"Velvet" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... almost all away; and he used to dine sometimes with lord Oxford, privately, in a velvet cap. His dress of ceremony was black, with a tie-wig and ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson, LL.D. in Nine Volumes - Volume the Eighth: The Lives of the Poets, Volume II • Samuel Johnson
... alone, will, I am sure, restore it entirely. I have just seen the dress that my father had made abroad for his part in my play: a bright amber-colored velours epingle, with a border of rich silver embroidery; this, together with a cloak of violet velvet trimmed with imitation sable. The fashion is what you see in all the pictures and prints of Francis I. My father is very anxious, I think, to act the play; my mother, to have it published before it is acted; and ...
— Records of a Girlhood • Frances Anne Kemble
... Ragnall himself. Certainly he was a splendid-looking man, very tall, very broad, very handsome, with a peaked beard, a kind and charming face, and large dark eyes. He wore a cloak upon his shoulders, which was thrown back from over a velvet coat, and, except for the light double-barrelled rifle in his hand, looked exactly like a picture by Van Dyck which Mr. Savage had just informed me was that of one of his lordship's ancestors of the time ...
— The Ivory Child • H. Rider Haggard
... Anon, with velvet foot and Tarquin strides, Subtle Grimalkin to his quarry glides— Grimalkin grim, that slew the fierce rodent Whose tooth insidious Johann's ...
— English as She is Wrote - Showing Curious Ways in which the English Language may be - made to Convey Ideas or obscure them. • Anonymous
... off at full gallop. Coronado had laid aside his American dandy raiment, and was in the full costume of a Mexican of the provinces—broad-brimmed hat of white straw, blue broadcloth jacket adorned with numerous small silver buttons, velvet vest of similar splendor, blue trousers slashed from the knee downwards and gay with buttons, high, loose embroidered boots of crimson leather, long steel spurs jingling and shining. The change became him; he seemed a larger and handsomer man ...
— Overland • John William De Forest
... than Tocqueville's, but is still more instructive for every student of politics. Duvergier de Hauranne had long experience of public life. He remembered the day when he saw Cuvier mount the tribune in a black velvet suit and speak as few orators have spoken, and carry the electoral law which was the Reform Bill of 1817. Having quarrelled with the Doctrinaires, he led the attack which overthrew Guizot, and was one of three on whom Thiers was relying to save the throne, when the king went away in ...
— Lectures on the French Revolution • John Emerich Edward Dalberg-Acton
... scarlet; and his very shoes were golden, set with precious stones. His followers rode on blood horses; while he, with a wonderful affectation of humility in the midst of his great splendour, ambled on a mule with a red velvet saddle and bridle ...
— A Child's History of England • Charles Dickens
... shallowness) of thought—in a word of his character, of himself. But this is impossible with him who has written much. Of such a person we get, from his books, not merely a just, but the most just representation. Bulwer, the individual, personal man, in a green velvet waistcoat and amber gloves, is not by any means the veritable Sir Edward Lytton, who is discoverable only in 'Ernest Maltravers,' where his soul is deliberately and nakedly set forth. And who would ever ...
— International Weekly Miscellany, Vol. I, No. 6 - Of Literature, Art, And Science, New York, August 5, 1850 • Various
... meadows by the river, came a young man in homespun carrying a long, old-fashioned, muzzle-loading duck-gun. Two days before this he had seen a fine buck, with antlers perfect and new-shining from the velvet, feeding on the edge of this meadow. The young woodsman had his gun loaded with buckshot. He wanted both venison and a pair of horns; and, knowing the fancy of the deer for certain favourite pastures, he had great hopes of finding the buck ...
— The House in the Water - A Book of Animal Stories • Charles G. D. Roberts
... that Alexander the Great was a 'well-built stout little man with a thick yellow-red beard, red cheeks, and eyes like a basilisk,' and that the old chronicler, quite after the fashion of the modern purveyor for ladies' journals, informs us that Roxana wore a dress entirely of blue velvet trimmed with gold ...
— The Faust-Legend and Goethe's 'Faust' • H. B. Cotterill
... Rathbawne, digging her chin reproachfully into her black velvet collar, "how can you say such things? Mr. Nisbet will think you have had no bringing up at all. And do ...
— The Lieutenant-Governor • Guy Wetmore Carryl
... having solicited patronage, he was beckoned into the box where the defendant was sitting, and was offered a shilling for a full-length likeness. This sum the defendant consented to enlarge to fifteen pence, provided the artist would agree to draw him in "full fig:"—red velvet smalls—nankeen gaiters—sky-blue waistcoat—canary wipe—and full-bottomed fantail. The bargain was struck and the picture finished, but when presented to the sitter, he swore "he'd see the man's back open and shet afore he'd pay the wally of a farden piece for sitch a reg'lar 'snob' as he ...
— The Book of Anecdotes and Budget of Fun; • Various
... of love and days of pleasure, I must leave them all, lassie. Scenes of love and hours of leisure, All are gone for aye, lassie. No more thy velvet-bordered dress My fond and longing een shall bless, Thou lily in the wilderness; And who shall love thee then, lassie? Long I've watched thy look so tender, Often clasped thy waist so slender: Heaven, in thine own love defend her, God protect my ...
— Life and Remains of John Clare - "The Northamptonshire Peasant Poet" • J. L. Cherry
... with a gentleman on board the steamer John Simonds, bound for Louisville, late one night, and had won a few hundred dollars from him, when he got up without saying a word, and went to the ladies' cabin. In a short time he came back with a small velvet-covered box in his hand, and said to me, "Come, let us finish our game." He opened the box, and I saw it was full of ladies' diamond jewelry. I said: "What are you going to do with those?" Said he, "I will put them up as money." "Oh, no, I have ...
— Forty Years a Gambler on the Mississippi • George H. Devol
... Phil's little girl, who had come around to show her new velvet basque, 'but shells do sing, for I've often listened to mamma's, and Bessy gives it to me at night to put me to sleep. You know, Aunt Bertie, for you once made ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. III, No IV, April 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... door had fled to her room on velvet shod feet and closed her door, her face white with horror, her lips set with purpose, her heart beating wildly. She must put a stop somehow to this diabolical plot against him. Whether he was worthy or not they should not do this thing to him! She rang for the maid ...
— The Search • Grace Livingston Hill
... clerk, or else the master of a national school—whatever he was, it is clear his present position is a change for the better. His income is small certainly, as the rusty black coat and threadbare velvet collar demonstrate: but then he lives free of house-rent, has a limited allowance of coals and candles, and an almost unlimited allowance of authority in his petty kingdom. He is a tall, thin, bony man; always wears shoes and black cotton stockings with his surtout; and ...
— Sketches by Boz - illustrative of everyday life and every-day people • Charles Dickens
... our buccaneer had grown, to be sure! How different from the poor, humble clerk upon the sugar wharf! What a deal of gold braid! What a fine, silver-hilled Spanish sword! What a gay velvet sling, hung with three silver-mounted pistols! If Master Harry's mind had not been made up before, to be sure such a spectacle of glory would ...
— Howard Pyle's Book of Pirates • Howard Pyle
... scholarly feelings to see the pages dog's-eared. I was lulled to sleep by the well-rhymed charms of that rustic maiden—'prettier than the turnip-flower,' 'with a cheek more savoury than cheese.' But to get such a well-scented notion of the contadina, one must lie on velvet cushions in the Via Larga—not go to look at the Fierucoloni stumping in to the Piazza della Nunziata this ...
— Romola • George Eliot
... person which attracted attention. He wore the ordinary Andalucian cap—of which such hideous parodies are now making themselves common in England—but was not contented with the usual ornament of the double tuft. The cap was small, and jaunty; trimmed with silk velvet—as is common here with men careful to adorn their persons; but this man's cap was finished off with a jewelled button and golden filigree work. He was dressed in a short jacket with a stand up collar; and that also was covered with golden buttons and ...
— John Bull on the Guadalquivir from Tales from all Countries • Anthony Trollope
... gentleman, under the Stuarts, was fine only in his lace and his velvet doublet; his language was coarse, his manners coarser, his vices the coarsest of all. No wonder when the king himself could get so drunk with Sedley and Buckhurst as to be unable to give an audience appointed for; and when the chief fun of his two companions was to divest themselves of all ...
— The Wits and Beaux of Society - Volume 1 • Grace Wharton and Philip Wharton
... pointing to two, when May rose from the velvet-seated chair, and went to the little writing-table which stood in another part of the room. She took a plain sheet of note-paper, and, with a hand far from steady, began, not writing, but printing, certain ...
— Our Friend the Charlatan • George Gissing
... Mr. Velvet Purr, a quiet old bachelor, who sat nearly all day in the sun on a garden seat watching the birds, but who was much too well fed to catch mice. Miss Velveteen Purr, his sister, went with him, she was a very pretty singer, wore a fur tippet, and drank a good deal ...
— A Apple Pie and Other Nursery Tales • Unknown
... already overwhelmed (ecrase), your Assemblies, and your Conventions, your Vergniauds and your Guadets, your Jacobins and your Girondins. They are all dead! What, who are you? nothing—all authority is in the Throne; and what is the Throne? this wooden frame covered with velvet?—no, I am the Throne! You have added wrong to reproaches. You have talked of concessions—concessions that even my enemies dared not ask! I suppose if they asked Champaigne you would have had me give them La Brie besides; but in four ...
— Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte, Complete • Louis Antoine Fauvelet de Bourrienne
... speak merely of its quantity, which we know would have been little or no addition to the trouble of whatever office had its hands the fullest. But what has been the real condition of the old office of Secretary of State? Have their velvet bags and their red boxes been so full that nothing more could possibly be crammed ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. II. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... corner, blissfully conscious of Amiel's careless arm about her shoulder, gave herself up to happiness. The night was soft as velvet, sewn with the gold spangles of stars. The waves whispered secrets to each other as they waited for the moon to rise. Dorothea, rapturously using the atmosphere as a background for Lady Ursula, became suddenly aware that the singing of "Juanita" ...
— Stories from Everybody's Magazine • 1910 issues of Everybody's Magazine
... In the midst of the quadrilles I saw the wife of my friend and that of the mathematician. Madame Alexander wore a charming dress; some flowers and white muslin were all that composed it. She wore a little cross a la Jeannette, hanging by a black velvet ribbon which set off the whiteness of her scented skin; long pears of gold decorated her ears. On the neck of Madame the Professoress sparkled a ...
— Analytical Studies • Honore de Balzac
... Ladies' Institute, 83. Regent Street, Quadrant. LADIES of taste for fancy work.—by paying 21s. will be received as members, and taught the new style of velvet wool work, which is acquired in a few easy lessons. Each lady will be guaranteed constant employment and ready cash payment for her work. Apply personally to Mrs. Thoughey. N. B. Ladies taught by letter at any ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 185, May 14, 1853 • Various
... portraits, reproduced by the looking-glasses, and the numerous wax candles disposed to that effect, offered to her sight a spectacle entirely new to her, and from which she could not withdraw her eyes. Sitting down on a stool I contemplated her elegant person with rapture. A coat of rosy velvet, embroidered with gold spangles, a vest to match, embroidered likewise in the richest fashion, breeches of black satin, diamond buckles, a solitaire of great value on her little finger, and on the other hand a ring: such was her toilet. Her black ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... the fashions be rare and strange, so is the stuff whereof their hats be made divers also; for some are of silk, some of velvet, some of taffetie, some of sarcenet, some of wool, and, which is more curious, some of a certain kind of fine haire; these they call bever hattes, of xx, xxx, or xl shillings price, fetched from beyond the seas, from whence a great ...
— Notes & Queries 1850.02.09 • Various
... and accomplished, and plainly formed by nature to act a brilliant part in the affairs of his time. According to the customs of that period with men of fortune, his apparel was very elaborate and costly, of velvet and satin, embroidered with gold and silver lace. "His equipage was splendid, and public occasions he rode with six beautiful bay horses and attended by servants in livery." Mach of his large fortune was spent ...
— Annals and Reminiscences of Jamaica Plain • Harriet Manning Whitcomb
... hour on my piano—a fantasia and new etude of his—interesting man and still more interesting playing; he moved me strangely. The over- excitement of his fantastic manner is imparted to the keen- eared; it made me hold my breath. Wonderful is the ease with which his velvet fingers glide, I might almost say fly, over the keys. He has enraptured me—I cannot deny it—in a way which hitherto had been unknown to me. What delighted me was the childlike, natural manner which he showed in his ...
— Frederick Chopin as a Man and Musician - Volume 1-2, Complete • Frederick Niecks
... have sufficed for a king's ransom; the diamonds were of the first water; the rubies flashed crimson; delicate pearls gleamed palely upon their velvet beds; there were emeralds of priceless value. One of the most beautiful and costly jewels was an entire suite of ...
— Dora Thorne • Charlotte M. Braeme
... I put on my best black cloth suit, trimmed with scarlet ribbon, very neat, with my cloak lined with velvet, and a new beaver, which altogether is very noble, with my black silk knit canons I ...
— Confessions of a Book-Lover • Maurice Francis Egan
... was sitting at the window in an easy-chair, with a velvet dressing-gown wrapped about him, and at the sound of her entrance, he turned his face around, and ...
— Dainty's Cruel Rivals - The Fatal Birthday • Mrs. Alex McVeigh Miller
... Chepe I began me drawne, Where mutch people I sawe for to stande; One ofred me velvet, sylke, and lawne, An other he taketh me by the haunde, Here is Parys thred, the fynest in the launde. I never was used to such thyngs in dede, And wanting mony ...
— A Chronicle of London from 1089 to 1483 • Anonymous
... The Luck moved across the velvet night. The steady beat of flame from her tubes was a tiny spark of man-made vengeance on the face of ...
— Turnover Point • Alfred Coppel
... staircase hung on either side with fine old portraits and rare tapestries, his feet sinking deep in the rich velvet carpet. On the first landing was a piece of sculptured marble of inestimable worth, seen in the soft warm light that sifted through a great pictorial stained-glass window overhead, the subject representing ...
— The Lion and The Mouse - A Story Of American Life • Charles Klein
... so. All the things that are never said by people who are truly intimate with each other were said several times over as the little party moved away. Their voices receded into the distance, though they continued for a while to prick through the silence that fell like a velvet ...
— The Way of an Eagle • Ethel M. Dell
... August 19, when you were settling up, and when there was 5s. 31/2d. due to you, you took a hat and feathers, some velvet, and a jacket. You got a great deal more then than was due to you-Yes; because we had a number of veils knitting for the merchant at the time, and they all go into the account for the goods ...
— Second Shetland Truck System Report • William Guthrie
... Lord Governor went to Church he was accompanied with all the Councillors, Captains, other officers, and all the gentlemen, and with a guard of fifty Halberdiers in his Lordships Livery, fair red cloaks, on each side and behind him. The Lord Governor sat in the choir, in a green velvet chair, with a velvet cushion before him on which he knelt, and the Council, captains, and officers, on ...
— Virginia under the Stuarts 1607-1688 • Thomas J. Wertenbaker
... father's brother, it was not convenient to press the assumption, and it was therefore resolved that young Edward should go to Amiens to perform his homage to Philippe. He was only fifteen days absent from England, and duly swore fealty to Philippe; the one robed in blue velvet and golden lilies, the other in crimson velvet worked with the English lions; but the pageant was a worthless ceremony, and the journey was chiefly important as bringing him to a full sense of the esteem ...
— Cameos from English History, from Rollo to Edward II • Charlotte Mary Yonge
... that which then stood on the beach of St. John's harbor—swarthy, bronzed sailors and fishermen of Spain, Portugal, and France, in the costumes of the sixteenth century. Soon a circle formed round one commanding figure—a man of noble presence, wearing the richly slashed and laced doublet, velvet cloak, trunk-hose, and gay hat and feather which constituted the dress of gentlemen in the days of Queen Elizabeth. This was no other than Sir Humphrey Gilbert, one of the gallant knights of Devonshire. ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 1-20 • Various
... to inform him of the arrival of Madame Godin, and the languid state of her health. Upon this intelligence, M. R. could do no less, having promised to render her his services, than hasten to join her, bringing with him four silver dishes, a silver saucepan, a velvet petticoat, one of Persiana, and one of taffety, some linen, and other trifles, belonging to her brothers as well as herself; adding, that all the rest were rotten, forgetting that bracelets, snuff-boxes, and rosaries of gold, and ...
— Perils and Captivity • Charlotte-Adelaide [nee Picard] Dard
... spent much of her time indoors. The window was open and a rose vine was clinging to the frame, rich in bloom. There was a work basket on the low, velvet-cushioned seat—a child's sock lay near it and several ridiculous toys, rigidly propped against the wall, as if on review. Birds sang outside in the plum and peach trees and birds inside, not realizing their bondage, ...
— The Shield of Silence • Harriet T. Comstock
... beneath which, on a platform, there was an armchair for the Empress, covered with a cloth of gold. To the left of the canopy, on the Bavarian side, towards Braunau, was set a large table with a velvet cloth, on which the plenipotentiaries were to write their signatures. Two lines of young green trees had been set out, one leading to the French hall, the other to the Austrian. On the side of the first, towards Braunau, were drawn three regiments, in ...
— The Happy Days of the Empress Marie Louise • Imbert De Saint-Amand
... clattering of feet and carts aright. To convince themselves, all they had to do was to raise their eyes; but the first triumph would have been to Tilliedrum if they had done that. The invaders—the men in Aberdeen blue serge coats, velvet knee-breeches, and broad blue bonnets, and the wincey gowns of the women set off with hooded cloaks of red or tartan—tapped at the windows and shouted insultingly as they passed; but, with pursed lips, Thrums bent fiercely over its wobs, ...
— Auld Licht Idyls • J.M. Barrie
... in court clothes of velvet, his fair hair in long curls, his three-cornered hat held beneath his arm, his court rapier hanging at his side, bright silver buckles at knees and on shoes, advanced down the walk to the little lady who was waiting for him. She was in flowered satin, ...
— Historic Boyhoods • Rupert Sargent Holland
... door, attended by two grooms with two led saddle horses. 'I will not go, brother,' said Olivia, 'if you drive.' 'He drive?' replied Andrews. 'Never believe it! No, no Miss Mowbray, I will be your Jehu. I will wheel you along, over velvet, every yard smooth as sailing.' 'No Jack,' interrupted Hector, 'that won't do. Trevor is no company, has nothing to say, or nothing that I want to hear. Sister and he will match best. He will tell her what is Greek for a gauze cap, and she will teach him how to make it up. You and I will pair off ...
— The Adventures of Hugh Trevor • Thomas Holcroft
... being all similar. The majority of those you've caught are certainly of the ordinary species of green crab and uneatable, if even they had been of any tolerable size; but, that little fellow there is a young 'velvet fiddler' or 'swimming crab.' If you notice, his hind legs are flattened, so as to serve him for oars, with which he can propel himself at a very good rate through the water if you give him a chance. ...
— Bob Strong's Holidays - Adrift in the Channel • John Conroy Hutcheson
... up on the poop, and I followed, both of us intently staring in the direction indicated by the lookout; but the transient gleam had by this time flickered itself out, and we might as well have been staring at a vast curtain of black velvet, for all that we could see. However, by patiently waiting, and persistently staring in the proper direction until the next flash came, we at length contrived to get a momentary glimpse of her, a dozen voices at least exclaiming at ...
— A Middy of the King - A Romance of the Old British Navy • Harry Collingwood
... in the west a pale stream of light was fading smoothly out, absorbed by the velvet softness of the summer night. There was no moon, but the starlit vault shone dazzlingly upon the shadowed valley. Already among the trees the yellow oil lamps were shining within the ...
— The Law-Breakers • Ridgwell Cullum
... velvet, Behold the yonker dressed; Bedizen'd o'er with ribbons, A cross upon his breast. Prime minister they made him, He wore a star of state; And all his poor relations Were courtiers, rich ...
— Faust Part 1 • Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe
... May 3. Nothing had been done or thought of for two weeks in Springfield but the preparations for this day, and they had been made with a thoroughness which surprised the visitors from the East. The body lay in state in the Capitol, which was richly draped from roof to basement in black velvet and silver fringe. Within it was a bower of bloom and fragrance. For twenty-four hours an unbroken stream of people passed through, bidding their friend and neighbor welcome home and farewell; and at ten o'clock on May ...
— A Short Life of Abraham Lincoln - Condensed from Nicolay & Hay's Abraham Lincoln: A History • John G. Nicolay
... nor furniture of any kind, but subsequently chairs were found for us. The salutations on the part of the numerous women servants were most profound, each prostrating herself to the floor, and touching the mat with her forehead every time she entered or left the apartment. Velvet mats were carried into the room by a servant and placed around a brazier of charcoal. In a few minutes servant after servant entered, prostrating herself to the ground, and placing before us some Japanese delicacy. One served soup in small lacquer bowls, another fish, a third ...
— Round the World • Andrew Carnegie
... from transparent paper from crackers, and from certain advertisements, will save these for children to whose homes such treasures never come. A box containing scraps of soft cloth, possibly a bit of velvet, some bits of smooth and shining coloured silk give the pleasure of sense discrimination without the formality of the Montessori graded boxes, and are easier to replace. Some substitute for "mother's button ...
— The Child Under Eight • E.R. Murray and Henrietta Brown Smith
... tired" (pathetically), "but it is never too late for Jesus," he added bravely, while a tear rolled down the velvet cheek. "He is sure to come, 'cause it is the Rising Day" (exultingly). "Don't ...
— Life and Literature - Over two thousand extracts from ancient and modern writers, - and classified in alphabetical order • J. Purver Richardson
... plunging upon distant sands. This Pinetum stretches along the shore of the Adriatic for about forty miles, forming a belt of variable width between the great marsh and the tumbling sea. From a distance the bare stems and velvet crowns of the pine-trees stand up like palms that cover an oasis on Arabian sands; but at a nearer view the trunks detach themselves from an inferior forest-growth of juniper and thorn and ash and oak, the tall roofs of the stately firs shooting their breadth of sheltering ...
— Sketches and Studies in Italy and Greece, Second Series • John Addington Symonds
... any contempt or roughness to blend with such a putting aside of men's judgments. The velvet glove may be worn upon the iron hand. All meekness and lowliness may go with this wholesome independence, and must go with it unless that independence is false and distorted. 'With me it is a very small thing to be judged of you, or of man's judgment,' need ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture: Romans Corinthians (To II Corinthians, Chap. V) • Alexander Maclaren
... at Travers, and Travers smiled in some annoyance. The electric bell rang violently from different floors, but the young man did not heed it. He had halted the elevator between two landings, and he now seated himself on the velvet cushions and crossed one leg over the other, as though for a protracted debate. Travers gazed about him in humorous apprehension, as though alarmed at the position in which he found himself, hung as it were between the ...
— Cinderella - And Other Stories • Richard Harding Davis
... saddle and attired in the complete outfit of a vaquero.[147-1] Overcome though he was by heavy deerskin trousers, open at the side from the knees down, and fringed with bullion buttons, an enormous flat sombrero,[147-2] and stiff, short embroidered velvet jacket, I was more concerned at the ponderous saddle and equipments intended for the slim Chu Chu. That these would hide and conceal her beautiful curves and contour, as well as overweight her, seemed certain; that she would resist them all to the last ...
— Short Stories of Various Types • Various
... a star so passing fair Should in a crib be holden! Who mighty nobles' children are Should lie in cradles golden! Ah! hay and straw too wretched are, Silk, velvet, purple better far, Were for ...
— Paul Gerhardt's Spiritual Songs - Translated by John Kelly • Paul Gerhardt
... This and other Considerations formerly deliver'd, Illustrated by Experiments with black and white Marble (122, 123.) Thirdly, from the Black appearance of Holes in white Linnen, and from the appearance of Velvet stroak'd several ways, and from an Observation of Carrots (124, 125.) Fourthly, from the small Reflection from Black in a darkned Room (125, 126.) Fifthly, from the Experiment of a Checker'd Tile expos'd to the Sun-beams (127.) which is to be preferr'd before a Similar ...
— Experiments and Considerations Touching Colours (1664) • Robert Boyle
... And he came to a lake on the side of which was a fair castle, and on the border of the lake he saw a hoary-headed man sitting upon a velvet cushion, and his attendants were fishing in the lake. When the hoary-headed man beheld Perceval approaching, he arose and went into the castle. Perceval rode to the castle, and the door was open, and he entered the hall. And the hoary-headed man received ...
— Bulfinch's Mythology • Thomas Bulfinch
... knew a garden green and fair, Flanking our London river's tide, And you would think, to breathe its air And roam its virgin lawns beside, All shimmering in their velvet fleece, "Nothing can ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 152, May 23, 1917 • Various
... lazily dreaming, Young Diana, the huntress, lies: One white side thro' the violets gleaming Heaves and sinks with her golden sighs, One white breast like a diamond crownet Couched in a velvet casket glows, One white arm, tho' the violets drown it, ...
— Collected Poems - Volume Two (of 2) • Alfred Noyes
... hand rested like warm velvet upon my lips. "Not another word, Sir! You should have been at the office for evening duty half an hour ago; only I hadn't the heart to remind you. Some day, perhaps, when you have won your place in the world, we shall ...
— The Lost World • Arthur Conan Doyle
... he said, "my pearless one!" Once again he kissed it, and then, drawing his hand across his eyes, he slowly wrapped the violin in a velvet cloth, put it away in an iron box, and locked it up. But presently he changed his mind, took it out again, and put it on the table, shaking his ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... upon the stairs, and Jack Hopkins presented himself. He wore a black velvet waistcoat, with thunder-and-lightning buttons; and a blue striped shirt, ...
— The Pickwick Papers • Charles Dickens
... looked like a drunken beau half rifled by bullies, or like a fresh tenant of Newgate when he has refused the payment of garnish, or like a discovered shoplifter left to the mercy of Exchange-women {111a}, or like a bawd in her old velvet petticoat resigned into the secular hands of the mobile {111b}. Like any or like all of these, a medley of rags, and lace, and fringes, unfortunate Jack did now appear; he would have been extremely glad to see his coat in the condition of Martin's, but infinitely gladder to ...
— A Tale of a Tub • Jonathan Swift
... time there was a fashionable furor for lace work. Mother sent me to learn it, and then procured me pupils, whom I taught, usually sitting on their knee. But lace work soon gave way to painting on velvet. This, too, I learned, and found profit in selling pictures. Ah, what pictures I did make. I reached the culminating glory of artist life, when Judge Braden, of Butler, gave me a new crisp five dollar bill for a Goddess of Liberty. Indeed, he ...
— Half a Century • Jane Grey Cannon Swisshelm
... kind, fled from this visitor, and crept into holes and corners, moaning and wailing in a low and broken tone. He came into the middle of the hall, and still he seemed no more than an ordinary man, only somewhat fantastically dressed, in a doublet of black velvet pinked upon scarlet satin under his cloak, a jewel in his ear, with large roses in his shoes, and a kerchief in his hand, which he sometimes ...
— Woodstock; or, The Cavalier • Sir Walter Scott
... liked to sew, but I never had much to do with. Mrs. Thomas makes lovely things for all the town ladies. Did you know Mrs. Gardener is having a purple velvet made? The velvet came from Omaha. My, but it's lovely!" Lena sighed softly and stroked her cashmere folds. "Tony knows I never did like out-of-door work," ...
— My Antonia • Willa Sibert Cather
... in the abyss; the Indians in their bright colors, riding up the river trail; the eagle poised like a feather on the air, and a beneath him the grazing cattle making black dots on the sage; the deep velvet azure of the sky; the golden lights on the bare peaks and the lilac veils in the far ravines; the silky rustle of a canyon swallow as he shot downward in the sweep of the wind; the fragrance of cedar, the flowers of the spear-pointed ...
— Wildfire • Zane Grey
... strange old man, not unlike my mother, but with a nose more hooked, small dark eyes, and a bald head on which he set a cap of velvet. Even in the heat of summer he was always cold and wore a frayed fur robe, complaining much if he came into a draught of air. Indeed he looked like a Jew, though a good Christian enough, and laughed about it, because he said that this appearance of his served ...
— The Virgin of the Sun • H. R. Haggard
... entered the apartment accordingly, holding in her hand a number of papers. Her dress was a mourning habit, with a deep train of black velvet, which was borne by a little favourite attendant, a deaf and dumb girl, whom, in compassion to her misfortune, the Countess had educated about her person for some years. Upon this unfortunate being, with the ...
— Peveril of the Peak • Sir Walter Scott
... machine of his own,—proceeded to invent a machine for using up silk waste (then cast away as useless), spinning it into silk of the finest kind, and by means of the power-loom to weave it into velvet of the best quality. The attempt had never before been made by any inventor; and it seemed to be of insuperable difficulty. Mr. Lister had already made a fortune by the success of his combing machine, such as to enable him to retire from business, and live in comfort ...
— Thrift • Samuel Smiles
... the great shining God Within thy mind, seest not; but I see And sicken at them. Yet do I not require Thy purpose; whether thy proud heart must have The wound of death from steel that has not toucht The peevish misery these Jews call blood; Whether thy mind is for velvet slavery In the desires of some Assyrian lord— Forgive me, Judith! there my love spoke, made Foolish with injury; and I should be Unwise to stay here, lest it break the hold I have it in. I go, and I am humbled. But thou shalt have ...
— Emblems Of Love • Lascelles Abercrombie
... glimmered the shimmering avalanche of dislodged snow. Amid this ever-shifting panorama, giving it life and beauty, covering pool and channel with merry, restless knots of diving, feeding, coquetting, quarreling swimmers, relieving the colorless ice with groups of jetty velvet and scoter ducks, gray and white-winged coots, crested mergansers in their gorgeous spring plumage, and fat, lazy black ducks, with Lilliputian blue and green winged teal, filling the air with the whirr of swift pinions, and the ceaseless ...
— Adrift in the Ice-Fields • Charles W. Hall
... fortune of her own. Two of the most glorious rubies in the world represent her lips; her eyes are sapphires that put to shame the rocks of all the Sultans; when she smiles, you may look upon pearls that would make the Queen of Sheba's trinkets look like chinaware; her skin is of the rarest and richest velvet; her hair is all silk and a yard wide; and, best of all, she has a heart of pure gold. So there you are, me man. Half the royal progeny of Europe have been suitors for her hand, and the other half would be if they didn't happen to ...
— Green Fancy • George Barr McCutcheon
... this platform one had to walk up four or five steps, which were made of hard rubber, over which was laid a thick red velvet carpet, which continued across the platform and up this most impressive flight of stairs and disappeared into the opening in the Little Peace Maker. Bands were playing, children were laughing, but not one soldier was ...
— L. P. M. - The End of the Great War • J. Stewart Barney
... sharp conditions of his new life, stamp themselves upon his consciousness as the signet on soft wax;—a single pressure is enough. Let me strengthen the image a little. Did you ever happen to see that most soft-spoken and velvet-handed steam-engine at the Mint? The smooth piston slides backward and forward as a lady might slip her delicate finger in and out of a ring. The engine lays one of its fingers calmly, but firmly, upon a bit of metal; it is a coin now, and will remember that touch, and tell ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 1, Issue 2, December, 1857 • Various
... dark, and it seemed to Herbert so vast and strange at this late hour. Candles gleamed on the altar, at the end of a long, shadowy aisle. Their footsteps made no sound on the velvet carpet as they walked under the dim arches to the front seat. His aunts and his uncles and his brother's big friends from the training camp seemed suddenly to appear out of the shadows and silently fill the front rows. In the queer light he kept recognizing familiar faces that smiled and nodded at ...
— Four Days - The Story of a War Marriage • Hetty Hemenway
... velvet-footed, from the velvety stem. The pileus is thin, submembranaceous, smooth, convex, or expanded, grayish-rufous when moist, cinereous when dry, a half to one and a half ...
— The Mushroom, Edible and Otherwise - Its Habitat and its Time of Growth • M. E. Hard
... the body of the King himself lay outstretched; that was too sad for a little boy. But Castrum doloris was sheer delight, and it really was splendid. First you picked your way for a long time along narrow corridors, then high up in the black-draped hall appeared the coffin covered with black velvet, strewn with shining, twinkling stars. And a crowd of candles all round. It was the most magnificent sight I had ...
— Recollections Of My Childhood And Youth • George Brandes
... big feather bed, and unfastened the inner window shutters, and drew the cotton blind and opened the window, though the paint had stuck, and looked out upon the veld. The great stars throbbed in the purple velvet darkness overhead. The falling dew wetted the hand she stretched out into the cool night air. She drew back the hand and touched her cheek with it, and started, for the fresh, cool, fragrant touch seemed like that ...
— The Dop Doctor • Clotilde Inez Mary Graves
... sweet, silvery notes, in the same pitch of voice, and quite unaccented; the latter marks, the concluding notes, wherein the tone and inflection are changed. The throat and breast of the male are a rich black, like velvet, his face yellow, and his ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 104, June, 1866 • Various
... not sway by the power of his melody. He played a lullaby, and all things slept. He played a love-lilt, and the flowers sprang up in full bloom from the cold earth, and the dreaming red rosebud opened wide her velvet petals, and all the land seemed full of the loving echoes of the lilt he played. He played a war-march, and, afar off, the sleeping tyrants of the forest sprang up, wide awake, and bared their angry ...
— A Book of Myths • Jean Lang
... bouncing buck, and velvet chair, Clement comes but once a year; Off with the pot, and on with the pan, A good ...
— Rhymes Old and New • M.E.S. Wright
... merchant. As soon as he ceases to pay these dues he ceases to be a merchant in the legal sense of the term, and returns to the class to which he formerly belonged. There are some families whose members have belonged to the merchant class for several generations, and the law speaks about a certain "velvet-book" (barkhatnaya kniga) in which their names should be inscribed, but in reality they do not form a distinct category, and they descend at once from their privileged position as soon as they cease to pay ...
— Russia • Donald Mackenzie Wallace
... closet with the Fleece about his neck (Don John of Austria is armed upon the deck.) The walls are hung with velvet that is black and soft as sin, And little dwarfs creep out of it and little dwarfs creep in. He holds a crystal phial that has colours like the moon, He touches, and it tingles, and he trembles very soon, And his face is as a fungus of a ...
— Modern British Poetry • Various
... the village he picked up a friend and put her in the carriage. She was a velvet-coated old lady with a flat white face and two bright birdlike brown eyes which she never took off us. Conversation was impossible, as she had only one tooth, round which her speech whistled unintelligibly, and she hiccuped loudly ...
— The Luck of Thirteen - Wanderings and Flight through Montenegro and Serbia • Jan Gordon
... the yelling charge of the Afghan ghazi. All were dressed in their bravest and best for the occasion, as is meet for him who goes to meet his Lord, most of them in pure white, but some of the leaders in richly embroidered velvet coats. The fight was short, desperate, and decisive; and in the end every one of these brave, if misguided, warriors was killed or captured. The brunt of the charge fell on the 18th Punjab Infantry, who lost one officer and sixteen men in ...
— The Story of the Guides • G. J. Younghusband
... smooth Bandhuka-leaves; thy cheek Which the dark-tinted Madhuk's velvet shows; Thy long-lashed Lotus eyes, lustrous and meek; Thy nose a Tila-bud; thy teeth like rows Of Kunda-petals! he who pierceth hearts Points with thy lovelinesses all ...
— Indian Poetry • Edwin Arnold
... appearance. Not that his broadening-out did not suit him; the slight stoutness his slender figure with its formerly somewhat stiff but always perfect carriage had assumed suited his years, and the silver threads that commenced to gleam in his beard and at his temples. It suited also the comfortable velvet coat he always put on as soon as he came home, suited his whole manner of being. Strange that anybody could become such a practical person, to whom everything relating to business had formerly been such a burden, nay, even most repugnant. He would not have picked up ...
— The Son of His Mother • Clara Viebig
... as keen as a razor. It was about ten inches long, and not more than half an inch broad, with a hilt of carved ivory, yellow with age, and inlaid with fine lines of silver. Certainly a very dangerous weapon. The sheath was of purple velvet, very worn and faded. ...
— The Seven Secrets • William Le Queux
... lofty trees succeed giant mountains. As the first grow higher the second diminish. This is the land of ferns and mosses. The air feels soft, slightly damp, and smells of moist leaves. It is as different to the sharp dry air of the Canterbury ranges as velvet is to canvas; it soothes, and in hot weather relaxes. The black birch with dark trunk, spreading branches, and light leaves, is now mingled with the queenly rimu, and the stiff, small-leaved, formal white pine. ...
— The Long White Cloud • William Pember Reeves
... quite a boy, composed his whole audience. The Doctor's spouse invited me behind the curtains to the fire, on one side of which sat the great conjuror himself, his person being enveloped in an old green, greasy roquelaire, and his head decorated with a black velvet cap. On the other side of the fire-place sat Mrs. Katerfelto and daughter, in a corresponding style of dress—that is to say, equally ancient and uncleanly. The family appeared, indeed, to be in distressed circumstances. ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 17, No. 477, Saturday, February 19, 1831 • Various
... Burton allowed herself to slip back in her chair, resting her head more comfortably against a brown velvet cushion. ...
— The Campfire Girls on the Field of Honor • Margaret Vandercook
... headgear was then of beaver, like a squashed top hat, very broad at the top, narrowing sharply to a wide curly brim, which curious head-covering, well forced down over his ears, is generally ornamented with a black velvet band, and a buckle, sometimes of silver, stuck right in ...
— Through Finland in Carts • Ethel Brilliana Alec-Tweedie
... broadcast her gorgeous colors and her melting mellowness. That men might not surfeit of her sweets, she tempered her daytime prodigality of heat by nights of frost. People were coming back to town, a few, very few, in velvet gowns, but mostly in rags and anxious about their autumn wardrobes; and yet these were days to make one long, as one does in spring, for the smell of the good brown earth and the sniff of untainted country ...
— Jewel Weed • Alice Ames Winter
... before them pale and trembling, declaring that his son had very nearly been assassinated the day before, near the palace. The mob had insulted him on account of the ostentatious luxury of his wife, whose house was hung with red velvet edged with gold fringe. This lady was the daughter of Nicholas de Camus, who arrived in Paris with twenty francs in his pocket, became secretary of state, and accumulated wealth enough to divide nine millions of francs among his children ...
— Twenty Years After • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... the topic of this poor menial's tragic history, it may be as well to trace the progress of the romantic legend, as it blossomed after the death of the Man, whose Mask was not of iron, but of black velvet. Later we shall show how the legend struck root and flowered, from the moment when the poor valet, Martin (by his prison pseudonym "Eustache Dauger"), was immured in the French fortress of Pignerol, in ...
— The Lock and Key Library/Real Life #2 • Julian Hawthorne
... than he would fain admit! This girl with the enthralling face and noble beauty of form, had a mind as well. All the slavish adoration she received had not robbed her of that. It was an experience to him, as they lounged there on the taffrail together in the gold-spangled velvet hush of the tropical night. How delightfully companionable she could be, he thought; so responsive, so discriminating and unargumentative. Argumentativeness in women was a detestable vice, in his opinion, for it meant everything but what the word ...
— The Sign of the Spider • Bertram Mitford
... flushed mind recorded automatically, and with acute vividness, every detail of the room; the pattern of the gray French wall-paper, with the watered stripe, and of the hot, velvet upholstery, buff on a crimson ground; the architecture of the stained walnut sideboard and overmantel, with their ridiculous pediments and little shelves and bevelled mirrors; the tapestry curtains, the palms in shining turquoise blue pots, ...
— The Immortal Moment - The Story of Kitty Tailleur • May Sinclair
... face was shrunken, shrivelled, and of a chalky whiteness, except where relieved by two or three glaring red blotches like those occasioned by the erysipelas: one of these blotches extended diagonally across the face, completely covering up an eye as if with a band of red velvet. In this disgusting condition the body had been brought up from the cabin at noon to be thrown overboard, when the mate getting a glimpse of it (for he now saw it for the first time), and being either touched with remorse for his crime or struck ...
— The Works of Edgar Allan Poe - Volume 3 (of 5) of the Raven Edition • Edgar Allan Poe |
