"Buttonhole" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... not have been more to our wish if it had been created expressly for us. It was that of Monsieur Le Fort, a professor in the Medical College, a handsome elderly man with the bit of red ribbon coveted by Frenchmen in his buttonhole. Madame Le Fort, a charming, graceful woman midway between thirty and forty, and a pretty daughter of seventeen, completed the family. With great satisfaction we took possession of the pretty rooms, all white and gold, that overlooked the Rond Point ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 15, - No. 86, February, 1875 • Various
... been too engrossed in the surgical profession to observe much apart. "I believe I'm going to decorate you." And she dimpled up at the Senior Surgeon, coquettishly. Selecting one of the blossoms with great care, she drew it through the buttonhole in his lapel. "See, I'm decorating you with the Order of the Golden Primrose—for brilliancy." Whereupon she dropped ...
— The Primrose Ring • Ruth Sawyer
... growing dawn which now vied with the flickering light of the overhead lamp in their compartment. The stranger was a very tall man in dark clothes, who gave an instant impression of long rectangularity. He had a long nose, a long upper lip which hung over a thin slit of a mouth which resembled a buttonhole slightly frayed by wear. His chin was long and square and, like his upper lip, blue, as though a stiff black beard were in constant battle with a razor. His eyes were large and regarded Renwick with a mild melancholy as he bowed the Englishman a good morning. Renwick nodded ...
— The Secret Witness • George Gibbs
... He, George Vavasor, had never so held her hand since the day when they had parted, and now on this first occasion of her freedom she felt it again. What did he think of her? Did he suppose that she could transfer her love in that way, as a flower may be taken from one buttonhole and placed in another? He read it all, and knew that he was hurrying on too quickly. "I can understand well," he said in a whisper, "what your present feelings are; but I do not think you will be really angry with me because ...
— Can You Forgive Her? • Anthony Trollope
... which he had a habit of shaking as a lion is supposed to shake his mane. His face was clean shaven, and he had a wide mouth and rather small dark eyes, set quite too near together: Mr. Braham wore a brown frock coat buttoned across his breast, with a rose-bud in the upper buttonhole, and light pantaloons. A diamond stud was seen to flash from his bosom; and as he seated himself and drew off his gloves a heavy seal ring was displayed upon his white left hand. Mr. Braham having seated himself, deliberately surveyed the entire house, made a remark ...
— The Gilded Age, Complete • Mark Twain and Charles Dudley Warner
... hour without a large bribe, so unbecoming was it; but somehow Lieutenant Worthington grew to like the gray gown as a part of Katy herself. And if by chance he brought a rose in to cheer the dim stillness of the sick-room, and she tucked it into her buttonhole, immediately it was as though she were decked for conquest. Pretty dresses are very pretty on pretty people,—they certainly play an important part in this queer little world of ours; but depend upon it, dear girls, no woman ever has established so distinct and clear a claim ...
— What Katy Did Next • Susan Coolidge
... graciousness that she obtained permission to take me with her, and for the first time I saw the Count Louis, Madelaine's fiance. He was a very handsome young man, of majestic and distinguished air. He had hair and eyes as black as ink, red lips, and a fine mustache. He wore in his buttonhole the cross of the royal order of St. Louis, and on his shoulders the epaulettes of a major. He had lately come from San Domingo [where he had been fighting the insurgents at the head of his regiment].[23] Yes, he was a handsome young man, a bold cavalier; and Madelaine idolized him. ...
— Strange True Stories of Louisiana • George Washington Cable
... used to it," Joey told him; "eight o'clock, then, on Sunday; plain evening dress. If you like to wear a bit of red ribbon in your buttonhole, why, do so. You can get it at Evans', in ...
— Tommy and Co. • Jerome K. Jerome
... Then followed the information that Mr. Fitzpatrick was coming to breakfast, and that he was to tell Miss Nancy the moment we arrived. He then reduced the bulge in his outside pocket by thrusting his big hands into his white gloves, gave a sidelong glance at the flower in his buttonhole, and bore my card aloft with the air of a ...
— Colonel Carter of Cartersville • F. Hopkinson Smith
... that I could get it to agree with me if I could so effectually buttonhole and fasten on to it as to eat it. Most men have an easy method with turtle soup, and I had no misgiving but that if I could bring my first premise to bear I should prove the better reasoner. My difficulty lay in this initial process, for I had not with me the argument ...
— The Humour of Homer and Other Essays • Samuel Butler
... light silk gowns, covered with diamonds and precious stones, in carriages decorated with flowers. Coachmen and footmen wore powdered wigs, white or grey, silk stockings and knee-breeches and a flower in the buttonhole matching the colour of their livery and the flowers which hung about the horses' ears. Some of the carriages had no coachman's box or driver, but were harnessed to four horses ridden by postillions in green satin or scarlet velvet, with white ...
— Recollections Of My Childhood And Youth • George Brandes
... was nicknamed, always had a pack of cards in his pocket, and to annex everything left on the tables he considered to be his privilege. One day, when he was asked how he came by the fine carnation in his buttonhole, he said it was a present from Sally, neglecting to add that he had told the child to steal it from a basket which a ...
— Vain Fortune • George Moore
... his favourite recreation or his religious convictions. These, I venture to say, are grave omissions. The picture is sadly wanting in suitable accessories. If I had been painting it I should have put a simple yellow daffodil in the MINISTER'S buttonhole, and pictured through an open window a sunlit bed of leeks, with perhaps a goat gambolling among them. I should have represented the MINISTER OF MUNITIONS in his study practising putting with a small bomb. And on the wall should ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 150, March 22, 1916 • Various
... it is, I send you, you are to take from me. I could not even put in what I pleased but I have said all about it in the word or two of preface, as also that I beg leave to stick the bunch in your buttonhole. May I beg that Mrs. Tennyson will ...
— The Brownings - Their Life and Art • Lilian Whiting
... size. Tie two rings together and fasten them at the back of the loom, to head, foot, and sides, as in the illustration. One must then decide how close the warp is to be strung. Measure the string, which should be continuous, allowing enough to go to the rings at the back and make a buttonhole stitch each time. Then wind on a long thin stick or dress steel, in such a way that it will pass easily through the rings. In stringing the hammock in the illustration, a penholder was used. The rings are tied, with white cord, to the four sides of the ...
— Hand-Loom Weaving - A Manual for School and Home • Mattie Phipps Todd
... This would not happen once in a hundred years. Towards the end of his dinner with the two Chaplains, the Colonel let out his waistcoat and leaned over the table to look at some Mission Reports. The bar of the watch-guard worked through the buttonhole, and the watch—Platte's watch—slid quietly on to the carpet. Where the bearer found it next morning and ...
— The Works of Rudyard Kipling One Volume Edition • Rudyard Kipling
... The gilt buttons also bore fleurs-de-lis; on the shoulders a pair of straps cried out for useless epaulettes; these military appendages were there like a petition without a recommendation. This old gentleman's coat was of dark blue cloth, and the buttonhole had blossomed into many colored ribbons. He, no doubt, always carried his hat in his hand—a three cornered cocked hat, with a gold cord—for the snowy wings of his powdered hair showed not a trace of its pressure. He might have been ...
— The Purse • Honore de Balzac
... polished leather boots, yellow gloves, handsome studs, and a very pretty gold chain passed through the buttonhole of his waistcoat of black silk with blue flowers. Madame de la Chanterie took a little silver whistle from her pocket and blew it. The ...
— The Brotherhood of Consolation • Honore de Balzac
... these waited on their customers in silence, she was full of lively talk, and as unblushing in her eagerness to sell as a 'bouquetiere' by profession. She had grown dangerously pretty. Fred was dazzled when she wanted to fasten a rose into his buttonhole, and then, as he paid for it, gave him another, saying: "And here is another thrown in ...
— Jacqueline, Complete • (Mme. Blanc) Th. Bentzon
... believe that Frenchmen are changed, until I hear that there is no ballet in Paris; you might as well tell me, that the Swiss will abjure the money which makes a part of his distinction, as the Frenchman give up the laced coat, the powdered queue, and the order of St Louis at his buttonhole. Those things are the man, they are his mind, his senses, himself. He is a creation of monarchy—a clever, amusing, ingenious, and brave one; but rely upon my knowledge of human nature—if French nature be any thing of the kind—that Paris, ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Volume 55, No. 340, February, 1844 • Various
... told me when I was quite small, Padre: how the Romans of old used to send packets of good news bound with laurel, or of bad news, tied with the plumes of ravens. I stared into Julian O'Farrell's stare, and wished that he'd stuck a green leaf or a black feather in his buttonhole to ...
— Everyman's Land • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... three figures entering the room. These were Fancy, who had assumed the garb and aspect of an itinerant showman, with a box of pictures on her back; and Memory, in the likeness of a clerk, with a pen behind her ear, an inkhorn at her buttonhole and a huge manuscript volume beneath her arm; and lastly, behind the other two, a person shrouded in a dusky mantle which concealed both face and form. But Mr. Smith had a shrewd idea that it was Conscience. How kind of Fancy, Memory and Conscience to visit the old gentleman ...
— Twice Told Tales • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... was only a fawn Nimble became very fond of water lilies. But he didn't carry them as a bouquet, nor wear one in his buttonhole. He was fond of lilies in a different way: he liked to eat them, and their flat, round, glossy pads. At night his mother often led him to the edge of the lake on the other side of Blue ...
— The Tale of Nimble Deer - Sleepy-Time Tales • Arthur Scott Bailey
... himself down with his face to the ground like the cowardly guides. "But I suppose we'd better do as these gentry require, or else they'll be hitting us under the fifth buttonhole; and, what would become of ...
— Tom Finch's Monkey - and How he Dined with the Admiral • John C. Hutcheson
... on feeling a thousand years younger." She smiled caressingly, and began to twist a finger in a buttonhole of his coat. "U'm—don't you think, daddy, that such a very young gentleman as you are, such a regular ...
— Counsel for the Defense • Leroy Scott
... from the dairy window, which, overgrown with creepers, made a dark frame for the brightly-coloured picture. There was Mr Buckle, a young farmer of the neighbourhood, in a light-grey suit with a blue satin tie and a rose in his buttonhole. There was Bella, her face covered with self-satisfied smiles, mounting to his side. There was Agnetta carrying the new parasol high in the air with all its lace fluttering. How gay and happy they all looked! Mrs Greenways stood nodding at the window. She had meant to go out to ...
— White Lilac; or the Queen of the May • Amy Walton
... eight mirrors. But somehow the black man was like the black hat. He also was black, and yet his glossy skin flung back the light at eight angles or more. It is needless to say that he wore white spats and a white slip inside his waistcoat. The red flower stood up in his buttonhole aggressively, as if it had suddenly grown there. And in the way he carried his cane in one hand and his cigar in the other there was a certain attitude—an attitude we must always remember when we talk of racial prejudices: something innocent and ...
— The Wisdom of Father Brown • G. K. Chesterton
... the most important sights which awaited them were the Metropolitan Tabernacle and some tunnel under the Thames. The only other passenger was a rather smart-looking gentleman with a flower in his buttonhole, who made himself very pleasant; engaged Austin in conversation, gave him hints as to how best to enjoy himself in London, asked him a number of questions about where he lived and how he spent his time, and finished up by inviting him to lunch. ...
— Austin and His Friends • Frederic H. Balfour
... Mick was full of the spirit of adventure, and looked forward to that spring Wednesday when he should leave for Queenstown, his mother made up for his heartless joy by her lugubriousness. As the time drew near she would buttonhole all and sundry whom she could catch to pour out her sorrows. The trailing gown and ragged lace shawl became a danger signal which we would all flee from, an it were not sprung upon us too suddenly. We had a shrewd suspicion that the tears Mrs. Sheehy shed so ...
— An Isle in the Water • Katharine Tynan
... moment she would have bodices to her frocks that buttoned up in front, that she might pass the little silver bar through the buttonhole; and she set herself to make watch-pockets in all her skirts, which she managed by cutting slits in them just below the waistband, and sewing to the slits on the inside little pockets like small bag purses. Lydia showed her how to do it; ...
— The Carroll Girls • Mabel Quiller-Couch
... buttonhole parts, $60. This last is beyond all question the simplest, easiest to manage and to keep in order, of any machine in the market. Machines warranted, and ...
— Punchinello, Vol. 1, No. 2, April 9, 1870 • Various
... lots of wimmen and girls on the streets, some on 'em sellin' posies for charity, I bought two little bunches, one on 'em I put in Josiah's buttonhole, though he objected and said it would probable make talk for a man of his age and dignity to be trimmed ...
— Samantha at the St. Louis Exposition • Marietta Holley
... something else, carried the point, for it was an entirely cheerful young woman who came into the library, with a rose for Uncle John's buttonhole. Miss Montfort was already there, and responded with sad sprightliness to Margaret's greeting. "Thank you, my dear! I was just telling your uncle, it is a mere matter of form to ask if I have slept. I seldom sleep, especially if I am up-stairs. The servants ...
— Margaret Montfort • Laura E. Richards
... cane, and stopped before the house to ask if one of the descendants of a certain Jean Tessier did not live hereabouts. He was fat and red-faced, and he perspired, but—Dieu!—he was distingue, and he had an order in his buttonhole. Madame Lapierre, who came out to answer his question, knew at once that he ...
— True Stories of Crime From the District Attorney's Office • Arthur Train
... Calendar. The newspapers employed watchers, who picketed the block where Parnell and his wife lived, and telegraphed to Christendom the time the lights were out, and whether Mr. Parnell appeared with a shamrock or a rose in his buttonhole. The facts that Mrs. Parnell wore her hair in curls, and smilingly hummed a tune as she walked to the corner, were construed into proof of brazen guilt and a ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Vol. 13 - Little Journeys to the Homes of Great Lovers • Elbert Hubbard
... for the good sense of the public to distinguish true remedies from false, pure wine from adulterated; or, it is for the good sense of the public to distinguish in a buttonhole the decoration awarded to merit from that prostituted to mediocrity and intrigue. Why, then, do you call yourselves the State, Power, Authority, Police, if the work of Police must be performed by the ...
— The Philosophy of Misery • Joseph-Pierre Proudhon
... trusty she had constrained herself to civility. She had taken Mrs. Carder the flowers last night, and Rufus had put some tiny blooms in his buttonhole and caressed them at supper-time with significant glances ...
— In Apple-Blossom Time - A Fairy-Tale to Date • Clara Louise Burnham
... face Mr. Beale, looking particularly smart in a well-fitting grey suit, a grey felt hat and a large bunch of violets in his buttonhole. ...
— The Green Rust • Edgar Wallace
... buttonhole. Conrad twisted his in his strong yellow teeth, turned it over, and then spat it out. The action, though of doubtful taste in itself, was ennobled by his perfect rendering of it. He brought it, so to speak, forever within ...
— Prisoners - Fast Bound In Misery And Iron • Mary Cholmondeley
... The wretch, she may be passing fair. She may say how lovely you are while her fingers are still moist with your blood. Tell me, will this be kindness? It may be your fate to be imprisoned in the hair of one whom you know to be heartless or to be thrust into the buttonhole of one who would not dare to look you in the face were you a man. It may even be your lot to be confined in some narrow vessel with only stagnant water to quench the maddening thirst that warns of ...
— The Book of Tea • Kakuzo Okakura
... and to tell the truth she had palled before, more than once. She was so amiable, so well-finished,—with her smooth flaxen hair, her neat nose, her buttonhole of a mouth, and her trim shape,—that she appealed to the opposite sex quite generally and irresistibly as a worthy helpmate. The only trouble was that she began to bore her suitors somewhat too early in the game, and they never got far ...
— The Story Of Waitstill Baxter • By Kate Douglas Wiggin
... separated strands across the shiny bald pate. A low collar of enormous circumference encircled his short neck and his tie was drawn through a Zodiac ring. His clothes were ill-fitting—shapeless trousers and a voluminous morning coat, in the buttonhole of which was a pink carnation with a silver papered stem, an immense watch-chain spread across a coarsely knitted waistcoat of Berlin wool. And he seemed out of breath. The pistol in his extended hand vibrated in sympathy with an ...
— Men of Affairs • Roland Pertwee
... simply must promise to come before he went away; she insisted. And she asked suddenly: "When I saw you on the seventeenth, didn't you have a bow in your buttonhole?" ...
— Shallow Soil • Knut Hamsun
... remorselessly, and showed, in the first place, that the eye was not like any eye that Nature ever made; and, indeed, being examined closely, and abstracted from the rest of the face, it has a very queer look,—less like a human eye than a half-worn buttonhole! Then he attacked the ear, which, he affirmed and demonstrated, was placed a good deal too low on the head, thereby giving an artificial and monstrous height to the portion of the head above it. The forehead met with no better treatment in his ...
— Passages From the French and Italian Notebooks, Complete • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... douche at Keyser's hydropathic establishment at the top of the Faubourg Saint-Honore Twenty minutes' fencing, boxing, or single-stick followed by a bath and a cold douche; then a little halt at the flower-shop, as he came out, to have a carnation stitched in his buttonhole; then a constitutional as far as the Arc de l'Etoile, Stenne and the phaeton following close to the footway. Finally came a turn in the Bois, where Paul, thanks to his observance of fashionable hygiene, displayed ...
— The Immortal - Or, One Of The "Forty." (L'immortel) - 1877 • Alphonse Daudet
... and the adoring pride of his downward gaze at her, stirred all the women's hearts and roused a sympathetic thrill in the men's breasts. Colin made a good show in the regulation bridegroom's frock coat, and with a sprig of orange blossom in his buttonhole. There was no doubt that he was extremely happy. He gave a short manly speech in response to Sir Luke's rather academic oration proposing the health of the wedded pair. The Premier too made a speech, and so did ...
— Lady Bridget in the Never-Never Land • Rosa Praed
... what is given or achieved. He already not only regretted giving the ten thousand francs to Jenny, but the two hundred francs to the servants—nay the six sous given to the waiter at the restaurant, even the money he had spent on the bunch of violets. The bouquet still hung in his buttonhole, faded and shrivelled. What good did it do him? While the sous which he had paid for it—! He did not think of his wasted millions, but could not drive away the thought of that ...
— The Mystery of Orcival • Emile Gaboriau
... the visitor, and swept him with an appreciative glance, her eye lingering a second on the oleander in his buttonhole. ...
— Jerry • Jean Webster
... chief of staff! I forgot to congratulate you, Your Excellency. Your Excellency! Think of that! But it's no surprise to me. Didn't we go to school together? How could any one ever go to school with me and not be a great man? And I'm wearing a flower in my buttonhole! La, ...
— The Last Shot • Frederick Palmer
... pieces of stuff in such a way that the edges to be fastened together touch one another from top to bottom. Then, if it is a buttoning-frame, the teacher will show the child the different stages of the action. She will take hold of the button, set it opposite the buttonhole, make it enter the buttonhole completely, and adjust it carefully in its place above. In the same way, to teach a child to tie a bow, she will separate the stage in which he ties the ribbons together from that in which ...
— Dr. Montessori's Own Handbook • Maria Montessori
... voice, but not unmusically. He was a young fellow, of some five or six-and-twenty perhaps, and was dressed in such a free and fly-away fashion, that the long ends of his loose red neckcloth were streaming out behind him quite as often as before; and the bunch of bright winter berries in the buttonhole of his velveteen coat was as visible to Mr Pinch's rearward observation, as if he had worn that garment wrong side foremost. He continued to sing with so much energy, that he did not hear the sound of wheels until ...
— Life And Adventures Of Martin Chuzzlewit • Charles Dickens
... exclaimed the dazzled Chupin, and indeed, seen from this distance, she did not look a day more than thirty-five—an age when beauty possesses all the alluring charm of the luscious fruit of autumn. She was giving orders for the drive, and her coachman, with a rose in his buttonhole, listened while he reined in the spirited horse. "The weather's superb," added Chupin. "She'll no doubt drive round the lakes in ...
— The Count's Millions - Volume 1 (of 2) • Emile Gaboriau
... the steps of the Palazzo Venier and the deep-scented darkness of the garden. As we passed through to supper, I plucked a spray of yellow Banksia rose, and put it in my buttonhole. The dew was on its burnished leaves, and evening had ...
— Sketches and Studies in Italy and Greece, Complete - Series I, II, and III • John Symonds
... faithful catalogue of his possessions. His fetter-and-link albert of gold and platinum was minutely described. His spotted blue ascot, with its gentlemanly pearl scarfpin, was set forth, and the fact that the buttonhole in the left lapel of his morning coat showed signs of use was duly noted. What Parkinson saw he recorded, but he made no deductions. A handkerchief carried in the cuff of the right sleeve was simply that to him and not an indication that Mr. ...
— Four Max Carrados Detective Stories • Ernest Bramah
... taken possession of him? Thomas says the two sneak off together every chance they get, and sometimes are n't back till eleven or twelve. I wish dadda would put a stop to it. Like as not, 't is for pilfering they are bound." Miss Meredith began anew on the buttonhole, and had she been thrusting her needle into either man or dog, she could not have sewed ...
— Janice Meredith • Paul Leicester Ford
... assure you, for Toby had a red feather-duster in his head, two remarkable flags waved over the carriage, Kit had a blue bow on his neck, which nearly drove him wild, Demi wore a nosegay of dandelions in his buttonhole, and Mrs. Jo carried the queer Japanese umbrella ...
— Little Men - Life at Plumfield With Jo's Boys • Louisa May Alcott
... trousers by the waist and place together the first two suspender buttons, one on the left and the other on the right. This will make the fold preserve the natural crease and dispose of the extra material, button and buttonhole tab at the waist. Trousers carefully folded will only need pressing about twice a year. Hose should be well shaken, and unless perfectly clean, thrown in the soiled-linen basket. Evening silk hose can be worn several times. The undervest, or undershirt, ...
— The Complete Bachelor - Manners for Men • Walter Germain
... buttonhole was jauntily erect, his immaculately garbed figure fitted in perfectly with every detail of the whole scene of which he was a part. He looked—and was—the exquisitely turned-out man-about-town. Only his eyes told of other things, and they, as the organs welled to the sounds of the ...
— The Riddle of the Frozen Flame • Mary E. Hanshew
... just set free when the busy-looking man came back along with a tall red-nosed fellow. I noticed his red nose because it was the same colour as a book he held, whose leather cover was like a bad strawberry. He had a little ink-bottle hanging at his buttonhole and a pen in his mouth, and was followed by quite a crowd ...
— Brownsmith's Boy - A Romance in a Garden • George Manville Fenn
... interwoven with it, as well as the skill of its making. It was a construction of blocks, according to patchwork law, every alternate block of the border having an applied rose cut from printed calico in alternate colors of yellow, red, and blue. These roses were carefully applied with buttonhole stitch, and the cotton ground underneath cut away to give uniform thickness for quilting. The main body of the quilt was unnoticeably good, being a collection of faintly colored patches of correct construction. The quilting was a marvel—a large carefully drawn design, evidently inspired by branching ...
— The Development of Embroidery in America • Candace Wheeler
... out here," retorted Prescott, slipping the silver watch into a vest pocket and passing the chain through a buttonhole. ...
— The Grammar School Boys Snowbound - or, Dick & Co. at Winter Sports • H. Irving Hancock
... the ally of a boy named Aubrey Mills and founded with him a gang of adventurers in the avenue. Aubrey carried a whistle dangling from his buttonhole and a bicycle lamp attached to his belt while the others had short sticks thrust daggerwise through theirs. Stephen, who had read of Napoleon's plain style of dress, chose to remain unadorned and thereby heightened for himself the pleasure of taking ...
— A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man • James Joyce
... I assure you, my dear children, kept up most carefully. There was always a button to sew on, a buttonhole to remake, or a tear to be mended. Thus constantly in touch with the household Madame Hen soon thought she belonged to it. Indeed, worn out by the teasing of her companions, by the constant arguments she had with them, and touched ...
— The Curly-Haired Hen • Auguste Vimar
... been amazingly handsome, I thought, as I gazed admiringly at my comrade. Our staring made him shy, and as he blushed and touched up the stephanotis in his buttonhole, the engineer changed the subject by saying, "Talking of the squire, is it true, Dennis, what Jack tells me about the twenty pounds? Did he really ...
— We and the World, Part II. (of II.) - A Book for Boys • Juliana Horatia Ewing
... again; and after my friend had made a note respecting some additional relief for the family, we bade the woman good day. We had not gone far before a little ragged lass looked up admiringly at two pinks I had stuck in my buttonhole, and holding up her hand, said, "Eh, gi' me a posy!" My friend pointed to one of the cottages we passed, and said that the last time he called there, he found the family all seated round a large bowl of porridge, made of Indian meal. This meal is sold at a penny a pound. ...
— Home-Life of the Lancashire Factory Folk during the Cotton Famine • Edwin Waugh
... by, walking slowly, and looking about him with his rather pathetic eyes. He saw Jacob Crayford, smartly dressed, a white flower in his buttonhole, standing in a group of pressmen, went up to him and gently took ...
— The Way of Ambition • Robert Hichens
... a riotous supper and baccarat, and afterward went to sleep only to see cards and horses and moving crowds and clouds of dust; days spent in a short covert coat, with a field-glass over his shoulder and with a pasteboard ticket dangling from his buttonhole; and then came the change that brought conscience up again, and the visits to the Jews, and the slights of the men who had never been his friends, but whom he had thought had at least liked him for himself, even if he did not like them; and then debts, and more debts, and the borrowing of ...
— Gallegher and Other Stories • Richard Harding Davis
... table near the divan. Henceforth the perfume of violets seemed a thing apart from the perfume of all other flowers to the man who stood there waiting, himself with a few of the light purple blossoms in the buttonhole of his ...
— Berenice • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... on the bench near the end of the lane. By his side was a basin tied up in a cotton handkerchief; in the buttonhole of his coat there was a sprig of sweet-william. The girls from the big house came and stood still in front of him, staring at him rudely, but he did ...
— Very Short Stories and Verses For Children • Mrs. W. K. Clifford
... who in Moscow had worn a Persian costume, had now the appearance of a most correct officer of the Guards. He was clean-shaven and wore a Guardsman's padded coat with an Order of St. George at his buttonhole and a plain forage cap set straight on his head. He took off his wet felt cloak in a corner of the room, and without greeting anyone went up to Denisov and began questioning him about the matter in hand. Denisov told him of the designs the large ...
— War and Peace • Leo Tolstoy
... the landlord, who seemed to have been proud of the official visit to his guest. He was profuse in his attentions, and even introduced him to a singularly artistic-looking man of middle age, wearing an order in his buttonhole, whom he met ...
— Selected Stories • Bret Harte
... Mr. Tooting, with fine indignation. "I was a poor boy, and had to earn my living, but I've made up my mind I've worn the collar long enough—if I have to break rocks. And I want to repeat what I said a little while ago," he added, weaving his thumb into Mr. Crewe's buttonhole; "I know a thing or two, and I've got some brains, as they know, and I can make you governor of this State if you'll only say the word. It's ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... Malee's art is the making of nosegays, from the little "buttonhole," which is equivalent to a cough on occasions when baksheesh seems possible, to the great valedictory or Christmas bouquet. The manner of making these is as follows. First you gather your flowers, cutting the stalks as short as possible, and tie each one firmly to an artificial ...
— Behind the Bungalow • EHA
... staggered. She looked quickly at old Perce and saw that he was in his best clothes, with a lovely new spotted blue and white tie, and a dahlia in his buttonhole. ...
— Coquette • Frank Swinnerton
... six. Maggie went with him to the creek, to see him sail. In the garden she picked a chrysanthemum and stuck it in his buttonhole, forgetting that he couldn't wear her token. There were so ...
— The Helpmate • May Sinclair
... long for the appearance of the lawyer, a fat, pale-faced gentleman, wearing gold-rimmed spectacles, tightly buttoned up in a frock-coat, the buttonhole of which was adorned with the red rosette of the ...
— The Pools of Silence • H. de Vere Stacpoole
... distinction of a double guard posted at the front door, sits a short, fiercely mustached General of some sort—evidently a person of great importance from the commotion his entry caused among all the other officers in the room. In his buttonhole he wears the Iron Cross of the second class, the Iron Cross of the first class pinned to his breast, and underneath the rare "Pour le Merite Order, with Swords." His bill amounts to about 7 francs, for he consumed ...
— The New York Times Current History of the European War, Vol 1, Issue 4, January 23, 1915 • Various
... for ever sketching in pen and ink, indoors and out—he used at one time to carry a little ink-bottle at his buttonhole, and steel pens in his waistcoat-pocket, and thus equipped he would sketch whatever took his fancy in his walks abroad—houses, 'busses, cabs, people—bits of street and square, scaffoldings, hoardings with advertisements—sea, river, moor, lake, and mountain—what has he not sketched ...
— Social Pictorial Satire • George du Maurier
... introduced to one another, just before going to the scene of the contest. Both were dressed for the occasion, and I tell you they were sights! The bank clerk had on a collar so high that he could hardly turn his head, a high silk hat, long black frock-coat, and an immense white rose in his buttonhole. ...
— Montezuma's Castle and Other Weird Tales • Charles B. Cory
... the whole a most loving, kissing, kind-hearted gentleman. He is very young, genteel, and handsome. He has a pair of very good eyes in his head, which not being sufficient, as it should seem, for the many nice and difficult purposes of a senator, he has a third also, which he suspended from his buttonhole. The boys halloo'd, the dogs barked, puss scampered, the hero, with his long train of obsequious followers, withdrew. We made ourselves very merry with the adventure, and in a short time settled into our former tranquillity, never ...
— The Ontario Readers: The High School Reader, 1886 • Ministry of Education
... the big man, mopping his face with a large silk handkerchief, which, even at that distance, gave out a powerful perfume. "Go ahead, Snuffin, and we will settle this matter later," and, adjusting a large rose in his buttonhole, the self-important individual took his place on the cushioned seat at the wheel, while the big red motor boat drew ...
— Tom Swift and his Photo Telephone • Victor Appleton
... easy-chairs were a little pile of reviews, several volumes of poetry, and a couple of library books. In the centre of the mantelpiece was a photograph, the photograph of a man a little older, perhaps, than this newly-arrived visitor, with rounder face, dressed in country tweeds, a flower in his buttonhole, the picture of a prosperous man, yet with a curious, almost disturbing likeness to the pale, over-nervous, loose-framed youth whose eye had been attracted by its presence, and who was gazing at ...
— The Cinema Murder • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... an inferior force! Is that the way they mean to reconquer Venice by dint of arms? If ever they do regain Venetia it will be through the blood of our Brandenburghers and Pomeranians, and not their own.' During this tirade a little old Belgian in black, with the chain of St. Peter at his buttonhole by way of watchguard, capered off to communicate the grateful news to a group of his ecclesiastical fellow-travellers, shrieking out ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... and was as destructive as his age, "the place will lose its charm. They grow for the End of the World, and the End of the World belongs to them. This wonderful spot will have no beauty when they're gone." To wear a blossom in the hair or buttonhole was to be protected ...
— The Extra Day • Algernon Blackwood
... excited). Spiegelberg, they will say, art thou a magician, Spiegelberg? 'Tis a pity, the king will say, that thou wert not made a general, Spiegelberg, thou wouldst have thrust the Austrians through a buttonhole. Yes, I hear the doctors lamenting, 'tis a crying shame that he was not bred to medicine, he would have discovered the elixir vitae. Ay, and that he did not take to financiering, the Sullys will deplore in their cabinets,—he would have turned ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller
... occasions, and she had invariably expressed her appreciation through the dainty lips of a boutonniere arranged by her own fingers. Now while he recognized the roses resting on her corsage, her eyes dwelt on her favorite double lilac violets, nestling in the buttonhole of ...
— At the Mercy of Tiberius • August Evans Wilson
... out where they keep it, and I've stolen some. I'm Scotch, you know, and I believe in brownies. They're good to believe in. Old fables are generally all but true. You've only to 'put in one to make it so,' as children say in 'odd and even.'" And Miss Craydocke overcasted her first buttonhole energetically. ...
— A Summer in Leslie Goldthwaite's Life. • Mrs. A. D. T. Whitney
... the column where events are listed; and when I found the third page there was your face so splendidly reproduced, and you seemed so fine and noble to me I forgot about the dress suit and the badge in your buttonhole, or to wonder when or how or why it could have happened. I just sat there shouting in my soul, 'David! David! Medicine Man! ...
— The Harvester • Gene Stratton Porter
... black bags which doctors carry. He was a young man in appearance, one of those whom one sees in the White Light District, with unnaturally bright eyes which speak of late hours and a fast pace. He wore a flower in his buttonhole—a very fetching touch with some women. Debonair, dapper, dashing, his face was not one readily forgotten. As we passed hurriedly I observed that he had torn open the note and had thrown the envelope, ...
— The Ear in the Wall • Arthur B. Reeve
... overgrown, unlovely big town, which flounders under the questionable dignities of being a station of an army corps and a prefecture: Bureaucracy and Officialdom are writ large all over everything, and a poor mortal without a handle to his name, or a ribbon in his buttonhole, is looked upon as a sort of outcast when he enters a cafe, and accordingly he waits a long time ...
— The Automobilist Abroad • M. F. (Milburg Francisco) Mansfield
... man bent over Andy he saw the lad's watch dangling from its chain, fastened to a buttonhole of the youth's vest. Then his ferret-like eyes caught sight of a fine ruby pin in ...
— The Mystery at Putnam Hall - The School Chums' Strange Discovery • Arthur M. Winfield
... the wounded occupied the lower floor; typhoid, malaria, and other ills were upstairs. Stores were being brought in, packages of clothing and lint received at the door. A favorite surgeon made his rounds. He was cool and jaunty, his hands in his pockets, a rose in his buttonhole. "What are you malingerers doing here, anyhow? You're eating your white bread, with honey on it—you are! Propped up and walking around—Mrs. McGuire reading to you—Mrs. Randolph smilingly letting you beat her at her ...
— The Long Roll • Mary Johnston
... a man's house each day for less than he now pays for gas. Just before election you could go into your private office, throw in a large dose of campaign whisky, light a campaign cigar, fasten your buttonhole to the wall by an elastic band, so that there would be a gentle pull on it, and turn the electricity on your mechanical thought supply. It would save time and money, and the result would be the same as it is now. This would only be the beginning, of course, and after ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume VII. (of X.) • Various
... fair hair. There was a light in the room, so as she comes back through the window I sees her as plain as I sees you now. I knows her in a minute. It was the young lady as every Sunday morning pesters my life out of me to cut her a rose for her buttonhole: Miss Taylor, I think ...
— The New Girl at St. Chad's - A Story of School Life • Angela Brazil
... soft "Good-morning," and walked with him into the garden, among the roses and sweet-smelling things of summer. And then—oh, wonderful, exquisite marvel!—plucked a sprig of mignonette, smelled it, and placed it in his buttonhole. ...
— Colorado Jim • George Goodchild
... the house-boat in which he and another man lived, he felt in his pocket to make sure that I was still there. At the house-boat he put me in a tumbler of water out of sight of his friend, and frequently he stole to the spot like a thief to look at me. Early next morning he put me in his buttonhole, calling me sweet names. When his friend saw me, he too whistled, but not in the same way. Then my owner glared at him. This happened ...
— My Lady Nicotine - A Study in Smoke • J. M. Barrie
... as they sat there in the eye of the westering sun. The man (aged about one-and-twenty) wore the uncomfortable Sunday-best of a mechanic, with a shrivelled, but still enormous, bunch of Sweet-William in his buttonhole. The girl was dressed in a bright green gown and a white bonnet. Both were flushed and perspiring, and I still think they must have ordered hot cocoa in haste, and were repenting it at leisure. ...
— The Delectable Duchy • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... clothes, with a rose from the Dovecot hot-house for buttonhole (which he slipped into his pocket when he saw other boys approaching), delivered them at the doors of the aristocracy, where, by the way, he had been a few weeks earlier, ...
— Sentimental Tommy - The Story of His Boyhood • J. M. Barrie
... the eyelids, while she sipped her tea, she took in the salient changes the last five years had produced in him, noting in particular that though slightly older he had improved in looks, and that the dark-red carnation still held its place in his buttonhole. ...
— The Inner Shrine • Basil King
... attractive woman in a fine equipage. The Countess di Moccoli had left her own phaeton for a seat beside Mrs. Denvil—an attention the most gratifying in public—to discuss the Nile voyage. Also the Count Martellini, in faultless attire, a jasmine blossom in his buttonhole, and yellow gloves, having assisted at this exchange, had consented to take a seat opposite the two ladies. He seldom drove with Mrs. Denvil. The count punctiliously observed appearances. He did not dislike the circulation of a rumor which elected him as the devoted cavalier of the rich American ...
— Stories by American Authors, Volume 7 • Various
... myself by men who glanced at me with eyes of hate and passed on to another compartment which was already crowded or stood up in the aisle of the car, I made a point of buying an American flag for my buttonhole. ...
— My Year of the War • Frederick Palmer
... my poor head, and my poor head lets them out, and then you put them in again. What noble perseverance! If I live a while longer I do really think you will make a clever man of me. Let me put the rose in your buttonhole for you. And I say, I wish you would allow me to ...
— Jezebel • Wilkie Collins
... paper what I have to say. I can readily appreciate that the encounter is disagreeable. To meet one who has made a thing impossible to you sets the nerves on edge." He caught up his opera hat, his cane and gloves. He raised the lapel of his coat and sniffed at the orchid in the buttonhole. ...
— Arms and the Woman • Harold MacGrath
... selected a blossom for his buttonhole, and then proceeded to draw David out. Under the skillful, schooled ...
— David Dunne - A Romance of the Middle West • Belle Kanaris Maniates
... altruistic, rather than the newer and perhaps brusquer style of manners. His was a "mild and magnificent" blue eye in which so many, who loved him so, liked to dwell, and he had no need to wear glasses. The only sign of ornament about him was his gold watch-chain and cross-bar in his black vest buttonhole. ...
— Charles Carleton Coffin - War Correspondent, Traveller, Author, and Statesman • William Elliot Griffis
... to class he plucked up courage to purchase a small buttonhole for her, and blushed a very warm red when Joan took his offering with a smile and pinned it into ...
— To Love • Margaret Peterson
... countenances close to the sculptor's with an unchangeable grin, that gave still more ludicrous effect to the comic alarm and sorrow of their gestures. Just then, a figure came by, in a gray wig and rusty gown, with an inkhorn at his buttonhole and a pen behind his ear; he announced himself as a notary, and offered to make the last will and testament of the assassinated man. This solemn duty, however, was interrupted by a surgeon, who brandished a lancet, three feet long, and proposed to him ...
— The Marble Faun, Volume II. - The Romance of Monte Beni • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... Matthias should have his bouquet, apart from all consideration of his prophecy. Suddenly, an excellent idea occurred to me; I divided my own bouquet, tied up the half of it with a white ribbon, and fastened it to his buttonhole by a gold pin, keeping a common one for myself. Matthias was charmed with this ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. 4, No 3, September 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... that the Haverly Mastodon Minstrels headed the third division of the Garfield inaugural parade. Ever mindful and proud of his men, Frohman, at his personal expense, bought a buttonhole bouquet for every member for the occasion and fastened it on their coats himself. On the sidewalk he followed with admiring eye and flushed face ...
— Charles Frohman: Manager and Man • Isaac Frederick Marcosson and Daniel Frohman
... looked about him with that bored and commiserating expression with which city men are apt to regard the shallow skyline of a small town. He was of medium height and carefully groomed from his well-tailored clothes to the carnation in his buttonhole and manicured polish of his nails. His face, clean-shaven save for a close-cropped and sandy mustache, held a touch of the florid and his figure inclined to stoutness. At the livery stable where he called for a buggy, after learning ...
— The Tyranny of Weakness • Charles Neville Buck
... it, but deceivingly unconventional to the eye of the uninitiated. This he put on, taking particular pains to select a very plain cravat, and to fasten in it with care the scarf-pin bestowed upon him by old Benson, the little watchmaker on the corner below. Through the buttonhole in the lapel of his coat he drew a spicy-smelling sprig of ground-pine, chanting whimsically as he did so a couplet ...
— The Brown Study • Grace S. Richmond
... Mrs. Luna had tattled about. Mr. Burrage was successful, he could see that in the turn of an eye; not perhaps as having a commanding intellect or a very strong character, but as being rich, polite, handsome, happy, amiable, and as wearing a splendid camellia in his buttonhole. And that he, at any rate, thought Verena had succeeded was proved by the casual, civil tone, and the contented distraction of eye, with which he exclaimed, "You don't mean to say you were not moved ...
— The Bostonians, Vol. II (of II) • Henry James
... to make discord; so quiet, indeed, was all the earth that I became startled by the sudden chatter of a squirrel disturbed at my approach, and unthinkingly I stooped to pluck a delicate pink flower blooming in the grass, and placed it in a ragged buttonhole of ...
— My Lady of the North • Randall Parrish
... and Evacuation Day, when the British redcoats got out of Boston and Patrick evicted the snakes from Ireland. For observing the day, wear a turkey-red coat, or vest, and put a bit of green ribbon, or a shamrock, in the buttonhole—the green above the red. On Easter day, wear a scrambled ...
— The Foolish Dictionary • Gideon Wurdz
... with gray silk, which trail on their spurs, and with collars of costly beaver or striped American raccoon, and long sleeves forever dangling unused. A snippet of orange and black ribbon worn in the buttonhole shows us that the wearer belongs to the much-coveted military Order of St. George. There are civilians in black cape-coats of the military pattern, topped off with cold, uncomfortable, but fashionable chimneypot hats, or, more sensibly, with high ...
— Russian Rambles • Isabel F. Hapgood
... wave of his stick. He was tall and he was thin. His trousers were extremely elegant, a light cloth, black and white check, hung on his legs in graceful lines, and he wore tiny boots with light brown cloth tops. The jacket and waistcoat were in dark brown cloth, and the odour of the gardenia in his buttonhole contrasted with that of the sachet- scented silk pocket-handkerchief which lay in his side pocket. His throat showed white and healthy in the high collar tied with a white silk cravat in a sailor's knot, fastened with a small diamond. ...
— Spring Days • George Moore
... flower in his buttonhole, welcomed Roger uproariously. "Here's Whittington," he said. "You ought to hear his poem, fellows, about a little cat. He had us ...
— Contrary Mary • Temple Bailey
... see him, I knew exactly how he would be looking at Ivor, his keen grey eyes narrowed, his clean-shaven lips drawn in, the long, well-shaped hand, of which he is said to be vain, toying with the pale Malmaison pink he always wears in his buttonhole. ...
— The Powers and Maxine • Charles Norris Williamson
... hair danced wildly over his shoulders, as if electrified: he had a quick eye, and wore enviably well-fitting ducks: his neck, besides supporting his head and all its contents, supported an inextricable labyrinth of gold chains; from every buttonhole of his waistcoat the chains they came in, and the chains they came out, like the peripatetic man on the Boulevards who sells them: his gloves, well-fitting, and buttoning at the wrist, were of the whitest kid, and grasped a yet whiter and highly-scented ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 62, Number 361, November, 1845. • Various
... Each button of his coat and low-cut vest was a diamond, and from the front of his rimless cap waved a plume of diamonds. On his wrists were heavy gold bracelets of Malayan workmanship, and his fingers were cramped with almost priceless rings. In his buttonhole blazed a diamond orchid. The handle and scabbard of his sword were a solid mass of precious stones. Altogether this little known Oriental potentate possessed $10,000,000 worth of diamonds, the second ...
— Tales of the Malayan Coast - From Penang to the Philippines • Rounsevelle Wildman
... He was very dapper in a new tailcoat and a flower in his buttonhole. He was very nervous, too, for he was to give the address of the day. He pulled a small box ...
— Highacres • Jane Abbott
... after Alan's wonderful success," replied Katharine lightly, as she took out the daffodil she had been wearing in her buttonhole and tossed it over to her cousin. Then she added soberly, "It isn't any story at all, but I believe, while we wait, I'll tell you about the saddest funeral I ...
— Half a Dozen Girls • Anna Chapin Ray
... a surprise that would be distinctly pleasant, though," said Wade, giving a great deal of attention to the selection of a match from his silver case. "For instance, if you were to give me a small piece of that lilac for my buttonhole." ...
— The Lilac Girl • Ralph Henry Barbour
... halfback caught it and started up the field. Right at him came Birdie Andrews, hat in hand, and when the halfback arrived he bowed and asked him to stop. The runner declined. McMurty was right behind and he also begged the runner to stop. Boggs tried to buttonhole him. Skeeter Wilson, who was as fast as a trolley car, ran along with him for twenty-five yards, pleading with him to listen to reason and consent to be downed. It was no use. The halfback went over the goal line. The Kiowa delegation didn't know whether to go crazy ...
— At Good Old Siwash • George Fitch
... he buttonhole you on your way to school, and say, 'Jackson, a word in your ear. You stick on side.' Or did he lead up to it in any way? Did he say, 'Talking of side, you stick it on.' What had you ...
— Mike • P. G. Wodehouse
... heavy-set man with a debonnaire, dapper way about him. He wore a flower in his buttonhole, a smart touch which seemed very fetching, evidently, to ...
— Constance Dunlap • Arthur B. Reeve
... remember was the arrival of the new baby, my brother Jack, when I was two years old. Dr. Cox was spoiling my mother's good-night visit while I was being dried after my bath. My pink flannel dressing-gown, with white buttonhole stitching, was hanging over the fender; and he was discussing some earnest subject in a low tone. He got up and, ...
— Margot Asquith, An Autobiography: Volumes I & II • Margot Asquith
... up in the country. He had not thought, for a long time before, of the dear old woman who supposed her son was turning his wits to good account in the city. But Miss Sydney did not know how much he wished for a bit to put in his buttonhole when she indignantly went back to the dining-room to wait until that impertinent ...
— An Arrow in a Sunbeam - and Other Tales • Various
... writer. Wouldn't you like me to leave college and go into a dramatic school? And then I'll send you a box for all my performances, and smile at you across the footlights. Only wear a red rose in your buttonhole, please, so I'll surely smile at the right man. It would be an awfully embarrassing mistake if I picked out ...
— Daddy-Long-Legs • Jean Webster
... him somewhat disapprovingly, but said nothing; and presently the three rose, without vocal suggestion from any of them, and strolled thoughtfully back to the theatre, pausing a moment by the way, while Tinker bought a white carnation for his buttonhole. There was a good deal, he remarked absent-mindedly, in what Mr. Potter had said ...
— Harlequin and Columbine • Booth Tarkington
... the Marines are to the Senior Service, "I." is to us. Should a Subaltern come in with the yarn that the spook of HINDENBURG accosted him at Bloody Corner and offered him a cigar, or a balloon cherub buttonhole you with the story of a Bosch tank fitted with rubber tyres, C-springs and hot and cold water, that he has seen climbing trees behind St. Quentin, we retort, "Oh, go and tell it to 'I.'" and then sit back and see what the inspired official organ of the green tabs will ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 153, Oct. 17, 1917 • Various
... pomaded, with laced waist, the hips of a woman, the bust of a Prussian officer, the murmur of admiration from the boulevard wenches surrounding him, his cravat knowingly tied, a bludgeon in his pocket, a flower in his buttonhole; such was ...
— Les Miserables - Complete in Five Volumes • Victor Hugo
... dusk, however, you, personally, take him for a walk near the Park, and if, among the other Cingalese you may meet, you should see one dressed as an Englishman, and wearing a scarlet flower in his buttonhole, take no notice of how often you see him nor ...
— Cleek, the Master Detective • Thomas W. Hanshew
... to me a confused rush of memories. It was that of a woman who sat on an ottoman in the smallest room which was almost empty. Her companion was a small, vivacious man with a gray imperial, and the red ribbon in his buttonhole, to whose continuous stream of talk, eked out with meridional gestures, she had the air of being listlessly resigned. Her dress, a marvel of discretion, its colour the yellow of old ivory, was of some very rich and stiff stuff ...
— The Poems And Prose Of Ernest Dowson • Ernest Dowson et al
... this little Lisette, who had the impudence to flout him? A girl in a florist's, if you can believe me, with no particular beauty herself, and not a son by way of dot! And yet—one must confess it—she turned a head as swiftly as she made a "buttonhole"; and Pomponnet, the pastrycook, was paying court to her, too—to say nothing of the homage of messieurs Tricotrin, the poet, and Goujaud, the painter, and Lajeunie, the novelist. You would never have guessed ...
— A Chair on The Boulevard • Leonard Merrick
... strange to know that there was once a time when Cree was young and straight, a callant who wore a flower in his buttonhole, and tried to be a hero for ...
— Auld Licht Idylls • J. M. Barrie
... my final leave of her she put a flower in my buttonhole. My reflection was then, and is now, that if she already knew the truth from John himself, how well ...
— Lady Baltimore • Owen Wister
... meals, in their walks; listening to my father's songs, my mother's sweet playing, and always unseen and unheeded by them. Moreover, I soon learned to touch things without sensibly blurring the dream. I would cull a rose, and stick it in my buttonhole, and there it remained—but lo! the very rose I had just culled was still on the rose-bush also! I would pick up a stone and throw it at the wall, where it disappeared without a sound—and the very same stone still lay at my ...
— Peter Ibbetson • George du Marier et al
... quarters. I could not sit down on a bench by myself or set my foot any place without being assailed by insignificant accidents, miserable details, that forced their way into my imagination and scattered my powers to all the four winds. A dog that dashed by me, a yellow rose in a man's buttonhole, had the power to set my thoughts vibrating and occupy me for a length ...
— Hunger • Knut Hamsun
... which he had entered and which opened into the main lobby he slowed his gait long enough to undo the overcoat and slip out of it. The top button caught fast in its buttonhole, the coat being new and its buttonholes being stiff. He gave a sharp tug at the rebellious cloth, and the button, which probably had been insecurely sewed on in the first place, came away from its thread fastenings and lodged in the fingers of his right hand. Mechanically ...
— From Place to Place • Irvin S. Cobb
... all, there was a perfect jam in the town hall. I sat up in front, with a lot of fellows, and had a splendid view. The old Italian came out dressed in his best suit of clothes—black broadcloth, flower in his buttonhole, and so on. He made a fine bow, and he said he was 'pleased too see ze fine audience, and he was going to show zem ze fine animals, ze finest animals in ze world.' Then he shook a little whip that he carried in his hand, and he said 'zat zat whip didn't mean zat he was cruel. He cracked it ...
— Beautiful Joe - An Autobiography of a Dog • by Marshall Saunders |
