Sweeping

“ Now, for years past, he has remarked that the small sweeps, who mount so glibly to the top of the flue, rarely do anything but make a noise—they scream and shout for ten minutes, or so, and then come down, with their eyes red, and their noses bloody, and cry themselves sick, till they get bread-and-butter. ”

“ Descending with a sweep, which, though majestic, is yet soft and gentle, it seems about to sink upon the waves, when, almost as it touches them, it glides again softly upwards, to descend once more in the same manner. Thus, ever rising and sinking, seeming always about to rest, yet never resting, it glides, tireless, and seems to coquet with the sea. On land, too, these wide circling sweeps had had a grace and charm, but it had not entirely pleased the eye. ”

“ But it is no more discreditable for a scavenger to be dirty than for a deep-sea diver to be wet. A sweep is no more disgraced when he is covered with soot than Michael Angelo when he is covered with clay, or Bayard when he is covered with blood. ”

“ PLAIN SEWING; OR, HOW TO ENCOURAGE THE POOR.
"Do you know of any poor body who does plain sewing?" asked Mrs. Lander of a neighbour upon whom she called for the particular purpose of making this inquiry. "I have a good deal of work that I want done, and I always like to give my plain sewing to people that need it."
"I think I know of a person who will suit you," replied Mrs. Brandon, the lady to whom the application had been made. "She is a poor widow woman, with four children dependent upon her for support. She sews neatly. ”

“ As the feeling of heat, for example, is the last psychic antecedent of sweating, as the feeling of bright light is that of the pupil's contraction, as the sight or smell of carrion is that of the movements of disgust, as the remembrance of a blunder may be that of a blush, so the idea of a movement's sensible effects might be that of the movement itself. It is true that the idea of sweating will not commonly make us sweat, nor that of blushing make us blush. ”

“ WHEN Persons grew no better for Sweating, but weaker, and the Distemper higher, it was judged fatal.
FOR after Nature had made such an Effort to expel the Venom to no Purpose, all Hopes of Recovery could not but vanish. A great Expence of Spirit, and a general Decay of Strength, must be the Consequence of such a Wast; and a Continuance of Sweat likewise brings on a dangerous Colliquatation, or is a Sign of it; and those hot sharp Sweats, which vesicate the Skin, are also to be suspected: Moreover, it is very hazardous when cold Sweats come after such hot ones. ”

“ Sweat, and the blood which flows down with it, dim their eves, so that they can hardly see a thing; and very often they missed their blows, like men who did not see to wield their swords upon each other. ”

“ In all, 120 sweepers bathe weekly, or about a seventh of the entire working body. The increase at the three baths last mentioned, in sweepers bathing, is from 5 to 10 per cent.
Among the lower-class sweepers there are but few who wash themselves even once throughout the year. They eat, drink, and sleep in the same state of filth and dirt as when engaged in their daily avocation. Others, however, among the better class are more cleanly in their habits, and wash themselves every night. ”

“ By and by we perceived what those super-delicate colors, and their continuous play and movement, reminded us of: it is what one sees in a soap-bubble that is drifting along, catching changes of tint from the objects it passes. A soap-bubble is the most beautiful thing, and the most exquisite, in nature: that lovely phantom fabric in the sky was suggestive of a soap-bubble split open, and spread out in the sun. ”

“ She can’t do her sewing decently, because she’s nervous. Why, I might have been as nervous as she is, if I’d have petted and coddled myself as she does. But I get up early, take a walk in the fresh air of a mile or so before breakfast, and come home feeling the better for it. I do all my own sewing,—never put out a stitch; and I flatter myself my things are made as they ought to be. I always make my boys’ shirts and Mr. ”

“ No; but we know why the sweep comes, and what he wants to do; whereas this little creature, which runs nobody knows how, and nobody knows from where, and which goes and returns hardly giving one time to see it.... In fact, mamma, many persons who are grown up are afraid of mice, but no one is afraid of a chimney-sweep. ”

“ The shivering sweep, who has just travelled through half a dozen stacks of chimneys, also quickens every motion of his weary little limbs, when he comes within sight of the destined breakfast, and beholds the reversionary heel of a loaf and roll of butter awaiting his arrival. ”

“ Spenser, Faërie Queene.... Honour, estate, and all this worlde’s good, For which men SWINCKE and sweat incessantly.
1891. Wrench, Winchester Word-Book, s.v. Swink.... The former [to sweat] is the primary Wykehamical meaning: SWINK and sweat have therefore changed places.
Swipes, subs. 1. (Stonyhurst) .—The boy-servant who serves out beer at dinner.
2. (Harrow) .—Supper.
To be swiped, verb. phr. (Harrow) .—To be birched.
Swish, verb (Eton and Charterhouse) .—To flog. Hence SWISHING = a beating. ”

“ She learned her letters as if by magic, and was very soon able to read plain reading; but the sewing was a more difficult matter. The creature was as lithe as a cat, and as active as a monkey, and the confinement of sewing was her abomination ”

“ The savage spurned the worthless rags, and perceiving that the shawl had already become a prize to another, his bantering but sullen smile changing to a gleam of ferocity, he dashed the head of the infant against a rock, and cast its quivering remains to her very feet. ”

“ Well; many years ago we began to be a steady and matter-of-fact sort of people, and dancing in spring being beneath our dignity, we gave it up, and in course of time it descended to the sweeps—a fall certainly, because, though sweeps are very good fellows in their way, and moreover very useful in a civilised community, they are not exactly the sort of people to give the tone to the little elegances of society. The sweeps, however, got the dancing to themselves, and they kept it up, and handed it down. ”

“ Large suction sweepers, worked by a powerful inhaling bellows, which swiftly and silently suck up, from carpet, furniture, and curtains, all particles of accumulated dust, are the perfected instruments chosen ”

“ Then with my hands I crumbled the dirt chunks into powder and carefully sifted, smoothed off, rolled, tumbled, and otherwise adjusted the net product.
Sweat is the fluid excreted from the sudoriferous glands of the skin.
The sudoriferous glands of Yours Truly worked overtime. Yours Truly excreted, exuded, flooded. To be swimming around in your own atmosphere is a novel and sometimes [Pg 62] pleasurable experience. ”

“ But healthy persons also subject themselves to the treatment. In this case the sole purpose of the sweating is obviously that of lustration. Just as we ourselves occasionally experience relief [Pg 253] from the flow of perspiration, so also may the one who has passed through the ceremony of the sweat-lodge feel himself reborn, as it were. ”

“ For sodenly a dedly and burnyng sweate inuaded their bodyes and vexed their bloud with a most ardent heat, infested the stomack and the head greuously: by the tormentyng and vexacion of which sicknes, men were so sore handled and so painfully pangued that if they were layed in their bed, beyng not hable to suffre the importunate heat, they cast away the shetes and all the clothes liyng on the bed. ”

“ The object of not attempting a full sweep is that the hands may come back easily, and without disturbing the water in front of the chest and checking progress, as they are apt to do. They should slip back, and then the thumbs being held naturally, just as you would lay your flat hand on the table, they do not meet with resistance as they do if held under the palm. ”

“ But, Excess of Sweating, is like other sorts of Fluxes, of which, some will scowr to death; others vomit to death; and others the like Fluxes will occasion
death; the like is of Sweating: so that the Sweating-Sickness is but like a Fluxive-Sickness. But, as I said, Regular Sweating is as necessary as other ordinary Evacuations: and as some are apt to be restringent, others laxative; and sometimes one and the same Man will be laxative, other times, costive; so are Men concerning Sweating: and as some Men take Medicines to purge by Stool, or Vomits, or Urine ”

“ A woman with a child in her arms came walking near the tree, carrying different sorts of roots and two fishes in her hands, which she held out to the savage, who, desirous to have them, descended a branch or two, but went back again. ”

“ The custom of swinging practised for various reasons. Swinging at harvest. The custom of swinging has been practised as a religious or rather magical rite in various parts of the world, but it does not seem possible to explain all the instances of it in the same way. People appear to have resorted to the practice from different motives and with different ideas of the benefit to be derived from it. ”

“ So lacking are these poor savages in any sufficient clothing, whether for day or night, that the children, we were assured, were habitually laid to sleep among the swine, in order to share the natural warmth of those beasts. In one abode only did we discover such convenience as a wooden chest. ”

“ Sweat, sweat, sweat! Work and sweat, cry and sweat, pray and sweat!" ”

“ THE CHIMNEY-SWEEPER When my mother died I was very young,
And my father sold me while yet my tongue
Could scarcely cry "Weep! weep! weep! weep!"
So your chimneys I sweep, and in soot I sleep. ”

“ Sometimes also these Swellings are like Trees, Fishes, Birds, or other sorts of Animals, according to the ardent desire that Women with Child have had for things that they cou'd not obtain when they longed for 'em. ”

“ Meaning unexplained.
sweam, faintness, attack of dizziness; ‘The slothfull sweames of sluggardye’, Mirror for Mag., Iago, Lenvoy, st. 1; ‘Sweam or swaim, subita aegrotatio’, Gouldman. ‘Sweem’ is a Somerset word for a state of giddiness or faintness, see EDD. (s.v. Swim, sb.2) . Cognate with OE. swīma, dizziness, giddiness (B. T.) . See sweme.
sweet-breasted, sweet-voiced, having a sweet voice. Beaumont and Fl., Love’s Cure, iii. 1 (Alguazier) .
swelt, to faint, swoon; ‘In weary woes to swelt’, Gascoigne (Nares) ; swelt, pt. t., Spenser, F. Q. iv. 7. 9; vi. 12. 21. ”

“ This Shewing was quick and life-like, and horrifying and dreadful, sweet and lovely. And of all the sight it was most comfort to me that our God and Lord that is so reverend and dreadful, is so homely and courteous: and this most fulfilled me with comfort and assuredness of soul. ”

“ My mother was kept very busy with her sewing; sometimes she would have another woman helping her. ”

“ So, naturalists observe, a flea Has smaller fleas that on him prey; And these have smaller still to bite 'em, And so proceed ad infinitum. Thus every poet, in his kind, Is bit by him that comes behind: Who, though too little to be seen, Can teaze, and gall, and give the spleen; ”

“ I saw four manner of dryings: the first was bloodlessness; the second was pain following after; the third, hanging up in the air, as men hang a cloth to dry; the fourth, that the bodily Kind asked liquid and there was no manner of comfort ministered to Him in all His woe and distress. Ah! hard and grievous was his pain, but much more hard and grievous it was when the moisture failed and began to dry thus, shrivelling.
These were the pains that shewed in the blessed head: the first wrought to the dying, while it had moisture; and that other, slow, with shrinking drying, [and] ”

“ In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread, Till thou return unto the ground; for thou Out of the ground wast taken, know thy birth, For dust thou art, and shalt to dust return. ”

“ "The Swallow is come!
The Swallow is come!
O fair are the seasons, and light
Are the days that she brings,
With her dusky wings,
And her bosom snowy white." ”

“ A SWALLOW, returning from abroad and especially fond of dwelling with men, built herself a nest in the wall of a Court of Justice and there hatched seven young birds. A Serpent gliding past the nest from its hole in the wall ate up the young unfledged nestlings. The Swallow, finding her nest empty, lamented greatly and exclaimed: “Woe to me a stranger! that in this place where all others’ rights are protected, I alone should suffer wrong.” ”

“ With what infinite and unwearied expectation and proclamation the cocks usher in every dawn, as if there had never been one before, and the dogs bark still, and the thallus of lichens springs, so tenacious of life is nature. ”

“ And a cold sweat trills down o'er all my limbs, As if I were dissolving into water. ”

“ 'Tis the voice of the sluggard; I heard him complain,
"You have waked me too soon, I must slumber again." ”

“ You abuse snuff! Perhaps it is the final cause of the human nose. ”

“ Shaving was not an easy task, for his hand continued to shake very much; and shaving requires attention, even when you don't dance while you are at it. But, if he had cut the end of his nose off, he would have put a piece of sticking-plaster over it, and been quite satisfied. ”

“ All philanthropy—no age has seen more of it than our own—is only a savoury fumigation burning at the mouth of a sewer. This incense offering makes the air more endurable for passers-by, but it does not hinder the infection in the sewer from spreading. ”

“ In the middle of the floor lay a dead swallow, with his beautiful wings firmly pressed to his sides, while his legs and the head were drawn up under his feathers. The poor bird must have died of cold. ”

“ Give me for my friends and neighbors wild men, not tame ones. The wildness of the savage is but a faint symbol of the awful ferity with which good men and lovers meet. ”