"Sleeveless" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... the Gerad, who arose, deposited his black coral rosary, took up an inkstand, donned a white "Badan" or sleeveless Arab cloak over his cotton shirt, shuffled off the Dais into his slippers, and disappeared. Presently we were summoned to an interview with the Amir: this time I was allowed to approach the outer door with covered feet. Entering ceremoniously as before, ...
— First footsteps in East Africa • Richard F. Burton
... it an irresistible rhythmic cadence. Even Burke felt the call of the dance, until he studied the evolutions of the merrymakers. Oddly assorted couples, some in elaborate evening dress, women in shoulderless, sleeveless, backless gowns, men in dinner-coats, girls in street clothes with yard-long feathers, youths in check suits, old men in staid business frock coats—what a motley throng! All were busily engaged in the orgy of a bacchanalian dance in which couples reeled and writhed, cheek ...
— Traffic in Souls - A Novel of Crime and Its Cure • Eustace Hale Ball
... approaching the camp; and upon turning out to investigate, they saw that this was indeed the case, the new arrivals being in number about a hundred, and apparently a party of soldiery, all being attired alike in a sort of uniform consisting of a sleeveless white tunic girt about the waist with a belt, and buskins reaching halfway to the knee; their heads were bare, save for a thick mop of black hair, arranged in curls which reached to the shoulders; and each man was armed ...
— The Adventures of Dick Maitland - A Tale of Unknown Africa • Harry Collingwood
... of Sunday morning Eleanor was in a state of physical and emotional exhaustion. She was sitting before her dressing-table in a sleeveless pink negligee, with her hair dangling in two thick childish braids over her shoulder, when Papa Claude dashed in from the next room to announce that Mr. Pfingst had invited the entire cast to ...
— Quin • Alice Hegan Rice
... her eyes glittered at her gorgeous reflection in the mirror. Then suddenly her expression changed, her lips parted in scorn, and with a savage, tigerish gesture, she tore off her splendors. She stood once more in her simple tunic of knee-length, sleeveless, beauty-revealing; and picking up her dagger with the gold cord she knotted it about her waist and ...
— The Pirate Woman • Aylward Edward Dingle
... one knows so well of the old Puritans in Cromwell's time. The dress of the peasants, though unlike the English fashion of any period, had an old-world look. The married women wore white kerchiefs twisted round the head, sleeveless jackets, with a mystery of lace adornments. The marriageable girls sat together in one part of the church, which I thought very funny; they wore drum-shaped hats poised on the head in a droll sort of way. Some of them had a kind of white ...
— Round About the Carpathians • Andrew F. Crosse
... moved about the boat never palled. His nose reminded her of the prow of a ship of war, and his deep-set eyes were continually searching the horizon for an enemy. Such were her fancies. In the early morning when he donned his sleeveless bathing suit, she could never resist the temptation to follow him on deck to see him plunge into the cold ocean: it gave her a delightful little shiver—and he was made like one of the ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... was a gadder about or a gossip, but she was sleeveless, dawdling, and dreamy, and always behindhand. Everything was out of its place. Thus Foster would take up a spill-case, expecting to find material wherewith to light his evening pipe; but instead of spills, it was full of greasy hair-pins. ...
— True to his Colours - The Life that Wears Best • Theodore P. Wilson
... return them the same way." She gave the Court ladies each a beautiful embroidered gown and a few hundred taels, the same to the Young Empress and the Secondary wife. The presents which she gave us were a little different, consisting of two embroidered gowns, several simple ones, jackets and sleeveless jackets, shoes, and flowers for the Manchu headdress. She said that we had not so many gowns, and instead of giving us the money, she had things made for us. Besides that, she gave me a pair of very pretty earrings, but none ...
— Two Years in the Forbidden City • The Princess Der Ling
... as he went forward, stood to greet him, her gown, sleeveless, neckless, taking the bluish tinge that early twilight gives to snow, a tinge that deepened to dusk about her eyes and in her hair. She gave him her hand and at once he felt a balm poured into his tortured heart. After all, men were born ...
— The Seeker • Harry Leon Wilson
... partitions, forming four tiny compartments. In the first, the entrance slip, which had four bunks, there were two persons—an old man and a woman. Immediately adjoining this, was a rather long slip of a room; in it was the landlord, a young fellow, dressed in a sleeveless gray woollen jacket, a good-looking, very pale citizen. {60} On the left of the first corner, was a third tiny chamber; there was one person asleep there, probably a drunken peasant, and a woman in a pink blouse which was loose in ...
— What To Do? - thoughts evoked by the census of Moscow • Count Lyof N. Tolstoi
... the ludicrous altogether. To me, when I reflect upon the train of misfortunes which have pursued men through life, owing to that accursed drapery, the cap presents as purely frightful an object as the sleeveless yellow coat and devil-painted mitre of the San Benitos.—An ancestor of mine, who suffered for his loyalty in the time of the civil wars, was so sensible of the truth of what I am here advancing, that ...
— The Works of Charles Lamb in Four Volumes, Volume 4 • Charles Lamb
... long. Anna thought she had tucked up her sleeves in her zeal for thoroughness, but when she appeared with the afternoon coffee—the local tea was undrinkable—she still had bare arms; and, examining her more closely, Anna saw that it was her usual state, for her dress was sleeveless. Nor was her want of sleeves her only peculiarity. Anna began to wonder whether her house would ever ...
— The Benefactress • Elizabeth Beauchamp
... humanoid, and they were undoubtedly women. The muffling cloaks gone, they wore sleeveless garments of silver which were girded at the waist with belts of blue gems. Only in their hair and their eyes did they betray alien blood. For the hair which flowed and wove about them, cascading down shoulders, rippling ...
— Key Out of Time • Andre Alice Norton
... was standing before the door to his suite, a tall blonde in a sleeveless black and gold sheath; a beautiful body, a warm, lovely, humorous face. The warmth and humor were real, but masked a mind as impersonally efficient as a computer, and a taste for high and dangerous living. When Quillan ...
— Lion Loose • James H. Schmitz
... was the sleeveless dimity B.V.D. undershirt, in which he resembled a small boy humorlessly wearing a cheesecloth tabard at a civic pageant. He never put on B.V.D.'s without thanking the God of Progress that he didn't wear tight, long, old-fashioned undergarments, ...
— Babbitt • Sinclair Lewis
... zamarra, a sheepskin coat; possibly derived ultimately from Gr. [Greek: cheimerios], "wintry," i.e. a winter overcoat), in modern English use the name of a garment worn as part of the ceremonial dress of Anglican bishops. It is a long sleeveless gown of silk or satin, open down the front, gathered in at the back between the shoulders, and with slits for the arms. It is worn over the rochet (q.v.), and its colour is either black or scarlet (convocation robes). By a late abuse the sleeves of the rochet ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 6, Slice 2 - "Chicago, University of" to "Chiton" • Various
... Greek costume was often a sleeveless garment, falling in folds, and when confined at waist line with cord the upper part bloused over it; the material was draped so as to leave the arms free, the folds being held in place by ornamental clasps upon the shoulders. ...
— Woman as Decoration • Emily Burbank
... gold-banded fountain pen, and a gold watch that indicated a quarter past three. On the lower edge of the picture in the mirror appeared the back of a gilt chair, over which a garment of peculiar construction had been carelessly thrown. It was in the form of that sleeveless cassock of purple, opening at the side, whose lower flap is called a bishop's apron; the corner of the frogged coat showed behind the chair-back, and the sash lay crumpled on the floor. Black doeskin breeches, still warmly lined with ...
— Soul of a Bishop • H. G. Wells
... summer's dawn, of medium height, with violet eyes, and an extraordinary wealth of ruddy-golden hair which, confined to her head by a fillet of what looked like red velvet set with precious stones, rolled thence to far below her waist in great waves. Her outer garment, sleeveless, might have been copied from those depicted on the Greek vases in the British Museum and, like her grandfather's, was red in colour, adorned with braiding in the same colours as his. Her sandals were of white ...
— In Search of El Dorado • Harry Collingwood
... across the shoulders, or the two rims might be pulled across the upper arm as far as the elbow, and fastened in several places by means of buttons or agraffes, so that the naked arm became visible in the intervals, by means of which the sleeveless chiton received the appearance of one with sleeves. Where the diploidion was detached from the chiton, it formed a kind of handsome cape, which, however, in its shape, strictly resembled the Diploidion proper. Its shape was considerably modified by fashion, ...
— Museum of Antiquity - A Description of Ancient Life • L. W. Yaggy
... 151. Pursuivants, attendants on the heralds, their TABARD being a sleeveless coat. Chaucer applies the name to the loose frock of the ploughman (Prologue, 541). See Clarendon Press ed. of Chaucer's ...
— Marmion • Sir Walter Scott
... understood. A sleeved cope, then, was the distinctive garb of a canonist not in holy orders, and as Thomas Chandler became S.T.P. in 1450, the capa manicata would be obviously out of place on his person. The tabard, generally associated with heralds, was a sleeveless garment, worn with and probably over the gown, with which it was afterwards combined, and the sleeves of which, at that period, came through the armholes. This garment, a dress of dignity, might be worn ...
— The Customs of Old England • F. J. Snell
... of a "dzamadan," a red waistcoat, embroidered with gold or black silk—the former on gala occasions—over which the "gunj" is worn, a long, white or very pale blue coat, cut so that the breast is left open and free. Another sleeveless jacket is worn, again, over the gunj, called the "jelek," and is a mass of heavy gold and silk embroidery, quite stiff in fact, and a marvel of ...
— The Land of the Black Mountain - The Adventures of Two Englishmen in Montenegro • Reginald Wyon
... noted that Lapo had on a new, short, sleeveless surcoat, or vest, of whitish leather, trimmed on its edges with vair, and laced down the sides with tinsel. In this festive garment, so different from his usual attire, the grim tyrant was ill at ease, secretly anxious, almost timid. Avoiding her eye, he assumed an elaborate carelessness, ...
— O. Henry Memorial Award Prize Stories of 1920 • Various
... their hair or letting it hang loose, and of riding astride or side-saddle as they pleased. At the same time, to both sexes, except on State occasions, liberty of choice was accorded in the matter of wearing sleeveless jackets fastened in front with silk cords and tassels, though in the matter of trousers, men had to gather theirs in at the bottom with a lace. By and by, the tying up of the hair by women was forbidden in its turn; the wearing of leggings ...
— A History of the Japanese People - From the Earliest Times to the End of the Meiji Era • Frank Brinkley and Dairoku Kikuchi
... bound the smallest of jewelled sandals upon feet that were too small, even for them; another produced a long palla or sleeveless tunic of apple tint ornamented with feather patterns, and fastened it with amethyst brooches at the shoulders. Last, the head tirewoman herself came to perform what was, after the hair-dressing, the most delicate of all these operations—the adjustment of the cyclas ...
— The Lion's Brood • Duffield Osborne
... sat back on her heels. She had slipped her bared arms into the armholes of the sleeveless white "fluff-and-flimsy" evening frock, and the "sparklers" of the low-cut bodice now framed her blue-print clad shoulders with an astonishing effect of incongruity. "I have a wonderful inspiration. Let's ask Jeannette out here for ...
— Under the Country Sky • Grace S. Richmond
... awaiting a summons to the meal that evening when Nancy entered; a new Nancy, and one so wondrous to behold that Sandy and I started at the sight of her. She wore a gown of yellow crepe embroidered in gold, low and sleeveless, with a fold in the back, after the fashion of the ladies of Watteau, and a long train falling far behind. Her hair was gathered high and dressed with jewels which sparkled as well upon her throat and hands. The thing that marked ...
— Nancy Stair - A Novel • Elinor Macartney Lane
... your practice, and to keep me back, You sent Jack Daw your son with ka-ka-ka, To tell a sleeveless tale! lay hold on him, To Newgate with him and your tut-a-tut! Run, Redcap, and trudge about, Or bid your father's ...
— A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. VII (4th edition) • Various
... on the beach in front of the adjacent Outrigger Club, and entering and leaving the water, a score of women, not provoking gasping notice, were more daringly garbed. Their men's suits, as brief of leg-tights and skirts, fitted them as snugly, but were sleeveless after the way of men's suits, the arm-holes deeply low- cut and in-cut, and, by the exposed armpits, advertiseful that the wearers were ...
— On the Makaloa Mat/Island Tales • Jack London
... strange to see a ragged clerke, Some stammell weaver, or some butcher's sonne, That scrubb'd a late within a sleeveless gowne, When the commencement, like a morrice dance, Hath put a bell or two about his legges, Created him a sweet cleane gentleman: How then he 'gins to follow fashions. He whose thin sire dwelt in a smokye roofe, Must make tobacco, and must wear a locke. His thirsty ...
— Hazlitt on English Literature - An Introduction to the Appreciation of Literature • Jacob Zeitlin
... sanguine eyes carried a twisted, puzzled look; some unanswerable problem was apparently in the forefront of his brain. His face was hairless; the hair of his head was short and manly; his brow was wide. He was clothed in a black, sleeveless robe, and bore a long staff in his hand. There was an air of cleanness and austerity about the whole man ...
— A Voyage to Arcturus • David Lindsay
... president takes his stand in his box, lifts a large handkerchief or napkin, and drops it. Immediately the bolts of the barriers are withdrawn, and the chariots dash forward towards the point marked A. The drivers, clothed in a close sleeveless tunic and wearing a skull-cap, all of their particular colour, lean forward over their steeds, and encourage them with whips and shouting. At their waists you will see the reins gathered to a girdle, at which also hangs a knife, ...
— Life in the Roman World of Nero and St. Paul • T. G. Tucker
... Wear, Cleveland. In season, and particularly during the frenzied dog-days of August, when the fate of the new waist-line or his daring treatment of cloth of silver hung yet in the balance, and the spirit of Detroit must be browbeaten by the dictum of the sleeveless thing in evening frocks, Leon Kessler himself smoked a day-long chain of cigarettes, lighting ...
— Humoresque - A Laugh On Life With A Tear Behind It • Fannie Hurst
... him off. He veered clear, and began circling about again. A second time I escaped him by the same manoeuvre. The third rush was a miss on both sides. He sheered at the moment my hands should have landed on his nose, but his sandpaper hide (I had on a sleeveless undershirt) scraped the skin off one ...
— South Sea Tales • Jack London
... sole of ox-leather and uppers of strips of dried sheeps' skin (opute); a longer oputa passes several times round the ankle and holds the shoe firm; it turns up at the toe and looks quite Oriental. Instead of the krozet, or over it, some wear the jacerma, a sleeveless red cloth jacket, covered in front with little discs of tin (siliki), or large balls of silver (toke), or by rows of coins. And over the pas they have the pasnjaca, a band of red leather covering ...
— The Shores of the Adriatic - The Austrian Side, The Kuestenlande, Istria, and Dalmatia • F. Hamilton Jackson
... of honey five drachmae," took him to the meal market, and showed him half a peck of meal for an obol, then took him to the olive market, and showed him a peck of olives for two coppers, and lastly showed him that a sleeveless vest[737] was only ten drachmae. At each place Socrates' friend exclaimed, "How cheap this city is!" So also we, when we hear anyone saying that our affairs are bad and in a woful plight, because we are not consuls or governors, ...
— Plutarch's Morals • Plutarch
... and take one extra one. You can wash one and wear the other. Be sure to have a new shirt plenty loose in the neck as camp washing in cold water will make it shrink. Do not go around in gymnasium shirts or sleeveless jerseys. One of my companions did this once and was so terribly sunburned that ...
— Outdoor Sports and Games • Claude H. Miller
... and thereto dike*, and delve, *dig ditches For Christe's sake, for every poore wight, Withouten hire, if it lay in his might. His tithes payed he full fair and well, Both of his *proper swink*, and his chattel** *his own labour* **goods In a tabard* he rode upon a mare. *sleeveless jerkin ...
— The Canterbury Tales and Other Poems • Geoffrey Chaucer
... you can then," quoth the archer, moving out into the open space, and keeping a most wary eye upon his opponent. He had thrown off his green jerkin, and his chest was covered only by a pink silk jupon, or undershirt, cut low in the neck and sleeveless. Hordle John was stripped from his waist upwards, and his huge body, with his great muscles swelling out like the gnarled roots of an oak, towered high above the soldier. The other, however, though near a foot shorter, was a man of great strength; and ...
— The White Company • Arthur Conan Doyle |
