Vocabulary Word
Word: buoyant
Definition: able to float; cheerful and optimistic; N. buoyancy; Ex. buoyancy of wood/water/American market
Definition: able to float; cheerful and optimistic; N. buoyancy; Ex. buoyancy of wood/water/American market
Sentences Containing 'buoyant'
The strange, upheaving, lifting tendency of the taffrail breeze filling the hollows of so many sails, made the buoyant, hovering deck to feel like air beneath the feet; while still she rushed along, as if two antagonistic influences were struggling in her--one to mount direct to heaven, the other to drive yawingly to some horizontal goal.
Then, again, it would never do in plain sight of the world's riveted eyes, it would never do, I say, for this straddling captain to be seen steadying himself the slightest particle by catching hold of anything with his hands; indeed, as token of his entire, buoyant self-command, he generally carries his hands in his trowsers' pockets; but perhaps being generally very large, heavy hands, he carries them there for ballast.
Though apparently the most massive, it is by far the most buoyant part about him.
Unerringly impelling this dead, impregnable, uninjurable wall, and this most buoyant thing within; there swims behind it all a mass of tremendous life, only to be adequately estimated as piled wood is--by the cord; and all obedient to one volition, as the smallest insect.
If the only whales that thus sank were old, meagre, and broken-hearted creatures, their pads of lard diminished and all their bones heavy and rheumatic; then you might with some reason assert that this sinking is caused by an uncommon specific gravity in the fish so sinking, consequent upon this absence of buoyant matter in him.
For young whales, in the highest health, and swelling with noble aspirations, prematurely cut off in the warm flush and May of life, with all their panting lard about them; even these brawny, buoyant heroes do sometimes sink.
But there are instances where, after the lapse of many hours or several days, the sunken whale again rises, more buoyant than in life.
More Vocab Words
::: canker - any ulcerous sore; ulcer; any evil; CF. cancer::: qualms - uneasy feelings; misgivings; uneasy fears especially about matters of conscience; Ex. I have no qualms about giving this assignment to Helen.
::: hibernal - wintry; wintery; of or like winter
::: deprecate - express disapproval of; deplore; protest against; belittle; ADJ. deprecatory
::: dour - sullen; gloomy; stubborn
::: gorge - stuff oneself (with food); glut; CF. gorgeous: dazzlingly beautiful
::: disburse - pay out (as from a fund); N. disbursement; CF. purse
::: uproar - noisy confusion
::: summation - act of finding the total; summing-up; summary (esp. one given by the judge at the end of a trial)
::: cantata - story set to music to be sung by a chorus (shorter than an oratorio)
