"Feminine" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... Her feminine instinct had been right. Now for the first time taken out of his shut-up nursery life, where he himself had been the principal object—where he had no playfellows and no companions save those he had been used to from infancy—removed from this, ...
— A Noble Life • Dinah Maria Mulock Craik
... charged into the street, they heard behind them a wild feminine shriek, then a crash of pottery and glass, then silence, and an instant later the Ship ...
— The Red Cross Girl • Richard Harding Davis
... half-past nine and ten; they retired very late, bidding their landlady wake them at eight-thirty. She would see to it that they were not aroused until ten. When they awoke and saw the time, they would jump out of bed, hurriedly dress and dash off like a shot, cursing the landlady. Then, when the feminine element of the house gave signs of life, every nook would echo with cries, discordant voices, conversations shouted from one bedchamber to another, and out of the rooms, their hands armed with the night-service, would come the landlady, one of Dona Violante's daughters, a tall, obese ...
— The Quest • Pio Baroja
... with the feminine character in one who possessed it in a simple but also at the same time grand and noble form. His own wife had enabled him to see into the depths of the real woman's nature, as in a bright mirror-like lake. He saw in her the true heroine who fought with weapons that were constantly unconquerable. ...
— Weird Tales, Vol. II. • E. T. A. Hoffmann
... three of us entered the house together. I remember the musty, warm, shut-in odour of the front room. I heard the faint cry of a child. The room was dim, with a single kerosene lamp, but I saw three women huddled by the stove, in which a new fire was blazing. Two looked up as we entered, with feminine instinct moving aside to hide ...
— Adventures In Friendship • David Grayson
... the skylight. It thrilled me. Not the words—she was but giving a direction to the Chinese steward—but the rich, sweet quality of the voice. I, the foc'sle Jack, whose ears' portion was harsh, bruising oaths, felt the feminine accents as a healing salve. They stirred forgotten memories; they sent my mind leaping backwards over the hard years to my childhood, and the sound of my mother's voice. No wonder; I had scarce once heard the mellow sound of a good woman's voice since I ran away to sea five years before, ...
— The Blood Ship • Norman Springer
... seated herself before her cash-boxes and explained her highly original financial operations. One would be indeed in dire distress of mind could one refrain from smiling when, having made the preliminary announcement,—"The great feminine financier of the century is in her counting-room: let the earth tremble!"—she planted herself on the bed, oriental fashion, took pencil and account-book in lap, spread cigar-box, sugar-bowl, and ginger-jar before her on the pillows, and ruffled her ...
— Polly Oliver's Problem • Kate Douglas Smith Wiggin
... adroitness, but mistakenly carrying by storm the love of the lady for himself. The lady is so confoundedly attractive in these circumstances, possibly because there is about them a tonic which lends additional colour to the feminine cheek and a new brilliance to the eye. And, however bitter may be the first moment when the true personalities are divulged, it all comes right in the end. Here is a story of intrigue and battle and ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 156, Jan. 29, 1919 • Various
... in nature, her books live, while those of her ponderous rival are being very rapidly forgotten. "Romola" and "Daniel Deronda" are dead beyond hope of resurrection; "The Mill on the Floss", being more feminine, still lives, even though its destiny is to be forgotten when ...
— Modern Painting • George Moore
... second half of the last line is that there is very frequently no unaccented syllable between the second and the third accented ones. Among occasional variations of the normal strophe as here described may be mentioned the following: The end-rhyme is in a few instances feminine instead of masculine; while on the other hand the ending of the first half-lines is occasionally masculine instead of feminine, that is, the caesura is not "ringing." In a few scattered instances we find strophes that rhyme throughout in the caesura ...
— The Nibelungenlied - Translated into Rhymed English Verse in the Metre of the Original • trans. by George Henry Needler
... following the bent of her dearest wishes—in marrying this man she loved so truly. She was weak; she was giving way to temptation; she was going back from her word; she was, she said, giving up her claim to that high standard of feminine character, which it should be the proudest boast ...
— The Kellys and the O'Kellys • Anthony Trollope
... woman. As for Miss Blunt's being thirty, she is about twenty-four; She wore a fresh white dress, with a violet ribbon at her neck, and a rosebud in her button-hole,—or whatever corresponds thereto on the feminine bosom. I thought I discerned in this costume a vague intention of courtesy, of deference, of celebrating my arrival. I don't believe Miss Blunt wears white muslin every day. She shook hands with me, and made me a ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 100, February, 1866 • Various
... herself a supernumerary, treated with civility, and no more, as she ate her meals with a very feminine Court, for almost all the gentlemen were in Ireland with the King. She had a room in the entresol to herself, in Pauline's absence, and here she could in turn sit and dream, or mend and furbish up her clothes—a serious matter now—or ...
— A Reputed Changeling • Charlotte M. Yonge
... presented to Antony, who gave the head to his wife, Fulvia, whose crimes Cicero had often rebuked. Forsyth says, "She took it, and placing it on her lap, addressed it as if it were alive, in words of bitter insult. She dragged out the tongue, whose sarcasms she had so often felt, and with feminine rage pierced it with her bodkin. It was then taken and nailed to the rostra, together with the hands, to molder there in mockery of the triumphs of his eloquence, of which that spot had so often been the scene. A sadder sight was ...
— History of Education • Levi Seeley
... physician had recommended him to an absolutely quiet place for the entire summer. She burned with an irrepressible desire to have me make the acquaintance of this son of wealth and literature, either from the feminine proclivity for match-making, or because, possibly, she thought, having an intense reverence for writers, that our conversation would be of an edifying and uncommon character. I fear she was disappointed, for on the occasion ...
— A Village Ophelia and Other Stories • Anne Reeve Aldrich
... even for medley; but proceed we into the interior of the grand and luxurious feminine institution, where their sex is speedily discovered, but for certain reasons concealed by the discoverers. Lectures on the past and what might be done to accomplish female equality, and description of the boundaries, ...
— Early Reviews of English Poets • John Louis Haney
... that his subscription-lists flourished, his bazaars prospered, his missions and retreats overflowed with feminine money, and his Church was overloaded with floral tributes. The brutal tribe of men, however, sneered at him, and perversely suspected his motives; nor were they reconciled to him when they saw him relieving the gloom of a generally (so it was understood) ascetic existence by dining at a smart restaurant ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 100, April 25, 1891 • Various
... great social wheel, every mail brought her a flood of notes, every quarter hour summoned her to the telephone, every fraction of the day had its appointed pleasure. Julia must swiftly eliminate from her life much of the rich feminine tradition of housewifery; it was not for her to darn her husband's hose, to set exquisite patches in thinning table linen, to gather flowers for jars and vases. Julia never saw Jim's clothing except when he was wearing it, the table linen was Ellie's affair, ...
— The Story Of Julia Page - Works of Kathleen Norris, Volume V. • Kathleen Norris
... dust." Mr. Clayton said that the matter examined by him was "merely wind-borne dust from the roads and lanes of Wessex." This opinion is typical of all scientific opinion—or theological opinion—or feminine opinion—all very well except for what it disregards. The most charitable thing I can think of—because I think it gives us a broader tone to relieve our malices with occasional charities—is that Mr. Clayton had not heard of the astonishing extent of ...
— The Book of the Damned • Charles Fort
... made in respect of foreign words which retain their original form, especially those which retain their Latin plurals, the feminine singular being often confused with the neuter plural. For instance, there is the word animalcule (plural animalcules), also written animalculum (plural animalcula). Now, the plural animalcula is often supposed to be the feminine singular, ...
— Literary Blunders • Henry B. Wheatley
... severity. Men, when they show themselves unmerciful for certain errors, are too apt to forget that they have all, more or less, spent part of their lives seeking to bring them about for their own benefit. But there is in the feminine type which I have just sketched something more shocking than immorality itself, which, however, it is rather difficult to separate from it. And so, notwithstanding my desire of not making myself conspicuous in anything, I have been unable to take upon myself ...
— Led Astray and The Sphinx - Two Novellas In One Volume • Octave Feuillet
... of action; but among no class of human beings has nature so profusely distributed this principle of life and action as through the whole sensitive family of genius. It reaches even to a feminine susceptibility. The love of praise is instinctive in their nature. Praise with them is the evidence of the past and the pledge of the future. The generous qualities and the virtues of a man of genius are really produced by the applause conferred ...
— Literary Character of Men of Genius - Drawn from Their Own Feelings and Confessions • Isaac D'Israeli
... on to love him, and then—either betrayed his brutal nature so that hers rose up in revolt, or—just as likely—that kind of man would do anything—gone off and left her. His picture revealed a smart-looking person with black hair and a waxed moustache, and complexion of feminine red and white (Geoffrey called ...
— Geoffrey Strong • Laura E. Richards
... from what may be considered specifically a soubrette character. Complaints are uttered about the difficulty of finding a player to represent the comic mother-in-law; indeed, playwrights are sometimes affected in their work by the fear that if they write broad comedy for feminine parts the difficulty of casting ...
— Our Stage and Its Critics • "E.F.S." of "The Westminster Gazette"
... understand; but by the accent the young man plainly saw that the beautiful Englishwoman was in a great rage. She terminated it by an action which left no doubt as to the nature of this conversation; this was a blow with her fan, applied with such force that the little feminine weapon flew ...
— The Three Musketeers • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... amusing part of our experience was yet to come. I had been speculating, as evening approached, on our prospects for the night's accommodation. As our pale, melancholy-looking landlady and her fat baby were evidently the only specimens of the feminine gender about the establishment, it was hardly reasonable to suppose that any of the other cabins contained wherewithal to furnish us a comfortable lodging, and the one in which we were offered nothing of the sort to view, but two beds, uncurtained, extended ...
— Wau-bun - The Early Day in the Northwest • Juliette Augusta Magill Kinzie
... nothing, for he had just seen an example of her courage in a deed that had tried even his own nerve, and, withal, she was a bright, happy girl, earnest and true, possessing all the softer graces of his sisters, and that exquisite touch of feminine delicacy and refinement which appeals more to ...
— Betty Zane • Zane Grey
... greatly; but for some time so busy were we that neither of us spoke. On my own part I experienced a strange hesitancy in addressing her upon terms of equality. Ordinarily not easily embarrassed in feminine society, I felt in this instance a definite barrier between us, which prevented my feeling at ease. Now and then as we sat opposite each other, eating amid a silence most unpleasant, I would catch her eyes glancing across at me, but they were lowered instantly ...
— My Lady of the North • Randall Parrish
... he had ever known, and nearly all the mother too; unless Gyda might have the better claim to that title. All the readier, perhaps, he was able to deal with this burst of thoroughly natural passion, thoroughly womanish as it also was. His point of view had not been spoiled by feminine pettinesses. He took this paroxysm of what it was; something that must in the first instance have its way and work its own relief. He did not speak to Hazel at first, nor attempt to check the outflow of ...
— The Gold of Chickaree • Susan Warner
... fascinating. Women yielded gracefully, nay, eagerly, to his sway; and much delicate flattery had their eyes and lips fed him upon. Sylvie piqued him a trifle by her utter unconcern—or was it the fine instinct of coquetry inherent in feminine nature? ...
— Hope Mills - or Between Friend and Sweetheart • Amanda M. Douglas
... mind | |and the finishings of the interior of the | |house. | | | | The thing was suggested to him by a | |bonfire he saw a man build in the street. | |Charlotte hadn't seen the other fire. For | |some reason Charlotte's feminine mind | |refused to understand just what the fire | |was like. | | | | Consequently nothing remained for | |Johnnie to do but build a fire of his own. | |He piled all of the newspapers and | |playthings that ...
— Newspaper Reporting and Correspondence - A Manual for Reporters, Correspondents, and Students of - Newspaper Writing • Grant Milnor Hyde
... increasingly illustrate, the beauty and potency, of the passive virtues—of the spiritual element of endurance and non-resistance. He will show to us that a true and perfected character—a character molded after that of the divine Exemplar—must have also, and with equal emphasis, the sweet and feminine passive graces of life as an essential element. In India today the Anglo-Saxon is wont to speak with contempt of "The mild Hindu." That mildness which we are too apt to despise contains the germs of that half of Christian character which is too largely wanting in the spiritual ...
— India's Problem Krishna or Christ • John P. Jones
... of her benevolence becomes a perpetual trickle of advice, remonstrance, and even reproof. A strong-minded parson of course soon makes himself master of his District Visitors, but the ordinary vicar generally feels that his District Visitors are masters of him. The harm that comes of this feminine despotism is the feminine impress it leaves on the whole aspect of the parish. Manly preaching disappears before the disappointed faces the preacher encounters on Monday. A policy of expedients and evasions takes the place of any straightforward attempt to meet or denounce ...
— Stray Studies from England and Italy • John Richard Green
... being lost, cannot be lamented? Fear was not that I should do ill, but that I should do nothing Fear: begets a terrible astonishment and confusion Feared, lest disgrace should make such delinquents desperate Feminine polity has a mysterious procedure Few men have been admired by their own domestics Few men have made a wife of a mistress, who have not repented it First informed who were to be the other guests First thing to be considered in love matters: a fitting time Flatterer in your old ...
— Quotes and Images From The Works of Michel De Montaigne • Michel De Montaigne
... also "showed the vile note of impudency." One parson thus severely addressed them from the pulpit: "The special sin of woman is pride and haughtiness, and that because they are generally more ignorant and worthless," and he added that this feminine pride vented itself in gesture, hair, behavior, and apparel. I fear all this was true, for the Court also complained of my ignorant and worthless sex for "cutting and curling and laying out of the hair, especially among the younger sort." Increase Mather gave them this thrust in his sermon on the ...
— Customs and Fashions in Old New England • Alice Morse Earle
... hard by hate, Till good Josiah drove them thence to Hell. With these came they who, from the bordering flood Of old Euphrates to the brook that parts Egypt from Syrian ground, had general names Of Baalim and Ashtaroth—those male, These feminine. For Spirits, when they please, Can either sex assume, or both; so soft And uncompounded is their essence pure, Not tried or manacled with joint or limb, Nor founded on the brittle strength of bones, Like cumbrous flesh; but, in what shape they choose, Dilated or condensed, bright or obscure, Can ...
— Paradise Lost • John Milton
... circumstantial evidence in her search for the murderer in a most bewildering and thoroughly feminine fashion.... The story is brimful of excitement, and no little ingenuity is displayed in its ...
— The Passenger from Calais • Arthur Griffiths
... waiting some minutes in the outer office; he proposed that he should bring her in; and I gathered from his manner, that he expected her to pronounce against his accepting my solicitation, and so terminate our interview pleasantly, with the aid of the feminine social grace. ...
— Under the Prophet in Utah - The National Menace of a Political Priestcraft • Frank J. Cannon and Harvey J. O'Higgins
... reckoned on a dowry; what allured him was the remarkable beauty of the innocent girl, above all her innocent appearance, which had a peculiar attraction for a vicious profligate, who had hitherto admired only the coarser types of feminine beauty. ...
— The Brothers Karamazov • Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... by the count, sometimes obliged to spend several days with certain great ladies, he had never married; in fact, his reputation had hindered certain young women from accepting him. Incapable of finding consolation in the practice of his profession, which gave him such power over feminine weakness, the poor bonesetter felt himself born for the joys of family and yet was ...
— The Hated Son • Honore de Balzac
... with side passages opening into it, here and there. Feminine curiosity compelled Idalia to cast a glance into each one of these caverns; here she could use the full light of her lantern. One of these caverns might have been a wine-cellar; there were still some casks there; from this she concluded that there must be a still ...
— Peter the Priest • Mr Jkai
... familiar; his foppery went no farther than a care for his personal appearance which made him agreeable; he showed consideration for rank; he allowed young men a certain freedom, to which his Parisian experience assigned due limits; though skilful with sword and pistol, he was noted for a feminine gentleness for which others were grateful. His medium height and plumpness (which had not yet increased into obesity, an obstacle to personal elegance) did not prevent his outer man from playing the part of a Bordelais Brummell. ...
— The Marriage Contract • Honore de Balzac
... conviction which, as he conceived, animated the whole. And now, the other man, in whose heart those contemptuous words still rankled, found his turn had come. He had bitterly resented Barron's sarcastic reference to those holy things which guided his life; there was something of feminine nature in him too; so he did not ...
— Lying Prophets • Eden Phillpotts
... hunch dismissed summarily this expression of opinion as altogether feminine. But he had something to say about the package itself, which kept the good woman waiting, though a customer or two ...
— The Mystery of the Hasty Arrow • Anna Katharine Green
... generally wore a short round skirt, and long basque like overgarments, the two invariably of different, but bright, colors. All of them wore much ribbon and jewelry, but, as a rule, they were too dark of countenance to suit the ideas of the five concerning feminine beauty. At rare intervals, however, they saw a girl with light hair and light eyes and light complexion, and ...
— The Free Rangers - A Story of the Early Days Along the Mississippi • Joseph A. Altsheler
... processions, white and black, in their outings and celebrations, or with bowed head and thoughtful countenance he has led the march to the grave. As I recollect Uncle Guy, he was the embodiment of neatness, feminine in build—it seemed that nature intended to form a woman instead of a man. Like a woman, he plaited his hair and drew it down behind his ears. His hands and feet were small, his fingers tapering; his face was black, his eyes small, his lips and nose thin, ...
— Hanover; Or The Persecution of the Lowly - A Story of the Wilmington Massacre. • David Bryant Fulton
... a form of refreshment to which the female inhabitants of that delightful place were strongly addicted. In vain did Dr. Weatherby, the great authority in all that concerned the health of the neighborhood, lift up his voice against the mild feminine dram-drinking of these modern days, denouncing it in no measured terms: the ladies of Oldfield listened incredulously, and, softly quoting Cowper's lines as to the "cup that cheers and not inebriates," still presided over their dainty little tea-tables, and vied with one ...
— Not Like Other Girls • Rosa N. Carey
... story of Little Red Riding-Hood, but the particular feature was an inscription upon the cover written in a delicate feminine hand— ...
— Quicksilver - The Boy With No Skid To His Wheel • George Manville Fenn
... writes a correspondent in The Daily Mail, "that a clearly defined waist-line should be reintroduced into feminine dress." Others claim that as the neck-line is now worn round the waist the reintroduction of a waist-line elsewhere can only lead ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 159, September 8th, 1920 • Various
... of Edward the Confessor, was a highly accomplished lady, who sometimes intercepted the master of Westminster School and his scholars in their walks, questioning them in Latin. She was also skilled in all feminine works, embroidering the robes of her royal ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 18, No. 107, September, 1866 • Various
... with people who get money by public exhibitions as mediums, or with semi-idiots such as those who make a court for a Mrs. ——, or other feminine personages of that kind, I would not willingly place any barriers between my mind and any possible channel of truth affecting the human lot. The spirit in which you have written in the paper you kindly sent me is likely to touch others, and arouse them at least to attention in a case where you ...
— The Life of Harriet Beecher Stowe • Charles Edward Stowe
... in caprice and free-will she may find an answer to those two questions which stir her to her depths: What is she that God should so love her? and how comes she to be away from Him? Clothed in the body of either man or woman, the soul is predominantly feminine—the Feminine Principle beloved of, and returning to, the Eternal Masculine of God. Caprice is feminine; Caprice and Mystery are two enchanting sisters, and in Woman we see them as being irresistible to Man. Angels, though ...
— The Prodigal Returns • Lilian Staveley
... and declared all women of "lewd character" unfit to vote. "Lewd" not being interpreted, of course, as prostitution IN marriage. It goes without saying that illegal prostitution and gambling have been prohibited. In this regard the law must needs be of feminine nature: it always prohibits. Therein all laws are wonderful. They go no further, but their very tendencies open all the floodgates of hell. Prostitution and gambling have never done a more flourishing business than since the law has been ...
— Anarchism and Other Essays • Emma Goldman
... of power is an infernal passion, because its root is self love; in woman, it is a divine impulse, connected only with the love of noble uses. Our author is no advocate for women's rights, there being two orders of human capacities, masculine and feminine. Man is master of the outer world: woman cannot cope with him there; her sphere is freer, deeper, higher, and of more importance to the future destinies of the race. This book will be sharply criticized ...
— Continental Monthly , Vol. 6, No. 1, July, 1864 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy. • Various
... could get. When he was some distance off she charged him, whereupon he bolted back toward his wife. The bear overtook him, knocked him down and bit him severely. But the man's wife, without hesitation, attacked the bear with that thoroughly feminine weapon, an umbrella, and frightened her off. The man spent several weeks in the Park hospital before he recovered. Perhaps the following telegram sent by the manager of the Lake Hotel to Major Pitcher illustrates with sufficient clearness the mutual relations of the bears, the tourists, ...
— American Big Game in Its Haunts • Various
... looking quite into the dim future, Mrs. Herbert," he laughed. "You see, since I first went on active service I have been removed altogether from feminine attractions. Of course I have been thinking it over, but for the present my inclination turns towards yachting. I have always been fond of the water, and had a strong wish to go to sea when I was a boy, but that aspiration was not encouraged. However, I can follow ...
— The Queen's Cup • G. A. Henty
... well begin pouring the tea at once," she observed coolly; "that's a feminine duty, you ...
— The Blunders of a Bashful Man • Metta Victoria Fuller Victor
... "Oiseau," as you know, comes from "avis;" but it had at this time got "oisel" for its singular number, of which the terminating "sel" confused itself with the "selle," from "ancilla" in domisella and demoiselle; and the feminine form "oiselle" thus snatched for itself some of the delightfulness belonging to the title of a young lady. Then note that "esperitel" does not here mean merely spiritual, (because all angels are spiritual) ...
— Love's Meinie - Three Lectures on Greek and English Birds • John Ruskin
... OF DESIRE An absorbing romance written with all that sense of feminine tenderness that has given the novels of ...
— The Land of Promise • D. Torbett
... pretty, feminine work might beguile you of a few of the long hours of these long days," said mother. "One can't be ...
— Stepping Heavenward • Mrs. E. Prentiss
... not treat Mercy Philbrick as a stranger; for Mrs. Hunter had told him already all she knew of her friend's life, and had showed him several of Mercy's poems, which had surprised him much by their beauty, and still more by their condensation of thought. They seemed to him almost more masculine than feminine; and he had unconsciously anticipated that in seeing Mercy he would see a woman of masculine type. He was greatly astonished. He could not associate this slight, fair girl, with a child's honesty and appeal in her eyes, with the forceful words he ...
— Mercy Philbrick's Choice • Helen Hunt Jackson
... and the heat of June, Jan quite decided on that Uzhitze mud patch that a holiday would do little harm to himself, and good to everybody else. Then, however, came the problem of Jo. Jo is a socialistic sort of a person with conservative instincts. She has the feminine ability to get her wheels on a rail and run comfortably along till Jan appears like a big railway accident and throws the scenery about; but once the resolution accomplished she pursues the idea with a determination and ferocity which leaves Jan far ...
— The Luck of Thirteen - Wanderings and Flight through Montenegro and Serbia • Jan Gordon
... pictures roused a spirit of devotion, whether the women of the Philippines are exceptional, the feminine part of the assembly remained silent. Scarcely was heard even a yawn, stifled behind a fan. The men made more stir. The most interesting and animated group was formed by two monks, two Spanish provincials, and an officer, seated round ...
— An Eagle Flight - A Filipino Novel Adapted from Noli Me Tangere • Jose Rizal
... than the otherwise more advanced Malays and Javanese. There were three women in the party. One of the men was dressed as a woman and his hands were tatued. Though his voice was quite manly, there was something feminine about him and in appearance he was less robust than the others. According to my Chinese interpreter, who has travelled much, there are many such men ...
— Through Central Borneo: - An Account of Two Years' Travel in the Land of Head-Hunters - Between the Years 1913 and 1917 • Carl Lumholtz
... answer, but only indicated with his eyes a feminine figure. It was a young girl of seventeen or eighteen, wearing a Russian dress, with her head bare and a little shawl flung carelessly on one shoulder; not a passenger, but I suppose a sister or daughter of the station-master. She was standing near ...
— The Schoolmistress and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov
... have nearly as often been men as women, and the forces of Anti-feminism have been the vague massive inert forces of an order which had indeed made the world in an undue degree "a man's world," but unconsciously and involuntarily, and by an instrumentation which was feminine as well as masculine. The advocates of Woman's Rights have seldom been met by the charge that they were unjustly encroaching on the Rights of Man. Feminism has never encountered an ...
— Essays in War-Time - Further Studies In The Task Of Social Hygiene • Havelock Ellis
... they shone, White-veiled, and pale of face, and still and meek, An inly-bending curve, like some young moon Whose crescent glitters o'er a dusky strait. In front were monks dark-stoled: for Hilda ruled, Though feminine, two houses, one of men: Upon two chasm-divided rocks they stood, To various service vowed, though single Faith:— Not ever, save at rarest festival, Their holy inmates met. 'Is this the man Favoured, though late, ...
— Legends of the Saxon Saints • Aubrey de Vere
... the conditions of a scientific hypothesis. No man who is cautious would dream of trusting to an explanation of this kind simply because it explained one particular set of facts. Before you can possibly be safe in dealing with Nature—who is very properly made of the feminine gender, on account of the astonishing tricks which she plays upon her admirers!—I say before you can be safe in dealing with Nature, you must get two or three kinds of cross proofs, so as to make sure not only ...
— Coral and Coral Reefs • Thomas H. Huxley
... above all—society knows I speak the truth—WELL DRESSED, for by the latter virtue alone is a woman allowed any precedence nowadays—would not all the less fortunate and lovely of her sex feel somewhat envious? Ah, yes; they would and they do; but believe me, the selfish feminine thing, whose only sincere worship is offered at the shrines of Fashion and Folly, is of all creatures the one whose life is to be despised and never desired, and whose death makes no blank even in the circles of her ...
— Vendetta - A Story of One Forgotten • Marie Corelli
... lids had been previously closed, the long lashes resting on his cheek, had raised them; and the large blue orbs, fixed in a sort of wondering stare on the face of the American captain, bore out his remark in some sense, as they appeared feminine in character, although wanting in expression and ...
— Picked up at Sea - The Gold Miners of Minturne Creek • J.C. Hutcheson
... The Lane none more deserved distinction than Mary Magovern. The grandmother of a numerous family, she united all the masculine and feminine virtues. About the stiff, spotless and colossal frill of her cap curled wreaths of smoke from her stout dhudeen as she sat before the door blacking the small boots of her grandchildren, stopping from time to time to remove the pipe from her mouth, that she might deliver in her full ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. XXVI., December, 1880. • Various
... serious studies, I by no means neglect my little feminine occupations. I am embroidering on canvas a huntsman carrying a gun, and holding his hound by ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. IV. October, 1863, No. IV. - Devoted to Literature and National Policy. • Various
... kvass or water! [Exit LUKA] What a way to reason! A man is in desperate need of his money, and she won't pay it because, you see, she is not disposed to attend to money matters!... That's real silly feminine logic. That's why I never did like, and don't like now, to have to talk to women. I'd rather sit on a barrel of gunpowder than talk to a woman. Brr!... I feel quite chilly—and it's all on account of that little bit of fluff! I can't even ...
— Plays by Chekhov, Second Series • Anton Chekhov
... are enthroned on high, with St. Francis and St. Liberale on either hand. The Child's glance is turned upon the soldier-saint, a gallant figure with his lance at rest, his dagger on his hip, his gloves in his hand, young, high-bred, with features of almost feminine beauty. The picture is conceived in a new spirit of simplicity of design, and shows a new feeling for restraint in matters of detail. It is the work of a man who has observed that early morning, like late evening, has a marvellous power of ...
— The Venetian School of Painting • Evelyn March Phillipps
... queen of heaven unrolled Before the Jew a threadbare turban "Three shillings." "One. 'T will suit some old Terrific feminine suburban." ...
— The Poetical Works of Oliver Wendell Holmes, Complete • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... her regal grace, and eyes that had stolen the tenderest blue from a turquoise sky beneath the shade of modest lashes. Appealing lotus-like lips, rosy- ripe and moist with the dew of promised bliss; sensuous curves and graceful feminine lines..... such a woman was Helen. And he! Six feet of Western manhood; a graduate of Yale, and still an athlete at 35. A man with the highest ideals of fine, clean, strong manhood. He had gone West shortly ...
— Reno - A Book of Short Stories and Information • Lilyan Stratton
... her like a light mantle she had snatched up from nature to wear about her always, did not displace the other vision of beauty in his heart. It did not even jostle it. Esther Blake was, he knew, the sum of the ineffable feminine. ...
— The Prisoner • Alice Brown
... to him in the pitiful attempts at home making shown in the few crude decorations. A feminine instinct for domesticity evidenced itself in the imitation of the scalloped border of a lace curtain made in soap on the glass of the small window in the back of the wagon, in a pin cushion of coarse muslin worked in blue worsted yarn, in the bouquet of dried goldenrod ...
— The Fighting Shepherdess • Caroline Lockhart
... lack of personal attractiveness for the humbler tasks of life. Instinctively we associate them with household work, nursing, and the general drudgery of existence. One never dreams of their having a life of their own. They have no accomplishments, nor any of the feminine charms. Women to whom an offer of marriage would seem as terrifying as a comet, they belong to the neutrals of the human hive, and are, practically speaking, only a little higher than the paid domestic. Indeed, perhaps their one distinction is ...
— Different Girls • Various
... yet how feminine is the sentiment! No man could have written that sonnet. It rises spontaneously from the heart of a Christian woman, which overflows with feelings more gracious and more graceful than ever man's can be. It teaches us what religious poetry truly is; for it makes affections inspired ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 56, Number 349, November, 1844 • Various
... in her present disheveled condition, she was beautiful—a trifle on the petite side, with black hair and black eyes that quirled up oddly at the outer corners. Her nails were black-lacquered and spotted with little gold stars, evidently a new feminine fad from Terra. ...
— Ullr Uprising • Henry Beam Piper
... the great struggle of human life. Ah, in the battle of life you want a stronger weapon than a lace fan or a croquet mallet! The load of life is so heavy that in order to draw it, you want a team stronger than one made up of a masculine grasshopper and a feminine butterfly. ...
— New Tabernacle Sermons • Thomas De Witt Talmage
... as a feminine whimsicality too deep for mere male wisdom. Once on the way back he thought of the route that would go ...
— Once to Every Man • Larry Evans
... the noblest form, of character unfolding itself by means of one action, as far as possible in one place, and within the limits of one day. It is bound by other formal and conventional rules: of versification—such as the alternation of masculine and feminine pairs of rhymes, and of taste—such as the avoidance of all "doing of deeds" on the stage (e.g., all fighting and dying take place behind the scenes) and the grouping of the fewest possible secondary parts around ...
— Esther • Jean Racine
... of hospitality or in performing those little household offices which fall so gracefully on the young. Engrossed with her books and studies, pursuits noble and ennobling in themselves, but degraded from their high and holy purpose when cultivated to the exclusion of the lovely, feminine virtues, Mittie was almost a stranger ...
— Helen and Arthur - or, Miss Thusa's Spinning Wheel • Caroline Lee Hentz
... his thin lip and reflecting mournfully upon the change in his position since he had talked with his father in the morning. While they had been speaking Marietta had gone to a little distance, affecting to unfold the mantle and fold it again according to feminine rules. As she heard the door shut again she glanced at her father's face, and saw that he was ...
— Marietta - A Maid of Venice • F. Marion Crawford
... cried Mrs. March. "How—how did she look there, Basil?" She had her feminine misgivings; she was not sure but the girl was something of a poseuse, and enjoyed the picturesqueness, as well as the pain; and she wished to be convinced that it was ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... He developed his researches on the lines of Hogarth, but was only able to discover a prolongation of sexual pleasure in aesthetic facts. "Where," he exclaims, "is there any beauty that does not come from the feminine figure, the centre of all beauty? The undulating line is beautiful, because it is found in the body of woman; essentially feminine movements are beautiful; the notes of music are beautiful, when they melt into one another; a poem is beautiful, ...
— Aesthetic as Science of Expression and General Linguistic • Benedetto Croce
... fell on her, Mrs. Carriswood was in her dressing-room, peacefully watching Derry unpack a box from Paris, in anticipation of a state dinner. And Miss Van Harlem, in a bewitching wrapper, sat on the lounge and admired. Upon this scene of feminine peace and happiness enter the Destroyer, in the shape of a note from Tommy Fitzmaurice! Were they going on Beatoun's little excursion to Alexandria? If they were, he would move heaven and earth to put off ...
— Stories of a Western Town • Octave Thanet
... frowning guns, for them to have come so far and then be delivered at the hands of the General and his staff was quite something. One of the letters I recognized as being from my mother, the other aroused my curiosity. The envelope, directed in a feminine hand, was very neat, but the end had been burned off and the contents were held in place by a narrow red ribbon daintily tied. In so conspicuous a place, with a battle on, I could not trust myself to open my treasures. It was near night ...
— The Story of a Cannoneer Under Stonewall Jackson • Edward A. Moore
... the nooks most haunted by honeysuckle in my own wood, that the reason for its twining is a very feminine one,—that it likes to twine; and that all these whys and wherefores resolve themselves at last into—what a modern philosopher, of course, ...
— Proserpina, Volume 2 - Studies Of Wayside Flowers • John Ruskin
... the little shop-world of Mrs. Mantalini, the fashionable dressmaker; and in Cheeryble Brothers, the golden-hearted old merchants who take Nicholas into their counting-house. Then for single characters commend me to Mrs. Nickleby, whose logic, which some cynics would call feminine, is positively sublime in its want of coherence; and to John Browdie, the honest Yorkshire cornfactor, as good a fellow almost as Dandie Dinmont, the Border yeoman whom Scott made immortal. The high-life ...
— Life of Charles Dickens • Frank Marzials
... A despiser of feminine habits had Clorinda been from her childhood. She disdained to put her hand to the needle and the distaff. She renounced every soft indulgence, every timid retirement, thinking that virtue could be safe wherever it went in its own courageous heart; and so she armed ...
— Stories from the Italian Poets: With Lives of the Writers, Vol. 2 • Leigh Hunt
... contained the usual feminine properties: a handkerchief, sachet-bag, a pocket mirror, and some thin papers, ...
— Jacqueline of Golden River • H. M. Egbert
... fills great space in literature, stocks the circulating library, and counts its Werthers by the thousand in every age. Now we expect this malady, as we look for mumps and measles in the growing child. It is feminine,—unwilling to be weak, yet not able to stand and go. The strong quickly leave ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 13, No. 76, February, 1864 • Various
... Imam is a slim-built, sharp-looking individual of about forty summers, with a face pale, refined, and intellectual; hands white and slender as a lady's, and a foot equally shapely and feminine. He wears a monster green turban, takes his turn regularly at the kalian, and passes it on to the next with the easy gracefulness that comes of good breeding; and by his manners and appearance he creates an impression of being a person rather superior ...
— Around the World on a Bicycle Volume II. - From Teheran To Yokohama • Thomas Stevens
... he saw the lady walking impatiently up and down the room, tapping at the window, mending the fire, and expressing her haste in many other pettish manners so truly feminine. It was Florine. He knew the girl well from his frequenting Bertrand's during this piece of business. Jerome sent her word he would be in, and changing his costume to one he usually wore, presented himself before her in the ...
— The Black Wolf's Breed - A Story of France in the Old World and the New, happening - in the Reign of Louis XIV • Harris Dickson
... hesitated. There was something she had meant to say. In spite of decency, in spite of feminine decorum, she had intended to give him a little shove into the path that should lead him, still innocently, to her own blazonment as a woman who could have her little triumphs like the rest. "If you should ever feel to ...
— Country Neighbors • Alice Brown
... know not what unimaginable nonsense; and holdings of skeins of silk, more difficult to unwind than the labyrinth through which Ariadne's thread conducted Theseus; and pickings up of whatever your feminine carelessness chose to drop on the carpet; and endurance of all the legions of annoyances with which young ladies delight to harass young gentlemen? Have you no backing for your mother and me? One word from you ought to be worth a thousand ...
— The Lost Hunter - A Tale of Early Times • John Turvill Adams
... Matoaca, that Dr. Peterson's last sermon in St. Paul's on the feminine sphere would have been a far safer guide for you. His text, Mr. Starr," she added, turning to me, "was, 'She looketh well to the ways ...
— The Romance of a Plain Man • Ellen Glasgow
... you didn't find him," said that lady. "Was it something about the wedding?" she added, smiling, her feminine curiosity getting ...
— Harvest • Mrs. Humphry Ward |
