All 50 Uses of
grave
in
Bleak House
- He receives these salutations with gravity and buries them along with the rest of his knowledge.†
Chpt 1-3
- She was always grave and strict.†
Chpt 1-3
- I had never been shown my mama's grave.†
Chpt 1-3
- "I don't say that," returned Mr. Kenge gravely.†
Chpt 4-6
- The housekeeper gravely nods and continues: "Partly on account of this division between them, and partly on other accounts, Sir Morbury and his Lady led a troubled life.†
Chpt 7-9
- And I will walk here, though I am in my grave.†
Chpt 7-9
- He nodded gravely.†
Chpt 7-9
- It was impossible not to laugh at the energetic gravity with which he recommended this strong measure of reform.†
Chpt 7-9
- From beneath his feet, at such times, as from a shrill ghost unquiet in its grave, there frequently arise complainings and lamentations in the voice already mentioned; and haply, on some occasions when these reach a sharper pitch than usual, Mr. Snagsby mentions to the 'prentices, "I think my little woman is a-giving it to Guster!"†
Chpt 10-12
- Then there is my Lord Boodle, of considerable reputation with his party, who has known what office is and who tells Sir Leicester Dedlock with much gravity, after dinner, that he really does not see to what the present age is tending.†
Chpt 10-12
- Richard was a little grave after these interviews, but invariably told Ada and me that it was all right, and then began to talk about something else.†
Chpt 13-15
- When they came, he encircled Ada with one arm in his fatherly way and addressed himself to Richard with a cheerful gravity.†
Chpt 13-15
- "Miss Flite," said Mr. Woodcourt in a grave kind of voice, as if he were appealing to her while speaking to us, and laying his hand gently on her arm, "Miss Flite describes her illness with her usual accuracy."
Chpt 13-15 *grave = serious and solemn
- "I believe I and my family have also had the honour of furnishing some entertainment in the same grave place," said my guardian composedly.†
Chpt 13-15
- This made him almost grave.†
Chpt 16-18
- This led to our saying again, with a great deal of gravity, all that we had said already and to our coming to much the same conclusion afterwards.†
Chpt 16-18
- My guardian was very kind and cordial with him, but rather grave, enough so to cause Ada, when he had departed and we were going upstairs to bed, to say, "Cousin John, I hope you don't think the worse of Richard?"†
Chpt 16-18
- "But since then," he gravely interposed, anticipating what I meant to say, "I have reflected that your having anything to ask me, and my having anything to tell you, are different considerations, Esther.†
Chpt 16-18
- As the bell was yet ringing and the great people were not yet come, I had leisure to glance over the church, which smelt as earthy as a grave, and to think what a shady, ancient, solemn little church it was.†
Chpt 16-18
- His manner is the gravely impressive manner of a man who has not committed himself in life otherwise than as he has become the victim of a tender sorrow of the heart.†
Chpt 19-21
- Mr. George, who has been looking first at one of them and then at the other, as if he were demented, takes his venerable acquaintance by the throat on receiving this request, and dragging him upright in his chair as easily as if he were a doll, appears in two minds whether or no to shake all future power of cushioning out of him and shake him into his grave.†
Chpt 19-21
- Meanwhile he looks at Mr. Smallweed with grave attention and now and then fans the cloud of smoke away in order that he may see him the more clearly.†
Chpt 19-21
- …he has dined to-day, and has his bit of fish and his steak or chicken brought in from the coffee-house, he descends with a candle to the echoing regions below the deserted mansion, and heralded by a remote reverberation of thundering doors, comes gravely back encircled by an earthy atmosphere and carrying a bottle from which he pours a radiant nectar, two score and ten years old, that blushes in the glass to find itself so famous and fills the whole room with the fragrance of southern…†
Chpt 22-24
- "Well, Richard," said I as soon as I could begin to be grave with him, "are you beginning to feel more settled now?"†
Chpt 22-24
- Whatever you do on this side the grave, never give one lingering glance towards the horrible phantom that has haunted us so many years.†
Chpt 22-24
- When we came to the court, there was the Lord Chancellor—the same whom I had seen in his private room in Lincoln's Inn—sitting in great state and gravity on the bench, with the mace and seals on a red table below him and an immense flat nosegay, like a little garden, which scented the whole court.†
Chpt 22-24
- "The muffled drums," said Mr. George, turning to Richard and me and gravely shaking his head.†
Chpt 22-24
- He smokes gravely and marches in slow time.†
Chpt 25-27
- Perhaps this morning's pipe is devoted to the memory of Gridley in his grave.†
Chpt 25-27
- That done, he takes a turn at the dumb-bells, and afterwards weighing himself and opining that he is getting "too fleshy," engages with great gravity in solitary broadsword practice.†
Chpt 25-27
- "Hum!" says he gravely.†
Chpt 25-27
- Sir Leicester says it slowly and with gravity and doubt, as not being sure but that he is called a lead-mistress or that the right word may be some other word expressive of some other relationship to some other metal.†
Chpt 28-30
- Sir Leicester is reading with infinite gravity and state when the door opens, and the Mercury in powder makes this strange announcement, "The young man, my Lady, of the name of Guppy."†
Chpt 28-30
- A lady started up, a disguised lady, your ladyship, who went to look at the scene of action and went to look at his grave.†
Chpt 28-30
- Charley laid down her pen, the copy being finished, opened and shut her cramped little hand, looked gravely at the page, half in pride and half in doubt, and got up, and dropped me a curtsy.†
Chpt 31-33
- "I don't suspect anything more than I know, William," returns the other gravely.†
Chpt 31-33
- "Guv'ner," says Phil with exceeding gravity, "he's a leech in his dispositions, he's a screw and a wice in his actions, a snake in his twistings, and a lobster in his claws."†
Chpt 34-36
- As they proceed with great gravity through the streets towards the region of Mount Pleasant, Mr. Bagnet, observing his companion to be thoughtful, considers it a friendly part to refer to Mrs. Bagnet's late sally.†
Chpt 34-36
- In such a very hard manner and with eyes so particularly green that Mr. Bagnet's natural gravity is much deepened by the contemplation of that venerable man.†
Chpt 34-36
- Mr. Bagnet's gravity becomes yet more profound.†
Chpt 34-36
- Mr. Bagnet's gravity has now attained its profoundest point.†
Chpt 34-36
- Mr. Bagnet, in a perfect abyss of gravity, walks up and down before the little parlour window like a sentry and looks in every time he passes, apparently revolving something in his mind.†
Chpt 34-36
- I did not dare to linger or to look up, but I passed before the terrace garden with its fragrant odours, and its broad walks, and its well-kept beds and smooth turf; and I saw how beautiful and grave it was, and how the old stone balustrades and parapets, and wide flights of shallow steps, were seamed by time and weather; and how the trained moss and ivy grew about them, and around the old stone pedestal of the sun-dial; and I heard the fountain falling.†
Chpt 34-36
- We danced for an hour with great gravity, the melancholy child doing wonders with his lower extremities, in which there appeared to be some sense of enjoyment though it never rose above his waist.†
Chpt 37-39
- Introduced into the back shop by Mr. Smallweed the younger, they, fresh from the sunlight, can at first see nothing save darkness and shadows; but they gradually discern the elder Mr. Smallweed seated in his chair upon the brink of a well or grave of waste-paper, the virtuous Judy groping therein like a female sexton, and Mrs. Smallweed on the level ground in the vicinity snowed up in a heap of paper fragments, print, and manuscript which would appear to be the accumulated compliments…†
Chpt 37-39
- There is an expression on his face as if he had discharged his mind of some grave matter and were, in his close way, satisfied.†
Chpt 40-42
- Mr. Tulkinghorn had listened gravely to this complaint and inquires when the stationer has finished, "And that's all, is it, Snagsby?"†
Chpt 40-42
- Here he produced a card and read, with much gravity and a little trouble, through his eye-glass, "Mr.†
Chpt 43-45
- Allan proceeds to tell him all he knows about Jo, unto which the trooper listens with a grave face.
Chpt 46-48grave = serious and solemn
- Mr. Woodcourt looks round with that grave professional interest and attention on his face, and glancing significantly at the trooper, signs to Phil to carry his table out.†
Chpt 46-48
Definition:
-
(grave as in: Her manner was grave.) serious and/or solemnThe exact meaning of this sense of grave can depend upon its context. For example:
- "This is a grave problem," or "a situation of the utmost gravity." -- important, dangerous, or causing worry
- "She was in a grave mood upon returning from the funeral." -- sad or solemn
- "She looked me in the eye and gravely promised." -- in a sincere and serious manner