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Countenance   Listen
noun
Countenance  n.  
1.
Appearance or expression of the face; look; aspect; mien. "So spake the Son, and into terror changed His countenance."
2.
The face; the features. "In countenance somewhat doth resemble you."
3.
Approving or encouraging aspect of face; hence, favor, good will, support; aid; encouragement. "Thou hast made him... glad with thy countenance." "This is the magistrate's peculiar province, to give countenance to piety and virtue, and to rebuke vice."
4.
Superficial appearance; show; pretense. (Obs.) "The election being done, he made countenance of great discontent thereat."
In countenance, in an assured condition or aspect; free from shame or dismay. "It puts the learned in countenance, and gives them a place among the fashionable part of mankind."
Out of countenance, not bold or assured; confounded; abashed. "Their best friends were out of countenance, because they found that the imputations... were well grounded."
To keep the countenance, to preserve a composed or natural look, undisturbed by passion or emotion.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Countenance" Quotes from Famous Books



... you know about the 'sacerdotal directors' as you call them, of Rome?" asked Gherardi slowly, his eyes narrowing at the corners, and his whole countenance expressing ineffable disdain, "Do you think we give out the complex and necessary workings of our sacred business ...
— The Master-Christian • Marie Corelli

... worries Doctor John or Marcella. They are too happy to care for gossip or outside curiosity. The Barrys are not coming to the wedding, I understand. They refuse to forgive Marcella or countenance her folly, as they call it, in any way. Folly! When I see those two together and realize what they mean to each other I have some humble, reverent idea of what ...
— Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1907 to 1908 • Lucy Maud Montgomery

... and the various shades of dignity, sarcasm, and boredom gradually vanished from the young man's countenance. He smiled and shrugged his big shoulders with the gesture of a ten-year-old schoolboy, and moving over to a hoary mirror with a freckled gilt frame, he executed a brief ...
— The Opened Shutters • Clara Louise Burnham

... measures which had been adopted, all serious trouble was at an end. He slept soundly, and did not rise until eleven o'clock, when he came down to the breakfast-room in morning-gown and slippers, and with a smiling countenance. Here appalling tidings met him. The exasperated populace were tearing down and trampling under foot the conciliatory proclamation of M. Thiers. The national troops, disgusted with the contradictory ...
— Louis Philippe - Makers of History Series • John S. C. (John Stevens Cabot) Abbott

... acting-dean of Sunrise, a second Fenneben, already declared? His face was full of pathos, yet even in his feverish grief it seemed a better face to Dennie than the cold scholarly countenance ...
— A Master's Degree • Margaret Hill McCarter

... General B. F. Butler, who subsequently claimed for himself and the troops under his command, the honor of capturing New Orleans, was on board the "Clifton." He took passage in her to the city. No one who has ever looked upon that unique countenance can ever forget it; and as his glance rested for a moment upon us, each one conceived himself to be the special object of the General's regard; for owing to his peculiar visual organs, that distinguished individual seems to possess ...
— The Narrative of a Blockade-Runner • John Wilkinson

... and soul-stirring appeals to the imagination and emotional faculties, that tell so forcibly upon an English jury. It is disappointing to listen to Mr. Gordon for the first time. His appearance is sufficiently distingue, for he is tall of stature, and he has a decidedly intellectual cast of countenance. But when he commences to speak there is an almost painful absence of embellishment or emotional feeling; his language is severely practical and argumentative; but his logic is unimpeachable, and he can summon to his aid no end of hard and ...
— Western Worthies - A Gallery of Biographical and Critical Sketches of West - of Scotland Celebrities • J. Stephen Jeans

... his military equipage, to which he had the air of having been long inured. He was above the middle size, and of strength sufficient to bear with ease the weight of his weapons, offensive and defensive. His age might be forty and upwards, and his countenance was that of a resolute weather-beaten veteran, who had seen many fields, and brought away in token more than one scar. At the distance of about thirty yards he halted and stood fast, raised himself on his ...
— A Legend of Montrose • Sir Walter Scott

... But to take a portion as a more condensed representation of his art in combining all varieties into one harmonious whole: his genius is like the oratory of Nestor as described by its effects in the seventh and eighth stanzas. Every variety of attitude and countenance and action is harmonized by the influence which is at once the occasion of debate, and the charm which restrains by the fear of its own loss: the eloquence and the listening form the one bond of the unruly ...
— A Dish Of Orts • George MacDonald

... might take shelter and repose) would probably, after all, should it take place, be much the same as all their meetings, of no great importance. As on every other evening, once he was in Odette's company, once he had begun to cast furtive glances at her changing countenance, and instantly to withdraw his eyes lest she should read in them the first symbols of desire and believe no more in his indifference, he would cease to be able even to think of her, so busy would ...
— Swann's Way - (vol. 1 of Remembrance of Things Past) • Marcel Proust

... Of those feelings I witnessed a significant manifestation in a hotel at Savannah. At the public dinner-table I sat opposite a lady in black, probably mourning. She was middle-aged, but still handsome, and of an agreeable expression of countenance. She seemed to be a lady of the higher order of society. A young lieutenant in Federal uniform took a seat by my side, a youth of fine features and gentlemanly appearance. The lady, as I happened to notice, darted a glance at him which, as it impressed ...
— McClure's Magazine, Vol. 31, No. 1, May 1908 • Various

... countenance as he regarded them. “We are in trouble,” said he, “these are some of the rascally Arapahoes that robbed me last year.” Not a word was uttered by the rest of the party; they silently slung their powder-horns, ball-pouches, and prepared themselves ...
— The Great Salt Lake Trail • Colonel Henry Inman

... himself in sudden alarm lest he might have said too much, and looked searchingly at his son. A pure soul shone through Ephraim's open countenance, and showed his father that his real meaning had ...
— A Ghetto Violet - From "Christian and Leah" • Leopold Kompert

... advances and with the point of the Sacred Spear touches Amfortas's wound. "One weapon alone avails. The wound can be closed only by the Spear which made it. Be whole, pardoned and absolved, for I now hold the office in your stead!" Amfortas's countenance of holy ecstasy proclaims the instant virtue of the remedy. As Parsifal holds up to the enraptured gaze of the knights the Spear which he has brought back to them, the Parsifal-motif is heard again, for the last time, triumphant, broad, and glorious. He proceeds ...
— The Wagnerian Romances • Gertrude Hall

... the door they were dragging their chairs noisily up to the table. Brayley, one eye swollen almost shut, his lips thick like a negro's with the blows which had hammered them, had just taken his seat. The men's eyes were quick to catch the bruised countenance of the man at the door, and ran swiftly from it to Brayley's face and back again. One man chuckled aloud, Toothy giggled like a girl, and the others grinned broadly. For a moment Brayley's face darkened ominously. Then his frown passed, and he turned about in his ...
— Under Handicap - A Novel • Jackson Gregory

... he, his countenance assuming a convulsive and ghastly aspect, "I arose on tiptoe, and collecting the heavy comforters and large downy pillows of the bed, I deliberately piled them on her one upon the other, and pressing them down with all my gathered force, I stifled ...
— Strange Visitors • Henry J. Horn

... God and man and this dissolves the union, and hinders the communion. An enemy has come between two friends, and puts them at odds, and oh! an eternal odds. Sin hath sown this discord, and alienated our hearts from God. Man's glory consisted in the irradiation of the soul from God's shining countenance, this made him light, God's face shined on him. But sin interposing has eclipsed that light and brought on an eternal night of darkness over the soul. And thus we are spoiled of the image of God, as when ...
— The Works of the Rev. Hugh Binning • Hugh Binning

... which adorn the banks on either side, that in which the empress Josephine had resided for six months, not long before her death. When he spoke of her, he rested upon his oars to descant upon her virtues, her generosity, her affability, her goodness to the poor, and his countenance became quite animated with enthusiasm. Here, in France, wherever the name of Josephine is mentioned, there seems to exist but one feeling, one opinion of her beneficence and amabilite of character. Our boatman had also rowed Marie Louise across the lake, ...
— The Diary of an Ennuyee • Anna Brownell Jameson

... solemn and sad, with hope tempering its sadness. Mrs Jameson's note of it is: 'Above, in the centre, Christ and the Virgin are throned in separate glories. He turns to the left, towards the condemned, while he uncovers the wound in his side, and raises his right arm with a menacing gesture, his countenance full of majestic wrath. The Virgin, on the right of her Son, is the picture of heavenly mercy, and, as if terrified at the words of eternal condemnation, she turns away. On either side are ranged the Prophets of the Old Testament, the Apostles and other saints, severe, solemn, dignified figures. ...
— The Old Masters and Their Pictures - For the Use of Schools and Learners in Art • Sarah Tytler

... records that he said:—'David, Madam, looks much older than he is; for his face has had double the business of any other man's; it is never at rest; when he speaks one minute, he has quite a different countenance to what he assumes the next; I don't believe he ever kept the same look for half-an-hour together in the whole course of his life; and such an eternal, restless, fatiguing play of the muscles must certainly wear out a man's face before ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 2 • Boswell

... months to ingratiate himself into the favour and confidence of his master. The grocer had a daughter, who, though not remarkable for the beauty of her face or the elegance of her person, had nevertheless an agreeable countenance, and ten thousand independent charms to render it more agreeable. She was some eighteen months older than William; and when he first came to be an apprentice with her father, and a boarder in his house, she looked upon ...
— Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland, Vol. XXIII. • Various

... at once what he had to expect. I once witnessed at Weimar a representation of the Adelphi of Terence, entirely in ancient costume, which, under the direction of Goethe, furnished us a truly Attic evening. The actors used partial masks, cleverly fitted to the real countenance, [Footnote: This also was not unknown to the ancients, as it proved by many comic masks having in the place of the mouth a circular opening of considerable width, through which the mouth and the adjoining features were allowed ...
— Lectures on Dramatic Art - and Literature • August Wilhelm Schlegel trans John Black

... Grande Mademoiselle, even her shrewish relations with her step-mother, even her haughty contempt for her half-sisters, but we cannot pardon her M. de Lauzun. We are all well acquainted with that individual, with his cunning and supercilious cast of countenance, servile or arrogant, according to circumstances and interests, adroit in concealing a merciless egotism, a revolting brutality, under the guise of a theatrical liberality; brave so far as was necessary to be insolent with impunity, intelligent ...
— Political Women, Vol. 2 (of 2) • Sutherland Menzies

... must copy the document, which does not give his indescribable pronunciation—"by Canada steamer radies arrived. The correspondent, who is me, went to Grand Hotel, which the radies is. Radies is of Canada, and in-the-time-before of Engrand. They have a beautiful countenance." ...
— Humour of the North • Lawrence J. Burpee

... hardened as he looked, and Mr. Finney's lugubrious countenance seemed positively despairing, while Amos hopped on one foot crying: "Leave me look through your glass, Chris! What do you see? ...
— Mr. Wicker's Window • Carley Dawson

... the cause he has made his own, I should have shirked the task. But there we were, seated on a fairly worn-out charpai, surrounded by men, women and children. Mr. Ewbank opened fire on a man who had put himself forward and who wore not a particularly innocent countenance. After he had engaged him and the other people about him in Gujrati conversation, he wanted me to speak to the people. Owing to the suspicious looks of the man who was first spoken to, I naturally pressed ...
— Third class in Indian railways • Mahatma Gandhi

... in general (I do not mean the cultivators of the earth in the provinces, who have also that appellation, but the mountaineers) have a fine cast of countenance; and the most beautiful women I ever beheld, in stature and in features, we saw levelling the road broken down by the torrents between Delvinachi and Libochabo. Their manner of walking is truly theatrical; but this strut is probably the effect of the capote, or cloak, depending from one shoulder. ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 2 • George Gordon Byron

... is man! What could be more innocent? A bright child might have adopted that ruse to surprise his teacher. She laughed heartily the while, but I felt a strange coldness as though a cloud had settled on me; my countenance changed. ...
— The Confession of a Child of The Century • Alfred de Musset

... than others I had seen as the wives of sealers, from the inhabitants of the Australian continent, possessing quite the negro cast of countenance, and hair precisely of their woolly character. These characteristics are nowhere to be found on the continent, natives from every part of which have come under my observation. The difference existing is so great, that I feel warranted in pronouncing them to be a distinct race. Excellent ...
— Discoveries in Australia, Volume 2 • John Lort Stokes

... Beverly's, when he was old, and when his heart was crushed by the loss of his son Henry at Buena Vista, of which event he had only heard the day before: he doubted no more. I shall ever remember the expression of that noble countenance as, turning to me, he said: "Read that!" Rising from his seat, he went to the garden, where, under a large live-oak, I found him an hour after, deeply depressed. It was sorrow, not anger, that weighed upon him. In reply to a remark from ...
— The Memories of Fifty Years • William H. Sparks

... women of no importance, though she was not quite bad-looking; in fact, she appeared to me to possess eyes, a nose, a mouth, some sort of hair—just a colorless type of countenance. She was one of those beings on whom one only thinks by accident, without taking any particular interest in the individual, and who ...
— The Works of Guy de Maupassant, Volume IV (of 8) • Guy de Maupassant

... being then tending his small allotment of sheep in a common field," as I recount in a brief life of a good man. As to what awaits me on the other side of that River, I do expect it with a peaceful heart, and in humble hope that a man may reach the City with a cheerful countenance, no less than through groans and sighs and fears. For we have not a tyrant over us, but a Father, that loveth a cheerful liver no less than a cheerful giver. Nevertheless, I thank thee for thy kind thought of one that is not of thy company, nor no Nonconformist, ...
— Old Friends - Essays in Epistolary Parody • Andrew Lang

... the goddess of wisdom and skill, and the teacher in warfare. She has a serious and thoughtful countenance, a spear in one hand and a shield in the other, while a helmet covers her head. She is said to have sprung ...
— Museum of Antiquity - A Description of Ancient Life • L. W. Yaggy

... remembrance of the eternal God, that they are always as fresh and clear in his sight, as if they were but just now in committing. He calleth again the things that are past (Eccl 3:15), and hath set "our [most] secret sins in the light of his countenance" (Psa 90:8). As he also saith in another place, "Hell [itself] is naked before him, and destruction hath no covering" (Job 26:6), that is, the most secret, cunning, and hidden contrivances of the most subtle of ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan

... is more than all else to men, the recognition that whilst there are many that say, 'Who will show us any good?' and put the question impatiently, despairingly, vainly, they that turn the seeking into a prayer, and ask, 'Lord! lift Thou the light of Thy countenance upon us,' will never ask in vain. To seek is to desire, to turn the direction of thought and will and affection to Him and to take heed that the ordering of our daily lives is such as that no mist rising from them shall come between ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren

... from reputation—or character—whose edge is not taken off by the strong, sweet, hypnotic perfume of money? Also, Palmer's appearance gave the lie direct to any scandal about him. It could not be—it simply could not be—that a man of such splendid physical build, a man with a countenance so handsome, had ever been a low, wicked fellow! Does not the devil always at once exhibit his hoofs, horns, tail and malevolent smile, that all men may know who and what he is? A frank, manly young leader of men—that was the writing on his countenance. And ...
— Susan Lenox: Her Fall and Rise • David Graham Phillips

... such an abominable cry?" So he drew his bow and aimed at it. The crow forthwith fled away, and next proceeded to the house of Shiki the younger, where it cried, saying: "The child of the heavenly deity summons thee. Haste! haste!" Then Shiki the younger was afraid, and changing countenance, said: "Thy servant, hearing of the approach of the conquering deity of heaven, is full of dread morning and evening. Well hast thou ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 1 • Various

... days,' Lady Lapith went on, 'I should have been laughed out of countenance if I'd said a thing like that. But then in my young days souls weren't as fashionable as they are now and we didn't think death was at all poetical. It ...
— Crome Yellow • Aldous Huxley

... regular officer. He was some retainer, however, to the German troops, and as much of a brute as any one I have ever seen in human form. The wretch came near enough to elbow us, and, half unsheathing his sword, with a countenance that bespoke a most vehement desire to use it against us, he grunted out in broken English, 'Eh! you rebel! ...
— American Prisoners of the Revolution • Danske Dandridge

... mutilated and maimed. A fleet sailed on this service in the sixteenth year of Prakrama's reign, he effected a landing in Arramana, vanquished the king, and obtained full satisfaction.[2] He next directed his arms against the Pandyan king, for the countenance which that prince had uniformly given to the Malabar invaders of the island. He reduced Pandya and Chola, rendered their sovereigns his tributaries, and having founded a city within the territory of the ...
— Ceylon; an Account of the Island Physical, Historical, and • James Emerson Tennent

... except a blanket and without bridle. When the crude but symmetrical picture was finished, he handed the piece of bark to the other. The dwarf studied it a minute or two with close interest, Deerfoot meanwhile watching his countenance. ...
— Deerfoot in The Mountains • Edward S. Ellis

... with that of some young gentlemen of his acquaintance, who, while he was squandering away the best part of his inheritance, had improved their fortunes, strengthened their interest, and increased their reputation. He was abandoned by his gaiety and good-humour, his countenance gradually contracted itself into a representation of severity and care, he dropped all his amusements and the companions of his pleasure, and turned his whole attention to the minister, at whose levees he never failed ...
— The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle, Volume I • Tobias Smollett

... countenance showed no surprise, for no news could have had any power over the emotion which mastered him. The long, slow years were fulfilled. Long and slow and the fulfilment late, but the joy it brought was the greater. Youthful passion is sweet, but it ...
— Pages from a Journal with Other Papers • Mark Rutherford

... knew how to mask an inner emotion behind their normal outward semblance. When they presently left the study for the luncheon table, Simon wore his usual frown above knitted brows, while Miss Ocky displayed her accustomed placidity of countenance with its high-lights of humor about her lips ...
— The Monk of Hambleton • Armstrong Livingston

... especially addressed that the question can have for us no practical importance save as marking an auspicious step toward the betterment of the condition of the modern peoples and the cultivation of peace and good will among them; but in this view it behooves us as a nation to lend countenance and ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various

... foreign power, we may safely conclude that it is because the defective laws of that State provide no escape for those malignant humours which are natural to men; which can best be done by arranging for an impeachment before a sufficient number of judges, and by giving countenance to this procedure. This was so well contrived in Rome that in spite of the perpetual struggle maintained between the commons and the senate, neither the senate nor the commons, nor any single citizen, ever sought redress at the hands of ...
— Discourses on the First Decade of Titus Livius • Niccolo Machiavelli

... loathsome bleeding and quivering substances. Yet the inner organs are well enough in their place and doubtless pleasing to the microbes that inhabit them; and a man is not hideous because his cross-section would not offer the features of a beautiful countenance. So the structure of the world is not therefore barren or odious because, if you removed its natural outer aspect and effects, it would not make an interesting landscape. Beauty being an appearance and life an operation, ...
— The Life of Reason • George Santayana

... 'where there were a great many householders and inhabitants there is now but a shepherd and his dog.' 'I am sorie to report it,' says Harrison,[224] 'but most sorrowful of all to understand that men of great port and countenance are so far from suffering their farmers to have anie gaine at all that they themselves become graziers, butchers, tanners, sheepmasters, and woodmen, thereby to enrich themselves.' The Act against pulling down farmhouses was evaded ...
— A Short History of English Agriculture • W. H. R. Curtler

... toward the fire a pair of spotted seal moccasins. These were so small that the feet on which they were laced seemed an infant's, and sorted strangely with the mature keen face above them. Youth, age, and wise sylvan life were brought to a focus in that countenance. ...
— The Lady of Fort St. John • Mary Hartwell Catherwood

... volumes and manuscripts, but he was neither writing nor reading, nor had he lighted his lamp. The moonlight shone through the vine climbing up and covering the narrow window. He looked up and saw by Adone's countenance that something was wrong. ...
— The Waters of Edera • Louise de la Rame, a.k.a. Ouida

... think she would like them," he says. "I suppose disparity in marriages is generally condemned for kindred reasons, one has gone by the heyday of youth, and the other should be in it. Almost I am tempted to try a German. Would Latimer keep me in countenance, ...
— Floyd Grandon's Honor • Amanda Minnie Douglas

... Oneguine passes Between the stalls, along the toes; Seated, a curious look with glasses On unknown female forms he throws. Free scope he yields unto his glance, Reviews both dress and countenance, With all dissatisfaction shows. To male acquaintances he bows, And finally he deigns let fall Upon the stage his weary glance. He yawns, averts his countenance, Exclaiming, "We must change 'em all! I long by ballets have been bored, ...
— Eugene Oneguine [Onegin] - A Romance of Russian Life in Verse • Aleksandr Sergeevich Pushkin

... Moore, while earnestly watching the result of the fight about the village of Elvina, was struck on the left breast by a cannon-shot; the shock threw him from his horse with violence; yet he rose again in a sitting posture, his countenance unchanged, and his steadfast eye still fixed upon the regiments engaged in his front, no sigh betraying a sensation of pain. In a few moments, when he saw the troops were gaining ground, his countenance brightened, and he suffered himself ...
— MacMillan's Reading Books - Book V • Anonymous

... and you will be sure to have the Hebrew's valor. Now, with the Hebrew's benediction, I close: 'The Lord bless you and keep you. The Lord make his face shine upon you, and be gracious to you. The Lord lift up his countenance upon you, and given ...
— The History of Minnesota and Tales of the Frontier • Charles E. Flandrau

... papyrus with a skilful hand, separating the layers and peering into the openings to decipher the contents. While thus engaged, the corpulent courtier's round eyes sparkled brightly and it seemed to the youth as if the countenance of the man, whose comfortable plumpness and smooth rotundity at first appeared like a mirror of the utmost kindness of heart, now had ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers

... Eva bent down and kissed the little, delicate face; then she looked at her sister and at Andrew, and her own countenance seemed fairly illuminated. "I 'ain't told you all," said she. Then she stopped ...
— The Portion of Labor • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman

... the Lady Abbess of the Cistertians' convent afforded. Yet that was severe enough; for maiden aunts, whether abbesses or no, are not tolerant of the species of errors of which Eveline was accused; and the innocent damosel was brought in many ways to eat her bread in shame of countenance and bitterness of heart. Every day of her confinement was rendered less and less endurable by taunts, in the various forms of sympathy, consolation, and exhortation; but which, stript of their assumed forms, were undisguised anger and insult. The company of Rose was all which Eveline had to sustain ...
— The Betrothed • Sir Walter Scott

... Hugh Pawlett was ranged on the side of the Seigneur of Rozel. Kinsman of the Comtesse de Montgomery, of Queen Elizabeth's own Protestant religion, and admiring De la Foret, he had given every countenance to the Camisard refugee. He had even besought the Royal Court of Jersey to grant a pardon to Buonespoir the pirate, on condition that he should never commit a depredation upon an inhabitant of the island—this he was to swear to by the little finger of St. ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker

... the evidences of the pernicious drug! You can not be unconscious of the effects, though you may wish to forget the cause. All around you behold the wild eye, the sallow countenance, the tottering step, the trembling hand, the disordered frame! and yet will you not be awakened to a sense of your danger, and I must add, your guilt? Is it a small thing, that one of the finest of human understandings should be lost? That your talents should be buried? ...
— The Opium Habit • Horace B. Day

... I will tell you presently. Going thither they found it occupied by some of their relatives, and they had the greatest difficulty in making the latter understand who they should be. For these good people, seeing them to be in countenance so unlike what they used to be, and in dress so shabby, flatly refused to believe that they were those very gentlemen of the Ca' Polo whom they had been looking upon for ever so many years as among the dead.[4] So these three gentlemen,—this ...
— The Travels of Marco Polo Volume 1 • Marco Polo and Rustichello of Pisa

... much bruised up—his eye swollen, and limping—came in. An expression of the deepest humility and cringe was on his battered countenance. ...
— The Spoilers of the Valley • Robert Watson

... of the chancel rail I gently led her by the arm up the three steps to the choir place, and turning, faced all the town as I went to my seat beside my father. I was as happy as a lover can be; but I didn't know how much of all this was written on my countenance, nor did I notice the intense hush that fell on the company. I had faced the oncoming of Roman Nose and his thousand Cheyenne warriors; there was no reason why I should feel embarrassed in a prayer meeting in the Presbyterian Church at Springvale. The service was short. I remember not one word of ...
— The Price of the Prairie - A Story of Kansas • Margaret Hill McCarter

... shillings. (Artemus always wore his hair straight until his severe illness in Salt Lake City. So much of it dropped off during his recovery that he became dissatisfied with the long meagre appearance his countenance presented when he surveyed it in the looking-glass. After his lecture at the Salt Lake City Theatre he did not lecture again until we had crossed the Rocky Mountains and arrived at Denver City, the capital of Colorado. On the afternoon he was to ...
— The Complete Works of Artemus Ward, Part 6 • Charles Farrar Browne

... It's funny that he should have those three wrinkles in his forehead like you; they're like the wave-lines in the countenance of Denmark. You both look as if ...
— Pelle the Conqueror, Complete • Martin Andersen Nexo

... the youth whose hand she still held was, as might be seen in every feature, none other than the sculptor's son. Both were dark-eyed, with noble and splendid heads, and in stature perfectly equal; but while the son's countenance beamed with hearty enjoyment, and seemed by its peculiar attractiveness to be made—and to be accustomed—to charm men and women alike, his father's face was expressive of disgust and misanthropy. It seemed, indeed, as though the newcomer ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers

... the passion over all his nature. It expands the sentiment; it makes the clown gentle and gives the coward heart. Into the most pitiful and abject it will infuse a heart and courage to defy the world, so only it have the countenance of the beloved object. In giving him to another it still more gives him to himself. He is a new man, with new perceptions, new and keener purposes, and a religious solemnity of character and aims. He does not longer appertain to his ...
— Essays, First Series • Ralph Waldo Emerson

... you. It is beyond the power of mortals to conceal vicious habits and propensities for any long period. And when once discovered, who will repose confidence in such a youth? Who will trust him, or encourage him, or countenance him? Who will give him employment? Who will confide anything to his oversight? Who will render him assistance in his business affairs, when he is straitened and in need of the aid of friends? Behold his prospects! How unpromising, how ...
— Golden Steps to Respectability, Usefulness and Happiness • John Mather Austin

... the largest woman I had ever seen in my life, fat, fair, and fifty with a broad rosy countenance, beaming with good-humour and contentment, and with a general look of affluence over her whole comfortable person. She spoke in a loud voice which made itself heard over the remaining din in the garden and out, and with a patois between Scotch and Irish, which puzzled ...
— Honor O'callaghan • Mary Russell Mitford

... suddenly stopped short. "If I go inside with this countenance on, mamma will punish ...
— The Silver Lining - A Guernsey Story • John Roussel

... Jonathan Webb, turning on her a benevolent and wrinkled countenance, with two bright red spots in the midst of each weather-beaten cheek. Miss Henderson again noticed the observant curiosity in the old man's eyes. Everybody, indeed, seemed to look at her with the same expression. As a woman farmer she was no doubt ...
— Harvest • Mrs. Humphry Ward

... Marius was speaking in the presence of Cosette and Jean Valjean of the whole of that singular adventure, of the innumerable inquiries which he had made, and of the fruitlessness of his efforts. The cold countenance of "Monsieur Fauchelevent" ...
— Les Miserables - Complete in Five Volumes • Victor Hugo

... was much against him, for although he had a really fine face, a noble forehead, and the most benign expression I ever saw upon a human countenance, yet his clothes and bearing quite spoiled him. His round jacket made him look like a tall boy who had grown too fast for his strength; he stooped a little and walked in a loose-jointed manner. He was very bashful, and totally destitute of the power of pushing his way, or arguing with a ...
— Captains of Industry - or, Men of Business Who Did Something Besides Making Money • James Parton

... be disloyalty, it will be dealt with with a firm hand of stern repression; but if it lifts its head at all, it will lift it only here and there, and without countenance, except from a lawless and ...
— Germany, The Next Republic? • Carl W. Ackerman

... the Masters of letters that have adorned and elevated the speech of our race Dr. Johnson is in many ways the most lovable. The son of a poor bookseller in Lichfield {40} with an uncouth figure and an undistinguished countenance, he rose by the massive force of his character and the tireless persistence of his industry to an unchallenged supremacy in the literary world of his age, displaying in his whole life the truth of his own dictum that "few things are impossible to diligence and ...
— Great Testimony - against scientific cruelty • Stephen Coleridge

... of what is odd in an opponent's countenance of this priceless value in ordinary quarrels among the young and the ill-mannered (just as abuse of the opposing counsel is the best way of covering the poverty of one's own case at law), but the music-hall humorist has no easier or surer road to the risibilities ...
— A Boswell of Baghdad - With Diversions • E. V. Lucas

... laying it down an the Table: then shuffle again keeping your packe whole, and so haue you two aces lying together in the bottome: & therefore to reforme that disordered Card, as also for a grace and countenance to that action, take off the vppermost Card of the bunch, and thrust it into the middest of the Cards, and then take away the nethermost Card, which is one of your aces, and bestow him likewise: then may you begin as before, shewing an other ...
— The Art of Iugling or Legerdemaine • Samuel Rid

... uttered this audacious speech, Mr. Mayne started back, and his expression of mingled wrath and dismay was so ludicrous that under any other circumstances his son would have found it difficult to keep his countenance. ...
— Not Like Other Girls • Rosa N. Carey

... having regard to the state of their own feelings, can understand the feelings of others, and therefore remember only the good deeds and not the acts of hostility of their foes. Thou hast acted even as good men of prepossessing countenance do, who transgress not the limits of virtue, wealth, pleasure and salvation. O child, remember not the harsh words of Duryodhana. Look at thy mother Gandhari and myself also, if thou desirest to remember ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Part 2 • Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa

... alderman, was not wearing gloves. It was he, Denry, who had broken the ice, so that the alderman might plunge into the water. He first had danced with the Countess, and had rendered her up to the alderman with delicious gaiety upon her countenance. By instinct he knew Bursley, and he knew that he would be talked of. He knew that, for a time at any rate, he would displace even Jos Curtenty, that almost professional "card" and amuser of burgesses, in the popular imagination. It would not be: "Have ye ...
— The Card, A Story Of Adventure In The Five Towns • Arnold Bennett

... offering the hand of genial fellowship. Kirkwood accepted it half-heartedly (what else was he to do?) remarking at the same time that Calendar had recovered much of his composure. There was now a normal coloring in the heavily jowled countenance, with less glint of fear in the quick, dark eyes; and Calendar's hand, even if moist and cold, no longer trembled. Furthermore it was immediately demonstrated that his impudence had ...
— The Black Bag • Louis Joseph Vance

... are very choicely come," he cried, holding out both hands to La Boulaye. "You shall embrace our happy Hercules yonder, and wish him joy of the wedded life he has the audacity to exploit." Then, as he espied the crimson ridge across the secretary's countenance, "Mon Dieu!" he exclaimed, "what have you done to ...
— The Trampling of the Lilies • Rafael Sabatini

... subject gave a slight shade of anxiety to Mrs. Chester's sweet countenance, as she sat waiting for her guests. She could just hear the two chickens that lay cosily, wing to wing, in the oven, simmering in their warm nest. The potatoes in a sauce-pan in front of the stove were slowly lifting up the lid and pouring ...
— The Old Homestead • Ann S. Stephens

... the nature of ambition" (Ambitio multos mortales falsos fieri coegit, etc.) "to make men liars and cheaters; to hide the truth in their breasts, and show, like jugglers, another thing in their mouths; to cut all friendships and enmities to the measure of their own interest, and to make a good countenance without the help of good will." And can there be freedom with this perpetual constraint? What is it but a kind of rack that forces men to say what they have no mind to? I have wondered at the extravagant and barbarous stratagem of Zopirus, and more at the praises ...
— Cowley's Essays • Abraham Cowley

... heart opened wide and took him in, as, gathering the bent head in my arms, as freely as if he had been a child, I said, 'Let me help you bear it, John!' Never on any human countenance have I seen so swift and beautiful a look of gratitude, surprise, and comfort as that which answered me more eloquently ...
— Lives of Girls Who Became Famous • Sarah Knowles Bolton

... girl of twenty-three who interested him greatly—for the moment. Her name was not very attractive—Ella F. Hubby, as he eventually learned—but she was not unpleasing. Her principal charm was a laughing, hoydenish countenance and roguish eyes. She was the daughter of a well-to-do commission merchant in South Water Street. That her interest should have been aroused by that of Cowperwood in her was natural enough. She was young, foolish, impressionable, easily ...
— The Titan • Theodore Dreiser

... the man, of whom I had heard so much, with a great deal of curiosity. Shy and diffident with strangers, his manner even somewhat abrupt, one could not fail to be impressed with the expression of power, resolution, and kindness, on the rugged countenance, and with the keen, piercing glance of the blue eyes, which seemed to read one through in an instant. He greeted us, as he did every newcomer, most warmly, and under his guidance we passed into the completed portion of the house, the ...
— South African Memories - Social, Warlike & Sporting From Diaries Written At The Time • Lady Sarah Wilson

... was a true British matron, and preserved a quiet, immovable countenance; only a grim smile passed over it now and then. At last she remarked coolly, as if commenting on the weather, "I don't believe she will trouble you, my son." Never a word about the lace episode or the ...
— Five Little Peppers Abroad • Margaret Sidney

... through every period of his life. But he was negligent in his dress; and so careless about dressing his hair, that he usually had it done in great haste, by several barbers at a time. His beard he sometimes clipped, and sometimes shaved; and either read or wrote during the operation. His countenance, either when discoursing or silent, was so calm and serene, that a (130) Gaul of the first rank declared amongst his friends, that he was so softened by it, as to be restrained from throwing him down a precipice, in his passage over the Alps, when he had ...
— The Lives Of The Twelve Caesars, Complete - To Which Are Added, His Lives Of The Grammarians, Rhetoricians, And Poets • C. Suetonius Tranquillus

... beautiful, I declare," answered the pleased spectator readily. "Why, I did n't see you, nor Mis' Brown. Yes; I felt it best to refresh my mind an' wear a cheerful countenance. When I see 'Liza Jane I was able to divert her mind consid'able. She was glad I went. I told her I 'd made an effort, knowin' 'twas so she had to lose the a'ternoon. 'Bijah left property, if he did die away from home on ...
— The Queen's Twin and Other Stories • Sarah Orne Jewett

... that the terms 'knowing' and'meditating' are seen to be used in place of each other in the earlier and later parts of Vedic texts. Compare the following passages: 'Let a man meditate on mind as Brahman,' and 'he who knows this shines and warms through his celebrity, fame, and glory of countenance' (Ch. Up. III, 18, 1; 6). And 'He does not know him, for he is not complete,' and 'Let men meditate on him as the Self (Bri. Up. I, 4, 7). And 'He who knows what he knows,' and 'Teach me the deity on which you meditate' (Ch. Up. ...
— The Vedanta-Sutras with the Commentary by Ramanuja - Sacred Books of the East, Volume 48 • Trans. George Thibaut

... show that the American races show nearly as great a variety in this respect as the nations of the old continent; there are among them white races with a florid complexion, and tribes black or of a very dark hue; that their stature, figure, and countenance are ...
— The Antediluvian World • Ignatius Donnelly

... and calmly next to her mother. Nobody could guess from her apparently ingenuous countenance that she knew that she, and not the Terror of the departments and his wife, was the originating cause of Mr. Morfey's ...
— Mr. Prohack • E. Arnold Bennett

... on the man's small-sized countenance my words had seemed to make a impression. But yet he didn't want to give up in a minute; he spoke of how the Mormons had flourished since they come to Utah, how they had turned the desert into a garden, and ...
— Around the World with Josiah Allen's Wife • Marietta Holley

... for a moment put out of countenance, had recovered their usual bearing, and the Bishop of Beauvais, drying his eyes, began to read the act of condemnation. He reminded the guilty one of all her crimes, of her schism, idolatry, invocation of demons, how she had been admitted to repentance, and how, "seduced by the Prince of Lies, she ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 07 • Various

... Ralph," he said, with the pleasant smile which constantly lighted up his countenance; "I want to give you something which you will like and value." He was leading me towards the courtyard at the back of the house. "I wish that I could go with you myself, that we might take care of each other; but as I cannot ...
— My First Voyage to Southern Seas • W.H.G. Kingston

... spoke he stretched out his legs, and leaned back in the chair. His form became less vague, and the colors of his garments more distinct and evident, while an expression of gratified relief succeeded to the anxiety of his countenance. ...
— Humorous Ghost Stories • Dorothy Scarborough

... unable to face the light, and the lines of his face, the hooked nose, and the thin, constantly quivering, drawn-in lips suggested a mixture of boldness and baseness, of cunning and sincerity. But there is no book which can instruct one to read the human countenance correctly; and some special circumstance must have roused the suspicions of these four persons so much as to cause them to make these observations, and they were not as usual deceived by the humbug of this skilled actor, a past master in ...
— CELEBRATED CRIMES, COMPLETE - DERUES • ALEXANDRE DUMAS, PERE

... They took us into their lodges and showed us blankets, knives, and guns, and then, with a suggestive motion, said all was "Mormonee," by which we understood they had got them from the Mormons. The Indian in the back part of the lodge looked very pleasant and his countenance showed a good deal of intelligence for a man of the mountains. I now told the boys that we were in a position where we were dependent on some one, and that I had seen enough to convince me that these Indians were perfectly friendly with the Mormons, and that for our own benefit we had better ...
— Death Valley in '49 • William Lewis Manly

... once, then read it over again. Extreme satisfaction beamed over his countenance, and he sat mute for some seconds seemingly in utter astonishment. But soon after, the expression of his face changing, he opened the envelope and threw the enclosure down, jocularly saying to the astrologer, ...
— Five Years Of Theosophy • Various

... then, fair daughters, the possession of that inward grace, whose essence shall permeate and vitalize the affections, adorn the countenance make mellifluous the voice, and impart a hallowed beauty even to your motions. Not merely that you may be loved, would I urge this, but that you may, in truth, be lovely—that loveliness which fades not with time, nor is marred or alienated by disease, but ...
— Searchlights on Health - The Science of Eugenics • B. G. Jefferis and J. L. Nichols

... phlegmatic attitude of a strong man who feels himself vanquished; his countenance, cold, silent, entirely English, revealed the consciousness of his dignity in a momentary resignation. Moreover, he had already thought, in spite of the vehemence of his anger, that it was scarcely prudent to compromise himself with the ...
— The Girl with the Golden Eyes • Honore de Balzac

... famed for beauty, but rather it had the even glow of ivory. Her nose was large and high in the bridge, her flexible mouth was not of the smallest: and yet whatever other persons might have said, to Jurgen this woman's countenance was in all things perfect. Perhaps this was because he never saw her as she was. For certainly the color of her eyes stayed a matter never revealed to him: gray, blue or green, there was no saying: they varied as does the sea; but always these eyes were lovely ...
— Jurgen - A Comedy of Justice • James Branch Cabell

... marked Iff's exhibition of matchless impudence. Each hesitated to speak while the captain was occupied with a vain attempt to make Iff realise his position by scowling at him out of a blood-congested countenance. But of this, Iff appeared to be wholly unconscious. When the situation seemed all but unendurable for another second (Staff for one was haunted by the fear that he would throw back his head and bray like a mule) Manvers took ...
— The Bandbox • Louis Joseph Vance

... ruin on Troy, so his father ordered him to be slain at birth. The slave, however, did not destroy him, but exposed him upon Mount Ida, where shepherds found him and, brought him up as one of themselves. "He gained the esteem of all the shepherds, and his graceful countenance and manly development recommended him to the favour of Oenone, a nymph of Ida, whom he married, and with whom he lived in the most perfect tenderness. Their conjugal bliss was soon disturbed. At the marriage of Peleus and Thetis, ...
— Selections from Wordsworth and Tennyson • William Wordsworth and Alfred Lord Tennyson

... would be twins—and as I said son, and surely I meant the son that would be born then—and twins is all as one as one, they say. Promise fettering still! Bad off as ever, may be," said Cornelius. His whole countenance and voice changed; he sat down on a fallen tree, and rested his hands on his knees. "What shall we do now, Harry, with ...
— Tales & Novels, Vol. IX - [Contents: Harrington; Thoughts on Bores; Ormond] • Maria Edgeworth

... observed my manoeuvre. Did he seem displeased? Not at all: he even condescended to smile. But the next day he placed M. on the side opposite to myself. In one respect this was really an improvement; because it gave me a better view of my cousin's sweet countenance. But then there was the loss of the hand to be considered, and secondly there was the affront. It was clear that vengeance must be had. Now there was but one thing in this world that I could do even ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Vol 58, No. 357, July 1845 • Various

... Soup Face," continued The Sky Pilot. A battered wreck half rose and extended a pudgy hand. Red whiskers, matted in little tangled wisps which suggested the dried ingredients of an infinite procession of semi-liquid refreshments, rioted promiscuously over a scarlet countenance. ...
— The Oakdale Affair • Edgar Rice Burroughs

... love alone. The second daughter, Birtha, as I have said, was absent. The third, Catherine, "between the woman and the child," had hazel eyes and fine features, altogether with a delicate shape and complexion. Cuthbert, the only son, was a boy of eleven or twelve, with an open, expressive countenance. ...
— International Weekly Miscellany Vol. I. No. 3, July 15, 1850 • Various

... members of the Institute, in attendance upon the annual meeting, graybearded, long-faced educators, devotees of theories and systems, known at a glance by a certain earnestness of manner and intensity of expression, middle-aged women of a resolute, intellectual countenance, and a great crowd of youthful schoolmistresses, just on the dividing line between domestic life and self-sacrifice, still full of sentiment, and still leaning perhaps more to Tennyson and Lowell than to ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner

... enveloping them in its folds, toward the round opening in the dome. A dark object had appeared there, sliding downward like a huge rope and descending toward them with lightning rapidly. They gave a great gasp as they recognized the countenance of King Anko, the sea serpent, its gray hair and whiskers bristling like those of an angry cat, and the usually mild blue eyes glowing with a ferocity even more terrifying than ...
— The Sea Fairies • L. Frank Baum

... this was the time when the Artists' Club of Rome were giving a Veglione (a kind of fancy-dress ball), and as Alma and my husband desired to go to it, and were still in the way of using me to keep themselves in countenance, I consented to accompany them on condition that I did not dress or dance, and that they would go with me to Benediction the ...
— The Woman Thou Gavest Me - Being the Story of Mary O'Neill • Hall Caine

... no long time after seemed to discover that odd mortal symptom in him not mentioned by Hippocrates, that is, to lose his own face, and look like some of his near relations; for he maintained not his proper countenance, but looked like his uncle, the lines of whose face lay deep and invisible in his healthful visage before: for as from our begin- ning we run through variety of looks, before we come to consistent and settled faces; so before our ...
— Religio Medici, Hydriotaphia, and the Letter to a Friend • Sir Thomas Browne

... loyal to the Union. But there he stopped absolutely. With the next step, which went outside the Union, and which his friends at home were considering, he would have nothing to do, and he would not countenance any separatist schemes. In the national Congress, however, he was prepared to advance as far as the boldest and bitterest in opposition, and he either voted against the war taxes or abstained from voting on them, in company with the strictest ...
— Daniel Webster • Henry Cabot Lodge

... blue: carried to the utmost—a phrase borrowed from the idea of a vessel making out of port, and getting into blue water.—To look blue, to be surprised, disappointed, or taken aback, with a countenance expressive of displeasure. ...
— The Sailor's Word-Book • William Henry Smyth

... and the Count had returned to his seat, Norvin fancied he detected once more that grave look he had surprised in his friend's countenance upon ...
— The Net • Rex Beach

... the drum-skin, the other end whips against the middle, and the skin is thus struck twice at the same time. The drum is commonly played by the man, and the playing is accompanied by a very monotonous song. We have not seen it accompanied by dancing, twisting of the countenance, or any ...
— The Voyage of the Vega round Asia and Europe, Volume I and Volume II • A.E. Nordenskieold

... and Mexico. Then he assured Sir John Purefoy that eighty miles a day was no great journey for a pacing horse, with a man of fourteen stone and a saddle and accoutrements weighing four more. The Major's countenance, when the Senator declared that no Englishman could ride, was a sight ...
— The American Senator • Anthony Trollope

... her. He was used to such scenes. He caught her before she had gone three steps, and rudely threw her down. She uttered scream after scream, and implored him not to part her from her child. Turning alternately from the unfeeling and repulsive countenance of the slave-trader to the retreating form of her late master, who bore away farther and farther from her all that she knew of love or hope on earth, her impassioned entreaties touched every key-note of human agony from frenzy to despair. It was of no use. Meminger ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 2 No 4, October, 1862 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various

... individuals from coming to be treated as public property, and Mrs. Bonniman was a handsome and rich young widow, the rumour of whose acceptableness to Mr. Sclater had reached Mistress Croale's ear before ever she had seen the minister himself. An unmistakable shadow of confusion crossed his countenance; whereupon with consideration both for herself and him, the woman made haste to go on, as if she had but chosen her instance at ...
— Sir Gibbie • George MacDonald



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