"Soothing" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... MRS HUSHABYE [soothing her]. Of course I believe him, dearest. But you should have broken it to me by degrees. [Drawing her back to her seat]. Now tell me all about him. Are you in ...
— Heartbreak House • George Bernard Shaw
... put into a carriage, each wild mule harnessed with a civilized one, and such kicking and flinging up of heels I never witnessed. However, the mozos can manage anything, and in about half an hour, after much alternate soothing and lashing, they trotted along with the heavy coach after them, only rearing ...
— Life in Mexico • Frances Calderon De La Barca
... have had reason to bless the 'Sisters of Charity.' They have ministered to their wants and performed those kind womanly offices which are better to the sick than medicine, and are so peculiarly soothing to the dying. These noble women have attended their sick-beds when other Christian ladies of the South looked on unpityingly, and turned away without even tendering the cheap charity of a kind word. They have done what ...
— Sword and Pen - Ventures and Adventures of Willard Glazier • John Algernon Owens
... he followed her, saying from the landing to his guests, "Excuse me for a little. I'll get the boy quiet, and let his mother come down. I've a fine talent for that sort of thing. That rooster will have to be given some soothing syrup—he's ...
— The Indifference of Juliet • Grace S. Richmond
... the suppression of artistic longings; but he made pictures, he tells me, everywhere—"alonga wind, alonga cloud altogether, alonga water, alonga dirt, alonga stone." They were mostly imaginative, but to his mind, in fine frenzy rolling, they were soothing and real. He made pictures out of airy nothing, and gloated over them with his mind's eye. No power other than that which had bestowed the breath of life could subdue the beneficient mania ...
— My Tropic Isle • E J Banfield
... while thy healing hands Close-covered both my eyes beside thy breast, Pressing the brain, which too much thought expands, Back to its proper size again, and smoothing Distortion down till every nerve had soothing, And all lay ...
— Robert Browning: How To Know Him • William Lyon Phelps
... In spite of soothing powders, however, he passed a restless night and arose unrefreshed, but ordered his valet to bring one of his lightest suits, and, having dressed, he set a white flower upon his coat, while the servant proceeded to apply various pigments to the wrinkled ...
— The Strollers • Frederic S. Isham
... Westminster Abbey. But in our professional playgoers this indispensable preliminary conception of sanctity seems wanting. They talk of actors as mimes and mummers, and, I fear, think of dramatic authors as liars and pandars, whose main business is the voluptuous soothing of the tired city speculator when what he calls the serious business of the day is over. Passion, the life of drama, means nothing to them but primitive sexual excitement: such phrases as "impassioned poetry" or "passionate love of truth" have fallen quite out of their vocabulary ...
— Bernard Shaw's Preface to Major Barbara • George Bernard Shaw
... him. We first see Miriam watching the cradle-ark in which the infant was concealed, and she never appears except some event in his career brings her into view. Yet, through their long lives she was his companion and helper, participating in his labours, soothing his sorrows, and aiding and encouraging him in his work. She is a type of a large class—we mean the daughters and the sisters who are not wives. Her life shows that a woman may be honourable, useful, distinguished, and happy, and yet remain single—that the holy duties of the wife and ...
— Notable Women of Olden Time • Anonymous
... sleep, William," ordered the sergeant in a more soothing voice. "I've often told you that one so young shouldn't ...
— Uncle Sam's Boys as Sergeants - or, Handling Their First Real Commands • H. Irving Hancock
... he knew so well, but, to their surprise, they heard a new and lovely melody, so softly, sweetly played, that they could hardly believe it could be Nat. It was one of those songs without words that touch the heart, and sing of all tender home-like hopes and joys, soothing and cheering those who listen to its simple music. Aunt Meg leaned her head on Demi's shoulder, Grandmother wiped her eyes, and Mrs. Jo looked up at Mr. Laurie, saying, in ...
— Little Men - Life at Plumfield With Jo's Boys • Louisa May Alcott
... that," says Jim, as soothing as he could; but he thought it best to tell nothing ...
— News from the Duchy • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... bring it up without its mother? He did what was best, and hired an old woman to look after it. Only here was a wonder! all day long the babe would take no food, and did nothing but cry; there was no soothing it anyhow. But during (a great part of) the night one could fancy it wasn't there at all, so silently ...
— Russian Fairy Tales - A Choice Collection of Muscovite Folk-lore • W. R. S. Ralston
... eyes and fought the pain. He heard Steve say, "Give me the spray can." Then something cool and soothing spread over his face. ...
— The Flying Stingaree • Harold Leland Goodwin
... wherein the Medium is guided by her delicate spiritual insight; the quiet hush; the whispered conversation; the darkened room; the darker drapery of the mysterious Cabinet, with its untold possibilities; the subdued chords of the dim melodeon; the soothing tones of familiar hymns, in which all voices join; the words full of assurance of a deathless life, of immortal love, of reunion with earthly idols, not lost, but gone before only a very little distance, and now present ...
— Preliminary Report of the Commission Appointed by the University • The Seybert Commission
... There is no soothing so complete, As sitting in the sun, Or chasing butterflies through wheat, Although ...
— Some Broken Twigs • Clara M. Beede
... work; of cooking, washing, ironing; of mending and caring for the three children, although Jenny was fast becoming a notable little housewife, quick, ready, and capable. They were months in which there had been many a weary night of watching by Aurelia's bedside; of soothing and bandaging and rubbing; of reading and nursing, even of feeding and bathing. The ceaseless care was growing less now, and the family breathed more freely, for the mother's sigh of pain no longer came from the ...
— Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... them. It is miserable hypocrisy and cant to talk of a revolutionary necessity for violating the first principles of human society. Ah! it is Reason, Intelligence, and Duty, calm as the voices of angels, soothing as the "music of the spheres," which alone should guide nations, in all crises and difficulties, to the attainment of those rights and privileges on which all true ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume IX • John Lord
... predictions of Samuel against him, and baleful passions, made Saul so wretchedly melancholy, that some of his attendants suggested to the monarch that he should try the soothing effect of music. The proposition was favorably received, and upon the recommendation of another friend, David, the son of Jesse, of whom Saul knew nothing before, was sent for to play upon the harp. The young minstrel won the respect and affection ...
— Half Hours in Bible Lands, Volume 2 - Patriarchs, Kings, and Kingdoms • Rev. P. C. Headley
... her down to a winding path covered in under trees, which led to the sea by steps cut in the rock. They sat down on a bench. The sea air was fresh and soothing. ...
— Love at Second Sight • Ada Leverson
... Mr. Lorry, in a soothing tone, bringing his left hand from the back of the chair to lay it on the supplicatory fingers that clasped him in so violent a tremble: "pray control your agitation—a matter of business. ...
— A Tale of Two Cities - A Story of the French Revolution • Charles Dickens
... hold no intercourse with political opponents; but that one who had been a steady Whig in the worst times might venture, when the good cause was triumphant, to shake hands with an old friend who was one of the vanquished Tories. His kindness was soothing to the proud and cruelly wounded spirit of Swift; and the two great satirists resumed ...
— Critical and Historical Essays Volume 2 • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... Soothing him with his artless talk of her, the child persuaded him to take some rest, to walk abroad, to do almost as he desired him. And, when the day came, on which they must remove her, in her earthly shape, from earthly eyes forever, he led him ...
— McGuffey's Sixth Eclectic Reader • William Holmes McGuffey
... Here their wounds were dressed, by a priest who accompanied the vessel in her voyages, landing at the different stations, and ministering to the garrisons of the islands. He had some knowledge of the healing art, and poured soothing oils into the wounds inflicted by the arrows. The men were much alarmed lest these arrows should be poisoned, but Ned assured them that none of those who had been wounded, during the attacks on shore, had died from the effects; ...
— Under Drake's Flag - A Tale of the Spanish Main • G. A. Henty
... visions of chivalric splendor, is but the type of men everywhere, who, but for resources supplied by the mind, would have sunk beneath the blows of adverse fortune, or else sought forgetfulness in brutalizing and destructive pleasures. Sometimes a book is better far than medicine, and more truly soothing than the best anodyne. Sometimes a rich-freighted memory is more genial than many companions. Sometimes a firm mind, that has all it needs within itself, is a watchtower to which we may flee, and from which look down calmly upon our own losses and misfortunes. ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 16, No. 96, October 1865 • Various
... knowing this, you care to take that room I gave you this afternoon, it's yours for as long as you want it. I like you. I'm sudden in my likes, but I don't like your hell-less doctrine. I advise you not to turn that loose in St. Ange. We're none too good now, but if a soothing syrup was poured out, them as valued their lives would have ...
— Joyce of the North Woods • Harriet T. Comstock
... seduced thy heart To take the weaker, though the better part. What but rank folly, for thy curse decreed, Could into Satire's barren path mislead, 100 When, open to thy view, before thee lay Soul-soothing Panegyric's flowery way? There might the Muse have saunter'd at her ease, And, pleasing others, learn'd herself to please; Lords should have listen'd to the sugar'd treat, And ladies, simpering, own'd it vastly sweet; Rogues, in thy prudent verse with virtue graced, Fools mark'd ...
— Poetical Works • Charles Churchill
... the way of soothing her, Mrs. Van Buren talked of the winter in Washington, and the honors which would always be accorded to her as the wife of an M.C., and then dwelt upon the possibility of her one day writing herself governor's lady, Ethelyn's girlish ambition was roused, ...
— Ethelyn's Mistake • Mary Jane Holmes
... rightful supremacy of the mind over the body; they supersede that morbid brooding upon painful experiences which generates either melancholy or querulousness; and they leave in the moral nature an unobstructed entrance to all soothing and elevating influences. ...
— A Manual of Moral Philosophy • Andrew Preston Peabody
... stood trembling. Yeager leaned forward and patted the neck of the colt softly. His soothing voice still comforted and reassured. Gradually its ...
— Steve Yeager • William MacLeod Raine
... "Soothing, Ramon, soothing!" He laughed away too, like a good fellow, and didn't get mad in the least. I suppose our Spanish was as funny to him. He never laughed at us, though; I ...
— The Little Gold Miners of the Sierras and Other Stories • Various
... found the mixture gave one's face the ruddy tanned look supposed to be indicative of health and hard muscle. A thorough ablution in the public wash basin reduced the color, but left the skin very soft and smooth; in fact, as a lotion for the skin it is excellent. It is a soothing and healing application for poisonous ...
— Woodcraft • George W. Sears
... thick-leaved sycamore, a few paces from the church-porch. Vespers were just ended; the low chant had reached my ears, and I missed the soothing undertone. The women, in their high white caps, and the men, in their blue blouses, were sauntering slowly homeward. The children were playing all down the village street, and not far away a few girls and young men were ...
— The Doctor's Dilemma • Hesba Stretton
... from the driver, and placed it on an adjacent table with her plants. In the twinkling of an eye, she removed her hood, unfastened her shawl, and then knelt down in front of the sick man, after kissing him tenderly on the forehead. From the corner where Julien had seated himself, he could hear her soothing voice. Its caressing tones contrasted pleasantly with the harsh accent of ...
— A Woodland Queen, Complete • Andre Theuriet
... taught him self-government beyond his years. But what he benefited most by, after all, was the direct and calming effect upon his agitated heart, and irritated nerves, that preceded, and accompanied, and followed these sweet, tranquilizing visits. They were soft, solacing, and soothing; they were periodical and certain, he could count on leaving his cares and worries, twice every week, at the door of that dear villa; and, when he took them up again, they were no longer the same; heavenly balm had been shed over them, ...
— Put Yourself in His Place • Charles Reade
... down the bits of white wood. He did it deliberately, and no one present imagined how the sight of Vandecar tore at his heartstrings. Cronk could tolerate no robbing him of his revenge, no taking away his chance of soothing the haunting ...
— From the Valley of the Missing • Grace Miller White
... to pass in which the girl's paroxysm of tears exhausted itself, and then caressing her gently, she began, in a soothing tone: ...
— Her Mother's Secret • Emma D. E. N. Southworth
... with last year, I derived great benefit from the administration of codeine, in combination with terpine hydrate, in the pill form. The codeine has the advantage over all other opium preparations that it does not affect the digestive organs, and still acts in a soothing manner. While during last year's sickness my patients lost from ten to twenty pounds of their bodily weight, this year but one lost eight pounds and the ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 795, March 28, 1891 • Various
... birth in Europe; and those we saw in cages at Orotava and Santa Cruz had been bought at Cadiz, and in other ports of Spain. But of all the birds of the Canary Islands, that which has the most heart-soothing song is unknown in Europe. It is the capirote, which no effort has succeeded in taming, so sacred to his soul is liberty. I have stood listening in admiration of his soft and melodious warbling, in a garden at Orotava; but I have never seen him sufficiently near to ascertain to ...
— Equinoctial Regions of America • Alexander von Humboldt
... Ursula?' she would ask, in a tremulous voice. 'I have been dreaming, I think, and the pain in my head confuses me so: do not let me talk so much.' But I always succeeded in soothing her. ...
— Uncle Max • Rosa Nouchette Carey
... must be poured forth in the country of the enemy to embitter their vengeance. These sat silently within their lodges, and strove to conceal their feelings behind a stoical countenance; but they would probably have failed had not the soothing ...
— Indian Boyhood • [AKA Ohiyesa], Charles A. Eastman
... sylvan and pastoral character in a tract of country that is not notable for either. Counties farther east can show hundreds of such scenes; but the quiet rusticity and woodland features here come with a special touch of soothing and repose after the long, bare moorlands, sandy dunes, and stern, naked cliffs. There is also another attraction—the convent of Lanherne, once the manor-house of the Arundells. Mr. Baring-Gould ...
— The Cornwall Coast • Arthur L. Salmon
... habit of violating the instincts of the sick give place to a judicious study of these same instincts. It will be found that bodily, like mental insanity, is best managed, for the most part, by natural soothing agencies. Two centuries ago there was a prescription for scurvy containing "stercoris taurini et anserini par, quantitas trium magnarum nucum," of the hell-broth containing which "guoties-cumque sitit oeger, large bibit." When I have ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)
... in the days of that excellent landlady, Mrs. Hammond, it meant to the wearied mariner boundless cheer, the latest London papers, pipes and soothing rum punch mixed by a comely and cheerful bar-maid, to the unsophisticated Canadian peasant, attracted to the Lower Town on market days, it ...
— Picturesque Quebec • James MacPherson Le Moine
... clattered down the road, dust-hidden behind a galloping horse. Mrs. Jim Mann, who was a loving mother of children, was soothing little Dan'l. Johnny Trumbull watched at the gate. When the wagon returned he ran out and hung on behind, while the strong, ungainly farm-horse galloped to the house set high ...
— The Copy-Cat and Other Stories • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... said I know not, but the lady, comforted, Bade farewell with calm voice and tranquil eyes, And saw with new-born strength the new sun rise. Perhaps in Fairyland there chanced to be For them that grieve some sovereign alchemy To turn the worst to best, and the good queen Applied this soothing balm. Such things have been; But yet I doubt if any fairy art Was needed in the case of Elfinhart; The medicine that charmed away her dole Nature had planted in her own sweet soul. Of all sure things, this thing I'm surest of,— That the ...
— Gawayne And The Green Knight - A Fairy Tale • Charlton Miner Lewis
... Alice in a soothing tone: "don't be angry about it. And yet I wish I could show you our cat Dinah. I think you'd take a fancy to cats, if you could only see her. She is such a dear quiet thing," Alice went on, half to herself, as she swam lazily about in the pool, "and she sits purring ...
— Junior Classics, V6 • Various
... another halcyon, soothing tone, which quiets none of my alarms, assuages none of my apprehensions, commends me to my nightly rest with no more resignation. And that is, the plea that we may trust the popular branch of the legislature, we may look to the House of Representatives, ...
— The Great Speeches and Orations of Daniel Webster • Daniel Webster
... that this incident caused me much anxiety, as I remembered that, in spite of the keen interest Zarlah had evinced, she had carefully avoided any allusion to the subject afterwards. But in the subsequent events of the evening this escaped my notice, and, glad to observe the soothing effect my words had upon her, I did not pursue the ...
— Zarlah the Martian • R. Norman Grisewood
... cheer, daughter, an' tell us what ye know about it all,—easy an' quiet," said the coroner in a soothing, paternal strain. ...
— The Mystery of Witch-Face Mountain and Other Stories • Charles Egbert Craddock
... of Petrolatum is sold a semi-solid substance derived from certain kinds of petroleum called cosmoline or vaselin. It has very soothing powers and does not become rancid and is used as a soothing dressing in sores, boils, and skin affections. It is frequently used as a base for ointments. Fluid or liquid petrolatum is much used now in the form of a spray in ...
— Mother's Remedies - Over One Thousand Tried and Tested Remedies from Mothers - of the United States and Canada • T. J. Ritter
... keys to Isabel, who would have addressed some soothing flatteries to Boabdil, but the emotion and excitement were too much for her compassionate heart, heroine and queen though she was; and when she lifted her eyes upon the calm and pale features of the fallen monarch, ...
— McGuffey's Sixth Eclectic Reader • William Holmes McGuffey
... gallant knight, riding to save some poor oppressed maiden, dashes across the foaming torrent; and just in the middle, as he is being swept away, his eyes are opened, and he sees fairy water-nymphs soothing his terrified horse and guiding him gently to the opposite shore. They are close at hand, these sprites, to the simple peasant or the gallant knight, or to anyone who has the gift of the fairies and can see them. but the man who scoffs ...
— The Fairy-Land of Science • Arabella B. Buckley
... that the fight was as difficult now as it had been years before, when he had struck his mother's soothing hand from his shoulder and later had kissed that same hand and had wept his heart out with his cheek upon it. In the brief moment as he stood with clenched fists and bowed head, waiting for the red mist to give way to his normal ...
— The Forbidden Trail • Honore Willsie
... followed, and then all was once more hushed in silence. I turned over, gave the clothes an extra jerk, and again sought the land of dreams. Vain and delusive hope!—trains seemed starting or arriving every half-hour, and the whole night was spent 'mid the soothing varieties of mineral trumpets and bells, and animal hoofs and tongues, till from sheer exhaustion, about five A.M., I dropped off into a snooze, which an early start rendered it necessary to ...
— Lands of the Slave and the Free - Cuba, The United States, and Canada • Henry A. Murray
... in glee; How dear to the sailor thy sweet monody! Soul-soothing calm, Soul-healing balm, For hearts beating fondly for hearts on ...
— Rowena & Harold - A Romance in Rhyme of an Olden Time, of Hastyngs and Normanhurst • Wm. Stephen Pryer
... six feet by one of an earthen bed was all he wished. The pleasant warmth from the blankets flowed through his veins, and his limbs and senses relaxed. There was firing again, faint and from a distant point, but it was soothing now like the tune played on the little mouth-organ earlier in the evening, and he fell into a ...
— The Hosts of the Air • Joseph A. Altsheler
... the door open. During the night we heard a commotion in the kitchen and much choking, coughing, and groaning, and at breakfast the boy was unable to swallow food with his usual ravenousness. After breakfast he came to me whimpering, and asking for something soothing for his throat, admitting that he had seen the "gingerbread," and "felt so starved" in the night that he ...
— A Lady's Life in the Rocky Mountains • Isabella L. Bird
... and, by listening quietly to his complaints of Jack Pringle—which, however, involved a disclosure of the fact which he had intended to keep to himself, that he had sought the lawyer's advice—she succeeded in soothing him completely, so that he forgot his anger ...
— Varney the Vampire - Or the Feast of Blood • Thomas Preskett Prest
... the truth, sir, it was loquat syrup. Very soothing to the chest, and, upon my honour, perfectly wholesome. Mrs. Brooker makes it regularly every year, and—we sell a twenty-gallon barrel over the counter, besides what we keep for ourselves. And if I am to be exposed ...
— The Dop Doctor • Clotilde Inez Mary Graves
... from the French general Montcalm, who gave him to understand that Mr. Wolfe had landed in the neighbourhood of Quebec, and seemed determined to undertake the siege of that city; that he had honoured him (the French general) with several notes, sometimes couched in a soothing strain, sometimes filled with threats; that the French army intended to give him battle, and a few days would determine the fate of Quebec. Though Mr. Amherst was ignorant of the proceedings of the Quebec squadron, his ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.II. - From William and Mary to George II. • Tobias Smollett
... sufficiently uneasy about her to be always at her bedside. Usually the sick girl stayed alone, with her window-curtains closed, lying there in the soft half-light that was soothing to her nerves. The silence was broken at intervals by the voice of Modeste, who would come and offer her her medicine. When Jacqueline had taken it, she would shut her eyes, and resume, half asleep, her sad reflections. These were always the same. What could ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... and Ben and I will take our juleps before supper. I've been working in my garden, you see; there's nothing so satisfying in old age as a taste for flowers. It's more absorbing than chess, as I tell George—old George, I mean—and it's more soothing than children. Were you far enough South, my dear, to see the yellow jessamine grow wild? They tell me, too, that the Marshal Niel rose runs there up to the roofs of the houses. With us it is a very delicate rose. I have never been able to do anything with it,—but I have ...
— The Romance of a Plain Man • Ellen Glasgow
... Calm night, our soothing mother, bringing rest to all, freed them at last from the insulting taunts of their savage guards as their swarthy forms were swallowed up ...
— Birch Bark Legends of Niagara • Owahyah
... trifling means to obtain even lime to whitewash his cabin. Then, if he do smoke his "dhudeen, leaning against his door-way," where so proper for him to be, as with his wife and children? And is the so-named "weed of peacefulness" sought for by the highest in the land as a soothing enjoyment; by those who have but to wish for and obtain every luxury and blessing that wealth can give—is the scanty use of the meanest portion of it, improper or slothful in him who knows no single blessing but his wife and family? But it cannot be fairly deemed so. The custom ...
— Facts for the Kind-Hearted of England! - As to the Wretchedness of the Irish Peasantry, and the Means for their Regeneration • Jasper W. Rogers
... in their wholesale possession, and his thorough resignation to the inevitable, continually to be rebuked, and in part made envious of the old man's right-of-title situation. Nature, after all, is kinder than unkind to him, and always has a compensation and a soothing balm for every blow that age may deal him. And in the fading embers of the old man's eyes there are, at times, swift flashes and rekindlings of the smiles of youth, and the old artlessness about the wrinkled face ...
— Complete Works of James Whitcomb Riley • James Whitcomb Riley
... a long time by Ellis's bedside. I suspect Ellis wasn't feeling much like pudding at the moment. I couldn't hear very well what was going on, but Ellis was chattering as only Ellis can, and the comfortable Burnett was apparently soothing him with an occasional "All right, old man. I'll see what I ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 156, Jan. 15, 1919 • Various
... on my arm and patted it in the abominably soothing way she has doubtless acquired in the babies' ward. In my case it was about as effectual as the traditional red rag to ...
— Sweetapple Cove • George van Schaick
... herself down on the bed and lay there a twisted heap of blue flannel, her face buried in the pillows, her whole body shaken by a paroxysm of sobs. Tims supposed that this might be a good thing for Milly; but for herself it created an awkward situation. Her soothing remarks fell flat, while to go away and leave her friend in this condition would seem brutal. She sat down to "wait till the clouds rolled by," as she phrased it. But twenty minutes passed and still the clouds did ...
— The Invader - A Novel • Margaret L. Woods
... especially if he is also the author of it, develops a sort of intermittent insanity. He plucks at his mustache, if he has one; at his hair, if he has not. He mutters to himself. He gives vent to occasional despairing cries. The soothing suavity which marked his demeanor in the earlier rehearsals disappears. He no longer says with a winning smile: "Splendid, old man; splendid. Couldn't be better. But I think we'll take that over just once more, if you don't mind. You missed out a few rather good lines, and ...
— The Gem Collector • P. G. Wodehouse
... more materially minded may think that Moses, being moved, when he wrote the passage, by the greatness of God's wrath, desired to enforce its truths by repetition; for reiteration of statements is soothing to troubled minds. Thus did David repeat his lament over his son Absalom, 2 Sam 18, 33. So viewed, this narrative shows depth of feeling and extreme agitation of mind. This example of wrath so impresses the narrator that for emphasis he mentions ...
— Commentary on Genesis, Vol. II - Luther on Sin and the Flood • Martin Luther
... forty-three years continuously, so utterly had he made wars to cease on all sides. Not only was the spirit of the Romans subdued and pacified by the gentle and just character of their king, but even the neighbouring cities, as if some soothing healthful air was breathed over them from Rome, altered their habits and longed to live quiet and well-governed, cultivating the earth, bringing up their families in peace, and worshipping the gods. And gay festivals and ...
— Plutarch's Lives, Volume I (of 4) • Plutarch
... are mere soothing ones: creation of Provincial Assemblies, 'for apportioning the imposts,' when we get any; suppression of Corvees or statute-labour; alleviation of Gabelle. Soothing measures, recommended by the Notables; long clamoured for by all liberal men. Oil cast on the waters has been known to ...
— The French Revolution • Thomas Carlyle
... longer seemed a mere machine but a remarkable woman, a womanly woman, too. He liked the old house with its atrocious horsehair sofa and chair tidies and the Rogers group in the front bay window. The fire had been so elemental and soothing, so were the pots of flowers, the shabby piano, and even more shabby books. One could rest there, distributing whole flocks of newspapers where he would. The death awe had not been permitted to take a paramount place. How lucky Luke was, to have ...
— The Gorgeous Girl • Nalbro Bartley
... Peter consumed the rice and stew, his bruised feet were bathed in warm water, rubbed with a soothing ointment, and wrapped in ...
— Peter the Brazen - A Mystery Story of Modern China • George F. Worts
... in the treetops was his only answer; so after listening for a minute to the soothing sound, he took the Book of Life from his blouse and ...
— Jewel's Story Book • Clara Louise Burnham
... and the scene had but changed to this extent that the moving figures had settled down to a man to give themselves up to the soothing influence of tobacco. On his rug, U Saw had not stirred a limb save to flick the ashes from his cheroot, nor had his gaze wandered aside from the glowing flame. The quiet had become profound. Then, in deep silence, there was a sound of footsteps approaching the ...
— Jack Haydon's Quest • John Finnemore
... and usually, since Spenser was not a minute observer, follow the conventions of Renaissance literature. They are commonly great plains, wide and gloomy forests (where the trees of many climates often grow together in impossible harmony), cool caves—in general, lonely, quiet, or soothing scenes, but all unquestionable portions of a delightful fairyland. To him, it should be added, as to most men before modern Science had subdued the world to human uses, the sublime aspects of Nature were mainly dreadful; the ocean, for example, seemed to him ...
— A History of English Literature • Robert Huntington Fletcher
... and England, and it is not twenty-five years ago since we, in common with every visitor to the Tower, were glad to see "the Royal Lion." Dr Livingstone's experience, we have not the slightest wish to prove its accuracy, shows that the lion has a soothing, or rather paralysing power over his prey, when he has knocked it ...
— Heads and Tales • Various
... attention to the consecutive fifths by which he depicts the disordered mind of King Saul. This first movement, opening in G minor, ends on the chord of G major. We now come to a movement (B flat) entitled "The Refreshing Melody from David's Harp." The following is part of David's soothing theme:— ...
— The Pianoforte Sonata - Its Origin and Development • J.S. Shedlock
... the streets, the pavements, the cafes, his friends of many years; all the things he used to see, day after day; all the thoughts suggested by familiar things—the thoughts effortless, monotonous, and soothing of a Government clerk; he regretted all the gossip, the small enmities, the mild venom, and the little jokes of Government offices. "If I had had a decent brother-in-law," Carlier would remark, "a fellow with a heart, I would not be here." He had left the army and ...
— Tales of Unrest • Joseph Conrad
... his flame, and to assure him of the love she bore him, as soon as time and occasion served, she returned to the holy friar, and having sat herself down at his feet in the church, fell a weeping. The friar asked her in a soothing tone what her new trouble might be. Whereto the lady answered:—"My father, 'tis still that accursed friend of thine, of whom I made complaint to you some days ago, and who would now seem to have been born for ...
— The Decameron, Volume I • Giovanni Boccaccio
... (They already lack for meat and milk and eggs in many places). To ally any feeling of this sort that might tend to excite those who are so emotional as even to love their own grandchildren, some sort of soothing syrup should be administered. A preparation put out by the Chief of the United States Bureau of Soils and fully endorsed by the great optimist, the Secretary of Agriculture, is recommended as an article very much superior to Mrs. Winslow's. ...
— The Story of the Soil • Cyril G. Hopkins
... had seen the ring and his eyes suddenly brightened. She turned away towards the window, holding her lip between her teeth, as if she had committed an indiscretion. She had been talking against time slowly and continuously to prevent his talking or thinking, to give the apothecary's soothing drug time to take effect. For the little man of medicine had spoken very clearly of concussion and its after-effects. He had posted off to Pampeluna to fetch a doctor from there, leaving instructions that should Marcos recover ...
— The Velvet Glove • Henry Seton Merriman
... wild, but she did not impress Pan as being ready to kill him. He took time. He talked to her. With infinite patience he closed up on her, inch by inch. And at last he got a hand on her neck. She flinched, she appeared about to plunge, but Pan's gentle hand, his soothing voice kept her still. The brand on her flank was old. Pan had no way to guess how long she had been free, but he concluded not a great while, because she was not wild. He loosened the noose of his lasso on her neck. ...
— Valley of Wild Horses • Zane Grey
... not seem to hear. The car hummed along the dusty road, making a soothing, purring noise. Pensively she looked across the distant fields, whence came the hum and whir of reaping. There was a far-away look in her face that the man beside her was powerless to understand. She was making swift readjustments ...
— Old Rose and Silver • Myrtle Reed
... German mother is rich in expression, her voice soothing and magnetic as she sways her babe to and ...
— A History of Nursery Rhymes • Percy B. Green
... accosted with false and servile respect by the assassins of his family. Eusebia, rejoicing in the success of her benevolent schemes, embraced him with the tenderness of a sister; and endeavored, by the most soothing caresses, to dispel his terrors, and reconcile him to his fortune. But the ceremony of shaving his beard, and his awkward demeanor, when he first exchanged the cloak of a Greek philosopher for the military habit of a Roman prince, amused, during a few days, ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 2 • Edward Gibbon
... while I read them, my servant opened a little box in which he had deposited the weapons I had ordered him to bring, took them out, placed them on a table close at my bed-head, and then occupied himself in soothing the dog, who, however, seemed to heed him ...
— Haunted and the Haunters • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... what was said, smiled blandly, and addressed himself to Miss Pemberton. He spoke English perfectly, with only a slight foreign accent, in a melodious voice, attractive and soothing to his hearers. He and Father Lascelles bowed politely as they were introduced to the company, and at once made themselves at home, uttering not a word to which even ...
— Clara Maynard - The True and the False - A Tale of the Times • W.H.G. Kingston
... accustomed to Andre's soothing presence, and was surprised into feeling very happy at the constant delicate attentions and looks of affection that he lavished upon her. She did not feel any love for him yet; but a separation would ...
— File No. 113 • Emile Gaboriau
... For days at a time, when there's been sickness in the mill village, he has devoted himself faithfully to whoever seemed to take his fancy. His big, ungainly hand has a truly wonderful power of soothing. When I had rheumatic fever, he was the only person I could endure to have in the room with me. His step was lighter even than that of my wife, and I really believe I should have died but for ...
— Reels and Spindles - A Story of Mill Life • Evelyn Raymond
... grain and less hay, which should be dampened with water if dusty. Do not feed dusty, musty or bulky food, but give plenty of potatoes, apples, kale and green grass. Have your druggist make you up one quart of Fowler's Solution of Arsenic, omitting the Tincture of Lavender. This is soothing to the organs of breathing, and should be given two tablespoonfuls three times a day on the feed. After a week or ten days you might increase the dose slightly. Although this will make the horse work much better, do not give it with the hope of effecting a complete ...
— The Veterinarian • Chas. J. Korinek
... glad he is home again?" asked quiet little Helen Burgess, who somehow always managed to say soothing things when one felt sort of ruffled up ...
— Caps and Capers - A Story of Boarding-School Life • Gabrielle E. Jackson
... not in good repair. One saw no broken fences, no slovenly out-houses, no glaring advertisements afield: nobody was asked impertinently if Soandso's soap had been used that morning, nor did the bambini cry for soothing-syrups. Everything was of stone (for wood is precious in Italy), generally whitewashed, and presenting the smiling countenance of comfort and cleanliness. The Italian in the city is seldom clean; there, it is so easy to lie in the gutters ...
— The Lure of the Mask • Harold MacGrath
... endurance, and, like Isaiah, Ezekiel, and Daniel, his strength turned to corruption. But the glorified Saviour was the same sympathetic being on whose breast John leaned, at the last supper, and he lays his endearing hand on John, and, by soothing words, restores his confidence. He explains the mystery contained in the symbols shown, and enjoins on him to write the things he had seen—symbolic of the things which then were, and of those which were then in the future. As no created resemblance ...
— A Brief Commentary on the Apocalypse • Sylvester Bliss
... round the shivering animal, re-dried the blanket at the fire, and covered the pitifully weak and panting creature. The colt's restless lifting of its head he overcame by sitting near it and stroking its muzzle with a soothing hand. ...
— Overland Red - A Romance of the Moonstone Canon Trail • Henry Herbert Knibbs
... will sustain me even then, my darling brother, and give me power to forget my own anguish in soothing your ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXIII No. 4 October 1848 • Various
... are on board the Palermo steamer, which is to convey us hence to Messina. The baked deck, which has been saturated with the sun's heat all day, is now cooling to a more moderate warmth, and soothing would be the scene but for the noise of women and children. Large liquid stars twinkle here and there, like so many moons on a reduced scale, over the sea, and the night is wholly delightful! A bell rings, which diminishes our ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXLV. July, 1844. Vol. LVI. • Various
... alone conveyed the assurance he desired. She was deeply affected. She knew the ardent, generous nature of her lover, and she felt that every word that had just fallen from his lips, tended only to unravel the true emotions of his heart: but soothing as was his impassioned language, she deemed it almost criminal, at such a moment, to listen ...
— Hardscrabble - The Fall of Chicago: A Tale of Indian Warfare • John Richardson
... it, and was soothing it ere its existence penetrated at all to the old woman's preoccupied brain. Its pipings had been like an unheeded wail of wind round some centre of tragic experience. Even when she realized the child's existence her brain groped ...
— Ghetto Comedies • Israel Zangwill
... given by one of the sailors to Timoa, who developed a wonderful capacity for drawing unmusical sounds out of it. The singing was now low and plaintive, anon loud and harsh—always wild, like the song of the savages. The two combined assisted the pipe in soothing William McCoy—at least so we may assume, because he had commanded the music, and lay in his bunk in the attitude of one enjoying it. He sometimes even added to the harmony by uttering a bass ...
— The Lonely Island - The Refuge of the Mutineers • R.M. Ballantyne
... naturally, has fashioned its own Christmas. The English have made it a season of solid material comfort, of good-fellowship and "charity," with a slight flavour of soothing religion. The modern French, sceptical and pagan, make little of Christmas, and concentrate upon the secular celebration of the jour de l'an. For the Scandinavians Christmas is above all a time of sport, recreation, good living, and social gaiety in the midst of a season when little outdoor ...
— Christmas in Ritual and Tradition, Christian and Pagan • Clement A. Miles
... presented myself at the Great Hospital next day, and returning presently informed me that Mr. Lorrimer was disengaged, and would see me at once, if I would be so good as to come this way. How familiar the whole proceeding seemed! And how well I knew the place! the soothing silence, the massive grandeur, the long, dimly lighted gallery to the right, the door at which the servant stopped and knocked, the man who opened it, and met my eyes fearlessly, bowing with natural grace, and bidding me enter—a tall, fair man; self-contained and dignified; cold, pale, and unimpassioned—so ...
— Ideala • Sarah Grand
... must bankrupt the soil before autumn, I felt as if weary eyes and overtasked brains might reach their happiest haven of rest. We all remember Shenstone's epigram on the pane of a tavern window. If we find our "warmest welcome at an inn," we find our most soothing companionship in the trees among which we have lived, some of which we may ourselves have planted. We lean against them, and they never betray our trust; they shield us from the sun and from the rain; their spring welcome is a new ...
— Our Hundred Days in Europe • Oliver Wendell Holmes
... as he had harried her. When he had charged about like a mad bull because he could not button his collar, or find the pipe he had mislaid in his own pocket, she had never said more than "Now, Mr. Hutchinson," or done more than leave her sewing to button the collar with soothing fingers, and suggest quietly that sometimes he DID chance to carry his pipe about with him. She was of the class which used to call its husband by a respectful surname. When she died she left him as a sort of legacy to her daughter, spending the last weeks of her life ...
— T. Tembarom • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... her deep grief shrank from contact with strangers and clung to her young husband. So they kept themselves much apart from their fellow-passengers. Edward devoting himself to Zoe, soothing her with fond endearing words and tender caresses, and every day their hearts ...
— Grandmother Elsie • Martha Finley
... into their ears. In these labors of kindness she was assisted by another relative of the lamented Colonel Ledyard—Mrs. John Ledyard—who had also brought her household stores to refresh the sufferers, and lavished on them the most soothing personal attentions. The soldiers who recovered from their wounds, were accustomed, to the day of their death, to speak of these ladies in terms ...
— Woman on the American Frontier • William Worthington Fowler
... shall I not feel the soothing recollection of those dear years which I spent in retirement, in preparation for my deliverance from Egypt, asking for light, and by degrees getting it, with less of temptation in my heart and sin on my conscience than ...
— Obiter Dicta • Augustine Birrell
... was received—rather as an honoured guest than as a naughty child sent to Coventry—was soothing to her ruffled feelings. Still she had a great deal to, bear. She was deeply grieved to be suddenly and completely parted from Don Juan; and she imagined that he would be as much distressed as herself. But the idea of rebelling against her father's decree never entered ...
— Clare Avery - A Story of the Spanish Armada • Emily Sarah Holt
... could have seen that a broken leg was at least one of the injuries my charge had suffered. I laid the dirty yellow object down on the heavy rug before the fire, and he stopped the whining, and his trembling, too, as soon as the soothing heat began to permeate his half-frozen body. I knew there was a pine board in my closet, and from this I made some splints and bound up the broken limb as gently as I could, but my fingers were not very deft nor my skill more than ordinary, and as a consequence a few fresh howls were ...
— The Love Story of Abner Stone • Edwin Carlile Litsey
... then, or at least you start to have words with him, but he puts his knee in your chest and tells you that it really doesn't hurt at all, but is only your imagination, and utters other soothing remarks of that general nature. He then exchanges the crochet needle for a kind of an instrument with a burr on the end of it. This instrument first came into use at the time of the Spanish Inquisition but has ...
— Cobb's Anatomy • Irvin S. Cobb
... of warring sects, which for many years disturbed the peace of the city, satisfied a craving not yet allayed. Then, after a long interval, came Transcendentalism, a pleasant mixture of literature and moral guidance, and to-day Boston is as earnest as ever in pursuit of vague ideals and soothing doctrines. ...
— American Sketches - 1908 • Charles Whibley
... she thought, in trying to argue with him. She did not know what to do, and so she succumbed to his more persistent will. After all, she had no reason to fear that anything would go wrong. She said that she would go for a week or ten days, but not for a longer time. "Well, well," said Hugo, in a soothing tone, as if he were making a concession, "come back in a week, if you like, my good Mrs. Shairp. You will find the house very uncomfortable—that is all. I am going to turn painters and decorators ...
— Under False Pretences - A Novel • Adeline Sergeant
... an impatient muttering beyond him, and he made public a soothing and exaggerated apology. All the men in the room, even the group bent over a diagram of a marine engine they had drawn in chalk on their table, looked up in surprise, first at the youngster who had raised his voice, and ...
— London River • H. M. Tomlinson |
