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Shape   /ʃeɪp/   Listen
Shape

verb
(past shaped; past part. shaped or shapen; pres. part. shaping)
1.
Shape or influence; give direction to.  Synonyms: determine, influence, mold, regulate.  "Mold public opinion"
2.
Make something, usually for a specific function.  Synonyms: forge, form, mold, mould, work.  "Form cylinders from the dough" , "Shape a figure" , "Work the metal into a sword"
3.
Give shape or form to.  Synonym: form.  "Form the young child's character"



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"Shape" Quotes from Famous Books



... equally tormented, though the phenomena took rather a different form. Alone in his bedroom at night, the shape of the room would frequently change; either the walls and ceiling would recede, and recede, until they assumed the proportions of some vast chamber, full of gloom and strange shadows; or they would slowly, very slowly, close in upon him, as if it were their intention to crush him to death. A feeling ...
— The Sorcery Club • Elliott O'Donnell

... dead masses of matter, awaiting another impulse which starts again their inner energies into activity and a new solar life cycle is begun. And thus it is with all the worlds; they are born, grow and die; only to be reborn. And thus it is with all the things of shape and form; they swing from action to reaction; from birth to death; from activity to inactivity—and then back again. Thus it is with all living things; they are born, grow, and die—and then are reborn. ...
— The Kybalion - A Study of The Hermetic Philosophy of Ancient Egypt and Greece • Three Initiates

... individual, in those days, just as patches did in my grandmother's time; and Virginie's hair was not to my taste, or according to my principles: it was too classical. Her large, black eyes looked out at you steadily. One cannot judge of the shape of a nose from a full- face miniature, but the nostrils were clearly cut and largely opened. I do not fancy her nose could have been pretty; but her mouth had a character all its own, and which would, I think, have redeemed a plainer face. ...
— My Lady Ludlow • Elizabeth Gaskell

... stitched together make the sails. This boat thus equipped may be furnished with all necessaries from the same tree. There is not a month in which the cocoa does not produce a bunch of nuts, from twenty to fifty. At first sprouts out a kind of seed or capsula, of a shape not unlike the scabbard of a scimitar, which they cut, and place a vessel under, to receive the liquor that drops from it; this drink is called soro, and is clear, pleasant, and nourishing. If it be boiled, it grows hard, and makes a kind of sugar much valued in the Indies: distil this liquor ...
— A Voyage to Abyssinia • Jerome Lobo

... with that nameless fear to which she could give neither shape nor direction, and after a moment's hesitation ...
— Queechy, Volume II • Elizabeth Wetherell

... readily, as he conjectured that a fresh contest would result from it; he found his brother the cardinal engaged, with the assistance of a valet-de-chambre, in trying on a prelate's costume, a little worldly-looking, perhaps, in its shape and fashion, but elegant and ...
— The Forty-Five Guardsmen • Alexandre Dumas

... who having no end, could have no beginning? Not those of this world only, we may be sure. It is so small and there are so many others, millions upon millions of them, and such an infinite variety of knowledge is needed to shape the soul of man, even though it remain as yet imperfect and but a shadow of what ...
— Love Eternal • H. Rider Haggard

... heavy, and could not well be transported with the limited means at the command of Indians. They are therefore well adapted to the uses of village Indians, who remain permanently in a place and prosecute agricultural pursuits. They are generally of rectangular shape, and from 10 to 20 inches in length by 6 to 12 in width, and are composed of various kinds of rock, the harder, coarse-grained kinds being preferable, though in some instances sandstone is employed; the most desirable stone is porous lava. These stones are sometimes carried with families ...
— Illustrated Catalogue Of The Collections Obtained From The Indians Of New Mexico And Arizona In 1879 • James Stevenson

... thousand organizations which are altruistic and philanthropic, outside the limits of ecclesiastical Christianity. It will be so in India, and throughout the world. And the Christian Church must take this into account and shape its policy accordingly. ...
— India, Its Life and Thought • John P. Jones

... mine aw'd thresh him, Wol th' skin coom off his back; Aw'd cure him teein door-snecks, Then givin th' door a whack. Aw'd leearn him to draw th' shape o' me Wi' chalk on th' nessy door, An mak mud pies o' awr front steps An leeav 'em thear ...
— Yorkshire Lyrics • John Hartley

... very stern. She had laid bare to him her whole heart, and he had answered her love by never a word. He had made no reply in any shape,—given her no thanks for her heart's treasure. He had responded to her affection by no tenderness. He had not even said that this might have been so, had that other not have come to pass. By no word had he alluded to her confession,—but had regarded her ...
— Castle Richmond • Anthony Trollope

... the skipper struck a hand-bell which stood on the cabin table; in response to which summons a black steward, clad, like his master, in dingy white, made his appearance from the neighbouring pantry. Our host thereupon formed his right hand into the shape of a cup and raised it to his mouth, at the same time exhibiting three fingers of his left hand; and the steward, nodding and grinning his comprehension of the mute order, withdrew, to reappear next moment with a case-bottle of rum, three ...
— The Congo Rovers - A Story of the Slave Squadron • Harry Collingwood

... both with Rome and Constantinople, contains a series of monuments which is of unequalled interest in the history of the centralised plan. (1) The mausoleum of the empress Galla Placidia, sister of the emperor Honorius, who died in 450 A.D., is a building of cruciform shape, consisting of a square central space covered by a dome, with rectangular projections on all four sides. The projection through which the building is entered is longer than the others, and the plan thus ...
— The Ground Plan of the English Parish Church • A. Hamilton Thompson

... for ousting Dunkirk took shape, I saw clearly that, if he were to be overthrown at once, I must use part of the existing control of the machine of the party,—it would take several years, at least three, to build up an entirely new control. To work quickly, I must use Croffut, Dunkirk's colleague ...
— The Plum Tree • David Graham Phillips

... sufficiently for one age it has been necessary to do the work again for the next. As soon as the errors of one set of people have been made apparent, another set has arisen with fresh objections, or the old fallacies have reappeared in another shape. It is not too much to say that it has never yet been so clearly proved that Christ rose again from the dead, that a jury of educated Englishmen should be compelled to assent to it, even though they had never before heard ...
— The Fair Haven • Samuel Butler

... go any sooner than right now. I hate to take these young men from y'u, lady, but, as I said, I'll send them back in good shape. Adios, senorita. Don't forget to whom y'u belong." He swaggered to the door and turned, leaning against the jamb with one hand again it. "I expect y'u can say those lovey-dov good-byes without my help. I'm going into the yard. If y'u want to y'u can plug me in the back through ...
— Wyoming, a Story of the Outdoor West • William MacLeod Raine

... the aisle. Is his wife so unfortunate as to accompany him? We analyze her bonnet, her dress, her features, her figure. If not, he monopolizes all attention. In five minutes we can, any of us-there are a few rare exceptions-tell you the cut of his coat, the character of his cravat, the shape of his collar, the way he wears his hair. If he has any peculiar pulpit habit, woe betide him; he is odd. If he has not, woe betide him; he is commonplace and conventional. He rises to invoke the blessing of God. If he goes to the throne of God he goes alone. We go no farther ...
— Laicus - The experiences of a Layman in a Country Parish • Lyman Abbott

... intimation that the door from the library to the hall had been opened. Sally, for one, remained firmly persuaded that they two were alone in the silent house until the instant when she saw a second man hurl himself upon the back of the first—a swift-moving shape of darkness, something almost feline in his grim, violent fury that afforded the victim no time either to turn or to lift a hand in self-defence. In a twinkling the two went headlong to the floor and disappeared, screened by the broad top ...
— Nobody • Louis Joseph Vance

... blue border around the unique shape of two overlapping right triangles; the smaller, upper triangle bears a white stylized moon and the larger, lower triangle bears ...
— The 2001 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency.

... bared shoulders, and arms so inimitably fair and lovely: her spread hands crossed over her charming neck; yet not half concealing its glossy beauties: the scanty coat, as she rose from me, giving the whole of her admirable shape, and fine- turn'd limbs: her eyes running over, yet seeming to threaten future vengeance: and at last her lips uttering what every indignant look and glowing feature portended: exclaiming as if I had done the worst I could do, and vowing never to forgive me; wilt thou wonder if I resumed ...
— Clarissa, Volume 5 (of 9) • Samuel Richardson

... their voyage a-fishing, because the year began to waste; the master would not depart till he had the company of the Elizabeth, whereupon the master told our captain that he was afraid his men would shape some contrary course while he was asleep, and so he should lose us. At length, after much talk and many threatenings, they were content to bring us to the land which we looked ...
— Voyages in Search of the North-West Passage • Richard Hakluyt

... by finding two shell hairpins, and near them a single hoof print, that, sheltered by a heavy growth of sage, had escaped the obliteration of the wind. This he knelt and studied carefully, taking in all the details of size and shape and direction; then, finding no more hairpins or combs, he carefully put his booty into his pocket and hurried back to the cabin, his brow knit ...
— The Man of the Desert • Grace Livingston Hill

... storage, drums of, dust in, explosibility of, fire, risk of, formula for, granulated, heat-conducting power of, of formation of, impurities in, inertness of, in residues, physical properties of, purity of, quality, regulations as to, sale and purchase of, regulations as to, scented, shape of lumps of, sizes of, small, yield of gas from, specific gravity of, heat of, standard, British, German, "sticks," storage regulations for, subdivided charges of, sundry uses of, swelling of, during decomposition, "treated," yield of ...
— Acetylene, The Principles Of Its Generation And Use • F. H. Leeds and W. J. Atkinson Butterfield

... 'pon my soul, that's clever. Say how I owe you one." Thus Nat replied, stopping in a desperate effort to light a short cigar without damaging the down he persisted in calling his mustache. He also raised his hat, and throwing his body into the shape of a triangle, made one of these bows which are peculiar to members ...
— The Life and Adventures of Maj. Roger Sherman Potter • "Pheleg Van Trusedale"

... should not be disappointed. His pledge to her father was a Jephthah's oath, honorable only in the breaking. His mission, all his hours in Hunston, took changed shape before the eye of his whirling mind, monstrous, accusing, unbelievably base. Reward that trust with treachery, that faith with betrayal? ...
— Captivating Mary Carstairs • Henry Sydnor Harrison

... were figures which had nothing of agreeable, nothing of beauty on their outside; but when any one took the pains to open them and search into them, he there found the figures of all the deities. So in the shape that Horace presents himself to us in his satires we see nothing at the first view which deserves our attention; it seems that he is rather an amusement for children than for the serious consideration ...
— Discourses on Satire and Epic Poetry • John Dryden

... on picquet, or at night, usually presents arms to nobody; but a sentinel on camp-guard by day is expected to perform that ceremony to anything in human shape that has two rows of buttons. Here was a human shape, but so utterly buttonless that it exhibited not even a rag to which a button could by any earthly possibility be appended, buttonless even potentially; and my ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 14, No. 84, October, 1864 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various

... marrow, young as her purpose, and soft as pity; no Monument to worship, but a mould to make men in, a neat one, and I know how e're she appears now, which is near enough, you are stark blind if you hit not soon at night; she would venture forty pounds more but to feel a Flea in your shape bite her: drop no more Rings forsooth, this was the prettiest thing ...
— Wit Without Money - The Works of Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher • Francis Beaumont

... finished speaking, Rea was downstairs and out on the east veranda. At the kitchen door stood a Chinaman, throwing bits of meat to the scrambling seventeen cats,—black, white, tortoise-shell, gray, maltese, yellow, every color, size, shape of cat that was ever seen. And they were plunging and leaping and racing about so, that it looked like twice as many cats as there really were, and as if every cat had a dozen tails. "Sfz! Sfz! Sputter! Scratch, spp, spt! Growl, growl, miaow, miaow," they went, till, between the noise and the ...
— The Hunter Cats of Connorloa • Helen Jackson

... scandal—produced by Mark Ambient's masterpiece. It was the most complete presentation that had yet been made of the gospel of art; it was a kind of aesthetic war-cry. People had endeavored to sail nearer to "truth" in the cut of their sleeves and the shape of their sideboards; but there had not as yet been, among English novels, such an example of beauty of execution and genuineness of substance. Nothing had been done in that line from the point of view of art for art This ...
— The Author of Beltraffio • Henry James

... will from the very beginning. They have avoided marriage, not because they thought it a shame and a surrender, a treason to their sex, a base yielding to the unjust pretensions of men, but because there existed at the time some obstacle in their way in the shape of the vested interest of some other woman. When Mary Godwin chose to mate herself with Shelley, she took her good name in her hands; but still there was Harriet. As soon as Harriet was dead, Mary showed she had no deep principle of action involved, by marrying Shelley. When George ...
— The Woman Who Did • Grant Allen

... north side, at all events, for there was the faithful Taylour, pirouetting on his hill-top in the eye of the wind. Two fields more (in one of which he caught his first sight of any of the hounds, in the shape of Ruby, carefully rolling on a dead crow), and then, under the lee of a high bank, he came upon Patsey Crimmeen, the farmers, and the country boys, absorbed in the contemplation of a fight between Tiger, the butcher's brindled cur, and ...
— All on the Irish Shore - Irish Sketches • E. Somerville and Martin Ross

... Natural Experiments: with the state of these studies, as then cultivated at home and abroad. We then discoursed of the circulation of the blood, the valves in the venae lacteae, the lymphatic vessels, the Copernican hypothesis, the nature of comets and new stars, the satellites of Jupiter, the oval shape of Saturn, the spots in the sun and its turning on its own axis, the inequalities and selenography of the moon, the several phases of Venus and Mercury, the improvement of telescopes, the grinding of glasses for that purpose, the weight of air, the possibility or impossibility of vacuities, ...
— History of the English People, Volume VI (of 8) - Puritan England, 1642-1660; The Revolution, 1660-1683 • John Richard Green

... temporary halt in some place of strength. But now it was universally known that they were probably waylaid by a desperate and remorseless freebooter, who, as he put his own trust exclusively in the sword, allowed nobody to hope for any other shape of deliverance. ...
— Memorials and Other Papers • Thomas de Quincey

... of intellectual isolation and of the effort to shape everything in accordance with hard and fast rules and doctrines was the systematisation and codification of juristic and ritual tradition, a work with which a beginning was made in the century following the destruction of Jerusalem. Towards the end of the 2nd century the Pharisaic doctrine ...
— Prolegomena to the History of Israel • Julius Wellhausen

... it," he said, "all over those halls at York House. I seemed to behold the grisly shape standing behind one and another, as they ate and laughed; and when the Archbishop and his priests and the King came in it seemed only to make the pageant complete! Only now and then could I recall those blessed words, ...
— The Armourer's Prentices • Charlotte M. Yonge

... is a princely thing to do well, and to be ill-spoken of. It is a shameful thing that the face should be subject unto the mind, to be put into what shape it will, and to be dressed by it as it will; and that the mind should not bestow so much care upon herself, as to fashion herself, and to dress herself as best ...
— Meditations • Marcus Aurelius

... agreeable to him; but now, in attempting to open the ears of women to reason, and their consciences to justice, on behalf of Maggie Tulliver, he suddenly found himself as powerless as he was aware he would have been if he had attempted to influence the shape of bonnets. Dr. Kenn could not be contradicted; he was listened to in silence; but when he left the room, a comparison of opinions among his hearers yielded much the same result as before. Miss Tulliver ...
— The Mill on the Floss • George Eliot

... alfalfa and clover, and which is flanked on the south by dense forests of pine, encroaching downward from the mountain slopes clear on to the level greensward, is rather an agreeable surprise; the secret of the magic change does not remain a secret long; it reveals itself in the shape of sundry broad snow-patches still lingering on the summits of a higher mountain range beyond. These pine forests, the pleasant greensward, and the lingering snow-banks, tell an oft-repeated tale; they speak eloquently of forests preserved and the winter snow-fall thereby ...
— Around the World on a Bicycle V1 • Thomas Stevens

... fire from end to end; Now ashes, save the tip that holds a spark! Yet, blow the spark, it runs back, spreads itself A little where the fire was: thus I urge The soul that served me, till it task once more What ashes of my brain have kept their shape, And these make effort on the last o' the flesh, Trying to taste ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 14, No. 85, November, 1864 • Various

... that he or anybody else had been pretty well, Miss Wade asked him to what she was indebted for the honour of seeing him again? Mr Meagles, in the meanwhile, glanced all round the room without observing anything in the shape of a box. ...
— Little Dorrit • Charles Dickens

... constructed normally, or as near what is regarded as normal as is possible, in order safely to assume the responsibility of carrying a pregnancy to a successful completion. No one but a physician, who is skilled and familiar in the knowledge of what constitutes the proper size, and shape, and quality, and relations, one with another, of your bones, and ligaments, and muscles, can tell [69] whether you can safely be permitted to carry a pregnancy to term or not. If the anatomical conditions are not just right; if circumstances from a medical standpoint are not favorable; ...
— The Eugenic Marriage, Volume I. (of IV.) - A Personal Guide to the New Science of Better Living and Better Babies • W. Grant Hague, M.D.

... the car, which was unusual in size and shape, and cried out, "That's the one, that's the one, mother! and those are ...
— Patty's Summer Days • Carolyn Wells

... plentiful; sheep are also very large. Cattle are small; many are oxen. Milk of camels and goats is preferred to that of cows. Horses are small, and are principally fed upon camels' milk; they are of the greyhound[50] shape, and will travel three days without rest. They have dromedaries[51] which travel from Timbuctoo[52] to Tafilelt in the short period of five or ...
— An Account of Timbuctoo and Housa Territories in the Interior of Africa • Abd Salam Shabeeny

... Cameron said. "I hae seen a deal of blasting when I was in the army. I can heat the end of a ramrod in a fire and hammer it into the shape of a borer." ...
— True to the Old Flag - A Tale of the American War of Independence • G. A. Henty

... that nothing could possibly have survived in that furnace of flame, and with the whites all slain and the house ablaze, there was no reason why they should desire to enter it, for the fire would effectually destroy everything in the shape of plunder. But they had driven off the whole of the live stock, and that alone should have ...
— Through Veld and Forest - An African Story • Harry Collingwood

... detail of the make-up remains as it was in the beginning, suffers no change and can suffer none; the basis of the character; the temperament, the disposition, that indestructible iron framework upon which the character is built, and whose shape it must take, and keep, throughout life. We call ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain

... the Eternal Son assuming to himself his nature. Equally inconsistent, too, not with any passing expressions, but with the whole scheme of God's dealings with man as recorded in His word, is Mr. Darwin's daring notion of man's further development into some unknown extent of powers, and shape, and size, through natural selection acting through that long vista of ages which he casts mistily over the earth upon the most favoured individuals of his species. We care not in these pages to push the argument further. We have done enough for our purpose in thus succinctly intimating its ...
— Famous Reviews • Editor: R. Brimley Johnson

... a curious ornament, in the shape of an elephant, of massive gold, standing on a pedestal formed of enormous pearls placed side by side. There is also a table, thickly inlaid with Oriental topazes, presented by the Empress Catherine of Russia to the Vizier Baltadji Mustapha, together with a very remarkable collection of ancient ...
— Harper's Young People, February 24, 1880 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various

... I wrote the book which is now going forth in English dress. The great leader of the theories in question has passed away; the waves of thought he set in motion are assuming smoother shape; and I can only add to what I have already written, that not only have I had no occasion to retract any of the statements or views laid down in the book, but I perceive the religious as well as the scientific world growing more and more into accord with the views I have maintained, ...
— The Theories of Darwin and Their Relation to Philosophy, Religion, and Morality • Rudolf Schmid

... to complain to the higher powers, promises to be quiet and still, and this scene at last resolved itself into a promise from Sybil to tell a story, if the restless individual would only be quiet. Immediately a reinforcement offered itself to the party in the shape of Zoe and Winny. A pretty little group of four eager listeners and one inspired narrator soon disposed themselves in the unstudied grace of childhood, and the soft voice was heard in regular cadence, ...
— Yr Ynys Unyg - The Lonely Island • Julia de Winton

... ghost in the gloom. Unable to imagine what this might be, or how any other human creature save himself would venture to sail with the dead on a voyage whose end could be but destruction, he advanced a step towards that looming shape, and started back with a cry, as he recognised the very man he had ...
— Temporal Power • Marie Corelli

... But possibly Theodoric had begun to feel the necessity laid upon all rulers of men, not only to be, but also to seem, anxious for the welfare of their subjects. Possibly some dull, unsympathetic Quaestor had failed to present the generous thoughts of the King in a sufficiently attractive shape to the minds of the people. This much at all events we know, that when the young Consiliarius, high-born, fluent, and learned, poured forth his stream of panegyric on 'Our Lord Theodoric'—a panegyric which, to an extent unusual with these orations, reflected ...
— The Letters of Cassiodorus - Being A Condensed Translation Of The Variae Epistolae Of - Magnus Aurelius Cassiodorus Senator • Cassiodorus (AKA Magnus Aurelius Cassiodorus Senator)

... enforcement of a living wage policy. They are: Firstly, the amount of wage increase undertaken; secondly, the importance of the wages received by the groups in question in the total expenses of production; thirdly, the shape of the demand curve for the products of the groups; fourthly, the chances for improvements in the methods of production; fifthly, the chances of encouraging better business management by enforcing living wage standards; ...
— The Settlement of Wage Disputes • Herbert Feis

... first gave definite shape to the sinister idle talk. Mercy should have known better than to hire anyone from the Nooseneck Hill country, for that remote bit of backwoods was then, as now, a seat of the most uncomfortable superstitions. As lately as 1892 an Exeter ...
— The Shunned House • Howard Phillips Lovecraft

... anniversaries, commencements, debates, cattle-shows, and sewing-circles without partiality and without price. For the first five years the income was all experience. Then voluntary gifts began to come occasionally in the shape of a jack-knife, a ham, a book, and the first cash remuneration was from a farmers' club, of seventy-five cents toward the "horse hire." It was a curious fact that one member of that club afterward moved to Salt Lake City and was a member ...
— Acres of Diamonds • Russell H. Conwell

... enlistments for the rebel cause; by the presence of a small rebel force of occupation; and by quiet enrolments of us loyalists for service when our time should come. But in the beginning of the warm weather of 1776, the war became apparent in its own shape. The king's troops under Sir William Howe had at last evacuated Boston and sailed to Halifax, taking with them a host of loyalists, whose flight was held up to us New York Tories as prophetic of our own fate. Washington ...
— Philip Winwood • Robert Neilson Stephens

... the teaching of the apprentice the use of the tools of his trade, the nature of its materials, and the construction and operation of the machinery employed in its prosecution. He would next be taught how to shape the simpler geometrical forms in the materials of his trade, getting out a straight prism, a cylinder, a pyramid, or a sphere, of such size and form as may be convenient; getting lines and planes at right angles, or working ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 433, April 19, 1884 • Various

... his guide for perhaps two hundred and fifty feet when they emerged into a large chamber of irregular shape, lighted by four large lamps set on a square wooden table. There were two rude cots in one corner, and it was here apparently that his guides ...
— Cast Upon the Breakers • Horatio Alger

... most likely in his death, if not in terrible difficulties; he determined, under the circumstances, to make himself as disagreeable as possible to all parties. With this amiable resolution Mahomet adopted a physical infirmity in the shape of deafness; in reality, no one was more acute in hearing, but as there are no bells where there are no houses, he of course could not answer such a summons, and he was compelled to attend to the call of his own name—"Mahomet! ...
— The Nile Tributaries of Abyssinia • Samuel W. Baker

... yielding under protest to these opposing forces, "the saviour comes in so questionable a shape, that I fear, whenever the appointed time may be, his appearance will only be welcomed by the ...
— The History of Sir Richard Calmady - A Romance • Lucas Malet

... fancy you in a lot of colors; and your beautiful head deformed into the shape of a gourd, with a beast of a chignon stuck out behind, made ...
— Put Yourself in His Place • Charles Reade

... the Pacific and Atlantic oceans. It includes three islands larger than Great Britain; and in one of them, Borneo, the whole of the British Isles might be set down, and would be surrounded by a sea of forests. New Guinea, though less compact in shape, is probably larger than Borneo. Sumatra is about equal in extent to Great Britain; Java, Luzon, and Celebes are each about the size of Ireland. Eighteen more islands are, on the average, as large as Jamaica; more than a hundred are as large as the Isle of Wight; ...
— The Malay Archipelago - Volume I. (of II.) • Alfred Russel Wallace

... of a trunk, bifurcating and rebifurcating into the most delicate, hair-like threads, symmetrically arranged. We are struck with its singular beauty. And, moreover—and here we drop from our kneeling into a sitting posture—this also we remark: of that same exact shape and outline is our thorn-tree seen against the sky in mid-winter: of that shape also is delicate metallic tracery between our rocks; in that exact path does our water flow when without a furrow we lead it from the dam; so shaped ...
— The Story of an African Farm • (AKA Ralph Iron) Olive Schreiner

... there are also magazines and other works, some of which are both interesting and well-written. If I found no quick sale going on, I generally selected some work treating of either England or the English, so as to ascertain the popular shape in ...
— Lands of the Slave and the Free - Cuba, The United States, and Canada • Henry A. Murray

... Mexican custom on Good Friday to burn Judas in effigy on the Plaza Mayor. Judas was a manikin made in the shape of the person who happened to be most unpopular at the time. It was quite admissible to burn Judas under different shapes, and sometimes these summary autos da fe were multiplied to suit the occasion and the temper ...
— Maximilian in Mexico - A Woman's Reminiscences of the French Intervention 1862-1867 • Sara Yorke Stevenson

... power of appropriating nutrient material, of dividing and subdividing, so as to form new masses like itself. When not built into a tissue, it has the power of changing its shape and of moving from place to place, by means of the delicate processes which it puts forth. Now, while there are found in the lowest realm of animal life, organisms like the amoeba of stagnant pools, consisting ...
— A Practical Physiology • Albert F. Blaisdell

... which passed away at his last words. Under pretence of gathering together some of those loose pages, he examined her more closely and realised that he had done her at first scant justice. She was very thin, and the expression of her face was spoilt by the discontented curve of her lips. The shape of her head, however, was good. Her dark hair, notwithstanding its temporary disarrangement, was of beautiful quality, and her eyes, though dull and spiritless-looking, were large and full of subtle promise. He replaced ...
— The Cinema Murder • E. Phillips Oppenheim

... out his hand and locked Lee's in a grip that made the sore fingers wince. Then, swinging upon the heel of his boot, he went back to collect a hundred dollars from Melvin and help Bayne Trevors shape his plans. ...
— Judith of Blue Lake Ranch • Jackson Gregory

... quite probable that the party referred to had made an unusual lucky strike, for I had met parties that had done the same thing. I had had in my hands at one time, in San Francisco, a piece of solid gold metal, something in the shape of the cover of a sugar loaf, that was worth $4,500, found by a couple of green Irishmen. They inquired of some miners in the interior where was a good place to dig. The miners said in fun, dig there in that sand bank behind you. The Irishmen took them up in earnest and went to digging. ...
— The Adventures of a Forty-niner • Daniel Knower

... art. It would be inconvenient to have a scandal in the Senate about the Velasquez and the other pictures; on the other hand, if anything more of the same sort should happen, it would be very convenient indeed to catch a pair of culprits in the shape of Malipieri, a pardoned political ...
— The Heart of Rome • Francis Marion Crawford

... high. Ransom would have thought she looked like an Oriental, if it were not that Orientals are dark; and if she had only had a goat she would have resembled Esmeralda, though he had but a vague recollection of who Esmeralda had been. She wore a light-brown dress, of a shape that struck him as fantastic, a yellow petticoat, and a large crimson sash fastened at the side; while round her neck, and falling low upon her flat young chest, she had a double chain of amber beads. It ...
— The Bostonians, Vol. I (of II) • Henry James

... not appear to me so various, and so novel, as those of the women. The greater part of the former had three-cocked hats, some of straw, some of pasteboard, and some of beaver; jackets, red, yellow, and blue; and breeches of the same fancy colours. The women were dressed in a variety both of shape and colour, which defies all description. When seen from a distance, the assembly had a very picturesque appearance: the sun shining on the various colours, gave them the appearance of so many flowers. The general features of the fair did not differ much ...
— Travels through the South of France and the Interior of Provinces of Provence and Languedoc in the Years 1807 and 1808 • Lt-Col. Pinkney

... which gave security both in fact and appearance. He also used reeded legs. His console and other tables are beautiful in design and workmanship, being painted usually in different forms of the radiating fan design, or inlaid with beautiful colored woods. The inlay used was often oval in shape, sometimes only a line and sometimes panels of different woods or matched veneer. The handles used were round or oval. He made sofas and settees with either chair-back backs or all upholstered with the frame ...
— Furnishing the Home of Good Taste • Lucy Abbot Throop

... borrow every changing shape To find expression... dance, dance Like a dancing bear, Cry like a parrot, chatter like an ape. Let us take the air, in a tobacco trance— Well! and what if she should die some afternoon, Afternoon grey and smoky, evening yellow and rose; Should die ...
— Poems • T. S. [Thomas Stearns] Eliot

... ancestors. Here we observe the effect of crossing between varieties or different races, or on the contrary that of consanguinity. This effect is observed in character and in sexual disposition, as much as in the shape of the nose, or the color of the skin and hair, etc. It is important that men should learn to know themselves, and also study each other from this point of view before marrying. On the whole, we may say that the average civilized ...
— The Sexual Question - A Scientific, psychological, hygienic and sociological study • August Forel

... the Arrowhead blacksmith, was the last to leave—or think of leaving—though he had mule shoes to shape and many mules to shoe. He glanced wistfully again at Adolph, in cool water to his knees, tugged at his yellowish-white beard, said it was a dog's life, if any one should ask me, and was about to slump mournfully off to his shop—when his eye ...
— Somewhere in Red Gap • Harry Leon Wilson

... over with potential offence, in which his delicately pencilled mustache took the shape of a light sneer, and demanded in his turn, in English much better than Lanfear's Italian: "What right have ...
— Between The Dark And The Daylight • William Dean Howells

... When she lays by the rich embroidered gown, And modestly compounds for just enough, Perhaps some dozens of mere flighty stuff; With lawns and lute strings, blonde and Mechlin laces, Fringes and jewels, fans and tweezer-cases; Gay cloaks and hat, of every shape and size, Scarfs, cardinals, and ribands, of all dyes, With ruffles stamped and aprons of tambour, Tippets and handkerchiefs, at least threescore; With finest muslins that fair India boasts, And the choice herbage from Chinesian coasts; Add feathers, furs, rich satin, and ducapes, ...
— The Wit of Women - Fourth Edition • Kate Sanborn

... principle to regard all order in the world (e.g., the shape of the earth, mountains, and seas, the members of animal bodies) as if it proceeded from the design of a supreme reason leads the investigator on to ...
— History Of Modern Philosophy - From Nicolas of Cusa to the Present Time • Richard Falckenberg

... was with the advance at Raystown, Forbes was still in Philadelphia, trying to bring the army into shape, and collecting provisions, horses, and wagons; much vexed meantime by the Assembly, whose tedious disputes about taxing the proprietaries greatly obstructed the service. "No sergeant or quartermaster of ...
— Montcalm and Wolfe • Francis Parkman

... both as regarded fortune and family, and that he lived in a palace befitting his condition. A crowd of domestics belonged to his household, but the Captain was aware that their cribs were remote, and that but little in the shape of resistance was to be feared from them, should they be aroused. Still great caution was requisite, for if they did not bite they could bark, and that would be equally as fatal to their success on this occasion. The only difficulty ...
— The Adventures of a Bear - And a Great Bear too • Alfred Elwes

... which I purposed to give a slight idea of those public, or partially public banquets, the custom of which so thoroughly prevails among the English people, that nothing is ever decided upon, in matters of peace and war, until they have chewed upon it in the shape of roast-beef, and talked it fully over in their cups. Nor are these festivities merely occasional, but of stated recurrence in all considerable municipalities and associated bodies. The most ancient times appear to have been as familiar with them as the ...
— Our Old Home - A Series of English Sketches • Nathaniel Hawthorne

... disappear. The little monuments become nothing but slight inequalities in the surface of the snow, undistinguishable from a thousand others. The air is thick and murky, and shuts off alike all distant prospects, and the shape and conformation of the land that is near; the bewildered traveler has not even the stars to guide him, as there is nothing but dark, falling flakes, descending from an impenetrable canopy of stormy clouds, to be seen in ...
— Hannibal - Makers of History • Jacob Abbott

... outfit? Assembly? Yes, that's it—and take their medicine. Twenty thousand dollars of a debt. Well, sir, on the back of all that didn't their Grand Mogul—archbishop—you know, from the West—no, not Macgregor—their chief pusher. Superintendent? Yes—come in and put an ice pack on them in the shape of a new scheme for exploration and extension in the Kootenay country, the Lord knows where, some place out of sight. Well, you ought to have heard him. He burned red fire, you bet. Pardon my broken ...
— The Prospector - A Tale of the Crow's Nest Pass • Ralph Connor

... young king, and threw the water upon him, saying: "If the Creator of all things did form thee as thou art at present, or if He be angry with thee, do not change; but if thou art in that condition merely by virtue of my enchantments, resume thy natural shape, and become what thou wast before." She had scarcely spoken these words when the prince, finding himself restored to his former condition, rose up and returned thanks to God. The enchantress then said to him, "Get thee from this castle, and never return on pain of death." The young king, yielding ...
— The Arabian Nights - Their Best-known Tales • Unknown

... over the forepart of the head, and conducted separately behind the ears, the end of each string reaching down to the shoulders. This singularly ornamental head-dress was surmounted by a flatfish low-crowned hat, with a narrow brim, the whole shape not a little resembling that of Mambrino's helmet; the frame-work, constructed of loosely wove split rattan, was covered over and ornamented with leaves, the bones of monkeys and other animals, and a few white, and occasionally red, feathers; the latter of which appeared to have ...
— A Voyage Round the World, Vol. I (of ?) • James Holman

... listen to the end; Whoe'er he be, whether he be Dimitry Rescued, or else some spirit in his shape, Some daring rogue, some insolent pretender, In any case Dimitry ...
— Boris Godunov - A Drama in Verse • Alexander Pushkin

... in the way of celebrities, two which happened this year are worth recording; the one on account of its intrinsic extravagance, which succeeded nevertheless in taking in quite a number of sober folk; the other on account of the letter it drew from Huxley about his cat. The former appeared in the shape of a highly-spiced advertisement about certain Manx Mannikins, which could walk, draw, play, in fact do everything but speak—were living pets which might be kept by any one, and indeed Professor Huxley was the possessor of a remarkably fine pair of them. Apply, enclosing stamps ...
— The Life and Letters of Thomas Henry Huxley Volume 3 • Leonard Huxley

... was one of the daintiest in apparel of his day; but he was amazed that the suit in which Berenger had paid his devoir to Queen Elizabeth should have been set aside—it was of pearl-grey velvet, slashed with rose-coloured satin, and in shape and fashion point-device—unless, as the Ambassador said good-humouredly, 'my young Lord Ribaumont wished to be one of Monsieur's clique.' Thus arrayed, then, and with the chaplet of pearls bound round the small cap, with a heron-plume ...
— The Chaplet of Pearls • Charlotte M. Yonge

... is that of a man of thirty. When the cares of a partisan warfare do not darken it, its expression must surely be frank and joyous. Beautiful blond hair frames it; great blue eyes enliven it; the head, of a shape peculiarly Breton, seems to show, if we believe in Gall's system, an exaggerated development of the organs of self-will. And the man has two names. That by which he is known to his soldiers, his familiar name, is Round-head; and his real name, received from brave and ...
— The Companions of Jehu • Alexandre Dumas

... city, the most beautiful and original that there is; the environs are pleasant, not pretty, not unsightly; but the view from above out of the Kremlin, over this circle of houses with green roofs, gardens, churches, towers of the most extraordinary shape and color, most of them green or red or light blue, generally crowned on top by a colossal golden bulb, usually five or more on one church, and surely one thousand towers! Anything more strangely beautiful than all this, lighted by slanting ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. X. • Kuno Francke

... was there always, from the beginning of the world? My dear child, you have no proof of that either. Everything round you is changing in shape daily and hourly, as you will find out the longer you live; and therefore it is most reasonable to suppose that this glen has changed its shape, as everything else on earth has done. Besides, I told you not that Madam ...
— Madam How and Lady Why - or, First Lessons in Earth Lore for Children • Charles Kingsley

... of usquebaugh, I said to them, "Gentlemen, my orders are to land you at any port of France that you should prefer. Have you made up your minds as to which it shall be, for it will be necessary that we shape a ...
— The Privateer's-Man - One hundred Years Ago • Frederick Marryat

... mysterious formulae. Without using the Rosetta-stone of Swedenborg, Emerson finds in every phenomenon of nature a hieroglyphic. Others measure and describe the monuments,—he reads the sacred inscriptions. How alive he makes Monadnoc! Dinocrates undertook to "hew Mount Athos to the shape of man" in the likeness of Alexander the Great. Without the help of tools or workmen, Emerson makes "Cheshire's haughty hill" stand before us an impersonation of kingly humanity, and talk with us as a god from Olympus might ...
— Ralph Waldo Emerson • Oliver Wendell Holmes

... happiness of meeting Miss Burdett Coutts on the Marine Parade, notwithstanding all he has gone through for her, she would not condescend to take the slightest notice of him. So far from offering anything in the shape of consolation, the witty barrister remarked, "Upon my soul, her conduct was in perfect keeping with her situation, for what on earth could be more in unison ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 1, September 18, 1841 • Various

... British Museum has a mould which was found at Camirus, intended to give shape to glass earrings. It is of a hard greenish stone, apparently a sort ...
— History of Phoenicia • George Rawlinson

... The most of men have never answered that question. They live from hand to mouth, driven by circumstances, guided by accidents, impelled by unreflecting passions and desires, knowing what they want for the moment, but never having tried to shape the course of their lives into a consistent whole, so as to stand up before God in Christ when He puts the question to them, 'What seek ye?' and to answer ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - St. John Chapters I to XIV • Alexander Maclaren

... eye Staring to threaten and defy, That thought comes next—and instantly The freak is over, The shape will vanish, and behold! A silver shield with boss of gold That spreads itself, some faery bold In fight ...
— The Evolution of Expression Vol. I • Charles Wesley Emerson

... didn't sound true; he felt sure it was not true; but he had no wisdom with which to meet it. He went to school with those last words of his father's ringing in his heart, and his thoughts took shape, and spoke in the very first sentence that he addressed to Mr. Holbrook, whom he overtook as he came out of ...
— Tip Lewis and His Lamp • Pansy (aka Isabella Alden)

... Skene a pat, promised him some breakfast, and was going aft toward the galley, but just then Johannes had turned the skin back over the bare skull, pretty well restoring the shape of the head, and he held ...
— Steve Young • George Manville Fenn

... the horse for the carrying their baggage; also, for a small matter of three days' work that his man did for him before he went, he let him have an old topgallant sail[194] that was worn out, but was sufficient, and more than enough, to make a very good tent. The soldier showed how to shape it, and they soon, by his direction, made their tent, and fitted it with poles or staves for the purpose: and thus they were furnished for their journey; viz., three men, one tent, one horse, one gun for the soldier (who would not go without arms, for now he said he was ...
— History of the Plague in London • Daniel Defoe

... upon us. We have told the enormous sun to stand still; we have fixed him on our shields, caring no more for a star than for a starfish. And when there were powers of Nature we could not for the time control, we have conceived great beings in human shape controlling them. Jupiter does not mean thunder. Thunder means the march and victory of Jupiter. Neptune does not mean the sea; the sea is his, and he made it. In other words, what the savage really said about the sea was, "Only my fetish ...
— A Miscellany of Men • G. K. Chesterton

... about this enterprise of which he had suddenly become the master loomed to the skies. Together with the rest of the outer world, he had comfortably and vaguely regarded a newspaper as a sort of automatic mill which, by virtue of having a certain amount of grain in the shape of information dumped into it, worked upon this with an esoteric type-mechanism, and, in due and exact time, delivered a definite grist of news. Of the refined and articulated processes of acquisition, selection, and elimination ...
— The Clarion • Samuel Hopkins Adams

... here of the shape and size of a second- class Scotch salmon-stream, with swirling brown pools beneath grey crags, which make one long to try in them the virtues of 'Jock Scott,' 'the Butcher,' or the 'Dusty Miller.' And perhaps not without effect; for salmon ...
— Prose Idylls • Charles Kingsley

... how soon, Vanish shape and beauty's noon! Of thy cheeks a moment vaunting, Like the milk and purple haunting,— ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 10, No. 57, July, 1862 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various

... ye think? Mebby 'twould do as well t' git a couple of sicond-hand dongolas an' have thim painted up. If they was in purty good shape no wan would know th' difference, an' 'twould make a bit more rake-off fer th' ...
— The Water Goats and Other Troubles • Ellis Parker Butler

... thee tell me all that has come to thine ears on this subject; and thou art to tell me, without adding anything to the good or taking away anything from the bad; for it is the duty of loyal vassals to tell the truth to their lords just as it is and in its proper shape, not allowing flattery to add to it or any idle deference to lessen it. And I would have thee know, Sancho, that if the naked truth, undisguised by flattery, came to the ears of princes, times would be different, and other ages would be reckoned iron ages more than ours, which I hold to be the ...
— Don Quixote • Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

... Satanic power in which profanity and obscenity run riot. In these representations the painter and the glass-stainer vied with the sculptor. Among the early paintings on canvas a well-known example represents the devil in the shape of a dragon, perched near the head of a dying man, eager to seize his soul as it issues from his mouth, and only kept off by the efforts of the attendant priest. Typical are the colossal portrait of Satan, and the vivid picture of the devils cast out of the possessed and entering into the ...
— History of the Warfare of Science with Theology in Christendom • Andrew Dickson White

... appeared also a strange thing to her, that this beauty did not appear to notice Cedric—that is, with the notice due so handsome, rich and titled beau. There was not another in the room with so elegant and fine shape; of so great vigour and strength; none that could be so shaken and yet tender with passion; none that could so command with a look; none that had such pure, noble blood. And strange to say, for the first time she saw ...
— Mistress Penwick • Dutton Payne

... she could no longer keep awake that her thoughts assumed even a terrible shape. She dreamed, and in her dream a head came through the dirt floor close to her bed. It was covered by a war-bonnet of feathers. Beside it, thrust up by lissome fingers—fingers white and strangely familiar—was ...
— The Plow-Woman • Eleanor Gates

... more," says Terence, "that settles the business," says he; "an' oh! blur and ages is it not a quare thing," says he, "for a dacent respictable man," says he, "to be walkin' about the counthry in the shape iv an ould gandher," says he; "and oh, murdher, murdher! is not it often I plucked him," says he, "an' tundher and ouns might not I have ate him," says he; and wid that he fell into a could parspiration, savin' your prisince, ...
— The Purcell Papers - Volume III. (of III.) • Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu

... it, foolish, faithful creature that he is. What could I do? It was,—the enormity you perceive. I was obliged to give it a place of honour,—fortunately, I seldom use this room when I am alone; I was forced to praise its tint, which I abominate, and its shape, which is wholly detestable. What would you? I could not wound my good Guiseppe; the vase has remained, the chief ornament—in his eyes—of my drawing-room. Now, thanks to you, my charming child, I am delivered of this encumbrance, and ...
— Hildegarde's Neighbors • Laura E. Richards

... to the awful sufferings of Leighton, and all Christians of his time, under that bigoted demon in human shape, Laud.—Ed. ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan



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