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Float   Listen
verb
Float  v. i.  (past & past part. floated; pres. part. floating)  
1.
To rest on the surface of any fluid; to swim; to be buoyed up. "The ark no more now floats, but seems on ground." "Three blustering nights, borne by the southern blast, I floated."
2.
To move quietly or gently on the water, as a raft; to drift along; to move or glide without effort or impulse on the surface of a fluid, or through the air. "They stretch their broad plumes and float upon the wind." "There seems a floating whisper on the hills."






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Float" Quotes from Famous Books



... different from the slowness of a drawl, was the natural voice of that big starry world so generous of time. Occasionally he made a remark which ought to have been flattery, but which, coming from him, was so quiet and true that one might float on it to topics of unknown depth. He was so evidently interested in everything she said, and his attention was so single-minded and sincere, that Janet was soon chatting again upon the subject of her recent circumnavigation of the prairie, which, as she now saw it in the light ...
— The Wrong Woman • Charles D. Stewart

... upon his lovely breast! see how they mangle his lifeless corse! Horror! give me my child, barbarians! his head shall lie upon his Suky's bosom—she will embalm him with her tears. Ha! plunge him in the deep!—shall my boy then float in a watery tomb? Justice, most mighty emperor! justice upon the villain who hath ruined us all! May Heaven's dreadful vengeance overtake him! may the keen storm of adversity strip him of all his leaves and fruit! may peace forsake his mind, ...
— The Adventures of Sir Launcelot Greaves • Tobias Smollett

... so," Blake replied unguardedly, for he did not see where his uncle's remark led. "Boring plant is expensive, and transport costs something. Then you have to spend a good deal beforehand if you wish to float a company." ...
— Blake's Burden • Harold Bindloss

... proportion to their weight; and their bones are more hollow than those of animals that do not fly: air-vessels also enable them to blow out the hollow parts of their bodies, when they wish to make their descent slower, rise more swiftly, or float in the air. The spine is immovable, but the neck has a greater number of bones, (never less than nine, and varying from that to twenty-four,) and consequently of joints, and more varied motion, than in quadrupeds. The breast-bone is very large, with a prominent keel down the middle, and is formed ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. 19, Issue 547, May 19, 1832 • Various

... Helvoetsluys, I was observed to breathe with some difficulty; upon the inhabitants inquiring into the cause, I informed them that the animal upon whose back I rode from Harwich across to their shore did not swim! Such is their peculiar form and disposition, that they cannot float or move upon the surface of the water; he ran with incredible swiftness upon the sands from the shore, driving fish in millions before him, many of which were quite different from any I had yet seen, carrying their ...
— The Surprising Adventures of Baron Munchausen • Rudolph Erich Raspe

... is the great thing. There's nothing much wrong with you except cheek. You've got enough of that to float a ship. ...
— The Politeness of Princes - and Other School Stories • P. G. Wodehouse

... the scene is often noble, although it is always sad. The upper air is still bright with sunlight; a glow still rests upon the Gabelano Peak; but the fogs are in possession of the lower levels; they crawl in scarves among the sandhills; they float, a little higher, in clouds of a gigantic size and often of a wild configuration; to the south, where they have struck the seaward shoulder of the mountains of Santa Lucia, they double back and spire up skyward ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition - Vol. 2 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... life whose signs denote us As mourners clothed with regret for the life gone by; To the waters of gloom whence winds of the dayspring float us Goodnight ...
— A Century of Roundels • Algernon Charles Swinburne

... Miss Campbell, watching, unmoved, the process of shaking the pine needles from the bread. "Starving, rather. If I don't have my dinner in a minute, I shall be light enough to float away like a thistledown." ...
— The Motor Maids at Sunrise Camp • Katherine Stokes

... surmounted by an ostrich-plume. The nine cords were stretched diagonally and quivered under the long, slender hands of the harpist, who often, in order to reach the lower notes, bent with a sinuous motion as if she were about to float on the waves of music and accompany ...
— The Works of Theophile Gautier, Volume 5 - The Romance of a Mummy and Egypt • Theophile Gautier

... by a short, straight bristle; and slight notches on the sides of the leaves bear similar bristles. On both surfaces there are many small papillae, crowned with two hemispherical cells in close contact. The plants float near the surface of the water, and are quite destitute of roots, even during the earliest period of growth.* They commonly inhabit, as more than one observer has remarked to ...
— Insectivorous Plants • Charles Darwin

... the air with the bow, as if to recall a former touch and tune. A satisfied look shot up in his face, and then with an almost impossible softness he drew the bow across the strings, getting a distant delicate note, which seemed to float and tenderly multiply upon itself—a variation, indeed, of the tune which De Casson had played. A rapt look came into his eyes. And all that look behind the general look of his face—the look which has to do with a man's past or future—deepened and ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker

... but when she's my age—well, I guess you and your old crowd are the last of the Mohicans. I doubt if there'll even be any chaperons left. Joan may not smoke nor drink. Who cares for 'vices,' anyhow? But you haven't got a moat and drawbridge round Rincona, and she'll just get out and mix. She'll float with the stream—and all streams ...
— The Sisters-In-Law • Gertrude Atherton

... happened, he has grabbed the bright flowers, torn them out, and danced back to the very highest corner of his cage, where, jabbering with delight, he picks the petals off one by one, and lets them float down to the ground. He is big, so none of the others dare take his prize from him; but woe betide any little monkey who finds such a treasure. He darts off with it, and then begins a wild race right across the cage; one monkey after another joins in, ...
— The Children's Book of London • Geraldine Edith Mitton

... enjoy a sudden sunset—we want the clouds of gold that float in the azure sea. No one would enjoy a sudden sunrise—we are in love with the morning star, with the dawn that modestly heralds the day and draws aside, with timid hands, the curtains of the night. In other words, we want ...
— The Works of Robert G. Ingersoll, Volume VIII. - Interviews • Robert Green Ingersoll

... to us—they must be of the generous kind, at any rate. Father says that he never could keep a farthing; he would always give it away to undeserving people. Miss Du Prel, I find on closer acquaintance, is not without certain jealousies and weaknesses, but these things just seem to float about as gossamer on a mountain-side, and one counts them in relation to herself, in about the same proportion. Mr. Temperley—I don't know quite what to say about him. He is a tiny bit too precise and finished perhaps—a ...
— The Daughters of Danaus • Mona Caird

... midday dinners and it was two o'clock before we all arose from her long table, at one end of which had been demolished a spiced ham and from the other end had disappeared two fat summer turkeys. A saddle of lamb had been passed in between and we had wound up with sweet potato custards, apple float ...
— The Heart's Kingdom • Maria Thompson Daviess

... at its wit's end to provide the financial end of the tremendous military budget. Investment markets were sluggish, and there were thousands of notes whose values were rapidly depreciating. The French Government was unable to float a loan of $200,000,000 which was necessary ...
— Kelly Miller's History of the World War for Human Rights • Kelly Miller

... rising to a fence, landed the docile creature's forefeet upon the crown or arching centre of the road. The larger half of the little equipage had then cleared our over-towering shadow: that was evident even to my own agitated sight. But it mattered little that one wreck should float off in safety, if upon the wreck that perished were embarked the human freightage. The rear part of the carriage—was that certainly beyond the line of absolute ruin? What power could answer the question? Glance of eye, thought of man, wing of angel, which of these had speed ...
— Miscellaneous Essays • Thomas de Quincey

... have said will apply as well to one as to the other. In the little book, as in the big one, we hear a great deal about the Arabs, and something about Columbus and Galileo, who made men accept sundry truths in the teeth of clerical opposition; and, as before, we float gently down the current of history without being over well-informed as to the precise didactic purpose of our voyage. Here, indeed, even our headings and running-titles do not materially help us, for though we are supposed to be witnessing, or mayhap assisting in, a perennial conflict between ...
— The Unseen World and Other Essays • John Fiske

... float and float Along the moat Around the Bishop's garden, And the white clouds push Across a blue sky With edges that seem to draw in ...
— American Poetry, 1922 - A Miscellany • Edna St. Vincent Millay

... (meaning unknown), extinct. H. ? Shocco (meaning unknown), extinct. I. ? Waxhaw (meaning unknown), extinct. J. ? Sugeri (meaning unknown), extinct. K. Santee (meaning unknown). L. Wateree (derived from the Catawba word wateran, "to float in the water"). M. Sewee (meaning unknown). N. ...
— The Siouan Indians • W. J. McGee

... water? Are scaffolds or trees used as burial places; if so, describe construction of the former and how the corpse is prepared, and whether placed in skins or boxes. Are bodies placed in canoes? State whether they are suspended from trees, put on scaffolds or posts, allowed to float on the water or sunk beneath it, or buried in the ground. Can any reasons be given for the prevalence of any one or all of the methods? Are burial posts or slabs used, plain, or marked, with flags or other insignia ...
— An introduction to the mortuary customs of the North American Indians • H. C. Yarrow

... old trapper, do you mean to foot it to the settlements, when here is a boat that will float the distance in half the time, that the jackass, the Doctor has given the Pawnee, could ...
— The Prairie • J. Fenimore Cooper

... ideas that float in the air of one's time, this notion shrinks from dogmatic general statement and expresses itself only partially and by innuendo. It seems to me that few conceptions are less instructive than this re-interpretation of religion as perverted sexuality. ...
— The Varieties of Religious Experience • William James

... on, ignoring his ironic turn of phrase, "the Nautilus has run aground at a moment when the sea is full. Now then, the tides aren't strong in the Pacific, and if you can't unballast the Nautilus, which seems impossible to me, I don't see how it will float off." ...
— 20000 Leagues Under the Seas • Jules Verne

... said Altman, "why would it not be wise to cross the river at this point, or make the rest of the journey through the Ohio woods? We who know how to swim can take over those who cannot, or better, perhaps, construct a raft upon which to float to the ...
— The Phantom of the River • Edward S. Ellis

... tonnage he had to go into Conception Bay, one of the many great sacks of inlets that make the island something that resembles nothing so much as a section of a jig-saw puzzle. The harbour of St. John's could float Renown, but its narrow waters would not permit her to turn, and the Prince had to transfer his Staff and baggage to Dragon in order to complete the next stage of ...
— Westward with the Prince of Wales • W. Douglas Newton

... has changed; but—I don't know exactly how to word it—an extraordinary goodness seems to have come into her face. It always seemed to me that a great deal of her charm was in the kindness which seemed to float about her and to look out of her eyes, and that look which you know, or ...
— Sister Teresa • George Moore

... the morning, the glow of the noon, The play of the clouds as they float past the moon, The most magical tint on the snowiest peak, They are gone while I gaze, fade before you can speak, Yet they stay in my palace ...
— What I Remember, Volume 2 • Thomas Adolphus Trollope

... built of volcanic sands and ashes, and many of the strata are exceedingly light and friable. The specific gravity of some of these rocks is so low that they will float on water. Into the faces of these cliffs, in the friable and easily worked rock, many chambers have been excavated; for mile after mile the cliffs are studded with them, so that altogether there are many thousands. Sometimes a chamber or series ...
— Aboriginal Remains in Verde Valley, Arizona • Cosmos Mindeleff

... world, soothing the beat Of the great-hearted lake that lies unlit Beyond that silver portal. Peace is here In moony palaces that rose for her Pale, lustrous—it is well with her to dwell. The truth—will not these phantom fabrics fail Under the fierce white fire—yes, float away Like mists that wanly rise and ...
— Defenders of Democracy • Militia of Mercy

... down could grow to feathers And her wing-plumes could develop; Yet did Ukko wisely order, And the aged Father's wisdom Gave his daughter wind-like pinions, Wings of wind and cloudy pinions, That his child might float upon them, Far into the distance soaring. Siuru, bird and Taara's daughter, Siuru, bird of azure plumage, Sailed afar into the distance, And she winged her way to southward, Then she turned again to northward, And above three worlds went sailing. One of these the world of maidens, ...
— The Hero of Esthonia and Other Studies in the Romantic Literature of That Country • William Forsell Kirby

... for something to happen. A little after daybreak the ship sank so low and with such a list that the raft slipped into the water and floated of its own accord. On this all of them, including two had been wounded by flying splinters, rolled overboard after it, caught hold of the clumsy old float, and tried to swim it out to where Powell could pick them up. They had only gained a few yards when a steam-launch coming from the harbor bore down on them. Some marines in the bow were about to open fire, ...
— "Forward, March" - A Tale of the Spanish-American War • Kirk Munroe

... the world can give like that it takes away When the glow of early thought declines in feeling's dull decay: 'Tis not on youth's smooth cheek the blush alone that fades so fast; But the tender bloom of heart is gone e'er youth itself be past. Then the few whose spirits float above the wreck of happiness Are driven o'er the shoals of guilt, or ocean of excess: The magnet of their course is gone, or only points in vain The shore to which their shivered ...
— Lady Byron Vindicated • Harriet Beecher Stowe

... sunshine. To-night it is much worse! Wishing to obtain a glimpse of popular manners, I went to the Strada di Porto, where I now am. All about me animated throngs of people crowd and press before the eating-places; and I float like a waif among these living surges, which, even while they submerge you, still caress. For this Neopolitan people has, in its very vivacity, something indescribably gentle and polite. I am not roughly jostled, I am merely swayed about; and I think that by dint of thus rocking me to and ...
— The Crime of Sylvestre Bonnard • Anatole France

... rowed out upon the Rhine, and swam in the moonlight, with nothing but nose and eyes out of the water, as far as the Maeusethuerm near Bingen, where the bad bishop came to his end. It gives one a peculiar dreamy sensation to float thus on a quiet warm night in the water, gently carried down by the current, looking above on the heavens studded with the moon and stars, and on each side the banks and wooded hill-tops and the battlements of the old castles bathed in the moonlight, whilst nothing falls on one's ear ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol. 5 • Various

... flying-machine, in addition to everything else, an immunity from accident which no human experience leads us to believe possible, it would be liable to derangements of machinery, any one of which would be necessarily fatal. If an engine were necessary not only to propel a ship, but also to make her float—if, on the occasion of any accident she immediately went to the bottom with all on board—there would not, at the present day, be any such thing as steam navigation. That this difficulty is insurmountable would ...
— Side-lights on Astronomy and Kindred Fields of Popular Science • Simon Newcomb

... Sari proved easier than I contemplated. Perry wanted me to get in and break some-thing over the bow as she floated out upon the bosom of the river, but I told him that I should feel safer on dry land until I saw which side up the Sari would float. ...
— Pellucidar • Edgar Rice Burroughs

... should be inaugurated. I can only say that I hope that they may be, for I certainly shall attend. Even Spartan broth would be acceptable. The bread is all but uneatable. If you put it in water, straw and bits of hay float about. A man, who ought to know, solemnly assured me this morning that we had only food for six days; but then men who ought to know are precisely those who know nothing. I do not think that we are so badly off as this; but the end is a question no longer of months, but ...
— Diary of the Besieged Resident in Paris • Henry Labouchere

... full. It was not. Staring blankly over the side of the ship she saw a buoy float slowly by. She saw it with the utmost clearness, and on its round black surface was painted in white letters the word "Flank." There could not be two Flank buoys. It was the Flank buoy of the Mozewater ...
— The Lion's Share • E. Arnold Bennett

... different from what the children had been led to expect. She was a slender pretty looking lady, who seemed to float down the long parlor, she walked so lightly and gracefully, her long silk dress trailing behind her. The next day the two little girls amused themselves by playing "Mrs. Featherfew," Edith putting on a long gown of ...
— Five Happy Weeks • Margaret E. Sangster

... excluded. He tried to wrench the boat's chain from the bows, and, failing, he tried to force the lock, but the iron was solid and the lock was good; moreover, the chain was too short to allow the skiff to float to the end of the wall, if he had launched it. The idea of seeing into the garden became a determination as soon as he found that there were serious obstacles in the way, and by the time he had persuaded himself that the boat could not help him he would have readily risked life and limb ...
— Via Crucis • F. Marion Crawford

... many-tinted ether, there came the first faint, tremulous blush of dawn, behind her rosy veil; and presently the welcome face shines boldly out, glad, glorious, beautiful, and aureoled with flaming hues of orange, fringed with amber and gold, wherefrom flossy webs of color float wide through the sky, paling as they go. A vision of comfort and gladness, that tropical March morning, genial as a July dawn in my own less ardent clime; but the memory of two round, tender arms, and two little dimpled hands, ...
— The English Governess At The Siamese Court • Anna Harriette Leonowens

... a diver's outfit and material, and build bulk-heads in her, both sides of the hole in her bottom. Then I'd have an engine and pumps, and show that I could get the water out of her, or enough of it so that she'd float." ...
— Blow The Man Down - A Romance Of The Coast - 1916 • Holman Day

... she was of a somewhat lighter hue than her father or the rest of the gipsy tribe. Yet there was something of a darker grain than the grain in her people that lurked beneath her skin. And she was light on her feet. Even trudging in the deep snow, she seemed more to float, to skim ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1921 and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various

... mode of locomotion in which he greatly delighted, for, at best, the shaking of the great lumbering coach was not easy to him, and he always begged to be carried in Malcolm's arms till he found how pleasantly he could lie in the stern of the Manse boat, and float about on the smooth water, watching the mountains ...
— A Noble Life • Dinah Maria Mulock Craik

... streets after 8 P.M., I had waited till 9 to be screened by the darkness, and then, walking down the river on the dike, I slipped down to the water's edge by the path, and gently tossed the boots into the rapid current. Seeing the dangerous articles float away into the dark, I turned to go up the dike to the road running along the top of it, when, to my dismay, I heard a sentinel directly across the road challenge, saw the officer of the guard coming on his rounds, and heard his reply to the challenge. I hurried down the bank, ...
— The Autobiography of a Journalist, Volume I • Stillman, William James

... all well-behaved pedestrians. The fatigued tradesman, the weary labourer, may at any time saunter round and walk to the brink of the giddy heights facing Levi; feast their eyes on the striking panorama unrolled at their feet; watch the white winged argosies of commerce float swan-like on the bosom of the mighty flood, whilst the wealthy citizen, in his panelled carriage, would take his afternoon drive round the Park en payant. The student, the scholar, the traveller might each in turn find ...
— Picturesque Quebec • James MacPherson Le Moine

... there was no gold were caught in the sieve and thrown away. After a certain number of buckets of earth had been run through in that way, the settlings behind the slats in the trough were put in a milk-pan and the water was allowed to run in the pan and the fine earth and sand would float on the top of the water. You would ...
— The Adventures of a Forty-niner • Daniel Knower

... sun and shadow, with a few citizens plodding about their business in the hot midday, or a quiet little abbe crossing the piazza on his way to Mass. Canale has made a special study of the light on wall and facade, and of the transparent waters of the canals and the azure skies in which float great snowy fleeces. ...
— The Venetian School of Painting • Evelyn March Phillipps

... previous exertions, he swam out to the struggling person, who was further off than the other two had been, and, waiting till he had ceased to fling his arms about, he seized him by the collar, and swam on towards the beach. The man seemed to float much lighter than had either of the other two, and the cause of this we discovered, when we got hold of him, to be owing to a life-buoy round his waist. He would, however, notwithstanding this, have been drowned, had not Solon gone to his assistance, ...
— My First Voyage to Southern Seas • W.H.G. Kingston

... Caspar turned into his comfortable bunk aboard the raft on the night of the storm, it never once occurred to him that the Venture might float before morning. She never had floated, and she seemed so hard and fast aground that he imagined a rise of several feet of water would be necessary to move her. It had not yet rained where he was, ...
— Raftmates - A Story of the Great River • Kirk Munroe

... Master Hugh to seek employment for me, I was up by break of day, and off to the ship yard of Mr. Butler, on the City Block, near the draw-bridge. I was a favorite{257} with Mr. B., and, young as I was, I had served as his foreman on the float stage, at calking. Of course, I easily obtained work, and, at the end of the week—which by the way was exceedingly fine I brought Master Hugh nearly nine dollars. The effect of this mark of returning good sense, on my part, was excellent. He was very ...
— My Bondage and My Freedom • Frederick Douglass

... sped by steam, build up anew the race of American sailors? Who shall say now? To-day they are manned by Scandinavians and officered, in the main, by the seamen of the foreign nations whose flags they float. But the American is an adaptable type. He at once attends upon changing conditions and conquers them. He turned from the sea to the railroads when that seemed to be the course of progress; he may retrace his steps now that the pendulum ...
— American Merchant Ships and Sailors • Willis J. Abbot

... immediately taken in, and the boats lowered. We had struck just before dark, and at daylight I observed land some eight miles distant. High tide was expected at about eleven o'clock, when it was hoped the vessel would float off, though we feared she would ...
— Adventures in Southern Seas - A Tale of the Sixteenth Century • George Forbes

... vein, twine themselves in fair and perfect order about delicate trellises; broad stone pines and tall cypresses overshadow them, bright birds hover here and there in the serene sky, and groups of angels, hand joined with hand, and wing with wing, glide and float through the glades of the unentangled forest. But behind the human figures, behind the pomp and turbulence of the Kingly procession descending from the distant hills the spirit of the landscape is changed. Severer ...
— Modern Painters Volume II (of V) • John Ruskin

... had been filled with so many varied and poignant emotions for him; through the dream in which his whole being seemed to float, Sir Adrian found a moment to think of the humble followers whom he had left so abruptly on the island, and of the pleasure the auspicious ...
— The Light of Scarthey • Egerton Castle

... one-celled animal divides into two or more, which is its way of multiplying, the daughter-units thus formed float apart and live independent lives. But there are a few Protozoa in which the daughter-units are not quite separated off from one another, but remain coherent. Thus Volvox, a beautiful green ball, found in some canals and the like, is a colony of a thousand or even ten thousand cells. ...
— The Outline of Science, Vol. 1 (of 4) - A Plain Story Simply Told • J. Arthur Thomson

... would not float upstream the song-hunter was conveyed by four sunbeams, one attached to each end of the cross-logs, to the box canyon whence he emerged. Upon his return he separated the logs, placing an end of the solid log into the ...
— Ceremonial of Hasjelti Dailjis and Mythical Sand Painting of the - Navajo Indians • James Stevenson

... boat was loaded by the natives the ebb of the tide had left her aground, and Aymes asked leave of the coxswain to take a stroll, engaging to be back for the flood. Leave was granted him, but during his absence, the tide haying come in sufficiently to float the boat, James Thorn, the coxswain, did not wait for the young sailor, who was thus left behind. The captain immediately missed the man, and, on being informed that he had strolled away from the boat on leave, flew into a violent passion. Aymes soon made his appearance ...
— Narrative of a Voyage to the Northwest Coast of America in the years 1811, 1812, 1813, and 1814 or the First American Settlement on the Pacific • Gabriel Franchere

... o'er them float, Strange bugles sound an awful note, And all their faces and their eyes Are lit with starlight ...
— The Great War As I Saw It • Frederick George Scott

... often graceful enough, as if the delicate beauty of the object of worship had effectually taken hold on the fancy of the worshipper. Shelley's Sensitive Plant shows in what mists of poetical reverie such feeling may still float about a mind full of modern lights, the feeling we too have of a life in the green world, always ready to assert its claim over our sympathetic fancies. Who has not at moments felt the scruple, which is with ...
— Greek Studies: A Series of Essays • Walter Horatio Pater

... taken it out on getting into the water, had forgotten or not cared to put in again. He took it in his hands and looked at it with a singular emotion. He had an instinct to keep it, but his sentimentality irritated him, and he flung it away. It gave him quite a little pang to see it float down the stream. ...
— The Trembling of a Leaf - Little Stories of the South Sea Islands • William Somerset Maugham

... harbor. He made his escape, however, by crawling through the sewer, as Jack Sheppard did from Newgate prison. The sentinel on duty saw a mass of seaweed floating on the surface of the water. Now, this was nothing extraordinary, but it was extraordinary for seaweed to float against the tide. Uncle Obed's head was in that floating mass. He was hailed and ordered to swim back. He made no answer. A volley of musketry was discharged at him, but no boat being very handy, he got off and made his escape, ...
— The Three Brides, Love in a Cottage, and Other Tales • Francis A. Durivage

... when we cuts 'em an' lets 'em lay thar whar they falls in ther creek beds," McGivins had explained. "Afore ther spring tide comes on with ther thaws an' rains, we builds a splash dam back of 'em an' when we're ready we blows her out an' lets 'em float on down ter ther nighest boom fer raftin'. Ef a flood like this comes on they gits scattered, an' we jest kisses 'em good-bye. Thet's happenin' right now all along these ...
— A Pagan of the Hills • Charles Neville Buck

... the ensuing action at once redoubled the clamour on shore. A dozen of the foremost natives flung themselves into crazy boats, that seemed as if they could not float long enough to reach the vessel. But the men handled them with consummate skill and with equal daring. In a twinkling they were within hail, and a man, wearing a long frieze coat, a fisherman's red cap, and little besides, stood up in the bow ...
— The Wild Geese • Stanley John Weyman

... believed that it was some act of devotion. Then because I thought it might not arrive safely and the ships were all the while approaching Castile I made another package like that and placed it on the upper part of the poop in order that if the ship should sink the barrel might float at ...
— The Northmen, Columbus and Cabot, 985-1503 • Various

... upon the lake, which were found to be two hundred and thirty, and in each of them he put no more than four mariners. So he sailed to Tiberias with haste, and kept at such a distance from the city, that it was not easy for the people to see the vessels, and ordered that the empty vessels should float up and down there, while himself, who had but seven of his guards with him, and those unarmed also, went so near as to be seen; but when his adversaries, who were still reproaching him, saw him from the walls, they were so astonished that they supposed all the ships were full of armed men, ...
— The Wars of the Jews or History of the Destruction of Jerusalem • Flavius Josephus

... some wood. He could not take it all at once. The balance we shall put on a float, and so carry it to our destination. Thus I could bring the Bible to ...
— The Three Comrades • Kristina Roy

... workin fowk wi a smile o' ther face As they labour thear day after day; An hear th' women's voices float sweetly throo th' place, As they join i' some favorite lay; It saands amang th' din, as the violet seems At peeps aght th' green dockens among, Diffusing a charm ovver th' rest by its means, Thus it blends i' that steady old song; Nick a ting, nock a ting, Wages ...
— Yorkshire Lyrics • John Hartley

... pathways doth float the Y Hui scented breeze! The radiant moon in the whole hall shines on ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book I • Cao Xueqin

... called at Samoa while we were there. They sighted her lying high and dry on the reef, sent a boat ashore, and found her abandoned. She was bilged, but not badly, as far as they could see. On the cabin table was nailed a letter, written by the captain, saying that being unable to float the ship again, and fearing that he and his unarmed crew would be attacked by the savages, he was starting off in his boats for Thursday Island, the nearest port. Now, that is a big undertaking, and the chances are that the poor fellows never ...
— Yorke The Adventurer - 1901 • Louis Becke

... softer than leaves from the pine, 310 And they fell on Sir Launfal as snows on the brine, That mingle their softness and quiet in one With the shaggy unrest they float down upon; And the voice that was softer than silence said, "Lo, it is I, be not afraid! 315 In many climes, without avail, Thou hast spent thy life for the Holy Grail; Behold, it is here,—this cup which thou Didst fill at the streamlet for me but now; This crust is my body ...
— The Vision of Sir Launfal - And Other Poems • James Russell Lowell

... those, all gold and red. Night after night I can sit here and warm my heart at that fireside. Could you, tea-king, buy for my eyes a picture more wonderful? The fire is dying. The cloud coals grow fainter—now purple; and now in ashes they float away into the chill blue. But they will come again. Could your millions, tea-king, buy for me a sweeter music than the valley's heart throb as ...
— The Soldier of the Valley • Nelson Lloyd

... when it is associated with some of his airy glimpses of external nature, and his power of suggestive sketching is not more extraordinary than his immaculate taste and nervous precision of language. His images may be obscure, from the moonlight haze in which they float, but they are rarely so through faults of diction. It is disappointing to remember that this gifted man executed little more than fragments; his life ebbed away in the contemplation of undertakings still ...
— Handbook of Universal Literature - From The Best and Latest Authorities • Anne C. Lynch Botta

... boat if I can, or else build a raft and float on that. I'll not go down as long as I can find something ...
— Peter the Whaler • W.H.G. Kingston

... hesitated, in regret that he had gone so far with this adventure. He had heard fearful tales of dark deeds committed on the waters of the Bosporus and the Golden Horn; and he himself, when roving during his leisure hours along the verdant banks of those waters, had seen the livid corpse float with the tale-telling ...
— Wagner, the Wehr-Wolf • George W. M. Reynolds

... cranes returning clanged across the sky, No half-way flight, no errand incomplete I purpose. Not, as once in dreams, with pain I mount, with fear and huge exertion hold Myself a moment, ere the sickening fall Breaks in the shock of waking. Launched, at last, Uplift on powerful wings, I veer and float Past sunlit isles of cloud, that dot with light The boundless archipelago of sky. I fan the airy silence till it starts In rustling whispers, swallowed up as soon; I warm the chilly ether with my breath; ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. VI.,October, 1860.—No. XXXVI. - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various

... delightful luncheon that Charles Kingsley gave for Mr. Clemens; also an evening when Lord Dunraven brought Mr. Home, the medium, Lord Dunraven telling many of the remarkable things he had seen Mr. Home do. I remember I wanted so much to see him float out of a seven or eight story window, and enter another, which Lord Dunraven said he had seen him do many times. But Mr. Home had been very ill, and said his power had left him. My great regret was that ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine

... civilization. We have tried to keep step with city maidens, shorn of ridiculous hoops and trailing trains. We nave known them trip up the great sides of Tahawus, press through the trunked and bouldered horrors of Indian Pass, float over Lake Placid, and scale the long steep slide up the crest of White Face. Lovely as dreams and light as clouds, no toil stayed them, no danger appalled; panther, wolf, and bear stories were told in vain by lazy brothers ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 6, No 4, October, 1864 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various

... shoulders," said Owen, "and I will tow you up to the grating; just float, and do not attempt ...
— Owen Hartley; or, Ups and Downs - A Tale of Land and Sea • William H. G. Kingston

... in Tom Drift to cry "I have sinned! I will return!" No, once loose from his moorings, he let himself float down the stream, watching the receding banks in mute despair, raising no shout for succour, ...
— The Adventures of a Three-Guinea Watch • Talbot Baines Reed

... spouse of Christ, and her purity was all that she could bring Him as a dowry. But when evening came, and that other airy sea of fine golden mist flowed in from the west, and made a gorgeous blur of all things, then the city seemed to float upward from the earth and rise toward heaven all stirring with the wings of its guardian angels, and Silvia would beg that the New Jerusalem might not be assumed till she should have the happiness of being ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, December 1878 • Various

... How in the world did ever she get here? I knew she'd left the Turon, and that old Mullockson had dropped a lot of his money in a big mining company he'd helped to float, and that never turned out gold enough to pay for the quicksilver in the first crushing. We'd heard afterwards that he'd died and she'd married again; but I never expected to see her brought down so low as this—not but what we'd known many a woman that started on the ...
— Robbery Under Arms • Thomas Alexander Browne, AKA Rolf Boldrewood

... agreed to withdraw her troops from all her posts north of the parallel of 31 degrees. She also agreed that New Orleans should be a port of deposit. This was of great advantage to the growing West, for the farmers, thereafter, could float their bacon, flour, lumber, etc. down the Ohio and the Mississippi to New Orleans and there sell it for export to the ...
— A Brief History of the United States • John Bach McMaster

... unique in its beauty. It is full of freedom, elasticity, spiritual exaltation. It seems to float, as it were, in the upper air without connection with a human throat. Its charm is irresistible. It is a joy alike to the singer and the listener. It is the most important part of any singer's equipment. Why is it so ...
— The Head Voice and Other Problems - Practical Talks on Singing • D. A. Clippinger

... down in the dark," he says, "the moon glinting in at the open door. I sat with one leg over the chair and let my mind float." ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine

... the hundred different head-dresses seemed to float around her. She clung to her father's arm for support. Her mother was in ...
— Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland, Vol. XXIII. • Various

... language then, Revealing the divinest grace Possessed by truly noble men, And, prophecy of triumph, when With foe brought face to face, The choice remains, defeat or death, The flag will float till latest breath. ...
— Gleams of Sunshine - Optimistic Poems • Joseph Horatio Chant

... together. Pour this mixture into a saucepan containing the stock; place it over the fire and heat the contents gradually, stirring often to prevent the egg from sticking to the bottom of the saucepan. Allow it to boil gently until the stock looks perfectly clear under the egg, which will rise and float upon the surface in the form of a thick white scum. Now remove it and pour it into a folded towel laid in a colander set over an earthen bowl, allowing it to run through without moving or squeezing it. Season with more salt if needed, and quickly serve very hot. This should ...
— The Whitehouse Cookbook (1887) - The Whole Comprising A Comprehensive Cyclopedia Of Information For - The Home • Mrs. F.L. Gillette

... thereunto appertaining and belonging, is inexpressively grand and inspiring; and I gaze, and gaze, while my soul is filled with holy delight, and my heart expands to receive thy spirit-presence, as aforesaid. Above me is the glory of the sun; around him float the messenger clouds, ready alike to bless the earth with gentle rain, or visit it with lightning, and thunder, and destruction; far below the said sun and the messenger clouds aforesaid, lying prone upon the earth in the verge of the distant horizon, like the burnished shield of ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume X (of X) • Various

... the impression of extreme fragility, sustained by strength of will. It was the same with her delicate face, haloed round by her sunny hair, ready to float in every breeze. The small mouth was thin and decided, and the large, full blue eyes could be soft or stern as the passing mood prompted. They were very gentle as she looked at Nono when the noonday rest came, and told him he might come into the house with ...
— The Golden House • Mrs. Woods Baker

... their main dish at lunch, and sometimes at dinner too. This soup is called gazpacho, and it is made with Spanish olive oil, vinegar, tomato juice and ice water. Very fine bread crumbs help make it thick, and little pieces of fresh, cold tomatoes, cucumbers, green peppers, olives and onions float on top. ...
— Getting to know Spain • Dee Day

... "My freckles might float away like powder from the butterfly's wings," with a weird fluttering of Dozia's ...
— Jane Allen: Junior • Edith Bancroft

... day in auditing accounts with his butler would have made all secure. He had neither wife, child nor dependent kinsmen, yet it was found that his household consumed nine hundred pounds of meat a week and enough beer to float a ship. For a man to waste his own funds in riotous living is only a trifle worse than to allow others ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 7 - Little Journeys to the Homes of Eminent Orators • Elbert Hubbard

... necessary would they be for the sweetness itself to become a beauty! If we had the perfume in a flask, no one would think of calling it beautiful: it would give us too detached and controllable a sensation. There would be no object in which it could be easily incorporated. But let it float from the garden, and it will add another sensuous charm to objects simultaneously recognized, and help to make them beautiful. Thus beauty is constituted by the objectification of pleasure. It is ...
— The Sense of Beauty - Being the Outlines of Aesthetic Theory • George Santayana

... open to his spiritual sight.[348] His was that type of mind to which every thought becomes an image, and a logical process is like an animated photograph. "I am myself my own book," he says; and in writing, he tries to transcribe on paper the images which float before his mind's eye. If he fails, it is because he cannot find words to describe what he is seeing. Boehme was an unlearned man; but when he is content to describe his visions in homely German, he is lucid enough. Unfortunately, the scholars ...
— Christian Mysticism • William Ralph Inge

... the same tide before low-water again, by art of the said John Bulmer, and help of the said engine, be advanced and elevated so high, as that the same shall pass and be delivered over London Bridge, together with this said man or boy, in and on board her, and float again in the said River of Thames, on the other side the said bridge in safety." He then proceeds to covenant for himself, his heirs, &c., to perform this within the space of one month, &c., or so soon as the undertakers, wagering against him six for one, should have deposited in the assurance ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. XIX. No. 532. Saturday, February 4, 1832 • Various

... the autumn—the reddening of the fruit, the ripening of the nuts, the falling of the leaves—appeared to occur in the hours between sunset and sunrise. A thin and watery moon shed a spectral light over the meadows, which seemed to float midway between the ashen band of the road and the jagged tops of the pines on the horizon. There was no wind, and the few remaining leaves on the trees looked as if they were cut out of velvet. The promise of a hoar-frost ...
— The Miller Of Old Church • Ellen Glasgow

... space, falling like a star, down, down into the shallow sea. Far below I saw a streak of living light shoot through the water—on, on, closer to the surface now, and at last she fairly sprang into the air, quivering like a gaffed salmon, then fell back to float and clear her blue eyes ...
— The Maids of Paradise • Robert W. (Robert William) Chambers

... life, we have two currents of perception; an outer current of physical things seen and heard and perceived; an inner current of mind-images and thoughts. The outer current ceases in sleep; the inner current continues, and watching the mind-images float before the field of consciousness, we "dream Even when there are no dreams, there is still a certain consciousness in sleep, so that, on waking, one says, "I have slept well," or "I ...
— The Yoga Sutras of Patanjali • Charles Johnston

... commodious. Its vicinity to Greece, Sicily, and Africa, afforded it great opportunities and facilities for commerce. The inhabitants are represented by some authors as having been the inventors of a particular kind of ship, which retained in some degree the form of a raft or float. Their government, which at first was aristocratical, was afterwards changed to a democracy; and it is to this popular form of government that their prosperity and wealth are ascribed. The number of people in the whole state amounted to 300,000; ...
— Robert Kerr's General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 18 • William Stevenson

... Mrs. Trefoil; he had discovered that shame had come upon her and him; and he had made out the nature of the relations between his niece and Captain Cosmo Bertram. But Captain Bertram was not in Paris; Mrs. Trefoil had disappeared and left no sign. So many exciting stories float about Paris in the course of a season, that such an event as the appearance of a Kentish farmer in search of Mrs. Daker, afterwards Mrs. Trefoil, and the connexion of Captain Bertram with her name, is food for a few days only. This is a very quiet humdrum story, ...
— The Cockaynes in Paris - 'Gone abroad' • Blanchard Jerrold

... tell of a prospector by the name of Lewis who wandered into those foot-hills during that year, found some high-grade float, and traced it to a larger outcropping than the one down by the dry wash. But he had hardly made the marvelous discovery when he caught sight of a turbaned head above a rocky ridge about fifty yards away. He abandoned his search to seek the nearest cover. By the time ...
— When the West Was Young • Frederick R. Bechdolt

... told her nothing—because she did not know how—merely a word, a restless question half ashamed, barely enough to shadow forth the something stirring her toward an awakening in a new world, where with new eyes she might catch glimpses of those dim and splendidly misty visions that float through sunlit silences when a young girl ...
— The Fighting Chance • Robert W. Chambers

... lain asleep in the stifling air of the cottage and the weariness of guiding the plough. And by and by she took a needle from her girdle and pricked the thoughts on the leaves of the trees and sent them into the air to float hither and thither. And it came to pass that people began to pick them up, and holding them against the sun, to read what was written on them, and this was because the simple little words on the leaves were only, after all, a part of one of the King's messages, such as ...
— Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm • Kate Douglas Wiggin

... gained the solid ice. The peril was great, and it needed all the strength and activity of the white men and the skill of the paddlers to avoid the danger which momentarily threatened them. So quickly did the blocks float down upon them that Pearson thought it might be impossible to avoid them all. The skins, therefore, were hung round the boat, dropping some inches into the water, and these, although they could not have prevented ...
— True to the Old Flag - A Tale of the American War of Independence • G. A. Henty

... his bosom, he gazes fervently on her countenance; in sweet intoxication he inhales her youthful breath. Caressingly his arm encircles her sylphic waist. She gently inclines her head towards him, and both seemed overshadowed by the long beautiful tresses which float in wild luxuriance. From Don Lope's flashing eye the innocent Theodora drinks large draughts of sweet but deadly poison; a tear of tenderness starts to overwhelm her eye and falls on the lover's hand; a deep sigh ...
— Gomez Arias - The Moors of the Alpujarras, A Spanish Historical Romance. • Joaquin Telesforo de Trueba y Cosio

... fence, and swim, and float, And use the gloves with ease too, Could play base ball, and row a boat, And hang on a trapeze too; His temper was beyond rebuke, And nothing made him lose it; His strength was something quite superb, But ...
— Our Boys - Entertaining Stories by Popular Authors • Various

... great fear, ran as fast as feet could run to the place where the head of Rose was to be seen on the pond, like a float on the top of green weeds. When Mark came to the slope, he went down it with care, lest the fate of Rose ...
— The Book of One Syllable • Esther Bakewell

... have made a start at it without thinking much about it," said Roger. "The Club had a float, you know, in the ...
— Ethel Morton's Holidays • Mabell S. C. Smith

... one sees projected on the outer world his own imaginings, now fair, now gloomy; while the other sees in the world, land to be cut up into corner-lots for speculation, and water for sawmills and cotton-mills, and to float clipper-ships and steamers. The one is this-worldly; the other is other-worldly. The one is armed and equipped at all points to deal with the Actual, to subdue it and make the most of it; he aims ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 3, Issue 15, January, 1859 • Various

... not a strange type of the things which "out of weakness are made strong?" If one of those little flakes of mica-sand, hurried in tremulous spangling along the bottom of the ancient river, too light to sink, too faint to float, almost too small for sight, could have had a mind given to it as it was at last borne down with its kindred dust into the abysses of the stream, and laid, (would it not have thought?) for a hopeless eternity, in the dark ooze, the most despised, forgotten, and feeble of ...
— Modern Painters, Volume IV (of V) • John Ruskin

... 7th of January, the vice-admiral, Sir William Woodhouse, was directed to go instantly to sea, pressing everything that would float, and promising indemnity to the owners in the queen's name. Thirty thousand men were rapidly on their way to the coast; the weather had all along been clear and frosty, with calms and light east winds, and the sea off Dover was swiftly covered with a miscellaneous crowd of ...
— The Reign of Mary Tudor • James Anthony Froude

... endurance in the Sinai, so that hard work under able leadership was all that was required to uphold the flag of achievement which had yet received no stain. As the days wore on, and we had almost forgotten our trench activities at Havrincourt, rumours began to float once more about an early move, and this move was to be connected with a big stunt coming off soon "up north." At any rate no one disputed the suggestion that our next contact with the enemy would probably be of a more serious nature than ...
— The Seventh Manchesters - July 1916 to March 1919 • S. J. Wilson

... yet to my mind Charity is a sweeter name, and one more likely to float us over troubled waters." And the elder's pleasant smile disarmed his words of all sting. "Priscilla," continued he, turning to the girl, "I hear that thy father keeps his bed to-day, and thy mother is ...
— Standish of Standish - A story of the Pilgrims • Jane G. Austin

... was so intent on her sport that it would seem as if she had grown from the sedge at the waterside. Womanlike, she was enthusiastic over fishing when the fish were on the feed and biting freely, to tire quickly of the sport should her float remain for long untroubled by possible captures nibbling at the bait. She avoided those parts of the river where anglers mostly congregated; she preferred and sought the solitude of deserted reaches. Perigal, ...
— Sparrows - The Story of an Unprotected Girl • Horace W. C. Newte

... sir, by placing two marks on the bank. When we start lanterns will be placed on these. We shall cross higher up so as to strike the bank a little above where I believe the boat to be, then we shall float along under the bushes until the lanterns are in a line one with another, and we shall know then that we are ...
— The Lion of the North • G.A. Henty

... to hold both of us. Accordingly, you evolved your terrific campaign. My business was to be seriously damaged. And I was to be murdered. And then you were to get the concern cheap from my executors, and to float me dead since you could not float me living. What folly, Ravengar! What stupendous folly! Even if the fanciful and grotesque scheme had succeeded as far as my death, it could not have ...
— Hugo - A Fantasia on Modern Themes • Arnold Bennett

... towers and down the oak-clad vestibule. Away over the common went the glad message of Earth's Saviour, away high into the air, startling the rooks upon their airy courses, as though the iron notes of the World's rejoicing would fain float to the throned feet of ...
— Colonel Quaritch, V.C. - A Tale of Country Life • H. Rider Haggard

... either side. At the distance of a mile from the great river the pass enters the northern end of Moon Lake, a crescent-shaped sheet of water, probably an old bed of the Mississippi. The lake is seven or eight miles long and from eight hundred to a thousand yards wide, with a uniform depth enough to float the largest steamboats. Two or three plantations were then on the east shore, but the rest was unbroken forest, quiet and isolated, abounding in game as the waters did in fish. The pass issues again half way down the eastern side, through an opening so shut in with trees that it can scarcely be ...
— The Gulf and Inland Waters - The Navy in the Civil War. Volume 3. • A. T. Mahan

... interest were it not for their enormous possibilities of reaction upon the really living portion of the social organism. This really living portion seems at first sight to be as deliquescent in its nature, to be drifting down to as chaotic a structure as either the non-functional owners that float above it or the unemployed who sink below. What were once the definite subdivisions of the middle class modify and lose their boundaries. The retail tradesman of the towns, for example—once a fairly homogeneous class throughout Europe—expands here into vast store companies, and dwindles ...
— Anticipations - Of the Reaction of Mechanical and Scientific Progress upon - Human life and Thought • Herbert George Wells

... no longer sang, or made merry in the evening. A young Brussels corporal in our party suddenly broke into sobbing when he heard the chorus of "Tipperary" float over the channel from a transport of untried British lads. The Belgians are a race of children whose feelings have been hurt. The pathos of the Belgian army is like the pathos of an orphan-asylum: it ...
— Golden Lads • Arthur Gleason and Helen Hayes Gleason

... Bainrothe," Mr. Stanbury rejoined, "in your expressions to me, or I will look into that illegal erasure and still stand to my oar in this golden galley of yours, in which you expect to float with the stream, and so soon to have every thing your own way. I like plain sailing, sir; am a plain, straightforward man myself, to whom truth is second nature; and, were it not for the violence it might do the feelings ...
— Miriam Monfort - A Novel • Catherine A. Warfield

... onward progress stirs up the slime in the shallows, and this is the Backwash of War. It is very ugly. There are many little lives foaming up in the backwash. They are loosened by the sweeping current, and float to the surface, detached from their environment, and one glimpses them, weak, hideous, repellent. After the war, they will consolidate again into the ...
— The Backwash of War - The Human Wreckage of the Battlefield as Witnessed by an - American Hospital Nurse • Ellen N. La Motte

... a boat. We could pole a boat. You has to hev water to float logs, an' the river's run out considerable. I'm only afeerd fer the horses. If we hit or drag, they might plunge ...
— The Spirit of the Border - A Romance of the Early Settlers in the Ohio Valley • Zane Grey

... Ark of our happy childish memories is built, if not of gopher-wood, at least upon the lines laid down in Scripture. Has Hammy ever tried to get his to float? Mine invariably used to sink—straight to the bottom of the bath. Perhaps that continually-recurrent catastrophe had something to do with the sapping of my infant faith, or the establishment of a sinking-fund of doubt regarding the veracity of ...
— The Dop Doctor • Clotilde Inez Mary Graves

... formidable, and hardly fordable brook. That kennel is the stream of life—and a dirty and a weary one it is, if we may judge by the old gentleman's looks. All is hurried into that common sewer, the grave! What bubbles float down it! Everything that is fairly in the middle of the stream seems to sail with it, steadily and triumphantly—and many a filthy fragment enters the sewer with a pomp and dignity not unlike the ...
— Rattlin the Reefer • Edward Howard

... under-water ship; the ways, leading from the shop to the creek, were well greased, and all was in readiness for the launching. The tide would soon be at flood, and then the boat would slide down the timbers (at least, that was the hope of all), and would float in the element meant to receive her. It was decided that no one should be aboard when the launching took place, as there was an element of risk attached, since it was not known just how buoyant the craft was. It was expected she would ...
— Tom Swift and his Submarine Boat - or, Under the Ocean for Sunken Treasure • Victor Appleton

... States has already considered the question of making this canal deep enough to float ordinary lake-craft, so that gunboats and other war vessels may be sent through from the Mississippi to the lakes in case of war with our English neighbors. Probably it will be done some time, but in the interests of commerce ...
— Up the River - or, Yachting on the Mississippi • Oliver Optic

... victors they are sad; they do not drink, they do not sing. Paris might be a town that had been assaulted and taken by dumb enemies; the irritation has worn itself off, and the tears have not yet come. The tricolour flags which float from all the windows surprise us; there does not seem any reason for rejoicing. Yet, of late especially, the triumph of the Versaillais has been ardently wished for by the greater portion of the population; but all are so tired that they have not the energy ...
— Paris under the Commune • John Leighton

... pleasure-boats had, but water-ballast in breakers, which now proved no additional burthen to the boat. It was also fortunate that she was built partly of deal, and had only her lower streaks of jarra wood, which does not float. ...
— The Bushman - Life in a New Country • Edward Wilson Landor

... the shadow whence they came, as foam returns to the darkness of an evening sea. In the imaginative pictures the principle begins to be applied more largely, till throughout the fairy story the figures float in and out from the unknown, as fancies should. This method in its simplicity counts more to keep the place an Ali Baba's cave than many a more complicated procedure. In luxurious scenes it brings the soft edges of Correggio, and in solemn ones a light and shadow ...
— The Art Of The Moving Picture • Vachel Lindsay

... nameless, fameless, 'Small Unknown'; Men who can form a 'corner', float a loan, Wire-pull a local Caucus, But cannot paint poor pictures, write bad plays, Or on a platform wildly flame or praise In rolling tones ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 98, January 25th, 1890 • Various

... to his death. They abated as death approached, and he besought of me, as he had often done in the years of his childhood, to sing him to sleep. I sang—I was able to sing. He received pleasure from the song, which increased in power, and with a heavenly smile, whilst heavenly pictures seemed to float before his eyes, he said, 'Ah, it is divine!' and I sang better and ever clearer. I saw his eyes change themselves, his breath become suspended, and I knew that then was the moment of separation between soul and body—between me and him! but I did not then feel it, ...
— The Home • Fredrika Bremer

... so roads are made from the village of one boy to the castle of another: the boy who has made a cardboard house unites with another who has made miniature ships from nut-shells, the house as a castle crowns the hill, and the ships float in the lake below, while the youngest brings his shepherd and sheep to graze between the mountain and the lake, and all stand and behold with pleasure and satisfaction the ...
— The Child Under Eight • E.R. Murray and Henrietta Brown Smith

... as probable that most of these diseases are generated by the microscopic plants which float in an impure or miasmatic atmosphere, and are taken ...
— The American Woman's Home • Catherine E. Beecher and Harriet Beecher Stowe

... the horizon where sea and sky meet in a vapory haze. At night the Falm is a favorite resort of the men whose houses are on the Oberland. With arms resting on the broad wall, they look down on the twinkling lights of the houses far beneath, listen to the laughter or song which float up from the small tables outside the cafe, or watch the specks of light on the dark gleam of the North Sea. It is a prospect of which one could hardly tire, if it was not that in summer one has in Heligoland a surfeit of ...
— Seeing Europe with Famous Authors, Volume V (of X) • Various

... climbed, can be broken by the wave or shattered by the lightning or the powder blast. Would man display his power and grandeur to advantage, let him flee far from the hills; for the broad pennants of God, even his clouds, float upon the tops of the hills, and the majesty of God is most manifest among the hills. Call Gibraltar the hill of Tarik or Hercules if you will, but gaze upon it for a moment and you will call it the hill of God. Tarik and the old giant may have built upon ...
— The Bible in Spain • George Borrow

... end of the loft, whence, without being observed, she could see all that passed. Long did she gaze, without taking off her eyes for an instant, on the dance—on the bold and wonderful springs of the little creatures, who seemed to float in the air, and not so much as to touch the ground, while the ravishing melody of the Elves filled her whole soul. The child, meanwhile, which lay in her arms grew sleepy and drew its breath heavily, and, without ever thinking on the promise she had ...
— The Fairy Book - The Best Popular Stories Selected and Rendered Anew • Dinah Maria Mulock (AKA Miss Mulock)

... and formed a curious contrast with the occasional clamour of the surges. The wind was westerly, and the weather being extremely agreeable, as soon after breakfast as the tide had sufficiently overflowed the rock to float the boats over it, the smiths, with a number of the artificers, returned to the beacon, carrying their fishing-tackle along with them. In the course of the forenoon, the beacon exhibited a still more extraordinary appearance than ...
— Records of a Family of Engineers • Robert Louis Stevenson

... closured; old rules must be abandoned without a sigh, and give way to others more adapted to the necessity of the time. Above all things the House of Lords must be flouted, humiliated, and defied. It is on the spring-tide of popular democratic and anti-aristocratic passion we shall have to float the next Liberal ...
— Sketches In The House (1893) • T. P. O'Connor

... laid in water or in places where water is apt to accumulate, otherwise they will not hatch. Some species lay their eggs in little masses (Fig. 52) that float on the surface of the water, looking like small particles of soot. Others lay their eggs singly, some floating about on the surface, others sinking to the bottom where they remain until the young issue. Some of the eggs may remain over winter, but usually those ...
— Insects and Diseases - A Popular Account of the Way in Which Insects may Spread - or Cause some of our Common Diseases • Rennie W. Doane

... the gulf is fringed with islands, some solitary, others in groups. On the blue background of the high coast they seem to float on silvery patches of calm water, arid and grey, or dark green and rounded like clumps of evergreen bushes, with the larger ones, a mile or two long, showing the outlines of ridges, ribs of grey ...
— 'Twixt Land & Sea • Joseph Conrad

... of the huge mosque upon the lofty rocks were impalpable fingers pointing an endless flight. The very trees seemed so little real and substantial that they gave the eye the impression that they might rise and float away. The Nile was hung with mist, a trailing cloud unwound from the breast of the Nile-mother. At last the sun touched the minarets of the splendid mosque with shafts of light, and over at Ghizeh ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker

... was the only star that night. Not one showed its face among the clouds, and there was no moon to wrinkle her droll features at the little men on earth. Helen was the star, shining in the larch-wood. He called her name, but she did not hear, and he seemed to be caught up by the sound and to float among the clouds. ...
— Moor Fires • E. H. (Emily Hilda) Young

... round the isle I go, up stream and down, and dive and float and wallow with bliss there is no telling—till the waters all dry up and disappear, and I am left wading in weeds and mud and drift and drought and desolation, and wake ...
— The Martian • George Du Maurier

... yesterday from America, Lord Loudon has found an army of twenty-one thousand French, gives over the design on Louisbourg, and retires to Halifax. Admiral Holbourn writes, that they have nineteen ships to his seventeen, and he cannot attack them. It is time for England to slip her own cables, and float away ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole, Volume 2 • Horace Walpole

... quiescence. The body becomes more active, the senses and perceptions more lordly and acute. It is a life of swimming and climbing and resting after exertion. The skin seems to grow more sensitive to light and air, and the feel of water and the earth and leaves. Hour after hour one may float in the warm lagoons, conscious, in the whole body, of every shred and current of the multitudinous water, or diving under in a vain attempt to catch the radiant butterfly- coloured fish that flit in and out of the thousand windows of their gorgeous coral palaces. Or ...
— Letters from America • Rupert Brooke

... system of universal education is in our age the most prominent and salutary feature of the spirit of enlightenment, and it is peculiarly appropriate that the schools be made by the people the center of the day's demonstration. Let the national flag float over every schoolhouse in the country and the exercises be such as shall impress upon our youth the patriotic ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents, Volume IX. • Benjamin Harrison

... the oar, brother, and speed the boat; Swift o'er the glittering waves we'll float; Then home as swiftly we'll haste again, Loaded with wealth of the plundered main. Pull away, pull away! row, boys, row A long pull, a strong ...
— The Mirror of Taste, and Dramatic Censor - Vol. I. No. 3. March 1810 • Various

... to give them a 'send off.' But the inevitable little defects cropped up, and the machines only got as far as the Cape. A change made by Day in the exhaust arrangements had neglected the heating jackets of the carburetters; one float valve was bent and one clutch troublesome. Day and Lashly spent the afternoon making good these defects in ...
— Scott's Last Expedition Volume I • Captain R. F. Scott

... whimsical plan for accomplishing his object. Having scooped out a melon, and thrust his head into the cavity, he threw himself into the canal, and swam down the stream in such a way that the melon appeared to float in the water. The trick succeeded in attracting the attention of the Crusaders, and as the melon was passing that part of the bank where the Lord of Joinville was encamped, there was much excitement among ...
— The Boy Crusaders - A Story of the Days of Louis IX. • John G. Edgar

... called Jack, and the sound of their axes followed. Ropes were severed with a blow, but the wire shrouds were tougher, and it was not until several minutes had passed that the mast, with its tangle of sails and ropes, was chopped free to float away on the ...
— The Moving Picture Girls at Sea - or, A Pictured Shipwreck That Became Real • Laura Lee Hope

... willingness to finance the war effort, which includes the ability to tax, to float internal loans, and to create foreign credits, may well determine the extent and duration of the national capability ...
— Sound Military Decision • U.s. Naval War College

... the river at once. There are horses waiting on the opposite side, lower down. We can float with the current till we ...
— Afar in the Forest • W.H.G. Kingston

... in difficulties with a black, he took a brush from my hand, and it seemed to have hardly touched the canvas when the ugly heaviness of my tiresome black began to disappear. There came into it grey and shimmering lights, the shadows filled up with air, and silk seemed to float and rustle. There was no method-there was no trick; he merely painted. My palette was the same to him as his own; he did not prepare his palette; his colour did not exist on his palette before he put it on the canvas; ...
— Modern Painting • George Moore

... full of confidence in the blessed Virgin, had still preserved the chaplet of Xavier, and feared not drowning while he held it in his hand. The float of planks was hardly adrift upon the waves, when he found he was transported out of himself, and believed he was at Meliapor with Father Francis. Returning from his extacy, he was strangely surprised to find himself on an unknown coast, and not to see about him the companions of his ...
— The Works of John Dryden, Volume XVI. (of 18) - The Life of St. Francis Xavier • John Dryden

... the ends stuck firmly in the bottom, in a depth of about six feet of water, and about five or ten yards apart. On the top of each was a lump of ambatch-wood about ten inches in diameter. Around this was wound a powerful line, and, a small hole being made in this float, it was lightly fixed upon the point of the bamboo, or fishing rod. The line was securely attached to the bamboo, then wound round the large float, while the hook, baited with a live fish, was thrown to some distance beyond. Long rows of these fixed rods were set every morning by natives in canoes, ...
— The Albert N'Yanza, Great Basin of the Nile • Sir Samuel White Baker

... 4.30 next morning chase and fire on some men whom they see hauling a boat over a sandbank into the river Peneus, with others retreating into the forest. There followed another chase up the river with the lighter boats, which after rowing up stream as far as they would float found only the small boat seen the day before, abandoned and with no one in sight. In these expeditions the name of Lieutenant Hart is frequently mentioned by my father. When in later years Captain Yorke succeeded to the earldom of Hardwicke, he remembered this gentleman, found him a place as agent ...
— Charles Philip Yorke, Fourth Earl of Hardwicke, Vice-Admiral R.N. - A Memoir • Lady Biddulph of Ledbury

... How he loves her! How he loves everything! Everybody, everything! All is good, all is beautiful.... He sleeps. The cricket on the hearth cheeps. His grandfather's tales, the great heroes, float by in the happy night.... To be a hero like them!... Yes, he will be that ... he is that.... Ah, how good it ...
— Jean-Christophe, Vol. I • Romain Rolland

... Byzantium; but on his voyage he was overtaken by a violent storm, in which sixty of his ships were sunk; he himself must have perished, if he had not been rescued by a pirate, who landed him safe in Pontus. Mithridates still had a small float of fifty ships, on board of which were 10,000 land forces. These were at sea; but with what object does not appear: they were met, however, near Lemnos, by a Roman squadron, and entirely defeated; thirty-two of them being captured, and the rest sunk. On receiving ...
— Robert Kerr's General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 18 • William Stevenson

... on—came—passed, and the villagers assembled on the heights (their eyes fixed the while on the devoted vessel like vultures watching for their prey) had at length the satisfaction of seeing the laboring bark yield to the war of the elements, and her timbers float, ...
— International Miscellany of Literature, Art and Science, Vol. 1, - No. 3, Oct. 1, 1850 • Various

... Britain and Germany protected their coasts by laying fields of mines in the sea so placed that they would float just under water and arranged to explode on contact with the hull of a ship. Through these mine fields carefully hidden channels gave access to the different ports. So long as ships stayed in port or inside the fields of mines they were safe ...
— A School History of the Great War • Albert E. McKinley, Charles A. Coulomb, and Armand J. Gerson



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