cling

O hayloft where the cobwebs cling,

Bagheera would lie out on a branch and call, “Come along, Little Brother,” and at first Mowgli would cling like the sloth, but afterward he would fling himself through the branches almost as boldly as the gray ape.

That was Matthew’s way--take a whim into his head and cling to it with the most amazing silent persistency--a persistency ten times more potent and effectual in its very silence than if he had talked it out.

Something of his birthplace seemed to cling to the man, and I never looked at his pale, keen face or the poise of his head without associating him with grey archways and mullioned windows and all the venerable wreckage of a feudal keep.