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Penetrating   /pˈɛnətrˌeɪtɪŋ/   Listen
Penetrating

adjective
1.
Having or demonstrating ability to recognize or draw fine distinctions.  Synonyms: acute, discriminating, incisive, keen, knifelike, penetrative, piercing, sharp.  "Incisive comments" , "Icy knifelike reasoning" , "As sharp and incisive as the stroke of a fang" , "Penetrating insight" , "Frequent penetrative observations"
2.
Tending to penetrate; having the power of entering or piercing.  Synonym: penetrative.  "A cold penetrating wind" , "A penetrating odor"



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"Penetrating" Quotes from Famous Books



... the critical discharges—not to attempt to check the process going on, but simply to assist the natural operation. His principles and practice were based on the theory of the existence of a restoring essence (or {physis}) penetrating through all creation; the agent which is constantly striving to preserve all things in their natural state, and to restore them when they are preternaturally deranged. In the management of this vis medicatrix naturae the art of the physician consisted. Attention, therefore, to regimen and ...
— Fathers of Biology • Charles McRae

... puddle trenches have been carried, for the purpose of penetrating water-bearing strata, and reaching impenetrable ground, in some cases, has been as much as 160 ft. below the natural surface of the ground, and the expense of timbering, pumping, and excavation in such an instance can be easily imagined. This may be realized by referring to ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 595, May 28, 1887 • Various

... that were made were numerous. In one place there were a number of people penetrating a path that led only to a hedge and deep ditch; indeed it was a ...
— Varney the Vampire - Or the Feast of Blood • Thomas Preskett Prest

... flooded with light, had been carefully closed. The iron door leading on deck was then securely fastened in such a manner as to prevent even a drop of water from penetrating to ...
— The Mysterious Island • Jules Verne

... Chinese merchants an enormous profit. Quite naturally that sagacious nation saw the danger of letting the truth concerning the origin, manufacture and cost of their most precious commodity pass into the possession of other people, and they strove to prevent foreigners from penetrating to their inland tea gardens, while they plied inquisitive enquirers with fairy tales which were eagerly swallowed. They said that every different kind of tea was the product of a different species of plant, which bore a different name, and that the manufacture was a most intricate process depending ...
— Tea Leaves • Francis Leggett & Co.

... am not now alluding to that superiority of mind which leads to the creation of ideal beauty, when life surveyed with a penetrating eye, appears a tragi-comedy, in which little can be seen to satisfy the heart ...
— A Vindication of the Rights of Woman - Title: Vindication of the Rights of Women • Mary Wollstonecraft [Godwin]

... himself a painter as well as a connoisseur, and his landscapes are not without indications of the strong feeling for nature which he undoubtedly possessed. Wordsworth, who had seen very few pictures, but was a penetrating critic of those which he knew, discerned this vein of true feeling in his friend's work, and has idealized a small landscape which Sir George had given him, in a sonnet which reproduces the sense of happy pause and voluntary fixation with which ...
— Wordsworth • F. W. H. Myers

... gathered that morning; and, what seemed still more remarkable, the pitchers and ewers were freshly filled with water. This obliged Miss Milly to notice another singular fact, namely, that the house was free from dust, the one most obtrusive and penetrating visitor of Five Forks. The floors and carpets had been recently swept, the chairs and furniture carefully wiped and dusted. If the house WAS haunted, it was possessed by a spirit who had none of the usual ...
— Tales of the Argonauts • Bret Harte

... up from reading the telegram to see the eyes of the Japanese Privy Councillor fixed upon me with the inscrutable, penetrating gaze of ...
— The International Spy - Being the Secret History of the Russo-Japanese War • Allen Upward

... bleared eyes telling unmistakable truths of cider-brandy and New England rum, his scant locks of white lying in confusion over his wrinkled forehead and cheeks, his whole air squalid, hopeless, and degraded,—not so much by the poverty of vice as by its demoralizing stamp penetrating from the inner to the outer man, and levelling it even below the plane of ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. IV, No. 22, Aug., 1859 • Various

... group there were all the bankers, Mullins and Duff and Pupkin (with the cameo pin), and about four others. They had their photographs taken at Ed Moore's studio, taken in a line with a background of icebergs—a winter scene—and a pretty penetrating crowd they looked, I can tell you. After all, you know, if you get a crowd of representative bank men together in any financial deal, you've got a ...
— Sunshine Sketches of a Little Town • Stephen Leacock

... the clear, mellow voice, penetrating the mist of her meditations, "that you own a very rare, a very unusual breed of dog. I couldn't make out much from Radcliffe's description, but apparently the dog is ...
— Martha By-the-Day • Julie M. Lippmann

... few words which have occupied us this morning we have found such a depth of thought that we despair of penetrating farther. If such is the forecourt of the sanctuary, if the portico of the temple is so grand and magnificent, if the splendor of its beauty thus dazzles the eyes of the soul, what will be the holy of holies? Who ...
— The World's Great Sermons, Volume I - Basil to Calvin • Various

... of them, however, represent higher stages of insight. In the latter, Nature is viewed not only with the eye of the observer, but also with the mind's eye, curious to discover the reasons for things seen. The most penetrating inward inquiry accompanies the acutest external observation in such chapters as those of Darwin and ...
— Young Folks' Library, Volume XI (of 20) - Wonders of Earth, Sea and Sky • Various

... approached, cringing and bowing, Pauline noted that a penetrating, not unkindly eye gleamed from under his bushy brow, scrutinizing her in flashes between his obeisances. Unlike the other Indians, he was not afraid to look the Great White Queen in the face, as he solemnly repeated the ...
— The Perils of Pauline • Charles Goddard

... voice is full and deep, he speaks rapidly, and, altogether, he seems clearly a man who, once upon the track of a mystery which appealed to him, would pursue it with unremitting vigor. His eyes are kind, quick, and penetrating; and there is no doubt that he much prefers gazing at a Crookes tube to beholding a visitor, visitors at present robbing him of much valued time. The meeting was by appointment, however, and his greeting was cordial and hearty. In addition to his own language he speaks French well and English ...
— Little Masterpieces of Science: - Invention and Discovery • Various

... tumultuously squatting. Her gin-soddened face came, like a scarlet cloud, to the view from the embrace of a vagabond black bonnet, braided with rags, viciously glittering here and there with the stray bugles which survived from some bygone era of comparative respectability. Her penetrating snores denoted that she was oblivious of the lounging approach of the policeman, whose blue and burly form was visible in the extreme distance. Julian stopped to observe her reflectively. His eye, which loved the grotesque, was pleased by the bedragglement of her attitude, ...
— Flames • Robert Smythe Hichens

... very quiet. Bruno, the great dog, comes forward and studies him with sagacious, penetrating eyes. He pats him and ...
— Floyd Grandon's Honor • Amanda Minnie Douglas

... throne of their own soul. It is impossible to read the compositions of the most celebrated writers of the present day without being startled with the electric life which burns within their words. They measure the circumference and sound the depths of human nature with a comprehensive and all-penetrating spirit, and they are themselves perhaps the most sincerely astonished at its manifestations; for it is less their spirit than the spirit of the age. Poets are the hierophants of an unapprehended inspiration; the mirrors of the gigantic shadows ...
— English literary criticism • Various

... reassured her as best he could, and began to examine her attentively as they conversed together. "She was," he said, "a woman naturally courageous and fearless; naturally gentle and good; not easily excited; clever and penetrating, seeing things very clearly in her mind, and expressing herself well and in few but careful words; easily finding a way out of a difficulty, and choosing her line of conduct in the most embarrassing circumstances; light-minded and fickle; unstable, ...
— CELEBRATED CRIMES, COMPLETE - THE MARQUISE DE BRINVILLIERS • ALEXANDRE DUMAS, PERE

... was not a boy. She would not cry: she felt proud, obdurate, scornful, outraged. All these images, borrowed from the holy Inquisition, were meant to frighten her—and had simply irritated her. The blow of a weapon that glances off, stinging, but not penetrating, only enrages. It was a moment of fearful danger to her character, to ...
— The Guardian Angel • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.

... alliance of ignorance and presumption; and lament that the human mind should be capable of falling into a state of so deplorable degeneracy. Among the fathers of the church we admire men the most learned of their age, the most penetrating and most judicious, and at the same time {147} the most holy and sincere; who, being endowed with true simplicity of heart, discovered in the mysteries of the cross the secrets of infinite wisdom, which they made their study, and ...
— The Lives of the Fathers, Martyrs, and Principal Saints - January, February, March • Alban Butler

... falling far out upon the frozen lake when the meal was finished, and the sun, sinking early to its rest beyond the homeless solitudes, infused but little warmth as the three hunters prepared to leave. It was only three o'clock, but a penetrating chill was growing in the air. Half an hour more and only a reddish glow would be where the northern sun still shone feebly. In the far North winter night falls with the swiftness of wings; it enshrouds one like a palpable, moving thing, a curtain of gloom that can almost be touched ...
— The Gold Hunters - A Story of Life and Adventure in the Hudson Bay Wilds • James Oliver Curwood

... that this is the most just cause of the creation of the world, that works which are good should be wrought by the God who is good; whether he had read these things in the Bible, or whether by his penetrating genius he beheld the invisible things of God as understood by the things which are made"—ST. AUGUSTINE, "De Civ. Dei," lib. xi. ...
— Christianity and Greek Philosophy • Benjamin Franklin Cocker

... while Mr. Oke was despatching his Saturday heap of Conservative manifestoes and rural decisions—he was justice of the peace in a most literal sense, penetrating into cottages and huts, defending the weak and admonishing the ill-conducted—one morning while I was making one of my many pencil-sketches (alas, they are all that remain to me now!) of my future sitter, Mrs. Oke gave me her version of the story of ...
— Hauntings • Vernon Lee

... the Golden Gate came from. I have discovered the laboratory. For the past two weeks we have been sailing continually in a dense, wet, grey cloud of mist, so thick at times as almost to hide the topgallant yards, and so penetrating as to find its way even into our little after-cabin, and condense in minute drops upon our clothes. It rises, I presume, from the warm water of the great Pacific Gulf Stream across which we are passing, and whose vapour is condensed into fog by the cold north-west winds from Siberia. It is the ...
— Tent Life in Siberia • George Kennan

... house, and the charm of every private society which he honoured with his presence. Perhaps there never arose in this country, nor in any country, a man of a more pointed and finished wit; and (where his passions were not concerned) of a more refined, exquisite, and penetrating judgment. If he had not so great a stock, as some have had who flourished formerly, of knowledge long treasured up, he knew better by far, than any man I ever was acquainted with, how to bring together within a short time, all that was necessary to establish, to illustrate, and to decorate ...
— Selections from the Speeches and Writings of Edmund Burke. • Edmund Burke

... in the ordinary kiers, and do not call for further notice, except that in filling the goods into the kiers care should be taken that while sufficiently loose to permit of the alkaline liquors penetrating through the hanks properly, yet they should be so packed that they will not float about and thus ...
— The Dyeing of Cotton Fabrics - A Practical Handbook for the Dyer and Student • Franklin Beech

... female eye in Seville can support the glance of hers, so fierce and penetrating, and yet so artful and sly, is the expression of their dark orbs; her mouth is fine and almost delicate, and there is not a queen on the proudest throne between Madrid and Moscow who might not, and would not, envy the ...
— George Borrow - The Man and His Books • Edward Thomas

... artificial than natural; and many were the sly bargains which he smuggled into effect under the comfortable cloak of singularity. No wonder, then, that the crafty Morris grew gradually in repute as a person of infinite utility and excellent qualifications; or that the penetrating friends of his deceased sire bowed to the thriving itinerant, with a respect which they denied to many in loftier professions ...
— The Disowned, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... doubt," resumed the penetrating judge of human nature, "that you would have been withheld by the laudable and generous scruples which characterize your happy age, from voluntarily disclosing to me the state of your heart. You might suppose that, proud of the position I once held, or sanguine in the hope of regaining ...
— My Novel, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... light, in quest of the hidden treasure. Spike and his boatswain differed as to the place which had just been described to them, as men will differ even in the account of events that pass directly before their eyes. While thus employed, the report of a heavy gun came through the doors of the cabin, penetrating to the recess in which they ...
— Jack Tier or The Florida Reef • James Fenimore Cooper

... great charm in conversation, as in the lecture-room. It was never loud, never shrill, but singularly penetrating. He was apt to hesitate in the course of a sentence, so as to be sure of the exact word he wanted; picking his way through his vocabulary, to get at the best expression of his thought, as a well-dressed woman crosses the muddy pavement ...
— Ralph Waldo Emerson • Oliver Wendell Holmes

... the thought that we must keep the true balance between these two aspects of that great divine nature—the majesty, the terror, the awfulness, the soaring elevation, the all-penetrating vision, the power of the mighty pinion, one stroke of which could crush a universe into nothing; and, on the other side, the yearning instinct of Fatherhood, the love and gentleness, and all the tender ministries for us, His children, to which ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren

... the greatest influence on the mind of the spectator, not any pretension to a supposed inward greatness of mind or noble meritorious sentiments; consequently duty, not merit, must have not only the most definite, but, when it is represented in the true light of its inviolability, the most penetrating, influence ...
— The Critique of Practical Reason • Immanuel Kant

... out, "Biled, by Jove!" One, with a stiff, thick, new overcoat, was met with the anxious inquiry, "Have you got plenty of stuffing in that coat, about here" (with a hand spread over stomach and heart), "because the Yankee bullets is mighty penetrating." Each new joke was hailed with shouts of laughter and ear-piercing rebel yells, but at last the "melish" was marched off ...
— Memories - A Record of Personal Experience and Adventure During Four Years of War • Fannie A. (Mrs.) Beers

... service," replied Titmouse, trembling involuntarily all over. The stranger again slightly inclined towards him, and—still more slightly—touched his hat; fixing on him, at the same time, an inquisitive penetrating eye, which really abashed, or ...
— Ten Thousand a-Year. Volume 1. • Samuel Warren

... London may one escape the sight of abject poverty, while five minutes' walk from almost any point will bring one to a slum; but the region my hansom was now penetrating was one unending slum. The streets were filled with a new and different race of people, short of stature, and of wretched or beer-sodden appearance. We rolled along through miles of bricks and squalor, and from each cross street and alley flashed long vistas of bricks and misery. Here and there ...
— The People of the Abyss • Jack London

... Questioned as to his knowledge of anything that occurred between them on the day of Gleason's departure, he said he knew nothing. Ray had refused to talk on the subject. The surgeon had given the necessary medical testimony as to cause,—a gunshot wound penetrating the heart and causing almost instant death. The post commander told of the charges against Lieutenant Ray, and of the fact that the deceased was a principal witness—indeed, an accuser, and that seemed all that was necessary. The jury desired ...
— Marion's Faith. • Charles King

... turning in the carriage towards his companion, "weak creature as I am, so unpretending in genius, so low in the scale of intelligent beings, it has never yet happened to me to converse with a man without penetrating his thoughts through that living mask which has been thrown over our mind, in order to retain its expression. But to-night, in this darkness, in the reserve which you maintain, I can read nothing on your features, and something tells me that I shall have great difficulty in wresting from ...
— The Man in the Iron Mask • Alexandre Dumas, Pere

... and spite of the metropolitan magnificence around me, I was mysteriously alive to a dreadful feeling, which I had never before felt, except when penetrating into the lowest and most squalid haunts of sailor iniquity in Liverpool. All the mirrors and marbles around me seemed crawling over with lizards; and I thought to myself, that though gilded and golden, the serpent of ...
— Redburn. His First Voyage • Herman Melville

... stairs at No.—Wall-street. At one end they looked upon the white wall of the interior of a spacious sky-light shaft, penetrating the building from top to bottom. This view might have been considered rather tame than otherwise, deficient in what landscape painters call "life." But if so, the view from the other end of my chambers ...
— Bartleby, The Scrivener - A Story of Wall-Street • Herman Melville

... As they retired, Sill's brigade followed in a spirited charge, driving them back across the open ground and behind their intrenchments. In this charge the gallant Sill was killed; a rifle ball passing through his upper lip and penetrating the brain. Although this was a heavy loss, yet the enemy's discomfiture was such as to give us an hour's time, and as Colonel Greusel, Thirty-sixth Illinois, succeeded to Sill's command, I directed ...
— The Memoirs of General Philip H. Sheridan, Vol. I., Part 2 • P. H. Sheridan

... no light of understanding in David's face, but his penetrating eyes, the size and beauty of which she could not help observing, seemed to invite ...
— The History of David Grieve • Mrs. Humphry Ward

... intellect on the side espoused by himself. The name alone of Eugene Aram, at a day when scholarship was renown, would have been no ordinary acquisition to the cause of the Earl's party; but that judicious and penetrating nobleman perceived that Aram's abilities, his various research, his extended views, his facility of argument, and the heat and energy of his eloquence, might be rendered of an importance which could not have been anticipated from the name alone, ...
— Eugene Aram, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... not answer. He had first been stupefied by his mistake, and was now racking his brain to discover the cause of it, which was soon discerned by his penetrating mind. ...
— File No. 113 • Emile Gaboriau

... rocky coast of Skye. The keen-witted Flora had devised a new and bold plan for the safety of her charge, no less a one than that of trusting the Lady Margaret McDonald, wife of Sir Alexander, with her dangerous secret. This seemed like penetrating the very stronghold of the foe; but the women of the Highlands had—most of them—a secret leaning to Jacobitism, and Flora felt that she could trust her ...
— Historical Tales, Vol. 4 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris

... in Sicily, Hesychius, his disciple, was seeking the old man through the world, searching the shores, penetrating the desert, and only certain that, wherever he was, he could not long be hid. So, after three years were past, he heard at Methone {118} from a Jew, who was selling old clothes, that a prophet of the Christians had appeared in Sicily, working such wonders that he was ...
— The Hermits • Charles Kingsley

... Penetrating the clear water, the light revealed the tiniest stone at the bottom: but there was no fish, no water-rat, or moorhen on this side. Neither on that nor many succeeding mornings could anything be seen there; the tail of the arch was evidently ...
— Nature Near London • Richard Jefferies

... amphitheatre: "The cup hath it, the cup! the cup!" and he saw the Lord of Les Baux lying at a little distance with blood trickling upon the sand from the bars of his helmet. For Richard's lance had slipped upward and penetrating between gorget and helmet had pierced and dislocated Barral's jaw. This alone was enough to give Richard his second victory, but there were three added points of humiliation for the Knight of Les Baux, ...
— Romance of Roman Villas - (The Renaissance) • Elizabeth W. (Elizbeth Williams) Champney

... fascination. If inferior to Pindar in passion and loftiness, it glows with a more genial humanity, and with purer wit. It cannot be enjoyed fully, except by those versed in the experiences of life. Such perceive a calm wisdom, a penetrating sagacity, a sober enthusiasm, and a refined taste, which are unusual even among the masters of human thought. It is the fashion to depreciate the original merits of this poet, as well as those of ...
— The Old Roman World • John Lord

... were worthy of that splendid name, so bandied by the Press and the Academies and doled out to divers windbags greedy of money and flattery—the poets, despising impudent rhetoric and that slavish realism which nibbles at the surface of things without penetrating to reality, had intrenched themselves in the very center of the soul, in a mystic vision into which was drawn the universe of form and idea, like a torrent falling into a lake, there to take on the ...
— Jean Christophe: In Paris - The Market-Place, Antoinette, The House • Romain Rolland

... Breaking back to cover, the chase hot on his heels, he had run full tilt into a party of village youths from Glen Ellen and Caliente. Their squirrel and deer rifles had missed him, but his back had been peppered with birdshot in a score of places, the leaden pellets penetrating maddeningly in a score of places just ...
— Michael, Brother of Jerry • Jack London

... "A penetrating sulphurous scent stole through the thick air. Then right under my bee-swollen feet swung a small black kettle, suspended by a chain round its bail, and filled with a yellowish substance, burning bluely. It was brimstone, of which we had a supply for fastening ...
— The Junior Classics Volume 8 - Animal and Nature Stories • Selected and arranged by William Patten

... exhibitions, is of the novelists' dowager Duchess type. A short, obese, and jovial figure, or dried and withered but imperious distinction, as the case may be. There is much crackling of fine garments, a brilliant display of lorgnette, and this penetrating and comprehensive royal critical dictum: "Isn't that ...
— Walking-Stick Papers • Robert Cortes Holliday

... a man who is educated all over; whose nerves are brought to their acutest sensibility, whose brain is cultured, keen, incisive, penetrating, broad, liberal, deep; whose hands are deft; whose eyes are alert, sensitive, microscopic, whose heart ...
— Architects of Fate - or, Steps to Success and Power • Orison Swett Marden

... it get like that?" he exclaimed, with the penetrating squeak of a very young child. "I don't see. ...
— The Green Carnation • Robert Smythe Hichens

... it is not my purpose to pronounce his eulogy. That pleasing task has been assigned to abler hands, and to a more suitable occasion. He will there be presented in other, though not less interesting lights. As the penetrating delineator of manners and character in the British Spy; as the biographer of Patrick Henry, dedicated to the young men of your native commonwealth; as the friend and delight of the social circle; as the husband ...
— Memoir of the Life of John Quincy Adams. • Josiah Quincy

... beats were heard within the tent, accompanied by a low groaning and moaning, which gradually increased in volume and pitch until presently it became a high, penetrating, blood-curdling screech. This continued for perhaps half an hour, the drum beats never ceasing their ...
— The Gaunt Gray Wolf - A Tale of Adventure With Ungava Bob • Dillon Wallace

... that time presses if we are to take part in these exploring labors. And that is not all, since, while some are thus advancing with sure steps to the discovery of the sources of the Nile, others are penetrating to the very ...
— Five Weeks in a Balloon • Jules Verne

... being that of trade with the Indians rather than a self-supporting agriculture, favored the swift expansion of these colonies and their wide influence among the Indians. Scattered companies of fur-traders would be found here and there, wherever were favorable points for traffic, penetrating deeply into the wilderness and establishing friendly business relations with the savages. It has been observed that the Romanic races show an alacrity for intermarriage with barbarous tribes that is not to be found in the Teutonic. ...
— A History of American Christianity • Leonard Woolsey Bacon

... Burton had for some months shown signs of bodily decay; and he now daily grew weaker. His eyes, though still fierce and penetrating, were sunk into hollow cavities. His body was emaciated, his hands were thin to transparency, his voice was sometimes inarticulate, and he could hardly walk without support. Still, there seemed no immediate cause for anxiety, and, as will be seen from the ...
— The Life of Sir Richard Burton • Thomas Wright

... which are mere verbal bridges over the gaps in that knowledge, and mark the lacunae and unsolved problems of the science. Yet it is just such terms that seem to clothe "Science" in its pontifical garb; the cowl is taken for the monk; and when a penetrating critic, like M. Henri Poincare, turned his subtle irony upon them, the public cried that he had announced the "bankruptcy of science," whereas it is merely the language of science that he had reduced ...
— Winds Of Doctrine - Studies in Contemporary Opinion • George Santayana

... honorably, and to put them under a necessity of conviction, that we were now become sincerely their friends, by delivering to them so sacred a pledge of amity, as our principal blood. Can we then, unmoved, behold them so basely abusing that thorough confidence of ours? Beautiful, all-seeing, all-penetrating luminary! without whose influence the mind of man has neither efficacy nor vigor, thou hast seen to what a pitch that nation (who are however our brothers) has carried its insolence towards our principal maidens. Our resentment would not have been so extreme with respect to girls of more ...
— An Account Of The Customs And Manners Of The Micmakis And Maricheets Savage Nations, Now Dependent On The Government Of Cape-Breton • Antoine Simon Maillard

... low but singularly penetrating, falling in minor cadences to a new silence, came from ...
— The Insidious Dr. Fu-Manchu • Sax Rohmer

... lay upon the crags, then deepened and spread, penetrating the darkness below, which was no longer black, but dusky purple. Rosemary's heart sang as she climbed, and the fragrance of the lily thrilled her soul with pure delight. The path was smooth, now, and thorns no longer hurt her feet. The hand that held the lily, however, was bleeding, from some ...
— Master of the Vineyard • Myrtle Reed

... to Paris being, it was said, sufficient to sicken it, and impart such a shock to its delicate constitution that it was unlikely to recover from it. To attain perfection, this wine, which is what the French term a vin vif, penetrating into the remotest corners of the organ of taste, requires to be kept a couple of years in wood and half-a-dozen ...
— Facts About Champagne and Other Sparkling Wines • Henry Vizetelly

... fearing that he might turn his head and see her eye at the small aperture, she reached up and covered the lamp, leaving her own room in complete darkness. The double covering, which closed over the semi-globular lamp like an eyelid, kept every ray of light from penetrating into ...
— Jennie Baxter, Journalist • Robert Barr

... hand lay upon the desk, and as he spoke he fingered an open pamphlet. His penetrating eyes were on ...
— The Voice of the People • Ellen Glasgow

... weather, they were always there, contentedly feeding on the sweet, early-cured tufts of grass that the raging alpine gales kept uncovered. It was fascinating to watch them; neither wild winds nor blinding snow seemed to disconcert them; their thick wool coats were impervious to the keenest, most penetrating blasts. True, on terribly stormy days they sought the shelter of giant upthrusts of rock, towering cliffs or sky-piercing spires that faced eastward, away from the prevailing winds. There they probably stayed for days at a time, as long as the worst storms prevailed. Such days ...
— A Mountain Boyhood • Joe Mills

... and, seating himself on a camp-stool at the curb, opened the piano. After a discouraged glance at the darkened windows, the other, in a hoarse, strident tenor, to the accompaniment of the piano, began to sing. The voice of the man was raucous, penetrating. It would have reached the ...
— The Lost House • Richard Harding Davis

... died down and she was in terror of extinction, she had only to send for him to have her fear taken from her. She had only to pick up a book of his, to read a sentence of his, and she would feel herself afire again. Everything about him, his voice, his look, the touch of his hand, had this penetrating, life-giving quality. ...
— The Creators - A Comedy • May Sinclair

... well-shaped head, dark flashing eyes, sensitive lips and nostrils, he was a direct contrast to those who are usually associated with the crime of which he was accused. Even the judge, who looked at him with keen, penetrating eyes, could not help being impressed by the fact. He was a man capable of controlling other men, a man who could deal with large affairs. Passionate, perhaps, and vengeful, but not likely to wreak his passion like ...
— The Day of Judgment • Joseph Hocking

... Being transported with fury one against the other, they struggled to rid themselves of the hindrance caused by their friend; and in so doing, the one whose sword was held by the blade by Mr. Howell, drew it away roughly, and nearly cut his hand off, severing the nerves and muscles, and penetrating to the bone. The other, almost at the same instant, disengaged his sword, and aimed a blow at the head of his antagonist, which Mr. Howell observing, raised his wounded hand with the rapidity of thought to prevent the blow. The sword fell on the back of his already wounded hand, and cut it severely. ...
— Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds • Charles Mackay

... rapture thrills me through When I contemplate all those thoughts may do; Like snow-white eagles penetrating space, They may explore full many an unknown place, And build their nests on mountain heights unseen, Whereon doth lie that dreamed-of ...
— Maurine and Other Poems • Ella Wheeler Wilcox

... the fracture of an unequally heated glass vessel, the rocks cleave off in slabs which slip down the steeps of the mountain and collect as screes in the valley. At lower levels the expansive force of vegetable growth is not unimportant, as all will admit who have seen the strong roots of the pines penetrating the crannies of the rocks. Nor does the river which flows in the bed of the valley act as a carrier only. Listening carefully we may detect beneath the roar of the alpine torrent the crunching and knocking of descending boulders. ...
— The Birth-Time of the World and Other Scientific Essays • J. (John) Joly

... twenty, rather tall and very slender, her hair was neither chestnut nor auburn, but a most decided bright, light red; her complexion was remarkably fair and brilliant, her head small, neck long, chin well turned, but very short, lips thin and red, eyes clear hazel, quick, and penetrating, but entirely destitute of poetry or feeling. She had, or might have had, many suitors in her own rank of life, but scornfully repulsed or rejected them all; for none but a gentleman could please her refined taste, and ...
— The Tenant of Wildfell Hall • Anne Bronte

... sang, awake with the stars. We entered the narrower banks of the Brenta, and arrived at the shore of the Laguna at sunrise on the sixth of September. The bright orb slowly rose from behind its cupolas and towers, and shed its penetrating light upon the glassy waters. Wrecks of gondolas, and some few uninjured ones, were strewed on the beach at Fusina. We embarked in one of these for the widowed daughter of ocean, who, abandoned and fallen, sat forlorn on her propping isles, looking towards the far mountains of Greece. We rowed ...
— The Last Man • Mary Shelley

... could not, it is true, be considered as a diligent scholar, by those who looked at the progress made by him in the regular and ostensible occupations of the institution; but it is undeniable, that the activity of his powerful, accurate, and penetrating mind found solid and unremitting occupation in a wide circle of general reading. His own account of the acquirements he had made at this period, and of the various branches of study which he had cultivated with more or less assiduity, proves that, however desultory may have been the ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 57, No. 356, June, 1845 • Various

... Irishman, nothing of the Celt about him. He was cold, distant and unexpansive in manner and had more followers than friends. His speech was not that of a great orator. Yet he was singularly powerful and penetrating, with here and there brilliant flashes that showed profound wisdom. A man of few words, of strength rather than breadth of mind—his political ideals were often uncertain and confused—he was better fitted to be ...
— Ireland Since Parnell • Daniel Desmond Sheehan

... years of age and looks like a decent City clerk who has spent his life keeping books at a desk. He has nothing to distinguish him from the ordinary respectable Londoner, with his clean-shaven face and his somewhat heavy appearance, nothing except his terribly keen, bright, penetrating eyes. ...
— The Blonde Lady - Being a Record of the Duel of Wits between Arsne Lupin and the English Detective • Maurice Leblanc

... should be specially commended. The foe has not been allowed opportunity either to plant or to cultivate or to reap. The season, which to him has usually been one of repose and preparation for renewed conflict, has been vigorously occupied by incessant and harassing pursuit, by penetrating his hiding places and laying waste his rude dwellings, and by driving him from swamp to swamp and from everglade to everglade. True, disease and death have been encountered at the same time and in the same pursuit, but they have been disregarded by a brave and gallant army, determined ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents: Tyler - Section 2 (of 3) of Volume 4: John Tyler • Compiled by James D. Richardson

... your typewriter brought in here. I want you to do some work for me—work that isn't to be spoken of—not even to Mr. Tetlow." He looked at her with grave penetrating eyes. "You will not ...
— The Grain Of Dust - A Novel • David Graham Phillips

... declaring that they did thus and so at such a time. The criminal overwhelmed with astonishment and confusion generally admits the charge, and is sentenced accordingly. A stranger is at once struck with the quick and penetrating power of Judge Dowling's glance. He seems to look right through a criminal, and persons brought before him generally find it impossible to deceive him. This has made him the terror of criminals, who have come to regard an arraignment before him as equivalent ...
— Lights and Shadows of New York Life - or, the Sights and Sensations of the Great City • James D. McCabe

... was not instantaneous, the lightweight porcelain bullet had far less penetrating power than an arrow, and the thing boomed and belched out a cloud of smoke that would have shown the Gerns exactly ...
— Space Prison • Tom Godwin

... smiling seductively, though his gaze seemed hard and penetrating. He hung over the lad not unlike some bird of prey, waiting for a ...
— Ralph Granger's Fortunes • William Perry Brown

... entering Indiana, and marching as nearly due east as possible, he would reduce to a minimum the distance necessary to be covered, and yet threaten and alarm the population of the two States as completely as by penetrating deeply into them; more so, indeed, for pursuing this line he would reach the immediate vicinity of Cincinnati and excite fears for the safety of that city. While he intended to prolong the raid to the uttermost, he proposed ...
— Famous Adventures And Prison Escapes of the Civil War • Various

... (p. 369): "The river runs through the suburbs." I do not know what is the worth of the old engravings in Montanus. A view of Fu-chau in one of these (reproduced in Astley, iv. 33) shows a broad creek from the river penetrating to the heart of ...
— The Travels of Marco Polo, Volume 2 • Marco Polo and Rustichello of Pisa

... voice, though not loud in ordinary speech, was distinct and penetrating. In a moment Alicia's ...
— Half a Hero - A Novel • Anthony Hope

... lawn was fast beginning to resemble a golf course we locked Excalibur up in the washhouse, where his hyena-like howls rent the air for the rest of the evening, penetrating even to the dining-room. This was particularly unfortunate, because we were having a dinner party in honor of a neighbor who had recently come to the district, no less a personage, in fact, than the new lord-lieutenant of the county and his lady. Stella was naturally anxious ...
— Scally - The Story of a Perfect Gentleman • Ian Hay

... those strangely unsuggested remembrances flashed into her mind: the gleam of a dove's white wing against the burning blue of a July sky, the blaze of flowers in the rectory garden, and the subtle, penetrating fragrance of mignonette. Perhaps the contrast of the intense cold and the gathering night brought the scene before her; she sighed; if she and John could go away from this grief and misery and sin, which they seemed powerless to ...
— John Ward, Preacher • Margaret Deland

... might, nay, would be otherwise indifferent. There is something quite singular in the unconsciously serious and critical way two young people of different sex look at each other on meeting for the first time; in the scrutinising and penetrating glances they exchange, in the careful inspection which their various traits undergo. This scrutiny and analysis represent the meditation of the genius of the species on the individual which may be born and the combination of its qualities; and the greatness of their delight ...
— Essays of Schopenhauer • Arthur Schopenhauer

... by several screams of terror from outside, interrupted the conversation. Dave stopped short to listen, and Jessie threw wide-open the door to do likewise. Another yell rang out, fierce and penetrating, and then came several more screams, and a rush ...
— Dave Porter At Bear Camp - The Wild Man of Mirror Lake • Edward Stratemeyer

... sure feeling of a perfect disguise, I came yesterday to the local scoundrels,—the "high commission of investigations" as they call this filthy, impossible place where they meet. It used to be the Ecclesiastical School in other days. I had quite a time penetrating these regions guarded by the Reds. The man to whom I was recommended was an elderly kind-faced fellow. All he was saying to me was virtually addressed to the crowd of Reds in the room; as for the room, I think it used to be in former times ...
— Rescuing the Czar - Two authentic Diaries arranged and translated • James P. Smythe

... operatic tenor of the present generation, to those who have both heard and seen him in some of his many roles. Or, to those who have only listened to his records, again visions of the wonderful voice, with its penetrating, vibrant, ringing quality, the impassioned delivery, which stamps every note he sings with the hall mark of genius, the tremendous, unforgettable climaxes. Not to have heard Caruso sing is to have missed ...
— Vocal Mastery - Talks with Master Singers and Teachers • Harriette Brower

... century ago, James Boswell made an expedition to Corsica, and was entertained with distinction by Pascal Paoli. Next to conducting Samuel Johnson to the Hebrides, the exploit of penetrating to what was then considered a sort of Ultima Thule in southern Europe, was the greatest event in the famous biographer's life; and, next to his devotion to the English sage, was the homage he paid to the ...
— Rambles in the Islands of Corsica and Sardinia - with Notices of their History, Antiquities, and Present Condition. • Thomas Forester

... ago, produced in the latter end of the last, a Gentleman, of whom it may be justly said, he left no stone unturned to come at the truth. This is Mons. Seguier, whose long life has been employed in collecting a cabinet of Roman antiquities, and natural curiosities, and whose penetrating genius alone could have discovered, by the means he did, an inscription, of which not a single letter has been seen for many ages; but this habile observateur, perceiving a great number of irregular holes upon the frontal and frize of this edifice, concluded that they were the cramp-holes ...
— A Year's Journey through France and Part of Spain, 1777 - Volume 1 (of 2) • Philip Thicknesse

... They went on, penetrating a lifeless silence; their horse's feet making the first prints since early morning in the unbroken smoothness of the way, and the only sound the gentle tinkle of their own bells, as they moved pleasantly, but not ...
— Faith Gartney's Girlhood • Mrs. A. D. T. Whitney

... that claimed their attention was Sugar-Maple Island, a fine, thickly-wooded island, rising with steep, rocky banks from the water. A beautiful object, but too densely wooded to admit of our party penetrating beyond a ...
— Lost in the Backwoods • Catharine Parr Traill

... moment of time, the human mind is not only enabled to number worlds beyond the unassisted ken of mortal eye, but to trace the events of indefinite ages before the creation of our race, and is not even withheld from penetrating into the dark secrets of the ocean, or the interior of the solid globe; free, like the spirit which the poet described as ...
— The Harvard Classics Volume 38 - Scientific Papers (Physiology, Medicine, Surgery, Geology) • Various

... moment the mess helpers passed along the line with buckets of steaming hot coffee, and the men welcomed it eagerly, for it was late in the autumn and the night air was chill and penetrating. "Come, little cup, to one who loves thee well," murmured Tom, as he swallowed his ...
— Army Boys in the French Trenches • Homer Randall

... full of hideous menace to her. Hence he proposed that three of us should carry out the hunter's plan, leaving the fourth to take the hint given by the charred stick and the swimming ambush crew, and so penetrating to the valley by the stream cavern, be at hand to strike a blow for our dear lady's honor in ...
— The Master of Appleby • Francis Lynde

... roused his ever ready fighting instincts, whereas, once Walpole's fall was practically assured the weak forces of the Opposition (William Pitt being yet many years from power) could have availed but little to enlist his penetrating intellect. And he may by now have found that politics afforded, in those days, but scanty support to ...
— Henry Fielding: A Memoir • G. M. Godden

... aspect, these plays are often affecting or curious, possessing penetrating and thoughtful psychology. The most celebrated dramas still left to us of the Indian stage are The Chariot of Baked Clay and the affecting and delicate Sakuntala the gem of Indian literature, the work ...
— Initiation into Literature • Emile Faguet

... so vigorous; so penetrating, so melodious, so beautiful, come from behind jail bars, it is high time that thinking men and women awoke to the fate that awaits bold dreamers and singers under the present ...
— Bars and Shadows • Ralph Chaplin

... the body of this mighty luminary, that all the planets thus thrown out of it would make scarcely any perceptible diminution of it, as mentioned above. The cavity mentioned above, as measured by Dr. Wilson of 4000 miles in depth, not penetrating an hundredth part of the sun's semi-diameter; and yet, as its width was many times greater than its depth, was large enough to contain a greater body than ...
— The Botanic Garden - A Poem in Two Parts. Part 1: The Economy of Vegetation • Erasmus Darwin

... the masquerade, I had time to collect myself. I never shall forget the sensation which rushed through my bosom when I first looked toward the pit. I beheld a gradual ascent of heads. All eyes were fixed upon me, and the sensation they conveyed was awfully impressive; but the keen, the penetrating eyes of Mr. Garrick, darting their lustre from the centre of the orchestra, were, beyond all others, the ...
— Beaux and Belles of England • Mary Robinson

... obtaining the other for an antagonist. Then Vabhruvahana, laughing, pierced the diadem-decked Arjuna, that foremost of men, in the shoulder with a straight shaft. Equipt with feathers, that shaft penetrated Arjuna's body like a snake penetrating on an anthill. Piercing the son of Kunti through, the shaft went deep into the Earth. Feeling acute pain, the intelligent Dhananjaya rested awhile, supporting himself on his excellent bow. He stood, having recourse to his celestial energy ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 4 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli

... bonnet, missed it, jumped again and barked-the high-pitched, penetrating yelp of ...
— Greyfriars Bobby • Eleanor Atkinson

... come to hoodwink them, and might resent it. You know how much that would involve."[611] He did not seem to realise that the refusal to pass sentence was equally hoodwinking the English, and that the trial would only defer the moment of their penetrating the deception; a trial was ...
— Henry VIII. • A. F. Pollard

... French army, exactly resembles a similar attack at Aspern and Wagram, and the last onset of the Imperial Guards at Waterloo. The account of the progress of the English column, and the means by which its advance was at length arrested, might pass for a narrative of the penetrating of the Austrian centre by the French column under Lannes, on the second day of Aspern, or the famous advance of the Old and Middle Guard against the British right centre, on the evening of the 18th June 1815. ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 61, No. 379, May, 1847 • Various

... divil—tish!—go along!' says he, making a kick at her. With that the cat gave a reproachful look at him, and her eyes glared just like a pair of mail-coach lamps in a fog. With that, sir, the cat, with a mysterious 'mi-ow' fixed a most penetrating glance on Tom, and ...
— Handy Andy, Vol. 2 - A Tale of Irish Life • Samuel Lover

... once rude, magnificent, and corrupted. She is placed immediately about the person of the queen, and is apparently her favorite attendant. The affection of the wicked queen for this gentle and innocent creature, is one of those beautiful redeeming touches, one of those penetrating glances into the secret springs of natural and feminine feeling which we find only in Shakspeare. Gertrude, who is not so wholly abandoned but that there remains within her heart some sense of the virtue she has forfeited, seems to look with a kind ...
— Characteristics of Women - Moral, Poetical, and Historical • Anna Jameson

... besieged showered down missiles, in vain poured over the caldrons of boiling oil they had prepared in readiness. The strength of the beams defied the first; the hides lapping over each other prevented the second from penetrating to ...
— The Cat of Bubastes - A Tale of Ancient Egypt • G. A. Henty

... whose very trail robs them of light, or as paling glow-worms hide away before some prying lantern; and all who have in one way or another prided themselves on some harmless peculiarity, avoid his penetrating glance as the eye of a basilisk. Then, again, those casual encounters of witlings in the world authorial, so anticipated by a hostess, so looked-forward-to by guests! In most cases, how forlorn they be! how dull; constrained, suspicious! like rival traders, with pockets instinctively ...
— The Complete Prose Works of Martin Farquhar Tupper • Martin Farquhar Tupper

... unexpectedly, before he could step forward. Her hand went to her bosom; out came her silver whistle; a blast shrilled forth from it, loud and penetrating. ...
— Daughter of the Sun - A Tale of Adventure • Jackson Gregory

... which lay between him and the bed of death, still trying, at quieter intervals, to snatch profit by the way; peeping, at the most unlikely hours, on the objects of his curiosity, waiting for a glimpse of dawn through glowing church windows, penetrating into old church treasuries by candle-light, taxing the old courtiers to pant up, for "the view," to this or that conspicuous point in the world of hilly woodland. From one such at last, in spite of everything with pleasure to Carl, ...
— Imaginary Portraits • Walter Pater

... Crane's penetrating accents must have been audible in the remotest corner of the ground-floor rooms: he made no effort to modulate them ...
— The False Faces • Vance, Louis Joseph

... then a pause of about five seconds; then a slow, sweet, solemn utterance of the holy name in a tone as of meditative wonder; then another pause; then another wild, rich, passionate warble. Could you see him, you would marvel how so powerful and penetrating a soprano could ripple from so minute a throat; for he is one of the very tiniest of all feathered singers, yet his chant can be heard far across the broad river, and children going to school pause daily on ...
— Glimpses of an Unfamiliar Japan - First Series • Lafcadio Hearn

... Angels, in 1517, and those of Whitsuntide, 1518.[9] The first must have been bold, and according to the testimony of Hedion, who was present, the second were "beautiful, thorough, solemn, comprehensive, penetrating, evangelical, in the power of their language reminding one of the oldest church-fathers." A part of the monks were scandalized, but the Abbot and Geroldseck encouraged and ...
— The Life and Times of Ulric Zwingli • Johann Hottinger

... with a swift penetrating glance, as though he were seeing me for the first time and would wish at once to weigh ...
— The Dark Forest • Hugh Walpole

... or yesterday,' but are the same in all times, and under all forms of government. Then when the storm descends and the winds blow, though he knows not beforehand the hour of danger, the pilot, not like Plato's captain in the Republic, half-blind and deaf, but with penetrating eye and quick ear, is ready to take command of the ship ...
— Gorgias • Plato

... original single-turret form, armed with the large-calibre smooth-bores, which were fired with great deliberation and with surprising accuracy. I could not see how any rifled guns could have improved on their practice. The conical shot would, of course, have excelled in penetrating power and in range, but the big round shells seemed to be put just where the gunners wished. A group of men stood on the deck of the monitor behind the turret, and they frequently came out from its cover to watch the effect ...
— Military Reminiscences of the Civil War V2 • Jacob Dolson Cox

... wind swept up the river, penetrating our soaked garments. But we paid little attention to this, only pulling the harder, not only to keep the circulation going, but every pull of the oars put us that much nearer home. We never paused in our rowing until we anchored at 4.30 ...
— Through the Grand Canyon from Wyoming to Mexico • E. L. Kolb

... had been out, shouldn't you have been aware of it?" asked his father, fixing a penetrating gaze ...
— In School and Out - or, The Conquest of Richard Grant. • Oliver Optic

... not only reduced bribery to a system of government practically, but theoretically. For when he despaired any longer of concealing his bribes from the penetrating eye of Parliament, then he took another mode, and declared, as your Lordships will see, that it was the best way of supplying the necessities of the East India Company in the pressing exigencies of their affairs; that thus a relief to the Company's affairs might be yielded, which, in the ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. X. (of 12) • Edmund Burke

... will be great art when with the subject-matter the artist gives love, a great universal kindness that thinks not of itself but, being no respecter of persons, looks upon each child in the light of that child's own best realization. This penetrating sympathy, this great understanding, will call forth from the child an answering love, which grows daily into a larger humanity of soul until the child, in time too, comes to have a universal sympathy. This is the true ...
— A Study of Fairy Tales • Laura F. Kready

... hardly to be supposed, of course, that this story is pure romance; but it is difficult, on the other hand, to believe that the incident has been related by Sterne exactly as it happened. That the recorded prediction may have been made in jest—or even in earnest (for penetrating teachers have these prophetic moments sometimes)—is, of course, possible; but that Sterne's master was "very much hurt" at the boy's having been justly punished for an act of wanton mischief, or that he recognized it as the natural privilege of nascent genius to deface ...
— Sterne • H.D. Traill

... Beauchamp knocking at doors late at night, the sturdy beggar of a vote! or waylaying workmen, as he confessed without shame that he had done, on their way trooping to their midday meal; penetrating malodoriferous rooms of dismal ten-pound cottagers, to exhort bedraggled mothers and babes, and besotted husbands; and exposed to rebuffs from impertinent tradesmen; and lampooned and travestied, shouting speeches ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith

... apprehensions on his own score. My deportment and tone tallied well with the practised indifference which had distinguished my previous overt conduct. It deceived him on that head; but the truth, like a sharp knife, was no less keen in penetrating to his soul; and, preserving my coolness and directness, with that singular tenacity of purpose which I could maintain in spite of my own sufferings—and keep them still unsuspected—I did not scruple to impel the sharp iron into every sensitive ...
— Confession • W. Gilmore Simms



Words linked to "Penetrating" :   penetrating trauma, perceptive



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