"Motherly" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... marriage. He went home as soon as he had sufficient salary, married her, and brought her out. She was a brilliant dark beauty, who became quickly a motherly, housewifely, common-place person—I should think there had been a poet's love, ...
— The Young Step-Mother • Charlotte M. Yonge
... in a tone of motherly pity, "here's a pie for you. Don't you think now you can go ...
— Little Grandmother • Sophie May
... no heed just at that moment to the wondrous beauties of nature to be seen on every hand, when even the rough barn was gilded and perfumed, for standing in the doorway, as if literally petrified with astonishment, was a motherly looking little woman whose upraised hands told of bewilderment and surprise, while from the expression on her face one could almost have believed that she was really afraid of the ...
— Aunt Hannah and Seth • James Otis
... at Lime was for two or three months overrun with visitors and vivacity. Fathers and mothers made fatherly and motherly stays, with the hottest of air-tights put up for their benefit in the front room; sisters and sisters-in-law brought the fashions and got up tableaux; cousins came on the jump; Miss Jones, Pauline Dallas, and I were invited in turn, and the ...
— Men, Women, and Ghosts • Elizabeth Stuart Phelps
... message which had disturbed the serenity of big Webb Mackenzie and had given to the motherly heart of his wife an unusual flutter. The best of news it could not be, for the ranger had already written them of the confession of Anderson, which included the statement of the death of their little daughter. But at least he might bring the next best news, ...
— Bucky O'Connor • William MacLeod Raine
... the childish band, Grateful for gifts the Holy Christmas gave her, Here meekly kissed the grandsire's withered hand. I feel, O maid! thy very soul Of order and content around me whisper,— Which leads thee with its motherly control, The cloth upon thy board bids smoothly thee unroll, The sand beneath thy feet makes whiter, crisper. O dearest hand, to thee 'tis given To change this hut into a lower ...
— Faust • Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe
... "Nonsense, my dear, partial, motherly judge. Lookers-on see most of the game," said Uncle Richard good-humouredly. "I was looking on from the landing for some time, and from what I saw, I have no hesitation in saying that Master Tom got ...
— The Vast Abyss - The Story of Tom Blount, his Uncles and his Cousin Sam • George Manville Fenn
... wanderings by a fragile infant, which she seemed to carry with especial care and tenderness. Sometimes, too, in the bleak afternoons, she would be seen wending her way through mud and mire, setting her weary face against the bitter east wind, and patiently singing on; and motherly women, coming from the gay shops and stores, where they had been purchasing Christmas toys for their own children, would often stop to look at the baby's pinched, white features with pity, and would say, while ...
— Stories By English Authors: London • Various
... spoke out one motherly dame, "they two do look clean-like. Children, too—who'd gi' them stones when they beg for bread? I'll do for them this night myself; and thou, the good man, and Kit can sleep in the hutch. So there, dears; now let's see the Lord ...
— Master Skylark • John Bennett
... hardly reached farther back than the advent of my uncle at Lake Adieno, and all my early associations were connected with the cottage and its surroundings. I had a glimmering and indistinct idea of something before our coming to Parkville. It seemed to me that I had once known a motherly lady with a sweet and lovely expression on her face; and I had a faint recollection of looking out upon a dreary waste of waters; but I could not fix the idea distinctly in my mind. I supposed that the ...
— Breaking Away - or The Fortunes of a Student • Oliver Optic
... against the lintel. Her mother had begun to prepare the evening meal; fresh fish were frying on the fire, and the oat cakes toasting before it. Yet, as she moved rapidly about, she was watching her daughter and very soon she gave words to the thoughts troubling and perplexing her motherly speculations. ...
— A Knight of the Nets • Amelia E. Barr
... its prompt and almost inevitable destruction. [Footnote: The scandals that occasionally arise in connection with that saintly institution, the Foundling Hospital at Naples, are enough to make humanity shudder. Of 856 children living under its motherly care during 1895, 853 "died" in the course of that one year-only three survived; a wholesale massacre. These 853 murdered children were carried forward in the books as still living, and the institution, which has a yearly revenue of over 600,000 francs, ...
— Old Calabria • Norman Douglas
... said the woman, her motherly sympathies aroused; "I'm rilly concerned for ye. Solomon!" she called from the window. "I say Sol, is that ar man going to tote ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol VIII • Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton, Eds.
... to the counter, which she caught for support. One of the girls ran to her, but Mrs. Trubus, standing close by, placed a motherly arm about ...
— Traffic in Souls - A Novel of Crime and Its Cure • Eustace Hale Ball
... been overworking himself in the attempt to settle a dock strike, and had come to Duddon to rest. Victoria was much attached to him in a motherly way, and he to her. They sparred a good deal; she attacking "agitators" and "demagogues," he, fierce on "feudal tyranny," especially when masked in the beauties and amenities of such a place as Duddon. But they were friends all the same, exchanging the unpaid ...
— The Mating of Lydia • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... up the little gravelled path, and reaching the door, found herself folded in Aunt Debby's motherly embrace, with Aunt Debby's arms round her, and Aunt Debby's round, rosy face pressed ...
— Aunt Judith - The Story of a Loving Life • Grace Beaumont
... noisy little brook went tumbling and bustling merrily over the stones, filling the sweet, warm air with a cheery song of its own. A plank served as a bridge across the stream; and as Susie walked steadily over it she noticed a fat, motherly old duck nestling down amongst the ferns and dock-leaves on the bank. Mother Duck uttered a startled and indignant "Quack, quack," as Gypsy jumped over her head and dashed headlong into ...
— Golden Moments - Bright Stories for Young Folks • Anonymous
... into the telegraph-office of the White House, laughing. He had picked up a child's book in his son "Tad's" room and looked at it. It was a story of a motherly hen, struggling to raise her brood to lead honest and useful lives; but in her efforts she was greatly annoyed by a mischievous fox. She had given him many lectures on his wicked ways, and—said the President: "I thought I would turn over to the finis, and ...
— The Lincoln Story Book • Henry L. Williams
... in it, I thought the charm might remain; but it vanished when she could run about once more. And she is such a healthy, self-reliant little thing," added Laura, glancing toward the bed with a momentary look of motherly pride that seemed strangely out of place ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 20, No. 117, July, 1867. • Various
... could find in a county. His wife (the lovely Evelyn Wormgate, a daughter of the Duke of Bognor and Wormgate) had died while the radiant Moll was but a puling infant. Thus it was that, knowing no hand of motherly authority, the child perforce ran wild ...
— Terribly Intimate Portraits • Noel Coward
... this to heart, on personal grounds, I suppose. She drawled along for five minutes, reproaching him with his perfidy and grew quite motherly. 'Now you've got a nice little wife of your own—you have,' she said. 'She's ten times too good for a fat old man like you, and, look he-ere, you never told me a word about her, and I've been thinkin' about it a ...
— The Works of Rudyard Kipling One Volume Edition • Rudyard Kipling
... the whole long day alone in the cottage parlour, chiefly meditating; though more than once friendly Mrs. Tod broke in upon my solitude. She treated me in a motherly, free-and-easy way: not half so deferentially as ...
— John Halifax, Gentleman • Dinah Maria Mulock Craik
... and afterward felt better, so that he sat up and gazed about him. It was the same room he had visited earlier in the evening, but the picture of home comfort was not the same, on account of the absence of the comfortable form and motherly face of Mrs. Bordine, who had retired ...
— Five Thousand Dollars Reward • Frank Pinkerton
... mellow old tone to every thing in its furniture and belongings. It was a parlor of the past, and not of to-day, yet exquisitely neat and well-kept. The Turkey carpet was faded: it had been part of the wedding furnishing of Grace's mother, years ago. The great, wide, motherly, chintz-covered sofa, which filled a recess commanding the window, was as different as possible from any smart modern article of the name. The heavy, claw-footed, mahogany chairs; the tall clock ...
— Pink and White Tyranny - A Society Novel • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... cheerfulness, her powers of dispensing comfort, and warmth, and happiness, and promoting the direct and indirect welfare of everyone who came in her path. By what strange coincidence the brothers Foxley had been led to her glowing fireside and her motherly arms brimming over with zeal and kindness for the whole human race, does not matter. It is sufficient that they found her and found with her a sense of comparative peace and security which compensated for ...
— Crowded Out! and Other Sketches • Susie F. Harrison
... Mrs. Downey's secret trepidation. She gave a half-timid, half-tender look at him and signalled to her ladies to withdraw. She herself remained behind, superintending the removal of the feast; keeping a motherly eye, too, on the poor boy and his claret. Ever since that one dreadful Sunday morning when she had found him asleep in full evening dress upon his bedroom floor, Mrs. Downey was always expecting to see him drop under the table. He had never done it yet, but there was ...
— The Divine Fire • May Sinclair
... other's calves is certainly erroneous. During the catching of elephants many cases occur in which young ones, after losing their mothers by death or separation, are refused assistance by the other females, and are buffeted about as outcasts. I have only known one instance of a very gentle, motherly elephant in captivity, allowing a motherless calf to suck along with her own young one. When a calf is born the mother and the herd usually remain in that place for two days. The calf is then capable of marching. Even at this tender age calves ...
— Natural History of the Mammalia of India and Ceylon • Robert A. Sterndale
... large motherly woman. She had light hair and blue eyes and had not talked long before Bob discovered that she had a deep interest in her husband's business, for the questions she asked were such that he knew the banker ...
— Hidden Treasure • John Thomas Simpson
... wife, who was a good, motherly person, took charge of the little orphan, and arriving at Carvel Hall delivered her to my grandfather, who brought her up as his own daughter. You may be sure the emblem of Catholicism found upon her was destroyed, and she was baptized ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... Burl! Please don't; it hurts me so—it nearly kills me!" And with the loved pictures of home—the motherly face, with its white cap; the mother's bed, with his own little trundle-bed underneath; the table, with its white cloth folded and laid upon it; the hickory-bound cedar water-bucket, with its crooked handled gourd; the red corner-cupboard, with its store of Johnny-cakes and cold potatoes for quiet ...
— Burl • Morrison Heady
... it's one o' them gray-ha'red old ladies. Young females that a-way is all right, an' it's plenty nacheral for a gent to be cur'ous an' pleased tharwith; but I never does track up with an old lady, white-ha'red an' motherly mind you, but I takes off my sombrero an' says: "You'll excuse me, marm, but I wants to trespass on your time long enough to ask your pardon for livin'." That's right; that's the way I feels; plumb religious at the mere sight of 'em. If I was to ...
— Wolfville Days • Alfred Henry Lewis
... old woman came round the table and occupied her husband's chair. If Seth were not writing, then she might as well avail herself of the opportunity which she had long wanted. She had no children of her own, and lavished all her motherly instincts upon this man. She was fond of Rosebud, but the girl occupied quite a secondary place in her heart. It is doubtful if any mother could have loved a son more than she ...
— The Watchers of the Plains - A Tale of the Western Prairies • Ridgewell Cullum
... really natural and animated. They were much impressed and excited by his departure, and wanted to ask a hundred questions about the life in the trenches. Many of them Hugh had to promise to answer when he got there. Then he would see just exactly how things were. Mrs. Britling was motherly and intelligent about his outfit. "Will you want winter ...
— Mr. Britling Sees It Through • H. G. Wells
... where the girl is. If he did, he wouldn't tell. When you arrest him, he can tell a good story about Mrs. Loraine's motherly care ...
— Seek and Find - or The Adventures of a Smart Boy • Oliver Optic
... so long. Only the eldest sister held that it would have been right and honourable to have spoken before flashing out the flame; but when, with many tears of contrition, Aurelia owned that she had long thought so, and longed to confess it, what could the motherly sister do but kiss the tears away, and rejoice that the penance was over which had been borne ...
— Love and Life • Charlotte M. Yonge
... Robert, shaving his shingle attentively, 'so long as Canadians look back to England as home, and speak of it as home, there's little fear of annexation or revolt. Mother country has only to keep up the motherly relation, and patiently loosen the leading strings, according as her colonies grow able ...
— Cedar Creek - From the Shanty to the Settlement • Elizabeth Hely Walshe
... her pipe, the old woman continued to gaze with almost motherly affection at the figure in the corner. To say the truth, whether it were chance, or skill, or downright witchcraft, there was something wonderfully human in this ridiculous shape, bedizened with its tattered finery; and as for the countenance, it appeared to shrivel its ...
— The International Monthly Magazine - Volume V - No II • Various
... said Herbert, when I told him so, "is the best of housewives, and I really do not know what my Clara would do without her motherly help. For, Clara has no mother of her own, Handel, and no relation in ...
— Great Expectations • Charles Dickens
... themselves to my mind as I went on, and I got round me a circle of persons as to whom I knew not only their present characters, but how those characters were to be affected by years and circumstances. The happy motherly life of Violet Effingham, which was due to the girl's honest but long-restrained love; the tragic misery of Lady Laura, which was equally due to the sale she made of herself in her wretched marriage; and the long suffering but final success of the ...
— Autobiography of Anthony Trollope • Anthony Trollope
... just heard the news, and she could scarcely speak, but she folded the young girl, her dear pet lamb, in her arms, and rocking herself to and fro she sobbed and eased her aching, motherly heart. ...
— I Will Repay • Baroness Emmuska Orczy
... in reply, however, only breathed the affectionate overflowings of kind hearts. Mrs. Glenallan sent her motherly blessing to George; and Emily, in addition to a long communication to her brother, wrote to Acme as to a beloved sister; begging her to hasten George's return to England, that they might meet one, in whom they must henceforward ...
— A Love Story • A Bushman
... Mrs. Fane-Smith's motherly heart was touched; she sat down there and then, and for the first time since the summer day when Luke Raeburn had been turned out of his father's house, she wrote to her brother. Rose in the meantime had taken a piece of paper from her mother's ...
— We Two • Edna Lyall
... "So much for motherly love! Dang it, what's her heart made of?" said a voice. I turned round; it was old Ben, who had been an ...
— Poor Jack • Frederick Marryat
... Etienne," she went on in motherly tones. "We are at this moment old comrades; speak to me as you would ...
— The Muse of the Department • Honore de Balzac
... more, when I was at Longford Castle with my two companions, who are no more with us, we found there a pleasant, motherly old housekeeper, or attendant of some kind, who gave us a draught of home-made ale and left a cheerful remembrance with us, as, I need hardly say, we did with her, in a materialized expression of our good-will. It always rubbed very hard on my feelings ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)
... We'll look after you," said motherly Mrs. Brown. "Come along, Bunny and Sue. Mrs. Newton will be at ...
— Bunny Brown and his Sister Sue Giving a Show • Laura Lee Hope
... older woman with her knowing charm, the younger with her freshness, present a dualism more bewildering than any he has ever read about in his philosophy books, and part of the fun consists in seeing him fall in love with the younger in terms of pure reason, and finally, when the motherly young countess has quietly got him a professorship at Konigsberg, present to his ...
— Antwerp to Gallipoli - A Year of the War on Many Fronts—and Behind Them • Arthur Ruhl
... the good woman took off my clothes and put me in bed while she mended them. I went asleep then and did not awake for a long time. When I got up at last she brought a big basin of water and washed me with such motherly tenderness in voice and manner that I have never forgotten it. Uncle Eb lay sleeping on the lounge and when she had finished dressing me, Fred and I went out to play in the garden. It was supper time in a little while and then, again, the woman ...
— Eben Holden - A Tale of the North Country • Irving Bacheller
... Jean's letter were in Mrs. Morrison's lap. She had read them both, and sat looking at them with a varying sort of smile, now motherly and now unmotherly. ...
— The Forerunner, Volume 1 (1909-1910) • Charlotte Perkins Gilman
... ascended the stairs. "It was an evil hour," she said, "that you insisted on going to this place. Mr. Mirabel—" The sight of Emily's face suspended the next words on her lips. She took the poor young mistress in her motherly arms. "Oh, my child! what has ...
— I Say No • Wilkie Collins
... little Indian seemed likely to form no accession to the quiet household, but he soon became its brightest ornament and pride. Everything was in his favor at the pleasant home of Mrs. Trevor. He was treated with motherly kindness and tenderness, yet firmly checked when he went wrong. From the first he had a well-spring of strength, against temptation, in the long letters which every mail brought from his parents; and all his ...
— Eric • Frederic William Farrar
... race has not altered much in Australia, from a physical point of view—not yet. The rabbit has developed into something like a cross between a kangaroo and a possum, but the bush has not begun to develop the common cat. She is just as sedate and motherly as the mummy cats of Egypt were, but she takes longer strolls of nights, climbs gum-trees instead of roofs, and hunts stranger vermin than ever came under the observation of her northern ancestors. Her views have widened. She is mostly thinner than the English farm ...
— On the Track • Henry Lawson
... everything was different. What a smiling welcome they received, my grandfather standing with his hat off, my grandmother with the tears in her motherly vehement eyes, gathering the two wanderers defiantly to her breast as if daring all the world to come on. Behind a little (but not much) was Aunt Jen, asserting her position and rights in the house. She did not seem to see Miss Irma, but to make up, she never took her ...
— The Dew of Their Youth • S. R. Crockett
... came in from the kitchen. She was a huge person with a severe yet motherly face. She had her hands on her hips, and she cast a rather disapproving ...
— Wildfire • Zane Grey
... said, domestic animals vary more than wild ones. Every farmer and poultry-grower knows that some hens are better with chickens than others—more motherly, more careful—and rear a greater number of their brood. The same is true of sows with pigs. Some sows will eat their pigs, and wild animals in cages often destroy their young. Some ewes will not own their lambs, and occasionally a cow will not own her calf. ...
— Ways of Nature • John Burroughs
... station" is of course ironical. The babe would set a seal on Electra's degradation to the peasant class, and so end the blood-feud, as far as she was concerned. Clytemnestra, longing for peace, must rejoice in Electra's degradation. Yet she has motherly feelings too, and in fact hardly knows what to think or do till she can consult Aegisthus (p. 71). Electra, it would seem, actually calculates upon these ...
— The Electra of Euripides • Euripides
... They took a strong fancy to each other on the spot. Selma preferred a person who would tell you everything about herself and to whom you could tell everything about yourself without preliminaries. People like Mrs. Taylor repressed her, but the motherly loquacity and comprehension of Mrs. Earle drew her out and thawed at once and forever the ice of acquaintanceship. Before she quite realized the extent of this fascination she had promised to recite something, and as in a ...
— Unleavened Bread • Robert Grant
... Feather put it, that she should no longer occupy the little dog-kennels of nurseries, so these new apartments had been added in the rear. A whim of his also that Andrews, whose disciplinary methods included pinching, should be dismissed and replaced by Dowson, a motherly creature with a great deal of common sense. Robin's lonely little heart opened to her new nurse, who became in time ...
— Robin • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... psychological observations of children grow wiser, more sympathetic, and more subtle, we shall see cause to make radical changes in the objects which are Froebel's legacy to the kindergarten. This we may do, but we can never improve upon the motherly tenderness of spirit with which they were devised by the great pioneer of child-study, nor upon the philosophic insight which based them on the universal ...
— Froebel's Gifts • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... I have heard of a good woman, that had, as this old man, a bad and ungodly son, and she prayed for him, counselled him, and carried it motherly to him for several years together; but still he remained bad. At last, upon a time, after she had been at prayer, as she was wont, for his conversion, she comes to him, and thus, or to this effect, begins again to admonish him. Son, said she, ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... served at the meal. Motherly Mrs. Bentley laid aside her motoring dust coat and marshaled the girls for the various tasks to which she ...
— The High School Boys' Fishing Trip • H. Irving Hancock
... Pa-Ramesu. The man's honest joy over Kenkenes' safety was good to look upon. A few words of explanation concerning his very apparent exhaustion were fruitful of some comfort to the young Egyptian. The Hebrew's wife had a motherly heart, and the weary face of the comely youth touched it. Therefore, she brought him bread and wine and made him a place in the shadow of her tent-furnishings where he might sleep till what time the ...
— The Yoke - A Romance of the Days when the Lord Redeemed the Children - of Israel from the Bondage of Egypt • Elizabeth Miller
... been fishing ever since they could handle a rod. They are supposed to empty the free water by Little Deeping Village every spring. So I limit them to three fish a day," said Mrs. Dangerfield; and there was a ring of motherly pride in ...
— The Terrible Twins • Edgar Jepson
... appearance and manners, strutted and put himself forward like his father, as a big calf might place itself beside the parent cow. Mr. Copperhead did not look upon his offspring, however, with the cow's motherly complacency. He laughed at him openly, with cynical amusement. He was clever in his way, and Clarence was stupid; and besides he was the proprietor, and Clarence, for all he was porcelain, was his goods and chattels. When he looked at him, a wicked leer of ...
— Phoebe, Junior • Mrs [Margaret] Oliphant
... thanks to his preserver. Mr. Harper assured her that his feat was merely a little exertion of muscular strength, and at last grew evidently uncomfortable at being made so much of. Returning home with them, he would fain have crept away from the scene of his honours; but the good-natured, motherly-hearted Emma implored him ...
— Agatha's Husband - A Novel • Dinah Maria Craik (AKA: Dinah Maria Mulock)
... babes, and on going to camp, he sent his wife out with a horse to bring in the meat. When the Indian woman arrived at the spot, she found the two cubs cuddled up against the dressed meat of their mother, and crying as if their poor hearts would break. Their affectionate behaviour so touched the motherly heart of the old woman that, after loading the meat aboard the travois—a framework of poles stretched out behind the horse—she picked up the sobbing children and, wrapping them in a blanket to keep them from falling off the travois, bestrode her horse, and brought ...
— The Drama of the Forests - Romance and Adventure • Arthur Heming
... were all over from that time. He had thenceforth to recover under his aunt's motherly care, while talking endlessly over the home that she loved almost as well as he did. He was well more quickly than she had ventured to hope, and nothing could check his impatience to reach his home, not even the hopes of having his aunt for a companion. ...
— The Daisy Chain, or Aspirations • Charlotte Yonge
... tiny French cap on the back of her head, as she made these motherly demonstrations, and its graceful lightness threw her into a charming state ...
— The Old Homestead • Ann S. Stephens
... and the prosecution was nervous. The way that old black woman took the court and its officers into her bosom was enough to disconcert any ordinary tribunal. She patronised the judge openly before the hearing began and insisted upon holding a gentle motherly conversation with ...
— The heart of happy hollow - A collection of stories • Paul Laurence Dunbar
... this request with precision on Ina's nastiest moments, but she always rose, unabashed, and went, motherly and dutiful, to hear devotions, as if that function and the process of living ran their two ...
— Miss Lulu Bett • Zona Gale
... misdemeanors shall she be condemned? Because she has shown him a room in his innermost soul, which seems to have stood fine and clean and unoccupied all these years awaiting just such a tender and motherly little woman; or because she has already such power over him that he hardly dares to swear lest she hear it; or for what shall ...
— Invisible Links • Selma Lagerlof
... this splendor, in a dress of yellow silk, trimmed with purple flowers, gorgeous as a houri of Paradise, and, like them, prepared to receive her elect. Her mother smoothed the thick folds of her dress, looked triumphantly at her, and said, in a transport of motherly love, "How beautiful you are ...
— Debit and Credit - Translated from the German of Gustav Freytag • Gustav Freytag
... is a most kind, motherly woman," Harry said. "But it isn't the Back Kitchen, neither," he added with a ...
— The History of Pendennis, Vol. 2 - His Fortunes and Misfortunes, His Friends and His Greatest Enemy • William Makepeace Thackeray
... clothes off, except for a wash, since I entered the army. I had evidently been living beyond my strength, and now the latter gave way and I found myself unable to leave my bed for the next two weeks. Dr. William Frothingham gave me most excellent medical treatment, and with the motherly nursing of Mrs. Platt I was ...
— War from the Inside • Frederick L. (Frederick Lyman) Hitchcock
... books of yours," said Mrs. Munday, who took a motherly interest in him, "and you read and you read, and you take no account of time. And now you'll have to eat your dinner half cold, and no time for it to settle proper before you goes off to school. It's ruination to ...
— Love and Mr. Lewisham • H. G. Wells
... thanks which ought to have made them offices of affection as well as duty; while the poor little boys would indeed have fared ill if their half-sister Mary, though only twelve years old, had not been one of those girls who are endowed from the first with tender, motherly instincts. ...
— Two Penniless Princesses • Charlotte M. Yonge
... tried to be good, and had managed to control yourself, and had not thrown the hatchet, I am quite sure you would not have hated Philip for long. Perhaps you would have thought how much better Philip used to behave before your father and mother died, and a little elder-sisterly, motherly feeling would have mixed with your wrath at seeing him with his fat legs planted apart, and his shoulders up, the very picture of wilful naughtiness. Perhaps you might have thought you had repulsed him a little harshly when he wanted to help, as you ...
— A Great Emergency and Other Tales - A Great Emergency; A Very Ill-Tempered Family; Our Field; Madam Liberality • Juliana Horatia Gatty Ewing
... sent for and surprised him with his piano, which had to be carried up the mountain on the backs of mules. In the quiet cloisters she cared for him with motherly tenderness, and there he learned again to awake the slumbering echoes with divine music. Several of his best pieces were composed at Majorca during his convalescence, where the soft semi-tropical breeze laved his cheek, the birds warbled him their sweetest carols, and away ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great - Volume 14 - Little Journeys to the Homes of Great Musicians • Elbert Hubbard
... Hill, who was a large, motherly soul and not to be bowed down by work, "I'm sure that some of ...
— Silver and Gold - A Story of Luck and Love in a Western Mining Camp • Dane Coolidge
... power, and therefore became in need of the service of woman. Wherever the State touches the personal life of the infant, the child, the youth, or the aged, helpless, defective in mind, body or moral nature, there the State enters "woman's peculiar sphere," her sphere of motherly succor and training, her sphere of sympathetic and self-sacrificing ministration to individual lives. If the service of women is not won to such governmental action (not only through "influence or the shaping of public opinion," but ...
— The History of Woman Suffrage, Volume IV • Various
... Pa's got the horse around all right," said Mrs. Beebe, going out into the shop, "so I s'pose you all must go, though sorry I be to have you." She gave Polly a motherly little pat on the shoulder, and fairly cried over Phronsie. "Well, you've got to go, I s'pose," she said again, "'cause Pa's a-waitin'; yes, Pa," she called, "they're a-comin'." And presently the little Peppers, except Phronsie, all ...
— The Adventures of Joel Pepper • Margaret Sidney
... life, I had never seen money, never a penny of my own. Now it was the other way. After the funeral I went down to the bank to consult with Mister Gaynor. He handed me a sealed envelope. It was a message from the dear, kind, motherly Mrs. Lannarck. It was a letter of kindly advice, personal and spiritual. She said that she never doubted but that I would walk in the right path, but she made this final appeal. If I never married, never had heirs or dependents, and if there was ...
— David Lannarck, Midget - An Adventure Story • George S. Harney
... place immediately after death, they are taken into heaven and confided to angel women who in the life of the body tenderly loved little children and at the same time loved God. Because these during their life in the world loved all children with a kind of motherly tenderness, they receive them as their own; while the children, from an implanted instinct, love them as their own mothers. There are as many children in each one's care as she desires from a spiritual parental affection. This heaven appears in front ...
— Heaven and its Wonders and Hell • Emanuel Swedenborg
... Derby day, when the terrible horse, "Gladiateur," beat all the English steeds. She was then very much changed indeed, appearing as a full-blown Egyptian matron, with two very handsome daughters flaringly dressed in genuine Gipsy fashion, to whom she was giving motherly counsels as to the best means to hok and dukker the gentlefolk. All her Christianity she appeared to have flung to the dogs, for when the writer spoke to her on that very important subject she made no answer save by an indescribable Gipsy look. ...
— Gipsy Life - being an account of our Gipsies and their children • George Smith
... the sun; a peasant-like old man kept on sawing wood, and a little child stood still amidst the larkspurs and marigolds of a tiny garden, while over the flower-pots on the low window-sill of the neighboring house to which it belonged, a young, motherly face gazed peacefully out. The great extent of the convent grounds had left this poor garden scarce breathing-space for its humble blooms; with the low paling fence that separated it from the adjoining house-yards ...
— A Chance Acquaintance • W. D. Howells
... me, I will, to my last hour, wish him good: although he hath overwhelmed the fatherless, and digged a pit for his friend: fatherless may she well be called, and motherless too, who has been denied all paternal protection, and motherly forgiveness. ...
— Clarissa, Volume 7 • Samuel Richardson
... Sparre, when he said a short time previously, "If a congregation is to have the peaceful, comforting feeling that their souls are well cared for, they should have the example of a peaceful, homely life before their eyes, in the form of a motherly wife at the rectory, and even better still, a family of ...
— Garman and Worse - A Norwegian Novel • Alexander Lange Kielland
... worried silence, replying only in monosyllables to the remarks of McComas, who sat at his table, and of Mrs. McComas, who had taken quite a young-motherly fancy to him; and the amount that he ate was so much at variance with his usual hearty appetite that even the maid who waited on his table, a tall, gangling girl with a vinegar face and a kind heart, worried for fear he might be sick, and added unordered ...
— The Early Bird - A Business Man's Love Story • George Randolph Chester
... dean and Mrs. Greystock would think so;—Lady Fawn was very sure of that. Lady Fawn was one of the best women breathing,—unselfish, motherly, affectionate, appreciative, and never happy unless she was doing good to somebody. It was her nature to be soft, and kind, and beneficent. But she knew very well that if she had had a son,—a second son,—situated as was Frank Greystock, ...
— The Eustace Diamonds • Anthony Trollope
... events were developing, some of the old women of the Hog Mountain Range had begun to manifest a sort of motherly interest in the affairs of Woodward and Sis Poteet. These women, living miles apart on the mountain and its spurs, had a habit of "picking up their work" and spending the day with each other. Upon one occasion it chanced that Mrs. Sue Parmalee and ...
— Mingo - And Other Sketches in Black and White • Joel Chandler Harris
... motherly Feelings had changed: Love, by harsh evidence, Thrown from its eminence; Even God's ...
— The Golden Treasury - Of the Best Songs and Lyrical Poems in the English Language • Various
... French! Charmian trembled for it, for him because of it. If Mrs. Mansfield could have known how solicitous, how tender, how motherly, the girl felt at that moment under her mask of shining, radiant hardness! But Mrs. Mansfield was glancing about the house with ...
— The Way of Ambition • Robert Hichens
... standing in the lane below. The elder, who had spoken in that small, anxious voice, had a pale little face with pointed chin; her hair, the color of over-ripe corn, hung fluffy on her thin shoulders, her flower-like eyes, with something motherly in them already, were the same hue as her pale-blue, almost clean, overall. She had her smaller, chubbier sister by the hand, and, having delivered her message, stood still, gazing up at Tod, as one might at God. Tod dropped ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... Thorold. I have met their father several times at the Manners' flat, and have likewise—low be it spoken—received two evening calls from him in my own domain. He says it is such a comfort to find a kind, motherly woman with whom to talk over his difficulties! He hesitates to trouble Mrs Manners, who is already overworked. Winifred holds one shoulder a little higher than the other. Does that mean anything wrong with the spine? Ought she to lie down flat? Billie, the curly two-year-old, is always catching ...
— The Lady of the Basement Flat • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... measured many thousands of slum children, besides examining over 120,000 boys and girls as to their fitness for factory labor, states (British Medical Journal, October 14, 1905) that "fifty years ago the slum mother was much more sober, cleanly, domestic, and motherly than she is to-day; she was herself better nourished and she almost always suckled her children, and after weaning they received more nutritious bone-making food, and she was able to prepare more ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 6 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis
... a refuge at once? What was to become of them when all they now possessed was spent. The gods be thanked! she was not forlorn; she still had friends. She could find protection and love with Pollux and look to dame Doris for motherly counsel. ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... dear," spoke a soft voice. "It's only me," and if there wasn't a great, big, motherly-looking hoptoad, out in the dusty road, and the next moment if that toad didn't begin hopping up and down as fast as she ...
— Buddy And Brighteyes Pigg - Bed Time Stories • Howard R. Garis
... sleeves and frayed suspenders; but whatever his caste-symbols, every Beaver was distinguished by an enormous shrimp-colored ribbon lettered in silver, "Sir Knight and Brother, U. F. O. B., Annual State Convention." On the motherly shirtwaist of each of their wives was a badge "Sir Knight's Lady." The Duluth delegation had brought their famous Beaver amateur band, in Zouave costumes of green velvet jacket, blue trousers, and scarlet fez. The strange thing was that beneath their scarlet pride the Zouaves' faces remained ...
— Main Street • Sinclair Lewis
... I remember," replied the Countess, in a matter-of-fact tone; but her motherly eye was sharp, and already it began to look on the highly eligible Rudolph with more approval ...
— The Lunatic at Large • J. Storer Clouston
... have a good time," said another woman with a kind, motherly face. "They will soon grow up, and then they will have to work hard ...
— Bertha • Mary Hazelton Wade
... able to judge better in the morning. Come on now back with me, an think no more about it. [She takes his arm with motherly solicitude and urges him gently ...
— John Bull's Other Island • George Bernard Shaw
... nearer to the bare table and began to eat with them. Sarah's motherly protestations induced him to take off his coat and hang it up in the watchman's office to dry. The same tender care served out to him the most delicate morsels, from a generous if uncouth table, and insisted upon their acceptance. If his old friends were hot with curiosity to know ...
— Aladdin of London - or Lodestar • Sir Max Pemberton
... lamely come upon him that it colored his face. And the halting boyishness of the request had warmed Cecille's face too; warmed her through and through. She knew an impulse to hug his head to her breast, a very mature and motherly impulse. ...
— Winner Take All • Larry Evans
... her hand. She was a voluminous woman in a stiffly starched house dress, everything about her as clean as a new pin, and a pair of silver-bowed spectacles pushed up to her fast graying hair. She was a wholesome, hearty, motherly looking woman, and Nan Sherwood was attracted to her ...
— Nan Sherwood's Winter Holidays • Annie Roe Carr
... affair, she commenced by informing me that at ten years of age she was a scholar of Mrs. Chatterton, his mother, where she was taught plain work, and remained with her until she was near twenty years of age; that she slept with her, and found her kind and motherly, insomuch that there were many things which in moments of affliction Mrs. C. communicated to her, that she would not have wished to have been generally known; and among others, she often repeated how happy she was that her unfortunate ...
— Old and New London - Volume I • Walter Thornbury
... of faintness came upon her before she had been carried to the little bed which had been made ready for her. When she opened her eyes, while a spoon was held to her lips, the first thing she saw was the sweetest, calmest, most motherly of faces bent over her, one arm round her, the other giving her the spoon of some cordial. She looked up and even smiled, though it was a sad contorted smile, which brought a tear into the good sister's eyes; but then she fell asleep, and only half awoke when the Countess came up ...
— Grisly Grisell • Charlotte M. Yonge
... a short time when the motherly sympathy of Mrs. Miller was aroused on account of his extreme ignorance on many subjects, and she did not grow weary in explaining the meaning of new words and in doing all else that she knew to do to enlighten his mind. That she might have a better opportunity to talk with ...
— The Poorhouse Waif and His Divine Teacher • Isabel C. Byrum
... a mild and a motherly woman, just the one fitted to inspire young men with confidence and that home feeling which all men desire to find somewhere. Her house was a free and easy ground, social for most of the young ...
— The May Flower, and Miscellaneous Writings • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... They used to arrive in an almost perfect state of comfort, with all the necessary papers enabling me to disperse them among their different villages in Egypt. One of the first messages the General sent to me was this, 'Do try and find a motherly European woman to receive these poor women and children, for they have never been in Egypt yet before.' With the regularity of clockwork over 2000 refugees arrived, all the arrangements for their transport ...
— General Gordon - A Christian Hero • Seton Churchill
... happened since! I now feel like an old hen that would like to gather you both under her wing in shelter from all trouble," and again her little laugh chimed out while she wiped away the tears which sprang from her motherly heart. ...
— The Earth Trembled • E.P. Roe
... me very welcome as had ever been her way. She was an eccentric, but embarrassingly straightforward old lady; and if I had heeded her simple motherly counsel in the past all ...
— The Green Eyes of Bast • Sax Rohmer
... one was stricken down with a bad case of influenza and was unable to leave his bed. This of course made Margery also practically hors de combat. The little folks spent most of their time across the street in motherly Mrs. Lambert's care. Upon Ned Holiday's children rested the chief ...
— Wild Wings - A Romance of Youth • Margaret Rebecca Piper
... from home at the time of our calling, but we were received with hearty and homely welcome by his wife—a notable, motherly woman, and a complete pattern for wives, since, according to Master Simon's account, she never contradicts honest Jack, and yet manages to have her own way, and to control him in everything. She ...
— Bracebridge Hall • Washington Irving
... have it, Aunt Trudy decided to come home on an earlier train and found herself in the midst of bundle-laden Eastshore shoppers who had spent the day in the city and were returning with their spoils. Motherly Mrs. Dunning occupied a seat with Aunt Trudy and what more natural than that she should speak of how much help Rosemary had been to her that summer? The wonder was that Aunt Trudy had so long escaped hearing but she went about ...
— Rosemary • Josephine Lawrence
... Mrs. Savor's house when she came to it, nor Mrs. Savor, who stopped, all blowzed and work-deranged from trying to put it in order after the death in it, and gave Idella a motherly welcome. Annie fancied a certain surprise in her manner, and her own ideal of duty was put to proof by Mrs. Savor's owning that she had not expected Annie to bring Idella ...
— Annie Kilburn - A Novel • W. D. Howells
... fright we had," exclaimed Mrs. Digby, a motherly-looking woman, dabbing at her eyes with capacious pocket handkerchief, "we gets a letter tellin' us that our ...
— The Boy Scouts of the Eagle Patrol • Howard Payson
... me," the signora said, and laid her motherly hand on the trembling little ones held out to her in entreaty. "We will look out for that. Matteo shall not hurt you or Claudio. I am going to send for Monsignor Catinari again, and you must tell him the truth this time. ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, December 1878 • Various
... from our plates, but stole it out of our very mouths, fluttered continually about the room, so that we were obliged to look very attentively at every chair on which we intended to sit down. On the floor a cock was continually fighting with his three wives; and a motherly hen, with a brood of eleven hopeful ducks, cackled merrily between. I wonder that I did not contract a squint, for I was obliged continually to look upwards and downwards lest I should cause mischief, and lest mischief should befall me. During the night the heat and the stench were ...
— A Visit to the Holy Land • Ida Pfeiffer
... Nelson—just Nobody from Nowhere," quoth Nancy to Miss Trigg, the teacher and school secretary who, despite her thick spectacles and angular figure, displayed more of a motherly interest in Nancy than anybody else ...
— A Little Miss Nobody - Or, With the Girls of Pinewood Hall • Amy Bell Marlowe
... a queen,' she murmured with motherly pride,' indeed there's no queen like her in ...
— The Torrents of Spring • Ivan Turgenev
... this morning, and I brought you a little angel who has got out of heaven, and needs some of your motherly care." ...
— The Hoosier Schoolmaster - A Story of Backwoods Life in Indiana • Edward Eggleston
... time, and in the little summer-house all was dark; but Iris, as she spoke, sprang to her feet, and the next moment found herself clasped in Fortune's motherly arms. ...
— A Little Mother to the Others • L. T. Meade
... washed her down with motherly care - Head, shoulders, arm, and foot, To the very hem of the robes that drape her - All expertly And alertly, Till a long ...
— Moments of Vision • Thomas Hardy
... as good as gold," said the little creature, oh, in such a motherly, womanly way. "And when Emma's tired, he puts her to bed. And when he's tired he goes to bed himself. And when I come home and light the candle, and has a bit of supper, he sits up again and has it with me. Don't ...
— Ten Girls from Dickens • Kate Dickinson Sweetser
... most intimate companions. Cases are not rare of this kind. Let one pass in absence from childhood to maturity, and who that had not seen him in the mean time could tell that it was he? The trouble arising thence is finely illustrated by Shakspeare in the motherly solicitude of Constance, who, on learning that her young son has been imprisoned by his uncle, King John, and will probably be kept until he pines to death, cries in ...
— The Destiny of the Soul - A Critical History of the Doctrine of a Future Life • William Rounseville Alger
... by her, and begged her to give him a kiss. He looked quite nice and pretty for the moment, and Kaethe thought she had better do as he wished, or he might begin his antics again. So she gave him a motherly kiss, just as she would give to her baby brother, smack! on the cheek. Immediately the queer look went out of his eyes, and a more ...
— Fairy Tales from the German Forests • Margaret Arndt
... a great deal to be said regarding Mrs Varden's doubts, and motherly alarms, and shrewd suspicions; and it appeared that from Mrs Varden's penetration and extreme sagacity nothing had ever been hidden. She had known it all along. She had seen it from the first. She had always predicted it. She had been aware of it before the principals. She had said within ...
— Barnaby Rudge • Charles Dickens
... understood, and saw that the young man was alone and comfortless. He passed his hours below, in his own room, and twice a day his mother found him in the parlour, and then they sat through their silent, miserable meals. She would then leave him, always saying some soft words of motherly love, and putting her hand either upon his shoulder or his arm. On such occasions he was never rough to her, but he would never respond to her caress. She had ill-treated him, preferring in her trouble ...
— Orley Farm • Anthony Trollope
... five rooms, and these were furnished in the plainest manner. In the sitting room were his mother and aunt. Mrs. Harding was a motherly-looking woman, with a pleasant face, the prevailing expression of which was a serene cheerfulness, though of late it had been harder than usual to preserve this, in the straits to which the family had been reduced. She was setting ...
— Jack's Ward • Horatio Alger, Jr.
... yer wouldn't let ennythin' in shape ev a human creetur go perishin' past aour fire sech weather's this," replied the woman, as she took the baby, which recognized the motherly hand at its first ...
— Ramona • Helen Hunt Jackson
... going about their labours without boisterous laughter, the children playing quietly, and the good wives in their kitchens and dairies bustling less than usual and modulating the sharpness of their voices, the most motherly among them in truth finding themselves falling into whispering as they gossiped of the great ...
— His Grace of Osmonde • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... politician. Trim waiters stood round, like statues tailored and anxiously waiting a guest's nod. As I cast a bird's eye glance down the scene, in popped the General's missus, all calm, and with an air of motherly gentleness that inspired me with lofty reflections on woman's mission. As she approached with her hand extended, and such a sweet smile on her face, I could not resist a salutation thus earnest, and grasping it, gave it a good, warm-hearted shake. She said great was her ...
— The Adventures of My Cousin Smooth • Timothy Templeton
... everything and everybody on principle. Knowing that I was an orphan he sometimes took me aside and gave me sound fatherly advice which I have since remembered, and am now beginning to appreciate. His wife, too, was a kindly motherly woman who, because being practically homeless I was often compelled to spend my holidays at school, seemed better disposed towards me than to the majority ...
— The Great White Queen - A Tale of Treasure and Treason • William Le Queux
... figures on the platform, and then threw himself back in his seat and gave free vent to his own feelings. Two girls sitting beside him sniggered at the sight of the strong-built young fellow giving way to tears, but a motherly-looking woman opposite presently put ...
— In The Heart Of The Rockies • G. A. Henty
... journey passed almost in silence, and we drove straight to the nursing home in Mayfair. We were admitted to a little waiting-room in a bright, fresh-looking house, and were presently greeted by a genial and motherly old lady, dressed in a sort of nursing uniform, who told us that Mr. Payne was expecting us. We asked anxiously how he was. "Oh, he is very cheerful," she said; "his nurse, Sister Jane, thinks he is the most amusing man she ever saw. You ...
— Father Payne • Arthur Christopher Benson
... a strange feeling at the face of Wolska which, though worn and faded, beamed with a deep motherly love. She looked like a beggar woman in her dark, stained cloak and gray dress, frayed at the bottom; she wore a straw hat and black mended gloves and carried a parasol which was rusty from continual use. But ...
— The Comedienne • Wladyslaw Reymont
... frowns on every hand, even in sunshine, when the waterfalls flow like silver, and the crags are decked with diamonds. There are no 'trencher-scraping, napkin-carrying,' waiters in the house, but country damsels attend upon you, and a motherly dame, their mistress, expresses her hope every morning that you have slept well. If you have not, it is the fault of your conscience: you have had a poet's recipe for it, for you have been 'within the hearing of a hundred streams' ...
— Some Private Views • James Payn
... a bad little thing, au fond, when you get to know her. It is society that has spoilt her. She would have made a nice, helpful, motherly body if she'd ...
— Hilda Wade - A Woman With Tenacity Of Purpose • Grant Allen
... I don't know. I was so dreadfully sorry for him all that time before, and I felt so very friendly towards him, so very—oh, Gerald, so motherly. And I wanted to be wanted so badly, and you didn't seem to want me in that way. That was why, when he had gone, I went right away from you, and asked you not to write to me; I wanted to think it ...
— First Plays • A. A. Milne
... her to college and you thought you would come over and let me give her a little motherly counsel while you borrowed the money of Tom Adams to pay her college bills. ...
— A Hoosier Chronicle • Meredith Nicholson |
