"Floor" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... from 1817 to 1821. The present occupier is a Mr. Roberts, who kindly allows us to inspect the interior. It has the dining-room on the left-hand side of the entrance and the drawing-room on the first floor, and is altogether a pleasantly-situated, comfortable, and respectable dwelling. No. 11, "the second house in the terrace," is overgrown with a Virginia creeper, which, from its possible association with Dickens's earliest years, may have induced him to plant the now magnificent one which exists ...
— A Week's Tramp in Dickens-Land • William R. Hughes
... Raymond had escaped with minor hurts; but John's case was plainly serious, and the flow of blood had been very great before any help could reach him. He was quite unconscious, and looked like death as he lay on the floor of the cave; and after fruitless efforts to revive him, the Prince commanded a rude litter to be made wherein he might be transported to the Palace by the huntsmen who had not taken part in the struggle, and were therefore least weary. ...
— In the Days of Chivalry • Evelyn Everett-Green
... a student, was told that unless he should point out the pupil who had put matches on the floor, he would be expelled. X then said that ...
— Elements of Debating • Leverett S. Lyon
... upper gown, that graceful and picturesque attire of the Scottish peasantry, was thrown carelessly over her shoulders; her mutch was put on awry, and from under its immense border her face appeared, as white almost as the cap itself. She walked right into the centre of the floor, laid her heavy hand on Sybilla's ...
— Olive - A Novel • Dinah Maria Craik, (AKA Dinah Maria Mulock)
... all overgrown with moss and rank vegetation. However, Jiuyemon, who was afraid of nothing, cared little for the appearance of the place, and having made himself as comfortable as he could in so dreary a spot, sat down on the floor, lit his pipe, and kept a sharp look-out for the goblins. He had not been waiting long before he saw a movement among the bushes; and presently he was surrounded by a host of elfish-looking creatures, of all shapes ...
— Tales of Old Japan • Algernon Bertram Freeman-Mitford
... acknowledged that he had paid for one, and kindly offered him a mattress on the floor, assuring him that there would be plenty of berths after the ...
— Hatchie, the Guardian Slave; or, The Heiress of Bellevue • Warren T. Ashton
... ever cheery, full of hope and valour. Light Louvet glances hare-eyed, not hare-hearted: only virtuous Petion's serenity 'was but once seen ruffled.' (Meillan, pp. 119-137.) They lie in straw-lofts, in woody brakes; rudest paillasse on the floor of a secret friend is luxury. They are seized in the dead of night by Jacobin mayors and tap of drum; get off by firm countenance, rattle of muskets, and ...
— The French Revolution • Thomas Carlyle
... she fancied she heard the moving of benches or seats, and many voices together shouting she knew not what. Then again a door creaked on its hinges, and after that all was so still that she could have heard a needle drop on the floor; and this alarming silence continued till presently a deep, resonant man's ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... night; on which occasions the Colonel, Jim, and myself would occupy the same or adjoining apartments, "we white folks" sleeping on four posts, while the more democratic negro spread his blanket on the floor. Thrown together thus intimately, it was but natural that we should learn much ...
— Among the Pines - or, South in Secession Time • James R. Gilmore
... from the end of a stick hung parallel to the floor by a twisted cord which whirls the stick rapidly when it is let go. Care has to be taken not to bite the candle burning on the other end. Sometimes this test is made easier by dropping the apples into a tub of water and diving for them, or piercing them ...
— The Book of Hallowe'en • Ruth Edna Kelley
... one end of the form, unfortunately before his equipoise, the second footman, had taken his place at the other end. The result was that the form tipped up, and a cataract of flunkies poured down upon the floor. There was a ghastly silence; then the Gadarene herd slowly recovered itself, and resumed its place. The Squire read the chapter in an accent of suppressed fury, while the remainder of the party, with handkerchiefs pressed to their faces, made the most unaccountable sounds and motions for the ...
— At Large • Arthur Christopher Benson
... did not take a good hold of the Candy Rabbit, or whether the lady let go of him too soon, I don't know. But, all of a sudden, the Candy Rabbit slipped from the lady's hand and began falling. Straight toward the floor he fell! ...
— The Story of a Candy Rabbit • Laura Lee Hope
... not conclude without commending to your favorable consideration the interest of the people of this District. Without a representative on the floor of Congress, they have for this very reason peculiar claims upon our just regard. To this I know, from my long acquaintance with them, ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Section 4 (of 4) of Volume 5: James Buchanan • James D. Richardson
... one of the most beautiful in the Pyrenees, and presents to the visitor a succession of vast halls with roofs that are curved like a dome, or are in the form of an ogive, or are as flat as a ceiling. It is easy to explore these halls, for the floor is covered with a thick stalagmitic stratum, and is not irregular as in the majority of ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 508, September 26, 1885 • Various
... half-armed, and at the mercy of a merciless foe. He looked wildly round for some means of escape. The tread of many feet was on the stairs. To attempt resistance was hopeless. Flight was the only resource left him, and in a mad impulse of terror he flung himself on the floor, and crept beneath the bed, the arras of which concealed him from sight. There he lay panting and trembling, whilst the door was burst open and ...
— The Lord of Dynevor • Evelyn Everett-Green
... and her she generally resides, particularly in summer, for the delightfulness of its situation. We were admitted, by an order Mr. Rogers had procured from the Lord Chamberlain, into the presence chamber, hung with rich tapestry, and the floor, after the English fashion, strewed with hay, {8} through which the Queen commonly passes on her way to chapel. At the door stood a gentleman dressed in velvet, with a gold chain, whose office was to introduce to the Queen any person of distinction ...
— Travels in England and Fragmenta Regalia • Paul Hentzner and Sir Robert Naunton
... occupied by a rather miscellaneous assembly—the drunk and disorderly element conspicuous—who were awaiting their several calls to appear before a local justice and make answer for various misdeeds. Some were pacing the floor, others sat moodily on benches ranged against the wall, while a few were still peacefully slumbering upon the floor. It was a frowsy, disreputable crowd, evincing but mild curiosity at the arrival of a new prisoner. ...
— Keith of the Border • Randall Parrish
... in full swing, tempers were roused in proportion to the arguments flung about at haphazard, and the quantities of liquor consumed in the process of the debate. At first the centre of the floor had been kept clear for the speakers, and the audience was lined up around the walls, but as the discussion warmed there was less order, and Doc Crombie, in spite of his sternest language, was powerless to keep the judicial atmosphere ...
— The One-Way Trail - A story of the cattle country • Ridgwell Cullum
... leg with the handle. He immediately raised up both hind legs at once, and that fork flew out of my hands, and went rattling up against the timbers above, and came down again in an instant, the end of the handle rapping me with such force on the top of the head that I sat right down on the floor under the impression that I was standing in front of a drug-store in the evening. I went back to the house and got some more stuff on me. But I couldn't keep away from that stable. I went out there again. The thought struck me that ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume III. (of X.) • Various
... way but downward, with the muck-rake in his hand; who was offered a celestial crown for his muck-rake, but who would neither look up nor regard the crown he was offered, but continued to rake to himself the filth of the floor. ...
— Standard Selections • Various
... before an empty house, Knocking and knocking at the closed door; He wakes dull echoes—but nor man nor mouse, If he stood knocking there for evermore.— A mother angel, see! folding each wing, Soft-walking, crosses straight the empty floor, And opens to ...
— A Book of Strife in the Form of The Diary of an Old Soul • George MacDonald
... itself, and the German, stopping short in the middle of the room, banged his cane upon the floor, and, looking savagely at the quiet lady who had nodded and ...
— Camp-fire and Wigwam • Edward Sylvester Ellis
... and never left off trying until they got to Austin Friars, where, in a very dark passage on the first floor, oddly situated at the back of a house, across some leads, they found a little blear-eyed glass door up in one corner, with Mr FIPS painted on it in characters which were meant to be transparent. There was also a wicked old sideboard ...
— Life And Adventures Of Martin Chuzzlewit • Charles Dickens
... soon found us a house, of which we took all but the ground floor: the entresol was mine, the first floor was Madame d'Henin's, and that above it was for M. de Lally. It was near the cathedral, and still in a prolongation of Madame de Maurville's street, la Rue ...
— The Diary and Letters of Madame D'Arblay Volume 3 • Madame D'Arblay
... chair. But restless was the chair; the back erect Distressed the weary loins that felt no ease; The slippery seat betrayed the sliding part That pressed it, and the feet hung dangling down, Anxious in vain to find the distant floor. These for the rich: the rest, whom fate had placed In modest mediocrity, content With base materials, sat on well-tanned hides Obdurate and unyielding, glassy smooth, With here and there a tuft of crimson yarn, Or scarlet crewel in the cushion fixed: ...
— The Task and Other Poems • William Cowper
... store-rooms, past floors used for nothing at all, they went—the man's face white, the boy wailing out incoherent supplications. And then, within ten feet of the top of the shaft, and within a foot of the top floor of the building, the elevator came to a rickety stop. It wabbled back and forth; it did ...
— Lifted Masks - Stories • Susan Glaspell
... almost snowed under, for the snow was fully six feet deep. It was a Saturday night and very crowded. When it became time for the people to go home they could not go. So they had to stay, and they stayed three days. They slept on billiard tables, on the floor or where they could. We did our best, but it was a big crowd. Interesting? It was most interesting indeed to me, for I could get no milk. I could supply them with all the wine they wanted, but no milk! And they demanded milk for ...
— Greenwich Village • Anna Alice Chapin
... son shall go. I heed not dainty viands now Fair wreaths of flowers to twine my brow, Soft balm or precious scent: My very life I count as naught, Nothing on earth can claim my thought But Rama's banishment." She spoke these words of cruel ire; Then stripping off her gay attire, The cold bare floor she pressed. So, falling from her home on high, Some lovely daughter of the sky Upon the ground might rest. With darkened brow and furious mien, Stripped of her gems and wreath, the queen In spotless beauty lay, Like heaven obscured with gathering cloud, When shades ...
— The Ramayana • VALMIKI
... was a tremendous smash from the pantry, and the sound of things clattering about and rolling on the floor, as if all the crockery in the ship was broken, whereat Tim and the second mate and Matthews burst altogether into one simultaneous shout ...
— Afloat at Last - A Sailor Boy's Log of his Life at Sea • John Conroy Hutcheson
... sphere, With a bright cup for Jove himself to drink, Some star, that shone beneath thy tread, Raising its amorous head To kiss those matchless feet, Checked thy career too fleet, And all heaven's host of eyes Entranced, but fearful all, Saw thee, sweet Hebe, prostrate fall Upon the bright floor of the azure skies; Where, mid its stars, thy beauty lay, As blossom, shaken from the spray Of a spring thorn, Lies mid the liquid sparkles of the morn. Or, as in temples of the Paphian shade, The worshippers of ...
— The Complete Poems of Sir Thomas Moore • Thomas Moore et al
... that fight is a classic to-day in the hills. When it ended two of the rustlers were dead, two badly wounded, and the others galloping away for their lives. The chief and his unknown friend were lying on the floor shot to pieces." ...
— The Highgrader • William MacLeod Raine
... golden cord, was only a lock of hair. It lay like a little yellow serpent in Maudelain's palm. "And yet five years ago," he mused, "this hair was turned to dust. God keep us all!" Then he saw the tall lean emissary puffed out like a candle-flame; and upon the floor he saw the huddled cloak waver and spread like ink, and he saw the white parchment slowly dwindle, as snow melts under the open sun. But in his hand remained the lock ...
— Chivalry • James Branch Cabell
... much prefer to have heard from every member on this floor declarations of opinion that this Union could never be dissolved, than the declaration of opinion by anybody, that in any case, under the pressure of any circumstances, such a dissolution was possible. ...
— American Eloquence, Volume II. (of 4) - Studies In American Political History (1896) • Various
... floor on the street, it was made into two apartments; one of which was occupied by M. Dutocq, clerk of the justice of peace, a retired government employee, and a frequenter of the Thuillier salon; the other by the hero of this Scene, about whom we must content ourselves at the present moment ...
— The Lesser Bourgeoisie • Honore de Balzac
... occupied by the watchers of the ford. There they lived, no man knows how long, on their perch over the waters of Clyde. They dwelt at top of a stone structure some eight feet above low water mark, for they could not live on the ground floor, of which the walls, fifty feet thick at the base, defied the waves of the high tides driven ...
— The Clyde Mystery - a Study in Forgeries and Folklore • Andrew Lang
... repeated the weary sigh and turned her head aside, glancing down to where with one small shoe she was restlessly tapping the floor of the cab. They were both silent for ...
— Fire-Tongue • Sax Rohmer
... floor, Sea, and all thy wideness yieldeth, Now rejoice, and leap, and roar. Leafy infants of the wood, Fields, and all that on you feedeth, Dance, O dance, ...
— England's Antiphon • George MacDonald
... know not the thoughts of the Lord, neither understand they His counsel; for He gathereth them as the sheaf for the threshing-floor." ...
— Christology of the Old Testament: And a Commentary on the Messianic Predictions, v. 1 • Ernst Wilhelm Hengstenberg
... of Durbelliere was a large square building, three stories high, with seven front windows to each of the upper stories, and three on each side of the large door on the ground floor. Eight stone steps of great width led up to the front door; but between the top step and the door there was a square flagged area of considerable space; and on the right hand, and on the left, two large whitewashed lions reclined on brick and mortar ...
— La Vendee • Anthony Trollope
... I hunted up the place, next day; the girl saw us driving up, and flew down the stairs and received me. Her quarters were the second story of a little wooden house—another family on the ground floor. The husband was at the machine shop, the wife kept no servant, she was there alone. She had a little parlor, with a chair or two and a sofa; and the artist-husband's hand was visible in a couple of ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... slowly was the frigate moving, and so clear was the water, that sometimes as she sailed over a valley of glistening sand the smallest coloured pebble or fragment of broken coral could be as clearly discerned upon the snowy floor as if it lay embedded in a sheet of flawless crystal; and then again the quivering walls of weed and sponge would seem to rise ahead as if to bar her way, then slowly sink astern in the ...
— Rodman The Boatsteerer And Other Stories - 1898 • Louis Becke
... dressed for the first time, holding tight by her shoulder, and by every piece of furniture on his way to the sofa, Rollo attending in almost pathetic delight, gazing at him from time to time, and thumping the floor with his tail? He had various visitors after his arrival—the first being his Rector, who came on his way back from church to give his congratulations, mention the number of convalescents who had there appeared, and speak ...
— The Three Brides • Charlotte M. Yonge
... glass of brandy, explained that he had felt an inclination to drink a little Cognac, and had sent her to fetch a bottle. She had not been long absent, and at the very moment when she returned she had fallen rigid on the floor without uttering a word. Macquart himself had carried her ...
— The Fortune of the Rougons • Emile Zola
... key into its lock, turned it, and we passed down a passage into an open patio. It was a silent place, beyond the reach of the street echoes; there were four rooms built round the patio on the ground floor, and three or four above. One side of the tower of the minaret was visible from the courtyard, but apart from that the place was nowhere overlooked. To be sure, it was very dirty, but I had an idea that the steward had brought his men out for business, not for an evening stroll, so I bade Salam ...
— Morocco • S.L. Bensusan
... rear of this there was a stairway, which led down to the first floor and behind the stage; thus Madam and Edith were enabled to reach the dressing-room without being seen by any one, and just as the orchestra were playing the closing bars of the last selection before the ...
— The Masked Bridal • Mrs. Georgie Sheldon
... in a circle, the floor being several yards square. Mortimer stepped behind him, gravely looking toward the hiding-place, and exerting all his mentality toward "guiding" Hanlon to it. At no time was he nearer than two feet, though once, making a quick ...
— Raspberry Jam • Carolyn Wells
... is to draw out a party of carpenters to make Bell tents, they are to apply to Col. Miflin for tools, boards & nails to make them of. 300 men for fatigue to morrow. The Quarter Master is to make an estimate of the necessary quantity of boards to floor the tents & apply to the Quarter Master general for them. The Cols. or commanding officers of each regiment is to give an order for the boards, certifying the quantity wanted. A return is to be made of the state of the cartridges ...
— The Campaign of 1776 around New York and Brooklyn • Henry P. Johnston
... in a tumble on her shoulders and the light of the logs on her bare arms, was stretched upon the hearth-rug, looking up at Eugenia, who lay in an easy-chair, her feet almost touching the embers. A waiter of russet apples was on the floor ...
— The Voice of the People • Ellen Glasgow
... stairs to her room, and tossed her belongings into her trunk. Over the first layer she cried, but then it suddenly came upon her that she was having her own way and that it led into her dear spring garden, and she laughed forthwith. Downstairs the cap'n stood pondering, his eyes on the floor, and Jake regarded him at first keenly and in anger, and then with a ...
— Country Neighbors • Alice Brown
... her arm with her own, uttering exclamations of astonishment and curiosity: possibly Catharine was the first of a fair-skinned race this poor savage had ever seen. After her meal was finished, she set the birchen dish on the floor, and restrapping the papoose in its cradle prison, she slipped the basswood-bark rope over her forehead, and silently signing to her sons to follow her, she departed. That evening a pair of ducks were found fastened to the wooden latch of the door, a silent offering of gratitude ...
— Lost in the Backwoods • Catharine Parr Traill
... rights for the day. The cedar water bucket had been properly replenished; the jagged flange of a fifteen-cent chunk of ice protruded above the rim of the bucket; and alongside, on the appointed nail, hung the gourd dipper that the master always used. The floor had been swept, except, of course, in the corners and underneath things; there were evidences, in streaky scrolls of fine grit particles upon various flat surfaces, that a dusting brush had been more or less sparingly employed. A spray of trumpet flowers, ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1917 - and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various
... experiment. Should she go in? She hesitated, but only for a moment; something seemed to urge her on. After some searching she found the spring; the door flew open, and, holding her candle high, she went in. She could not suppress a cry of terror when she saw that her uncle lay stretched upon the floor. He moaned a little as she went towards him, and she was thankful to hear his voice. Broken glass was strewed upon the floor, and there was an unpleasant chemical odour in the room. She knelt beside ...
— Hunter's Marjory - A Story for Girls • Margaret Bruce Clarke
... stopped me, Miss Erema, from being truly accurate in my testimony. What with walking the floor, and thumping his back, and rattling of the rings to please him—when they put me on the Testament, cruel as they did, with the lawyers' eyes eating into me, and both my ears buzzing with sorrow and fright, I may have gone too far, with my heart in my mouth, for my mind to keep out of contradiction, ...
— Erema - My Father's Sin • R. D. Blackmore
... old staircase with the balustrade of chestnut wood (the stone steps ceased after the second floor), crossed a shabby antechamber, and came into the presence in a little wainscoted drawing-room, beyond a dimly-lit salon. The carved woodwork, in the taste of the eighteenth century, had been painted gray. There were monochrome paintings on the frieze panels, and the walls were adorned ...
— Two Poets - Lost Illusions Part I • Honore de Balzac
... appointed to visit the French fort; but the garrison had been forewarned. Radisson knew of the coming spies from his Indian father; and the Jesuits had learned of the Council from their converts. Before the spies arrived, the French had built a floor over their flatboats, and to cover the fresh floor had heaped up a dozen canoes. The spies left the fort satisfied that neither a deluge nor an escape was impending. Birch canoes would be crushed like egg-shells if they were run through the ice jams of spring floods. Certain that their victims ...
— Pathfinders of the West • A. C. Laut
... into the room. The following spectacle met their eyes. In the solitary window stood a big wooden bedstead with an immense feather bed on it. On the rumpled feather bed lay a creased and crumpled quilt. A pillow, in a cotton pillow case—also much creased, was on the floor. On a little table beside the bed lay a silver watch, and silver coins to the value of twenty kopecks. Some sulphur matches lay there too. Except the bed, the table, and a solitary chair, there was no furniture in the room. Looking under the bed, the superintendent saw two dozen empty bottles, ...
— The Cook's Wedding and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov
... inmates had been all swept off by typhus; for in these peculiar and not uncommon cases, no other family would occupy the house thus left desolate, so that the cause of its desertion was easily understood. The floor was strewed in some places with little stopples of rotten thatch, evidently blown in by the wind of the previous night; the cheerless fire-place was covered with clots of soot, and the floor was all spattered over with the black shining moisture ...
— The Black Prophet: A Tale Of Irish Famine • William Carleton
... eyes fixed on the door of the cow house, which formed a sort of black hole in the wall of the building. Nothing could be seen inside, but they heard a vague noise, movements and footsteps and the sound of hoofs, which were deadened by the straw on the floor, and soon the man reappeared in the door, wiping his forehead, and came toward the house with long, slow strides. He passed the strangers without seeming to notice them ...
— International Short Stories: French • Various
... sunshine. There it stood, poor devil of a contrivance that it was!—with only the thinnest vesture of human similitude about it, through which was evident the stiff, rickety, incongruous, faded, tattered, good-for-nothing patchwork of its substance, ready to sink in a heap upon the floor, as conscious of its own unworthiness to be erect. Shall I confess the truth? At its present point of vivification, the scarecrow reminds me of some of the lukewarm and abortive characters, composed of heterogeneous materials, used for the ...
— Mosses from an Old Manse and Other Stories • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... been laid for the lower floor and the studding now being put up and the upper joist laid on preparatory to erecting the rafters. John was an expert in building, and was really the directing hand at the various steps in the operation. While engaged ...
— The Wonder Island Boys: The Tribesmen • Roger Finlay
... patted and stroked the dog with his big fat hand, as he spoke in a soft soothing tone, which had the effect of making him the best of friends with Duke, who whined and licked at the hand, and kept up a regular throbbing pat-pat-pat upon the floor of the wagon. ...
— Diamond Dyke - The Lone Farm on the Veldt - Story of South African Adventure • George Manville Fenn
... The red coals click beneath the flame, and see, with slow and silent feet The hooded shadows cross the woods to where the twilight waters beat! Now, fan-wise from the ruddy fire, a brilliance sweeps athwart the floor; As, streaming down the lattices, the rain comes sobbing to the door: As, streaming down the lattices, The rain comes sobbing to ...
— The Poems of Henry Kendall • Henry Kendall
... capable of discharging the duties belonging to their branch of the government without instructions from a head of department whom many of them looked upon as only an official subordinate of Congress. For the same reason they refused with prompt decision to permit the secretary to appear upon the floor of the House to explain some proposed measure. In the Carrington letter Hamilton said that he had "openly declared" a "determination to treat him [Madison] as a political enemy." He probably took care that Madison should hear of it, for he was not a man who made idle threats. ...
— James Madison • Sydney Howard Gay
... whole course of her busy life never found a moment for occasional dozes, peeped into the room, smiled with satisfaction when she saw him, tripped lightly across the floor to steal a pillow comfortably under his white head, arranged the window-curtains so as to shade his eyes, and then ran upstairs with that swift and wonderfully light movement which was habitual to her. She had a great deal to do, and she was not a person who was ever much affected ...
— Frances Kane's Fortune • L. T. Meade
... late, and preparations were being made to put me to bed, which was done by placing some hay on the floor of the camp and spreading some bed clothing which we had brought along. The bed was soon ready, and I was snugly placed upon it, although I could not go to sleep, knowing that we were to go out early in the morning ...
— The Dismal Swamp and Lake Drummond, Early recollections - Vivid portrayal of Amusing Scenes • Robert Arnold
... at least I am not responsible." But what does history think {160} of this judicial Pilate? It holds him to be a responsible agent in the death of Jesus. He was attempting a neutrality which was impossible. The great wind was blowing across the threshing floor of the nation, and the people were separated into two distinct heaps, and must be counted forever as chaff or as wheat. He that was not with Christ was against him, and Pilate's place, even in spite ...
— Mornings in the College Chapel - Short Addresses to Young Men on Personal Religion • Francis Greenwood Peabody
... last house my companion halted, and taking me by the hand, led me into a long low room lit with lamps of earthenware. Here some women came forward and kissed him, while others whom I took to be servants, saluted him by touching the floor with one hand. Soon, however, all eyes were turned on me and many eager questions were asked of the chief, of which I ...
— Montezuma's Daughter • H. Rider Haggard
... chattering all the time, led them down-stairs to a room where there was a good fire burning. Susan wondered to herself why Monsieur and his sister sat in the kitchen, for she saw pots and pans and dishes, all very bright and clean, at one end of the room. The floor was covered with oil-cloth; but by the fire, on which a saucepan hissed and bubbled gently, was spread a bright crimson rug, which made a little spot of comfort. On it there stood a small table neatly laid with preparations ...
— Susan - A Story for Children • Amy Walton
... the stairway into the kitchen, or living- room, her father turned from the hopeless-seeming tangle of soiled and torn netting on the floor before him, and looked at her half wistfully from under the glazed brim ...
— Sara, a Princess • Fannie E. Newberry
... swaggered forward, the lash of the whip trailing across the puncheon floor. Triumph rode in his voice and straddled in his gait. He stood with his back to the fireplace absorbing heat, hands behind him and feet set wide. His eyes gloated over the victims he had trapped. Presently he would settle with ...
— Man Size • William MacLeod Raine
... to the summons. He called; and found, instead of the dashing young master he had once known, a soft and savage old man whom he at first utterly failed to recognize. Surface paced the floor and spoke his mind. It seemed that an irresistible impulse had led him back to his old home city; that he had settled and taken work there; and there meant to end his days. Under these circumstances, some deep-hidden instinct—a ...
— Queed • Henry Sydnor Harrison
... in the first floor, consisting of many chambers, each of which is a thoroughfare to the most distant. It is not ten minutes since I was seated, and preparing to write to thee, when Anna came to pass through the room where I was, and retire to her own apartment. She was fatigued, I imagine, by the journey; ...
— Anna St. Ives • Thomas Holcroft
... brought in carriages, and worked up in my house; an hundred and fifty of their beds sewn together made up the breadth and length, and these were four double, which, however, kept me but very indifferently from the hardness of the floor, that was of smooth stone. By the same computation they provided me with sheets, blankets, and coverlets, tolerable enough for one who had been so long inured to ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 5 • Charles Sylvester
... my hair. He insisted upon knowing my name, and on learning it, flew into a passion. I suppress the details of his disagreeable propositions. Seated sideways in his confessional, he stamped on the floor, abused me, and spoke disrespectfully of the King. I could not stand such scandalous behaviour for long; and, wearing my veil down, I got into my coach, being thoroughly determined that I would take a good long holiday. M. de Vivonne soundly ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre
... built in a different style, being raised entirely above ground, with the caves about five feet high and the door at the corner. Near the end, opposite this door, is a single fireplace, round which are the beds, raised four feet from the floor of earth; over the fire are hung the fresh fish, which, when dried, are stowed away with the wappatoo-roots under the beds. The dress of the men is like that of the people above, but the women are clad in a ...
— First Across the Continent • Noah Brooks
... swoop all the plates, glasses, and cutlery on the saloon tables crashed to starboard. Were it not for the restraint of the fiddles everything must have been swept to the floor. There were one or two minor accidents. A steward, taken unawares, was thrown headlong on top of his laden tray. Others were compelled to clutch the backs of chairs and cling to pillars. One man involuntarily seized the hair of a lady who devoted an ...
— The Wings of the Morning • Louis Tracy
... but there was none. Filled with apprehension that she would meet Lord Donal coming up, she had difficulty in timing her footsteps to the slow measure that was necessary. She reached the bottom of the stair in safety and unimpeded, but once on the main floor a new problem presented itself. Nothing would attract more attention than a young and beautiful lady walking the long distance between the gallery end of the room and the entrance stairway entirely alone and unattended. ...
— Jennie Baxter, Journalist • Robert Barr
... a parallel in the world is now being prepared for exhibition by the Directors of the American Museum of Natural History. Scattered about the third floor of the Arsenal, in Central Park, lie 394 logs, some carefully wrapped in bagging, some inclosed in rough wooden cases, and others partially sawn longitudinally, horizontally, and diagonally. These logs represent all but 26 of the varieties of trees indigenous ...
— Scientific American Supplement No. 360, November 25, 1882 • Various
... silk stockings, with the other she raised a lorgnette. After a measured scrutiny her lips tightened, her nose lifted, she blew loudly like a porpoise, and, gathering her skirts closely, waddled away, as if fleeing from contagion. She continued to clutch the hosiery until a floor- walker, in answer to the clerk's frantic signal, intercepted her. Another crowd promptly gathered to listen to her indignant ...
— The Auction Block • Rex Beach
... lord out of the room; he went into his library, and threw himself on the floor, and there he staid, and would hear no reason, that was talked to him. When my lady recovered, she enquired for him, but, afterwards, said she could not bear to see his grief, and desired we would let her die quietly. She ...
— The Mysteries of Udolpho • Ann Radcliffe
... darkness at the corner of the house, to keep watch, and listen for the sound of guns from Mr. May's. Father came home at eleven. He said the South Carolinians had asked permission to sleep in an empty cabin. He and Mr. May had followed them, and he had crept under the cabin floor and listened, and they had seemed to be sleeping soundly. So we all went to bed, but father slept with a revolver under his head, which Mr. May had insisted on lending him. The next morning the South Carolinians went quietly on their journey. ...
— Personal Recollections of Pardee Butler • Pardee Butler
... A seal living in the midst of their room. The people had heard of our coming and thus put the monster in the room to thaw it up to feed our dogs with. The animal was soon taken away. The house was clean, but small. In this place we had to sleep on the floor, and we used our blankets to make a couch as well as we could. A sailcloth was used as a curtain, so that we had something like a separated place for us. Our two drivers were also in the same room, and they cared ...
— Bowdoin Boys in Labrador • Jonathan Prince (Jr.) Cilley
... the loan of a few children on Christmas Eve, nor would their own sensitiveness permit them to approach neighbours or friends in the building with a well-meant request that might have met with a chilly rebuff. One really cannot go about borrowing children from people on the floor below and the floor above, especially on Christmas Eve when children are so much in demand, even in the most fortunate of families. It is quite a different matter at any other time of the year. One can always borrow a whole family of children when the mother happens to feel the call ...
— Mr. Bingle • George Barr McCutcheon
... they told us had done much harm to the shipping, and was severer than any other they had experienced during the last seven years. While the conversation was going on, plash made one, plash made another, plash made a third, by spurting a certain brownish secretion on the floor! I had often heard of this as an American habit, but always thought our cousins in this matter (as in many others) were caricatured. Here, however, was the actual fact, and that in the presence of a lady! Yet these were apparently ...
— American Scenes, and Christian Slavery - A Recent Tour of Four Thousand Miles in the United States • Ebenezer Davies
... 'don't I? What will you bet—five, ten, fifty, hundred? Tush! you dare not bet, you know you are wrong:' and with an air of superiority and self-satisfaction, he will take long strides over his well-washed floor, ...
— Travels and Adventures of Monsieur Violet • Captain Marryat
... the nowhere apparently, old Andrew Townley came in and shuffled across the floor to the armchair by the stove. Then Mason Hope appeared, hands in pockets and lank hair falling on his shoulders. Norman Teale came next, with ...
— A Son of the Hills • Harriet T. Comstock
... burned anybody? No. Had he ever put anybody in the inquisition? No. Ever put the thumb-screw on anybody? No. Ever put anybody in prison so that some poor wife and mother would come and hold her little babe up at the grated window that the man bound to the floor might get one glimpse of his blue-eyed babe? Did ...
— Lectures of Col. R. G. Ingersoll - Latest • Robert Green Ingersoll
... ship, where even what little light there was had to struggle through an iron grating. Behind the counter that ran half way round it stood several large iron tanks, strongly padlocked, labelled "Soap," "Oil," "Waste," "Lamp Wicks," etc. The floor was covered with various necessaries for engine use, and from the beams overhead swung lamps of all shapes and sizes, while the walls were covered with bolts, bars, hammers, and tools ...
— Harper's Young People, March 23, 1880 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various
... could have done it as he did it, who was not supported by the authority of a high and stainless character consistently maintained. What he said was not without effect; even the coarse burly Harpour dared not look up, but could only fix his eyes on the floor and kick the matting in sullen wrath while this virtuous and noble boy looked at him and rebuked him; but Tracy was more deeply moved. Tracy, weak, foolish, and feebly fast as he was, had some elements of good and ...
— St. Winifred's - The World of School • Frederic W. Farrar
... Maude (pacing the floor). "As a traveler, among the mighty mountains, fails to realize—to realize the heights to which he has climbed, so we, in Life's dusty pathway, cannot estimate the distance we have—we have,—cannot estimate the distance ...
— The Sweet Girl Graduates • Rea Woodman
... bend forward, exhaling breath, taking care not to bend the knees, until your fingers touch your toes, head hanging as low as possible, toes and head as limp as possible, fingers reaching towards the floor. Repeat upright position. Keep the knees straight throughout. Aim to stretch the entire body and hands upward and backward as far as possible, with the upward motion of the arms. If you can't touch the floor without bending the knees, just come as near it as you can. Practice ...
— The Doctrine and Practice of Yoga • A. P. Mukerji
... please. The Senate passed an act of oblivion. The agitation in the army was quieted when the men heard that their lands were secure. But there were two other questions which required an answer, and an immediate one. Caesar's body, after remaining till evening on the floor of the senate-house, had been carried home in the dusk in a litter by three of his servants, and was now lying in his palace. If it was not to be thrown into the Tiber, what was to be done with it? Caesar had left a will, which was safe with his other papers in the hands ...
— Caesar: A Sketch • James Anthony Froude
... romances.[15] Whether this feature be due to Rusticiano I cannot say, but I have not been able to trace anything of the same character in a cursory inspection of some of his romance-compilations. Still one finds it impossible to conceive of our sober and reticent Messer Marco pacing the floor of his Genoese dungeon, and seven times over rolling out this magniloquent bombast, with sufficient deliberation to be overtaken by the pen of ...
— The Travels of Marco Polo Volume 1 • Marco Polo and Rustichello of Pisa
... experience, rise rampant and unchecked. She was following the lead of her own convictions with the terrible unswerving of a child, even in the face of her own hurt. She was, metaphorically, bumping her own head against the floor in her vain struggles for mastery over the mighty ...
— The Portion of Labor • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... and selling—G.G.G. Co. give farmer equal rights with city man in speculation on what farmer grows—Horn into Grain Exchange, little office—Under Crerar Co. grows to much the biggest corporation in Exchange; whole ground floor offices of G.G.G. Co. which as commercial organization focuses the buying and selling end of whole agrarian movement—Head of this, naturally chief of movement—All remedial and legislative programmes merged in economics of G.G.G. Co.—Crerar wiry, quiet executive, now ...
— The Masques of Ottawa • Domino
... led by the blind man, the daughter reading some chapters in the Bible indicated by him. The two old men and I occupied separate cots in one small side room. Happening to wake up at dawn the following morning, I saw those old men sit up facing each other, with their feet upon the floor, and begin their morning hymn of praise, after which the house resounded with younger voices from the other end with a similar song. I do not call to mind any special untidiness at that poor blind man's house to warrant his sobriquet; my recollections ...
— Origin of the Anglo-Boer War Revealed (2nd ed.) - The Conspiracy of the 19th Century Unmasked • C. H. Thomas
... Sheepshead Bay; and on Monday afternoons in midwinter it was a regular thing that I should go with him to New York to ramble among the old book-shops in Nassau Street and eat oysters at Dorlon's stall, with wooden tables and sawdust-sprinkled floor, in Fulton Market. Say what you please about the friendship of books: it was worth a thousand times more to have the friendship of such ...
— Days Off - And Other Digressions • Henry Van Dyke
... these cloaks, and behind that curtain, the Nun was said to issue. I did not believe this, nor was I troubled by apprehension thereof; but I saw a very dark and large rat, with a long tail, come gliding out from that squalid alcove; and, moreover, my eye fell on many a black-beetle, dotting the floor. These objects discomposed me more, perhaps, than it would be wise to say, as also did the dust, lumber, and stifling heat of the place. The last inconvenience would soon have become intolerable, had I not found means to open and prop up the skylight, thus admitting some freshness. Underneath ...
— Villette • Charlotte Bronte
... Edwin, as floor manager, now called out a new "set" and as the dancers began to "form on," Joe Belford hunched his brother. "Go after him now," he said. With deadly slowness of action, Marsh sauntered up to Blackler and said something in a ...
— A Son of the Middle Border • Hamlin Garland
... under the gables, to complete the desolate picture. We can all discourse, I dare say, if so minded, about our recollections of the "Talbot," the "Queen's Head," or the "Lion" of those days. We have all been to that room on the ground floor on one side of the old inn yard, not quite free from a certain fragrant smell of tobacco, where the cruets on the sideboard were usually absorbed by the skirts of the box-coats that hung from the ...
— Speeches: Literary and Social • Charles Dickens
... continued to reside alternately at Nohant, whither she came with her son and daughter for their holidays—Solange being now placed in a children's school kept by some English ladies at Paris,—and her "poet's garret," as she styled her third floor appartement ...
— Famous Women: George Sand • Bertha Thomas
... more touching in their way than the porch of Rossura Church: it is dated early in the last century, and is absolutely without ornament; the flight of steps inside it lead up to the level of the floor of the church. One lovely summer Sunday morning passing the church betimes, I saw the people kneeling upon these steps, the church within being crammed. In the darker light of the porch, they told out against the sky that showed through the ...
— Selections from Previous Works - and Remarks on Romanes' Mental Evolution in Animals • Samuel Butler
... castle were soon together to crumble into ruins; and all the forms, desires, beliefs, and convictions of the old world were passing away never to return. A new continent had arisen beyond the western sea. The floor of heaven, inlaid with stars, had sunk back into an infinite abyss of immeasurable space; and the firm earth itself, unfixed from its foundations, was seen to be but a small atom in the awful vastness of the universe. In the fabric of habit which they ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol XI. • Edited by Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton
... result was unexpected. The bully went sprawling, knocked down by a well directed blow from the undersized, bespectacled young assemblyman—and some of the gang that attempted to bring aid to the fallen also found themselves upon the floor. Roosevelt, flashing his teeth in characteristic manner, told the little knot of his enemies who had gathered to witness the affair that he was much obliged to them,—that he hadn't enjoyed himself so much since he had been ...
— A Treasury of Heroes and Heroines - A Record of High Endeavour and Strange Adventure from 500 B.C. to 1920 A.D. • Clayton Edwards
... seen that the verdict of Funafuti is clearly and unmistakeably in favour of Darwin's theory. It is true that some zoologists find a difficulty in realising a slow sinking of parts of the ocean floor, and have suggested new and alternative explanations: but geologists generally, accepting the proofs of slow upheaval in some areas—as shown by the admirable researches of Alexander Agassiz—consider that it is ...
— Darwin and Modern Science • A.C. Seward and Others
... for fear of allowing the roaming lion to see the eating, and her guests. Just as the hired girl was bringing in the dessert a distant shot rang out, and uttering a scream the girl, whose nerves were on edge, let the dessert saucers fall to the floor with a crash. ...
— Out with Gun and Camera • Ralph Bonehill
... should retain his hat and gloves in his hand on entering the room. The hat should not be laid upon a table or stand, but kept in the hand, unless it is found necessary from some cause to set it down. In that case, place it upon the floor. An umbrella should be left in the hall. In an informal evening call, the hat, gloves, overcoat and cane may be ...
— Our Deportment - Or the Manners, Conduct and Dress of the Most Refined Society • John H. Young
... that he had been asleep only a few minutes when he was suddenly awakened by a terrific crash, followed by a concussion that shook the cruiser from stem to stern. His hammock rolled so violently that he promptly fell out on the floor of the flat. Before he could rise, the occupant of the next hammock tried his level best to thrust his toes into Trefusis' mouth. The rest of the midshipmen, who were watch below, were either thrown from their hammocks ...
— The Submarine Hunters - A Story of the Naval Patrol Work in the Great War • Percy F. Westerman
... into an apartment that, from its noble proportions and beauty, might fairly be called magnificent. Its ceiling was panelled with worked timber, and its floor beautifully inlaid with woods of various hue, whilst the walls were thickly covered with pictures, chiefly sea-pieces, and all by good masters. He had, however, but little time to look about him, for a door opened at the further end of the room, and admitted ...
— Dawn • H. Rider Haggard
... top-floor apartment in the Human Block, known as the Cranium, and kept by the Sarah Sisters—Sarah Brum and Sarah Belum, assisted by Medulla Oblongata. All three are nervous, but are always confined to their cells. The Brain is done in gray and white, and furnished with light and heat, ...
— The Foolish Dictionary • Gideon Wurdz
... robbers said the old woman was right, and they left off searching, and sat down to eat, and the old woman dropped some sleeping stuff into their wine, so that before long they stretched themselves on the cellar floor, sleeping and snoring. When the bride heard that, she came from behind the cask, and had to make her way among the sleepers lying all about on the ground, and she felt very much afraid lest she might awaken any of them. But by good luck she passed through, ...
— Household Stories by the Brothers Grimm • Jacob Grimm and Wilhelm Grimm
... so,—though his stomach abhorred garlic; and his three slaves—the fewest a man could have—wait on him as he lies before the clean white marble table, leaning on his elbow. He does not forget the household gods, and pours a few drops upon the cement floor in libation to them, out of the little earthen saucer filled from the slim-necked bottle of Campanian earthenware. Then to sleep, careless of getting up early or late, just as he might feel, to stay at home and read or write, or to wander about the city, or to play the favourite left-handed ...
— Ave Roma Immortalis, Vol. 1 - Studies from the Chronicles of Rome • Francis Marion Crawford
... to my report. I craftily did not return to the imperial quarters until night was approaching and Napoleon, having dismounted had gone to his apartment. Brought before him in order to make my report, I found him lying at full length on an immense map which was spread on the floor. As soon as he saw me, he called out "Well now! Marbot, how many Chasseurs are there in my guard? Are there twelve hundred as Morland claims?" "No sire" I replied."I counted only eleven hundred and twenty, that is a shortfall of eighty." "I was sure that there was a lot missing." ...
— The Memoirs of General the Baron de Marbot, Translated by - Oliver C. Colt • Baron de Marbot
... with the majority of the house for attempting thus to censure a man, such as they knew Mr. Adams to be, than whom he was confident the whole house would bear him witness that there was not an individual on that floor more regular, more assiduous, or more laborious, in the discharge of his public duty. A motion was then made to lay the resolution on the table, ...
— Memoir of the Life of John Quincy Adams. • Josiah Quincy
... place to sympathy. Some of the most charitably disposed among the citizens visited her, bringing comforts and delicacies for her and presents for the pretty, innocent babes who all unconscious of the cloud that hung over them, played happily upon the floor of the dark and bare room in which their mother's life was burning out. Nurse Betty, an ample, motherly soul, with cheeks like winter apples and eyes like blue china, and a huge ruffled cap hiding her straggly grey locks from view—versatile Betty, who was not only nurse for the children and ...
— The Dreamer - A Romantic Rendering of the Life-Story of Edgar Allan Poe • Mary Newton Stanard
... art no longer a little girl, Primrose, though it grieves me to say it. Patty scolds about lengthening thy gowns all the time, and Anabella is sure I will keep thee an old maid. Though between two stools she is like to come to the floor for aught I see. Her British lover never so much as wrote her a line, and young Matthews, that she made quite certain of, hath married Kitty Strong. She need not worry about thee, since thou hast nearly two years' grace behind her. But her ...
— A Little Girl in Old Philadelphia • Amanda Minnie Douglas
... shook off her comforting arms, and mounted the steps, holding to the rail as he did so. He went directly indoors, and to his room, with the instinct of a wounded creature to seek its cave or burrow. Save for a cold, cheerless patch of moonlight on the floor it was dark, and he felt no desire to turn on the lights. For a while he sat, silent and motionless, on the edge of the bed. But he could not stand the closed-in solitude. The place seemed filled with the fragrant presence of the girl who was not there; would never ...
— 'Smiles' - A Rose of the Cumberlands • Eliot H. Robinson
... the room began to attack the King's Son. The looking glass on the wall flung itself at him and hit him on the back of the head. The leg of the table gave him a terrible blow at the back of the knees. He saw the two candles hopping across the floor to burn his legs. He ran out of the room, and when he got to the door it swung around and gave him a blow that flung him away from the tower. The crane that was waiting on the tower flew down, its neck and beak outstretched, and gave him a blow on ...
— The King of Ireland's Son • Padraic Colum
... is made for the seating of every one entitled to a seat on the floor of the house; and the act declares that "such joint meeting shall not be dissolved until the count of electoral votes shall be completed and ...
— Studies in Civics • James T. McCleary
... represented an open shed, m, for carts and wagons to remain under cover, thirty feet by fifteen, while l l l l l l are bins for vegetables, to be filled through scuttles from the floor of the story above, and surrounded by solid walls. The area of this whole floor equals one hundred feet by fifty-seven. k, is an open space, nearly on a level with the cow-chamber, through the door p. s, stairs to the third story and to the cellar, d d d, passage next to the ...
— Cattle and Their Diseases • Robert Jennings
... can't tell you. She was never a great friend of mine. I was too busy to make friends. She had part of a house in Soho Square. Some people in business had the first floor. ...
— A Vanished Hand • Sarah Doudney
... carry everything before her, as he was sure she would do. When Acton caught himself thinking these thoughts he began to walk up and down, with his hands in his pockets, frowning a little and looking at the floor. What did it prove—for it certainly proved something—this lively disposition to be "off" somewhere with Madame Munster, away from all the rest of them? Such a vision, certainly, seemed a refined implication of matrimony, ...
— The Europeans • Henry James
... of France assembled at Tours in response to royal writs issued in the preceding February.[2] The chancellor, Jouvencal, opened the session with a tedious, long-winded harangue calculated to weary rather than to illuminate the assembly. Then the king took the floor and delivered a telling speech. With trenchant and well chosen phrases he set forth the reasons why Normandy ought to be an intrinsic part of the French realm. The advantages of centralisation, the weakness ...
— Charles the Bold - Last Duke Of Burgundy, 1433-1477 • Ruth Putnam
... into Mr. Furnival's room, a pleasant apartment on the first floor, with windows looking out upon a charming oasis of grass and trees. The lawyer apologized for keeping him waiting, intimated delicately that he had a pressing appointment in five minutes' time, and expressed his sympathy with Oswyn's ...
— A Comedy of Masks - A Novel • Ernest Dowson and Arthur Moore |
