brown study

From obsolete brown (“gloomy”) and study.

• "Phædra. [...] Why Soſia! What, in a brown Study? / Soſia. A little cogitabund, or ſo; concerning this diſmal Revolution in our Family!"
• "So gathering up the shavings with another grin, and throwing them into the great stove in the middle of the room, he went about his business, and left me in a brown study."
• "Finding that Holmes was too absorbed for conversation, I had tossed aside the barren paper, and leaning back in my chair, I fell into a brown study. Suddenly my companion's voice broke in upon my thoughts."
• "After that he kept such a silence, falling as it seemed to me into a brown study, that he went away without so much as bidding me farewell, or being conscious, as far as I could tell, of my presence."
• "Once or twice she spoke harshly to Louis; she fell at other times into a brown study; and when she thought that I was not watching her, her face wore a look of deep anxiety."
• "Major Valentine came in—to find me in a brown study."
• "But Quatrefages glared at his plate in a brown study."