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adjective
Pressing  adj.  Urgent; exacting; importunate; as, a pressing necessity.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Pressing" Quotes from Famous Books



... Duncan's face as he encountered the blank blue stare of a young man whose very smooth and very bright red face was admirably set off by semi-evening dress. "Great Scott!" he cried, warmly pressing the lackadaisical hand that drifted into his. ...
— The Fortune Hunter • Louis Joseph Vance

... romance, and Grace had her's. The attentions of George Herbert had been those of a brother, but during this visit they partook of a warmer character. He lingered by her side, occasionally pressing her hand with a warmth that brought the blood to her cheeks, and made her turn away from his glances. She understood what was meant; and it is almost certain that her heart was in a measure touched by that which she saw in him. But she did not mean to yield. ...
— Grace Darling - Heroine of the Farne Islands • Eva Hope

... the valley of the Arickaree, and as the boys came rolling out with cordial shouts of welcome, his eyes smarted a little. He slipped from his horse and shook hands all around, and ended by snatching Pink and pressing her soft cheek against his lips—something ...
— The Eagle's Heart • Hamlin Garland

... three million clause. Mr. Webster defended himself most conclusively and effectively, and before the session closed the difficulties with France were practically settled. He also gave great attention to the ever-pressing financial question, trying to mitigate the evils which the rapid accumulation of the public funds was threatening to produce. He felt that he was powerless, that nothing indeed could be done to avert the approaching disaster; but ...
— Daniel Webster • Henry Cabot Lodge

... the phrase "a permanent possibility of feelings" exhaust all our conception of a personal self. Recurring to the experiences of yesterday, I remember the feelings I experienced on beholding the sun, and also on pressing against the closed door, and I confidently expect the recurrence, under the same circumstances, of the same feelings. Does the belief in "a permanent possibility of feelings" explain the act of memory ...
— Christianity and Greek Philosophy • Benjamin Franklin Cocker

... chance at the Forty-second Street corner of Fifth Avenue and drifted westward, pausing at each book stall to stare at the titles of the bargain offerings in literature. As she stood at one of these stalls near Sixth Avenue, she became conscious that two men were pressing against her, one on either side. She moved back and started on her way. One of the men was standing before her. She lifted her eyes, was looking into the cruel smiling eyes of a man with a big black mustache and the jaws of a prizefighter. ...
— Susan Lenox: Her Fall and Rise • David Graham Phillips

... at the state which they must consider as ripeness, they do not cut, but pull the barley: to the oats they apply the sickle. Wheel carriages they have none, but make a frame of timber, which is drawn by one horse with the two points behind pressing on the ground. On this they sometimes drag home their sheaves, but often convey them home in a kind of open panier, or frame of sticks upon ...
— A Journey to the Western Isles of Scotland • Samuel Johnson

... said the General, pressing his fists so tightly together that if there had been anything inside them it would have been crushed ...
— The Day of Wrath • Maurus Jokai

... boughs She heaped o'er the fallen form— Wolf nor hawk nor lawless storm Him from his rest should rouse; But first, with solemn vows, Took rifle, pouch, and horn, And the belt that he had worn. Then, onward pressing fast Through the forest rude and vast, Hunger-wasted, fever-parch'd, Many bitter days she marched With bleeding feet that spurned the flinty pain; One thought always throbbing through her brain: "They shall never say, 'He was afraid,'— They shall ...
— Dreams and Days: Poems • George Parsons Lathrop

... the invitation and they arrived together at Fairholm on one of the early autumn evenings. They both greeted Eric with the utmost affection; and he seemed never tired of pressing their hands, and looking at them again. Yet every now and then a memory of sadness would pass over his face, like a dark ripple on the clear surface ...
— Eric, or Little by Little • Frederic W. Farrar

... you will work in before long, and at the end of six months—after you have done a thing or two on your own account—you will like it. And then it will be very pleasant for you, having your sister over there. It will be pleasant for her to have you, too. Yes, Valentin," continued Newman, pressing his friend's arm genially, "I think I see just the opening for you. Keep quiet and I'll ...
— The American • Henry James

... about the horse, which he had again seen, the landlord having shown it to him on learning that he was a friend of mine. He told me that the horse pleased him more than ever, he having examined his points with more accuracy than he had an opportunity of doing on the first occasion, concluding by pressing me to buy him. I begged him to desist from such foolish importunity, assuring him that I had never so much money in all my life as would enable me to purchase the horse. Whilst this discourse was going on, Mr. Petulengro and myself were ...
— The Romany Rye - A Sequel to 'Lavengro' • George Borrow

... deceiving yourself and me. I am an old man, and have been too many years in this chair, not to ascertain by the answers which I receive, whether the conscience is unloaded. Yours, I am convinced, has something pressing heavily upon it; something for which you would fain have absolution, but which you are ashamed to reveal. If not a principal, you have been a party to crime; and never shall you have absolution until you have made a full confession." Her ...
— The Pacha of Many Tales • Captain Frederick Marryat

... patrons of music; and one of their family, Richard, practised the art as his profession. This excellent musician was educated in Italy; and, when his education was completed, he returned to England with great reputation. He resided in his own country for some time, but, upon a very pressing invitation, went to Brussels, and became organist to the convent of English nuns there. From the marriage of Charles I., until the time when that monarch left England, he was organist to the Queen. In 1610 he was admitted to the degree of Bachelor ...
— Notes & Queries 1850.01.12 • Various

... still raining, and, as we crossed the fields of mud, I began to feel the weight of my equipment pressing on my shoulders, which with my camera and spare films made my progress very slow. Many a time during that march the men offered to help me, but, knowing that they had quite enough to do in carrying their own load, ...
— How I Filmed the War - A Record of the Extraordinary Experiences of the Man Who - Filmed the Great Somme Battles, etc. • Lieut. Geoffrey H. Malins

... symptom was received with kindling eye and eager questionings. It was worst in her back this morning? So! now how would she describe the pain? Was it acute, darting, piercing? No? Dull, then! Would she call it grinding, boring, pressing? Ah! that was most interesting. And for other symptoms—yes! yes! that naturally followed; he should ...
— Geoffrey Strong • Laura E. Richards

... friend I like!" cries Demian. "I can't bear people who require pressing. But now, dear friend, take just this one ...
— The Talking Beasts • Various

... Pressing on at a steady gait, he did not halt until some time after nightfall, and then built no fire, but ate a cold supper, staked his horse out, rolled up in his blankets, ...
— Buffalo Bill's Spy Trailer - The Stranger in Camp • Colonel Prentiss Ingraham

... of the day he was either in the warehouse, or carried messages, and generally did such odd jobs as were required. A fortnight after his arrival, one of the clerks was kept away by a sharp attack of fever; and as work was pressing, the agent asked Gregory to take ...
— With Kitchener in the Soudan - A Story of Atbara and Omdurman • G. A. Henty

... turn of fortune's wheel was this? The lady! I heard Craig's smothered chuckle, but before I had sufficiently regained control over my own feelings to venture upon a suitable reply, the entire party had drawn forward, the leader pressing so close to my side that I felt safer with ...
— My Lady of the North • Randall Parrish

... God is come already, and men are everywhere "pressing into it" (S. Luke xvi. 16). But His rule over the hearts of men is imperfect, and will be so as long as it can be said "We see not yet all things put under Him" (Heb. ii. 8). Therefore He has taught His faithful people ...
— The Kingdom of Heaven; What is it? • Edward Burbidge

... the murderers of Fitzmaurice, the old man, so brutally slain the other day near Lixnaw, in the presence of his daughter, for taking and farming a farm given up by his thriftless brother. "He will find," said one of the company, "the mischief done in this instance also by prematurely pressing for evidence. The girl Honora, who saw her father murdered, never ought to have been subjected to any inquiry at first by any one, least of all by the local priest. Her first thought inevitably was that if she intimated ...
— Ireland Under Coercion (2nd ed.) (2 of 2) (1888) • William Henry Hurlbert

... more in this new but fast-growing cluster of settlements. Though they did not say so to him, the settlers thought his errand a crazy one. As chance would have it, he did happen on a man as zealous for the cause as himself and with no pressing engagement for the time being. On his arriving he started with the shepherd on a round of visits, exhorting and baptizing, and announcing he would celebrate the Lord's supper, the last Sunday before his return to Toronto. So many promised to come that it was seen the ...
— The Narrative of Gordon Sellar Who Emigrated to Canada in 1825 • Gordon Sellar

... Phoebus, with an elegant obeisance. "I certainly wish you success, and regret that my own affairs are so immediately pressing that I cannot have the pleasure of attending you. Besides, I am not upon the best of terms with King Pluto. To tell you the truth, his three-headed mastiff would never let me pass the gateway; for I should be compelled to take a sheaf ...
— The Children's Hour, Volume 3 (of 10) • Various

... chaste, Mother ever-virgin, pray for me!' he stammered in his fear, pressing close to the Virgin's feet, as if he could hear Albine's sonorous footfalls behind him. 'You are my refuge, the source of my joy, the seat of my wisdom, the tower of ivory in which I have shut up my purity. I place myself in your spotless hands, I beseech you to take ...
— Abbe Mouret's Transgression - La Faute De L'abbe Mouret • Emile Zola

... "Pressing forth eagerly to the relief of their comrades' rescue, all ordinary precautions were neglected. When the van entered the ravine, a terrible fire mowed down the front ranks by scores; those in the rear fled panic-stricken from the woods. Some of the Americans rallied and ...
— See America First • Orville O. Hiestand

... little street as we put on our calashes and pinned up our gowns; Miss Barker hovering about us with offers of help, which, if she had not remembered her former occupation, and wished us to forget it, would have been much more pressing. ...
— Cranford • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell

... We are but as others, we mystics; it is only that we take—or rather are led, for it is no will of ours, but an imperious voice that calls us—the straight and flowery road to God, pressing through but one hedge of thorns, while you and others struggle to Him along the dusty road that winds and wanders. But our paradise would be no paradise if we did not know that our brothers were coming, coming; the beauty that we behold, sheer ugliness if we ...
— Memoirs of Arthur Hamilton, B. A. Of Trinity College, Cambridge • Arthur Christopher Benson

... sent Folk, his chief officer, to take this news to Wermund, who then chanced to be in his house Jellinge. (1) Folk found the king feasting with his friends, and did his errand, admonishing him that here was the long-wished-for chance of war at hand, and pressing itself upon the wishes of Wermund, to whom was give an immediate chance of victory and the free choice of a speedy and honourable triumph. Great and unexpected were the sweets of good fortune, so long sighed for, and now granted ...
— The Danish History, Books I-IX • Saxo Grammaticus ("Saxo the Learned")

... fixed and locomotive steam-power were suggested. Thomas Gray urged his plan of a greased road with cog rails; and Messrs. Vignolles and Ericsson recommended the adoption of a central friction rail, against which two horizontal rollers under the locomotive, pressing upon the sides of this rail, were to afford the means of ascending the inclined planes. The directors felt themselves quite unable to choose from amidst this multitude of projects. The engineer expressed himself as decidedly as heretofore in favour of smooth rails and locomotive ...
— Lives of the Engineers - The Locomotive. George and Robert Stephenson • Samuel Smiles

... there is so much to do, there is so much to undo, that no man can afford to waste his time on an infinite future of time, space, and leisure. Men cannot afford to lose your best energies. "God" can get on very well without them. Time is short, and needs are pressing; and this thing you know—you can keep busy doing good right here. If there is a hereafter, could there be a better preparation ...
— Men, Women, and Gods - And Other Lectures • Helen H. Gardener

... the priest is kneeling, they take the cocoa-nuts in their hands, and press upon one another, each crying, 'I am first, I am first.' Then ten of the most respectable people come out, stand apart from the rest, make the people who are pressing forward stand back, and take the cocoa-nuts, which the people have brought, into their own hands. Four others, strong men, stand near the priest; the elders hand the cocoa-nuts to them; and they keep on breaking them on the priest's head; the priest, all the time, having ...
— Old Daniel • Thomas Hodson

... each coil more and more, then contracting as she progressed upward until the desired height and form were attained. As the clay was adhesive, each coil was attached to the one already formed by pinching or pressing together the connecting edges at short intervals as the winding went on. This produced corrugations or indentations marvelously resembling the stitches of basket-work. Hence accidentally the vessel thus built up appeared so similar to the basket which ...
— A Study of Pueblo Pottery as Illustrative of Zuni Culture Growth. • Frank Hamilton Cushing

... necessary; theirs, by such reasons as did only conclude a necessity of using them at some times, and in some places. 13. Ours are urged after the full promulgation of the gospel and acknowledgment of Christian liberty; theirs, before the same. 14. Ours are urged with the careless neglect of pressing more necessary duties; theirs not so. These and other differences betwixt the controverted and Jewish ceremonies, do so break the back of Mr Sprint's argument, that there is no ...
— The Works of Mr. George Gillespie (Vol. 1 of 2) • George Gillespie

... behind, paused to accost L'Estrange. "Your Lordship will explain to Mr. Egerton how his adopted son deserved his esteem, and repaid his kindness. For the rest, though you have bought up the more pressing and immediate demands on Mr. Egerton, I fear that even your fortune will not enable you to clear those liabilities which will leave him, ...
— My Novel, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... reached for it. My hand trembled. There were sixty or seventy dollars upon the table, and my own contribution was my last cent. As I fumbled I felt the strain of bodies pressing against mine, and heard the hiss of feverish breaths, and a foolish laugh or two. Nevertheless ...
— Desert Dust • Edwin L. Sabin

... of allowing their legs to hang naturally down the horses' sides, they draw them up till their knees are on a level with their chargers' backs, the object (apparently) being to obtain a firm seat by pressing the base of the horse's neck between the two knees. The naked legs seem to indicate that it was found necessary to obtain the fullest and freest play of the muscles to escape the inconveniences ...
— The Seven Great Monarchies Of The Ancient Eastern World, Vol 2. (of 7): Assyria • George Rawlinson

... he may,' and the poor cleric lifted up his eyes unconsciously and threw his hope into the form of a prayer. 'For, to speak frankly, Mr. Larkin, my circumstances are very pressing. I have just heard from Cambridge, and find that my good friend, Mr. Mountain, the bookseller, has been dead two months, and his wife—he was a widower when I knew him, but it would seem has married since—is ...
— Wylder's Hand • J. Sheridan Le Fanu

... The numerous banishments and executions had deprived the colony of some of its most intelligent and useful citizens, while the plundering of both parties during the Rebellion, and the numberless forfeitures that followed the establishment of peace, had reduced many men to poverty. Nor had the most pressing of the grievances that had caused the people to rise against the government been redressed. The Navigation Acts were still in force, the commons were yet excluded from their rightful share in the government, the taxes ...
— Virginia under the Stuarts 1607-1688 • Thomas J. Wertenbaker

... "They are pressing steadily north, burning and slaying. I hear that they spare none, and that the whole land of the Trinobantes, from the Thames to the Stour, has been turned into ...
— Beric the Briton - A Story of the Roman Invasion • G. A. Henty

... approached, pressing forward, with their eyes wide open and their looks fixed on the treasurer, praying him to exhibit the presents at the designated place. At this very moment the Sultan spurred his horse to a gallop and rode from their presence. When he was far away and out of their sight, ...
— Malayan Literature • Various Authors

... is not bad. Enormous success. I had to come before the curtain three times, and as I did so Davydov was shaking my hand, and Glama, like Manilov, was pressing my other hand to her heart. The ...
— Letters of Anton Chekhov • Anton Chekhov

... unselfish enthusiasm born of the love of investigation and the delight in benefiting our fellow men, it is inspiring, and there are few pursuits more deservedly so, considering the vast losses to our farmers from insect injury and the pressing need that the distressed husbandman has for every aid that can be given him. Our work is elevating in its sympathies for the struggles and suffering of others. Our standard should be high—the pursuit of knowledge for the advancement of ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 787, January 31, 1891 • Various

... stripped for exercise. Marius had been surprised at the luxurious variety of the litters borne through Rome, where no carriage horses were allowed; and just then one far more sumptuous than the rest, with dainty appointments of ivory and gold, was carried by, all the town pressing with eagerness to get a glimpse of its most beautiful woman, as she passed rapidly. Yes! there, was the wonder of the world—the empress Faustina herself: Marius could distinguish, could distinguish clearly, the well-known profile, ...
— Marius the Epicurean, Volume One • Walter Horatio Pater

... matter not been just a little pressing we wouldn't have ventured over as late," Benson replied, softly. "However, you understand what I would ...
— The Submarine Boys on Duty - Life of a Diving Torpedo Boat • Victor G. Durham

... there had been the greatest Intimacy between us for an Year and half together, during all which time I cherished his Hopes, and indulged his Flame. I leave you to guess after this what must be his Surprize, when upon his pressing for my full Consent one Day, I told him I wondered what could make him fancy he had ever any Place in my Affections. His own Sex allow him Sense, and all ours Good-Breeding. His Person is such as might, without Vanity, make him believe himself not incapable ...
— The Spectator, Volume 2. • Addison and Steele

... comparatively plain sailing. The wall country of the Cotswold tableland is exactly the reverse of the vale. The pace there is often tremendous, but the obstacles are not formidable enough to those accustomed to walls to keep the eager field from pressing the pack, save on those rare occasions when, on a burning scent, the hounds manage to get a start of horses; and then they will never be caught. Well-bred horses are almost invariably ridden in this wall country; if in hard condition, ...
— A Cotswold Village • J. Arthur Gibbs

... friend's name and designation was still on the door, and when it was opened the old domestic appeared a good deal older, I thought, than he ought naturally to have looked, considering the period of my absence. "Is Mr. Sommerville at home?" said I, pressing forward. ...
— Chronicles of the Canongate • Sir Walter Scott

... quick aim at a distant tree and pressed the trigger. There was a twang as the arrow was ejected. He jerked the sliding pistol grip forward and back to reload, pressing the trigger an instant later. Another ...
— Space Prison • Tom Godwin

... to have convinced Jackson that his danger was not pressing. It was evident that the enemy had as yet no idea of his strength. Stuart's cavalry watched every road; Ewell held a strong position on Broad Run, barring the direct approach from Warrenton Junction, and ...
— Stonewall Jackson And The American Civil War • G. F. R. Henderson

... along the beach with a joyful sound. What a beauty! And now there came another. That was the way to live—carelessly, recklessly, spending oneself. He got on to his feet and began to wade towards the shore, pressing his toes into the firm, wrinkled sand. To take things easy, not to fight against the ebb and flow of life, but to give way to it—that was what was needed. It was this tension that was all wrong. To live—to live! And the perfect morning, ...
— The Garden Party • Katherine Mansfield

... discreet inquiry also as to any strangers in the neighbourhood. When you have collected some fresh evidence, come to me again. That is the best advice which I can give you, Mr. Hilton Cubitt. If there are any pressing fresh developments, I shall be always ready to run down and see you ...
— The Return of Sherlock Holmes • Arthur Conan Doyle

... actual experience. Let Walt Whitman give us his. "Doubtless there comes a time when one feels through his whole being, and pronouncedly the emotional part, that identity between himself subjectively and Nature objectively which Schelling and Fichte are so fond of pressing. How it is I know not, but I often realise a presence here—in clear moods I am certain of it, and neither chemistry nor reasoning, nor aesthetics will give the ...
— Nature Mysticism • J. Edward Mercer

... the first flood of his enthusiasm. Again, when the friendship ripened, we cannot well imagine Nietzsche, the younger man, being anything less than intoxicated by his senior's attention and love, and we are therefore not surprised to find him pressing Wagner forward as the great Reformer and Saviour of mankind. "Wagner in Bayreuth" (English Edition, 1909) gives us the best proof of Nietzsche's infatuation, and although signs are not wanting in this ...
— Thus Spake Zarathustra - A Book for All and None • Friedrich Nietzsche

... spiritual fruit than any field of labour on which he had yet operated. When he arrived in Corinth he resolved, therefore, to avoid, as much as possible, mere metaphysical argumentation, and he sought rather to stir up sinners to flee from the wrath to come by pressing home upon them earnestly the peculiar doctrines of revelation. In the first epistle, addressed subsequently to the Church now established in this place, he thus describes the spirit in which he conducted his apostolical ...
— The Ancient Church - Its History, Doctrine, Worship, and Constitution • W.D. [William Dool] Killen

... were chattering in the various rooms—music-, dining-, ball-, library and so forth—I was being shown the kitchen, pantry, wine cellar, and also various secret doors and passages whereby mine host by pressing a flower on a wall or a spring behind a picture could cause a door to fly open or close which gave entrance to or from a room or passage in no way connected with the others save by another secret door and leading always to a private exit. I wondered at once at the character of the ...
— Twelve Men • Theodore Dreiser

... nothing that he did not know—nothing that he really knew. He knew nothing, for instance, of music, but he could sit down to the piano and accompany, after a fashion, a woman who consented after much pressing to sing a ballad learned by heart in a month of hard practice. Incapable though he was of any feeling for poetry, he would boldly ask permission to retire for ten minutes to compose an impromptu, and return with a quatrain, flat as a pancake, wherein ...
— Lost Illusions • Honore De Balzac

... said, pressing tenderly the hand she held in hers, "you are never to lose them. They may be called home before you, but the separation will be short and the reunion for eternity—an eternity of unspeakable joy, unclouded bliss at the right hand of Him ...
— Elsie at Nantucket • Martha Finley

... Horn, Miss Jemima, the young secretary, Tommy Dudgeon—to whom had been given a very pressing invitation to join the party,—and Mr. Durnford, alighted from the train at the station which served for Daisy Lane, and ...
— The Golden Shoemaker - or 'Cobbler' Horn • J. W. Keyworth

... understand, she saw that there was danger, pressing and immediate, for both Gudel and Fanfar. She waited until La Roulante's heavy breathing showed that she was asleep, and then the young girl cautiously crept from her bed and to the door, which, fortunately, was not locked. She hurried to her father's ...
— The Son of Monte Cristo • Jules Lermina

... since a longer residence would, I am persuaded, have introduced me to very pleasant society, and made me acquainted with antiquities, of all kinds, well deserving of some record, however trivial. As it is, I must be content with what the shortness of my time, and the more immediately pressing nature of my pursuits, have brought me in contact. A sight of the Crucifixion by Hans Burgmair, and the possession of the most genuine copy of the editio princeps of Horace, have richly repaid all the toil and expense of the journey from Stuttgart. ...
— A Bibliographical, Antiquarian and Picturesque Tour in France and Germany, Volume Three • Thomas Frognall Dibdin

... is changing from day to day and even from hour to hour; such changes depend on the wind, but it may not necessarily be a local [Page 218] wind, so that at times they seem almost mysterious. One sees the floes pressing closely against one another at a given time, and an hour or two afterwards a gap of a foot or more may be seen between each. When the floes are pressed together it is difficult and sometimes impossible to force a way through, but when there is release of pressure the sum of many little gaps allows ...
— The Voyages of Captain Scott - Retold from 'The Voyage of the "Discovery"' and 'Scott's - Last Expedition' • Charles Turley

... flavor if slightly frappeed. It should always be served very cold. Like Sauterne, Champagne and Burgundy are served from the bottle. In serving them the wire should be cut, and the cork carefully worked out of the bottle by pressing it up with the thumbs. It is wise to work out the cork under the edge of the table, since it is sometimes projected with much power. The temperature for ...
— Prepare and Serve a Meal and Interior Decoration • Lillian B. Lansdown

... Worship was preserved for them in the Book of Common Prayer, But how to provide for the perpetuation of the "Doctrine and Sacraments and the Discipline of Christ as the Lord had commanded and as this Church had received the same," that was the great practical pressing question with which they were brought face to face. Ordination, Confirmation, and the government of the Church must of need be secured. Nor can we greatly wonder if what no entreaties had been able to obtain while the colonies were a part of the ...
— Report Of Commemorative Services With The Sermons And Addresses At The Seabury Centenary, 1883-1885. • Diocese Of Connecticut

... of the affairs of the District of Columbia having been placed in the hands of purely executive officers, while the Congress still retains all legislative authority relating to its government, it becomes my duty to make known the most pressing needs of the District and ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Section 3 (of 3) of Volume 8: Grover Cleveland, First Term. • Grover Cleveland

... two companions stood at the window of the little back parlor, pressing their noses against the glass, and looking out, he could not resist the temptation to join them, although he thought proper to punch them in the ribs, and call them a pair of inquisitive puppies, by way of showing how much he was superior to the ...
— Round the Block • John Bell Bouton

... in China peculiar to Royalty. In private houses it is usual to have three doors leading from the court to the guestrooms, and there is a great exercise of politeness in reference to these; the guest after much pressing is prevailed on to enter the middle door, whilst the host enters by the side. (See Deguignes, Voyages, I. 262.) [See also H. Cordier's Hist. des Relat. de la Chine, III. ch. ...
— The Travels of Marco Polo Volume 1 • Marco Polo and Rustichello of Pisa

... citizens may have had at the beginning of this article that in putting forward my idea of being a lawyer backwards, or the idea that we must all practice at being lawyers backwards to ourselves, I am putting forward just a gay pleasant thoughtlet, instead of a grave and pressing national issue, an issue on which the fate of a people is at stake, fades away when one really begins to think of how the idea would really work out if ...
— The Ghost in the White House • Gerald Stanley Lee

... did not have time, or perhaps did not receive a pressing invitation until he had returned with his MS. from California. Then, through young Charles Langdon, his Quaker City shipmate, he was invited to Elmira. The invitation was given for a week, but through a subterfuge—unpremeditated, and certainly fair enough in a matter of ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain

... he said, "you are to do just exactly what I tell you, step by step, so much and no more. If you make any other move, if I only think you are going to, I shall shoot. My finger is pressing the trigger constantly. And I guess you can see that at this range, though my hold on the gun is a bit cramped, I could not miss ...
— The Young Railroaders - Tales of Adventure and Ingenuity • Francis Lovell Coombs

... and cheering broke out at this. It is strange how much more pressing is the small need of a dinner than the large need of a rescue. The mystery of the schooner was overlooked in a sight of the plates ...
— The Cruise of the Dry Dock • T. S. Stribling

... her:—"Hath he left me?" says she. "We had words this morning: he was very gloomy, and I angered him: but he dared not, he dared not!" As she spoke a burning blush flushed over her whole face and bosom. Esmond saw it reflected in the glass by which she stood, with clenched hands, pressing her swelling heart. ...
— The History of Henry Esmond, Esq. • W. M. Thackeray

... to these outward temptations, which assail all mankind daily and hourly, the Christian knows he must resist inward temptations, which perhaps are known to none but himself and his God. These temptations are more pressing than other temptations, on account of their peculiar nature: for the one, if indulged in, brings the displeasure or frowns of the world—the other, as I said before, is perhaps unknown to all ...
— Brotherly Love - Shewing That As Merely Human It May Not Always Be Depended Upon • Mrs. Sherwood

... age by taking a piece of horn, pressing it out flat and punching a hole in the center. When a child is a certain age he has one of these tied about his neck, and every year the child is supposed to cut a notch in the piece of horn. I did not learn how old they had to be ...
— Thirty-One Years on the Plains and In the Mountains • William F. Drannan

... not a good fighting man is a lamentable mistake; he is a good fighter. He has not perhaps the initiative of the British, or the avalanche-like ardor in a charge of the French soldier, but with his officers pressing him behind and in mass formation, he is as formidable a foe ...
— S.O.S. Stand to! • Reginald Grant

... hand—pressing his lips to it as if to leave the mark of his burning passion. He closed the door and the carriage rolled rapidly away under the porch, and out to ...
— The Child of Pleasure • Gabriele D'Annunzio

... long while I went every evening to some theatre, and little by little I fell into idle ways. I grew more and more slack over my work; even my most pressing tasks were apt to be put off till the morrow, and before very long there was an end of my search after knowledge for its own sake; I did nothing more than the work which was absolutely required to enable me to get through the examinations ...
— The Country Doctor • Honore de Balzac

... is nearly all done in the saddle and calls for much hard riding. He rides like a Centaur, but is clumsy on his feet. Being so much in the saddle his walking muscles become weakened, and his legs pressing against the body of his horse, in time, makes him bowlegged. In addition he wears high-heeled Mexican boots which throw him on his toes when he walks and makes his already shambling gait ...
— Arizona Sketches • Joseph A. Munk

... Trojans drave forward in close array, and Hector led them, pressing straight onwards, like a rolling rock from a cliff, that the winter-swollen water thrusteth from the crest of a hill, having broken the foundations of the stubborn rock with its wondrous flood; leaping ...
— The Iliad of Homer • Homer (Lang, Leaf, Myers trans.)

... of the anguish that must have followed the confession—whether, in the subsequent solitude of the prison, conscience retracted or confirmed the self-taxing words—that anguish seemed to be pressing on her own heart and urging the slow bitter tears. Every vulgar self-ignorant person in Florence was glibly pronouncing on this man's demerits, while he was knowing a depth of sorrow which can only be known to the soul that has loved ...
— Romola • George Eliot

... till the next event of the evening, supper, had to be prepared for. Lydia seemed to have given up the struggle; she consented to stay for the meal without much pressing. When the table was laid Mrs. Poole went upstairs to her brother's bedroom. On opening the door she was met with a very strong odour of chemical experimentalising. Despite the warmth of the season, there was a fire, with two or three singular pots boiling upon it. A table was covered with jars and ...
— Thyrza • George Gissing

... thoughts, said to her: "Above all things, mother, be sure to keep secret our possession of the lamp, for thereon depends the success we have to expect;" and after this caution they parted to go to rest. Aladdin rose before daybreak, awakened his mother, pressing her to get herself dressed to go to the sultan's palace, and to get admittance, if possible, before the great officers of state went in to take their seats in the divan, where the ...
— The Arabian Nights - Their Best-known Tales • Unknown

... sounds. Waiting among these many echoes and mysteries of every kind, and light and darkness, and life and death, we seize a note or two of the great symphony, and try to sing; and because these notes happen to jar, we think all is discordant hopelessness. Then come pressing onward in the crowd of life, voices with some of the notes that are wanting to our own part—voices tuned to the same key as our own, or to an accordant one; making harmony for us as they pass us by. Perhaps this is in life the happiest of all experience, ...
— A Book of Sibyls - Miss Barbauld, Miss Edgeworth, Mrs Opie, Miss Austen • Anne Thackeray (Mrs. Richmond Ritchie)

... varies every minute as the wind and clouds change. I can keep mine constant with mathematical accuracy, or vary the light to a nicety by pressing a button." ...
— The Healthy Life, Vol. V, Nos. 24-28 - The Independent Health Magazine • Various

... roared Bill. "Nark that language, I say. Speak that I can understand you. Wait a minute till I reshiperate that," he suddenly exclaimed pressing a charge into his rifle magazine and curving over the parapet. He sent five shots in the direction from which he supposed the sniper who had been potting at us all day, was firing. Then ...
— The Red Horizon • Patrick MacGill

... buried fell back slowly and gave him place. For an instant he appeared, in this frame of granite, like the angel of chaos, but in pushing back the lateral rocks, he lost his point of support, for the monolith which weighed upon his shoulders, and the boulder, pressing upon him with all its weight, brought the giant down upon his knees. The lateral rocks, for an instant pushed back, drew together again, and added their weight to the ponderous mass which would have been sufficient to crush ten ...
— The Man in the Iron Mask • Alexandre Dumas, Pere

... envoys. Selim, who watched over the fire, was a youth in appearance as gentle as his heart was intrepid, and his special duty was to be in readiness to blow up the whole place at any moment. The pacha gave him his hand to kiss, inquiring if he were ready to die, to which he only responded by pressing his master's hand fervently to his lips. He never took his eyes off Ali, and the lantern, near which a match was constantly smoking, was entrusted only to him and to Ali, who took turns with him in watching it. Ali drew a pistol from his belt, making ...
— Celebrated Crimes, Complete • Alexandre Dumas, Pere

... story of a prophet who, after expressing several very interesting opinions as to practical conduct, both personal and political, which are now of pressing importance, and instructing his disciples to carry them out in their daily life, lost his head; believed himself to be a crude legendary form of god; and under that delusion courted and suffered a cruel execution ...
— Preface to Androcles and the Lion - On the Prospects of Christianity • George Bernard Shaw

... after the surrender of the colony to England, although the terms of the cession were as favorable to religion as could be desired, and the British power could not introduce there any of the penal laws still pressing so hard on English and Irish Catholics, nevertheless, a great danger arose in consequence, which is particularly visible now after more than a century has passed away. Though Catholicity could not be persecuted, and, for once, England faithfully observed the terms of a capitulation which ...
— Irish Race in the Past and the Present • Aug. J. Thebaud

... longer. I must answer Lizzie's letter and tell her all. My duties for the coming week will be pressing, allowing me no opportunity for writing, equal to ...
— Leah Mordecai • Mrs. Belle Kendrick Abbott

... standing there in the moonlight, like a little wraith of silver, smiling with absent eyes at Johnny's muttered words, withdrawing, in childish panic, from Johnny's close pressing ardor. She knew that if he persisted . . . but before her soft detachment, her half laughing evasiveness of his mood, he did not persist. He seemed oddly struggling with some ...
— The Innocent Adventuress • Mary Hastings Bradley

... expression of their personal reunion—this, obviously, was one way of doing so. He rubbed his cheek, tenderly, and with a deep vague murmur, against her face, that side of her face she was not pressing to his breast. That was, not less obviously, another way, and there were ways enough, in short, for his extemporised ease, for the good humour she was afterwards to find herself thinking of as his infinite ...
— The Golden Bowl • Henry James

... look upon emancipation as a policy which would spread of itself. At any rate it is certain fact that the chief among the men who had made the Constitution had at that time so regarded it, and continued to do so. Under this belief and in the presence of many pressing subjects of interest the early movement for emancipation in America died down with its work ...
— Abraham Lincoln • Lord Charnwood

... far into the depths of the primeval African forest where this huge, man-like beast had fought shoulder to shoulder with him years before. He saw the black Mugambi wielding his deadly knob-stick, and beside them, with bared fangs and bristling whiskers, Sheeta the terrible; and pressing close behind the savage and the savage panther, the hideous apes of Akut. The man sighed. Strong within him surged the jungle lust that he had thought dead. Ah! if he could go back even for a brief month of it, to feel again the brush of leafy branches against his naked hide; ...
— The Son of Tarzan • Edgar Rice Burroughs

... then, little ones, and welcome; but never, at any one's door, knock so loud again," added the woman, pressing her ...
— Fairy Book • Sophie May

... the lad, clasping him tightly to her bosom, and pressing her lips to his. "Take my life," she cried; "kill me first ...
— Hebraic Literature; Translations from the Talmud, Midrashim and - Kabbala • Various

... Montgomery but served to inflame the Indians. July 11th the General Assembly represented their inability to prevent the ravages made by the savages on the back settlements, and by unanimous vote entreated the lieutenant governor "to use the most pressing instances with Colonel Montgomery not to depart with the king's troops, as it might be attended with the most pernicious consequences." Montgomery, warned that he was but giving the Cherokees room to boast among the other tribes, of their having obliged the English army to retreat, not only from ...
— An Historical Account of the Settlements of Scotch Highlanders in America • J. P. MacLean

... of the Angel's eye, machinery and tongues were engaged in a contest which filled the ozone with an incomparable hum. Men and women in profusion were leaning against walls or the pillars on which the great roof was supported, assiduously pressing buttons. The scent of expanding food revived ...
— Another Sheaf • John Galsworthy

... tree after tree came whistling down, he cast his eyes upward at the vacancies they left in the heavens, with a melancholy gaze, and finally turned away, muttering to himself with a bitter smile, like one who disdained giving a more audible utterance to his discontent. Pressing through the group of active and busy children, who had already lighted a cheerful fire, the attention of the old man became next fixed on the movements of the leader of the emigrants and of his savage ...
— The Prairie • J. Fenimore Cooper

... I am sure, who moved your family in that conventional pilgrimage of ambitious Chicagoans—west, south, north. Neither your father nor your mother would have stirred from sober little Grant Street had you not felt the pressing necessity for a career. Rumor got hold of you first on the South Side, and had it that you were experimenting with some small contractor. The explosion which followed reached me even in Vienna. Did you feel that you could go farther, or ...
— Literary Love-Letters and Other Stories • Robert Herrick

... love you with all my soul and heart and strength." Her hand trembled in his, but she could not take it away. Before she had answered he had dropped to his knee and was pressing the ...
— Doctor Claudius, A True Story • F. Marion Crawford

... flourishing commonwealth; and from a cave below issued Time leading forth his daughter Truth, who held in her hand an English bible, which she offered to the queen's acceptance. Elizabeth received the volume, and reverently pressing it with both hands to her heart and to her lips, declared aloud, amid the tears and grateful benedictions of her people, that she thanked the city more for that gift than for all the cost they had bestowed upon her, and that she would often read over that book. ...
— Memoirs of the Court of Queen Elizabeth • Lucy Aikin

... to trouble you; but then our interests are so pressing. What do you mean to do, Captain Scarborough? ...
— Mr. Scarborough's Family • Anthony Trollope

... excited by the opening of this new act in the drama, and by the venturesome part that I am playing in it myself. Strange to say, I am quiet and depressed. The thought of Midwinter has followed me to my new abode, and is pressing on me heavily at this moment. I have no fear of any accident happening, in the interval that must still pass before I step publicly into the place of Armadale's widow. But when that time comes, and when ...
— Armadale • Wilkie Collins

... most of the time kneeling by the fire, now rose, glanced round fearfully and crouched hiding behind the tree. The gate of the great courtyard flew open with a great clatter before a frantic kick, and Willems darted in carrying Aissa in his arms. He rushed up the enclosure like a tornado, pressing the girl to his breast, her arms round his neck, her head hanging back over his arm, her eyes closed and her long hair nearly touching the ground. They appeared for a second in the glare of the fire, then, with immense strides, ...
— An Outcast of the Islands • Joseph Conrad

... in a state of great mental perturbation. The whole of the journey, which occupied nearly an hour, he continued in this strain, putting questions and answering them himself, shrugging his shoulders, pressing the prince's hand, and assuring the latter that, at all events, he had no suspicion whatever of HIM. This last assurance was satisfactory, at all events. The general finished by informing him that Evgenie's uncle was head of one ...
— The Idiot • (AKA Feodor Dostoevsky) Fyodor Dostoyevsky

... was levelled at a horseman who had ridden down the street and was pressing upon the outskirts of the crowd: and this was no less a dignitary than the Mayor of Falmouth, preceded on foot by a beadle and two mace-bearers, all three of them shouting "Way! Make way for the Mayor!" with such effect that in less than half a minute the crowd had ...
— Sir John Constantine • Prosper Paleologus Constantine

... my health and humors being evidently so, the Dowager Lady Ashburton (not the high Lady you saw, but a Successor of Mackenzie-Highland type), who wanders mostly about the Continent since her widowhood, for the sake of a child's health, began pressing and inviting me to spend the blade months of Winter here in her Villa with her;—all friends warmly seconding and urging; by one of whom I was at last snatched off, as if by the hair of the head, (in spite of my violent No, no!) on the eve of Christmas last, and have been here ever since,— ...
— The Correspondence of Thomas Carlyle and Ralph Waldo Emerson, 1834-1872, Vol II. • Thomas Carlyle and Ralph Waldo Emerson

... rise, but, as before, Maxine's hands were laid upon his shoulders, pressing him back into his seat. He saw her hands in the starlight—saw the glint of his ...
— Max • Katherine Cecil Thurston

... wanting to place these provinces on a proper permanent footing; that I knew the temper of colony folks better than they did, and you will find in my Journals the subject often mentioned. But no, a debate on a beer bill, or a metropolitan bridge, or a constabulary act, is so pressing, there is no time. Well, sure enough that's all come true. First, the Canadian league started up, it was a feverish symptom, and it subsided by good treatment, without letting blood. Last winter ...
— Nature and Human Nature • Thomas Chandler Haliburton

... waiting for him, and he was much inclined to complain of the consequences of the two days' comparative holiday, which had resulted in over-work for the week to come. He had hardly time to speak to his family, he had so immediately to rush off to pressing cases of illness. But Molly managed to arrest him in the hall, standing there with his great coat held out ready for him to put on, but whispering as she ...
— Wives and Daughters • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell

... turn you over to Don Esteban, and as his business is pressing, I will excuse you if you wish to accompany ...
— The Broncho Rider Boys with Funston at Vera Cruz - Or, Upholding the Honor of the Stars and Stripes • Frank Fowler

... go. 'Twas cruel to leave them in this heat, With none to water them. This heat's a judgment. They were my sons: I bore and suckled them. This heat's a judgment on me, pressing down On my brain like ...
— Krindlesyke • Wilfrid Wilson Gibson

... center of the valley. It was a shrinking valley to Alan, Babs and Dr. Kent, for they too, were enlarging. But the fighting giant figures were growing faster. In only a moment their shoulders were up there in the sky, pressing against ...
— Beyond the Vanishing Point • Raymond King Cummings

... see," cried Dyke; and pressing his cob's sides he went off at a gallop, not, however, in pursuit of the bird, which ran right forward, with its head turned to watch its ...
— Diamond Dyke - The Lone Farm on the Veldt - Story of South African Adventure • George Manville Fenn

... Buller, pressing forward, moved the whole of his infantry, with the exception of Barton's Brigade, and nearly all the artillery, heavy and field, across the river, and in the afternoon sent two battalions from Norcott's Brigade and the Lancashire Brigade—to ...
— London to Ladysmith via Pretoria • Winston Spencer Churchill

... at the chateau, set out in the cool of the day for Epourville, whither they gave him and Madame St. Aubert a pressing invitation, prompted rather by the vanity of displaying their splendour, than by a wish to make ...
— The Mysteries of Udolpho • Ann Radcliffe

... stone dead, with his neck broken, the huge carcass pressing on the legs of his rider. Guy was quite senseless; his face of a dull, ghastly white; there was a deep cut on his forehead; but we all felt we did not see the worst. With great trouble we drew him from under the dead horse. ...
— Guy Livingstone; - or, 'Thorough' • George A. Lawrence

... was aware of her will, breaking through her peace, going out towards him, fastening on his mind to make him care; to make him say he cared, now, this minute. She was aware of her hands, clenched and unclenched, pressing the sharp edge of the seat into their palms as she dragged back ...
— The Romantic • May Sinclair

... The immediate and increasingly pressing disadvantage is that you have no sugar. Have you ever had a craving for sugar which never leaves you, even when asleep? It is unpleasant. As a matter of fact the craving for sweet things never seriously worried us on this journey, and there must have been some sugar in our ...
— The Worst Journey in the World, Volumes 1 and 2 - Antarctic 1910-1913 • Apsley Cherry-Garrard

... and, being a quick-witted fellow, saw that all the space was not accounted for by the smaller drawers in the part beneath the lid of the desk. Prying about with busy eyes and fingers, he at length came upon a spring, on pressing which, a hidden drawer flew from its hiding-place. It had never been opened but by the maker. The mahogany shavings and dust were lying in it as when the artisan closed it,—and when I saw it, it was as fresh as if that ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 3, No. 18, April, 1859 - [Date last updated: August 7, 2005] • Various

... for something which the world in the West as well as the East is more and more feeling as a presence, and even a pressure. It might be called the spiritual world let loose; or a sort of psychical anarchy; a jungle of mango plants. And it is pressing upon the West also to-day because of the breaking down of certain materialistic barriers that have hitherto held it back. In plain words the attitude of science is not only modified; it is now entirely reversed. ...
— The New Jerusalem • G. K. Chesterton

... Mike rode at it. The animal dropped his hind-legs, Mike heard the gate rattle, and a little ejaculatory cry come from those he left behind. It was a close shave. Turning in his saddle he saw the immense crowd pressing about the gate, which could not be opened, and he knew very well that he would have the hounds to himself for many ...
— Mike Fletcher - A Novel • George (George Augustus) Moore

... tea the affable French banker told me of a rapid journey to Liverpool which he had taken a few days before, he having some pressing business with a man who was on the point of sailing for New York. The person in question had absconded from Paris owing the bank a large sum of money, and he had that day cabled to the New York police asking for his ...
— The Stretton Street Affair • William Le Queux

... be used at any time, for they can only be unpleasant to those who are resolved to run headlong the contrary way; and if we must let alone everything as absurd or extravagant which by reason of the wicked lives of many may seem uncouth, we must, even among Christians, give over pressing the greatest part of those things that Christ hath taught us, though He has commanded us not to conceal them, but to proclaim on the house-tops that which He taught in secret. The greatest parts of His precepts are more opposite to the ...
— Ideal Commonwealths • Various

... the couch of Vittoria at her death. When the last breath had gone, "he raised her hand, and kissed it with a sacred respect." It is touching to know, that the sublime old man, years afterwards, recalling that scene to a friend, lamented, that, in the awe of the moment, he had refrained from pressing his lips on those of the sainted Colonna. Hermann Grimm says, "How great the loss was which he sustained can be realized only by him who has himself felt the void which the removal of a superior intellect irretrievably leaves behind it. It must have been to him ...
— The Friendships of Women • William Rounseville Alger

... "What's the use of going on now?" She opened the throttle to its widest and pressing her lips together tightly, gave herself up to the intoxication ...
— The Bent Twig • Dorothy Canfield

... about him whilst I am here. Another reason why I must bide a while longer. But in the meanwhile, dear, I pray you find Mademoiselle Lange; she lives at No. 5 Square du Roule. Through her I know that you can get to see Armand. This second letter," he added, pressing a smaller packet into her hand, "is for him. Give it to him, dear heart; it will, I hope, tend to cheer him. I fear me the poor lad frets; yet he only sinned because he loved, and to me he will always be your brother—the man who held your affection ...
— El Dorado • Baroness Orczy

... her. Mrs. Mittens crossed the hall hurriedly, looking very pale and anxious; there were strange voices too, somewhere. One, Agnes thought, seemed loud and angry. Then she hurried back to the dining-room and shut the door, pressing both her hands on her heart to stop its beating. Something dreadful was happening, she felt sure, but in that household she was quite alone and forgotten; no one ...
— Little Folks (July 1884) - A Magazine for the Young • Various

... well for us: from these alarms, Like children scared, we fly into thine arms; And pressing sorrows put our pride to rout With a swift faith which has not ...
— Richard Vandermarck • Miriam Coles Harris

... the conclusion of my first ten days' term in the jacket, I was brought back to consciousness by Doctor Jackson's thumb pressing open an eyelid, I opened both eyes and smiled up into ...
— The Jacket (The Star-Rover) • Jack London

... me without replying, and I looked down at him without pressing him too soon with a repetition of my idle question. Just then there came a vague vibration in the earth and air, quickly changing into a violent pulsation, and an oncoming rush that caused me to start back, as though it had a force to draw me down. When ...
— The Lock and Key Library • Julian Hawthorne, Ed.

... should bring him as often as possible, and she obtained from Frau Brohl the unwonted permission of inviting him to the Sunday luncheon. Wilhelm had little pleasure in going into ordinary society, especially to strangers, but this invitation was so warm and pressing that he could not ...
— The Malady of the Century • Max Nordau

... been a conviction of pressing necessity—a belief that we are to be deprived in the Union of the rights which our fathers bequeathed us—which has brought ...
— The Victim - A romance of the Real Jefferson Davis • Thomas Dixon



Words linked to "Pressing" :   impression, press, part, urgent, imperative, compressing, pressure, pushing, compression



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