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Alcove   /ˈælkˌoʊv/   Listen
Alcove

noun
1.
A small recess opening off a larger room.  Synonym: bay.






WordNet 3.0 © 2010 Princeton University








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"Alcove" Quotes from Famous Books



... sitting in a beautiful alcove, on her wonted throne, and clad in a splendid robe; over it she is arrayed in a garment of gold tissue. The Nereids and the Nymphs, together, who tease no fleeces with the motion of their fingers nor draw out the ductile threads, are placing the plants in due order, and arranging in baskets ...
— The Metamorphoses of Ovid - Literally Translated into English Prose, with Copious Notes - and Explanations • Publius Ovidius Naso

... "spirit-sticks." ... If the family worships its ancestors according to the Buddhist rite, the mortuary tablets are placed in the Buddhist household-shrine, or Butsudan, which usually occupies the upper shelf of an alcove in one of the inner apartments. Buddhist mortuary-tablets (with some exceptions) are called ihai,—a term signifying "soul-commemoration." They are lacquered and gilded, usually having a carved lotos-flower ...
— Japan: An Attempt at Interpretation • Lafcadio Hearn

... never been swept; the bricks had disappeared beneath layers of dirt, dust, dried mud, and any and every thing thrown down by Toupillier. A miserable stove of cast-iron, the pipe of which entered a crumbling chimney, was the most apparent piece of furniture in this hovel. In an alcove stood a bed, with tester and valence of green serge, which the moths had transformed into lace. The window, almost useless, had a heavy coating of grease upon its panes, which dispensed with the necessity of curtains. The whitewashed ...
— The Lesser Bourgeoisie • Honore de Balzac

... mean time, the dying monarch lay helpless upon his bed, in the alcove of his apartment, distressed and wretched. To look back upon the past filled him with remorse, and the dread futurity, now close at hand, was full of images of terror and dismay. He thought of his wife, and of the now utterly irreparable injuries which ...
— History of King Charles II of England • Jacob Abbott

... had an historical character. We will only state here that, with the exception of an alcove which was contrived there for the use of Madame Grotius, it differed in no respect from the other cells of the prison; only, perhaps, it was a little higher, and had a splendid view ...
— The Black Tulip • Alexandre Dumas (Pere)

... reliefs which filled the spaces between the salient episodes of the slender and naive plot. I couldn't help wondering how Jack Stacey, whom we left at 10.45 in a horrible stupor, shut away in a gilded alcove of Wang Fu's opium den, could appear at 11.30 at Lady Handley's in immaculate evening dress and with entirely unruffled hair, having in the meantime cut down and restored to consciousness two tortured Chinese and heard the true story of his daughter's adventures. ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 159, December 8, 1920 • Various

... and look for my young acquaintance in the bank, in order to procure a penny for a candle. I passed unhindered through all the rooms; I passed a dozen tables at which men sat chatting, eating, and drinking; I passed into the back of the cafe, ay, even into the red alcove, without succeeding ...
— Hunger • Knut Hamsun

... of honor in a Japanese home is a small alcove designated as "the Tokonoma." In this ancient house simple decorations of a priceless scroll and a flowering plum graced the recess. Before it on a cushion of rich brocade I ...
— The House of the Misty Star - A Romance of Youth and Hope and Love in Old Japan • Fannie Caldwell Macaulay

... were half a dozen copper axes, some of the first of that particular style that had ever been brought to the United States. Besides the sculptured stones and the mosaics were jugs, cups, vases, little gods, sacrificial stones—enough, almost, to equip a new alcove in the museum. ...
— The War Terror • Arthur B. Reeve

... "The curtains of the alcove floated gently round her like clouds, and the rays of the two tapers burning on the night-table seemed to shine like dazzling halos. Then she let her head fall back, fancying she heard in space ...
— The Public vs. M. Gustave Flaubert • Various

... the room, which was very large, there appeared to be a sort of alcove before which a ...
— Everychild - A Story Which The Old May Interpret to the Young and Which the Young May Interpret to the Old • Louis Dodge

... Everybody's Home. As she turned from the window with it in her fingers she was trembling slightly and wondering whether she could have a minute's seclusion to face the answer which her last letter might have brought. There was a small alcove beside a public desk at one side of the room. Linda stepped into this, tore open the envelope and slipped out the sheet it contained. Dazedly she stared at the slip that fell from it. Slowly the color left her cheeks and then came rushing ...
— Her Father's Daughter • Gene Stratton-Porter

... let me tell you once more, that your kindness in promising us a visit has charmed us both. I shall see you again. I shall hear your voice. We shall take walks together. I will show you my prospects, the hovel, the alcove, the Ouse and its banks, everything that I have described. I anticipate the pleasure of those days not very far distant, and feel a part of it at this moment. Talk not of an inn! Mention it not for your life! We have never had so many visitors, but we could easily accommodate ...
— Cowper • Goldwin Smith

... the room where they were on exhibition, she was attracted another way, by seeing a crowd of people standing before an alcove that had been curtained off, and where a so- called "transformation scene" was being enacted before admiring ...
— Katherine's Sheaves • Mrs. Georgie Sheldon

... lady who commanded, so he obeyed. They had drawn a green portiere across the curtain pole in the doorway until the little alcove with the bookcase was shut off from the larger room for all practical intents and purposes. Jimmy, the Southern Avenue boy, waxing more and more masterful, had appointed himself postmaster, and strutted beside the narrow opening which remained. ...
— A Son of the City - A Story of Boy Life • Herman Gastrell Seely

... of course. She wheedled Bedelia, the cook, into letting her keep the veal roast hot in the oven of the gasoline range. She herself spread one of mommie's cherished lunch cloths on Bedelia's little square table in the kitchen alcove, where she and Johnny could be alone while he ate. She dipped generously into the newest preserves and filled a glass dish full for him. She raided the great refrigerator, closing her eyes to the morrow's ...
— The Thunder Bird • B. M. Bower

... Out yonder, in the alcove, a lady sits and darns, And interjects remarks that always serve to spice our yarns; She's Mrs. Stoddard; there's a dame that's truly to my heart: A tiny little woman, but so quaint, and good, and smart That, if you ...
— Songs and Other Verse • Eugene Field

... terrace, called "tupubi," takes its name from the flat piki oven, the variety of fireplace generally built in these alcoves. The transfer of the fireplace from the second-story room to the corner of such a roofed-terrace alcove was easily accomplished, and probably led to the occasional use of the cooking-pit, with protecting chimney hood on the open and unsheltered roof. Fig. 72 illustrates a deep cooking-pit on an upper terrace of Walpi. In this instance the cooking pit is very ...
— A Study of Pueblo Architecture: Tusayan and Cibola • Victor Mindeleff and Cosmos Mindeleff

... suggestive of delicacy, but having nothing like primness, still less of the rigidity which is often noticeable in the generation succeeding next to that of the men in their shirt-sleeves, he would have been noticed anywhere as one evidently a scholarly thinker astray from the alcove or the study, which were his natural habitats. His voice was very sweet, and penetrating without any loudness or mark of effort. His enunciation was beautifully clear, but he often hesitated as if waiting for ...
— Essays • Ralph Waldo Emerson

... chair with a praying-desk and a back, from six to eight feet high, let into and fixed in the wall. The room to the right of this was the friar's bed-room; at the farther end of it was situated the alcove, very low, and paved above with flags like a tomb. The room to the left was the workshop, the refectory, the store-room of the recluse. A press at the far end of the room had a wooden compartment with ...
— Frederick Chopin as a Man and Musician - Volume 1-2, Complete • Frederick Niecks

... office in the middle of an afternoon and finding him absent, dusted it from force of habit and began turning the pages of a battered copy of "Elia" she kept tucked away in an alcove that contained the Indiana Reports. A sign pinned on the door stated that her father would return in half an hour. This card, which had adorned the door persistently for several years, had lately ceased to prophesy falsely, ...
— Otherwise Phyllis • Meredith Nicholson

... followed her trunk to the blue room, which she found to be a lovely apartment with an alcove, adjoining Bertha's sitting-room, and furnished with all the comfort and elegance to which she had been accustomed to all her life in her ...
— His Heart's Queen • Mrs. Georgie Sheldon

... I could have sworn that this was so. I called to Savage to bring the lamp that stood upon my table, and by its light made an examination. The curtain was drawn back, very tidily, being fastened in its place clear of the little alcove by means of a thin brass chain. Also along one edge of it, that which I had nailed to the panelling, the tin-tacks were still in their places; that is, three of them were, the fourth I found ...
— The Ivory Child • H. Rider Haggard

... vague, but he knew that he was forgiven. They were ushered to their places by a portly maitre d'hotel, and she approved of his table. It was set almost in an alcove, and was partially hidden from the ...
— The Pawns Count • E. Phillips Oppenheim

... Jules—listen to me!" he ordered. "Did any one else enter the musicians' room whilst he was lying in the alcove?" ...
— The Pawns Count • E. Phillips Oppenheim

... a map there were— Here hung the pictured world, an infant there: That framed his genius, this enshrined his love. And as at eve he glanced round th' alcove, Where jailers watched his very thoughts to spy, What mused he then—what dream of years gone by Stirred 'neath that discrowned brow, and fired ...
— Poems • Victor Hugo

... she had nothing to complain of. Of course, you did not notice it, as you had other things to think of, but it was handsomely furnished. There was a bed in an alcove, some flowers on the table, some books, and even a harpsichord—evidently it was intended that her imprisonment should be made ...
— In the Irish Brigade - A Tale of War in Flanders and Spain • G. A. Henty

... with drawers,—he drew out each as he wanted its contents, and closed it at will when done with them. The scholar's mind, to use a similar comparison, is furnished with shelves, like his library. Each book knows its place in the brain as well as against the wall or in the alcove. His consciousness is doubled by the books which encircle him, as the trees that surround a lake repeat themselves in its unruffled waters. Men talk of the nerve that runs to the pocket, but one who loves his books, and ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)

... the crowd to find what he wanted, but Harry and I were obliged to stand still in a corner, ignorant of everything save the name of our hostess, waiting for something to turn up. The ordeal was not so disagreeable as it might seem. The band played in the alcove, the women were well dressed and, to our eyes, radiantly beautiful, while the men appealed to our critical curiosity. Plenty of our college dons were there, and many of the leading men of the day, but more interesting to us were the perfectly-dressed, ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Volume 22. October, 1878. • Various

... tie and began to gather together discarded garments so as to make the room tidy for the visitor. It was a comfortable bed-sitting-room, with the bed in an alcove and a tiny dressing-room attached. A wood fire burned on the hearth on each side of which was an armchair. Presently there came a knock at the door. Rogers opened it and admitted Papadopoulos, who forthwith began to execute his usual manoeuvres of salutation. Rogers stood staring ...
— Simon the Jester • William J. Locke

... divergence farther west toward "Cliefden's proud alcove, the bower of wanton Shrewsbury and love," we find ourselves in a luxuriant rolling country, rural and slumberous. Cookham parish, which we should traverse, claims quite loudly American kinship on the strength of its including an estate once the property of Henry Washington, ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science - February, 1876, Vol. XVII, No. 98. • Various

... Cafe Reynaud on Westchester Square. Take a seat at table in left alcove. Ask waiter for card of Cornelius Woodbridge, Junior. Before ordering ...
— Stories Worth Rereading • Various

... where I had put up was a good specimen of the old Spanish inn, being much the same as those described in the time of Philip the Third or Fourth. The rooms were many and large, floored with either brick or stone, generally with an alcove at the end, in which stood a wretched flock bed. Behind the house was a court, and in the rear of this a stable, full of horses, ponies, mules, machos, and donkeys, for there was no lack of guests, who, however, for the most part slept in the stable with their caballerias, being either arrieros ...
— The Pocket George Borrow • George Borrow

... There were two glass cabinets containing bottles of many descriptions, and a plain Normandy oak armoire, fitted with shelves upon which were specimens and materials for work. A fibre mat and a couple of kitchen chairs completed the furnishings of the main part, but in a sort of alcove which formed the base of the L, and which was curtained off by thick red hangings, was a camp bed with a table beside it and a chest of drawers. Here, so she was told by Jacques the servant, the doctor not infrequently ...
— Juggernaut • Alice Campbell

... fare, or of an ostentatious amount of splendour. The company of officers and gentlemen of the Ravenna district dined together in a spacious hall, where Drusus imagined they had a rather more bounteous repast than did the immediate guests of their entertainer. At one end of this large hall was a broad alcove, raised a single step, and here was laid the dinner for the proconsul. Caesar passed through the large company of his humbler guests, followed by Curio and Drusus,—now speaking a familiar word to a favourite centurion; now congratulating a ...
— A Friend of Caesar - A Tale of the Fall of the Roman Republic. Time, 50-47 B.C. • William Stearns Davis

... went quickly up the stairs to the second floor. The rooms here corresponded with his own below, yet how different they were. Everything was fresh and dainty. Cheap, but pretty, curtains hung before the windows and about the alcove where the bed was. The furnishing was sufficient, not rich, yet showing taste in the choice; two or three inexpensive prints adorned the walls, and on the toilet table were candlesticks, a china tray, and some cut-glass bottles. The boards were polished, and here and ...
— The Light That Lures • Percy Brebner

... the morning I arose, and armed with a couple of loaded pistols and a hanger, went to the back part of the squire's garden, climbed over the wall, and, according to Mrs. Sagely's direction, concealed myself in a thicket, hard by an alcove that terminated a walk at a good distance from the house, which (I was told) my mistress mostly frequented. Here I absconded from five o'clock in the morning to six in the evening, without seeing a human creature; at last I perceived two women approaching, whom, ...
— The Adventures of Roderick Random • Tobias Smollett

... now that I had seen some volumes there when I had no time or inclination to look at them, and I wanted something to read; for although I found reading very irksome at this period, there was really little else I could do. I found the books—three volumes—in the lower part of an alcove in the wall; above them, within a niche in the alcove, on a level with my face as I stood there, I observed a bulb-shaped bottle, with a long thin neck, very beautifully colored. I had seen it before, ...
— A Crystal Age • W. H. Hudson

... need to be actually present," said Grace, with sudden inspiration. "Look here, this is a little alcove," and she pulled aside a hanging curtain and showed a recess in the library wall. "You can stand in there, and hear whatever he has to say. I'd feel safer if you were near. Of course there's Peterson, but he's so queer, ...
— Larry Dexter's Great Search - or, The Hunt for the Missing Millionaire • Howard R. Garis

... 24 and 31. As for the manuscripts, Father Denifle thinks that the oldest of those which are known is that at Barcelona: Archivo de la corona de Aragon, Ripoll, n. 41 (Archiv., t. i., p. 148). There is one in the National Library of Paris, Latin alcove, No. 3817, which includes a curious note: "Apud Perusium felix domnus papa Gregorius nonus gloriosi secundo pontificus sui anno, quinto kal. martii (February 25, 1229) legendam hanc recepit, confirmavit et censuit fore tenendam." Another manuscript, which ...
— Life of St. Francis of Assisi • Paul Sabatier

... prostrating myself before his throne—if in every idea I may entertain to-morrow, here at Vaux, will not be the most glorious day my king ever enjoyed—may Heaven's lightning blast me where I stand!" Aramis had pronounced these words with his face turned towards the alcove of his own bedroom, where D'Artagnan, seated with his back towards the alcove, could not suspect that any one was lying concealed. The earnestness of his words, the studied slowness with which he pronounced them, the solemnity of his oath, ...
— The Man in the Iron Mask • Alexandre Dumas, Pere

... were closed. The alcove was lighted from two of the narrow windows, cut so high in the wall that they gave no view of the Mole and the street outside unless a man were to climb on a chair and get his shoulders on a level with the bamboo ...
— Isle o' Dreams • Frederick F. Moore

... stands Within the little alcove dim; Gone also are the faithful hands That hung sweet roses on its rim; And vanished even is the bust Which watched ...
— Poems • John L. Stoddard

... from an alcove a little book, and gives it to me to examine. It is an English copy of ...
— Glimpses of an Unfamiliar Japan - First Series • Lafcadio Hearn

... a great josher," Mr. Hale told Janet confidentially as he escorted them into the dining-room. And Ditmar, gazing around over the heads of the diners, spied in an alcove by a window a little table with ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill

... yet dispersed, his four lawful Mohammedan wives, and many concubines, were gazing furtively down from behind their haiks. There was a fountain in the middle of the patio, and at the farther end of it, within an alcove that opened out of a horseshoe arch, beneath ceilings hung with stalactites, against walls covered with silken haities, and on Rabat rugs of many colours, sat Ben Aboo and ...
— The Scapegoat • Hall Caine

... reckless waltzing of the piano in the drawing-room; it stopped the cackle incident to cork-pool in the billiard-room; it even stopped a good deal of the whispering under the Chinese lanterns beneath the stairs and in the alcove at the top of the stairs. What it did not stop was the consumption of mince-pies and claret-cup in the small breakfast-room; people mumbled about her ...
— The Matador of the Five Towns and Other Stories • Arnold Bennett

... been gradually driven from his magnificent suite of rooms au premier, to a little chamber in the fifth story:—we mounted, and found him. It was a little shabby room, with a few articles of rickety furniture, and a bed in an alcove; the light from the one window was falling full upon the bed and the body. Jack was dressed in a fine lawn shirt; he had kept it, poor fellow, TO DIE IN; for in all his drawers and cupboards there was not a single article of clothing; he had pawned everything ...
— The Paris Sketch Book Of Mr. M. A. Titmarsh • William Makepeace Thackeray

... little pillow-slips which an elderly maiden aunt had embroidered with their monogram; the latter consisted of two huge letters, formed of flowers, joined together in one single embrace, and kissing here and there, wherever they touched, at the corners. The bride had her own little alcove, which was screened off by a Japanese screen. The drawing-room, which was also dining-room, study and morning-room, contained her piano, (which had cost twelve hundred crowns) his writing-table with twelve pigeon-holes, (every single piece of it real walnut) a pier-glass, armchairs; a sideboard ...
— Married • August Strindberg

... snow. The ribbon rosettes were fully revealed, and as she glanced at their reflection, she heard the words, "Look at that train and those rosettes!" whispered behind her, and saw in the mirror two pretty young women turn away with their handkerchiefs over their mouths and retreat hurriedly to an alcove. All the feet in the room except Ariel's were in dainty kid or satin slippers of the color of the dresses from which they glimmered out, and only ...
— The Literary World Seventh Reader • Various

... before he found it, a hollow among rocks, with dwarf pines clustering thickly at the sides and in front. It was so well hidden that he would have missed it had he not been looking for just such a happy alcove, and at first he was quite sure that some wild animal must be using ...
— The Last of the Chiefs - A Story of the Great Sioux War • Joseph Altsheler

... words than a strange thing came to pass. Alfred remained sitting, his face turned toward the bed. The lodge was lighted by the sickly light of a winter's day, and by a lamp. At the moment his wife pronounced the name Cabrion, Pipelet thought he saw in the shade of the alcove the immovable, cunning face of the painter. It was he, his pointed hat, long hair, thin face, satanic smile, queer beard, and paralyzing gaze. For a moment, Pipelet thought himself in a dream; he passed his hand over his eyes, believing that he was ...
— The Mysteries of Paris V2 • Eugene Sue

... light! in diamond mines Their gems invite the hand that delves; So learning's treasured jewels shine Ranged on the alcove's ...
— The Poetical Works of Oliver Wendell Holmes, Complete • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.

... diamond necklace which Sagarika has left with her for presentation to him. He declines the offer. Looking at it attentively he wonders where she could have procured such a valuable necklace. They both go to the king who has gone from the queen's apartments to the crystal alcove and is lamenting thus:—"Deceitful vows, tender speeches, plausible excuses and prostrate supplications had less effect upon the queen's anger than her own teaks; like water upon the fire they quenched the blaze of her indignation. I am now only anxious for Sagarika. ...
— Tales from the Hindu Dramatists • R. N. Dutta

... 'downy ironheart' That from the cliffs o'erhanging grew, And o'er the alcove, every part, Such beauteous ...
— A Dictionary of Austral English • Edward Morris

... you see is yours. We whose voices you hear are your servants and shall obey all your commands with our utmost care and diligence. Retire, therefore, to your chamber and repose on your bed of down, and when you see fit repair to the bath. Supper awaits you in the adjoining alcove when it pleases you ...
— Bulfinch's Mythology • Thomas Bulfinch

... Occasionally the Royal Stuart tartan appeared, for Her Majesty always maintained that she was an ardent Jacobite. Water-colour sketches by Victoria hung upon the walls, together with innumerable stags' antlers, and the head of a boar, which had been shot by Albert in Germany. In an alcove in the hall, stood a life-sized statue of Albert in ...
— Queen Victoria • Lytton Strachey

... want to know what is the matter?" asked Mrs. Farrington, as she took the handkerchief from Patty's hand. "Well, go and look behind those curtains, and see what's in the alcove." ...
— Patty in Paris • Carolyn Wells

... little room to be arranged in a very elegant fashion; the sofa was soft and warm; scents, pomades, and soaps adorned the marble washstand, and the pale light fell from the ceiling with a soft glow, like the gleams of a lamp suspended in an alcove. Macquart, amidst this perfumed soporific atmosphere fell asleep, thinking that those scoundrels, the rich, "were very fortunate, all the same." He had covered himself with a blanket which had been given to him, and with his head and back and arms reposing on the cushions, he stretched himself ...
— The Fortune of the Rougons • Emile Zola

... them slipped down behind the chest in the hall. It was a heavy oak chest, a great carved affair that had belonged in the family a long time, and it was seldom moved. It stood below the hat-rack in the alcove in the hall, and I figured it out that the man must have meant to keep those papers himself, so there would be no incriminating evidence in father's hands, and that he must have picked them up without father's noticing and started to carry them home; but that when he was ...
— Cloudy Jewel • Grace Livingston Hill

... Another was engaged in trimming a tiny pair of satin boots with beads of every color. She was short, small, and swarthy, her chief beauty being a languishing pair of black eyes. A third lay at full length on a small bed in an alcove, reading Harper's Bazaar with the avidity of a milliner, or a lady of fashion. She was exceedingly pretty and ladylike. Two of them wore the inevitable white wrapper, while the third was fully dressed in a simple gray walking-suit. The lovely ...
— Lights and Shadows of New York Life - or, the Sights and Sensations of the Great City • James D. McCabe

... white muslin curtains held in the centre an embroidered anchor which dragged inward, as the breeze rushed in through open windows. An arched recess in the wall, whence a door communicated with the adjoining chamber, was concealed by a portiere of blue that matched the lambrequins, and the alcove served as a miniature dressing-room, where the brass faucet emptied ...
— At the Mercy of Tiberius • August Evans Wilson

... a lean, resolute man, very soberly clad for that place, and already I had marked his face watching me in the breakfasting hall, and afterwards as we went along the passage I had avoided his eye. But now, as we sat in a little alcove, smiling at the pleasure of all the people who went to and fro across the shining floor, he came and touched me, and spoke to me so that I was forced to listen. And he asked that he might speak to me for a ...
— Twelve Stories and a Dream • H. G. Wells

... been painted from experience, and felt with the enthusiasm of affection. It breathes of healthy open air, of life upon the road, of casual joys and wayside pleasure, snatched with careless heart by men whose tastes are natural. There is very little of the alcove or the closet in this verse; and the touch upon the world is so infantine, so tender, that we are indulgent to the generalities with ...
— Wine, Women, and Song - Mediaeval Latin Students' songs; Now first translated into English verse • Various

... Stretched through the mullioned casements to the wall, And wove fantastic shadows over all. The revelry was hushed. In tranquil ease The warriors grouped themselves by twos and threes About the dames and damsels of the court, And chattered careless words of small import; But in an alcove, unobserved, apart, Young Gawayne sat with Lady Elfinhart, In Arthur's court no goodlier knight than he Wore shirt of mail, or Cupid's panoply; And Elfinhart, to Gawayne's eager eyes. Of all heaven's treasures seemed ...
— Gawayne And The Green Knight - A Fairy Tale • Charlton Miner Lewis

... I to myself, as I walked, one rainy morning, as a sailor walks the quarter-deck, up and down a short alcove, extending before the windows of a modern house. It was one of those days in June, in which our summer-hopes take umbrage at what we call unseasonable weather, though no season was ever known to pass without them. Unlike the rapid and delightful showers of warmer days, ...
— The Ladies' Vase - Polite Manual for Young Ladies • An American Lady

... The sense of colour, colour both captive and atmospheric, was a new and persistent delight, for it was colour purified, specialized, and infinitely extended in either direction from the crudity of the seven-winged spectrum. The room was like an alcove of outdoors, not divorced from the open air and set in contra-distinction, but made a continuation of its space and order and ancient repose—a kind of exquisite porch ...
— Romance Island • Zona Gale

... were prepared for the scene which met their view. In a richly-ornamented alcove, seated on a pile of cushions, were two persons; one of whom they immediately knew must be the rajah. He was magnificently attired in Oriental costume, covered with gold ornaments; a turban covering his head, surmounted by a plume of bird of paradise ...
— The Young Rajah • W.H.G. Kingston

... that the men in the room above would discover him. I caught sight of him as he ascended to the roof of the alcove, by means of a single rope which hung to the ground. In the roof was a trap-door, through which he disappeared, and closed it silently after him, having first drawn up the rope. Again going below, I met Jose, and told him that the dog was dead, charging him to ask ...
— Manco, the Peruvian Chief - An Englishman's Adventures in the Country of the Incas • W.H.G. Kingston

... but repaired with straw, With tape-tied curtains, never meant to draw, The George and Garter dangling from that bed Where tawdry yellow strove with dirty red, Great Villiers lies—alas! how changed from him, That life of pleasure, and that soul of whim!— Gallant and gay, in Cliveden's proud alcove, The bower of wanton Shrewsbury and love; Or just as gay, at council, in a ring Of mimic'd statesmen and their merry king. No wit to flatter left of all his store! No fool to laugh at, which he valued more. There, victor of his health, of fortune, friends, And ...
— Essay on Man - Moral Essays and Satires • Alexander Pope

... above, leaning his back against the blighted flowers of the wall-paper. From an oval window at the head of the stairs the summer sunshine streamed upon them, and illuminated the high-shouldered clock which, ensconced in an alcove, seemed top ...
— The Stillwater Tragedy • Thomas Bailey Aldrich

... some closed curtains at one end of the room, which I had not hitherto noticed. Drawing aside the curtains, he revealed to view an alcove, in which stood a neat little gas-stove for cooking. Drawers and cupboards, plates, dishes, and saucepans, were ranged around the alcove—all on a miniature scale, all scrupulously bright and clean. "Welcome to the kitchen!" ...
— The Law and the Lady • Wilkie Collins

... large, panelled chamber, richly furnished. A wood fire smouldered on the hearth—a curtained alcove to the left partly concealed a bed—a corresponding alcove to the right, fitted with altar and crucifix, served as an oratory. In the centre of the room stood a table covered with a cloth. It needed no second glance to tell me what object lay beneath that cloth, uplifting it in ghastly outline! ...
— In the Days of My Youth • Amelia Ann Blandford Edwards

... lamp was expiring, the fire in my stove extinguished, and my half-opened door was letting in an icy wind. I got up, with a shiver, to shut and double-lock it; then I made for the alcove, and went ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet

... in one room, her husband nearest the door, the other in a small alcove some ten feet away. Both were unconscious; both were surrounded by groups of frightened attendants who fell back as she approached. A doctor stood at the bed-head of her husband, but as her eye met his he stepped aside with a shake of the ...
— The Golden Slipper • Anna Katharine Green

... mist was in the air. Drawn by the bright lights, Jeff entered a saloon and sat down in an alcove with his arms on the table. Why did they hammer him so because he told the truth as he saw it? Why must he toady to the ideas of Bland as everybody else at the University seemed to do? He was not respectable enough for them. That was the trouble. They were pushing him back ...
— The Vision Spendid • William MacLeod Raine

... Polish count, with two sets of moustaches, I could not have been more flattered and "entertained." My fame soon spread through the rooms, as two little apartments, with a door between them that made each an alcove of the other, were called; and even the men, the young ones in particular, began to take an interest in me. This latter interest, it is true, did not descend to the minutiae of trimmings and work, or even ...
— Autobiography of a Pocket-Hankerchief • James Fenimore Cooper

... answered the Magician: and the star became a lovely alabaster lamp, set in an alcove in his study. Her chaste radiance was shed over his page as long as he continued to read. At a certain hour he extinguished ...
— The Twilight of the Gods, and Other Tales • Richard Garnett

... stepping silently, and passed through a door at the end of the hall into a large and barren looking dining-room, stiffly and skimpily furnished, but well-lighted, owing to the fact that one end of it had been transformed into a narrow "conservatory," a glass alcove now tenanted by two dried palms and a number of vacant ...
— The Flirt • Booth Tarkington

... little alcove which they had reached, considerably embarrassed and surprised. She had not, however, the most remote idea of what he was about to say to her. Had any other man in the world, almost, spoken to her in the same language, she ...
— The Kellys and the O'Kellys • Anthony Trollope

... and here was gathered a Flemish family. The event was half over, as Mrs. Bracher, closely followed by Scotch and Hilda, rushed in. The mother, fully dressed, was lying on a wooden bed that fitted into an alcove. She was typically Flemish, of high cheek-bones and very red cheeks. The entire family was grouped about the bed—a boy of twelve years, a girl of nineteen, and a girl of three. Attending the case, was a ...
— Young Hilda at the Wars • Arthur Gleason

... subjects and held court. The roof is supported by nine rows of graceful columns cut from red sandstone and formerly covered with gold. The rest of the building is marble. The throne stood upon a high platform in an alcove of white marble, richly decorated, and above it are balconies protected by grilles or screens behind which the sultanas were permitted to watch the proceedings. Back of the audience-room is a great quadrangle, planted with trees, flowers and vines. ...
— Modern India • William Eleroy Curtis

... In this alcove hewed out of the dark trees, the atmosphere seemed to Denis agreeably elegiac. He sat down beside her under the shadow of the pudic goddess. There was a ...
— Crome Yellow • Aldous Huxley

... my object, so that I can live respectably here, you must instantly leave Salzburg. You will say, that may never come to pass; at all events, industry and exertion shall not be wanting on my part. Do try to come over soon to see me. We can all live together. I have a roomy alcove on my first room in which two beds stand. These would do capitally for you and me. As for my sister, all we can do is to put a stove into the next room, which will only be an affair of four or five florins; for in mine we might heat the stove till it is red-hot, and leave the stove-door ...
— The Letters of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, V.1. • Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

... surrounded the royal apartments on three sides, and seem to have been tolerably careless where they sent their lead. A shot came into the room where the queen and her sister lay in bed. They were frightened, and got up, and the attendants placed mattresses on the floor, in the angle of an alcove, upon which the children lay down, and after some time fell asleep. "The poor children were hungry, and asked for supper, but there was nothing to give them; and from two in the afternoon of the 7th, till eight in the morning of the 8th, they did not taste food." What a curious ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - Volume 57, No. 352, February 1845 • Various

... the low, round hat he assumed in a sort of curtained alcove containing a washstand, a row of wooden pegs and a shelf, brought out wonderfully the length of his grave, brown face. He stepped back into the full light of the room, looking like the vision of a cool, reflective Don Quixote, with the sunken eyes of a dark enthusiast ...
— The Secret Agent - A Simple Tale • Joseph Conrad

... animals—one to mammals, one to birds, one to fishes, and so on. In each case very beautiful sets of specimens have been prepared, illustrating the anatomy and physiology of the group of animals in question. Here one may see, for example, in the alcove devoted to birds, specimens showing not only details of the skeleton and muscular system, but the more striking examples of variation of form of such members as the bill, legs, wings, and tails. Here are preparations also ...
— A History of Science, Volume 5(of 5) - Aspects Of Recent Science • Henry Smith Williams

... some five minutes outside the great house in St. James' Square, watching the couples in the rooms above, and particularly interested in one face which appeared in, and disappeared from, a brilliantly lighted alcove twice while he was standing there. A certain grace of girlhood attended this apparition; the dress was rich and costly and exquisitely made; but that which held Alban's closer attention was the fact that the wearer of it unquestionably ...
— Aladdin of London - or Lodestar • Sir Max Pemberton

... curious Zosia from the depths of the alcove had been following this mysterious conversation through a crack; she had heard Thaddeus tell frankly and boldly of his love, and with fluttering heart she had seen those two great tears in his eyes. Though she could ...
— Pan Tadeusz • Adam Mickiewicz

... and a trouble to all his neighbors, and to us among the number. Readers recollect that young Lady's Serene Mother, and a meeting she once had with her Uncle Peter,—at Magdeburg, a dozen years ago, in a public drawing-room with alcove near; anecdote not lightly to be printed in human types, nor repeated where not necessary. The Mother is now dead; Father still up to the eyes in puddle and trouble: but as for the young Lady herself, she is Niece to the now Czarina Anne; ...
— History Of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. VIII. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle

... drew the curtain shutting off one bed and a small space around it. Dick, used to primitive customs, said good-night and retired within his alcove, taking his saddle bags. There was a small window near the foot of the room, and when he noticed it he resolved to let in a little air later on. The mountaineers liked hot rooms all the time, but he did not. This window contained no glass, but was ...
— The Guns of Shiloh • Joseph A. Altsheler

... bits of china, curios and exquisitely tinted shells lay in picturesque confusion upon tables and wall brackets of native woods; soft silken draperies fell from the windows and partially screened from view a large alcove where microscopes of different sizes stood upon cabinets whose shelves were filled with a miscellaneous collection of rare plants and beautiful insects, specimens from the agate forest of Arizona, petrified remains from the 'Bad Lands' of Dakota, feathery fronded seaweed, ...
— A Beautiful Possibility • Edith Ferguson Black

... and mules at rest, and everything very quiet and peaceful in the alcove. The rill murmured a little in its stony bed, and, far overhead, he heard the wind sighing among the trees on the mountain. He chose a place close to the wall, spread two blankets there, on which he expected to lie, and prepared to cover himself with two more. He realized now that ...
— The Great Sioux Trail - A Story of Mountain and Plain • Joseph Altsheler

... literature, I took refuge with Charles Sumner. That accomplished scholar, himself for once at fault, could only frankly advise me to do at last what I ought to have done at first,—to apply to Theodore Parker. I did so. "Go," replied he instantly, "to alcove twenty-four, shelf one hundred and thirteen, of the College Library at Cambridge, and you will find the information you need in a thick quarto, bound in vellum, and lettered 'Potgiesser de Statu Servorum.'" I straightway sent for ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. VI.,October, 1860.—No. XXXVI. - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various

... the luxury on the Place Vendome! A felt carpet on the floor, the bed hidden away in an alcove, Algerian curtains with red stripes, an ornamental clock in green marble on the chimneypiece, the whole lighted by lamps of which the flames can be regulated at will. Our oldest member, M. Chalmette, is not better lodged at Dijon. ...
— The Nabob • Alphonse Daudet

... instead, Jack stood before him. Jack, on account of the occurrence of his mother's birthday, had a holiday, and was at work with his books. Ida was asleep on her bed in the alcove. The two men looked at each other in silence. This time the poet had not the advantage. In the first place, he was not at home; next, how could he treat as an inferior this tall, proud-looking fellow, in whose intelligent face appeared, as if still more ...
— Jack - 1877 • Alphonse Daudet

... dried, and scarcely a trace of its former existence remained. The broad flat stone was broken. The shady alcove beneath which the waters came up so cool and clear, had been removed. All was naked and barren. Near by stood an old deserted house. The door was half open, the windows were broken out, the chimney had fallen, ...
— Words of Cheer for the Tempted, the Toiling, and the Sorrowing • T. S. Arthur

... faintly blue. There was a deep lounge of the softest brown leather with somnolence drifting about it like a haze. There was a high screen of Chinese lacquer chiefly concerned with geometrical fishermen and huntsmen in black and gold; this made a corner alcove for a voluminous chair guarded by an orange-colored standing lamp. Deep in the fireplace a quartered shield was ...
— The Beautiful and Damned • F. Scott Fitzgerald

... Getting a good entrance all the boats went through without the slightest mishap. A mile below this place we landed at the mouth of a pretty little stream entering through a picturesque and narrow canyon on the left. We called it Alcove Brook. ...
— A Canyon Voyage • Frederick S. Dellenbaugh

... wriggled herself clear of the last cot, and was over the sill and in the corridor, the twilight aiding her escape. Regaining her feet, she darted noiselessly down the long hall. At the head of the stairs she paused. On the floor below was a small alcove where she might hide. Making sure that no one was in sight, she sped down, but as she reached the lower step one of the nurses ...
— Polly of the Hospital Staff • Emma C. Dowd

... state to the railway station to receive them. All, save Master Cheese. He walked about somewhat disconsolately, thinking the proceedings rather slow. In his wandering he came upon Tynn, placing good things upon one of the tables, which was laid in an alcove. ...
— Verner's Pride • Mrs. Henry Wood

... room, and ate luncheon to the melancholy accompaniment of a three-man orchestra struggling vainly with Bach in an alcove off the dining room. After that she began to make inquiries. Neither clerk nor manager knew aught of Charlie Benton. They were both in their first season there. They advised her to ask ...
— Big Timber - A Story of the Northwest • Bertrand W. Sinclair

... only in fine black robes. While he was there, some rice-beer was brewed. On being given some of it to drink, he was very joyful, and then danced. Then, as he went out-of-doors, he re-entered the house with a piece of hard dung in his mouth, and put it in the alcove. As the master of the house became angry and beat him, he, being a large crow, flew out of the window, making the sound "K[a]! k[a]!" For this reason, even crows are creatures to be dreaded. Be very careful!—(Translated literally. Told by ...
— Aino Folk-Tales • Basil Hall Chamberlain

... a sort of semi-office by Starkweather at such times when he is in Washington. Door to right; also, door to right rear. At left rear is an alcove, without hangings, which is dark. To left are windows. To left, near windows, a fiat-top desk, with desk-chair and desk-telephone. Also, on desk, conspicuously, is a heavy dispatch box. At the center rear is a ...
— Theft - A Play In Four Acts • Jack London

... inspection, however, Mr. McKay is out of bed again and fumbling about in his alcove. His room-mate sleepily inquires from beyond the partition what he wants in the dark, but is too long accustomed to his vagaries to expect definite information. When Mr. McKay slips softly out ...
— Starlight Ranch - and Other Stories of Army Life on the Frontier • Charles King

... saw a room unfamiliar, yet already hated. It was a small, but beautiful room, the walls covered with Moorish work, such as I had seen at the Alhambra. I lay on a divan-bed, in an alcove without windows; but in the room beyond, I saw one with a dainty filigree frame, supported by a marble pillar. There was also an archway, from which a curtain was pushed aside, and I could see the end of ...
— The Car of Destiny • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson

... the gesture of a one-armed man, the green coat, with its empty embroidered sleeve, pointed out to the unfortunate sculptor the glorious insignia hung up on the walls of his alcove. Then, as though wishing the better to torment his victim, to assume every aspect, and every attitude, the cruel coat drew nearer the fire, and leaning forward on his arm-chair with a little old-fashioned ...
— Artists' Wives • Alphonse Daudet

... about her admiringly. It was just such a bedroom as she would have chosen for herself. The colouring was green and white, with softly shaded electric lights, an alcove bedstead, which was a miracle of daintiness, white furniture, and a long low dressing-table littered all over with a multitude of daintily fashioned toilet appliances. Through an open door was a glimpse of the bathroom—a ...
— Anna the Adventuress • E. Phillips Oppenheim

... With a crash an alcove belched music, and in a moment all the winking length of the gallery was throbbing ...
— Anthony Lyveden • Dornford Yates

... his home was. He was eager to see the paternal roof again. But when he arrived there so sad a spectacle met his gaze, that he had scarcely the courage to enter. The shop was in utter disorder, the rooms deserted, his father's alcove empty. Everything presented to his eyes the wretchedness of utter ruin. Not a chair remained; all the drawers had been ransacked, the till broken open, the chest taken away; nothing had escaped the ...
— International Short Stories: French • Various

... to be frightened, Lucy, when I am with you," he said, gently. "What is it?" He looked out of the alcove as he spoke, and saw a little dog among the trees. "Is it the dog?" ...
— Little Novels • Wilkie Collins

... a crash—then, hark! Across the stage comes the sweet-voiced Lark. She daintily sways, with an airy grace, And flutters a bit of gossamer lace, While the leafy alcove echoes and thrills With her liquid runs and lingering trills. Miss Goldfinch came next, in her satin gown, And shaking her feathery flounces down, With much expression and feeling sung Some "Oh's" and "Ah's" in a foreign tongue; While to give ...
— The Home Book of Verse, Vol. 1 (of 4) • Various

... walked around a scale model of Harvest Moon, the O.G. station, which occupied the center of the Hall, and went on among the exhibits. There were views taken on Manon Planet in one alcove, mainly of Manon's aerial plankton belt and of the giant plasmoids called Harvesters which had moved about the belt, methodically engulfing its clouds of living matter. A whale-sized replica of a Harvester dominated one end of the Hall, a giant dark-green sausage in external ...
— Legacy • James H Schmitz

... guards, snatched from his supine arms the captured sword that had been intrusted to his keeping. Before he or any other of the astonished spectators could take any action Evander had leaped lightly into the alcove of the window, and, dragging by main force the heavy table in front of him, so as to blockade his corner, showed himself snugly intrenched behind a rampart which his single sword might well hope to hold at least for some time against the swords of ...
— The Lady of Loyalty House - A Novel • Justin Huntly McCarthy

... Hodge were called on to take turns, week and week about, at being orderly, and the name of the one responsible for the appearance of the room was placed on the orderly board, hung to the front of the alcove partition. ...
— Frank Merriwell's Chums • Burt L. Standish

... the mouth of the receptacle is hermetically closed with a lid of the same white silk. Lastly, a few threads, stretched like a thin curtain, form a canopy above the nest and, with the curved tips of the leaves, frame a sort of alcove wherein the mother takes ...
— The Life of the Spider • J. Henri Fabre

... he felt, a ridiculous position for a Hidalgo of Spain. But his dignity was to suffer still greater damage. In another moment she had bundled him into an alcove behind the arras at the chamber's end, a tiny closet that was no better than a cupboard contrived for the storing of household linen. She had-moved with a swift precision which at another time might have provoked his admiration, snatching up his cloak and hat, and other evidences of his presence, ...
— The Historical Nights Entertainment, Second Series • Rafael Sabatini

... prisoners of state. Dethroned monarchs and fallen statesmen would not have needed to remonstrate against a domicile so spacious, so deeply secluded from the world's scorn, and so admirably in accordance with their thenceforward sunless fortunes. An alcove here might have suited Sir Walter Raleigh better than that darksome hiding-place communicating with the great chamber in the Tower, pacing from end to end of which he meditated upon his "History of the World." His track would ...
— Our Old Home - A Series of English Sketches • Nathaniel Hawthorne

... pressed his hand to his forehead, and for some time paced the chamber in silence; then, approaching a small alcove at one extremity of the apartment, he raised the heavy and sumptuous hangings and revealed a small silver casket of exquisite workmanship and appointments, that sparkled as the mellow light poured in upon it. M. Dantes knelt beside the ebony table on which this casket ...
— Edmond Dantes • Edmund Flagg



Words linked to "Alcove" :   cubicle, niche, bay, stall, carrel, recess, carrell



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