"High-backed" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... was of the same material as the chair to which I was strapped, viz:—ebony inlaid with ivory. This furniture was scanty. There was a heavy table in one corner of the dungeonesque place, on which were a number of books and papers. Before this table was a high-backed, heavily carven chair. A smaller table stood upon the right of the only visible opening, a low door partially draped with bead work curtains, above which hung a silver lamp. On this smaller table, a stick of incense, in a silver holder, sent up a pencil of vapor into the air, and the chamber ...
— The Return of Dr. Fu-Manchu • Sax Rohmer
... queer figure, that old man, in the high-backed, high-fender sleigh. On his head was a tall peaked fur cap, with a barred coon tail flopping at its apex. A big fur coat, also covered with coon tails, made the man's figure almost Brobdingnagian in circumference. It was ...
— The Rainy Day Railroad War • Holman Day
... sinister disapproval at the distant table, laden with fruit and flagons; at the Bishop and the Knight, now sitting nigh to one another; the Bishop in his chair of state facing the door, the Knight, on a high-backed seat at the Bishop's right ...
— The White Ladies of Worcester - A Romance of the Twelfth Century • Florence L. Barclay
... the quaint little table, in the old high-backed chair, eating what tasted better than the best chicken that ever went into an oven, Juanita Sterling forgot Mrs. Puddicombe and her daughter Blanche, and ...
— Polly and the Princess • Emma C. Dowd
... head, like the tube of a telescope when the astronomer is searching for a lost planet. Some of these timid female creditors, when their little claim has been satisfied (for L1,000 in the Consols only produces L7 10s. a quarter), retire to an archway in the Rotunda, where there are two high-backed leathern chairs, behind the shelter of which, with a needle and thread, they stitch the money into some secret part of their antiquated garments. The two private detective officers on duty generally watch these careful proceedings with amusement and interest, and are looked upon by the ...
— Old and New London - Volume I • Walter Thornbury
... a rag carpet of all the colors of the rainbow; a little old four-post bedstead, with a patchwork counterpane; two high-backed rocking chairs, with patchwork covers over the backs; a table with an oil cloth cover, that had a little old tea tray on it, set up against the wall; two bright brass candlesticks, and a china tea set; and in one corner was a glass cupboard, ...
— Funny Little Socks - Being the Fourth Book • Sarah. L. Barrow
... frame structure that bore his painted sign was nothing more or less than a loafing place for him and his rheumatic friends, and a place in which the owner could spend the heat of the day in a position of comfort to his stiff leg—that is to say, asleep in a high-backed office chair, his feet propped upon his desk. It was here that Tom could usually be found, and when one of those hateful statements arrived from the East he merely roused himself, put on his wide gray hat, limped around to the bank, and pledged more ...
— Flowing Gold • Rex Beach
... her the rest of the way down-stairs, where she paused again, making more observations. The hall was extremely broad, and on either side of the front door was a wide, deeply-set window, which threw the shadows of everything back into the house. There were high-backed chairs along the wall and big Eastern vases upon tables, and, on either side, a large cabinet with a glass front and little curiosities within, dimly gleaming. The doors were open—into the darkened parlor, the library, the dining-room. All these rooms seemed ...
— The Europeans • Henry James
... attend to all she said. She closed her eyes, and lay still. I went to the fire, and sat down in a high-backed arm-chair, to wait the event.—There was plenty of fuel in the corner. I made up the fire, and then, leaning back, with my eyes fixed on it, let my thoughts roam at will. Where was my old nurse now? What was she seeing or encountering? Would ...
— The Portent & Other Stories • George MacDonald
... high-backed Windsor chair at the door of his house, smoking. Before him the road descended steeply to the harbor, a small blue patch of which was visible from his door. Children over five were at school: children under that age, and suspiciously large for their years, played about in careless disregard of the ...
— Short Cruises • W.W. Jacobs
... a minute," said Iris suddenly, and ran into the house. She pushed open the door of Mrs Fotheringham's sitting-room gently and peeped in. Her godmother was sitting very upright in her high-backed chair, a frown on her brow, and the parrot on her shoulder. She looked so alarming that Iris felt almost inclined to run away again, but the old lady turned her head suddenly and ...
— A Pair of Clogs • Amy Walton
... ceiling, so that a quarter of the high-pitched thatching of the house showed overhead. A dozen middle-aged Hillmen stood along the wall, evidently the influential men of the village. Across from them an aged Hillman sat in a rough-hewed, high-backed chair. ...
— Terry - A Tale of the Hill People • Charles Goff Thomson
... hall branched off on either side the long series of state-rooms, poorly furnished with high-backed chairs and long queer Venice glasses, when first I came to the property; but afterwards rendered so splendid by me, with the gold damasks of Lyons and the magnificent Gobelin tapestries I won from Richelieu at play. ...
— Barry Lyndon • William Makepeace Thackeray
... September 11, and of Germantown, October 4, 1777, were held here as prisoners of war, and on July 9, 1778, the Articles of Confederation and perpetual union between the States were signed here by representatives of eight States. The room contains much of the furniture of those days. The table and high-backed Chippendale chair of mahogany used by the presidents of the Continental Congress and occupied by John Hancock at the signing still remain, and on the table is to be seen the silver ink-stand with its quill box and sand shaker, in which the ...
— The Colonial Architecture of Philadelphia • Frank Cousins
... in the smoke; an English clock stood in one corner, a tall cupboard in another, and a geranium in the window-seat. Along the side opposite the door, and parallel to a dresser of shining crockery, ran a strong deal table. Some high-backed chairs, a pair of brass candlesticks with snuffers, a book or two, a few old hats, and a lanthorn, on various pegs, completed the furniture of ...
— The Astonishing History of Troy Town • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... avoided this room. Its subdued light; its oppressive atmosphere, invariably suggesting the image of "Ole Miss" lying there amidst banks of flowers which matched in purity her calm face; the uniform arrangement of high-backed chairs, suggesting in their white coverings a line of tombstones; the two massive crystal chandeliers, hanging like weights of an old clock which would never again be wound;—were all too much for Zack's heart ...
— Sunlight Patch • Credo Fitch Harris
... the room, attracted by the contents of a cupboard filled with cheap pottery and some bits of fine old English lustre. Then I examined the furniture of the curious interior,—the high-backed chairs, mahogany table,—one leg replaced with pine,—the hair sofa and tall clock in the corner by the door. They were all old and once costly, and all of a pattern of by-gone days. Everything was scrupulously clean, even to ...
— A Gentleman Vagabond and Some Others • F. Hopkinson Smith
... the milkmaid, instead of sitting, singing, in a green meadow, watching her beautiful gold-horned cow, had to sit all day in a high-backed chair, her feet on a little foot-stool with an embroidered pussy cat on it, and do fancy work. The young ladies worked by electric light; for the seminary was asleep nearly all the time, and no sunlight could get in at the windows, for boards clapped down over them like so many ...
— The Pot of Gold - And Other Stories • Mary E. Wilkins
... thus given to Janet. Something swelled in her throat as if to suffocate her, but there could be no reply, and to burst out crying would only make him think her younger still; so as he turned to his mournful task, she ensconced herself in a high-backed chair, and watched him from ...
— Magnum Bonum • Charlotte M. Yonge
... with other portraits, a careful observer would have promptly distinguished and reunited them, so pronounced were the family features common to them all. The furniture of the room was not unworthy of these proud defunct ones. High-backed chairs and enormous armchairs, dating from the time of Louis XIII; more modern sofas, which had been made to harmonize with the older furniture, filled the room. They were covered with flowered tapestry in thousands of shades, which must ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... near the pulpit in a pew, which was generally raised a foot or two above the level of the meeting-house floor, and which contained, usually, several high-backed chairs and a table or a broad swinging-shelf for use at the communion service. These venerable men were a group of awe-inspiring figures, who, next to the parson, received the respect of the community. In Bristol, Connecticut, the deacons wore starched white linen caps in the meeting-house ...
— Sabbath in Puritan New England • Alice Morse Earle
... thereupon led the way within, and placed an easy chair for Mr. Gordon under the large hurricane lamp that hung from the low ceiling, and cast its yellow light about the room. The skipper glanced rapidly at the dark, old-fashioned furniture, at the high-backed chairs, cushioned with the skins of seals, the strong teak-wood sideboard, and the heavy round table, upon which stood a quaint Dutch spirit bottle and a couple of horn drinking cups. He looked at the several pictures of ships battling with terrible storms, and at the ...
— The Pilots of Pomona • Robert Leighton
... her chair, a soft flush on her thin, high-bred face. Her figure, in a beautiful gown of beryl plush embroidered with gold, seemed artistically designed for the carved, high-backed chair in which she sat, and both her companions were too appreciative to lose the grace of the ...
— The Philistines • Arlo Bates
... smelt of pine branches, which were scattered upon the even more than usually clean floor. On the old-fashioned, high-backed sofa, before a table spread with fine linen, sat old Saul and sipped his fragrant tea. The huge samovar had been taken down from the cupboard and gleamed with red coals and hissed and steamed in the next room, where ...
— An Obscure Apostle - A Dramatic Story • Eliza Orzeszko
... that the chamber had grown duskier than ever; but a mild and moonlight splendor gleamed from within the vase, and rested alike on the four guests and on the doctor's venerable figure. He sat in a high-backed, elaborately-carved, oaken arm-chair, with a gray dignity of aspect that might have well befitted that very Father Time, whose power had never been disputed, save by this fortunate company. Even while quaffing the ...
— English Prose - A Series of Related Essays for the Discussion and Practice • Frederick William Roe (edit. and select.)
... protected by well-fastened screens or by slats of wood. Beds afford a good place for a romp or play, but high-backed chairs should be placed at the side to prevent a fall. A strap across the waist should be fastened to the sides of the carriage to prevent falling out. Everything possible should be done to prevent falls. Outdoor hammocks are exceedingly dangerous for the baby. Never leave a child in one unguarded. ...
— The Mother and Her Child • William S. Sadler
... gown was completed, another group of the clever little creatures clambered up to the top of the high-backed chair in which Betty was seated, and began to arrange her hair. Some had quaint little pots in their hands from which they poured delicate perfumes over Betty's head,— Joan picked up one of the ...
— Cornwall's Wonderland • Mabel Quiller-Couch
... sergeant, he had not slept for three days, and was too utterly tired out to be of any assistance. He had done what he could, and had now to await developments. The fire was good, and he had dropped, at the rancher's request, into a comfortable high-backed chair in a corner, ...
— The Rising of the Red Man - A Romance of the Louis Riel Rebellion • John Mackie
... found on the walls of every American household, however humble, whose members are wishful of imparting an artistic and literary atmosphere to their home. A third guide greeted us warmly when we drove to the cottage, a mile or two from the town, where the Hathaway family lived. Here we saw the high-backed settle on which Shakspere sat, night after night, wooing Anne Hathaway. I myself sat on it to test it. I should say that the wooing could not have been particularly good there, especially for a thin man. That settle had a very hard seat and history does not ...
— Europe Revised • Irvin S. Cobb
... red brick, and on the wide hearth burnt a fire of logs, between two attractive chimney-corners tucked away in the wall, well out of any suspicion of draught. A couple of high-backed settles, facing each other on either side of the fire, gave further sitting accommodations for the sociably disposed. In the middle of the room stood a long table of plain boards placed on trestles, with benches down each side. At one end of it, ...
— The Wind in the Willows • Kenneth Grahame
... a high-backed lounge against the wall, where, seated on its extreme edge, he gazed silently at her with an expression of sentimental concern. Mr. Moses Feldt was a short round man, bald but for a fluffy rim of pale hair, and with the palest imaginable eyes in a countenance perpetually flushed by the physical ...
— Linda Condon • Joseph Hergesheimer
... followed Francis through the vestibule, where a servant received us with a military salute, and showed us into an immense drawing-room hung with embossed gilt leather. Here the General was taking a nap in a high-backed easy-chair. Francis entered the room softly enough, but the loud heavy step of the Captain, who thought fit to follow us, awoke the sleeper ...
— Major Frank • A. L. G. Bosboom-Toussaint
... single glance upon these familiar pictures, but gazed down at the thirteen elderly and the same number of much younger men, who in their high-backed chairs were holding council together at her left hand far below her. These were the burgomasters of the city, of whom an elder and a younger one directed for the space of a month, as "Questioner," ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... was the Cardinal's study, a small room, very high and lighted by a single tall window which opened upon an inner court of the palace. The furniture was very simple, consisting of a large writing-table, a few high-backed chairs, and the Cardinal's own easy-chair, covered with dingy leather and well worn by use. On the dark green walls hung two engravings, one a portrait of Pius IX., the other a likeness of Leo XIII. The Cardinal himself sat in the arm-chair, holding a newspaper ...
— Marzio's Crucifix and Zoroaster • F. Marion Crawford
... sweetness of her filled the room. She had left behind her not only a memory but the enduring impress of personality. The house was full of Ediths. There was one at the table, another at the piano, one leaning against the mantel with hands clasped behind her, another in a high-backed rocker, leaning back against a dull green cushion, and one upon the stairway, ascending with light steps that died away with the closing of a door, or descending with a quick rustle of silken skirts that presently merged into perfume, ...
— Master of the Vineyard • Myrtle Reed
... or a window seat. He could polish the piano and then sit down to it and play "Those Tassels on Her Boots" or "Marching through Georgia" with great skill. He could paint bunches of gold grapes and leaves on the old-fashioned high-backed rocker, and, as soon as it was dry, could sit down in it and entertain the whole family without charging ...
— Mother Carey's Chickens • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... wished to show me, as a specimen of a real country inn, the head-quarters of village gossips. I had remarked it before, in my perambulations about the place. It has a deep, old-fashioned porch, leading into a large hall, which serves for tap-room and travellers'-room; having a wide fire-place, with high-backed settles on each side, where the wise men of the village gossip over their ale, and hold their sessions during the long winter evenings. The landlord is an easy, indolent fellow, shaped a little like one of his own beer-barrels, and is apt to stand gossiping ...
— Bracebridge Hall, or The Humorists • Washington Irving
... that room with its strange mystery of shadows, its odour of mingled tragedy and absurdity. Grant rose from a high-backed chair guarding the table, as Wingate approached. The latter glanced towards the three men crouching around the table. Their white faces gleamed weirdly against the background of shaded light. There were black lines under Dredlinton's eyes. He made a gurgling effort ...
— The Profiteers • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... She turned a high-backed rocker toward the fire and Madame Bernard leaned back luxuriously, stretching her tiny feet to the blaze. She wore grey satin slippers with high French heels and silver buckles. A bit of grey silk ...
— Old Rose and Silver • Myrtle Reed
... the words and gestures of the public play. I had the certitude that this mother, refused in her heart to give her son up after all. It was more than Rachel's inconsolable mourning, it was something deeper, more inaccessible in its frightful tranquillity. Lost in the ill-defined mass of the high-backed chair, her white, inclined profile suggested the contemplation of something in her lap, as though a beloved head were ...
— Under Western Eyes • Joseph Conrad
... in two wide, high-backed chairs, rang for tea, and began to question Lionel about affairs in the High Valley, while Imogen, still under the influence of surprise at finding herself calling on these strangers, glanced curiously at the younger ladies of the party. The Comtesse ...
— In the High Valley - Being the fifth and last volume of the Katy Did series • Susan Coolidge
... woman had refused to stay in the bedroom after she had come to her senses. She had insisted that she could not breathe, and that she was cold and must go back to the kitchen. Her mother and Mrs. Jake had wrapped her in blankets and drawn the high-backed wooden rocking chair close to the stove, and here she was just established when Mrs. Martin opened the outer door. Any one of less reliable nerves would have betrayed the shock which the sight ...
— A Country Doctor and Selected Stories and Sketches • Sarah Orne Jewett
... curious to see her. So when more than five minutes had passed and no Dave reappeared, I proposed that Dolly and I should go up to look for him, and we went, Aunt Maria following in our wake, to cover contingencies. She went back, after introducing me to the very sweet old lady in a high-backed chair, who comes in as the explanation of the beginning of this illegible scrawl. How funny children are! I do believe Uncle Moses was right when he said that Dave, if anything, preferred his loves to be 'a bit elderly.' ...
— When Ghost Meets Ghost • William Frend De Morgan
... place was little changed, and every thing around that well-remembered spot came laden with so many sweet and early associations, that the memory of by-gone hours swept thrillingly across my heart-strings, and it was not until after I had taken my accustomed seat in the old-fashioned high-backed pew, that I was roused from my busy wanderings in the "shadowy past," by the voice of ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXIII No. 3 September 1848 • Various
... immediately chosen, then they threw away their cigarettes and returned to the court. The gentleman declared to the presiding justice that he was chosen foreman, and stepping over the feet of each other, the jury again seated themselves in the two rows of high-backed chairs. ...
— The Awakening - The Resurrection • Leo Nikoleyevich Tolstoy
... described as being 'wide enough to drive a carriage and pair up,' with massive oak posts and balustrades. The walls are covered with tapestry, given to the house by 'The Merry Monarch,' after his visit. An oak chest or two, and some high-backed chairs on the landings, picture to one a suitable habitation for a ghost. Fortunately, or unfortunately, I had no belief in ghosts, and commenced an investigation of ...
— A Week's Tramp in Dickens-Land • William R. Hughes
... now where she had sat for thirty years. Her high-backed rocker, with its cushion of copperplate patch and its crocheted tidy, stood always by a southern window that looked out on the river. The river was a sheet of crystal, as it poured over the dam; a rushing, ...
— The Village Watch-Tower • (AKA Kate Douglas Riggs) Kate Douglas Wiggin
... river passing through the old bridge and busy with boats. One side of the White Tower has been taken out, and we can see, as under a sort of shrine, the paved room where the duke sits writing. He occupies a high-backed bench in front of a great chimney; red and black ink are before him; and the upper end of the apartment is guarded by many halberdiers, with the red cross of England on their breast. On the next side of the tower he appears again, leaning out of window and ...
— Familiar Studies of Men & Books • Robert Louis Stevenson
... the white step that led into an ante-room filled with divans and coffee-tables. Beyond was a lofty apartment with an arched roof, in the centre of which was an oval table laid for breakfast, and decorated with masses of trumpet-shaped scarlet flowers in silver vases. Behind each of the four high-backed chairs stood an Arab motionless as a statue. Evidently the Count's fete was to be attended by a good deal of ceremony. Domini felt sorry, though not for herself. She had been accustomed to ceremony all her life, and noticed it, as a rule, almost as little as the air she breathed. But she feared ...
— The Garden Of Allah • Robert Hichens
... sitting in that high-backed green chair, with his eyes glued to his shoes, and holding his hat and cane in front of him like breastworks, as if he were preparing to repel an attack. He didn't look very approachable, but I boldly accosted him and asked if he were Mr. Stanthrope. He stood ...
— When Patty Went to College • Jean Webster
... his skill—"Father," "Mother," "Amy," "Fred," "Norton," "Mary," "Teddums," "May." Eight names in all, but nine chairs, and the ninth no ordinary, cane-seated chair like the rest, but a beautiful, high-backed, carved-oak erection, ecclesiastical in design, which looked strangely out of place in the ...
— The Empire Annual for Girls, 1911 • Various
... with a plate of biscuits and another of dried raisins, that I woke out of my musing. While I drew the arm-chair nearer the fire, he pushed forward the table with the wine to my elbow. After this, he poured me out a glass and fell to dusting a high-backed chair with vigour, as though he had caught it standing at ease and were giving it a round dozen for insubordination in the ranks. "Was there anything more?" "Nothing, ...
— I Saw Three Ships and Other Winter Tales • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... safe seclusion of her high-backed chair Emma McChesney smiled approvingly. Seventeen years ago, when her son had been born, and ten years ago, when she had got her divorce, Emma McChesney had thanked her God that her boy had not been a girl. Sometimes, ...
— Roast Beef, Medium • Edna Ferber
... took Edward by the arm, and, lighted by the servant, they passed through several lofty rooms, which were very handsomely furnished, although in an old-fashioned style, with faded Flemish carpets, large chandeliers, and high-backed chairs: everything in keeping with what the youth had already seen in the castle. Here were the ladies of the house. At the other end of the room, by the side of an immense stove, ornamented with a large shield of the family arms, ...
— International Weekly Miscellany, Vol. I, No. 6 - Of Literature, Art, And Science, New York, August 5, 1850 • Various
... in the room, and it was some time before her eyes became accustomed to the dim light around her. Then the glimpse she caught, through the half-open door, of one or two familiar objects,—the desk which had been her father's, and the high-backed chair of carved oak in which her mother used to sit so many, many years ago,—assured her that she ...
— The Orphans of Glen Elder • Margaret Murray Robertson
... rise, but remained kneeling, fascinated by the look of joy that shone out of the other man's eyes. And the other man moved the high-backed chairs one by one, and came towards ...
— Novel Notes • Jerome K. Jerome
... bill. Here, Dancer, don't bite him so, but bring him here! Chick, chick, churr! Mister Red-squirrel, we'll 'give you a few,' as Jared used to say. On that knot in the green hemlock, he sits with his tail spread out over his head, for all the world like a young miss in a high-backed, old-fashined easy-chair. Well, we wont harm him, for the sake of the ...
— The Knickerbocker, or New-York Monthly Magazine, May 1844 - Volume 23, Number 5 • Various
... the haunted house with the green gables," some will say, glowing with satisfaction. "And they do say the eccentric old man who built it for his parents has silent, trusty Negro servants dressed in spotless white who stand behind the high-backed chair of the master and mistress at the table laden with gleaming silver and a sumptuous feast. The old man firmly believes ...
— Blue Ridge Country • Jean Thomas
... deadly sin. The week succeeding the accident which had nearly proved so fatal to Denbigh, the inhabitants of the hall were surprised with the approach of a being, as singular in his manners and dress as the equipage which conveyed him to the door of the house. The latter consisted of a high-backed, old-fashioned sulky, loaded with leather and large-headed brass nails; wheels at least a quarter larger in circumference than those of the present day, and wings on each side large enough to have supported a full grown roc in the highest regions of the upper air. It was drawn by ...
— Precaution • James Fenimore Cooper
... a throne, in shape like a high-backed chair with a footstool before it. The chair stands on lion's feet, and the stool on bull's feet, and both are ...
— The King's Cup-Bearer • Amy Catherine Walton
... There the ceiling was panelled in oak; and the banisters, the cocoa-nut matting, the bit of stained glass, and the religious prints, suggested a mock air of hieratic dignity. And the room Mr. Hare was shown into continued this impression. Cabinets in carved oak harmonised with high-backed chairs glowing with red Utrecht velvet, and a massive table, on which lay a folio edition of St. Augustine's City of God and the Epistolae Consolitoriae ...
— Celibates • George Moore
... dingy room, long and narrow, with a single window. Against the door that led into an adjoining room, stood a high-backed, uninviting sofa, with a table in front of it. Between this and the window was the writing-bureau, a flat, man-high piece of furniture, with drawers and pigeon-holes, and a broad flap that let down for writing purposes. Against the opposite wall stood the neglected ...
— Maurice Guest • Henry Handel Richardson
... the traitor's head," said a voice from one of the high-backed chairs, "the ancient doom ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume VI. (of X.) • Various
... known to be contained in an official despatch-box. When the curtain rose on the last act, it revealed this despatch-box on a table right opposite a French window, while at the other side of the room a high-backed arm-chair discreetly averted its face. Every one could see at a glance that the romantic Anarchist was going to sneak in at the window and attempt to abstract the despatch-box, while the heroine was to lie ...
— Play-Making - A Manual of Craftsmanship • William Archer
... also to belong to the daughter of the house, was white, shiny tile from floor to ceiling, and it contained every conceivable device known to the mind of a modern plumber that makes for comfort in a bath-room. Could Elinor have but glimpsed the high-backed tin tub in which Arethusa had bathed all of her life ...
— The Heart of Arethusa • Francis Barton Fox
... high-backed chair, a sweet-faced nun, with her golden hair hidden from sight, and her dark-lashed eyes looking lovelier than ever when contrasted with the white bands across her forehead. She had been so busy dressing others that ...
— Pixie O'Shaughnessy • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... the tremulous glitter of diamonds. It was now so nearly sunset that the chamber had grown duskier than ever; but a mild and moon-like splendor gleamed from within the vase, and rested alike on the four guests, and on the doctor's venerable figure. He sat in a high-backed, elaborately carved oaken chair, with a gray dignity of aspect that might have well befitted that very Father Time, whose power had never been disputed, save by this fortunate company. Even while quaffing the third draught of the Fountain of Youth, they ...
— The Great English Short-Story Writers, Vol. 1 • Various
... Genoese velvet. Near it, a broad ottoman, with a chair on its left. Behind, near the foot of the stairs, Lulu's Pierrot-picture on a decorative stand and in a gold frame made to look antique. In the centre of the hall, a heavy square table, with three high-backed upholstered chairs round it and a vase of white ...
— Erdgeist (Earth-Spirit) - A Tragedy in Four Acts • Frank Wedekind
... from his office in such a way that the affair assumed the complexion of a national courtesy offered by the Filipino to the American. For us, as Government employees, to disregard this was impossible. So we went en masse to the Roman Catholic church, where two rows of high-backed chairs were arranged facing each other up the centre of the church for our ...
— A Woman's Impression of the Philippines • Mary Helen Fee
... wild gesture toward a high-backed easy-chair beside the table, his eyes gleaming with an almost fiendish excitement; then the gleam faded, and he turned back ...
— The Gloved Hand • Burton E. Stevenson
... had descended a long narrow flight of uncarpeted stairs, 'the back ones,' as Mysie explained, and had reached a slippery oak hall with high-backed chairs, and all the odds and ends of a family-garden hats, waterproofs, galoshes, bats, rackets, umbrellas, etc., ranged round, and a great white cockatoo upon a stand, who observed—'Mysie, Cockie wants his breakfast,' as they went ...
— The Two Sides of the Shield • Charlotte M. Yonge
... down by the small table and poured chocolate for them, a white-capped maid at her chair, Mr. Hamilton Dyce on the other side as grand helper. Then the girls settled down in pretty groups on the broad window-seats, and on the high-backed chairs, and gave themselves up to the supreme content of ...
— Five Little Peppers and their Friends • Margaret Sidney
... case of need. So she led the way down the corridor and through the living-part of the house, and we passed several rooms, and one little parlour lined with shelves and musty books. The blinds were pulled, but let enough light in to show a high-backed horsehair chair that stood at the table. In front of it lay an open volume, and a pair of horn-rimmed spectacles, that I had often seen on Maskew's nose; so I knew it was his study, and that nothing had been moved since last he sat there. Even now I trembled to think in whose house I was, ...
— Moonfleet • J. Meade Falkner
... long oaken table, at which sat huge dark-haired Cornishmen, with here and there among them the yellow head of a Norseman, who were Alef's following or fighting men. Boiled meat was there in plenty, barley cakes, and ale. At the head of the table, on a high-backed settle, was Alef himself, a jolly giant, who was just setting to work to drink himself stupid with mead made from narcotic heather honey. By his side sat a lovely dark-haired girl, with great gold torcs upon her throat and wrists, and a great gold brooch fastening a shawl which had plainly ...
— Hereward, The Last of the English • Charles Kingsley
... way about rather aimlessly, pointing to this thing and that, our voices subdued. There were all the high-backed chairs—fourteen, we counted, with those already carried down. Most of them would need new rush bottoms and black paint, but otherwise they had withstood the generations. They were probably a part of the old house's original furnishing—these and at least one of the ...
— Dwellers in Arcady - The Story of an Abandoned Farm • Albert Bigelow Paine
... Benjamin Franklin sit at right in the high-backed chairs, the volumes upon their knees. That they are true book-lovers is instantly apparent. They are lost to everything that goes on about them. They sit with their backs towards the door at left, quite screened from the view of any one entering ...
— Patriotic Plays and Pageants for Young People • Constance D'Arcy Mackay
... bed with chintz curtains and a warm-looking counterpane of rich faded embroidery. There was a bit of carpet by the bedside, and another bit in front of the fire; and there the old man sat, on one side, in a high-backed not very easy- looking chair. With a great effort he managed to rise as I approached him, notwithstanding my entreaties that he would not move. He looked much older when on his feet, for he was bent nearly double, ...
— Annals of a Quiet Neighbourhood • George MacDonald
... kitchen, with a cold round of beef, and other hearty viands upon it, over which two foaming tankards of ale seemed mounting guard. Travellers of inferior order were preparing to attack this stout repast, while others sat smoking and gossiping over their ale on two high-backed oaken seats beside the fire. Trim housemaids were hurrying backwards and forwards under the directions of a fresh, bustling landlady; but still seizing an occasional moment to exchange a flippant word, and have a rallying laugh, ...
— Old Christmas From the Sketch Book of Washington Irving • Washington Irving
... rude structure built in a wild spot among the rocks and trees, and evidently the abode of pinching poverty; but everything was clean and neat, and the occupants, an elderly woman reclining in a high-backed wooden rocking-chair with her feet propped up on a rude bench, and a young girl who sat sewing by a window overlooking the road, wore an air of refinement, and spoke English more correctly and with ...
— Elsie's children • Martha Finley
... the raised platform bearing it, was covered with a cloth of gold. Here she received the homage of her officers and the nobility. The ancient coronation-chair, which is probably the greatest curiosity in the abbey, is a most unpretentious and uncomfortable-looking old high-backed chair with a hard wooden seat. Every sovereign of England has been crowned in it since Edward I. There is a similar chair alongside it, the duplicate having been made for the coronation of William and Mary, when two chairs were necessary, ...
— England, Picturesque and Descriptive - A Reminiscence of Foreign Travel • Joel Cook
... reply, they were across the threshold. There was a sound as of a rheumaticky hen stirring in its nest. The neck of Sir Tobias craned painfully round the corner of a high-backed chair. ...
— The Kingdom Round the Corner - A Novel • Coningsby Dawson
... better known than it is. "There now," said Daubson, the painter of "the all but breathing Grenadier," (alas! rejected by the Academy). "Then get up and sit down, if you please, mister." "He pointed to a narrow high-backed chair, placed on a platform; by the side of the chair was a machine of curious construction, from which protruded a long wire. 'Heady stiddy, mister.' He then slowly drew the wire over my head and down my nose and chin." Such was ...
— Pickwickian Manners and Customs • Percy Fitzgerald
... Sitting in his high-backed chair, Luke Claridge seemed a part of its dignified severity. In the sparsely furnished room with its uncarpeted floor, its plain teak table, its high wainscoting and undecorated walls, the old man had the look of one who belonged to some ancient ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... door he saw the hall, dimly lit and thick with fog. Nothing, of course, was visible—nothing but the hat-stand, the African spears in dark lines upon the wall and the high-backed wooden chair standing grotesquely underneath on the oilcloth floor. For one instant the fog seemed to move and thicken oddly; but he set that down to the score of the imagination. The ...
— Three John Silence Stories • Algernon Blackwood
... companion destined for her, and she prevailed, for mamma pronounced that she had been very sage and reasonable all day, and the grandmamma, who was so soon to part with her, could refuse her nothing. So she was full dressed, with hair curled, and permitted to stand by the tall high-backed chair where the old lady sat to ...
— A Modern Telemachus • Charlotte M. Yonge
... from nine to half-past ten; and then church service. Two of the children always remained for the sermon voluntarily, and the other always remained too—for stronger reasons. The church's high-backed, uncushioned pews would seat about three hundred persons; the edifice was but a small, plain affair, with a sort of pine board tree-box on top of it for a steeple. At the door Tom dropped back a step ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... easily aired. A room that has two or more windows can be better ventilated than a room with only one. When there is only one window, it should be opened both top and bottom. If there is not a screen, one can be made by hanging a shawl or a blanket over a clothes horse or a high-backed chair, or over a line stretched across the lower part of the window. A fire place or a stove keeps the air circulating—the air being constantly drawn up the chimney—and so helps ...
— Scouting For Girls, Official Handbook of the Girl Scouts • Girl Scouts
... on a high-backed chair and stretched her eyes wide open. For hours and hours she sat there, growing more sleepy every minute. Towards morning she began to nod; she could hardly keep her eyes open, though she tried to prop the lids with her finger tips. ...
— The Curious Book of Birds • Abbie Farwell Brown
... of the simpler sort the only requirements are a high-backed chair or settee, a table for cartes de visite, an umbrella receptacle, and a mirror wall hanger with hooks for the use of guests. The time-honored halltree is no more, and long may it rest in peace. If there had been no other reasons ...
— The Complete Home • Various
... was scantily furnished, but the few objects it contained, the carved table, the high-backed chairs and the chiselled bronze brazier, bore the stamp of the time when art had not long been born again. On the walls there were broad tapestries of bold design, showing green forests populated by all sorts of animals in stiff attitudes, staring ...
— In The Palace Of The King - A Love Story Of Old Madrid • F. Marion Crawford
... and the floor also was of polished oak, over the centre of which, however, was spread a thick richly-colored Turkey carpet. Opposite the door was a large mullioned bay-window, then, however, concealed behind an ample flowing crimson curtain. On the farther side of the fireplace stood a high-backed and roomy armchair, almost covered With Kate's embroidery, and in which Mrs. Aubrey had evidently, as usual, been sitting till the moment of their arrival—for on a small ebony table beside it lay her spectacles, and an open volume. Nearly fronting the fireplace was a recess, in which ...
— Ten Thousand a-Year. Volume 1. • Samuel Warren
... of books still lined the walls of the morning room. The long mahogany table in the center was still littered with maps and papers. There were the same rusted muskets and small swords in the rack by the fireplace, and in front of the fire in a great, high-backed armchair my father was sitting. I paused with a curious feeling of doubt, surprise and diffidence. Somehow I had pictured a different meeting and a different man. He must surely have heard my step and the jingling of my spurs as I crossed the room, but he never so much as raised his head. ...
— The Unspeakable Gentleman • John P. Marquand
... red Martian custom, was triangular, for there were three in our family. Carthoris and I presided in the centre of our sides of the table—midway of the third side Dejah Thoris' high-backed, carven chair stood vacant except for her gorgeous wedding trappings and jewels which were draped upon it. Behind stood a slave as in the days when his mistress had occupied her place at the board, ready to do her bidding. It was the ...
— The Gods of Mars • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... rooms. These were bare and gaunt, so that she, with her feminine sense of fitness, of course considered what she would do to make them habitable. She had a neat fancy for furniture, and distributed her tones and half tones and bits of colour freely about the walls and ceilings, with a high-backed chair here, a spindle-legged sofa there, and a claw-footed table in the centre, until her eye was caught by a very dirty deal desk, on which stood an open book, with an inkstand and some pens. On the leaf she read the ...
— Democracy An American Novel • Henry Adams
... not been so used in many years, but the old furnishing of some former Spanish owner still told the tale of coaches before the colonnade outside and of hidalgo guests within the great house. There was the stately sofa of honor flanked by throne-like armchairs, with high-backed ones next in line, all once of bright crimson satin and now frazzled and stained. The inevitable mirror leaned from its inevitable place over the sofa, but it was cracked and the gilt of the heavy frame had tarnished to red. At the other end of the sala, a considerable journey, ...
— The Missourian • Eugene P. (Eugene Percy) Lyle
... himself, and, begging Ideala to enter, bade her be seated at a writing-table which stood in the middle of the room, and himself took the chair in front of it, and looked at Ideala's card which lay before him. Another gentleman, whom Lorrimer introduced as "My brother Julian," lounged on a high-backed chair at the other side of the table. The room was a good size, but so crowded with things that there was scarcely space to turn round. The light fell full upon Lorrimer as he sat facing the window, ...
— Ideala • Sarah Grand
... the door at the end of the passage, and the three friends entered a long, low-roofed room, furnished with a large number of high-backed, leather-cushioned chairs, of fantastic shapes, and embellished with a great variety of old portraits and roughly coloured prints of some antiquity. At the upper end of the room was a table, with a white cloth ...
— The Inns and Taverns of "Pickwick" - With Some Observations on their Other Associations • B.W. Matz
... dim old portraits on the walls, and paintings that hinted at old mastership filled whole panels; and the tall, high-backed, wonderfully wrought oaken chairs had heraldic devices in relief upon their bars and corners; and there was a great, round mosaic table, in soft, rich, dark colors, of most precious stones; these, in turn, hidden with ...
— Real Folks • Mrs. A. D. T. Whitney
... directly to the dining-room, but sat on one of the high-backed benches on the platform and began to read the papers. The Unteroffizier looked out and found me fairly buried in them. He returned a little later and saw ...
— The Land of Deepening Shadow - Germany-at-War • D. Thomas Curtin
... was large, and, being lighted only by the great fire that burned upon the hearth and two candles, all this end of it was hid in shadow. Near to the deep window-place the shadow ceased, however, and here, seated in a high-backed oak chair, with the light of the blazing fire falling full upon her, was Cicely Foterell, Sir John's only surviving child. She was a tall and graceful maiden, blue-eyed, brown-haired, fair-skinned, with ...
— The Lady Of Blossholme • H. Rider Haggard
... a yell, hurling himself wildly over the high-backed seats in an effort to catch and hold the legs ere Red could get out. But Larry heard him coming, and quickly clambered down the back of the wagon to the deck of ...
— The Circus Boys Across The Continent • Edgar B. P. Darlington
... one side of the kitchen, with a cold round of beef and other hearty viands upon it, over which two foaming tankards of ale seemed mounting guard. Travellers of inferior order were preparing to attack this stout repast, while others sat smoking and gossiping over their ale on two high-backed oaken settles beside the fire. Trim housemaids were hurrying backwards and forwards under the directions of a fresh bustling landlady, but still seizing an occasional moment to exchange a flippant word and have a rallying laugh with the group ...
— The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, Gent. • Washington Irving
... her in a big chair now, with a high back which peaked over her head and Nancy had another high-backed chair, and Richard standing on the hearth-rug surveyed the two ...
— Mistress Anne • Temple Bailey
... in small recesses made by the high-backed seats, were other students. There was a ...
— Andy at Yale - The Great Quadrangle Mystery • Roy Eliot Stokes
... in all these details at once; for his attention was immediately directed to a high-backed armchair covered in black satin which stood with its back to the door. He stared at this chair; for, peeping out above the back, making a splash of deep golden brown against the black sheen of the upholstery, was a mass of curls... Barbara ...
— Okewood of the Secret Service • Valentine Williams
... sitting in a high-backed easy-chair, facing the fire, when the announcement was made, and therefore Mollett still fancied that he was in the presence of Sir Thomas until he was well into the room and the door was closed upon him; otherwise he might probably have turned ...
— Castle Richmond • Anthony Trollope
... rest. Presently they turned in at some iron gates, and drove down a long approach, bordered with fir trees. At the end of this stood the manor, a solid, comfortable, well-built country house, its rather plain exterior veiled with ivy and creepers. Donovan led her into the hall, where stately old high-backed chairs and a suit or two of old armor were intermixed with modern appliances, fishing tackle, a lawn-tennis box, and a sprinkling of toys, which indicated that there were children ...
— We Two • Edna Lyall
... after their long drive through the cool October evening. A brass lamp of antique design, with perforated shade of the same material, was suspended from the ceiling, and helped illumine this strange apartment. From each end of the mantelpiece an immense high-backed sofa projected into the room, cushioned and padded, and looking as if built into its present position with the house. The walls were covered with odd portraits, whose frames were crumbling in decay, and the window curtains adorned with fairy scenes and mythological figures. The ...
— The Ghost of Guir House • Charles Willing Beale
... gayly enough for Adelaide Howard Hyde when she made her bridal tour to her new home; and cold as she found the aspect of that house, with its formal mahogany chairs, high-backed, and carved in grim festoons and ovals of incessant repetition,—its penitential couch of a sofa, where only the iron spine of a Revolutionary heroine could have found rest,—its pinched, starved, and double-starched portraits of defunct Hydes, Puritanic ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. IV, No. 22, Aug., 1859 • Various
... perhaps twice a year I am invited to tea at the Vicarage, and I sit up straight in a high-backed chair and say 'Yes' and 'No' when I am spoken to, and answer prettily—like a schoolgirl. The vicar's wife would have a fit if I lounged like this," flinging herself back with an air of abandon on the hay. ...
— When the Birds Begin to Sing • Winifred Graham
... from Mrs. Eames made him look up. The farmer's wife had been putting away some of the plates and dishes that had been used at dinner, and in so doing happened to pull aside a large dish leaning on one of the shelves of the high-backed dresser. ...
— Great Uncle Hoot-Toot • Mrs. Molesworth
... falls away until the floor is conveniently up to the height of a wagon's bed; then the road dips again until the porch is on a level with the saddle-stirrups and the women dismount with ease from their high-backed, tasseled side-saddles as they ...
— Sergeant York And His People • Sam Cowan
... as snow. The table was laid for two persons. Amber-colored wine sparkled in a long cut-glass bottle; and a large jug of blue china, with a silver lid, was filled with foaming cider. Near the table, in a high-backed armchair, reclined, fast asleep, a woman of about thirty years of age, her face the very picture of health and freshness. Upon her knees lay a large cat, with her paws folded under her, and her eyes half-closed, purring in ...
— Louise de la Valliere • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... provided for the bedrooms, adding the two quaint sofas and the upright piano and spreading the rugs in an artistic fashion, Ethel managed to make the "parlor part" of the room appear very cosy. The dining corner had a round table and high-backed chairs finished in weathered oak, and when all was in order the effect was not inharmonious. Some inspiration had induced Mr. Merrick to send down a batch of eighteen framed pictures, procured at a bargain but from a reliable dealer. He thought they might "help out," and Ethel knew ...
— Aunt Jane's Nieces at Millville • Edith Van Dyne
... the furniture in 'the White Parlour,' as it is still called, is of historic value and interest. To take but one example. A low, high-backed chair, covered with petit point embroidery, is believed to have been the prie-dieu on which the Princesse de Lamballe knelt during the whole of the night preceding her terrible death. In a document which was sold with the chair in 1830, her servant—who, ...
— From Out the Vasty Deep • Mrs. Belloc Lowndes
... of the world? My world is here, between these walls and the sheet of glass above; here among gilded flagons and dull jewelled arms, tarnished frames and canvasses, black chests and high-backed chairs, quaintly carved and stained in blue ...
— The King In Yellow • Robert W. Chambers
... whence came this same queer name will be told in good time. The parlour suited its name anyway better far than it would that of "drawing-room," which would be given it nowadays. There was a round table in the middle; there were high-backed mahogany chairs against the wall, polished by age and careful rubbing to that stage of dark shininess which makes even mahogany pleasant to the eye, and with seats of flowering silk damask whose texture must have been very good to be so faded without being ...
— "Us" - An Old Fashioned Story • Mary Louisa S. Molesworth
... answer, and, following her, he found that she had entered one of the high-backed, old-fashioned pews, and ...
— Glory of Youth • Temple Bailey
... smouldering log; The keeper fetched the yelping hounds their meat; The hostler whistled in the stalls; anon, With rustling skirt and slumber-freshened cheek, The kerchief'd housemaid tripped from room to room (Sweet Gillian, she that broke the groom his heart), While, wroth within, behind a high-backed chair The withered butler for his master waited, Cursing the cook. ...
— Wyndham Towers • Thomas Bailey Aldrich
... me; but she insisted, and after a while a whole new lot came, made in a hurry with the water not boiling, and I had to gulp down a nasty cup—Ceylon tea, too! I hate Ceylon tea! Mr. Montgomerie warmed himself before the fire, quite shielding it from us, who shivered on a row of high-backed chairs beyond the ...
— Red Hair • Elinor Glyn
... finally succeeded in doing over the dining room. Over the old walnut paneling she had hung loose folds of faded blue Italian velvet, with old silver candle sconces at irregular intervals along the walls. The great table and high-backed chairs were likewise Italian, and the old-fashioned white marble fireplace had been given an over-mantel, also white, enclosing an old tapestry. For warmth of color there were always flowers, and that ...
— A Poor Wise Man • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... heard the door burst open. He heard some one approaching on the jump. With a spring he concealed himself behind a high-backed ...
— Frank Merriwell's Pursuit - How to Win • Burt L. Standish
... Bates, who, from the high-backed plush rocker, rapped with the blue glass paperweight on the red glass lamp and, in the absence of Mr. Bates, called the meeting to order. The Old Trail Town Society was organized on a platform of "membership unlimited, dues nothing ...
— Christmas - A Story • Zona Gale
... was as she had expected. Mason stood majestically over the tea-table; James, his satellite, approached with a tray of cakes and sandwiches; Aunt Maria sat waiting in her high-backed chair—so far all was just as she had planned; what she was all unprepared for, however, was the presence of three youthful visitors, two girls and a youth, who sat facing the door, staring at ...
— A College Girl • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... Mosby. As he stood waiting in the cool, high-ceilinged hall, he was struck by the quiet of the place. It had an air of waiting. What for? There was a high walnut hat-rack with a mirror and a marble slab with a card tray on it, and two high-backed chairs, likewise black walnut and elaborately carved and atrocious, and in the dim recesses of the stair a horsehair sofa, all just as they had been for years. They were mute but they seemed expectant. What could they be waiting for? They were on the outside edge of things—where life was ...
— Stubble • George Looms
... interstices of shingle and clapboard, on some creeping vine, they unexpectedly burst and bourgeoned on the walls like banners; or later, when they rotted in brown heaps in corners, outlined the edges of the floor with a thin yellow border, or invaded the ranks of the high-backed benches which ...
— A Protegee of Jack Hamlin's and Other Stories • Bret Harte
... conclave. His heart and soul were in this new land and her advancement, but his wife demanded his company most of his evenings. She sat in her high-backed chair wrapped in furs listening to his reading aloud or appearing to, though she often drowsed off. But there was another who drank in every word, if she did not quite understand. The wide stone ...
— A Little Girl in Old Quebec • Amanda Millie Douglas
... a private hall for the ladies and the nobly born; but the common assembly-room was invariably chosen by all those who were not accompanied by ladies. The huge fireplace, with high-backed benches jutting out from each side of it, the quaint, heavy bowlegged tables and chairs, the liberality of lights, the continuous coming and going of the brilliantly uniformed officers stationed at Fort Louis, the silks and satins of the nobles, the soberer woolens of the burghers and seamen, ...
— The Grey Cloak • Harold MacGrath
... lord, to any poor attainments that your servant may possess. Such as they are, they will always be at my lord's service," replied Leoni, and he slowly resumed his seat in the high-backed chair, in obedience to a commanding gesture from ...
— The King's Esquires - The Jewel of France • George Manville Fenn
... long Venetian glass, and afterwards sank gratefully into the high-backed chair to which she motioned him. At her request he told her everything which had happened since the coming of Reist to London. And from below there came to them often the murmur ...
— The Traitors • E. Phillips (Edward Phillips) Oppenheim
... stood waiting while I crossed the floor to the window and threw it open. Her first glance flashed to the mantel and its adjacent wainscoting; then, finding everything satisfactory in that direction, it flew over the desolate walls and stiff, high-backed chairs, till it rested on the bare four-poster, denuded of ...
— The Forsaken Inn - A Novel • Anna Katharine Green
... sidled into the parlor before a rather awful wave of the ebony stick, and sat down on the edge of a chair near the door. Mrs. Tree crossed the room to her own high-backed armchair, took her seat deliberately, put her feet on the crimson hassock, and leaned forward, resting her hands on the crutch-top of her stick, and her chin on her hands. In this attitude she looked more elfin than human, and the light that danced in her black eyes was not ...
— Mrs. Tree • Laura E. Richards
... fitting some corner of his apartment; and he is very eloquent in praise of an ancient elbow-chair, from which he takes occasion to digress into a censure on modern chairs, as having degenerated from the dignity and comfort of high-backed antiquity. ...
— Bracebridge Hall, or The Humorists • Washington Irving |
