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Touching   /tˈətʃɪŋ/   Listen
Touching

adjective
1.
Arousing affect.  Synonyms: affecting, poignant.  "Poignant grief cannot endure forever" , "His gratitude was simple and touching"






WordNet 3.0 © 2010 Princeton University








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"Touching" Quotes from Famous Books



... by a touching appeal from our senior partner. Mr. Brown, though prosaic enough in his general ideas, was still sometimes given to the Muses; and now, with a melancholy and tender cadence, he quoted the ...
— The Struggles of Brown, Jones, and Robinson - By One of the Firm • Anthony Trollope

... must be Mr. Barron, so he wrote to these English people, and told them what a wicked thing their relative had done in leaving his animals to starve. In a short time, he got an answer from them, which was, at the same time, very proud and very touching. It came from Mr. Barron's cousin, and he said quite frankly that he knew his relative was a man of evil habits, but it seemed as if nothing could be done to reform him. His family was accustomed to send a quarterly allowance ...
— Beautiful Joe - An Autobiography of a Dog • by Marshall Saunders

... smouldering fell out from among her clothes. This was evidently what had set her on fire, but how it had come there, was the question. Jenny was loud in her praise of the young gentleman. He was so gentle, and kind, and didn't mind touching the dirty old creature, and helping to place her in an easy position. He took out his purse, and observing that he hadn't much money, he gave her a handful of shillings, as he said, to help to pay the doctor and to buy her ...
— Mountain Moggy - The Stoning of the Witch • William H. G. Kingston

... Her attitude was so touching, her whole appearance so earnest and appealing, that I saw Mr. Gryce's countenance brim with suppressed emotion, though his eye never left the coffee-urn upon which it had fixed itself ...
— The Leavenworth Case • Anna Katharine Green

... warns The Old Man in that most simply touching of Maeterlinck's plays, Interieur; "we do not know how far the soul extends about men." It is a subtle and characteristic saying, and it might have been used by the dramatist as a motto for his Pelleas ...
— Debussy's Pelleas et Melisande - A Guide to the Opera with Musical Examples from the Score • Lawrence Gilman

... woman wept, it was not because he knew how to tell the story in a touching manner, but because Peter was near to her, and because she was interested, heart and soul, in what was going on in ...
— Contemporary Russian Novelists • Serge Persky

... Unspeakably touching it is, however, when I find both dignities united; and he, that must toil outwardly for the lowest of man's wants, is also toiling inwardly for the highest. Sublimer in this world know I nothing than a peasant saint. Such a one will take thee back to Nazareth itself; thou ...
— De La Salle Fifth Reader • Brothers of the Christian Schools

... subordinate assumptions contrary to the hypothesis, we may rest with this general statement, which almost every page of Dr. Balguy's book bears out, that the question which he has set himself to solve is anything rather than the real one touching the Origin of Evil; and that this attempt at a solution is as ineffectual as any of those which we ...
— The Fallen Star; and, A Dissertation on the Origin of Evil • E. L. Bulwer; and, Lord Brougham

... with a resolution of the House of Representatives of the 3d instant, touching the formation of a new government by the Cherokee tribe of Indians within the States of North Carolina, Georgia, Tennessee, and Alabama, and requesting copies of certain correspondence relating thereto, I transmit to the ...
— A Compilation of Messages and Letters of the Presidents - 2nd section (of 3) of Volume 2: John Quincy Adams • Editor: James D. Richardson

... us have some more of it.' And he shouted, 'Master!' at the top of his voice. 'More of this,' said Lockwood, touching the measure. 'Beer or ale, which ...
— Lord Kilgobbin • Charles Lever

... Touching the important matter of speed, let me say a little. All important it is, indeed, in this age of fast progress. When I first sailed for Australia, in 1840, we were, I think, 141 days on the way. Nor was that a very inordinate passage then. This time I expect, ...
— Personal Recollections of Early Melbourne & Victoria • William Westgarth

... glory of the Lord, as they carried the brilliant scenes of the day in their hearts. Every heart-beat had the solemnity of a vow, a prayer, a song of praise, a psalm of thanksgiving. What devout worship in those homes that night when the fathers told the touching story of the Greyfriars' ...
— Sketches of the Covenanters • J. C. McFeeters

... could not control shook Doris's voice. She shrank from touching the exquisite detachment of Sister Angela by the truth, and yet she must have as much sympathy ...
— The Shield of Silence • Harriet T. Comstock

... court, and then if he is found to be persuading any, whether young or old, to act contrary to the written law, he is to be punished with the utmost rigour; for no one should presume to be wiser than the laws; and as touching healing and health and piloting and navigation, the nature of them is known to all, for anybody may learn the written laws and the national customs. If such were the mode of procedure, Socrates, about these sciences ...
— Statesman • Plato

... Sterne refused to give anything, but his heart smote him for his churlishness to the meek old man. From Calais he goes to Montriul (Montreuil-sur-Mer) and thence to Nampont, near Cressy. Here occurred the incident, which is one of the most touching of all the sentimental sketches, that of "The Dead Ass." His next stage was Amiens, and thence to Paris. While looking at the Bastille, he heard a voice crying, "I can't get out! I can't get out!" He thought it was a child, ...
— Character Sketches of Romance, Fiction and the Drama - A Revised American Edition of the Reader's Handbook, Vol. 3 • E. Cobham Brewer

... he will use the right, which he claims to own, when he sees fit to do so; and it should be decided if it is right to suffer this thing. Also, because I as fiscal attend to the defense of your royal jurisdiction, should the bishop have license to declare in writing that I had made a proposition touching the Holy Inquisition? It was not only this, but that the statement went from one pulpit to another, by his command, that to say that the bishop was not judge of that cause was a heresy. These and other words of which the Audiencia will give information caused no little scandal in this ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898, V7, 1588-1591 • Emma Helen Blair

... then, as well as blind, that he talked to himself? Maisie"s heart beat more wildly, and she breathed in gasps. Dick rose and began to feel his way across the room, touching each table and chair as he passed. Once he caught his foot on a rug, and swore, dropping on his knees to feel what the obstruction might be. Maisie remembered him walking in the Park as though all the ...
— The Works of Rudyard Kipling One Volume Edition • Rudyard Kipling

... make one's choice between Pantheism and Christianity, then the question arises, Are Kierkegaard's teachings really historic Christianity, and not rather a rational adaptation? And this question must be answered in the negative, since it is possible to assimilate it without touching upon the question of the revelation of the Holy Ghost in the shape of a dove, to the Voice from the clouds, and the whole string ...
— Recollections Of My Childhood And Youth • George Brandes

... shamefull repulse, Ethelmere earle of Deuonshire and his people submit themselues to Swaine, he returneth into Denmarke, commeth back againe into England with a fresh power, is incountred withhall of the Englishmen, whose king Egelred is discomfited, his oration to his souldiers touching the present reliefe of their distressed land, their resolution and full purpose in this their perplexitie, king Egelred is minded to giue place to Swaine, he sendeth his wife and children ouer into Normandie, the Londoners yeeld vp their ...
— Chronicles (1 of 6): The Historie of England (7 of 8) - The Seventh Boke of the Historie of England • Raphael Holinshed

... call rang through the village. Sunset, the hour of prayer! Now, now they would know. Solemnly old Pandita Asin led the chant while the Moros prostrated themselves in supplication, and the dying sun slipped over the mountains, touching every tree and flower ...
— The Adventures of Piang the Moro Jungle Boy - A Book for Young and Old • Florence Partello Stuart

... after the battle, to share the captivity and alleviate the sufferings of her husband who had been severely wounded, and left in the enemy's power. The American historian, Lossing, has described both these touching episodes of the campaign, in a spirit that does honour to the writer as well as to his subject. After narrating the death of General Fraser on the 8th of October, he says that "It was just at sunset, on that calm October evening, that the corpse of General Fraser was carried up the hill to the ...
— The Fifteen Decisive Battles of The World From Marathon to Waterloo • Sir Edward Creasy, M.A.

... midshipman who was present, [Footnote: Afterwards Professor John Robison, of Edinburgh.] used to relate, that as Wolfe sat among his officers, and the boats floated down silently with the current, he recited, in low and touching tones, Gray's Elegy in a country churchyard, then just published. One stanza may especially have accorded with his ...
— The Life of George Washington, Volume I • Washington Irving

... sleep she was awakened by a hand touching her, a light being flashed in her eyes, and Aunt Lydia's strong, deep voice bidding her get up and come with ...
— The Children's Pilgrimage • L. T. Meade

... into the chair at the other window, and while the girl went slowly but briefly on, touching only the vital points of the story, and breaking at times into a bitter drollery, she sat as if without the power ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells

... Iliad (xviii. 489), asserts that the Great Bear never set in those latitudes. Now it has been found that the precession of the equinoxes explains all these puzzles; shows that in springtime on the Mediterranean the Bear was just above the horizon, near the sea but not touching it, between 750 B.C. and 1000 B.C.; and fixes the date of the poems, thus confirming other evidence, and establishing Homer's character for ...
— History of Astronomy • George Forbes

... series somewhere about the middle of January, in Dublin. Touching the details of the realisation of this hope, will you tell me in a line as soon as you can—Is the exhibition room a good ...
— The Letters of Charles Dickens - Vol. 2 (of 3), 1857-1870 • Charles Dickens

... in my expectation of touching this strange being by proffers of kindness, I turned toward the parsonage. Aaron was already gone on his ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 10, No. 58, August, 1862 • Various

... pale, when they quitted their grassy retreat. The blue sky looked dull to them, and the ardent sun was clouded over to their eyes, but they perceived not the solitude and silence. They walked quickly side by side, without speaking or touching each other, for they appeared to be irreconcilable enemies, as if disgust had sprung up between them, and hatred between their souls, and from time to time Henriette ...
— The Works of Guy de Maupassant, Volume III (of 8) • Guy de Maupassant

... unavoidable; but let us remember it is an evil; and that so far as it is avoidable, it becomes our duty to check the impulse. It is not for me to lead you at present into any consideration of a matter so closely touching your private interests and feelings; but it surely is a subject for serious thought, whether it might not be better for many of us, if, on attaining a certain position in life, we determined, with God's permission, to choose a home in which to live and die,—a home not to be ...
— Lectures on Architecture and Painting - Delivered at Edinburgh in November 1853 • John Ruskin

... stranger still, the ending of the contrast in the identification of these typical women in their death, both going to the same scaffold, discrowned of all their hopes. Of all the lessons which life has taught to ambition, none are more touching than when it points to the figures of these women as they are hurried by the procession in which they ...
— Brave Men and Women - Their Struggles, Failures, And Triumphs • O.E. Fuller

... help. The huge buildings of the public ovens were next to the walls of the palace where we were living. The terraces were almost touching. It was on the immense terraces of the public ovens that the crushing and mixing took place of all sorts of chicken food which was added to the rotten flour to make the garrison's bread. The stable lad Bastide had noticed that when the workmen of the bakery left the terraces, ...
— The Memoirs of General the Baron de Marbot, Translated by - Oliver C. Colt • Baron de Marbot

... received a touching note at this date from Mrs. Marsden, with explanation of her reluctance to let Rev. Geo. Marsden, her husband, go to Canada as President of the ...
— The Story of My Life - Being Reminiscences of Sixty Years' Public Service in Canada • Egerton Ryerson

... because she had aforetime been in Zubeideh's service. So she put the henbane in my drink, and when it was night, I drank, and the drug had no sooner reached my stomach than I fell to the ground, with my head touching my feet, and knew not but that I was in another world. When Zubeideh saw that her plot had succeeded, she put me in this chest and summoning the slaves, bribed them and the doorkeepers, and sent the former to do with me as thou sawest. So my delivery was at thy hands, ...
— The Book Of The Thousand Nights And One Night, Volume I • Anonymous

... simpler than either of these, consists in applying a strip of lead or tape across the front of the body at the level of the anterior superior iliac spines, and another touching the tips of the two trochanters. Any want of parallelism in these lines indicates a change in the position of one or ...
— Manual of Surgery Volume Second: Extremities—Head—Neck. Sixth Edition. • Alexander Miles

... tentative motions, pranced a little like a dog about to take to water, pretended to bark, and ran to and fro on the carpet. So far there was no actual fear in his manner, but he was uneasy and anxious, and nothing would induce him to go within touching distance of the walking cat. Once he made a complete circuit, but always carefully out of reach; and in the end he returned to his master's legs and rubbed vigorously against him. Flame did not like the performance at all: that ...
— Three John Silence Stories • Algernon Blackwood

... any more touching incident in the history of man's inhumanity to man, I do not know it, or cannot now recall it; and it was to visit the scene of it near "Grimsbe," or Great Grimsby, as it is now called, that we set out, after viewing ...
— Seven English Cities • W. D. Howells

... public-houses, and railed on their drunken husbands for spending the house-money in gin. A thicker crowd, towards the middle of the street, poured in and out at the door of a cookshop. Here the people presented a less terrible spectacle—they were even touching to see. These were the patient poor, who bought hot morsels of sheep's heart and liver at a penny an ounce, with lamentable little mouthfuls of peas-pudding, greens, and potatoes at a halfpenny each. Pale children in corners supped on penny basins ...
— The Fallen Leaves • Wilkie Collins

... thought the French people,—meaning principally, again, by the French people the people properly so called, the peasant,—she thought it "the most kindly, the most amiable, of all peoples." Nothing is more touching than to read in her Journal, written in 1870, while she was witnessing what seemed to be "the agony of the Latin races," and undergoing what seemed to be the process of "dying in a general death of one's family, one's country, and one's nation," ...
— Selections from the Prose Works of Matthew Arnold • Matthew Arnold

... touching and impressive, though short, sermon. At its conclusion the whole congregation rose and surrounded the missionary. The men shook his hands, the women kissed them, the children clung to his legs. It was a wonderful ...
— The Spirit of the Border - A Romance of the Early Settlers in the Ohio Valley • Zane Grey

... some description at that time, the earth still held his attention; but it was soon to lose interest for him.—"The appearance of Tracy and Quennevieres," he wrote, "is simply unbelievable: ruins, an inextricable entanglement of trenches almost touching one another, the soil turned over by the shells, the holes of which one sees by thousands. One wonders how there could be a single living man there. Only a few trees of a wood are left standing, the others beaten down by the "marmites,"[16] and everywhere may be seen the yellow color ...
— Georges Guynemer - Knight of the Air • Henry Bordeaux

... Examination of William Shakespeare, &c., before Sir Thomas Lucy, touching Deer-stealing, 19th September, 1582; and A Conference of Master Edmund Spenser with the Earl of Essex, touching the state of Ireland, 1595. Fcap. 8vo, ...
— Chatto & Windus Alphabetical Catalogue of Books in Fiction and General Literature, Sept. 1905 • Various

... done. He then spoke of the destitution in which she had lived at first, of the begging letters which she addressed to all people of distinction, and especially to Cardinal de Rohan, in consequence of his well-known liberality. He painted in lively and touching colors the scene where the cardinal, struck by the name of the suppliant, went in person to the attic to convince himself whether it were really true that a descendant of the Kings of France had been driven to such poverty and humiliation, and to give her assistance for the sake of the royal ...
— Marie Antoinette And Her Son • Louise Muhlbach

... were loosed and out rushed the animal with the cowboy bobbing about on his back. Red Pepper seemed a whirlwind of fury. He rushed forward, his nose almost touching the ground, and then he began to go up in the air. Up he would leap, coming down with all four legs held stiff and his back arched, to shake, if it were possible, Snake from the saddle. The cowboy rose in his stirrups to take the shock as much as possible from ...
— The Boy Ranchers at Spur Creek - or Fighting the Sheep Herders • Willard F. Baker

... footstep pass, Myriads of ferns and soft maianthemums, Or lily-breathing slender pyrolas Distil their hearts for you. Far in your pine-clad fastnesses ye keep Coverts the lonely thrush shall wander through, With echoes that seem ever to recede, Touching from pine to pine, from steep ...
— Alcyone • Archibald Lampman

... it casts shadows we see now that the room is an artist's studio. The silent figure in the ingle-nook is the artist. Mrs. Don is his wife, the two men are Major Armitage and an older friend, Mr. Rogers. The girl is Laura Bell. These four are sitting round the table, their hands touching: they are endeavouring to commune with one who ...
— Echoes of the War • J. M. Barrie

... was to walk along in the shelter of it, touching the rails now and then to make certain of not straying, until he should come out on the road, at the gate lodge. It was absurdly easy; compared to what he had been undergoing. Besides, the lee of the fence ...
— Further Adventures of Lad • Albert Payson Terhune

... touching my arm as we passed out of the dining-room window, "always suggests to me the English character—not much flower, but a quantity ...
— Dross • Henry Seton Merriman

... sufficiently broad, we trust, to include whatever may be necessary to insure a ready comprehension of the essential matters which are to follow as our review is carried forward to completion. What we have said touching these elementary truths will probably be sufficient to facilitate a clear understanding of the requirements essential to the perfection and regularity which characterize the normal performance of the various movements that ...
— Special Report on Diseases of the Horse • United States Department of Agriculture

... The clergyman had delivered a beautiful and touching sermon, the candidates were deeply moved by it; it was indeed a very important day for them; they were all at once transformed from mere children to grown-up people; the childish soul was to fly over, as it were, into a ...
— Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen • Hans Christian Andersen

... quandary. The thought of the grimy hand touching Clare's was detestable yet, if the request had been made in innocence it seemed churlish to object. Clare, who overheard, settled the question for him, by coming out and offering her hand to the ...
— The Woman from Outside - [on Swan River] • Hulbert Footner

... command the scouts came to a stop. They had been gradually concentrating as they pushed forward, so that when this halt was made they formed half a circle, and each fellow was almost touching elbows ...
— Pathfinder - or, The Missing Tenderfoot • Alan Douglas

... carries us, and whilst her helm Is held aright we gain good friends and true. Following such courses 'tis my steadfast will To foster Thebe's greatness, and therewith In brotherly accord is my decree Touching the sons of Oedipus. The man— Eteocles I mean—who died for Thebes Fighting with eminent prowess on her side, Shall be entombed with every sacred rite That follows to the grave the lordliest dead. But for his brother, who, a banished man, Returned to devastate and burn with ...
— The Seven Plays in English Verse • Sophocles

... deplored with many a sigh that bitter fact. And if aught had been wanting to increase the weight of fear and anguish on my already over-burdened mind, and to aid in what almost seemed an infernal plot to utterly distract me, I had it in fresh, wild conjectures touching Madonna Paola. Where indeed could she be that Ramiro's men had failed to find her for all that they had scoured that part of the country in which I had left her to wait for my return? What if, by now, ...
— The Shame of Motley • Raphael Sabatini

... things seem to indicate that the great allegory is by no means so remote from the earth as has sometimes been imagined; and perhaps the most touching commentary upon this statement is the curious and very unlovely burying-ground in Bunhill fields, cut through by a straight path that leads from one busy thoroughfare to another. A few yards to the left of that path is the tomb and monument of John Bunyan, while at an equal distance ...
— Among Famous Books • John Kelman

... stiff for a few days," he said as he laid the mail sack down on the floor; "sorry, miss, I scared your horse," and touching his ten-gallon ...
— Land of the Burnt Thigh • Edith Eudora Kohl

... failing prevented him in most cases from touching the women off with a clean brush: but the quality of liveness pertains to them in almost a higher measure: and perhaps testifies even more strongly to his almost uncanny faculty of communicating it by touches which are not always unclean and are sometimes slight to an ...
— The English Novel • George Saintsbury

... that there is something strange and indefensible in the opinions of Mr. Hobbes. He maintains that doctrines touching the divinity depend entirely upon the determination of the sovereign, and that God is no more the cause of the good than of the bad actions of creatures. He maintains that all that which God does is just, because there is none above him with ...
— Theodicy - Essays on the Goodness of God, the Freedom of Man and the Origin of Evil • G. W. Leibniz

... up a hand to any one to carry her. If refused, she turns her face down, and makes grimaces of the most bitter human weeping, wringing her hands, and sometimes adding a fourth hand or foot to make the appeal more touching. Grass or leaves she draws around her to make a nest, and resents anyone meddling with her property. She is a most friendly little beast, and came up to me at once, making her chirrup of welcome, smelled my clothing, and held out her hand to be shaken. I slapped her palm without offence, though she ...
— The Last Journals of David Livingstone, in Central Africa, from 1865 to His Death, Volume II (of 2), 1869-1873 • David Livingstone

... like a rock and allowing nothing whatever to move her. In these dangerous days—and what dangerous days they were!—the safety of the country simply depended on a few such figures as the Countess. Queen Victoria was another of them, and for her the Archdeacon had a real and very touching devotion. Thank God he would be able to show a little of it in the prominent part he intended to play in the Polchester Jubilee festivals ...
— The Cathedral • Hugh Walpole

... upon one knee, a hand upon the headstone, and read again the inscription. Then instinctively his hand left the stone and rested upon the low mound of turf, touching it with the softness of a caress; and then, before he was aware of it, he was stretched at full length upon the earth, beside the grave, his arms about the low mound, his lips pressed against the grass with which it was covered. The pent-up grief ...
— The Octopus • Frank Norris

... know or have heard of any of those offenders to affirm all such that were not of their opinions touching the premises, to be schismatics and in error. And whom do you know hath so affirmed? And when and ...
— Studies from Court and Cloister • J.M. Stone

... of the sloping ascent, or the stones of the altar were from the valley of Bethcerem.(580) And they digged deeper than virgin soil, and brought from thence perfect stones over which iron(581) was not waved. For the iron defiles by touching. And a scratch defiles everything. In any of them a scratch defiled, but the others were lawful. And they whitewashed them twice in the year; once at the passover, and once at the feast of Tabernacles. ...
— Hebrew Literature

... seen any picture but his own drawings, nor knew that such an art as the Engraver's existed! He sat over the box with enamoured eyes; his mind was in a flutter of joy; and he could not refrain from constantly touching the different articles, to ascertain that they were real. At night he placed the box on a chair near his bed, and as often as he was overpowered by sleep, he started suddenly and stretched out his hand to satisfy himself that the possession of such a treasure was not merely a pleasing ...
— The Life, Studies, And Works Of Benjamin West, Esq. • John Galt

... branch, my materials are by far most considerable. If I shall be able to publish this part, perhaps it may induce persons of curiosity and knowledge to assist me in the darker parts of the story touching our architects, statuaries, and engravers. But it is from the same kind friendship which has assisted me so liberally already, that I expect to draw most information; need I specify, Sir, that I mean yours, when ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole Volume 3 • Horace Walpole

... weary, and only wishes to be with Christ. Godwin spent a few days with her then, and the next year we find him at her funeral, as she died on August 13, 1809. His letter to his wife on that occasion is very touching, from its depth of feeling. He mourns the loss of a superior who exercised a mysterious protection over him, so that now, at her death, he for the first time ...
— Mrs. Shelley • Lucy M. Rossetti

... balls," concluded Hippy, "and the habit became so firmly fixed with him that he even rose and chased them in his sleep. He lost flesh at an alarming rate, and three months after his wedding day they laid him to rest in the quiet churchyard, with the touching epitaph over him, 'Things are ...
— Grace Harlowe's Junior Year at High School - Or, Fast Friends in the Sororities • Jessie Graham Flower

... family. In my boyhood, Saturday evening or perhaps better Thanksgiving Day, when their descendants all gathered together as long as either of the grandparents lived, we had an illustration of something very like Heine's touching picture of an old Jewish peddler who worked hard through the week, but on Friday night put on his long black coat and his three-cornered hat, lit the seven candles at the table, and told his children and grandchildren how Jehovah had led His people through the wilderness, ...
— The Menorah Journal, Volume 1, 1915 • Various

... know." Her voice was as gentle as ever, but she spoke so decidedly that the young man was obliged to tell her everything. All the time he was speaking, she kept touching me gently with her fingers. When he had finished his account of rescuing me from ...
— Beautiful Joe • Marshall Saunders

... through the Body and Head, but the Skewer takes hold of the Spit to preserve the Haunches. But to truss a couple of Rabbits, there are seven Skewers, and then the Spit passes only between the Skewers, without touching the Rabbits. ...
— The Country Housewife and Lady's Director - In the Management of a House, and the Delights and Profits of a Farm • Richard Bradley

... about these little hospitals of France are touching, without having any particular connection. There was a surgeon in one of these isolated villages, with an X-ray machine but no gloves or lead screen to protect himself. He worked on, using the deadly rays to locate pieces of shell, ...
— Kings, Queens And Pawns - An American Woman at the Front • Mary Roberts Rinehart

... passionately, touching her sleeve with his hand. "After the war? Perhaps—again, ...
— The Dark Forest • Hugh Walpole

... I have to read to her, and she discusses with me all sorts of interesting problems and subjects. She seems entirely transformed; it is as if she were ashamed of the savagery which she betrayed to me and of the cruelty with which she treated me. A touching gentleness transfigures her entire being, and when at the good-night she gives me her hand, a superhuman power of goodness and love lies in her eyes, of the kind which calls forth tears in us and causes us ...
— Venus in Furs • Leopold von Sacher-Masoch

... with food and weapons, the Northmen were accustomed to spend many weeks together on the sea, now and then touching land. In such vessels they made their way to Algiers and Constantinople, to the White Sea, to Baffin's Bay. It is not, therefore, their voyage to Greenland that seems strange, but it is their success in founding a colony which could last for more than four centuries ...
— The Discovery of America Vol. 1 (of 2) - with some account of Ancient America and the Spanish Conquest • John Fiske

... finished his narrative he looked at Stella and saw she was deeply moved. Neither spoke for a few minutes, then Stella leaned her head towards Penloe and said in a soft touching voice: ...
— A California Girl • Edward Eldridge

... and the clapping of whose wings was thunder. He had lived long in the skies above the stars; but, when he heard the rushing and dashing about of the waters, he descended from his seat to the ocean, and touching it, the earth instantly rose, and remained on the surface of the water. It rose of its present size, covered with verdure, as the low grounds which have been flooded by winter rains are green when these rains are withdrawn from them. The mountains, then as now, towered to the ...
— Traditions of the North American Indians, Vol. 2 (of 3) • James Athearn Jones

... table, laid his hand on the Bible, and repeated clause by clause after me the following oath - I fear it may sound even comic in English, but it is a very pretty piece of Samoan, and struck direct at the most lively superstitions of the race. 'This is the Holy Bible here that I am touching. Behold me, O God! If I know who it was that took away the pig, or the place to which it was taken, or have heard anything relating to it, and shall not declare the same - be made an end of by God this life of mine!' They all took it with so much seriousness ...
— Vailima Letters • Robert Louis Stevenson

... seemed hard and dry, the details of the architecture insufferably mean and insultingly familiar. I longed with all my heart to get away from Thorn into the new world which had opened to me—a world of perfumes and flowers and flower-like scents and Oriental marvels, of low voices, too, and the touching of soft hands ...
— Red Axe • Samuel Rutherford Crockett

... she had moved up to within one thousand yards range of the Spanish guns, and there were only six inches of water under her keel. The Wilmington draws nine feet of water forward and ten and a half feet aft. When the soundings showed that she was almost touching, her guns were in full play, and the Spaniards had missed a beautiful opportunity. The Spanish gunners must have miscalculated her distance and misjudged her draught, else they would have done more effective work at a range of two ...
— The Boys of '98 • James Otis

... discolorations may be removed from the face by a preparation composed of one part chemically pure carbolic acid and two parts pure glycerine. Touch the spots with a camel's-hair pencil, being careful that the preparation does not come in contact with the adjacent skin. Five minutes after touching, bathe with soft water and apply a little vaseline. It may be necessary to repeat the operation, but if persisted in, the blemishes ...
— Searchlights on Health - The Science of Eugenics • B. G. Jefferis and J. L. Nichols

... watching you this past week. You are the most domestic man I know. I never saw a man work so singlemindedly at his house and home. Domesticity is a rare outworn virtue here, I assure you. It is really quite touching to see a man so devoted ...
— The Gray Dawn • Stewart Edward White

... be taken out through the beautiful Bosphorus, across the Black Sea to Sebastopol and Balaklava, a run of about twenty-four hours. Here it is proposed to remain two days, visiting the harbors, fortifications, and battlefields of the Crimea; thence back through the Bosphorus, touching at Constantinople to take in any who may have preferred to remain there; down through the Sea of Marmora and the Dardanelles, along the coasts of ancient Troy and Lydia in Asia, to Smyrna, which will be reached in two ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain

... "I don't care for it in my case." That struck me as rather touching, but I had no right to enter uninvited into the intimacy of her meaning, and I said, looking as little at her as I need, "Aren't ...
— Questionable Shapes • William Dean Howells

... conversions which he worked. But, indeed Lerins was a hive whence swarmed forth the teachers and apostles of Southern Gaul. Hence came the modest Vincent of Lerins, the first controversialist of his time, who at the head of his greatest work inscribed a touching testimony of his love for that poor little isle where he had spent so many years, and learned so much. Salvian, also, the "Master of Bishops," as he was called, though himself only a priest, was held to be the most eloquent man ...
— In Troubadour-Land - A Ramble in Provence and Languedoc • S. Baring-Gould

... not by any means think that I am touching upon a subject which is not worth my while to mention when I recommend people to be careful to preserve what they have earned or inherited. For to start life with just as much as will make one independent, that is, allow one to live comfortably without having to work—even if one has only just enough ...
— The Essays Of Arthur Schopenhauer: The Wisdom of Life • Arthur Schopenhauer

... Spurgeon makes most effective and touching prayers, remembering, at least once on a Sunday, the United States. 'Grant, O God,' he said recently, 'that the right may conquer, and that if the fearful canker of slavery must be cut out by the sword, it be wholly eradicated from the body politic of which it is the ...
— The Black Phalanx - African American soldiers in the War of Independence, the - War of 1812, and the Civil War • Joseph T. Wilson

... friend,' I said to her, 'I am going to send you that piece of ivory. You will invent some ingenious, touching, poetic story, anything that you wish, to explain your desire for parting with it. It is, of course, a family heirloom left ...
— Maupassant Original Short Stories (180), Complete • Guy de Maupassant

... to advance the time; and we shall take the occasion thus offered to make a few explanations touching certain events which have been passed over ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII. No. 3. March 1848 • Various

... you'll carry off all the honours. You were superb today, and held us all like magic, though it was so hot there, I really think I couldn't have stood it for anyone else,' added Dolly, labouring to be gallant and really offering a touching proof of devotion; for the heat melted his collar, took the curl out of his hair, and ruined ...
— Jo's Boys • Louisa May Alcott

... ragged jacket, better than most people who have got a good coat on their backs." And with those words he had put his hand in his pocket, and had rewarded the boy's impudence with a present of a shilling. "Wrong here-abouts," said the grocer, touching his forehead. "That's my ...
— Armadale • Wilkie Collins

... 88.).—Mr. SANSOM will find some curious information touching the words [Hebrew: 'or], [Greek: eggastrimuthos], &c., in Dr. Maitland's recent Illustrations and Enquiries relating to Mesmerism, pp. 55. 81. The Lexicons of Drs. Lee and Gesenius may also be consulted, under the word [Hebrew: 'or]. The ...
— Notes & Queries, No. 38, Saturday, July 20, 1850 • Various

... you old sport, you've given me an idea! Now just prepare your minds for a pretty and touching little scene at the beginning of the mediaeval arts lecture. No, I shan't tell you what it is beforehand. It'll be something for you to ...
— The Madcap of the School • Angela Brazil

... violent bursts in which Rachel shows her power. It was an outburst of passion of which I have no conception, and I felt as if I saw a new order of being; not a woman, but a personified passion. The vehemence and strength were wonderful. It was in parts very touching. There was as fine an opportunity for Aricia to show some power as for Phedre, but the automaton who represented Aricia had no power to show. Oenon, whom I took to be the sister Sarah, was something of an actress, but her part was so hateful that no one could ...
— Maria Mitchell: Life, Letters, and Journals • Maria Mitchell

... basalts and porphyries which occur in many places, the rich red tint which the surface of the sandstone rocks often takes under the scorching sun, give depth of tone to the landscape; and though the flood of midday sunshine is almost overpowering, the lights of morning and evening, touching the mountains with every shade of rose and crimson and violet, are indescribably beautiful. It is in these morning and evening hours that the charm of the pure dry air is specially felt. Mountains fifty or sixty miles away ...
— Impressions of South Africa • James Bryce

... would on this Bare Pittance take tithe and toll, often in a most Extortionate manner. Then these Gaol birds would fall to thieving from one another, even as they slept; and if a man was weak of Arm and Feeble of Heart, he might go for a week without touching a doit of his allowance, and so might Die of Famine, unless he could manage to beg a little filthy Cabbage Soup, or a lump of Black Bread, from some one not wholly ...
— The Strange Adventures of Captain Dangerous, Vol. 2 of 3 • George Augustus Sala

... distant locality, with the once abundant Rhododendron. Nothing in Nature has for me a more fascinating interest than these secret movements of vegetation,—the sweet blind instinct with which flowers cling to old domains until absolutely compelled to forsake them. How touching is the fact, now well known, that salt-water plants still flower beside the Great Lakes, yet dreaming of the time when those waters were briny as the sea! Nothing in the demonstrations of Geology seems grander ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 10, No. 62, December, 1862 • Various

... up sadly, yet firmly; the expression of his face, whereon filial awe contended with yet higher feelings of duty, was very touching. Anlaf felt it, and in his heart respected his son, while sometimes he felt furious at ...
— Alfgar the Dane or the Second Chronicle of Aescendune • A. D. Crake

... happiness to know Griggins, we became extremely desirous to see so pleasant a fellow, the more especially as a stout gentleman with a powdered head, who was sitting with his breeches buckles almost touching the hob, whispered us he was a wit of the first water, when the door opened, and Mr. Griggins being announced, presented himself, amidst another shout of laughter and a loud clapping of hands from the younger branches. This welcome ...
— Sketches by Boz - illustrative of everyday life and every-day people • Charles Dickens

... same reason I suppose, sir, that you think my father never would have been quite the same being he is if he had not made that notable discovery touching our descent from the great William ...
— The Caxtons, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... fancied he was rather too fond of superfine discriminations and of discovering subtle intentions in shallow places. At moments, too, he plunged into the sea of metaphysics, and floundered a while in waters too deep for intellectual security. But his abounding knowledge and happy judgment told a touching story of long attentive hours in this worshipful company; there was a reproach to my wasteful saunterings in so devoted a culture of opportunity. "There are two moods," I remember his saying, "in which ...
— The Madonna of the Future • Henry James

... dry season. I was only twice hit; once near Karree Siding when a pom-pom shell burst just under my horse and took off the heel of one of my boots; the second time a sniper's bullet went through my coat sleeve without touching me. But I was unfortunate otherwise. One night I was riding along the veldt on a horse which had been presented to me when I left Adelaide by a friend of mine, one of the best horsemen in South Australia, Stephen Ralli, which we had christened Bismarck. We suddenly came to the edge ...
— The Chronicles of a Gay Gordon • Jose Maria Gordon

... much at an opening in the earth, out of which poured fire, as if from a well. Close by, the naphtha which was poured out formed a large lake. This substance is like bitumen, and is so easy to set on fire, that without touching it with any flame, it will catch light from the rays which are sent forth from a fire, burning the air which is between both. The natives, in order to show Alexander the qualities of naphtha, lightly sprinkled with it the street which led to his quarters, and when ...
— Plutarch's Lives Volume III. • Plutarch

... seize an advantage from a German!" whispered the Frenchwoman, beginning to look flushed and expectant. "You see that woman in the chair you are touching? She was one of the greatest actresses of the world, Madame Rachel Berenger. Now she is too old and large to act, so she lives in a beautiful villa, across the Italian frontier. She is always coming to Monte Carlo to ...
— The Guests Of Hercules • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson

... then," said Wild Jack, just touching the prostrate man with the toe of his boot. "We will leave you now, with many apologies, madam, ...
— Tales from Many Sources - Vol. V • Various

... Well! What other face could he have dreamed of? And her complexion was fairer than Parian marble, than the heads of angels. The wind at the end was the morning breeze entering through the open porthole and touching his face before the schooner could swing to the ...
— Within the Tides • Joseph Conrad

... shall do to the best of my power till God and her Highness shall otherwise dispose for me, wishing that shortly it should come to pass, if it may so stand with her Highness's good contention and your honour. As touching the fifth article, which purported this in effect that I should not suffer the lady Elizabeth's Grace to have conference with any suspect person out of my hearing, that she do not by any means either receive or ...
— Studies from Court and Cloister • J.M. Stone

... hair, and stretching it out in that direction he stroked and patted a rounded something. But the feel of it, and still more the fact that instead of a responsive movement, absolute stillness greeted his touch, made him look over the arm. What he had been touching rose to meet him. It was in the attitude of one that had crept along the floor on its belly, and it was, so far as could be collected, a human figure. But of the face which was now rising to within a few inches of ...
— A Thin Ghost and Others • M. R. (Montague Rhodes) James

... Ursula with the company of virgins, in the same church. He made in one hand of the said Saint a standard with the arms of Pisa, which are a white cross on a field of red, and he made her offering the other hand to a woman who, rising between two mountains and touching the sea with one of her feet, is stretching both her hands to her in the act of supplication; which woman, representing Pisa, and having on her head a crown of gold and over her shoulders a mantle covered with circlets and eagles, is seeking assistance from that Saint, being much ...
— Lives of the Most Eminent Painters Sculptors and Architects - Volume 1, Cimabue to Agnolo Gaddi • Giorgio Vasari

... saw us slipping through and ran at us with his stick. My mother went first and escaped him. Then came my sister, then I, then my brother. My father was last of all. The man hit with his stick and it came down thud along side of me, just touching my fur. He hit again and broke the foreleg of my brother. Still we all managed to get through into the wood, except my father ...
— The Mahatma and the Hare • H. Rider Haggard

... right and their arguments always wrong. Reason is always a kind of brute force; those who appeal to the head rather than the heart, however pallid and polite, are necessarily men of violence. We speak of "touching" a man's heart, but we can do nothing to his head but hit it. The tyranny of the Puritans over the bodies of men was comparatively a trifle; pikes, bullets, and conflagrations are comparatively a trifle. Their real tyranny was the tyranny of aggressive ...
— Varied Types • G. K. Chesterton

... and can be hit either off the forehand or backhand side. The ball rebounds off the side wall, goes cross court and hits the opposite side wall just inches away from the front wall. It bounces out and practically parallel to the front, barely touching or "kissing" the front wall for a winner, or at least a very difficult "get" for your opponent (see figs. 13 [Forehand boast.] & 14 [Forehand boast.]). The only prerequisite for hitting this shot properly is that you should be fairly far back in the court and close to one of the ...
— Squash Tennis • Richard C. Squires

... Beautiful! Feet closer at the recovery. Perfect!) Young gentlemen, good evening. Take your usual places, please, all of you, for our preliminary exercises. Now, the chassee round the room. Will you lead off, please, Dummer; the hands just lightly touching the shoulders, the head thrown negligently back to balance the figure; the whole deportment easy, but not ...
— Vice Versa - or A Lesson to Fathers • F. Anstey

... replied the fellow at the masthead, touching his hat. For such was the height of discipline on board of the Beauty, that even at that height he was obliged to mind it or be shot ...
— Captain Boldheart & the Latin-Grammar Master - A Holiday Romance from the Pen of Lieut-Col. Robin Redforth, aged 9 • Charles Dickens

... it is absurd to suppose that a body can create, for no body acts except by touching or moving; and thus it requires in its action some pre-existing thing, which can be touched or moved, which is contrary to the very idea ...
— Summa Theologica, Part I (Prima Pars) - From the Complete American Edition • Thomas Aquinas

... that she might be able to induce Arthur to refrain from indulging in such sports as would be likely to endanger the watch; or else to give it into her charge. At any other time she would have trembled at the thought of touching it; but now she felt so sure it would be safer with her than with him, that she would ...
— Elsie Dinsmore • Martha Finley

... the guard, sir," replied the Adjutant, touching his hat with a submission that was scrupulously exacted on all occasions of duty by ...
— Wacousta: A Tale of the Pontiac Conspiracy (Complete) • John Richardson

... next, and a ghastly crew they were. But the precautions he took for their comfort were very complete, and although immediately before reaching me they had to cross a very bad part of the desert between Abou Hamed and Korosko, they reached me in wonderful spirits. It was touching to see the perfect confidence they had that the promises of Gordon Pasha would be fulfilled. After the fall of Khartoum, and your brother's death, a good many of the Egyptian officers who had been with your brother managed to escape, and to come down the river disguised in many cases ...
— The Life of Gordon, Volume II • Demetrius Charles Boulger

... to my old-country habit of raising the hat in salutation instead of merely nodding or touching the brim. No doubt he expressed a feeling that was quite general at the time. But after Mulberry Street had taken notice of Roosevelt's friendship for me there was a change, and then it went to the other extreme. It never quite got over ...
— The Making of an American • Jacob A. Riis

... brutes? I suppose this first, that they have done no harm; next, that they have no power whatever of resistance; it is the cowardice and tyranny of which they are the victims which makes their sufferings so especially touching. For instance, if they were dangerous animals, take the case of wild beasts at large, able not only to defend themselves, but even to attack us; much as we might dislike to hear of their wounds and agony, yet our feelings would be of a very different kind; but there is something so very dreadful, ...
— Parochial and Plain Sermons, Vol. VII (of 8) • John Henry Newman

... waterless expanse, stretching for hundreds of miles in a dead level, over which the winds drove at will the shifting sands, constantly threatening to bury any work which man ventured to lay upon the desert's broad breast. West of Bokhara and south of Khiva stretched the great desert of Kara-Kum, touching the Caspian Sea on the west, the Amu-Daria River on the east, the home of the wandering Turkomans, the born foes of the settled races, but from whom all thought of disputing the Russian rule had for the time been ...
— Historic Tales, Vol. 8 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris

... like to encourage hounds to visit me occasionally in the house, as then they are, so to speak, on their honour, and they so much appreciate these visits that they lie peacefully near the fire with the cats in perfect friendship, after having carefully examined, without touching, everything in the room. They may look and smell, but not touch, and as bad behaviour in this respect means instant ejection, they soon become like visitors to a museum. The worst about puppy walking is that one has to ...
— The Horsewoman - A Practical Guide to Side-Saddle Riding, 2nd. Ed. • Alice M. Hayes

... said: 'As the resolution receives my unqualified approval, I vote Aye;' and that further on the 5th of February, 1861, before the inauguration of President Lincoln, in a speech made by Logan in the House in favor of the Crittenden Compromise measures, he used the following language touching Secession: ...
— The Great Conspiracy, Complete • John Alexander Logan

... much to say of the road which we were travelling for the second time. Reaching Middletown, my first call was on the wounded Colonel and his lady. She gave me a most touching account of all the suffering he had gone through with his shattered limb before he succeeded in finding a shelter, showing the terrible want of proper means of transportation of the wounded after the battle. It occurred to me, while at this house, ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 10, No. 62, December, 1862 • Various

... Oxford, at last, through the Christian and faithful counsel of that queen, he was so armed against all infidelity, that both he hunted in the aforesaid park, and also entered into the town of Oxford, and had no harm. But because touching the memorable virtues of this worthy queen, partly we have said something before, partly because more also is promised to be declared of her virtuous life (the Lord so permitting), by other who then were about her, I will cease in this ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to prose. Volume III (of X) - Great Britain and Ireland I • Francis W. Halsey

... to take your word for it, but it looked uncommonly touching—so like the real thing, and yet merely a case of ...
— The Road to Mandalay - A Tale of Burma • B. M. Croker

... with a touching story told of these unquiet and misery-haunted times. Ulrich, Count of Linzgau, was, so the story goes, taken prisoner by the Magyars, and long held captive in their hands. Wendelgarde, his beautiful wife, after waiting long in sorrow for ...
— Historical Tales, Vol 5 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality, German • Charles Morris

... lying here,' he answered, touching his chest, 'which presses down to the grave. If they can't do something to remove that, I'm a dead man. No word of that young ...
— The Guinea Stamp - A Tale of Modern Glasgow • Annie S. Swan

... is another thing touching the matter," said the Colonel suddenly. "Forister is your chief rival, although I little know what has passed between them. Nothing important, I think, although I am sure Forister is resolved to have her for a bride. Of that I am certain. He ...
— The O'Ruddy - A Romance • Stephen Crane

... from his side and climbed upon his stool. In the first forward surge of people towards him, Razumov expected to be torn to pieces, but they fell back without touching him, and nothing came of it but noise. It was bewildering. His head ached terribly. In the confused uproar he made out several times the name of Peter Ivanovitch, the word "judgement," and the phrase, "But this is a confession," uttered by somebody in a desperate shriek. ...
— Under Western Eyes • Joseph Conrad

... for this reason that I published among other things, in the course of the year 1865,—now a quarter-century past,—a treatise entitled Unknown Natural Forces, and touching certain questions analogous to those which are to occupy our attention in this paper; and so I ask my readers to note the following quotations therefrom, as an introduction to ...
— The Arena - Volume 4, No. 19, June, 1891 • Various

... the veins we should therefore add the external application of stimulant materials; as of vinegar, which makes the lips pale on touching them. ...
— Zoonomia, Vol. II - Or, the Laws of Organic Life • Erasmus Darwin

... unnecessary. The Postmaster clapped his hand to his forehead, and publicly called himself a fool, though, later, he tried to excuse his mistake by saying that in England the science of mechanics had reached such a pitch that wooden legs were manufactured which would enable the wearer, on touching a spring, ...
— Dead Souls • Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol

... Newhaven, touching them affectionately. "But," he added, with a shade more listlessness than before, "Society has become accustomed to do without them, and does ill without them, but we must conform to her." Hugh started slightly, and then remained ...
— Red Pottage • Mary Cholmondeley

... his tools exactly as a painter his pencil, and you may recognize the decision of his thought, and glow of his temper, no less in the workmanship than the design. The modern system of modelling the work in clay, getting it into form by machinery, and by the hands of subordinates, and touching it at last, if indeed the (so called) sculptor touch it at all, only to correct their inefficiencies, renders the production of good work in marble a physical impossibility. The first result of it is that the sculptor thinks in clay instead of marble, and ...
— The Crown of Wild Olive • John Ruskin

... in a corner, tight up against the brick wall, and away it went again close to the water's edge and was nearly lost, but for a lucky kick from Harry which saved it. No one else cared about touching the monster, and at last it appeared as though the prize would escape after all, for Bob was trying to retain it with one hand only— the other appearing to be disabled in some way or another; but it was not so, for Bob meant mischief, and his hand reappeared with his great bread ...
— Hollowdell Grange - Holiday Hours in a Country Home • George Manville Fenn

... of some secret matter to which Vallancey and Richard were wedded, had been earlier excited by Westmacott's indiscretions, was full of sly questions now touching the business which might be taking Vallancey to Scoresby. But Richard was too full of the subject of the fear he had instilled into Wilding to afford his companion much satisfaction on any other score. Thus they came to Lupton House, ...
— Mistress Wilding • Rafael Sabatini

... said the little girl, touching her ankle, which she had decently covered with her gown: "I believe I am hurt here, but not much," added she, trying to rise; "only it ...
— Children's Literature - A Textbook of Sources for Teachers and Teacher-Training Classes • Charles Madison Curry

... recited his secret mantras, and kindling a fire poured libations of clarified butter upon it. Giving away a thousand kine unto a thousand Brahmanas all of whom were fully conversant with the four Vedas, he caused them to utter benedictions upon him. Touching next diverse kinds of auspicious articles and beholding himself in a clear mirror, Krishna addressed Satyaki, saying, "Go, O descendant of Sini, and repairing to Yudhishthira's abode, ascertain whether that king of great energy is dressed for visiting Bhishma." At these words of Krishna, ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 3 - Books 8, 9, 10, 11 and 12 • Unknown

... the touching story of his love: how he was Adamastor, of the race of Titans, and how he loved Thetis, the fairest being of the sea; and how, deceived by the (magic) arts of her "who was the life of his body," he found ...
— The Life of Columbus • Arthur Helps

... rejoice in the smile of Infinite Beneficence. The heart may swell with rapture as it looks abroad on a happy universe, replenished with so many evidences of the divine goodness; nay, the story of a Saviour's love, set forth in eloquent and touching language, may draw tears from our eyes, and the soul may rise in gratitude to the Author of such boundless compassion; and yet, after all, we may be mere sentimentalists in religion, whose wills and whose lives are in direct opposition to all laws, both human and divine. Infidelity ...
— A Theodicy, or, Vindication of the Divine Glory • Albert Taylor Bledsoe

... reaped from this turn of mind, it tended much to cure him of credulity of which the following instance is given by Sir Thomas More. There was a man who pretended that, though he was born blind, he had recovered his sight by touching the shrine of St. Albans. The duke, happening soon after to pass that way, questioned the man, and seeming to doubt of his sight, asked him the colors of several cloaks, worn by persons of his retinue. The man ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part B. - From Henry III. to Richard III. • David Hume

... absolution for them can only be granted by the Pope himself, who delegates his power to the Grand Penitentiary, and he receives such confessions in the chair in which he was seated to-day. They are, however, very rare; but this evening, after he had finished touching the people, a man, dressed like a peasant in a loose brown frock, worsted stockings, and brogues, apparently of the lowest order, dark, ill-looking, and squalid, approached the Confessional to reveal some great ...
— The Greville Memoirs - A Journal of the Reigns of King George IV and King William - IV, Volume 1 (of 3) • Charles C. F. Greville

... the Griffin suffered from the blow upon his tender paws was as nothing compared to the blow to the Griffin's feelings when he realised that his ineffably touching picture of the Sleeping Beauty had been spoiled for the evening. A great surge of sudden hatred swept over the Griffin at the swaggering intruder who had dared to strike him, and simultaneously the Griffin remembered something he had once heard said ...
— The Tale of Lal - A Fantasy • Raymond Paton

... began to fail. The six maidens were less clearly seen, but the deep meaning of them did not lessen. In the gathering darkness they and their sweet effort became more touching, more lovable. Their persistence was exquisite now that they confronted with ...
— In the Wilderness • Robert Hichens

... make out what I can by myself. And under the influence of the Solstitial sign of June I will go backwards, or askance, to the practical part of the business, where I left it three months ago, and take up that question first, touching Liberty, and the relation of the loose swift line to the resolute slow one and of the etched line to the engraved one. It is a worthy question, for the open field afforded by illustrated works is tempting even to ...
— On the Old Road Vol. 1 (of 2) - A Collection of Miscellaneous Essays and Articles on Art and Literature • John Ruskin

... his horse and foot, using each to strengthen the other. Apart they are weak. Together they are strong. The archer who can weaken the enemy's line, the horseman who can break it when it is weakened, as was done at Falkirk and Duplin, there is the secret of our strength. Now touching this same battle of Falkirk, I pray you for one instant to give ...
— Sir Nigel • Arthur Conan Doyle

... Very touching indeed was the friendship maintained to the end between these two leaders of thought—free as their intercourse was from any smallest trace of self-seeking or jealousy. When in 1874 I spent some time with Lyell in his Forfarshire ...
— Darwin and Modern Science • A.C. Seward and Others

... Commodore gives me a sailor's greeting. I have had confidential interviews with the double-headed daughter of Africa,—so far, at least, as her twofold personality admitted of private confidences. I have listened to the touching experiences of the Bearded Lady, whose rough cheeks belie her susceptible heart. Miss Jane Campbell has allowed me to question her on the delicate subject of avoirdupois equivalents; and the armless fair one, ...
— The Poet at the Breakfast Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.

... knight proposing to combat might, if he pleased, select a special antagonist from among the challengers, by touching his shield. If he did so with the reverse of his lance, the trial of skill was made with what were called the arms of courtesy, that is, with lances at whose extremity a piece of round flat board was fixed, so that no ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 6 • Charles H. Sylvester

... man felt his heart fortified by the genuine and touching sincerity of these words, and, after coughing once more with uncommon vigour and resolution, by way of a parting adieu to the temptations of cowardice, and thereby steeling his mind the ...
— A Hungarian Nabob • Maurus Jokai

... thirst of humanity outraged, until swelling to a flood it shall rush with wasting violence over the ill-gotten heritage of the oppressor. Startling incidents authenticated, far excelling fiction in their touching pathos, from the pen of self-emancipated slaves, do now exhibit slavery in such revolting aspects, as to secure the execrations of all good men, and become a monument more enduring than marble, in testimony strong ...
— Narrative of the Life and Adventures of Henry Bibb, an American Slave, Written by Himself • Henry Bibb

... something touching in the child's voice, or in this description of his solitude, for the Captain looked at him very good-naturedly, and the trooper called Steele put his hand kindly on the lad's head, and said some words in ...
— Boys and girls from Thackeray • Kate Dickinson Sweetser

... hopelessly and go about her appointed task with an unflagging but despairing diligence that was touching to see. ...
— The Thin Red Line; and Blue Blood • Arthur Griffiths

... not only interesting but instructive and even touching to watch from a little distance the life and movements of these brooding-places. You can then see the birds walking up and down the exterior path or public promenade in pairs, or even four, six, or eight together, looking very like officers promenading on a parade day. Then all ...
— The International Monthly Magazine, Volume 5, No. 1, January, 1852 • Various

... to the margin" is still more instructive. It is that touching apologue, with its profound ethical sense, of the woman taken in adultery—which, if internal evidence were an infallible guide, might well be affirmed to be a typical example of the teachings of Jesus. Yet, say the revisers, ...
— Collected Essays, Volume V - Science and Christian Tradition: Essays • T. H. Huxley

... took up the bow, placed the arrow across it, and drew the bow so that the arrow split into twelve pieces and the bow burst. Then the prince said, "Did I not tell you? and was I to put myself to shame by touching a bow that one of my servants ...
— Cossack Fairy Tales and Folk Tales • Anonymous

... been the result had not nature come to his help. He was on the point of turning his pony's head around, to re-enter the timber he had left, when he discovered to his astonishment that he had already reached it. There were the trees directly in front, with the nose of Dick almost touching ...
— The Young Ranchers - or Fighting the Sioux • Edward S. Ellis

... the catamount, which they allowed had been seen in the Canadian forests during the early settlement of the country. I had heard this animal described as being of large size, and possessing such strength and agility, as enabled them to spring from the boughs of one tree to those of another without touching the ground, and at such times their savage cries were such as to fill the heart of the boldest hunter with terror. I shall never forget the laugh which my grown-up brothers enjoyed at my expense when trembling with terror, ...
— The Path of Duty, and Other Stories • H. S. Caswell

... company as a cup-companion. Accordingly he paid him frequent visits, till Al-Rashid departed to the mercy of Almighty Allah; and glory be to Him who dieth not the Lord of the Seen and the Unseen! And among tales they tell is one touching ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 9 • Richard F. Burton

... addressing himself to me rather than to you? Ah! my son, take it out of my sight, and put it where you please. I had rather you would sell it than run the hazard of being frightened to death again by touching it; and if you would take my advice, you would part also with the ring, and not have anything to do with genies, who, as our prophet has told us, ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments • Anonymous

... inspection, and learned to think. She had heard of a separate state, and that angels sometimes visited this earth. She would sit in a thick wood in the park, and talk to them; make little songs addressed to them, and sing them to tunes of her own composing; and her native wood notes wild were sweet and touching. ...
— Mary - A Fiction • Mary Wollstonecraft

... risen again and was driving dark masses of cloud across the sky; in the west a sullen red flared up from behind the hills, touching the lower edges of the vaporous mountains with purple. In a small, clear space above the red hung the silver sickle of the new moon, and near it shone a single star.... Lydia was like that star, he told himself—as wonderful, ...
— An Alabaster Box • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman and Florence Morse Kingsley

... lay close within the shadow of the church—touching the wall, as if they clung to it for comfort and protection. Others had chosen to lie beneath the changing shade of trees; others by the path, that footsteps might come near them; others, among the graves ...
— The Old Curiosity Shop • Charles Dickens

... embarkation, was to prepare proper counsel and instruction for his wife and children. This he did in the form of a letter written at Worminghurst, August 4, 1682. He knew not that he should ever see them again, and his heart poured forth to them the most touching utterances of affection. But it was not the heart alone which indited the epistle. It expressed the wisest counsels of prudence and discretion. All the important letters written by Penn contain a singular union of spiritual ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 12 • Editor-In-Chief Rossiter Johnson

... translated the mountains of their native land into excellent verse. Everybody remembers Mr. Bryant's "Monument Mountain," for its touching story, and ...
— The Aldine, Vol. 5, No. 1., January, 1872 - A Typographic Art Journal • Various

... act of well-meant violence. Walther was grateful, no doubt, upon calmer reflection, to have been saved from the ruinous folly he had projected. The two men are obviously fast friends. There is in Sachs's attitude a touching deference toward the younger man, the heart-wholly acknowledged superior in talent. It is a pleasant spectacle, the grey meistersinger's eager glorying in the golden youth's simple, abundant, God-bestowed gift. The motif of his address to Walther has a touch of charming ...
— The Wagnerian Romances • Gertrude Hall

... panting from the chase he had given himself, for just a second, and in that second he felt a large hand grip his arm in a firm grasp. But it was not the policeman. Beside him, with his head touching the curb, lay a strong young man. Across their bodies was the vehicle which Glen had overturned, something like a large baby buggy or a small invalid chair, with a steering wheel in front. No one came to their help, for Glen had instinctively selected the quiet streets and ...
— The Boy Scout Treasure Hunters - The Lost Treasure of Buffalo Hollow • Charles Henry Lerrigo

... am very sorry to lose him, he is so amiable and agreeable, and I have known him ever since I can remember anybody; he is, besides, equally liked and on equally good terms with both parties here, which was of the greatest importance. It was touching to see him so low and ill ...
— The Letters of Queen Victoria, Volume 1 (of 3), 1837-1843) • Queen Victoria

... patients live for many months without touching bread, because they could not eat baker's bread. These were mostly country patients, but not all. Home-made bread or brown bread is a most important article of diet for many patients. The use of aperients may be entirely superseded by it. Oat cake ...
— Notes on Nursing - What It Is, and What It Is Not • Florence Nightingale

... lost and the wind or impulse leads,—generally, therefore, between intellectual, and brutal, or meaningless, music. Therefore, when Apollo prevails, he flays Marsyas, taking the limit and external bond of his shape from him, which is death, without touching the mere muscular strength, yet ...
— The Queen of the Air • John Ruskin



Words linked to "Touching" :   buss, manipulation, tag, palpation, jab, tactual exploration, tickle, brush, kiss, skimming, shaving, striking, osculation, stroke, dig, pat, light touch, stroking, human action, handling, deed, grazing, moving, act, grope, affecting, snap, hit, contact, lick, tickling, dab, fingering, tap, catch, hitting, physical contact, impinging, snatch, human activity, titillation, lap, grab



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