"On air" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... other," the supplanter who had basely betrayed her under the sycamores; she clenched her little fist as she saw Paula watching Orion's retreating form with beaming eyes. Paula went back into the house, happy and walking on air, while the other poor, deeply-wounded child burst into violent weeping at the first hasty words from her mother, who was not at all satisfied with the disorder of her dress; and she ended by declaring with defiant audacity that she would not present the flowers ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... Lady Tranmore at the end of the ballroom, she made her way thither surrounded by a motley crowd of friends. She walked as though on air, "raining influence." And as Lady Tranmore caught the glitter of the diamond crescent, and beheld the small divinity beneath it, she, too, smiled with pleasure, like the other spectators on Kitty's march. The dress was monstrously costly. She knew that. But she forgot the inroad on William's ...
— The Marriage of William Ashe • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... across the bridge from Boston to Charlestown, the motions of the sea-gulls.... Often have I attempted to unravel the mystery of their motion so as to bring the principle of it to bear upon this very subject, but I never experimented upon it. Many ingenious men, however, have experimented on air navigation, and have so far succeeded as to travel in the air many miles, but always with the current of wind in their favor. By navigating the atmosphere is meant something more than dropping down with the tide in a boat, without sails, or oars or other means of ...
— Samuel F. B. Morse, His Letters and Journals - In Two Volumes, Volume II • Samuel F. B. Morse
... seemed perfectly natural and sensible to him, nor had he any particular feeling that in falling in love with Lady Maud Marsh and pursuing her to Belpher he had set himself anything in the nature of a hopeless task. Like one kissed by a goddess in a dream, he walked on air; and, while one is walking on air, it is easy to overlook the boulders in ...
— A Damsel in Distress • Pelham Grenville Wodehouse
... was always arrived; while other men hesitated he acted; while others debated he declared; fearing God, he was lifted above every other fear; and though he has passed away for a time—only for a time, remember: the wheel is still turning, we can't stand on air—he will come back again, but in the meantime he is still a "preacher of righteousness" to our souls as effective in death ...
— Modern Eloquence: Vol III, After-Dinner Speeches P-Z • Various
... of her stay, the former belief made him feel like treading on air, or like the hero of many a magazine story; but as time went on this flattering supposition began to fail him, when Nuttie showed her weariness of the subjects which, in his exclusiveness, he deemed the only ...
— Nuttie's Father • Charlotte M. Yonge
... Journalism." Talking of Yellow Journalism, by the way, the expressions "a beat," and "a scoop," for what we in England call an "exclusive" item of news, were unknown to me until I went to America. I was a little bewildered, too, when I was told of a family which "lived on air-tights." Their diet consisted of canned (or, as ...
— America To-day, Observations and Reflections • William Archer
... twice around the Mirabelle, rising higher as it went. Below, the few lights of the ship had been carefully hooded away from the sea, and the bird, spiraling lightly on air currents, drifted out ...
— Mr. Wicker's Window • Carley Dawson
... said Saffredent, "must be of the nature of the chameleon, which lives on air. (9) There is not a man in the world but would fain declare his love and know that it is returned; and further, I believe that love's fever is never so great, but it quickly passes off when one knows the contrary. ...
— The Tales Of The Heptameron, Vol. III. (of V.) • Margaret, Queen Of Navarre
... polka. When the music ceased he followed the custom of the country, and shouted for his partner. She drank sherry. He left the hall a few minutes later, with the girl's kiss, lightly given, tingling on his lips, and walked away quickly, treading on air. Presently he began to question himself. Why this growing exuberance? Was it drink? Never before had he felt its influence. He pulled himself together. He was crowding his sensation: it was time to cry ...
— In the Roaring Fifties • Edward Dyson
... seen that my apparatus for experiments on air is, in fact, nothing more than the apparatus of Dr. Hales, Dr. Brownrigg, and Mr. Cavendish, diversified, and made a little more simple. Yet notwithstanding the simplicity of this apparatus, and the ease with which all the operations are conducted, I would not have any person, who is ...
— Experiments and Observations on Different Kinds of Air • Joseph Priestley
... my tump-line and started on light. After carrying a heavy pack so long, I seemed to tread on air. The thicket, before so formidable, amounted to nothing at all. Perhaps the consciousness that the day's work was in reality over lent a little factitious energy to my tired legs. At any rate, the projected ...
— The Forest • Stewart Edward White
... not enter upon the new claim until the afternoon. For Barker, in spite of his mistress's injunction, had no idea of taking what he couldn't pay for; he would keep the claim intact until something could be settled. For the rest, he walked on air! Kitty loved him! The accursed wealth no longer stood between them. They were both poor ...
— Selected Stories • Bret Harte
... walked away, while Mrs. Meredith almost trod on air as she climbed the three flights of stairs and sought her niece's chamber. Over the interview which ensued that night we pass silently, and come to the next morning, when Anna sat alone on the piazza at the rear of the hotel, watching the playful gambols of some children on the ...
— The Rector of St. Mark's • Mary J. Holmes
... as happy as we can in the meantime. That's what ma says, and she really does practise it. So I've got to look after you now when you can't pay me. I'm going to see if I can't find something to eat. The man who lives here surely doesn't live on air. He must have some food in ...
— Under Sealed Orders • H. A. Cody
... him. Also my weekly sketch was chosen from among all the others, and I was given number one. That means my choice of tabourets on Monday morning, voyez vous? So do you wonder that I came home with Suzanne, walking on air, and that as soon as dejeuner was finished I flew in here to ...
— The Dark Star • Robert W. Chambers
... light hearts; indeed, it seemed as though they must be treading on air, and they could hardly refrain from hugging each other, the world looked so bright ...
— The House Boat Boys • St. George Rathborne
... carry it. Faith, if I lay in it, I should be asleep ere ever they had borne me ten paces. What a life it is that I lead! Late to bed and up by prime, so busy is my mistress; and she lives as it were without sleep, and feeds on air." ...
— A Monk of Fife • Andrew Lang
... passed but some poor uninitiated was brought to test the merits of that gift. Miss Winnie looked upon this removal to more enlightened regions, as a change altogether for the best; for how could such as she, at that age which never comes but once in a lifetime, be content to feed on air, a la prairie. She had tired of looking at the same half-dozen raw-boned gallants, and had come to the grand final decision, that her charms should not be wasted thus; and now that she was surrounded by those urbane solicitors, which do mingle with those of more enlargement of ...
— Natalie - A Gem Among the Sea-Weeds • Ferna Vale
... dominions of nature, where all are free. As the wind bloweth wherever it listeth, so move the moods of men's minds, when there is nought to shackle them, and when the burden of their cares has been dropt, that for a while they may walk on air, and feel that they too ...
— Recreations of Christopher North, Volume 2 • John Wilson
... want of meat, Jack kisses Jill and bids her freely eat: Jill says, Of what? says Jack, On that sweet kiss, Which full of nectar and ambrosia is, The food of poets. So I thought, says Jill, That makes them look so lank, so ghost-like still. Let poets feed on air, or what they will; Let me feed full, till that I fart, ...
— The Hesperides & Noble Numbers: Vol. 1 and 2 • Robert Herrick
... of the ragged urchin. You must also reflect that the heart of any high-born youth in the land might well have been fluttered by signs of peculiar favour from Princess Sophie Zobraska. Why' then, should Paul be blamed for walking on air instead of greasy pavement on the way from Berkeley Square to Portland Place? Moreover, as sanity returned to him, his quick sense recognized in his Princess's offer to support him, a lovely indiscretion. Foreign ladies of high position must be chary of their public appearances. ...
— The Fortunate Youth • William J. Locke
... Tom Burney rose with the feeling that he trod on air, such a strange exhilaration of spirit ...
— The Village by the River • H. Louisa Bedford
... more finished than ours, that ours is so weak, so awkwardly conceived, encumbered with organs that are always tired, always on the strain like locks that are too complicated, which lives like a plant and like a beast, nourishing itself with difficulty on air, herbs and flesh, an animal machine which is a prey to maladies, to malformations, to decay; broken-winded, badly regulated, simple and eccentric, ingeniously badly made, a coarse and a delicate work, the outline of a being which might become ...
— Masterpieces of Mystery, Vol. 1 (of 4) - Ghost Stories • Various
... line, conducted to a long belvidere, terminating in a little circular summer-house, that, by a sudden wind of the lake below, hung perpendicularly over its transparent tide, and, seen from the distance, appeared almost suspended on air, so light were its slender columns and arching dome. Another door from the library opened upon a corridor which conducted to the principal sleeping-chambers; the nearest door was that of Cleveland's private study communicating with his bedroom and dressing-closet. The ...
— Ernest Maltravers, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... hurried back to the cabin for a spade, walking on air, breaking with snatches of song the terrible stillness of the woods, where one hears only the high fitful sighing of the wind, or the eternal mutter of the sea. As I came out of the hut with the spade over my shoulder I waved my hand to the Island ...
— Spanish Doubloons • Camilla Kenyon
... Ten thousand bullets! March you at our head, and you will see how we like it.' His words gave us new heart; his promises seemed already to clothe us. We were ragged and tired; but it seemed, after that speech, as if we walked on air, and were dressed in silken robes. Forward, march! Boom—boom—boom! Ta-ra, ta-ra-ra! Hear the drums! See us marching! We marched through the day; we marched through the night. We were faint with hunger, but we marched. We were at Montenotte on the eleventh of April. ...
— The Boy Life of Napoleon - Afterwards Emperor Of The French • Eugenie Foa
... to procure horse and escort to convey her safely to Salisbury the next morning. He advised Stephen to keep out of her sight for the rest of the day, giving leave of absence, so that the youth, as one treading on air, set forth to carry to his brother, his aunt, and if possible, his uncle, the intelligence that he could as yet hardly believe was more ...
— The Armourer's Prentices • Charlotte M. Yonge
... at her gate, and she was trembling from what emotion he only dared guess. But she did not answer. She only returned the pressure of his hand, and drawing it away, rushed into the house. She durst not trust her voice. Bartley went home walking on air. ...
— The Strength of Gideon and Other Stories • Paul Laurence Dunbar
... I am absolutely walking on air today! Just when I thought my cherished dream of a free kindergarten would have to be given up, the checks from home came! You were a trump to get them all interested, and it was beautiful the way they responded. Only why did you tell Jack? He oughtn't to have sent so much. I'd send it back ...
— Lady of the Decoration • Frances Little
... prevailing winds, which will be more regular than at present, can be counted upon to continue practically as they are. It may not be plain to you why the trade winds do not blow towards the equator due south and north, since the equator has much the same effect on air that a stove has in the centre of a room, causing an ascending current towards the ceiling, which moves off in straight lines in all directions on reaching it, its place being taken by cold currents moving in opposite directions along the floor. Picture to yourselves the ascending currents ...
— A Journey in Other Worlds - A Romance of the Future • John Jacob Astor
... rise above what it was before, in a degree proportioned to the compression. If the air be allowed immediately to escape from under the pressure, it will recover its original temperature, because the fall in heat, on air expanding from a certain pressure, is equal to the rise on its being compressed to the same; but if, while the air is in its compressed state, it be robbed of its acquired heat of compression, and then be allowed to escape, it will issue at a temperature as much below the original one, ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 430 - Volume 17, New Series, March 27, 1852 • Various
... softened; sighs would sometimes break forth—persuasive sighs!—Dora was no longer the scornful lady in rude health, but the interesting invalid—the victim going to be sacrificed. Dora's aunt talked of the necessity of advice for her niece's health. Great stress was laid on air and exercise, and exercise on horseback. Dora rode every day on the horse Harry Ormond broke in for her, the only horse she could now ride; and Harry understood its ways, and managed it so much better than any body else; and Dora ...
— Tales & Novels, Vol. IX - [Contents: Harrington; Thoughts on Bores; Ormond] • Maria Edgeworth
... reading had been followed by a little observation, acutely put, which Faith felt raised a barrier between him and the truth she had been pressing. She felt it, and yet she could not answer him. She knew it was false; she could see that his objection was foundationless—stood on air; but she did not see the path by which she might bring the doctor up to her standing-point where he might see it too. It was as if she were at the top of a mountain and he at the bottom; her eye commanded a full wide view of the whole country, while his ...
— Say and Seal, Volume II • Susan Warner
... miserably around. It was quite true that people like these had no money to spend on strolling players. But we had to live somehow, and our animals could not exist on air, even well-salted air. ...
— The Maids of Paradise • Robert W. (Robert William) Chambers
... weak points in my scheme. She said she could judge better if I would let her see my manuscript. She asked me to come and lunch with her next Friday—"just our two selves"—at Rodfitten House, and to bring my manuscript with me. Need I say that I walked on air? ...
— Seven Men • Max Beerbohm
... another and a longer explosion from below, and more bullets wasted themselves on air. ...
— The Prince and Betty - (American edition) • P. G. Wodehouse
... whom Miss Mitchell's good opinion seemed almost the most important thing in the world, went about as if she were treading on air, and repeated the precious sentence to herself as proudly as if it were a patent ...
— Monitress Merle • Angela Brazil
... old buggy, leaving three little maids watching him with admiring eyes. We all loved Doctor Chester. "Now, girls," I said, "we must get our breakfast. We cannot live on air." ...
— Holiday Stories for Young People • Various
... guardsman brought up the rear with his rifle at the trail; and his majesty was further accompanied by a Rarotongan whalerman and the playful courtier with the turban of frizzed hair. There was never a more lively deputation. The whalerman was gapingly, tearfully tipsy; the courtier walked on air; the king himself was even sportive. Seated in a chair in the Ricks' sitting-room, he bore the brunt of our prayers and menaces unmoved. He was even rated, plied with historic instances, threatened with the men-of-war, ordered to restore the tapu on the spot—and nothing in the least affected ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 18 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... courage, and it is done. This stake must be driven through her. It well be a fearful ordeal, be not deceived in that, but it will be only a short time, and you will then rejoice more than your pain was great. From this grim tomb you will emerge as though you tread on air. But you must not falter when once you have begun. Only think that we, your true friends, are round you, and that we pray for you ...
— Dracula • Bram Stoker
... day Rounded by hours where each outdid the last In miracles of pomp, we must be proud, As if associates of the sylvan gods. We seemed the dwellers of the zodiac, So pure the Alpine element we breathed, So light, so lofty pictures came and went. We trode on air, contemned the distant town, Its timorous ways, big trifles, and we planned That we should build, hard-by, a spacious lodge And how we should come hither with our sons, Hereafter,—willing they, and ...
— Poems - Household Edition • Ralph Waldo Emerson
... and I limped off, walking on air, tempered with pins and needles. Joy! my luck had turned! At the top of the worn stone stairway, cut in the pylon, I met Biddy. She was dim as one of Cleopatra's Ptolemaic ghosts, in the darkness of ...
— It Happened in Egypt • C. N. Williamson & A. M. Williamson
... dare say I didn't explain myself properly. But, do you know, for a moment or two I felt as if that little back street was beautiful, and the noise of the children and the men in the public-house seemed to fit in with the sky and become part of it. You know that old saying about "treading on air" when one is glad! Well, I really felt like that as I walked, not exactly like air, you know, but as if the pavement was velvet or some very soft carpet. And then—I suppose it was all my fancy—the air seemed to smell sweet, like the incense in Catholic ...
— The House of Souls • Arthur Machen
... child could scarcely express his gratitude to the gracious being who seemed to him like an angel from heaven. As he went out again into the crowded street, he seemed to tread on air. He bought some fruit and other little delicacies to tempt his mother's appetite, and while spreading out the feast of good things before her astonished gaze, with tears in his eyes, he told her of the kindness of ...
— Eclectic School Readings: Stories from Life • Orison Swett Marden
... The man who sets his heart upon a woman Is a chameleon, and doth feed on air; From air he takes his colors—holds his life,— Changes with every wind,—grows lean or fat, Rosy with hope, or green with jealousy, Or pallid with despair—just as the gale Varies from North to South—from heat to cold! Oh, woman! woman! thou shouldst have few sins Of thine own ...
— The Lady of Lyons - or Love and Pride • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... lament he howls amain, He scampers, marvelling in his throes What brought him there To sup on air, While Jane unharmed goes, While Jane ...
— Collected Poems 1901-1918 in Two Volumes - Volume II. • Walter de la Mare
... down Falmouth Street I seemed to be treading on air. If I had loved my love before, it seemed to have increased a thousandfold now; besides, I knew that she must care for me, or she would not have braved so much to save me from danger. I had difficulty in keeping from shouting aloud, so great was my joy. I felt that ...
— The Birthright • Joseph Hocking
... that no one meant to come out of the hut Rushing River resolved to go in, and did so with another yell and a flourish of his deadly weapon, but again was he doomed to expend his courage and violence on air, for he possessed too much of natural dignity to expend his wrath on ...
— The Prairie Chief • R.M. Ballantyne
... breathed, laying his hand upon hers. She sighed; her red lips parted in the soft, luxurious ecstasy of discovery; she breathed of a curiously light and buoyant atmosphere; she was walking on air. Little bells tinkled softly, but she knew not whence came ...
— The Rose in the Ring • George Barr McCutcheon
... no word difficult in French to a German. but I can tell you that, as we cannot live on air, and these promises do not bear present fruit, master has been forced ...
— The Son of Clemenceau • Alexandre (fils) Dumas
... morning I appeared to tread on air, but I could not help laughing out aloud at the, I thought, ridiculous and anything but picturesque dresses of the women. Their coal-scuttle bonnets and their long waists diverted me, although I was sorry to observe in my healthy and fair countrywomen such an ignorance of good taste. ...
— A Sailor of King George • Frederick Hoffman
... felt a glow of delight in this achievement such as no words can describe. They marched on their way with a swinging stride, as if they stood on air. First they had the keen professional delight of having built up by their own observation a theory which proved true in every particular save one—that the blood found on the scene of the accident had flowed from a cut in the arm, and not in the head. But that was a mere detail; ...
— The Wolf Patrol - A Tale of Baden-Powell's Boy Scouts • John Finnemore
... went down the hill again to the hotel, Dinah felt as if she were treading on air. The whole world had magically changed for her. Fears still lurked in the background, such fears as she did not dare to turn and contemplate; but she herself had stepped into such a blaze of sunshine that she felt literally bathed ...
— Greatheart • Ethel M. Dell
... pelt the friends of Dialogue with nicknames— doctrinaires, airy metaphysicians, and the like. The thing she loved of all else was to chaff them and drench them in holiday impertinence, exhibit them treading on air and arguing with the clouds, or measuring the jump of a flea, as a type of their ethereal refinements. But Dialogue continued his deep speculations upon Nature and Virtue, till, as the musicians say, the interval between them was two full ...
— Works, V1 • Lucian of Samosata
... to live is but to dream: Man dreams what he is, and wakes Only when upon him breaks Death's mysterious morning beam. The king dreams he is a king, And in this delusive way Lives and rules with sovereign sway; All the cheers that round him ring, Born of air, on air take wing. And in ashes (mournful fate!) Death dissolves his pride and state: Who would wish a crown to take, Seeing that he must awake In the dream beyond death's gate? And the rich man dreams of gold, Gilding cares it scarce conceals, ...
— Life Is A Dream • Pedro Calderon de la Barca
... Prolonging Human Life, by Hufeland, preceded by Hippocrates on Air, Water, and Situation, and followed by Cornaro's book on a Sober and Temperate Life, ...
— How to Form a Library, 2nd ed • H. B. Wheatley
... daring to touch it with mine, I lifted the soft little hand to my lips, stammered something which was, no doubt, sufficiently foolish, and hurried away, as if I were treading on air and breathing sunshine. ...
— In the Days of My Youth • Amelia Ann Blandford Edwards
... silver box. And together we made up a theory, that of every event something reminiscent lingers on the spot where it happened. If only our eyes were different, we should be able, wherever we went, to see filmy, mysterious pictures painted on air—fadeless, moving photographs of all the people and all the deeds which have made up ...
— The Heather-Moon • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... I waltzed away on air to write an account of the whole affair to Freddy, and dictate a plan of operations. I was justified in feeling proud of myself. Most men would have tamely submitted to their fate instead of chasing up ...
— The Motormaniacs • Lloyd Osbourne
... the ideal turns up at the right moment," she said, bluntly; "but I am very glad you have come to make Crystal look like other girls. Now, Miss Ferrers, as only lovers can feed on air, I propose that we go in search of luncheon, for the gong has sounded long ago;" and as even Raby allowed that this was sensible advice, they ...
— Wee Wifie • Rosa Nouchette Carey
... long, but when they went away Robert Browning trod on air. The beautiful girl-like face, in its frame of dark curls, lying back among the pillows, haunted him like a shadow. He was thirty-three, she was thirty-five. She looked like a child, but the mind—the subtle, appreciative, receptive ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 5 (of 14) • Elbert Hubbard
... according to the properties and conditions of lovers who are diversely wrought upon by fickle love."[615] Here and there some fine similes are found in which figure the chameleon, for instance, who was supposed to live on air alone, or the hawk: "Chameleon a proud creature is, that lives upon air without more; thus may I say in similar fashion only through the love hopes which I entertain is ...
— A Literary History of the English People - From the Origins to the Renaissance • Jean Jules Jusserand
... known her by it for months. It may have been only fancy on his part, he thought he felt just the lightest imaginable pressure on his arm as he spoke. At any rate, he was vain enough or audacious enough to take the impression for a reality, and walked the rest of the way to the dining-room on air. ...
— The Angel of the Revolution - A Tale of the Coming Terror • George Griffith
... disagreeable. But these struck aside to their various destinations or were out-walked and left behind; and when she had driven off with sharp words the proffered convoy of some of her nephews and nieces, she was free to go on alone up Hermiston brae, walking on air, dwelling intoxicated among clouds of happiness. Near to the summit she heard steps behind her, a man's steps, light and very rapid. She knew the foot at once and walked the faster. "If it's me he's wanting, he can run for it," ...
— Weir of Hermiston • Robert Louis Stevenson
... dining-room, and of Croesus's library, with its burden of insiduous mould. The pair of trim-built flirtlings, walking so daintily down the gravel path, becomes indistinct, and their forms are seen but as the shadows of things dead—treading on air, between three worlds. The few feet of bank above the sea, dignified by the name of cliff, fall back to a gaping chasm, a sheer horror of depths, misty and unfathomable. Onward slides the thick cloud, and soon the deep-mouthed monotone of the fog-horns in the distance tells it ...
— Doctor Claudius, A True Story • F. Marion Crawford
... seized the throne and destroyed the Li family to almost the last man, he fled with his wife into the heart of the mountains. They changed their names to Lu, and, since they lived in hiding in the caverns in the rocks, he called himself the Mountain Guest or the Guest of the Rocks. He lived on air and ate no bread. Yet he was fond of flowers. And in the course of time he acquired ...
— The Chinese Fairy Book • Various
... traversing the long jetty and the silent streets, rain driving at our backs. We trod on air, I think; I remember no fatigue. Davies sometimes broke into a little run, ...
— Riddle of the Sands • Erskine Childers
... destroying ships, and sinking them, together with the men in them. Nevertheless I will impart others, which are not dangerous because the mouth of the tube through which you breathe is above the water, supported on air ...
— The Notebooks of Leonardo Da Vinci, Complete • Leonardo Da Vinci
... that the big boys should get to their homes as soon as possible and dry their boots and stockings. He dismissed the pupils, and so that eventful day was ended. Jack's boots were full of dampness still, and his feet were chilly, but as he walked home he walked on air. ...
— The Wolf's Long Howl • Stanley Waterloo
... on air as he walked home. Flying up to Esther—his usual confidant—be related to her the whole affair, and gave at great length his conversation ...
— The Garies and Their Friends • Frank J. Webb
... or faster than he did that morning. When the noon dinner bell rang, he seemed to be walking on air as he followed Josiah into the cabin. Sally was putting dinner on the table. Abe slipped up behind her and pulled one of her pigtails. Taken by surprise, she jumped and dropped a pitcher of cream. The pitcher ...
— Abe Lincoln Gets His Chance • Frances Cavanah
... dine with him. It was more pleasant now to feel her influence and power over him. She knew it, though she only half admitted it. They seemed for the moment to walk on air, as they strolled, ...
— Constance Dunlap • Arthur B. Reeve
... Nelka's godmother. These two years in Europe were a very happy, steadying and pleasant time for Nelka and she regained a hold of herself. Especially she loved Paris as she always did. She told me once that when in Paris at the time she was so exhilarated that she felt like walking on air. But her observations of life and its questions continued as always, something that never left her. She wrote a great deal to her aunt Susie and there are many interesting observations ...
— Nelka - Mrs. Helen de Smirnoff Moukhanoff, 1878-1963, a Biographical Sketch • Michael Moukhanoff
... Phil Forrest backed from the tent and walked rapidly toward the entrance. It seemed to him as if he were walking on air. ...
— The Circus Boys on the Flying Rings • Edgar B. P. Darlington
... liked the new interest it put into her life, yet did nothing to encourage it and thought that if she gave this love no food it would soon starve to death. But it seemed to thrive on air, and presently she began to feel as if a very strong will was slowly but steadily influencing her in many ways. If Mac had never told her that he meant to "make her love him," she might have yielded unconsciously, but now she mistook the impulse to obey this undercurrent ...
— Rose in Bloom - A Sequel to "Eight Cousins" • Louisa May Alcott
... we can not live on air, and I doubt if I would stand transplanting to the wild life you love, better than you to a clerk's desk. You have that fancy which gilds the tin cans in the back yard; I have that unfortunate eye which would multiply their number by three, and their unsightliness by ...
— The Mascot of Sweet Briar Gulch • Henry Wallace Phillips
... scandal having scattered them to the winds. He begins to breathe again, and employ his hours to better purpose. If he loses both money and reputation he must feel, I should think, as though treading on air. The last fools gone! And ...
— Alone • Norman Douglas
... the platform—and walked on ice. But that wasn't Toddles' undoing. The trouble with Toddles was that he was walking on air at the same time. It was treacherous running, they were nosing a curve, and in the cab, Kinneard, at the throttle, checked with a little jerk at the "air." And with the jerk, Toddles slipped; and with the slip, the center of gravity of the stack of periodicals shifted, and they bulged ominously ...
— The Boy Scouts Book of Campfire Stories • Various
... poor child?' As he spoke, he put down the cup and rose from his seat to approach her, when a sudden pang shot coldly to his heart, and was followed by a wild, confused, dizzy sensation at the brain. The floor seemed to glide from under him—his feet seemed to move on air—a mighty and unearthly gladness rushed upon his spirit—he felt too buoyant for the earth—he longed for wings, nay, it seemed in the buoyancy of his new existence, as if he possessed them. He burst involuntarily into a loud ...
— The Last Days of Pompeii • Edward George Bulwer-Lytton
... thinking much then. We just waited. The willow walls waved gently, the moss carpet was spotted with little gold patches of sunlight, in the shade a few of the red flowers still bloomed, and big, lazy bumblebees hummed around them, or a hummingbird stood on air before them. A sort of golden throbbing filled the woods, and my heart began to leap, why, I don't know; but I'm sure Laddie's did too, for I looked at him and his eyes were shining as I never had seen them before, while his cheeks were a little red, and he ...
— Laddie • Gene Stratton Porter
... Red Guard was lined up on both sides of the street, wild with delight. The other old peasant spoke to his comrade, "I am not tired," he said. "I walked on air all the way!" ...
— Ten Days That Shook the World • John Reed
... seventh heaven. I trod on air. It was the first frank admittance of her love. And with such benediction I was made so strong that I knew I could kill a score of Fortinis and snap my fingers at a score of ...
— The Jacket (The Star-Rover) • Jack London
... was not long before he went to see the Princess, and puss, as usual, marched in before him, arching his back. The King took a long step, and quite thought he had the tail under his foot, but the cat turned round so sharply that he only trod on air. And so it went on for eight days, till the King began to think that this fatal tail must be full of quicksilver—it was ...
— The Blue Fairy Book • Various
... digressed to tell us that he was a beginner at that time at the salary of a pound a week and fifteen shillings a day for travelling expenses. He thought this a great thing at first; when he heard what he was to get he walked about on air all day long, repeating to himself, "Fifteen shillings a day for expenses!" It was incredible; he had been poor, earning about five shillings a week, and now he had suddenly come into this splendid fortune. It wouldn't be much for him ...
— A Traveller in Little Things • W. H. Hudson
... the office, crossing the yard, Captain Jack Benson and Hal Hastings felt exactly as though they were walking on air. Even Hal, quiet as he was, had caught the joy-infection of these orders to proceed to Annapolis. To be sent to the United States Naval Academy on a tour of instruction is what officers of the Navy ...
— The Submarine Boys and the Middies - The Prize Detail at Annapolis • Victor G. Durham
... who have been in politics," he protested, taken aback by my hardly disguised attack upon him,—for he was in reality "party" and "machine." "Surely, you understand the situation. We must have money to maintain our organization, and to run our campaign. Our workers can't live on air; and, to speak of only one other factor, there are thousands and thousands of our voters, honest fellows, too, who must be paid to come to the polls. They wouldn't vote against us for any sum; but, unless we pay them for the day lost in the fields, they ...
— The Plum Tree • David Graham Phillips
... happiness she found herself gliding round the room with Dermot's arm about her. The band was playing a dreamy waltz, and her partner danced perfectly. Neither of them spoke. Noreen could not; she felt that all she wanted was to float, on air it seemed, held close to Dermot's breast. She gave a sigh when the dance ended. In the interval she did not want to talk; it was enough to look at his face, to hear his voice. She hated her next partner when ...
— The Elephant God • Gordon Casserly
... safe in view of the land they had desired with their whole hearts. It was necessary, first of all, to find some means of subsistence, for men do not live on air, and as they had nothing of their own, they took what belonged to others. One happy resource lightened their misfortunes; for they found a palm grove not far from the coast, between which and the neighbouring swamps there wandered herds of wild swine. They lived, therefore, ...
— De Orbe Novo, Volume 1 (of 2) - The Eight Decades of Peter Martyr D'Anghera • Trans. by Francis Augustus MacNutt
... so precious for all the world, dear Felicia," said Stephen, who now walked on air for several blocks, and what was said during that walk is private correspondence that we have no right to read. Only it is a matter of history that day that the basket never reached its destination, and that over in the other direction, late in the afternoon, the Bishop, walking along quietly from ...
— In His Steps • Charles M. Sheldon
... fail to give any impression of. Imagine an immense cavern, all pure azure—as if God had made a tent there with some residue of the firmament; a surface of water so limpid, so transparent, that you seem to float on air: above you, the pendant stalactites, huge and fantastical, reversed pyramids and pinnacles: below you a sand of gold mingled with marine vegetation; and around the margin of cave, where it is bathed by the water, the coral shooting ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Vol. 53, No. 331, May, 1843 • Various
... ordered me merely to take off my hat: the bow and the general effrontery were of my own invention. God knows what instigated me to perpetrate the outrage! In my frenzy I felt as though I were walking on air. ...
— The Gambler • Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... He went out into the street, and seemed to fairly walk on air. Then he heard the newsboys crying, "Extra paper, read about the Enterprise's Boy Reporter." And when Archie saw the paper, there on the front page was his picture, together with the story of his ...
— The Adventures of a Boy Reporter • Harry Steele Morrison
... as gluttons. This, however, is but one half the fact. They can eat, they can also fast, indefinitely. For a week they gorge themselves without exercise, and have no indigestion; for a week, exercising vigorously, they live on air, frozen air, too, and experience no exhaustion. Last winter half a dozen appeared at Square-Island Harbor, sent out their trained dogs, drove in a herd of deer, and killed thirteen. They immediately encamped, gathered fuel, made fires, began to cook and eat,—ate themselves ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 90, April, 1865 • Various
... Lettice walked on air as she came out of the precincts of the jail, which had now lost all its terrors. In less than twenty-four hours she was to come again, and transport her hero—whom the dense and cruel world had ...
— Name and Fame - A Novel • Adeline Sergeant
... on air during the two minutes' walk to the Hotel de l'Europe. At the bureau he ordered a couple of packs of cards and a supply of drinks and went to his palatial room on the ground floor. In a few moments the Comte de Lussigny appeared. Aristide offered him a two francs corona which was ceremoniously ...
— The Joyous Adventures of Aristide Pujol • William J. Locke
... and reason came back to him he was like a new being. Happiness gave wings to his feet and he walked on air. A divine song seemed to be singing in his ears. Mechanically, he went through the regular routine of school, with no difference that others could see. To himself, heart and soul—detached and divorced ...
— The Dreamer - A Romantic Rendering of the Life-Story of Edgar Allan Poe • Mary Newton Stanard
... breakfast table he could have worshiped that man. Washington was one of that kind of people whose hopes are in the very, clouds one day and in the gutter the next. He walked on air, now. The Colonel was ready to take him around and introduce him to the employment he had found for him, but Washington begged for a few moments in which to write home; with his kind of people, to ride to-day's new interest to death and put off yesterday's till another ...
— The Gilded Age, Part 1. • Mark Twain (Samuel Clemens) and Charles Dudley Warner
... hand-worked, in generators, Coefficient of expansion of acetone, air, dissolved acetylene, gaseous acetylene, liquid acetylene, simple gases, Coefficient of friction of acetylene, of coal-gas, Coke filters for acetylene, Cold, effect of, on acetylene, on air-gas, on carburetted acetylene, on generation, Colour judging by acetylene, of acetylene flame, of air-gas flame, Colour of atmospheric acetylene flame, of coal-gas flame, of electric light, of incandescent acetylene flame, of spent carbide, Combustion ...
— Acetylene, The Principles Of Its Generation And Use • F. H. Leeds and W. J. Atkinson Butterfield
... moment, he was capable of thinking only of Celia; the past was like a dream, his heart was in the present and future; and his happiness was alloyed by one regret only—that he had concealed from Celia his real name and his connection with the Heytons. But, as he walked on air towards the village, he told himself that such concealment would not long be necessary, that he would tell her the ...
— The Woman's Way • Charles Garvice
... sister very soon which had marked the opening days of her convalescence. But beyond and back of all this was some secret joy, unintelligible to the nurse, which helped rather than retarded the sick girl's recovery, and made Carmel appear at times as if she walked on air and breathed the very breath of Paradise—an anomaly which not only roused Miss Unwin's curiosity, but led her to regard with something like apprehension, any change in her patient's state of mind which would rob her of the strange and unseen delights which fed her secret soul and ...
— The House of the Whispering Pines • Anna Katharine Green
... Oh, yes! Mike got a letter from his girl. I don't know what she said, but he's walking on air." ...
— Space Tug • Murray Leinster
... people who were not getting on Air of knowing everything, and really they knew nothing—nothing As if man's honour suffered when he's injured Autocratic manner of settling other people's business Avoid falling between two stools Bad business to be unable to take pride in anything one does Begging ...
— Quotations from the Works of John Galsworthy • David Widger
... waste a charge in air. So one thing we can do is to wait here until they come, and I can account for a few of them before they shoot me down; but thou canst not fight with a broken leg, and they will take thee alive, and then there is a dance on air at Dorchester Jail.' ...
— Moonfleet • J. Meade Falkner
... exotic the love, the more difficult its culture.—True, An orchid may life on air. Yes; but how torrid and vaporous ...
— Hints for Lovers • Arnold Haultain
... expect he has a nice time of it," said Atherley. "However, it is not my fault. I warned him how it would be when he was engaged. I said: 'I hope, for one thing, you can live on air, old chap for you will get nothing more for dinner if you trust to Cissy to ...
— Cecilia de Noel • Lanoe Falconer
... peasant; and indeed it was true. For the guide's business was exactly that of St Christopher, except that the Saint took no money, and lived, I suppose, on air. ...
— The Path to Rome • Hilaire Belloc
... Alexandra said soothingly, kneeling down and gathering her mother affectionately in her arms, "Owen did every bit of this except the very first second and, if you'll just FORGET IT, in a few months he'll be thinking he did it all! Wait until you see him; he's walking on air! He's dazed. My dear"—the strain of happy confidence was running smoothly again—"my dear, we lunched together, and then we went out in the car to Burning Woods, and sat there on the porch, and talked and TALKED. It was perfectly wonderful! Now, he's gone to ...
— The Treasure • Kathleen Norris
... picked his way round it. If his thoughts had not been so entirely preoccupied, he would probably have noticed a slight movement of something behind the portrait as he passed. But exultation held him; he walked on air. ...
— The Mating of Lydia • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... can assure you that I know as much about them as anybody not in the accursed business. It is in the air—" "There are so many things in the air that they get mixed up. Your whole argument is based on air. Now, mon ami, you turn to to-morrow and study up the record of every man in that Senate, as well as the legislative methods of his State. When you know all about it, I shall be delighted to be instructed. But I don't want any more air. Now come in to dinner, and if you allude to the subject ...
— Senator North • Gertrude Atherton
... quite genteel, Shoo's fair an slim, an dresses weel; Shoo luks soa delicate an fair, Yo'd fancy shoo could live on air. But thear yo'd find yor judgment missed, For shoo's a mooast uncommon twist; Whear once shoo's called to get a snack, It's seldom at they've axt her back. To a cookshop we went one neet, An th' stuff at vanished aght o'th' seet, Made th' chap at sarved us gape an grin, But shoo went on an ...
— Yorkshire Lyrics • John Hartley
... Dolly grew more uneasy. He was not looking well, nor happy, nor easy; his manner was constrained, his spirits were forced; and for all that appeared, he might suppose that Dolly and her mother could live on air. He gave them nothing else to live on. What did he live on himself, Dolly queried, besides wine? and she made up her mind that, hard as it was, and doubtful as the effect, she must have a talk with him the next time he came down. "O father, father!" she cried ...
— The End of a Coil • Susan Warner
... herself (to use a vulgarism). She walked on air, as it were, and could talk of nothing else but the elegance ...
— Marguerite Verne • Agatha Armour
... upon one of the wildest head-waters of the Tees. A strong mountain torrent from a desolate ravine springs forth with great ferocity, and sooner than put up with any more stabs from the rugged earth, casts itself on air. For a hundred and twenty feet the water is bright, in the novelty and the power of itself, striking out freaks of eccentric flashes, and even little sun-bows, in fine weather. But the triumph is brief; and a heavy retribution, created by its violence, awaits below. From the ...
— Mary Anerley • R. D. Blackmore
... separate before — Made Rome their victim. Oh! Ambition blind, That stirred the leaders so to join their strength In peace that ended ill, their prize the world! For while the Sea on Earth and Earth on Air Lean for support: while Titan runs his course, And night with day divides an equal sphere, No king shall brook his fellow, nor shall power Endure a rival. Search no foreign lands: These walls are proof that in their infant days A hamlet, not the world, was prize enough To cause ...
— Pharsalia; Dramatic Episodes of the Civil Wars • Lucan
... was settled between them that Blanche should renew her acquaintance with the country that summer at Cloom, and when Ishmael left he walked on air. It was not that he was excited so much as that a deep content filled him; life seemed full of promise and even more worth living than he had thought it. The distrust which that news of Carminow's had engendered ...
— Secret Bread • F. Tennyson Jesse
... joys compete Take now your choice; the world is at your feet, All turned into a gay and shining pleasance, And every face has smiles to greet your presence. Treading on air, Yourself you look more fair; And the dear Birthday-elves unseen conspire To flush your cheeks and set your eyes ...
— The Vagabond and Other Poems from Punch • R. C. Lehmann
... girl who was the cause of all this heart-burning. Her behaviour was exemplary. She was docile, courteous, gentle in demeanour and speech, grateful for everything, but enthusiastic over nothing, differing in this respect from Teen, who appeared to walk on air, and carried her exaltation of spirit in her look and tone. But Liz was dull and silent, content to walk and drive, and breathe that heavenly air which ought to have been the very elixir of life ...
— The Guinea Stamp - A Tale of Modern Glasgow • Annie S. Swan
... period of death and burial it experienced this, but in a very different manner. Then it arose from distaste and powerlessness, but now it is the effect of plenitude and abundance; just as if a person could live on air, he would be full without feeling his plenitude, or knowing in what way he had been satisfied; he would not be empty and unable to eat or to taste, but free from all necessity of eating by reason of his satisfaction, without knowing how the air, entering by all his pores, ...
— Spiritual Torrents • Jeanne Marie Bouvires de la Mot Guyon
... with a few words on the power of heavy guns, when employed in various ways. The first consideration is accuracy of fire. No matter how deadly the projectile may be, it is useless if it does but waste itself on air. Accuracy is of two kinds—true direction and precision of range. All modern guns are capable of being made to shoot straight; but their precision of range depends partly on the successful designing of the gun and ammunition, so ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 324, March 18, 1882 • Various
... on air when I entered the familiar street and saw, in the distance, the house I knew so well. The street was silent. I reached the house, pulled myself together and knocked at the door. Happiest of thoughts ...
— The Sequel - What the Great War will mean to Australia • George A. Taylor
... afraid as the devil of him. So the Grand Turk, and Asia, and Africa, had recourse to magic. They sent us a demon, named the Mahdi, supposed to have descended from heaven on a white horse, which, like its master, was bullet-proof; and both of them lived on air, without food to support them. There are some that say they saw them; but I can't give you any reasons to make you certain about that. The rulers of Arabia and the Mamelukes tried to make their troopers believe that the ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol 3 • Various
... again, she took the Princess into the house and grudgingly doled out to her just enough of her gay attire to make her presentable, while the rest she pretended to have lost. After this they found that they were very hungry, for one cannot live on love, any more than on air, and then the old woman's lamentations were louder than before. 'What!' she cried, 'feed people who were as happy as all that! Why, it ...
— The Green Fairy Book • Various
... in this regard may not be without interest. The warrior who becomes an ascetic eats leaves, and is clothed in grass. For one month he eats fruits every third day (night); for another month every sixth day; for another month every fortnight; and for the fourth month he lives on air, standing on tiptoe with arms stretched up. Another account says that the knight eats fruit for one month; water for one month; and for the third month, nothing (III. 33. 73; 38. 22-26; 167). One may compare with these ascetic ...
— The Religions of India - Handbooks On The History Of Religions, Volume 1, Edited By Morris Jastrow • Edward Washburn Hopkins
... exceedingly beautiful with those blazing homa fires all around, over which those high-souled ascetics poured libations of clarified butter. Valkhilyas and Asmakuttas, Dantolakhalinas, Samprakshanas and other ascetics, as also those that subsisted on air, and those that lived on water, and those that lived on dry leaves of trees, and diverse others that were observant of diverse kinds of vows, and those that forswore beds for the bare and hard earth, all came to that ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 3 - Books 8, 9, 10, 11 and 12 • Unknown
... sold them told her the way to the street he lived in; it was not very far of the quay. She seemed to float on air, to have wings like the swallows, to hear beautiful musk all around. She felt for her beads, and said aves of praise. ...
— Bebee • Ouida
... eating properly, Ellen—that's what's the matter with you," said Bunting suddenly. "Now I come to think of it, you haven't eat half enough these last two days. I always did say—in old days many a time I telled you—that a woman couldn't live on air. But there, you never ...
— The Lodger • Marie Belloc Lowndes
... of paradise exactly, and yet we had to live on air sometimes—and a thin enough diet it was. You will never guess what I had ...
— Orrain - A Romance • S. Levett-Yeats
... say that I looked radiant when I came down to be married. The radiance was in their thoughts. Or if my face did shine, and if I moved as if treading on air, it was because I had triumphed over all difficulties and could pass down to the altar without fear of that interrupting voice crying out: 'I forbid! She is mine! The wife of William Pfeiffer can not wed ...
— The Filigree Ball • Anna Katharine Green
... look graver, in spite of himself. The fever, if such it was, went gently forward, wasting the young girl's powers of resistance from day to day; yet she showed no disposition to take nourishment, and seemed literally to be living on air. It was remarkable that with all this her look was almost natural, and her features were hardly sharpened so as to suggest that her life was burning away. He did not like this, nor various other unobtrusive ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 7, Issue 42, April, 1861 • Various
... the ruins of Sopwell Priory in the foreground, the churches of St. Stephens and St Michaels on either hand, and in the centre of the picture the Abbey of St. Albans brooding over all. We decided to be married in the abbey. I trod on air. ...
— The Motor Pirate • George Sidney Paternoster
... pale blue paper, and in it he was enlarging upon ingratitude. The men sympathized with Billy and their feet sounded resentfully upon the stones. Billy alone marched with elaborate lightness, quite as though he were walking on air and loved the very ...
— The Long Roll • Mary Johnston
... subordinates—the callous mediocrities who would let Kimberley work out its own salvation. It was reported at this time—for the better security of our peace of mind—that a grand march was to be made on Bloemfontein, while Kimberley was to live on air ...
— The Siege of Kimberley • T. Phelan
... love's sake and his law's Their powers have no more power on; they divide Spoils wrung from lust or wrath of man or pride, And keen oblivion without pity or pause Sets them on fire and scatters them on air Like ashes shaken from ...
— Songs before Sunrise • Algernon Charles Swinburne
... advance," he said, handing her an envelope as he left her, and when she opened it she found a crisp and substantial bank note. He took the little girl home that night, and when he returned to take Elizabeth out to dinner, she was so elated that she seemed to be walking on air; but she insisted that they go to a little Italian restaurant, where she had been in ...
— Ainslee's, Vol. 15, No. 6, July 1905 • Various
... now in the seventh heaven, walking as if on air. A proletarian government at last, the first in history! A government of working-men like himself, running their own affairs, without the help of politicians or bankers! Coming out before the world and telling the truth about matters of state, in ...
— Jimmie Higgins • Upton Sinclair
... joyful anticipation as he strode from the store, his new rope in his hand. He would rope that cayuse and just about burn the ground for the Concho! Maybe he wouldn't make young Andy White sit up! The Ridin' Kid from Powder River was walking on air when— ...
— The Ridin' Kid from Powder River • Henry Herbert Knibbs
... another, a yet stronger, balm. And I went as though I trod on air, my heart singing within me. For I had not, after all, to resume my task of writing that letter to ...
— And Even Now - Essays • Max Beerbohm
... on air craft, submitted in October, 1918, contained a full account of the difficulties, drawbacks and questionable management that had held back the manufacture and shipment of airplanes to Europe. In September there were on the French-Belgian front between 300 and machines, all of which ...
— America's War for Humanity • Thomas Herbert Russell
... Inna seemed to walk on air; going here and there about the farm with Oscar, who was too weak for study still, but trying with all his might to take an interest in what was ...
— The Heiress of Wyvern Court • Emilie Searchfield
... mouth, charged with some chemical substance I did not know the use of, permitted me to breathe at first with some ease. And what was more extraordinary was this, that while in the woods the fog had seemed to suffocate me, here it was exhilarating; bracing a man's steps so that he seemed to walk on air; exalting him so that his mind was on fire and his head full of the wildest notions. No coward that ever lived would have known a moment's fear under the stimulation of that clear blue vapour. I bear witness, and ...
— The House Under the Sea - A Romance • Sir Max Pemberton |
