"Velvety" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... eye—and a woman's measure is not very accurate—it may be one hundred or one hundred and fifty feet. Tall trees at the summits interlace, and where they have fallen, bridge the passage from one side to the other. Rich, velvety mosses cover the rocks like a royal garment, and wild vines, almost glittering in their autumnal brightness, lay on them like rich embroidery, so that we might say, as truly as was said of the magnificence of oriental nature, ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 2 No 4, October, 1862 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... was so sweet! I never saw any one so sweet as Vallie, when she had been found fault with and was sorry; the tears used to come up into her big brown eyes very slowly and stay there, making them look like velvety pansies ...
— My New Home • Mary Louisa Molesworth
... down on the ground—a carpet for the feet of the majestic corn—hundreds and thousands of orange-coloured pumpkins turning their huge shiny carcases to the ripening rays of the sun, and all around in fantastic lines, rows of tall sunflowers, a blaze of amber, with thick velvety hearts ...
— A Bride of the Plains • Baroness Emmuska Orczy
... seemed to be continually trying to salute her cheeks, for which no one could possibly blame them. Her nose was, to say the least, irreproachable. Then came the rich red pouting under, and the short chisselled upper lip; the beautiful pearly arched teeth within them; the little round velvety chin, and the perfectly oval peach-like cheeks. In short, so pretty a creature was seldom to ...
— Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland Volume 17 • Alexander Leighton
... was an insinuating sweetness in his voice as it echoed through the hall. Jesse, doubtless recognizing the velvety quality of the tone, made his appearance promptly. "Jess," said the major softly, "I wish you'd please fetch me my shotgun. Make 'aste, Jess, and ...
— Free Joe and Other Georgian Sketches • Joel Chandler Harris
... the form of the lips that lent pleasantness to the smile with which Mr. Jacquetot was greeted, rather than the expression of the velvety eyes, which had in reality no power of smiling at all. They were sad eyes, like those of the women one sees on the banks of the Upper Nile, which never alter in expression—eyes that do not seem to be busy with this life at all, but fully occupied with something else: something ...
— The Slave Of The Lamp • Henry Seton Merriman
... possessed extraordinary force of personality. Her English was not nearly so fluent as that spoken by the colonel, but this handicap only served to emphasize the masculine strength of her intellect. Truly she was a remarkable woman. With her blanched hair and her young face, and those fine, velvety eyes which possessed a quality almost hypnotic, she might have posed for the figure of a sorceress. She had unfamiliar gestures and employed her long white hands in a manner that was new to me and ...
— Bat Wing • Sax Rohmer
... lay over a velvety plain, and for a couple of hours we rode on, the only incident at all exciting, being an effort on my part to leave my head perched upon a heavy limb of an overhanging tree. This danger past, no new ...
— Six Days on the Hurricane Deck of a Mule - An account of a journey made on mule back in Honduras, - C.A. in August, 1891 • Almira Stillwell Cole
... has puzzled so many minds; and as he watched the dragon-fly, a couple of swallows skimmed by him, darted over the wall, and were gone. Then, flopping idly along in its clumsy flight, came a white butterfly, and directly after a bee—one of the great, dark, golden-banded fellows, with a soft, velvety coat. ...
— The Weathercock - Being the Adventures of a Boy with a Bias • George Manville Fenn
... the whitening of the hair, it was effective in enhancing the beauty of Aurelia's dark arched brows, the soft brilliance of her large velvety brown eyes, and the exquisite carnation and white of her colouring. Her features were delicately chiselled, and her face had that peculiar fresh, innocent, soft, untouched bloom and undisturbed repose which form the special charm and glory of the first ...
— Love and Life • Charlotte M. Yonge
... fragrance of the late blossoms seemed an emanation of the tranquil scene, a landscape tutored to the last degree of rural elegance. In the foreground glowed the warm tints of the gardens. Beyond the lawn, with its pyramidal pale-gold maples and velvety firs, sloped pastures dotted with cattle; and through a long glade the river widened like a lake under the silver light of September. Lily did not want to join the circle about the tea-table. They represented ...
— House of Mirth • Edith Wharton
... cave once more with a glance of approval. It furnished shelter, warmth, food in abundance, and with its furs even a certain velvety richness for the eye, and Tayoga nodded assent. Meanwhile they waited for the fierce blasts of the ...
— The Masters of the Peaks - A Story of the Great North Woods • Joseph A. Altsheler
... limits of England, I have been assured that with two breeds of sheep the wool was slightly changed by the flocks being pastured in different localities.[689] It has been asserted on good authority[690] that horses kept during several years in the deep coal-mines of Belgium become covered with velvety hair, almost like that on the mole. These cases probably stand in close relation to the natural change of coat in winter and summer. Naked varieties of several domestic animals have occasionally appeared; but there is no reason to {279} believe that this is in any way related to the nature ...
— The Variation of Animals and Plants Under Domestication, Volume II (of 2) • Charles Darwin
... walls, standing on a gentle elevation, and overlooking a wide extent of country. The grounds which surrounded it were large, and contained woods, and shady walks, and fishponds, or rather lakes, and ornamental flower gardens, and rich velvety lawns, and ...
— Ernest Bracebridge - School Days • William H. G. Kingston
... of roses and flowering shrubs, which in their season filled the air with perfume, and made the spot brilliant with beauty. Directly through the center of this garden ran the stream of which we have spoken, and as its mossy banks were never disturbed, they presented the appearance of a soft, velvety ridge, where each spring the starry dandelion and the ...
— 'Lena Rivers • Mary J. Holmes
... the prettiest street in Berwick. Spacious and comfortable-looking homes stood on either side of it, each in its setting of lawn and shade trees. Most of these showed no dividing fences or hedges, and boundaries were indiscernible in the green velvety sward that swept in a gentle slope to ...
— Two Little Women • Carolyn Wells
... was gone as soon. Bianca felt a sense of disappointment, as though she could have wished her life held a little more of that. He stole a glance at her out of his dark eyes, which, when narrowed, had a velvety look, like the body of a wild bee, then jerked his thumb at the picture ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... walls, and the fragrance of mignonette and roses and petunias was wafted into the rooms looking over the garden, and that of wild thyme and honeysuckle into those which looked over the fields; when the tall acacias began to shoot upwards straight and graceful from their velvety green carpet, and scattered upon it their perfumed moth-like flowers; while we listened to the humming of the happy bees in the sweet-smelling lime trees and to the wondrous song of the rival nightingales challenging each other from bower to bower in the calm, warm nights of summer-time. And ...
— Philip Gilbert Hamerton • Philip Gilbert Hamerton et al
... Holm as leader, furnished the music; and beautiful it was, as it echoed from the porch out over the assembly on the lawn. When the strains of a waltz floated out, a dozen couples glided softly over the velvety grass. ...
— Added Upon - A Story • Nephi Anderson
... with peace in their faces they arrived at home, just five minutes before the painter was due, and unloaded their packages. Father lifted out the big roll of soft, velvety carpeting, gray as a cloud, with moss roses scattered over it. He was proud to think he could buy things like this for Mother. Of course now they had no need to save and scrimp for Stephen the way they had done during the years; so it was well to make the rest of the way as bright ...
— The Witness • Grace Livingston Hill Lutz
... and before she had seized the squeaking thing and had slipped the tissue wrapper from its body, another Death's Head whirred through the window; then another, then two; then others. The room swarmed; they were crawling all over the tumbler, the table, the bed. The room was filled with the soft, velvety roar of whirring wings beating on wall and ceiling and against the tumbler where Madam Death sat imprisoned, quivering her wings, her eyes two molten rubies, and the ghastly ...
— Barbarians • Robert W. Chambers
... spikes of greyish blue flowers, its fibrous, velvety leaves, its strong, pungent perfume, which is not squandered or repressed, is the stoic of my native terraces. It responds generously to the personal touch, and serves the Lebanonese, rich and poor alike, with a little luxury. Ay, who of us, wandering on foreign strands, ...
— The Book of Khalid • Ameen Rihani
... round a wide amphitheater, and up a steep corner to the top. This turned out to be level and smooth for a long way, with a short, velvety yellow grass, like moss, spotted with flowers. Here at thirteen thousand feet, the wind hit us with exceeding force, and soon had us with freezing hands and faces. All about us were bold black and gray peaks, with patches of snow, and above them ...
— Tales of lonely trails • Zane Grey
... golden hair, the pelargonium blazing scarlet, beds of white stock wafting fragrance, violets scrambling over every soft bank of deep earth exhaling fragrance; roses, not many in flower, but their young leaves in masses of claret-red; wherever a ledge allowed it, there pansies of velvety blue and black and brown had been planted. In a hot sun I climbed the chateau cliff to where the water, conveyed to the summit, dribbled and dropped, or squirted and splashed, nourishing countless fronds of fern and beds of moss, and many a bog plant. The cedars and umbrella ...
— In Troubadour-Land - A Ramble in Provence and Languedoc • S. Baring-Gould
... however, and has more perfect results. Here the grain is removed, and the velvet finish secured by buffing the surface on an emery wheel. The surface of the leather is cut away in minute particles by this process, and the result is an exceedingly even and velvety texture, superior to that obtained by other methods. European manufacturers do not approach the ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 794, March 21, 1891 • Various
... the fields and they were faintly green with tiny shoots of oats. These thickened into a rank velvety carpet while the homesteaders were hauling a hundred loads of rocks to form a crude dam across the stream below the take-out. The water was gradually raised till it ran almost flush with the top of the head gate. The gates were lifted and the diverted waters sped smoothly down ...
— The Settling of the Sage • Hal G. Evarts
... Blake's arrival at the Flying Heart Ranch she had seen Mariedetta flitting noiselessly here and there, but had never heard her speak. The pretty, expressionless face beneath its straight black hair had ever retained its wooden stolidity, the velvety eyes had not laughed nor frowned nor sparkled. She seemed to be merely a part of this far southwestern picture; a bit of inanimate yet breathing local color. Now, however, the girl dropped her jug, and with a low cry glided to her lover, who tossed aside his ...
— Going Some • Rex Beach
... have a transverse cavity under the throat; wings long and narrow, collapsing with a double flexure outwards; fur soft and velvety. (Dobson includes this genus in his ...
— Natural History of the Mammalia of India and Ceylon • Robert A. Sterndale
... and silently along the border of the matchless velvety lawn, noting the many features of beauty in the old grey face of the University building—the harmonious variety of lines and curves in curious gargoyles, dragons, and gryphons that adorned the cornices ...
— The Prospector - A Tale of the Crow's Nest Pass • Ralph Connor
... we rode over many suspension bridges and crossed the backbone of Japan in unforgettable scenes of romantic beauty. From the craggy paths of our highlands, amid a wealth not only of gorgeous flowers and greenery but of great velvety butterflies, we saw the far-off ...
— The Foundations of Japan • J.W. Robertson Scott
... and such a din, That, frightened half to death, I hurried in. Although I pique myself upon my courage And heartily I cursed him in my heart, For but for him, I'd taken part, In conversation with the gentle creature, Who my advances would encourage. She is velvety, like us, with a long tail, A modest look, and sparkling eyes, And is much like a rat. She spies The objects round her. I turned pale On hearing the other creature's din, Or else I should have asked her in." "My child," said the mother, "this last was a cat, An enemy of ...
— Aesop, in Rhyme - Old Friends in a New Dress • Marmaduke Park
... beautiful Gipsy, with a clear, dark complexion, rich, mantling colour in her velvety cheeks, intensely black hair—long, thick, and wavy—great, flashing, brown eyes, and rather a large mouth, with ripe, red lips, and dazzling white teeth—one's very beau-ideal of a bewitching, intriguing waiting-maid, and one that ...
— Captain Fracasse • Theophile Gautier
... little cries, and sweet The puzzled look her forehead wears; For all she knows the Umpire goes Away to Leg to say his prayers. And yet, so velvety her eyes, I even find a charm in this, And think, How foolish to be wise When ...
— More Cricket Songs • Norman Gale
... lips parted. She was delightfully pretty. He knew that every nerve in her body was straining to understand him. Her braid had slipped over her shoulder. It was as thick as his wrist, and partly undone. He had never dreamed that a woman's hair could hold such soft warm fires of velvety gold. Suddenly he straightened himself and tapped his chest, an inspiring ...
— The Golden Snare • James Oliver Curwood
... the amphitheatre was grass of the same character as that I had found in the road; if anything, more deliciously soft, thick, velvety, and miraculously green. It was hard to conceive how all this ...
— The Works of Edgar Allan Poe - Volume 2 (of 5) of the Raven Edition • Edgar Allan Poe
... the wings are spotted like the upper, the only difference being, that round the whole disc of the four wings there runs a band of ashy-green atoms. The antennae and feet are black, and the breast whitish. The vivid colour of the yellow spots on the velvety black of the wings distinguish it at once ...
— Narrative of a Survey of the Intertropical and Western Coasts of Australia] [Volume 2 of 2] • Phillip Parker King
... strong quinine flavor is like a spring tonic. Cut a branch of the black cherry, peel back the bark, and smell the pungent, bitter almond aroma, which of itself is enough to identify this tree. Every sense tells of life; the smell of the cherry, the taste of the aspen, the touch of the velvety mosses and the gummy buds on the poplars, the color of the twigs and buds, the music of the birds, all these ...
— Some Winter Days in Iowa • Frederick John Lazell
... martyr; His sad face compassion begat in the heart of the dark-eyed Winona. Oft she came to the teepee and spoke; she brought him the tongue of the bison, Sweet nuts from the hazel and oak, and flesh of the fawn and the mallard. Soft hanpa[P] she made for his feet and leggins of velvety fawn-skin, A blanket of beaver complete, and a hood of the hide of the otter. And oft at his feet on the mat, deftly braiding the flags and the rushes, Till the sun sought his teepee she sat, enchanted with what he related Of the white-winged ships on the ...
— The Feast of the Virgins and Other Poems • H. L. Gordon
... took his breakfast with his comrades of the Strangers. The morning was uncommonly bright. There was not a trace of cloud in the heavens, which had turned to the soft, velvety blue that one sometimes sees in winter, and which can make a man fancy that it is summer when he looks up, rather than ...
— The Hosts of the Air • Joseph A. Altsheler
... northern aspect the sand spit is the steeper. There the folds of the sea fall in velvety thuds ever so gentle, ever so regular. On the southern slope, where the gradient is easy, the wavelets glide up with heedless hiss and slide back with shuffling whisper, scarce moving the garlands of brown seaweed which a few ...
— My Tropic Isle • E J Banfield
... in imitation of Mr Whistler, with mushrooms, truffles, grilled meat, pickled walnuts, black pudding, French plums, porter—a dinner in soft velvety black, eaten in a starlight of small scattered candles. That, too, led to a resignation: Art ...
— Select Conversations with an Uncle • H. G. Wells
... remembered also by the long-flight passenger pigeon, coming into the land for the mast. Best of all wild things whose safety lies not in the wing but in the foot, it is loved by the hare for its young, for refuge. Those lithe, velvety, summer-thin bodies! Observe carefully the tops of the still hemp: are they slightly shaken? Among the bases of those stalks a cotton-tail is threading its way inward beyond reach of its pursuer. Are ...
— The Reign of Law - A Tale of the Kentucky Hemp Fields • James Lane Allen
... sky. In the obscurity he at first heard the plashing of the fountains without being at all able to see them, but on approaching he at last distinguished the slender phantoms of the ever rising jets which fell again in spray. And above the vast square stretched the vast and moonless sky of a deep velvety blue, where the stars were large and radiant like carbuncles; Charles's Wain, with golden wheels and golden shaft tilted back as it were, over the roof of the Vatican, and Orion, bedizened with the three bright stars of his belt, ...
— The Three Cities Trilogy, Complete - Lourdes, Rome and Paris • Emile Zola
... presently stood blinking his delighted eyes in a little natural clearing that was a glorious climax to all the tantalizing coquetry of the creek. Encircled by drooping, long-leaved willows that were themselves enringed by stately trees, lay a broad, deep pool, clear as crystal, one side carpeted with velvety turf and screened with leafy draperies, and the whole canopied by the smiling blue sky. With a cry of pleasure the young man hastily threw off his clothing, and, as he undressed, a school-boy taunt ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume V. (of X.) • Various
... After a velvety oyster soup came shad and cucumbers, then a young broiled turkey with corn fritters, followed by a canvas-back with currant jelly and a celery mayonnaise. Mr. Letterblair, who lunched on a sandwich and tea, dined deliberately and deeply, and insisted on his guest's doing ...
— The Age of Innocence • Edith Wharton
... key, the whole arm, hand and fingers are relaxed—as loose as possible. You caress the keys as though you loved them, as though they were a very part of you; you cling to them as to something soft, velvety or downy—with pressure, pressure, ...
— Piano Mastery - Talks with Master Pianists and Teachers • Harriette Brower
... he thinks me very ugly?' said Mary, with her hands clasped upon her knees, her eyes fixed on Wetherlam, upon whose steep brow a craggy mass of brown rock clothed with crimson heather stood out from the velvety ...
— Phantom Fortune, A Novel • M. E. Braddon
... tax their weak joints, I heard a fresh and tender bough suddenly fall like a fan to the ground, when there was not a breath of air stirring, broken off by its own weight. In August, the large masses of berries, which, when in flower, had attracted many wild bees, gradually assumed their bright velvety crimson hue, and by their weight again bent down and broke ...
— Walden, and On The Duty Of Civil Disobedience • Henry David Thoreau
... to be perfectly wonderful, Nickols," I said, as if I had seen it for the first time, while my eyes followed the sweep of the flagstone walk from the well house beneath the old graybeard poplars out past stretches of velvety lawn, with groups of shrubs and trees casting deep shadows even to the kitchen garden, whose long rows of vegetables, bordered with old-fashioned blooming herbs and savories, led the observer out into the meadows to the Home Farm and beyond to the dim line of Paradise Ridge. "It is different ...
— The Heart's Kingdom • Maria Thompson Daviess
... studied myself long in my blotched looking-glass. I saw just what I expected. My face was too thin, my nose too large, my complexion too dull. My hair, which was curly enough, was too short to be described as luxurious tresses; and the color was neither brown nor black. My hands were neither white nor velvety; the fingers ended decidedly, instead of tapering off like rosy dreams. I was disgusted with my wrists; they showed too far below the tight sleeves of my dress of the year before ...
— The Promised Land • Mary Antin
... when the carriage entered the long avenue, bordered with velvety grass and primeval elms, and at the end Savigny awaiting her with its ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... towns are alike. Ekaterinburg is exactly the same as Perm or Tula. The note of the bells is magnificent, velvety. I stopped at the American Hotel (not at all bad), and at once sent word of my arrival to A. M. S., telling him I meant to stay in my ...
— Letters of Anton Chekhov • Anton Chekhov
... where the moonlight falls In silver radiance o'er the time-stained walls, A man and woman stand—he, strong and fair, She, lovelier than the flowers that scent the air. Her eyes are velvety and soft and brown, Her hair—a shimmering splendor falls low down, Her dark robes sweep the marble floor; one hand Is clasped in his; in silence now they stand, No need of words when silence speaketh more Than all the wealth ...
— Love or Fame; and Other Poems • Fannie Isabelle Sherrick
... Howe, I send down the last slips of a theatre notice at midnight and am here in this chair"—Mr. Sinclair brought his open palm down upon the arm of it—"by eleven the following day!" Mr. Sinclair's chin was thrust passionately forward, moisture dimmed the velvety brightness of those eyes which, in more dramatic moments, he confessed to have inherited from a Nawab great grandfather. "But I don't complain," he said, and drew in his chin. It seemed to bring his argument to a climax over which he looked at Hilda ...
— Hilda - A Story of Calcutta • Sara Jeannette Duncan
... dense shade where interlacing limbs roofed one of the winding walks, and paused before the circular stand on which lemon, rose, white, crimson, and variegated carnations, nodded their fringed heads and poured spicy aromas from their velvety chalices. ...
— Vashti - or, Until Death Us Do Part • Augusta J. Evans Wilson
... morning, she herself brought me a cup of chocolate. I have never drunk anything like it, soft, velvety, perfumed, delicious. I could scarcely take my lips away from the cup, and she had hardly left the room when Rivet came in. He seemed nervous and irritable, like a man who had not slept, and he said to me crossly: "If you ...
— The Works of Guy de Maupassant, Volume II (of 8) • Guy de Maupassant
... times. Twice cooking still leaves the intoxicating quality; but if eaten then it does not cause death: it is curious that the natives do not use it expressly to produce intoxication. When planted near a tree it grows all over it, and yields abundantly: the skin of the pod is velvety, like ...
— The Last Journals of David Livingstone, in Central Africa, from 1865 to His Death, Volume I (of 2), 1866-1868 • David Livingstone
... massive walls, chemin de ronde and machiolated cornices, gave us an impression of power and majesty, we found that it also had a smiling face turned toward the hill and the lovely gardens. Here the windows open upon a lawn with turf as green and velvety as that of England, and parterres of flowers laid out in all manner of geometrical figures. From a court basking in sunshine, two beautiful Renaissance doors lead into the castle. Through one of them we passed into a small room in which ...
— In Chteau Land • Anne Hollingsworth Wharton
... bright milk-cans and pans hanging on the red walls, like placks in a drawing-room; we had seen gardens flooded with roses, and long stretches of water carpeted with lilies white and yellow; then we had come to pine forests and heather, and always we had had the good klinker which, though not as velvety for motoring as asphalt, is free from dust even in dry weather. We had run almost continuously on our fourth speed; and even in Laren I came down to the second only long enough to let them all see the beauty of ...
— The Chauffeur and the Chaperon • C. N. Williamson
... Englishman's face. But Jan's voice was soft and dispassionate, his touch was velvety in its hint, and he went with the guiding hand away from the curtained window, smiling in a companionable way. Jan's teeth gleamed back. The Englishman chuckled. Then Jan's hands changed. They flew to the thick reddening throat of the man from ...
— Back to God's Country and Other Stories • James Oliver Curwood
... sitting-room, and the dining-room, which had been decorated during the warm afternoon with borrowed palms and with roses from the neighbor's vines, were being ventilated. Windows were rising, and doors opening. The velvety air of May was fluttering everywhere. And there was so much life in it, that when Mrs. Pennington saw the two boys pass out of the alley gate, she saw the Perkins boy grab her son's hat and run away whooping, while Piggy followed, throwing ...
— The Court of Boyville • William Allen White
... a green, velvety pelouse which gives an admirable approach. The architecture of the Ecuries is of a heavy order and the sculptured decorations actually of little esthetic worth, representing as they do hunting trophies and the like. Before the great ...
— Royal Palaces and Parks of France • Milburg Francisco Mansfield
... adored and kissed and petted, divining in her the feminine spirit of themselves. Surely, she should be happy, Aline, the beautiful girl made for love, poetic, tender. The lovely eyes were there, but veiled; the velvety skin had roughened; and the small body was almost heavy. The wood nymph had been ...
— Together • Robert Herrick (1868-1938)
... such is my opinion. I don't greatly care for that blonde, babyish style of loveliness—I prefer Agnes Campion. Did you notice her—the tall, dark girl with the ropes of hair and a sort of crimson, velvety bloom on her face, who took honours ...
— Kilmeny of the Orchard • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... looked up at her and smiled. It was like having it all herself,—this youth and beauty,—to have it belonging to her, and showing its charming ways and phases, in little Bel. Why shouldn't the child, with her fair, sweet freshness, and the deep-green, velvety leaves making her look already like a rose against which they leaned themselves, have on this delicate rose dress? If things stayed, or came, where they belonged, to whom should it more fittingly fall to wear it ...
— The Other Girls • Mrs. A. D. T. Whitney
... overhead the stars were shining. The wonderful perspective the firelight makes in the forest, here brought out and deepened the mass of color of the evergreens, there made the bare trunk and limbs of a leafless oak stand like a chalk drawing against the black background, and again it gave rich velvety warmth to the brown of the dead leaves which hung thick on some trees, while the gloom beyond and the snug enclosure of our little quadrangle of tents shut us in with a sense of shelter, and completed a picture ...
— Military Reminiscences of the Civil War V2 • Jacob Dolson Cox
... saw that the antennae, very short and feathery, were so arched back over the two jewel-specks of eyes in the velvety head, as to give the appearance of a really handsome pair ...
— In Ghostly Japan • Lafcadio Hearn
... rabbit, which in habits they very much resemble. They have long tails, however, which the rabbit has not, though the latter beats them in the length of his ears. The colour of the chinchilla is known to everybody, since its soft, velvety fur is highly prized by ladies as an article of dress, and may be seen in every ...
— Popular Adventure Tales • Mayne Reid
... happy that it verges on pain. The straight, vigorous flower- spikes are something like hyacinths, but all aglow with a divine intensity of brightness that a yellow hyacinth never yet possessed and never will; and then they are not waxy, but velvety, and their leaves are not futile drooping things, but delicate, strong sprays of an exquisite grey-green, with a bloom on them that throws a mist over the whole field; and as for the perfume, it surely is the perfume ...
— The Solitary Summer • Elizabeth von Arnim
... a harsh, angry tone. Her eyes blazed with passion. Her features had lost all their usual grace. She was not the same being whom we saw creeping softly into the family circle at General Harrington's with that velvety tread and sidelong ...
— Mabel's Mistake • Ann S. Stephens
... scratches in Turkish, did not arrive until the last minute, and with them came the chief, the great Bedri Bey himself— a strong man and a mysterious one, pale, inscrutable, with dark, brooding eyes and velvety manners, calculated to envelop even a cup of coffee and a couple of boiled eggs in an ...
— Antwerp to Gallipoli - A Year of the War on Many Fronts—and Behind Them • Arthur Ruhl
... patches of smooth turf, through which daffodils and lilies were scattered, and little clusters of carnations occasionally showed where flower-beds had once existed. 'What would I not give,' thought Joe, as he strolled along the velvety sward, over which a clear moonlight had painted the forms of many a straggling branch—'What would I not give to be the son of a house like this, with an old and honoured name, with an ancestry strong enough ...
— Lord Kilgobbin • Charles Lever
... little services from the daughter of the house: she would pour his tea for him, counting the lumps of sugar and dropping cream upon them in the distracting way we knew; she would amuse him with her sweet-voiced chatter. He was so old, so handsome with his velvety eyes and his moustache, she might even fall in love with him. However, Georgy was not given to sentiment, and Tony, for his part, was utterly indifferent to her: indeed, the most exclusive circles in Belfield opened to him at once, for a young man ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Volume 22. July, 1878. • Various
... to the colon, there are, it is estimated, over 20,000,000 rootlets (called glands, lacteals, follicles, villi), which take up intestinal juices as roots of a plant take sap from the soil. These millions of rootlets give a velvety appearance to the alimentary canal, like a nap or downy surface. Intestinal rootlets of the small intestines, like vegetal rootlets, demand a certain amount of normal fluid and solid substance, free from noxious gas. It is the down or nap of fabrics, and not their body, ...
— Intestinal Ills • Alcinous Burton Jamison
... the extremity of the fine country. From here the trees are replaced by dwarf bushes, and finally by brambles; the velvety-green turf is succeeded by stony ground, and steep rocks rise behind, at the foot of which lie a quantity ...
— A Woman's Journey Round the World • Ida Pfeiffer
... creature in the town; almond eyes, lids that dropped like curtains, lashes like a paint-brush, a face with an oval to drive Raffaelle mad, a skin of the most delicious coloring, tints well-blended, velvety! and hands, oh!—" ...
— A Start in Life • Honore de Balzac
... pleasantest camp we have ever had. The river runs its whole length. The hospital and surgeons' tents are located on a very pretty little island, a quiet, retired spot, festooned with vines, in the shadow of great trees, and carpeted with moss soft and velvety as the best ...
— The Citizen-Soldier - or, Memoirs of a Volunteer • John Beatty
... weed is before you see the weeds, but if they do appear, don't run away from them. When none are in sight, the chances are that upon microscopic examination, a velvety fuzz of green would be discovered. These are minute weed seedlings, but yet slightly rooted, and easily treated by simple dislodgment. A hot, windy day is a good time to hoe between your plants, because the wind and sun kill the uprooted weeds in ...
— Making a Garden of Perennials • W. C. Egan
... and vases and candlesticks off some of the chairs, and we sat down. The chairs were velvety, with gilt legs. It was ...
— The Story of the Treasure Seekers • E. Nesbit
... ranges present a picture of unusual beauty. The leaves of trees are rich in velvety varieties and the undergrowth appears as if trimmed by skilled hands. This is a desirable place to live. But I learned that the inhabitants of Saturn do not appreciate all this wealth of beauty, in its atmosphere or on its earth, a whit more ...
— Life in a Thousand Worlds • William Shuler Harris
... plant, of a salsolaceous character, found in the alluvial flats of the Murray, among the polygonum brushes, and in many other places. A single plant will spread over an area of many yards in diameter, covering the dry and arid ground with a close, soft, and velvety carpet in the heat of summer, at which time the fruit is in perfection. To collect so small a berry with facility, and in abundance, the natives cut a rounded tray of thin bark, two or three feet long, and six or eight ...
— Journals Of Expeditions Of Discovery Into Central • Edward John Eyre
... velvety feeling of the corolla, and the number of leaflets in it are next discovered and described by the pupils. Lastly, in a withering flower they discover the seed cases and ...
— Ontario Teachers' Manuals: Nature Study • Ontario Ministry of Education
... Brae was a charming place. Like the house, it had been the care and pleasure of generations of the Hunters. Its lawns were soft and velvety. The impertinent daisy and the pushing dandelion had never been allowed their way amongst the tender grass, and it was smooth and springy to walk on. It was Peter's pride that no such lawns could be shown anywhere in or around Heathermuir. There was nothing stiff or formal in this garden, ...
— Hunter's Marjory - A Story for Girls • Margaret Bruce Clarke
... head by way of explaining that such considerations had no weight with her whatever; then she untied her hat. The darkness of her black curls descended over her eyes, and bathed them in velvety shadow. She remained a little while quite motionless, and her face assumed a surprising expression of reverie. But all of a sudden she darted at some oranges which the tavern-keeper had brought in a basket, and began to throw them, one by one, into ...
— The Crime of Sylvestre Bonnard • Anatole France
... cavity of the uterus prepared to receive and protect it, the mass of cells sinks into the soft, velvety lining of the organ. Here it is entirely surrounded by tissue which belongs to the mother. But just before implantation takes place the architecture of the ovum is modified in such a way as to indicate the trend of its subsequent development. We left it, a hollow ...
— The Prospective Mother - A Handbook for Women During Pregnancy • J. Morris Slemons
... shave; level, roll; macadamize; polish, burnish, calender[obs3], glaze; iron, hot-press, mangle; lubricate &c. (oil) 332. Adj. smooth; polished &c. v.; leiodermatous[obs3], slick, velutinous[obs3]; even; level &c. 213; plane &c. (flat) 251; sleek, glossy; silken, silky; lanate[obs3], downy, velvety; glabrous, slippery , glassy, lubricous, oily, soft, unwrinkled[obs3]; smooth as glass, smooth as ice, smooth as monumental alabaster, smooth as velvet, smooth as oil; slippery as an eel; woolly &c. (feathery) 256. Phr. ...
— Roget's Thesaurus
... shone down, clothing the world in a beautiful silver light. The stars in myriads danced in a sky of soft, velvety blue. The river flowed in an illuminated, molten mass. A light wind hummed a pleasant song among the brown leaves. Robert had a curious feeling of rest and safety. He was quite sure that neither the slaver nor the spy could hit him while he lay in the dip, and no movement of theirs would escape ...
— The Sun Of Quebec - A Story of a Great Crisis • Joseph A. Altsheler
... thought. "Shake, good sir." In consternation and surprise, I instantly released his hand. "HOW is it possible to be both honest and slippery at the same time! This must be a Yankee-man," thought I. I saw real moss, green and velvety as the richest carpet, and I drank of singing, bubbling waters. Many kinds of berries and nuts, hard to crack, grew in the wild glens of the forest. I gathered flowers, larger and more beautiful than any I had ever seen, but they lacked the perfume of German flowers; ...
— Tales of Aztlan • George Hartmann
... and Twinkle trotted so fast that the Rolling Stone had hard work to keep up with her. But when she got to the bushes she found a flock of strange birds sitting upon them and eating up the berries as fast as they could. The birds were not much bigger than robins, and were covered with a soft, velvety skin instead of with feathers, and they had merry black eyes and long, slender beaks curving downward from their noses, which gave to their faces a saucy expression. The lack of usual feathers might not have surprised Twinkle so much had ...
— Twinkle and Chubbins - Their Astonishing Adventures in Nature-Fairyland • L. Frank (Lyman Frank) Baum
... afterwards. Broad avenues approached in several directions, the castle standing at the far side of a wide circle or parade ground. The open space before the balconies was fully three hundred yards square, and was paved. From each side stretched the velvety green with its fountains, its trees, its arbors, its flowers, its ...
— Graustark • George Barr McCutcheon
... as he approached the castle, the last fires of sunset were burning in the sky behind it—the long irregular mass of buildings stood out in varying shades of blue, against varying, dying shades of red: the grey stone, dark, velvety indigo; the pink stucco, pink still, but with a transparent blue penumbra over it; the white marble, palely, scintillantly amethystine. And if he was interested in her environment, now he could study it to his heart's content: the wide marble staircase, up which he ...
— The Cardinal's Snuff-Box • Henry Harland
... used it in speaking of the battle of the Falkland Islands. "The range of them" seems a sure prescription for victory. Nothing in all the history of the war appeals to me as quite so smooth a bit of tactics as the Falkland affair. It was so smooth that it was velvety; and it is worth telling again, as I understand it. Sir Frederick is another young admiral. Otherwise, how could the British navy have entrusted him with so important a task? He is a different type from Beatty, who in an ...
— My Year of the War • Frederick Palmer
... asked Horace. Horace was already well acquainted with the waiting man, and called him Nat, though he was a very sober youth, with velvety hair, and a green neck-tie, as stiff ...
— Prudy Keeping House • Sophie May
... you that pass. It may move you to mirth, but there is nothing mirthful here; only the eternal sorrow and the eternal joy. Perchance you do not make love in this way; but love is love.... Under every brooding oak recline the rapt couples, snatching their moments in this velvety green. Drowsy fragrance is everywhere. The quiet breeze disorders stray ringlets, and sometimes light laughter is carried sleepily to sleepy ears. Love, says an old Malayan chanty which I learned at West India Dock—Love is kind to the least of men. ...
— Nights in London • Thomas Burke
... head, so far as his collar would permit him, declared that, "he felt sure of it beforehand," and almost turned the conversation to the diplomatic topic of Metternich himself. Varvara Pavlovna, with an expressive look in her velvety eyes, said in a low voice, "Why, but you too are an artist, un confrere," adding still lower, "venez!" with a nod towards the piano. The single word venez thrown at him, instantly, as though by magic, effected a complete transformation in Panshin's whole appearance. ...
— A House of Gentlefolk • Ivan Turgenev
... the enfolding velvety darkness ahead of him, and looking towards those firefly sparks shining on the heights, came the sound of stealthy measured footsteps and muffled voices talking Dutch. The enemy had made a sortie. The defences had been rushed, the town surrounded! Yet there were only two of them—a ...
— The Dop Doctor • Clotilde Inez Mary Graves
... village, the horses turned and began to mount the hill which led to Gallito's isolated cabin. Their progress was necessarily slow, for the road was rough and full of deep ruts. The velvety blackness of a mountain night was all about them and even the late spring air seemed icy cold. Pearl had begun to shiver in spite of her wraps when the light from a cabin window gleamed across the road and the ...
— The Black Pearl • Mrs. Wilson Woodrow
... wild bird fly over the rose-hedge just below us. It was about as big as a crow, but with a strange iridescent plumage. When it flitted into the sunshine its back and wings shone like a rainbow, and the next moment it looked perfectly black and velvety in the shade. Now a turquoise-blue tint comes out on its spreading wings, and a slant in the sunshine turns the blue into a chrysoprase green. Nobody could tell me its name: our Dutch host spoke ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, Vol. XVII, No. 99, March, 1876 • Various
... Beyond them he was seeing home. God's country! Green forests and waters spattered with golden sun—things he had almost forgotten; once more the faces of women who were white. And with those faces he heard the voice of his people and the song of birds and felt under his feet the velvety touch of earth that was bathed in the aroma of flowers. Yes, he had almost forgotten those things. Yesterday they had been with him only as moldering skeletons—phantasmal dream-things—because he was going mad, but now they were real, they ...
— The River's End • James Oliver Curwood
... of about medium height, and her exquisite figure was already assuming the rounded graces of budding womanhood. Her skin was a clear pale olive with just the faintest and most delicate tinge of colour in the velvety cheek; her face was a perfect oval, and her small exquisitely poised head was covered with a wealth of soft, silky, chestnut hair, so dark as to appear black in the shade, but when a ray of light fell upon it, the rippling ringlets revealed the full beauty of ...
— Under the Meteor Flag - Log of a Midshipman during the French Revolutionary War • Harry Collingwood
... brave, he no sooner conceived a project than he promptly carried it out. His brow shone in that clear light which seems to serve as a halo of success to natures so privileged as his; his fine eyes, of a soft and velvety black, subdued the hearts of men who could not resist their charm, and his caressing smile made conquest sweet. A child of destiny, he had but to use his will; some power unknown, some beneficent fairy had watched over his birth, and undertaken to ...
— CELEBRATED CRIMES, COMPLETE - JOAN OF NAPLES—1343-1382 • ALEXANDRE DUMAS, PERE
... birds have the entire head, neck and breast velvety black, abruptly defined against the white underparts. The back, wings and tail are greenish or bluish black, and the scapulars, white; length of bird 20 inches. They are well known throughout the west, where their bold and ...
— The Bird Book • Chester A. Reed
... turned and was busily hunting moths on the raspberry bushes when they reached the gate. And so excellent are the rewards of attending your own business, that he found a Promethea on a lilac in a corner; a moth of such rare wine-coloured, velvety shades that it almost sent Mrs. Comstock to her knees again. But this one was fully developed, able to fly, and had to be taken into the cabin hurriedly. Mrs. Comstock stood in the middle of the room holding ...
— A Girl Of The Limberlost • Gene Stratton Porter
... said the beetle solidly. "You've a nice velvety softness about you, and then you have the best name of them all. What sick person wouldn't like ...
— Soap-Bubble Stories - For Children • Fanny Barry
... thinking of lost Jim. A sound, faint, of horses' footfalls had entered her dream. With a silent gesture of alarm she sprang to her feet, staring with wide eyes at a company of Indians ascending the hill. They avoided the hard driveway, their horses treading with velvety softness upon the shaven lawn. They were many in number, twenty perhaps, and they were in gala dress. Head-dresses of eagles' feathers, gaily colored, hung from their crowns over the sides of their mounts, ...
— Dorothy on a Ranch • Evelyn Raymond
... hours and in the long, quiet nights. She was like a portrait by Veronese with her fair, glossy hair, which seemed to cast a radiance on her skin, a skin with the faintest tinge of pink, softened by a light velvety down which could be perceived when the sun kissed her cheek. Her eyes were an opaque blue, like those of Dutch porcelain figures. She had a tiny mole on her left nostril and another on the right of her chin. She was tall, well developed, with willowy figure. Her clear ...
— Une Vie, A Piece of String and Other Stories • Guy de Maupassant
... windows—the moat, now dry, which had once served to keep out a body of Cromwell's horse—the tall elms, which had nestled many a generation of rooks—the clump of beech trees, and the venerable wide-spreading oak— the broad gravelled court on one side, and the velvety lawn on the other, sloping away down to the fine, large, deep fish-pond, whose waters, on which I had obtained my first nautical experiences, as seen through the green foliage, were sparkling brighter than ever under the deep ...
— A Voyage round the World - A book for boys • W.H.G. Kingston
... figure, a dazzling complexion, and a certain languid grace which passed easily for gentle-womanliness. She always dressed becomingly, and in what Fiddletown accepted as the latest fashion. She had only two blemishes: one of her velvety eyes, when examined closely, had a slight cast; and her left cheek bore a small scar left by a single drop of vitriol—happily the only drop of an entire phial—thrown upon her by one of her own jealous ...
— Selected Stories • Bret Harte
... Pont-a-Mousson lay between the main street and the flank of the Bois-le-Pretre. The quarter was almost totally deserted, probably not more than ten houses being inhabited out of several thousand. The streets that led into it had grass growing high in the gutters, and a velvety moss wearing a winter rustiness grew packed between the paving-stones. Beyond the main street, la rue Fabvrier went straight down this loneliness, and halted or turned at a clump of wrecked houses a quarter of a mile ...
— A Volunteer Poilu • Henry Sheahan
... into the body itself. As though my form was sucking it in like a sponge. The scientist and his helper were tense and taut with excitement. And suddenly my comfortable feeling left me. Until then it had seemed so smooth and velvety and peaceful drifting around over their heads, as though lying on a soft, fleecy cloud. But now I felt a sudden squeezing of my spirit body. Then I was in an agony. Before I knew what I was doing my ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science April 1930 • Various
... won't do!" he finally exclaimed, and shaking himself, he hurried out of the building and on to the broad, velvety college campus. ...
— The Rover Boys in Alaska - or Lost in the Fields of Ice • Arthur M. Winfield
... odour of earth and water hung in the air, and through the sunlight, orange-tipped butterflies danced above the marsh grass, soft velvety butterflies ...
— The King In Yellow • Robert W. Chambers
... letter, leave out the velvety product of La Savonnerie from the aristocratic society of hangings woven in the classic stitch of the Gobelins. They have reason. Yet, because the weave is one we often see in galleries, also on furniture both old and new, it ...
— The Tapestry Book • Helen Churchill Candee
... alcohol which thickens the velvety lining of the stomach, and hardens the soft tissues, the thin sheaths of nerves, and the gray matter of the brain. We crowd meats, vegetables, pastry, confectionery, nuts, raisins, wines, fruits, etc., into one of the most delicately constructed organs of the body, and ...
— Pushing to the Front • Orison Swett Marden
... me we are several hundred miles off the South American coast. And yet, only the other day, it seems, we were scarcely more distant from Africa. A big velvety moth fluttered aboard this morning, and we are filled with conjecture. How possibly could it have come from the South American coast these hundreds of miles in ...
— The Mutiny of the Elsinore • Jack London
... vanishing out of it with noiseless resolution. No power on earth could have kept her in there for another minute. On deck she found a moonless night with a velvety tepid feeling in the air, and in the sky a mass of blurred starlight, like the tarnished tinsel of a worn-out, very old, very tedious firmament. The usual routine of the yacht had been already resumed, the awnings had been stretched aft, a solitary round lamp had been hung as usual ...
— The Rescue • Joseph Conrad
... the strong room. It was beautifully decorated and furnished. On the walls was a sort of heavy, velvety green wall-paper. Exquisite hangings were draped about, and on the floor were thick rugs. In all I noticed that the prevailing tint ...
— The Dream Doctor • Arthur B. Reeve
... from her work-table, and, shaking out its fleecy softness, began to work, the big wooden needles making a velvety sound as they rubbed together. Gifford was opposite her, his hands thrust moodily into his pockets, his feet stretched straight out, and his head sunk on his breast. But he did not look as though he were resting; an intent anxiety seemed to pervade his big frame, and Helen could not fail to observe ...
— John Ward, Preacher • Margaret Deland
... Winona. Oft she came to the teepee and spoke; she brought him the tongue of the bison, Sweet nuts from the hazel and oak, and flesh of the fawn and the mallard. Soft hanpa [b] she made for his feet and leggins of velvety fawn-skin,— A blanket of beaver complete, and a hood of the hide of the otter. And oft at his feet on the mat, deftly braiding the flags and the rushes, Till the sun sought his teepee she sat, enchanted ...
— Legends of the Northwest • Hanford Lennox Gordon
... common pressures, gave a better brush than oxygen, but did not equal nitrogen; the colour was greenish gray. In rarefied hydrogen, the ramifications were very fine in form and distinctness, but pale in colour, with a soft and velvety appearance, and not at all equal to those in nitrogen. In the rarest state of the gas, the colour of the light ...
— Experimental Researches in Electricity, Volume 1 • Michael Faraday
... purity, a pardoned man has to struggle daily with the bitter relics of his old self, to wage war against evils the force of which he never knew till he tried to resist them, against sins which were all sleek, and velvety, and purring, as long as he fondled and stroked them, but which flash out sharp claws when he would fling them from their dens in his heart. Forgiveness does not at once conquer sin, and forgiveness leads to deeper consciousness of sin. Hence the order of petitions here. Following on the ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Ezekiel, Daniel, and the Minor Prophets. St Matthew Chapters I to VIII • Alexander Maclaren
... had hung the sky with rose, painted the mountain-tops and turned the West into a blazing smeltery of dreams, had slowly yielded to a night starlit, velvety, breathless, big with the gentle witchcraft of an amber moon. Nature went masked. The depths upon our left seemed bottomless; a grey flash spoke of the Gave de Pau: beyond, the random rise and fall of a high ridge argued the summit of a gigantic screen—the ...
— Jonah and Co. • Dornford Yates
... spring had come. No leafy thickness had yet clad the woodlands, but the budding leaves hung like a tender mist about the trees. In the open country the meadow lands lay a sheeny green, the cornfields a dark velvety color, for they were thick and soft with the growing blades. The plowboy shouted in the sun, and in the purple new- turned furrows flocks of birds hunted for fat worms. All the broad moist earth smiled in the warm light, and each little green hill clapped ...
— The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood • Howard Pyle
... him and set him a-tingle with a queer delight. Gracious, what pretty dark velvety ...
— Wyoming, a Story of the Outdoor West • William MacLeod Raine
... head and thorax rugose; the prothorax transverse, its anterior margin slightly curved, with the lateral angles produced forwards and very acute; the thorax narrowed to the metathorax, which is armed with two divergent acute spines. Abdomen velvety black and globose; the scale of the petiole produced laterally into long, bent, acute spines, which curve backwards to the ...
— Journal of the Proceedings of the Linnean Society - Vol. 3 - Zoology • Various
... four acres of comfortably wooded land about the house, of which nearly an acre had formed the pleasaunce of the old lodge. This was now a beautifully-kept modern garden, with a broad, gently-sloping lawn, whose turf had been growing more and more velvety year by year for over three centuries, and divided from it by a low box-hedge was another, levelled up and devoted to tennis and new-style croquet. The Old Lawn, as it was called, sloped away from a broad verandah which ran the whole ...
— The Mummy and Miss Nitocris - A Phantasy of the Fourth Dimension • George Griffith
... he was not following her. He was smiling to himself as he looked up into her virginal face, so innocent, so penetratingly innocent, that its purity seemed always to enter into him, driving out of him all dross and bathing him in some ethereal effulgence that was as cool and soft and velvety as starshine. We know there are nasty things in the world! He cuddled to him the notion of her knowing, and chuckled over it as a love joke. The next moment, in a flashing vision of multitudinous detail, he sighted the whole sea of life's nastiness ...
— Martin Eden • Jack London
... the hill the old White Horse soon appears in view, cut in the velvety turf of the rolling chalk downs. But, in the words of ...
— A Cotswold Village • J. Arthur Gibbs
... upon a time, great basins had been hollowed out. But these had now fallen into ruin, and were nothing but gigantic jardinieres, fringed with stained and cracked marble. In one of the largest of them, the wind had sown a wonderful basketful of pansies. The velvety blooms seemed almost like living faces, with bands of violet hair, yellow eyes, paler tinted mouths, and chins of ...
— Abbe Mouret's Transgression - La Faute De L'abbe Mouret • Emile Zola
... and there among the flower-beds in the sunshine he saw—first, John Gardener driving a mowing-machine over the velvety grass under Master Arthur's very nose, so there was no getting a private interview with him. Secondly, Master Arthur himself, sitting on the ground with his terrier in his lap, directing the proceedings by means of a donkey-headed stick with elaborately ...
— Melchior's Dream and Other Tales • Juliana Horatia Ewing
... do quite satisfactory work. You may use up a good deal of seed in experimenting, but that will not matter. One common mistake in lawn-making is to use too little seed. A thinly-seeded lawn will not give you a good sward the first season, but a thickly-seeded one will. In fact, it will have that velvety look which is one of the chief charms of any lawn, after its first mowing. I would advise you to tell the dealer of whom you purchase seed the size of your lot, and let him decide on the quantity of seed required to make a good ...
— Amateur Gardencraft - A Book for the Home-Maker and Garden Lover • Eben E. Rexford
... tissues in which the night seemed enveloped and obscured save for the white gleaming of the stars. This was the clear color that the brackish water wore as it reflected the night. It reflected suddenly a face—a face with a long velvety muzzle, a pair of spreading antlers, and dark eyes, gentle, timorous, liquidly bright. The water stirred with a sibilant lapping sound as the buck's tongue licked at the margin. Once he held up his head to listen, with his hoof lifted, then he bent again to the ripples. There ...
— The Mystery of Witch-Face Mountain and Other Stories • Charles Egbert Craddock
... faultless taste. No feeble extravagance offends our feelings; no tinsel or affectation thwarts our admiration. The execution is worthy of the thought, which is simply beautiful. The portrait is like Raphael's divinest Madonna, with the changing radiance and velvety warmth of life thrown into the matchless face. Why could we not have had more such, instead of such indifferent ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol III, Issue VI, June, 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... weather culminated one afternoon in a dead faint of earth and sea and sky. An Alpine cloudland of snow that had mocked the upturned eyes of Greyport for hours, began to darken under the folding shadow of a black and velvety wing. The atmosphere seemed to thicken as the gloom increased; the lazy dust, thrown up by hurrying feet that sought a refuge, hung almost motionless in the air. Suddenly it was blown to the four quarters in one fierce gust that as quickly dispersed the loungers drooping ...
— By Shore and Sedge • Bret Harte
... By-the-way, John has kept the grounds looking well, hasn't he? The lawn doesn't seem to have a weed on it," said Bessie, walking to the window and gazing out at the soft velvety sward in the ...
— Paste Jewels • John Kendrick Bangs
... distance from the shore rose from the sea the dark outlines of vessels, thrusting up into the dark sky their pointed masts with various colored lights at their tops. The sea reflected the lights, and was spotted with masses of yellow, quivering patches. This was very beautiful on the velvety bosom of the soft, dull black water, so rhythmically, mightily breathing. The sea slept the sound, healthy sleep of a workman, wearied out by his ...
— Creatures That Once Were Men • Maxim Gorky
... Grey, 'did not live wholly to me, until I met with an incident while hunting in South Africa. Coming upon a young spring-buck, which had been exhausted by the pursuit, I lifted it into the saddle before me, and carried it home. All the way, the velvety skin of the little fellow was brushing against ...
— The Romance of a Pro-Consul - Being The Personal Life And Memoirs Of The Right Hon. Sir - George Grey, K.C.B. • James Milne
... for a fresh gallop, when her ear caught the sound of another horse's hoofs; and, looking back, she saw approaching her at a rapid rate a gentleman whom she knew to be a stranger. Not caring to be overtaken, she chirruped to the spirited Gritty, who, bounding over the velvety turf, left the unknown rider far ...
— Maggie Miller • Mary J. Holmes
... of the ports and peered through its thick window. Mado was fussing with the controls. The velvety blackness of the heavens; the myriad diamond points of clear brilliance. Cold, too, it looked out there, and awesomely vast. The sun and Earth had been left behind and could not be seen. But Carr didn't care. The heavens were marvelous when viewed without the obstruction of ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science, November, 1930 • Various
... god of farming, or to some other tutelary deity of the place. At the eastern outlet of the valley a strip of blue sea bounds the horizon; westward are the distant mountains. In the foreground, in front of a farmhouse, snug-looking, with its roof of velvety-brown thatch, a troop of sturdy urchins, suntanned and stark naked, are frisking in the wildest gambols, all heedless of the scolding voice of the withered old grandam who sits spinning and minding the house, while her son and his wife are away toiling at some outdoor ...
— Tales of Old Japan • Algernon Bertram Freeman-Mitford
... gain hold, and, not content with having its own way on green and campus, is forever attempting the conquest of path and road. The warm red bricks of the college buildings are well-nigh hidden by ivy, which, too, is an ardent expansionist. And where neither grass nor ivy can subjugate, soft, velvety moss reigns humbly. ...
— Behind the Line • Ralph Henry Barbour
... long, sunny days and velvety nights sped by and was succeeded by the moon of falling leaves. The air was tinged with frost and the forest flamed with color. The cornfield no longer held a lure for Ringtail, but the beech trees were dropping their little, three-cornered nuts and the big raccoon was ...
— Followers of the Trail • Zoe Meyer
... Mr. Lennox. 'She would be up to looking through every speech that a young man made her for the arriere-pensee of a compliment. But I don't believe Margaret,—Stay!' exclaimed he, 'Let me help you;' and he gathered for her some velvety cramoisy roses that were above her reach, and then dividing the spoil he placed two in his button-hole, and sent her in, pleased and happy, to ...
— North and South • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
... Hebrew, in Sanscrit, in Choctaw you write, Sweet singer who gave us the Voices of Night, Though in buskin or slipper your song may be shod; Or the velvety verse that Evangeline trod, ...
— The Poetical Works of Oliver Wendell Holmes, Complete • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... William and Lord Beaconsfield. One is light blue and the other yellow, so that, en masse, they are effective at a distance. The rich, dark, velvety Pansies are really more beautiful to look at, but we must stand close by them or hold them in the hand in order to enjoy them. In photographs the flowers of dark varieties hardly show at all. A good example of the handling of Pansies for effectiveness ...
— The Mayflower, January, 1905 • Various
... larks trilled high in the heavens; his heart was lyric with joy; He plucked a posy of lilies; he sped like a love-sick boy. He stole up the velvety pathway—his cottage was sunsteeped and still; Vines honeysuckled the window; softly he peeped o'er the sill. The lilies dropped from his fingers; devils were choking his breath; Rigid with horror, he stiffened; ghastly his face was as death. Like a nun ...
— Ballads of a Cheechako • Robert W. Service
... in cool glasses, and women laughed happily, and every one was under the spell of the velvety summer evening; but he had looked into the face of Love and the face of Death—and both were still near to ...
— The Girl and The Bill - An American Story of Mystery, Romance and Adventure • Bannister Merwin
... the plant attacked by this disease rapidly become covered with a dull brownish velvety mould, or fungus, known as Cladosporium fulvum. From the mouldy spots and patches thousands of spores are readily carried by a slight current of air to the surrounding healthy crop, and unless prompt measures are taken to check the pest the whole house is ...
— The Culture of Vegetables and Flowers From Seeds and Roots, 16th Edition • Sutton and Sons
... so ill and tired that the children felt they could not ask her any questions. She sank into an arm-chair. Phyllis took the long pins out of her hat, while Roberta took off her gloves, and Peter unfastened her walking-shoes and fetched her soft velvety ...
— The Railway Children • E. Nesbit
... indeed," answered Nycteris, "and shall be again. But why you should be, I cannot in the least understand. You must know how gentle and sweet the darkness is, how kind and friendly, how soft and velvety! It holds you to its bosom and loves you. A little while ago, I lay faint and dying under your hot lamp.—What is it ...
— Stephen Archer and Other Tales • George MacDonald
... might as well happen to be there as anywhere else, we sent him a postcard and went. This would be in June or early in July. All day we walked across a plain of vines, past hurdles of wattled cannes and great wind-screens of velvety cypresses, sixty feet high, all white with dust on the north side of 'em, for the mistral was having its three-days' revel, and it whistled and roared through the cannes till scores of yards of 'em at a time were bowed nearly to the earth. A roaring day it was, I remember.... ...
— Widdershins • Oliver Onions
... had Madge Ellston viewed the field and stands and the outlying country from this high vantage point; but never with the same mingling emotions, nor had the sunshine ever been so golden, the woods and meadows so green, the diamond so smooth and velvety, the whole scene ...
— The Redheaded Outfield and Other Baseball Stories • Zane Grey |
