"Springy" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... upon legs, so that no wind from under the door could get at them; and on the flat bottom called the bed-stock, there was placed a thick strong bag called a mattress, which was stuffed with some soft material which made it springy and pleasant to touch or lie down upon. The shape of it was a long square, or what may be called a rectangular parallelogram. I strongly advise you all to learn that word, for it is rather an amusing idea ...
— Aunt Judy's Tales • Mrs Alfred Gatty
... Jimmy Urquhart. It was bound to be somebody—at her age. Thirty-two she must be, when they begin to like a fling. Well, there was nothing in it. Later on it occurred to him that she was looking uncommonly well just now. He saw her, in white, cross the lawn: a springy motion, a quick lift, turn of the head. She looked a girl, and a pretty one at that. His heart warmed to her. How could a man have a better wife than that? Success without effort again! ...
— Love and Lucy • Maurice Henry Hewlett
... and a piece of knitting-needle for crank shaft, on which are mounted a small eccentric brass wipe, W, and a copper collar, D. Against D presses a brass brush, B1 connected with the binding post, T1; while under W is a long strip of springy brass against which W presses during part of every revolution. T2 is connected to one end of the coil winding, and T1 through a 4-volt accumulator or three dry cells, with the other end of the coil. When W touches B2 the circuit is completed, and the coil draws in the plunger, the contact being ...
— Things To Make • Archibald Williams
... sheath-knife Jock was not long in piling under the sheltered underside of a great rock over which the heather grew, such a heap of heather twigs as Ralph could hardly believe had been cut in so short a time. These he compacted into an excellent mattress, springy and level, with ...
— The Lilac Sunbonnet • S.R. Crockett
... twice, when the rays of the moon pierced through the clouds, Camors thought he saw her wipe away a tear with the end of her glove. He guided her cautiously in the darkness, although the light step of the young woman was little slower in the obscurity. Her springy step pressed noiselessly the fallen leaves—avoided without assistance the ruts and marshes, as if she had been endowed with a magical clairvoyance. When they reached a crossroad, and Camors seemed uncertain, ...
— Monsieur de Camors, Complete • Octave Feuillet
... facings and the steps and marchings, the simple movements by fours, guiding and dressing. When we blundered, there was his little concealed smile to make us swear to do the thing right next time. As we marched he kept pace with us, and then all his languor was gone. His step was springy, his arms swung, his eye roved up and down the line, and he snapped out his "One, two, three, four!" each like a little pistol shot. Remarked Corder, beside me, "His time is absolutely perfect—do you notice?" I had noticed. The ...
— At Plattsburg • Allen French
... crossbred yarns. They are of good length, sound staple, have good felting properties, and are of good color. They are useful for blending with mungo and shoddy, to give to these remanufactured materials that springy, bulky character ...
— Textiles • William H. Dooley
... that occasion, but how infinitely more miserable was he now! The hills, the rocks, the streams were far more beautiful than he had ever thought them, but they mocked him with their beauty. He longed to get out of the vehicle, and feel the springy turf, the yielding heather, beneath his feet; to lave his hands in the sparkling brook, to lie on the moss-grown rock, and bask in the blessed sun. Perhaps he should never see them any more—these simple everyday beauties, of which he had scarcely taken ...
— Bred in the Bone • James Payn
... stony road and walked upon the springy turf bordering the moorland. Little curled-up shoots of light green were springing from the bracken. Here and there, a flame of gorse filled the air with its faint, almond-like blossom. And the birds! Farmlands stretched away on his left-hand side, and above the tender growth of corn, ...
— Nobody's Man • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... water-worn road the heather made a low wall, two or three feet high, and stretched right away to the horizon in every direction. In the lulls, between the fierce blasts, I could hear the trickle of the water in the rivulets deep down in the springy cushion of heather. A few nimble sheep would stare at me from a distance, and then disappear, or some grouse might hover over a piece of rising ground; but otherwise there were no signs of living creatures. Nearing Kildale, ...
— Yorkshire Painted And Described • Gordon Home
... not ungraceful in his height. This was Harry Van Horn, a neighboring cattleman, and he wore the ranchman's rig, including the broad hat and the revolver slung at his hip. But everything about the rig was fresh and natty, in the sunshine. He looked alert. His step was clean and springy as he crossed the room, and his voice not unpleasant as he briskly greeted Doubleday and looked keenly at his guests—last and longest at Kate sitting at ...
— Laramie Holds the Range • Frank H. Spearman
... casting its shadow over the shorn grass, or up in the hedge-road, or on the brown banks where the drought had struck. On his back he carried a fishing-basket, containing his bits of refreshment; and in his right hand a short springy rod, the absent sailor's favorite. After long council with Mabel, he had made up his mind to walk up-stream as far as the spot where two brooks met, and formed body enough for a fly flipped in very carefully to sail downward. Here he began, and the ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol. 5 • Various
... more than what Dias had said to convince Harry of the seriousness of the danger to which they had been exposed, for as a rule Donna Maria had scoffed at any offers of aid, even in the most difficult places, and with her light springy step had taxed the power of the others to keep up with her. These offers had not come from Dias, who showed his confidence in his wife's powers by paying no attention whatever, and a grim smile had often played on his lips when Harry ...
— The Treasure of the Incas • G. A. Henty
... seemed to reveal more and more, beneath the roundness and fairness of surface, the elasticity and strength of an athlete in training. But when the eye was not exploring the delicate, hard, and yet supple depressions and swellings of the muscles, the slender shapeliness of the long legs and springy feet, the back bulging with strong muscles above, and going in, tight, with a magnificent dip at the waist; all impressions were merged in a sense of ease, of suavity, of full-blown harmony. Here was no pomp of anatomical lore, of cunning handicraft, but the life seemed to circulate strong ...
— Renaissance Fancies and Studies - Being a Sequel to Euphorion • Violet Paget (AKA Vernon Lee)
... much better luck making the bow than his sister had had. The trouble was that the sticks Janet had picked up were not the right kind. They would not bend, and to make a bow that shoots arrows a piece of wood that springs, or bends, is needed. For it is the springy action of the wood that shoots the arrow on ...
— The Curlytops at Uncle Frank's Ranch • Howard R. Garis
... party as they silently left the yard, the filly stalking dutifully with a long and springy step beside her master. It was a moment full of bitterness, and of a quite ...
— All on the Irish Shore - Irish Sketches • E. Somerville and Martin Ross
... trees, and a thousand other blooms of incredible size and beauty. Loving them all, their little Spanish mistress flitted about among them like a bird, alert, active, bright-eyed, straight as an arrow, and as springy of step as a girl of sixteen, although even then she was ...
— The Life of Mrs. Robert Louis Stevenson • Nellie Van de Grift Sanchez
... cheap and labor dear many a crop that would not pay for the cutting would rot where it grew. Jasper, however, possessed one of the antiquated kind which bound the sheaves with wire, and occasionally led to wild language when a length of springy steel got mixed up with the thrasher. Every joint and sinew ached, there were times when we were almost too tired to sleep, but—and this was never the case with Coombs—wherever the work was hardest the master of the homestead did two men's share, and ...
— Lorimer of the Northwest • Harold Bindloss
... shade, and they came out into a long narrow glen, carpeted with short springy turf, and bordered, as by an avenue, with trees knee-deep in bracken. The rectangular shape and enclosed nature of the glade came as a surprise in the midst of the wild woodlands. The place had more the air ...
— The Ashiel mystery - A Detective Story • Mrs. Charles Bryce
... before she left Bulangi's house to paddle up to Sambir she had heard voices outside the house when all in it but herself were asleep. And now, with her knowledge of the words spoken in the darkness, she held in her hand a life and carried in her breast a great sorrow. Yet from her springy step, erect figure, and face veiled over by the everyday look of apathetic indifference, nobody could have guessed of the double load she carried under the visible burden of the tray piled up high with cakes manufactured by the thrifty hands of Bulangi's wives. In that supple figure straight ...
— Almayer's Folly - A Story of an Eastern River • Joseph Conrad
... then reared his majestic form dripping from the lake. He stood upon the 'point.' I never saw so grand an animal; it seemed as though no single ball could kill him, and although his head and carcass were enormous, still his length of leg appeared disproportionately great. With quick, springy paces he advanced directly for his favourite tree and began his process of rubbing, perfectly unaware of the hidden ...
— The Rifle and The Hound in Ceylon • Samuel White Baker
... Clovelly?" he puffed at last, and they flung themselves down on the short, springy turf between the drone of the sea below and the light summer wind among the inland trees. They were looking into a combe half full of old, high furze in gay bloom that ran up to a fringe of brambles and a ...
— Stalky & Co. • Rudyard Kipling
... it and comes up again on the other side, as a ship into the hollow of the sea. Hence the whole appearance of the bed of the stream is changed, and all the lines of the water altered in their nature. The quiet stream is a succession of leaps and pools; the leaps are light and springy, and parabolic, and make a great deal of splashing when they tumble into the pool; then we have a space of quiet curdling water, and another similar leap below. But the stream when it has gained an impetus takes the shape of its bed, never stops, is equally ...
— Modern Painters Volume I (of V) • John Ruskin
... brown, merry and set wide apart. Well marked brows. Nose of medium length and slightly crooked to the left. Short upper lip. Firm mouth with an upward twist at the corners. A strong square chin. A habit of holding the head slightly at an angle. Quick way of speaking and walks with a springy step. Stands with one hand on ...
— Men of Affairs • Roland Pertwee
... brown little Bourne, and beyond the bridge lies Chertsey Mead, one huge hayfield, bounded on the left by wooded slopes, on the right by the Thames itself. Two or three narrow paths intersect the level of waving grass; the turf underfoot is as springy as peat, and the standing crop scents the June wind, rich with daisies and clover. Beyond Chertsey before you lies St. Anne's Hill, dark and incumbent over the town; but you do not guess that the Thames edges that ...
— Highways and Byways in Surrey • Eric Parker
... last to seat himself on the springy cushion of brown pine needles, and he sat throughout the meal in moody silence. Blake and the ladies attributed this to the fatigue of working through the long hot morning while suffering from his unhealed ...
— Out of the Depths - A Romance of Reclamation • Robert Ames Bennet
... starting along Fifth Avenue, drew suddenly back around the corner. A man, walking rapidly, was just turning into Fifth Avenue from the opposite corner. Jimmie Dale drew in his breath sharply. He had got out of sight just in time. He recognised the quick, springy walk of the other. It was Meighan, of Headquarters. And then Jimmie Dale smiled a little whimsically. They were both bound for the same place, he and Meighan, of Headquarters—Kenleigh's apartment, that was a little way further on ...
— The Further Adventures of Jimmie Dale • Frank L. Packard
... Honor's ambition. One day, when she was with her father at Ballycroghan, she saw exactly the realization of her ideal. It was a small black cob, which showed a trace of Arab blood in its arching neck, slender limbs, and easy, springy motion. Though its bright eyes proved its high spirit, it was nevertheless as gentle as a lamb, and well accustomed to carrying a lady. Its owner, a local horse-dealer, was anxious to sell it, and pressed Major ...
— The New Girl at St. Chad's - A Story of School Life • Angela Brazil
... suddenly, and the man came out again, and, descended the walk with the springy step Gabriella had noticed at their first meeting. Notwithstanding his size, he moved with the lightness and agility of a boy, and without looking at him she could see, as she bent over the flower-bed, that he had the look of ...
— Life and Gabriella - The Story of a Woman's Courage • Ellen Glasgow
... is bad, but a substitute that will work can be made if you have some strong string and a stout pocket knife. Cut two sections of a springy sapling, and bind them securely to the front fork, one on either side, and sufficiently long to reach just above the broken bar. Next tie securely a stout stick of proper length to the broken bar, and tie to this the end of the uprights. If properly done, this will enable you to finish your journey, ...
— Healthful Sports for Boys • Alfred Rochefort
... buildings, made such vast shelves that the road was impassable for some time: and so over to an arable field on the other side, which was strangely torn and disordered. The second pasture- field, being more soft and springy, was protruded forward without many fissures in the turf, which was raised in long ridges resembling graves, lying at right angles to the motion. At the bottom of this enclosure the soil and turf rose many feet against the bodies of some oaks that obstructed ...
— The Natural History of Selborne, Vol. 2 • Gilbert White
... Yvon vowed I must learn to fence, and told some story of an ancestor of mine who was the best swordsman in the country, and kept all comers at bay in some old fight long ago. I took the long bit of springy steel, and found it extraordinary comfortable to the hand. Practice with the fiddle-bow since early childhood gave, I may suppose, strength and quickness to the turn of my wrist; however it was, the marquis cried out that I was born for the sword; and ...
— Rosin the Beau • Laura Elizabeth Howe Richards
... on elastic sward, Of the steed three parts extended, Hard held, the breath of his nostrils broad, With the golden ether blended; Then the leap, the rise from the springy turf, The rush through the buoyant air, And the light shock landing—the veriest serf Is an emperor ...
— Poems • Adam Lindsay Gordon
... afternoon it was Honor who entertained him. She had just come home from High School and she wore a middy blouse and a short skirt and looked less than her years. "Let's sit in the garden, shan't we?—I hate being indoors a minute more than I can help!" She led the way across the green, springy lawn to the little rustic building over which the vivid Bougainvillaea climbed and swarmed, and he followed at his halted pace. "Besides, we can see Jimsy from here when he comes by from football practice, and call him in. I just didn't happen ...
— Play the Game! • Ruth Comfort Mitchell
... by fifteen each, and two little bath-rooms. A verandah ran along the whole length of the front, and this was planked to prevent little feet from slipping through. But the rooms were covered with thick mats, and the floor was so springy it danced as you moved. We put very little furniture into these rooms, and the inside walls were only eight feet high, so that though you could not see into the next room, you could hear all that went on in all three rooms. The cook-house and ...
— Sketches of Our Life at Sarawak • Harriette McDougall
... to Petronius," said the young man, entering the tepidarium with a springy step. "May all the gods grant thee success, but especially Asklepios and Kypris, for under their double protection ...
— Quo Vadis - A Narrative of the Time of Nero • Henryk Sienkiewicz
... hands; the wood was flexible and springy. It was Diane who offered the next suggestion. She, too, was working at another spear—what wonder if her breath came fast!—but her eyes were alight, and her mind ...
— Astounding Stories, May, 1931 • Various
... delicately wrought legs. Now the eye was directed to a wicker trunk fitted with trays and partitions, and ventilated with little apertures, since the scents were doubtless strong. Two most comfortable beds were to be observed, fitted with springy string mattresses and decorated with charming designs in gold. There in the far corner, placed upon the top of a number of large white jars, stood the light chariot which Yuaa had owned in his lifetime. In all directions stood objects gleaming with ...
— The Treasury of Ancient Egypt - Miscellaneous Chapters on Ancient Egyptian History and Archaeology • Arthur E. P. B. Weigall
... silent-footed contingents trailing along the yellow sands, carrying in well-worn dilly-bags oysters and scraps of half-baked fish smeared with smoke, and gritty. All their lives had they trudged along the convenient margin of the sea, where the receding tide leaves a firm, level, springy track. They were familiar with all its moods, and took little heed ...
— Tropic Days • E. J. Banfield
... continuous strip of metal but were built up in strips, which tore at the points of junction.] Before it is fitted, German silver should be heated red hot and allowed to cool. This makes it more ductile, like lead, and therefore less springy: the metal should be as thin ...
— The Worst Journey in the World, Volumes 1 and 2 - Antarctic 1910-1913 • Apsley Cherry-Garrard
... diameter, under the entire house and for several feet all around it, like a big gridiron. When this is buried under one or two feet of clean gravel or sand you will have a permanently dry plot of ground to build upon. The same treatment will be effective if the ground is "springy." But there must be a "cut-off" encircling the house. This you can make by digging a trench a foot wide, reaching down to the drain tiles, and filling it nearly to the top with loose stones or coarse gravel, the surface of the ground being graded to slope sharply toward the trench. ...
— The House that Jill Built - after Jack's had proved a failure • E. C. Gardner
... so fresh and invigorating as that of the Sussex Downs; no turf so springy to the feet as their soft greensward. A flight of larks flies past us, and a cloud of mingled rooks and starlings wheel overhead.... The fairies still haunt this spot, and hold their midnight revels upon it, as yon dark rings testify. The common folk hereabouts term the good people 'Pharisees' ...
— Seaward Sussex - The South Downs from End to End • Edric Holmes
... way to the gate, refusing with a wave of his hand Mrs. Chinnery's offer to help him down the three steps leading to the shore. With head erect and a springy step he gained his own garden, and even made a pretence of attending to a flower or two before sitting down. Then the deck-chair claimed him, and he lay, a limp bundle of aching old bones, until his housekeeper came down the garden to see ...
— Salthaven • W. W. Jacobs
... Fatty dropped out. His intentions were good, but he was no match for the others in running. Monroe, the athlete of the group, was swinging along in light springy strides; Bob, the silent, ran heavily and mechanically; while Tom, eager for the recovery of his kites, kept to the front with ...
— The Boy with the U. S. Weather Men • Francis William Rolt-Wheeler
... suppressing all day were echoing on the stillness when a voice came from the little cot by her bed and the General in disheveled nightshirt and rumpled head rose by her pillow and stood with uncertain feet on his own springy place of repose. ...
— Rose of Old Harpeth • Maria Thompson Daviess
... know those cricket-bats, what they look like and how they feel after you've been used to meeting fast ones with a narrow baseball-bat. They are wide and heavy and springy. Chiz doesn't pay any attention to three or four balls that come along, except to fend them away from the wicket with his wide cricket-bat. He knew what he wanted, and by and by he got one—one about knee-high with a little incurve to it. Chiz sets himself and swings and whale-O it goes, ...
— The U-boat hunters • James B. Connolly
... the Washburn superintendent!" he cried. "He said they might call me up here if they came to a decision." He had apparently forgotten Lydia's presence, or else the fact that she knew nothing of his affairs. He disappeared into the hall, his long, springy, active step resounding quickly as he hurried to the instrument. Lydia heard his voice, decisive, masterful, quiet, evidently dictating terms of some bargain that had been hanging in the balance. When he came back, his head was up, like a conqueror's. "I've ...
— The Squirrel-Cage • Dorothy Canfield
... paper. Manly strength, you say, appears only with manhood; the vital spirits, distilled in their proper vessels and spreading through the whole body, can alone make the muscles firm, sensitive, tense, and springy, can alone cause real strength. This is the philosophy of the study; I appeal to that of experience. In the country districts, I see big lads hoeing, digging, guiding the plough, filling the wine-cask, driving the cart, like their fathers; you would take them for grown men if their ...
— Emile • Jean-Jacques Rousseau
... around Tunbridge Wells are numerous. The common, with its mixture of springy turf, golden gorse, with here and there a bold group of rocks, is one of the most beautiful in the home counties, and in whatever direction one wanders there are long views over far-stretching ...
— What to See in England • Gordon Home
... striking an old path that seemed to lead in the right direction, ran on in solitude, raising a rustle of leaves, with a naked parang in his hand and a cloud of flies about his head. The sun declining to the westward threw shafts of light across his dark path. He ran at a springy half-trot, his eyes watchful, his broad chest heaving, and carrying the emerald ring on the forefinger of a clenched hand as though he were afraid it should slip off, fly off, be torn from him by an invisible force, or spirited away by some enchantment. Who could ...
— The Rescue • Joseph Conrad
... later she went for a walk along the springy turf of the valley. The sun shone overhead, but from her spirit the mist had not quite lifted. Suddenly a small white ball came scudding towards her feet. She looked round and saw herself amid little flags sticking in the ground. Distant ...
— The Grey Wig: Stories and Novelettes • Israel Zangwill
... had been a stiff one. The day was very hot, and, rather purple about the face and breathing heavily, the sailor relapsed on the springy, scented turf close to the cliff's edge and gazed pensively at the vista of shimmering sea spread out ...
— Stand By! - Naval Sketches and Stories • Henry Taprell Dorling
... all sorts of painting, will be of very general utility. For most of your brushes select the long and thin, rather than the short and thick ones. The stubby brush is a useless sort of thing for most work. There are men who use them and like them, but most painters prefer the more flexible and springy brush, if it is not weak. So, too, the brush should not be too thick. A thick brush takes up too much paint into itself, and does not change its tint so readily. For rubbing over large surfaces where a good deal of the same color is thickly spread on the canvas, the thick, strong ...
— The Painter in Oil - A complete treatise on the principles and technique - necessary to the painting of pictures in oil colors • Daniel Burleigh Parkhurst
... thorough pedestrian and gymnastic preparation. The diminutive stature of the men and their precision in accomplishing the allotted length of the step, gave to it something of a steady loping movement, but yet so firm and springy that the effect was most animated. Another feature in the general excellence of the Zouaves was noted in their method of handling their arms, which, instead of the inanimate and gingerly treatment so observable even among finely drilled companies when executing the manual, ...
— Perley's Reminiscences, Vol. 1-2 - of Sixty Years in the National Metropolis • Benjamin Perley Poore
... was looking sharp to see what kind of seed they dropped into the furrow, a gang of fellows by my side suddenly began to hook up the virgin mould itself, with a peculiar jerk, clean down to the sand, or rather the water—for it was a very springy soil—indeed all the terra firma there was—and haul it away on sleds, and then I guessed that they must be cutting peat in a bog. So they came and went every day, with a peculiar shriek from the locomotive, from and to some point of the polar regions, as it seemed to me, like a flock of ...
— Walden, and On The Duty Of Civil Disobedience • Henry David Thoreau
... another attempt to reach the West Indies for this season; and if they were to remain in our latitude, they could hardly have selected a more desirable location. The marsh, or meadow, was sheltered and sunny, while the best protected corner was at the same time one of those peculiarly springy spots in which the grass keeps green the winter through. Here, then, these seven wayfarers stayed week after week. Whenever I stole up cautiously and peeped over the bank into their verdant hiding-place, I was sure to hear the familiar cry; and directly one bird, and then another, and another, would ...
— The Foot-path Way • Bradford Torrey
... of every detail of the room—the deep springy green carpet, smooth under his feet, the straight hanging thin silk curtains, the half-dozen low tables with a wealth of flowers upon them, and the books that lined the walls. The whole room was heavy with the scent of roses, although the windows were wide, and the night-breeze stirred ...
— Lord of the World • Robert Hugh Benson
... after looking shyly aside at him, continued her walk at the same steady pace. The twilight had darkened much since he had left the town, but the moonlight showed him the graceful pose of the head, the light, springy tread, and the mass of golden hair which escaped from the red hood covering her head. Cardo took ...
— By Berwen Banks • Allen Raine
... Ready every one? Then—go!" As the word "Go" left Jim's lips the four ponies sprang forward sharply, and a moment later were in full gallop over the soft springy turf. It was an ideal place for a race—clear ground, covered with short soft grass, well eaten off by the sheep—no trees to bar the way, and over all a sky of the brightest blue, ...
— A Little Bush Maid • Mary Grant Bruce
... at the expelled chaff, and carrying it yet farther apart. I think I see old Eppie now, filling her sack with what the wind blew her; not with the grain: Eppie did not covet that; she only wanted her bed filled with fresh springy chaff, on which she would sleep as sound as her rheumatism would let her, and as warm and dry and comfortable as any duchess in the land that happened to have the rheumatism too. For comfort is inside more than outside; and eider down, delicious as it is, ...
— Ranald Bannerman's Boyhood • George MacDonald
... bases immense buttresses, have to be felled, a platform of light poles is built around each of these giants to the height of about 15 feet. Two men standing upon this rude platform on opposite sides of the stem attack it with their small springy-hafted axes (Fig. 11) above the level of the buttresses (Pl. 55). One man cuts a deep notch on the side facing up the hill, the other cuts a similar notch about a foot lower down on the opposite ...
— The Pagan Tribes of Borneo • Charles Hose and William McDougall
... up to open the door, and Venning overtopped him by inches, yet he did not look either small or unwieldy. His step was springy, and his head, poised on a massive neck, was well set, with the chin raised. He was a man, evidently, who had always looked the world straight in the face. His eyes had a yellowish tinge, and in their colour and their calm they reminded Venning somehow of a lion, an impression ...
— In Search of the Okapi - A Story of Adventure in Central Africa • Ernest Glanville
... side glance at her. The sun striking through the trees of the park flushed translucently the smooth, fair flesh of her cheek and her ungloved hand. In her white frock, moving freely, with the springy grace of a young animal, she attracted the eye. Her head, under her wide hat-brim, was pensive, but she looked up at him with a smile. "If you could bring yourself to it, you know," she began, and broke off. "I mean," she began again, "I think you must either be ...
— The Squire's Daughter - Being the First Book in the Chronicles of the Clintons • Archibald Marshall
... white fluid that flowed from the wounds made by their axes. I tried it. The taste was not unpleasant, but it left a sticky feeling in the mouth. The helmsman of my boat, Luiz, a powerful negro, chopped into the tree, balancing himself with springy ease on a slight scaffolding. The honey was in a hollow, and had been made by medium-sized stingless bees. At the mouth of the hollow they had built a curious entrance of their own, in the shape of a spout of wax ...
— Through the Brazilian Wilderness • Theodore Roosevelt
... gate which closed its course. As he rose with a grand lift to take the leap she closed her eyes in terror. Easy and swift as a bird's flight was the leap with which the strong-limbed horse cleared the high palings and lighted on the soft springy turf within; another bound or two and she heard a sharp, strong voice which rang above the storm with a tone of command that ...
— Bricks Without Straw • Albion W. Tourgee
... among the budding trees, and through the soft springy turf that was growing green again in spite of the bitter spring winds, but she found no little native lurking among the birches, and was disappointed to come to the other side of the wood much more quickly than she expected, without the detour being ...
— Geordie's Tryst - A Tale of Scottish Life • Mrs. Milne Rae
... from yesterday when they were here—different because memory recalled actual words, deeds, kisses of loved ones whose life was ended. Utterly futile was it for Lenore to try to think of Dorn in that way. She saw his stalwart form down through the summer haze, coming with his springy stride through the wheat. Yet—the words—mortally wounded! They had burned into her thought so that when she closed her eyes she saw them, darkly red, against the blindness of sight. Pain was a sluggish stream with source high in her breast, and it moved with her unquickened blood. If Dorn were ...
— The Desert of Wheat • Zane Grey
... with the mystery of sun and sea, they confessed youth's excited wonder about the world; Carl sitting cross-legged, rubbing his ankles, a springy figure in blue flannel and a daring tie; while Ruth, in deep-rose linen, her throat bright and bare, lay with her chin in her hands, a flush beneath the gentle brown of her cheeks, her white-clad ankles crossed under her skirt, slender against ...
— The Trail of the Hawk - A Comedy of the Seriousness of Life • Sinclair Lewis
... the journey was made through a belt of pine wood, the timber of which left the human figure something so infinitesimal that its passage was incapable of disturbing the abiding silence. The scrunch of the springy carpet of needles and pine cones under heavily shod feet was completely lost. The profoundness of the ...
— The Triumph of John Kars - A Story of the Yukon • Ridgwell Cullum
... springy tread, I saw—Tom Herbert! Tom Herbert, radiant; Tom Herbert, the picture of happiness; Tom Herbert, singing in his gay and ...
— Mohun, or, The Last Days of Lee • John Esten Cooke
... off, rose a huge gray rock, partly covered on one side with moss, and round about were oaks and a few ash trees of a poor scrubby sort (else they would long ago have been cut out). The earth underneath was soft and springy ...
— Adventures In Contentment • David Grayson
... the hunter dipped his springy oar into the water, and, with a few vigorous strokes, sent his canoe to the shore, and, having moored it to a root, he glided into the thickets, and disappeared with a tread so noiseless as to leave Claud, for many minutes, wholly ...
— Gaut Gurley • D. P. Thompson
... over the springy sod beside the road, which was becoming fainter the farther they got from the town. In the distance they could see the mountains, a dark mass ...
— Ted Strong's Motor Car • Edward C. Taylor
... was a rough model of the human ear, carved in oak, and provided with a drum which actuated a bent and pivoted lever of platinum, making it open and close a springy contact of platinum foil in the metallic circuit of the current. He devised some ten or twelve different forms, each an improvement on its predecessors, which transmitted music fairly well, and even a word or two of speech with ...
— Heroes of the Telegraph • J. Munro
... the springy board floor, nimble fingers worked a moment at the cords, then the flap was thrown open and the adjutant's office stood partially revealed. It was a big wall tent backed up against another of the same size and pattern. Half a dozen plain chairs, two ...
— Found in the Philippines - The Story of a Woman's Letters • Charles King
... agricultural interests of our state, and it is the inquiry which alone I propose to consider, but cannot resist the remark that wherever we do find timber throughout the broad field of prairie, it is always in or near the humid portions of it, as along the margins of streams, or upon or near the springy uplands. Many most luxurious growths are found in the highest portions of the uplands, but always in the neighborhood of water. For a remarkable example, I may refer to the great chain of groves extending from and including the Au Sable grove on the east and Holderman's ...
— The Land of the Miamis • Elmore Barce
... the hounds beside her, walked through the nearest grove. The ground was soft and springy and brown with pine-needles. Then she saw that a clump of trees had prevented her from seeing the most striking part of this natural park. The cowboys had selected a campsite where they would have the morning sun and afternoon ...
— The Light of Western Stars • Zane Grey
... spindling, crazy-looking hackmatacks or native larches, with pallid green tufts sticking out fantastically all over them. It shelved so deeply, that, while the hemlock-tassels were swinging on the trees around its border, all would be still at its springy bottom, save that perhaps a single fern would wave slowly backward and forward like a sabre with a twist as of a feathered oar,—and this when not a breath could be felt, and every other stem and blade were motionless. There was an old story of one having perished here in ...
— Elsie Venner • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... themselves; to wool, which, being compressed, has an elastic force; to slender wires of different substances, consistencies, lengths, and thickness; in greater curls or less, near to, or remote from each other, etc., yet all continuing springy, expansible, and compressible. Lastly, they may also be compared to the thin shavings of different kinds of wood, various in their lengths, breadth, and thickness. And this, perhaps, will seem the most eligible ...
— A History of Science, Volume 4(of 5) • Henry Smith Williams
... fled the house and went across the country, now fording a flood of melted snow, now floundering through a drift, now walking on springy sod, unaware of the soft spring, conscious only of a sort of fire in his breast. He suffered and he resented his suffering, and he would have killed his heart if, by so doing, he could have given it peace. And all day he did not once think of Joan, but only of the "tall child" ...
— The Branding Iron • Katharine Newlin Burt
... on the wheel-spokes. The narrow tires sunk slightly in the yielding shingle fragments. Brittle! Brittle! Brittle! the sound said to Bobby. Above all things he loved to watch the gossamer-like wheels, apparently too light and delicate to bear the weight they must carry, flying over the springy road. ...
— The Adventures of Bobby Orde • Stewart Edward White
... not permit of this, so he stripped and stood forth, the beau-ideal of a well-formed, agile man. He was greatly superior in size to his antagonist, and more muscular, the savage being slender and extremely lithe and springy. ...
— The Dog Crusoe and his Master • R.M. Ballantyne
... undertook only in rare instances which promised a large, undoubted profit. Two or three times he had to sit in jail, but these sessions went to his benefit; he not only did not lose his rapacious high-handedness and springy energy in his transactions, but with every year became more daring, inventive, and enterprising. With the years to his brazen impetuousness was joined a ...
— Yama (The Pit) • Alexandra Kuprin
... sure your mouth is covered?" she asked, adapting her springy gait with difficulty to the dragging steps of ...
— The Indian Lily and Other Stories • Hermann Sudermann
... faces, over the long hollow, and up a slope again, until, as the white grass rolled behind her, Flora Schuyler yielded to the exhilaration of swift motion, and, flinging off the constraint of the city, rejoiced in the springy rush of the mettlesome beast beneath her. Streaming white levels, the blue of the sliding sky, the kiss of the wind on her hot cheek, and the roar of hoofs, all reacted upon her until she laughed aloud when she hurled her half-wild broncho ...
— The Cattle-Baron's Daughter • Harold Bindloss
... juice; by keeping, they gradually part with a portion of this moisture, the quantity varying with the temperature and the circulation of air about them, and being much more rapid when first picked than after a short time, and by parting with this moisture they become springy or yielding, and in a better condition to pack closely in barrels; but this moisture never shows on the surface in the form of sweat. In keeping apples, very much depends upon the surroundings; every variation in temperature causes ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 358, November 11, 1882 • Various
... she would die in the woods, or be captured by Shawnees, before calling him back. But she watched him. Slowly the tall, strong figure, with its graceful, springy stride, went down the glade. He would be lost to view in a moment, and then she would be alone. How dark it had suddenly become! The gray cloak of twilight was spread over the forest, and in the hollows night already had settled down. A breathless silence pervaded the woods. How lonely! thought ...
— The Last Trail • Zane Grey
... and handed it to me. Then, more amicably, we settled the details of the stock transfer and he gave me the location of my property. I went back to the Intelligencer office with the springy step of a man who acknowledges no master. In my mind I prepared a triumph: I would wait—even if it took days—for the first bullying word from Le ffacase and then I would magnificently fling my resignation ...
— Greener Than You Think • Ward Moore
... told to Blakely as the foremost litter came. He listened with hardly a word of comment; then asked for his scouting notebook. He was sitting up now. They helped him from his springy couch to a seat on the rocks, and gave him a cup of the cold water. One by one the other litters were led into the little amphitheater and unlashed. Everyone seemed to know that here must be the bivouac for the night, their abiding place for another ...
— An Apache Princess - A Tale of the Indian Frontier • Charles King
... of shaded grass, between lane and hotel-grounds and bandstand, was starred by white-clad children, and by men who sprawled drowsily upon the springy turf, their straw hats tilted above their eyes. The time was mid-February. The thermometers on the Royal Palm veranda registered seventy-three. No rain had fallen in weeks to mar ...
— Black Caesar's Clan • Albert Payson Terhune
... as bright and white, but the spring was already advanced. The wet soil smelt of spring. Clear cold water ran everywhere from under the loose, thawing snow. The branches of the trees were springy and elastic. For miles and miles around, the country opened up in ...
— Best Russian Short Stories • Various
... gunnery!" said the young man, stooping over it, after treading the last spark into the springy sand. "The little artillery man is wanted here. Ladies, you may safely stay here now. They will not make two hits in proximity ...
— Springhaven - A Tale of the Great War • R. D. Blackmore
... of the men walked out towards our camp, and my father called to me to come and see a genuine Western man; he was about six feet two inches tall, was well built, and had a light, springy and wiry step. He wore a broad-brimmed California hat, and was dressed in a complete suit of buckskin, beautifully trimmed and beaded. He saluted us, and father invited him to sit down, which he did. After a few moments conversation, he turned to me ...
— The Life of Hon. William F. Cody - Known as Buffalo Bill The Famous Hunter, Scout and Guide • William F. Cody
... of early spring, the radiant clearness of the atmosphere making neighbors of the mountains, all combined to make a tonic which showed signs of going to Polly's head. After all, there are few sensations like the starting out upon a horseback trip; the mare's springy trot, the freshness of her own healthy body, even the feel of the ...
— Across the Mesa • Jarvis Hall
... medium-sized and upright man of seventy, whose brown face was perfectly clean-shaven. His grey, silky hair was brushed in a cock's comb from his fine forehead, bald on the left side. He stood before the hearth facing the room, and his figure had the springy abruptness of men who cannot fatten. There was a certain youthfulness, too, in his eyes, yet they had a look as though he had been through fire; and his mouth curled at the corners in surprising smiles. The room was like the man—morally large, void of red-tape and almost void ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... in, Mr. Culver bringing the hamper of supper. The Ferry is a very large place and every foot of it is covered with tan-bark, smooth and brown and springy. Rosanna felt as though she was walking in a riding academy. Everything was ...
— The Girl Scouts at Home - or Rosanna's Beautiful Day • Katherine Keene Galt
... stripped axis of the cone. Then of course he is ready for another, and if you are watching you may catch a glimpse of him as he glides silently out to the end of a branch and see him examining the cone-clusters until he finds one to his mind; then, leaning over, pull back the springy needles out of his way, grasp the cone with his paws to prevent its falling, snip it off in an incredibly short time, seize it with jaws grotesquely stretched, and return to his chosen seat near the trunk. But ...
— The Mountains of California • John Muir
... was a wide pathway striking through the forest at right angles to the river. It resembled a drive in an English forest, save that tropical bushes with their sword-like leaves grew at the side, and the ground was covered with an unmarked springy moss instead of grass, starred with little yellow flowers. As they passed into the depths of the forest the light grew dimmer, and the noises of the ordinary world were replaced by those creaking ...
— The Voyage Out • Virginia Woolf
... whispered Jimbo, uncertain whether the shiver he felt was his sister's or his own. 'He's much too springy.' ...
— A Prisoner in Fairyland • Algernon Blackwood
... Kells had a springy step, a bright eye, a lifted head, and he seemed to be listening. Perhaps he was—to the music of his sordid dreams. Joan watched him sometimes with wonder. Even a bandit—plotting gold robberies, with violence and blood merely means to an end—built ...
— The Border Legion • Zane Grey
... herself knew exactly what she meant seemed not to be entirely clear to her. For, when Mr. Puma, dressed in a travelling suit and carrying a satchel, arrived at her apartment in the Hotel Rajah, and entered the reception room with his soundless, springy step, she came out of her bedroom partly dressed, and still hooking ...
— The Crimson Tide • Robert W. Chambers
... the aid of a few pins, she made a large package of the hat. To be sure, it did not look like a hat when it was done, but that was all the better. The feathers were upheld and packed softly about with bits of paper crushed together to make a springy cushion, and the whole built out and then covered over with paper. She reflected that girls who wore their hair wound about their heads and covered by plain felt hats would not be unlikely to carry large newspaper-wrapped packages through the ...
— The Mystery of Mary • Grace Livingston Hill
... summit of the Goulet there was no marked road—only upright stones posted from space to space to guide the drovers. The turf underfoot was springy and well scented. I had no company but a lark or two, and met but one bullock-cart between Lestampes and Bleymard. In front of me I saw a shallow valley, and beyond that the range of the Lozere, sparsely wooded and well enough modeled in the flanks, but ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition - Vol. 1 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... no: the climate is different. Here, if the life is dull, you can be dull too, and no great harm done. [Going off into a passionate dream] But your wits can't thicken in that soft moist air, on those white springy roads, in those misty rushes and brown bogs, on those hillsides of granite rocks and magenta heather. You've no such colors in the sky, no such lure in the distances, no such sadness in the evenings. Oh, the dreaming! the ...
— John Bull's Other Island • George Bernard Shaw
... over the springy turf, the bay mare beaten but not cowed, responding docilely to every touch of Brett's hands on the bridle. She had learned her lesson, recognised the man who ...
— The Vision of Desire • Margaret Pedler
... rheumatism or gout. It was for this reason that Coquenil had been at such pains to learn whether Kittredge suffered from these maladies. It appeared that he did not. Indeed, M. Paul himself remembered the young man's quick, springy step when he left the cab that fatal night to enter Bonneton's house. So now he proposed to make Lloyd walk back and forth several times in a pair of his own boots over soft earth in the prison yard and then show that impressions of these new footprints were different ...
— Through the Wall • Cleveland Moffett
... train on which they were riding, came to a slow, noisy stop. From it, alighted the four boys, sun-burned, clear-eyed and springy of step. They were clad in the regulation suits of the cowboy, the faded garments giving evidence of long service ...
— The Pony Rider Boys in Montana • Frank Gee Patchin
... citizens who remember the lands on Fulton Avenue near Nevins Street and De Kalb Avenue before the changes which were produced by the filling-in of those streets, will recollect that their original character was marshy and springy, being in fact the bed of the valley which received the drain of the hills extending on either side of it from the Waalebought to Gowanus Bay. This would lead to the conclusion that the name was given on account of the locality; but though we have very imperfect accounts ...
— The Campaign of 1776 around New York and Brooklyn • Henry P. Johnston
... with stars, casting a filmy light over the marching columns. Dick was with the troops passing to the right, and he observed again their springy and ...
— The Rock of Chickamauga • Joseph A. Altsheler
... at Carpaccio, even in my copy. The colorist says, "First of all, as my delicious paroquet was ruby, so this nasty viper shall be black"; and then is the question, "Can I round him off, even though he is black, and make him slimy, and yet springy, and close down—clotted like a pool of black blood on the earth—all the same?" Look at him beside Michael Angelo's, and then tell me the Venetians can't draw! And also, Carpaccio does it with a touch, with ...
— Lectures on Landscape - Delivered at Oxford in Lent Term, 1871 • John Ruskin
... she murmured. 'Come and lie down like me. It is so springy and soft, all this straw; and it tickles one so funnily in the neck. Do you roll about in the straw at home? There is nothing I am fonder of—— Sometimes I tickle the soles of my feet with it. That is ...
— Abbe Mouret's Transgression - La Faute De L'abbe Mouret • Emile Zola
... the room with the springy, feather-footed step that distinguished her among all the women that he knew. In a few moments she was back. Instead of giving him the key, she put it down on the table ...
— Man Size • William MacLeod Raine
... slipped quietly up the broad cathedral steps. They were the daughters of the rank and file, but their movements were graceful and they were tastefully dressed. Then the blue-shirted, sinewy men, who strolled past, smoking, roused her curiosity. They had not acquired their free, springy stride in the cities; these were adventurers who had met with strange experiences in the frozen North and the lonely West. Some of them had hard faces and a predatory air, but that added to their interest. Margaret Keith liked to watch them all, and speculate about their mode of life; that pleasure ...
— The Intriguers • Harold Bindloss
... trees; and at once their forms were lost to sight, while I gave myself over to superintending the labours of my chosen aides in the gathering of boughs of the fragrant evergreen, and in arranging this material at equidistant intervals about our camp-fire site so as to form six springy couches. As completed, these couches lacked that luxurious appearance I had been led to expect; but I consoled myself with the reflection: Pretty ...
— Fibble, D. D. • Irvin Shrewsbury Cobb
... a springy lope, with his chin up, elbows in and chest distended, his quick small feet slopping regardlessly through the viscous mud of the unpaved byway. "Hear that!" he cried, as a series of short, sharp yells rose in the bazaar ...
— The Bronze Bell • Louis Joseph Vance
... that they were going northward. Hence he inferred that they would make no further attack upon the white hunters, and were bound for what they called home. Refreshed by his rest and sleep, and relieved by the removal of the bandages from his wrists, he walked beside Wyatt with a springy step, and his outlook upon life was fairly cheerful. It was wonderful what the comradeship of one of his own kind did for him! After all, he had probably been deceived about Braxton Wyatt. Merely because his ways were not the ways of Henry and ...
— The Forest Runners - A Story of the Great War Trail in Early Kentucky • Joseph A. Altsheler
... heard one afternoon late in the Autumn of 1808, on the road that leads from Peterborough to Yaxley. A body of men, four abreast, and for the most part in the garb and with the bearing of soldiers, was marching along. But the sight was not exhilarating. The swing and springy step of soldiers on the march is always a pleasant sight; but there was a downcast look on most of these men's faces, and a general shabbiness of appearance that was not attractive. And no wonder: for they had come from the battlefield, and crossed the sea in crowded ships, not too comfortable; ...
— The French Prisoners of Norman Cross - A Tale • Arthur Brown
... Sprain elartikigi. Sprawl sterni. Spray (sprinkle) surversxi, sxprucigi sur. Spread (news) disvastigi. Spread (extend) etendi. Sprig vergeto, brancxeto. Sprightly sprita, viva. Sprightliness viveco. Spring salti. Spring (season) printempo. Spring (of watch, etc.) risorto. Springy elasta. Sprinkle sxprucigi sur. Sprinkler sxprucigilo. Sprite feino, koboldo. Sprout (bud) elkreski. Spue vomi. Spume sxauxmo. Spur sprono. Spurious falsa. Spurn eljxeti. Spurt elsxpruci. Spy spioni. Spy ekvidi, esplori. Spyglass vidilo. Squabble malpaceti. Squad tacxmento, ...
— English-Esperanto Dictionary • John Charles O'Connor and Charles Frederic Hayes
... the children saw and did during their visit to the Dale Farm: how they rode on the hay, then came jogging back in the empty cart for more; how they drove with the farmer in his spring-cart, which was not so very springy; how they learned to milk, and quite got over their fear of cows. Altogether they had such a delightful time that they hope they may go ...
— Laugh and Play - A Collection of Original stories • Various
... fresh summer morning when with springy step I set out to call upon the District Contract Agent for the first time. Innocently enough I expected to arrange for the installation of a telephone within the next two or three days. But I recollect that as I ascended the steps of his premises I became depressed by that House of Usher ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 158, February 25th, 1920 • Various
... he found his mattress, whatever it was, to be a springy, luxurious bed, and was about to resign himself to slumber when he observed that, from the position in which he lay, he could see the cavern in all its extent. Opening his half-closed eyes, therefore, he watched the proceedings of his ...
— Blown to Bits - or, The Lonely Man of Rakata • Robert Michael Ballantyne
... perturbed spirit, as he sat under the apple-trees and heard Lyddy going to and fro in the cottage. "She isn't any old maid," he thought; "she doesn't step like one; she has soft shoes and a springy walk. She must be a very handsome woman, with a hand like that; and such a voice! I knew the moment she spoke that she didn't belong in ...
— The Village Watch-Tower • (AKA Kate Douglas Riggs) Kate Douglas Wiggin
... curve toward the foot of the bed, and be sure to make the head of your bed away from the opening of the "lean-to" and the foot toward the opening. Over this bed spread your rubber blanket with rubber side down, your sleeping blanket on top, and you will be surprised how soft, springy, and fragrant a bed you have, upon which to rest your "weary frame," ...
— Camping For Boys • H.W. Gibson
... A springy motion in her gait, A rising step, did indicate Of pride and joy no common rate, That flush'd her spirit: I know not by what name beside I shall it call: if 'twas not pride, It was a joy to that ...
— The Golden Treasury - Of the Best Songs and Lyrical Poems in the English Language • Various
... and build a sustaining wall. After this had been done, we were asked if the wall could not be devoted to some useful purpose, and it was determined to build a lean-to grapery against it. The chief difficulty in the way was the wet and springy nature of the ground at the level marked water line in Fig. 38. It was found, however, that it could be drained; but at certain seasons of the year surface water would accumulate from the overflow of a milldam. But there is generally some way to overcome difficulties. In this ...
— Woodward's Graperies and Horticultural Buildings • George E. Woodward
... a very different person from him just described. He was still young, tall, sinewy, gaunt, yet springy and strong, stooping and round-shouldered, with a face that carried a very decided top-light in it, like that of the notorious Bardolph. In short, whiskey had dyed the countenance of Gershom Waring with a tell-tale hue, that did not less infallibly ...
— Oak Openings • James Fenimore Cooper
... action, covered the floor with springy step. Taking a book of colossal size from a shelf, he whirled the pages, running his finger down a column ...
— No Clue - A Mystery Story • James Hay
... was intent on the scanner screen. There were heavy foliage spots, but there were also bare areas covered by a soft, springy turf and patches of wild flowers. But there was no sign of man or his works. There was not so much as a board, the glint of a nail, not a furrow, not even the scar of a campfire. And no indication that there had ...
— Eight Keys to Eden • Mark Irvin Clifton
... front and bearing had all the fearless dignity of a warrior, blended with the grace of nature. The only obvious defects were in his walk, which was Indian, or in-toed and bending at the knee; but, to counterbalance these, his movements were light, springy and swift. I fancied him, in figure, the very beau-ideal of ...
— Satanstoe • James Fenimore Cooper
... up, he whispers (for the colors have passed), "Henry, if you lead the regiment out of this battle, I ask you never to forget my last wishes." The two friends clasp hands silently. With a bright smile, whose light lingers as he spurs past the springy column, he takes the lead, falcon-eyed, riding down silently into the gloomy forest-shades ...
— The Little Lady of Lagunitas • Richard Henry Savage
... as she peeped into the hollows and caves where they grew, it seemed as if she was being shown the secret store-house of Nature, where she kept all the most lovely plants, out of sight of the world. A soft carpet seemed to spring under Dot's feet, like a nice springy mattress, as she trotted along. She asked the Kangaroo why the earth was so soft, and was told that it was not earth, but the dead leaves of the tree-ferns above them, that had been falling for such a long, long time, that no kangaroo could remember ...
— Dot and the Kangaroo • Ethel C. Pedley
... freckled, milky face hit the moist springy ground as Bud or Abe or Jim bumped into him at their play. He was glad when the day ended and he could go home. For Mealy Jones abhorred the dirt that begrimed his face and soiled his white starched collar. He liked to play in lukewarm water, to slosh in the suds, ...
— The Court of Boyville • William Allen White
... with a bale hook hung in his belt, is a figure to fascinate the eye. When he works—which is to say, when he is out of funds—he works hard. He will swing a two-hundred-pound sack to his back and do fancy steps as he marches with it up the springy gangplank to the river steamer's deck, uttering now and then a strange, barbaric snatch of song. He has no home, no family, no responsibilities. An ignorant deck hand can earn from forty to one hundred dollars a month. Pay him off at the end of the trip, let him get ashore with his ...
— American Adventures - A Second Trip 'Abroad at home' • Julian Street
... use my head intelligently, and command my motions so well, at a time of such excitement. We grew hot, perspired, breathed fast and loud, kept our muscles tense, and held each other with glittering eyes as we moved about on firm but springy feet. We must have fought very swiftly, for the ring of the steel sounded afterward in my ears as if it had been almost continuous. How long we kept it up, I do not exactly know. We came to panting ...
— The Bright Face of Danger • Robert Neilson Stephens
... face. For the rest, his broad massive shoulders indicated unmistakably the possession of great strength; whilst his waist, slim almost as that of a woman, his lean muscular lower limbs, and his quick springy step, told of great bodily activity. His disposition was exactly what one would, from a study of his externals, judge it to be—frank, generous, genial, kindly, and sympathetic to his friends, but a fearless and formidable ...
— The Pirate Island - A Story of the South Pacific • Harry Collingwood
... chickens, to give him room. At the last instant, he twisted the impellers to full pitch again, pulled out the throttle for a moment, then slammed the lever to the closed position. His ship touched down on springy turf, its landing gear settling gently to accept the weight. A klaxon was sounding, and warning lights flashed from the landing slot, to warn ships ...
— Final Weapon • Everett B. Cole
... I am on the lookout for watercresses. It is a plant that has the pungent April flavor. In many parts of the country the watercress seems to have become completely naturalized, and is essentially a wild plant. I found it one day in a springy place, on the top of a high, wooded mountain, far from human habitation. We gathered it and ate it with our sandwiches. Where the walker cannot find this salad, a good substitute may be had in our native spring cress, which is also in perfection ...
— A Year in the Fields • John Burroughs
... finds higher and higher powers. Once he throttled his game, and often perished in the desperate struggle; then he trapped it; then pierced it with the javelin; then shot it with an arrow, or set the springy gases to hurl a rifle-ball at it. Sometime he may point at it an electric spark, and it shall be his. Once he wearily trudged his twenty miles a day, then he took the horse into service and made sixty; invoked the winds, and rode on ...
— Recreations in Astronomy - With Directions for Practical Experiments and Telescopic Work • Henry Warren
... ten minutes, then. I'll join you there," said McLean, glancing over his shoulders at his comrade as he started across the springy turf to obey the summons. "What is it, Miss Forrest?" he inquired. "Good-morning Mrs. Gordon—Mrs. Wells—everybody," he continued, as, with forage-cap in hand, he made his obeisance to the various ladies of ...
— 'Laramie;' - or, The Queen of Bedlam. • Charles King
... on opposite sides of the gridiron, and half a dozen footballs were produced. Punting and catching punts was the order of the day, and Neil was soon busily at work. The afternoon was warm, but not uncomfortably so, the turf was springy underfoot, the sky was blue from edge to edge, the new men supplied plenty of amusement in their efforts, the pigskins bumped into his arms in the manner of old friends, and Neil was happy as a lark. After one catch for which he had to run back several yards, he let himself out and booted the ...
— Behind the Line • Ralph Henry Barbour
... ride, our first day's battue was closed early. The party defiled in loose order among the trees in the open forest, cantered over springy turf, and brushed through patches of fern to a sheltered dell in which we were to bivouac, and where the sumpter horses had already halted. Then followed such a rude feast as in all my rambles I had never before chanced to witness. Imagine ...
— Rambles in the Islands of Corsica and Sardinia - with Notices of their History, Antiquities, and Present Condition. • Thomas Forester
... progressive and enterprising and so appallingly candid. I've been the "one woman", the "unknown but remembered ideal" since that encounter. Of course, that was to be said, but strangely enough he meant it. He was actually and unaffectedly making love to me. He's not so large or tall, but quick and springy, and muscled like a panther. He's not beautiful either but pleasant to look at, one of those broad high-cheeked faces one sees so much in the West, with the funniest quick yellowish grey eyes and the most disreputable moustache I ever saw, yellow and ragged, If he must eat it, I wish he ...
— The Spenders - A Tale of the Third Generation • Harry Leon Wilson
... woman, Signor Marchese," said the little impresario, trotting along with short steps by the side of the Marchese, and rising on his toes in a springy manner, that made his walk resemble that of a cock-sparrow. "Truly a wonderful woman. I have seen and known a many in my day, Signor Marchese, as you are well aware, sir; but such an one as that, such an out-and-outer, I ...
— A Siren • Thomas Adolphus Trollope
... came to a wide common, with short, springy turf, where horses of all colours, with skins of satin, were kicking up their heels in play. The sight of them so delighted Helga that she nearly sprang from her saddle with a ...
— The Brown Fairy Book • Andrew Lang
... pair of winners. I put my money on them. Nothing on earth can stop those fellows, native-born Americans, all grit and get-up. See that tall one smoking a cigar and looking at the women? He's an athlete. Name's Mervin; all whipcord and whalebone; springy as a bent bow. He's a type of the Swift. He's bound to get there. See the other. Hewson's his name; solid as a tower; muscled like a bear; built from the ground up. He represents the Strong. Look at the grim, determined face of him. You can't ...
— The Trail of '98 - A Northland Romance • Robert W. Service
... over the back of the head, where it is somehow fixed to a back hair-comb, and the two ends hang down over the shoulders in front; or, more often, one end is thrown over the opposite shoulder, so that the young lady's face is set in it, like a picture in a frame. Add to this a springy step, the peculiarly unconstrained movement in walking which comes of living in the open air and wearing a loose dress, a pleasant pale face, small features, bright eyes, small hands and feet, little slippers and no stockings, and you have as good a picture of ...
— Anahuac • Edward Burnett Tylor
... in Haverhill last night. It was as usual stormy. I had a good audience, but not springy and inspiriting like that at Waltham. Some audiences seem to put spring into one, and some to take it out. This one seemed good but heavy. I had to lift them, while in Framingham and Waltham ...
— The Life of Harriet Beecher Stowe • Charles Edward Stowe |
