"Couchant" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... laughed at me once for an experience of my own at the Piper's Knowe, on which any man, with a couchant ear close to the grass, may hear fairy tunes ...
— John Splendid - The Tale of a Poor Gentleman, and the Little Wars of Lorn • Neil Munro
... and after dinner we began to tell fortunes and laughed almost as much as we did before, that is, the others did, but I could not. Then we poured melted wax into cold water (it is the shadow that is looked at). I had in succession a lion couchant with one of his front paws extended, holding a rose; isn't it odd? Then a great heap of something surmounted by ...
— Marie Bashkirtseff (From Childhood to Girlhood) • Marie Bashkirtseff
... Day-light Gate, i.e. Evening, the down gate of daylight. See Promptuarium Parvulorum, (edited by Way for the Camden Society,) page 188, "Gate down, or downe gate of the Sunne or any other planet."—Occasus. Palgrave gives, "At the sonne gate downe; sur le soleil couchant." ...
— Discovery of Witches - The Wonderfull Discoverie of Witches in the Countie of Lancaster • Thomas Potts
... stern at me, "Don't laugh yet!" says he, like thunder. "Well, he goes on: Mr. George caught my eye across the table, and said, so as not to be heard by his uncle, 'If that bird was rampant, you would see your own arms, Marquis.'" And Mel replied, quietly for him to hear, 'And as that bird is couchant, Mr. George, you had better look to your sauce.' Couchant means squatting, you know. That's heraldry! Well, that wasn't bad sparring of Mel's. But, bless you! he was never taken aback, and the gentlefolks was glad enough to get him to sit down amongst 'em. So, says Mr. George, ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... chestnut and others—and makes a handsome addition to the garden, irrespective of its historical associations. The chalet is of dark wood varnished, and has in the centre a large carving of Dickens's crest, which in heraldic terms is described as: "a lion couchant 'or,' holding in the ...
— A Week's Tramp in Dickens-Land • William R. Hughes
... at which time it is said this remarkable pulpit was put up; and notwithstanding its great age, which appears to be 832 years, it is still in good condition. At the foot of the steps is a large figure, intended to represent a lion couchant, but carved after so grotesque a fashion, as to puzzle the naturalist in his attempts to determine its proper classification. In other respects the ornamental sculpture about the pulpit is neat and appropriate, and presents ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 12, - Issue 348, December 27, 1828 • Various
... is vested in a long dark habit, buttoned down to the feet, after the manner of a cassock, the ordinary dress of an English gentleman at the time. There is a garland of four roses round his head, and at his feet a lion couchant. The SS collar adorns the neck, with a pendant jewel, on which a swan is engraved—the device of Richard II, to whom Gower was Poet Laureate. On the wall of the canopy, at the foot of the tomb, there is a sculptured and coloured representation ...
— Bell's Cathedrals: Southwark Cathedral • George Worley
... downright beggars. Ay, Without equivocation, statute beggars, Couchant and passant, guardant, rampant beggars; Current and vagrant, stockant, ...
— Rookwood • William Harrison Ainsworth
... dragoons, proceeded to prepare it for the reception of the ladies. It was a cumbrous vehicle, whose faded linings and tarnished hammer-cloth, together with its panels of changing color, denoted the want of that art which had once given it luster and beauty. The "lion couchant" of the Wharton arms was reposing on the reviving splendor of a blazonry that told the armorial bearings of a prince of the church; and the miter, that began to shine through its American mask, was a symbol of the rank of its original owner. The chaise which conveyed Miss Singleton was also safe, ...
— The Spy • James Fenimore Cooper
... no one has depicted man's sense of guilt and fear more eloquently than Dean Stanley when speaking of the Egyptian Sphinx. Proceeding upon the theory that that time-worn and mysterious relic is a couchant lion whose projecting paws were long since buried in the desert sands, and following the tradition that an altar once stood before that mighty embodiment of power, he graphically pictures the transient generations of men, in all the sin and weakness of their ...
— Oriental Religions and Christianity • Frank F. Ellinwood
... and strong, and that can reach to the bottom, and also beyond, of all misery and distress, that Christians are subject to in this life. Indeed mercy seems to be asleep, when we are sinking: for then we are as if all things were careless of us, but it is but as a lion couchant, it will awake in time for our help (Psa 44:22,26, Mark 4:36-39). And forasmuch as this term is it, which is applicable to the lion in his den; it may be to shew that as a lion, so will God at the fittest season, arise for the help and deliverance of a sinking people. Hence when ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... existence, with its great and rapid transitions, happy events are always imminent. One may be performing her own menialities to-day, and to-morrow, in an ambassador's carriage, be folded in a fur robe with couchant lions upon it; to-day be quartered in a single attic, to-morrow be treading the tapestries of her own drawing-rooms. Thus the golden Fate turns and keeps turning; it is only when, through frigidness or fear, we refuse to ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 102, April, 1866 • Various
... he said,—the room was glowing with light, the boys in a knot about the fire; some sitting, some standing, one or two couchant upon the rug. Sam was the spokesman just then—the rest listening, interrupting, applauding; the flashing firelight shewing such different faces! such varied indications!—they looked like a little Congress ...
— Say and Seal, Volume I • Susan Warner
... wearily from the limpid dawn to the tiny image of a lion couchant on a small blue enameled shield which he used ...
— The Cruise of the Dry Dock • T. S. Stribling
... the wine and found it delicious, soft and mellow as summer moonlight. While I sipped it the big Newfoundland, who had stretched himself in a couchant posture on the hearth-rug ever since Cellini had first entered the room, rose and walked majestically to my side and rubbed his head caressingly against ...
— A Romance of Two Worlds • Marie Corelli
... To rumble o'er his heraldry; which done, Told him he was a gentleman of note, And that he had a very glorious coat. "Prithee, what is 't?" quoth he, "and take your fees." "Sir," says the herald, "'tis two rampant trees, One couchant; and, to give it further scope, A ladder passant, and a pendent rope. And, for a grace unto your blue-coat sleeves, There is a bird i' th' crest that ...
— The Jest Book - The Choicest Anecdotes and Sayings • Mark Lemon
... repairing to Saint Julian's pillar, while the rising sun came peeping through the low eastern window of the vaulted Church of Saint Faith, Master Headley on his knees gave thanks for his preservation, and then put forward his little daughter, holding on her joined hands the figure of poor Spring, couchant, and beautifully modelled in bronze ...
— The Armourer's Prentices • Charlotte M. Yonge
... works by Delacroix, including examples of his vivid renditions of lions and tigers, and Mr. Slater has here his "Christopher Columbus," Mr. Potter Palmer, of Chicago, lending the "Giaour and Pacha." Gericault is represented by but one picture, a noble couchant lion, but in addition to the "Suicide," there are several other Decamps, notably the magnificently colored "Turkish Butcher's Shop," which, with a splendid Rousseau, the "Forest of Fontainebleau," comes ...
— The American Architect and Building News, Vol. 27, Jan-Mar, 1890 • Various
... beneath, look up with dull, peering eyes, and impotently snarl! But you,"—and here his gazed rested doubtfully, yet questioningly, on his companion's open, serene countenance—'you, if rumor speaks truly, should have been able to tame YOUR bears and turn them into dogs, humble and couchant! Your ...
— Ardath - The Story of a Dead Self • Marie Corelli
... [Looking at his signet. Stands here inscribed: it is the seal of fate! Ha!—Had ever monster fitting lair, 'tis yonder! 170 Thou yawning den, I well remember thee! Mine eyes deceived me not. Heaven leads me on! Now for a blast, loud as a king's defiance, To rouse the monster couchant ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge - Vol I and II • Samuel Taylor Coleridge
... the nervous organization, lies the dread arbitration of—Fall or stand: doomed thou art to yield, or strengthened constitutionally to resist. Most of those who have but a low sense of the spells lying couchant in opium have practically no sense at all; for the initial fascination is for these effectually defeated by the sickness which Nature has associated with the first stages of opium-eating. But to that other class whose nervous sensibilities vibrate to their profoundest ...
— The Opium Habit • Horace B. Day
... Je suis la Pit, cette fille si chre, 20 Qui t'offre de ce roi les plus tendres soupirs. Du feu de ton amour j'allume ses desirs. Du zle qui pour toi l'enflamme et le dvore La chaleur se rpand du couchant l'aurore. Tu le vois tous les jours, devant toi prostern, 25 Humilier ce front de splendeur couronn, Et confondant l'orgueil par d'augustes exemples, Baiser avec respect le pav de tes temples. De ta gloire anim, lui seul de tant de rois S'arme pour ta querelle, ...
— Esther • Jean Racine
... placed a golden sphere; and on the upper battlements, the figures of two soldiers as sentinels: beneath, in a large square, King James I. is represented standing in gilt armour, at whose feet are a lion and unicorn, both couchant, the first the supporter of England, and the other for Scotland. On the west side of the gate is the figure of Fortune, finely gilded and carved, with a prosperous sail over her head, standing on a globe, overlooking the city. Beneath it is the King's arms, with the usual motto, ...
— London in 1731 • Don Manoel Gonzales
... appeared an iron gate, of considerable size, dividing a lofty stone wall. And upon the top of that one of the stone pillars supporting the gate which I could see, stood a creature of stone, whether natant, volant, passant, couchant, or rampant, I could not tell, only it looked like something terrible enough for a ...
— Annals of a Quiet Neighbourhood • George MacDonald
... the only well-to-do man in the place was an American. It was he who lived in the square, red brick house with white blinds always pulled down, even in soft welcome spring days, and with plaster casts of lions and deer couchant on futile little wooden pedestals in the garden. It was he who owned the new and prosperous mill which had superseded the worn-out one lower down the stream, the old mill that the artists loved, and that reminded the Mr. Foxley's of home. It was he ...
— Crowded Out! and Other Sketches • Susie F. Harrison
... home, escorted valiantly by three stout boys, who guided her by a most circuitous route across Bruntsfield Links, that she might gain a moonlight view of the couchant lion of Arthur's Seat. They amused her the whole way home with tales of High-school warfare. On reaching the garden-gate she was half surprised to hear the unwonted cheerfulness of her own laugh. The sunshine she daily strove to cast around her was ...
— Olive - A Novel • Dinah Maria Craik, (AKA Dinah Maria Mulock)
... harvest sermon I proceeded on my way which lay to the south-east. I was now drawing nigh to the mountainous district of Eryri; a noble hill called Mount Eilio appeared before me to the north; an immense mountain called Pen Drws Coed lay over against it on the south, just like a couchant elephant with its head lower than the top of its back. After a time I entered a most beautiful sunny valley, and presently came to a bridge over a pleasant stream running in the direction of the south. As I stood upon that bridge I almost fancied myself ...
— Wild Wales - Its People, Language and Scenery • George Borrow
... received from the red hands Of that gigantic Empire, insolent Spain, spurred fiercer resentments up like steeds Revolting, on the curb, foaming for battle, In all men's minds, against whatever odds. On one side of the throne great Walsingham, A lion of England, couchant, watchful, calm, Was now the master of opinion: all Drew to him. Even the hunchback Burleigh smiled With half-ironic admiration now, As in the presence of the Queen they met Amid the sweeping splendours of her court, A cynic smile that seemed ...
— Collected Poems - Volume One (of 2) • Alfred Noyes
... volcan souterrain, Grece qu'on connait trop, Sardaigne qu'on ignore, Cites de l'Aquilon, du Couchant, de l'Aurore, Pyramides du Nil, Cathedrales du Rhin! Qui ...
— Letters of Franz Liszt, Volume 1, "From Paris to Rome: - Years of Travel as a Virtuoso" • Franz Liszt; Letters assembled by La Mara and translated
... seemed most absurd to critics whose domiciles were on the Nor-Loch, in which there was not sufficient water for a tolerable quagmire. Edinburgh Castle is a noble rock—so are the Salisbury Craigs noble craigs—and Arthur's seat a noble lion couchant, who, were he to leap down on Auld Reekie, would break her backbone and bury her in the Cowgate. But place them by Pavey-ark, or Red-scaur, or the glamour of Glaramara, and they would look about as magnificent ...
— Recreations of Christopher North, Volume 2 • John Wilson
... etait un roi d'Yvetot, Peu connu dans l'histoire; Se levant tard, se couchant tot, Dormant fort bien sans gloire, Et couronne par Jeanneton D'un simple bonnet de coton, Dit-on. Oh! oh! oh! oh! ah! ah! ah! ah! Quel bon petit roi ...
— The Paris Sketch Book Of Mr. M. A. Titmarsh • William Makepeace Thackeray
... well, the extraordinary brightness, the colour, the glitter and gleam that belonged to those times when every man went dressed in some gay livery wearing the colours and the crest of his lord. Who rides there, the hart couchant—the deer at rest—upon his helm? A Knight belonging to the Court: one of the Knights of King Richard the Second. Who march with the bear and ragged staff upon their arms? They are the Livery of the Earl of Warwick. The clash and gleam of arms and armour everywhere: colour on the men as well as ...
— The History of London • Walter Besant
... followed him through a scene of melancholy interest. Beside the mast, within a shattered palisade, lay huddled the vast corpse of the Mylodon of Patagonia, couchant amidst his fodder of chopped hay. The expression of the huge animal was placid and urbane in death. He was the victim of the ceaseless curiosity of science. Two of the five-horned antelope giraffes of Central Africa ...
— The Disentanglers • Andrew Lang
... love, and pleasure, and the ruddy strife Of hearts and lips! Ah, miserable me!" The God, dove-footed, glided silently Round bush and tree, soft-brushing, in his speed, The taller grasses and full-flowering weed, Until he found a palpitating snake, Bright, and cirque-couchant in ...
— Lamia • John Keats
... hushed War's couchant tigers in their lair The tranquil time to one brings not repose— A voice was whispering to his soul—"Despair! The gods will give the triumph to thy foes." Can sleep, with leaden hand, our eyelids close ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXIII No. 2 August 1848 • Various
... a great occasion," he mused. "We have seen what we came out to see, and what more have we a right to demand? The dear people rampant, the respected mayor quiescent, but biding his time, Cobbens couchant but fanged, the President raised to a sublime apotheosis. It is always a pleasure—is it not?—to witness transcendent ability, even if it be in the line of practical politics. The perfection of each ...
— The Mayor of Warwick • Herbert M. Hopkins
... flight of granite steps, weedy in the interstices of the old stone, and terminating in a pair of couchant lions at the base, led down to the middle terrace, which was called the upper garden. This was split in twain by a very gallery of gigantic box trees running down towards the lower terrace, and bearing eloquent witness ...
— Love-at-Arms • Raphael Sabatini
... favourite subject. But the chance was too good to be lost; he sacrificed his oratorical longings on the altar of party purpose, and limited his speech to a mere statement of his motion. Off flew on the wings of Hansom a youthful member, more trusty than the trusted Undy, to the abode of the now couchant Treasury Argus. Morpheus had claimed him all for his own. He was lying in true enjoyment, with his tired limbs stretched between the unaccustomed sheets, and snoring with free and sonorous nose, restrained ...
— The Three Clerks • Anthony Trollope
... hope's limits,—a monotonous, reiterate, indestructible chord in the creature's mystic existence, that, once struck by some mighty, shrouded Hand of Power, still reverberated, and trailed its still renewing echoes through every fibre of its secret habitation. Nor yet for spring;—a couchant leopard has posed itself with horrid intent; murder glitters in its fixed golden eye, quivers in the tense loins, creeps in the tawny glitter of the skin, clutches the keen claws, that recoil, and grasp, and recoil ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 32, June, 1860 • Various
... bull's or buffalo's head, a collar round his neck studded with gems, and on the breast a shield with the arms of Neville. The female figure has a high crowned bonnet, and the mantle is drawn close over the feet, which rest on two dogs couchant. The tomb is ornamented with small figures of ecclesiastics at prayer, but is without inscription. Leland ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 210, November 5, 1853 • Various
... reservoirs. I would like to have you walking in that thick forest growth; there is no underbrush; I can see from one side to the other. After a long walk, you come to the noble portals, guarded by lions couchant, and just beyond is the spot where Louis XVI. was guillotined. I do not believe there is a nobler view in Europe than now opens to the spectator. There before me is the Obelisk of Luxor, which was brought from Egypt, and now stands in ...
— Young Americans Abroad - Vacation in Europe: Travels in England, France, Holland, - Belgium, Prussia and Switzerland • Various
... tame (Train'd, like ourselves, thy path to know, By words of love and blame); Friend! who beside the cottage door, Or in the rich man's hall, With steadfast faith still answerest The one familiar call; Well by poor hearth and lordly home Thy couchant form may rest, And Prince and Peasant trust thee still, To ...
— Heads and Tales • Various
... contre un petit rocher qui empechait qu'on ne put me voir du cote de la terre, je n'avais plus devant moi que le ciel et la mer. Entre ces deux immensites qu'embellissaient les rayons d'un soleil couchant, je passai en revant des heures delicieuses; et la, je serais devenu poete, si j'avais su ecrire dans une ...
— Life of Lord Byron, Vol. II - With His Letters and Journals • Thomas Moore
... great boulders as with houses, and encircled with a girdle of green woods and an outer girdle of blue sea. I know of nothing more wild than that gray waste of boulders; it is a natural Salisbury Plain, of which icebergs and ocean-currents were the Druidic builders; in that multitude of couchant monsters there seems a sense of suspended life; you feel as if they must speak and answer to each other in the silent nights, but by day only the wandering sea-birds seek them, on their way across the Cape, ...
— Oldport Days • Thomas Wentworth Higginson
... sides panelled and adorned with shields of arms and bears the figure of an earlier Sir Thomas Markenfield, clad in armour of the period between Poitiers and Agincourt, and wearing a very curious collar of park palings with a stag couchant in front, possibly (as has been suggested) a badge of adherence to the party of Lancaster. The figure of Lady ...
— Bell's Cathedrals: The Cathedral Church of Ripon - A Short History of the Church and a Description of Its Fabric • Cecil Walter Charles Hallett
... know. There stands his suit of armour, too, newly blackleaded, whose coat of arms is a couchant typewriter on ...
— The Triumphs of Eugene Valmont • Robert Barr
... as members of that Church—in any article but this I should, from mere habit, say sect—usually are. This is due to his memory; for, by all I heard, when he changed his religion he ceased to be Lucas couchant, and became Lucas rampant, fanged and langued gules. (I looked into Guillim[58] to see if my terms were right: I could not find them; but to prove I have been there, I notice that he calls a violin a violent. How comes the word to take this form?) I met with several Roman Christians, born and ...
— A Budget of Paradoxes, Volume II (of II) • Augustus de Morgan
... outermost is a crucifix, and between both, towards the middle, are figures of the Virgin Mary and St. John, the latter holding a cup with a lamb. The outer arch is adorned with knobs, and within both is a small slit or loop. At the bottom of the outer arch are two beasts couchant. If one of them by his proboscis was not evidently an elephant, I should suppose them the supporters of the Scotch arms. Parallel with the Crucifix are two plain stones, which do not appear to have had anything upon them. Here is not the least trace of a door in these arches, ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, No. 333 - Vol. 12, Issue 333, September 27, 1828 • Various
... known as the Gurnard's Head. It is a favourite show-place, winning perhaps more attention than it deserves in comparison with other places near it; but the rocky and turf-clad headland, with its traces of a far-distant past, is really very beautiful, reaching like a couchant beast into the waves that are sometimes of the purest blue, sometimes white with seething foam. There was an old chapel on the neck of the promontory, and near are remains of some rude granite huts. The popularity of the place has brought ...
— The Cornwall Coast • Arthur L. Salmon
... sensed a change. The scow no longer leaped and crashed, and the roar of the rapids grew faint. No longer the form of Vermilion appeared couchant, tense; and, among the scowmen, one laughed. Chloe drew a deep breath, and a slight shudder shook her frame. She glanced about her in bewilderment, and, reaching swiftly down, raised the inert form of Harriet Penny and rested it gently against ...
— The Gun-Brand • James B. Hendryx
... and air Are golden everywhere, And golden with a gold so suave and fine The looking on it lifts the heart like wine. Trafalgar Square (The fountains volleying golden glaze) Gleams like an angel-market. High aloft Over his couchant Lions in a haze Shimmering and bland and soft, A dust of chrysoprase, Our Sailor takes the golden gaze Of the saluting sun, and flames superb As once he flamed it on his ocean round. The dingy dreariness ...
— The Song of the Sword - and Other Verses • W. E. Henley
... (adjutores), who pursued Caesar. We know, at all events, that Sylla formed a right estimate of Caesar's character, and that, from the complexion of his conduct in this one instance, he drew that famous prophecy of his future destiny; bidding his friends beware of that slipshod boy, "for that in him lay couchant many a Marius." A grander testimony to the awe which Caesar inspired, or from one who knew better the qualities of that Cyclopean man by whose scale he measured the patrician ...
— "De Bello Gallico" and Other Commentaries • Caius Julius Caesar
... man, In this bad world, when mists and couchant storms Hide Heaven's fine circlet, springs aloft in faith Above the clouds that threat him, to the fields Of ether, where the day is never veil'd With intervening vapours, and looks down Serene upon the troublous sea, that hides The earth's ...
— The Poetical Works of Henry Kirke White - With a Memoir by Sir Harris Nicolas • Henry Kirke White
... plastered, standing sidewise to the road, with doors on either side, we found the house apparently in charge of a little girl of nine or ten years, a weird but pretty child with very delicate well-cut features, who lay couchant upon her doubled-up arm on a low bed in a corner of the main room, and peered at us over her elbow with sparkling ...
— Ireland Under Coercion (2nd ed.) (1 of 2) (1888) • William Henry Hurlbert
... often felt in his new office, and the preposterously large salary attached to it, he reminded himself constantly that he trod on unsure ground. Once or twice he had been conscious of a strange sense as of some couchant beast beside him ready to spring; also of some curious weakening and disintegration in Melrose, even since he had first known him. He seemed to be more incalculable, less to be depended on. His memory was often faulty, ...
— The Mating of Lydia • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... of the sea was in his nostrils; greetings, many-keyed, hoarse-whistled by plying craft, were in his ears; creamy-foamed wakes of turbulent keels, swift-sent or laboring, boiled their swirling splendor against the black water. Mysterious, couchant, straining, the bulwarked city rode the waves; a mighty ship, her funnels the great buildings beyond, where sullen streamers of smoke trailed motionless and darkling; the indescribable, multitudinous hum of the city's blended voices for purring of monster engines, deep ...
— The Desire of the Moth; and The Come On • Eugene Manlove Rhodes
... railings of the Parish Church he paused, recalling something. Low and square-towered, couchant in the moonlight behind its railings, the Parish Church guarded under its long flank ...
— The Combined Maze • May Sinclair
... the galley, Mahommed thought of the tales in the East not less common than in the West, and believed in them faithfully, for chivalry was merely on the wane—tales of beauteous damsels shut up in caves or adamantine castles, with guardian lions couchant at the gates, and of well-sworded heroes who marched boldly up to the brutes, and slew them, and delivered the captives always with reward. Of course, in making the application, the Princess was the prisoner, the ship the lion, and himself—well, ...
— The Prince of India - Or - Why Constantinople Fell - Volume 1 • Lew. Wallace
... that was thus unconsciously preparing all things for the snake that even now—'her crest brightening with hope' was couchant by her children's cradle. Unhappy children! that on this quiet summer-night were to be driven out upon the main sea of a stormy and wicked world from the quiet haven of their father's castle, and had already on this earth parted for ever ...
— Walladmor: - And Now Freely Translated from the German into English. - In Two Volumes. Vol. II. • Thomas De Quincey
... land, a common occurrence on these lakes at night. On turning the point of red sandstone rock, which the Indians call Pug-ge-do-wau (Portage), the Porcupine Mountains rose to our view, directly west, presenting an azure outline of very striking lineaments—an animal couchant. As night drew on, the water became constantly smoother; it was nine before daylight could be said to leave us. We passed, in rapid succession, the Mauzhe-ma-gwoos or Trout, Graverod's, Unnebish, or ...
— Personal Memoirs Of A Residence Of Thirty Years With The Indian Tribes On The American Frontiers • Henry Rowe Schoolcraft |
