All 13 Uses of
discern
in
The Return of the Native
- At length he discerned, a long distance in front of him, a moving spot, which appeared to be a vehicle, and it proved to be going the same way as that in which he himself was journeying.†
Chpt 1
- He discerned the young girl's form in the passage, and said, "Thomasin, then, has reached home.†
Chpt 1
- The mist had now so far collapsed that the tips of the trees and bushes around his house could just be discerned, as if boring upwards through a vast white cobweb which cloaked them from the day.†
Chpt 1
- They went by her, and at the moment of passing appeared to discern her dusky form.†
Chpt 2
- On the further side of a table bearing candles she could faintly discern faces, and that was all.
Chpt 2 *discern = notice something that is not easy to see
- When he had reclined for some considerable time, gloomily pondering, he discerned above the ferns a drawn bonnet of white silk approaching from the left, and Yeobright knew directly that it covered the head of her he loved.†
Chpt 3
- By degrees they discerned coming towards them a pair of human figures, apparently of the male sex.†
Chpt 4
- That Venn's keen eye had discerned what Yeobright's feeble vision had not—a man in the act of withdrawing from Eustacia's side—was within the limits of the probable.†
Chpt 4
- Looking from one of them he could discern a pale, tragic face watching him drive away.†
Chpt 5
- At length Thomasin reached a hollow and began to discern through the rain a faint blotted radiance, which presently assumed the oblong form of an open door.†
Chpt 5
- Nothing but the froth of the waves could be discerned in the pool below.†
Chpt 5
- Yeobright could now also discern the floating body, though but indistinctly; and imagining from Wildeve's plunge that there was life to be saved he was about to leap after.†
Chpt 5
- Yeobright strained his eyes across the dark-green patch beyond the paling, and near the black form of the Maypole he discerned a shadowy figure, sauntering idly up and down.†
Chpt 6
Definition:
-
(discern) to notice or understand something -- often something that is not obvious