"Lean against" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... smaller. By this time the Doctor had become far too small for his arms to encircle the leg of the table. The Banker looked down to the floor, and saw him standing beside the table leg, leaning one hand against it as one would lean against the great stone ...
— The Girl in the Golden Atom • Raymond King Cummings
... Norgate, she must have been so put about to have to go away with her husband last night. How the scamp got into the drawing-room I cannot tell; but he could do nothing but lean against the wall: he could not have bitten his fingers to save his life. She did not show her mortification unless by going away immediately. A wonderful amount of countenance has that poor young woman; but I take it she will not go out with him again if she can help it—and she need not, ...
— Girlhood and Womanhood - The Story of some Fortunes and Misfortunes • Sarah Tytler
... the wind were enough to cause real danger of a frost-bitten face. To clear the anemometer vane he had to go to the other end of the hut and climb a ladder; and twice while engaged in this task he had literally to lean against the wind with head bent and face averted, and so stagger ...
— The Voyages of Captain Scott - Retold from 'The Voyage of the "Discovery"' and 'Scott's - Last Expedition' • Charles Turley
... the injured foot from the ground and stood upon the other. Not a hand was stretched out to help him, and he felt that he was growing dizzy. He made a frantic effort to hop on one leg towards the furnace, so as to lean against the brickwork. ...
— Marietta - A Maid of Venice • F. Marion Crawford
... at first wildly, then, as little by little the hidden sense comes to her, her rosy lips slowly part and lengthen out until every snowy tooth is visible. Then Pipa covers her face with her apron, and shakes from head to foot in such a fit of laughter, that she has to lean against the wall not to fall down. "Oh hello!" is all she can say. This Pipa repeats ...
— The Italians • Frances Elliot
... old desk of mine," he said, holding it out to Baird, who took it and slightly turned away to lean against the mantel, ...
— In Connection with the De Willoughby Claim • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... knew every inch of the way to the top; to climb it was like going up a well-known staircase, and the sensation of sitting there aloft, high in air, on a bough which curved and swung, with another bough exactly fitting her back to lean against, was full of delight and fascination. It was like moving and being at rest all at once; like flying, like escape. The wind seemed to smell differently and more sweetly up there than in lower places. Two or three ...
— Eyebright - A Story • Susan Coolidge
... strength of the black smoky rafters. The four ancient chairs were carved up the legs with faces and arms and strange crawling animals and their backs were twisted into the oddest shapes and were uncomfortable to lean against, but Peter Westcott sat up very straight with his little legs dangling in front of him and his grey eyes all over the room at once. He could not see all of the room because there were depths that the ...
— Fortitude • Hugh Walpole
... weather were beyond all description—twelve to fifteen degrees Reaumur, with a cutting wind and driving snow, with nothing to eat, as the field kitchens on these roads could not follow. During pauses in the march one could but lean against the wall of a miserable house or lie down in the burned-out ruins, without straw to lie on and no covering. Men and horses sank to their hips in the snow, and so we worked our way forward, usually only ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume V (of 12) - Neuve Chapelle, Battle of Ypres, Przemysl, Mazurian Lakes • Francis J. Reynolds, Allen L. Churchill, and Francis Trevelyan
... to stare, too, up at him, through the pane, as he rides laughing, aloft in the faint far sky; and my presumptuous eyes have rained down tears in consequence. I am trying now to read; but a hundred thousand things distract me: the sun shining warm on my shoulder, as I lean against the window; the divine morning clamor of the birds; their invitations to come out that will take no nay; and last, but oh! not, not least, the importunate voices of Barbara and Tou Tou. Every morning at this hour they have ...
— Nancy - A Novel • Rhoda Broughton
... hat. Her hair loosened and blew unkemptly about her face. The road which led across the high, level prairie was quite smooth and dry, but still it jolted her, and the pam in her back increased. She had nothing to lean against, and the weight of the child grew greater, till she was forced to place him on the sacks beside her, though she could not loose her hold for ...
— Main-Travelled Roads • Hamlin Garland
... managed to rise and lean against the jacal. "I see you made it. Mr. Dingwell, my ...
— The Sheriff's Son • William MacLeod Raine
... soldiering was coming back; I wish my old legs would come back and be the same as they used to when I could walk for weeks, instead of aching like this when I haven't had to walk, but have been riding all day. Hah!" he sighed, as he lowered himself down into the back of the chariot to lean against the side once more. "I can keep watch over him just as well sitting down as standing up. I don't see that I need watch at all when the boy's got a pillow with a set of teeth like a rat trap that will take fast hold of anyone who came to interfere ...
— Marcus: the Young Centurion • George Manville Fenn
... wanly at the bad taste of the decoration, till one line of fire leaped from the text at him, "Thou Shalt Not Kill." But he needed no further lessoning in that wisdom. He retreated from the accusing page and went to lean against the dormer window and look out upon the world from the jail of his past. No jury could release him from that. Everywhere he looked, everywhere he thought, he saw evidence of the penalty he had brought upon his father and ...
— In a Little Town • Rupert Hughes
... stood watching there till he began to feel drowsy, and this made him lean against the great trunk, his head began to nod, and twice over he was ...
— Off to the Wilds - Being the Adventures of Two Brothers • George Manville Fenn
... there, 'fore I'd even told you as I'd have you." And the demure little widow cast a smile out from under a curl that had fallen down into her bright eyes that was so young and engaging that Mr. Crabtree had to lean against the counter to support himself. His storm-tossed single soul was fairly blinded at even this far sight of the haven of his double desires, but it was just as well that he was dumb for joy, for Mrs. Rucker was more than equal ...
— Rose of Old Harpeth • Maria Thompson Daviess
... had other pleasures than these. Previously I had regarded the City with awe, but now I felt a glow of possession come over me whenever I approached it. Often in those first two months I used to lean against the Mansion House in a familiar sort of way; once I struck a match against the Royal Exchange. And what an impression of financial acumen I could make in a drawing-room by a careless reference to my "block of Jaguars!" Even those who misunderstood me and thought I ...
— Happy Days • Alan Alexander Milne
... hillside his glance strayed to the several five-story towers of the pawnshops. Celestial Uncles! Spurlock chuckled, and a bit of chestnut, going down the wrong way, set him to coughing violently. When the paroxysm passed, he was forced to lean against the ...
— The Ragged Edge • Harold MacGrath
... almost as soon as born, are ty'd flat on their Backs to a Board; and so may be flung on the Ground, or put to lean against any Thing, or be flung over their Neck in Travelling, or hung upon a ...
— The Present State of Virginia • Hugh Jones
... the third floor she found herself short of breath, and for a moment was obliged to lean against the balustrade. Quenu, much astonished, followed her into her bedroom without saying a word. It was the first time she had ever invited him to enter it. She closed the door, and letting go the corners of her apron, ...
— The Fat and the Thin • Emile Zola
... administrators can serve but as poor defenders for an embarrassed prince and an assailed government against even enemies who are in themselves insignificant and not free from the vices of a corrupt society and a decaying age, and it was only on such that Hienfung had in the first place to lean against his opponents. Even his own Manchus, the warlike Tartars, who, despite the smallness of their numbers, had conquered the whole of China, had lost their primitive virtue and warlike efficiency in the southern climes which they had made their home. To them the opulent ...
— China • Demetrius Charles Boulger
... above all, must not reach up and wig-wag signals while she is receiving, any more than she must wave to people as she goes up and down the aisle of the church. She must not cling to her husband, stand pigeon-toed, or lean against him or the wall, or any person, or thing. She must not run her arm through his and let her hand flop on the other side; she must not swing her arms as though they were dangling rope; she must not switch herself this way ...
— Etiquette • Emily Post
... houses of the neighborhood are equally oblivious to modern opinion. They consent to lean against each other while jointly turning an indifferent face to the world, like a man about whose ugliness there is no dispute. No two run consecutively with the walks, and all together present a sky-line that ...
— Mlle. Fouchette - A Novel of French Life • Charles Theodore Murray
... say that you don't know what it is to lean against a tree? Why, where was you raised? What kind o' folks hev you got? Your old man must be mighty smart to raise a boy as big as you be, an' not learn him what it means to ...
— The Evolution of Dodd • William Hawley Smith
... she did hear, as Mr. Linden arranged the cushions and with gentle force made her lean against them, but either he did not feel himself able to touch directly what they were both thinking of—or else thought her not able to bear it. His tone was very quiet, the rest of his hand upon her hair hardly longer than it had been yesterday, ...
— Say and Seal, Volume I • Susan Warner
... returned with the medicine which Zebedee had left for such emergencies, she found her stepmother beside the rolling-pin. Her mouth was open and a little twisted, and she was heavy and unwieldy when Helen raised her body and made it lean against the wall. ...
— Moor Fires • E. H. (Emily Hilda) Young
... the edge of a bunk. For a few minutes the child would stand there smiling with a perennial confidence, waiting to be noticed. Then she would come closer, without a word from her usually nimble little tongue, lean against McWha's knee, and look up coaxingly into his face. If McWha chanced to be singing, for he was a "chanter" of some note, he would appear so utterly absorbed that Rosy-Lilly would at last slip away, with a look of hurt surprise in her face, to be comforted by one of her faithful. But if McWha ...
— The Backwoodsmen • Charles G. D. Roberts
... arms are round you, and I lean Against you, while the lark Sings over us, and golden lights, and green Shadows are on ...
— Modern British Poetry • Various
... young man who held him by the hand, "Let me touch the pillars on which the building rests, that I may lean against them." Now the building was full of men and women, and all the rulers of the Philistines were there, and on the roof about three thousand men and women were looking on while Samson amused them. Samson called on Jehovah and said, "O Jehovah, remember ...
— The Children's Bible • Henry A. Sherman
... also in his mouth there was a wisp of straw. The steel-blue smoke floated out lazily, which his steel-blue eyes regarded with appreciation. It was an Elysium of indolence. The cigar, the not having to kill anybody for a few minutes, and a place to lean against, these were content. Troubadour phrases droned soothingly in his brain. Of course he had ...
— The Missourian • Eugene P. (Eugene Percy) Lyle
... near to death, Chutney, as any man can come," said the colonel a little later, when Guy was able to sit up and lean against the fragments of the canoe. "Forbes saved you on this occasion. He got awake just in time, and crawling over the logs—for he was unable to walk—he brought down the butt of the revolver on the fiend's head. He first tried to shoot, ...
— The River of Darkness - Under Africa • William Murray Graydon
... part of Juniper was an explosion of laughter, which seemed as if it would tear him in pieces. One outburst of merriment followed another, till he was obliged to lean against a tree for support. ...
— Frank Oldfield - Lost and Found • T.P. Wilson
... I thought, until I happened to lean against a tree, and down went the tree and myself too. Upon examination I found that merely the bark remained, with a few filaments inside—the rest of the interior having been entirely devoured by ants. Yet some of the top branches seemed still alive, and had leaves. Again, even when quite sound, ...
— Across Unknown South America • Arnold Henry Savage Landor
... Involuntarily she fled into the grove. It was dark and cool; it smelled sweetly of pine; there were narrow aisles and little sunlit glades. She hurried on till a fallen tree blocked her passage. Here she turned—she would wait—the tree was good to lean against. There came Cleve, a dark, stalking shadow. She did not remember him like that. He ...
— The Border Legion • Zane Grey
... seemed to be, at least, in the then position of domestic affairs. Walter eyed him kindly many a time in passing in and out; and poor old Sol, when Walter was not there, would come and lean against the doorpost, resting his weary wig as near the shoe-buckles of the guardian genius of his trade and shop as he could. But no fierce idol with a mouth from ear to ear, and a murderous visage made of parrot's feathers, was ever more indifferent to the appeals of its savage votaries, than was the ...
— Dombey and Son • Charles Dickens
... dreamily, as if thinking aloud. "He slept in that tent. It looks like a little ghost to me these nights in the moonlight, the curtains flap in such a lonely way. That gate was his back door through the woods to town. His wheel used to lean against this tree. I miss his fair head in the sun, and his white trousers springing up the hill. But one cannot keep one's boy forever. You have made him a man, ...
— A Touch Of Sun And Other Stories • Mary Hallock Foote
... he gaze upon cheap and horrible woodcuts of gentlemen in fashionable raiment trying to lean against conspicuously inadequate rustic gates; equally fashionable ladies, with flat chests, and rat's nest hair; and animals whose attitudes denoted playful sportiveness of disposition. Each of these pictures was explained in minute detail. Bennington's distress became apathy. Mrs. Lawton returned ...
— The Claim Jumpers • Stewart Edward White
... ran deeper, shelving off rapidly, until it rose well above his waist, and with sufficient current do that he was compelled to lean against it to maintain balance, scarcely venturing forward a foot at a time. Once he stumbled over some obstruction, barely averting a fall; he felt the swift clutch of her fingers at his throat, the quick adjustment ...
— Molly McDonald - A Tale of the Old Frontier • Randall Parrish
... sitting in the street, all smoking, none showing particular concern about anything. Their lethargy surprised him. He had expected to find the town mad with excitement, to behold here the gold fever blazing without restraint; but wherever there was a post to lean against a man was leaning against it, exactly as if there were nothing doing, and the world had not just run demented over the richness of their Victorian fields. It remained for him to learn that this very ...
— In the Roaring Fifties • Edward Dyson
... had finished, she hastened to change the altar-cloth, taking the greatest care not to smudge the beading. Then she arranged the cross, the candlesticks, and the vases symmetrically. Abbe Mouret had gone to lean against the wooden screen which separated the choir from the nave, by the side of Brother Archangias. Not a word passed between them. Their eyes were fixed upon the silver crucifix, which, in the increasing gloom, still cast some glimmer of light on the feet and the left ...
— Abbe Mouret's Transgression - La Faute De L'abbe Mouret • Emile Zola
... without one word about a place which lies between Mentone and San Remo. Bordighera has a beauty which is quite distinct from both. Palms are its chief characteristics. They lean against the garden walls, and feather the wells outside the town, where women come with brazen pitchers to draw water. In some of the marshy tangles of the plain, they spring from a thick undergrowth of spiky leaves, and rear their tall aerial arms against the deep blue background of the sea or darker ...
— Sketches and Studies in Italy and Greece • John Addington Symonds
... Quaker, left alone, turned to look at the dead rebel. For a moment horrible nausea and faintness made him lean against the tree for support. It was the first violent death of which he had ever been an eye-witness. He had known this man,—who was indeed the same Griffin, who had assisted the unwilling Pepperill to bring the tar-kettle to the wood-side on a certain memorable evening; ...
— Cudjo's Cave • J. T. Trowbridge
... iron night; the same stillness and mild weather. My soul is pondering. I walk mechanically over to a tree, pull my cap deep down over my eyes, and lean against that tree, with hands clasped behind my neck. I gazed and think; the flame from my fire dazzles my eyes, and I do not feel it. I stand in that stupor for a while, looking at the fire; my legs fail me first, and grow tired; thoroughly stiff, I sit down. Not ...
— Pan • Knut Hamsun
... Here was a man, a protector, something to lean against, of whom even the Butchertown toughs were afraid as soon ...
— The Valley of the Moon • Jack London
... the broad aisle of the church. As soon as the organ began to sound its sonorous tones Pearl forgot her strange surroundings entirely and sat between her brother and Mr. Grey as if in a trance. Not until the sermon was well under way did she move, and then only to lean against Periwinkle and whisper, "Isn't this fun, Peri?" "Not fun exactly," he whispered in reply, "but awfully nice. Hush, Pearl, and if you get tired just practice on your ...
— Pearl and Periwinkle • Anna Graetz
... are so like her! Lean against me, dear, as she would, and we'll try to weather this together." And Charley, with a tremulous sigh, laid her soft cheek against his rough, unshaven one. They sat there until the tent was filled with the lovely gray of the filtered moonlight. Then Roger persuaded Charley ...
— The Forbidden Trail • Honore Willsie
... a strange reaction, Foedor felt his knees failing him, and he was obliged to lean against a wall to prevent himself from falling. At this moment, when he was about to see Vaninka again, this soul of his soul, for whom alone he had done so much, he dreaded lest he should not find her the same as when he had left her. ...
— CELEBRATED CRIMES, COMPLETE - VANINKA • ALEXANDRE DUMAS, PERE
... Farm. There are three doors. One opens to the staircase, one to the garden and a third into the back kitchen. At a table in the middle of the room EMILY stands ironing some net window curtains. JESSIE and ROBIN lean against the table watching her. By the open doorway, looking out on the garden, stands THOMAS, a mug of cider in one hand and a large slice of bread in the other. As he talks, he takes alternate drinks ...
— Six Plays • Florence Henrietta Darwin
... bed-room, my eyes suddenly fell on two trunks covered with mud, and on the brass plates of which was stamped the name of "Edward Middleton, Esq." At the same moment the door opened, and he stood before me. I felt myself turning as white as a sheet, and was obliged to lean against the wall to prevent myself from falling. He seized my hand, and said, with apparent ...
— Ellen Middleton—A Tale • Georgiana Fullerton
... the girl, still looking down, "I will lean against the horse." She rested against Mutineer, who looked around to see who was taking this insulting liberty with a Kentucky gentleman. Having looked at her he said: "You're quite welcome, you pretty dear!" Peter thought he would like to be a horse, but then it occurred to him that ...
— The Honorable Peter Stirling and What People Thought of Him • Paul Leicester Ford
... in my faith, and in the darkest hours, when misfortunes seemed thronging most thickly upon us, I have never felt the want of anything to lean against; but I own I did feel like shaking hands with a few hundred people when I heard of our Fourth of July, 1863, work, and should like to have heard and joined in an ...
— Memoir of John Lothrop Motley, Complete • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... my anguish, and I had to bite my handkerchief to prevent myself from yielding to the temptation. The weird noise of my stifled sobs attracted the attention of some one who was praying in the little chapel on the other side of the wall which I had chanced to lean against. A Gothic window, with its stone mullions surmounted by a trefoil, was exactly on a level with ...
— Mauprat • George Sand
... name of the pew-owner painted in large white letters. They were secured when closed by clumsy wooden buttons. In many country congregations the elderly men—stiff old farmers—had a fashion of standing up in the middle of the sermon to stretch their cramped limbs, and they would lean against and hang over the pew door and stare up and down the aisle. In Andover, Vermont, old Deacon Puffer never let a summer Sunday pass without thus resting and diverting himself. One day, having ill-secured the wooden button at the door of his pew, the leaning-place gave way under his weight, and out ...
— Sabbath in Puritan New England • Alice Morse Earle
... burst into a roar of laughter so violent that he had to lean against the mud wall, and hold his sides. "Ha, ha! that I should be father-in-law to a fool!" and then he set off again. "That the sober, dainty little wench should have wedded a ...
— The Armourer's Prentices • Charlotte Mary Yonge
... distressed; was ready to sink; and forced to lean against the wainscot, as I kneeled at her feet. A stream of tears at last burst from her less indignant eyes. Good heaven! said she, lifting up her lovely face, and clasped hands, what is at last to be my ...
— Clarissa, Volume 5 (of 9) • Samuel Richardson
... in his narrative Granice stood up, and went to lean against the mantel-piece, looking down at Ascham, who had not moved from his seat, or changed his ...
— The Early Short Fiction of Edith Wharton, Part 1 (of 10) • Edith Wharton
... in a room devoted to his use, Mr. Browning would work till the afternoon was advanced, and then set forth on a long walk over the cliffs, often in the face of a wind which, as he wrote of it at the time, he could lean against as if it were a wall. And during this time he was living, not only in his work, but with the man who had inspired it. The image of Aristophanes, in the half-shamed insolence, the disordered majesty, in which he is placed before the reader's mind, was present to him from the first moment in which ...
— Life and Letters of Robert Browning • Mrs. Sutherland Orr
... the hospital. It was not until she got into the Fulham Road that tears began to run down her cheeks; they poured faster and faster, like rain after long dry weather. The whole world disappeared in a mist of tears. And so overcome was she by her grief that she had to lean against the railings, and then the passers-by turned and ...
— Esther Waters • George Moore
... Tai-yue, being unable to stand much wine and to take any crabs, told, on her own account, a servant to fetch an embroidered cushion; and, seating herself in such a way as to lean against the railing, she took up a fishing-rod and began to fish. Pao-ch'ai played for a time with a twig of olea she held in her hand, then resting on the window-sill, she plucked the petals, and threw them into the water, attracting ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book II • Cao Xueqin
... When she left her room she was in the throes of uncontrolled agitation, and all down the long hallway she fought herself. At the half-open door she paused to lean against the wall. There she had the will to still her nerves, to acquire serenity; and she prayed for wisdom to make her presence and her words of infinite good to ...
— The Desert of Wheat • Zane Grey
... call was at the home of a private society in a little brick house that seemed to lean against the wall of a large lying-in hospital in the ...
— The Woman Thou Gavest Me - Being the Story of Mary O'Neill • Hall Caine
... jumped," said the man, "until I am tired out, and I cannot imagine how to get into those breeches." "Oh," said the traveller, "you might stay here as long as you wished, for you would never get into them this way. Come down and lean against the tree." Then he took his legs and put them in the breeches, and after he had put them on, he said, "Is that right?" "Very good; bless you; for if it had not been for you, God knows how long I should have had to jump." Then the traveller ...
— The Book of Noodles - Stories Of Simpletons; Or, Fools And Their Follies • W. A. Clouston
... something she had heard (she had forgotten what it was) disturbed her, and that recent trifling with pain, in her excess of happiness, laid her open to it. Her heart was weaker, and fluttered, as if with a broken wing. She thought, "if I can be near him to lean against him for one full hour!" it would make her strong again. For, she found that if her heart was rising on a broad breath, suddenly, for no reason that she knew, it seemed to stop in its rise, break, and sink, like a wind-beaten ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... he could move about very easily. Then the hip would stiffen and he would be obliged to lean against a tree for ...
— The High School Boys in Summer Camp • H. Irving Hancock
... for a walk!" she cried. "I'm tired of rain and I want to go over and lean against that ...
— Success - A Novel • Samuel Hopkins Adams
... became more pronounced, and she felt tired. Her position on the heeling boat irked her, and she remembered the headache he had cured and the soothing rest that resided in him. He was sitting beside her, quite beside her, and the boat seemed to tilt her toward him. Then arose in her the impulse to lean against him, to rest herself against his strength—a vague, half-formed impulse, which, even as she considered it, mastered her and made her lean toward him. Or was it the heeling of the boat? She did not know. She never knew. She knew ...
— Martin Eden • Jack London
... and worthy celebrating, that when the Prince came upon that sea he was perplext and wist not what to do, so he leapt from the back of the Father of the Pigeon and set his steed standing beside him that he might lean against his quarter[FN532] when, of the excess of his night watching, he fell asleep and was drowned in slumber. Then, by doom of Destiny the beast shook his head and snorted and set off at full speed making for the wild and the wold and was presently amiddlemost ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 5 • Richard F. Burton
... past me, coming nearly to my neck; and it was icy cold. One had to lean against it, and the water so took away one's weight that at any moment one might have slipped and been carried away. The guide, a much taller man (indeed he was six foot three or so), supported me, holding my arm: and again in a moment we ...
— The Path to Rome • Hilaire Belloc
... but decent. The Empress sits in a great easy-chair! but the Archduchesses are ranged on chairs with tall, straight Backs, but without arms; whilst the other Ladies of the Court (poor things) may stand on one Leg, or lean against sideboards, to rest themselves as they choose; but Sit Down they Dare not. This is the same Discipline, I believe, that still prevails, and so I speak of it in the present tense. The Table is entirely set out, and served by the Empress's Maids of Honour (who put on the very dishes and sauces), ...
— The Strange Adventures of Captain Dangerous, Vol. 2 of 3 • George Augustus Sala
... reaches six inches in thickness we place along the edge a number of lumps of spawn at about one foot apart. These lumps are placed level with the manure on the edge facing the wall. This portion of the surface of the manure ought to be raised vertically, and should lean against the earthen wall of the trench. The other half of the surface ought to slope gently toward the wall, leaving a space of three or four inches between it and the side of the trench, so that it may be trimmed. The lumps of spawn on this ...
— Mushrooms: how to grow them - a practical treatise on mushroom culture for profit and pleasure • William Falconer
... go inland through the solitude along meadow paths, and soon birch woods would receive him, extending far over the rolling country. He would sit down in the moss and lean against a tree from which he could see a patch of ocean between the trunks. At times the wind would carry to him the noise of the surf, like distant boards falling on each other. The caw of crows above the treetops, hoarse, desolate, forlorn ... He had a book on his ...
— The German Classics of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries - Masterpieces of German Literature Vol. 19 • Various
... shall always remember," the young Marquess often said when he had grown to be a man and was Duke, and had wife and children of his own. "I loved to sit upon her knee, and lean against her breast, and gaze up into her eyes. 'Twas my child-fancy that there was deep within them something like a star, and when I gazed at it, I felt a kind of loving awe such as grew within me when I lay and looked up at a ...
— His Grace of Osmonde • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... obliged to lean against the side of the fireplace. "To a councilor belonging to the parliament, sire, whose ...
— The Vicomte de Bragelonne - Or Ten Years Later being the completion of "The Three - Musketeers" And "Twenty Years After" • Alexandre Dumas
... over carefully. The porch was low and roofed; its eaves projected a foot. If, as Garrison fancied, the stricken man might have come here in weakness, to lean against the post, and had then gone down, perhaps leaving heel-marks in the earth, all signs of any such action had been obliterated, despite the fact that no rains had fallen since the date of the man's demise. Garrison scrutinized the ground closely. A piece of broken crockery, a cork, the ...
— A Husband by Proxy • Jack Steele
... that she was oppressed by a feeling almost of suffocation, and was obliged to stop and lean against a pillar for ...
— Mona • Mrs. Georgie Sheldon
... went downstairs, I found my daughter had made preparations for such work. I thought, "Well, if she feels like washing, I will not say anything; perhaps I shall get over this." After breakfast I went about my work, thinking I could lean against the tub and wash with more ease than I could do up the morning work. I tried to treat myself as I had done before,—tried to realize that "all is Mind, there is no matter;" that "God is All, there is nothing beside Him," ...
— Miscellaneous Writings, 1883-1896 • Mary Baker Eddy
... affairs, a business man, with the care of half a dozen fortunes on my hands. Now, what's the matter with me? I begin to tremble when I look that sober old steward in the face. If he had handed me a letter to-night, I should have had to lean against the wall for support. This will never do at all. I have not seen her face, I do not know her name; for all I know, she may be this Leddy Lightfinger.... No, that would be impossible. Leddy Lightfinger would have made an appointment. What possesses me to dwell in this realm of fancy, ...
— The Lure of the Mask • Harold MacGrath
... driven into pieces of wood built into the structure for the purpose, were the long-handled frying-pan, the pot-hook, the boring iron, the branding iron, the long iron peel, the roasting hook, the fire-pan, the scoop-shaped fire-shovel, with a trivet or two. The stout slice and tongs lean against the ...
— The New England Magazine Volume 1, No. 3, March, 1886 - Bay State Monthly Volume 4, No. 3, March, 1886 • Various
... royalty in Jerusalem, is well worthy of a visit by travellers in the Holy Land. Some of the stone coffins lean against the solid walls, others lie in massive richness ...
— Half Hours in Bible Lands, Volume 2 - Patriarchs, Kings, and Kingdoms • Rev. P. C. Headley
... arms, sitting in one of the seats, and said to her, "Where do you stay?" She said "Just here." "How long have you been here?" "Since the beginning." (two months) she replied. "How do you sleep at night?" "I lay the baby on the desk in front of me, and I have this post at the back to lean against. This is a very good place. Thank ...
— Crescent and Iron Cross • E. F. Benson
... began to flicker, and then grow bright and red. And it was discovered that rugs and cushions had been placed (not too near the fire) for people to sit on while they drank their coffee and liquors, and that there were logs to lean against, and boxes of cigars and cigarettes where they could ...
— IT and Other Stories • Gouverneur Morris
... reached terra-firma never to set foot on that lake again; and I have kept my word inviolate. I was miserably sick, as were nearly all the passengers. I tried to keep on my feet, as much as I could; sometimes I would take hold of the railing and gaze upon the wild terrific scene, or lean against whatever I could find, that was stationary, near mother and the rest of the family. Mother was calm, but I knew she had little hope that we would ever reach land. She said, her children were all with her and we should not be ...
— The Bark Covered House • William Nowlin
... arrogance. Thousands of noble women, as they traverse those gorgeous halls, feel those fires of indignation glowing in their souls, which glowed in the bosom of Madame Roland. Thousands of young men, with compressed lip and moistened eye, lean against those marble pillars, lost in thought, and almost excuse even the demoniac and blood-thirsty mercilessness of Danton, Marat, and Robespierre. These palaces are a perpetual stimulus and provocative to governmental aggression. There they stand, in all their gorgeousness, empty, swept, and garnished. ...
— Napoleon Bonaparte • John S. C. Abbott
... said, a few moments later, when the cook and steward had shown symptoms of doing something beside lean against the sink and whistle, "do you suppose you could get along for a few minutes while I went ...
— Mary-'Gusta • Joseph C. Lincoln
... she whimpered complainingly, trying vainly to steady the glasses. He slipped his arms around her, and let her lean against him; she did not even seem to realize it. Just then she had caught sight of something, and her intense interest steadied her so that ...
— Lonesome Land • B. M. Bower
... just for the mere pleasure of joining in the laughter. She never got the remotest inkling of why the two would double up with joy when one or the other got the hiccoughs in the midst of a sentence. But she would lean against the sideboard and laugh with them, the tears ...
— Lydia of the Pines • Honore Willsie Morrow
... to teach your dog to stand on his hind legs, you will know what was being done to Umboo. When you try to teach your dog this trick, you generally take him where he can stand up in a corner, so he can lean against the wall and will not fall over backwards or sideways; for that is what he feels like doing when you lift ...
— Umboo, the Elephant • Howard R. Garis
... his eyes as he spoke, and started back, pale and trembling, fain to lean against the nearest tree for ...
— Outpost • J.G. Austin
... nevertheless, in every other respect a most gentlemanlike, entertaining, and intelligent person, next to its inland situation, this monstrous extent of Adelaide will turn out to be the most fruitful of complaints. You may lean against any tree in the City and exclaim, "This shadowy desert, unfrequented woods, I better brook ...
— A Source Book Of Australian History • Compiled by Gwendolen H. Swinburne
... of the bricklayers. The first course of voussoirs would be sloped in this fashion, and would rest upon some mass of crude brick in the centre of the building. The bricks of the second course would lean against it, and their weight would be brought in to add cohesion and solidity to the whole structure instead of being entirely occupied in adding to the perpendicular thrust, while the ease with which they could be placed without an internal support would be much increased. Assisted ...
— A History of Art in Chaldaea & Assyria, v. 1 • Georges Perrot
... he—the Viscount. She turned away; the street was empty. She was so overwhelmed, so sad, that she had to lean against a wall to ...
— Madame Bovary • Gustave Flaubert
... and another dance began, the enthusiasts forgetting Bill as quickly as they had saluted him; but the ex-watchman continued to lean against the post, a picture of sullenness, and in the box The Lily stood with knitted brows, as if trying to ...
— The Plunderer • Roy Norton
... lean against the wall for a minute or two to recover yourself," Harry said. "I see you have your coat cut on the shoulder, and are bleeding pretty freely, but it is nothing to be frightened about. If you will give me your handkerchief I will ...
— In the Reign of Terror - The Adventures of a Westminster Boy • G. A. Henty
... beneath a low, grey sky. Here we see oranges against a blue sky a million miles deep. What a blend! Myra, let's go to a fancy-dress ball when we get back. You go as an orange and I'll go as a very blue, blue sky, and you shall lean against me." ...
— The Sunny Side • A. A. Milne
... I lived, played, and slept the greater part of the time during the first few months of my life. Whether I was made to lean against a lodge pole or was suspended from a bough of a tree, while my grandmother cut wood, or whether I was carried on her back, or conveniently balanced by another child in a similar cradle hung on the opposite side of a pony, I was ...
— Indian Child Life • Charles A. Eastman
... work is completed. "There!" we say, standing back, a little flushed and out of breath with the excitement of the thing. "There! There's a place in which to live! Could any existence be more glorious?" And then we advance a step and lean against the walls to survey the surrounding prospect. It is the fatal action. The material body touches the aerial structure and down with a crash the castle comes—back we pitch into the foundations, and thwack, bump, thwack, comes the masonry ...
— Once Aboard The Lugger • Arthur Stuart-Menteth Hutchinson
... that there were people who traveled in such a manner; that wants could be so perfectly foreseen; that railroad officials, porters at stations, the staff of restaurants, could be by magic transformed into active and eager servants. To lean against the upholstered back of a railway carriage and in luxurious ease look through the window at passing beauties, and then to find books at your elbow and excellent meals appearing at regular hours, these unknown perfections made it necessary for him at times to pull ...
— The Lost Prince • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... up all for lost. He drew in his legs, shut his eyes, and coiled himself up in as small a space as possible, hoping that O'Grady would do the same. He heard a man stop and lean against the tree, as if looking in. Fortunately a cloud at that moment passed across the sun, and prevented the ...
— Paul Gerrard - The Cabin Boy • W.H.G. Kingston
... arranged the signal very artistically, leaving the iron door ajar a little, and then neatly poising the large tin basin on its edge, so as to lean against it. Having extremely enjoyed this part of the proceeding, they went to look at the theatricals again, the boys being highly delighted at ...
— Eric • Frederic William Farrar
... Nathan Johnson, of New Bedford, Massachusetts, because he had just been reading about the virtuous Douglass in the works of Sir Walter Scott. How wonderful then, in the light of a few years, that a fugitive slave from America, bearing one of the most powerful names in Scotland should lean against the pillars of the Free Church of Scotland, and meet and vanquish its brightest and ablest teachers (the friends of slavery, unfortunately), Doctors Cunningham ...
— History of the Negro Race in America from 1619 to 1880. Vol. 2 (of 2) - Negroes as Slaves, as Soldiers, and as Citizens • George Washington Williams
... of Porto Cabello is less ardent than that of La Guayra. The breeze there is stronger, more frequent, and more regular. The houses do not lean against rocks that absorb the rays of the sun during the day, and emit caloric at night, and the air can circulate more freely between the coast and the mountains of Ilaria. The causes of the insalubrity of the atmosphere must be sought in ...
— Equinoctial Regions of America V2 • Alexander von Humboldt
... we went across the lawn and through the trees, and away along all the old tracks to the farm, following Jane, who, knowing we were behind her, flew like the wind, without once looking back. We soon lost her, for we often paused to pant and lean against one another for a moment's respite in this strange memorable race. We did not speak, but I looked at Rachel, and she was like a poor lily soiled and crushed by the storm, with her white dress trailing through the dust, and her satin shoes torn on her feet. But that ...
— The Late Miss Hollingford • Rosa Mulholland
... paroxysm of helpless fear, caused by his father's glance towards him, I suppose: there was nothing else to produce such humiliation. He made several efforts to obey, but his little strength was annihilated for the time, and he fell back again with a moan. Mr. Heathcliff advanced, and lifted him to lean against ...
— Wuthering Heights • Emily Bronte
... with miniature turnpike-gates. The principal chimney-sweep of that fashionable quarter lived at the blind end of Mews Street; and the same corner contained an establishment much frequented about early morning and twilight for the purchase of wine-bottles and kitchen-stuff. Punch's shows used to lean against the dead wall in Mews Street, while their proprietors were dining elsewhere; and the dogs of the neighbourhood made appointments to meet in the same locality. Yet there were two or three small airless houses at ...
— Little Dorrit • Charles Dickens
... the bedside, and, asking for a spoon, she tried with a trembling hand to pour out some of the mixture from the vial. Her hands shook so that she could not. In despair she allowed the nurse to administer it, while Gretchen supported her, seating herself behind her in such a way that Hilda could lean against her, and still see the face of the sick man. In this position she watched while the nurse put the liquid into Lord Chetwynde's mouth, and saw ...
— The Cryptogram - A Novel • James De Mille
... for the first time in her life glad that she had something to lean against. Dick patted her on the shoulder tenderly but clumsily, for he was not quite sure ...
— The Works of Rudyard Kipling One Volume Edition • Rudyard Kipling
... Lipscombe. "Back from those boats, men! I'll blow the brains out of the mutinous dog who dares to enter first. Discipline must be maintained. Here, Waters, let me lean against you." ...
— In the King's Name - The Cruise of the "Kestrel" • George Manville Fenn
... little pinch with the tips of her fingers. "I—a little misunderstanding, no doubt. Willis,—the Blue Room,—for the present!" But Willis was suffering from a sudden and violent fit of coughing, which shook his whole frame, and made it necessary for him to rest his trunk against the wall and lean against it, with his head down; so that it was fully five minutes before Miss Sophronia Montfort's trunk got up to the ...
— Margaret Montfort • Laura E. Richards
... lodging, had not moved from the fireplace since she had taken up her position there. Women are as clever as Napoleon or Julius Caesar in selecting strong positions when there is to be an encounter, and a fireplace, with a solid mantelpiece to lean against, to strike, to cry upon or to cling to, is one of the strongest. The enemy is thus reduced to prowling about the room and handling knick-knacks while he talks, or smashing them if he is ...
— The Primadonna • F. Marion Crawford
... not likely to prove of value to himself or to any one else. So he put on his hat and coat, called a cab, and started for home. His experiences in the cab were quite of a kind with the experiences of the morning, and attended with no little personal danger. He would lean against the cab door and put his arm out and try to touch horse-cars as they passed. Once or twice he nearly had his head knocked off by sticking it out of the windows; but by some happy chance he got interested in the cab curtains and the inviting little strings, which, ...
— The Booming of Acre Hill - And Other Reminiscences of Urban and Suburban Life • John Kendrick Bangs
... better things are in store for them. Cold to the very bone, I walked up and down the saloon to warm myself. The floor was wet, and covered with saturated rugs; there were no fires in the stoves, and my only resource was to lean against the engine-enclosure, and warm my frozen hands on the hot wood. I was joined by a very old gentleman, who, amid many complaints, informed me that he had had an attack of apoplexy during the night, and some one, finding him insensible, had opened ...
— The Englishwoman in America • Isabella Lucy Bird
... brought them to the little red house, and having rewarded her guide Ann Eliza unlatched the gate and walked up to the door. Her heart was beating violently, and she had to lean against the door-post to compose her twitching lips: she had not known till that moment how much it was going to hurt her to speak of Evelina to Mrs. Hochmuller. As her agitation subsided she began to notice how much the appearance of the house had changed. It was not only that ...
— Bunner Sisters • Edith Wharton
... and I got in and the cab started. A hansom cab is better than any carriage you ever rode in, with soft cushions to lean against and little looking-glasses to look at yourself in, and, somehow, you don't hear the wheels. I leaned back and looked at myself and felt like a duchess, for I had my new hat and mantle on, and I knew I looked nice by the way the young men on the tops of the ...
— In Homespun • Edith Nesbit
... could lean against the rail, his shoulder lightly touching hers, and calmly say to himself that he loved her. He could calmly permit her to pass out of his life as a cloud passes down the sea-rim. He hadn't enough, but this evil must befall him. Love! He spread out ...
— Parrot & Co. • Harold MacGrath
... your skate wagon," he said to Flop Ear. "You take it to some street that runs down hill and you start at the top. Stand up on the board, near the box, and lean against it so you won't fall off. Take hold of the handles, and then push yourself off. Down the hilly street you will roll on the skate wheels, just like ...
— Curly and Floppy Twistytail - The Funny Piggie Boys • Howard R. Garis
... for an opportunity to spring the trap; but the sea was so rough and choppy, and the current so swift, that he was not willing to embark in the boats. It looked altogether too perilous. Besides, Bitts did not lean against the mast and go to sleep, and Cleats sent a hand down to bring up his luncheon, and the vice-principal staid ...
— Down the Rhine - Young America in Germany • Oliver Optic
... hungry after all." So back we went together and, reaching the fire, found the accursed bird burned black as any coal, whereupon I stood mighty downcast and abashed the while she laughed and laughed until she needs must lean against a tree; and I, seeing her thus merry at my expense, presently laughed also. Hereupon she falls on her knees, and taking the thing from the fire sets it upon a great leaf for dish, and turns it this way ...
— Black Bartlemy's Treasure • Jeffrey Farnol
... tenderness sweeping to and fro between them. A great light had taken possession of her face. He felt her lean against him confidingly, and he put his arm around her and drew her head to his shoulder, and then, with a boldness he would till now have ascribed only to a god, he put his hand under her warm face, turned it upward and kissed her on the lips. She nestled closer to him and shut her eyes, ...
— Dixie Hart • Will N. Harben
... eat anything which was not strictly 'kurgemass'. Mrs. March played upon the interest which each of them felt in his own case so artfully that she kept them talking of their cure, and left Burnamy and Miss Triscoe to a moment on the bridge, by which they profited, while the others strolled on, to lean against the parapet and watch the lights in the skies and the water, and be alone together. The stream shone above and below, and found its way out of and into the darkness under the successive bridges; the town climbed into the night with lamp-lit windows here ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... don't know what to do with myself. It's easy enough for Mr. Yardsley to say occupy yourself somehow, but what I want to know is, how? I can't look inquiringly at you all that time, waiting for you to say "Ireland! Oh, yes—yes—just over from Dublin." I can't lean against the mantel-piece and gaze into the fire, because the mantel-piece is only canvas, and would fall down if ...
— The Bicyclers and Three Other Farces • John Kendrick Bangs
... with a final probe among the surrounding rocks before selecting one to lean against. "Yet if this person ...
— Kai Lung's Golden Hours • Ernest Bramah |
