"Odour" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... loosening the neckerchiefs of those who are too drunk, and picking up scraps of conversation which he will retail outside. There is something peculiarly pathetic in the whole picture. One remembers Defoe, who for so many years lived in the reputation of honourable politics and in the odour of such sanctity as Robinson Crusoe could give, until the discovery of certain yellow papers revealed the base political treachery for which the great island story had been a kind of anodyne to conscience. So Samuel Pepys ...
— Among Famous Books • John Kelman
... sweep which ran around the house—and she thought she detected a faint disagreeable smell, as of drugs. She unbolted a window and flung it wide and the warm June air came flowing in, banishing the unpleasant sharp odour. ...
— Love of Brothers • Katharine Tynan
... crowded with strange, lithe, nearly naked human beings, with black, straight, long wet hair, and brown shining skins, jostled at every step by holy bulls or cows, roaming at their own sweet will with large placid lustrous eyes, in an atmosphere heavy with the half-delicious, half-repulsive odour of innumerable flowers, mostly yellow, that lay about everywhere in heaps, fresh and rotten, till I came out finally upon the river bank. A light steamy mist, converted by the low sun's horizontal rays into a kind of ...
— Bubbles of the Foam • Unknown
... engravings from Raffaelle, and a marine water-colour or two, besides all my own attempts at family portraits, with a case of well-bound books. Those two rooms were perfectly redolent of their masters—I say it literally—for the scent of flowers was in Clarence's room, and in Griff's, the odour of cigars had not wholly been destroyed even by much airing. For in those days it was regarded by parents and guardians ...
— Chantry House • Charlotte M. Yonge
... where the poste for Gimel may be caught. But from Arzier there is a short cut of less than two hours along the side of the hills, leaving that village by a deep gorge not unfitly named L'Enfer, and a dark wood which retains an odour of more savage bygone times in its name of the 'Bear's Wood,' as containing a cavern where an old bear was detected in the ...
— Ice-Caves of France and Switzerland • George Forrest Browne
... blest for bounteous uses Is the birth of pure vine-juices! Safe's the table which produces Wine in goodly quality. Oh, in colour how auspicious! Oh, in odour how delicious! In the mouth how sweet, propitious To the ...
— Wine, Women, and Song - Mediaeval Latin Students' songs; Now first translated into English verse • Various
... then fasted for three more. On the last of these they sighted the island where grew the grapes. It was thickly wooded, with trees bending under the weight of the fruit, filled with all manner of good vegetation, and exhaling an odour like that of an house full of pomegranates (mala punica). Here they landed, pitched the tent, and stayed ...
— Brendan's Fabulous Voyage • John Patrick Crichton Stuart Bute
... military society was soon in better odour with her than the clerical. She had been making strenuous efforts to get to St. Herbert's, with Mr. Mitchell, for some time past, but the road was in a state of being repaired, and the coachman was determined against taking his horses there. As to ...
— The Clever Woman of the Family • Charlotte M. Yonge
... other. "He will assume that I died in the odour of sanctity, in the atmosphere of a rectory, in the arms of a parson. He'll worry no more, poor old chap, about my past or my future. This is the turning-point of our fortunes. Don't look so glum, man. Here—hit ...
— Bunch Grass - A Chronicle of Life on a Cattle Ranch • Horace Annesley Vachell
... dead fly which makes the ointment of the apothecary to stink might be left out of that without injury. But it was not left out; and it is precisely because it was there, and diffused so remarkable an odour over the whole, that I characterized the definition as I did—and most justly. Accessible to all men in a certain stage of development! When and how accessible? What species of development, I beseech you, is meant? And what is the stage of it? The ...
— Phases of Faith - Passages from the History of My Creed • Francis William Newman
... back of the shop—if that can be spoken of as a separate room which was, in fact, entirely walled off with books laid flat and rising in stacks from the floor. The place, in fact, suggested a cave or den rather than a shop, with stalagmites of piled literature and a subtle pervading odour of dust and decayed leather. The girl, after shutting the bolts behind her, led the way cautiously, and, crossing a passage at the rear of the shop, opened a door upon a far more cheerful scene. Here, in a neat parlour hung with old prints and mezzotints and water-colours, a hanging lamp shed ...
— Shining Ferry • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... road with two wagon-ruts revealed picturesque views at every turn. The path finally chosen by the sisters led to a hollow. Its sides, overgrown with bushes and weeds, looked wildly beautiful. From its depth came the sweet, warm odour of clover, and down below its white bosom grass was visible. A small narrow bridge, propped up from below with thin slender stakes, hung over the hollow. On the other side of the bridge a low hedge stretched right and left, and ...
— The Created Legend • Feodor Sologub
... had been given up to die. I gave him a fragrant white pink. His thin feverish fingers grasped it eagerly. In all his life he had never held a flower in his hand before. He pressed it to his lips, his soul thrilled at its sweet odour, and the little tired spirit came staggering back from the mists of Eternity just to see what it meant. He will live. It was the feather's weight that tipped the beam of life the right way. How little it takes sometimes to give ...
— The Root of Evil • Thomas Dixon
... awoke one morning feeling very hot, and stifled, and that my head was against flesh; that flesh was all about me, my mouth and nose being embedded in hair, or some thing scrubby, which had a hot peculiar odour. I have a recollection of a pair of hands suddenly clutching, and dragging me up on to the pillow, and of daylight then. I have no recollection of a word being uttered. This incident I could not long have forgoten, having told my ...
— My Secret Life, Volumes I. to III. - 1888 Edition • Anonymous
... never seen it look so beautiful. The rosy-cheeked fruit glowed in the bright sunlight. The monkey could hardly wait to make his bow, say the long hard name over twice and ask for the fruit with a "please." What a beautiful colour and what a delicious odour that fruit had! The monkey had never in all his life been so near to anything which smelled so good. He took a big bite. What a face he made! That beautiful sweet smelling fruit was bitter and sour, and ...
— Fairy Tales from Brazil - How and Why Tales from Brazilian Folk-Lore • Elsie Spicer Eells
... phial, and uncorking this, measured out a certain number of drops into a silver spoon. As he swallowed the dose the phial slipped from his fingers and rang upon the hearthstone, spilling its contents in the ashes. A pungent and heady odour ...
— The Bronze Bell • Louis Joseph Vance
... hammering of the iron hoops in the cooperage. No longer the teams of upstanding mules, with the music of their brass bells, are seen leaving the cellars with their load of the succulent wine. No longer is the air filled with that odour which is so well known to those whose lives are spent amidst the casks in which the wine is maturing. Instead, peace and quiet reign. Sacrificing their time to the interests of charity, the holy sisters dwell ...
— The Chronicles of a Gay Gordon • Jose Maria Gordon
... wherein is the house of Amin al-Hukm; and when 'tis the season of the round and folk are asleep, do thou pass, thou and those who are with thee of the men, and thou wilt see me sitting and on me fine raiment and ornaments and wilt smell on me the odour of Ottars; whereupon do thou question me of my case and I will say, 'I hail from the Citadel and am of the daughters of the deputies[FN15] and I came down into the town for a purpose; but night overtook me all unawares and the Zuwaylah Gate[FN16] was shut against me and all the other portals and ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 2 • Richard F. Burton
... other; and the licentiousness of the verse is equal to that of the emotion; every natural instinct of the language is violated, and the simple music native in French metre is replaced by falsetto notes sharp and intense. The charm is that of an odour of iris exhaled by some ideal tissues, or of a missal in a gold case, a precious relic of the pomp and ritual of an archbishop ...
— Confessions of a Young Man • George Moore
... the sacrificial vessels by using them for his drunken carouse, and therein had done just what we do when we take the powers of heart and mind and will, which are meant to be filled with affections, thoughts, and purposes, that are 'an odour of a sweet smell, well-pleasing to God,' and desecrate them by pouring from them libations before creatures. Is not love profaned when it is lavished on men or women without one reference to God? Is not the intellect desecrated when its force is spent on finite objects of thought, ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Ezekiel, Daniel, and the Minor Prophets. St Matthew Chapters I to VIII • Alexander Maclaren
... to read, an odour he had been vaguely conscious of inhaling all along was wafted very perceptibly to his nostrils. Then he became aware that the letter ...
— Cleo The Magnificent - The Muse of the Real • Louis Zangwill
... before the fire in the afternoon darkness, there flashed across my mind a vision of cloudless Egypt—trees rustling in the hot wind, yellow mountain-walls rising beyond the emerald plain of the Nile, the white pencils of minarets in the distance, the creamy odour of bean-blossoms in the air—a world of glorious vitality, where Death seemed an unaccountable accident. Here, Life existed only on sufferance, and all Nature frowned with a robber's demand to give it up. I flung my pipe across ...
— Northern Travel - Summer and Winter Pictures of Sweden, Denmark and Lapland • Bayard Taylor
... are of many patterns and devices, and most of them dilapidated and dreadfully dirty; so dirty that they stick to one another, and so greasy and discoloured by usage that I always fancied they gave off an unpleasant odour. They are not nice things to put in your pocket! I speak of those of moderate value, say 100 dollars. I believe those of higher denominations, not so much in use, are better. Accustomed to our clean and crisp notes, I was ...
— The Truth About America • Edward Money
... antiquities of the rarest kind—ivories, enamels, crystals, engraved gems, medals, coins, breviaries, illuminated manuscripts, silver of delicate workmanship were massed together in high cabinets behind the auctioneer's table. A peculiar musty odour, arising from the clamminess of the atmosphere and this collection of ...
— The Child of Pleasure • Gabriele D'Annunzio
... a crucifix hung, pale, against the wall, and two tapers kept dim vigils—she conducted me to an apartment where three children were asleep in three tiny beds. A heated stove made the air of this room oppressive; and, to mend matters, it was scented with an odour rather strong than delicate: a perfume, indeed, altogether surprising and unexpected under the circumstances, being like the combination of smoke with some spirituous essence—a smell, ...
— Villette • Charlotte Bronte
... I was hustled into the car, squeezed tightly between several men. On the floor of the car were a number of large sacks, exhaling an odour none too savoury. The door was slammed, I saw a figure step on to the driving seat, and once more the powerful car shot out into the night, its search-lamps lighting up the road as far ...
— The Four Faces - A Mystery • William le Queux
... been absent in the spring, When proud-pied April drest in all his trim Hath put a spirit of youth in every thing, That heavy Saturn laugh'd and leap'd with him. Yet nor the lays of birds, nor the sweet smell Of different flowers in odour and in hue, Could make me any summer's story tell, Or from their proud lap pluck them where they grew Nor did I wonder at the lily's white, Nor praise the deep vermilion in the rose; They were, but sweet, but figures of delight, Drawn after you, you pattern ...
— English literary criticism • Various
... others were away beating the scrub. The half-caste brought with him a wild duck he had trapped, and set about cooking this in its feathers. The two dined together shortly after mid-day, and the sun was streaming into the gully, the air was heavy with the odour of wild musk, and the Bush was as silent as if no life remained in the intense heat. Ryder had risen, and was looking at Wallaroo standing with his nose in the shade of a gum-butt, fighting the avaricious flies with his tail. At that instant ...
— In the Roaring Fifties • Edward Dyson
... brought a number of big bandboxes with lids covered with black oilcloth; and Angela's maid was there, too, and they tried one thing after another on her, ready-made garments for the first hours of mourning. Then they were gone, and she was dressed in black, and the room was filled with the unmistakable odour of black crape, which is not like anything ...
— The White Sister • F. Marion Crawford
... cushions fitted into the sinuous lines of the furniture, and as some Frenchman has put it, "a vague, discreet perfume pervaded the whole period, in contrast to the heavier odour of the First Empire." ...
— The Art of Interior Decoration • Grace Wood
... the acquisition of a bed—although it might possess the odour of a bed of tuberoses—when all of his pleasant calculations were upset by the appearance of a German burgher and his family. It was then that he learned that these people had booked le compartement from Strassburg ...
— The Husbands of Edith • George Barr McCutcheon
... quietus at once; the last sentence admits of no reply from a pennyless author. My breakfast table is but the spectre of former times;—no eggs on each side of my cup, or a plate of fresh Lynn shrimps, with an inviting salt odour, that would create an appetite in the stomach of an invalid; a choice bit of dried salmon, or a fresh cut off the roll of some violet-scented Epping butter;—all have disappeared; nay, even the usual allowance of cream has degenerated ...
— The English Spy • Bernard Blackmantle
... then made eight little fires—that being the number of my hunters; on each he cast some roots,[9] which emitted a curious sickly odour and thick smoke; into each he cast a small stone, shouting, as he did so, the name to which the stone was dedicated; then he ate some "medicine," and fell over in what appeared to be a trance for about ten minutes, during all which time his limbs ...
— The Making of Religion • Andrew Lang
... innermost depths of your need. That need may be great, but the everlasting arms are underneath it all. Think of Him now, at this moment—the great Angel of the Covenant, with the censer full of much incense, in which are placed your feeblest aspirations, your most burdened sighs—the odour-breathing cloud ascending with acceptance before the Father's throne. The answer may tarry;—these your supplications may seem to be kept long on the wing, hovering around the mercy-seat. A gracious God sometimes sees it meet thus to test the faith and patience of His people. He ...
— The Words of Jesus • John R. Macduff
... were noted. A vase of flowers; the curtains swaying in the breeze; an elusive odour that often haunted Northrup's waking hours. The room was now as it always had been. That being assured, Northrup, still in deep sleep, turned to the corridor and expectantly viewed the closed doors. But right here a new note was interjected. ...
— At the Crossroads • Harriet T. Comstock
... smaller boats had got there first. I had the greatest difficulty in persuading the Malays to give shelter to the Chinese Christians and children. I answered for their good behaviour; but all Chinese, whether rebels or no, were in sufficiently bad odour in those days. At last I got them part of a house to themselves. No sooner was all arranged than the Bishop arrived in his little boat; it was like receiving him ...
— Sketches of Our Life at Sarawak • Harriette McDougall
... uncomfortable to sit upon. The house was clean enough, and the bare floors of the numerous bed-chambers, which were only enlivened here and there with small strips or bands of Dutch carpet, sent up a homely odour of soft soap; for Mrs. Tadman took a fierce delight in cleaning, and the solitary household drudge who toiled under her orders had a hard time of it. There was a dismal kind of neatness about everything, and a bleak empty look in the ...
— Fenton's Quest • M. E. Braddon
... technique. Nearly every trait is overcharged; for instance, in his story of the Midnight Mass he rings the changes interminably upon the old business of the wonderful medicine in the vagrants' blessed horn that had a strong odour of whisky; but what an admirably humorous figure is this same Darby O'More! Out of the Poor Scholar alone, that inchoate masterpiece, you could illustrate a dozen phases of Carleton's mirth, beginning with the famous sermon ...
— Irish Books and Irish People • Stephen Gwynn
... words themselves, without reference to that peculiar order. Hence the vanity of translation; it were as wise to cast a violet into a crucible that you might discover the formal principle of its colour and odour, as seek to transfuse from one language into another the creations of a poet. The plant must spring again from its seed, or it will bear no flower—and this is the burthen of ...
— English Critical Essays - Nineteenth Century • Various
... on the rug. In one corner was a large baking oven like a beehive, half in one and half in the room next door. A wide shelf ran from the beehive almost to the open door. There were two small windows, each about the size of this book wide open. Jan and Jo sniffed. Where had they smelt that odour before? ...
— The Luck of Thirteen - Wanderings and Flight through Montenegro and Serbia • Jan Gordon
... describe the variety of shrubs we found on the island. Many were evergreens. One, which the doctor called the suriana, emitted a peculiarly strong, though not unpleasant odour. We used to be very glad, when the rays of the sun came down fiercely on our heads, to take shelter under these trees, and to rest during our long journeys from one end of our dominion ...
— A Voyage round the World - A book for boys • W.H.G. Kingston
... the wines began to come in; and the examiners assembled to adjudge the prize. The first vessel was unsealed. Its odour was such that the judges, without tasting it, pronounced unanimous condemnation. The next was opened: it had a villainous taste of clay. The third was sour and vapid. They proceeded from one cask of execrable liquor to another, till at length, in ...
— The Miscellaneous Writings and Speeches of Lord Macaulay, Vol. 1 (of 4) - Contibutions to Knight's Quarterly Magazine] • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... and youngsters with wisps and gleaning baskets. Farther on, the dry docks, where large vessels were laid low on their sides till their yards dipped in the water; they were singed with thorn-bushes to free them of sea weed; there rose an odour of pitch, and the deafening clatter of the sheathers coppering the bottoms with broad sheets of ...
— Tartarin of Tarascon • Alphonse Daudet
... and dim, That knew not a white man's feet, I smelt the odour of sun-warmed fur, Musky, ...
— Last Poems • Laurence Hope
... symptoms of putrescency had left him; his tongue and teeth were clean; there remained no unnatural blackness or foetor in his stool, which had now regained their proper consistence; his dozing and muttering were gone off; and the disagreeable odour of his breath and perspiration was no longer perceived. He took nourishment to-day, with pleasure; and, in the afternoon, sat up an ...
— Experiments and Observations on Different Kinds of Air • Joseph Priestley
... presume to be a window. On the floor, in addition to the slender furniture noticed by the light of the candle, I vaguely distinguish the outlines of my travelling trunk and of a water-jug. The cold humid air gives off a musty odour. Silence reigns, but, as I move, the sound of my footsteps echoes and re-echoes beneath the vaulted roof ...
— The Idler Magazine, Volume III, June 1893 - An Illustrated Monthly • Various
... house of Gundhar, he bade them throw open the doors of the hall and set the tree in the midst of it. They kindled lights among the branches until it seemed to be tangled full of fire-flies. The children encircled it, wondering, and the sweet odour of the ...
— The Blue Flower, and Others • Henry van Dyke
... be seen no one to be heard! Without the cabin, as within, reigned a profound silence. Not a living thing in sight—save the black vultures—a score of which, perched on the dead-woods overhead, and fetid as their food, were infecting the air with their carrion odour. Although within easy range of my rifle, the foul birds took no heed of my movements; but sat still, indolently extending their broad wings to the sun—now and then one coming, one going, in slow silent flight— ...
— The Wild Huntress - Love in the Wilderness • Mayne Reid
... went with him. Imagine that room—foul air, sanded floor, kerosene lamps, an odour of bad wine, tobacco, and stale humanity. Grimshaw pushed his way to a table and sat down with a surly Gascon and an enormous Negro from some American ship ...
— O. Henry Memorial Award Prize Stories of 1921 • Various
... seem cheerful and well? Mind when you write to me you answer these questions, as I wish to know. Also give me a detailed account as to how you get on with your pupil and the rest of the family. I have received a general assurance that you do well and are in good odour, but I want ...
— Charlotte Bronte and Her Circle • Clement K. Shorter
... carriage, while the train would not start, and has not longed to say to them, 'Stand not upon the order of your going, but go at once!' And of all such farewells, the ship's farewell is the longest and the most dreary. One sits on a damp bench, snuffing up the odour of oil and ropes, cudgelling one's brains to think what further word of increased tenderness can be spoken. No tenderer word can be spoken. One returns again and again to the weather, to coats and cloaks, ...
— The Three Clerks • Anthony Trollope
... love, which melts and dissolves the soul, and carries it to God. In proportion as it melts, it gives out its odour, and this odour comes from ...
— A Short Method Of Prayer And Spiritual Torrents • Jeanne Marie Bouvires de la Mot Guyon
... after waltz began and ended, couple after couple brushed by with smiling lips, laughter, and snatches of talk; or with set lips, and eyes searching the throng; or again, with silent, parted lips, and eyes on each other. And the scent of festivity, the odour of flowers, and hair, of essences that women love, rose suffocatingly in the heat of the ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... his voice into accents of the softest tenderness), "if not too high to scorn me, what should war against our loves and our bridals? For worn equally on my heart were the flower of thy sweet self, whether the mountain top or the valley gave birth to the odour and ...
— Leila or, The Siege of Granada, Book I. • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... think it was our third or fourth on the island—Barrington Cowles and I went outside the cottage before retiring to rest, to enjoy a little fresh air, for our room was small, and the rough lamp caused an unpleasant odour. How well I remember every little circumstance in connection with that night! It promised to be tempestuous, for the clouds were piling up in the north-west, and the dark wrack was drifting across the face of the ...
— The Captain of the Pole-Star and Other Tales • Arthur Conan Doyle
... light of his lantern he saw something white on the floor. He picked it up listlessly, and then the odour of violets came to him—it was Thursa's hand-kerchief, that she had dropped that day. He buried his ...
— The Second Chance • Nellie L. McClung
... other paraphernalia, and a grand supper to be prepared, awaited Salabaetto; who, being come there as soon as 'twas dark, had of her a gladsome welcome, and was regaled with an excellent and well-served supper. After which, they repaired to the chamber, where he was saluted by a wondrous sweet odour of aloe-wood, and observed that the bed was profusely furnished with birds,(2) after the fashion of Cyprus, and that not a few fine dresses were hanging upon the pegs. Which circumstances did, one and all, beget in him the belief that this ...
— The Decameron, Vol. II. • Giovanni Boccaccio
... "dope" used in the woods to keep off mosquitoes is called oil of citronella. It has a very pungent odour that the mosquitoes do not like and the chances are that you will not like it either. At the same time it may be a good plan to take a ...
— Outdoor Sports and Games • Claude H. Miller
... could scarcely be felt, yet, though the sun scorched me, the heat was not oppressive. The woods, dense and tangled though they were, threw up no exhalations of mud or rotting leaves, but a clean, aromatic odour. It seemed to give them a substance without which they had been but a mirage, a scene painted on a cloth, so motionless and apparently lifeless they stood, with the long vines hanging from their boughs, and the hot, rarefied air quivering ...
— Poison Island • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch (Q)
... for the manufacture of oil from putrid fish, which agreeable occupation announced itself in the shape of such an overpowering odour, that I seized a glass of cognac, and fled precipitately, taking my way towards the caravanserai of Ain Mokra. Poor old Nero, whom I had brought with me, got into a scrape here, and narrowly escaped being drowned. It appears that the putrid entrails of ...
— Notes in North Africa - Being a Guide to the Sportsman and Tourist in Algeria and Tunisia • W. G. Windham
... when she let down the bars of the orchard, leading into the farm-yard. Here the air was moist and heavy with the pungent odour of manure; a turkey gobbler and four timid hens roosting in a low apple tree, stirred uneasily as the cows passed beneath them to their stable next to the kitchen—a stable with a long stone manger and walls two feet thick. ...
— A Village of Vagabonds • F. Berkeley Smith
... counterpanes so prepared were purchased for the use of the hospital at Vienna; and, after an experience of several years, the purchase has been renewed. It was remarked, among other things, that the influence of the wood-wool prevented parasitic insects from lodging in the beds, and the aromatic odour arising from it had been found as beneficial as it was agreeable. Shortly afterwards, the Penitentiary at Vienna was provided with the same kind of quilts; and they have since been adopted—as well as mattresses filled with the ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 458 - Volume 18, New Series, October 9, 1852 • Various
... final closing of the door, the sending forth different birds as the flood abated, the offering of sacrifices when the flood had subsided, the joy of the Divine Being who had caused the flood as the odour of the sacrifice reached his nostrils; while throughout all was shown that partiality for the Chaldean sacred number seven which appears so constantly in the Genesis legends and ...
— History of the Warfare of Science with Theology in Christendom • Andrew Dickson White
... The odour emanating from so many dead fowls, on which the sun, already high in the heavens, was shining, became disagreeable to her, and a strong sense of discomfort, whose cause, however, she did not seek, ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... cave, which here rose very high, was illuminated by torches made of pine-tree, which emitted a bright and bickering light, attended by a strong though not unpleasant odour. Their light was assisted by the red glare of a large charcoal fire, round which were seated five or six armed Highlanders, while others were indistinctly seen couched on their plaids, in the more remote recesses of the cavern. In one large aperture, which the robber facetiously ...
— Waverley • Sir Walter Scott
... His eyes were small and red, and so deep set in the sockets, that each appeared like the unextinguished snuff of a farthing candle, gleaming through the horn of a dark lanthorn. His nostrils were elevated in scorn, as if his sense of smelling had been perpetually offended by some unsavoury odour; and he looked as if he wanted to shrink within himself from the impertinence of society. He wore a black periwig as straight as the pinions of a raven, and this was covered with a hat flapped, and fastened to his head ...
— The Adventures of Sir Launcelot Greaves • Tobias Smollett
... at a quarter before midnight; the clock had attracted his attention as soon as he lit the candles. The candles, he had noticed, had been used not long previously, for the wicks were softish, and he had been aware of an odour of tobacco, not stale, in the atmosphere of the study. These two little discoveries had been sufficient to end the incipient idea induced by the stillness and chilliness that the house might ...
— Till the Clock Stops • John Joy Bell
... and the music of the rill. Cull thy flowers, darling girl, and cull the flower of thy youth, the flower that grows but once for all like thee, the flower whose glory puts high heaven to shame, and whose odour ...
— The Coming of Cuculain • Standish O'Grady
... sea to slumber stilly, Bind its odour to the lily, Bind the aspen ne'er to quiver, Then bind Love to last ...
— The Golden Treasury - Of the Best Songs and Lyrical Poems in the English Language • Various
... uneven ground, the vaguely phosphorescent bones of jack rabbits that had fallen into this natural trap, of coyotes, even of a young cow that had been overpowered before it could struggle upward along the steep sides. And the odour clinging to the mouth of the hole was indescribably ...
— Six Feet Four • Jackson Gregory
... gloom of the mighty roof, there rose a fiercely petulant sound, a chorus of angry cries. Large shadows with beating wings came and went rapidly through the forest of heavy columns. The monstrous bats of Hathor were disturbed in their brooding reveries. A heavy smell, like the odour of a long-decaying past, lifted itself, as if with a slow, determined effort, to Mrs. Armine's nostrils. And ever the light of day failed slowly as she and Nigel went onward, drawn in despite of themselves by the power ...
— Bella Donna - A Novel • Robert Hichens
... have seen here have this defect, which the Parisians do not seem to consider one, although the odour of dinner must enter the salons, and that in the evening visitors must find servants occupied in removing the dinner apparatus, should they, as generally happens, come for ...
— The Idler in France • Marguerite Gardiner
... the carcasses of pigs, the unclean beast of the Jews, pallid as a corpse. The butchers passed in and out, sweating and greasy, hoarsely crying the prices as they cut and hacked the meat. The people crowded about, sniffing the odour of dead flesh, hungry ...
— Jonah • Louis Stone
... was staring at the open fireplace, in which were three birch logs; or rather he had at first thought they were logs, until Jonas pointed out to him that they were only clever imitations made of iron, full of tiny holes, through which flowed an evil-smelling odour called gas when Jonas turned a small faucet. Rollo was at first mightily amused at these logs, and admired especially the life-like way in which the bark was shown to be covered with moss ...
— Rollo in Society - A Guide for Youth • George S. Chappell
... will try to climb up their own body, and snap, as if to bite at one’s hand; but their only real mode of defence is to inflate the body with air to its utmost power of expansion, and then emit it again, charged with a strong odour, repulsive enough to drive most things from it. {71a} They are found in length from one foot and a half to three feet; and the writer has seen one killed, from which 32 unhatched eggs were taken, each egg about an inch long. ...
— Records of Woodhall Spa and Neighbourhood - Historical, Anecdotal, Physiographical, and Archaeological, with Other Matter • J. Conway Walter
... where even, as in the case of a dead body, nature would send forth scents of the most repulsive kind. In such instances, sometimes in life, sometimes in death, sometimes in health, sometimes in loathsome diseases, there issues from the physical frame an odour of unearthly sweetness, perhaps communicating itself to objects which touch the ...
— The Life of St. Frances of Rome, and Others • Georgiana Fullerton
... curious facts which have hitherto been so poorly interpreted. When surprised by abnormal conditions, we see insects suddenly fall over, drop to the ground, and lie as though struck by lightning, gathering their limbs under their bodies. A shock, an unexpected odour, a loud noise, plunges them instantly into a sort of lethargy, more or less prolonged. The insect "feigns death," not because it simulates death, but in reality because this MAGNETIC condition resembles that of death. (7/9.) ...
— Fabre, Poet of Science • Dr. G.V. (C.V.) Legros
... stopped, and presently I was aware of a loud lapping and gurgling. The creature was drinking at the stream. Then again there was silence, broken by a succession of long sniffs and snorts of tremendous volume and energy. Had it caught the scent of me? My own nostrils were filled by a low fetid odour, mephitic and abominable. Then I heard the steps again. They were on my side of the stream now. The stones rattled within a few yards of where I lay. Hardly daring to breathe, I crouched upon my rock. Then the steps drew away. I heard the splash as it returned across the river, and ...
— Tales of Terror and Mystery • Arthur Conan Doyle
... symbolism cannot exist elsewhere. But in the severe little cottage where Washington made his headquarters, down by the stream, with all his frugal campaigning furniture and accessories in their old places, I felt more emotion than in the odour of sanctity. The simple reality of ...
— Roving East and Roving West • E.V. Lucas
... cheerfulness, cordiality, compassion, forgiving injuries, simplicity, candour—all, in short of that sort of little virtues. They, like unobtrusive violets, love the shade; like them are sustained by dew; and though, like them, they make little show, they shed a sweet odour ...
— Character • Samuel Smiles
... supperless to bed. See!" she added, pointing to a small brazen kettle, which her quick eye detected among the leaves, and which was soon followed by a second that Emperor stirred up from its concealment, and both of them, as was soon perceived, still retaining the odour of a recent savoury stew: "Look well, Emperor: where the kitchen is, the larder cannot be far distant. I warrant we shall find that Nathan has provided ...
— Nick of the Woods • Robert M. Bird
... broad day, and first thing light the fire downstairs and cook the breakfast, then brush his wife, sponge her with a damp sponge, then brush her again, in all this using scent very freely to hide somewhat her rank odour. When she was dressed he carried her downstairs and they had their breakfast together, she sitting up to table with him, drinking her saucer of tea, and taking her food from his fingers, or at any rate being ...
— Lady Into Fox • David Garnett
... of Aix-la-Chapelle,' says a traveller, 'makes one think (at least, makes me think) of cards and dice,—sharks and pigeons. It has a "professional odour" upon it, which is certainly not that of sanctity. I entered the Redoute with my head full of sham barons, German Catalinas, and the thousand-and-one popular tales of renowned knights of the green cloth,—their seducing confederates, ...
— The Gaming Table: Its Votaries and Victims - Volume I (of II) • Andrew Steinmetz
... It has become a normal thing that millionaires commence by going up to London with their tools at their back, and half-a-crown in their pockets. That sort of origin is getting so respected,' she continued cheerfully, 'that it is acquiring some of the odour of ...
— A Pair of Blue Eyes • Thomas Hardy
... answer, so I was forced to leave. "Scissors" had not once looked up at me during all this scene; he had heard my voice, and recognized me by it. You are in such bad odour here, thought I, that he doesn't even take the trouble to answer you. I wonder if that is an order of the editor's. I had, 'tis true enough, right from the day my celebrated story was accepted for ten shillings, overwhelmed him with work, rushed to his door nearly every day with unsuitable ...
— Hunger • Knut Hamsun
... dinners have been going on in it for the last two hours; the [Greek: knise]—the odour of roast meat, which the gods loved, but which most men dislike—pervades the atmosphere; your next-door neighbour is eating a rather high grouse while you are at your apple-tart, or the perfumes of a deliquescent Camembert mingle with your coffee. As to beverages, you may, if you choose, follow ...
— Collections and Recollections • George William Erskine Russell
... way all at once through the palpable perfumes, but he returned to the light again and again, like the singed moth. At last he discovered that the various smells did not entirely mix, no fiend being there to stir them round. Odour of family predominated in two corners; stewed rustic reigned supreme in the centre; and garlic in the noisy group by the window. He found, too, by hasty analysis, that of these the garlic described the smallest aerial orbit, and the scent of ...
— The Cloister and the Hearth • Charles Reade
... enough there sprang forth from it the loveliest flowers. They yielded so strong a perfume that the king commanded that the mice who stood nearest the chimney should stick their tails in the fire, in order that the smell of the singed hair should overpower the odour from the ...
— The Sand-Hills of Jutland • Hans Christian Andersen
... vividly before us a picture of the various scholars assembled in a school of the philosophers. After observing that philosophy exercises some influence even over those who do not go deeply in it, just as people sitting in a shop of perfumes carry away with them some of the odour, he adds, "Do we not, however, know some who have been among the audience of a philosopher for many years, and have been even entirely uncoloured by his teaching? Of course I do, even most persistent and continuous hearers; whom I do not call pupils, ...
— Seekers after God • Frederic William Farrar
... is a heavy, oily and colourless liquid, of specific gravity 1.541 at 0 deg. C., and boiling-point 97.7 deg. C. It has a greasy, somewhat bitter taste, and gives off a vapour at ordinary temperature which has a pungent odour and an irritating effect on the eyes. The word chloral is derived from the first syllables of chlorine and alcohol, the names of the substances employed for its preparation. Chloral is soluble in alcohol and ether, in less than its own weight of water, and in ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 6, Slice 3 - "Chitral" to "Cincinnati" • Various
... show the wound. Anna leaned against the door-post and heard him. Outside his brown pony was rattling the rings of the bit and switching at flies, and she perceived the faint smell of the sweat- stained saddlery and the horse-odour she knew so well. Before her, the tall grimy man, with bandages looped about him, his pleasant face a little yellow from the loss of blood, babbled boastfully. It was a scene she was familiar with, for of old on the Free ...
— Vrouw Grobelaar and Her Leading Cases - Seventeen Short Stories • Perceval Gibbon
... albeit there wanted of the trysting time but a single day. So I stood before the chamber aforesaid and, after a moment's hesitation, opened the door which was plated with red gold, and entered. I was met by a perfume whose like I had never before smelt; and so sharp and subtle was the odour that it made my senses drunken as with strong wine, and I fell to the ground in a fainting fit which lasted a full hour. When I came to myself I strengthened my heart and, entering, found myself in a chamber whose floor was bespread with saffron and blazing with light from ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 1 • Richard F. Burton
... quadruped, mule, horse, or bullock, near our washing places. We don't mind them on the march; they are dotted along every road in South Africa now, I should think; but when making a refreshing toilette they jar painfully. Kipling somewhere describes a subtle and complex odour, which, he says, is the smell of the great Indian Empire. That of the great African Empire in this year of grace is the direct and simple one which I have indicated. In the evening we had a grand supper of fried eggs, jam, chupatties, and cocoa. ...
— In the Ranks of the C.I.V. • Erskine Childers
... flat feet she moved away towards the back-staircase, leading down to the offices from the far end of the passage, leaving an odour of pastry ...
— Deadham Hard • Lucas Malet
... replied Pao Ch'ai blandly, "to the odour of fumigation; good clothes become impregnated with the smell ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book I • Cao Xueqin
... freedom and a republic. If he had staid there a little longer, he would have become a loyal and a loving subject of his Majesty King George IV. He lampooned the French Revolution when it was hailed as the dawn of liberty by millions: by the time it was brought into almost universal ill-odour by some means or other (partly no doubt by himself) he had turned, with one or two or three others, staunch Bonapartist. He is always of the militant, not of the triumphant party: so far he bears a gallant show of magnanimity; but his gallantry is hardly of the right stamp: ...
— Hazlitt on English Literature - An Introduction to the Appreciation of Literature • Jacob Zeitlin
... he had walked from Uxbridge Road Station, where the green 'bus stopped, and in spite of the fuming kilns under Acton, a delicate odour of the woods and summer fields was mysteriously in the air, and he had fancied that he smelt the red wild roses, drooping from the hedge. As he came to his gate he saw his wife standing in the doorway, with a light in her hand, and he threw his arms violently about her as she welcomed him, ...
— The House of Souls • Arthur Machen
... and recognised, not without terror, Akakiy Akakievitch. The official's face was white as snow, and looked just like a corpse's. But the horror of the important personage transcended all bounds when he saw the dead man's mouth open, and, with a terrible odour of the grave, gave vent to the following remarks: "Ah, here you are at last! I have you, that—by the collar! I need your cloak; you took no trouble about mine, but reprimanded me; so ...
— Taras Bulba and Other Tales • Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol
... this noble poet would again inspire me to get a real hold on the language, but the hope was vain. I had not chosen the right teacher, and, moreover, his sitting-room in which we pursued our studies looked out on a tanyard, the repulsive odour of which affected my nerves so strongly that I became thoroughly disgusted both with Sophocles and Greek. My brother-in-law, Brockhaus, who wanted to put me in the way of earning some pocket-money, gave me the correcting ...
— My Life, Volume I • Richard Wagner
... possibility of final disaster. While he was considering these things attentively, the spy who had brought word of the presence of the enemy again sought him. As he entered, Ling perceived that his face was the colour of a bleached linen garment, while there came with him the odour of sickness. ...
— The Wallet of Kai Lung • Ernest Bramah
... notes a singular property in the Henna-flower that when smelt closely it exhales a "very powerful spermatic odour," hence it became a favourite with women as the tea-rose with us. He finds it on the nails of mummies, and identifies it with the Kupros of the ancient Greeks (the moderns call it Kene or Kena) and the (Botrus cypri) ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 7 • Richard F. Burton
... Speaking of the Touaricks, he said: "These people are getting dissatisfied with us. Formerly we paid them better; but being robbed of our money by the Turks, we can't give them much. They smell also a disagreeable odour now. Formerly they came in and went out our city as a garden." "What odour is that?" I asked. "It's that Rais," he whispered in my ear. The fact is, the Touaricks felt themselves more at home before the Turks came ...
— Travels in the Great Desert of Sahara, in the Years of 1845 and 1846 • James Richardson
... issued forth, formed the outer entrance to the nest. One could not see the delicate structure itself, for it appeared to be several feet within the rock. A mass of powdered fish bones and the pungent odour from within were all the outward signs of the inner nest. By standing on a jutting ledge of the soft cretaceous rock, and holding on by another ledge, which appeared not unlikely to come down and crush you, one could peep into the hole and comfort oneself ...
— A Cotswold Village • J. Arthur Gibbs
... assemblage of gear, ranging from the comparatively undamageable wireless masts occupying a portion of the deck amidships, to a selection of prime Australian cheeses which filled one of the cabins, and pervaded the ward-room with an odour which remained one of its ...
— The Home of the Blizzard • Douglas Mawson
... picked their way swiftly and cleanly. They might have been steering by the stars. But it was only their instinct sense of smell which told them when they were approaching a bog too soft to be negotiated. Then they would turn their faces to the hill, questing for the good odour of the "gall" or bog-myrtle, which is the characteristic smell of good going in the Galloway wilderness. Stretches of that delightful plant surround all bogs, morasses and other dangerously wet spots, but the little beasts knew ...
— Patsy • S. R. Crockett
... recognise in this fancy portrait the Basilides regarding whom a large body of eminent critics conclude that he did not know our Gospels at all, but made use of an uncanonical work, supplemented by traditions from Glaucias and Matthias; but, as if the heretic had not been sufficiently restored to the odour of sanctity, the additional touch is given in the passage more immediately before us. Dr. Westcott conveys the information contained in the single sentence of Clement of Alexandria, [Greek: kathaper ho Basileides kan Glaukian epigraphetai didaskalon, hos auchousin autoi, ton ...
— A Reply to Dr. Lightfoot's Essays • Walter R. Cassels
... save all the floating trash that so moves your pity, you would only lower the standard of humanity. Hell is the furnace made to consume such worthless rubbish. You are even apologising for hell because you can't stand the odour of burning flesh. I like the old God of Israel better than the ghost you moderns have set up. Honestly, Frank, you have never treated Van Meter decently. He's a small man, but he is in dead earnest, and he is historically a Christian. I don't know what the devil you are, and I ...
— The One Woman • Thomas Dixon
... directions in the following moments, and all the time my nose was being assailed by a very savoury odour, for the ...
— Brownsmith's Boy - A Romance in a Garden • George Manville Fenn
... of the Blaney brother and sister, Patty blinked several times, before she could collect her senses. It was very dimly lighted, and a strange, almost stifling sense of oppression came over her. This was caused by the burning of various incense sticks and pastilles which gave out a sweet, spicy odour, and which made a slight haze of smoke. Becoming a little accustomed to the gloom, Patty discerned her host, amazingly garbed in an Oriental burnoose and a voluminous silk turban. He took her hand, made a deep salaam, and kissed her finger-tips ...
— Patty Blossom • Carolyn Wells
... upon us, it is great; when it is over, Why, it is over. The smoke of the sacrifice rises to heaven, Of a sweet savour, no doubt, to Somebody; but on the altar, Lo, there is nothing remaining but ashes and dirt and ill odour. So it stands, you perceive; the labial muscles that swelled with Vehement evolution of yesterday Marseillaises, Articulations sublime of defiance and scorning, to-day col- Lapse and languidly mumble, while men and ...
— Amours de Voyage • Arthur Hugh Clough
... in the dismal twilight. Your money came out of, or went into, wormy old wooden drawers, particles of which flew up your nose and down your throat when they were opened and shut. Your bank-notes had a musty odour, as if they were fast decomposing into rags again. Your plate was stowed away among the neighbouring cesspools, and evil communications corrupted its good polish in a day or two. Your deeds got into extemporised strong-rooms ...
— A Tale of Two Cities - A Story of the French Revolution • Charles Dickens
... The counter ran from the front window lengthwise to the back of the shop, and at the back, on your left as you went in, was a closed door. A wooden chair with arms stood beside the front window. You could get behind the counter only by a swinging gate at the back end. There was a delightful warm odour about the place, very much the same odour Freddie liked to smell when his father opened his old tobacco-box on the mantel-piece in the sitting-room upstairs and filled his pipe, when he came home in the evening and put on his carpet-slippers and spread out that everlasting newspaper that had ...
— The Old Tobacco Shop - A True Account of What Befell a Little Boy in Search of Adventure • William Bowen
... my task when I fancied I smelt a smell of burning, but for the first minute or so I paid little attention to it, as the air had been for a long time pervaded by a strong choking sulphurous odour. I had struck but a few strokes with my tomahawk however, when a very strong whiff assailed my nostrils, and at the same instant a thin wreath of smoke appeared hovering over the fore-scuttle. Dropping my tomahawk, I darted toward the opening, and, looking down, found ...
— Under the Meteor Flag - Log of a Midshipman during the French Revolutionary War • Harry Collingwood
... head; the wind and rain beat through the flimsy dwelling, and I must arise and go. I have sported with life as though it were a pretty plaything; and I find it turn upon me like a wild beast, gaunt, hungry, angry. I am terrified by its evil motions, I sicken at its odour. That is the deep mystery and horror of life, that one yields unerringly to blind and imperious instincts, not knowing which may lead us into green and fertile pastures of hope and happy labour, and which may draw us into thorny wildernesses. ...
— The Altar Fire • Arthur Christopher Benson
... A sweet odour pervades his sleeping apartment—not that peculiar and delicious fragrance with which the Saints of the Roman Church are said to gratify the neighbourhood where they repose—but oils, redolent of the richest perfumes of Macassar, essences ...
— The Newcomes • William Makepeace Thackeray
... light garments, and they, their faces and their clothing, are all blue-white. They stand silently, packed side by side like sardines; it doesn't look as if they would have room to lie, or even to sit down. As we glide slowly past a strange odour floats over from them enveloping us—an odour made up of spices and camels and tired unwashed humanity; there is a hint of coffee in it and a touch of wood-smoke—it suggests Eastern bazaars and ...
— Round the Wonderful World • G. E. Mitton |
