half-paternal

Updated: May 15, 2025

Stahl, sometimes from a distance, sometimes coming close, kept over him a kind of half-paternal, half-professional attendance, the Irishman accepting his ministrations without resentment, almost with indifference. "I shall be on deck between two and three in the morning to see the comet," the German observed to him casually toward evening as they met on the bridge. "We may meet perhaps "

Algernon Blackwood - The Centaur

The Government sent an Indian agent to treat with them, in its usual half-paternal, half-aggressive, and wholly inconsistent policy. Elijah, who still retained the imitative sense and adaptability to surroundings which belong to most lazy, impressible natures, and in striped yellow and vermilion features looked the chief he personated, met the agent with silent and becoming gravity.

Bret Harte - A Drift from Redwood Park