the lay of the land

“I don’t understand the intricacies and nuances, the lay of the land, the psyche.”

"I now think of political identity as like water that's always going somewhere, that needs to go somewhere, but where it goes depends on the lay of the land, the rock formations that stand in its way," she told me.

“The way the fire’s moving and the lay of the land, the terrain, the features, the ridge lines, we that Estes Park is not out of the woods but we feel that as the fire progresses and moves to the southeast, the way it’s moving … we do feel that the community of Estes Park is not imminently threatened or in the direct line of fire.”

So, what is Seattle’s “sense of itself”? People of all stripes likely would agree that it derives from the city’s unique lay of the land — the lyrical, physical contours that created a natural stage for urban beauty and demanded ingenuity for the shaping of a prosperous port.

Stung by his defection, his marked neglect of her—seeing, moreover, with woman’s instinct the real lay of the land—the fair Edith had by no means buried the secret of her relationship towards Philip within her own breast.