the breath of life

英ドラマ「シャーロック・ホームズの冒険（1984-1994）」の第5話「まがった男( THE CROOKED MAN)」から表現を拾います。

夫婦で口論中に謎の死を遂げたバークレイ大佐と失神して意識を失った夫人、真犯人は一対誰なのかを解明すべく、ホームズとワトソン博士は依頼を受けます。調査をすすめていくと、ある背中や膝が「まがった男」にたどり着きます。
この場面では、この「まがった男」がバークレイ夫妻と自分の過去について語っています。

Holmes: Why did Nancy Devoy not marry the man she loved?

Harry Wood: It was monsoon time in 1857, when the Sepoys rose up against the British, the regiment was shut up in Bhrtee. There were 10,000 rebels round us, pinning us down like terriers round a rat cage. We’d run short of food and ammunition. We had to communicate with General Neil’s column that was moving up-country. It was our only chance to get help, our company commander had asked for a volunteer, a fit, strong soldier to slip out of the garrison at dead of night and make contact with the relief column out on the plain beyond. Like a fool, I volunteered. It was a dangerous mission all right, there were a 1,000 lives in peril. But I was thinking of only one of them…
Nancy Devoy, the woman I loved, and the finest girl that ever had the breath of life between her lips. Saying goodbye to her was the hardest thing. As we exchanged moments, I never thought that I was saying goodbye to her for 30 years.

今回取り上げる表現は “the breath of life”です。G4（大修館書店）で確認してみますと「〈人〉にとって不可欠［貴重］なもの」とありました。 “breath”は魂・精神・生命力を象徴しています。

“breath”を用いた表現は以前も多く取り上げられています。
ここにいくつか紹介します。

“tuna breath”
http://d.hatena.ne.jp/A30/20150613/1434144027
“hold one’s breath”
http://d.hatena.ne.jp/A30/20140810/1407650654
“waste one’s breath”
http://d.hatena.ne.jp/A30/20130905/1378315845