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Divan   Listen
noun
Divan  n.  
1.
A book; esp., a collection of poems written by one author; as, the divan of Hafiz. (Persia)
2.
In Turkey and other Oriental countries: A council of state; a royal court. Also used by the poets for a grand deliberative council or assembly.
3.
A chief officer of state. (India)
4.
A saloon or hall where a council is held, in Oriental countries, the state reception room in places, and in the houses of the richer citizens. Cushions on the floor or on benches are ranged round the room.
5.
A cushioned seat, or a large, low sofa or couch; especially, one fixed to its place, and not movable.
6.
A coffee and smoking saloon. (Colloq.)






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Divan" Quotes from Famous Books



... taking a seat at the table. I led Eve to a divan at the farther corner of the room. We sat there and watched the people. There were many whose faces I knew—a sprinkling of stock-brokers, one or two actresses, and half a dozen or so men about town of a dubious type. On the whole the company ...
— An Amiable Charlatan • E. Phillips Oppenheim

... the center of the room drew their attention and they saw that Phaestra had risen from her seat in a deeply cushioned divan and now stood at its side in an attitude of welcome. Nearly as tall as Frank, she was a figure of commanding and imperious beauty. The whiteness of her body was accentuated by the silver embroidered and tightly fitted black vestments that covered yet did not conceal its charms. A halo of ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science, August 1930 • Various

... divan in front of him, Baya would drone him monotonous tunes with a guitar in her fist; or else, to distract her lord and master, favour him with the Bee Dance, holding a hand-glass up, in which she reflected her white teeth and ...
— Tartarin of Tarascon • Alphonse Daudet

... facility translate simple songs from the Persian into the Tartar language. Bodenstedt put into Mirza-Schaffy's mouth the songs which were written during his intercourse with the Eastern sage, to give vividness to the picture of an Eastern divan of wisdom. ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol. 5 • Various

... very pleasant, too, to find myself once again in the flagstoned halls of the Yildiz Kiosk, the Sultan's palace. My little friend Abdul Aziz rose at once from his cushioned divan under a lemon tree and came shuffling in his big slippers to meet me, a smile of welcome on his face. He seemed, to my surprise, radiant with happiness. The disasters attributed by the allied press to his unhappy country appeared to sit lightly ...
— The Hohenzollerns in America - With the Bolsheviks in Berlin and other impossibilities • Stephen Leacock

... Snow Man's family had a lovely floating gait—and the scholars took them with feeble curtesies, and began fanning. A stiff north wind blew in at the windows. The forest was all creaking and snapping with the cold. The poor children, fanning themselves, on an ice divan, would certainly have frozen if the Snow Man's wife had not suggested that they all have a little game of "puss-in-the-corner," to while away the time before dinner. That warmed them up a little, for they had to run very fast indeed to play with the Snow Children who seemed to fairly blow in the ...
— The Pot of Gold - And Other Stories • Mary E. Wilkins

... shake, no deluge invade, their house among the everlasting rock-ribs. Bright crackled their fire, and on the broad divan of cedar he had hewn and covered thick with furs, they two could lie and talk and dream, and let the storm rage, careless ...
— Darkness and Dawn • George Allan England

... was reached. Spero carried the unconscious girl up the stairs and gently laid her on the divan. He then got on his knees beside Jane, and, hiding his face in ...
— The Son of Monte-Cristo, Volume II (of 2) • Alexandre Dumas pere

... than settled when two young men sauntered out of the smoking room and took the seat just back of their divan. The girls nudged each other, and squeezed hands, but did not emit the usual ...
— The Girl Scouts at Sea Crest - The Wig Wag Rescue • Lillian Garis

... crouds the rich Divan to-day With turbaned heads, of every hue Bowing before that veiled and awful face Like Tulip-beds of different shapes and dyes, Bending beneath the invisible west ...
— Flowers and Flower-Gardens • David Lester Richardson

... man" is sitting in his wife's room on a small embroidered armless chair. Opposite to him on a large elevated divan lies his wife, a tiny, elegant, transparent little lady, with a face of alabaster, and wee wee hands which a child of two would not have known what to do with if they had been doled out to her. Her small strawberry-like mouth scarcely seemed to have been made for talking purposes; ...
— The Day of Wrath • Maurus Jokai

... skylight in the roof. The floors were of hardwood and covered partially with foreign rugs. There were low divans, but no tables nor chairs. The whole scene was akin to that described as oriental. Lena returned with the robes for Cora, and laid them on a divan. Then she adjusted a screen, thus forming a dressing room in one corner. This corner was hung with an oblong mirror, framed in wonderful ebony. Helka saw that this ...
— The Motor Girls Through New England - or, Held by the Gypsies • Margaret Penrose

... sedition—of contempt of established authorities—was thus raised under the influence of private pique and long-cherished envy: it soon found an echo in the painted walls where the conclave sat "in close divan," and it was handed about from mouth to mouth, till it reached the ears of the Inquisitor, within the dark recesses of his house of terror. A cloud was now gathering over the head of the devoted Salvator which it seemed no human power could avert. But ere the bolt fell, his fast ...
— Anecdotes of Painters, Engravers, Sculptors and Architects, and Curiosities of Art, (Vol. 2 of 3) • Shearjashub Spooner

... a divan in Hector's library, she wept freely. She bewailed her life, broken at twenty, her lost youth, her vanished, once radiant hopes, the world's esteem, and her own self-respect, which she ...
— The Mystery of Orcival • Emile Gaboriau

... extraordinary contrast to the poor conception of a being who ought not, even in that lowest degradation, to have seemed so unworthy an antagonist. Neither has Tasso been more happy, where he represents the divan of darkness in the enchanted forest as presided over by a monarch having a huge tail, hoofs, and all the usual accompaniments of popular diablerie. The genius of Milton alone could discard all these vulgar puerilities, ...
— Letters On Demonology And Witchcraft • Sir Walter Scott

... about two crazy lads who are supposed to have joined the Mecca pilgrims in disguise.... Of course our clerks are Copts and do pick up a bit and the Copts will talk.... I say, Jack, what are you doing?" he broke off to demand in astonishment, for Jack Ryder had seated himself upon a divan and was absorbedly rolling up ...
— The Fortieth Door • Mary Hastings Bradley

... observatory and had seated themselves, Orlon took out his miniature ray-projector, no larger than a fountain pen, and flashed it briefly upon one of the hundreds of button-like lenses upon the wall. Instantly each chair converted itself into a form-fitting divan, ...
— Skylark Three • Edward Elmer Smith

... was invited on the poop deck of my diahbeeah; this was always furnished with carpets and sofas so as to form a divan. ...
— Ismailia • Samuel W. Baker

... in danger of being lost again. The other African states of the Mediterranean have today no real connection with the Porte; and France in her hesitation whether she should keep the most beautiful of them as her own is looking to the cabinet of St. James rather than to the Divan at Constantinople. In Arabia finally, and in the holy cities themselves, the Sultan has had no actual authority ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. X. • Kuno Francke

... was allayed, however, by the sight of his next course—oeufs aux saucissons. Tender, poetic memories stirred within him. The little truffled French sausages aroused his better nature. Two of them reposed luxuriously upon an egg-divan in the dainty French baking-dish of dull green. Over them—a fitting baptism, was the rich wine sauce of golden brown—a sauce that might have been the tears of envious angels, wept over a mortal creation so ...
— The Spenders - A Tale of the Third Generation • Harry Leon Wilson

... stride, he accordingly walked up to the place. Scarcely had he passed the threshold of the public house, when he perceived some one or other among the visitors who had been sitting sipping their wine on the divan, jump up and come up to greet him, with a face beaming ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book I • Cao Xueqin

... myself next her on a divan, 'I want to hear about the ghost. Up to the present I confess I have been so taken up with more material and, may I add'—casting a well-measured glance of admiration at her beautifully moulded features and lovely eyes—lovely, in ...
— Byways of Ghost-Land • Elliott O'Donnell

... important ally arrived. The news had speedily reached Djezzar that Sir Sidney and his officers were themselves defending the breach. The old pasha had hitherto taken no personal part in the conflict, but had, as was the Turkish custom, remained seated on his divan every day, receiving reports from his officers, giving audience to the soldiers who brought in the heads of enemies, and rewarding them for their valour. Now, however, he leapt to his feet, seized his sabre, and ran to the breach, shouting to the soldiers to follow ...
— At Aboukir and Acre - A Story of Napoleon's Invasion of Egypt • George Alfred Henty

... and The Players was crowded with its members; not only actors, but men of every profession, from the tall, robust architect to the quiet surgeon tucked away among the cushions of the corner divan. In the hall—giving sound advice, perhaps, to a newly fledged tragedian—sat some dear, gray-haired old gentleman in white socks who puffed silently at a long cigar, while from out the low-ceiled, black-oak dining room, resplendent in pewter and hazy with tobacco smoke, came intermittent ...
— The Lady of Big Shanty • Frank Berkeley Smith

... divan in the centre of the room, where Raoul was perorating. She stood there with her arm in that of Madame Octave de Camp, an excellent woman, who kept the secret of the involuntary trembling by which these violent emotions betrayed themselves. Though the eyes ...
— A Daughter of Eve • Honore de Balzac

... doors closed and the lights on, Craig exhaled his breath as noisily as a blown swimmer. "What a day! What a day!" he half-shouted, dropping on the divan and thrusting his feet into the rich and rather light upholstery of a ...
— The Fashionable Adventures of Joshua Craig • David Graham Phillips

... appearance Mr. Jay betook himself to a cigar-divan, and read the magazines over a cheroot. From the divan he strolled to the tavern and had his chops. I strolled to the tavern and had my chops. When he had done he went back to his lodging. When I had done I went back to mine. He was overcome with drowsiness early in the ...
— The Queen of Hearts • Wilkie Collins

... eastern side of this eyrie a broad divan invited one to rest. Over it were suspended Austrian and Bulgarian captures—a lance with a blood-stiffened pennant, a cuirass, entrenching tools, a steel helmet with an eloquent bullet-hole through the crown. Some few framed portraits of noted "aces" hung here and elsewhere, with ...
— The Flying Legion • George Allan England

... it was at first difficult to distinguish objects clearly. However, their eyes having become accustomed to the gloom after a few minutes, the Caliph and his Vizier, who had entered quietly and unobserved, and had seated themselves on a low sofa or divan which ran round the sides of the apartment, perceived that the company were all rough, seafaring men of a very fierce and truculent aspect. Among them one was seated, who appeared by his dress and demeanour to be the chief or captain of the band. This man, addressing those ...
— Tales of the Caliph • H. N. Crellin

... covered by a screen of straw which made the place dark save for the warm glow of the fire, near which a little Turkish-looking man was seated, and a largely proportioned Turkish woman reclined on a rough kind of divan. ...
— Yussuf the Guide - The Mountain Bandits; Strange Adventure in Asia Minor • George Manville Fenn

... most perilous thing that Herod could do, to have that banquet. Lying back on his divan, lolling on his cushions, eating his rich food, quaffing the sparkling wine, exchanging repartee with his obsequious followers, it was as though the petals and calyx of his soul were all open to receive the first insidious spore of evil that might float past ...
— John the Baptist • F. B. Meyer

... considered, the day was passing well enough. I picked up a book, and threw myself on a comfortable divan to smoke and reflect before continuing my explorations. As I lay there, Bates brought me a telegram, a reply to my message ...
— The House of a Thousand Candles • Meredith Nicholson

... hundred a year it wouldn't be a penny too much if you really like it, if you will feel happy and at home in it. I'm going to furnish it for you, quite simply, of course. Just rugs and a divan or two, and a screen to shut out the door, two or three pretty comfortable chairs, some draperies—only thin ones, nothing heavy to spoil the acoustics—a few cushions, a table or two. Oh, and you must have a spirit-lamp, a ...
— The Way of Ambition • Robert Hichens

... to the stage born. In fact, nearly stage-born, as my mother played her part almost up to the night I made my debut in the great game of Life. My childhood was spent mostly in the flies, and my earliest memories are of being propped up on an impromptu, triangular divan formed by a piece of wood stuck between two joists and covered with cushions; of watching my mother use lip stick and other make-up things; of hearing the warning knock and admonition: 'Thirty minutes, ...
— Penny of Top Hill Trail • Belle Kanaris Maniates

... the dragoman, and standing up on his divan). {3}—Proud are the sires, and blessed are the dams of the horses that shall carry his Excellency to the end of his prosperous journey. May the saddle beneath him glide down to the gates of the happy city, like a boat swimming on the third river of Paradise. May he sleep the sleep of a child, when ...
— Eothen • A. W. Kinglake

... hurriedly donned clothes more suitable for rough night work. My last care was to slip into my pockets a brace of double-barreled pistols which formed part of my traveling kit. When I returned I found the baron already booted and spurred; this without metaphor. He was stretched full length on the divan, and did not speak as I came in, or even look at me. Chewing an unlit cigar, with eyes fixed on the ceiling, he was evidently following some ...
— The Lock And Key Library - Classic Mystery And Detective Stories, Modern English • Various

... room, with two very large windows on one side, a massive chimney-piece at the end opposite the door, and facing the windows the most enormous divan Margaret had ever seen. Over this a great canopy was stretched, a sort of silk awning of which the corners were stretched out and held up by more or less mediaeval lances. The divan itself was so high that an ordinary person would have to climb upon it, and it was completely covered by a wild ...
— Fair Margaret - A Portrait • Francis Marion Crawford

... Won't you sit down?' Logotheti looked at the divan. Margaret half sat upon the arm of ...
— Fair Margaret - A Portrait • Francis Marion Crawford

... and led us up a stone stairway to the level roof, which, with its surrounding parapet, recalled the one described in "Ben Hur." Here fruit was served by a Syrian maid clad in the native costume. On our return to the lower floor, our hostesses conducted us to the divan salon or Oriental smoking room. There, while we rested on low couches, the Syrian maid passed around Turkish coffee in dainty cups, and then brought a lighted narghileh from which, in turn, each one present took a few whiffs of the ...
— A Trip to the Orient - The Story of a Mediterranean Cruise • Robert Urie Jacob

... neglect Egyptian politics. He used a native council for consultation and for the promulgation of his own ideas. Immediately after his entry into Cairo he appointed nine sheikhs to form a divan, or council, consulting daily on public order and the food-supplies of the city. He next assembled a general divan for Egypt, and a smaller council for each province, and asked their advice concerning the administration of justice and the collection ...
— The Life of Napoleon I (Volumes, 1 and 2) • John Holland Rose

... the modern city outside in the wintry electric lights was well forgot in the enchantment of the moment, and Patricia lost count of time and sense of self in the pageant that swept across the lofty chamber to make its obeisance at the imperial divan. ...
— Miss Pat at School • Pemberton Ginther

... the hand-clasp, nodded, and made room on the leather-covered divan for the new-comer. Hildreth, the editor of the Argus, put it aptly when he said that the grim-faced old cattle king had "blown" into politics. He was a compromise on the People's Party ticket; was no part of the Bucks programme, and had been made to feel it. Tradition had it that ...
— The Grafters • Francis Lynde

... as I staggered to a seat on the chart-room divan: 'We're tremendously grateful to 'em in Illinois. We've never had a chance of exercising all the Fleet together. I've turned in a General Call, and I expect we'll have at least two hundred ...
— A Diversity of Creatures • Rudyard Kipling

... must remember that the feet of the guests were not, as amongst us, concealed under the table, but extended on a level with the body on the divan, or triclinium.] ...
— The Life of Jesus • Ernest Renan

... Auguste passed through the rooms without finding the woman who now exercised so mighty an influence on his fate. He entered an empty boudoir where card-tables were placed awaiting players; and sitting down on a divan he gave himself up to the most contradictory thoughts about her. A man presently took the young officer by the arm, and looking up the baron was stupefied to behold the pauper of the rue Coquilliere, the Ferragus of Ida, the lodger in the rue Soly, the Bourignard of Justin, ...
— The Thirteen • Honore de Balzac

... locked the door behind them. She was seated on a low divan wrapped in a loose robe, and by her side, glittering with silver and with gems, lay her bridal ...
— Fair Margaret • H. Rider Haggard

... the promenade deck, peering through the darkness, and observing the huge waves that occasionally washed the upper deck. He had not slept a wink during the night, though he had reclined an hour on the divan in the pilot-house. He was not alarmed for the safety of his ship, but he looked out for her ...
— Across India - Or, Live Boys in the Far East • Oliver Optic

... tall Florentine vases, they too were waiting and breathing out their sweetness. On the divan cover and on the walls inscriptions on silver scrolls singing the praises of woman and of wine gleamed in the rays of the setting sun, and harmonised admirably with the faded colours of the sixteenth ...
— The Child of Pleasure • Gabriele D'Annunzio

... arms in a way to show how conscious she was of the danger I incurred in even thus visiting her; after which we seated ourselves, side by side, on a little divan, and began to speak of those things that were most natural to a brother and sister who so much loved each other, and who had not met for five years. My grandmother had managed so well as to prevent all interruption for an hour, if we saw fit ...
— The Redskins; or, Indian and Injin, Volume 1. - Being the Conclusion of the Littlepage Manuscripts • James Fenimore Cooper

... of a lean-to to the garden side of the house. A large lamp was burning brightly there. The floor was of mere flag-stones but the few rugs scattered about though extremely worn were very costly. There was also there a beautiful sofa upholstered in pink figured silk, an enormous divan with many cushions, some splendid arm-chairs of various shapes (but all very shabby), a round table, and in the midst of these fine things a small common iron stove. Somebody must have been attending it lately, for the fire roared and the warmth of the place ...
— The Arrow of Gold - a story between two notes • Joseph Conrad

... was conducted by the telegraph or telephone; and the room, therefore, was absorbed neither by books nor writing desks. It was furnished solely with a view to comfort. There was a round table in the centre, under a large moderator lamp which gave an exceptionally brilliant light. A divan covered with dark brown velvet occupied three sides of the room. A few choice pieces of old blue Oriental ware in the corners enlivened the dark brown walls. Three or four easy chairs stood about near the broad, old-fashioned ...
— Phantom Fortune, A Novel • M. E. Braddon

... sleep but by the effect of laudanum. This misfortune at this crisis was peculiarly vexatious and mortifying for me, as it put it out of my power to accompany the Pasha, who departed with the army for Dongola on the 26th, taking his route on the west bank of the river, and leaving the Divan Effendi and a small party of soldiers to expedite the loading and forwarding the boats that had not as yet got ready ...
— A Narrative of the Expedition to Dongola and Sennaar • George Bethune English

... exactly—and by removing the pillows it looked like a comfortable and venerable divan. The logs in the fire were soon burnt through, and she did not like to ask for more, but leaving her room and wandering up and down the empty house in the long, pale afternoon, she searched for fragments of ...
— The Happy Foreigner • Enid Bagnold

... on the divan beside her, and there is a glimpse of Floyd in his face. His voice falls to a most persuasive inflection as he rejoins, "Tell me, ask me anything, and I will answer you truly. There has never been any horrible ...
— Floyd Grandon's Honor • Amanda Minnie Douglas

... was a Persian rug. The boudoir, wholly modern, and furnished entirely after Madame Moreau's own taste, was arranged in imitation of a tent, with ropes of blue silk on a gray background. The classic divan was there, of course, with its pillows and footstools. The plant-stands, taken care of by the head-gardener of Presles, rejoiced the eye with their pyramids of bloom. The dining-room and billiard-room were ...
— A Start in Life • Honore de Balzac

... paper windows of the Chinese. The paper windows shut out the cold, it is true, but, being opaque, they also shut out the sunlight. And how gorgeously they are furnished! Such ebony chairs, such wonderful carved tables! Now and then we meet some one who has picked up an old opium divan, a magnificent, huge bench of carved ebony, with marble seat and marble back, very deep, capable of holding two people lying crosswise at full length, with room for the smoker's table between them. ...
— Peking Dust • Ellen N. La Motte

... melancholy retreat to themselves, and seated on the divan enclosing the central steam-radiator, they were staring silently at the glass cabinets mounted in ebonised wood which contained ...
— The Age of Innocence • Edith Wharton

... along the walls, and the great writing table in the center. The high ceiling, and restful wall decorations were emphasized by all the furnishings, the soft rug, into which the feet sank noiselessly, the numerous leather-upholstered chairs, the luxurious couch, and the divan filling the bay-window. The only light was under a shaded globe on the central table, leaving the main apartment in shadows, but the windows had their heavy curtains closely drawn. The sole occupant was a man in evening dress, seated in a high-backed leather chair, facing the entrance, ...
— Gordon Craig - Soldier of Fortune • Randall Parrish

... day of rest and amusement. She slept till long after mid-day, ate an epicurean breakfast in a little dressing-room with rose-tinted draperies, ran lazily over the pages of some French novel, in the silken depths of a pretty Turkish divan, heaped up with cushions, till long after dark; then threw herself into the mysteries of a superb toilet, and came into her exquisite little drawing-room like a princess—say Marguerite of Navarre—ready to entertain the guests, invariably ...
— The Old Countess; or, The Two Proposals • Ann S. Stephens

... to the divan-corner where it was you-and-I between them as with rivulets meeting and branching, running parallel, uniting and branching again, divided by the theme, but unending in the flow of the harmony. So ran their chirping arguments and diversions. The carrying on ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith

... now led before the governor himself, a stern and grave-looking man, sitting cross-legged on a divan surrounded by officers and attendants. He heard in silence the account given him by the escort, bowed his head at the commands of Suleiman, and, without addressing a word to Cuthbert, indicated to two attendants ...
— Winning His Spurs - A Tale of the Crusades • George Alfred Henty

... more like a bath-house than a monastery. The cells were comfortable inside, without any air of sadness; each held a bed, a divan, and ...
— Caesar or Nothing • Pio Baroja Baroja

... with a shade of gorgeous pattern, a library table, several huge easy rockers, some dado book shelves, and a gilt curio case, filled with oddities. Pictures were upon the walls, soft Turkish pillows upon the divan footstools of brown plush upon the floor. Such accommodations would ordinarily cost a ...
— Sister Carrie • Theodore Dreiser

... course impossible, and therefore Kharrak Singh continued to come each day to the Residency with his attendants, dismissing all but a favoured few with a regal wave of the hand at the foot of the steps, and climbing on the divan arranged for him, to sit there and talk under the pretence of looking at pictures. Gerrard had sent for his books from down-country by this time, and after long journeying on the heads of groaning coolies, and many vicissitudes by the way, they now graced his meagrely ...
— The Path to Honour • Sydney C. Grier

... afraid to meet the gaze of a man in uniform, the pitiable jeunesse that could not pass the physical examination of the army. Most of the other young men who bent over the tables talking, or leaned back on a divan to smoke cigarettes, were strangers, and I saw many who were unquestionably Roumanians or Greeks. A little apart, at a corner table, a father and mother were dining with a boy in a uniform much ...
— A Volunteer Poilu • Henry Sheahan

... the place the women left them, and servants with gold chains round their necks escorted them to a dais in the middle of the hall where were many cushions, as yet unoccupied, arranged in a semicircle, of which the centre was a divan higher and ...
— The Brethren • H. Rider Haggard

... had made a dozen mosquito bars for the explorers. They were canopies, terminating in a point at the top, where they were suspended to the cross rods on which the canvas roof was supported. The netting was tucked in under the cushions of the divan, and the ...
— Four Young Explorers - Sight-Seeing in the Tropics • Oliver Optic

... that's an old one," mocked Mollie. "Any candy left, Grace?" and Mollie, who had been artistically posing on a divan, crossed the room to where Grace sat near a table strewn with books and papers, a box of chocolates ...
— The Outdoor Girls at Rainbow Lake • Laura Lee Hope

... much longer than that, but when she came back from her kitchenette he had dropped like a log upon her divan, submerged beyond all soundings. So she tugged him around into a more comfortable position, managed to divest him of his dinner-jacket and his waistcoat, unbuttoned his collar and shirt-band, took off his shoes, and covered him up with an ...
— Mary Wollaston • Henry Kitchell Webster

... in the great white salon where the organ was. Maude Lome sang, and the man with the monocle accompanied her on the organ. Mrs. Rosscott sat on a divan between Holloway and General Jiggs. Jack was left ...
— The Rejuvenation of Aunt Mary • Anne Warner

... captain, propped him up against a divan, and rubbed him vigorously. This friction, administered skilfully, reanimated Nicholl, who opened his eyes, instantly recovered his presence of mind, seized Ardan's hand, and ...
— The Moon-Voyage • Jules Verne

... bounties and was prodigal to the Ryots of justice and equity, with goodly policy and polity. When he had effected this much of his affect, he caused bring forth the Cook and his household to the divan, but spared the old woman who had nursed him, because she had been the cause of his deliverance. Then all assembled without the town and he tormented the Cook and those who were with him with all manner torments, after which he did him to die by the foulest of deaths[FN553] and burning him with ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 1 • Richard F. Burton

... behind him and the door swung shut of its own weight with a click. We were in a high-ceilinged, very long room, having seven sides. There were windows to right and left. A deep divan piled with scented cushions occupied the whole length of one long wall, and there were several huge cushions on the floor against another wall. There was one other door besides that we ...
— Caves of Terror • Talbot Mundy

... join the league against France, Acton concluded a treaty with your country, and informed the Sublime Porte of the machinations of our Committee of Public Safety in sending De Semonville as an Ambassador to Constantinople, which, perhaps, prevented the Divan from attacking Austria, and occasioned the capture and imprisonment of ...
— Memoirs of the Court of St. Cloud, Complete - Being Secret Letters from a Gentleman at Paris to a Nobleman in London • Lewis Goldsmith

... narrowed and took on a look of cunning as she turned them sidewise toward the open door. As stealthily as a cat she crept to it and looked in. On a divan in the farthest corner the nurse lay stretched in a deep sleep, whose unpremeditatedness was shown by the book which lay on the floor, dropped, evidently, from her suddenly relaxed fingers. The patient retreated as noiselessly as she had advanced, and, going to a mantel-mirror in her sitting-room, ...
— Many Kingdoms • Elizabeth Jordan

... Shumla, the once formidable Hussein. To this redoubted personage, now apparently verging on eighty, Mr Paton was introduced by M. Petronevich at an evening audience, it being contrary to etiquette to receive visits by day during the Ramadan—and found him "sitting in the corner of the divan at his ease, being afflicted with gout, in the old ample Turkish costume. The white beard, the dress of the Pasha, the rich but faded carpet, the roof of elaborate but dingy wooden arabesque, were all in perfect keeping; and the dubious light of two thick wax candles rising two or three feet from ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 364, February 1846 • Various

... accent. It was the strange guest in the tavern by Corinth. The Prince—prince surely, whatever his other title—was in the same rich dress as at the Isthmus, only his flowing beard had been dyed raven black. Yet Democrates's eyes were diverted instantly to the peculiarly handsome slave-boy on the divan beside his master. The boy's dress, of a rare blue stuff, enveloped him loosely. His hair was as golden as the gold thread on the round cap. In the shadows the face almost escaped the orator,—he thought he saw clear blue eyes and a marvellously brilliant, almost girlish, ...
— A Victor of Salamis • William Stearns Davis

... the Paynim's dark divan, The Templars next advance; Then the tall halberds of Lausanne, Foremost to stand in battle van ...
— Poems • Victor Hugo

... terrible State reasons have made tremble and weep. D'Axel, Wattelet, all the gommeux of the Grand Club little guessed when the king, quitting the Avenue de Messine, rejoined them at the club with heavy fevered eyes, that he had spent the evening on a divan, by turns repulsed or encouraged, his feelings played upon, his nerves unstrung by the constant resistance; rolling himself at the feet of an immovable, determined woman, who with a supple opposition abandoned to his impassioned ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern — Volume 11 • Various

... great divan on which mused Larry; two smaller ones, half a dozen low seats and chairs carved apparently of ivory and ...
— The Moon Pool • A. Merritt

... artistic rubbish—plaster hands, canvases, sketches begun and discarded, and draperies thrown over chairs. Feeling very tired, he took off his cloak, placed the portrait abstractedly between two small canvasses, and threw himself on the narrow divan. Having stretched himself out, he finally ...
— Taras Bulba and Other Tales • Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol

... visitors arrived he knocked twice on the postern and retired from the scene. The door was opened and a negress appeared, who, without saying a word, conducted the two gentlemen across a narrow interior courtyard to a small, cool room where the lady awaited them, posed on a divan. ...
— Tartarin de Tarascon • Alphonse Daudet

... 27th July, Captain Tuckey was introduced to the Chenoo or sovereign, who sat in full divan, with his councillors around him, beneath a spreading tree, from the branches of which were suspended two of his enemies' skulls. He was dressed in a most gaudy fashion. He could not be made to comprehend the objects of the expedition, ...
— Life and Travels of Mungo Park in Central Africa • Mungo Park

... draft form to St. Petersburg the Czar accepted it, doubtless because he saw that its statements were vague in a sense which might be interpreted to his advantage. At Constantinople the document swiftly evoked protest, and the Divan refused to sanction it without alteration. England, France, and Austria recognised the force of the amendments of Turkey, and united in urging Russia to adopt them. The Emperor Nicholas, however, was too proud a man to submit to dictation, especially from the ...
— Lord John Russell • Stuart J. Reid

... the Christian camp, and bring us back the best terms you can obtain. The crown has passed from the head of El Zogoybi; Fate sets her seal upon my brow. Unfortunate was the commencement of my reign— unfortunate its end. Break up the divan." ...
— Leila or, The Siege of Granada, Book V. • Edward Bulwer Lytton

... woman-glance around the room that The Author had been so anxious to investigate. It was altogether a man's room, the scoured floor partly covered with a handsome rug, and the divan on which I was sitting covered with another. On both sides of the big fireplace were crowded book-shelves, above which hung weapons gathered from the four corners of the earth. There were two or three deep, comfortable arm-chairs, a square table, a couple of Winchesters in a corner, ...
— A Woman Named Smith • Marie Conway Oemler

... probably. I know she tells me things sometimes," replied Bet seriously. "I love to lie on that divan in the hall and watch her. And she tells me all about the good times they used to have in these very rooms." Bet had dreamed so often beneath the vivacious, smiling face that she had come to believe that Lady Betty really did talk ...
— The Merriweather Girls and the Mystery of the Queen's Fan • Lizette M. Edholm

... the room with a handful. "The postman was good to every one of us." She tossed two across the room to Betty, who sat reading on the divan, and one to Henrietta, who had just finished cleaning ...
— The Little Colonel's Chum: Mary Ware • Annie Fellows Johnston

... brought her in before Ma'aruf, he began scattering gold on the people's heads, and they made her a mighty fine procession, whilst Ma'aruf expended in her honour vast sums of money. Then they brought him in to Princess Dunya and he sat down on the high divan; after which they let fall the curtains and shut the doors and withdrew, leaving him alone with his bride; whereupon he smote hand upon hand and sat awhile sorrowful and saying, "There is no Majesty and there is no Might save in Allah, the Glorious, ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 10 • Richard F. Burton

... Queen, and the glass which reflected the smiles and frowns of royalty. He afterwards saw her the idol of the party which opposed government, sung by Waller, flattered by Holland, presiding with all the frivolity and pride of a pretty trifler at the dark divan, while Pym and St. John disclosed their hopes of extending their aggressions to seizing the remaining prerogatives of the alarmed and conceding King. Weak, vain, passionate, and unprincipled, with no determined object but her own aggrandizement—no ...
— The Loyalists, Vol. 1-3 - An Historical Novel • Jane West

... room had flaunting green walls with a red border; the ceiling was gaudily painted with angels, flowers, and festoons. Some colored prints hung on the walls—a portrait of the Empress Eugenie on horseback, in a Spanish dress, and four glaring views of Vesuvius in full eruption. A divan, covered with well-worn chintz, ran round two sides of the room. Between the ranges of the graceful casements stood a marble console-table, with a mirror in a black frame. An open card-table was placed ...
— The Italians • Frances Elliot

... sitting on a luxurious divan and he held my milk-white hand in his. I do not make that statement as a startling announcement of an unusual occurrence, but simply ...
— Fair to Look Upon • Mary Belle Freeley

... Tim Fisher sat on the low divan in the living room half-facing each other. Apart, but just so far apart that they could touch with half a gesture, they were discussing the problem of domicile. They were also still quibbling mildly about the honeymoon. Tim Fisher wanted a short, noisy one. ...
— The Fourth R • George Oliver Smith

... he was remarkable for learning and wisdom, and there are extant collections (almost all certainly spurious) of proverbs and verses which bear his name: the Sentences of Ali (Eng. trans., William Yule, Edinburgh, 1832); H. L. Fleischer, Alis hundert Spruche (Leipz. 1837); the Divan, by G. Kuypert (Leiden, 1745, and at Bulak, 1835); C. Brockelmann, Gesch. d. arabisch. Lit. ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia

... denial that would convince her. His mounting vanity drove away his anger. He forgot everything but her sheathed loveliness, the enticement of this lovely creature whose smoldering eyes invited. Crossing the room, he stood behind her divan and looked down at her with his hands on the back ...
— The Vision Spendid • William MacLeod Raine

... against their meddling with the affair of slavery, or attempting to mend the condition of the slaves, it put me in mind of a similar one made about one hundred years since by Sidi Mehemet Ibrahim, a member of the Divan of Algiers, which may be seen in Martin's Account of his Consulship, anno 1687. It was against granting the petition of a sect called Erika, or Purists, who prayed for the abolition of piracy and slavery as being unjust. Mr. Jackson does not quote it; ...
— Anti-Slavery Opinions before the Year 1800 - Read before the Cincinnati Literary Club, November 16, 1872 • William Frederick Poole

... scream interrupted her, a quick catching of the breath by a stout lady, a newcomer, who was seated on a divan, I should have judged this woman to be a rather commonplace person except that her deeply sunken eyes seemed to carry a far away expression as if she saw things that were invisible to others. Now her eyes were ...
— Possessed • Cleveland Moffett

... long day of outdoor fun, stupefied with fresh air and exercise, Lawrence, and Sylvia too, could not keep their eyes open, and dozed and woke and dozed again, coiled like so many little kittens among the cushions of the big divan. In all the intensely enjoyed personal pleasures of her later youth, and these were many for Sylvia, she was never to know a more utter sweetness than thus to fall asleep, the music a far-off murmur in her ...
— The Bent Twig • Dorothy Canfield

... the ship," Colonel Pennington boomed with his best air of hearty expansiveness. "Well, well," he continued, leading Mrs. Poundstone to a divan in front of the fire, "this is certainly delightful. My niece will be down in two shakes of a lamb's tail. Have a ...
— The Valley of the Giants • Peter B. Kyne

... Humphrey remained over to sit on the music-stool, with the air of one playing the pianola. In this position he found his uses. There are times when a husband may legitimately be annoyed; at these times it was pleasant to kick Humphrey off his stool on to the divan, to stand on the divan and kick him on to the sofa, to stand on the sofa and kick him on to the book-case; and then, feeling another man, to replace him on the music-stool and apologise to Celia. It was thus ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 147, October 14, 1914 • Various

... fittings, with their voices tinkling pleasantly in a cascade of solicitous little questions. Cushat-Prinkly detested the whole system of afternoon tea. According to his theory of life a woman should lie on a divan or couch, talking with incomparable charm or looking unutterable thoughts, or merely silent as a thing to be looked on, and from behind a silken curtain a small Nubian page should silently bring in a tray with cups and dainties, to be accepted silently, ...
— The Toys of Peace • Saki

... settled the question for me. It snapped without warning—how it had supported my weight up to then I don't know—and I fell in a heap (and, as it seemed to me at the time, with a most reverberating crash) on to the soft divan I had prepared for ...
— The Man with the Clubfoot • Valentine Williams

... snowy whiteness; her hair was parted in front, and fastened up behind a l'antique: but she wore no ribbon, no ornament—nothing but what was necessary. The furniture of the room, which served at the same time as a sitting-room and studio, was equally simple: a little divan, some chairs and two arm-chairs covered with gray cloth, a round table, a black marble time-piece of the simplest form; two engravings, the 'Spasimo di Sicilia' and the 'Three Maries,' alone ornamented the walls; green blinds were placed over the windows, not for ornament, but to ...
— Chambers' Edinburgh Journal - Volume XVII., No 423, New Series. February 7th, 1852 • Various

... up from that floor instantly," ordered the girl on the divan. "Nothing worse for colds than rag carpet rugs. There's plenty of room up here out of drafts. Come, lovey. Do try to curl up some. I always fear you will break up in splinters when I see you ...
— Jane Allen: Junior • Edith Bancroft

... not unnatural that Diane should go and sit on the divan beside Dorothea for any exchange of such confidences as could not be conveniently made from a distance. If she admitted anything on her own part, it was by implication rather than by direct assertion, and though she did not promise in words to come to ...
— The Inner Shrine • Basil King

... Upon a divan in the splendid armoury of the pacha's palace at Bosnia-Serai, the young Turk Ibrahim was seated in deep thought, the day after his return home. On the walls around him were displayed weapons and military accoutrements of every kind. Damascus sabres richly inlaid, ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXLII. Vol. LV. April, 1844 • Various

... way back to the pilot-house I stopped in at the engine-room. I found Moses Brickland, seated on his leather-cushioned divan, watching the movements of the engine. Notwithstanding the uneasy movement of the vessel the machinery seemed to be working ...
— Up the River - or, Yachting on the Mississippi • Oliver Optic



Words linked to "Divan" :   council chamber, boardroom, diwan, chamber, divan bed



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