"Corpulency" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... smoky lamps which burnt but dimly in the shop itself, as though its plethora sat heavy on their lungs; and glancing, then, at one of the two faces by the parlour-fire; Trotty had small difficulty in recognising in the stout old lady, Mrs. Chickenstalker: always inclined to corpulency, even in the days when he had known her as established in the general line, and having a small balance against him in ...
— The Chimes • Charles Dickens
... Provence, for it seemed a fair one to which none of his warlike neighbours could object. Moreover, it was even generous, coming as it did from Aldobrandino, who, though he had been a doughty knight in his day, could now scarcely sit his saddle for corpulency or aim a straight ...
— Romance of Roman Villas - (The Renaissance) • Elizabeth W. (Elizbeth Williams) Champney
... already described Mr John Forster's character; we have now only to introduce his person. Mr John Forster was about the middle height, rather inclined to corpulency, but with great show of muscular strength. His black nether garments and silk stockings fitted a leg which might have been envied by a porter, and his breadth of shoulder was extreme. He had a slouch, probably contracted by long poring over the desk; and his address was as abrupt as his ...
— Newton Forster • Frederick Marryat
... meditation or contemplative studies. The ideal did not worry him in the least; and when he had said his mass, read his breviary, confessed the devout sinners and visited the sick, he gave the rest of his time to profane but respectable amusements. He was of robust temperament, with a tendency to corpulency, which he fought against by taking considerable exercise; his face was round and good-natured, his calm gray eyes reflected the tranquillity and uprightness of his soul, and his genial nature was shown in his full smiling mouth, his thick, ...
— A Woodland Queen, Complete • Andre Theuriet
... have gradually lost a large portion of my surplus fat, my weight having gone down some twenty pounds, and my size being reduced by several inches at the point where corpulency was the most prominent; and I am still losing weight and ...
— The No Breakfast Plan and the Fasting-Cure • Edward Hooker Dewey
... danger to himself, but to some one, and perhaps to several, of his fellow beings. Children as early as the age of four may acquire the art; none are too young, none too old. Doctors recommend swimming as the best all-around exercise. It is especially beneficial to nervous people. Swimming reduces corpulency, improves the figure, expands the lungs, improves the circulation of the blood, builds up general health, increases vitality, gives self-confidence in case of danger, and exercises all the muscles in the body at one time. As an aid to development of the muscular system, it excels other ...
— Swimming Scientifically Taught - A Practical Manual for Young and Old • Frank Eugen Dalton and Louis C. Dalton
... on the former side, and causes us to regard, with a peculiar indulgence, all tendency to modesty and self-diffidence; as esteeming the danger less of falling into any vicious extreme of that nature. It is thus in countries where men's bodies are apt to exceed in corpulency, personal beauty is placed in a much greater degree of slenderness, than in countries where that is the most usual defect. Being so often struck with instances of one species of deformity, men think they can never keep at too great a distance ...
— An Enquiry Concerning the Principles of Morals • David Hume
... now besought, urged, even commanded me to make my escape at any rate, which, as I was young, I might easily do; as for herself, she said, her age and corpulency rendered all attempts of that sort impossible; however, she would willingly meet death if she could have the satisfaction of seeing that she was not the occasion of mine. But I absolutely refused to leave her, and, taking her by the ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 03 • Various
... whether the occasion justified the expenditure of ten cents for a drink when a hand was placed on his shoulder, and a voice said, "Have one with me, neighbour." He found himself addressed by a man of about his own age, shorter and somewhat lighter of frame and with a growing hint of corpulence. The stranger wore a good pepper-and-salt suit, and the stone on his ...
— The Homesteaders - A Novel of the Canadian West • Robert J. C. Stead
... his faultless right hand—and oddly enough his great corpulence did not extend in the slightest degree to his hand, but stopped short at the wrists—and stroked his immense chin. His skin was like Lou Macon's, except that in place of the white-flower bloom his was a parchment, dead pallor. He lowered his hand with the same slow precision ...
— Gunman's Reckoning • Max Brand
... a broad red divan, the cushions of which were considerably the worse for wear. Such was the bureau of the Deftendar Effendi, who sat surrounded with papers, and the implements of writing. He was a man apparently of fifty-five years of age, slightly inclining to corpulence, with a very short neck, surmounted by large features, coarsely chiselled; but not devoid of a certain intelligence in his eye, and dignity in general effect. He spoke English with a correct accent, but slowly, ...
— Servia, Youngest Member of the European Family • Andrew Archibald Paton
... speed; but a violet has no business whatever to run anywhere, being appointed to stay where it was born, in extremely contented (if not secluded) places. "Half-hidden from the eye?"—no; but desiring attention, or extension, or corpulence, or connection with anybody else's ...
— Proserpina, Volume 2 - Studies Of Wayside Flowers • John Ruskin
... alone in the cleanly kept room which she and her husband occupied. Madame Toussaint was a portly woman, whose corpulence increased in spite of everything, whether it were worry or fasting. She had a round puffy face with bright little eyes; and was a very worthy woman, whose only faults were an inclination for gossiping and a fondness ...
— The Three Cities Trilogy, Complete - Lourdes, Rome and Paris • Emile Zola
... put her face through an opening to be photographed, in consideration of another present."[92] As a consequence of their long enforced idleness in the shade the girls grow fat and their dusky complexion bleaches to a more pallid hue. Both their corpulence and their pallor ...
— Balder The Beautiful, Vol. I. • Sir James George Frazer
... sufficiently solved the riddle of that corpse. But the ship, perfect in all respects, was like a stroke of magic. She lay with a slight list or inclination to larboard, but on the whole tolerably upright, owing to the corpulence of her bilge. The hollow or ravine that formed her bed went with a sharp incline under her stern to the sea, which was visible from the top of the cliffs here through the split in the rocks. The shelving of the ice put the wash of the ocean at a distance of ...
— The Frozen Pirate • W. Clark Russell
... will describe to you the retired General-major Vyatcheslav Ilarionovitch Hvalinsky. Picture to yourselves a tall and once slender man, now inclined to corpulence, but not in the least decrepit or even elderly, a man of ripe age; in his very prime, as they say. It is true the once regular and even now rather pleasing features of his face have undergone some change; his cheeks are flabby; there are close wrinkles like rays ...
— A Sportsman's Sketches - Works of Ivan Turgenev, Vol. I • Ivan Turgenev
... shape and are clean-limbed, receive still greater ease and grace from it; while at the same time, it prevents the gathering of those gross and foggy humors which in time form a disagreeable and inconvenient corpulence. On the other hand, those whose make and constitution occasion a kind of heavy proportion, whose muscular texture is not distinct, whose necks are short, shoulders round, chest narrow, and who, in short are, what may be called, ...
— A Treatise on the Art of Dancing • Giovanni-Andrea Gallini
... details to the doctor, who did not curse his corpulence the less for that. He wished to judge for himself about ...
— The English at the North Pole - Part I of the Adventures of Captain Hatteras • Jules Verne
... have singular ideas of feminine perfection. The gracefulness of figure and motion, and a countenance enlivened by expression, are by no means essential points in their standard. With them corpulence and beauty appear to be terms nearly synonymous. A woman of even moderate pretensions must be one who cannot walk without a slave under each arm to support her; and a perfect beauty is a load for a camel. In consequence of this ...
— Travels in the Interior of Africa - Volume 1 • Mungo Park
... tall and bulky, inclined to corpulence, which he did not lessen by much exercise; for he was very sluggish and sedentary, rose late, and when he had risen, sat down to his books or papers. A woman that once waited on him in a lodging, ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson, LL.D. in Nine Volumes - Volume the Eighth: The Lives of the Poets, Volume II • Samuel Johnson
... a man of about three-and-forty,—dark-eyed, sallow, with short, prominent features, a massive conformation of jaw, and thick, sensual, but resolute lips; this man was the Prince di —. His form, above the middle height, and rather inclined to corpulence, was clad in a loose dressing-robe of rich brocade. On a table before him lay an old-fashioned sword and hat, a mask, dice and dice-box, a portfolio, and an inkstand ...
— Zanoni • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... which the Duchess was reduced, she again bethought herself of a special mission to Spain. At the end of the year (1564), it was determined that Egmont should be the envoy. Montigny excused himself on account of private affairs; Marquis Berghen "because of his indisposition and corpulence." There was a stormy debate in council after Egmont had accepted the mission and immediately before his departure. Viglius had been ordered to prepare the Count's instructions. Having finished the rough draught, he laid it before the board. The paper was conceived in general terms and might mean ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... on the 22d, we sent our water-casks ashore and filled them with excellent water. At about noon his sable majesty paid us another visit, accompanied by his three wives and his favorite minister. These females were of an extraordinary corpulence, and of unmeasured size. They were dressed in the fashion of the country, having nothing but a piece of tapa, or bark-cloth, about two yards long, passed round the hips and falling to the knees. We resumed the negotiations ...
— Narrative of a Voyage to the Northwest Coast of America in the years 1811, 1812, 1813, and 1814 or the First American Settlement on the Pacific • Gabriel Franchere
... other side," Mr. Foster affirmed emphatically, his corpulence seeming to give weight to the dictum as he threw himself forward in ...
— Quisante • Anthony Hope
... that gentleman. He was about fifty-two years old; a great tyrant in his little way; a compound of ignorance, selfishness, cant, and conceit. He knew nothing on earth except the price of his goods, and how to make the most of his business. He was of middle size, with a tendency to corpulence; and almost invariably wore a black coat and waistcoat, a white neck handkerchief very primly tied, and gray trousers. He had a dull, gray eye, with white eyelashes, and no eyebrows; a forehead which seemed ashamed ...
— Ten Thousand a-Year. Volume 1. • Samuel Warren
... decked of summer's pride With spots of gold and purple, azure and green: These, as a line, their long dimension drew, Streaking the ground with sinuous trace; not all Minims of nature; some of serpent-kind, Wonderous in length and corpulence, involved Their snaky folds, and added wings. First crept The parsimonious emmet, provident Of future; in small room large heart enclosed; Pattern of just equality perhaps Hereafter, joined in her popular tribes Of commonalty: Swarming next appeared The female bee, that feeds her ...
— Paradise Lost • John Milton
... formed a picture of contentment in complete harmony with the scene of which he was a part. This was Oliver Whyte, the owner of the house and garden, which he had christened, in true Australian fashion, "The Mia-Mia." He was a man of about sixty, short and thick-set in appearance with a tendency to corpulence. His character was written in his fine open face, clean-shaven save for a ring of white hair that set his honest countenance in an oval frame; was felt as one listened to the tones of his rough, good-natured voice. He was joined by an elderly ...
— Australia Revenged • Boomerang
... Quincey's sketch of him in 1807:—"In height he seemed about five feet eight inches, in reality he was an inch and a half taller.[K] His person was broad and full, and tended even to corpulence; his complexion was fair, though not what painters technically call fair, because it was associated with black hair; his eyes were soft and large in their expression, and it was by a peculiar appearance of haze or dimness ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 88, February, 1865 • Various
... sophisticated state of human nature and human society. In those juicy quarters and surloins of beef and those fat porcine carcasses the vegetable-eater, Grahamite or Brahmin, sees nothing but the cause of beastly appetites, scrofula, apoplexy, corpulence, cheeks flushed with ungovernable propensities, tendencies downward toward the plane of the lower animals, bloodshot eyes, swollen veins, impure blood, violent passions, fetid breath, stertorous respiration, sudden death,—in fact, ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 101, March, 1866 • Various
... the Duke's stately stature, which was needed to give grace and dignity to a strength otherwise cumbrous and graceless. And indeed, since William's visit to England, his athletic shape had lost much of its youthful symmetry, though not yet deformed by that corpulence which was a disease almost as rare in ...
— Harold, Complete - The Last Of The Saxon Kings • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... wrought in mosaic, advanced toward the valley of Ardres. No man, from personal inclinations or personal qualities, was better calculated to sustain his part in a brilliant ceremonial such as then struck the eyes of the spectators. An admirable horseman, tall and muscular, slightly inclined to corpulence, with a red beard and ruddy countenance, Henry VIII was at this time, by the admission of his rivals, the most comely and commanding prince of his age. Closely attending on the King was Sir Henry Guilford, the master of the horse, leading a spare charger, not less splendidly ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 9 • Various
... and died of sickness. Chares informs us that he was kept in confinement for seven months, in order that he might be tried in the presence of Aristotle himself, but that during the time when Alexander was wounded in India, he died of excessive corpulence, covered with vermin. ...
— Plutarch's Lives Volume III. • Plutarch
... he resembled Ben Jonson in extreme corpulence, and proposed him for the model of dramatic writing, seems to have affected the coarse and inelegant debauchery of his prototype. He lived chiefly in taverns, was a gross sensualist in his habits, and brutal in his conversation. His fine ...
— The Works Of John Dryden, Vol. 7 (of 18) - The Duke of Guise; Albion and Albanius; Don Sebastian • John Dryden
... still further, for without money there could be no journey to St. Petersburg. And then there were losses of time, which he regretted but could not avoid, such as having to pose for David of Angers, who was modelling his monumental bust; having to take long walks, in order to keep down his growing corpulence; and inviting a few friends to Le Rocher de Cancale, Victor Hugo and Leon Gozlan, in order to entertain a Russian, M. de Lenz, who wished to meet him,—a sumptuous and lively dinner which cost him a hundred and twenty ...
— Honor de Balzac • Albert Keim and Louis Lumet
... man. And with him the commercial spirit of the age. Enter the clink of coin and the unctuous corpulence of a roll of bills. Enter the essence of self-satisfaction, the glorious spectacle of a man who spells "myself" with ...
— From a Girl's Point of View • Lilian Bell
... seat, bracing her feet against the driving iron, while Mary, reaching up, tucked the dust-rug neatly about her skirts. Patch—whose looks and figure unmistakably declared his calling—short-legged and stocky, inclining to corpulence yet nimble on his feet, clean shaven, Napoleonic of countenance, passed reins and whip into her hands as Tolling, the groom, ...
— Deadham Hard • Lucas Malet
... had it been removed. There was a French bronze group representing a duel with swords, fought by a couple of very fat toads, one of them (characterised by that particular buoyancy which belongs to corpulence) in the act of making a prodigious lunge forward, which the other receives in the very middle of his digestive apparatus, and under the influence of which it seems likely that he will satisfy the wounded honour of his opponent by promptly expiring. There was another bronze figure which always ...
— The Life of Charles Dickens, Vol. I-III, Complete • John Forster
... let us go upstairs. How glad I am," Maslenikoff began excitedly, seizing Nekhludoff by the arm, and, notwithstanding his corpulence, nimbly leading him up the stairs. Maslenikoff was in a particularly happy mood, which Nekhludoff could not help ascribing to the attention shown him by the important person. Every attention shown him by an important ...
— The Awakening - The Resurrection • Leo Nikoleyevich Tolstoy
... chevalier, intending to relate his new adventure in all its details, invited some of his friends to sup with him at the pastrycook Lecoq's. This man, who was a brother of the famous Lecoq of the rue Montorgueil, was the cleverest eating-house-keeper in Avignon; his own unusual corpulence commended his cookery, and, when he stood at the door, constituted an advertisement for his restaurant. The good man, knowing with what delicate appetites he had to deal, did his very best that evening, and that nothing might be wanting, waited upon his guests himself. They spent the ...
— Celebrated Crimes, Complete • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... standing, and gazing about him, a man whom I shall describe. In height he might seem to be above five feet eight: (he was in reality about an inch and a half taller;) his person was broad and full, and tended even to corpulence: his complexion was fair, though not what painters technically style fair, because it was associated with black hair: his eyes were large and soft in their expression: and it was from the peculiar appearance of haze or dreaminess, which mixed ...
— Biographia Epistolaris, Volume 1. • Coleridge, ed. Turnbull
... continued to be heavily in debt, partly because of lavish extravagance, which was one expression of his inherited reckless wilfulness. Throughout his life he was obliged to make the most heroic efforts to keep in check another inherited tendency, to corpulence; he generally restricted his diet almost entirely to such meager fare as potatoes and soda-water, though he often broke out also into ...
— A History of English Literature • Robert Huntington Fletcher
... juvenile poems; and although they were remarkable for a young man of twenty, they were not of sufficient merit to attract the attention of the public. At this time he was abstemious in eating, wishing to reduce a tendency to corpulence. He could practise self-denial if it were to make his person attractive, especially to ladies. Nor was he idle. His reading, if desultory, was vast; and from the list of books which his biographer has noted it would seem that ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume XIII • John Lord
... continual successes of the French armies overrunning Europe forbade the duke to keep up his retinue of artists. But he secured Weber a post at Stuttgart as private secretary to his brother, Ludwig, another younger brother of the King of Wuertemberg, a monster of corpulence, who had to have his dining-table made crescent-wise that he might get near enough to eat. Into the circle of these two unlovable figures and their ...
— The Love Affairs of Great Musicians, Volume 1 • Rupert Hughes
... more like a silver penny than a genius. It was a neat fiddle-faddle bit of sterling, that had read good books, and kept good company; but was too trifling for use, and only fit to please a child."—On Dr. Nash's first volume of 'Worcestershire': "It is a folio of prodigious corpulence, and yet dry enough; but it is finely dressed with many heads and views." He characterises Pennant; "He is not one of our plodders (alluding to Gough); rather the other extreme; his corporal spirits (for I cannot call them animal) do not allow him ...
— Calamities and Quarrels of Authors • Isaac D'Israeli
... to corpulence, the result of sedentary life; she had round shoulders and very short legs. Her face would not have been disagreeable but for its spoilt complexion; the homely features, if health had but rounded and ...
— The Odd Women • George Gissing
... a burden to her, and she entrusts them as far as possible to the housekeeper. Altogether she finds country life very tiresome, but, possessing that placid, philosophical temperament which seems to have some casual connection with corpulence, she submits without murmuring, and tries to lighten a little the unavoidable monotony by paying visits and receiving visitors. The neighbours within a radius of twenty miles are, with few exceptions, more or less of the Ivan Ivan'itch ...
— Russia • Donald Mackenzie Wallace
... rich but respectable parents; called, with no uncertain voice, to the Bar in 1894; of a weighty corpulence and stormy visage, Mr. Jones now settles himself in his arm-chair to hear and determine all this business about Absalom Adkins and the Boots. How admirably impressive is Mr. Jones's typically English absence of hysteria, his calm, his restfulness. Indeed, ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 159, November 24, 1920 • Various
... Sylvia was so used to him that, like the others of her circle, she accepted, indeed hardly noticed, his somewhat startling eccentricities, his dirty linen, his face and hands to match, his shapeless garments hanging loosely over the flabby corpulence of his uncomely old body, his beery breath. To her, old Reinhardt was but the queer external symbol of a never-failing enchantment. Through the pleasant harmonious give-and-take of the other instruments, the voice of his violin vibrated with the ...
— The Bent Twig • Dorothy Canfield |
