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Brighten   Listen
verb
Brighten  v. i.  To grow bright, or more bright; to become less dark or gloomy; to clear up; to become bright or cheerful. "And night shall brighten into day." "And, all his prospects brightening to the last, His heaven commences ere world be past."






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Brighten" Quotes from Famous Books



... shall cease; And Hope, like the rainbow, unfold, through the shower, Her bright-written promise of peace? And, oh! if that rainbow of promise may shine On the last scene of life's wint'ry gloom, May its light in the moment of parting be mine; I ask but one ray from a source so divine, To brighten the vale ...
— Sanders' Union Fourth Reader • Charles W. Sanders

... she wrote a hymn, and showed it to her father. It was the first thing of the kind she had ever let him see, and his surprise and delight showed her that here was one way more in which she could brighten his life. She had not thought, in her extreme humility, that by hiding her verses she was depriving him of pleasure. After this she showed him all she wrote, but the secret ...
— Saxe Holm's Stories • Helen Hunt Jackson

... Sentiment counts, after all, Amzi. Too bad you had to be a banker, when I distinctly remember how you used to drive us all crazy with your flute; and you did spout Byron—you know you did! You ought to travel; there's nothing like it—a sentimental pilgrimage would brighten you up. If I couldn't move around I'd die. But I always was a restless animal. Dear me! If this isn't the same old dinner service father bought when we were youngsters. It's wonderful that you've kept it; but I don't miss a thing. You've even hung on to the old double-barreled pickle thing ...
— Otherwise Phyllis • Meredith Nicholson

... in the classroom, exhausted with the lassitudinous warmth of spring and with the painful uncertainty of whether she'd be called to translate the Vergil passage she hadn't mastered, visions of that coming glory would rise to brighten weary hours; and the last thing at night, in falling asleep, as the moon stole in tenderly to touch her smiling face, she took them to her dreams. She saw a slender girl in white, standing alone on a lighted stage, gazing with luminous eyes out on a darkened auditorium. Sometimes they had poky old ...
— Missy • Dana Gatlin

... October morning I kissed the little fellows goodbye and started out with Hance, who was to put me on the trail. I left the children with sorrow and pity at heart. I am glad now that my visit was a golden hiatus in the sick monotony of their young lives and that I was able to brighten a few days of their dreary existence. They had begged for the privilege of sleeping with me on a shake-down from the first; and when, as often happened, a pair of little feverish lips would murmur timidly ...
— Woodcraft • George W. Sears

... brighten up at first. You see, he was sort of pensioned off by mother and she kept him pretty well inside his income.... Well, he seemed to sort of brighten up—liven up—when he found out ...
— While the Billy Boils • Henry Lawson

... simplest of black summer silks, soft and full in the skirt, short-sleeved, and with a touch of lace at the square-cut neck. She arranged her hair in a becoming loose knot, and somehow managed to look noticeably lovely and distinguished, in the gay assemblies. To brighten the black gown she wore a rope of pearls, looped twice about her white throat, and hanging far below her waist; pearls, as Mrs. Adams remarked in discouragement later, that "just made you feel what's the use! She could wear a kitchen apron with those pearls if she wanted to, everyone ...
— The Rich Mrs. Burgoyne • Kathleen Norris

... consider how necessary amusement is to all, and how bounteously it has been supplied by Providence, we shall feel certain that man will always have beside him this light, which although it cannot lead as a star, can still brighten his path and cheer his spirits ...
— History of English Humour, Vol. 2 (of 2) • Alfred Guy Kingan L'Estrange

... unmixed good in a strange house. The governing power is strong in her. She has scarce crossed the threshold ere the utensils seem to brighten; the hearth to sweep itself; the windows to let in more light; and the soul of an enormous cricket to animate the dwelling-place. But this cricket is a Busy Body. And that is a tremendous character. It has no discrimination. ...
— The Cloister and the Hearth • Charles Reade

... them, has prayed to her gods, and been suspended between the depths of man's depravity and the heights of his achievements, around whose wintry peaks winds of ambition have roared, storms of vaulting self-love have gathered, tempests of passion have contended in angry and fierce strife. To brighten the heights they assailed each one, to clear the lofty airs embracing them. They shine now where clouds were wont to hover; sunshine steeps the rugged declivities where mists of ages hung their impenetrable folds, paths invite ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 4, No. 1, July, 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various

... alone. Her eyes were heavy, for she had been weeping long. Her sky seemed overcast; there was not a rift discoverable anywhere, and she was almost broken-hearted. Nearly two months had passed, and no sign of her lover had she seen to brighten her. Edward had told her that her lover had renounced her, and in spite of herself she almost began to believe the story. Lettice had gone out on her mission once more, but she questioned whether she would ever go again, and she prepared herself, as the time for ...
— Heiress of Haddon • William E. Doubleday

... a volunteer under governor Lyttleton. The affair, however, proved to be a mere flash in the pan: for the Cherokees finding that things were not exactly in the train they wished, sent on a deputation with their wampum belts and peace-talks to bury the hatchet and brighten the old chain of friendship with the whites; and the good-natured governor, thinking them sincere, concluded a treaty with them. The troops of course were dismissed, and ...
— The Life of General Francis Marion • Mason Locke Weems

... the afternoon did his eyes brighten. Miss Mink caught the sudden change in his expression and, following his glance, saw Lois Chalmers coming through the ward. She had thrown aside her heavy fur coat, and her slim graceful little figure as alert as a bird's darted from cart to cot as she tossed ...
— Miss Mink's Soldier and Other Stories • Alice Hegan Rice

... eyes evilly upon Messer Dante while he had been speaking, and he kept them fixed on Messer Dante's face now that he had made an end of speaking. I saw that Dante's face flushed a little, even to the hair above the high forehead, and his eyes for a moment seemed to widen and brighten like those of some fierce, brave bird. Then he pushed his way to the front of the company and looked up at Simone steadfastly, and his arms were still folded across his body and his sharp-featured face was tense with suppressed rage, and he spoke very quickly but clearly, ...
— The God of Love • Justin Huntly McCarthy

... and they paid more attention to their pipes and their cigarettes than they paid to the young woman's underclothing.... But when The Girl Gets Left began, and the whimsical face of Cream was seen peering through the window of the scene, the lassitude was lifted and the men's eyes began to brighten again. The first words, the first gesture of comic helplessness, from Cream sent a ripple of laughter round the theatre, and immediately the place was full of that queer, ...
— The Foolish Lovers • St. John G. Ervine

... protruding, the jaw broad and strong; the hands, like the rest of the body, were plump, and the fingers thick and short. There was nothing striking about his general expression; but when the conversation turned upon music, and especially if Beethoven were the topic of discussion, his eyes would brighten at once, and the whole ...
— Story-Lives of Great Musicians • Francis Jameson Rowbotham

... quarters there is no sign of life, no human habitations among these morose and now empty barracks of a monkish army. Some of them have been turned into military casernes, and the bright red and blue uniforms of the Spanish officers and troopers now brighten the cloisters that used to see nothing gayer than the gowns of cord-girdled friars. A large garrison is always kept here. The convents are convenient for lodging men and horses. The fields in the vicinity produce great store of grain and alfalfa,—food for beast and rider. It is near enough ...
— Castilian Days • John Hay

... a little child of my own," she said, "how the walls would ring with her laughter, and how the flowers would brighten at her coming. Then, indeed, I should ...
— Boys and Girls Bookshelf; a Practical Plan of Character Building, Volume I (of 17) - Fun and Thought for Little Folk • Various

... prospects of the successful accomplishment of artificial transmutation brighten almost daily. The ancients seem to have had something more than an inkling that the accomplishment of transmutation would confer upon men powers hitherto the prerogative of the gods. But now we know definitely that the material aspect of transmutation would be of small importance in comparison with ...
— The Outline of Science, Vol. 1 (of 4) - A Plain Story Simply Told • J. Arthur Thomson

... she was young and happy, and had frisked and frolicked, and liked pretty things like any ordinary girl. Cynthia and Betty felt a chill of dismay, but Nan's heart gave a throb of delight. This was one of the very starved, joyless lives which she longed to brighten; it would have been difficult to find a better type of the class. She walked quickly forward, and held out a warm, ...
— Betty Trevor • Mrs. G. de Horne Vaizey

... gold of the sassafras, And the gold of the spicewood-bush, Bewilder the ways of the forest pass, And brighten the underbrush: The white-starred drifts of the wild-plum tree, And the haw with its pearly plumes, And the redbud, misted rosily, ...
— Poems • Madison Cawein

... going out of your depth again, girls," continued he, looking at our wondering, half-puzzled faces. "Let it go, Alice; Life is a problem too hard for you to solve as yet; perhaps it will solve itself. Meantime, we will brighten ourselves up to-morrow by a good scamper over the hills, and, the next day, if your fancy for study still holds, we will plan out some hard work, and I will show you what real study is. Now go to bed; but see first that Aunt Molly has her sandwiches and ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 2, Issue 10, August, 1858 • Various

... Fleet—which brings him very nearly to the same position he would have been placed in, if a true estimate had been formed of his powers at first. Oh fathers! if Tom is a donkey, keep him at home or make him an attorney—it is amazing how a few years in "the office" will brighten him—but don't trust the lives of men, and the honour of the flag, to any but the best and wisest of your sons. Such a school for moral training has never been devised as one of the floating colleges that carry guns. The youngest midshipman acquires habits of command, ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 56, Number 350, December 1844 • Various

... the lamp dull. The rain beat in an uncanny way upon the windows. I never like to hear the rain upon the windows. I liked it less than usual that night, and was just trying to brighten the fire a little, when the front ...
— Men, Women, and Ghosts • Elizabeth Stuart Phelps

... Catholic emancipation he promised as a condition; Viscount Melville was driven from the Admiralty on a charge of malversation, his own health broke down, and the victory of Trafalgar scarcely served to brighten his closing days; given to deep drinking, and culpably careless of his private moneys, he yet lived a pure, simple, amiable life; with an overcharged dignity, he was yet an attractive man and a warm friend; England ...
— The Nuttall Encyclopaedia - Being a Concise and Comprehensive Dictionary of General Knowledge • Edited by Rev. James Wood

... winds, a-blowen high, Do zweep the clouds vrom all the sky, An' laurel-leaves do glitter bright, The while the newly broken light Do brighten up, avore our view, The vields wi' green, an' hills wi' blue; What then can highten to my eyes The cheerful feaece ov e'th an' skies, But Meaery's smile, o' Morey's Mill, My rwose o' ...
— Poems of Rural Life in the Dorset Dialect • William Barnes

... it; if we rear temples, they will crumble into dust; but if we work upon immortal minds, if we imbue them with principles, with a just fear of God, and love of our fellow-man, we engrave on those tablets something that will brighten to all eternity." Teachers, be faithful. Dress neatly and well, if your income will allow. One can always be neat and clean, however. It is certainly a miserable mistake that makes the majority of our people think that they must dress so as to be conspicuous for blocks ...
— Sparkling Gems of Race Knowledge Worth Reading • Various

... dinner, she had gone out to gather a nosegay of wild flowers to brighten her little living-room. She was busily engaged in arranging them in a pudding bowl, smiling to think that her hand had lost none of the cunning to which Miss Wickham had always paid grudging tribute, even if her improvised vase was of homely ...
— The Land of Promise • D. Torbett

... to love!" And Drusus thought, with his keen lover's eye, he could see the dimming face brighten, and the hands go up in ...
— A Friend of Caesar - A Tale of the Fall of the Roman Republic. Time, 50-47 B.C. • William Stearns Davis

... very tired. The fresh air did not brighten and enliven her as it usually did. The warm, moist wind that came in gusts from the south was not invigorating, and she went slowly up the church-steps, glad that her walk was over. There was no one in the church. Even the sexton was not visible; and ...
— Christie Redfern's Troubles • Margaret Robertson

... bierfarejo. Bribe subacxeti. Brick briko. Brick (fire) fajrsxtono. Bride novedzino. Bridge ponto. Bridle brido. Brief mallonga. Brier rozo sovagxa. Brigade brigado. Brigand rabisto. Brigandage rabado. Bright (clear) hela. Bright, to get heligxi. Brighten briligi. Brighten (polish) poluri. Brightness brilo. Brilliant brila. Brilliant (jewel) brilianto. Brimful plenpota. Brine peklakvo. Bring alkonduki. Bring back rekonduki. Bring down (of prices) ...
— English-Esperanto Dictionary • John Charles O'Connor and Charles Frederic Hayes

... as it may, we all felt it—every one of us. The party was clouded. Cards and Clare did their best to brighten things up again, and Peter and Tony and Janet Gale played silly games and made a great deal of ...
— Fortitude • Hugh Walpole

... "is always this way or that, a moment filled with pain or pleasure, with darkness or brightness, with sunlight or heavy, black clouds; and according to the moment in which we view our past and future, these will darken or brighten. Should existence in the shining light possess lesser reality than existence in the dark?" "No, it should not," was the answer that came from everything within and about him, filling him with youthful, ...
— Atlantis • Gerhart Hauptmann

... satisfied"; a place "where constant association with agreeable companions and the influence of well-bred college men in a clean and healthy moral atmosphere make for noble manhood; a place where athletic sports harden the muscles, tan the skin, broaden the shoulders, brighten the eye, and send each lad back to his school work in the fall as brown as a berry and as hard ...
— Camping For Boys • H.W. Gibson

... the woman's countenance seemed to brighten up, and in a few minutes she began to tell with great volubility the events of the attack. The trader, she said, had come suddenly on them in the dead of night with a large band, and had at once routed the warriors of the village, who were completely taken by surprise. A few had ...
— The Gorilla Hunters • R.M. Ballantyne

... investors wary. Azerbaijan accounted for 1.5% to 2% of the capital stock and output of the former Soviet Union. Azerbaijan shares all the formidable problems of the ex-Soviet republics in making the transition from a command to a market economy, but its considerable energy resources brighten its propects somewhat. Old economic ties and structures have yet to be replaced. A particularly galling constraint on economic revival is the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, said to consume 25% of Azerbaijan's ...
— The 1993 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency.

... and perfect trust that made him as beautiful to look at, in his high-backed chair, as the child Pansie on her pillow; and sometimes the spirits that were watching him beheld a calm surprise draw slowly over his features and brighten into joy, yet not so vividly as to break his evening quietude. The gate of heaven had been kindly left ajar, that this forlorn old creature might catch a glimpse within. All the night afterwards, he ...
— The Life and Genius of Nathaniel Hawthorne • Frank Preston Stearns

... comforted. "So you would, my dear!" For her sake he tried to brighten up. He joked clumsily as they stood on the threshold of the chamber, whispering, blinking his eyes to make up for the lack of ...
— Old Lady Number 31 • Louise Forsslund

... timekeepers of progress. They record the world's advancement. They stimulate the energy, enterprise and intellect of the people, and quicken human genius. They go into the home. They broaden and brighten the daily life of the people. They open mighty storehouses of information to the student. Every exposition, great or small, has helped to some ...
— The Art of Public Speaking • Dale Carnagey (AKA Dale Carnegie) and J. Berg Esenwein

... his arts and assiduity, and that scarce a farmer's daughter within ten miles round but what had found him successful and faithless. Though this account gave me some pain, it had a very different effect upon my daughters, whose features seemed to brighten with the expectation of an approaching triumph, nor was my wife less pleased and confident of their allurements and virtue. While our thoughts were thus employed, the hostess entered the room to inform her husband, that the strange gentleman, who had been two days in the house, wanted money, ...
— The Vicar of Wakefield • Oliver Goldsmith

... and louder; Like pillars of ancient halls and ruins of times remote, they sat. Like a voice from the dim pillars Mirabeau rose; the thunders subsided away; A rushing of wings around him was heard as he brighten'd, and cried out aloud: 'Where is the General of the Nation?' The walls re-echo'd: 'Where is the General ...
— A Study of Poetry • Bliss Perry

... tarpaulin was not put down over the opening, and consequently there were a few vivid pencils of light to brighten ...
— Sail Ho! - A Boy at Sea • George Manville Fenn

... boiled their porridge, and mixed their small beer, sour and thick as we are told it was, with water to make it go further, and each contributed some word of edification to the general stock, brought forward some homely illustration which might serve to brighten the next sermon when it should be preached, or told a pleasant tale, thought out during the day—a story with a moral. Of the five left behind at Canterbury it is to be observed that no one of them was qualified as yet to preach in the vernacular. William of Esseby was too young for ...
— The Coming of the Friars • Augustus Jessopp

... something ought to be done and can be done to brighten the lives of these poor folks. They live in the hills remote from church and Sunday School, which they never attend, and exist as heathen in a Christian country. Their forefathers in England were among the best yeomen of the land, and I believe many of these have ...
— The Kentucky Ranger • Edward T. Curnick

... manufacturing cities, louder than their furnace blast, is all in very deed for this,—that we manufacture everything there except men; we blanch cotton, and strengthen steel, and refine sugar, and shape pottery; but to brighten, to strengthen, to refine, or to form a single living spirit, never enters into our estimate of advantages. And all the evil to which that cry is urging our myriads can be met only in one way: not ...
— Selections From the Works of John Ruskin • John Ruskin

... dreary trail at best, and these evidences of death did not help to brighten it in the least. We wondered often where it led to and what new things would be our experience. After walking fast all day we came to quite an elevation, where we could stand and look in all directions. The low black range where we left the Jayhawkers was in sight, and this spur of the great ...
— Death Valley in '49 • William Lewis Manly

... cleaning, in order that their darker feathers may not be dulled by contact with the white plaster. Should this happen, however, in spite of all pains, it will be found that beating with feathers, and a light touching over with wadding, on which a very little benzoline has been poured, will brighten them up wonderfully. Ostrich and other feathers may be effectually cleaned by any of the foregoing methods, and, by management, re-curled with a blunt knife and ...
— Practical Taxidermy • Montagu Browne

... Brighten and cloud on her wings that close And open slow, As a butterfly's move, on the breast of a rose Rocked to and fro By a ...
— A Cluster of Grapes - A Book of Twentieth Century Poetry • Various

... and a bride blushing in her sweet bliss. There are after all only three great events in human history which, projected forward or reflected backward, colour all the rest—birth, marriage, and death. The most sordid or sullen population will collect in knots, brighten a little, forget hard fate or mortal wrongs for a moment, in the interest of seeing a wedding company go by. The surliest, the most whining of the onlookers will spare a little relenting, a happier ...
— Life of Her Most Gracious Majesty the Queen V.1. • Sarah Tytler

... a great pleasure to me to keep a journal for you if I were well enough, but I am not. I have my sick headache now once a week, and it makes me really ill for about three days. Towards night of the third day I begin to brighten up and to eat a morsel, but hardly recover my strength before I have another pull-down, just as I had got to this point the door-bell rang, and lo! a beautiful May-basket hanging on the latch for "Annie," full of pretty and good things. I can hardly wait till morning to see how her eyes ...
— The Life and Letters of Elizabeth Prentiss • George L. Prentiss

... my fortunes did not brighten—notwithstanding that I hunted in every direction for work, and tried to wean my mind from painful associations by hopeful anticipations of "something turning up" on the morrow. The morrow came, sure enough; but no good luck:—my fortunes ...
— She and I, Volume 2 - A Love Story. A Life History. • John Conroy Hutcheson

... dead, is banished from our shores; the duello has been laughed to death; cock-fighting and bull-baiting have ceased to charm: politics alone remains to gratify the pugnacity and cruelty that civilisation has robbed of their due objects. How we brighten up again at a bye-election, when duels which passed unregarded in the big battle, when towns scarcely noted at the fag-end of the great campaign, become the cynosure of every eye. Through Slocum or Eatonswill the hub of the universe ...
— Without Prejudice • Israel Zangwill

... surprised to find Norah's friend Louise Martin so much like other girls, and when Norah described the hall bedroom in the gloomy boarding-house, which was her only home, Miss Virginia began to wish and then to wonder if she could not do something to brighten a ...
— The Pleasant Street Partnership - A Neighborhood Story • Mary F. Leonard

... o'er him bent his sire, and never raised His eyes from off his face, but wiped the foam From his pale lips, and ever on him gazed, And when the wish'd-for shower at length was come, And the boy's eyes, which the dull film half glazed, Brighten'd, and for a moment seem'd to roam, He squeezed from out a rag some drops of rain Into his dying child's mouth—but ...
— Don Juan • Lord Byron

... very few heroes, indeed, ever saw their equal; though, if any hereabouts object, I will not be so cruel or unreasonable as to hope they will admit it. At first, full of soft light, gentle and alluring, they brighten up to blaze upon you lustrously, and fascinate the gazer's dazzled glance: there are depths in them that tell of the unfathomable soul, heights in them that speak of the spirit's aspirations. It is gentleness ...
— The Complete Prose Works of Martin Farquhar Tupper • Martin Farquhar Tupper

... its silken banners, violet and white. Sitting in the little parlour, where I would pass the time until dinner with a book, I might hear the water dripping from our chestnut-trees, but I would know that the shower would only glaze and brighten the greenness of their thick, crumpled leaves, and that they themselves had undertaken to remain there, like pledges of summer, all through the rainy night, to assure me of the fine weather's continuing; it might rain as it pleased, but to-morrow, over the white fence of Tansonville, there ...
— Swann's Way - (vol. 1 of Remembrance of Things Past) • Marcel Proust

... he went round his pickets for the second time. He was becoming more and more surprised that the attempt had been delayed so long, and when some two hours later the coming dawn began to brighten the eastern sky and still no sign had been observed, his chagrin waxed keen. As the light increased, he withdrew his men to cover, and about seven o'clock, when it was no longer possible that anything would be attempted, he sent them by ones and twos to await their ...
— The Pit Prop Syndicate • Freeman Wills Crofts

... are mistaken. Jim expects me to brighten him up: he is not wholly without a sense of humor. But if you think I am going there for amusement, you are out again. I shall take Young's Night Thoughts, and Hervey's Meditations among the Tombs, and a volume or two of sermons, to read on the way, ...
— A Pessimist - In Theory and Practice • Robert Timsol

... always think you have on your shoulders your beadle's robe, and spend all your time reading your breviary. But I give you warning that if in polishing your chapel utensils you forget how to brighten up my sword, I will make a great fire of your blessed images and will see that ...
— Twenty Years After • Alexandre Dumas, Pere

... girl, I will never do any great harm either to you or the family. It is my way of enjoying life, and I guess I am a free agent. But keep on in your good work, and it will do for the both of us. I have brought something with me to brighten your eyes, sister. This will buy ...
— Nancy McVeigh of the Monk Road • R. Henry Mainer

... time of uncommon interest and excitement to the entire Nez Perce hunting village. They had plenty to eat and to drink, and some of them had received presents, and the prospect ahead seemed to brighten a little. By nightfall all the warriors were returned from accompanying the mining party, and it was a time for a grand smoke. Some of them had begged Yellow Pine for "fire-water," but not a drop had been obtained. Instead of ...
— Two Arrows - A Story of Red and White • William O. Stoddard

... a movement on foot," says The Daily Mail, "to brighten the dress of boys." Smith Tertius writes to say that, according to the best opinion in his set, the waist should be worn fuller and less attention paid to the "sit" of ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 158, January 21st, 1920 • Various

... a concert above my window, and one day I heard some new notes, and, peeping out, saw that five little robins had come to brighten the cozy nest. Such a busy time as the papa and mamma Redbreasts had now! Such a digging for worms to drop into the big mouths which seemed to be always asking for food! In a few weeks the baby birds learned to fly, and ...
— Buttercup Gold and Other Stories • Ellen Robena Field

... how to scroll a billet-doux. With what delight, methinks, I trace Your blood in every noble race! In whom thy features, shape, and mien, Are to the life distinctly seen! The Britons, once a savage kind, By you were brighten'd and refined, Descendants to the barbarous Huns, With limbs robust, and voice that stuns: But you have moulded them afresh, Removed the tough superfluous flesh, Taught them to modulate their tongues, And speak without the help of lungs. Proteus on you bestow'd ...
— Poems (Volume II.) • Jonathan Swift

... remembrance of the husband had swept across them like a glacial blast. Julio was the first to brighten up. ...
— The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse • Vicente Blasco Ibanez

... each tale more beer. Even dreamy Learoyd's eyes began to brighten, and he unburdened himself of a long history in which a trip to Malham Cove, a girl at Pateley Brigg, a ganger, himself and a pair of clogs ...
— Indian Tales • Rudyard Kipling

... been a saver, and his wife had helped him in that respect, but now his money was no more than dust in the corners of his mind, for there weren't no eye to brighten when he told of a bit more put by and no tongue to applaud and tell him what a model sort of man he was. He found, however, as he came to know Milly Bassett better, that though his good fortune and prosperity was nothing ...
— The Torch and Other Tales • Eden Phillpotts

... trials to brighten our crown," he said comfortingly. "I have seen white men dead from the nonos. They were not here in the old days, but since the jungle has overrun us because of depopulation, they are frightful. During the mass, when the priest cannot defend ...
— White Shadows in the South Seas • Frederick O'Brien

... intensity of concentration which takes on its color makes it seem so. The "rapture" is just the sense of being caught up into union with the highest; the joy of the rapture is the joy of every thought of God, here left free to brighten into ecstasy; and its "revelation-value" is again the sense of immediate union with a Being the intellectual concept of ...
— The Psychology of Beauty • Ethel D. Puffer

... her; I could hardly say I saw her, but she seemed to grow great and brighten in my eyes; and with that I suppose I must have lost my head, for I called out her name again and made a step at her with my ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 11 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... is constrained by low oil prices, rapid inflation, and political deadlock that are causing a lack of economic cooperation and leadership. However, a peace agreement with Saudi Arabia in February 1995 and the expectation of a rise in oil prices brighten Yemen's ...
— The 1995 CIA World Factbook • United States Central Intelligence Agency

... roadside slender trees of the hornbeam tribe are planted at intervals, and where these are wanting, tall flagstaffs take their place, to guide the wayfarer when six feet of snow cover the ground. Wild-flowers in plenty brighten the edges of the road—stonecrops, cornflowers, purple 'lady's fingers,' and many others; but wedged as we are in our not too comfortable caleche, to get out and pluck them ...
— The Roof of France • Matilda Betham-Edwards

... round, raising and stamping their feet and waving their arms; a kind of tune crept into their rhythmic recitation, and a refrain,—"Aloola," or "Balloola," it sounded like. Their eyes began to sparkle, and their ugly faces to brighten, with an expression of strange pleasure. Saliva dripped ...
— The Island of Doctor Moreau • H. G. Wells

... could, a secret, And question first once more the ancient Mimer. I question'd him, and murky fate's explorer Thus answer'd: "If the sun (ah, hear and tremble, And save thee, whilst thou canst!) if it to-morrow, When by its glories yonder hills are brighten'd, Which oft have echoed back the half-god's wailings, Behold him yet in love and yet rejected, Then likewise it beholds the spear which slays him, And Odin's tears and ...
— The Death of Balder • Johannes Ewald

... That independent spirit, and that ingenuous modesty, qualities inseparable from a noble mind, are, with the million, circumstances not a little disqualifying. What pleasure is in the power of the fortunate and the happy, by their notice and patronage, to brighten the countenance and glad the heart of such depressed youth! I am not so angry with mankind for their deaf economy of the purse:—the goods of this world cannot be divided without being lessened—but why be a niggard of that which ...
— The Complete Works of Robert Burns: Containing his Poems, Songs, and Correspondence. • Robert Burns and Allan Cunningham

... did not brighten with enjoyment. Rather it hardened into a set expression, and after a moment's pause he ...
— The Tyranny of Weakness • Charles Neville Buck

... had spoken of her beauty in terms that aroused his attention, had spoken even more emphatically of her goodness. Not an artist in words, the manager had yet conveyed a very definite idea to Trent's mind. 'There isn't a child about here that don't brighten up at the sound of her voice,' he had said, 'nor yet a grown-up, for the matter of that. Everybody used to look forward to her coming over in the summer. I don't mean that she's one of those women that are all kind heart and nothing ...
— Trent's Last Case - The Woman in Black • E.C. (Edmund Clerihew) Bentley

... driver; "but I'll hould a testher that a tight crapper Would soon brighten your eye. Come, come," he added, as she yawned again, "shut your pittaty trap, and go to the young lady in ...
— The Black Baronet; or, The Chronicles Of Ballytrain - The Works of William Carleton, Volume One • William Carleton

... I felt my heart swell with hope; the gloomy feelings of disappointment passed away, and I found myself gazing with astonishment at Mr Gunson, whose morose, disfigured face seemed to brighten up and glow, while his eye flashed again, as when Mr Raydon finished speaking he leaned forward and grasped ...
— To The West • George Manville Fenn

... exclaimed the old woman. "How the captain will brighten up! But my! I must go and alter ...
— The Captain's Toll-Gate • Frank R. Stockton

... 'Mr.'? 'The' would sound so odd in the vocative. And I can't very well call you 'MacQuern'—YOU don't think me unkind, do you? I simply can't bear to think of all these young lives cut short without my having done a thing to brighten them. What can I do?—what can I do to show ...
— Zuleika Dobson - or, An Oxford Love Story • Max Beerbohm

... and our depressing sorrows as we go through life; but, surely, we can avoid most of the troubles which keep us unhappy if we will but lift our thoughts above ourselves and employ our time in seeking to comfort and brighten the lives of those about us. Happiness is largely a habit, and we can do no better than to 'get the habit" and let others catch it ...
— Crayon and Character: Truth Made Clear Through Eye and Ear - Or, Ten-Minute Talks with Colored Chalks • B.J. Griswold

... strange significance. If I had to remember through coming years that you died for me all hopeless and unbelieving, do you think so poorly of me as to imagine I could be happy? Why can't you be generous enough to brighten the life you have saved? Among my father's last words he said I must be a sister to you. How can I if you die? You would make this dear old place, that we both love, ...
— Opening a Chestnut Burr • Edward Payson Roe

... I shall soon join my father and grandfather in the happy lands, for I am old! Yet, before my bones are buried at the foot of the hills, it would brighten my heart to see the glory of the Shoshones, which I know must be in a short time. Hear my words! Long ages ago some of our children, not finding our hunting-grounds wide enough for the range-of their arrows, left us. They first wandered in the south, and in the beautiful prairies ...
— Monsieur Violet • Frederick Marryat

... echo through the quiet, silent room; When no childish smile shall brighten, and no laughter lift the gloom; When the shadows that fall 'round us in the fire-light's fitful glow Shall be ghosts of those who sat there in ...
— Poems Teachers Ask For, Book Two • Various

... grasped it. Jack slowly opened his eyes. Lizzie's heart began to throb; it was as if the stillness of the sanctuary had given a sign. At first there was no recognition in the young man's gaze. Then the dull pupils began visibly to brighten. There came to his lips the commencement of that strange moribund smile which seems so ineffably satirical of the things of this world. O imposing spectacle of death! O blessed soul, marked for promotion! What earthly favor is like thine? Lizzie sank down on her knees, and, still clasping John's ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 89, March, 1865 • Various

... dawn was not new, he had seen if often in many countries, but it was a marvel of which he never tired. And there was about this sunrise a significance that had been attached to no other he had ever witnessed. Eagerly he watched the faint flush brighten and intensify, the pale streaks spread and widen into far flung bars of flaming gold and crimson. Daylight came with startling suddenness and as the glowing disc of the sun rose red above the horizon a horseman broke from the galloping ...
— The Shadow of the East • E. M. Hull

... Shaddy, taking off his cap, and giving his head a rub as if to brighten his brain, "that's ...
— Rob Harlow's Adventures - A Story of the Grand Chaco • George Manville Fenn

... "I hope you 'll find that this has the true Calvinistic flavour. And here's to you likewise. May you yet discover the length, the depth, and the uses of all the canals of Mars." Over the rim of his glass his eyes began to brighten in a manner which his guest already knew to be a prophecy of something good. "That was an excellent jest of the bishop's you told me of yesterday, calling you Peter when he handed you the keys of the door that leads to heaven. Now what did you say ...
— The Mayor of Warwick • Herbert M. Hopkins

... himself in the woods. Napoleon mounted a battery of 40 cannons on the left shore, and now the French could flatter themselves to be masters of the right shore while the bridges were made, and that their whole army would be able to cross. Napoleon's star seemed to brighten again, the officers grouped around him, saluting with expressions of joy, such as they had not ...
— Napoleon's Campaign in Russia Anno 1812 • Achilles Rose

... destiny, presented to her this lamented brother living; and he said to Isabel, "Give me your hand, Isabel; for your lovely sake I pardon Claudio. Say you will be mine, and he shall be my brother too." By this time Lord Angelo perceived he was safe; and the duke, observing his eye to brighten up a little, said, "Well, Angelo, look that you love your wife; her worth has obtained your pardon: joy to you, Mariana! Love her, Angelo! I have confessed her, and know her virtue." Angelo remembered, when dressed in a little brief authority, how hard his ...
— Tales from Shakespeare • Charles Lamb and Mary Lamb

... part I play in the world, with so much petty energy, such anxious responsibility. My purple-starred flower approved of my acquiescence, smiling trustfully upon me. "Here," it seemed to say, "I bloom and brighten, spring after spring. No one regards me, no one cares for me; no one praises my beauty; no one sorrows when these leaves grow pale, when I fall from my stem, when my dry stalks whisper together in the winter wind. But to you, because you have seen and loved me, I whisper my secret." ...
— The Thread of Gold • Arthur Christopher Benson

... sight!" With what sacred pleasure did Moses record the first promise, though at the distance of many centuries! What rapture thrilled through the patriarch's veins, when he spake of the coming of Shiloh, "unto whom the gathering of the people should be;" and how did his languid eyes brighten with new lustre in the dying hour, when he exclaimed, "I have waited for thy salvation, O Lord!" In what strains of holy joy did the "sweet singer of Israel" declare, "My heart is inditing a good matter; I speak of the things which I ...
— Female Scripture Biographies, Vol. II • Francis Augustus Cox

... way. Jest as we see our way clear of the woods, you act like you are lost. Smile, till you find the path, and then you want to cry. Act like you want the Lord to do it all—don't want the circuit jedge to do nothin'. That's it, brighten up there now, and, Guinea, you go out and tell that nigger woman to cook enough for a dozen folks. Hawes, I've got them chickens down to a p'int that would ...
— The Jucklins - A Novel • Opie Read

... did not get so. Later in the morning she came to Olive with the timid yet startling proposal that they would do what they could to brighten up the long-neglected front room. Olive was mystified and troubled, but consented, and thereupon ...
— Madame Delphine • George W. Cable

... festal Easter that dost bring Approach of sweetly-smiling spring, When Nature's clad in green: When feather'd songsters through the grove With beasts confess the power of love 5 And brighten all ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge - Vol I and II • Samuel Taylor Coleridge

... with vegetables, twitch their long ears and doze in the shady corners of the street. The gutters, flushed with clear water, flash in the sunlight. Baskets full of red roses and white carnations, at a few sous the armful, brighten the cool shade of the alleys leading to courtyards of wild gardens, many of which are filled with odd collections of sculpture discarded ...
— The Real Latin Quarter • F. Berkeley Smith

... will laugh when I tell you I have made a hero of you? For when people seem very sordid and mean and stupid (and it seems as if everybody was) then the thought will come like a little crumb of comfort "well, Mark Twain isn't anyway." And it does really brighten me up. ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain

... may have been spilled on the stove with a cloth dipped in hot water, and wipe the inside of the stove, taking care to dry it thoroughly. Wash the dripping-pan in hot water with soda in it, and rub it with sand to brighten it. Then wipe ...
— The Skilful Cook - A Practical Manual of Modern Experience • Mary Harrison

... justified by a deepening knowledge of his character, renders him intolerable, or the habit of seeing bodily defects dims the eye to them. The mind looks about for compensations; his countenance awakens curiosity; its features brighten; fleeting beauties appear in it. At last the inner, hidden beneath the outer, shows itself. Then, when the first impressions are fairly overcome, the attachment felt is all the stronger, because the soul clings ...
— The Village Rector • Honore de Balzac

... there is one there who will. To the subtle flattery, in short, of weakness and of ignorance, woman has now added the flattery of listening. To say little, to contribute hardly more than a cue now and then, but to be attentive, to be interested, to brighten at the proper moment, to laugh at the proper joke, to suggest the exact amount of difficulties which you require to make your oratorical triumph complete, and to join with an unreserved assent in its conclusion, that is the simple secret ...
— Modern Women and What is Said of Them - A Reprint of A Series of Articles in the Saturday Review (1868) • Anonymous

... hurled himself with splendid courage at the most brawny opponent he could single out. A short sharp conflict ensued, Fatteh Khan with his disabled arm using his sword, while his opponent, with an Affghan knife in one hand, was busy trying to induce the glow on his matchlock to brighten up, that the gun might definitely settle the issue. In the course of the skirmishing between the two men a curious accident, however, occurred. The tribesman, as was usual in those days, was carrying under his arm a goat-skin bag full of powder ...
— The Story of the Guides • G. J. Younghusband

... alone. The Yaqui was there. Suddenly a strange, cold sensation crept over Gale. It was new. He felt a presence. Turning, he expected to see the Indian, but instead, a slight shadow, pale, almost white, stood there, not close nor yet distant. It seemed to brighten. Then he saw a woman who resembled a girl he had seemed to know long ago. She was white-faced, golden-haired, and her lips were sweet, and her eyes were turning black. Nell! He had forgotten her. Over him flooded a torrent of memory. There was tragic woe ...
— Desert Gold • Zane Grey

... all hands had an idea of what was doing and all began to brighten up. Men off watch, supposed to be asleep in their cots below, began to stroll up and have a look around decks. Some lingered near the wireless door, and every time the messenger passed they sort of stuck their ears up at him. He was a long-legged ...
— The U-boat hunters • James B. Connolly

... appears that affairs began to brighten; for those Indians, after witnessing the kind treatment extended to them, and seeing that the Spaniards were more affable than they appeared on the outside, promised very fair reciprocity. The commander endeavored ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898, Volume XXIII, 1629-30 • Various

... bird, Tilly felt its tiny cold claws cling to her hand, and saw its dim eyes brighten as it nestled ...
— Aunt Jo's Scrap-Bag • Louisa M. Alcott

... for the evening was closing in fast, and then he began to brighten in the expectation of the something fresh that was to take place that night. But knowing that it might be hours before they started, he waited—and ...
— Fitz the Filibuster • George Manville Fenn

... good," returned Aunt Madge. "She makes the best of things. By-the-bye, what is this I hear of a grand new dress for the wedding?" And then Olivia did brighten up a little. ...
— Doctor Luttrell's First Patient • Rosa Nouchette Carey

... wanted to help Fanny, to do her good, to brighten her dull life. The contemplation of her pleasure gave me what some would call the most unselfish delight. Withal, as I say, how oddly various are one's motive springs, especially in youth! And, in some respects, what a blind young fool I was! That wine, now.... Who knows? ... I took but a sip ...
— The Record of Nicholas Freydon - An Autobiography • A. J. (Alec John) Dawson

... Venus, after clutching at his dusty hair, to brighten his ideas, 'let us put it another way. I open the business with you, relying upon your honour not to do anything in it, and not to mention me in ...
— Our Mutual Friend • Charles Dickens

... It was useless looking for her in the darkness. He could do nothing until the moon was up. The sky was already beginning to brighten with the coming light. So he stood where ...
— The Moon Rock • Arthur J. Rees



Words linked to "Brighten" :   change, clear up, lighten, lighten up, overcast, modify, clear, darken, alter, light up



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