"Cheerfulness" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... nature, which is a rough counsellor The last informed is better persuaded than the first The mean is best The mind grows costive and thick in growing old The most manifest sign of wisdom is a continual cheerfulness The most voluntary death is the finest The particular error first makes the public error The pedestal is no part of the statue The privilege of the mind to rescue itself from old age The reward of a thing well done is to have done it The satiety of living, inclines a man to desire to die ...
— Quotes and Images From The Works of Michel De Montaigne • Michel De Montaigne
... moment or two before I could think whom you meant by Mr. Dismal View. Why, he is one of the best of the brotherhood, so far as cheerfulness goes; for if he do not laugh himself, he makes the rest of us laugh continually. He is the quaintest and queerest personage you ever saw,—full of dry jokes, the humor of which is so incorporated with the strange ...
— Passages From The American Notebooks, Volume 2. • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... the group with affected cheerfulness, but his heart was heavier than he liked to admit. He made his way to the "ladies' parlor," as the little sitting-room in the south wing of the rambling old tavern, overlooking the court-green was ...
— The Sheriffs Bluff - 1908 • Thomas Nelson Page
... shuddered. At the end of the next three hours I had been through perils so awful that all peace of mind and all cheerfulness were gone from me. Gillespie had called and thrown me out of the window. Jones arrived promptly, and when I got ready to do the cowhiding he took the job off my hands. In an encounter with a stranger, ...
— Editorial Wild Oats • Mark Twain
... as if everybody was to have a sort of sober cheerfulness, and must yield to indolence under this charming atmosphere. I went into the courtyard by the sea-shore (where a few lazy ships were lying, with no one on board), and found it was the prison of the place. The door was as wide open ...
— Notes on a Journey from Cornhill to Grand Cairo • William Makepeace Thackeray
... them across the sea to lands where they are not. Into the heart of East London there poured from Russia, from Poland, from Germany, from Holland, streams of Jewish exiles, refugees, settlers, few as well-to-do as the Jew of the proverb, but all rich in their cheerfulness, their industry, and their cleverness. The majority bore with them nothing but their phylacteries and praying shawls, and a good-natured contempt for Christians and Christianity. For the Jew has rarely been embittered by persecution. He ...
— Children of the Ghetto • I. Zangwill
... with tedious verses upon it from the miller's pen; while in an alcove near the tomb was a mechanical arrangement of death's-heads which might keep the miller's thoughts from straying, when, as with Dr. Johnson's philosopher, cheerfulness would creep in. ...
— Highways & Byways in Sussex • E.V. Lucas
... cities in search of [v]superfluity. Remote from the polite, they still retained the [v]primeval simplicity of manners; and, frugal by habit, they scarce knew that temperance was a virtue. They wrought with cheerfulness on days of labor, but observed festivals as intervals of idleness and pleasure. They kept up the Christmas carol, sent love-knots on Valentine morning, ate pancakes on [v]Shrovetide, showed their wit on the first of April, and religiously cracked ...
— The Literary World Seventh Reader • Various
... neater appearance: they are brightly whitewashed, and the little windows are decorated with flowering plants. Within them there is an air of simple neatness and freshness we have seldom seen surpassed; the meagre furniture seems to have been arranged by some careful hand, and presents an air of cheerfulness in strange contrast with the dingy cabins around. In each there is a neatly arranged bed, spread over with a white cover, and by its side a piece of soft carpet. It is from these we shall draw forth the principal characters of ...
— Our World, or, The Slaveholders Daughter • F. Colburn Adams
... abide with cheerfulness the personal consequences which may result from the course of conduct which I feel ...
— The Felon's Track • Michael Doheny
... Hyde knew how small were the chances of such aid. Were the unpurged Long Parliament restored, what better could be hoped from them than that they would open negotiations upon the basis of the old treaty at Newport, which the late King "had yielded to with much less cheerfulness than he had walked ...
— The Life of Edward Earl of Clarendon V2 • Henry Craik
... those which he wrote himself, led the hubbub, and after we had drunk Jack's health there was such a noise that he escaped having to reply. When any one shouted for him, as they did fitfully for some time, their voices were always drowned in the general cheerfulness of the evening, and he finally came round from the other side of the table and sat down ...
— Godfrey Marten, Undergraduate • Charles Turley
... was shining radiantly, drying up the dew on the flowers, and making the red-tiled path glow warmly; it seemed to fill the garden, the cottage, and all Huldah's world with cheerfulness. By the time she had finished sweeping, the kettle was singing, so Huldah got the teapot and warmed it. She even warmed the cup and saucer too, in her anxiety that Mrs. Perry should have her tea as hot as possible. Then she cut a slice of bread as ...
— Dick and Brownie • Mabel Quiller-Couch
... yesterday at a ball, where they danced through the whole night, till—daylight. The good music, the tasteful dresses and lovely dancing of the ladies; but above all, the tone of social life, the cordial cheerfulness, astonished several foreigners who were present, and caused them to inquire whether they were really here under the seventieth ...
— Strife and Peace • Fredrika Bremer
... with many a classic spoil CAM rolls his reverend stream along, I haste to urge the learnd toil That sternly chides my love-lorn song: Ah me! too mindful of the days 5 Illumed by Passion's orient rays, When Peace, and Cheerfulness and Health Enriched me with the best of wealth. Ah fair Delights! that o'er my soul On Memory's wing, like shadows fly! 10 Ah Flowers! which Joy from Eden stole While Innocence stood smiling by!— But cease, fond Heart! this bootless moan: Those Hours on rapid Pinions flown Shall yet return, ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge - Vol I and II • Samuel Taylor Coleridge
... Broadway, especially by night. Depression vanishes before the cheerfulness of the great white way when the lights are lit and the human tide is in full flood. Rutherford had developed of late a habit of patrolling the neighbourhood of Forty-Second Street at theatre-time. He found it did him good. There is a gaiety, a bonhomie, in ...
— The Man Upstairs and Other Stories • P. G. Wodehouse
... in the face of hardships and difficult obstacles. If the cart broke down he whistled "Yankee Doodle," while he managed to mend it. If the road was especially rough and their progress most unpleasantly slow, he was certain to sing. Even Jerry could not fail to catch the spirit of his cheerfulness no matter what bad luck they had, and from looking glum, John would change to light-heartedness every time. Ree's smile was a never failing remedy ...
— Far Past the Frontier • James A. Braden
... as patiently as possible, but ultimately, with no sign of the travellers, they were obliged to dine alone; though the meal was not eaten with customary cheerfulness, for both the boys shared forebodings ...
— The Fiery Totem - A Tale of Adventure in the Canadian North-West • Argyll Saxby
... brightened rapidly after a week or two's practice. Railsford put his shoulder to the wheel with his usual energy. He would bowl or bat or field with equal cheerfulness, if thereby he might smarten up the form of any player, however indifferent, who really wanted to improve. He specially devoted himself to the candidates for a place in the second eleven; and it presently began to be rumoured that Railsford's would be able to put ...
— The Master of the Shell • Talbot Baines Reed
... been giving Maltravers some useful information respecting the management of his estate; and Evelyn was already interested in all that could interest her friend. She had one excellent thing in woman, had Evelyn Cameron: despite her sunny cheerfulness of temper she was quiet; and she had insensibly acquired, under the roof of her musing and silent mother, the habit of never disturbing others. What a blessed secret is that in the intercourse ...
— Alice, or The Mysteries, Book II • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... remained under a cloud. Florent sometimes ventured to show himself, and shook hands with his brother, while Lisa observed a frigid silence. He even dined with them sometimes on Sundays, at long intervals, and Quenu then made great efforts at gaiety, but could not succeed in imparting any cheerfulness to the meal. He ate badly, and ended by feeling altogether put out. One evening, after one of these icy family gatherings, he said to his wife with tears ...
— The Fat and the Thin • Emile Zola
... "resting" in January. But when he who sells goods on the road groans and tosses in the clutches of a dreadful dream, it is, strangely enough, never of canceled orders, maniacal train schedules, lumpy mattresses, or vilely cooked food. These everyday things he accepts with a philosopher's cheerfulness. No—his nightmare is always a vision of himself, sick on the road, at a country hotel in the ...
— Roast Beef, Medium • Edna Ferber
... day was Tuesday. It found Benton nearer cheerfulness than he had been since the Isis had in February pointed her bow eastward for the run across the Atlantic, under ...
— The Lighted Match • Charles Neville Buck
... it isn't. Not at all. Not at all. [Goes up to the desk, brings down about ten more bills with great affected cheerfulness.] There! You see, ...
— Dolly Reforming Herself - A Comedy in Four Acts • Henry Arthur Jones
... threw them into the sea, carefully dispersing them abroad, as if she wished to prevent the sight of them from reviving the remembrance of what she had done. She then plunged into the river, and after having washed her whole body, returned to the tents with the same gaiety and cheerfulness ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 12 • Robert Kerr
... received us with coldness and taciturnity, we therefore laid in our stock of provisions and fresh water as quickly as possible, and rejoiced in being at liberty to take leave of a country from whence one wrong-headed man has banished cheerfulness and content. ...
— A New Voyage Round the World, in the years 1823, 24, 25, and 26, Vol. 2 • Otto von Kotzebue
... he not?" It seemed a heavy disappointment; but the patient old man rallied straightway, saying, with his accustomed cheerfulness, "No doubt something hindered him; no doubt he would have come if he could. My poor, dear girl, how I wish I could have got word to her that I am safe! But I thank you all the same; it was kind in you to ...
— Cudjo's Cave • J. T. Trowbridge
... his mental image of that event. That is why until we know what others think they know, we cannot truly understand their acts. I have seen a young girl, brought up in a Pennsylvania mining town, plunged suddenly from entire cheerfulness into a paroxysm of grief when a gust of wind cracked the kitchen window-pane. For hours she was inconsolable, and to me incomprehensible. But when she was able to talk, it transpired that if a window-pane broke it meant that a close ...
— Public Opinion • Walter Lippmann
... Unavella," she said, with a pathetic cheerfulness which did not deceive her faithful handmaiden, who, as she confided afterwards to a friend, wuz weepin' bitter gall tears in her mind, though she kep' a calm front outside, for she wuzn't goin' ter be outdid in pluck by that little bit of sweetness. ...
— A Beautiful Possibility • Edith Ferguson Black
... unsuccessful, for so intimate is the mysterious connection between spirit and matter that he felt comparative relief—even to the extent of cheerfulness—when the muscles were in violent action and the perspiration was streaming down his brow; but when the second hut, or larder, was completed his depression returned in greater ...
— The Hot Swamp • R.M. Ballantyne
... respectful manner in which the address of the British Conference had been received by the Irish Conference, and he trusted the brethren would understand the import and bearing of that remark. Rev. Mr. Entwistle referred to the liberality and cheerfulness of the Irish preachers in their difficulties, when Dr. Bunting replied that if they had been in such difficulties their heads would have ...
— The Story of My Life - Being Reminiscences of Sixty Years' Public Service in Canada • Egerton Ryerson
... Miss Valery went into her own room, where, year after year, when all the duties and cheerfulness of the day were done, the solitary woman had shut herself in—alone with her own heart and with God. The young wife stood and looked with thoughtful reverence at the closed door ...
— Agatha's Husband - A Novel • Dinah Maria Craik (AKA: Dinah Maria Mulock)
... secrets were being discussed in whispers, Nuisance was always within earshot. He was the extra, the intruder, the tail to the kite. He did not actively offend against the traditions which govern freshmen in the incubator period. He was too clever for that. He had submitted to the mild hazing with a cheerfulness which robbed it of all its sting. He had climbed water towers and sung appropriate hymns. He had sat in washbasins and gravely pulled imaginary miles against the toothpicks furnished him as oars. He had submitted to the pi's as they came with a full recognition that the second and third ...
— Skippy Bedelle - His Sentimental Progress From the Urchin to the Complete - Man of the World • Owen Johnson
... to have taken the hint," she informed him, with a sort of surface cheerfulness. "Stanley is down there talking to Mr. Hart now, and the others have gone on. They'll all be well over the dead-line by sundown. There goes Stanley now. Do you really feel that your future happiness depends on getting through this gate? ...
— Good Indian • B. M. Bower
... idea and consciousness of the Unity takes possession of one, he feels a new sense of cheerfulness and optimism entirely different from any other feeling that he has ever experienced. He loses that distrust and hardness which seems to cling to so many in this age who have arrived at the Intellectual stage of development, and have been unable to progress ...
— A Series of Lessons in Gnani Yoga • Yogi Ramacharaka
... the faintest sound broke the stillness. If ever you want to squeeze away a man's cheerfulness like water from a rag, shut him up alone in the dark and silence. He will thank you to take him out into the daylight and hang him. In token whereof, my heart welcomed like ...
— Helmet of Navarre • Bertha Runkle
... and looked down into his face from his greater height with a sort of sobered cheerfulness. "How much do you ...
— The Quality of Mercy • W. D. Howells
... seemed never to have thought of her looks, and if he cared for her, it was for some other reason, just as she cared for him. She did not know what the reason could be, but perhaps it was her sympathy, her appreciation, her cheerfulness; Louise believed that she had ...
— The Story of a Play - A Novel • W. D. Howells
... he went, to the good-natured ecclesiastic's grief, promising, nevertheless, with a disconsolate affectation of cheerfulness, that all should be settled, and he under the Priest's ...
— The House by the Church-Yard • J. Sheridan Le Fanu
... broke down and had a good cry; while Philip comforted her, first by saying two or three funny things, and secondly by asserting, with a positive cheerfulness which was peculiar to him when he was hard pressed, that, even if the church withdrew all support, he (Philip) could probably get a job somewhere on a railroad, or in a hotel, where there was always a ...
— The Crucifixion of Philip Strong • Charles M. Sheldon
... and the good man went into his garden at the same time to supply another with something which he wanted thence, for they had nothing which those who wanted it were not welcome to. These good people were in the utmost cheerfulness, when they heard the report of a gun, and immediately afterwards a little dog, the favourite of the eldest daughter, came limping in all bloody and laid himself at his mistress's feet: the poor girl, who was about eleven years old, burst into ...
— Joseph Andrews, Vol. 2 • Henry Fielding
... I were possessed of your unwavering faith and cheerfulness!" said the king, profoundly sighing. "But my hope is gone; our misfortunes have crushed out not my courage but my belief in a ...
— Napoleon and the Queen of Prussia • L. Muhlbach
... glanced at each other, but neither replied. Their mother, however, did not notice their silence, for just then Miss Ward made her appearance. She was all smiles and cheerfulness now, for Mr. and Mrs. Hervey's return was the greatest ...
— Miss Mouse and Her Boys • Mrs. Molesworth
... box was to turn up a size or an ace. However, he instantly resumed his spirits, and expressed his wonder rather that his poetical popularity should have lasted so long, than that it should have now at last given way. At length he said, with perfect cheerfulness, 'Well, well, James, so be it—but you know we must not droop, for we can't afford to give over. Since one line has failed, we must just stick to something else:'—and so he dismissed me and resumed ...
— Memoirs of the Life of Sir Walter Scott, Volume V (of 10) • John Gibson Lockhart
... that eternal sadness reigned in this severe house, had never been in it, looked around with astonishment, and as it were with a feeling of disappointment, for the atrium produced rather an impression of cheerfulness. A sheaf of bright light falling from above through a large opening broke into a thousand sparks on a fountain in a quadrangular little basin, called the impluvium, which was in the middle to receive rain falling through the opening during ...
— Quo Vadis - A Narrative of the Time of Nero • Henryk Sienkiewicz
... The young Countess Dagmar stood at a window with Harry Anguish. The latter was flushed and nervous and acted like a man who expects that which is unexpected by others. With a strange confidence in his voice, he sought to cheer his depressed friends, but the cheerfulness was not contagious. The sombreness of a burial ...
— Graustark • George Barr McCutcheon
... The cheerfulness of his voice, as much as his words, caused Ralston to stop and turn upon his companion in ...
— The Broken Road • A. E. W. Mason
... be getting along perfectly together: there could be no mistaking the picture he saw before him. Sylvia told Daniel when she was alone with him that she had taken a great liking to Dorothea. She remarked that her cheerfulness was irresistible and contagious, and that when she was with children she ...
— The Goose Man • Jacob Wassermann
... qualified as aforesaid, have at sundry times freely granted several large subsidies and public aids for his Majesty's service, according to their abilities, when required thereto by letter from one of his Majesty's principal Secretaries of State; and that their right to grant the same, and their cheerfulness and sufficiency in the said grants, have been at sundry times ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. II. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... after, it had ceased altogether, and the vessel appeared to glide along more smoothly than ever. The nauseating sickness took its departure about the same time, and I felt the reaction of health, which produced a little cheerfulness within me. As my fears had kept me awake during the whole time the storm was raging, and as I had continued ill so long as the violent rocking prevailed, I was quite worn out; so that the moment things were smooth again, I fell ...
— The Boy Tar • Mayne Reid
... excitement as he did so. Skene struck up the blow with his right arm, and the impetuous youth spun and stumbled away until he fell supine in a corner, rapping his head smartly on the floor at the same time. He rose with unabated cheerfulness and offered to continue the combat; but Skene declined any further exercise just then, and, much pleased with his novice's game, promised to give him a scientific education and make a man ...
— Cashel Byron's Profession • George Bernard Shaw
... harrowed by the mutilation of the Hermae, and now that the moment of parting was at hand, all the perils and uncertainties of their grand enterprise rose up vividly before them. They were restored, however, to some degree of cheerfulness, when they reached the harbour of Peiraeus, and saw the magnificent fleet riding at anchor. Nearly all the vessels lying in the bay were Athenian; for the main body of the allies, and the commissariat ships, had been ordered to muster at Corcyra. The triremes ...
— Stories From Thucydides • H. L. Havell
... never been disposed to be niggard of cheerfulness; for it has always seemed to me that one of the duties of a writer is to supply solace in a world where, amid all the beauty, so many things seem to go wrong. But, while I would fain banish cankered melancholy, sour ill-humour, cynicism, and petty complaining, I have never ...
— Side Lights • James Runciman
... not?" says Molly, with the utmost cheerfulness, smiling on him. She is so sorry for his defeat, which she witnessed, that her smile is one of her kindest. "If this weather might only continue, how happy we should be. Even the flowers would remain with us." She holds up the white rose in her ...
— Molly Bawn • Margaret Wolfe Hamilton
... and most repetitious of household tasks banishes drudgery. "Give us, oh, give us," says Carlyle, "the man who sings at his work. He will do more in the same time, he will do it better, he will persevere longer. Wondrous is the strength of cheerfulness; altogether past ...
— Educational Work of the Girl Scouts • Louise Stevens Bryant
... psychological process we may realize how it is that even in the higher religions, however else they may differ, the practical value of asceticism and mortification as the necessary door to the most exalted religious state is almost universally recognized, and with complete cheerfulness. "Asceticism and ecstacy are inseparable," as Probst-Biraben remarks at the outset of an interesting paper on Mahommedan mysticism ("L'Extase dans le Mysticisme Musulman," Revue Philosophique, Nov., 1906). Asceticism is the necessary ante-chamber ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 6 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis
... employ of Bisonette; men, whose home is in the wilderness, and who love the camp fire better than the domestic hearth. They are contented and happy in the midst of hardship, privation, and danger. Their cheerfulness and gayety is irrepressible, and no people on earth understand better how "to daff the world aside and bid it pass." Besides these, were two or three half-breeds, a race of rather extraordinary composition, being according to the common saying ...
— The Oregon Trail • Francis Parkman, Jr.
... nor boisterous, will dispel the shades of care and hang the smiles of summer upon the sorrows of the coldest heart." Her animation gave life to all around her, and made her, at school, an unusual favorite; at home, the joy of her father's dwelling. It was probably this cheerfulness of her natural disposition which in after years enabled her to endure such protracted sufferings, and, by the side of her missionary husband, smile amid clanking fetters and gloomy dungeons. She loved to look upon the bright side of every picture, ...
— Daughters of the Cross: or Woman's Mission • Daniel C. Eddy
... composure of this woman, who, three hours before her first assignation, was rehearsing a comedy in her own home? Even at this moment she trembled more than Juliette; what maddened her was the consciousness of her own passion amidst the quiet cheerfulness of this drawing-room; she was terrified lest she should burst out into some angry speech. ...
— A Love Episode • Emile Zola
... her was a welcome sop to the Cerberus of their astonishment. A more striking contrast than that between her and her two aunts could hardly have been found in the whole island. She was like a star between two gray clouds of twilight. But she had not so much share in her own cheerfulness as her poor aunts had in their misery. She so lived because she was so made. She was a joy to others as well as to herself, but as yet she had no merit in her own peace or its rippling gladness. So strong was the ...
— Weighed and Wanting • George MacDonald
... called upon us in her way home, we being not merely her oldest, but almost her only friends; for lively and social as was her temper, there was a little touch of shyness about her, which induced her rather to shun than to covet the company of strangers. And indeed the cheerfulness of temper, and activity of mind, which made her so charming an acquisition to a small circle, rendered her independent of general society. Busy as a bee, sportive as a butterfly, she passed the greater part of her time in the open air, ...
— Country Lodgings • Mary Russell Mitford
... him. He expanded his chest and drew in long draughts of air. He told himself that this sharp weather was better than sunshine. He remembered that all travellers in romances battled with mist and rain. Presently his body recovered comfort and vigour, and his mind worked itself into cheerfulness. ...
— Huntingtower • John Buchan
... ladies, and which opened on a garden, really a park of thirteen or fourteen acres. The doors were always open, and one had a lovely view of green fields and trees. The moment you put your foot inside the court, you felt the atmosphere of peace and cheerfulness, though it was a hospital. The nuns all looked happy and smiling—they always do, and I always wonder why. Life in a cloister seems to me so narrow and monotonous and unsatisfying unless one has been bred in a convent and knows nothing of life but ...
— My First Years As A Frenchwoman, 1876-1879 • Mary King Waddington
... depression seems to have fallen upon the household. Mr. Barbauld was ailing; he was suffering from a nervous irritability which occasionally quite unfitted him for his work as a schoolmaster. Already his wife must have had many things to bear, and very much to try her courage and cheerfulness; and now her health was also failing. It was in 1775 that they gave up the academy, which, on the whole, had greatly flourished. It had been established eleven years; they were both of them in need of rest and change. Nevertheless, it was not without reluctance ...
— A Book of Sibyls - Miss Barbauld, Miss Edgeworth, Mrs Opie, Miss Austen • Anne Thackeray (Mrs. Richmond Ritchie)
... exhortation seemed rather a superfluous one to a man with a great pair of iron fetters on his feet. But Mr. Haley had got in the habit of commencing his relations with his stock with little exhortations of this nature, calculated, as he deemed, to inspire cheerfulness and confidence, and prevent the necessity of ...
— Uncle Tom's Cabin • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... Hamilton-Wells sent for the twins and lectured them, Lady Adeline sitting by, seriously perplexed. The children stood to attention together, and listened respectfully; and then went back to their lessons with undeviating cheerfulness; but Diavolo did Angelica's, and Angelica did his diligently, and none other ...
— The Heavenly Twins • Madame Sarah Grand
... up straight and gravely, and answered very courteously and holding-tightly all the amiable roundabout remarks the old gentleman was shoving forward like pawns on a chessboard before the real game begins. She answered with the same trained cheerfulness she could give her library children when her head and her disposition ached worst; and even warmed to a vicious enthusiasm over the state of the streets and the wetness of the ...
— The Rose Garden Husband • Margaret Widdemer
... little girls took their visitor into the schoolroom, where they were to amuse themselves until it was time to start for their walk. It was a large bright room like all the others in the house; but this cheerfulness did not seem to have affected the Winslows themselves. They were quiet children, always good and obedient, but rather dull. They did not seem to understand games, and seldom laughed. How very different they were to Sophia Jane! Certainly she was not nearly so well behaved, but ...
— Susan - A Story for Children • Amy Walton
... "I will draw water for thy camels also, until they have done drinking." Thus did the maiden clearly prove that she possessed some of the qualities most necessary for a wife—that ready self-forgetfulness, that kindness, cheerfulness, and desire to promote the happiness of others, that sunshine of the heart which sheds its brightening beams over all the clouds that darken domestic life. Through all the ages of the world, in all the circumstances in which mankind are placed, the wife has ever need of them, and ...
— Notable Women of Olden Time • Anonymous
... little one never changed, though it was so badly received. When the tanager turned savagely and gave his faithful friend a severe peck, instead of resenting it the hurt bird flew to another perch, where he stood a long time, uttering occasionally a low, plaintive call, as if of reproach, all his cheerfulness gone, a melancholy sight indeed. I waited only for warm days to set free the tanager, and at last they came. Early in June the bird was put into a traveling cage, carried into the country, where a lovely bit of woods and a pretty lake insured a good living, and the absence ...
— In Nesting Time • Olive Thorne Miller
... be possible!" thought Nanna. Magde, who as she spoke had passed her hand upon her forehead, now removed it, and from the expression of her dark eyes, which beamed with her accustomed cheerfulness, and from her proud and lofty bearing, it could be perceived that she had regained ...
— The Home in the Valley • Emilie F. Carlen
... day, indeed, glory be to God!" the stonebreaker made answer. There was a freshness in his expression, a cheerfulness in the prayer, that made of it ...
— Waysiders • Seumas O'Kelly
... work, God will surely find you work to do; and pleasanter, because in return for the little trouble it may cost you, or the little choking of foolish vulgar pride it may cost you, you will have a peace of mind, a quiet of temper, a cheerfulness and hopefulness about yourself and all around you, such as you never felt before; and over and above that, if you look for a reward in the life to come, recollect this—what we have to hope for in ...
— Sermons for the Times • Charles Kingsley
... just as the wind leaves off driving the clouds at sunset, and in the west there is a sweet tableau for men to look at, till night blots out the scene. So the Fool was usually well content to be alone. But when, as now, he was perplexed by any problem that disturbed his simple cheerfulness, he had to seek some other and wiser man for counsel, not being one of those men, more mind than heart, who unravel problems with as much accuracy and equanimity as a skilful weaver ...
— A Williams Anthology - A Collection of the Verse and Prose of Williams College, 1798-1910 • Compiled by Edwin Partridge Lehman and Julian Park
... Figure drew upon us the Eyes of the whole Room. He had no sooner seated himself at the upper End of the high Table, but he called for a clean Pipe, a Paper of Tobacco, a Dish of Coffee, a Wax-Candle, and the Supplement with such an Air of Cheerfulness and Good-humour, that all the Boys in the Coffee-room (who seemed to take pleasure in serving him) were at once employed on his several Errands, insomuch that no Body else could come at a Dish of Tea, till the Knight had got all his ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele
... wished to leave Paris? Who made me give up cards, and the opera, and the boulevard, and my social relations, and all that was my life before I knew you? Have I been faithful? Have I been obedient? Have I not borne my doom with cheerfulness? In all honesty, Anastasie, have I not a right to a stipulation on my side? I have, and you know it. I ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 6 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... glanced at them and recalled the schoolrooms of the old missions, with their monastic shadows which half hid the gaudy, tinseled saints and flaming or ensanguined hearts upon the walls, he feared that the little waif of Mother Church had not gained any cheerfulness ...
— Trent's Trust and Other Stories • Bret Harte
... charge of the tiller; and all were cheered with the fine speed they were making—their spirits rising in proportion to the distance passed over. Before daylight came to add to their cheerfulness, they must have made nearly a hundred miles; but ere the day broke, a sound fell upon their ears that caused a commotion among them—to all giving joy. It came swelling over the dark surface of the deep, louder than the rush of the water or the whistling of the wind. It resembled a human voice; ...
— The Castaways • Captain Mayne Reid
... college servant, with a woman to cook and do housework, had been found to look after him. He was working hard, at his symphony, and was on the whole much the same in health—very frail and often extremely irritable; with alternations of cheerfulness and depression. ...
— Lady Connie • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... quite a revulsion of feeling in regard to the painful duty before him, and came forward to assist Lucy into her long coat with considerable alacrity and cheerfulness. ...
— The Second Violin • Grace S. Richmond
... suddenly seemed so trivial, so impertinent—the stopped French clock, with its simpering, gilded cupids, on the mantelpiece; the photograph of a number of picnickers "grouped" on a hotel piazza gazing with monolithic cheerfulness at this grim business, this struggle of the two world forces, this crisis ...
— A Man's Woman • Frank Norris
... Mrs. Garie displayed great activity; her former cheerfulness of manner had entirely returned, and Mr. Garie often listened with delight to the quick pattering of her feet, as she tripped lightly through the hall, and up and down the long stairs. The birds that sang about the windows were ...
— The Garies and Their Friends • Frank J. Webb
... less affected than myself: he had formed a strong attachment towards me, and had a cheerfulness of disposition, which often beguiled the tedious hours of captivity; he was likewise a proficient in the Bambarra tongue, and promised on that account to be of great utility to me in future. But it was in vain to expect ...
— Life and Travels of Mungo Park in Central Africa • Mungo Park
... to her list. "One bull-pup, convenient size, for Allan." The plain cat could wait. She had heard of publicity campaigns; she had made up her mind, and a rather firm young mind it was, that she was going to conduct a cheerfulness campaign in behalf of this listless, beautiful, darkness-locked Allan of hers. Unknowingly, she was beginning to regard him as much her property as the check-book, and rather more so than the wolfhound. She moved ...
— The Rose Garden Husband • Margaret Widdemer
... Louisa. The Princess Caroline seems to have been by far the most lovable of the whole family. She inherited much of her mother's cleverness without her mother's coarseness. "Princess Caroline," says Lord Hervey, "had affability without meanness, dignity without pride, cheerfulness without levity, and prudence without falsehood." Her figure indeed is one of the bright redeeming visions in all that chapter of Court history. She stands out among the rough, coarse, self-seeking men and women somewhat as Sophy ...
— A History of the Four Georges, Volume II (of 4) • Justin McCarthy
... down the Hall, he turned to his train-bearers, and requested them to bear his train farther from him, apparently with a view to relieve himself from the weight. As he went down the Hall he conversed with much apparent cheerfulness with the bishop of Lincoln, who was ...
— Coronation Anecdotes • Giles Gossip
... strong common sense and deep fund of experience supply her lack of education, and one would not think while listening to her that she was ignorant of letters. Her life has been one of toil and sorrow, but her expression is one of brave cheerfulness. She and her husband came to this place forty years ago. They were the first white settlers, and for neighbors they had Indians and wolves. They entered most of the land on which the town now stands, and when other ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Volume 26, July 1880. • Various
... a few weeks she was more cheerful. It is one of the mysteries of humanity that mothers in her circumstances, and holding her creed, do regain not merely the faculty of going on with the business of life, but, in most cases, even cheerfulness. The infinite Truth, the Love of the universe, supports them beyond their consciousness, coming to them like sleep from the roots of their being, and having nothing to do with their opinions or beliefs. And hence spring ...
— Robert Falconer • George MacDonald
... had an opportunity of observing the English communities since their arrival in this country, have been edified by their amiable and heroic virtues. Their resignation to the persecution which they have so undeservedly suffered, their patience, their cheerfulness, their regular discharge of their religious observances, and, above all, their noble confidence in Divine Providence, have gained them the esteem of all who know them. At a village near London, a small community of Carmelites lived for several months, almost ...
— The Lives of the Fathers, Martyrs, and Principal Saints - January, February, March • Alban Butler
... which have been neglected in our educational systems, I would give a high rank to dancing. Rightly conducted, it embodies so much of grace, dignity, cheerfulness, playfulness, health, and the desire of pleasing, as to entitle it to a high rank in the promotion of health and virtue. Dancing is one of the imitative arts, and involves the amiable influence of imitation, as well as the more lively sentiments. The ...
— Buchanan's Journal of Man, June 1887 - Volume 1, Number 5 • Various
... convinced, be confirmed by the unanimous opinion of the army at Lucknow. Poor Adrian Hope and I often talked together on the subject; and many a time I expressed to Peel the high opinion I had of his men, and my admiration of their cheerfulness, and happy, contented looks, under all circumstances ...
— Our Sailors - Gallant Deeds of the British Navy during Victoria's Reign • W.H.G. Kingston
... a melancholy mood, and indulging in all these moans? When Y-ts'un came just now and he asked to see you, you only put in your appearance after a long while. But though you did come, you were not in the least disposed to chat with anything like cheerfulness and animation; you behaved, as you ever do, like a regular fool. I detected then in your countenance a certain expression of some hidden hankering and sadness; and now again here you are groaning and sighing! Does all you have ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book II • Cao Xueqin
... their shadows, the town's multifarious hues, I marked the fact that although, whenever dark-blue cavities in their substance permitted the beams of the sun to illuminate the buildings below, those buildings' roofs assumed tints of increased cheerfulness. The clouds seemed to glide the faster to veil the beams, while the humid shadows grew more opaque—and the scene darkened as though only for a moment had it ...
— Through Russia • Maxim Gorky
... be a round of diplomatic dinners," said the consul, with an attempt at cheerfulness. "I have brought two uniforms ...
— The Exiles and Other Stories • Richard Harding Davis
... cheerfulness; that of sorrow I call pain or melancholy. It is, however, to be observed that pleasurable excitement and pain are related to a man when one of his parts is affected more than the others; cheerfulness and melancholy, on the other hand, when all parts are equally affected. What the nature of desire is I have explained; and besides these three—joy, sorrow, and desire—I know of no other primary emotion, the others ...
— The Philosophy of Spinoza • Baruch de Spinoza
... her this, but he resolved that if possible she should see no tears. As for that cheerfulness, that reconciliation to his fate which she desired, he knew it to be impossible. He almost brought himself to believe as he travelled down to Pegwell Bay that it would be better that they should not meet. ...
— Marion Fay • Anthony Trollope
... Doubt not that many a soul then, was the simpler, and purer, and better, for reading the sweet singer of Syracuse. He has his immoralities; but they are the immoralities of his age: his naturalness, his sunny calm and cheerfulness, are all his own. ...
— Alexandria and her Schools • Charles Kingsley
... can leave you now, all right," the lawyer remarked unsympathetically, but with returning cheerfulness, since he saw the end of his quest in visible form before him. He reached quickly forward for the packet, which Aggie extended willingly enough. But it was Mary who, with a swift movement, caught ...
— Within the Law - From the Play of Bayard Veiller • Marvin Dana
... answered Morris, with a fine access of forced cheerfulness, "we will have some champagne for dinner and play ...
— Stella Fregelius • H. Rider Haggard
... all," said Toussaint, "to think of the slaughter and exile of those who drank wine together in the white mansions of yonder plain. But a wiser cheerfulness is henceforth to spread its sunshine over our land, with no ...
— The Hour and the Man - An Historical Romance • Harriet Martineau
... that name. They had just risen from their humble mid-day meal, and three of them were now lingering near the fire-place, filled with blazing logs, which, at that early season, diffused a warmth by no means disagreeable, and gave an air of cheerfulness to the interior of ...
— Hardscrabble - The Fall of Chicago: A Tale of Indian Warfare • John Richardson
... from some watchman's-box, which seemed to stand en the edge of the world. Ahaky Akakiyevich's cheerfulness diminished at this point in a marked degree. He entered the square, not without an involuntary sensation of fear, as though his heart warned him of some evil. He glanced back, and on both sides it was like a sea about him. "No, it is better not ...
— Best Russian Short Stories • Various
... great ardor in exploring its physical geography and resources. For two years, he was intimately associated with me; and I saw him under various circumstances of fatigue and trial in the wilderness, but always preserving his equanimity and cheerfulness. He was a zealous botanist, and a discriminating geologist. Assiduous and temperate, an accurate observer of phenomena, he accumulated facts in the physical history of the country which continually increased the knowledge ...
— Personal Memoirs Of A Residence Of Thirty Years With The Indian Tribes On The American Frontiers • Henry Rowe Schoolcraft
... had made him feel like an unpleasant cross between an alms-giver and a bully. "Now," said he, with forced but resolute cheerfulness, "we will ...
— The Grain Of Dust - A Novel • David Graham Phillips
... cannot be done, cannot be had, cannot be reached—that is just what the boy wants. As we could not yet actually realise the desolateness and barrenness of winter there, but only remember the delights and beauties of summer and autumn, we lost cheerfulness over the boxes and trunks, and sighed because of the brick walls, narrow streets, and toilsome school-work that were soon to ...
— Captain Mugford - Our Salt and Fresh Water Tutors • W.H.G. Kingston
... are very gay and pleasing. But why does Shakespeare give Romeo this involuntary cheerfulness just before the extremity of unhappiness? Perhaps to shew the vanity of trusting to those uncertain and casual exaltations or depressions, which many consider as certain foretokens of ...
— Preface to Shakespeare • Samuel Johnson
... evolving intelligence—a vast gymnasium for the development of moral fibre. We become mentally clever by playing at the game of life. We match our courage against its adversities and acquire fearlessness. We try our optimism against its disappointments and learn cheerfulness. We pit our patience against its failures and gain persistence. We are torn from the pinnacle of ambition by opponents and learn toleration of others. We fall from the heights of vanity and pride, and learn to be modest and humble. We encounter pain and sorrow and learn sympathy with suffering. ...
— Self-Development and the Way to Power • L. W. Rogers
... therein, it disperseth stone and gravel from the kidneys and strengtheneth the viscera and banisheth care, and moveth to generosity and preserveth health and digestion; it conserveth the body, expelleth disease from the joints, purifieth the frame of corrupt humours, engendereth cheerfulness, gladdeneth the heart of man and keepeth up the natural heat: it contracteth the bladder, enforceth the liver and removeth obstructions, reddeneth the cheeks, cleareth away maggots from the brain and deferreth grey hairs. In short, had not Allah (to whom be ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 5 • Richard F. Burton
... other reasons new owners are to be sought for the slaves. Here is a man and his wife and children to be sold. There is a general interest felt in arranging the sale so that the family may be in the same neighborhood. This is for the interest of the owners; it promotes contentment and cheerfulness in the servants. Cases of hardship are the exceptions to the general rule in disposing of servants. Admitting all that can properly be said of such cases, and of the various other evils connected with it, the ...
— The Sable Cloud - A Southern Tale With Northern Comments (1861) • Nehemiah Adams
... ancient village of St. Symphorien and the river Loire. Just across the river, so near that she could hear the ringing of the cathedral bell, lay the famous old town of Tours. There was something in these country sights and sounds that soothed her with their homely cheerfulness. The crowing of a rooster and the barking of a dog fell on her ...
— The Gate of the Giant Scissors • Annie Fellows Johnston
... hand and a generosity of heart that was far both from vanity and from weakness, and a magnanimity that would support, under the prospect of approaching and inevitable death, a most torturing pain of body with an unalterable cheerfulness of temper, and without once interrupting even to his last hour the most manly and the most vigorous activity of business." This William Craufurd is confounded by Lord Woodhouselee, and through him by others, with Robert Crauford, ...
— Life of Adam Smith • John Rae
... tenants; and therefore may naturally murmur at the payment of rent, as a subserviency they were not born to. If the tenants to the Church were honest farmers, they would pay their fines and rents with cheerfulness, improve their lands, and thank God they were to give but a moderate half value for what they held. I have heard a man of a thousand pounds a year, talk with great contempt of bishops' leases, as being on a worse foot than the rest of his ...
— The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, Vol. III.: Swift's Writings on Religion and the Church, Vol. I. • Jonathan Swift
... dear, at your boarding-place, and await, hopefully, the end. I trust it will all be right. I know I am innocent," said Emile, with a forced effort at cheerfulness. ...
— Leah Mordecai • Mrs. Belle Kendrick Abbott
... elements; but I enabled her to purchase a shelter;—there is no sporting with a fellow-creature's (p. 087) happiness or misery. The most placid good-nature and sweetness of disposition; a warm heart, gratefully devoted with all its powers to love me; vigorous health and sprightly cheerfulness, set off to the best advantage by a more than commonly handsome figure: these I think, in a woman may make a good wife, though she should never have read a page but the Scriptures of the Old and New Testament, nor have danced in a brighter ...
— Robert Burns • Principal Shairp
... story.... In conversation he was easy and pleasant, and the reverse of disputatious. Even in the worst of his political difficulties—and he had some pretty hard trials in this way—he had the power of throwing off public cares for the time, and in his house retained his cheerfulness and good-humour.... In matters of business he was an easy master to serve, and the duties of his private secretary were light as compared to others in the same position. He never made work and never was fussy, and even at the busiest times never seemed in a hurry.... Large matters he never ...
— Lord John Russell • Stuart J. Reid
... benumbed fingers of Italian grinders can scarcely turn the organ handles; tattered children and half-starved women, pale, shivering, and tearful, pester the pedestrian with offers of knitted wares, and of winter nosegays, meagre and miserable as themselves. The popular cheerfulness and merry-making of Christmas time are over, and have not yet been succeeded by the bustle and gaiety of the fashionable world. London is abandoned to its million of nobodies; the few thousands whose presence gives it life are still on ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCLXXVI. February, 1847. Vol. LXI. • Various
... presented itself to her were distressing, not so much in themselves as in herself. She rebelled against the outrages of poverty, and she drank to its dregs the cup of straitened circumstances. She was proud, as proud as Lucifer, and she was forced into positions which suppleness and cheerfulness might have made tolerable, if not agreeable. She wrung from these positions their last drop of bitterness. A very remarkable instance of this may be found in her relation to the Sidgwick family, who, by universal report, were generous, genial, and unassuming. To Charlotte Bronte these ...
— Some Diversions of a Man of Letters • Edmund William Gosse
... full. He pondered all the way home, neglecting all the blandishments of Black's conversation, who had visited a friend or two in Highcombe, and was full of cheerfulness and very loquacious. Geoff let him talk, but paid no attention. He himself had gone to Mrs. Warrender, whom he liked, with the hope of disburdening from his little bosom some of the perilous stuff which weighed upon his soul. He had ...
— A Country Gentleman and his Family • Mrs. (Margaret) Oliphant
... dressed in white gowns—a gay survival from Old Style days, when cheerfulness and May-time were synonyms—days before the habit of taking long views had reduced emotions to a monotonous average. Their first exhibition of themselves was in a processional march of two and two round the parish. Ideal and real clashed slightly as the sun lit up their figures ...
— Tess of the d'Urbervilles - A Pure Woman • Thomas Hardy
... Well, perhaps I did; but (with conciliatory cheerfulness) I meant no offence by it. A clergyman is privileged to be a bit of a fool, you know: it's on'y becomin' in his profession that he should. Anyhow, I come here, not to rake up hold differences, but to let bygones be bygones. ...
— Candida • George Bernard Shaw
... incident is not typical of the life of a British prisoner in Germany, but it is indicative of the position many of the 30,000 prisoners have taken up by reason of their strong individuality and extraordinary cheerfulness and confidence. My impression of them is of alert, resourceful men (their escapes have been wonderful)—men who never know when they are beaten. If Britain has sufficient of these people she cannot possibly lose ...
— The Land of Deepening Shadow - Germany-at-War • D. Thomas Curtin
... was gayety, a cheerfulness that, while not exactly joy itself, was constant and unalterable; it might be said that she was born a flower, and ...
— Child of a Century, Complete • Alfred de Musset
... it funny, I feel exactly the opposite? Something seems to tell me that at Aosta, if not before, you will, so to speak, 'read your title clear,'" said Molly, with aggravating cheerfulness. "As soon as you've settled what way to take, you must write or wire; and who knows but by-and-bye we shall cross each other's path again, on the road to ...
— The Princess Passes • Alice Muriel Williamson and Charles Norris Williamson
... we shall," Mrs. Farrell forced herself to respond, though her tone did not express the absolute conviction which the words implied. But Bernard was in great spirits, and for his sake she assumed a cheerfulness which she was far from feeling, as she bade him good-bye, and from the window watched him ...
— Apples, Ripe and Rosy, Sir • Mary Catherine Crowley
... that at this portion of my journey my mind is visited by much cheerfulness. However agreeable may be the valley of Aroukeen, with its grass patches, its clumps of trees, and the eternal shadow of its rocks, I find my strength begin, to a certain extent, to fail me. For several days I have had some threatening ...
— Narrative of a Mission to Central Africa Performed in the Years 1850-51, Volume 1 • James Richardson
... people going away) and sadder—more wounded coming back and more visible sorrow. We seem to be settling down to something that is more or less like Paris—so far less, but it may become more and more like it. And the confident note of an earlier period is accompanied by a dull undertone of much less cheerfulness. The end is—in the lap ...
— The Life and Letters of Walter H. Page, Volume II • Burton J. Hendrick
... any other gibe, if she but served her own purposes; and now, having made everybody laugh and given the conversation a lively turn, she was as perfectly content as if she had not been herself an offering to the cause of cheerfulness. She was, indeed, equal to any sacrifice in the enterprise she had undertaken, and would not only have given Kitty all her worldly goods, but would have quite effaced herself to further her own designs upon Mr. Arbuton. She turned again to her guide-book, and ...
— A Chance Acquaintance • W. D. Howells
... diffidence," he writes Brevoort, March 3, 1819, "about this reappearance in literature. I am conscious of my imperfections, and my mind has been for a long time past so pressed upon and agitated by various cares and anxieties, that I fear it has lost much of its cheerfulness and some of its activity. I have attempted no lofty theme, nor sought to look wise and learned, which appears to be very much the fashion among our American writers at present. I have preferred addressing ...
— Washington Irving • Charles Dudley Warner
... she could no longer ply her vocation successfully, it happened fortunately that her son, by his labour as a farm-servant, was able to make up the deficiency. He was a fine spirited young fellow, who went through his laborious occupations with a good-will and cheerfulness which was so satisfactory to his employer that he determined to advance, whenever opportunities offered, so assiduous a servant and ...
— Tales for Young and Old • Various
... fellow!" whispered Leo, with a return of his old cheerfulness, "have you been paying compliments? I should never have thought ...
— She • H. Rider Haggard
... house Dolly displayed another character, and soon became indispensable to her mother. In all consultations of business, in emergencies of packing, in perplexities of arrangements, Dolly was ready with a sweet, clear common sense, loving hands of skill, and an imperturbable cheerfulness and patience. It was only a few weeks that the confusion lasted; during those weeks Mrs. Copley came to know what sort of a daughter she had. And even Mr. Copley ...
— The End of a Coil • Susan Warner
... the fun we can take the scalp of a brave or two and retreat!" His friend construed his daring proposition to be a test of courage, which it would not become him, as a brave, to decline; therefore he assented with a show of cheerfulness. ...
— Indian Heroes and Great Chieftains • [AKA Ohiyesa], Charles A. Eastman
... less than his usual cheerfulness. He thought for a while of the Terror and boots and mud with a gloomy unamiability. Then he rose and betook himself to his toilet. In the middle of it he missed his shaving-brush. He hunted for it furiously; he could have sworn ...
— The Terrible Twins • Edgar Jepson
... opened, and volunteering his assistance in numerous things beyond his usual province, with singular briskness and energy; as if conscious that by doing so he was greatly gratifying Messrs. Quirk, Gammon, and Snap, whose wishes upon the subject he knew. He displayed such unwonted cheerfulness and patient good-nature throughout the day, that one of his companions, a serious youth, in a white neckerchief, black clothes, and with a blessed countenance—the only professing pious person in the establishment—took ...
— Ten Thousand a-Year. Volume 1. • Samuel Warren
... Winchester. O'Leary was tanked by Griffin and Clinch, in the Proserpine's cutters, while the intervals were filled by the remaining boats. The captain kept moving about in his own gig, giving his directions, somewhat confusedly, beyond a question; yet with a cheerfulness and indifference of air that aided in keeping alive the general gaite de coeur, When all was ready, he gave the signal to advance, pulling, for the first half mile, chivalrously in advance of the ...
— The Wing-and-Wing - Le Feu-Follet • J. Fenimore Cooper
... bonnes (nursery maids) still smiling while they chide, the jovial coachmen wrestling on their stands and playing like boys together, but all in good humour, and content seems to sit on every brow, and even the aged as they meet, greet each other with a smile. How infectious is cheerfulness, when I have the blue devils I always go and take a walk on the Boulevards; and what makes these people so happy? is the natural question; because they are content with a little, and pleased with a trifle; then they are a trifling people ...
— How to Enjoy Paris in 1842 • F. Herve
... ought to rule his wife, not as a master does a chattel, but as the soul governs the body, by sympathy and goodwill. As he ought to govern the body by not being a slave to its pleasures and desires, so he ought to rule his wife by cheerfulness and complaisance. ...
— Plutarch's Morals • Plutarch
... the base of the hill on the side hidden from the Bulgarians, and the trenches dug into it were crowded with the French. At that point of the line they greatly outnumbered the English. But it was not the elbow touch of numbers that explained their cheerfulness; it was because they knew it was expected of them. The famous scholar who wrote in our school geographies, "The French are a gay people, fond of dancing and light wines," established a tradition. And on hill 516, although it was to keep from freezing that they danced, and though the light wines ...
— With the French in France and Salonika • Richard Harding Davis
... critical accuracy. One of these gentlemen is since dead: the Abbe Morangis. I pay this tribute without reluctance to the memory of that noble, reverend, learned, and excellent person; and I should do the same with equal cheerfulness to the merits of the others, who I believe are still living, if I did not fear to hurt those whom I ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. III. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... than now; but in himself, that he would never be less himself, less thoroughly good and true than now. That, some time, he would be sure to come back again, and take up his old relations with them, brightening their dull life with his cheerfulness; infusing in their feminine household the new element of a clear, strong, energetic, manly will, which sometimes made Johanna say that instead of twenty-five the young man might be forty; and, above all, bringing into their ...
— Mistress and Maid • Dinah Craik (aka: Miss Mulock)
... houses. It was the high-water, full and strange, of that weekly trance to which the city of Edinburgh is subjected: the apotheosis of the Sawbath; and I confess the spectacle wanted not grandeur, however much it may have lacked cheerfulness. There are few religious ceremonies more imposing. As we thus walked and talked in a public seclusion the bells broke out ringing through all the bounds of the city, and the streets began immediately to be thronged with ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 20 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... son as he finished speaking, and some of the joy and cheerfulness that had shown in his eyes faded away, for he saw no return of his joy and happiness on his child's face; all that was written there was sorrow, pain, ...
— The Pastor's Son • William W. Walter
... that was all she had expected and indeed all that thus far she had wished or hoped. She had many sad hours; wounds like hers cannot heal readily in a true, sensitive woman's heart. While she gained in cheerfulness and confidence, the terrible and unexpected disaster which had overtaken her rendered impossible the serenity of those with whom all has gone well. Dread of something, she knew not what, haunted her painfully, and memory at times seemed malignantly ...
— He Fell in Love with His Wife • Edward P. Roe
... indebted to Gen. Wheeler, who, as previously stated, returned from the sick-list to duty during the afternoon. His cheerfulness and aggressiveness made itself felt on this part of the battle-field, and the information he furnished to me at various stages of the battle proved to ...
— The Gatlings at Santiago • John H. Parker
... their best for me, but it was little. I read in their faces, and in their studied cheerfulness when speaking in my presence, that they had made up their minds I was going to lose the number of my mess. They went to the commandant and the lieutenant besides the doctor in efforts to secure for me some sort of consideration, ...
— The Ivory Trail • Talbot Mundy
... little we succeeded in pacifying our host. He recovered his usual cheerfulness, but could not resist the temptation of adding a few words to his long argumentation. He had just begun to reveal to us certain peculiarities of his late brother's character, which induced him to be prepared, judging by the laws of ...
— From the Caves and Jungles of Hindostan • Helena Pretrovna Blavatsky
... There was a specimen of the English grumbler, big, burly, and as if in danger of choking from the tightness of his cravat. Every one knows him, his pleasant ways, and his constant flow of good humour and cheerfulness; that is he, sitting to the right. There were besides, numerous young gentlemen from the universities, from the army, from the bar, all with more or less hair on their upper lips; and there was a cavalry ...
— The Foreign Tour of Messrs. Brown, Jones and Robinson • Richard Doyle
... time to bid farewell to the subject of this tremendous note; and most sincerely do I wish I could 'draw the curtain' upon it, and say 'good night,' with as much cheerfulness and satisfaction at [Transcriber's Note: as] Atterbury did upon the close of his professional labours. But the latter moments of STEEVENS were moments of mental anguish. He grew not only irritable, but outrageous; and, in full possession of his faculties, ...
— Bibliomania; or Book-Madness - A Bibliographical Romance • Thomas Frognall Dibdin
... charming glitter to the dew-drops as they besparkled the grass and flowers. The tracts of the sheep might be seen by the disappearance of the "gentle dew" from their path as they proceeded to their pasture, driven by the watchful colley. It was a scene of cheerfulness, which every lover ...
— Anecdotes of Dogs • Edward Jesse
... Three sisters, Aglaia (the brilliant), Euphrosyne (cheerfulness), and Thalia (bloom of life). They were the daughters of Jupiter ...
— Palamon and Arcite • John Dryden
... I can hardly think it necessary to point out to the reader the association between sacred cheerfulness and solemn thought, or to explain any appearance of contradiction between passages in which (as above in Chap. V.) I have had to oppose sacred pensiveness to unholy mirth, and those in which I have to oppose ...
— The Stones of Venice, Volume II (of 3) • John Ruskin
... half after this, he came into my shop one day; but how changed. Instead of the bloated, wild, and despairing countenance that once marked him as a drunkard, he now wore an aspect of cheerfulness and health, of manliness and self-respect. I approached, took him by the hand, and said, "Well, ——, how do you do?" "I am well," said he, shaking my hand most cordially. "Yes," said I, "well in more respects than one." "Yes, I am," was his emphatic reply. ...
— Select Temperance Tracts • American Tract Society
... attitude towards God and the world. He was sent to be 'the Light of the world'; and so are we. He was sent to 'seek and to save that which was lost'; so are we. He was sent not to do His own will, but the will of the Father that sent Him; so are we. He took upon Himself with all cheerfulness the office to which He was appointed, and said, 'My meat is to do the will of Him that sent Me, —and to finish His work'; and that must be our voice too. He was sent to pity, to look upon the multitudes with compassion, to carry to them the ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture: St. John Chaps. XV to XXI • Alexander Maclaren
... action, especially when such action is directed towards removing the cause for alarm. So Mrs. Caspar and Elta, in flying about to prepare breakfast for the rescuing party, almost worked themselves into a state of hopeful cheerfulness. It was only after the meal had been hastily eaten, and the Major with his stalwart Swedes had departed, that a reaction came, and the anxious fears reasserted themselves. For hours they could do nothing but discuss the situation, and watch for some one to come with news. Several ...
— Raftmates - A Story of the Great River • Kirk Munroe
... bitter humour ("They won't let me go to Bedlam," he wrote, "because they say I make the inmates mad, nor into Newgate, because I make them wicked"); but there was little in his creed or in the scenes of his labours to promote cheerfulness of spirit. ...
— Americans and Others • Agnes Repplier
... tell his wife the terrible truth. And what would be the result? He recalled the whole course of his courtship, and saw Farnaby always on a level with himself in Regina's estimation. In spite of his natural cheerfulness, in spite of his inbred courage, his heart failed him, when he thought of ...
— The Fallen Leaves • Wilkie Collins
... latter days, let me be allowed to add, that which is given by the son of his friend, the Rev. John Sargent. More perfect patience than Hayley manifested under his excruciating tortures, it never was my lot to witness. His was not only submission, but cheerfulness. So far could he abstract himself from his intense sufferings, as to be solicitous, in a way that affected me tenderly, respecting my comfort and accommodation as his guest; a circumstance that might appear trivial to many, but which, ...
— Lives of the English Poets - From Johnson to Kirke White, Designed as a Continuation of - Johnson's Lives • Henry Francis Cary
... is strange that you should be so careful always to fling my age in my face, and that I should continually find you blaming my dress as well as my cheerfulness. One would imagine that old age ought to think of nothing but death, since it is condemned to give up all enjoyment; and that it is not attended by enough ugliness of its own, but must needs be ...
— The School for Husbands • Moliere
... at a green camping-site on the bank of a rocky little stream. Stevens fell a dead weight into Duane's arms, and one look at the haggard face showed Duane that the outlaw had taken his last ride. He knew it, too. Yet that cheerfulness prevailed. ...
— The Lone Star Ranger • Zane Grey
... letter, thoroughly characteristic of the pluck and cheerfulness of the young British officer, was received from a ...
— The New York Times Current History: the European War, February, 1915 • Various |
