"Imperceptibly" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... passed imperceptibly to more personal matters. Elaine, keeping to her resolve of the morning, led it in that direction. He learnt that she was an orphan; that her nearest relatives were entirely out of sympathy with her ideas and aspirations, and profoundly distasteful to her; that she took full pride in her independence ...
— Swirling Waters • Max Rittenberg
... manner that betrayed weariness, and looked out upon the ever-turning landscape, he murmured to his wife, "I haven't a doubt in my mind," and nodded significantly at the preoccupied little shape in his arms. His manner with the child was imperceptibly adroit, and very soon her prattle began to be heard. Mary was just turning to offer a gentle check to this rising volubility, when up jumped the little one to a standing posture on the gentleman's knee, and, all unsolicited and with silent ...
— Dr. Sevier • George W. Cable
... I do not know anything which relieves the mind so much from the sullens as trifling discussion about antiquarian old-womanries. It is like knitting a stocking, diverting the mind without occupying it; or it is like, by Our Lady, a mill-dam, which leads one's thoughts gently and imperceptibly out of the channel in which they are chafing and boiling. To be sure, it is only conducting them to turn a child's mill; what signifies that?—the diversion is a relief, though the object is of little importance. I cannot ...
— The Journal of Sir Walter Scott - From the Original Manuscript at Abbotsford • Walter Scott
... to him natural. Indeed, as they turned into Mill Street it occurred to him that Jeff might be providing solitude and a fitting place to talk. As they went down the old street, unchanged even to the hollows worn under foot in the course of the years, something stole over them and softened imperceptibly the harsh moment. There was Ma'am Fowler's where they used to come to buy doughnuts. There was the house where the crippled boy lived, and sat at the window waving signals to the other boys as they went past. At the same window a man sat now. Jeff was pretty ...
— The Prisoner • Alice Brown
... character asserted itself. Passing the sleeve of his uniform over his face he pulled himself together, His truculent glance turned slowly here and there, checked the noise where it fell; and the stiff body of the late Senor Hirsch, merchant, after swaying imperceptibly, made a half turn, and came to a rest in the midst of awed murmurs ...
— Nostromo: A Tale of the Seaboard • Joseph Conrad
... soothing to her dull senses that she ceased to perceive with them, and so passed into the possession of her farther faculty for blissful moments. She fancied the sea was as she best loved to have it, her favourite sea, with tiny wavelets bringing the tide in imperceptibly over the rocks, and the long stretch of water beyond heaving gently up to the horizon, with smooth unruffled surface shining in the sun. When she had done her work she fared forth to the sea, to sit by it, and feel the healthy happy ...
— The Beth Book - Being a Study of the Life of Elizabeth Caldwell Maclure, a Woman of Genius • Sarah Grand
... eyebrows almost imperceptibly and darted a keen, sidelong glance at Leonora. She had not heard her sister's last remark, the name of Torquato Tasso had obliterated the present and she was gazing dreamily at the ...
— Romance of Roman Villas - (The Renaissance) • Elizabeth W. (Elizbeth Williams) Champney
... of days on the road,—our lives imperceptibly growing into a closer and more intimate companionship as the days ambled slowly away with the bleak snow-clad mountains that we left behind.... Descending down the slopes into a fertile valley, the hillsides terraced ...
— Rescuing the Czar - Two authentic Diaries arranged and translated • James P. Smythe
... been bubbling under the hedge all along the hillside, begins, now that we have mounted the eminence and are imperceptibly descending, to deviate into a capricious variety of clear deep pools and channels, so narrow and so choked with weeds, that a child might overstep them. The hedge has also changed its character. It is no longer the close compact vegetable wall of hawthorn, ...
— Our Village • Mary Russell Mitford
... at him haughtily, sitting up very straight; he continued beside her in silence, face in his hands as though overwhelmed. Nothing was said for several minutes—until the clear disdain of her gaze changed, imperceptibly; and the rigidity of her ...
— The Gay Rebellion • Robert W. Chambers
... development of industry. This wrought a thoroughgoing change in the whole situation,—a change which reached its final act, achieved its legal acceptance, in the French Revolution of 1789, but which had in point of fact for three hundred years been imperceptibly advancing ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. X. • Kuno Francke
... softly in his cool arms, dandles him, kisses Him, flatters him, wooes him imperceptibly onwards. Now he is far from shore, and the multitudinous feet of the current are hurrying him away. The slow-moving boat is much nearer than it was a minute ago,—seems to be rasping towards him, in spite of the ...
— Idolatry - A Romance • Julian Hawthorne
... and Hydrocyanic Acid.—A plant bearing one leaf was introduced into a large bottle with a drachm (3.549 ml.) of chloroform, the mouth being imperfectly closed with cotton-wool. The vapour caused in 1 m. the lobes to begin moving at an imperceptibly slow rate; but in 3 m. the spikes crossed, and the leaf was soon completely shut. The dose, however, was much too large, for in between 2 and 3 hrs. the leaf appeared as if burnt, and ...
— Insectivorous Plants • Charles Darwin
... with a genius for it. It flourishes in the shade—like the Helmet-Flower.... But the sun in this Western Hemisphere of ours is devilish hot. It's gradually killing off our local tyrants—slowly, almost imperceptibly but inexorably, killing 'em off.... Of course, there are plenty still alive—tyrants of every degree born to the business of tyranny and making ...
— Barbarians • Robert W. Chambers
... pretensions of poetical fiction, had enfeebled and perverted our eye for nature. The study of the fine arts, which came into fashion about forty years ago, and was then first considered as a polite accomplishment, would tend imperceptibly to restore it. Painting is essentially an imitative art; it cannot subsist for a moment on empty generalities: the critic, therefore, who had been used to this sort of substantial entertainment, would be disposed to read poetry with the eye of ...
— The Spirit of the Age - Contemporary Portraits • William Hazlitt
... 0, says he, "there is good reason for this." What is the good reason? Why "if we will not consent to do anything ourselves ", "our money will be taken from us without our consent." This is conclusive argument indeed. And then he, as it were, imperceptibly glides into that which has ever appeared to be his favorite topick, however impertinent to the present point, viz, an independent support for the governor. He boldly affirms, what is a notorious untruth, that "we are unwilling to pay his Majesty's ...
— The Writings of Samuel Adams, volume II (1770 - 1773) - collected and edited by Harry Alonso Cushing • Samuel Adams
... Slowly, almost imperceptibly at first, the wrist began to turn from McRae. Sweat beads gathered on West's face. He fought furiously to hold his own. But the ...
— Man Size • William MacLeod Raine
... her left shoulder. A dreamy, tender light came into her eyes, and her rosy fingers sought the strings of her lute—strings of gold. Would she sing? Just then one of the maidens approached her, lisped musically into her ear, and pointed to the approaching knight. Almost imperceptibly, but oh, so graciously, the lips of the vision moved. As if in obedience to a command, the maiden approached, and said in rhythmical cadence: "Greetings, Sir Knight, from Dame Venus, who sends you message that all who love gaming and fair women are welcome at ...
— A Book of Operas - Their Histories, Their Plots, and Their Music • Henry Edward Krehbiel
... beautiful creature, and anxious to secure her to myself, I spread the blanket of friendship to the wind[B], and paddled my canoe towards her. As I came near her, I could perceive a strange alteration in her appearance. Her shape gradually altered, her arms imperceptibly disappeared, her complexion assumed a different hue, her cheek no more glowed with life, her eyes had lost their brilliancy, her before glittering locks glittered no longer, and, when I came to the ...
— Traditions of the North American Indians, Vol. 2 (of 3) • James Athearn Jones
... the moonlight lay across the flat, rolling prairie almost like a pathway of molten silver. On either side of the brilliant stretch the light merged gradually and imperceptibly into shadows—shadows which yet held a curious, half-luminous quality, giving a sense of shifting horizons and lending a touch of mystery to the vague distances which ...
— Shoe-Bar Stratton • Joseph Bushnell Ames
... Republic, its roots were bedded in the soil of a racial empire, to a larger vision of which Augusta Maturin clung: an empire of Anglo-Saxon tradition which, despite disagreements and conflicts—nay, through them—developed imperceptibly toward a sublimer union, founded not on dominion, but on justice and right. She spoke of the England she had visited on her wedding journey, of the landmarks and literature that also through generations have been American birthrights; and of that righteous ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... drew down the upturned sleeves of his black doublet. "All but dead," he answered. "The wonder is that any spark of life should still linger in a body with that hole in it. He is bleeding inwardly, and his pulse is steadily weakening. It must continue so until imperceptibly he passes away. You may count him dead already, Sir John." He paused. "A merciful, painless end," he added, and sighed perfunctorily, his pale shaven face decently grave, for all that such scenes ...
— The Sea-Hawk • Raphael Sabatini
... contour had not sloped upward to a cap. How, then, did we come to find ourselves in a depression? Did the grass shift like the sea it resembled? Or—incredible thought—had our weight caused us to sink imperceptibly into a ...
— Greener Than You Think • Ward Moore
... Stanton paused imperceptibly before answering, while his ultrafast mind considered the problem before arriving at a decision. Just how much confidence should he show the colonel? Mannheim was a man with tremendous confidence in his own abilities, but who was nevertheless capable of recognizing that there were ...
— Anything You Can Do ... • Gordon Randall Garrett
... turned at once the polarity of the compass needle: and so, perhaps, now and then, but as rarely, a violent motive may revolutionize a man's opinions and professions. But more frequently his honesty dies away imperceptibly from evening into twilight, and from twilight into utter darkness. He turns hypocrite so gradually, and by such tiny atoms of motion, that by the time he has arrived at a given point, he forgets his own hypocrisy in the imperceptible degrees of his conversion. The difference between ...
— Literary Remains (1) • Coleridge
... scintillating crystal her blue gaze plunged; and for a few moments she saw nothing. Then, almost imperceptibly, faint hues and rainbow tints grew in the brilliant and transparent sphere—gathered, took shape as she watched, became coherent and logical and clear ...
— Athalie • Robert W. Chambers
... imperceptibly in Disko's hands. A few seconds later a hissing wave-top slashed diagonally across the boat, smote Uncle Salters between the shoulders, and drenched him from head to foot. He rose sputtering, and went forward ...
— "Captains Courageous" • Rudyard Kipling
... his queer sedulous life, month after month, year after year, known among the studios as a quaint oddity, drawn out indulgently by the men, somewhat petted, monkey-fashion, by the women, forgotten by both when out of their presence, but developing imperceptibly day by day along the self-centring line. A kindly adviser suggested a gymnasium to keep him in condition for professional purposes. He took the advice, and in the course of time became a splendid young animal, a being so physically perfect as to be what ...
— The Fortunate Youth • William J. Locke
... must become the serfs of the land [65]. The more formidable warriors are mostly slain, or exiled, or conciliated by some remains of authority and possessions; the multitude remain the labourers of the soil, and slight alterations of law will imperceptibly convert the labourer into the slave. The earliest slaves appear chiefly to have been the agricultural population. If the possession of the government were acquited by colonizers [66],— not so much ...
— Athens: Its Rise and Fall, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... than the Giants, and with the term were bound up notions of sorcery and unholy power. But mythology is a woof of many colours, in which the hues are shot and blended, so that the various races of supernatural beings are shaded off, and fade away almost imperceptibly into each other; and thus, even in heathen times, it must have been hard to say exactly where the Giant ended and the Troll began. But when Christianity came in, and heathendom fell; when the godlike race of the Aesir became evil demons instead ...
— Popular Tales from the Norse • Sir George Webbe Dasent
... long tea-tables, with their rows of faces all turned deferentially towards him; the shadows slanting from the trees; the still expanse of the bay, and far across the bay a bank of clouds softly, imperceptibly marshalling. ...
— Corporal Sam and Other Stories • A. T. Quiller-Couch
... blowing from over the lingering Canadian snow-banks could not touch him, and he had the full benefit of the sun as it veered imperceptibly south from east. He lay there basking in it like some little animal which had crawled out from its winter nest. Before him stretched the fields, all flushed with young green. On the side of a gentle hill ...
— Jerome, A Poor Man - A Novel • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... gentleman went through a little piece of vehemence by himself, and got very tenor indeed, in the excitement of his feelings, to which the tall lady responded in a similar manner; then the small gentleman had a shake or two, after which the tall lady had the same, and then they both merged imperceptibly into the original air: and the band wound themselves up to a pitch of fury, and the small gentleman handed the tall lady out, and the ...
— Sketches by Boz - illustrative of everyday life and every-day people • Charles Dickens
... will form a saving-bank of genius, to which it may have recourse, as a wealth which it can accumulate imperceptibly amidst the ordinary expenditure. LOCKE taught us the first rudiments of this art, when he showed us how he stored his thoughts and his facts, by an artificial arrangement; and Addison, before he commenced his ...
— Literary Character of Men of Genius - Drawn from Their Own Feelings and Confessions • Isaac D'Israeli
... subjects—with the coming and going of artists and men of letters to her court, and the resuming of all those ancient Cyprian customs that might minister to the content of the nobles—whom it was ever most needful to satisfy with a sufficient show of gaiety—there had nevertheless been an imperceptibly increasing tightening of the threads of government which stretched far across the waters to Venice's own blue Adriatic, into the very Council-Chambers of the Palazzo ...
— The Royal Pawn of Venice - A Romance of Cyprus • Mrs. Lawrence Turnbull
... favour of worms, it should be hinted that green corn, plants, and flowers, are not so much injured by them as by many species of coleoptera (scarabs), and tipuloe (long-legs) in their larva, or grub-state, and by unnoticed myriads of small shell-less snails, called slugs, which silently and imperceptibly make amazing havoc in the field ...
— The Natural History of Selborne, Vol. 2 • Gilbert White
... to the mist he wondered. It had come to this, then—that he did not know whether Hermione and he were any longer friends. Almost imperceptibly, with movement so minute that it had seemed like immobility, they had been drifting apart through these days and nights of the summer. And now abruptly the ...
— A Spirit in Prison • Robert Hichens
... had never found Grosse so bearish and difficult before this visit to Como. As a rule Edmund was suavity itself, but this time even his gift of gently, almost imperceptibly, making every woman feel him to be her admirer was failing. How often he had been the life of any party in any class of society, and that not by starting amusements, not by any power of initiation, but by a gift for making others feel pleased, first with themselves, and consequently with life. ...
— Great Possessions • Mrs. Wilfrid Ward
... microscopic, molecular, subatomic. mere, simple, sheer, stark, bare; near run. dull, petty, shallow, stolid, ungifted, unintelligent. Adv. to a small extent [in a small degree], on a small scale; a little bit, a wee bit; slightly &c adj.; imperceptibly; miserably, wretchedly; insufficiently &c 640; imperfectly; faintly &c 160; passably, pretty well, well enough. [in a certain or limited degree] partially, in part; in a certain degree, to a certain ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... deliberately; "that is so, precisely. We will take no risks; we give our labour and in return the workman must live. Make the consumer pay, or pay yourselves out of your good years"—he turned imperceptibly towards the barrack-like house on the hill. "We don't care a ha'porth which it is!—only don't you come on the man who risks his life, and works like a galley-slave five days a week for a pittance of five-and-twenty shillings, or thereabouts, to pay—for he ...
— Sir George Tressady, Vol. I • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... too, that although the animal disguises were too transparent to endure a moment's reflection, yet that they were so gracefully worn that such moment's reflection was not to be come at without an effort. Our imagination following the costume did imperceptibly betray our judgment; we admired the human intellect, the ever ready prompt sagacity and presence of mind. We delighted in the satire on the foolishnesses and greedinesses of our own fellow mankind; but in our regard for the hero we forgot his humanity wherever it was his ...
— Froude's Essays in Literature and History - With Introduction by Hilaire Belloc • James Froude
... never uttered an oath in their lives while in the "States," now clothe themselves with curses as with a garment. Some try to excuse themselves by saying that it is a careless habit, into which they have glided imperceptibly from having been compelled to associate so long with the vulgar and the profane; that it is a mere slip of the tongue, which means absolutely nothing; etc. I am willing to believe this, and to think as charitably as possible of many persons here, who have unconsciously adopted a custom ...
— The Shirley Letters from California Mines in 1851-52 • Louise Amelia Knapp Smith Clappe
... was almost imperceptibly approaching their knoll, but so slowly that Ruth almost doubted if ...
— In the Quarter • Robert W. Chambers
... great change in my officers and troops; they had fallen into my ways and obeyed every order with alacrity. They had learned to place thorough reliance upon any plans that were arranged; and, now that they knew the necessity of obedience and discipline, they had, imperceptibly to themselves, changed from ruffians into very ...
— Ismailia • Samuel W. Baker
... cliffs of Culver at the extremity of the bay on the left, and the long range of cliffs of every hue and colour gradually declining in height as the eye glances along to the cottages of Sandown, and then again imperceptibly rising to their highest point ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 20, - Issue 570, October 13, 1832 • Various
... is generally sufficient, to tow the ships' heads in opposite directions. I scarcely know why this should have the effect, but certainly it appears that, be the calm ever so complete, or dead, as the term is, a vessel generally forges ahead, or steals along imperceptibly in the direction she is looking to; possibly from the conformation ...
— The Lieutenant and Commander - Being Autobigraphical Sketches of His Own Career, from - Fragments of Voyages and Travels • Basil Hall
... going to breakfast. They dined at one, and had a combined tea and supper at seven o'clock. At nine o'clock they went to bed. Before two months had passed away, everything went on like clockwork. One day passed away so like another, that the time flew imperceptibly, and they wondered that the Sundays came round so quick. They had now time to unpack everything, and the books which Mrs Campbell had selected and brought with her had been arranged on shelves in the parlour; ...
— The Settlers in Canada • Frederick Marryat
... as may be, between the federal Powers vested in Congress and the distinct Sovereignty of the several States upon which the private & personal Rights of the Citizens depend. Without such Distinction there will be Danger of the Constitution issuing imperceptibly and gradually into a consolidated Government over all the States; which, altho it may be wished for by some was reprobated in the Idea by the highest Advocates for the Constitution as it stood without Amendmts. I am fully persuaded that the population of the U S livg in different ...
— The Original Writings of Samuel Adams, Volume 4 • Samuel Adams
... end; and it was thought that if the bosom of the actual incumbent could be scrutinized, no little complacency in Swedish victories over the Faith's defenders would be found. An atmosphere of toleration was diffusing itself, bigotry was imperceptibly getting old-fashioned, the most illustrious victim of the Inquisition was to be well-nigh the last. If the noble and the serious could not be permitted, there was no ban upon the amiable and the frivolous: never had the land ...
— Life of John Milton • Richard Garnett
... few dreadful moments. Warren looked at the child without a flicker of change in his impassive look; George bit his lip, and almost imperceptibly shook his head. And in their faces Rachael read the death ...
— The Heart of Rachael • Kathleen Norris
... register except when the hook is moved slowly; or if the switchboard is one where the operator is signalled by a little disk which falls over a blank space the disk fails to move down but remains quivering almost imperceptibly in its ...
— The Book of Business Etiquette • Nella Henney
... seemed to slumber; only in her lips was any trace of the alertness that governed her brain, and those scarlet petals, which seemed to have been plucked from a love flower in the garden of passion, slowly, almost imperceptibly parted, until the dazzling teeth gleamed through in a smile that none might yet determine whether soft or terrible. And as the seconds heaped suspense upon suspense, the overbold Caliban was seized with a choking fear that he was ...
— The Pirate Woman • Aylward Edward Dingle
... looked around we saw that almost imperceptibly we had entered the new canyon and at this camp (33) we were fairly within the embrace of its rugged cliffs which, devoid of all vegetation, rose up four hundred feet, sombre in colour, but picturesque from ...
— A Canyon Voyage • Frederick S. Dellenbaugh
... desert. At sunset they camped under the lee of a low mesa. Cameron was glad his comrade had the Indian habit of silence. Another day's travel found the prospectors deep in the wilderness. Then there came a breaking of reserve, noticeable in the elder man, almost imperceptibly gradual in Cameron. Beside the meager mesquite campfire this gray-faced, thoughtful old prospector would remove his black pipe from his mouth to talk a little; and Cameron would listen, and sometimes unlock his lips to speak a word. And so, as Cameron began ...
— Desert Gold • Zane Grey
... perpetually engaged in, apparently, an unmethodical but extremely minute and critical inspection of the rhachis and the nerves or ribs of the leaf. Days pass. The ants are there all the time, examining the leaf and communicating with each other whensoever they meet. Imperceptibly the leaf begins to curl. The ants continue to make mesmeric passes over the ...
— The Confessions of a Beachcomber • E J Banfield
... of the spoken word, and the people of the word became a "people of the book." To THE BOOK were added in course of time THE BOOKS; the former was formally and solemnly introduced in two successive acts, the latter acquired imperceptibly a similar public authority for the Jewish church. The notion of the canon proceeds entirely from that of the written Torah; the prophets and the hagiographa are also called Torah by the Jews, ...
— Prolegomena to the History of Israel • Julius Wellhausen
... untie the sleeves or armlets, as is here described, is therefore to expose the shoulders, but not the back—a simple device, quickly accomplished, by which the magician could readily exercise his art almost imperceptibly to ...
— The Myth of Hiawatha, and Other Oral Legends, Mythologic and Allegoric, of the North American Indians • Henry R. Schoolcraft
... let his cigar burn out. He looked steadfastly at this strange little figure whose chair had imperceptibly moved a ...
— The Vanished Messenger • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... and looked down the long road which wound up from the valley and lost itself now and again in the land waves. Miles away she could see a little cloud of dust travelling behind the microscopic stage, which moved toward her almost as imperceptibly as the minute-hand of a clock. A bronco was descending the hill trail from the Flagstaff mine, and its rider announced his coming with song in ...
— Mavericks • William MacLeod Raine
... own, spread through my soul a delicious, all-pervading sense of uninterrupted happiness. No man, however rough, could thus associate with a delicate and refined woman without acquiring some of the elegance which distinguished her. I imperceptibly lost the clownish air which had so often bitterly mortified me; and as my perceptions became more acute I saw in my own manners all that could render me repulsive, and hastened ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Vol. 3, July, 1851 • Various
... get to work again, and is a good man. No wireless calls to-night, as there is a temporary breakdown—condenser jar broken. There is a very faint display of aurora in northern sky. It comes and goes almost imperceptibly, a most fascinating sight. The temperature is -20 Fahr.; 52 of frost is much too cold to allow one to stand ...
— South! • Sir Ernest Shackleton
... baskets on their backs, walking in silhouette along the ridges, the people that Sheila loved and tried to help; and were not these crofters' cottages with thatched roofs, like beehives, blending almost imperceptibly with the landscape, the dwellings into which she planned to introduce the luxury of windows; and were not these Standing Stones of Callernish, huge tombstones of a vanished religion, the roofless temple from which the ...
— Little Rivers - A Book Of Essays In Profitable Idleness • Henry van Dyke
... racket that there would be over the liquor in France; the talk is as sober as a money-lender's extempore speech; countenances flush, like the faces of the brides in frescoes by Cornelius or Schnorr (imperceptibly, that is to say), and reminiscences are poured out slowly while the smoke puffs ...
— Cousin Pons • Honore de Balzac
... deg., or it may be to 35 deg. or 30 deg.. What may naturally follow less than a deeper sleep? Is it not natural that the sleep so profound shall stop the laboring heart? Certainly. The great narcotic never travels without fastening on some victims in this wise, removing them, imperceptibly to themselves, into sleep ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 829, November 21, 1891 • Various
... regeneration began in Roaring Camp. Almost imperceptibly a change came over the settlement. The cabin assigned to "Tommy Luck"—or "The Luck," as he was more frequently called—first showed signs of improvement. It was kept scrupulously clean and whitewashed. Then it was boarded, ...
— The Luck of Roaring Camp and Other Tales • Bret Harte
... which soon made him a remarkable power, not only in his own college, but among the finer spirits of the University generally. He had the gift which enables a man, sitting perhaps after dinner in a mixed society of his college contemporaries, to lead the way imperceptibly from the casual subjects of the hour—the river, the dons, the schools—to arguments "of great pith and moment," discussions that search the moral and intellectual powers of the men concerned to the utmost, without exciting distrust or any but an argumentative opposition, Edward ...
— Marcella • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... from within, her features grew plain to Casanova's vision. A smile flitted across her face. Her arms fell to her sides; her lips moved strangely, as if whispering a prayer; once more she looked searchingly across the garden, then nodded almost imperceptibly, and at the instant someone who must hitherto have been crouching at her feet swung across the sill into the open. It was Lorenzi. He flew rather than walked across the gravel into the alley, which he crossed barely ten yards from Casanova, who held his breath as he lay behind the bench. Lorenzi, ...
— Casanova's Homecoming • Arthur Schnitzler
... augment the influence of the crown, as well as the authority and power of a military jurisdiction. All the articles of war established since the reign of Charles II., were submitted to the inspection of the commons; and in these appeared a gradual spirit of encroachment, almost imperceptibly deviating from the civil institutes of the English constitution, towards the establishment of a military dominion. By this new bill a power was vested in any commander-in-chief, to revise and correct any legal sentence of a court-martial, ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.II. - From William and Mary to George II. • Tobias Smollett
... enough for the warm heart of Delvile, not only to restore peace, but to awaken rapture. He was almost as wild with delight, as he had before been with apprehension, and poured forth his acknowledgments with so much fervour of gratitude, that Cecilia imperceptibly grew reconciled to herself, and before she missed her dejection, ...
— Cecilia vol. 3 - Memoirs of an Heiress • Frances (Fanny) Burney (Madame d'Arblay)
... and no geese or swans came to the blind. There was nothing for them to do except to talk together or sit dozing in the sun. And, imperceptibly, between them the elements of a pretty intimacy unfolded like spring buds on unfamiliar branches; but what they might develop into he did not know, and she ...
— Blue-Bird Weather • Robert W. Chambers
... she wore a poinsettia, whose peculiarly vivid red brought out the warm browns of her skin and hair. She had a superb neck and shoulders and bust, and the skin of her body was a delicate honey color that melted imperceptibly into the deeper tones of her ...
— The Sisters-In-Law • Gertrude Atherton
... thickened—the habitations no longer crowded the way-side, and we appeared to be entering a district, that was altogether less populous and affluent than the one we had left, but which was always neat, picturesque, and having an air of comfort. We were gradually, but almost imperceptibly ascending. ...
— A Residence in France - With An Excursion Up The Rhine, And A Second Visit To Switzerland • J. Fenimore Cooper
... imperceptibly made a sign of the holy cross with his hand which he held at his breast, as though he was about to leap from a sinking ship into a ...
— In Desert and Wilderness • Henryk Sienkiewicz
... the night seemed interminable; but at length his anxious eyes were gladdened by the appearance of a faint paling of the sky low down on the horizon in the eastern quarter. Gradually and imperceptibly the pallor spread right, left, and upward toward the zenith, until a broad arch of it lay stretched along the horizon, within the limits of which the stars one after another dwindled in brightness and presently disappeared. ...
— Dick Leslie's Luck - A Story of Shipwreck and Adventure • Harry Collingwood
... She imperceptibly crept closer, and he wrapped round them both a large piece of sail-cloth, which was sometimes used to keep the sun off the milk-cans. Tess held it from slipping off him as well as ...
— Tess of the d'Urbervilles - A Pure Woman • Thomas Hardy
... the three heads were bent eagerly forward watching for symptoms of returning life. Corrie was right. The seaman's left eye quivered for a moment, causing the hearts of the three children to beat high with hope. Presently the other eye also quivered; then the broad chest rose almost imperceptibly, and a faint sigh came feebly and broken ...
— Gascoyne, the Sandal-Wood Trader • R.M. Ballantyne
... the sea; but now it was far below us, and the footprints of the wind were marked on it, and it was not one blue, but a thousand blues, and it faded imperceptibly into the sky. The sail, making Mentone, was much nearer, and had developed into a two-masted ship. It seemed to be pushed, rather than blown, along by the wind. It seemed to have rigidity in all its parts, and to be sliding unwillingly over a vast slate. The road lay through craggy ...
— Sacred And Profane Love • E. Arnold Bennett
... professional schools of this kind are easily classified by virtue of their administrative relations, but in our own country the different orders of pedagogical training merge into each other almost imperceptibly because they are all based upon the same fundamental conception of the ...
— Final Report of the Louisiana Purchase Exposition Commission • Louisiana Purchase Exposition Commission
... they came out of every stream down which a scow could be thrust at flood-time; from tiny settlements far back among the hills; from those bustling sinks of iniquity, the river towns. But now, surely, yet almost imperceptibly, their commerce was slipping from them. At all the landings they were being elbowed by the newcomers—men who wore brass buttons and gold braid, and shiny leather shoes instead of moccasins; men with ...
— The Prodigal Judge • Vaughan Kester
... agreed.'[17] But when a party has once come into existence its fortunes depend upon facts of human nature of which deliberate thought is only one. It is primarily a name, which, like other names, calls up when it is heard or seen an 'image' that shades imperceptibly into the voluntary realisation of its meaning. As in other cases, emotional reactions can be set up by the name and its automatic mental associations. It is the business of the party managers to secure that these ...
— Human Nature In Politics - Third Edition • Graham Wallas
... is the case with all great inventions, its full significance was not at first understood. Silently and almost imperceptibly it paved the way for a social and political revolution. The gradual diffusion of knowledge among the people prepared them for the contemplation of a new social order. They began to think, to question and to doubt, and thenceforth the power ...
— The Spirit of American Government - A Study Of The Constitution: Its Origin, Influence And - Relation To Democracy • J. Allen Smith
... slightly, almost imperceptibly. "I will make no promises," said he. But still he spoke more to himself than ...
— Laicus - The experiences of a Layman in a Country Parish • Lyman Abbott
... sedative to his ambition. Nick's inferiority in age to his cousin sat on him more lightly than when they had been in their teens; and indeed no one can very well be much older than a young man who has figured for a year, however imperceptibly, in the House of Commons. Separation and diversity had made them reciprocally strange enough to give a price to what they shared; they were friends without being particular friends; that further degree could always hang before them as a suitable but not oppressive contingency, ...
— The Tragic Muse • Henry James
... tumultuously down in a beautiful cascade into a deep chasm of marble rocks. This fall of their sacred stream the people call the 'Dhuandhar', or 'the smoky fall', from the thick vapour which is always seen rising from it in the morning. From below, the river glides quietly and imperceptibly for a mile and a half along a deep, and, according to popular belief, a fathomless channel of from ten to fifty yards wide, with snow-white marble rocks rising perpendicularly on either side from a hundred to a hundred and ...
— Rambles and Recollections of an Indian Official • William Sleeman
... of superficial anatomy are to show, first, the form and proportions of the human body and, second, the surface landmarks which correspond to deeper structures hidden from view. This study blends imperceptibly with others, such as physical anthropology, physiognomy, phrenology and palmistry, but whereas these deal chiefly with variations, superficial anatomy is concerned with ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia
... everywhere visible, though unobtrusive. Arch beyond arch, to fourth apartments, lessening in dimension, with increase of wealth;— groups of beautiful women, on either hand, seated or half reclined; the pure or rich hues of their robes blending imperceptibly, or in gorgeous contrasts, with the soft outlines and colors of their supports; a banquet for the eyes and the mind; the perfect work of art and culture;—gliding about and among these, or, with others, springing and revolving in that monarch of all measures, which blends luxury and purity, ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 2, Number 9, July, 1858 • Various
... This terrible moment of my existence is everlastingly present to my soul; and I can contemplate it only in a doubting glance, with humility and contrition. My friend, he who carelessly takes a step out of the straight path, is imperceptibly impelled into another course, in which he will be deluded farther and farther astray. For him in vain the pole-star twinkles in the heavens; there is no choice for him; he must slide down the declivity, and offer himself ...
— Peter Schlemihl • Adelbert von Chamisso
... you. You have passed in two hours from the Arctic circle to the Tropics—from Lapland to Cuba. The snow-crested mountains are still in sight, and seem in the clear atmosphere to be very near you even when forty or fifty miles distant, but you are traversing a spacious plain which slopes imperceptibly to the Po, and is matched by one nearly as level on the other side. This great plain of upper Italy, with the Po in its center, commences at the foot of the lower Alps very near the Mediterranean, far west of Turin and of Genoa, and stretches across ...
— Glances at Europe - In a Series of Letters from Great Britain, France, Italy, - Switzerland, &c. During the Summer of 1851. • Horace Greeley
... duty of a good sauce," says the editor of the Almanach des Gourmands (vol. v. page 6), "to insinuate itself all round and about the maxillary gland, and imperceptibly awaken into activity each ramification of the organs of taste: if not sufficiently savoury, it cannot produce this effect, and if too piquante, it will paralyze, instead of exciting, those delicious titillations of tongue and vibrations of palate, that only the most accomplished philosophers ...
— The Cook's Oracle; and Housekeeper's Manual • William Kitchiner
... evening of Tuesday, the twenty-fourth of February, just as the silver-toned bells on the Russian warships were telling the hour of five, the anchor of the Moltke was drawn up and the vessel almost imperceptibly moved around and headed for the narrow outlet between the breakwaters. As we slowly steamed away from the Russian vessels, our band played the Russian national hymn and the Russian flag was elevated to the top of the Moltke's mast in a farewell salutation. Immediately the crowds of Russian ...
— A Trip to the Orient - The Story of a Mediterranean Cruise • Robert Urie Jacob
... praying in Latin. He made no special noise nor movement, but after a while I saw the sweat stand out on his forehead and his face was drawn and pale—and grew paler. Every now and then he'd give a sort of deep sigh and hitch along, almost imperceptibly, on his knees, from fatigue and nervous tension, and after about ten minutes he was almost in the fireplace. With anybody else I could never have stood it, but it was impossible not to respect Father Kelly, and I can tell you that whatever ...
— The Strange Cases of Dr. Stanchon • Josephine Daskam Bacon
... the Doctors of my youth. By no sudden wrench, no violent transition, but gently, gradually, imperceptibly, the type has transformed itself into that which we behold to-day. No doubt an inward continuity has been maintained, but the visible phenomena are so radically altered as to suggest to the superficial observer the idea of a new creation; and even we, who, as ...
— Fifteen Chapters of Autobiography • George William Erskine Russell
... it they allow it to remain unbent, for otherwise it would be unserviceable when the time for using it arrived. So it is with man. If he were to devote himself unceasingly to a dull round of business, without breaking the monotony by cheerful amusements, he would fall imperceptibly into idiotcy, or be struck ...
— Book of Wise Sayings - Selected Largely from Eastern Sources • W. A. Clouston
... shopman's empty talk seemed like the petty vexations by which narrow minds destroy a man of genius. But as he must even go through with it, he appeared to listen to his guide, answering him by gestures or monosyllables; but imperceptibly he arrogated the privilege of saying nothing, and gave himself up without hindrance to his closing meditations, which were appalling. He had a poet's temperament, his mind had entered by chance on a vast field; and he must see perforce the dry bones ...
— The Magic Skin • Honore de Balzac
... chasms obstructed the way on all sides, and a misstep or slip would send one down the blue steps where no friendly rope could rescue, and only the rushing water could be heard. To view the solid phalanxes of icy floes, as they fill the mountain fastnesses and imperceptibly march through the ravines and force their way to the sea, fills one with awe indescribable. The knowledge that the ice is moving from beneath one's feet thrills one with a curious sensation ...
— Oregon, Washington and Alaska; Sights and Scenes for the Tourist • E. L. Lomax
... 'Service of Man' is no better than a hobby or a sentimentality or a hypocrisy." No doubt he has carefully explained that he does not mean by God or religion what the clergy mean; but can he be sure that by imitating their phrases he may not imperceptibly slide into their frame of mind? or at any rate tempt the weaker brethren to do so? In using such an expression he comes perilously near the attitude adopted by the Bishop of London in a recent address to the sailors of the Grand Fleet. His Lordship told his hearers—we ...
— God and Mr. Wells - A Critical Examination of 'God the Invisible King' • William Archer
... strong, crafty face was suddenly and fearlessly uplifted when he saw the hostile crowd, and a half-scornful smile came to his straight thin lips. A man behind him put a detaining hand on his shoulder, but he shook it off impatiently. Almost imperceptibly men swerved this way and that until there was an open way through them to the State-house steps, and through that human lane, nearly every man of which was at that moment longing to take his life, the autocrat strode, meeting every pair of eyes with a sneer of cold defiance. Behind ...
— The Heart Of The Hills • John Fox, Jr.
... at Captain Matt Peasley and shook his head almost imperceptibly, as who should say: "Better give in to him, Matt. I know him longer than you do; he'll have his way if it kills him." And Matt took the hint, with the result that some six weeks later Cappy Ricks, accompanied by his faithful port captain and his equally faithful ...
— Cappy Ricks Retires • Peter B. Kyne
... plain covered with corn and verdure, and extending in a width of some thirty miles, by a series of undulations, to the foot of Tabor, where it came to an end. Two side ranges running almost parallel—little Hermon and Glilboa—disposed in a line from east to west, and united by an almost imperceptibly rising ground, serve rather to connect the plain of Megiddo with the valley of the Jordan than to separate them. A single river, the Kishon, cuts the route diagonally—or, to speak more correctly, a single ...
— History Of Egypt, Chaldaea, Syria, Babylonia, and Assyria, Volume 4 (of 12) • G. Maspero
... and imperceptibly, almost unnoticed by themselves, the coolness between husband and wife grew. There was no open quarrel, not even a cross word; but Stafford stayed out nearly every night and Virginia, left alone in the great library with only books for companions, wondered ...
— Bought and Paid For - From the Play of George Broadhurst • Arthur Hornblow
... this state of universal armament has been brought about gradually and imperceptibly, and because governments have exerted, in maintaining it, every resource of intimidation, corruption, brutalization, and violence, that we do not see its flagrant inconsistency with the Christian ideas and sentiments by which the modern world ...
— The Kingdom of God is within you • Leo Tolstoy
... take exercise, till headache and giddiness force him to try the fresh air. As the necessary result, he has broken down at last. It may end in paralysis, or it may end in death." Reporting this expression of medical opinion, Mrs. Rook's letter glided imperceptibly from respectful sympathy to modest regard for her own interests in the future. It might be the sad fate of her husband and herself to be thrown on the world again. If necessity brought them to London, would "kind Miss Emily grant her the ...
— I Say No • Wilkie Collins
... good and powerful God, intending to produce man, commence with the lowest possible forms of life; with the simplest organism that can be imagined, and during immeasurable periods of time, slowly and almost imperceptibly improve upon the rude beginning, until man was evolved? Would countless ages thus be wasted in the production of awkward forms, afterward abandoned? Can the intelligence of man discover the least wisdom ...
— Lectures of Col. R. G. Ingersoll, Volume I • Robert Green Ingersoll
... afar up the country, on its way to Samoset river and bay, flowed in many moods. Now it glided deep and smooth, almost imperceptibly, along steep banks that went up wooded to the sky line. Again it hurled itself recklessly down rocky inclines, frothing and foaming and fighting its way by sheer force through barriers of reefs. Now it ...
— The Rival Campers Ashore - The Mystery of the Mill • Ruel Perley Smith
... be to manufacture evidence against himself, in case of detection. Besides, the rough, jagged edge would hold the material he wished to inject all the better, while its saw-like points would tear the flesh, imperceptibly, but minutely, and so ...
— Hilda Wade - A Woman With Tenacity Of Purpose • Grant Allen
... rests on the consent of the governed; and that every people have a right to change, modify, or abolish a government when it ceases to answer the ends for which it was established, and permit this Government imperceptibly to slide from the moorings where it was originally anchored, and become a military despotism? It was well said by the Senator from New York [Mr. Seward], whom I do not now see in his seat—well said in a speech wherein I found but ...
— The Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government • Jefferson Davis
... her fury. He saw her eyes contract to the gleam of a new idea. She was silent a moment, while her vibrant, tense body swayed in front of him almost imperceptibly. ...
— No Clue - A Mystery Story • James Hay
... the bulls should wander back, or something else happen we knew not what; besides, the anxiety about our friends kept us awake. At last, however, as we sat shoulder to shoulder under the rock, sleep stole imperceptibly on us, and I do not think that I ever enjoyed a sounder slumber than I did that night. When we awoke we rubbed our eyes, not knowing where we were. It was broad daylight. We rose to our feet, and after stretching our cramped ...
— A Voyage round the World - A book for boys • W.H.G. Kingston
... went by, or perhaps three, for time passes imperceptibly in Tahiti, and it is hard to keep count of it; but at last a message was brought to Dr. Coutras that Strickland was dying. Ata had waylaid the cart that took the mail into Papeete, and besought the man who drove it to go at once to the doctor. But the doctor was out when the summons came, ...
— The Moon and Sixpence • W. Somerset Maugham
... of twenty-one. Nevertheless, as the weeks went on, the half-amused, half-contemptuous embarrassment, which had been the first natural effect of her presence upon the mind of a man so little used to women and their ways, had passed imperceptibly into something else. His reserved and formal manner remained the same. But Miss Fountain's goings and comings had ceased to be indifferent to him. A silent relation—still unknown ...
— Helbeck of Bannisdale, Vol. I. • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... loneliness of the landscape in which they stand, and still more the complete darkness which surrounds their origin, their object, and their history, that gives to them their unique interest. Whence came the builders? What tongue did they speak? What religion did they practise? Did they vanish imperceptibly away, or did they fly to the coast, or were they massacred in a rising of their slaves? We do not know; probably we shall never know. We can only say, in the words ...
— Impressions of South Africa • James Bryce
... fall. He could not stop; an iron weight upon his shoulders crushed him to the earth, but at the same time a force against which he could not struggle drove him on. He became possessed of the idea that again he was working in the mines, under the overseer's lash; the sound of his horse's feet merged imperceptibly into the tapping of the picks, hideously loud, and the maddening rhythm of the sound pounded his brain into bruised torpor. Then he knew that he was on fire; from head to foot he burned, parched as a soul in hell. Balls ...
— Nicanor - Teller of Tales - A Story of Roman Britain • C. Bryson Taylor
... indulge the contemplation of himself, and in the extravagance of his first raptures expects that his eye should regulate the motions of all that approach him, and his opinion be received as decisive and oraculous. His intoxication will give way to time; the madness of joy will fume imperceptibly away; the sense of his insufficiency will soon return; he will remember that the co-operation of others is necessary to his happiness, and learn to conciliate their regard by ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson - Volume IV [The Rambler and The Adventurer] • Samuel Johnson
... bicycles of that time, about which Aunt Susan humorously said in one of her letters that "they often prove rather restive, and are given to, or seized with, an inclination to butting the walls, and also of lazily lying down on the road over which they ought to be almost imperceptibly passing along." And during the war he kindly received, fed, and helped several francs-tireurs and stray French soldiers, perfectly aware that he was risking his life in case the Prussians came near; he even conveyed one of them to the Garibaldian ...
— Philip Gilbert Hamerton • Philip Gilbert Hamerton et al
... that loves its own land, and yet will wander the wide world over, a race that loves battle, and yet always falls—whilst doing this, it seemed to me that I was capturing for an instant a beauty that was dying slowly, imperceptibly, but would ...
— The Wind Bloweth • Brian Oswald Donn-Byrne
... enjoyed the soft tropical night. The air was tepid, heavy with unknown perfume, black as a band of velvet across the eyes, musical with the subdued undertones of a thousand thousand night insects. At points overhead the soft blind darkness melted imperceptibly ...
— African Camp Fires • Stewart Edward White
... these things. She looked toward her husband, whose eyes were fixed upon her; she would read in his countenance if he were pleased with her words. A smile played upon the lips of the king, and he bowed his head almost imperceptibly as a greeting ...
— Berlin and Sans-Souci • Louise Muhlbach
... from night to morning, without knowing what it is to lose. Far from losing the money you brought hither, as you have done in other places, you have doubled it, trebled it, multiplied it almost beyond your wishes, notwithstanding the exorbitant expenses you are imperceptibly led into. This, without doubt, is the most desirable situation in the, world: stop here, Chevalier, and do not ruin your affairs by returning to your old sins. Avoid love, by pursuing other pleasures: love has ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre
... immaculately dressed in perfectly-tailored clothes, upon his long, slender hands half hidden by filmy lace, and upon his face, across which at this moment a heavy strand of curly hair threw a curious shadow. At Armand's words his lips had imperceptibly tightened, his eyes had narrowed as if they tried to see something that was beyond the range of ...
— El Dorado • Baroness Orczy
... licked his dry lips. His rifle lay on his knees. Almost imperceptibly he moved it, moved it again, froze stiff as Kloon spat, then, by infinitesimal degrees, continued to edge ...
— The Flaming Jewel • Robert Chambers
... Years Since) at the house of a lady of quality attached to the cause of the Chevalier, where he found, as he expected, both the ladies. All rose as he entered, but Flora immediately resumed her place and the conversation in which she was engaged. Rose, on the contrary, almost imperceptibly made a little way in the crowded circle for his advancing the corner of a chair. 'Her manner, upon the whole, is most engaging,' said ...
— Waverley, Or 'Tis Sixty Years Hence, Complete • Sir Walter Scott
... knew I should be crushed,) and to pervade that whole mass with the gentle pressure, till I could lift it from off me. This sense seemed a new breath of air in my lungs, to keep the mountain from pressing me flat beneath it; and now I seemed to myself breathing my own life into the inert mass, till imperceptibly it became lighter and lighter, and at ...
— The Magician's Show Box and Other Stories • Lydia Maria Child
... state, and enjoy the unpretending pleasures of domestic and rural life, cultivating their garden, and, as far as the imperious calls of public affairs would allow them time, watching over the education of their children, to whom the example of their own tastes and habits was imperceptibly affording the best of all lessons, a preference for simple and ...
— The Life of Marie Antoinette, Queen of France • Charles Duke Yonge
... the leaven goes on imperceptibly until the whole is leavened, so the kingdom of our Lord must increase. How extraordinary has been the progress of Divine truth since Bunyan's days! and who can predict what it will be ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... encouragement. His sympathy, his condescension, his faith when brought in contact with men of promise, were extraordinary: they were not shaken, though they have been abused more than once. In all who loved Bunsen his spirit will live on, imperceptibly, it may be, to themselves, imperceptibly to the world, but not the less really. It is not the chief duty of friends to honor the departed by idle grief, but to remember their designs, and to carry out their mandates. (Tac. ...
— Chips From A German Workshop. Vol. III. • F. Max Mueller
... the door now, she guiding him toward it as imperceptibly and skillfully as if she controlled ...
— Young People's Pride • Stephen Vincent Benet
... should he know," said the baronet, gaily, but with something almost imperceptibly sarcastic in his tone. "Our friend, Marston, is privileged to be as ungallant as he pleases, except where he has the happy privilege to owe allegiance; but I, a gay young bachelor of fifty, am naturally curious. I really do trust that our charming ...
— The Evil Guest • J. Sheridan Le Fanu |
