"Lightness" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... from the throbbing sunshine into the green-black shadows of a tree, and seated himself with a boyish lightness in piquant contrast with his gray-haired dignity—a lightness that meant athletic years. Eleanor bent down the branch of a great bush that faced him and sat on it as if a bird had poised there. She smiled as their eyes met, and began to hum an air softly. The startled ...
— The Militants - Stories of Some Parsons, Soldiers, and Other Fighters in the World • Mary Raymond Shipman Andrews
... I thought it was love for his brother, and the shame, that had changed Philip—and that endeared him to me. All the lightness and carelessness of manner departed. A great, strong, tenderness took their place. But you know, it was so that he came into your life. He had a wide sympathy and charity, for all—oh! how it drew people to him. ...
— Joyce of the North Woods • Harriet T. Comstock
... once, and with frowning brow regained her coolness, standing upright upon one foot, like Cupid in the painting by Gerard; like him, also, she seemed about to fly away, there was so much airy lightness in her ...
— Gerfaut, Complete • Charles de Bernard
... prominent eyebrows. His hair was the richest tone of chestnut; his moustache and beard—the latter peaking slightly forward—inclined to redness. Excellent health manifested itself in the warm purity of his skin, in his cheerful aspect, and the lightness of his bearing. The lower half of his forehead was wrinkled, and when he did not fix his look on anything in particular, his eyelids drooped, giving him for the moment an air of languor. On sitting down, ...
— The Odd Women • George Gissing
... magnificence. They entered into architecture with the enthusiasm of their teachers, but, in their passion for novelty, lost sight of the simplicity which is the great fascination of a Doric Temple. "And they deemed that lightness and grace were to be attained not so much by proportion between the vertical and the horizontal, as by the comparative slenderness of the former. Hence we see a poverty in Roman architecture in the midst of profuse ornament. The great error was a ...
— The Old Roman World • John Lord
... it. But in spite of his long life of dissipation and adventure (he had campaigned with the Swiss Guards at thirteen, and, though he was much past forty, looked like a man of scarce thirty), there was still such an unrivalled grace in all he said and did, such an heroic lightness and gallantry in all he dared—and he dared everything—that he seemed to be eternally young and incomparably charming. It was with a new-born and deep disgust that Calvert noted the attentions of this man, whose ...
— Calvert of Strathore • Carter Goodloe
... with a lightness that Dinah found peculiarly exhilarating. He was evidently determined that she should not be dull. Her spirits rose. She suddenly felt like a child who has ...
— Greatheart • Ethel M. Dell
... make me blush!" She drew her sari across her face, hiding, under a veil of lightness, her joy ...
— Far to Seek - A Romance of England and India • Maud Diver
... Annaple's lightness and dexterity rendered her the best of the lady tennis-players, and the less practised Ursula found herself defeated in the match, in spite of a partner whose play was superior to Mark's, and with whom she shyly walked ...
— Nuttie's Father • Charlotte M. Yonge
... land, and fixt Where pure ethereal joins with foggy air. Defin'd each element, and from the mass Chaoetic, rang'd select, in concord firm He bound, and all agreed. On high upsprung The fiery ether to the utmost heaven: The atmospheric air, in lightness next, Upfloated:—dense the solid earth dragg'd down The heavier mass; and girt on every side By waves circumfluent, ...
— The Metamorphoses of Publius Ovidus Naso in English blank verse Vols. I & II • Ovid
... had never before realized the suffering this war was causing individuals until she saw the faces of those women with their sons and brothers and lovers; until she saw the faces of the brave boys, for the moment all the rollicking lightness gone, and only the pain of parting and the mists of the unknown future in ...
— The Search • Grace Livingston Hill
... a wondrous rustling everywhere! The steady shadows shook and thinned and died, The shining grass flashed brightness back for brightness, And sleep was gone, and there was heavenly lightness. ...
— Poems New and Old • John Freeman
... daughter of the stars in such array that it blinded one to look at her. She has never come near me since, and I have changed my opinion of her: a beguiling minx, with little taste or judgment, and more than her share of feminine lightness and caprice; an unconscionable flirt, ...
— Stories of Achievement, Volume IV (of 6) - Authors and Journalists • Various
... unexpected directions. Henderson sits with his big proportions quietly rested against the weight-boxes, pulling with monotonous vigor at the fifty-pound weights,—"the Stationary Engine" the boys call him. For a contrast, Draper is floating up and down between the parallel bars with such an airy lightness, that you think he must have hung up his body in the dressing-room, and is exercising only in his arms and clothes. Parsons is swinging in the rings, rising to the ceiling before and behind; up and down he goes, ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 7, Issue 41, March, 1861 • Various
... somewhat plain types exemplify the style which was in vogue at the same time in the Low Countries. It is good Gothic, to be sure,—at least, good as to its planning,—but without that ornateness or lightness known to-day as characteristic of the distinctive French type, which so ...
— The Cathedrals of Northern France • Francis Miltoun
... office—at least he thought it must be midafternoon until he consulted his watch and discovered that, to all intents and purposes, he had completely lost two hours. An amazing loss, truly. There was no lack of youthful vigor in Calvin Gray's movements at any time, but now there was an unusual lightness to his tread and his lips puckered into a joyous whistle. It had been a great day, a day of the widest extremes, a day of adventure and romance. And that is what every ...
— Flowing Gold • Rex Beach
... wood, the cotton wood, and the yellow white wood, are used in this part of Canada for all building purposes, wherein pine is employed elsewhere, and the last named makes the best flooring. I should think, from its lightness and beauty, that it might be used with great advantage ...
— Canada and the Canadians, Vol. 2 • Richard Henry Bonnycastle
... Greeks used it to suggest the gifts of the gods coming down from heaven. 'Blessings on this house.' I suppose the wreath in the hand used here was meant to suggest the crowning of the work. It explains why the figure is called "Victory." By the way, it has an architectural value in giving lightness and grace ...
— The City of Domes • John D. Barry
... his heart. "He acts where you debate. You're often afraid to take a serious step. Cyril never hesitates. You draw back and falter; Cyril goes straight ahead. But all the more reason, accordingly, that Cyril should admit the lightness of whatever you do, for if you do anything—anything in the nature of a definite step, I mean—why, far more readily, then, would Cyril, in like case, have ...
— What's Bred In the Bone • Grant Allen
... solemnity to the sound, and crowning a climax. A favourite instrument with Wagner is the harp, and he uses it freely in Tristan. The effect is, as it were, to place the orchestra upon springs, adding lightness and elasticity to the tone, as may be noticed in the accompaniment to the duet at the end of ...
— Wagner's Tristan und Isolde • George Ainslie Hight
... thing to avoid is stiffness or discomfort of any kind in the pose. At the same time one must have a gracious air, and while feeling perfectly solidly poised on the feet, must make the impression of a certain lightness and freedom from ...
— Caruso and Tetrazzini on the Art of Singing • Enrico Caruso and Luisa Tetrazzini
... in the carburizing material. Bohnite, a commercial carburizing compound is used exclusively at this plant. This does excellent work and is economical. Broadly speaking, the economy of a carburizing compound depends on its lightness. The space not occupied by work must be filled with compound; therefore) other things being equal, a compound weighing 25 lb. would be worth more than twice as much as one weighing 60 lb. per cubic foot. It has ...
— The Working of Steel - Annealing, Heat Treating and Hardening of Carbon and Alloy Steel • Fred H. Colvin
... Gilbert, with scornful lightness, as though his playing had never suffered from cold hands, "it's quite warm to-night!" Which ...
— The Matador of the Five Towns and Other Stories • Arnold Bennett
... reverence, Denzil suddenly began to think how curiously alike they were, these two! Strong man and fair woman, both had many physical points in common,—the same dark, level brows,—the same half wild, half tender eyes,—the same sinuous grace of form,—the same peculiar lightness of movement,—and yet both were different, while resembling each other. It was not what is called a "family likeness" which existed between them; it was the cast of countenance or "type" that exists between races or tribes, and had young Murray not ...
— Ziska - The Problem of a Wicked Soul • Marie Corelli
... hands," said Rosmore. "Truly, Sir John has made a mistake, his desire perhaps marring his judgment; but, as truly, I am your humble worshipper. No! please hear me out. In London I did not thrust myself upon you because I had wit enough to understand that professions with even a suspicion of lightness in them were distasteful to you; now, after what has occurred, I am at a disadvantage, and I have no intention of putting my happiness to the test at such an inopportune time. For the present look upon me as a friend who hopes presently to win a greater regard, and who is, meanwhile, ...
— The Brown Mask • Percy J. Brebner
... combat, it is vital that not one unnecessary pound be put on any man's back. Lightness of foot is the key to speed of movement and the increase of firepower. In judging of these things, every officer's thought should be on the optimistic side. It is better to take the chance that men will manage to get by on a little less than to overload them, ...
— The Armed Forces Officer - Department of the Army Pamphlet 600-2 • U. S. Department of Defense
... forgot the fact of his new clothes, except that he was conscious of walking with a lightness and elasticity strange to him, and in half an hour rang at the visitors' bell ...
— Facing Death - The Hero of the Vaughan Pit. A Tale of the Coal Mines • G. A. Henty
... more modern stories it is impossible not to be impressed by their lightness and swiftness, their flashes of beauty and emotion, their quick rippling talk; but it is hard, at times, not to feel them to be vitiated by their quite unconscious tendency to represent a point of ...
— Hugh - Memoirs of a Brother • Arthur Christopher Benson
... for the Prince, so he girded on his sword, and set out, singing as he went for pure lightness of heart. ...
— Boys and Girls Bookshelf (Vol 2 of 17) - Folk-Lore, Fables, And Fairy Tales • Various
... easy to fill with air a half-inflated bladder. It is already so buoyant with its own lightness, that it yields itself with ease to receive the generous air. The imagination of the woman flew higher than ever it had flown when the proposition came home to her in all its bearings. Of course it had been in her mind that her daughter should marry well;—but there had been natural fears. ...
— Lady Anna • Anthony Trollope
... to come at six. She gave herself one more day; for what she could not have said. A lightness of head seemed to swim over her, and a loss of breath, when she tried to see more clearly the goal, or what might still capture and ...
— Franklin Kane • Anne Douglas Sedgwick
... worship, or the private use of the ecclesiastical ministers. The memory of past calamities inspired Justinian with a wise resolution, that no wood, except for the doors, should be admitted into the new edifice; and the choice of the materials was applied to the strength, the lightness, or the splendor of the respective parts. The solid piles which contained the cupola were composed of huge blocks of freestone, hewn into squares and triangles, fortified by circles of iron, and firmly cemented ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 4 • Edward Gibbon
... finish of phrase. You have a picture of it in such a play as Moliere's Misanthropist, where we see a section of the polished life of the time—men and women making and receiving compliments, discoursing on affairs with easy lightness, flitting backwards and forwards with a thousand petty hurries, and among them one singular figure, hoarse, rough, sombre, moving with a chilling reality in the midst of frolicking shadows. But the shadows were all in all to one another. Not a point of conduct, not a subtlety of ...
— Studies in Literature • John Morley
... Although Tiberius approached them, they would engage in no open battle with him but kept moving from one place to another, devastating a great deal of ground. Owing to their knowledge of the country and the lightness of their equipment they could easily go wherever they pleased. When winter set in, they did much greater damage by invading Macedonia again. Rhoemetalces and his brother Rhascuporis got the better of this force ...
— Dio's Rome, Vol. 4 • Cassius Dio
... office he found Caleb alone, his face buried in his hands. Seating himself he plunged into his tale, ending it with an apology to Caleb for the lightness of the sentence ...
— Pearl-Maiden • H. Rider Haggard
... struck up a lively tune, and the queen, with marvelous lightness of step and ogling glances, ambled up to a tall, raw-boned Methodist preacher, who had come with me, and invited him to dance with her. The poor parson seemed sadly embarrassed, as her manner was very pressing, ...
— California Sketches, Second Series • O. P. Fitzgerald
... or galley, being, essentially, an oar vessel, had to fulfil certain simple conditions. She had to be light, or men might not row her. She had to be long, or she might not carry enough oarsmen to propel her with sufficient swiftness. Her lightness, and lack of draught, made it impossible for her to carry much provision; while the number of her oars made it necessary for her to carry a large crew of rowers, in addition to her soldiers and sail trimmers. It was therefore ...
— On the Spanish Main - Or, Some English forays on the Isthmus of Darien. • John Masefield
... rows, for letting off the water. The Indian plow used in cultivating is exceedingly simple: it is composed of four pieces of wood which the most unhandy ploughman can put together, with the mould board and share, which are of cast iron. The lightness and simplicity of this plough render it easy to be used in every kind of cultivation, where the plantations are divided into rows, such as those of tobacco, maize and sugar cane. It is used with great advantage, ...
— Tobacco; Its History, Varieties, Culture, Manufacture and Commerce • E. R. Billings
... you look pretty enough to kiss," exclaimed Mr. Dinsmore, assuming a lightness of manner which he was far from feeling. "Have you had ...
— Mona • Mrs. Georgie Sheldon
... may possess. Of all tools none, of course, is more exquisite than a fiddle-bow. But the fiddle-bow never could have been perfected, because there would have been no call for its tapering delicacy, its calculated balance of lightness and strength, had not the violinist's technique reached such marvellous fineness of power. For it is the accomplished artist who is fastidious as to his tools; the bungling beginner can bungle with anything. The fiddle-bow, however, affords only one example of a rule which is ...
— Progress and History • Various
... deck house, 33 by 56 feet; the walls of the deck house are bowed out to form bay windows. When you first enter the Library the effect is as though you were looking at shimmering marble, this is owing to the lightness of the panels which are sycamore stained in light gray. The mantelpiece is of white statuary marble. The great swing doors which admit you, have bevelled glass panels set in bronze casings. The chairs have mahogany frames ...
— Marvels of Modern Science • Paul Severing
... said, with a lightness which seemed natural enough, "whether to-night I might not have to dine alone whilst you poor people sat and played havoc with the shreds of my reputation. Groves, the cabinet Johannesburg and the '84 Heidsieck—though I am afraid," he added, ...
— A Prince of Sinners • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... drill will best develop the scope and efficiency of the gun as a naval arm, and will render most effective the peculiar advantages of its lightness and mobility in ...
— Ordnance Instructions for the United States Navy. - 1866. Fourth edition. • Bureau of Ordnance, USN
... walked on she felt an unselfish joy, a greater lightness of heart. Surely the spring would bring back some of her lost happiness to France. There would be another great drive, another tragic contest of strength, but the British ...
— The Campfire Girls on the Field of Honor • Margaret Vandercook
... a peculiar lightness of hand to give grace to these colloquial numbers, and the author of Ionica is more at home in the dryad-haunted forest with Comatas. In combining classic sentiment with purely English landscape ...
— Gossip in a Library • Edmund Gosse
... had a great charm, and a certain whimsical and fantastic humour, which made him do funny little undignified things, like a child. But every single dictum of Melbourne's has got something original and graceful about it—always full of good sense, never pompous, always with a delicious lightness of touch. The only person who took the trouble to put down Melbourne's sayings, just as they came out, was Queen Victoria—but then she was in love with him without knowing it: and in the end he got stuck into the heaviest and most ponderous of biographies, and is lost to the world. Stale politics—there's ...
— Father Payne • Arthur Christopher Benson
... smooth. Let rise until three times the original size. Knead slightly, put into a well greased pan. Let rise until double its bulk and bake 25 or 30 minutes in moderate oven. It will be well to consult some experienced person as to lightness of sponge ...
— A Little Book for A Little Cook • L. P. Hubbard
... your work and—and if you'd let me, I'd count all these things up. If they are too heavy, you know by how much they are too heavy, and you must have a list of things made out to your scale of lightness, and— ...
— Soldiers Three • Rudyard Kipling
... be admitted that if the style of these passages is less elaborate than that of the Decline and Fall, the deficiency, if it is one, is compensated by greater ease and lightness of touch. ...
— Gibbon • James Cotter Morison
... his reward, for Ethne understood that he had laid aside his suspicions, and she was able to set off his indefatigable cheerfulness against her own misery. And her misery was great. If for one day she had recaptured the lightness of heart which had been hers before the three white feathers came to Ramelton, she had now recaptured something of the grief which followed upon their coming. A difference there was, of course. Her pride was restored, and she had a faint hope born of Durrance's words ...
— The Four Feathers • A. E. W. Mason
... furtively followed his wife as she moved about near him, sometimes passing close to his chair in search of something she had mislaid. There was colour in her cheeks; her eyes, though preoccupied, were bright; there was a lightness and buoyancy in her step which she set to a little dancing air she was humming under ...
— Stories by English Authors: Orient • Various
... habit of dreaming and dawdling over his work. Such stories may be perfectly simple and even rather pointless and yet do good work; the whole object is to keep the child's fly-away imagination turned upon the work at hand, thus lending wings to his thought, and lightness to his fingers. Moreover, the mother who talks with her child while working is training in him the habit of bright unconscious conversation, thus giving him a most useful accomplishment. Making a game or a play out of the work is, of course, conducive to the ...
— Study of Child Life • Marion Foster Washburne
... she by the laddered pine Steal to the stars on high, Her fairy whiteness, Hidden in brightness, Her hiding-place would so out-shine The constellated sky, She could not 'scape the eye Of my pursuing, Nor her fawn-foot lightness ...
— A Jongleur Strayed - Verses on Love and Other Matters Sacred and Profane • Richard Le Gallienne
... no more to me, Homer in the dust-heap lies: I have found my Odyssey In the lightness of her glee, In the laughter of ...
— The Place of Honeymoons • Harold MacGrath
... tone of European literature proves. Foreigners, no doubt, do habitual injustice to the morality of French households; but it is impossible that fiction can utterly misrepresent the community which produces and reads it. When one thinks of the utter lightness of tone with which breaches, both of truth and chastity, are treated even in the better class of French novels and plays, it seems absurd to deny the correctness of the picture. Besides, it is not merely a question ...
— Women and the Alphabet • Thomas Wentworth Higginson
... should as yet be called, "No. 290," was barque-rigged, her standing gear being formed throughout of wire rope; thus combining strength with lightness to the utmost possible extent. Her ordinary suit of sails consisted of the usual square sails in the foremast, fore topmast staysail and jib, large fore and main topsails, maintop sail, topgallant sail ...
— The Cruise of the Alabama and the Sumter • Raphael Semmes
... buildings on the park. The architecture adopted for all four structures was Romanesque in style; granite was used for wall work, and darker stone for ornamentation. The plans accepted exhibited less massiveness than the original Romanesque, and showed a tendency towards the lightness and delicacy of finish which modern ...
— The Harris-Ingram Experiment • Charles E. Bolton
... Rupert broke in, a hint of soberness beneath the lightness of his tone as he looked about the almost bare room and then at the strained pallor of Val's thin face. "The Ralestones have been luckless too long. And now suppose we take possession of this commodious mansion. I suggest that we get settled as soon as possible. I don't like the looks of the western ...
— Ralestone Luck • Andre Norton
... that Mr. Robson baptised the girl, taking Miranda for godmother. Mabilla they called her by her sponsor's desire, "Mabilla By-the-Wood," and as such she was published and married. You may be disposed to blame him for lightness of conscience, but I take leave to tell you that he had had the cure of souls in Dryhope for five-and-thirty years. He claimed on that score to know his people. The more he knew of them, the less he was able to question ...
— Lore of Proserpine • Maurice Hewlett
... the remaining rooms were finished, according to their several purposes. Cleanliness and order prevailed throughout. Above all, the large panes of plate-glass contributed towards a perfect lightness, which had been wanting in the old house for many causes, but chiefly on account of the panes, which were for the most part round. My father was cheerful on account of the success of his undertaking; and if his good humor had not been often interrupted because the diligence and exactness ...
— Autobiography • Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
... swing did not reach the bole-bark. It reached nothing but air. He felt a sudden lightness as the stone fled from shaft, and he was left holding a stick ...
— The Beginning • Henry Hasse
... re-entering the Castle, was with its young Lord, who received him with his usual kindness and lightness ...
— Peveril of the Peak • Sir Walter Scott
... their convalescent State, complained of such a Giddiness, and Lightness of the Head, that they could neither walk nor stand; others, of a Dimness of the Eyes. These Symptoms, for the most part, went off as the Patients gathered Strength: The Use of the Bark, with now and then a Glass of Wine, hastened the Cure; and in two or three Cases ...
— An Account of the Diseases which were most frequent in the British military hospitals in Germany • Donald Monro
... her for its own lightness. It had not been so light for many a day. It seemed as if God was letting her know that He was there. She spread her cloak on a sunny spot of the floor, made Juliet lie down upon it, put a bundle of shavings under her head, covered her with her own cloak, ...
— Paul Faber, Surgeon • George MacDonald
... of Earth! Where'er thou movest Its dim shapes are clad with brightness, And the souls of whom thou lovest Walk upon the winds with lightness Till they fail, as I am failing, ...
— The Golden Treasury - Of the Best Songs and Lyrical Poems in the English Language • Various
... village inn. The actual measurements are given in order that these proportions may be followed. It is a well-known fact, that chairs, or seats of any kind, can not be successfully designed on paper with any hope of meeting the essential requirements of comfort, lightness, and stability. Making seats is a practical art, and the development of the design is a matter of many years of successive improvements. A good model should therefore be selected and copied, with such slight changes as ...
— Wood-Carving - Design and Workmanship • George Jack
... said Mrs Chick, with assumed lightness, 'here's Mr Dombey come to see you. Won't you speak to him? They want to lay your little boy—the baby, Fanny, you know; you have hardly seen him yet, I think—in bed; but they can't till you rouse yourself ...
— Dombey and Son • Charles Dickens
... necessarily interfere with the lightness of heart once proverbially characteristic of the French peasant. Still, he appears to a stranger cheerful, ready to chat, and at least as inquisitive as to the stranger's history and objects as Americans are commonly ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 18, No. 105, July 1866 • Various
... wandered at noon except for some bare-footed peasant or some monk with the rope around his waist, it was complete solitude; and on moonlit nights they sat by the waterfalls in an atmosphere that had the lightness of mountain air without its keenness. On one occasion they climbed by dry torrent courses five miles into the mountains, baby and all, on horseback and donkeyback—"such a congregation of mountains; looking alive in the stormy light we saw them by." It was certainly a blessed transformation ...
— Robert Browning • Edward Dowden
... added with a wave of the hand, "You see to what it has advanced me!" for whereas the rest of Spendilove's literary men toiled in two gangs, one on either side of a long high-pitched desk, and wrote slashing leaders for the provincial press, Mr. Joshua exercised his lightness of touch upon 'picturesque middles' in a sort of loose-box partitioned off from the main office by screens of opaque glass. This den—he spoke of it as his 'scriptorium'—had a window looking out upon an elevated ...
— Shining Ferry • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... in a grey surtout. Behind him rode the duke of Vicenza (Caulincourt), who, since the death of marshal Duroc, has succeeded to his office. When they had come up to the house, the master of the horse sprung from his steed with a lightness and agility which I should not have expected in such a raw-boned, stiff-looking gentleman, and immediately held that of ...
— Frederic Shoberl Narrative of the Most Remarkable Events Which Occurred In and Near Leipzig • Frederic Shoberl (1775-1853)
... day, I threw down my book an hour sooner than usual, and sallied out with a lightness of foot and exhilaration of spirit, to which I had long been a stranger. I had just sprung over a stile that led into one of those green shady lanes, which make us feel the old poets who loved, and lived for, Nature, were right in calling our island "the merry England"—when ...
— Pelham, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... is written for children has the lightness of touch and play of fancy which are characteristic of George MacDonald's fairy tales. Mr. Arthur Hughes's illustrations are all that ...
— The Dash for Khartoum - A Tale of Nile Expedition • George Alfred Henty
... square of pink cardboard from his waistcoat pocket and she read it, with a sudden lightness underlying her voice: ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1915 - And the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various
... forcing a lightness she did not feel, for as usual she was the first to sense the tense quality in the atmosphere, "for we have certainly had practice enough. We used to sing for the soldier boys at the Hostess House almost ...
— The Outdoor Girls at Bluff Point - Or a Wreck and a Rescue • Laura Lee Hope
... from pitching into a fellow twice his size. He could tell all about the great base-ball and foot-ball games of New York City, knew the pitchers by name and yet did not boast uncomfortably. He could swim like a duck and dive fearlessly. He could outrun them all, by his lightness of foot, and was an expert in gliding away from any hand that sought to hold him back. They admired him ...
— Lo, Michael! • Grace Livingston Hill
... took possession of the king at the sight and at the perusal of Fouquet's letter to La Valliere by degrees subsided into a feeling of pain and extreme weariness. Youth, invigorated by health and lightness of spirits, and requiring that what it loses should be immediately restored—youth knows not those endless, sleepless nights which enable us to realize the fable of the vulture unceasingly feeding on Prometheus. In instances where the man of middle life, in his acquired strength of will and purpose, ...
— The Vicomte de Bragelonne - Or Ten Years Later being the completion of "The Three - Musketeers" And "Twenty Years After" • Alexandre Dumas
... against their French invaders. In these, as though to show that under the ashes of his old democratic enthusiasm still lived its wonted fires, and that the inspiration of a popular cause was only needed to reanimate them, we find, with less of the youthful lightness of touch and agility of movement, a very near approach to the vigour of his early journalistic days. Whatever may be thought of the historic value of the parallel which he institutes between the struggle ...
— English Men of Letters: Coleridge • H. D. Traill
... the yarn from the wool of their own sheep, and it is then woven by a weaver in Kilronan for fourpence a yard—the men seem to wear an indefinite number of waistcoats and woollen drawers one over the other. They are usually surprised at the lightness of my own dress, and one old man I spoke to for a minute on the pier, when I came ashore, asked me if I was not cold with 'my ...
— The Aran Islands • John M. Synge
... before the ginger ale, for so arises a fatter and lustier bubblement of foam. The reason whereof they leave no testament. While this portion of the meal was under discussion their minds moved free, unpinioned, with airy lightness, over all manner of topics. It seemed no effort at all to talk. Ripe, mellow with long experience of men and matters, their comments were notable for wisdom and sagacity. The waiter, overhearing shreds of their discourse, made a private notation to the ...
— Pipefuls • Christopher Morley
... naturally into his place as the lieutenant seemed now to wake up to his work, and glanced at the sails, which were all set, and giving his orders sharply and well, a pull was taken at a sheet here and a pull there, the helm altered, and in spite of the lightness of the breeze the Kestrel began to work along with an increase of speed of quite ...
— In the King's Name - The Cruise of the "Kestrel" • George Manville Fenn
... Royle affirms that the Manila hemp (abaca fiber) excels the Russian in firmness, lightness, and strength in tension, as well as in cheapness, and has only the one disadvantage that ropes made from it become stiff in wet weather. The reason, however, is found in the manner in which it is spun, and may be ...
— The Former Philippines thru Foreign Eyes • Fedor Jagor; Tomas de Comyn; Chas. Wilkes; Rudolf Virchow.
... elegant and numerous; I have no less than eight different specimens, gathered from our immediate neighbourhood, some of which are extremely elegant, especially one that I call the "fairy fern," from its lightness. One elastic stem, of a purplish-red colour, supports several light branches, which are subdivided and furnished with innumerable leaflets; each leaflet has a footstalk, that attaches it to the branch, of so slight and hair-like a substance ...
— The Backwoods of Canada • Catharine Parr Traill
... evening gown the most fascinating emotions and secrets—love and hate and jealousy, cold and monstrous habits and desires, ruin impending or stealthily advancing, fortune giddying to a gorgeous climax, disease and shame and fear—yet only signs of love and laughter and lightness of heart visible. And she wondered whether at any other table there was gathered so curious an assemblage of pasts and presents and futures as at the one over which Freddie Palmer was presiding somberly. . . . Then her thoughts ...
— Susan Lenox: Her Fall and Rise • David Graham Phillips
... had gone to the Sunday-school with the children, and had laid them up in her memory more carefully than she had done with those other words and phrases; and she had studied them deeply, for her good and ours. One may see by this that she had a wise and thoughtful head, for all there was so much lightness and vanity ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... about the Works. But her only answer to his meaningless questions was silence. Blair was conscious that he was breathing quickly, and that made him angry. "Why am I such an ass?" he asked himself; then said, with studied lightness, that he was afraid he would have to absent himself from business for still a little longer, as he was going abroad. Fortunately—here the old sarcastic politeness broke into his really serious purpose to be respectful; fortunately he was so unimportant that his absence didn't ...
— The Iron Woman • Margaret Deland
... taken for a younger brother of Mr. John Hamerton. They were both tall and spare, the elder man especially; both were straight and of somewhat proud bearing; their eyes were blue, with a straightforward and fearless expression. The lightness of the beard and hair, together with the development of the forehead, completed the resemblance, though the whole aspect of Mr. John Hamerton was that of a country gentleman, whilst hard intellectual work had left its stamp on the younger man's ...
— Philip Gilbert Hamerton • Philip Gilbert Hamerton et al
... he answered, with an attempt at lightness. Then rising he added: "Perhaps I am a little tired. Will you ring the bell for Keen? I think I will go to bed. I am sorry, dearest, but I don't feel like talking to-night. The fresh air has gone to my head, I think; but I shall be all right after ...
— East of the Shadows • Mrs. Hubert Barclay
... de Selinville, earnestly, though with an affectation of lightness, 'a little wickedness is fair when there is a great deal at stake. For my part, I would not hesitate long, to find out how soon the King will relent towards my ...
— The Chaplet of Pearls • Charlotte M. Yonge
... know not what you swear. Look, as I blow this feather from my face, And as the air blows it to me again, Obeying with my wind when I do blow, And yielding to another when it blows, Commanded always by the greater gust, Such is the lightness of you common men." (Ib., Act ...
— Tolstoy on Shakespeare - A Critical Essay on Shakespeare • Leo Tolstoy
... touch or smell, surely becomes more vivid and more clear in our consciousness. This does not at all mean that it becomes more intense. A faint light to which we turn our attention does not become the strong light of an incandescent lamp. No, it remains the faint, just perceptible streak of lightness, but it has grown more impressive, more distinct, more clear in its details, more vivid. It has taken a stronger hold of us or, as we may say by a metaphor, it has come into the center of ...
— The Photoplay - A Psychological Study • Hugo Muensterberg
... trouble. They can be finely ground in a nut-mill and used for several purposes, mixed in the proportion of about two ounces to the pound of wheatmeal they produce a rich flavoured bread. They can also he used in sweet cakes and in rich puddings to increase their food value, lightness and taste. Pine kernels being very oily, can be used with flour in the ...
— The Chemistry of Food and Nutrition • A. W. Duncan
... Notwithstanding the lightness and satire with which our Hero appeared to treat the subject, poor Distich was not to be stayed ...
— Real Life In London, Volumes I. and II. • Pierce Egan
... Marshall woke with a lightness at his heart that had been long absent. For a moment, conscious only that he was happy, he lay between sleep and waking, frowning up at his canopy of mosquito net, trying to realize what change had come to him. Then he remembered. ...
— My Buried Treasure • Richard Harding Davis
... to Mary Louise in this hour of trial. The chair-girl, beneath her gayety of demeanor and lightness of speech, was deeply religious. Her absolute faith sounded so cheering that death was robbed of much of its horror and her bereaved friend found solace. Mary Louise was able to talk freely of "Mamma Bee" to Irene, while ...
— Mary Louise • Edith van Dyne (one of L. Frank Baum's pen names)
... terror. Instead of summoning a physician, to ascertain the nature of her symptoms, he called a negro and his cart from Bush Hill. In vain the neighbours interceded for this unhappy victim. In vain she implored his clemency, and asserted the lightness of her indisposition. She besought him to allow her to send to her mother, who resided a few miles in the country, who would hasten to her succour, and relieve him and his family from the danger and trouble ...
— Arthur Mervyn - Or, Memoirs of the Year 1793 • Charles Brockden Brown
... accomplished, and when she arrived at the palace with the equerry, she was received with royal honours, as became the bride of the prince. The guards looked at each other with astonished eyes, as the wizened creature, bowed with age, passed between their lines; but they were more amazed still at the lightness of her step as she skipped up the steps to the great door before which the king was standing, with the prince at his side. If they both felt a shock at the appearance of the aged lady they did not show it, and the king, with a grave bow, ...
— The Lilac Fairy Book • Andrew Lang
... to an end. And then, too, this mighty command of spaces and masses is only half his power. He spreads further than any one else, but he also touches the detail of the scene, the single episode, the fine shade of character, with exquisite lightness and precision. Nobody surpasses, in some ways nobody approaches, the easy authority with which he handles the matter immediately before him at the moment, a roomful of people, the brilliance of youth, spring sunshine in a forest, ...
— The Craft of Fiction • Percy Lubbock
... should then proceed to weigh the other bags against that which had been counted. While all were watching him as he poured out and counted the money with much noise and many loud exclamations from both merchants as to the lightness of some of the coins, neither the Caliph, Giafer, Mesrur, nor either of the slaves, perceived that behind them, barefoot and noiseless as camels, a number of huge and powerful black ...
— Tales of the Caliph • H. N. Crellin
... declared he can hardly repress a boyish excitement. "War is a huge entrainement," he writes in June, 1893; "there is no other temptation to be compared to it, not one. We were all wet, we had been five hours in the saddle, mostly riding hard; and we came home like schoolboys, with such a lightness of spirits, and I am sure such a brightness of eye, as you could have ...
— Adventures in Criticism • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... Billy!" "Lay it down, lad!" came in a rugged chorus, and Wriggs danced on with wonderful skill and lightness, putting in all the regular pulling and hauling business right to the very end, which was achieved with the most intense solemnity of manner, amid ...
— Fire Island - Being the Adventures of Uncertain Naturalists in an Unknown Track • G. Manville Fenn
... of Romeo, he sought to win her love; to turn her from the lightness and frivolity of coquetting, to the more womanly aspirations of home and marriage, and to penetrate the veil of mystery and doubt in which she seemed enfolded, and into which she plunged herself the more closely if followed. But ...
— The Secrets Of The Great City • Edward Winslow Martin
... gathered flowers, either as a lesson to himself or a gift for others; they hardly spoke of careless beauty to him, they were emblems of lightness and thoughtlessness, and Heath had no time to stop and consider the lilies ...
— The Pointing Man - A Burmese Mystery • Marjorie Douie
... Belknap-Jackson been—pardon me—quite drunk, I feel that the outcome would have been happier for us all. So far as I have thought along these lines, it seems to me that if one is to be kicked at all, one must be kicked good-naturedly. I mean to say, with a certain camaraderie, a lightness, a gayety, a genuine good-will that for the moment expresses itself uncouthly—an element, I regret to say, that was conspicuously lacking from the brief ...
— Ruggles of Red Gap • Harry Leon Wilson
... exquisite tracery, wherein flowers (chiefly lilies), leaves, and convoluted bands play a conspicuous part. Everywhere, on the cornices, tambours, and balconies, chaste wreaths and crowns of lilies add beauty and lightness to the fabric, and give to the whole the appearance ...
— Roumania Past and Present • James Samuelson
... be added, in conclusion, that the oars of a lifeboat are short, and so made as to combine the greatest possible strength with lightness. They are fastened to the gunwale by short pieces of rope, and work in a moveable iron crutch on an iron thole-pin. Each boat is provided with a set of spare oars. Her equipment of compass, cables, grapnels, ...
— Battles with the Sea • R.M. Ballantyne
... lightness of the offence divested the commencement of the trial of much of that importance and apparent dignity which attach themselves to most celebrated criminal cases. The prisoner was not bidden to look upon the juror, nor the juror to look upon the ...
— Orley Farm • Anthony Trollope
... spoke Dave, with a lightness that was deceptive, "I've really been in several worse scrapes than the ...
— Dave Darrin After The Mine Layers • H. Irving Hancock
... whole household when the door closed behind his broad back. Peace crippled perhaps for life, perhaps never to walk without crutches again! It was too dreadful to be true. Peace,—their gay little butterfly! Peace, whose feet seemed like wings! They never walked, but danced along with the lightness of a fairy, tripping, flitting, never still. ...
— Heart of Gold • Ruth Alberta Brown
... again in their little cottage, and Zephas' honest eyes—with no trace of evil knowledge or suspicion in their homely, neutral lightness—were looking into hers with his usual simple trustfulness, Mrs. Bunker trembled, whimpered, and—I grieve to say—basely funked her boasted confession. But here the Deity which protects feminine weakness intervened with the usual miracle. As he gazed at his ...
— Sally Dows and Other Stories • Bret Harte
... of titles of minor works, which Aulus Gellius has preserved, the lightness and beauty of such compositions are charmingly expressed. Among these we find—a Basket of Flowers; an Embroidered Mantle; and ...
— Curiosities of Literature, Vol. 1 (of 3) • Isaac D'Israeli
... had that morning, and he felt ready to tell her of his encounter with Drew. But fearing to raise her hopes unduly on so slender a basis he refrained, and stayed with her till the time was approaching for his visit to the house across the Park. Then he left her wondering at the feeling of lightness that came over him, and not attributing it to the fact that he had something to do—something which called his faculties into action to scheme and contrive the meeting without being baffled by those who dogged the steps of every one about ...
— In Honour's Cause - A Tale of the Days of George the First • George Manville Fenn |
