt—the same that secures the knife and pistol. There are cloth jackets too, such as are worn by sailors, and others of sky-blue cottonade—the costume of the Creole of Louisiana; some of red-brown leather—the jaqueta of the Spano-American; ...
— The War Trail - The Hunt of the Wild Horse • Mayne Reid
... want to stand." She stood beside the fire, a little lady, with an arm around the waist of her niece. The Squire seated was enjoying the suspense of ...
— Westways • S. Weir Mitchell
... fragment, I was reminded of the long black veil, hanging below her waist, which it was the habit of Miss Dunross to wear. Was it her dress, then, that I had heard softly traveling over the carpet; her kiss that had touched my forehead; her sigh that had trembled through the silence? Had the ill-fated and noble creature taken ...
— The Two Destinies • Wilkie Collins
... mentions that the female musicians of the King of Cebu were quite naked, or only covered with an apron of bark. The ladies of the Court were content with a hat, a short cloak, and a cloth around the waist. ...
— The Former Philippines thru Foreign Eyes • Fedor Jagor; Tomas de Comyn; Chas. Wilkes; Rudolf Virchow.
... my footsteps on the mosaic flooring, a waiter emerged from a little cubby-hole under the stairs. He had a blue apron girt about his waist, but otherwise he wore the short coat and the dicky and white tie of the Continental hotel waiter. His hands were grimy with black marks and so was his apron. He ...
— The Man with the Clubfoot • Valentine Williams
... small man, no more than four and a half feet tall; a trim, but powerfully made little figure, in the black and white linen uniform worn also by Tarrano. Yet more pretentiously dressed than his superior. A broad belt of dangling weapons; under it, a sash of red, encircling his waist and flowing down one side. Over his white ruffled shirt, a short sleeveless vest of black silk. A circular hat, with a vivid plume. A smooth-shaven face; black hair long to the base of the neck; a deep, red-brown complexion. A native of the Little People ...
— Tarrano the Conqueror • Raymond King Cummings
... some years, but my sleeves, at last, became threadbare; soon after, there were actual holes in them, and holes also in my waist; I was, I must ...
— The Talkative Wig • Eliza Lee Follen
... he found himself out in the world again, he shook his head now and then and even tossed it with the recurring sensations of a pony who was a mere boy and still slight in the waist. ...
— T. Tembarom • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... one side, and looked archly at her son. Her high gown, a work of the most approved Parisian art, was so cut as to show much more throat than usual, and, in addition, a row of very fine pearls. Her very elegant waist and bust were defined by a sort of Empire sash; her complexion did her maid and, indeed, her years, ...
— Sir George Tressady, Vol. I • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... properly defend himself, Bartlett sprang at him and grasped him round the waist. Yates was something of a wrestler himself, but his skill was of no avail on this occasion. Bartlett's right leg became twisted around his with a steel-like grip that speedily convinced the younger man he would have to give way or a bone would break. ...
— In the Midst of Alarms • Robert Barr
... gripped Nuttie tight round the waist, and laid her head on her shoulder, shaking with a few little sobs, which might be ...
— Nuttie's Father • Charlotte M. Yonge
... rings were sewn thickly, forming a sort of chain armour, while permitting perfect freedom of the limbs. The archers also wore steel caps, which, like those of the men-at-arms, came low down on the neck and temples. They had on tough leathern frocks, girded in at the waist, and falling to the knee; some of them had also iron rings sewn on the shoulders. English archers were often clad in green cloth, but Sir Eustace had furnished the garments, and had chosen leather, both as being far more ...
— At Agincourt • G. A. Henty
... but I do not desire to bear thee company, and I have still hopes to have the pleasure of seeing you go without me; at least I will have the pleasure to be rid of you now." And so saying, he seized her by the waist, and with strong arm flung her out of the room; but not before she had with her nails left a bloody memorial on his cheek: and thus this fond ...
— The History of the Life of the Late Mr. Jonathan Wild the Great • Henry Fielding
... reddening still of the warm brown cheeks whenever she thought of it—how, on the previous Sunday afternoon, she and Bernel had gone running over the downs through the waist-high bracken towards Breniere, the tide in their favourite pool below the rocks being too high for bathing. And on the slope above the Cromlech they had come suddenly on Gard, lying there looking out over the sea ...
— A Maid of the Silver Sea • John Oxenham
... and carrying the apples in this improvised bag, with his arm about her waist sustaining her, they came down ...
— Mistress Anne • Temple Bailey
... and be like Christ. Many a tempting amusement, or occupation, or speculation would start up in its own shape when this Ithuriel spear touched it. How it would save from distractions! How strong it would make us, like a belt round the waist bracing the muscles tighter! 'This one thing I do' is always ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus and Numbers • Alexander Maclaren
... hours, when the crew called out "she sucks!" i.e., the well is dry. This was gladsome news. It is gladsome even under favourable circumstances, but here were men who had stood almost continuously up to the waist in water; and sometimes a knot of a sea would smash right over them. Their sleeves were doubled up and they had neither boots nor stockings on. Their hands were cut and their arms and legs were red raw with friction ...
— The Shellback's Progress - In the Nineteenth Century • Walter Runciman
... this—that I want to go next Sunday to the Carmelite chapel in the Avenue de Messine. You know one of the Catholic ministers—an abbe, is that it?—I have seen him here, you know; that motherly old gentleman with the big waist-band. Please ask him if I need a special leave to go in, and if I do, beg him to obtain it ...
— The American • Henry James
... kempt and perfumed, and every day smell of the tailor; the exceedingly curious that are wholly in mending such an imperfection in the face, in taking away the morphew in the neck, or bleaching their hands at midnight, gumming and bridling their beards, or making the waist small, binding it with hoops, while the mind runs at waste; too much pickedness is not manly. Not from those that will jest at their own outward imperfections, but hide their ulcers within, their pride, lust, envy, ill-nature, with all ...
— Discoveries and Some Poems • Ben Jonson
... her own figure in the drawing-room mirror; her mantle disguised the fact that she had either a waist or a pair of arms, and she gave a little dry smile as she reflected that she had accepted a dolman cloak with all the other outward conventions of orthodoxy as understood by society ...
— Peter and Jane - or The Missing Heir • S. (Sarah) Macnaughtan
... outline of a trim little hat and fluffy hair, had sent him back into the shadows of the Pine Road to stand and shiver until the shadow left the window and the substance came out through the lighted doorway. Gladys came to the gate, her arm about her teacher's waist. They were talking softly. Gladys's voice was not so loud nor her look so bold as it once was. She ran back calling good-night, and the little figure of the teacher went on swiftly up the shaky frosty sidewalk. A few strides and Roderick was at her side. She ...
— The End of the Rainbow • Marian Keith
... nothing, but he knew she was trembling. As they entered Mrs. O'Brien's alley, they paused where it was dark enough, halfway between gaslights, for a man to put his arm around his wife's waist and ...
— The Vehement Flame • Margaret Wade Campbell Deland
... an emerald trail of seaweed had fashioned itself as a sign upon the flesh. Her thighs, fuller and soft-hued as ivory, were bared almost to the hips, where the white fringes of her drawers were like feathering of soft white down. Her slate-blue skirts were kilted boldly about her waist and dovetailed behind her. Her bosom was as a bird's, soft and slight, slight and soft as the breast of some dark-plumaged dove. But her long fair hair was girlish: and girlish, and touched with the wonder ...
— A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man • James Joyce
... might get for the bones. But—we got a cow yesterday, and I am to get milk to-morrow.... I grieve to write it, poor poodle 'Chitane' was drowned" [15th January, in the Chimbwe]; "he had to cross a marsh a mile wide, and waist-deep.... I went over first, and forgot to give directions about the dog—all were too much engaged in keeping their balance to notice that he swam among them till he died. He had more spunk than a hundred country ...
— The Personal Life Of David Livingstone • William Garden Blaikie
... of death at strife, Ground he at grammar; Still, through the rattle, parts of speech were rife: While he could stammer He settled HOTI's business—let it be!— Properly based OUN— {130} Gave us the doctrine of the enclitic 'De', Dead from the waist down. Well, here's the platform, here's the proper place: Hail to your purlieus, All ye highfliers of the feathered race, Swallows and curlews! Here's the top-peak; the multitude below Live, for they can, there: This man decided not to Live but Know— Bury this ...
— Introduction to Robert Browning • Hiram Corson
... past. A great man that Don Carlos! Brave in fight, astute in politics, jolly and hearty as one of the burgomasters of his own country; a great eater, a great drinker, and loving to catch the girls round the waist. But he had nothing Spanish about him. He only appreciated his mother's heritage for what he could wring out of it. Spain became a servant to Germany, ready to supply as many men as were required, and to furnish ...
— The Shadow of the Cathedral • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... the malo, a narrow strip of cloth wound round the loins, and passed between the legs. This was the only covering worn by men before the introduction of Christianity. Females wore the pau, a short petticoat made of tapa, which reached from the waist to the knees. To our eyes, the brown skin produces nearly ...
— The Hawaiian Archipelago • Isabella L. Bird
... shaking his fists at the grinning cadets. Suddenly the goat made another leap, this time striking Asa Lemm in the shoulder, and once more the professor went down, this time with his feet sliding directly under the bed, so that he became somewhat wedged in from his waist down. Then the goat made another leap and charged toward the ...
— The Rover Boys on Snowshoe Island - or, The Old Lumberman's Treasure Box • Edward Stratemeyer
... I dare not do it here, where we may at any moment be surrounded by spies, for these walls have ears indeed. Well, when we walk in that garden, would it be too great a penance for you to put your arm about my waist—you who ...
— Fair Margaret • H. Rider Haggard
... reminded Anne that her friend had long been motherless, and she slipped her arm affectionately around Laura's waist as she answered, "She is the most motherly woman I ever met. She seems to have room in her big, warm heart for every girl that wants mothering, no matter who or what she is." They were back at the camp now, and she added, "But we must get ...
— The Torch Bearer - A Camp Fire Girls' Story • I. T. Thurston
... dead, and off it (in those days poor folks ate anything) he cut as much flesh and blubber as he could carry, and toiled back towards the high-tide mark. But whether he lost his way among the banks, or whether he delayed too long, the tide came in on him up to his knees, his waist, his chin, and at last, at times, over his head. The boy made the sign of the cross (as all men in danger did then) and struggled on valiantly a full mile through the sea, like a brave lad never loosening his hold ...
— The Hermits • Charles Kingsley
... what mermaid's milliner's shop, hast thou emerged, Selvagee! with that dainty waist and languid cheek? What heartless step-dame drove thee forth, to waste thy ...
— White Jacket - or, the World on a Man-of-War • Herman Melville
... straight and narrow way seem so good. The column is soon united again and the back trail despondingly begun. Daylight of a Sunday morning aids our footsteps. We cross again the stream we had waded waist deep in the pitch dark and wondered that no one ...
— The History of the American Expedition Fighting the Bolsheviki - Campaigning in North Russia 1918-1919 • Joel R. Moore
... ask me—it is guess-work," answered the young doctor. "I think he may live a fortnight. He is practically paralyzed from his waist downwards—it is almost complete. What he eats does ...
— Taquisara • F. Marion Crawford
... generally represented as a tall, beautiful, and stately woman, crowned with heron plumes, the symbol of silence or forgetfulness, and clothed in pure white robes, secured at the waist by a golden girdle, from which hung a bunch of keys, the distinctive sign of the Northern housewife, whose special patroness she was said to be. Although she often appeared beside her husband, Frigga preferred to remain in her own palace, ...
— Myths of the Norsemen - From the Eddas and Sagas • H. A. Guerber
... heavy, with a pretty wave in it. Faith's was shorter, darker, and curly. Tom's curled tightly over his head, a fiery mat of curls. Deborah's, finest and silkiest of all, hung in soft auburn waves to her waist. Baby Joan's fluffy curls were the ...
— Anxious Audrey • Mabel Quiller-Couch
... himself to dodge Pelle's punches, but instead of letting his two hands fly, one after the other, he bent his huge body back from the waist, and at the same time shot his right foot upward ...
— A Soldier of the Legion • C. N. Williamson
... last; Evangelina's courage failed her, and she allowed herself to be won over. She began her preparations by disguising Rosa. Gathering herbs and berries, she made a stain with which she colored the girl's face and body, then she sewed a bundle of leaves into the back of Rosa's waist so that when the latter stooped her shoulders and walked with a stick her appearance of deformity ...
— Rainbow's End • Rex Beach
... been studying and cast a tender look upon the face of Dorothy. The girl had sprung up from her chair and had fixed her own gaze upon the time-piece while the color left her cheeks and she trembled violently. But Mrs. Ford's arm was about the slender waist and her ...
— Dorothy on a Ranch • Evelyn Raymond
... a sword had pierced her, passed her arm round Mary's waist, with a strong, nervous clasp, unlike her usual calm self, and said,—"Stay with me, daughter, to-day!—stay ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 4, No. 23, September, 1859 • Various
... in the faint light shed by the down-turned lamp, he saw the figure of a man, leaning slightly forward, clad in the attire of an ordinary bushman—an unbuttoned jacket hanging loosely open over a cotton shirt; tweed trousers secured at the waist by a narrow strap; travel-stained leggings and heavy boots with well-worn spurs dangling at the heels. The head was covered by a soft felt hat pulled forward, shading the upper part of the face, while the lower was hidden by a thick growth of yellow beard. ...
— The Rider of Waroona • Firth Scott
... search of his cousin and Simpson, and informed them of the proposed excursion. When he returned to the place where he had left Woods, he found him with a musket on his shoulder, and a cartridge-box buckled about his waist, pacing up and down ...
— Frank on a Gun-Boat • Harry Castlemon
... to be washed, the seams of a skirt do not require to be ripped apart, though it must be removed from the band at the waist, and the lining taken from the bottom. Trimmings or drapings, where there are deep folds, the bottom of which is very difficult to reach, should be undone, so as to remain flat. A black silk dress, without ...
— Practical Suggestions for Mother and Housewife • Marion Mills Miller
... the glade came as dainty a little maiden as ever stepped out of an illustration made especially to show how dainty little maidens may be. Eight years she might have been, and, possibly, a trifle more, or less. Her little waist and little black-stockinged calves showed how delicately fragile she was; but the fragility was of mould only. There was no hint of anaemia in the clear, healthy complexion nor in the quick, tripping step. She was a little, delicious blond, with hair spun of ...
— The Turtles of Tasman • Jack London
... with the mud in which she had been lying, and her wet hair was streaming over her shoulders; as Helen strove to lift her up the head sunk over upon her, but the girl bit her lips together grimly. She put her arm about the woman's waist, and David did the same on the other side, and so the three started, stumbling slowly along in ...
— King Midas • Upton Sinclair
... twice. A magnificent Poodle appeared, walking on his hind legs just like a man. He was dressed in court livery. A tricorn trimmed with gold lace was set at a rakish angle over a wig of white curls that dropped down to his waist. He wore a jaunty coat of chocolate-colored velvet, with diamond buttons, and with two huge pockets which were always filled with bones, dropped there at dinner by his loving mistress. Breeches of crimson velvet, silk stockings, and low, silver-buckled slippers completed his costume. ...
— The Adventures of Pinocchio • C. Collodi—Pseudonym of Carlo Lorenzini
... without a murmur. Her eye lingered long on the spot where the sun had set and watched the hidden sun gradually steal all of his rays from the skies to use them in another world. Drawing a heavy sigh, she lovingly caught her mother around the waist and led her into the parlor. Viola now became all gayety, but her mother could see that it was forced. She took a seat at the piano and played and sang. Her rich soprano voice rang out clear and sweet ...
— Imperium in Imperio: A Study Of The Negro Race Problem - A Novel • Sutton E. Griggs
... her slender waist as if to smooth some trifling wrinkle in her gown, turning sideways to see if its folds fell properly, and as she did so, she caught sight of the king on the couch behind her. The carpet had so muffled the sound of his steps that he had slipped ...
— Catherine de' Medici • Honore de Balzac
... seized the hero in his hands and dashed him upon the ground. And lo! instead of death, Makoma had found life, for he sprang to his feet mightier in strength and stature than before, and rushing in he gripped the giant by the waist and ...
— The Orange Fairy Book • Various
... her waist, Mr. Bennet drew his wife toward him and pointed with his head, but so imperceptibly that only she perceived it, toward the young people, as if he saw something more than a pair of lovers. The fond woman's eyes followed ...
— Trumps • George William Curtis
... passed, "Adorn thyself with me, thou beautiful child, adorn thyself with me!"—and, to please them, Pearl gathered the violets, and anemones, and columbines, and some twigs of the freshest green, which the old trees held down before her eyes. With these she decorated her hair and her young waist, and became a nymph child, or an infant dryad, or whatever else was in closest sympathy with the antique wood. In such guise had Pearl adorned herself, when she heard her mother's ...
— The Scarlet Letter • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... garments of either blanket or rabbit skin, while the women gloried in brilliant plaid shawls of two sizes—a small one for the head and a large one for the shoulders. The short cloth skirts of the women and girls were made so that the fullness at the waist, instead of being cut away, was merely puckered into place, and beneath the lower hem of the skirt showed a pair of beaded leggings and a pair ...
— The Drama of the Forests - Romance and Adventure • Arthur Heming
... but he would not. He promised, however, to come back next morning.——That day he was obliged to stay at home till about three o'clock, arranging and burning papers. He then came out to visit us, and found himself in the midst of crowds of men, drunken and bloody; many were naked to the waist, their breasts covered with blood. They carried fragments of clothing on their pikes and sabres—their faces were inflamed, their eyes haggard, the whole scene hideous. These groups became more and more frequent and numerous as he advanced. In mortal anxiety for us, he determined to push through ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction. - Volume 19, No. 531, Saturday, January 28, 1832. • Various
... other than some part of the North American continent near Rhode Island or Massachusetts, in the United States. Their ships were half-decked, high out of the water at stem and stern, low in the waist, that the oars might reach the water, for they were made for rowing as well as for sailing. The after-part had a poop. The fore-part seems to have been without deck, but loose planks were laid there for men to stand ...
— The story of Burnt Njal - From the Icelandic of the Njals Saga • Anonymous
... The day seemed of interminable length, and he tried vainly in sleep to escape from hunger and cold. His teeth chattered in his head, and when he rose at dark to continue his journey his tattered clothes were frozen stiff. In this plight he pushed on resolutely, and was obliged to wade to his waist for hundreds of yards through one of those deep and treacherous morasses that proved such deadly fever-pools for McClellan's army in the campaign of 1862. Finally he reached the high ground, and ...
— Famous Adventures And Prison Escapes of the Civil War • Various
... Irish. Owen's viaticum was only two or three oaten cakes tied in a little handkerchief, and a few shillings in silver to pay for his bed. With this small stock of food and money, an oaken stick in his hand, and his wife's kerchief tied about his waist, he undertook a journey of one hundred and ten miles, in quest of a landlord who, so far from being acquainted with the distresses of his tenantry, scarcely knew even their names, and not one of them ...
— Phelim O'toole's Courtship and Other Stories • William Carleton
... the marble staircase, with his arm about her waist, to the roof they went, where the silken awnings lay folded and the scented white flowers ...
— The Hawk of Egypt • Joan Conquest
... than he turned his face from the learned Judge and pressed his hand tightly against his mouth, straining his eyes as if he had swallowed a crown-piece. Mr. Bumpkin wore his long drab frock overcoat, with the waist high up and its large flaps; his hell-fire waistcoat, his trousers of corduroy, and his shirt-collar, got up expressly for the occasion as though he had been a prime minister. The ends of his neckerchief bore no inconsiderable likeness to two well-grown carrots. In his two ...
— The Humourous Story of Farmer Bumpkin's Lawsuit • Richard Harris
... the ground regretted 'they did not possess it,' but at last remembered that 'they had entered into negotiations on the subject, which as yet had been unsuccessful.'—The favorite device on the walls at Naples is a vermilion Picture of a Male and Female Soul respectively up to the waist (the waist of a soul) in fire, and an Angel above each, watering the sufferers from a watering-pot. This is intended to gain alms for Masses. The same populace sit for hours on the Mole, listening to rhapsodists who recite Ariosto. I have seen I think ...
— The Life of John Sterling • Thomas Carlyle
... bow to do the hauling and myself the waist for coiling, and it was a grand sight to see him heave in on that heavy gear on that December morning. Many men follow the sea, but not many are born to it. Hugh Glynn was. Through the gurdy he hauled the heavy lines, swinging forward his shoulders, first one and then the ...
— The Trawler • James Brendan Connolly
... striking to man's eye. It is such an eloquent pantomime of terror; and to see such a number of terrified creatures taking sanctuary in every nook along the shore is enough to infect a silly human with alarm. Perhaps they are only a-cold, and no wonder, standing waist-deep in the stream. Or perhaps they have never got accustomed to the speed and fury of the river's flux, or the miracle of its continuous body. Pan once played upon their forefathers; and so, by the hands of his river, he still plays upon these later generations down all the valley ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition - Vol. 1 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... Sarah's waist, or rather, around as much of it as she could encompass. "Aunt Julia wasn't in—and I wanted the very nicest bowl I could think of. It is so perfectly lovely to ...
— Patricia • Emilia Elliott
... ale-booth, leaving Myles for the nonce to shift for himself. By-and-by the old man had noticed a crowd gathered at one part of the fair-ground, and, snuffing a fight, had gone running, ale-pot in hand. Then, peering over the shoulders of the crowd, he had seen his young master, stripped to the waist, fighting like a gladiator with a fellow a head taller than himself. Diccon was about to force his way through the crowd and drag them asunder, but a second look had showed his practised eye that Myles was ...
— Men of Iron • Ernie Howard Pyle
... calico and homespun. Drusy was handsomer than ever, in a soft woollen gown of dull blue, with a red rose in the masses of her black hair and another at her throat. The schoolmistress, a pretty blonde, who was also a belle, wore white muslin, with a gay ribbon about her waist. Nearly all the men wore red shirts, but the tie of their cravats betokened careful study. Barker sported a gorgeous waistcoat, ornamented with brilliant flowers of all the colors in the rainbow, which he had purchased for the occasion from the cook at the camp, who had inherited ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, November 1885 • Various
... discards clothing that restricts her organs. She wears comfortable, well-fitting clothes. The old-fashioned corsets pushed the organs out of place, but the modern ones, made to conform to nature's lines, serve only as a support. As nature did not make a waist line, the one-piece dresses are especially desirable. Besides developing every organ and muscle of her body and training her mind, the modern girl goes to a training school to prepare for the mother ...
— Confidences - Talks With a Young Girl Concerning Herself • Edith B. Lowry
... of flame was round her waist; every limb was bathed in lambent light; all the multitudinous life of the autumn sea, stirred by her approach, had flashed suddenly ...
— Westward Ho! • Charles Kingsley
... where and how by the grace of God to fasten them, that M. Etienne, with roars of laughter, came unsteadily to my aid. He insisted on stuffing the whole of my jerkin under my blouse to give my figure the proper curves, and to make me a waist he drew the lacing-cords till I was like to suffocate. His mirth had by this time got me to laughing so that every time he pulled me in, a fit of merriment would jerk the laces from his fingers before ...
— Helmet of Navarre • Bertha Runkle
... privilege, Mistress Ruth, of saluting you according to kinship, and the ordering of the Canons." And therewith I bussed her well, and put my arm around her waist, being so terribly restricted in the matter of Lorna, and knowing the use of practice. Not that I had any warmth—all that was darling Lorna's—only out of pure gallantry, and my knowledge of London fashions. Ruth blushed ...
— Lorna Doone - A Romance of Exmoor • R. D. Blackmore
... to come away, and Bannon, observing it, broke off to speak to them. "Don't go," he said. "We'll have a brief council of war right here." So Hilda was seated on the nail keg, while Bannon, resting his elbows on the top of a spile which projected waist high through the floor of ...
— Calumet "K" • Samuel Merwin and Henry Kitchell Webster
... a hard one for another girl. She read of the wedding—the decorations, the gifts, the congratulations of friends—then putting down the paper forced back the tears and went out to finish the shirt waist she was making, for it must be ready to wear to the office in the morning. That evening he would come, she knew, to tell her again that it was not fair, that her family would get along some way and ...
— The Girl and Her Religion • Margaret Slattery
... tailor, so he had simply sawn off the legs to such a length as would clear his knees, and left it at that. The waist would have gone round him at least twice, so Chippy laid it over in folds, and lashed all tight with a piece ...
— The Wolf Patrol - A Tale of Baden-Powell's Boy Scouts • John Finnemore
... this morning one of the workmen employed in a lumber yard at Garrison, across the river, walking in behind a pile of lumber close to the river, was amazed to find a pillow slip lying on the ground. What was much more astonishing was the fact that a waist and a pair of legs protruded from the pillowcase, and the feet ...
— Dick Prescott's First Year at West Point • H. Irving Hancock
... down after her. She tried to drive him away. She spoke sternly to him. It only made him more frisky. He barked and jumped about her skirt in his usual, idiotic, high spirits. He scampered away in circles between the pines charging upon her and leaping as high as her waist. She commanded, "Go away. Go home." She even picked up from the ground a bit of a broken branch and threw it at him. At this his delight knew no bounds; his rushes became faster, his yapping louder; ...
— Chance • Joseph Conrad
... at five o'clock an' wukked 'em 'til way atter sundown, standin' right over 'em wid a gun all de time. If a Nigger lagged or tuk his eyes off his wuk, right den an' dar he would make him strip down his clo'es to his waist, an' he whup him wid a cat-o-nine tails. Evvy lick dey struck him meant he wuz hit nine times, an' it fotch da ...
— Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves: Volume IV, Georgia Narratives, Part 1 • Works Projects Administration
... to his waist, and it was only a question of minutes ere the slimy ooze would close over his head. It was a situation that demanded instant action. For a moment Charley stood silent beside the captain gazing ...
— The Boy Chums in the Forest - or Hunting for Plume Birds in the Florida Everglades • Wilmer M. Ely
... and that the waves of pale silk—a very delicate shade of pearly gray I think it must have been—were in fact the lower portion of a long court-train, the upper part of which hung in deep folds from the lady's waist. She moved in—I cannot describe the motion, it was not like ordinary walking or stepping backwards—till the whole of her figure and the clear profile of her face and head were distinctly visible, and when at last she stopped and stood there full in my view just, but only just ...
— Four Ghost Stories • Mrs. Molesworth
... with a scissors, to cut off the culprit's hair, which he did most effectually, flinging portions amongst the crowd, who scrambled after them. As soon as this was finished, and the man was stripped to the waist, the brush was dipped into the pitch, and the upper part of his person lathered therewith. Not a word escaped him, but the individual who had taken so prominent a part in the punishment, kept giving directions to the operator to put it on thick. Even his eyes and ears were not spared. As soon ...
— An Englishman's Travels in America - His Observations Of Life And Manners In The Free And Slave States • John Benwell
... a roof. There were many refugees from New Orleans, among them some acquaintances of mine. The peculiar style of [women's] dress necessitated by the exigencies of war gave the crowd a very striking appearance. In single suits I saw sleeves of one color, the waist of another, the skirt of another; scarlet jackets and gray skirts; black waists and blue skirts; black skirts and gray waists; the trimming chiefly gold braid and buttons, to give a military air. The gray and gold uniforms of the officers, glittering between, made up a carnival ...
— Strange True Stories of Louisiana • George Washington Cable
... halted in the waist, at some distance from the other members of his family, raised his paper, and fixed his gaze upon the staring announcement at the head of one of its columns. No one ventured to approach him; for he was the magnate ...
— Taken by the Enemy • Oliver Optic
... him, bending from the waist, her eyes slightly widened, so that their effect was to give her a ...
— No Clue - A Mystery Story • James Hay
... found on her return from the school a woman's bicycle leaning against the gate. Under the arbor sat the owner of the bicycle, fanning herself with a little "perky" hat. She wore a short plaid skirt, high shoes elaborately laced, and a flaming violet waist. Her eyes were travelling over the cottage and all ...
— The Web of Life • Robert Herrick
... his mistrust of us that he refused to let us keep the earthen vessel containing it until morning. As we had already paid the money to his son, we would not let him take the milk away until he had brought the money back. He then took a dagger from his waist and threw it before us as security, while he carried off the vessel and returned the price. I have frequently seen the same mistrustful spirit exhibited in Egypt. Our two Bedouins, to whom I gave some tobacco in the evening, manifested their gratitude by stealing the remainder ...
— The Lands of the Saracen - Pictures of Palestine, Asia Minor, Sicily, and Spain • Bayard Taylor
... petrified men, was the Girl! At first he thought she was standing naked there—naked under the staring eyes of the fiends about him. Her white arms gleamed bare, her shoulders and breast were bare, her slim, satiny body was naked to the waist, about which she had drawn tightly—as if in a wild panic of haste—an old and ragged skirt! It was the Indian woman's skirt. He caught the glitter of beads on it, and for a moment he stared with the others, unable to move or cry out her name. And then a breath of wind flung back her ...
— The Courage of Marge O'Doone • James Oliver Curwood
... full of the perfume of roses. They blossomed everywhere. There was a pink bud in John's buttonhole, and a red one in Sir Peter's. Phyllis had a great bunch of white roses at her waist. Her gown was white, too: soft and lacy and clinging. That would have been John's description of it; and he ...
— Old Valentines - A Love Story • Munson Aldrich Havens
... for another lady at a distance, and sometimes stooping and flourishing with his legs as he went along: when he approached her, he made a sort of salaam, and then retreated. Another would go softly up to a lady, and then suddenly seizing her by the waist, would turn and twist her round and round some fifty times till both were evidently giddy with the motion: this was sometimes performed by a few chosen dancers, and sometimes by several hundreds at once—all embracing each other ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 54, No. 337, November, 1843 • Various
... the impossible, has brought, as it were, a power to strike that word from his vocabulary. Living in conditions which in previous years would have caused his death, he has maintained his vitality of mind and body. Healthy amid the pestilence of decaying death, of chill from nights spent sometimes waist deep in water; or chattering with cold as misty morning finds him saturated with its clammy cold. Facing death from bullet, shell, and gas, and all the ingenuity that devilish manhood can devise, yet remaining the same ...
— Winning a Cause - World War Stories • John Gilbert Thompson and Inez Bigwood
... when it is stowed upon the booms, as is often done in a deep-waisted vessel; this space is used to contain any blocks, ropes, tackles, &c., which may be necessary on the forecastle, and probably derives its name from being neither on the starboard nor port side, neither in the waist, nor on ...
— The Sailor's Word-Book • William Henry Smyth
... in the greater danger. It was impossible to refuse his proffered aid. First he gave his arm, but the wind tore them apart as easily as coupled cherries. He steadied her bodily by encircling her waist with his arm; and ...
— The Well-Beloved • Thomas Hardy
... of all the tribes on the Upper Nile, go quite naked till near the age of puberty. A girl unmarried is distinguished by a sort of short leather apron, composed of a great number of leather thongs hanging like tassels from a leather belt fastened round the waist: and this is all her clothing, being no longer than that of our mother Eve after her fall. The married women, however, are generally habited in long coarse cotton clothes, which they wrap round them so as to cover their whole ...
— A Narrative of the Expedition to Dongola and Sennaar • George Bethune English
... said sharply, "I don't tell lies—" her hand shot from his waist and she slid suddenly to the ground. He pulled in his horse and turned a bewildered face. She had lighted on her feet and was poised back above him like an enraged eaglet—her thin nostrils quivering, her mouth as tight as a bow-string, and her ...
— The Trail of the Lonesome Pine • John Fox, Jr.
... and in this manner the hour for the assembly approached. God knows, I was thinking of nothing, when who should enter but the honourable Lady accompanied by her noble husband and their silly, scheming daughter, with her small waist and flat neck; and, with disdainful looks and a haughty air they passed me by. As I heartily detest the whole race, I determined upon going away; and only waited till the count had disengaged himself from their impertinent prattle, to take leave, when the agreeable ...
— The Sorrows of Young Werther • J.W. von Goethe
... on his shoulders—her face was close to his—she was simply irresistible. Arnold caught her round the waist and kissed her. Needless to tell him to get through the hoop. He had surely got through it already! Blanche was speechless. Arnold's last effort in the art of courtship had taken away her breath. Before she could recover herself a sound of approaching footsteps became plainly audible. ...
— Man and Wife • Wilkie Collins
... waist, I hurried into the dining-room. On a sideboard was a dish of fruit. I took two apples. I made her eat one, core and all. I ate the other. The fruit contained the malic acid I needed to manufacture the calomel, and I made it ...
— The Poisoned Pen • Arthur B. Reeve
... tepee with John's arm snugly about her slim waist. MacDonald waited patiently until he returned. He motioned Aldous to seat himself close at his side. Both men lighted their pipes before ...
— The Hunted Woman • James Oliver Curwood
... up his knees, and clasped both dirty hands over his abdomen. From waist to knees the old blue trousers were soaked with blood, black blood, stiff and wet. The brancardiers looked at each other and shook their heads. One shrugged a shoulder. Again the flashing eyes of the man on the ...
— The Backwash of War - The Human Wreckage of the Battlefield as Witnessed by an - American Hospital Nurse • Ellen N. La Motte
... was the first to take his place in the car. But scarcely had he done so, when Servadac noticed that his waist was encompassed by an enormous girdle that bulged out to a very extraordinary extent. "What's all ...
— Off on a Comet • Jules Verne
... had been put on, for which operation her hands had to be untied, the man raised the headdress which she had pulled down, and tied it round her neck, then fastened her hands together with one rope and put another round her waist, and yet another round her neck; then, kneeling before her, he took off her shoes and stockings. Then she stretched out her hands to ...
— Celebrated Crimes, Complete • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... ditch where the snow was waist high, floundered up a bank, and selected a fairly straight fence rail that would serve his purpose, and wallowed back with it. Once he fell and got snow up his sleeves as high as ...
— Mixed Faces • Roy Norton
... for it has no day of rest. Generally I think that my disease has its seat in the abdomen or in the waist. Mineral waters I can no more drink this summer. But is there not a mineral ...
— Essays on Scandinavian Literature • Hjalmar Hjorth Boyesen
... shelf and spread it out on the floor. "There, Mary Jane," she said, "look at that! There's a piece of your mother's first short dress and a piece of her mother's graduating dress—that pink sprigged scrap; and that's your Uncle Tom's shirt waist; and—well, don't you see? There they are; all the 'scraps' as you call them cut into pieces and made into a quilt. I've always promised that your mother should have this some day. I think I'll have to send it to her now ...
— Mary Jane—Her Visit • Clara Ingram Judson
... returned John, looking down upon her with a smile, and giving her waist as light a squeeze as his huge hand and arm could give. 'A dot and'—here he glanced at the baby—'a dot and carry—I won't say it, for fear I should spoil it; but I was very near a joke. I don't know as ever ...
— The Cricket on the Hearth • Charles Dickens
... frontispiece portrait, glancing up from a writing table (an obviously artificial cigar between the fingers of one hand, apparently made of carbon, and, presumably, the property of the photographer). The aspiring amateur boxer, in position, with his sparing trunks on and an American flag around his waist (or sometimes, in default of trunks, he is seen in his nether undergarment). The jolly girl in boy's clothes (who has not seen her?). The little child in costume performing a cute dance. The coloured beau, a heavy ...
— Walking-Stick Papers • Robert Cortes Holliday
... talking sentimental nonsense; but here the tables were turned. Hiram was the bashful one, and the young lady apparently the flirt. She explained, with, tantalizing nonchalance, how he ought to take a more encircling hold of her waist. She illustrated practically the different methods—close waltzing, medium waltzing, and waltzing at arms' length. She would waltz light and heavy—observing to Hiram that he might on some occasion have an awkward partner, and it was ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. IV. October, 1863, No. IV. - Devoted to Literature and National Policy. • Various
... little of Romarino, who, encircling Miranda's slender waist with his strong right arm, swung himself into the saddle with his gentle burden, and rode out through the castle ...
— Skipper Worse • Alexander Lange Kielland
... her round the waist and waltzed her across the room, and then, snatching the butcher-knife from the table, he presented arms and saluted and posed all in such an absurd fashion that in spite ...
— In Orchard Glen • Marian Keith
... shall presently unveil the vast and dangerous network of intrigue concealed under these charitable and holy appearances. The lady Superior, Mother Sainte-Perpetue, was a tall woman of about forty years of age, clad in a stuff dress of the Carmelite tan color, and wearing a long rosary at her waist; a white cap tied under the chin, and a long black veil, closely encircled her thin, sallow face. A number of deep wrinkles had impressed their transverse furrows in her forehead of yellow ivory; her marked ...
— The Wandering Jew, Complete • Eugene Sue
... coloured lamps; even the lofty cocoa-nut trees were not without a crown of rainbow tinted light. As I was assisted in my exit from the palanquin, two young Parsee boys, in flowing white robes, girt with a scarlet shawl round the waist, advanced and presented me, the one with a large bouquet of roses, tied, after their usual fashion, round a slender stick, and dripping with rose-water; the other, with a thin long chip of sandal-wood, ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 454 - Volume 18, New Series, September 11, 1852 • Various
... "I must run and put this letter in the box." And so saying, away she ran down stairs, up again in a second; then meeting the astonished Clara at the head of the stairs, she took her round the waist, and fairly waltzed her to her own door, opened it, threw herself into a chair, exclaimed, "I beg your pardon, Clara; you'll think me mad, but I'll tell you all ...
— The Two Guardians • Charlotte Mary Yonge
... act as the generous hero of romance would have done, and volunteer to share the flogging. He cowered back on his mother, and put his arm round her waist, while she said, "Jock told the truth, so I shall not ask you to flog him, Uncle Robert. He shall not do ...
— Magnum Bonum • Charlotte M. Yonge
... any part of you,' said the tailor, after the suit had been tried on. In the tailor's book Rathbun's measurement was entered: 'Forty-three inches around the waist and forty-two around the chest.' When he went for his suit his measurements were thirty-eight around the waist and thirty-eight ...
— The No Breakfast Plan and the Fasting-Cure • Edward Hooker Dewey
... and for a wonder freedom till four, the first spell of it for weeks. Went to a puddle some way off, near a Kaffir kraal, and washed. Some women came with calabashes for water, and I tried to buy the bead bangles and waist-lace off a baby child, but failed. Then I invaded the kraal for meal and chickens, but failed again. I never thought, when I visited Earl's Court a year ago, that I should look on the African original so soon. Round mud hovels, with ...
— In the Ranks of the C.I.V. • Erskine Childers
... upon a billowy heap of downy cushions, surrounded by many women. He only arose from his elbow to a sitting posture when I saluted him. Without saying a word to him, I approached, and, loosening my belt from about my waist, I unbuckled its mouth and poured out upon a large cushion by his side my three hundred shining golden eagles. The effect was electrical, for they were twice the size and three times as many as the coins I had given the Pharaoh. It must have seemed impossible to him that I could possess larger ...
— Pharaoh's Broker - Being the Very Remarkable Experiences in Another World of Isidor Werner • Ellsworth Douglass
... Tibet. Its barrel was more than six feet long, and the stock was curved like a golf stick. A powder fuse projected from a hole in the side of the barrel, and just behind it on the butt was fastened a forked spring. At his waist the man carried a long coil of rope, the slowly burning end of which was placed in the crotched spring. When about to shoot the native placed the butt of the weapon against his cheek, pressed the spring so that the burning ...
— Camps and Trails in China - A Narrative of Exploration, Adventure, and Sport in Little-Known China • Roy Chapman Andrews and Yvette Borup Andrews
... in his black cloak, steeple-hat, and trunk-breeches, girt about the waist with a leathern belt, in which hangs his steel-hilted sword; he has a long staff in his hand, such as gentlemen in advanced life used to carry, as much for the dignity of the thing as for the support ...
— The House of the Seven Gables • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... of these notes, when Ross led his wife into the room, arrayed in a crimson cloud of his choosing, which made even her brown face a picture, all her bronze hair, her husband's glory, floating round her far below her waist, confined lightly here and there by diamond clusters, which sparkled like stars amidst its creped luxuriance—"Daring to dress in the very height of the fashion," said Leta, "and all those diamonds on ...
— Not Pretty, But Precious • John Hay, et al.
... matter of fact, was none other than the King of kings, at that time the absolute master of most of the known world, though what his name may have been, I have no notion. He wore a long flowing robe of purple silk embroidered with gold and bound in at the waist by a jewelled girdle from which hung the private, sacred seal; the little "White Seal" that, as I learned afterwards, ...
— The Ancient Allan • H. Rider Haggard
... and Elfreda Carleton, each with an arm about the other's waist, hastened forward to ...
— Dorothy Dainty at Glenmore • Amy Brooks
... was quick and wary, and clasped Kerkuon round the waist, and slipped his loin quickly underneath him, while he caught him by the wrist; and then he hove a mighty heave, a heave which would have stirred an oak, and lifted Kerkuon, and pitched him, right over his shoulder on ...
— Types of Children's Literature • Edited by Walter Barnes
... of necks. Everyone seemed to be looking for the person who had uttered the sudden cry. Before anyone fully realized what had happened, Grace had reached the fainting woman's side, and supporting her with an arm about her waist, was leading her toward the ...
— The Film of Fear • Arnold Fredericks
... hundred of whom were among the auxiliaries—were better off, for they habitually dispensed with clothing; an apron from waist to knee being the only protection of these wild Kelts, who fought with the valour, and nearly, in the costume of Homeric heroes. Fearing nothing, needing nothing, sparing nothing, they stalked about the fens of Zeeland upon their long stilts, ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... awful!" puffed the boy. The girl did not reply trn she swung the plow about after the horse, and set it upright into the next row. Her powerful body had a superb swaying motion at the waist as she did this-a motion which ...
— Main-Travelled Roads • Hamlin Garland
... Beormas) tall, well-grown, with long hair shining with oil, ornamentally parted, combed, and frizzled, and held together by a head band, or covered with a cap resembling that shown in the accompanying woodcut, were clad in long variegated blouses, or "mekkor," fastened at the waist with a belt. Notwithstanding the feigned indifference shown at first, which was evidently considered good manners, we were received in a friendly way. We were first invited to try our luck and skill in the game in turn with the rest, when it soon appeared, to the no small ...
— The Voyage of the Vega round Asia and Europe, Volume I and Volume II • A.E. Nordenskieold
... received with Loud Cheers. He wore a new Pair of Gymnasium Shoes, spotless Trunks, and around his Waist was an American Flag, presented by his Admirers in ...
— Fables in Slang • George Ade
... little more than a cable's length from the shore, so that you can almost look down upon her decks. You perceive that she is a handsome craft of some six or seven hundred tons burthen, standing high out of water, in ballast trim, with a black hull, bright waist, and wales painted white. Her bows flare very much, and are sharp and symmetrical; the cut-water stretches, with a graceful curve, far out beyond them toward the long sweeping martingal, and is surmounted by a gilt scroll, or, as the sailors call ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII. No. 3. March 1848 • Various
... according to Albey Presort's "History of Voyages," were straight built and powerful, blacker than any Indian tribe hitherto met with in the Pacific Ocean Seas. They had long black hair plaited, which reached below the waist. All the men went about naked, but the women wore a garment, either composed of leaves or of stuff made from them, and sometimes the skins of beasts and birds. Occasionally they wore necklaces and bracelets made of bits ...
— Celebrated Travels and Travellers - Part 2. The Great Navigators of the Eighteenth Century • Jules Verne
... Kain, says he never saw anything superior to Madame Talma. We read the play in the morning, an excellent precaution, otherwise the novelty of the French mode of declamation would have set my comprehension at defiance. There was a ranting Hermione, who had a string too tight round her waist, which made her bosom heave like the bellows of a bagpipe whenever she worked with her clasped hands against her heart to pump out something like passion. There was also a wretched Pyrrhus, and an old Phoenix, whose gray wig I expected ...
— The Life And Letters Of Maria Edgeworth, Vol. 1 • Maria Edgeworth
... his feet became cold and this woke him, and when he raised his head he saw that day was beginning to break. He said to himself: "I must not stay here longer. I am out looking for buffalo for people who are starving. I must not lie here," so he rose and tied up his waist and started on. ...
— When Buffalo Ran • George Bird Grinnell
... group—a woman between fifty and sixty years of age—lay back on a large wooden chair, her eyes fixed on vacancy. Her dress was of simple dark stuff, very full upon the sleeves and below the waist, and relieved by a small white standing collar; a dark coif, of the fashion of the period, covered the grizzled hair, which was drawn back from the forehead and temples, leaving fully exposed a face, the rude features and heavy eyebrows ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 363, January, 1846 • Various
... assault the camp at close quarters, as the shallowness of the stream at that season of the year would previously have easily enabled them to have done, they found, to their astonishment, first that the current, which they did not expect to be more than a foot deep, rose above their waist-belts, then above their armpits, and finally above their heads, as, pushed onwards by their companions behind, they were submerged in the flood; while the miners, still sheltered by Ernest Wilton's trenched rampart above, rained down a pitiless hail of bullets into the half-drowned ...
— Picked up at Sea - The Gold Miners of Minturne Creek • J.C. Hutcheson
... a wild look around her. Foxy lay across her at her waist line—yes, there were paw-marks all over the counterpane, and Ivan, who seemed to have had more than his share of the cleansing, showed a distinct arc of wetness where his long body had lain at ...
— The Wishing-Ring Man • Margaret Widdemer
... have their own peculiar customs and dress, and never intermarry with the Spaniards. Their name is a clue to their origin, as it signifies 'Moorish Goths,' and at this present day their garb differs but little from that of the Moors of Barbary, as it consists of a long tight jacket, secured at the waist by a broad girdle; loose short trowsers which terminate at the knee, and boots and gaiters. Their heads are shaven, a slight fringe of hair being only left at the lower part. If they wore the turban, or barret, ...
— Letters of George Borrow - to the British and Foreign Bible Society • George Borrow
... which before I never did; I sat whole hours and days, and fixed my soul upon the lovely figure; I know its stature to an inch, tall and divinely made; I saw his hair, long, black, and curling to his waist, all loose and flowing; I saw his eyes, where all the Cupids played, black, large, and sparkling, piercing, loving, languishing; I saw his lips sweet, dimpled, red, and soft; a youth complete in all, like early May, that looks, and smells, and cheers above the rest: in fine, I saw him such ...
— Love-Letters Between a Nobleman and His Sister • Aphra Behn
... some twenty of us took our way to our desks. Radley mounted his low platform, and, resting his knuckles on his writing-table, gazed down upon us. He was a man of over six feet, with the shoulders, chest, and waist of a forcing batsman. His neck, perhaps, was a little too big, the fault of a powerful frame; and the wrist that came below his cuff was such that it made us wonder what was the size of his forearm. His mouth was hard, and set above a squaring chin, so that you ...
— Tell England - A Study in a Generation • Ernest Raymond
... one meets out of the prison. In truth, one meets very few women at all, and those that sees are far from attractive. Au reste, the convicts go about apparently very little guarded, with a chain round the waist and each leg. The church, which we afterwards visited, is rather an imposing edifice, and is being built by convict labour, at the ...
— Letters and Journals of James, Eighth Earl of Elgin • James, Eighth Earl of Elgin
... clasping the girl's slender waist in her long arm and leading her into the brightest of bright little kitchens, "I like that young feller—who he is I don't know, what he does I don't know, but what he is I do know, an' that's—a man, my dear! An' he called you—Hermione! Sounds kind o' pretty the way he ...
— The Definite Object - A Romance of New York • Jeffery Farnol
... understood his business, handling his favourite animal, a horse, overcame whatever scruples he may have had as to its leading to his daughters riding Hardy's horses, and in a few minutes one of the horses was mounted by Garth, with a skirt tied to his waist, and the horse trotted and cantered up and down the avenue. The other horse was also tried. The English groom's perfect riding was ...
— A Danish Parsonage • John Fulford Vicary
... day in building rough bridges across creeks waist deep to infantry, which had better have been waded, for the few hours so lost, prevented a successful attack at Spring Hill which Hood had ...
— A History of Lumsden's Battery, C.S.A. • George Little
... the world over. Pinky just kissed me half a hundred times an' cries a little, holdin' on to me all th' time, for naturally she don't like to see me go. Finally I have to make her break loose, an' I climbs down over the bluff an' wades out to my waist to meet the boat. I was aboard th' Dashin' Wave in two twos, shakin' hands with Bull McGinty, an' ten minutes later we had th' anchor up an' th' sails shook out, an' standin' off for the open sea. An' the last I ever ...
— Captain Scraggs - or, The Green-Pea Pirates • Peter B. Kyne
... was his aim that he struck the mud in the immediate neighbourhood of the hole, and sent the debris flying into the French-Canadian's mouth. Jacques spent the rest of his time when in the house watching for a long-haired half-breed with a red sash round his waist, who answered to the name of St. Croix ...
— The Rising of the Red Man - A Romance of the Louis Riel Rebellion • John Mackie
... Confucius found himself separated from his followers. Tsze-kung had arrived before him, and was told by a native of Chang that there was a man standing by the east gate, with a forehead like Yao, a neck like Kao-yao, his shoulders on a level with those of Tsze-ch'an, but wanting, below the waist, three ...
— THE CHINESE CLASSICS (PROLEGOMENA) • James Legge
... great extent upon the establishment of a wide range of stimuli capable of arousing the erotic impulses. As Finck has pointed out, this romantic sentiment is inseparable from the ideals of personal beauty.[3] As criteria of beauty he lists such characteristics as well-shaped waist, rounded bosom, full and red underlip, small feet, etc., all of which have come to be considered standards of loveliness because the erotic emotion has been conditioned to respond to their stimulation. Literature is full of references to such marks of beauty in its characters ...
— Taboo and Genetics • Melvin Moses Knight, Iva Lowther Peters, and Phyllis Mary Blanchard
... Phyllis thoughtfully. "Wallis, I believe there was more nervous shock and nervous depression than ever the doctors realized. And I believe all he needs is to be kept happy, to be much, much better. Wouldn't it be wonderful if he got so he could move freely from the waist up? I believe that may happen if we can keep him ...
— The Rose Garden Husband • Margaret Widdemer
... suddenly seized the minds of the Italians. The fear of Christ fell upon all: noble and ignoble, old and young, and even children of five years of age, marched through the streets with no covering but a scarf round the waist. They each carried a scourge of leathern thongs, which they applied to their limbs, amid sighs and tears, with such violence that the blood flowed from the wounds. Not only during the day, but even by night, and in the severest winter, they traversed the cities with burning torches ...
— The Black Death, and The Dancing Mania • Justus Friedrich Karl Hecker
... two very distinguished-looking men, of whom one, at any rate, wears an order; or else a servant out of livery follows her at a distance of ten yards. She displays no gaudy colors, no open-worked stockings, no over-elaborate waist-buckle, no embroidered frills to her drawers fussing round her ankles. You will see that she is shod with prunella shoes, with sandals crossed over extremely fine cotton stockings, or plain gray silk stockings; or perhaps she wears boots of the most exquisite ...
— Another Study of Woman • Honore de Balzac
... conversation, Villani, saying it was time for Teresa to prepare for the opera, left her. No sooner did the door close, than loosening the rich masses of jetty hair which formed a veil around her and descended far below her waist, Teresa advanced to a large mirror, and without a shadow of vanity or a smile, gazed steadily at her reflection. Never had a glass shown a fairer face ...
— The Duke's Prize - A Story of Art and Heart in Florence • Maturin Murray
... like this, there's bound to be. There's every sort of story floating about. Some people even go so far as to say that they only brought home the top end of him; that all that shows below his waist is only a padded roll of blankets. That's one reason I want so much to see him; I know I could tell whether there was any truth in such absurd stories." She pulled herself up short; then went on with a change of tone. "Of course, ...
— The Brentons • Anna Chapin Ray
... well known that it had worn a rut in the commerce of Great Britain; and the grocers, about the due time, began to garnish their windows with our particular brand of luminary. We wore them buckled to the waist upon a cricket belt, and over them, such was the rigor of the game, a buttoned top-coat. They smelled noisomely of blistered tin. They never burned aright, though they would always burn our fingers. Their use was naught, the pleasure of them merely fanciful, and yet a boy with a bull's-eye ...
— Talks To Teachers On Psychology; And To Students On Some Of Life's Ideals • William James
... round Jimmy's shoulder and Jimmy's arm was round Reggie's waist. He half carried, half supported him. He came out in the middle of a cloud of smoke that hid him. The smoke was followed by a burst of fire and another crash and roar as the ceiling of the first story plunged ...
— The Belfry • May Sinclair |
