"Threshold" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... feelings of a young man who thinks he is opening the door to the baker and finds incarnate spring upon the threshold. Spring in weather-beaten, well-cut clothes, with a sweet, friendly ...
— The Ffolliots of Redmarley • L. Allen Harker
... so well in their effort at concentration that neither was aware of the precipitate entry of Bateato and Michael Phelan, both of whom had sprinted a distance of two blocks. Phelan was puffing like a tugboat and stopped at the threshold of the room to catch his breath. He had prepared his mind for all manner of excitement and had burst in upon a tomb-like silence to be greeted by ...
— Officer 666 • Barton W. Currie
... wives and sisters weep in anguish as they look on those dearer to them than life, and see, trace by trace, their delicacy and purity of soul vanishing beneath the destroying libations that tempt them when they pass the domestic threshold. ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume I • Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and Matilda Joslyn Gage
... home ten chests of silver ingots, two chests of bar gold, and a casket of pearls, all of which were quickly transhipped to the Adventure, the crew of which thus found themselves the possessors of a fairly rich booty, while still upon the very threshold, as it were, of those seas wherein they hoped to make their fortune. But this was not all; for, in the process of rummaging the captain's cabin, Marshall found certain letters which he unhesitatingly opened and read, and among ...
— Two Gallant Sons of Devon - A Tale of the Days of Queen Bess • Harry Collingwood
... was over, and the night was nearly gone. A friend took charge of the thoughtless young girl that had accompanied Charles to the dance. Two young men, his companions in riot, undertook to convey him to his father's house. The stars were just beginning to fade away as they reached the threshold. Speechless, and almost lifeless, they laid him upon his ...
— Charles Duran - Or, The Career of a Bad Boy • The Author of The Waldos
... with a wall, that, unknown to anybody, I stocked the out-houses with means of defence: ammunition, bags of sand, gun-powder ... that, in short, I prepared for an alarm by setting up this unsuspected little fortress at twenty minutes from the Col du Diable ... on the very threshold of the frontier!" ...
— The Frontier • Maurice LeBlanc
... advantage of the fact that Henrietta had paused upon the threshold, to push her brutally out of the room at the risk of throwing her down, and fiercely banged the door. An hour afterwards the poor girl vehemently ...
— The Clique of Gold • Emile Gaboriau
... cottage, battered and decayed, Lets in new light through chinks that time has made: Stronger by weakness, wiser men become, As they draw near to their eternal home. Leaving the old, both worlds at once they view, That stand upon the threshold of the new. ...
— McGuffey's Sixth Eclectic Reader • William Holmes McGuffey
... All this was wrong—utterly wrong; but she fascinated him, and sometimes the sheer sagacity of a phrase would break the charm, replace the fascination by a sudden unwilling thrill of interest. Some women hovered, as it were, on the threshold of genius, he reflected. They did not want to know, or think, or understand. Passion stood for all that, and he was ready to believe that some startlingly profound remark, some appreciation of character, or a judgment upon an event, bordered on the miraculous. In the mature Antonia ...
— Nostromo: A Tale of the Seaboard • Joseph Conrad
... "Sir," she said, "it is requested that you will honorably enter." She conducted him to the entrance, where he removed his sandals; and an aged woman, whom he thought to be the R[o]jo, or matron of the household, came to welcome him at the threshold. The old woman then led him through many apartments to a large and well-lighted room in the rear of the house, and with many respectful salutations requested him to take the place of honor accorded to guests of distinction. He was surprised by the stateliness ...
— The Romance of the Milky Way - And Other Studies & Stories • Lafcadio Hearn
... never afterward recall having heard any report, yet as he stepped across the threshold a sharp flare of red fire cleft the blackness to his left. As though this was a signal he leaped recklessly forward, running blindly along the narrow path toward the ore-dump. Some trick of memory led him to remember a peculiar swerve in the trail just beneath the upper rim of the canyon. ...
— Beth Norvell - A Romance of the West • Randall Parrish
... as I know them, are really all against it," Trent replied, sitting on the threshold of the window and clasping his knees. "First, of course, no weapon is to be found. I've searched, and you've searched, and there's no trace of any firearm anywhere within a stone's throw of where the body lay. Second, ...
— The Woman in Black • Edmund Clerihew Bentley
... he walked with firmness to the door, he stepped over the body of old Tavender, upon the threshold, and bestowed upon it a downward mental glance, and passed on. By the time he reached the street, the memory of Tavender had become the merest shred of a myth. As he strode on, it seemed to him that his daughters came again, and took his ...
— The Market-Place • Harold Frederic
... They are circumscribing the power of ruling classes and abolishing their exclusive privileges which control of the state has made it possible for them to defend in the past. From present indications we are at the threshold of a new social order under which the few will no longer rule ...
— The Spirit of American Government - A Study Of The Constitution: Its Origin, Influence And - Relation To Democracy • J. Allen Smith
... fifteenth-century sculptors is almost ended; and already, on the threshold of the sixteenth, stands the mighty form of Michael Angelo. Andrea Contucci da Sansavino and his pupil Jacopo Tatti, called also Sansovino, after his master, must, however, next be mentioned as continuing the Florentine tradition without subservience to the style ...
— Renaissance in Italy Vol. 3 - The Fine Arts • John Addington Symonds
... two hundred paces. Now they paused beside one of those square mud-walled boxes, of which they could only discern the narrow door made of unplaned wood, and through the chinks of which a faint light glimmered weirdly. Two or three steps fashioned in the earth itself led down toward the threshold. Taurus Antinor descended these and ...
— "Unto Caesar" • Baroness Emmuska Orczy
... not intended to go all the way. He had expected to steal clear to the outer edge of the firelight; and then stand listening to the darkness for such impressions as the jungle would choose to give him. But there had been no threshold, no interlude of preparation. The jungle in all its mystery had ...
— O. Henry Memorial Award Prize Stories of 1921 • Various
... seemed so terrible, just on the threshold of an exciting voyage, in which he had painted to himself plenty of sport and adventure, ending in the discovery of his uncle and the men who had been his companions. All had gone wrong, and he felt that they would have to accept their failure, and try to get back to the nearest Norwegian port, ...
— Steve Young • George Manville Fenn
... day, and added: "I'm sure you'll be successful in Ireland for you have the suaviter in modo combined with the fortiter in re." It was a pretty compliment, and sincere I knew, for no one could meet him without recognising his frank outspoken nature. On the threshold of my new work such encouragement greatly cheered me and increased my determination to do my best. Until his death, not long ago, we often corresponded on railway and other matters, and he was always my staunch friend. He had a taste, too, for poetry which we sometimes discussed. The ...
— Fifty Years of Railway Life in England, Scotland and Ireland • Joseph Tatlow
... I can go," thought poor little Anne wildly, and just then the school-room door opened, and on the threshold appeared a self-contained young lady in pale violet gingham, and the young lady ...
— Judy • Temple Bailey
... cavern gives an appetite for lunch at the good inn which is hard by, and at whose threshold sits or did sit a very fat, broad-faced landlord, seemingly fashioned upon the model of an ideal tapster of old time. Here a friture of the famous gudgeons of the Dronne is placed before the guest, whether the fishing ...
— Two Summers in Guyenne • Edward Harrison Barker
... himself a brief period of ecstasy as he remembers that his mother crossed this threshold only recently, and in his eyes this renders ...
— Miss Caprice • St. George Rathborne
... I could distinguish the gilt cupola of the tomb before me; and as I perceived the horseman at some distance behind, I made all possible speed until I had passed the gateway of the sanctuary. Kissing the threshold of the tomb, I said my prayers with all the fervency of one who has got safe ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol VI. • Various
... guide. The door being opened, you see before you a continuation of the rocky staircase; with this difference in character, however, between what is passed and what is to come,—that whereas you mounted to the threshold under the canopy of heaven, you now move onwards, or rather upwards, through a cavity cut in the face of the solid stone itself. By-and-bye you come to a landing-place, beyond which, at the extremity of a narrow passage, you behold what ...
— Germany, Bohemia, and Hungary, Visited in 1837. Vol. II • G. R. Gleig
... have induced you——" were her first words to Elizabeth; but her attention was at that point distracted by seeing Cuff, outside the threshold, about to pull the door shut. "Don't close the door yet, boy. ...
— The Continental Dragoon - A Love Story of Philipse Manor-House in 1778 • Robert Neilson Stephens
... answered Dr. Alec, adding soberly, half to himself, half to his brother, "I wonder people are in such haste to 'bring out' their daughters, as it's called. To me there is something almost pathetic in the sight of a young girl standing on the threshold of the world, so innocent and hopeful, so ignorant of all that lies before her, and usually so ill prepared to meet the ups and downs of life. We do our duty better by the boys, but the poor little women are seldom provided with any armor worth having, and sooner or later they are sure to need ...
— Rose in Bloom - A Sequel to "Eight Cousins" • Louisa May Alcott
... a few words; and the old man farther asked him if he had met anybody on the road? "You are the first person I have seen," answered the king, "and I cannot comprehend how so fine and large a city comes to be without inhabitants." "Come in, sir; stay no longer upon the threshold," replied the old man, "or peradventure some misfortune may happen to you. I will satisfy your curiosity at leisure, and give you a reason why it is necessary ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments Complete • Anonymous
... children, "Little Father"? They are lying In their thousands at your threshold, waiting death. Gold you gather whilst your foodless thralls are dying! Is appeal, oh Great White Tsar, but wasted breath? On armaments aggressive are you spending What might solace the "black people" midst their dead? Of the millions the effusive Frank is lending Is there nothing left ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 101. October 10, 1891 • Various
... the very threshold of this novel enterprise, came the first—and it was not a trivial—difficulty. Where could experienced officers be found for such an organization? 'What! command niggers?' was the reply—if possible more amazed than scornful—of nearly every competent young lieutenant or captain of volunteers ...
— The Black Phalanx - African American soldiers in the War of Independence, the - War of 1812, and the Civil War • Joseph T. Wilson
... festivity begins in the fall, after the birds have left us and the holiday spirit of nature has commenced to subside. How absorbing the pastime of the sportsman, who goes to the woods in the still October morning in quest of him! You step lightly across the threshold of the forest, and sit down upon the first log or rock to await the signals. It is so still that the ear suddenly seems to have acquired new powers, and there is no movement to confuse the eye. Presently you ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 101, March, 1866 • Various
... the door?" said the Master, interrupting the silence which reigned. "Come in there!" he added in a rough tone. The door opened, and a little girl entered, saluted him timidly, and remained standing on the threshold. The clock had not yet struck five, nevertheless the fair hair of the little girl, who was about ten years old, had already been nicely combed, and every part of her dress, although poor, was neat and in order, her cheeks and hands ...
— The Young Emigrants; Madelaine Tube; The Boy and the Book; and - Crystal Palace • Susan Anne Livingston Ridley Sedgwick
... not speak then it shall be starvation in this hole—yes, starvation," he growled, showing a row of large and uneven teeth like those of some mongrel cur, "for I'll have that door walled in to-night, and not another living soul shall cross this threshold again until your flesh has rotted on your bones and the rats have had ...
— El Dorado • Baroness Orczy
... froze to senseless stone; Nor sigh of his, nor plaint, nor passion'd moan Had more been heard. Thus swell'd it forth: "Descend, Young mountaineer! descend where alleys bend Into the sparry hollows of the world! Oft hast thou seen bolts of the thunder hurl'd As from thy threshold; day by day hast been A little lower than the chilly sheen Of icy pinnacles, and dipp'dst thine arms Into the deadening ether that still charms 210 Their marble being: now, as deep profound As those are high, descend! ...
— Endymion - A Poetic Romance • John Keats
... firm step to the door leading into the family apartments of the President. On the threshold her feet faltered. She grasped the door facing, turned, and saw him standing with folded arms watching her—with the eyes of a madman. Her face went white. She lifted her hand to her heart and slowly stumbled ...
— The Southerner - A Romance of the Real Lincoln • Thomas Dixon
... deceased. Standing there, with shoulders thrown back, head erect, and smiling face, the statue seems to step forth to lead the double from its dark lodging where it lies embalmed, to those glowing plains where he dwelt in freedom during his earthly life: another moment, crossing the threshold, he must descend the few steps leading into the public hall. On festivals and days of offering, when the priest and family presented the banquet with the customary rites, this great painted figure, in the act of advancing, and seen by the light of flickering torches or smoking ...
— History Of Egypt, Chaldaea, Syria, Babylonia, and Assyria, Volume 2 (of 12) • G. Maspero
... relations of life, and had erected an idol wherever the eye could turn. It had a god of War, and a god of Peace; a god of the Sea, and a god of the Wind; a god of the River, and a god of the Fountain; a god of the Field, and a god of the Barn Floor; a god of the Hearth, a god of the Threshold, a god of the Door, and a god of the Hinges. [166:1] When we consider its power and prevalence in the apostolic age, we need not wonder at the declaration of Paul—"All that will live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution." ...
— The Ancient Church - Its History, Doctrine, Worship, and Constitution • W.D. [William Dool] Killen
... obstacles everywhere. Fools hindered his work; men less capable than he got jobs he should have had. Immersed in politics, he would have liked more time for writing; he would have liked a hundred other careers besides his own, and could have but the one. (Gerda and Kay, still poised on the threshold of life, still believed that they could indeed have a hundred.) No, Rodney was not immune from sorrow, but at least he had more with which to keep it at bay than Neville. Neville had no personal achievements; ...
— Dangerous Ages • Rose Macaulay
... upon the threshold of our inquiry by the essential question, What, according to Paul, was the mission of Christ? What did he accomplish? A clear reply to this question comprises three distinct propositions. First, the apostle plainly ...
— The Destiny of the Soul - A Critical History of the Doctrine of a Future Life • William Rounseville Alger
... gone, the rotting floor crumbles beneath the heel, and the winds moan through the paneless sashes, like invisible spirits hovering near and muttering some lugubrious secret. "This is the scene of some deed of darkness!" you are tempted to mutter, as you place your feet upon the threshold. When you leave the spot behind you, a weight seems lifted ...
— Mohun, or, The Last Days of Lee • John Esten Cooke
... talked until after the midnight hour, until Caruthers, his feet on a table, his head thrown back, his pipe between the fingers of his limp hand, fell asleep. Lyman sat there, more thoughtful, now that he felt alone. At the threshold of a new venture, we look back upon the hopes that led us into other undertakings, and upon many a failure we bestow a look of tender but half reproachful forgiveness. The trials and the final success of other men make us strong. And with his ...
— Old Ebenezer • Opie Read
... not?—I hope I may accept of my lot with your courage, Miss Jocelyn, and give to my humbler home the same impress of womanly refinement that you have imparted to yours. Believe me, I respected you and your mother thoroughly the moment I crossed your threshold." ...
— Without a Home • E. P. Roe
... and puzzling situation arose. When he stepped over the threshold and into the house ...
— Poor White • Sherwood Anderson
... of him as though you were his contemporary; no matter how old you may be, you do not date back to the pyramids of Egypt," I answered laughingly from the threshold of the shop. ...
— Humorous Ghost Stories • Dorothy Scarborough
... manner. She concluded with desiring her father to make an example of the slut, and to turn her out of doors; for that she would not otherwise enter his house, being resolved never to set her foot within the same threshold with the trollop, whom she detested so much the more because (which was perhaps true) she was ...
— The History of the Life of the Late Mr. Jonathan Wild the Great • Henry Fielding
... floors; these gentlemen being the rats, mice, and other gnawing, thieving, and crafty animals, of whom the citizens and housewives complain. When they saw the shrew-mouse they took fright, and all remained shyly at the threshold of their dens. Among these common people, in spite of the danger, one old infidel of the trotting, nibbling race of mice, advanced a little, and putting his nose in the air, had the courage to stare my lord shrew-mouse full in the face, although the latter ...
— Droll Stories, Complete - Collected From The Abbeys Of Touraine • Honore de Balzac
... and the most recent conquest of the human race. As far as the light of history can be projected into the past, we see Egypt among the first and foremost on the threshold of civilization. The continent discovered last and opened last to the enterprises of the world is still Africa. Why is it that we see there both the dawn of civilization and the tardiest development of ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume XIV • John Lord
... Vere was doing. She felt sure, though she did not know why, that Vere had not gone to bed. She realized to-night that her child was growing up rapidly, was passing from the stage of childhood to the stage of girlhood, was on the threshold of all the mysterious experiences that life holds for those who have ardent temperaments and eager interests, and passionate desires and ...
— A Spirit in Prison • Robert Hichens
... poor, patient widow sits, And awes some thirty infants as she knits; Infants of humble, busy wives, who pay Some trifling price for freedom through the day: At this good matron's hut the children meet, Who thus becomes the mother of the street: Her room is small they cannot widely stray, - Her threshold high they cannot run away: Though deaf, she sees the rebel-heroes shout, - Though lame, her white rod nimbly walks about; With band of yarn she keeps offenders in, And to her gown the sturdiest rogue can pin: ...
— The Borough • George Crabbe
... The woman without the threshold stood for a long time staring straight before her, then turned and walked away homeward—past the weary, patient, heroic man toiling deep in the earth for her sake—leaving him without a glance or ...
— The Moccasin Ranch - A Story of Dakota • Hamlin Garland
... which did it, with its brave cord of green, humblest of all the insignia of those who stand at the threshold of the Army. To Sim's vague soul it carried a purpose in life, knowledge that there was such a thing as service in the world. Daily his face now was new-reaped, his hands made clean. He imitated the erectness and ...
— The Sagebrusher - A Story of the West • Emerson Hough
... Maggie retired with Mistress Cormack; and when the soutar joined them, he said never a word about the discomfited gossip. Eppie having taken her tea, rose and bade them good-night, nor crossed another threshold in the village. ...
— Salted With Fire • George MacDonald
... get up—would not put on her hat—would act as if she were simply going to the street door for a moment. And she would not return—would escape the danger of a silly breakdown. She summoned all her courage, suddenly rose and moved swiftly toward the door. At the threshold she had to pause; she could not control her heart from a ...
— The Conflict • David Graham Phillips
... upon the price of wool, he remained standing, absolutely lost in gloomy dreams. It grew a little dark in the room, the sky being so overcast, and suddenly, all the voices having fallen, there was a gurgle of water by the threshold, and a little flood, coming in between sill and floor, reached as it were, a tiny finger of witness towards his great feet. He looked down at it uninterestedly, ...
— The Fifth Queen • Ford Madox Ford
... through his ruffled hair, and his gray eyes straying abstractedly away from the neglected page before him. I see him before he sees me. I have time to take in all the dejection of his attitude, all its spiritless idleness. At the slight noise my skirts make, he looks up. I stop on the threshold. ...
— Nancy - A Novel • Rhoda Broughton
... London to make inquiries after D——. I could learn no certain tidings of him, but heard that the most probable place to find him was a certain gaming-house in K—— Street. Thither I repaired forthwith. It was a haunt of no delicate and luxurious order of vice; the chain attached to the threshold indicated suspicion of the spies of justice; and a grim and sullen face peered jealously upon me before I was suffered to ascend the filthy and noisome staircase. But my search was destined to a brief end. At the head of ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. 17, No. 483., Saturday, April 2, 1831 • Various
... sharp breath as he crossed the threshold. He had stayed in that hotel often, and he knew where the switch of the electric light should be. He lifted a hand, found the switch, and turned the light on. And as it flooded the room, he pulled himself up to a tense rigidity. There, sitting ...
— The Rayner-Slade Amalgamation • J. S. Fletcher
... we shall have occasion elsewhere to observe. Suffice it here to point out, that even if a moral nihilism could be carried through and all definite interests abandoned, the vanity of life would not be thereby corrected, but merely exposed. When our steps had been retraced to the very threshold of being, nothing better worth doing would have been discovered on the way. That to suffer illusion is a bad thing might ordinarily be taken for an axiom, because ordinarily we assume that true knowledge and rational volition ...
— The Life of Reason • George Santayana
... him a glance acquiescing in the Caesar's proposal. Diogenes then went to a part of the ruined wall which was covered by some climbing shrubs, all of which he carefully removed. This showed a little postern door, closed irregularly, and filled up, from the threshold to the top, with large square stones, all of which the slave took out and piled aside, as if for the purpose of replacing them. "I leave thee," said Agelastes to the negro, "to guard this door, and let no one enter, except he has the sign, ...
— Waverley Volume XII • Sir Walter Scott
... in silent thanksgivings and prayers. Daisy would not have stirred till he did, no matter how long it might have been; but there came an interruption. A door opened, and Mrs. Randolph appeared on the threshold, and so soon as she saw Daisy, beckoned her to come to another room. Mr. Randolph's arms had relaxed their hold somewhat, and Daisy obeyed the signal, and ...
— Melbourne House • Elizabeth Wetherell
... Just on the threshold he turned abruptly and looked back. His forehead was furrowed like a corduroy road and the one rampant question in his mind at the moment seemed to be mired ...
— The White Linen Nurse • Eleanor Hallowell Abbott
... for many risked their lives last night to save you both. We could have done no more.' Then I gave a great groan for utter anguish, to think that he had given up the safety he had won for himself, and laid down his life, there on the beach, for me; to think that he had died on the threshold of his home; that I should never get a kind look from him again, nor ever hear his ...
— Moonfleet • J. Meade Falkner
... nine o'clock as we stood on the threshold of the station peering into the murk. Not a taxi was in the stand waiting; but from afar we could hear a great honking of auto-horns, that sounded like the night calls of monster birds flitting over the city. The air ...
— The Martial Adventures of Henry and Me • William Allen White
... been drawn closely to exclude the sun, and, for a moment after he first crossed the threshold of the library, West was unable to distinguish any occupant. He heard Sexton silently close the door behind him, but it was not until she moved slightly that he was able to perceive her presence directly across from where he stood. ...
— The Case and The Girl • Randall Parrish
... will treat thee now, even at the Door and Threshold of this house, but only with this Intelligence, that Mr. Badman lies dead within. Be pleased therefore (if thy leisure will serve thee) to enter in, and behold the state in which he is laid, betwixt his Death-bed and the Grave. He is ...
— The Life and Death of Mr. Badman • John Bunyan
... spent his little savings to procure himself a miserable subsistence. Disease, as usual, trod closely in the track of famine, and numbers of the unfortunate adventurers, sinking under the unaccustomed heats of the climate, perished on the very threshold of discovery. ...
— The History Of The Conquest Of Peru • William H. Prescott
... structure of the Knickerbocker Trust against a background of the lofty red of the AEolian Building, and the great white store on the opposite pavement." A city of amazement has been left behind. Here we are at the threshold of still another city. It is different at every hour of the day. But whether we see it in the sweet-scented dawn, or at high noon, or at the shopping hour, or later, when, to use Arnold Bennett's words, "the street lamps ...
— Fifth Avenue • Arthur Bartlett Maurice
... thresh fourteen bushels a day. The implement cost 2-1/2 yen from travelling vendors but only 1-1/2 yen from the co-operative society. While we talked the farmer appeared. I apologised to him for unwittingly stepping on the threshold of the barn—that is, the grooved timber in which the sliding doors run. It is considered to be an insult to the head of the house to tread on the threshold as in some way "standing on the ...
— The Foundations of Japan • J.W. Robertson Scott
... quite sure," returned Dick, with suppressed emotion, "that no Redskin shall cross this threshold as long as we three men have a spark ...
— Charlie to the Rescue • R.M. Ballantyne
... chain held by the great enemy of souls, who had indeed enchained her with the most dire and effectual of all his spells. She would cross the room with the rapidity of lightning, screaming that he was winding up the chain, and she must go—she could not stop. She was afraid to pass her own threshold, and fancied she heard unearthly voices, and saw spirits black and hideous all around her. "There they sit," she would say, "J——, M——," mentioning the names of all her children; "there they sit, grinning at me, and telling me I sent them to hell: they are on the beams and in the corners, ...
— Select Temperance Tracts • American Tract Society
... often before; Should pass through the gateway of glittering light, Where jokes that are merry and songs that are bright Ring out a warm welcome with flattering voice, And temptingly say, 'Here's a place for the boys!' Ah, what if they should! What if your boy or mine Should cross o'er the threshold which marks out the line 'Twixt virtue and vice, 'twixt pureness and sin, And leave all his innocent boyhood within? Ah, what if they should, because you and I, While the days and the months and the years hurry by, Are too busy with ...
— The Unfolding Life • Antoinette Abernethy Lamoreaux
... further remarks. Nelson made a cautious preliminary survey of the outer world to satisfy himself that no more tomatoes were to be apprehended, then opened the door, placed a chair upon the threshold, and settled to the enjoyment of a freshly-filled pipe while waiting for Steiner to put in an appearance. Varr strode to the farther end of the hallway and climbed the flight of narrow, rickety stairs which ...
— The Monk of Hambleton • Armstrong Livingston
... we must have been standing there on the threshold, we three, for close upon a minute before my father turned his eyes towards me— so far beyond this life was he travelling, and so far had the sound of our entrance to follow ...
— Sir John Constantine • Prosper Paleologus Constantine
... prisoner; for, it being made of straw, and the nature of jet to draw straw unto it, I would have nailed him to the pommel of my chair, till the play were done, and then have carried him to my chamber-door, and laid him at the threshold, as a wisp or a piece of mat, to wipe my shoes on every time ...
— A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. VIII (4th edition) • Various
... them you are waiting," she replied, and as she spoke she hurried from the room to the drawing-room. On the threshold she came face to face with Mr. Kendal, and at a glance she could not help but notice the happy, flushed look ...
— Pretty Madcap Dorothy - How She Won a Lover • Laura Jean Libbey
... should work nor scheme for the position that such a change might bring me. Nevertheless, believing, as I do, that we are on the threshold of a new and entirely different era in this country, if the time should come when I felt that I, as its most highly trained servant, could best serve the United States by taking her destinies entirely into my own hands, ...
— Senator North • Gertrude Atherton
... the door was opened, and Maryanne Brown entered the room. "Father," she said, as soon as her foot was over the threshold of the door; but then seeing that Mr. Brown was not alone, she stopped herself. There was an angry spot on her cheeks, and it was manifest from the tone of her voice that she was about to address her father in anger. "Oh, George; ...
— The Struggles of Brown, Jones, and Robinson - By One of the Firm • Anthony Trollope
... returned to the photograph of Toledo, which seemed to him the most arresting picture of them all. He could not take his eyes off it. He felt strangely that he was on the threshold of some new discovery in life. He was tremulous with a sense of adventure. He thought for an instant of the love that had consumed him: love seemed very trivial beside the excitement which now leaped in his heart. The picture he looked at was a long one, with houses crowded upon ...
— Of Human Bondage • W. Somerset Maugham
... chastising hand, for, however my will might incline me, Service were none—the Olympian's grasp is not easy to strive with. Once on a time my resistance avail'd not, when seizing me tightly, Here by the foot, I was hurl'd sheer down from the heavenly threshold! Down through the livelong day was I borne from the dawn to the sunset, Till upon Lemnos I fell, and but little of breath was remaining, When of the Sintian men I was kindly received at my falling." So did he speak, and with smiles was he heard by majestical ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 367, May 1846 • Various
... She turned back on the threshold of the kitchen door through which her work had been taking her to and fro during Garth's outbreak. Her voice was monotonous and smothered; it had its share ...
— Snow-Blind • Katharine Newlin Burt
... Cleveland kept his quarters. The light shone into our eyes through a drawn blind which told nothing; and Margery was dragging me forward to knock at the door when it opened and two men stepped quickly across the threshold and passed down the lane. They crossed the bar of light swiftly and were gone into the dark; and they trod softly—so softly that we listened ...
— The Laird's Luck • Arthur Quiller-Couch
... hangs from forest boughs. This was tied with knots of red bittersweet berries; the feathers of sea-birds were also displayed on the walls, and chains of their delicate-coloured eggs were hanging there. Caius had not stepped across the threshold before he began to suspect that he had passed from the region of the real ...
— The Mermaid - A Love Tale • Lily Dougall
... kettle of hominy hanging, for all fugitives and pursuers from any nation on the continent to partake. All fugitives, irrespective of their nationalities, fleeing for life, from their enemy, when once their feet touch the threshold of the fort, their life is safe; then the Queen conducts him or them into one end of her house, which is lengthwise east and west, with a door at each end and a partition in the center of the room by a curtain made of deer skin, ...
— Legends, Traditions, and Laws of the Iroquois, or Six Nations, and History of the Tuscarora Indians • Elias Johnson
... disturbed by puny passers-by. But his once popular folio was the life work of a particularly interesting and human person; and without affecting to penetrate to the darkest corners of the cavern, it may be instructive to stand a little while on the threshold. ...
— Gossip in a Library • Edmund Gosse
... door, which contained the remains of the bravest and the best, Bruce stood for a moment on the threshold. At the further end of the apartment, lighted by a solitary taper, lay the body of Wallace on a bier, covered with a soldier's cloak. Kneeling by its side, with her head on its bosom, was Helen. Her hair hung disordered over her shoulders, and shrouded ...
— The Scottish Chiefs • Miss Jane Porter
... the lightest footfalls: strong and clear, Basilio; light and irregular, Crispin—thus she mused. The kalao called in the woods several times after the rain had ceased, but still her sons did not come. She put the fishes inside the pot to keep them warm and went to the threshold of the hut to look toward the road. To keep herself company, she began to sing in a low voice, a voice usually so sweet and tender that when her sons listened to her singing the kundiman they wept without ...
— The Social Cancer - A Complete English Version of Noli Me Tangere • Jose Rizal
... the storm and at length, somewhat breathless, reached my house in the Cheap where the garlands of autumn flowers and greenery that I had caused to be wreathed from posts before the door were all torn away by the gale. Here I welcomed my wife as best I could, kissing her as she crossed the threshold and saying certain sweet words that I had prepared, to which she smiled an answer. Then the women took her to her chamber to make herself ready and afterwards came the feast, which was sumptuous of its sort, though the evil weather kept ...
— The Virgin of the Sun • H. R. Haggard
... he goes north he arrives only at Newfoundland or Nova Scotia; if he puts out to southward, the first land that he finds is the Bermudas. If he makes for Europe, it is generally at Liverpool or Southampton that he disembarks. On his very threshold in all directions, lies land over which floats the Union Jack and the same flag flies over half the vessels in the harbours of his ...
— The Twentieth Century American - Being a Comparative Study of the Peoples of the Two Great - Anglo-Saxon Nations • H. Perry Robinson
... almost an old woman!... Oh, I know it, I know it. You don't have to tell me. You and I are of the same age; but you are a man; and I'm a woman. And the way I've lived has added considerably to my years. You are still on the very threshold of life. I've been knocking about the world since I was sixteen, from one theatre to another. And my accursed disposition, my mania for concealing nothing, for refusing to lie, has helped make me worse than I really am. I have many enemies in this world who are just ...
— The Torrent - Entre Naranjos • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... citizen must begin at the cradle, and be continued through the plastic period of boyhood and carried forward by his parents, until the youth crosses his native threshold to act his part and assume his responsibilities in the broader field of his ...
— The True Citizen, How To Become One • W. F. Markwick, D. D. and W. A. Smith, A. B.
... the first look between the lady of his dreams and his erstwhile college associate, that the hour had come that he had dreaded. Silvia Holland had at last met a man whom, consciously or unconsciously, she acknowledged king. His rival was there, upon the threshold of her life, and he was a rival to be feared. That he might also be a rival in his profession, that he was so rich that he was far above the straits in which Morris found himself more and more frequently involved, only added to the flame that consumed him; ...
— An American Suffragette • Isaac N. Stevens
... she had never seen anything so horrible as the sight that greeted her when she pushed the door wide open, and stood on the threshold of the crofter's home. ...
— Little Folks - A Magazine for the Young (Date of issue unknown) • Various
... you that, in the belief that she was to enjoy a free lunch, my beloved yoke-fellow, who is just now very hot upon economy, forewent her breakfast and arrived upon your threshold faint and ravening, you will conceive the emotion with which she hailed the realization that that same hunger which she had encouraged could only be ...
— Jonah and Co. • Dornford Yates
... within as a notable and stirring woman could make it. Joe's daughter-in-law, the same described by Joe the other evening as the woman of a high spirit, was to-day absent on an errand to the town; and Edith, who loved children, stopped at the threshold to notice two or three little curly-headed prattlers, who were playing together at grotto making, an amusement which cost grandfather many a half-penny. Some dispute seemed to have arisen at the moment of their entrance between the young builders, for a good-humoured, plain-looking girl, ...
— Emilie the Peacemaker • Mrs. Thomas Geldart
... door opened and her husband appeared on the threshold. As he did so she turned swiftly so that only part of the left side of her ...
— The Woman With The Fan • Robert Hichens
... Blake An Ode on the Spring Thomas Gray Spring Henry Timrod The Meadows in Spring Edward Fitzgerald The Spring William Barnes "When Spring Comes Back to England" Alfred Noyes New Life Amelia Josephine Burr "Over the Wintry Threshold" Bliss Carman March William Morris Song in March William Gilmore Simms March Nora Hopper Written in March William Wordsworth The Passing of March Robert Burns Wilson Home Thoughts, from Abroad Robert Browning Song, "April, April" William Watson An April Adoration Charles G. D. Roberts ...
— The Home Book of Verse, Vol. 2 (of 4) • Various
... in dressing-gown and slippers, came thumping hastily down-stairs, in response to Bressant's summons. The strange solemnity in the latter's tone, no less than the ominousness of the hour, probably gave him premonition of some disaster. He reached the threshold of the room, and paused a moment there, settling his spectacles with trembling fingers, and looking from one silent face to another. The room was lighted only by the declining moon, which shone coldly through the windows. The bed, and that which was on it, were in ...
— Bressant • Julian Hawthorne
... Danforth to the door. The poor boy looked quite embarrassed to behold pretty, neat Ellen Williams standing there on the miserable, dirty threshold. "Good day, Willie," said she, pleasantly; "is your mother ...
— Eventide - A Series of Tales and Poems • Effie Afton
... He halted on the threshold of that inner room. If the old house below had seemed filled with rosy effulgence, this was the heart of the rose. Two small white beds were side by side in an alcove. Their covers were of pink overlaid with lace, and the chintz of the big couch and chairs reflected the same enchanting hue. ...
— Contrary Mary • Temple Bailey
... gent I told you of," said he, nodding in the direction of a hawk-faced little man smoking a vile cigar, who was sitting with his feet upon a table. "I'll leave you alone," he added, and sauntering across the threshold, took his stand in front of the ...
— The Confessions of Artemas Quibble • Arthur Train
... the Virginian's threshold, he said plaintively, "I reckon I am a dunce." And he sued for pardon. "When I waked up," he said, "I was ashamed of myself for a plumb half-hour." Nor could she doubt this day that he meant what he said. ...
— The Virginian - A Horseman Of The Plains • Owen Wister
... but stood near the window gazing up at the mountains. She was dressed in some rich soft stuff, and wore at her breast a bunch of wild-flowers. I had never seen her so beautiful. I did not wonder that Craig paused with his foot upon the threshold to look at her. She turned and saw us. With a glad cry, 'Oh! my darling; you have come to me,' she came with outstretched arms. I turned and fled, but the cry and the ...
— Black Rock • Ralph Connor
... in Philadelphia, tickets in hand, marshaling them to their respective seats in the cars as if born to command, and on arriving at Germantown, transferred them to carriages in waiting, with the promptness of a railroad official. Without noise or confusion one and all crossed the threshold of her well-ordered mansion, and with other invited guests were soon seated in the spacious parlor, talking in groups here and there. "Ah!" said Mrs. Smith on entering, "this will never do, think of all the good things that will be lost in these side talks. My plan is ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume III (of III) • Various
... of eternal friendship. It seems she is one of your authoresses, that you first foster, and then upbraid us with. But I forgive you. "The rogue has given me potions to make me love him." Well; go she would not, nor step a step over our threshold, till we had promised to come and drink tea with her next night. I had never seen her before, and could not tell who the devil it was that was so familiar. We went, however, not to be impolite. ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb, Vol. 5 • Edited by E. V. Lucas
... finish. The commodore knew it, and sat with bowed head in his gaunt arms, wondering, wondering. Slowly his body began to sway; he muttered something, slid forward on his face, and lay still. And as he lay there on the threshold of the unknown he dreamed that the Maggie II came into view around the headland, a bone in her teeth and every stitch of canvas flying. He saw her luff up into the wind and hang there shivering; a moment later her sails came down ...
— Captain Scraggs - or, The Green-Pea Pirates • Peter B. Kyne
... over, M'Adam turned, breathless, away. At the threshold of the room he stopped and looked round: a little, dim-lit, devilish figure, framed in the door; while from the blackness behind, Red ...
— Bob, Son of Battle • Alfred Ollivant
... suddenly the coming of something acutely impending; I took my courage in my hands and went boldly forward. In another moment I had hold of the mysterious secret of masculine energy, to which all my years of dilirious imaginings had been but as a waiting at the threshold, the ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 2 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis
... flew open almost before Rudolf had stopped knocking, but there was nothing very alarming about the person who stood on the threshold. Ann said afterward she had thought at first it was a Miss Spriggins who came sometimes to sew for her mother, but it was not; it was only a very large gray goose neatly dressed in blue and white bed-ticking, with a large white apron tied round her waist and wearing big spectacles ...
— The Wonderful Bed • Gertrude Knevels
... slowly, and there appeared on the threshold an old woman holding up a candle to her face, which was so hideous that the boy involuntarily stepped backwards, almost as frightened by the troop of lizards, beetles and such creatures that surrounded her, ...
— The Orange Fairy Book • Andrew Lang
... beat under a gingham gown. Pretty Ruth was chopping the mince, and singing so gaily as she worked that the four-and-twenty immortal blackbirds could not have put more music into a pie than she did. Saul was piling wood into the big oven, and Sophie paused a moment on the threshold to look at him, for she always enjoyed the sight of this stalwart cousin, whom she likened to a Norse viking, with his fair hair and beard, keen blue eyes, and six feet of manly height, with shoulders that looked broad and strong enough ...
— Kitty's Class Day And Other Stories • Louisa M. Alcott
... all the world knew that he loved her with a mad love—he had sold farms to buy her gowns. It was he that had brought her to Court, upon an ass, at Greenwich, when her mule—as all men knew—had stumbled upon the threshold. Once before, it was said, Culpepper had burst in with his sword drawn upon the King and Kate Howard when they sat together. And Lascelles trembled with eagerness at the thought of what use he might not make of this mad and insolent lover ...
— The Fifth Queen Crowned • Ford Madox Ford
... full of fear, making his rounds with Abimelech, hears the voice of Jeremiah, and recognises it as the voice of the one who wished to hold him back on the threshold of the declaration of war. He would pay heed now, could the decision be made over again. Jeremiah assures him that it is never too late to ask peace. Zedekiah is unwilling to be the first to move. What if his proposals ...
— The Forerunners • Romain Rolland
... reminiscences of Southampton when he was only seventeen or eighteen. {143a} But Shakespeare, already worn in worldly experience, passed his thirtieth birthday in 1594, and he probably tended, when on the threshold of middle life, to exaggerate the youthfulness of the nobleman almost ten years his junior, who even later impressed his acquaintances by his boyish appearance and disposition. {143b} 'Young' was the epithet invariably applied ...
— A Life of William Shakespeare - with portraits and facsimiles • Sidney Lee
... black goat which bore on his back the body of the King, and that the goat had spoken to him. On that same day Red William our King, the Conqueror's son, died of a secret arrow while he hunted in a forest. "This is a cross matter," said De Aquila, "to meet on the threshold of a journey. If Red William be dead I may have to fight for my lands. ...
— Puck of Pook's Hill • Rudyard Kipling
... Katharine?" asked the colonel, as he stood, tall and commanding, on the threshold, later that evening, surveying eight small Hollanders, looking so much alike, except for the difference in their sizes, that they might have passed for eight Dutch dolls propped up in a ...
— Boys and Girls Bookshelf; a Practical Plan of Character Building, Volume I (of 17) - Fun and Thought for Little Folk • Various
... threshold; he would gladly have pressed my hand... and, had I shown the slightest desire to embrace him, he would have thrown himself upon my neck; but I remained cold as a rock—and he left ...
— A Hero of Our Time • M. Y. Lermontov
... to the room-door, which I opened, and peered into the passage, nearly faint with horror lest some leering, shapeless thing should greet me upon the threshold. ...
— The Purcell Papers - Volume III. (of III.) • Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu
... more than one motion from her bed to the door, which the same impulse flung open and let her crush to her breast the little tumult of sobs and moans from the threshold. ...
— Annie Kilburn - A Novel • W. D. Howells
... had reserved from the provisions set before him, and prepared to carry them to his concealed guest. He did not think it necessary to take a light, being perfectly acquainted with every turn of the road; and it was lucky he did not do so, for he had hardly stepped beyond the threshold ere a heavy trampling of horses announced, that the body of cavalry, whose kettle-drums [Note: Regimental music is never played at night. But who can assure us that such was not the custom in Charles the Second's time? Till I ...
— Old Mortality, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott
... and imaginative sympathy. How can a little boy guess that some of the most beautiful stories in the world lie hid among a mass of wriggling consonants, or what a garden lurks behind the iron gate, with [Greek: blosko] and [Greek: moloumai] to guard the threshold? ...
— Joyous Gard • Arthur Christopher Benson
... inspiration, or even clearly to discern it, he becomes aware of the approach of that long-invoked idea. A mingled joy and terror warn him that before another day, another hour have passed, the inspiration shall have crossed the threshold of his soul and flooded it with its rapture. All day I had felt the need of isolation and quiet, and at nightfall I went for a row on the most solitary part of the lagoon. All things seemed to tell that I ...
— Hauntings • Vernon Lee |
