"Languidly" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... all pretty cool; he let me have my fling, and gave me time to get breath; then he leaned languidly over on his right side, shoved his left hand down into his left trouserpocket, and brought up a boot-lace, a box of matches, ...
— While the Billy Boils • Henry Lawson
... yet excited her as might some subtle drug. Her normally calm, frank eyes were heavy and mysterious with a drowsy languor. Her tall, vibrant figure likewise seemed to droop drowsily, the budding lines of her body tremulous with young life and womanhood. Her hands hung languidly upon the saddle horn. Only her rich young lips were firm and straight, as if her mind and will power were fighting resolutely against the desire to yield to the subtle influence which was steeping ...
— The Plunderer • Henry Oyen
... felt, somehow, weaker and more relaxed than at any time since I had gone out the previous morning. The effect of the Emperor's favor, the effect of the cold plunge, were wearing off: mind and body were losing tone. I swam languidly, alone, on my back and so swimming found myself about one third of the way from the upper end of the pool and about midway of its width. I was staring up at the panels of the vaulting, relishing the beauty of the color scheme, the ...
— Andivius Hedulio • Edward Lucas White
... her head languidly toward the ignoble dwelling and called: "Dave!" Then again, for the fiddle stayed not: "Dave! ...
— Ma Pettengill • Harry Leon Wilson
... with many emotions for deliberate thought, wandered on languidly, and as it were mechanically, upon these last trivial words. The doorway presented itself to my view as it had originally stood, with the discarded warning above it; and then, by a spontaneous comparison of ...
— The Lock and Key Library • Julian Hawthorne, Ed.
... blazing, for the weather was now intensely cold. She was alone, quite alone, all the other girls in the school, both the actors and those who were to look on, being far to busy to attend to her. She took up a book languidly and pretended to read. She had already read the said book. It was one of Sir Walter Scott's great novels. But Leucha hated Sir Walter Scott; she hated his dialect, his long descriptions; she was not interested even in this marvellous work of his, Ivanhoe, ...
— Hollyhock - A Spirit of Mischief • L. T. Meade
... in the household is busily toiling, And hither and thither boys bustle and girls; Whilst, up from the hearth-fires careering and coiling, The smoke round the rafter-beams languidly curls. Let the joys of the revel be parted between us! 'Tis the Ides of young April, the day which divides The month, dearest Phyllis, of ocean-sprung Venus, A day to me dearer than ...
— Horace • Theodore Martin
... entered upon. The only analogy between the past and present was an ample submission to authority and an indifference to the world and its interest. Even the fact of being without children did not seem to concern her, and when her mother-in-law regretted it she merely smiled languidly, or said, 'We are very well as we are.' Of the world and the flesh she lived almost in ignorance, suspecting their existence only through Miss Hender. Hender was attracted by her employer's kindness and softness of manner, and Kate by her assistant's strength of will. For some months past ...
— A Mummer's Wife • George Moore
... would have been taken for a youth had it not been for the tinge of gray about his temples. He was clean-shaven and had regular features, and all of his movements bore the indefinable but unmistakable stamp of culture. He spoke to no one, but sat languidly puffing cigarettes and sipping a glass of beer. He was the center of a great deal of attention; all of the old-timers were wondering who he was. When I had finished playing, he called a waiter and by him sent me a five-dollar bill. For about a month after that he was ...
— The Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man • James Weldon Johnson
... languidly, evidently enjoying his surprise. "I told you I expected to get into something good. By the way, I owe you a quarter—there it is. Much ...
— Helping Himself • Horatio Alger
... rich embroidery The valley lies in verdant amplitude, Great mountains—like old merchants—o'er it brood— And as a lovely woman languidly Trailing her long blue robes, so comes the sea To touch it softly in a wistful mood . . . The sky forgets her starry multitude, Seeing how fair ...
— The Inn of Dreams • Olive Custance
... in the Netherlands during the whole year 1598 were on a comparatively small scale and languidly conducted. The States were exhausted by the demands made upon the treasury, and baffled by the disingenuous policy of their allies. The cardinal-archduke, on the other hand, was occupied with the great events of his marriage, of his father-in-law's death, and of his own ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... with the air of a man but languidly interested,—your real gentleman always affects to be bored by what he cares for,—"you see I put it there because it is dedicated to old Rip ...
— The Faith Doctor - A Story of New York • Edward Eggleston
... of the building, and listened with aching heart to their remorseless thunder. He stood there disconsolate—the one workman out of work—and sipped the bitter cup, defeat. Then he walked out at the gates, and wandered languidly into the streets. He was miserable, and had nobody to mourn to, for the main cause of his grief lay beneath the surface of this defeat; and how could he reveal it, now that his ambitious love looked utter madness? Young as he was, ...
— Put Yourself in His Place • Charles Reade
... that it was a memorable occasion. They were going along well enough when he saw a little ripple running out from the shore across the bow. In the old days he could have told whether it indicated a bar there or was only caused by the wind, but he could not be sure any more. Turning to the pilot languidly, he said: "I feel a little tired. I guess you ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine
... so?" asked her mistress languidly, and with affected indifference. "It seems to me, on the contrary, that I am positively hideous. My eyes are sunken, and this colour makes me look immensely stout. I have half a mind to exchange this dress for a black ...
— Captain Fracasse • Theophile Gautier
... porch where his pretty sister sat languidly, and then toward the school where the other sister lived. John Taylor looked out on the porch, too. They glanced quickly at each other, and each wondered if the other had shared his thought. Harry Cresswell did not voice his mind for he was not wholly disposed to welcome what ...
— The Quest of the Silver Fleece - A Novel • W. E. B. Du Bois
... Raskolnikov sank languidly back on the pillow, put his hands behind his head and gazed at the ceiling. A look of dismay came into Luzhin's face. Zossimov and Razumihin stared at him more inquisitively than ever, and at last he showed ...
— Crime and Punishment • Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... lines of discontent around his brow and mouth were more strongly drawn. Apparently, his interview with his father had only the effect of reviving and stirring into greater activity a certain dogged sentiment that, through long years, had become languidly mechanical. He was no longer a beaten animal, but one roused by a chance success into a dangerous knowledge of his power. In his honest workman's dress, he was infinitely more to be feared than in his rags; in the lifting of his downcast eye, there was the revelation of a baleful ...
— Maruja • Bret Harte
... "word-building" to read themselves about little Jimmy and his absorbed pig. It may be continued, together with word-learning, until the children are able to say (is it reading?) the entire volume of this precious stuff. To what end? The children are only languidly interested; their minds are not awakened; the imagination is not appealed to; they have learned nothing, except probably some new words, which are learned as signs. Often children have only one book even of this sort, at which they are kept until they learn it through by heart, and they ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... little, but not enough to break my rest," replied the young man languidly. "No, all that's past. I find there are two flowers where I thought there was only one. Perhaps there are three, or four, or any number as good as the first... Mine is a curious fate. Who would have thought that all this could ...
— The Return of the Native • Thomas Hardy
... the address of Mr. Westgate's office was freely imparted by the intelligent black and was taken down by Percy Beaumont in his pocketbook. The two gentlemen then returned, languidly, to their hotel, and sent for a hackney coach, and in this commodious vehicle they rolled comfortably downtown. They measured the whole length of Broadway again and found it a path of fire; and then, deflecting to the ...
— An International Episode • Henry James
... vivid place. It is a young city on the rise. A handful of years ago it was a French mission, beginning to turn its eyes languidly towards lumber. It is on the neck that joins the waters of Superior and Huron, but the only through traffic was that of the voyageurs, who made the portage round the stiff St. Mary's Rapids, that, with a drop of eighteen feet in their length, forbade ...
— Westward with the Prince of Wales • W. Douglas Newton
... thin-faced, sharp-eyed young woman, who had been covertly appraising Marjorie during her talk with Miss Archer, came languidly forward. "This is Miss Dean." The two girls bowed rather distantly. Marjorie had conceived an instant and violent dislike for this lynx-eyed stranger. "Take Miss Dean to the locker room, then to Miss Merton. Say to Miss Merton that Miss Dean is a freshman, ...
— Marjorie Dean High School Freshman • Pauline Lester
... were discovered on our left, in the night between the 23d and 24th, had apprised us of the movement of the Russians towards Malo-Yaroslawetz; and yet the French army had marched thither languidly; a single division, thrown to the distance of three leagues from all succour, had been carelessly risked; the corps d'armee had remained out of reach of each other. Where were now the rapid movements of Marengo, Ulm, and Eckmuehl? Why so slow and drawling a march on such a critical occasion? ...
— History of the Expedition to Russia - Undertaken by the Emperor Napoleon in the Year 1812 • Count Philip de Segur
... herself. She attributed it entirely to the sore affliction which had fallen upon the household since her arrival, and which, she charitably reasoned, her own recovery must revive in their minds in full force. So she pardoned the fair, frail invalid who, reclining languidly upon the couch, asked as to her health and congratulated her in cool, set phrases ...
— Bricks Without Straw • Albion W. Tourgee
... took it, languidly glanced at it, knit his brows, and took up his reading-glass and examined it closely. No! his eyes had not deceived him. The card bore the ...
— The Lost Lady of Lone • E.D.E.N. Southworth
... over the edge of the rock ledge to peer down at a beach of fine sand, pale pink sand with here and there a glitter of a crystalline "shell"—or were those delicate, fluted ovals shells? Even the waves came in languidly. And the breeze which ruffled his hair, smoothed about his sun-browned, half-bare body, caressed it, did not buffet on its way inland to stir the growths which the Terran settlers called "trees" but which possessed long lacy fronds ...
— Key Out of Time • Andre Alice Norton
... She opened her eyes languidly, and they rested on Lucy Foster's head and profile bent over her book. Mrs. Burgoyne's mind filled with a sudden amused pity for the girl's rawness and ignorance. She seemed the fitting type of a young ...
— Eleanor • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... the girl stared languidly at the extended hand, then with a cry sprang suddenly from her chair, seized the little packet, and pressed it passionately to her ...
— A Bachelor's Dream • Mrs. Hungerford
... progressed—somewhat jerkily because of his lordship's inattention—through the pudding and cheese to coffee. Never had I known his lordship behave so languidly in the presence of food he cared for. His hosts ate even less. They were worried. Mrs. Belknap-Jackson, however, could simply no longer contain within herself the secret of their guest's identity. With excuses to the deaf ears of his lordship she ...
— Ruggles of Red Gap • Harry Leon Wilson
... castellated walls and its square towers at each end. The gardens were laid out in terraces after an old-world fashion. There was one terrace devoted to croquet, another to tennis. As Molly approached she saw Cicely and Merry playing a game of croquet rather languidly. They wore simple white frocks which just came down above their ankles, and had white washing-hats on their heads. Their thick, rather fair hair was worn in a plait down each young back, and was tied with a bunch of pale-blue ribbon ...
— The School Queens • L. T. Meade
... her caravan? Oh! language never can adequately express the sentiments of the heart; but picture to yourself my poor mistress, with a chain round her waist, seated upon a handful of straw, her head resting languidly against the panel of the carriage, her face pale and bathed with tears, which forced a passage between her eyelids, although she kept them continually closed. She had not even the curiosity to open her eyes on hearing the bustle of the guards when they expected our ...
— Manon Lescaut • Abbe Prevost
... ministry. Circumstances called him to that wider field of usefulness, the Pacific, in which so many millions of our dusky brethren either worship owls, butterflies, sharks, and lizards, or are led away captive by the seductive pomps of the Scarlet Woman, or lapse languidly into the lap of a bloated and Erastian establishment, ignorant of the Truth as possessed by our community. Against all these forms of soul-destroying error the Rev. Thomas Gowles thundered nobly, "passing," as an admirer said, "like ...
— In the Wrong Paradise • Andrew Lang
... at the depot, the doors of which were open. Captain Sol entered the waiting room and unlocked the ticket rack and the little safe. Issy, languidly toying with the broom on the front platform, paused in his pretense of sweeping and awaited permission to go home for breakfast. It came, in ...
— The Depot Master • Joseph C. Lincoln
... Psyche," which seems, however, to have been inspired by an engraving in Spenser's "Polymetis." Mrs. Tighe was one of the latest and best of the professed imitators of Spenser. There is beauty of a kind in her languidly melodious verse and over-profuse imagery, but it is not the passionate and quintessential beauty of Keats. She is quite incapable of such choice and pregnant word effects as abound in every ...
— A History of English Romanticism in the Nineteenth Century • Henry A. Beers
... the floor practicable, then he set off in her direction, trusting that he might find her niece in the vicinity. Halfway down he stopped again; he had recognised his sister, who fanned herself languidly, seated on one of two chairs partially concealed by a great mass of exotic shrubbery, in pots, which formed almost an alcove. She removed her long soft skirt, which she had thrown over the vacant seat, as he approached; and at this tacit ...
— A Comedy of Masks - A Novel • Ernest Dowson and Arthur Moore
... said Bertie, "but a promising pupil—O Lord!" He flew to the piano, played an air in a singularly wooden manner, and then dragged it languidly, yet laboriously, up and down the keys. "Variations, you perceive." After a little more of this treatment the unfortunate melody grew very lame indeed, and finally died of exhaustion. "That's Miss Emmeline Nash," said Bertie, spinning round on ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, Vol. 22, September, 1878 • Various
... I watched languidly while the buckets were filled and brought to the horses, until this process reached the barred stall. Then I became interested. One of the boys approached the stall with a bucket in one hand and a pitchfork held near the pronged end in the other. He swung open the lower ...
— Blister Jones • John Taintor Foote
... damask, with black velvet rugs and ebony chairs. Marcia's blonde, you know, and gets her effects daringly. I must admit that she looked dazzling, like a bit of Meissen or Sevres in an ormolu cabinet. She was lolling on a black divan smoking a cigarette and put out her slim fingers languidly. That's her pose—condescension mixed with sudden spasms of intense interest. She extended her fingers to be kissed—she had learned that nonsense in Europe somewhere—and so I kissed 'em. They were dry, cool, very beautifully tinted, with the nails long and ...
— Paradise Garden - The Satirical Narrative of a Great Experiment • George Gibbs
... vessel, evidently nearing the shore. He called for his spyglass, and surveying the craft, saw that she came from the neighboring island. She glided smoothly, slowly, over the summer sea. The warm morning air was sweet with perfumes, and silent with heat. The sea sparkled languidly, and the brilliant blue hung cloudlessly over. Scores of little island vessels had my grandfather seen come over the horizon, and cast anchor in the port. Hundreds of summer mornings had the white sails flashed and faded, like ...
— The Best American Humorous Short Stories • Various
... battle and the glorious cause. Gretchen musically sighs, but you see the brave boys lying where they fell: you hear the deep, sullen roar of the cannonade; you catch far away through the tumult of war the fierce shout of victory. And there sits the slight, pale figure with eyes languidly fixed upon the stage; his heart musing upon other scenes; himself the unconscious hero ...
— From the Easy Chair, vol. 1 • George William Curtis
... her down the hill. Her hands were cold. She seemed to lift her feet as though they had been of lead. She did not look at him. Always she looked ahead. She moved slowly and heavily. When he spoke, her lips answered him languidly. Rochester felt an intense and passionate anger burning in his veins. The vague disquiet of an hour ago had settled down into something definite. She was his no longer! Something had come between them! Even though he might ...
— The Moving Finger • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... no, I was lifted off earth, as it seemed, and on easy wings to an incredible height, where were no longer hedges, nor road, nor country round; but a great stillness, and only the mare and I running languidly through it. ...
— The Splendid Spur • Arthur T. Quiller Couch
... friend, Judge SWEENEY," continued the Ritualistic organist, languidly waving a spoon towards that gentleman, "who has a very good wife in the grave, and knows much more about women and gravy than I. As for me," exclaimed Mr. BUMSTEAD, suddenly climbing upon the arm of his chair and staring at Mr. CLEW'S head rather wildly, "my only bride was of black ...
— Punchinello, Vol. 1, No. 25, September 17, 1870 • Various
... old woman, feller," Tim refused, and hopped aground unassisted. McKay and Knowlton followed. But Jose, after moving languidly forward and contemplating the sharp slope, hesitated and then shrugged ...
— The Pathless Trail • Arthur O. (Arthur Olney) Friel
... last fond look at the lake and picked up her Baedeker. She searched languidly in the Y's and presently read in a monotonous, guide-book voice. "Um—um—um—yes, here it is, 'Yverdon is sixty-one miles from Geneva, three hours forty minutes, on the way to Neuchatel and Bale.' (Neuchatel is the cheese place; I'd rather go there and we could take a bag of those Swiss cakes.) ...
— Penelope's Postscripts • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... a Mrs. Perowne. She was sailing languidly down the other side of the street, in a very large crinoline, and a very long dress of pale silk, which floated after her along the dirty pavement, much, I remember, to my admiration. Above this was some tight-fitting thing with a good deal of lace about it, which was crowned by ...
— Six to Sixteen - A Story for Girls • Juliana Horatia Ewing
... thinking of what I fully believed had blighted my existence. My father sighed, thinking, I know, of his own vain wish to see me happily married. At last I could bear it no longer, and calling Sweep, I went out into the garden. It was moonlight, and Maria was languidly pacing the terrace. I joined her, and we strolled away into ...
— A Flat Iron for a Farthing - or Some Passages in the Life of an only Son • Juliana Horatia Ewing
... worse. An oppressive, inexplicable silence hovered about the house, where the faces at the windows had a depressing aspect behind the small old-fashioned, greenish panes. The she-goats, straying along the paths, languidly cropped the first shoots of grass, with occasional "baas" in the direction of their keeper, who seemed as bored as they, and followed visitors with a listless eye. There was an air of mourning, the deserted, terrified aspect of a plague-stricken spot. Yet that had once been an attractive, ...
— The Nabob, Volume 1 (of 2) • Alphonse Daudet
... here to argue it out," he said, languidly, after listening disgustedly to their loud lamentations in the hallway, and addressing his remarks to Mrs. Guffy, who had glanced into the room to be again assured regarding his comfort, and to express her deep regret over the unseemly racket. "The girl has fallen ...
— Bob Hampton of Placer • Randall Parrish
... Temptingly, languidly, lovingly, laughingly, Witchingly, roguishly, playfully, naughtily, Willfully, waywardly, meltingly, haughtily, Gleamed the eyes ...
— Court Life in China • Isaac Taylor Headland
... reflections on the back of the raven. Her strongly defined, and nearly straight eyebrows, were dark as night, as were the long, silky lashes which were displayed in clear relief against the fair, smooth cheek, as the lids lay closed languidly over the bright ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXIII No. 3 September 1848 • Various
... particular quality, some particular school of art for intemperate praise or, still worse, for intemperate abuse. Mr. Ruskin, I suppose, is answerable for the taste for this one-sided and spasmodic criticism; and every young gentleman who has the trick of a few adjectives will languidly vow that Marlowe is supreme, or Murillo foul. It is the mark of rational criticism as well as of healthy thought to maintain an evenness of mind in judging of great works, to recognize great qualities in due proportion, to feel that defects are made up by beauties, ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to Prose, Vol. VI (of X)—Great Britain and Ireland IV • Various
... not relaxed till the end. Whatever criticism it might challenge, no one could call it dull: the only offence in a book which neither gods nor men nor counters can pardon. If the narrative flowed languidly at times, there were moments in which the incidents flashed along with such vivid rapidity that the susceptible reader held his breath over the page. The character of Washington was an elaborate failure, and ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 09, No. 51, January, 1862 • Various
... the seat by the side of Miss Moorsom. The others were talking together languidly. Unnoticed he looked at that woman so marvellous that centuries seemed to lie between them. He was oppressed and overcome at the thought of what she could give to some man who really would be a force! What a glorious struggle with this amazon. What noble burden for ...
— Within the Tides • Joseph Conrad
... a few steps in silence, while Muriel Chetwynd Lyle moved languidly away from the ...
— Ziska - The Problem of a Wicked Soul • Marie Corelli
... collarless man, who until now had been standing on the top step that led up to the roof, came slowly forward, stepped languidly over a skylight or two, draped his handkerchief over a convenient chimney and sat down, hugging his ...
— Buttered Side Down • Edna Ferber
... that day, but fearfully hot. The sun showered down its burning rays upon the white Florida sands, the sky was one arch of cloudless blue, and the water-oaks swung their moss-wreaths languidly over the deserted streets. We had been dreaming and drowsing away the morning, Koenigin, Kitty and I, in the jelly-fish-like state into which one naturally falls ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, October, 1877, Vol. XX. No. 118 • Various
... three hours to fix ours," laughed Mollie, running up the steps of the Hamlin house. In the front hall Mollie spied an immense box of roses. They were for Harriet. Harriet picked up the box languidly and started upstairs. She had talked very little during the afternoon, and ...
— The Automobile Girls At Washington • Laura Dent Crane
... been overwhelmed by our praise and petitions; she has closed her eyes, she has turned away her head, and while the Jesus Parvulus lifts his tiny hands in blessing, she is indifferent, holding Him languidly, as though but half attentive to those priceless words which St. John, with the last light of a smile still lingering round his eyes, notes so carefully in his book. Something of the same eagerness, graver, and more youthful, ...
— Florence and Northern Tuscany with Genoa • Edward Hutton
... but even La Valliere herself; from fury he subsided into despair, and from despair to prostration. After he had thrown himself for a few minutes to and fro convulsively on his bed, his nerveless arms fell quietly down; his head lay languidly on his pillow; his limbs, exhausted with excessive emotion, still trembled occasionally, agitated by muscular contractions; while from his breast faint and infrequent sighs still issued. Morpheus, the tutelary deity of the ...
— The Man in the Iron Mask • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... powerful and of a more energetic nature than this eloquence aroused La Valliere. The king, who was kneeling before her, covered the palms of her hands with those burning kisses which are to the hands what a kiss upon the lips is to the face. La Valliere's senses returned to her; she languidly opened her eyes, and, with a dying look, murmured, "Oh! sire, has your ...
— The Vicomte de Bragelonne - Or Ten Years Later being the completion of "The Three - Musketeers" And "Twenty Years After" • Alexandre Dumas
... languidly on the terrace early the following morning, when a hum of voices caught her ear; one name rivetted her attention: a horrible conviction rushed upon her mind. She called a page, who at first equivocated; but the truth was at last owned. The cardinal was ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 20, - Issue 573, October 27, 1832 • Various
... the trouble you mind, though," replied the Toad languidly. "I can quite understand it. It's natural enough. You're tired of bothering about me. I mustn't ask you to do anything further. ...
— The Wind in the Willows • Kenneth Grahame
... had she been placed perchance in that position. The weather was close and sultry, and the dust gathered on the folds of her riding-dross added to the warmth and discomfort of her appearance. Her father carried her in his arms into the house, her head reclining languidly on his shoulder, her cheeks white as her muslin collar. Mittie caught a glimpse of Clinton's countenance as he stood in the back-ground, and read with exultation an expression of blank disappointment. After gazing fixedly at Helen, he turned towards Mittie, and his glance said ...
— Helen and Arthur - or, Miss Thusa's Spinning Wheel • Caroline Lee Hentz
... the unfelt wind in my little sail over the shallow estuary, I lay in my boat, lost in a dream of mere existence. The cool water glided through my trailing fingers; and leaning over, I watched the sands that slid beneath me, the weeds that languidly swayed with the boat's motion. I was the cool water, I was the gliding sand and the swaying weeds, I was the sea and sky and sun, I was the whole ...
— More Trivia • Logan Pearsall Smith
... she thought I had gone, after my night's watch, I returned softly to the half-opened door with a forgotten injunction about the medicines. All night Clem had babbled languidly of many things, of "a hunded thousan' hatchin' aigs," and "a thousan' brillion dollahs," of "Mahstah Jere" and "Little Miss," of a visiting Cousin Peavey whom he had been obliged to "whup" for his repeated misdemeanors; and darkly and often had he whispered, so low I could ...
— The Boss of Little Arcady • Harry Leon Wilson
... dinner. There they both sat silent, but holding hands, for nearly half an hour. At last the trotting of a horse sounded in the distance, the park gates opened with a clang, and then Mr. Naseby appeared, with stooping shoulders and a heavy, bilious countenance, languidly rising to the trot. Esther recognised him at once; she had often seen him before, though with her huge indifference for all that lay outside the circle of her love, she had never so much as wondered who he was; but now she recognised him, and found ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson, Volume XXI • Robert Louis Stevenson
... Mr. Sutton, drawing his chair up very close, leaned over Dosia with eyes for nobody else, his round face getting brick-red at times with suppressed emotion, though he tried to keep up his part in an amiable if desultory conversation. Lois reclined languidly in an easy-chair, and Justin alternately played with and scolded the irrepressible Redge, in ...
— McClure's Magazine, Vol. 31, No. 1, May 1908 • Various
... past the loge of the concierge, and mounted in the languidly moving elevator to the appartement. Felix went at once to the piano and began playing something Sylvia did not recognize, something brilliantly colored, vivid, resonant, sonorous, perhaps Chabrier, she thought, remembering his remark on the avenue. ...
— The Bent Twig • Dorothy Canfield
... languidly, his Stradivarius tucked under his arm, the bow held in a slim and graceful hand. His dark eyes roamed over the brilliant spectacle before him, from tier to tier, from top to bottom. He had seen it all before many times; ...
— The Black Cross • Olive M. Briggs
... mind not asking me why I'm here?" he said languidly. "I've just finished telling Jonah, ...
— Berry And Co. • Dornford Yates
... July day, set in a sky of unruffled blue, with sharp shadows across road and field, and a wind that had little coolness in it playing languidly over the downland. The long white dusty road kept its undeviating course eastward over hill and dale, through hamlet and town, till it was swallowed up in the mesh-work of ways round London, sixty-three miles away according to the mile-stone by which a certain small boy clad ...
— Christopher Hibbault, Roadmaker • Marguerite Bryant
... his matutinal headache. Here she will sit through the hour, gossiping with her friends, watching the antics of several beautiful, dubious women, camp followers of the rich, who add undoubted interest to the place; calling languidly to her dog: "Viens, Tou-tou! Viens vite!" above all waiting patiently, with crossed knees, for news-service photographers to come and take her picture—a picture which, when we see it presently in "Vogue," "Vanity Fair," or a Sunday newspaper, will present indisputable ...
— American Adventures - A Second Trip 'Abroad at home' • Julian Street
... sky absolutely cloudless, and the water thrashed down by the rain until it was smooth as a polished mirror. The heat was intense, and the men, notwithstanding their refreshing bath, went about their work languidly, perspiring at every pore. It was a positive relief to them to see the sun at last go down behind the gleaming horizon, and a greater relief still when, an hour later, a faint breeze from the eastward came creeping ...
— The Voyage of the Aurora • Harry Collingwood
... appeared at the back of the minister's cottage, with a basket slung over her arm. Rebecca ushered her up the stairs to the pretty blue room. Teola moved her head languidly, but, recognizing ...
— Tess of the Storm Country • Grace Miller White
... conscious of an oppression. When you entered it was still worse. A heavy inexplicable silence weighed on the house, and the faces you might see at the windows had a mournful air behind the little, old-fashioned greenish panes. The goats scattered along the paths nibbled languidly at the new spring grass, with "baas" at the woman who was tending them, and looked bored, as she followed the visitors with a lack-lustre eye. A mournfulness was over the place, like the terror of a contagion. Yet it had been a cheerful house, and one where even recently ...
— The Nabob • Alphonse Daudet
... you, Jess, is it?" the woman languidly asked as she lifted her head. "I thought it was Maggie. I was not expecting you so soon. What ...
— Jess of the Rebel Trail • H. A. Cody
... enough situation, but neither the girl nor the young man was heavy-witted. Doris rose slowly, languidly, it seemed, and though aware that her eyes must betray her, turned and greeted Bullard in cool, even tones. The ...
— Till the Clock Stops • John Joy Bell
... bluggy!" he remarked, languidly. "Wall all bluggy!" Then his eyes fell on his sister in her scarlet frock. "Gila all bluggy, too!" he laughed, and pointed ...
— The Witness • Grace Livingston Hill Lutz
... result of his resolve to look at things as they were, was his getting so heartily interested in them that he couldn't miss their decisive moment. There is a decisive instant in all matters; and if you look languidly, you are sure to miss it. Nature seems always, somehow, trying to make you miss it. "I will see that through," you must say, "with out turning my head"; or you won't see the trick of it at all. And the most significant thing in all his ...
— Mornings in Florence • John Ruskin
... rounding form of Hulda stepped on the footstool of his mind, touched his knee, and exhaled the aroma of her youth like a subtile musk, till he leaned back languidly, as if he smoked a pipe and on its bowl her bust was painted, and all her modesties dissolved into the intoxication. Brutality itself grew natural to this vision, as a fiercer joy and substitute for the deceit he could no longer practice. ...
— The Entailed Hat - Or, Patty Cannon's Times • George Alfred Townsend
... no more in explanation, and sat again at the study table. She was still bent over her book when Shellington opened the door and glanced in. The boy's eyes were closed as if in sleep, and Horace beckoned to Flea. She rose languidly and walked ...
— From the Valley of the Missing • Grace Miller White
... lay listening to the unfriendly rattling of the chain harness below for a long time. When he crawled languidly down from the hay-loft he glowered in a manner which was decidedly surly even for Bill Wrenn at a middle-aged English stranger who was stooping over a cow's hoof in a stall facing ...
— Our Mr. Wrenn - The Romantic Adventures of a Gentle Man • Sinclair Lewis
... I kissed my tears in, on her lips and on her eyes Which she opened only languidly to show her answering tears, And I kissed the diamond crescent that I saw sink down and rise, While it flashed upon the torches with a hundred ...
— Stories in Verse • Henry Abbey
... Langworthy, a little short, fat, bald gentleman, who, so far as the knowledge of his club members went, had never been connected with any part of the army or navy, unless one counted his congenial brigades of cocktail drinkers; Mrs. Langworthy, his supercilious, uninteresting wife; Marcia, his languidly graceful daughter, in whom Hampton gave certain signs of being considerably interested; Marshal Rogers, the Oakland lawyer, and Frank Farris, the artist. Also Marcia's maid and Hampton's Japanese valet, Fujioki. In due course of time this ...
— Judith of Blue Lake Ranch • Jackson Gregory
... beside her was a bunch of orchids and violets, and a yellow paper-bound book which seemed foreign. While he stared, she picked up the book, then glanced out of the window as though she was bored. She must have looked straight at him, and he had met her, but she gave no sign. She languidly pulled down the blind, and he stood still, a cold feeling of ...
— Babbitt • Sinclair Lewis
... "No," she agreed languidly. The sun was hot, and she had not had anything to eat since early breakfast, and the river mocked her parched throat with its cool glimmer below. She looked down at it wistfully, and Keith, watchful of every passing ...
— Her Prairie Knight • B.M. Sinclair, AKA B. M. Bower
... Marya Dmitrievna visited Vassilyevskoe according to her promise, with all her young people. The little girls ran at once into the garden, while Marya Dmitrievna languidly walked through the rooms and languidly admired everything. She regarded her visit to Lavretsky as a sign of great condescension, almost as a deed of charity. She smiled graciously when Anton and Apraxya kissed her hand in the old-fashioned house-servants' style; and in a ...
— A House of Gentlefolk • Ivan Turgenev
... The sunshine seemed to call all things to rest and not to labor; it was asleep itself on the moss-grown cow-shed; on the group of white ducks nestling together with their bills tucked under their wings; on the old black sow stretched languidly on the straw, while her largest young one found an excellent spring-bed on his mother's fat ribs; on Alick, the shepherd, in his new smock-frock, taking an uneasy siesta, half-sitting, half-standing on ...
— A Manual of the Art of Fiction • Clayton Hamilton
... up a little cold wine to start on," said Mr. Howard, as he rose languidly to incarcerate himself at the bidding of Mr. Vandeford. The same scene had been enacted between the two bright lights of American drama several times before with very good results. Mr. Howard's brain was of that peculiar caliber which does ...
— Blue-grass and Broadway • Maria Thompson Daviess
... her vehicle and retinue. She was young and beautiful, with dark, oriental features, and a bearing which aimed at supremity of arrogance. Having stepped down, she stood at the edge of the portico, languidly gazing this way and that, with the plain intention of exhibiting herself to the loiterers whom her appearance drew together; at every slightest movement, the clink of metal sounded from her neck, her arms, her ...
— Veranilda • George Gissing
... as he was wont to do, At first indeed that work divine he deemed, And as the white chips from the chisel flew Of other matters languidly he dreamed, For easy to his hand that labour seemed, And he was stirred with many a troubling thought, And many a doubt perplexed him as ...
— The Earthly Paradise - A Poem • William Morris
... led between a stretch of pasture-land on one side and a ploughed field on the other. The red coats and top-boots of both were liberally besprinkled with mud; even their hats had not quite escaped. Their steeds hung their heads and moved languidly; both horses and riders had evidently had a hard day's work. Presently the road sloped somewhat steeply to a hollow sheltered at one side by a steep bank overgrown with brushwood and large trees. The country behind the huntsmen was rather flat and very open, but from this point it became ...
— A Crooked Path - A Novel • Mrs. Alexander
... vow that he did this. After all that Carlyle had written about Goethe, he could hardly help studying him. But this Essay looks to me as if he had found the reading of Goethe hard work. It flows rather languidly, toys with side issues as a stream loiters round a nook in its margin, and finds an excuse for play in every pebble. Still, he has praise enough for his author. "He has clothed our modern existence with poetry."—"He ...
— Ralph Waldo Emerson • Oliver Wendell Holmes
... waking up at ten addressed Winnie, bringing in the breakfast tray, with jocular, exhausted civility, in the hoarse, failing tones of a man who had been talking vehemently for many hours together. His prominent, heavy-lidded eyes rolled sideways amorously and languidly, the bedclothes were pulled up to his chin, and his dark smooth moustache covered his thick lips capable of ...
— The Secret Agent - A Simple Tale • Joseph Conrad
... mistake, (I always suspected the former,) brought pint-bottles of Scotch ale, which he placed in the coolest part of the cellar. The evening happened to be exceedingly hot and sultry; and, as we were all fanning ourselves and talking languidly, Abel bethought him of his beer. In his thirst, he drank the contents of the first bottle, almost at a ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume I. (of X.) • Various
... with his own load of trouble, scarcely noticed her. Mrs. O'Shanaghgan took her place languidly at the head of the board. She poured out a cup of tea for her daughter and another for ...
— Light O' The Morning • L. T. Meade
... ingratitude. She listened in silent misery, unable to defend herself. The shaft of love had penetrated her bosom also, and it cost her almost as much for her own sake to dismiss the young man as it did to see him move away, slowly and languidly ...
— The Twilight of the Gods, and Other Tales • Richard Garnett
... get up at these fearful times?" inquired Miss Masters languidly, turning her eyes full upon the ...
— Diana • Susan Warner
... care to place, upon a little buffet, some cakes, and a bottle of Malaga wine, having heard that Madame Bontemps assisted her inspiration with that liquor. Her face, indeed, sufficiently proclaimed it. "Is that lady ill?" said she, seeing Madame de Pompadour stretched languidly on the sofa. I told her that she would soon be better, but that she had kept her room for a week. She heated the coffee, and prepared the two cups, which she carefully wiped, observing that nothing impure must enter ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre
... artificially preserved and mended, such gallant swords to look at, and such delicate honor to the sense of smell, would surely keep anything going for ever and ever. The exquisite gentlemen of the finest breeding wore little pendent trinkets that chinked as they languidly moved; these golden fetters rang like precious little bells; and what with that ringing, and with the rustle of silk and brocade and fine linen, there was a flutter in the air that fanned Saint Antoine and his devouring ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern — Volume 11 • Various
... the lion's head up with one of Haskin's boots. The effect was realistic enough. The lion lay stretched out in a most natural way, apparently gazing languidly at the sleeping cow-puncher. This was more or less accidental, as they dare not light the lamp for fear of waking the men. Bailey stole softly to the door and across to the house. Pete undressed and turned in, to dream of who knows what ghostly lions prowling through the timberlands of the ...
— The Ridin' Kid from Powder River • Henry Herbert Knibbs
... The negotiations were languidly protracted through the summer, without effecting any definite result. An opinion, drawn up jointly by Luther, Melancthon, and Bugenhagen, advised against an absolute rejection of the proposed restoration of episcopal ...
— Life of Luther • Julius Koestlin
... took the messengers which the Rochellais sent to Buckingham, or the spies which Buckingham sent to the Rochellais. In one case or the other, the trial was soon over. The cardinal pronounced the single word, "Hanged!" The king was invited to come and see the hanging. He came languidly, placing himself in a good situation to see all the details. This amused him sometimes a little, and made him endure the siege with patience; but it did not prevent his getting very tired, or from talking at every moment of returning to Paris—so that ...
— The Three Musketeers • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... argument going on when you appeared, Mr. Vivian," said Mrs. Heron, languidly. "It is sometimes a most difficult matter to decide what is right and what is wrong. I think you must decide ...
— Under False Pretences - A Novel • Adeline Sergeant
... We walk languidly. The afternoon lies heavy on the drowsy land and on stomachs richly provided and embellished with food. The remarks ...
— Under Fire - The Story of a Squad • Henri Barbusse
... Readers are languidly aware that phenomena do go on round their Friedrich; that their busy Friedrich, with his few Voltaires and renowned persons, are not the only population of their Century, by any means. Everybody is aware of that fact; yet, ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XII. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle
... poor distraught sleeper crouching on a stone bench in the sun. Her thick hair, straggling over her face, screened it from the glare and heat; her arms dropped languidly to the earth; she lay at ease as gracefully as a fawn, her feet tucked up beneath her; her bosom rose and fell with her even breathing; there was the same transparent whiteness as of porcelain in her skin and complexion that we so often admire in children's ...
— Farewell • Honore de Balzac
... cause of all this unrest opened heavy eyes upon a tossing gray world and turned her head languidly toward the porthole. ...
— Lucile Triumphant • Elizabeth M. Duffield
... day on foot from the station, and after acknowledging the farmer's salute with a distant nod requested him to send a cart for his luggage. He was a tall, good-looking young man, and as he stood in the hall languidly twisting his mustache Miss Rose ...
— Short Cruises • W.W. Jacobs
... JOAN. [Languidly.] I must say I don't see any flowers blooming here that I should particular care about ...
— Six Plays • Florence Henrietta Darwin
... the drawing-room, where a servant in striped print was languidly caressing the glass of a bookcase with a duster. "You can leave this a bit," Edwin said curtly to the girl, who obsequiously acquiesced and fled, forgetting a ...
— Clayhanger • Arnold Bennett
... Cartwright languidly agreed, but Grace frowned. Although she did not approve Cartwright, he was the head of her house, and to know his clever tricks were something of a joke hurt her dignity. Harry ...
— Lister's Great Adventure • Harold Bindloss
... mien so still, Her features so fatigued, her eyes, though sweet, 70 So sunk, so rarely lifted save to meet Her children's? She moves slow; her voice alone Hath yet an infantine and silver tone, But even that comes languidly; in truth, She seems one dying in a mask of youth. 75 And now she will go home, and softly lay Her laughing children in their beds, and play Awhile with them before they sleep; and then She'll light her silver lamp, which fishermen ...
— Matthew Arnold's Sohrab and Rustum and Other Poems • Matthew Arnold
... Passing languidly up through the house after breakfast, unable to decide to spend her Saturday morning as usual at a piano in one of the bedrooms, Miriam went, wondering in response to a quiet call from Fraulein Pfaff into the large room shared ...
— Pointed Roofs - Pilgrimage, Volume 1 • Dorothy Richardson
... and ceremony—but languidly withal, for her head was beginning to ache, and she wanted desperately to cry—she laid her purse in his hand. But she did ...
— McClure's Magazine, Vol. XXXI, No. 3, July 1908. • Various
... faintly. Overcome by the sudden violence of her feelings, her head dropped languidly on his breast. Then, drawing herself up, she gazed at him, and her eager, loving look encountered his flashing eye. She was, as it were, fascinated—happy as in a dream, and yet conscious of the most ...
— The Merchant of Berlin - An Historical Novel • L. Muhlbach
... scarcely tasted the second. He chopped a great many kindling after supper, and filled the woodbox, and thoughtfully wound the clock. Then instead of going out with his usual "I gotta beat it!" he sat languidly on the doorstep in the dusk, and when she anxiously questioned if he were ...
— The City of Fire • Grace Livingston Hill
... this frame of mind, was a purely gratuitous waste of Miss Garth's breath. What did Magdalen care for satire? What do Youth and Love ever care for except themselves? She never even said as much as "Pooh!" this time. She laid aside her hat in serene silence, and sauntered languidly into the morning-room to keep her mother company. She lunched on dire forebodings of a quarrel between Frank and his father, with accidental interruptions in the shape of cold chicken and cheese-cakes. She trifled away half an hour at the piano; and played, in that time, selections ...
— No Name • Wilkie Collins
... proper measures to make Miss Wheedle's mind easy with regard to her appearance, and she commenced her story rather languidly. ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... languidly honing a razor, the head barber, he who presided over the first of the row ...
— From Place to Place • Irvin S. Cobb
... fancy that will not draw for itself the picture, when a fortnight later the frequenters of the court-room hear the word of judgment. It is near the end of the hot far-southern June. The judge begins to read aloud. His hearers wait languidly through the prolonged recital of the history of the case. It is as we have given it here: no use has been made here of any testimony discredited in the judge's reasons for his decision. At length the evidence is summed ...
— Strange True Stories of Louisiana • George Washington Cable
... languidly towards the woods and sat down on the projecting root of a large tree. Then leaning back ...
— The Associate Hermits • Frank R. Stockton
... house, who should greet them but Rover, who got up languidly from the doorstep, his ...
— Bob Strong's Holidays - Adrift in the Channel • John Conroy Hutcheson
... come a long way for a disappointment," murmured the rejected lover, as he threw himself languidly upon the outside of the bed and clasped his hands above his head. "A fanatic she certainly is. A lunatic also most probably. Yet I cannot get her out of my head. I would go to Canada—to Quebec—if it ...
— For Woman's Love • Mrs. E. D. E. N. Southworth
... anything, Mary. It is not generous to believe the worst of a man. When you have got any power over him, I think you might try and use it to make him better; but that is what you never do. However, I'm going," Fred ended, languidly. "I shall never speak to you about anything again. I'm very sorry for all the trouble I've ...
— Middlemarch • George Eliot
... window by which to enter at that end. The glass, however, was clear, and the sun still bright, though beginning to set; and they could see not only the flamboyant blossoms inside, but the frail figure of the poet in a brown velvet coat lying languidly on the sofa, having, apparently, fallen half asleep over a book. He was a pale, slight man, with loose, chestnut hair and a fringe of beard that was the paradox of his face, for the beard made him look less manly. These traits were well ...
— The Innocence of Father Brown • G. K. Chesterton
... by, was languidly discharging uniformed troops; lighters of military supplies were being unloaded; the sound of a bugle floated from the shore. Moored to the docks or anchored in the harbor were several shallow-draught "tin-clad" coast-patrol ...
— Rainbow's End • Rex Beach
... treacherous hook." In the Spring you must give your fish more time before you strike them than in the Summer; because having been sickly and altogether out of order, and not yet having recovered his usual strength and activity, he bites but languidly, and does not gorge so quickly as when in prime condition. When you find Trout pulling or snatching at the worm, which may be termed runaway bites, and when in fact they neither take it nor let it alone, it is a sign ...
— The Teesdale Angler • R Lakeland
... still might seal his fate. Onward, therefore, he pushed. At length, however, from want of food and water, his strength failed him. His sight grew dim, and, fainting, he fell on the ground. How long he had lain there he knew not, when he heard a strange, deep-toned, sonorous voice. Languidly he opened his eyes, and saw standing over him a tall Indian, of dignified appearance and full costume of ...
— A True Hero - A Story of the Days of William Penn • W.H.G. Kingston
... heart he pursued his search; yet somehow his attention now was given but languidly to potential means of exit which the faces of the cliffs might afford. Something seemed irresistibly to draw it to the ground. Ha! that was it. Again that horrid gleam of whitened bones. Another skeleton lay before him—and look, another, ...
— The Sign of the Spider • Bertram Mitford
... said she, smiling languidly; "I beg not to be pressed any more. I am really not well—I absolutely cannot sing any more this morning. I have already sung so much—too much," added she, when the deputation had retired, so that the last words could ...
— Tales and Novels, Vol. VII - Patronage • Maria Edgeworth
... day, and no letter came from Kate. Ten evenings running he smoked over the gate, leisurely, largely, almost languidly, hut always watching for the peak of the postman's cap as it turned the corner by the Court-house, and following the toes of his foot as they stepped off the curb, to see if they pointed in his direction—and then turning aside with a deep breath and a smothered moan that ended ...
— The Manxman - A Novel - 1895 • Hall Caine
... at Tom; he had learnt now to consult his eye, and lean on him like a child. Tom looked a stout yes, and Elsley said languidly,— ...
— Two Years Ago, Volume II. • Charles Kingsley
... of which I have made mention several times, were caused by a series of irregular rocks, extending a hundred yards, in the space of which the stream made a descent of a dozen or twenty feet. At ordinary times the creek wound languidly around these obstructions, forming many deep, clear pools of water, that afforded the best kind of fishing. There was so much room for the current that there was no call for ...
— The Hunters of the Ozark • Edward S. Ellis
... the Field may have seen the same thing in his piscatorial wanderings in the Antipodes—huge gar-fish of three or four feet in length, with needle-toothed, narrow jaws, and with bright, silvery, sinuous bodies, as thick as a man's arm, would swim languidly in, seeking for the young mullet and gar-fish which had preceded them into the shallow waters beyond. These could be caught by the hand by suddenly gripping them just abaft of the head. A Moruya River black boy, named "Cass" (i.e., Casanova), who had been ...
— The Colonial Mortuary Bard; "'Reo," The Fisherman; and The Black Bream Of Australia - 1901 • Louis Becke
... long-linked mazes; while the few and ever-repeated ideas, the old, stale platitudes of praise of woman, love pains, joys of dancing, pleasure of spring (spring, always spring, eternal, everlasting spring) seem languidly to follow the life and movement of the mere metre. Poets, these German, Provencal, French, and early Italian lyrists, essentially (if we venture to speak heresy) not of ideas or emotions, but of metre, of rythm and rhyme; with just the minimum ...
— Euphorion - Being Studies of the Antique and the Mediaeval in the - Renaissance - Vol. I • Vernon Lee
... clouds of perfume; here Curacoa glistened from behind its strawy shield; and here a decanter of warranted real French brandy, side by side with a bottle of Stoughton's bitters, suggested that a cocktail might not only be desirable, but possible. But Roseton's eyes gazed languidly upon the spectacle, and the walls of the pyramid again ascending, shut the quadruple ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. I. February, 1862, No. II. - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various |
