Free translatorFree translator
Synonyms, antonyms, pronunciation

  Home
English Dictionary      examples: 'day', 'get rid of', 'New York Bay'




Sniff   /snɪf/   Listen
Sniff

verb
(past & past part. sniffed or snift; pres. part. sniffing)
1.
Perceive by inhaling through the nose.  Synonym: whiff.
2.
Inhale audibly through the nose.  Synonym: sniffle.



Related searches:



WordNet 3.0 © 2010 Princeton University








Advanced search
     Find words:
Starting with
Ending with
Containing
Matching a pattern  

Synonyms
Antonyms
Quotes
Words linked to  

only single words



Share |





"Sniff" Quotes from Famous Books



... empty vial was produced he opened it and took a short sniff. Then he drew his breath in sharply. A faint odor was perceptible, the same odor he had detected in the carpet on the upper hallway of ...
— The Mansion of Mystery - Being a Certain Case of Importance, Taken from the Note-book of Adam Adams, Investigator and Detective • Chester K. Steele

... basis to yourself. Far away he saw a number of men carrying spades and sticks come out of the street of houses and advance in a spreading line along the several paths towards him. They advanced slowly, speaking frequently to one another, and ever and again the whole cordon would halt and sniff the air and listen. ...
— The Door in the Wall And Other Stories • H. G. Wells

... in imagination the sniff of the unimaginative reader; I can figure to myself his instant dismissal of all these considerations as "sentiment." Let the word stand, coloured though it is with associations that degrade it. But is "sentiment" to be ignored ...
— The Open Secret of Ireland • T. M. Kettle

... common stinkhorn, which is intensified in the more beautiful and curious Clathrus. It is very probable that, after all, the odour of the Phallus would not be so unpleasant if it were not so strong. It is not difficult to imagine, when one encounters a slight sniff borne on a passing breeze, that there is the element of something not by any means unpleasant about the odour when so diluted; yet it must be confessed that when carried in a vasculum, in a close carriage, or railway car, or exposed in a close room, there is no ...
— Fungi: Their Nature and Uses • Mordecai Cubitt Cooke

... with Lamb here. Hissing seems to me to proceed for the most part from ill-temper, or at least from the dissatisfaction of the head. Applause is often the outburst of the heart, the gush of a feeling, an enthusiasm incapable of restraint. No wonder that the retired actor longs for a sniff of the footlights and for the echo of the reverberating plaudits to the accompaniment of which he ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, December 1878 • Various

... air simply flows along the lower nasal passages into the pharynx, scarcely entering the olfactory chamber at all. This is the reason why, when we wish to perceive a faint odor, we sniff up the air sharply. By so doing, the air which is forcibly drawn into the nostrils passes up even into the higher olfactory chamber, where some of the floating particles of the odorous material come into contact with the ...
— A Practical Physiology • Albert F. Blaisdell

... Lackland, so they variously called him—was a timid copy of his brother, a wry-necked reedy Richard with a sniff. Not so tall, yet more spare, with blue eyes more pallid than his brother's, and protruding where Richard's were inset, the difference lay more in degree than kind. Richard was of heroic build, but ...
— The Life and Death of Richard Yea-and-Nay • Maurice Hewlett

... stairs she began to sniff, and as he turned the knob of the attic door for her she said, "What a smell of ...
— Buried Alive: A Tale of These Days • Arnold Bennett

... they did not. He placed the chairs with dignity, and hoped instruction might prove as unwelcome to Barney and Tommie as it was to him. And as they jounced down into their seats the moment the steaming supper was put upon the table, and gazed at it with eager, hungry eyes, and even gave a sniff or two, he felt that here was a field for improvement, indeed. And he smiled. Not that Jim was a bad boy, or a malicious one, but when Barney and Tommie were wrong, it was the thing that they should ...
— The Widow O'Callaghan's Boys • Gulielma Zollinger

... on. Mr. Dale tried to read in the darkening light. Presently he heard a sniff. The sniff ...
— Girls of the Forest • L. T. Meade

... momentary gleam of joy, Which spoke, as plainly as a smile could speak, "Your master's speech is in that paper, boy." He waved his hand—the footboy left the room— Roebuck pour'd out a cup of Hyson bloom; And, having sipp'd the tea and sniff'd the vapour, Spread out the "Thunderer" before his eyes— When, to his great surprise, He saw imprinted there, in black and white, That he, THE ROE-buck—HE, whom all men knew, Had been expressly born to set worlds right— That HE was ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 1, Complete • Various

... had a sniff of the bone of contention, was not so easy in his mind. First quarter of the moon it might be, but the bone was not in its first quarter. "I could walk home with the boy," he suggested, "and get something at a chemist's ...
— Long Live the King • Mary Roberts Rinehart

... sniff the well-beloved fogs and coal-smoke of that best beloved little island to which I have the honor and glory of belonging, and my spirits are much revived thereby; for, to tell you the truth, England, bad as it is, is good enough for me, and I am grown old and stupid and sleepy ...
— Records of Later Life • Frances Anne Kemble

... dried meat he had been eating, Mr. Hume tossed it through the leaves. There came a sniff, a snap of the jaws, and a whimper. The hunter shifted his rifle till ...
— In Search of the Okapi - A Story of Adventure in Central Africa • Ernest Glanville

... now and then exchanging a sign of friendly interest, and in a while we left the main path and wandered where we would. Suddenly Schwartz began to hunt and sniff and bark on what I supposed to be the recent trace of a rabbit or a hare, and I stood still to watch him. He worried industriously here and there until he disappeared behind a clump of brushwood, and then I heard a sudden 'Yowk!' of unmistakable terror. After this there was dead silence. I ...
— Schwartz: A History - From "Schwartz" by David Christie Murray • David Christie Murray

... wynds do blow," said Mrs Dodley with something between a sniff and a sob. "Does Mrs Beeton ...
— Brownsmith's Boy - A Romance in a Garden • George Manville Fenn

... (offensive smell) stink, fetor, stench. Antonyms: inodorousness, scentlessness, anosmia. Associated Words: olfactory, reek, fume, perfume, inodorous, malodorous, odoriferous, odorous, osphresiology, osphretic, odorless, deodorize, deodorization, emanation, effluvium, sniff, whiff, disinfect, ...
— Putnam's Word Book • Louis A. Flemming

... incorrect in one or two details, but I am quite clear about its main outlines, and it is extremely vivid on the whole. I see him going in, quietly and unostentatiously—quite at his ease, yet a very unusual figure in such surroundings. I hear an old gentleman sniff and move his chair a little as this person in an exceedingly shabby blue suit with the collar turned up, with a muffler round his neck and large, bulging boots on his feet, comes and sits beside him. I perceive an earnest young lady, probably a typist in search ...
— None Other Gods • Robert Hugh Benson

... of overrunning Italy: and then came the first awful news of the Battle of Jutland, which the Germans claimed as a great victory. Susan was the only one who carried on. 'You need never tell me that the Kaiser has defeated the British Navy,' she said, with a contemptuous sniff. 'It is all a German lie and that you may tie to.' And when a couple of days later we found out that she was right and that it had been a British victory instead of a British defeat, we had to put ...
— Rilla of Ingleside • Lucy Maud Montgomery

... brought in. We shrewdly suspected that it must have been one of those abandoned by the unfortunate vessels who had fled, but etiquette forbade us saying anything about it. Even had it been, another day would have seen it valueless to any one, for it was by no means otto of roses to sniff at now, while they had certainly salved it at the peril of ...
— The Cruise of the Cachalot - Round the World After Sperm Whales • Frank T. Bullen

... all," signified Mr. Seymour. "Who knows but we may find this bundle worth fifty thousand francs to you, Walter, or rather to Mr. Frieshardt? Lay it down here. Now then, Hector, take a good sniff." ...
— Harper's Young People, December 16, 1879 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various

... sniff the local feeling on this proposition. It's about time I blew the lid off and said a few things about Bill Holton. If Bernstein brings in copy for his Christmas 'ad,' whistle for the boy and tell 'em to hustle it. Hang your stuff on the hook and I'll write the heads later. Don't let your ...
— Otherwise Phyllis • Meredith Nicholson

... honey, though he did not know it. A flock of grouse got leisurely out of his way and flew to a low tree, when he caught a whiff of man smell, then heard a crack like that which had stung him in the sheep-corral, and down fell one of the grouse close beside him. He stepped forward to sniff just as a man also stepped forward from the opposite bushes. They were within ten feet of each other, and they recognized each other, for the hunter saw that it was a singed Bear with a wounded ...
— Monarch, The Big Bear of Tallac • Ernest Thompson Seton

... calumny; but I doubt whether the most blameless of them all could have spoken more delicately of a lady of peculiar personal appearance who had been dining near me. "She's too fat," I grossly said on her leaving the room. The waiter shook his head with a little sniff: "E troppo materiale." This lady and her companion were the party whom, thinking I might relish a little company—I had been dining alone for a week—he gleefully announced to me as newly arrived Americans. They were Americans, I found, who wore, ...
— Italian Hours • Henry James

... castle—the little stateroom with the swinging-lamps, and the compass above the fastened bed, the row of books, the Aberdeen terrier, Duine Uasal, who slept peacefully on the rug, and who would go on deck and sniff the wind like a connoisseur.... And there was a manuscript poem of his father's in the Irish letter, Leaba Luachra, "The Bed of Rushes," which he had discovered and had framed. And there was a prized thing of his boyhood there, ...
— The Wind Bloweth • Brian Oswald Donn-Byrne

... beautiful. As for the country he had read a story by Mrs. Ewing called Our Field, and if the country was the tiniest part as wonderful as that, well . . . meanwhile Dora brought him back from the greengrocer's a pot of musk, which Mark used to sniff so enthusiastically that Dora said he would sniff it right away if he wasn't careful. Later on when Lima Street was fetid in the August sun he gave this pot of musk to a little girl with a broken leg, and when she died in September her mother ...
— The Altar Steps • Compton MacKenzie

... and yet with such heat and such smells as you have in Chicago, it is yet more astonishing that you live at all. I thought it dreadful to have the thermometer stand at 90 deg. in my bedroom, three weeks running, and to sniff a bad sniff now and then from our pond, when the water got low, but I see I was wrong. We have next to no flowers this summer; white flies destroyed the roses, frost killed other things, and then the three weeks of burning heat, with no rain, finished up others. Portulacca is our rear-guard, ...
— The Life and Letters of Elizabeth Prentiss • George L. Prentiss

... during one of these rests that he heard footsteps, and then a dreadful sound that made cold chills run all over him. Sniff, sniff, sniff! It was coming nearer. Grandfather Frog flattened himself down as close to the ground as he could get. But it was of no use, no use at all. The sniffing came nearer and nearer, and then right over ...
— The Adventures of Grandfather Frog • Thornton W. Burgess

... Miss Tame, with a plaintive cadence, taking a sniff from the camphor-bottle on the way. "However, I don't begrutch him to her,—I don't know as I do. It will make her a good hum, though, if ...
— Humorous Masterpieces from American Literature • Various

... wind is from the south, and they cannot scent us. I have found out all about that. Ever since the dear dark came, I have been amusing myself with them, getting every now and then just into the edge of the wind, and letting one have a sniff of me." ...
— Stephen Archer and Other Tales • George MacDonald

... hundred and fiftieth, and the prima donna had, as usual, began to hint for a new set of costumes. The stage-door keeper hesitated and was lost, and Van Bibber stepped into the unsuppressed excitement of the place with a pleased sniff at the familiar smell of paint and burning gas, and the dusty odor that came from ...
— Van Bibber and Others • Richard Harding Davis

... growled. This was his private hunting ground—the preserve he kept free of invaders. Dane put the cat down. The Salarik had found what he was seeking. He stood on tiptoe to sniff at a plant, his yellow eyes half closed, his whole stance spelling ecstasy. Dane looked to the steward ...
— Plague Ship • Andre Norton

... the violets, but sat holding them in her hands, now and then taking a luxurious sniff. She did not seem to expect a reply. Between Grace and herself it was quite understood that old Anthony Cardew was always as ...
— A Poor Wise Man • Mary Roberts Rinehart

... know, for she says she can't—she just can't keep it from bothering him some, she's afraid. As if any opera or symphony that ever lived was of more consequence than a man's own child!" finished Aunt Hannah, with an indignant sniff, as she reached for ...
— Miss Billy Married • Eleanor H. Porter

... a soldier and a journalist in a country where they only wash with water. In the summer we have whisky iced, in the winter we have it hot; an antidote for both heat and cold. Ah, Colonel, if you only might sniff a ...
— The Puppet Crown • Harold MacGrath

... past him with her Plymouth Rock manner. "I will go and look after the supper," she remarked, and added, as she reached the door, "however much people may sniff, there's nobody, so far as I know, who is ...
— Flint - His Faults, His Friendships and His Fortunes • Maud Wilder Goodwin

... this room sometimes?" she asked, with a barely perceptible sniff the merest contraction of her ...
— The Desert and The Sown • Mary Hallock Foote

... on her small knee, her head on her hand; I observed her draw a square inch or two of pocket-handkerchief from the doll-pocket of her doll-skirt, and then I heard her weep. Other children in grief or pain cry aloud, without shame or restraint; but this being wept: the tiniest occasional sniff testified to her emotion. Mrs. Bretton did not hear it: which was quite as well. Ere long, a voice, issuing from the corner, demanded— "May the bell be rung ...
— Villette • Charlotte Bronte

... tries to sniff disagreeable, and Meyers grunts disapprovin'; but Alvin had 'em goin' for all that. You could tell by the satisfied way the grocer lights up a cigar, and the soothed actions of Fosdick. As the others drops in one by one, Alvin kept on spreadin' seeds of sunshine, ...
— Shorty McCabe on the Job • Sewell Ford

... was the culprit, and he smiled as he waited, expecting to see the terrier jump on the chair which stood beside the table and seize Moggy's skirt between his teeth. But before Samuel reached the chair he suddenly stopped and began to sniff. Then putting his nose close to the floor he slowly drew near to the window. After sniffing at this for some moments he seemed quickly to change his mind, and turning round he ran out ...
— The Bountiful Lady - or, How Mary was changed from a very Miserable Little Girl - to a very Happy One • Thomas Cobb

... they responded to his strange calls, to his gentleness and fearlessness, with an alert understanding and confidence beautiful to see. His favourites were certain creatures of the deer species, which crowded to their fences to sniff his clothes, and to lick his hands, which he abandoned to their caresses with manifest satisfaction. His example encouraged the queenly Nora and her sprightly mother to feed the beautiful creatures with bread and buns, and to feel the suffusion of pleasure derived ...
— Master of His Fate • J. Mclaren Cobban

... help it. It affected him to see the priest holding out his arms and all the little girls, looking like angels, pass before him, clasping their hands; and the music of the organ stirred up his stomach and the pleasant smell of the incense forced him to sniff, the same as though someone had thrust a bouquet of flowers into his face. In short he saw everything cerulean, his heart was touched. Anyway, other sensitive souls around him were wetting their handkerchiefs. This was a beautiful day, the most beautiful ...
— L'Assommoir • Emile Zola

... enough facts for you? Shall I send you an inventory of my room, of my days, of my mental furniture? Some long afternoon I will spirit you up here in that little steel cage, and you shall peer out of my window, tapping your restless feet, while you sniff at the squalor below. You will move softly about, questioning the watercolors, the bits of bric-a-brac, the dusty manuscripts, the dull red hangings, not quite understanding the fox in his hole. You will gratefully catch the sounds from the mound below our feet, and when you say good-by ...
— Literary Love-Letters and Other Stories • Robert Herrick

... People sniff the air with an upward look— Even the mite of a girl Who never plays... Her mother smiles at her With eyes like vacant lots Rimming vistas of mean streets And endless washing days... Yet with sun on the lines And a ...
— The Ghetto and Other Poems • Lola Ridge

... over it, I felt less creepy and uncomfortable as I went down the companion-way than I had felt when I went below into the old brig's dusky cabin in the early dawn. But for all that I walked gingerly, and stopped to sniff at every step that I took downward; for I could not by any means get rid of my dread of coming upon some grewsome thing. However, the air was sweet enough—the slide of the hatch being closed, but the doors open and the cabin well ventilated—and when I ...
— In the Sargasso Sea - A Novel • Thomas A. Janvier

... odors so generously that it was a favorite diversion among the village children to stand in rows outside the fence, and, elevating their bucolic noses, simultaneously "sniff Miss Cummins' peas." The garden was large enough to have little hills and dales of its own, and its banks sloped gently down to the river. There was a gnarled apple tree hidden by a luxuriant wild grapevine, a fit bower for a "lov'd Celia" or a "fair Rosamond." There was ...
— Timothy's Quest - A Story for Anybody, Young or Old, Who Cares to Read It • Kate Douglas Wiggin

... that boy goes away," the Chinaman muttered to himself, waddling hastily to the oven, opening it, and closing the door again with a satisfied sniff. ...
— Betty Gordon at Boarding School - The Treasure of Indian Chasm • Alice Emerson

... of the Rathlin man had cowed the wildest spirits, and, still more than the fear of Stair, the acquiescence of the company in the justice of the punishment. Nevertheless, those in the cave were restless and uneasy, setting their heads out to sniff the salt of the sea beneath, and craning their necks through the spy-hole to watch the sand-pipers wheeling as if dancing new-fangled waltzes, or probing the sands after little shellfish and sea worms, never getting in each other's way, but each working ...
— Patsy • S. R. Crockett

... common-sense, had no occasion for it; and Soames only experienced a sense of exasperation amounting to pain, that he did not own her as it was his right to own her, that he could not, as by stretching out his hand to that rose, pluck her and sniff the very ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy

... tell me all about your birds," Gerda suggested; "and the way the moon shines on the long stretches of snow; and about the animals that creep out from the woods sometimes and sniff around your door. And I will tell you about my school, and the parties I have with my friends. And I will send you some new music ...
— Gerda in Sweden • Etta Blaisdell McDonald

... tendejon and rode to Steelman's house. Before entering he examined carefully both of his long-barreled forty-fives. He made sure that the six-shooters were in perfect order and that they rested free in the holsters. That sixth sense acquired by "bad men," by means of which they sniff danger when it is close, was telling him that smoke would rise before he ...
— Gunsight Pass - How Oil Came to the Cattle Country and Brought a New West • William MacLeod Raine

... Dan wanted a "sniff of it right off," so it was then and there opened; but as the lid flew back the yell of delight changed to a howl of disappointment. By some hideous mistake, Billy had ...
— We of the Never-Never • Jeanie "Mrs. Aeneas" Gunn

... bein' used in Arizona t' carry ore. I've often smiled when I've fancied the terror o' some lone prospector, should one o' them long-legged brutes poke up his nose above a ridge where gold had just been found, and sniff scornfully down on the feller. Some o' them camels may be still livin' an' doin' it at this ...
— Murder Point - A Tale of Keewatin • Coningsby Dawson

... old hands trembling as he placed the dishes before them. A hot thin soup, that warmed Felice and made her send a wavering smile across the table, a platter of ham boiled in apple cider whose delicious odors made her sniff hungrily, and after he had served the meat the old man put thin glasses beside their plates and brought a bottle of wine, wrapped carefully in an old napkin, and ...
— Little Miss By-The-Day • Lucille Van Slyke

... of a bull, that by some mischance has lost the common herd; and as he gallops along the meadows, when he finds himself alone, will stop suddenly at times, and, placing his broad nostrils to the earth, sniff the grass with the absorption of a huge pump; then lifting his head loftily in the air, will lash his tail, and madly tossing his legs, roar till the country round is filled with the sounds ...
— A Yacht Voyage to Norway, Denmark, and Sweden - 2nd edition • W. A. Ross

... console him, and the voices of the politest people on earth jar sorely. He knows every soul in the club, has thoroughly talked out every subject of interest, and would give half a year's—oh, five years'—pay for one lung-filling breath of air that has life in it, one sniff of the haying grass, or half a mile of muddy London street where the muffin bell tinkles in the four o'clock fog. Then the big liner moves out across the staring blue of the bay. So-and-so and such-an-one, both friends, are going home in her, ...
— Letters of Travel (1892-1913) • Rudyard Kipling

... a sniff of perfume about him, a nosegay of wild flowers pinned in the pocket of his shirt. Mackenzie marveled over these refinements in the old man's everyday appearance, but left it to his own time and way to tell what plans or ...
— The Flockmaster of Poison Creek • George W. Ogden

... fast, senor. Fare in advance, seven hundred dollars." Murguia looked for the haggling to come next, but somehow the sniff ...
— The Missourian • Eugene P. (Eugene Percy) Lyle

... he found them, Granny came up and sniffed at each. She knew that she could tell by the smell which one he had been at last. Finally she came straight toward the tall bunch of grass. Danny ducked down and scurried along one of his little tunnels. He heard Granny Fox sniff at the doorway he had just left. Suddenly something plunged down through the snow right at his very heels. Danny didn't have to look to know that it was Granny Fox herself, ...
— The Adventures of Danny Meadow Mouse • Thornton W. Burgess

... never supposed could die before Wash Sanders was laid away; they talked of the growing dissatisfaction among the negroes, of the church built by Father Brennon, of the trip to be taken to New Orleans by Jim and Tom. The fire-light died down. A chunk fell and the dog jumped up with a sniff and a sneeze. Old Gideon took no notice, for leaning back against the wall he was ...
— An Arkansas Planter • Opie Percival Read

... the air. About the crusts that I spoke of, when you find one, hop off and break it in. You probably will not see water, even though it is there, but, after you have broken open the crust, thrust your head into the opening and sniff the air." ...
— Grace Harlowe's Overland Riders on the Great American Desert • Jessie Graham Flower

... it would bring her story, but he had not schemed for this, and, unwilling, yet eager, to hear, was a prey to compunctions on more than one ground when, after a little gulp and sniff, she burst forth: ...
— Aurora the Magnificent • Gertrude Hall

... would have overcome a greenhorn at the fine prospect for a shot. He saw that the animal was a bit suspicious, since it frequently raised its head to sniff the air, and ...
— Chums in Dixie - or The Strange Cruise of a Motorboat • St. George Rathborne

... letter to you I recall judging harshly a concoction called "brewis." Experience here has taught me that our own delicacies meet with a similar fate at the hands of my present fellow countrymen. I offered Carmen on her arrival a cup of cocoa for Sunday supper. After one sniff, biddable and polite child though she was, I saw her surreptitiously pour the "hemlock cup" out of the open ...
— Le Petit Nord - or, Annals of a Labrador Harbour • Anne Elizabeth Caldwell (MacClanahan) Grenfell and Katie Spalding

... shoulders, and with limbs that felt like lead I headed a sort of procession towards that distant fragment of "sea-front." Half-way there we were reinforced by two awe-stricken little girls with spades, and later a lean little boy, with a penetrating sniff, appeared. He was, I remember, wheeling a bicycle, and he accompanied us at a distance of about a hundred yards on our right flank, and then I suppose, gave us up as uninteresting, mounted his bicycle and rode off over the level ...
— The First Men In The Moon • H. G. Wells

... at my snug tea, Margarina! Over my toast I muse on thee, Margarina! I sniff that smell, I see that dab, That greasy, grimy, marble slab. And thou art still the same I know, The slum's strange love, the slum's strange love. The poor man's "Butter," there ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 104, February 4, 1893 • Various

... the features:—in a line to paint Their moral ugliness, I'm not a saint. Not one of those self-constituted saints, Quacks—not physicians—in the cure of souls, Censors who sniff out mortal taints, And call the devil over his own coals— Those pseudo Privy Councillors of God, Who write down judgments with a pen hard-nibb'd; Ushers of Beelzebub's Black Rod, Commending sinners, not to ice thick-ribb'd, But endless flames, to scorch them up like flax— Yet ...
— The Poetical Works of Thomas Hood • Thomas Hood

... in the speech of Mr. Balfour, who had made the statement that such a policy as Home Rule had always led to the disintegration and destruction of empires. He rolled out the case of Austria, which had been preserved from ruin by Home Rule; and when there was a sniff from the Tory benches, Mr. Gladstone, in tones of thunder, referred to the speech of Lord Salisbury in 1885, when he was angling for the Irish vote, and when he pointed to Austria as perhaps supplying some indication of the method of settling the Irish ...
— Sketches In The House (1893) • T. P. O'Connor

... off by such alarms, that they do not fall readily into such facile tumults and phobias. What starts a male meeting to snuffling and trembling most violently is precisely the thing that would cause a female meeting to sniff. What we need, to ward off mobocracy and safeguard a civilized form of government, is more of this sniffing. What we need—and in the end it must come—is a sniff so powerful that it will call a halt upon the navigation of the ship from the forecastle, and put a competent staff on the bridge, ...
— In Defense of Women • H. L. Mencken

... the fact that, when we fold our tired hands over our bulging vests after dinner and lie down to rest, we know that there is no starving family in Homeburg which has had to celebrate Christmas by taking on an extra drink of water and indulging in a long, succulent sniff ...
— Homeburg Memories • George Helgesen Fitch

... room one of them stopped and put her small nose in the air, crying, "Um-o-o, what a funnee smell!" The others began to sniff the air as well, and one, the daughter of a butcher, exclaimed, "'Tsmells like my pa's shop," adding in the next breath, "Look, what's ...
— McTeague • Frank Norris

... still, old lowbrow," advised Peter. "Don't sniff at your betters. There's a great little old plot here, and we're going to make a good thing of ...
— The Come Back • Carolyn Wells

... Sniff! went her pink little nose. Spot knew it was smoke she smelled. The smoke came out of the chimney of a house. "Where there is smoke there is fire," thought Spot, "and where there is fire, it is warm to lie." So she jumped down from the fence and on her little padded feet ...
— Here and Now Story Book - Two- to seven-year-olds • Lucy Sprague Mitchell

... says the end of /94: so much the better, then; but I would like to submit to you my alternative plan. I could meet you at Hawaii, and reconduct you to Hawaii, so that we could have a full six weeks together and I believe a little over, and you would see this place of mine, and have a sniff of native life, native foods, native houses—and perhaps be in time to see the German flag raised, who knows?—and we could generally yarn for all we were worth. I should like you to see Vailima; and I should be curious to know how the climate ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 25 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... two lady authoresses of note to meet at one of her "at homes,". . . she welcomed both the masculine-looking ladies with a radiant smile, and introduced them, saying gently,—"You will be so pleased to know each other!" But the stony stare, stiff nod, portentous sniff, and scornful smile with which these two eminent females exchanged cold greetings, were enough to daunt the most sympathetic hostess that ever lived—and when they at once retired to different corners of the room and sat apart with their backs turned to one another ...
— Thelma • Marie Corelli

... had been gaping at the door, came in for some Scots sniff; and I would serve her. The wench was plaguy homely; and I told her so; or else, I said, I would have treated her. She, in anger, [no woman is homely in her own opinion,] threw down her penny; and I put ...
— Clarissa, Or The History Of A Young Lady, Volume 8 • Samuel Richardson

... studied the scene, two seasick navvies tottered out on deck to sniff the clean air. They dismally surveyed the traces of the storm. Then they moved weakly toward the boy, who was now scrutinizing the horizon ...
— The Cruise of the Dry Dock • T. S. Stribling

... Discovery to Kennedy's White, and from Hood's Sarsaparilla to Mother Seigel's Syrup. And there were, besides, some mildewed and half-empty bottles, the labels obliterated, over which Nares would sometimes sniff and speculate. "Seems to smell like diarrhoea stuff," he would remark. "I wish't I knew, and I would try it." But the slop-chest was indeed represented by the plugs of niggerhead and nothing else. Thus paternal laws are made, thus they are ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 13 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... beside the chair where he had flung himself on his knees when Walden had entered his mother's cottage,—and rubbed his knuckles hard into his eyes with a long and dismal sniff. ...
— God's Good Man • Marie Corelli

... with her weight. Then she reached out her chubby hand and plucked a cluster of the wild fruit. They were about the size of buckshot, and when her sound teeth shut down on them, the juice was so sour that she shut both eyes and felt a twinge at the crown of her head as though she had taken a sniff of ...
— Through Forest and Fire - Wild-Woods Series No. 1 • Edward Ellis

... anticipated, the ape was evidently bound for the interior of the cavern, for upon arriving at the entrance the creature paused for a moment, appeared to sniff the air carefully for a second or two, and then went boldly in, somewhat to Stukely's surprise, for although when he first saw the creature he gathered from its movements that it intended to enter the cave, he could not imagine why it should do ...
— Two Gallant Sons of Devon - A Tale of the Days of Queen Bess • Harry Collingwood

... An-heri-ertaitsa, and I am decreed to be strengthened in heart, for I have made offerings at the altars of my divine father Osiris; I rule in Tattu and I lift myself up over his land. I sniff the wind of the east by its hair; I lay hold upon the north wind by its hair, I seize and hold fast to the west wind by its body, and I go round about heaven on its four sides; I lay hold upon the south wind by ...
— Egyptian Literature

... Natalya would sniff contemptuously at the muddle of ancient finery on the floor and spurn it with her foot. 'How can I sell that?' she would inquire. 'Last time I gave you too much—I lost by you.' And having wrung the price down ...
— Ghetto Comedies • Israel Zangwill

... down, O Scribe, from yonder sniffy height; What pleasure lives in "sniff" (the Councillor sang), In sniff and scorn, the weakness of the "swells"? But cease to move so near the clouds, and cease To sit a votary of the "Great Pooh-Pooh"; And come, for Labour's in the valley, come, For Toil dwells in the valley, come thou down And watch him; by the dim slum ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 104, January 7, 1893 • Various

... get acrost that street, and that was to bust through the procession. And, as luck would have it, the place he picked out to cross was just ahead of the bloodhounds. And the first thing I knew, them dogs stretched out their noses and took a long sniff, and then bust out howling like all possessed. The boy, he tried to hold 'em, but 'twas no go. They yanked the chains out of his hands and took after that poet as if he owed 'em something. And every one of the four million other dogs that was in the crowd ...
— Cape Cod Stories - The Old Home House • Joseph C. Lincoln

... gallows. In fact, this woman of peace, who had seen only peace, argued constantly for a creed of illimitable ferocity. She was invulnerable on these questions, because eventually she overrode all opponents with a sniff. This sniff was an active force. It was to her antagonists like a bang over the head, and none was known to recover from this expression of exalted contempt. It left them windless and conquered. They never again came forward as candidates for suppression. And Martha walked her kitchen with ...
— The Monster and Other Stories - The Monster; The Blue Hotel; His New Mittens • Stephen Crane

... agreed that the Olmstead case was hardest, or, if they did not, Mrs. Updyke took pains to impress that idea upon them with a decisive sniff; for, being a next-door neighbor, she naturally desired that the affliction close by should outrank all ...
— Sara, a Princess • Fannie E. Newberry

... you fool! Would you call up our enemies with your noise? (The wailing drops to a moan.) Put out that fire—they can sniff smoke as far as a vulture smells carrion. (CHOCO stamps out the fire.) You, Choco, do you show your face to me, misgotten whelp of a coyote! It was you who ...
— The Arrow-Maker - A Drama in Three Acts • Mary Austin

... pitch darkness to recognise every man I know by the help of my nose alone; that is, if I passed near enough to him to sniff his atmosphere. I am almost ashamed to confess that men are the same to me as flowers; I judge them by their smell. I remember once a young English waiter in a restaurant who stirred all my sensibilities each ...
— The Dangerous Age • Karin Michaelis

... their feeding, she seemed always half starved. Waiting in my canoe I would hear the crackle of brush, as she trotted straight down to the lake almost heedlessly, and see her plunge through the fringe of bushes that bordered the water. With scarcely a look or a sniff to be sure the coast was clear, she would jump for the lily pads. Sometimes the canoe was in plain sight; but she gave no heed as she tore up the juicy buds and stems, and swallowed them with the appetite of a famished wolf. Then ...
— Types of Children's Literature • Edited by Walter Barnes

... might be hiding somewhere about with a terrible gun. So Reddy used his eyes and his ears and his nose as only he can use them. All seemed safe. It was as still in that little swamp as if no living creature had ever visited it. Stopping every few steps to look, listen, and sniff, Reddy ...
— Bowser The Hound • Thornton W. Burgess

... used to this incense to do more than sniff it in unconsciously, and she went on with ...
— Queen Lucia • E. F. Benson

... essence of savagery, and there is a superfluity of both in the Soudan. I have no desperate wish so to describe the vileness of the surroundings of the correspondents' camp at Dakhala that even casual thinkers will sniff at it. The place was bad enough in all conscience, and, mayhap, therein I have said all that is necessary. As for the worry of our lives, squatted as we were in the least agreeable quarter of the big rectangular fort, long will the memory of those days and nights burden our existence. What a ...
— Khartoum Campaign, 1898 - or the Re-Conquest of the Soudan • Bennet Burleigh

... the country faster and faster, the air blew more and more fresh against Netty's cheeks. She began to sniff. Could that delicious smell be the smell of the sea, the great, rolling blue sea which she had never seen, but which she had ...
— A Big Temptation • L. T. Meade

... Forsytes mingling that day with the crowd of other guests, there was a more than ordinarily groomed look, an alert, inquisitive assurance, a brilliant respectability, as though they were attired in defiance of something. The habitual sniff on the face of Soames Forsyte had spread through their ranks; they were on ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy

... way," Grief answered gravely, turning the strip of shark-meat over on the coals and noting the hungry sniff and look of Tehaa. "Don't do that, Tehaa, when the Big Devil comes. Look as if you and hunger were strangers. Here, cook those sea urchins, you, and you, Big Brother, cook the squid. We will have the Big Devil to feast with us. ...
— A Son Of The Sun • Jack London

... purposes, and allow their grooms to lead them around through the crowded thoroughfares just as though they were poodle dogs. It is true that the brutes wear muzzles, but you do not like the casual way they creep up behind you and sniff at the calves ...
— Modern India • William Eleroy Curtis

... was who pulled Michael through the port-hole into Dag Daughtry's stateroom and waited for that worthy to arrive by the roundabout way of the door. After a quick look around the room and a sniff of the bunk and under the bunk which informed him that Jerry was not present, Michael turned his ...
— Michael, Brother of Jerry • Jack London

... way along, for after he had gone around the circle a few times, he would jump from the beaten path as far as he could, and make off to other cover in a straight line. Before this was done it was my plan to get near the circle; taking care to approach it on the leeward side. If the fox got a sniff of human scent, he would leave his circle very quickly, and make tracks fast to be out of danger. By the baying of the hounds, the circle in which the race was kept up could be easily known. The last ...
— Beautiful Joe • Marshall Saunders

... the dog taking another sniff of the air, "they're taking her back to some other spacecraft." Buregarde looked up at Peter. ...
— History Repeats • George Oliver Smith

... replied Miss Mullett, with a sniff. She took up her hat and started toward the hall. At the door she turned and seemed about to speak, but evidently thought better of it and disappeared. Eve smiled. And then Miss Mullett's plain, sweet little face peered around the corner of the ...
— The Lilac Girl • Ralph Henry Barbour

... almost before Finn's sticky mouth could open in a bleat of protest, the Master's hand had returned him to the warm dugs. Again came the harsh, suspicious nose of the foster about Finn's tail, and this time a low growl followed the resentful sniff, and blind, helpless, unformed little jelly that Finn was, instinct made him wriggle fearfully from under that cold nose. The language in which bitches speak to the very young among puppies is simplicity itself. ...
— Finn The Wolfhound • A. J. Dawson

... at her for five minutes at a time. This made the cat very uneasy, and she would go about from place to place, trying to get away from those small, bright, inquiring eyes. At last the cub again got up courage to sniff at the old cat, and this time she did ...
— Black Bruin - The Biography of a Bear • Clarence Hawkes

... old women like a glass of wine. One of this sort once found a Wine-jar lying in the road, and eagerly went up to it hoping to find it full. But when she took it up she found that all the wine had been drunk out of it. Still she took a long sniff at the mouth of the Jar. ...
— Aesop's Fables • Aesop

... Helen's old familiar sniff was his answer. The matter, he was to know, was of no moment to her. But she knew otherwise, and looked at him swiftly hoping he had something else ...
— The Desert Valley • Jackson Gregory

... anything like that, you'd all have jumped on me," Hester Grimes declared with a sniff. "It wouldn't have ...
— The Girls of Central High Aiding the Red Cross - Or Amateur Theatricals for a Worthy Cause • Gertrude W. Morrison

... pitch dark out there. I couldn't see a thing. But I knew the man could not have gone far, or I should have heard him. I started to sniff round on the chance of picking up his trail. It wasn't long before ...
— The Man with Two Left Feet - and Other Stories • P. G. Wodehouse

... Skyrocket went over to sniff around Jack, the monkey, with which pet the Curlytops' dog was well acquainted, so ...
— The Curlytops and Their Playmates - or Jolly Times Through the Holidays • Howard R. Garis

... across the street, and then how the kettles would rattle, especially if they were empty! Each dog would give a bound and, never caring for his master's whistle, insist upon meeting the other halfway. Sometimes they contented themselves with an inquisitive sniff, but generally the smaller dog made an affectionate snap snap at the larger one's ear, or a friendly tussle was engaged in by way of exercise. Then woe to the milk kettles, and ...
— Hans Brinker - or The Silver Skates • Mary Mapes Dodge

... chance to go about much and ask," said the widow, with a preliminary sniff; "but I've met some as wa'n't ...
— The Henchman • Mark Lee Luther

... these stuckuppy snipsters, as jaw about quiet and peace, Who would silence the gay "constant-screamer" and line the Thames banks with perlice; Who sneer about "'ARRY at 'Enley," and sniff about "cads on the course," As though it meant "Satan in Eden"? I'll 'owl at sich oafs ...
— Punch, or The London Charivari, Vol. 101, August 15, 1891 • Various

... said Miss Penkridge, with a sniff. "The world's full of 'em! How many murders go undetected—how many burglaries are never traced—how many forgeries are done and never found out? Piles of 'em—as the police could tell you. And talking about forgeries, what about old Barrett, ...
— The Middle of Things • J. S. Fletcher

... amid the garbage of the Yelverton divorce case. I think of these facts and think of Baudelaire's prose poem, that poem in which he tells how a dog will run away howling if you hold to him a bottle of choice scent, but if you offer him some putrid morsel picked out of some gutter hole, he will sniff round it joyfully, and will seek to lick your hand for gratitude. Baudelaire compared that dog to ...
— Confessions of a Young Man • George Moore

... Nantasket as a summer resort began a long time ago, although the era of large hotels and popular excursions began in the last few years. Forty or fifty vears ago people from Boston, Dorchester, Hingham, and other towns, when hungering for a sniff of unalloyed sea-breeze, or a repast of the genuine clam-chowder, were in the habit of resorting to this beach, where they could pitch their tents, or find accommodations in the rather humble cottages which ...
— The Bay State Monthly, Volume 3, No. 3 • Various

... jumped into the water. In two strokes I reach'd him, gained footing, and with Anthony's sword cut the straps away and pull'd him up. And there we stood, up to our necks, coughing and spluttering; while on the deserted brink the bear sniff'd at the water and ...
— The Splendid Spur • Arthur T. Quiller Couch

... for some time stiffly, his head in the air, not condescending to speak. She had uttered blasphemy. He would find his parents, he vowed to himself, if only to spite Jane. Presently his ear caught a little sniff, and looking down, saw her dabbing her eyes with her handkerchief. His heart softened at once. "Never mind," said he. "You didn't ...
— The Fortunate Youth • William J. Locke

... stallkeepers. And then Marjolin declared that she smelt sweet from head to foot. She lived in the midst of roses, lilacs, wall-flowers, and lilies of the valley; and Marjolin would playfully smell at her skirts, feign a momentary hesitation, and then exclaim, "Ah, that's lily of the valley!" Next he would sniff at her waist and bodice: "Ah, that's wall-flowers!" And at her sleeves and wrists: "Ah, that's lilac!" And at her neck, and her cheeks and lips: "Ah, but that's roses!" he would cry. Cadine used to laugh at him, and call him a "silly stupid," and ...
— The Fat and the Thin • Emile Zola

... them an aged appearance; and, above all, there is an occasional dropping of water—yes, actual water—from the points of huge icicles! This is such an ancient memory that we can scarce believe our senses. We sniff, too, as we walk about; for there are scents in the air—old familiar smells of earth and vegetation—which we had begun to fancy we had ...
— The Big Otter • R.M. Ballantyne

... at my two goats. I believe they are the kindest and best goats in the world. See how they sniff the clear air, and skip and play in the sunshine. Whew! what a jump," he exclaimed as one of the goats made a lofty spring. "Madam Elizabeth, did you ever before see such an active goat?" Musing a moment, he continued: "He feeds on my bounty, and jumps ...
— Behind the Scenes - or, Thirty years a slave, and Four Years in the White House • Elizabeth Keckley

... a would-be modest, yet well-pleased sniff, which seemed to say that though it would not become her to endorse Joan's opinion of her talents, truth would not permit ...
— The Rebellion of Margaret • Geraldine Mockler

... Dick enter than the cat began to sniff the air. Then she caught a glimpse of the rats and mice, which were still feasting on the table. The cloth ...
— Dick and His Cat and Other Tales • Various

... sniff of the venison and is following us up," Charley declared. "We can never get away from it, and there is small chance of our being able to kill it in the dark. We may as well stop right here where there is a little wood and build a fire, that is ...
— The Boy Chums in the Forest - or Hunting for Plume Birds in the Florida Everglades • Wilmer M. Ely

... I had been able for months to clothe myself with decency and leave my room in less than fifteen minutes, I could not see why time dragged so for me when being clothed by Annette and Aunt Mary. True, Aunt Mary paused to sniff into her handkerchief every few minutes or to listen to Annette's French raptures as she laid upon me each foolish garment up unto the long swath of heathenish tulle she was beginning to arrange when an interruption occurred in the shape of Rufus, who put his head in the door and mysteriously ...
— The Golden Bird • Maria Thompson Daviess

... sniff and handkerchief, And dim and decorous mirth, With ham and sherry, they'll meet to bury The ...
— The Collected Poems of Rupert Brooke • Rupert Brooke

... sniff at his fallen enemy, gave the body the customary expression of a dog's contempt, then led ...
— Rolf In The Woods • Ernest Thompson Seton

... St. James's Street, and stopping to chaff the itinerant coffee vendor, who was preparing his stand at the corner of Piccadilly for his early customers, just about the time that Tom was beginning to rouse himself under the alder-tree, and stretch his stiffened limbs, and sniff the morning air. By the time the guardsman had let himself into his lodgings in Mount Street, our hero had undergone his unlooked for bath, and was sitting in a state of utter bewilderment as to what was next to be said or done, ...
— Tom Brown at Oxford • Thomas Hughes

... Not she," returned Hannah with a sniff of contempt. "Catch her a-cryin' over anything 'cept when she hasn't won a prize in a lottery. But come you in. I've ever so much to tell you. You'd best be off Reuben. ...
— Madame Flirt - A Romance of 'The Beggar's Opera' • Charles E. Pearce

... "Did he indeed?" she observed with a sniff. Then she reflected. "And what had you been saying to draw such a ...
— The Beth Book - Being a Study of the Life of Elizabeth Caldwell Maclure, a Woman of Genius • Sarah Grand

... a pebble picked up at random. The collie raced for it and after a sniff, returned ...
— The Spanish Chest • Edna A. Brown

... sensible smile. Mrs. Batjer accompanied her suggestions nearly always with a slight sniff and cough. Berenice could see that the mere fact of this conversation made a slight difference. In Mrs. Batjer's world poverty was a dangerous topic. The mere odor of it suggested a kind of horror—perhaps the equivalent ...
— The Titan • Theodore Dreiser

... the room with that perfect decorum which proclaims the well-trained domestic of an aristocratic house. As soon as the tall mahogany doors were closed behind him, Mme. la Duchesse took her spectacles off from her high-bred nose and gave a little sniff, which caused Mademoiselle Crystal to look up from her book and mutely to question Madame with those wonderful blue ...
— The Bronze Eagle - A Story of the Hundred Days • Emmuska Orczy, Baroness Orczy

... you observe," says Mr. Snagsby, pausing to sniff and taste the air a little, "don't you observe, Mr. Weevle, that you're—not to put too fine a point upon it—that you're ...
— Bleak House • Charles Dickens

... on, that they were together; a tramcar had flown forward with the interesting fact. From that moment, of course, the news, which really was great news, spread itself over the town with the rapidity of a perfume; no corner could escape it. All James's innumerable tenants seemed to sniff it simultaneously. And that evening in the mouth of the entire town (I am licensing myself to a little poetical exaggeration) there was no ...
— Helen with the High Hand (2nd ed.) • Arnold Bennett

... between banks of bright green grass, and fuss over the mossy rocks that lie in their beds. Deer lift heads often to listen and look and sniff the breeze between mouthfuls of the tender twigs they love. Shambling, slack-jointed bears move shuffling through the thickets, like the deer, lifting suspicious noses to test frequently the wind, lest some enemy steal upon ...
— The Lookout Man • B. M. Bower

... not to be thought of, and then what does the dame but sniff the air and protest that I had better take heed, for there may not be so many who would choose a spoilt, misruled maid like mine. There's the work of yonder Sarum woman. I tell thee, Tib, never was bull in the ring ...
— The Armourer's Prentices • Charlotte Mary Yonge

... left in town in the dull days will seem, in reading these pages, to sniff the fresh sea-breezes, to hear the cries of the sea-bird and the songs of the wood-bird, to be conscious of the murmuring stream and waving forests, and all the wild life that ...
— To Mars via The Moon - An Astronomical Story • Mark Wicks



Words linked to "Sniff" :   breathe in, smelling, sniffer, smell, inspire, inhale, whiff



Copyright © 2024 Free Translator.org