"Instep" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... a bad wound, too," said Mr Rawlings, who by this time had managed to take off Seth's boot and disclose the extent of the injury, a pretty deep cut right across the instep, which would probably lame the ex-mate for life, as far as ...
— Picked up at Sea - The Gold Miners of Minturne Creek • J.C. Hutcheson
... heaven's sake, Corydon, look here! Just now a bramble-spike Ran, there, into my instep—and oh how deep they strike, Those lancewood-shafts! A murrain light on that calf, I say! I got it gaping after her. Canst thou ...
— Theocritus • Theocritus
... were able to make out by the aid of strong glasses. From our position about the middle of the island the two extreme points of Wrangel island bore southwest and west-by-south respectively. In shape, Herald island is something like a boot with a depression at the instep, and at the westernmost extremity, near which it may be climbed with considerable ease, are found a number of jagged peaks and splintered pinnacles of granite, some of which resemble the giant remains of ancient sculpture, ...
— The First Landing on Wrangel Island - With Some Remarks on the Northern Inhabitants • Irving C. Rosse
... on whatever she did that it was her that told her or she'd never speak to her again. No. Honour where honour is due. There was an innate refinement, a languid queenly hauteur about Gerty which was unmistakably evidenced in her delicate hands and higharched instep. Had kind fate but willed her to be born a gentlewoman of high degree in her own right and had she only received the benefit of a good education Gerty MacDowell might easily have held her own beside any lady in the land and have seen herself exquisitely gowned with jewels ...
— Ulysses • James Joyce
... as a child's. The chair in which she reclined, was of massive oak, inlaid richly with ivory, and canopied with purple velvet, embroidered with, flowers of gold. Her foot-encased within the smallest shoe in Burgundy, and ornamented with a flashing jewel upon the instep-rested upon a footstool of massive oak, magnificently carved ...
— The Duke's Prize - A Story of Art and Heart in Florence • Maturin Murray
... there, and think you better looking than you are, and be angelically sweet.—Oh! madame has not her match, and you may boast of having done a very good stroke of business: a good heart, genteel manners, a fine instep—and ...
— Scenes from a Courtesan's Life • Honore de Balzac
... of the tracks betrayed a small, coquettish, slender foot, clad in an elegant high-heeled boot with a narrow sole and an arched instep. The other denoted a broad, short foot growing wider toward the end. It had evidently been incased in a ...
— Monsieur Lecoq • Emile Gaboriau
... is mostly white, homespun flannel "bawneens," and sandals of cowhide, fastened across the instep, which they call "pampooties." ...
— The Sunny Side of Ireland - How to see it by the Great Southern and Western Railway • John O'Mahony and R. Lloyd Praeger
... means of strips of deerskin, which were sunk into grooves in the under part of the soles to prevent them from chafing. Rough and ready they were, nevertheless they fitted well and tightly to their feet; but it was found that the want of a joint at the instep rendered it difficult to walk with these soles on, and impossible to run. Roy's ingenuity, however, soon overcame this difficulty. He cut the soles through just under the instep, and then, boring two holes in each part, lashed them firmly together with deerskin, thus producing ...
— Silver Lake • R.M. Ballantyne
... and sufficient allowance for this should be made. More feet are crippled and distorted by shoes that are too short than for any other reason. A shoe should fit snug yet be comfortable over ball and instep, and when first worn should not lace close together over the instep. Leather always stretches and loosens at instep and can be taken up by lacing. The foot should always be held firmly, but not too tightly ...
— Manual of Military Training - Second, Revised Edition • James A. Moss
... shapely waist, Her arms, her instep queenly; And her sweet parting lips are graced With rows of ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel, Volumes I-VI. - The Songs of Scotland of the Past Half Century • Various
... together; the great toe was alone left in its normal state. The fore-part of the foot had been so compressed with strong broad bandages, that instead of expanding in length and breadth, it had shot upwards and formed a large lump at the instep, where it made part and parcel of the leg; the lower portion of the foot was scarcely four inches long, and an inch and a half broad. The feet are always swathed in white linen or silk, bound round with ...
— A Woman's Journey Round the World • Ida Pfeiffer
... a man in a leather garb, and wearing a kind of gaiters bound to the legs by strips of hide which went across and across from the instep to far above the knee. There was a leathern girdle about the waist, and one hand was slightly raised, as if it had held a staff or spear, but no remains of these were to be seen. Probably the head had once been ...
— Dick o' the Fens - A Tale of the Great East Swamp • George Manville Fenn
... some wrong had been personally done to himself. He marked the dense blackness of her heavy mass of hair; the perfect clearness of her skin; the shapeliness of the slender, outstretched figure; the narrow boot, with its high-arched instep, peeping shyly beneath the blue skirt; the something rarely interesting, yet which scarcely made for beauty, revealed unconsciously in the upturned face with its rounded chin and ...
— Beth Norvell - A Romance of the West • Randall Parrish
... Way.—Where there is a great deal of standing to be done by any one, the feet sometimes yield more or less at the arch of the instep. This becomes flattened, and even great pain ensues; lameness sometimes follows. Young girls who have to stand much are especially liable to suffer in this way. In the first place rest must be had. Wise masters will provide due ...
— Papers on Health • John Kirk
... obeisance to the Duchess, and said, "You give me courage to speak, my noble, worthy lady. I must tell you, that if this ungodly young woman is my daughter, I shall know her by a violet mark between her shoulders, and another on the left instep. If she would but come with ...
— Famous Stories Every Child Should Know • Various
... Support is, they are made to fit and conform perfectly with ankle, giving free instep movement ...
— The Handy Cyclopedia of Things Worth Knowing - A Manual of Ready Reference • Joseph Triemens
... machinery up to examine its constitution and by-laws, and about two and a half pounds of wrought iron fell off and landed on my instep. ...
— You Can Search Me • Hugh McHugh
... It took two grooms, two of the gentlemen guests, and her husband to assist her to the ground. Her passage down the steps of the ladder had been long enough, however, to enable her to display a series of pretty poses, each one more effective than the others. When one has an instep of ideal elevation, what is the use of being born a Frenchwoman, unless one knows how ...
— In and Out of Three Normady Inns • Anna Bowman Dodd
... natural and partly constructed by the monks, measuring a full mile round, and from fifty to two hundred yards in width. It was in the shape of a man's shoe, the heel facing west like the house, but projecting beyond it, the narrow part representing the hollow of the instep, being exactly opposite to it, and the sole swelling out in ...
— Dawn • H. Rider Haggard
... was inflicting punishment; he had whipped him till exhausted,—rested himself, and returned again to the punishment. The wretched sufferer was in a most pitiable condition, and the warm blood and dry dust of the barn had formed a mortar up to his instep. Mr. Males jumped the fence, and remonstrated so effectually with Capt. Thorpe, that he ceased the punishment. It was six weeks before that slave ...
— The Anti-Slavery Examiner, Omnibus • American Anti-Slavery Society
... boots: boots weaken instead of strengthen the ankle. The ankle and instep require free play, and ought not to be hampered by boots. Moreover, boots, by undue pressure, decidedly waste away the ligaments of the ankle. Boots act on the ankles in a similar way that stays do on the waist—they do mischief by pressure. Boots waste away the ligaments of the ankle; stays ...
— Advice to a Mother on the Management of her Children • Pye Henry Chavasse
... down in a street where the sand was over the instep, before a stiff, graceless brick building, standing close up in one corner of an acre lot. On one side, in view from the front gate, was a dilapidated hen-house—on the other, a more unsightly stable with a pig-sty attached. All the space between the house and vineyard, ...
— Lippincott's Magazine. Vol. XII, No. 33. December, 1873. • Various
... moulded thing; even the slender arch of the instep had been preserved in unbroken line and curve, and yet Constans wondered vaguely why it should seem so beautiful to him. He put out his own foot and compared the two, laughed, half understood, and ...
— The Doomsman • Van Tassel Sutphen
... full of life, partly through the unanatomic contortions by means of which they are made to express their emotions. Often one sees elbows bent the wrong way to emphasize the gesture of denunciation, or a foot stepping quite across the instep of its mate in order to suggest speed of motion. Early Gothic work in England is usually bas-relief; one does not find the statue as early as in France. In 1176 William of Sens went over to England, to work on Canterbury Cathedral, and after that French influence was ...
— Arts and Crafts in the Middle Ages • Julia De Wolf Addison
... writhing fragments and flung them into the fire, in the midst of which they writhed still more horribly. Then seizing a good, stout, brightly- glowing brand from the fire, he coolly sat down and applied the almost white-hot end to the wound, which was in his left instep. I do not think I ever saw anything more heroic than this act of the savage, for though the flesh hissed and smoked and gave forth a most horrible odour of burnt flesh, the man never winced, but calmly and deliberately cauterised the bite with ...
— A Middy of the Slave Squadron - A West African Story • Harry Collingwood
... said: "Noble and pious lady, you have opened my heart. Permit me to tell you, that if this evil-disposed maiden is my daughter, she has a mark like a violet between her shoulders, and another of the same kind on the instep of her left foot. If she will only consent to go out of the ...
— Undine - I • Friedrich de la Motte Fouque
... a pale blue dimity, whose round, full blouse was belted with a soft ribbon. The skirt, with its three frills edged with tiny lace, came just to her instep, and disclosed ...
— Patty's Friends • Carolyn Wells
... himself off the bar, grasping it with both hands; then he passed the left knee through the right arm, so as to let the knee rest in the elbow; then he passed the right knee over the instep of the left foot, and letting go his left hand, he grasped his right foot with it. Thus he hung, suspended by his right hand, and coiled up like a ball. After hanging thus for a couple of minutes, he caught the bar by his other hand, and, uncoiling himself, brought his feet between his arms ...
— Ernest Bracebridge - School Days • William H. G. Kingston
... the other Philosophers, general discouragement was the order of the day. It was moved and seconded that Coxhead be kicked for having made "amnis" feminine, and having translated the French "impasse" as "instep." And Trimble was temporarily suspended from the service of the Conversation Club because he had put a decimal dot in the wrong place. Public feeling ran so high that any departure from the rules of syntax or algebra was regarded as treason against the ...
— Tom, Dick and Harry • Talbot Baines Reed
... but dat are a wrinkle. Oh, how missus would a lubbed you. It was loud all down sout dere was a great deal ob 'finement in her. Nobody was good nuff for her dere; dey had no taste for cookin'. She was mighty high 'mong de ladies, in de instep, but not a mossel of pride to de niggars. Oh, you would a walked right into de cockles ob her heart. If you had tredded up to her, she would a married you, and gub you her tree plantations, and eight hundred niggar, and ebery ting, and order ...
— Nature and Human Nature • Thomas Chandler Haliburton
... and transported to Geneva, where, thanks to the kindness of friends, I was immediately placed in the best medical hands. On the morning after my arrival in Geneva, Dr. Gautier discovered an abscess in my instep, at a distance of five inches from the wound. The two were connected by a channel, or sinus, as it is technically called, through which he was able to empty the abscess, without the ...
— Fragments of science, V. 1-2 • John Tyndall
... still further along the line—about a yard or so (according to the height of the individual)—keeping the shin-bone as nearly as possible perpendicular to the instep. The left leg should be straight and the left heel should not leave the ground. The heels should be both on the line, and the shoulders should be square to the left; i.e. the right shoulder should be well extended and the left held back. The weight is now, ...
— Broad-Sword and Single-Stick • R. G. Allanson-Winn
... out whar he went, Marse Rupert," said Matt, much roused. "I foun' out whar he is dishyer ve'y instep. He's in Hamlin County, keepin' sto' an' post-office at Talbot's Cross-roads; an', frum what I heah, Marse Tom De Willoughby de mos' pop'larist gen'leman an' mos' looked up ter ...
— In Connection with the De Willoughby Claim • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... no disobeying her, without rudeness; and indeed the girls' feet were already jigging; and Lizzie giving herself wonderful airs with a roll of learned music; and even while Annie was doing my collop, her pretty round instep was arching itself, as I could see from the parlour-door. So I took little Ruth, and I spun her around, as the sound of the music came lively and ringing; and after us came all the rest with much laughter, begging me not to jump over her; and anon my grave partner began to ...
— Lorna Doone - A Romance of Exmoor • R. D. Blackmore
... light and buoyant as at all comported with the fullness that properly belonged to her years. The limbs, seen below the folds of a short kirtle of bright scarlet cloth, were just and tapering, even to the nicest proportions of classic beauty; and never did foot of higher instep, and softer roundness, grace a feathered moccason. Though the person, from the neck to the knees, was hid by a tightly-fitting vest of calico and the short kirtle named, enough of the shape was visible to betray outlines ...
— The Wept of Wish-Ton-Wish • James Fenimore Cooper
... are never tired. It is my poor back." Whereupon she slowly, gracefully straightened out one of her legs, and without changing the position of her body, raised it, with toes and instep on a perfect line, until the heel was some three feet from the floor. Then she swung it slowly backward, twisting her body sinuously to one side. A moment later the foot was stretched out behind her and she lifted herself steadily, without apparent exertion, upon the other knee,—and then stood ...
— West Wind Drift • George Barr McCutcheon
... into a high golden comb that had been worn in Spain by many a beauty of the house of Moraga, and spiked the knot with two long pins globed at the end with gold, while the maid fastened her slippers and smoothed the pink silk stockings over the thin instep above; "what is a lover like? Is it like meeting one of the ...
— Rezanov • Gertrude Atherton
... goin'," ses I, "wid the shawl An' cotton umbrella an' basket an' all? Would ye not wait for McMullen's machine, Wid that iligant instep befittin' a queen? Oh, you wid the wind-soft gray eye wid a wile in it, You wid the lip wid the troublesome smile in it, Sure, the road's wet, ivery rain-muddied mile in it—" "Ah, the Saints'll be kapin' ...
— The Home Book of Verse, Vol. 2 (of 4) • Various
... of the arch of the foot is brought about by standing for long periods. Continuous pressure on a living structure weakens it, while intermittent pressure strengthens it; so the man who stands on his feet continuously develops a flat instep and a weak calf, while the professional dancer or runner acquires a high instep and a strong calf. Now there are many occupations which involve prolonged standing and so induce the condition of flat ...
— The Red Thumb Mark • R. Austin Freeman
... is short for Moses— Had one of the biggest kind of noses: It had a sort of an instep in it, And he fed it with snuff ...
— Successful Recitations • Various
... dog Balthasar, causing the animal to wake and attack his fleas; for though he was supposed to have none, nothing could persuade him of the fact. When he had finished he rubbed the place he had been scratching against his master's calf, and settled down again with his chin over the instep of the disturbing boot. And into old Jolyon's mind came a sudden recollection—a face he had seen at that opera three weeks ago—Irene, the wife of his precious nephew Soames, that man of property! Though ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... one in the scramble and flurry noticed the elderly pock-marked ayah who had been engaged as Leonie's bodywoman as she lifted the hem of the mem-sahib's skirt and laid it against her forehead, and touched the instep of the high caste native when he passed behind the girl and disappeared in the crowd of his countrymen which opened up a ...
— Leonie of the Jungle • Joan Conquest
... on the smooth triangle with the point extending beyond the toes several inches. Fold the point back over the instep, cross the ends, carry around the ankle ...
— Scouting For Girls, Official Handbook of the Girl Scouts • Girl Scouts
... in the shoe bargain, a curly-headed young Hebrew, who flattered her familiarly and talked as if he had known her from a child, but always with an eye to business. She stood, holding back her skirts and rocking her instep from right to left, while she considered the effect of the new style; patent-leather foxings and tan-cloth tops, and heels that came under the middle of her foot, and narrow toes with tips of stamped leather;—but what a price! More than a third of her chicken-money ...
— In Exile and Other Stories • Mary Hallock Foote
... close, white skirt hung from a plainly embroidered white waist to a silken instep; and from the crown of her charming head to the tall heels of her graceful white suede slippers, heels of a sweeter curve than the waist of a violin, she was as modern and lovely as this dingy old house was belated ...
— The Flirt • Booth Tarkington
... mothers and sisters are willing. The shirt should always be lettered with the name or initials of the team. Baseball shoes are usually provided with steel plates or leather knobs. Spikes are very dangerous and should not be permitted. The regulation baseball shoe reaches just under the instep. ...
— Outdoor Sports and Games • Claude H. Miller
... spaniel was frightened with something on the bed, and fell from it, and cried very much. The instep, or wrist, of the right leg, before was evidently bowed, and there was considerable heat and tenderness. It was well fomented on the two following days, and then set, and adhesive plaster was tightly applied, and ...
— The Dog - A nineteenth-century dog-lovers' manual, - a combination of the essential and the esoteric. • William Youatt
... fastened on the bare upper surface of the foot by two thongs, of which one was usually carried within the great toe, and the other in many circumvolutions round about the ankles, so that both finally met and tied just above the instep. ...
— Theological Essays and Other Papers v2 • Thomas de Quincey
... (Allekteega) with the hair inside, and reaching to the knee, where they tie. Over these come a pair of shoes of the same material; next a pair of dressed sealskin boots, perfectly water-tight; and over all a corresponding pair of shoes, tying round the instep. These last are made just like the moccasin of a North American Indian, being neatly crimped at the toes, and having several serpentine pieces of hide sewn across the sole to prevent wearing. The water-tight boots and shoes are made of the skin of the small seal (neitiek), except ...
— Three Voyages for the Discovery of a Northwest Passage from the • Sir William Edward Parry
... with women, must succeed with men; the real Lovelace is loved by all. Like gravitation, love draws all things. Our young man would have to be five feet eleven, or six feet, broad shoulders, light brown hair, deep eyes, soft and suggestive, broad shoulders, a thin neck, long delicate hands, a high instep. His nose should be straight, his face oval and small, he must be clean about the hips, and his movements must be naturally caressing. He comes into the ball-room, his shoulders well back, he stretches his hand to the hostess, he looks at her earnestly ...
— Confessions of a Young Man • George Moore
... Gunnlaug and Audun Festargram, and seven of them together, went up to Hladir to the earl. Gunnlaug was so clad that he had on a grey kirtle and white long-hose; he had a boil on his foot by the instep, and from this oozed blood and matter as he strode on. In this guise he went before the earl with Audun and the rest of them, and greeted him well. The earl knew Audun, and asked him tidings from Iceland. Audun told him what there was toward. Then the earl asked Gunnlaug who he was, and Gunnlaug ...
— The Story Of Gunnlaug The Worm-Tongue And Raven The Skald - 1875 • Anonymous
... the Warden's drawing-room had just struck eight, and already the ducal feet were beautiful on the white bearskin hearthrug. So slim and long were they, of instep so nobly arched, that only with a pair of glazed ox-tongues on a breakfast-table were they comparable. Incomparable quite, the figure and face and vesture of him who ...
— Zuleika Dobson - or, An Oxford Love Story • Max Beerbohm
... straight, ash-blond hair softened greatly her prominent cheek bones, and a frill of lace partially hid the peasant hand that had so frequently distressed him. Her high-heeled slippers shortened and gave an instep to her long, flat foot. He smiled a little at the prim dignity which she unconsciously took on with her clothes; but that at which he did not smile was the air of cool toleration with which she listened ...
— The Lady Doc • Caroline Lockhart
... Coelestum terras reliquit—we pronounced—in reference to the stockings still—that Modesty taking her final leave of Mortals, her last blush was visible in her ascent to the Heavens by the tract of the glowing instep. This might be called the crowning conceit; and was esteemed ...
— The Bed-Book of Happiness • Harold Begbie
... body I had noticed that she was wearing Louis XV. shoes, and also that there was still mud upon the heels. She had always been rather proud of her feet, and surely there is nothing which sets off the shape of a woman's foot better than the neat little shoe, with its high instep and heel. ...
— The Seven Secrets • William Le Queux
... top-boot to the yards of lawn that swathed the throat, that of the weaker sex, in the days of the Empire, was admirably fitted for August weather. Above pale, thin stuffs, girdled beneath the breast and falling straight and narrow to the instep, rose bare white neck and arms, while each charming face looked forth from an umbrageous bonnet of fine straw. Bonnet and large fan appeared the only ample articles of attire; even the gloves were but mitts. ...
— Lewis Rand • Mary Johnston
... coming as the invitation did at the particular juncture when fear and indignation at these adversaries could be transformed by a spring of the foot into a triumph over them, she abandoned herself to her impulse, climbed the gate, put her toe upon his instep, and scrambled into the saddle behind him. The pair were speeding away into the distant gray by the time that the contentious revellers became ...
— Tess of the d'Urbervilles - A Pure Woman • Thomas Hardy
... peered down and saw the broken flower-pot. I knew lying was more than useless and, as the truth had always served me well, I said, giving my father's servant, who looked sleepy, a heavy kick on the instep: ...
— Margot Asquith, An Autobiography: Volumes I & II • Margot Asquith
... one of the windows, thereby displaying to the unobservant air an instep large but exquisitely arched, Marcia Amherst comes slowly up to where the lazy fowl are dreaming. Almost unconsciously (because her face is full of troubled thought), or perhaps a little vengefully, she flicks the one nearest to her with the handkerchief ...
— Molly Bawn • Margaret Wolfe Hamilton
... appeared to have grown, if growth it can be called; the great toe alone remained in its natural state. The fore part of the foot had been so swathed and compressed by tight bandages, that, instead of expanding in length and breadth, it had shot upwards, so as to form a large lump at the instep, where it became, so to speak, a portion of the leg; the lower part of the foot was scarcely five inches long, and an inch and a half broad. The feet are always encased in white linen or silk, with silk ...
— The Story of Ida Pfeiffer - and Her Travels in Many Lands • Anonymous
... my servant thump on the floor. Thump, they go, and thump—dully, deformedly. My servant has shown me her feet. The instep has been broken upward into a bony cushion. The big toe is pointed as an awl. The small toes are folded under the cushioned instep. Only the heel is untouched. The thing is white and bloodless with the pallor ...
— Profiles from China • Eunice Tietjens
... over, made some measurements with a marked tape, and looked minutely at the bottoms. On each, in the angle between the heel and the instep, he detected a faint ...
— Trent's Last Case - The Woman in Black • E.C. (Edmund Clerihew) Bentley
... ultimate beauty, to know which was almost death in itself, and yet for the knowledge of which he would have undergone endless torture. He would have forfeited anything, anything, rather than forego his right even to the instep of her foot, and the place from which the toes radiated out, the little, miraculous white plain from which ran the little hillocks of the toes, and the folded, dimpling hollows between the toes. He felt he would have died ...
— The Rainbow • D. H. (David Herbert) Lawrence
... been excluded, remained on her memory only as a disagreeable dream. She imbibed her new monitor's ideas of simplicity of dress, assimilating her own with that of the peasant-girls in the neighbourhood: the black hat, the blue gown, the black stockings, the shoes, tied on the instep. ...
— Crotchet Castle • Thomas Love Peacock
... pointed. Robert, Comte de Dreux, who lived at the same period, is also dressed almost precisely like the Queen, notwithstanding the difference of sex and rank; his robe, however, only descends to the instep, and his belt has no hangings in front. The Queen is represented with her hair long and flowing, but the count ...
— Manners, Custom and Dress During the Middle Ages and During the Renaissance Period • Paul Lacroix
... upon snow Her raiment is, but round the hem Crimson stained; and, as to and fro Her sandals flash, we see on them, And on her instep veined with blue, Flecks of crimson, on those fair feet, High-arched, Diana-like, and fleet, 60 Fit for no grosser stain than dew: Oh, call them rather chrisms than stains, Sacred and from heroic veins! For, in the glory-guarded ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of James Russell Lowell • James Lowell
... is broad and comparatively shallow. The legs, especially the thighs, are long. The foot is long and strong, and rests its lower surface, not merely the outer margin as in apes, on the ground. The elastic arch of the instep must be excepted in the above description, and adds lightness and swiftness to his otherwise slow gait. The great toe is short and generally not opposable. The muscles of the leg are heavy and the knee-joint has a very broad articulating surface. But the great result of man's ...
— The Whence and the Whither of Man • John Mason Tyler
... breasts so firm that they bore up the folds of her bodice as they had been two walnuts; so slim was she in the waist that your two hands might have clipped her; and the daisy flowers that brake beneath her as she went tiptoe, and that bent above her instep, seemed black against her feet and ankles, so white was the maiden. She came to the postern-gate, and unbarred it, and went out through the streets of Beaucaire, keeping always on the shadowy side, for the moon was shining right clear, and so wandered she till she came to the tower where her ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol. 2 • Charles Dudley Warner
... of his neck was suddenly red. But the discovery awakened nothing of the coquette in her. Quite the contrary, there was something grateful, even gravely maternal, in the smile hovering on her lips for the rough trooper who took fright like a girl over a revealed instep. Still, the interest was not altogether maternal as she watched him doing the same service for Berthe. Perhaps he was too far away, or perhaps practice brought indifference, but at any rate, his neck was no longer ...
— The Missourian • Eugene P. (Eugene Percy) Lyle
... exaggerated care and precision, and their stiff conventional attitudes presented a picture from a Satsuma vase. Their dresses were of all shades, black, blue, purple, grey and mauve. The corner of the skirt folded back above the instep revealed a glimpse of gaudy underwear provoking to men's eyes, and displayed the intricate stenciled flower patterns, which in the case of the younger women seemed to be catching hold of the long sleeves and straying ...
— Kimono • John Paris
... herself up on the seat with her feet stretched out in front of her, one narrow foot resting lightly on the instep of the other, and she looked up at him speculatively from between the double fringe of her ...
— The Splendid Folly • Margaret Pedler
... begin the sacred rites by bathing and assuming the sacred garb. This suit consists of two woollen wrappers, one worn around the middle of the body and the other around the shoulders. With bare head and slippers covering neither heel nor instep the pilgrim sets forth on his ...
— Wealth of the World's Waste Places and Oceania • Jewett Castello Gilson
... manifest, therefore, that flexible strings passing along the interior of the angle, if left to themselves, would, when stretched, start from it. The obvious" (and it must not be forgotten that the preventive was obvious) "preventive is to tie them down. And this is done in fact. Across the instep, or rather just above it, the anatomist finds a strong ligament, under which the tendons pass to the foot. The effect of the ligament as a bandage can be made evident to the senses, for if it be ...
— Evolution, Old & New - Or, the Theories of Buffon, Dr. Erasmus Darwin and Lamarck, - as compared with that of Charles Darwin • Samuel Butler
... world this is known as "drop back to instep hang." Joe had done it most effectively, but that was not ...
— Joe Strong on the Trapeze - or The Daring Feats of a Young Circus Performer • Vance Barnum
... college claret slid forth silently, as if ashamed of the contents. Agnes was particularly pleasant. But her brother could not recover himself. He still remembered their desolate arrival, and he could feel the waters of the Pem eating into his instep. ...
— The Longest Journey • E. M. Forster
... Nellie said, "in which we would all be draped in Greek style, in sheets, and wear sandals and flesh colored hose, covered from neck to instep, and with long speeches in blank verse to mouth. That is the sort of a performance to ...
— The Girls of Central High Aiding the Red Cross - Or Amateur Theatricals for a Worthy Cause • Gertrude W. Morrison
... stared before him at Michael's foot, thrust out and tilted by the crossing of his knees. Michael's foot, with its long, arched instep, fascinated Anthony. He seemed to be thinking: "If I look at it long enough I may forget ...
— The Tree of Heaven • May Sinclair
... lines, the arms penciled downward from the shoulders and meeting in the delicately contoured buckle of her ten fingers, the thigh springing in a suave arc from the confluent planes of her torse, the straight shin to the curve of instep and toe and heel. Her hair was an altogether ...
— We Can't Have Everything • Rupert Hughes
... twig had caught the axe, which caused it to glance in its descent, and struck the instep of his right foot, making a gash about five inches long, the edge of the axe coming out at the sole of the foot. It was a dreadful cut,—one of the worst I ever saw— and I have seen and dressed a great many axe wounds since my ...
— Twenty-Seven Years in Canada West - The Experience of an Early Settler (Volume I) • Samuel Strickland
... patent leather, although black calfskin are at present the fashion, either with or without spats. If with spats, be sure that they fit close; nothing is worse than a wrinkled spat or one that sticks out over the instep like the opened ...
— Etiquette • Emily Post
... above the outer ankle, and make two circular turns, to prevent its slipping: then bring it down from the inside of the foot over the instep towards the outer part; pass it under the sole of the foot, and upwards and inward over the instep towards the inner ankle, then round the ankle and repeat again. Use, to retain dressings to the instep, heel, ...
— Enquire Within Upon Everything - The Great Victorian Domestic Standby • Anonymous
... till the red glare behind their green went out like the light of a lighthouse shut off twenty miles across the sea; till the eyes dropped, and the big head with them—dropped lower and lower, and the red rasp of a tongue grated on Mowgli's instep. ...
— The Second Jungle Book • Rudyard Kipling
... smile, adown from Turkish skies, And beams of cruel kindness shone within her hazel eyes; "Stranger," she said, "or rather say, my nearest, dearest friend, There's something in your eyes, your air, and that high instep's bend, That tells me you're of Arab race,—whatever spot of earth, Cheapside, or Bow, or Stepney, had the honor of your birth, The East it is your country! Like an infant changed to nurse By fairies, you have undergone a nurtureship ...
— The Poetical Works of Thomas Hood • Thomas Hood
... have on," Bee proceeded. "If you are tailor-made and it is morning, you sit straight like this. If it is afternoon and you are all of a Parisian fluff, you recline like this and put your feet as far out on the cushion as you can. It shows off your instep." ...
— At Home with the Jardines • Lilian Bell
... rustle of delicate mourning which made the endless variety of her garments, as a painter could take heed, strike one always as the same obscure elegance. She seated herself on the floor of my mother's chair, a little too much on her right instep as I afterwards gathered, caressing her stiff hand, smiling up into her cold face, commending and approving her without a reserve and without a doubt. She told her immediately, as if it were something for her to hold on by, that she was soon to sit to me for a "likeness," and these ...
— Embarrassments • Henry James
... the foot was so little he really couldn't see it! Isn't he perfectly great? Of course that's only his way of talking, for after all I only wear a number two, but these French heels and pointed toes do certainly make your foot look smaller, and it's always said a high instep helps, too. I used to think mine was almost a deformity, but they say it's a great beauty. Just put your feet beside mine, girls, and look at the difference; not that I care much, ...
— Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... of the average tallness; slender at neck, waist, wrist, and ankle, but filling out well in the figure, which had such curves as I swear I never saw elsewhere upon earth. She had the smallest foot, with the highest instep; such as one gets not often an idea of in England. Her little head, with its ripples of chestnut hair, sat like that of a princess; and her face, oval in shape, proud and soft by turns in expression—I have no way of conveying the impression it gave ...
— Philip Winwood • Robert Neilson Stephens
... city of Kamchau there is an idol temple five hundred cubits square. In the middle is an idol lying at length, which measures fifty paces. The sole of the foot is nine paces long, and the instep is twenty-one cubits in girth. Behind this image and overhead are other idols of a cubit (?) in height, besides figures of Bakshis as large as life. The action of all is hit off so admirably that you would think they were ...
— The Travels of Marco Polo, Volume 2 • Marco Polo and Rustichello of Pisa
... to go back to bed, and get up again, putting the right foot out first, he continued in the same unhappy state of mind. He made, as was his wont, a hasty toilet before breakfast. He wore an old shirt, and a pair of pantaloons that did not reach much above his hips. One of his slippers had no instep; the other was without a heel. His grizzly beard made him look like a wild man of the woods; a certain sardonic expression of countenance contributed to this effect. He planted his chair on its remaining hind leg at the cabin door, and commenced a systematic strain of ...
— Aunt Phillis's Cabin - Or, Southern Life As It Is • Mary H. Eastman
... over. The clock will chap twelve in ten minutes, and I'm going to my bed. I'm feared you won't sleep much, Mother. You look awake to your instep." ...
— A Knight of the Nets • Amelia E. Barr
... faint with pain and with one leg numb to the thigh, from an adroit smiting of his instep. The little assailant's heel had come down with trained force on this nerve center. And, for the moment, Roke was not only in ...
— Black Caesar's Clan • Albert Payson Terhune
... rather tall; she was thin and slender, but delicately shaped. She had pretty feet, more remarkable for the grace of her instep and ankle than for the more ordinary merit of slenderness; her gloved hands, too, were shapely. There were flitting patches of deep red in a pale face, which must have been fresh and softly colored once. Premature wrinkles had withered the delicately modeled ...
— La Grenadiere • Honore de Balzac
... out her hand for his, and then sat down, displaying one of the fascinating slippers, and the openwork instep of her silk stocking, through the meshes of which ...
— The Puritans • Arlo Bates
... it?" he asked, staring. "Nothing that I can see." He seized it, heel in one hand, instep in the other, and gyrated it. Scaramouche screamed in agony, until Climene caught Binet's arm and made ...
— Scaramouche - A Romance of the French Revolution • Rafael Sabatini
... supplemented by certain gifts of chance—a graceful figure, distinction of feature, a certain ring in the voice. All these, so important trifles, David lacked, while Nature had bestowed them upon his friend. Of gentle blood on the mother's side, Lucien was a Frank, even down to the high-arched instep. David had inherited the physique of his father the pressman and the flat foot of the Gael. Lucien could hear the shower of jokes at David's expense; he could see Mme. de Bargeton's repressed smile; and at length, without being exactly ...
— Two Poets - Lost Illusions Part I • Honore de Balzac
... dusky breast, and fell unconfined over full trousers of home-made dark blue linen striped with red, like the gussets under the arms of his white shirt. The trousers were tucked into high boots, slightly wrinkled at the instep, with an inset of pebbled horsehide, frosted green in hue, at the heels. This green leather was a part of their religion, the Tatars told me, but what part they would not reveal. As the soles were soft, like socks, he wore over ...
— Russian Rambles • Isabel F. Hapgood
... hitched his chair forward, stooped with extended arm and picked it up. It looked a slender thing in his big, thick hands. It was not really a slipper, but a low shoe of blue, glazed kid, rubbed and shabby. It had straps to go over the instep, but the girl only thrust her feet in, after her slovenly manner. Jacobus raised his eyes from the shoe to look ...
— 'Twixt Land & Sea • Joseph Conrad
... public, Sir Harry Wildair came and stood beside Mr. Vane. Her bright skin, contrasted with her powdered periwig, became dazzling. She used little rouge, but that little made her eyes two balls of black lightning. From her high instep to her polished forehead, all was symmetry. Her leg would have been a sculptor's glory; and the curve from her waist to her ...
— Peg Woffington • Charles Reade
... brown leather, with an anchor clasp, and empty loops for either fire-arm or steel, supported true sailor's trousers of the purest white and the noblest man-of-war cut; and where these widened at the instep shone a lovely pair of pumps, with buckles radiant of best Bristol diamonds. The wearer of all these splendors smiled, and seemed to become ...
— Mary Anerley • R. D. Blackmore
... her in surprise. He noticed her low black shoe and the slender instep showing from beneath the skirt as she worked the pedal. She wore thin black stockings, which in some way suddenly impressed the Swiss youth. Her bare blond head shone brightly as it disappeared through the gate into the outer court. He remembered that she had no children; ...
— The German Classics of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries - Masterpieces of German Literature Vol. 19 • Various
... perhaps, and looking like a wreathing coil of—Shame on such fancies!—to wrong that supreme crowning gift of abounding Nature, a rush of shining black hair, which, shaken loose, would cloud her all round, like Godiva, from brow to instep! He was sure he had sat down before the fissure or cave. He was sure that he was led softly away from the place, and that it was Elsie who had led him. There was the hair-pin to show that so far it was not ...
— Elsie Venner • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... said he, "are characterized by four joints on the instep, horned jaws, and remarkable strength. We have the mantispe species, the raphidie, and the termite species. The last is often known under the term of white ants, in which we count the deadly termite, ...
— Dick Sand - A Captain at Fifteen • Jules Verne
... particular stress on the necessity of riding boots having thin pliable soles, and being easy over the instep; because I once saw a lady dragged by her stirrup and only saved from death by her boot coming off and thus releasing her. I do not think that sufficient attention is paid either by ladies or bootmakers to the fact that a loose riding boot may be the means of saving its wearer's life: ...
— The Horsewoman - A Practical Guide to Side-Saddle Riding, 2nd. Ed. • Alice M. Hayes
... straight, strong profile. Is it really godlike, or is this impression the result of association? But any suggestion or reminiscence of it in the modern face at once gives one the idea of strength. It is a face strong in the loins, or it suggests a high, elastic instep. It is the face of order and proportion. Those arches are the symbols of law and self-control. The point of greatest interest is the union of the nose with the brow,—that strong, high embankment; it makes the bridge from the ideal to the ...
— Birds and Poets • John Burroughs
... said. "You could not have had them more than a few weeks. The soles which you are at this moment presenting to me are slightly scorched. For a moment I thought they might have got wet and been burned in the drying. But near the instep there is a small circular wafer of paper with the shopman's hieroglyphics upon it. Damp would of course have removed this. You had, then, been sitting with your feet outstretched to the fire, which a man would hardly do even in ...
— Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes • Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
... or, what is better, the floor of the play-room, and undergo the operation of "trussing." This is performed as follows:—The hands are first tied with a handkerchief at the wrists. The ancles are tied in the same manner. The Cock then has his hands brought to his instep, while his knees pass between his arms, and a short stick is thrust in under the knees and over the joints of the elbow, and secured in this situation. The fight now begins by each Cock advancing towards his enemy, and when they come close to each other, each endeavours, ...
— The Book of Sports: - Containing Out-door Sports, Amusements and Recreations, - Including Gymnastics, Gardening & Carpentering • William Martin
... five inches over six feet in his flat sandals but it was only in his unusual height and his enormous strength that he showed the blood of his Jovian father. His feet were small and shapely with a high-arched instep and his whole form was graceful and symmetrical. Crisply curling yellow hair surmounted a head which Praxiteles would have reveled in as a model for his youthful Hermes. As he faced the Viceroy, his usual pleasant smile ...
— Giants on the Earth • Sterner St. Paul Meek
... hair were brown, her lips a coral red, her skin faintly tinted olive. Her features were small and delicately formed. Her feet were positively tiny and he marveled at the natural curve of the high instep. ...
— Spring Street - A Story of Los Angeles • James H. Richardson
... fierce determination the task persisted, until, quite unexpectedly as it seemed, the boot was free; and then, shoving and squeezing the wallaby as a cushion for my right arm, the sole of the left boot began to rasp away at the instep of the right. In such a constrained position the operation, which could be persevered in by fits and starts only, was exasperatingly slow. The sun sopped up the morning mist and boldly explored the crevice, revealing the marvellous precision of the space between the walls. ...
— Tropic Days • E. J. Banfield
... take care of that,' he said coolly, and took from his pocket two strong black bootlaces which he proceeded to criss-cross over the instep and round the ankles. She sat quite still watching him, her eyes very bright, her hands twisted together on her lap. When he had finished she put out her feet and stared at them—they did look boats!—then she looked down at him. He was still kneeling, and ...
— The Love Affairs of Pixie • Mrs George de Horne Vaizey
... were whispering some tale of hope, sure and immortal; the raised hand revealed whence that hope arose. All love seemed to be concentrated in the brooding figure, so human, yet so celestial; all heaven seemed to lie an open path before those quivering wings. And see, the arching instep, the upward-springing foot, suggested that thither those wings were bound, bearing their God-given burden far from the horror of the earth, deep into the bosom of a changeless ...
— Ayesha - The Further History of She-Who-Must-Be-Obeyed • H. Rider Haggard
... shifted one of her little white-stockinged feet over the other. She had on the neatest of sandals, with black ribbons, which crossed over the instep. It was one of Zachariah's weak points, she considered, that he did not seem to care sufficiently for cleanliness, and when he came in he would sometimes put his black hand, before he had washed, on the white tea-cloth, or on the back of a chair, and leave behind him a patch of printer's ...
— The Revolution in Tanner's Lane • Mark Rutherford
... a little girl who was very pretty and delicate, but in the summer she was obliged to run about with bare feet, she was so poor, and in the winter to wear large wooden shoes, which made her little instep quite red, and ...
— The Pearl Story Book - A Collection of Tales, Original and Selected • Mrs. Colman
... meanwhile, the gallant Captain seemed to experience as much distress of mind, as if some stain had lain on his own most unblemished of reputations. He went up and down upon the points of his toes, rising up on his instep with a jerk which at once expressed vexation and defiance—He carried his nose turned up in the air, like that of a pig when he snuffs the approaching storm—He spoke in monosyllables when he spoke at all; and—what perhaps ...
— St. Ronan's Well • Sir Walter Scott
... my instep, my toes, the sole of my foot, the ball, the hollow, the heel, my toe joints, and my toe nails, which ...
— Object Lessons on the Human Body - A Transcript of Lessons Given in the Primary Department of School No. 49, New York City • Sarah F. Buckelew and Margaret W. Lewis
... is father of the man. Our prince signalized his entrance into the world by a feat worthy of his future life. He invented a new shoebuckle. It was an inch long and five inches broad. "It covered almost the whole instep, reaching down to the ground on either side of the foot." A sweet invention! lovely and useful as the prince on whose foot it sparkled. At his first appearance at a Court ball, we read that "his coat was pink silk, with white cuffs; his ...
— Henry Esmond; The English Humourists; The Four Georges • William Makepeace Thackeray |
