"Softening" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... hoped that if Andre and Joan were brought up together a tender intimacy would arise between the two children; and that the beauty of our skies, our civilisation, and the attractions of our court would end by softening whatever rudeness there might be in the young Hungarian's character; but in spite of my efforts all has tended to cause coldness, and even aversion, between the bridal pair. Joan, scarcely fifteen, is far ahead of her age. Gifted with a brilliant and mobile mind, a noble ...
— Celebrated Crimes, Complete • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... mamma no doubt and aunts), prick up their ears, and M. Kangourou translates to them, softening as much as possible, my heartrending decision. I feel really almost sorry for them; the fact is, that for women who, not to put too fine a point upon it, have come to sell a child, they have an air I was not prepared for: I can hardly say an air of respectability (a word in use with us, which ...
— Madame Chrysantheme • Pierre Loti
... coarse laugh, "or I had not disturbed myself to call you. But, maybe," added he, softening his manner a little, "you'll like some refreshments before you start? A stoup of Nantz will put you in cue for the ...
— Rookwood • William Harrison Ainsworth
... and the attorney, softening his voice, said that "Susan was a great deal too good to her; as you are, indeed," added he, "to everybody. I forgive her for your sake." Susan curtsied, in great surprise; but her lamb could not be forgotten, and she left the attorney's house as soon as she could, to make ...
— The Parent's Assistant • Maria Edgeworth
... shady paths; learn by quiet observation; and allow men of all kinds to pass him by, while he remained a fixture. He would gain the benefit of the distance with those below and above him, since he would be magnified for the one class, while seen from a softening point of view by the other. And so also he would admire the distant brightness, "the mightiness yonder," the more for keeping his own place. If seen too closely, the ...
— A Handbook to the Works of Browning (6th ed.) • Mrs. Sutherland Orr
... thought that the government of the Recollect fathers was milder, and hence they sighed for it. Those fathers tolerated their barbarous customs among a people so ferocious, and succeeded by their patience in softening and reducing them. Not so with the Dominican fathers, who learned the Zambals' tenacity at their own cost. In the village of Balacbac was an Indian chief named Dalinen; although he lived in that village, he kept his ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898 - Volume 41 of 55, 1691-1700 • Various
... Viscount, as he listened to Antoine's account of the Cure's imprisonment. What had astonished and overpowered his own undisciplined nature had not disturbed Monsieur the Preceptor. He had prayed in the chateau—he prayed in the prison. He had often spoken in the chateau of the softening and comforting influences of communion with the lower animals and with nature, and in the uncertainty of imprisonment he had tamed a toad. "None of these things had moved him," and, in a storm of grief ...
— Melchior's Dream and Other Tales • Juliana Horatia Ewing
... not quite satisfied with it; and at last our worthy friend volunteered to ride forward himself to prepare the way, suggesting that his rank, and his acquaintance with a large number of people, might have some little influence in softening matters. We in the meantime remained at the passangerang awaiting his return. Two hours passed away and he did not appear, and the widow began to be anxious; a third had elapsed, and no Lieutenant ...
— Mark Seaworth • William H.G. Kingston
... of hers, Those deep dark eyes where pride demurs When pity would be softening through, Fix'd me a breathing-while or two With life or death in the balance: right! The blood replenish'd me again; My last thought was at least not vain: I and my mistress, side by side Shall be together, breathe and ride, So, one day more am ...
— Book of English Verse • Bulchevy
... a shade of softening in her visitor's face. "We can't tell yet. She has had a severe fall, and the chill coming after it may have very serious consequences, but we can tell nothing yet. However, I did not come here to inform you of her condition," the voice growing stern and the face severe again. ...
— The Governess • Julie M. Lippmann
... of Mme de La Fayette in the revised and re-revised text of the "Maximes." [8] But we know that she was no less sagacious and no less an enemy to illusion than he was, and those are probably not far wrong who have detected a softening influence from her conversation on the late ...
— Three French Moralists and The Gallantry of France • Edmund Gosse
... get it, then?" said the man, softening slightly, which was not at all what the boys expected when Jane began to ...
— Five Children and It • E. Nesbit
... to him and let him feel her weight. But he was very fond of her, and, as she continued mutely to implore forgiveness—she, Lulu, his Lulu, whom every one envied him—his hasty anger once more subsided; he put his arms round her and kissed her. She nestled in against him, over-happy at his softening, and for some moments they stood like this, in the absolute physical agreement that always overcame their differences. In his arms, with her head on his shoulder, she smoothed back his hair; and while she gazed, with adoring eyes, at this face that constituted her world, she murmured ...
— Maurice Guest • Henry Handel Richardson
... and she had felt no anger, though much pain and pity. Her mind had thrown itself back into the unknown past almost tenderly towards the mother who had died long ago, to whom perhaps Bice had been what little Tom was now to herself. But when the further statement reached her ears all that softening which seemed to have swept over her disappeared in a moment. A horrible bewilderment had seized her. Was he two men, with two wives, two lives, two ...
— Sir Tom • Mrs. Oliphant
... character of death eternal. Thought and inquiry will satisfy themselves very readily with an answer as far as regards spiritual things: their whole vigour will be devoted to the things of this world, to science or to business, or to public matters, all alike hardening rather than softening to the mind, if its thoughts do not go to something higher and deeper still. And as years pass on, we may think on these our favourite or professional subjects more and more earnestly; our views on them may be clearer and sounder, but there comes again ...
— The Christian Life - Its Course, Its Hindrances, And Its Helps • Thomas Arnold
... her confusion at the thought, that the day drew near for her speaking fully to Nesta; when, between what she then said and what she said now, a cruel contrast might strike the girl and in toneing revelations now, to be more consonant with them then;—in softening and shading the edges of social misconduct, it seemed painfully possible to be sowing in the girl's mind something like the reverse of moral precepts, even to smoothing the way to a rebelliousness partly or wholly similar to her own. But Nataly's chief and her appeasing ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... my recent discoveries," explained the Sorceress. "I have found a way to make threads from emeralds, by softening the stones and then spinning them into long, silken strands. With these emerald threads we are weaving cloth to make Ozma a splendid court gown for her birthday. You will notice that the threads have all the beautiful ...
— The Magic of Oz • L. Frank Baum
... with an evident relish. The action of the opium was visibly renewing his powers. His expression, softening, became terrible with brute tenderness and longing. Gazing into shadows in which he saw that which he wished ardently to see, he stretched forth his arms, and his lips moved, ...
— Red Masquerade • Louis Joseph Vance
... words of the Rishi, 'Cook these jujubes well' were borne in her mind, O Bharata! The auspicious damsel, bearing those words of the great Rishi in her mind, began to cook those jujubes although the latter, O king, showed no signs of softening. The adorable Agni himself consumed her feet. For this, however, the maiden did not feel the slightest pain. Beholding this act of hers, the Lord of the three worlds became highly satisfied. He then showed himself in his own proper form to the damsel. The chief of the celestials then addressed ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 3 - Books 8, 9, 10, 11 and 12 • Unknown
... violently—and confronted me in speechless dismay; his color coming and going like the color of a young girl. Anybody who understands women will understand that this behavior on his part, far from softening me towards him, only encouraged ...
— Poor Miss Finch • Wilkie Collins
... old face softening. "Josie Lockwood's party, eh? And she's sent you an invitation. Well, that was kind of her, ...
— The Fortune Hunter • Louis Joseph Vance
... trees quivered faintly and expectantly over our heads, as though in response to the inward tremor of vague feelings and anticipations in us. Do you remember the purity, the goodness and trustfulness of ideas, the softening of noble hopes, the silence of full hearts? Were we not really then worth something better than what life has brought us to? Why was it ordained for us only at rare moments to see the longed-for shore, and never to stand firmly on it, never ...
— The Diary of a Superfluous Man and Other Stories • Ivan Turgenev
... his depravity, and anticipating with horror the termination of his evil course. One would naturally imagine, from the common course of things, that this scene would have awakened his reflection, and been the means of softening the ruggedness of his disposition,—that some tender ideas would have crossed his mind and melted the obduracy of his heart; but he continues hardened and ...
— The Works of William Hogarth: In a Series of Engravings - With Descriptions, and a Comment on Their Moral Tendency • John Trusler
... to hold one or more adults at the time, in which the pressure of the atmosphere can be exactly regulated. This form of treatment has been found of much value in the treatment of emphysema, early pulmonary tuberculosis (not in the presence of persistent high temperature, haemorrhage, softening or suppuration), delayed absorption of pleural effusions, heart disease, anaemia and chlorosis. But compressed air is contra-indicated in advanced tubercle, fever, and in diseases of kidneys, liver ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia
... a subject of his should be performing the important duties of Secretary to the Brussels Government, and his notice of von Giesselin gave the latter considerable prestige, for a time; an influence which he certainly exercised as far as he was able in softening the edicts and the intolerable desire to annoy and exasperate on the part of the Prussian Governors of province and kingdom. He even interceded at times for unfortunate British or French subjects, stranded in Brussels, and sometimes ...
— Mrs. Warren's Daughter - A Story of the Woman's Movement • Sir Harry Johnston
... for he was considered an adept. Jamie chucked at the compliments, and smiled at what was before them. They then fell to the viands, and ate with the hearty gusto of robust health. The eggs were certainly boiled too hard; but that defect they took good care to remedy, by softening them well with nice fresh butter, neither crying "Halt!" until there remained not the shadow ...
— Sinks of London Laid Open • Unknown
... here, anyhow, and I can stand it," said Joe, brightening a little, the tense severity of his face softening. "Never mind; I can ...
— The Bondboy • George W. (George Washington) Ogden
... the afternoon had been but a blue haze, softening the hard outlines of the street, had now settled down in earnest, choking up the doorways, wiping out the tops of the buildings, their facades starred here and there with gas-jets, and making a smudged drawing of the columns of the Custom ...
— Peter - A Novel of Which He is Not the Hero • F. Hopkinson Smith
... only, sent on them as a punishment for their original rejection of the god, being, as I said, when seen from the deeper motives of the myth, only a "sophism" of Euripides—a piece of rationalism of which he avails himself for the purpose of softening down the tradition of which he has undertaken to be the poet. Agave comes on the stage, then, blood-stained, exulting in her "victory of tears," still quite visibly mad indeed, and with the outward signs of madness, and as her mind wanders, musing still on ...
— Greek Studies: A Series of Essays • Walter Horatio Pater
... can earn what he has. Often I tell myself I am a fool to indulge you and Nancy as I do. I ought by rights to make you do without what you want until you can foot the bill for it." Mr. Crowninshield took a few hasty paces across the piazza. "Still," added he, his voice softening, "I fancy that scheme would be a sight harder on me than on you, for I like nothing better than to get you what ...
— Walter and the Wireless • Sara Ware Bassett
... his eye can trace The once rude ivory softening into grace— Pliant as wax that, on Hymettus' hill, Melts in the sunbeam, it obeys his skill; At every touch some different aspect shows, And still, the ...
— Memoirs of the Life of the Rt. Hon. Richard Brinsley Sheridan V1 • Thomas Moore
... don't know what you think about it, but this business of writing with five different colors of ink is queering me at a terrible rate and I am sure that I would die of softening of the brain if I were to keep it up any length of time. But I presume to say that your sceptical little Bessie will think this the most beautiful page she ever saw. I am sorry, but not surprised, to hear that your passes ...
— Eugene Field, A Study In Heredity And Contradictions - Vol. I • Slason Thompson
... After this the eye falls on the whole of the long ridge of AEtna, then on the left it catches a view of the sea-shore, as far as Catania, and even Syracuse, and then the wide and extensive view is closed by the immense smoking volcano, but not horribly, for the atmosphere, with its softening effect, makes it look more distinct, and ...
— Seeing Europe with Famous Authors, Vol VIII - Italy and Greece, Part Two • Various
... made of sal ammoniac and some galbanum, which well kneaded together and applied, seldom fails of destroying them. The general and principal cause of corns is, shoes too hard and stiff, or else too small. The cure consists in softening the corns by repeated washing, and soaking the feet in warm or hot water; then cutting the corn very carefully when softened, with a sharp penknife without wounding the quick, and afterwards applying a leaf of houseleek, ground ivy, or purslain, dipped in vinegar. Or instead of these ...
— The Cook and Housekeeper's Complete and Universal Dictionary; Including a System of Modern Cookery, in all Its Various Branches, • Mary Eaton
... secret contempt for Hannah's uncomplaining stoicism. She loved her mother, in a way, especially at certain times,—though she often wondered why she was unable to realize more fully the filial affection of tradition; but in moments of softening, such as these, she was filled with rage at the thought of any woman endowed with energy permitting herself to be overtaken and overwhelmed by such a fate as Hannah's: divorce, desertion, anything, she thought, would have been better—anything but to be cheated out ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... The plate-tax has made some noise; the ministry carried one question on it but by nine. The Duke of Newcastle, who reserves all his heroism for the war, grew frightened, and would have given up the tax; but Mr. Fox bolstered up his courage and mustered their forces, and by that and softening the tax till it was scarce worth retaining, they carried the next question by an hundred. The day before yesterday the King notified the invasion to both Houses, and his having sent for Hessians. ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole, Volume 2 • Horace Walpole
... bold and uncompromising, and a bit radical into the bargain. In his own delicious way, he has been no mean advocate of liberal principles and measures. He has argued for the repeal of the corn and the modification of the game laws, the softening of the cruelties of the criminal code, and the fair administration of law for all orders and conditions of men and women. He has had no respect for ermine, lawn, or epaulets, in his assaults upon the monopolies ...
— The Atlantic Monthly , Volume 2, No. 14, December 1858 • Various
... competence, which had made her so valuable to Madame as a saleswoman. She had the air not only of seeking to please, but of knowing just how to go about the difficult matter of pleasing. With the eye of an artist in dress, she analyzed Mrs. Pletheridge's possibilities; and softening here and there her pronounced features, succeeded presently in producing a charming and harmonious whole. By the time a dozen gowns were tried on and their available points discussed and criticised in detail, Mrs. Pletheridge had given the largest order ...
— Life and Gabriella - The Story of a Woman's Courage • Ellen Glasgow
... she continued, gaining ease at the softening of his brown eyes. "You know he is to be married to Lily Rose, the girl we saw at the organ recital ...
— Amarilly of Clothes-line Alley • Belle K. Maniates
... broken voice. "No, it is true it would not be fair to make you a beggar. I should be a cad to ask you. We must think of some way of softening ...
— Red Hair • Elinor Glyn
... furious when he heard this, and seizing a huge knife from his pocket he threatened to kill his wife for her disobedience. But Cannetella threw herself at his feet and implored him to spare her life, saying that hunger drove even the wolf from the wood. At last she succeeded in so far softening her husband's heart that he said, 'I will forgive you this time, and spare your life; but if you disobey me again, and I hear, on my return, that you have as much as moved out of the stall, I will certainly kill you. So, beware; for ...
— The Grey Fairy Book • Various
... but there are two objections to it: First, it imparts to the cervical border the color and appearance of decay, so that in three cases where an instrument passed readily into the tin I have removed the fillings, without any necessity for it, not even finding any softening of the margins. Second, its use requires the same conditions of dryness, shape of cavity, delicate manipulation, inconvenience to patient, and strain upon the operator as when gold is used alone." (Dr. D. ...
— Tin Foil and Its Combinations for Filling Teeth • Henry L. Ambler
... added to the influence of her tall, elegant figure, awed him so completely, that he felt himself incapable of aiming at anything like dramatic effect. Nay, as her warm tears fell upon his face, he experienced a softening influence that resembled emotion, but, like his father, he annexed associations to it that were selfish, and full of low, ...
— The Black Baronet; or, The Chronicles Of Ballytrain - The Works of William Carleton, Volume One • William Carleton
... along the coast, Lundy is often to be seen like a faint blue cloud on the horizon, especially when a softening haze hovers over the land—but on a clear day it is very distinct. And on a fine evening, when the dim blue twilight is creeping up on every side, it has the very air of an enchanted island against the radiant ...
— Devon, Its Moorlands, Streams and Coasts • Rosalind Northcote
... burrowing like so many squirrels. If this was the season of fruit, it was also the season of bonfires. Every one burned leaves in those days, blissfully unconscious of future city ordinances. A thin sweet haze of smoke hung constantly in the air mellowing the blue of the sky, softening the outlines of the hills, aromatic as an incensed cathedral. In the evenings the fires winked bravely on both sides the streets. Figures with rakes were silhouetted against them. Smaller figures careered wildly in and out the dense smoke. It was a great ...
— The Adventures of Bobby Orde • Stewart Edward White
... thoughts or so there was silence. Kathleen sat at one end of the big couch, the firelight shimmering round her in a softening glow. Blair stood painfully at the other side ...
— Kathleen • Christopher Morley
... a little bow, the lines of his face softening, his eyes sparkling with sudden humor at her speech. He stepped forward, called to the man who was still handling the luggage, and, in the tone of one ordering his groom, said: "Here, Mike!—Did you say his name was Mike?—Go, if you please, to this ...
— Felix O'Day • F. Hopkinson Smith
... Instead of softening him, as she had hoped that this attitude of humility would do, her words seemed to have the opposite effect. She had a feeling, all at once, that he enjoyed making her appeal to him, because it would give him the ...
— A Manifest Destiny • Julia Magruder
... Chippewayans trailed in with a team of mongrel curs from the south. Thereafter Cummins found but little time to devote to Melisse. The snow was softening rapidly, and the daily increasing warmth of the sun hastened the movement of the trappers. Mukee's people from the western Barren Lands arrived first, bringing with them great loads of musk-ox and caribou skins, and an army of big-footed, long-legged Mackenzie hounds ...
— The Honor of the Big Snows • James Oliver Curwood
... I have given some account in another part of this work. These successors of Schwartz, then, observed that they had persistently imitated the conduct of that able and good man; but that, while they took care to imitate his caution, and forbearance, they seized every opportunity of softening the mutual prejudices arising from distinctions of caste; and they also observe that, in consequence, those distinctions of caste have gradually lost a great deal of ...
— Gold, Sport, And Coffee Planting In Mysore • Robert H. Elliot
... the boy, his voice softening. "Holy Virgin, save him! For weeks, we've been in the hands of Aguinaldo's men. He's been so ill, all the time; have ...
— Jane Cable • George Barr McCutcheon
... actions of individuals divergencies or contradictions are constantly arising. War violates the ordinances of religion; diplomacy, the ordinances of truth; expediency, those of justice. And the conclusion is drawn that whatever be the softening influences of civilization upon the relations of private life, within the sphere of politics, barbarism, brutally aggressive or craftily obsequious, reigns undisturbed. Era succeeds era, faiths rise and set, statesmen and ...
— The Origins and Destiny of Imperial Britain - Nineteenth Century Europe • J. A. Cramb
... expressions of a Christian woman, as contradistinguished from those of a gentleman? He, with all his urbanity, is apt to show the smallest possible vein of testiness, or, at least, the clouded look of high-bred sense of honor. It seems to me there is no power which woman exerts over us, in softening and humanizing our feelings, more beautiful and effectual, than in her delicate forbearance and charity in taking the kind view of an irritating subject, without compromise of principle, but just the view which reflection, and gentler moods, and the softening hand of time, invariably present. She ...
— Bertha and Her Baptism • Nehemiah Adams
... together. Celeste insensibly fell into a passive attitude, and became what Brigitte wanted her,—a helot. The Queen Elizabeth of the household then passed from despotism to a sort of pity for the poor victim who was always sacrificed. She ended by softening her haughty ways, her cutting speech, her contemptuous tones, as soon as she was certain that her sister-in-law was completely under the yoke. When she saw the wounds it made on the neck of her victim, she took care of her ...
— The Lesser Bourgeoisie • Honore de Balzac
... violin fell daintily, caressing those which wrought out the melody enveloping but never overwhelming them. As the music ceased, the leader, turning to the second violin, met her reluctant eyes with a softening in his own keen ones. The hint of a laugh curved the corners of her lips as his smiled broadly. It was all the truce necessary. Charlotte's sulks never lasted longer ...
— The Second Violin • Grace S. Richmond
... Texas, had been subjected to the softening influences of St. Ursula's School for three years, without any perceptible result. She was the toughest little tomboy that was ever received—and retained—in ...
— Just Patty • Jean Webster
... did not overlook such a source of power. Alcoholic liquor became their implement of almost magical work in controlling the lives, labors, and resources of the Indians. The priests with their captivating story of the Cross had a large influence in softening savage natures and averting many an awful danger; but when everything else failed, rum always came to the rescue of ...
— Alice of Old Vincennes • Maurice Thompson
... and wheat grass pulp on her lumps, somewhat like the warm castor oil poultices I used on my mother's arthritic deposits. Poultices not only feel very comforting, but they have the effect of softening up deposits and tumors so that a detoxifying, fasting body is more able to re absorb them. Poultices draw, pulling toxins out through the skin, unburdening the liver. Clay (freshly-mixed potters clay I purchase from a potters' guild), mixed with finely chopped or blended young wheat ...
— How and When to Be Your Own Doctor • Dr. Isabelle A. Moser with Steve Solomon
... accustomed arms, he fasted and prayed for three days; and once again approaching the man, he humbly besought their liberation, and once again found he him a new Pharao. Then the saint spat on a stone by chance before them lying, and for the softening, the reproving, and the confounding of his hard-heartedness, the stone immediately splitted in three parts. But Tremeus becoming the more hardened by that which should have softened him, forthwith ascended his chariot, and scorning and rejecting the prayer of the saint, commanded these slaves ...
— The Most Ancient Lives of Saint Patrick - Including the Life by Jocelin, Hitherto Unpublished in America, and His Extant Writings • Various
... softening; he felt his own turn coming. "I kalkilated you had reasons for going off, leaving no address behind ...
— The Argonauts of North Liberty • Bret Harte
... fatal to so many. Other deaths from cold, reported to us, have reminded us of your great and sudden loss; yet what had I to say to you? I have thought that the echo from your son in Calcutta may have made your grief break out afresh.... I trust that time, which has not yet at all had softening powers, has not added any fresh bitterness ...
— Memoir and Letters of Francis W. Newman • Giberne Sieveking
... one knows that when the guns are silent the brief order which will ring out above the huddled men will hold their promise of death. Yet those men talk quietly, and there are some of them who in this time of danger find some poignant satisfaction, softening their anguish, in calling up the memory of those dear beings whom perhaps they will never see again. With my own ears I have heard a great fair-headed lad expatiate to all his neighbours on the pretty ways of his little daughter who is eight years old. A kind of dry ...
— The Soul of the War • Philip Gibbs
... don't know about that, Father," said Dan, his speech softening into Aunt Winnie's Irish tones with the warming of his heart. "You're very good to me, but sometimes I think—well, what I thrashed Dud Fielding for telling me: that I've no right to be pushing into a grand school like this. I ought to ...
— Killykinick • Mary T. Waggaman
... answer a few seconds, to take a last look at it before sending it to press. Then she said decisively:—"Yes." She made no softening reservation. She had already ...
— When Ghost Meets Ghost • William Frend De Morgan
... said the colonel, as he kissed his daughter's forehead. "It is a pleasure to see you sacrifice yourself for the sake of softening other people's suffering. Let us stay on. We shall never have to repent having ...
— Columba • Prosper Merimee
... her whole frame shook with the agony of her struggle. She arose at length and began to walk the floor, wringing her hands and moaning as if in pain. Thus she toiled and struggled in prayer all night, for it was the anniversary of her sister's anguish and death. Many a softening influence had crept into that frozen nature, with the young persons who brought their joys and their sorrows beneath her roof, and now came the solemn breaking up of her heart. She learned the true method of atonement ...
— The Old Homestead • Ann S. Stephens
... and they were not bad-looking fellows. Their faces were made for women's kisses, their necks for women's arms. They were lovable, as men are lovable. They were capable of love. A woman's touch redeems and softens, and they needed such redemption and softening instead of each day growing harsh and harsher. And I wondered where these women were, and heard a "harlot's ginny laugh." Leman Street, Waterloo Road, Piccadilly, The Strand, answered me, and I knew ...
— The People of the Abyss • Jack London
... and on that arch, sweet mouth, The smile was graver in its play, And, softening with the softening South, My April melted ...
— Poems of Henry Timrod • Henry Timrod
... as I can make out," replied the Judge, with a slight softening of his grim features, "it was because Miggs' wife takes in ...
— David Dunne - A Romance of the Middle West • Belle Kanaris Maniates
... was no use softening her words: "Father," she said instantly and firmly, "the night I came out from town in the storm I got lost. I got on the wrong side of the creek. My horse gave out; I ...
— Laramie Holds the Range • Frank H. Spearman
... Squire Benson, suddenly softening his tone, and assuming a pleasant smile, "Where did ...
— The Boat Club - or, The Bunkers of Rippleton • Oliver Optic
... lymphatic and nervous systems. Their digestive powers, like children, are strong, and their secretions and excretions copious, excepting the urine, which is rather scant. At the age of maturity they do not become dyspeptic and feeble with softening and attenuation of the muscles, as among those white people suffering the ills of a defective system of physical education, and a want of a ...
— Cotton is King and The Pro-Slavery Arguments • Various
... that a sudden change had come over the fierce purposes of Peter. For some time, the nature, artlessness, truth, feminine playfulness and kindness, not to say personal beauty of Margery, had been gradually softening the heart of this stern savage, as it respected the girl herself. Nothing of a weak nature was blended with this feeling, which was purely the growth of that divine principle that is implanted in us all. The quiet, earnest manner in which the girl had, that day, protested her desire to see the ...
— Oak Openings • James Fenimore Cooper
... saw the stooping figure of an old negro toiling up the red clay hillside, a staff in his hand and a bag of meal on his shoulder. In the vivid light of the sunset his stature was exaggerated in size, giving him an appearance at once picturesque and pathetic—softening his rugged outline and magnifying the ...
— The Voice of the People • Ellen Glasgow
... sir,' he pursues, 'being acquainted with old Mr Harmon, one would have thought it might have been polite in you, too, to give him a call. And you're naturally of a polite disposition, you are.' This last clause as a softening ...
— Our Mutual Friend • Charles Dickens
... of Tiberius that, in a remote province of the Roman empire, the Saviour was crucified. Animated by an unparalleled missionary spirit, His followers traversed the length and breadth of the empire, preaching everywhere the "glad tidings." Men's loss of faith in the gods of the old mythologies, the softening and liberalizing influence of Greek culture, the unification of the whole civilized world under a single government, the widespread suffering and the inexpressible weariness of the oppressed and servile classes,—all these things had prepared the soil for ...
— A General History for Colleges and High Schools • P. V. N. Myers
... as if he had betrayed his trust. He felt a criminal. In the darkness of his meditations a flash burst from his lurid mind, a celestial light appeared to dissipate this thickening gloom, and his soul felt as if it were bathed with the softening radiancy. He thought of May Dacre, he thought of everything that was pure, and holy, and beautiful, and luminous, and calm. It was the innate virtue of the man that made this appeal to his corrupted nature. His losses seemed nothing; his dukedom would be too slight a ransom for freedom ...
— The Ontario Readers: The High School Reader, 1886 • Ministry of Education
... grandchild—just about the same age and the same height that I must have been in the days when I was here last. My first feeling is one of almost anger, to see him playing on the gravel where I had played before, as if he had usurped something of my identity; but next moment I feel a softening and a sort of rising and qualm of the throat, accompanied by a pricking heat in the eye balls. I hastily join conversation with the child, and inwardly felicitate myself that the gardener is opportunely gone for the key of the house. But the child is a sort of ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. XXII (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... by night, the destruction that walketh by day, and the pestilence that wasteth at noonday. But night is often kindly—it brings the balm of sleep to our tired bodies and covers coarseness and filth with a softening veil. No Man's Land at night is more beautiful than by day, for we need not know of the horror we do not see, and it shuts us off from sight of our enemies, and lets us feel that the wall is thick and strong that stands between our homes and women kin, ...
— "Over There" with the Australians • R. Hugh Knyvett
... down," interposed Mrs. Wood, softening her asperity. "What I said about natural children doesn't apply to you. Don't suppose," she added, with a scornful glance at her helpmate, "that I would pay him the compliment of thinking he could possibly be the father of such a ...
— Jack Sheppard - A Romance • William Harrison Ainsworth
... Prussia!" repeated Prince Henry. "I could never forgive that; I would hold your ambition responsible for it, for you have access to the king's heart, and instead of dissipating his distrust against these foreign nations, you have endeavored to nourish it—instead of softening the king's anger, you have given it ...
— Frederick The Great and His Family • L. Muhlbach
... to me very softening in the presence of a woman,—some strange influence, even if one is not in love with them—which I cannot at all account for, having no very high opinion of the sex. But yet,—I always feel in better humour with myself and every thing else, if there is a woman within ...
— The Works of Lord Byron: Letters and Journals, Volume 2. • Lord Byron
... couldn't find the rococo room—or perhaps he didn't recognise it. So many people—so many, many people whom he did not know, whom he had never before laid eyes on—high-bred faces hard as diamonds; young, gay, laughing faces; brilliant eyes encountering his without a softening of recognition; clean-cut, attractive men in swarms, all animated, all amused, all at home among themselves and among the silken visions of loveliness passing and repassing, with here an extended gloved arm and the cordial greeting of camaraderie, there a ...
— The Fighting Chance • Robert W. Chambers
... The woman's softening had made him almost willing to trust her with a condensed version of the facts. But her "Adeline" reminded him that he was already committed to a ...
— Ambrotox and Limping Dick • Oliver Fleming
... power. In that warmth certain of his prejudices and inhibitions began to melt away; the display of feelings and sensibilities could not be wicked or even undesirable if it prepared the way for the gospel by softening the heart. He began to dabble in emotion himself, and that was a dangerous matter, for he knew nothing whatever about it save that, if he felt strongly, he could arouse strong feeling in others. Day by day he unwittingly became ...
— O. Henry Memorial Award Prize Stories of 1921 • Various
... put portraits of his friends into Trilby, softening the outlines, and giving the touches, legitimate in a work of art, which promote variation. He wrote impulsively, and a spirit of generous recognition of the achievements of all his friends almost ruined his book. The "lived ...
— George Du Maurier, the Satirist of the Victorians • T. Martin Wood
... withstanding the former power that attended the word to their hearts, their hearts did still abide as hard as a rock, there was no true and sound breaking, nor softening in that; wherefore there the word wanted depth of earth, as our Lord is pleased to call it; and anon when the sun was up, that which remained was presently scorched, and so ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... every step. An express is arrived from my Father; I must depart immediately for Madrid, and 'tis with difficulty that I have obtained a week's delay. The superstition of my Parents, supported by the representations of my cruel Aunt, leaves me no hope of softening them to compassion. In this dilemma I have resolved to commit myself to your honour: God grant that you may never give me cause to repent my resolution! Flight is my only resource from the horrors of a Convent, and ...
— The Monk; a romance • M. G. Lewis
... go to him and tell him how—how he treats us, and ask him to help us to go away into the country where he'll never find us any more." Her mother laughed. "You're a brave girl if you'd do that," she said, her face softening. "No, ...
— Fan • Henry Harford
... hand, has its virtues: the softening and refining of life, gradual development of sympathy, achievement of comfort and beauty; but peace has its vices. In times of peace and prosperity there seems to be no great cause at stake. Of course, always ...
— The Soul of Democracy - The Philosophy Of The World War In Relation To Human Liberty • Edward Howard Griggs
... day to teach me what I could be induced to learn, which was little enough. I was hot-tempered, headstrong, self-willed, accustomed to fight for what I wanted, getting nothing by any other means, and doing without what I could not get in that way. No softening, no refining influence came into my life. My one pleasure even then was music. I had a passion for it. Miss Vincent, the vicar's daughter, taught me to play the piano, and I used to spend hours in the deserted drawing-room, playing what I ...
— Fifty-Two Stories For Girls • Various
... action of this enormous force, aided by the softening power of the water, large sections of the gravelly mass are dislodged, and fall with great violence, the debris speedily disintegrating and disappearing under the resistless force of the water, ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 455, September 20, 1884 • Various
... of the last days that she and her daughter might spend together in their native land, and her tender heart had overflowed to them; there were even flowers from the royal gardens, and the air was fragrant; but in Dama Ecciva's manner there was no softening change. ...
— The Royal Pawn of Venice - A Romance of Cyprus • Mrs. Lawrence Turnbull
... which people break their fast in the evening is dates. My taleb, when visiting me, takes a few dates in his hands, and goes to a corner of the court-yard, or upon the house-top, about the softening, musing time, when the last solar rays are lingering playfully—and to the emaciated faster, teasingly, on this Saharan world, and there he listens in silence for the first accents of the shrill voice of the Muethan, calling to prayers, from the ...
— Travels in the Great Desert of Sahara, in the Years of 1845 and 1846 • James Richardson
... for an elaborate luncheon, and artificial lighting resorted to. Wax candles are the most pleasing, their radiance having a softening effect. ...
— Social Life - or, The Manners and Customs of Polite Society • Maud C. Cooke
... habit, and I am sure that these forms of intoxication are becoming more prevalent than they were a generation ago. Is this due to an increase in the disorders which are eased by such drugs? Is it not rather due to the softening influence of luxury, and the fact that we are all being constantly trained to feel that it is both easy and our right to escape ...
— Doctor and Patient • S. Weir Mitchell
... Theodora ran down-stairs, thinking it a discovery that there was more beauty in those eyes than merely soft brown colour and long black lashes. It was a long time since her heart had been so light. It was as if a cold hard weight was removed. That one softening had been an inexpressible relief, and when she had thrown aside the black veil that had shrouded her view, everything looked so bright and sweet that she could ...
— Heartsease - or Brother's Wife • Charlotte M. Yonge
... seemed to bend even protectingly toward them. She smiled at them, and the softening of her face ...
— Old Crow • Alice Brown
... bulblets of some varieties sprout early and at a low temperature, and an active effort should be made to get them into the ground before this comes to pass. The soil may be too cold to start the majority into growth, but the shells will still be softening and getting ready to grow as soon as there ...
— The Gladiolus - A Practical Treatise on the Culture of the Gladiolus (2nd Edition) • Matthew Crawford
... ovens for softening sealing compound are on the market. The heating element is brought close to the top of the battery. Where electric power is cheap, this method may be used. Otherwise it ...
— The Automobile Storage Battery - Its Care And Repair • O. A. Witte
... one throughout the world, and the stirring of spring in the roots of the grass and in the trunks of the trees touches also human hearts and wakes them from their winter. The season of hope, which was softening the clods of the field, and gentling the rough massive walls of the castle, were also making tender the austere face of a Covenanting minister standing in one of the deep window recesses of what was called in Scots houses of that day the gallery, and what was a long ...
— Graham of Claverhouse • Ian Maclaren
... were passing in Italy, Louis IX was following up the establishment of public peace and his darling object, the crusade, at the same time. The holy monarch did not forget that the surest manner of softening the evils of war, as well as of his absence, was to make good laws; he therefore issued several ordinances, and each of these ordinances was a monument of his justice. The most celebrated of all is the Pragmatic Sanction, which Bossuet called ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume VI. • Various
... wise, tender, full of charm. Even the hint of melancholy that was becoming more and more a part of him endeared him to others, for the broader and brighter the light into which he was steadily mounting, the more marked and touching was this softening shadow. ...
— Slippy McGee, Sometimes Known as the Butterfly Man • Marie Conway Oemler
... passed. The bitterness of the first hours was softening; each day brought additional tranquillity and calm; life resumed its course with weary languidness, and with the monotonous intellectual insensibility which follows great shocks. At the commencement, Laurent and Therese allowed themselves to drift into ...
— Therese Raquin • Emile Zola
... In addition to softening the steel, annealing benefits the metal by relieving strains in the piece. Should a particularly accurate job be called for, the steel should be annealed again after the roughing cuts have been ...
— The Boy Mechanic: Volume 1 - 700 Things For Boys To Do • Popular Mechanics
... out of his languid pose. He was erect and rigid. She saw him as some person other than the one to whom she had begun her appeal. He was still smiling, but his smile was of a different sort. Instead of being the significant thing about him in expression of his casualness, it seemed the softening ...
— Over the Pass • Frederick Palmer
... of that valley had she done nothing more than to set that rugged, fearless figure in the heart of America, a perpetual foil to effeminacy and submission to softening luxury, to the arts that seek merely popularity, to drunkenness and other vices which he combated even in that wilderness, to sycophancy and demagogy—a perpetual example of the "vir" and virtue in the noblest sense in which ...
— The French in the Heart of America • John Finley
... the Abbey best, too," observed Brick Willock thoughtfully. "Lahoma, she's read 'em all to me; that's the way we get through the winter months. They's something softening and enriching about that there Children of the Abbey; and Scottish Chiefs has got some mighty high work in it, too. I tells Lahoma that I guess them two books is just about as near the real thing out in the big world as you can get. David Copperfield ...
— Lahoma • John Breckenridge Ellis
... home, miles away by this time; yet, as a result of her flying visit, some of the softening influence of her presence and kindly usages of her court seemed to linger even amid the rougher and more turbulent atmosphere of ...
— Soldiers of the Queen • Harold Avery
... wonderful; the whole human race seems, as it were, delivered from their power. In Sophocles, however, they do not ever appear, but are kept altogether in the background; and they are never mentioned by their own name, but always alluded to by some softening euphemism. But this very obscurity, so exactly befitting these daughters of night, and the very distance at which they are kept, are calculated to excite a silent horror in which the bodily senses have no part. The clothing the grove of the Furies with all the charms of a southern spring completes ...
— Lectures on Dramatic Art - and Literature • August Wilhelm Schlegel trans John Black
... warm and liquid, and with softening touch Cherished the stiffened wounds and filled the veins, Till throbbed once more the slow returning pulse And every fibre trembled, as with death Life was commingled. Then, not limb by limb, With toil and strain, but rising at a bound Leaped from the earth erect the ...
— Pharsalia; Dramatic Episodes of the Civil Wars • Lucan
... the bird in ecstasy. She felt an infinite longing for happiness, for some sudden demonstration of tenderness, for the revelation of superhuman poetry, and she felt such a softening at her heart, and relaxation of her nerves, that she began to cry, without knowing why. The young man was now straining her close to him, yet she did not remove his arm; she did not think of it. Suddenly the nightingale stopped, and a voice ...
— Maupassant Original Short Stories (180), Complete • Guy de Maupassant
... concealed from its inhabitants. The two professors were in silent ecstasy. In their excitement they had unconsciously seized each other by the hand, and stood like two little children in the presence of a marvel, Challenger's cheeks bunched up into a seraphic smile, and Summerlee's sardonic face softening for the moment into ...
— The Lost World • Arthur Conan Doyle
... Christmas is near, and what is Christmas without snow, thickly falling snow? We have not had one snowfall all the time we have been drifting. The hard grains that come down now and again are nothing. Oh the beautiful white snow, falling so gently and silently, softening every hard outline with its sheltering purity! There is nothing more deliciously restful, soft, and white. This snowless ice-plain is like a life without love—nothing to soften it. The marks of all the battles and pressures of the ice stand forth just as when they were made, rugged and ...
— Farthest North - Being the Record of a Voyage of Exploration of the Ship 'Fram' 1893-1896 • Fridtjof Nansen
... of the poet's motive, like an impression bold and sharp from the matrix of the poet's mind. This was to hear the song of the poet and Nature's low echo. How tranquilising it was! How it effaced the petty vexations of the day!—"softening and concealing; and busy with ...
— Twenty-One Days in India; and, the Teapot Series • George Robert Aberigh-Mackay
... savoring everything almost with complacency. His music, he felt, was progressing now that, undisturbed, he lived all day long in the rhythm of it; his mind and his fingers were growing supple. The hard moulds that had grown up about his spirit were softening. As he walked back and forth in front of the church waiting for Jeanne, he took an inventory of his state of mind; he was ...
— Three Soldiers • John Dos Passos
... do, Conniston?" Mr. Crawford took his hand warmly, the fine lines of his stern old face softening genially. "I was mighty glad when Argyl told me that she had asked you over. Sit down, sit down. Have something to smoke. Tell us about yourself, and how"—the deep-set eyes twinkling—"you ...
— Under Handicap - A Novel • Jackson Gregory
... of the arc the temperature becomes sufficient to soften the glass of the rods, G, G, so that they bend as shown at O (Fig. 3), and allow the carbons to move onward until the heat has sufficiently diminished to prevent any further softening of the glass. In measure as the wearing away progresses, the preceding effects are reproduced; and, as these are produced in an imperceptible and continuous manner, there is perceived no jumping nor inconstancy in the light of the arc. Under such conditions, then, the regulation of the arc is effected ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 362, December 9, 1882 • Various
... face softening, "I am leaving the roof, the bread, the habit which were offered me, but while I have life, I will not cease telling of Christ, who is the Truth! I go forth, but not to remain silent. Do you remember giving me the letter to read, that St. Peter Damian wrote to a layman, who preached? That man ...
— The Saint • Antonio Fogazzaro
... reading the kind of poem annexed to it, I was surprised and rather grieved to find in it, amongst several things, disobliging but supportable against men in solitude, this bitter and severe sentence without the least softening: 'Il n'y a que le mechant qui fail feul.'—[The wicked only is alone.] —This sentence is equivocal, and seems to present a double meaning; the one true, the other false, since it is impossible that a man who is determined to remain alone can do the least harm to anybody, ...
— The Confessions of J. J. Rousseau, Complete • Jean Jacques Rousseau
... magnesia with a pound of gum. This compound had the advantage of being whiter than the pure sap. It was so firm that he used it as leather in the binding of a book. In a few weeks, however, he had the mortification of seeing his elegant white book-covers fermenting and softening. Afterwards, they grew as hard and brittle as shell, and so they ...
— Famous Americans of Recent Times • James Parton
... pretend that the repentance of old Paul Dombey throws any light on the psychology or philosophy of repentance. No doubt old Dombey, white-haired and amiable, was a great improvement on old Dombey brown-haired and unpleasant. But in his case the softening of the heart seems to bear too close a resemblance to softening of the brain. Whether these serious passages are as bad as the critical people or as good as the sentimental people find them, at least they do not convey anything in the way ...
— Appreciations and Criticisms of the Works of Charles Dickens • G. K. Chesterton
... bread, and my water . . . and give it unto men whom I know not whence they be?" (1 Sam. xxv. 8, 10, 11). And even if that be an extreme instance, it will not be denied that outward blessings in themselves, and considered only by themselves, are apt to have a hardening rather than a softening effect. It says much, therefore, for Barzillai, that amidst his great possessions, he still kept the free, ...
— Men of the Bible; Some Lesser-Known Characters • George Milligan, J. G. Greenhough, Alfred Rowland, Walter F. |
