"Burnish" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... it suiteth me," said Mr Headley coolly. "He wotteth well that Hillyer hath none who can burnish plate ...
— The Armourer's Prentices • Charlotte M. Yonge
... believed that some pearls were constituted by flashes of lightning playing on bubbles within the oyster. A relative of the family here seemed to be wooing the tropic sun of its beams, if not to vitalise, at least to burnish ...
— Tropic Days • E. J. Banfield
... Or, haply, to all eyes unknown, Is borne away without a groan, On a chance plank, 'mid joyful cries Of birds that pierce the sunny skies With seaward dash, or in calm bands Parading o'er the silvery sands, Or mid the lovely flush of shells, Pausing to burnish crest or wing. No fading footmark see that tells Of that poor ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 12, - Issue 344 (Supplementary Issue) • Various
... can ennoble even the fattest and flattest faces with its wonderful faculty for making mere surface markings, mere crowsfeet, interesting. Thus also with bronze: the polished, worked bronze, of fine chocolate burnish and reddish reflections, mars all beauty of line; how different the unchased, merely rough cast, greenish, with infinite delicate greys and browns, making, for instance, the head of an old woman like an exquisite withered, shrivelled, veined ...
— Euphorion - Being Studies of the Antique and the Mediaeval in the - Renaissance - Vol. II • Vernon Lee
... barge she sat in, like a burnish'd throne, Burn'd on the water. The poop was beaten gold; Purple the sails, and so perfumed that The winds were love-sick with them. The oars were silver, Which to the tune of flutes kept stroke, and made The water which they beat to follow faster, As ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to prose. Volume I (of X) - Greece • Various
... Knowing well that I have never had one hour of inspiration since it was begun, and have only beaten out my metal by brute force and patient repetition, I hoped some day to get a "spate of style" and burnish it—fine mixed metaphor. I am now so sick that I intend, when the Letters are done and some more written that will be wanted, simply to make a book of it by the pruning-knife. I cannot fight longer; ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 25 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... burnish'd brand and musketoon So gallantly you come, I read you for a bold Dragoon, That lists the tuck of drum." "I list no more the tuck of drum, No more the trumpet hear; But when the beetle sounds his hum My comrades take the spear. And O! though Brignall ...
— The Golden Treasury - Of the Best Songs and Lyrical Poems in the English Language • Various
... fathoms, and there lie like a duck in fifty or sixty feet of water. I remember on one occasion, however, that when we next weighed the anchor, it came up with parts polished bright, as in my childhood we used sometimes to burnish a copper cent. This seemed to show that it had been scoured hard along a sandy bottom. We had had no suspicion of the ship's dragging during the gale, and I have since supposed that it may have started from its bed as we began to heave, and so been ...
— From Sail to Steam, Recollections of Naval Life • Captain A. T. Mahan
... The Crocodile commands religious fear: Where Memnon's statue magic strings inspire With vocal sounds, that emulate the lyre; And Thebes, such, Fate, are thy disastrous turns! Now prostrate o'er her pompous ruins mourns; A monkey-god, prodigious to be told! Strikes the beholder's eye with burnish'd gold: To godship here blue Triton's scaly herd, The river-progeny is there preferr'd: Through towns Diana's power neglected lies, Where to her dogs aspiring temples rise: And should you leeks or onions eat, no time Would expiate the sacrilegious ...
— The Ancient History of the Egyptians, Carthaginians, Assyrians, • Charles Rollin
... trees and shrubs are the white thorn, maple-leaved or Virginia thorn (suitable for hedging), hawthorn, wild May cherry, or service berry, water beech, fringe tree, red bud, black alder, common alder, sumach, elder, laurel, witch-hazel, hazel-nut, papaw, chinkapin, burnish bush, nine bark, button-bush, honeysuckle, several varieties of the whortleberry or huckleberry, ...
— History and Comprehensive Description of Loudoun County, Virginia • James W. Head
... a fiery gospel writ in burnish'd rows of steel: "As you deal with my contemners, so with you my grace shall deal; Let the Hero, born of woman, crush the serpent with his heel, ...
— Scouting For Girls, Official Handbook of the Girl Scouts • Girl Scouts
... speaking, he closed his literary toils at dinner;" "Considering the burnish of her French tastes, her noticing even ...
— An English Grammar • W. M. Baskervill and J. W. Sewell
... the air; and then Crawls back neglected to his den.[4] So, when the war has raised a storm, I've seen a snake in human form, All stain'd with infamy and vice, Leap from the dunghill in a trice, Burnish and make a gaudy show, Become a general, peer, and beau, Till peace has made the sky serene, Then shrink into its hole again. "All this we grant—why then, look yonder, Sure that must be a Salamander!" Further, we are by Pliny told, This serpent is extremely cold; So cold, that, put ...
— The Poems of Jonathan Swift, D.D., Volume I (of 2) • Jonathan Swift
... inset with tracts of heath and bracken, for miles around. The whole arc of the sky, the whole circle of the world's rim, lay bare to the eye, infinitely varied by clouds and cloud-shadows, by pasture and arable, dark patches of woods and pallor of pools, by the lambent burnish of the west and the soft purpling of the east, even by differing weathers—here great shafts of sunlight, there the blurred column of a distant shower, or the faint smear, like a bruise upon the horizon, ...
— Secret Bread • F. Tennyson Jesse
... barge she sat in, like a burnish'd throne Burn'd on the water; the poop was beaten gold; Purple the sails, and so perfumed, that The winds were lovesick with them; the oars were silver, Which to the time of flutes kept stroke, and made The water which they beat to follow faster ...
— The Development of the Feeling for Nature in the Middle Ages and - Modern Times • Alfred Biese
... knowledge, and our walk was enlivened by some rather too lively discussions between us. We walked about together, however, till the shadows of the firs by the mills stretched nearly across the pond and the white moon began to put on a silvery burnish. Then we wound up by a bitter dispute, during which Gussie's eyes were very black and each cheek had a round, red stain on it. She had a little air of triumph at having ...
— Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1896 to 1901 • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... D'Aguesseau! In that illustrious catalogue of names, which she claims as of her children, and with honest pride holds up to the admiration of other nations, the name of LA FAYETTE has already for centuries been enrolled. And it shall henceforth burnish into brighter fame: for, if in after days, a Frenchman shall be called to indicate the character of his nation by that of one individual, during the age in which we live, the blood of lofty patriotism shall mantle in his cheek, the fire of conscious ...
— Life and Public Services of John Quincy Adams - Sixth President of the Unied States • William H. Seward
... and column'd towers, Unconscious of the stony hours; Harsh gateways startled at a sound, With burning lamps all burnish'd round; - ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... rejected by a virtuous Senate; and again by the glove of defiance hurled by the apostle of nullification at the avowed policy of the British empire peacefully to promote the extinction of slavery throughout the world. Young men of Boston, burnish your armor—prepare for the conflict; and I say to you, in the language of Galgacus to the ancient Britons, 'Think of your forefathers! ...
— Memoir of the Life of John Quincy Adams. • Josiah Quincy
... finished," returned Steve, with a laugh. "She's a city girl now. I've been looking schools over. There are several establishments where they burnish up young ...
— A Little Girl in Old New York • Amanda Millie Douglas
... and flight is shame! If any man shall hearken to the words Of this thy counsel, I will smite from him His head with sharp blue steel, and hurl it down For soaring kites to feast on. Up! all ye Who care to enkindle men to battle: rouse Our warriors all throughout the fleet to whet The spear, to burnish corslet, helm and shield; And cause both man and horse, all which be keen In fight, to break their fast. Then in yon plain Who is ...
— The Fall of Troy • Smyrnaeus Quintus
... the paths of Paradise more sweet; Bethought him of a wife ere half way gone, For 'twas uneasy travelling alone; And, in this masquerade of mirth and love, Mistook the bliss of heaven for Bacchanals above. Sure he presumed of praise, who came to stock The ethereal pastures with so fair a flock, Burnish'd, and battening on their food, to show 390 Their diligence of careful herds below. Our Panther, though like these she changed her head, Yet, as the mistress of a monarch's bed, Her front erect with majesty she bore, The crosier wielded, and the mitre ...
— The Poetical Works of John Dryden, Vol I - With Life, Critical Dissertation, and Explanatory Notes • John Dryden
... is, Till the sunshine, striking this, Alchemise its dulness, When the sleek curls manifold Flash all over into gold With a burnish'd fulness. ...
— Heads and Tales • Various
... deposited from a hot cyanide solution is spongy in the extreme, and if the maximum wear-resisting effect is to be obtained, it is advisable to burnish the gold rather than to rely ...
— On Laboratory Arts • Richard Threlfall
... He saw a girl in a dress of pink silk, standing in the front of the box, with her hands upon the ledge and leaning her head a little forwards beyond it. The glare striking up from the stage beneath her gave a burnish of copper to her hair and a warm light to her face. She seemed of a fragile figure and with features regular and delicate. Drake received a notion of unimpressive prettiness and turned his attention to the stage. When the lights were raised again in the auditorium, he noticed that Fielding ...
— The Philanderers • A.E.W. Mason
... pleasure. She was of an unusual type, tall and dark, dressed in black with the simplicity of a nun, with only a little gleam of white at her throat. Her hair—so much of it as showed under her flower-garlanded hat—was as black as jet, and yet, where she stood in the full glare of the sunlight, the burnish of it was almost wine-coloured. Her cheeks were pale, her expression thoughtful. Her eyes, rather heavily lidded, were a deep shade of violet. Her mouth ...
— The Great Prince Shan • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... the wattle gold trembles 'Twixt shadow and shine, When each dew-laden air draught resembles A long draught of wine; When the sky-line's blue burnish'd resistance Makes deeper the dreamiest distance, Some song in all hearts hath existence, — ...
— An Anthology of Australian Verse • Bertram Stevens
... through the tide, Then his clear glitt'ring side Is burnish'd with silver and gold; And the sweep of his flight Seems a rainbow of light, As again he ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel, Volume V. - The Songs of Scotland of the Past Half Century • Various
... melting lustre in her dark eyes, a gentleness in the smiling corners of her irresistible mouth. Her cheeks, even, seemed to have gained an added softness of contour. While the masses of dark hair revealed beneath her hat shone with the burnish of ...
— The Forfeit • Ridgwell Cullum
... side the Persians form'd;— First a light cloud of horse, Tartars they seem'd. The Ilyats of Khorassan deg.; and behind, deg.138 The royal troops of Persia, horse and foot, Marshall'd battalions bright in burnish'd steel. 140 But Peran-Wisa with his herald came, Threading the Tartar squadrons to the front, And with his staff kept back the foremost ranks. And when Ferood, who led the Persians, saw That Peran-Wisa kept the Tartars back, 145 He took ...
— Matthew Arnold's Sohrab and Rustum and Other Poems • Matthew Arnold
... bird of Paradise; And for no less than aromatic wine Of maidens-blush, commix'd with jessamine. Clean was the hearth, the mantle larded jet, Which, wanting Lar and smoke, hung weeping wet; At last i' th' noon of winter, did appear A ragg'd soused neats-foot, with sick vinegar; And in a burnish'd flagonet, stood by Beer small as comfort, dead as charity. At which amazed, and pond'ring on the food, How cold it was, and how it chill'd my blood, I curst the master, and I damn'd the souce, And swore I'd ...
— A Selection From The Lyrical Poems Of Robert Herrick • Robert Herrick
... bringing forward the argument that colours suffer in grey weather, and that strong sunlight is necessary to all the hues of heaven and earth. Here again there are two words to be said; and it is essential to distinguish. It is true that sun is needed to burnish and bring into bloom the tertiary and dubious colours; the colour of peat, pea-soup, Impressionist sketches, brown velvet coats, olives, grey and blue slates, the complexions of vegetarians, the tints of volcanic rock, chocolate, ...
— Alarms and Discursions • G. K. Chesterton
... corroded in places. She got a cloth and burnished them until they shone like gold. When she replaced it, the contrast with the other sword hurt her, and a rush of remorseful tenderness made her take that down also, and burnish it carefully. Poor father! almost as unknown as the young brother, she was grieved that he should have been the ...
— Princess • Mary Greenway McClelland
... sad farewell! To you my grateful heart still fondly clings, Tho' fluttering round on Fancy's burnish'd wings Her tales of future Joy Hope loves to tell. Adieu, adieu! ye much-lov'd cloisters pale! 5 Ah! would those happy days return again, When 'neath your arches, free from every stain, I heard of guilt and wonder'd at the tale! Dear haunts! where oft my simple ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge - Vol I and II • Samuel Taylor Coleridge
... the midst, a double throne. Like burnish'd cloud of evening shone; While, group'd the base around, Four Damsels stood of Faery race; Who, turning each with heavenly grace Upon me her immortal face, Transfix'd me to ...
— The Sylphs of the Season with Other Poems • Washington Allston
... often hung heavy on his hands, especially during the long hours of the evening. After thanking his father for his kindness, he rushed wildly off to order his horse to be prepared for him to accompany the troop, to re-burnish the arms which he had already chosen as fitting him from the armory, and to make what few preparations were necessary for ...
— Friends, though divided - A Tale of the Civil War • G. A. Henty
... chuckie Reekie's sair distrest, Down drops her ance weel burnish'd crest, Nae joy her bonnie buskit nest Can yield ava; Her darling bird that ...
— The Complete Works of Robert Burns: Containing his Poems, Songs, and Correspondence. • Robert Burns and Allan Cunningham
... That that foul miscreant's dark and stubborn flesh Recks not the force of arms:—such I forswear, Nor sword nor burnish'd shield of ample round Ask for the war; all weaponless, hand to hand (So may great Higelac's smile repay my toil) Beowulf will grapple with the mighty foe.'" ...
— Legends of the Middle Ages - Narrated with Special Reference to Literature and Art • H.A. Guerber
... . . . . . HOPE holds to Christ the mind's own mirror out To take His lovely likeness more and more. It will not well, so she would bring about An ever brighter burnish than before And turns to wash it from her welling eyes And breathes the blots off all with sighs on sighs. Her glass is blest but she as good as blind Holds till hand aches and wonders what is there; Her glass drinks light, she darkles down behind, All of ...
— Poems of Gerard Manley Hopkins - Now First Published • Gerard Manley Hopkins
... opened the gate. And Kai went in by himself, and he saluted Gwrnach the Giant. And a chair was placed for him opposite to Gwrnach. And Gwrnach said to him, "Oh man! is it true that is reported of thee, that thou knowest how to burnish swords?" "I know full well how to do so," answered Kai. Then was the sword of Gwrnach brought to him. And Kai took a blue whetstone from under his arm, and asked him whether he would have it burnished white ...
— The Mabinogion • Lady Charlotte Guest
... thing that was familiar since he was seen with the company—he laid his hand on Don Ruy's shoulder and felt that the horse lost was as a brother lost, and Chico had a fancy of his own to caress it, and even burnish the silver ...
— The Flute of the Gods • Marah Ellis Ryan
... cordiality, an exaggeration of family importance, and—the sniff. Danger—so indispensable in bringing out the fundamental quality of any society, group, or individual—was what the Forsytes scented; the premonition of danger put a burnish on their armour. For the first time, as a family, they appeared to have an instinct of being in contact, with some strange ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... burnisher, turpentine and beeswax; polish, shoe polish. [art of cutting and polishing gemstones] lapidary. [person who polishes gemstones] lapidary, lapidarian. V. smooth, smoothen[obs3]; plane; file; mow, 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, ...
— Roget's Thesaurus
... was a puddle of gloom and of shadowy things, He sped till the red and the gold of invisible day Was burnish and flames to the undermost spread of his wings, So he outlighted the stars as he ...
— Tam O' The Scoots • Edgar Wallace
... father gave us an excellent example in behaviour and in that gentleness, unselfishness, and sincerity which is the foundation of good breeding. My mother, who was never shy, and very good at mental diagnosis, added that burnish without which good manners often lose half their power. What she particularly insisted on was the practice of that graciousness of which she herself afforded so admirable an example. Naturally, like a good mother, she always reproved us for bad manners, or for being unkind to ...
— The Adventure of Living • John St. Loe Strachey
... done me all the honour that any man can receive from him, which is to be railed at by him." I am content to share the vituperation of this veteran—incapable in company with the poetaster George Gordon who suffered for "this Lord's station;" with that "burnish fly in the pride of May," Macaulay, and with the great trio, Darwin, Huxley and Hooker, who also have been the butts of his bitter and malignant abuse (April '63 and April '73). And lastly I have no stomach for ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 6 • Richard F. Burton
... earth taken dry out of the ground, Were of one colour with the robe he wore. From underneath that vestment forth he drew Two keys, of metal twain: the one was gold, Its fellow silver. With the pallid first, And next the burnish'd, he so ply'd the gate, As to content me well. "Whenever one Faileth of these, that in the key-hole straight It turn not, to this alley then expect Access in vain." Such were the words he spake. "One is more ...
— Song and Legend From the Middle Ages • William D. McClintock and Porter Lander McClintock
... inadequate. We ought to have been at least twenty feet high to fit the hour and the scene. Gradually the lights faded, the shadows faded, then both began to merge till a soft grey-blue dropped over all blending into the sky everywhere except west where the burnish of sunset remained. Before dark the old camp was reached; we found the saw by the last dying rays and then picked our backward path by starlight following the trail as we had come. Silence and the night were one ...
— A Canyon Voyage • Frederick S. Dellenbaugh
... Burden (refrain) rekantajxo. Burden sxargi. Burdensome multepeza. Bureau (office) oficejo. Burgess burgo. Burglar domorabisto. Burial enterigxo. Buried, to be enterigxi. Burn (trans.) bruligi. Burn (intrans.) bruli. Burner (gas) flamingo. Burnish poluri. Burrow kavigi. Bury (something) enfosi. Bury (inter.) enterigi. Bush arbetajxo. Bushel busxelo. Buskin duonboto. Business (profession) profesio. Business (in general) afero. Business-man aferisto. Bust busto. Bustle movo,—ado. Busy okupa. But sed. But (prep.) ...
— English-Esperanto Dictionary • John Charles O'Connor and Charles Frederic Hayes
... to a nicety. She had a knack of tidiness, with which she had infected the Doctor; everything was in its place; everything capable of polish shone gloriously; and dust was a thing banished from her empire. Aline, their single servant, had no other business in the world but to scour and burnish. So Doctor Desprez lived in his house like a fatted calf, warmed and ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 6 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... possibility could Coleridge's wild Rhyme have had .. aught to do with those mystical impressions which were mine, when I saw that bird upon our deck. For neither had I then read the Rhyme, nor knew the bird to be an albatross. Yet, in saying this, I do but indirectly burnish a little brighter the noble merit of the poem and the poet. I assert, then, that in the wondrous bodily whiteness of the bird chiefly lurks the secret of the spell; a truth the more evinced in this, ...
— Moby-Dick • Melville
... exterior of the barrel, lay it flat on a bench or board, to avoid bending it. The practice of supporting the barrel at each end, and rubbing it with a strap, buffstick, ramrod, or any other instrument to burnish it, is pernicious, and should ...
— Ordnance Instructions for the United States Navy. - 1866. Fourth edition. • Bureau of Ordnance, USN
... his third. But Diomede controll'd them all, and him Twice forty sable ships their leader own'd. 690 Came Agamemnon with a hundred ships, Exulting in his powers; more numerous they, And more illustrious far than other Chief Could boast, whoever. Clad in burnish'd brass, And conscious of pre-eminence, he stood. 695 He drew his host from cities far renown'd, Mycenae, and Corinthus, seat of wealth, Orneia, and Cleonae bulwark'd strong, And lovely Araethyria; Sicyon, ...
— The Iliad of Homer - Translated into English Blank Verse • Homer
... clear brow in sunlight glow'd; On burnish'd hooves his war-horse trode; From underneath his helmet flow'd His coal-black curls as on he rode, As he rode down to Camelot. [14] From the bank and from the river He flashed into the crystal mirror, "Tirra lirra," by the ...
— The Early Poems of Alfred Lord Tennyson • Tennyson
... cups and silver on the burnish'd board Sparkled and shone; so genial was the hearth: And on the right hand of the hearth he saw Philip, the slighted suitor of old times, Stout, rosy, with his babe across his knees; And o'er her second father stoopt a girl, A ...
— Enoch Arden, &c. • Alfred Tennyson
... comment. The car drew up and she stepped into it—a tall, slim figure, wonderfully graceful in her unrelieved black, her hair gleaming as though with some sort of burnish, as she passed underneath the electric light. She looked back at him with a smile of farewell as he stood bareheaded upon the steps, a smile which reminded him somehow of her father, a little sardonic, a little tender, having in ...
— The Evil Shepherd • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... incisively; the reporter took off his spectacles, and began to burnish them, for his ...
— One Wonderful Night - A Romance of New York • Louis Tracy
... always busy at his work, burnishing gold and melting silver, had no time to warm his love or to burnish and make shine his fantasies, nor to show off, gad about, waste his time in mischief, or to run after she-males. Now seeing that in Paris virgins do not fall into the beds of young men any more than roast pheasants into ...
— Droll Stories, Volume 3 • Honore de Balzac
... blaze, 215 Fan with soft breath, with kindling leaves provide, And lift the dread Destroyer on his side. So, with bright wreath of serpent-tresses crown'd, Severe in beauty, young MEDUSA frown'd; Erewhile subdued, round WISDOM'S Aegis roll'd 220 Hiss'd the dread snakes, and flam'd in burnish'd gold; Flash'd on her brandish'd arm the immortal shield, And Terror lighten'd o'er ...
— The Botanic Garden - A Poem in Two Parts. Part 1: The Economy of Vegetation • Erasmus Darwin
... pebble which his kingly foot First presses into some more costly stone Than ever blinded eye. I'll have one mark it And bring it me. I'll have it burnish'd firelike; I'll set it round with gold, with pearl, with diamond. Let the great angel of the church come with him; Stand on the deck and spread his wings for sail! God lay the waves and strow the storms at sea, And here ...
— Queen Mary and Harold • Alfred Lord Tennyson
... half out of the pulpit, was exhorting his hearers to "imitate Christ." With unspeakable disgust I gazed on this false shepherd of those who had just so failed in their duty to a poor stray lamb, Their church is so rich in ornaments, the seven baiocchi were hardly needed to burnish it. Their altar-piece is a very imposing composition, by an artist of Rome, still in the prime of his powers. Capalti. It represents the Circumcision, with the cross and six waiting angels in the background; ...
— At Home And Abroad - Or, Things And Thoughts In America and Europe • Margaret Fuller Ossoli
... piece of Silver that has been freshly Boyl'd, as the Artificers call it, (which is done by, first Brushing, and then Decocting it with Salt and Tartar, and perhaps some other Ingredients) you shall find it to be of a Lovely White. But if you take a piece of Smooth Steel, and therewith Burnish a part of it, which may be presently done, you shall find that Part will Lose its Whiteness, and turn a Speculum, looking almost every where Dark, as other Looking-glasses do, which may not a little confirm our Doctrine. ...
— Experiments and Considerations Touching Colours (1664) • Robert Boyle
... Cosy Moments stands where it did. May I count on your services, Comrade Wilberfloss? Excellent. I see I may. Then perhaps you would not mind passing the word round among Comrades Asher, Waterman, and the rest of the squad, and telling them to burnish their brains and be ready to wade in at a moment's notice. I fear you will have a pretty tough job roping in the old subscribers again, but it can be done. I look to you, Comrade ...
— Psmith, Journalist • Pelham Grenville Wodehouse
... the drawing tacked to the board of one of the men. "That'll do, Flynn," he said to the model. He glanced again at the drawing. "Bring out the hat a little more, Mack. They won't burnish it if you don't,"—to the artist. Then, turning about, ...
— Personality Plus - Some Experiences of Emma McChesney and Her Son, Jock • Edna Ferber
... sent was never meant for other than a first state; I never meant it to appear as a book. Knowing well that I have never had one hour of inspiration since it was begun, and have only beaten out my metal by brute force and patient repetition, I hoped some day to get a 'spate of style' and burnish it - fine mixed metaphor. I am now so sick that I intend, when the Letters are done and some more written that will be wanted, simply to make a book ...
— Vailima Letters • Robert Louis Stevenson
... it grows, the grass, the root of gold, The body and the bark of gold, all glistering to behold, The leaves of burnish'd gold, the fruits that thereon grow Are diadems set with pearl in gold, in gorgeous glistering show; And if this tree of gold in lieu may not suffice, Require a grove of golden trees, so Juno ...
— The Growth of English Drama • Arnold Wynne
... no novelty to Lad. But when a bath tub contained certain ingredients from boxes on the dog-closet shelf,—ingredients that fluff the coat and burnish it and make all its hairs stand out like a Circassian Beauty's, that meant but ...
— Further Adventures of Lad • Albert Payson Terhune
... basic color. You must remember always that it was a true trout, without scales, and so the more satiny. Furthermore, along either side of the belly ran two broad longitudinal stripes of exactly the color and burnish of the copper paint used on ...
— The Mountains • Stewart Edward White
... rose in early June, Fed with the sun and the dew, Each petal she said is a mount in the moon, The rose is the whole moon through and through, The moon is the whole pale-hearted rose, Round and radiance, burnish and blue, Break in the flood-tide that murmurs and flows, I love you, I ...
— Lundy's Lane and Other Poems • Duncan Campbell Scott
... Imperium was organized to secure our rights within the United States and we will make any sacrifice that can be named to attain that end. Our efforts have been to wash the flag free of all blots, not to rend it; to burnish every star in the cluster, but to pluck ...
— Imperium in Imperio: A Study Of The Negro Race Problem - A Novel • Sutton E. Griggs
... Nature made for? is it for us The beautiful world is burnish'd and blent? If we had not eyes, would blossoms shine thus? If we had not nostrils, ...
— Harry • Fanny Wheeler Hart
... with spears, and bright with burnish'd shields, The embattled legions stretch their long array; Discord's red torch, as fierce she scours the fields, With bloody tincture stains ...
— The Poetical Works of Beattie, Blair, and Falconer - With Lives, Critical Dissertations, and Explanatory Notes • Rev. George Gilfillan [Ed.]
... runs ringing through Reviews, And maids, wives, widows, smitten with my Muse, Assail me with Platonic billet-doux. From this suburban attic I'll dismount, With Coutts or Barclays open an account; Ranged in my mirror, cards, with burnish'd ends, Shall show the whole nobility my friends; That happy host with whom I choose to dine, Shall make set-parties, give his-choicest wine; And age and infancy shall gape to see The lucky bard, and ...
— Poems (1828) • Thomas Gent
... there is a temporary absence of more. Nothing shows everything more plainly and yet why is there more safety than numbers. Nobody knows the cloth to be blue. Nobody knows and nobody says what everybody seats himself to burnish. ...
— Matisse Picasso and Gertrude Stein - With Two Shorter Stories • Gertrude Stein
... is one admirable word here, enbarnis, which has so long been lost to French that it is not even in Littre. But Dryden's "burnish into man" probably preserves it in English; for this is certainly not the other "burnish" ...
— A History of the French Novel, Vol. 1 - From the Beginning to 1800 • George Saintsbury
... abrim with life; partly because in her straightness of limb and the clear treble of her voice, she was boyish. "What a pretty boy she would make!" was the first thought until you noticed the slim delicacy of her hands and feet, the burnish of gold on the dark wealth of her hair, the fine chiselling of brow and nose and chin. Then it was seen that she was all woman. She was tall and yet never looked tall. It seemed that you could pick her up with a finger, but try and she warned you of the weakness of your ...
— The Summons • A.E.W. Mason
... sun ariseth in his majesty Who doth the world so gloriously behold, That cedar-tops and hills seem burnish'd gold." ...
— William Shakespeare • John Masefield
... to the players, who have shot the drab texture of life with an infinity of bright and tender hues, so that he can bear to turn it in his hands and look upon it with a wistful pleasure. I say, then, let the shy man frequent the playhouse, and there facet and burnish his dulled mind until it reflects, if it may not touch, the ...
— Apologia Diffidentis • W. Compton Leith
... native pilot; for the post of the Blonde, and some other light ships, was between the blockading fleet and the blockaded, where perpetual vigilance was needed. This sharp service was the very thing required to improve his character, to stamp it with decision and self-reliance, and to burnish his quiet, contemplative vein with the very frequent friction of the tricks of mankind. These he now was strictly bound not to study, but anticipate, taking it as first postulate that every one would ...
— Springhaven - A Tale of the Great War • R. D. Blackmore
... mothers, household stuff, Live chattels, mincers of each other's fame, Full of weak poison, turnspits for the clown, The drunkard's football, laughing-stocks of Time, Whose brains are in their hands and in their heels, But fit to flaunt, to dress, to dance, to thrum, To tramp, to scream, to burnish, and to scour For ever slaves at home and ...
— Early Reviews of English Poets • John Louis Haney
... serving at table, a wise man's advice on the books his little Jack should read, the best English poets,—then Gower, Chaucer, Occleve, and Lydgate,—not the Catechism and Latin Grammar. It was very pleasant to come off the directions not to conveye spetell over the table, or burnish one's bones with one's teeth, to the burst of enthusiasm with which the writer speaks of our old poets. He evidently believed in them with all his heart; and it would have been a good thing for England if our educators since had followed his example. If the time ...
— Caxton's Book of Curtesye • Frederick J. Furnivall
... Evan, undaunted Lochiel, Place thy targe on thy shoulder and burnish thy steel! Rough Keppoch, give breath to thy bugle's bold swell, Till far ...
— Waverley, Or 'Tis Sixty Years Hence, Complete • Sir Walter Scott
... went to the same school with Donald. She was a shy little thing with big brown eyes, which looked at you wistfully, and a mass of yellow hair, which the sun in the summer mornings loved to burnish. Minnie at the age of ten felt drawn to Donald, as timid women generally feel drawn toward masterful men, ignoring the steadier love of gentler natures. Donald had from the start constituted himself her protector in a ...
— The Hunted Outlaw - Donald Morrison, The Canadian Rob Roy • Anonymous
... each about a foot in length. One piece should be too soft, another too hard, and the third piece of the right quality. Fix them in a vice, about an inch apart and in a vertical position, and with the light from a window shining upon them. Burnish them if necessary, and you will see a band of ...
— The Aeroplane Speaks - Fifth Edition • H. Barber
... round slim arms showed to the elbow; her hat she had taken off, and the sun danced in the gold lustres of her hair. She was all aglow; she belonged out in the fresh air and the sunlight like this; she could stand it; that dusky-gold radiance played from her like a burnish. Steering sat down on the log bench and watched her, hypnotised by her into haunting fancies of something, somebody, somewhere. She was one of those beings whose rich magnetism of face and personality brings them close to you, not only for the present, but also for the past, one of those people ...
— Sally of Missouri • R. E. Young
... serves, with the help of art, to adorn a great deal. How long did the canvas hang afore Aldgate? Were the people suffered to see the city's Love and Charity, while they were rude stone, before they were painted and burnish'd? No: no more should Servants approach their mistresses, but when they are ...
— Epicoene - Or, The Silent Woman • Ben Jonson
... a pair of delicate blue-green moths, with white bodies, and touches of lavender and straw colour. All around her lay flower-brocaded grasses, behind the deep green background of the forest, while the sun slowly sifted gold from heaven to burnish her hair. Mrs. Comstock heard a ...
— A Girl Of The Limberlost • Gene Stratton Porter
... and take off all that mud; it's filthy"; this was absolutely unnecessary and the fellows swore vehemently under their breath; to the drivers,—"Clean up that 'ere 'arness and get that mud hoff it"; he also compelled us to burnish the steel and made the gunners scrub the paint off the brass and sandpaper it up. This necessitated the men going to a shop and purchasing the sandpaper themselves, as disobedience of the order meant a sojourn in the clink and the excuse that ...
— S.O.S. Stand to! • Reginald Grant
... him in a path And drew a burnish'd brand And fifteen o' the foremost slew Till back the ...
— Sir Walter Scott and the Border Minstrelsy • Andrew Lang
... methinks, I seem to see One spot of burning brightness, beaming clear Through all the floating glory, like a sphere Quenching light with its own intensity. Yes! yes! it is the Holy City I behold, With God's sun, from its towers of burnish'd ...
— Poems • Walter R. Cassels
... them. All that I have observed since, of flowers and plants, and grass-plots, and of suburb delights, seems to me borrowed from 'that first garden of my innocence'—to be slips and scions stolen from that bed of memory. In this manner the darlings of our childhood burnish out in the eye of after years, and derive their sweetest perfume from the first heartfelt sigh of ...
— Table-Talk - Essays on Men and Manners • William Hazlitt |
