"Courtly" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... added to the family circle, that is all, and yet, what a change his coming has made. His presence seems to pervade the whole house. The servants look more cheerful when he speaks to them. His mother brightens up, and throws off her languor as she hears his tread upon the veranda. Even the General's courtly politeness is toned down into something like affection, and all his artificial stateliness takes its natural level, when contrasted by the simple dignity of this young man's nature. Indeed, until James Harrington came, I had no idea how superficial and untrue was the character of my guardian. But ...
— Mabel's Mistake • Ann S. Stephens
... replied Mr. Boythorn. "Ha ha ha! Sir Arrogant is here, and I am glad to say, has been laid by the heels here. My Lady," in naming whom he always made a courtly gesture as if particularly to exclude her from any part in the quarrel, "is expected, I believe, daily. I am not in the least surprised that she postpones her appearance as long as possible. Whatever can have induced that transcendent woman to marry that effigy and figure-head ...
— Bleak House • Charles Dickens
... at her, and the fierceness went out of his eyes. He bowed gravely with the most courtly homage, and left ...
— His Hour • Elinor Glyn
... OF THE NORTH The story of Fort o' God, where the wild flavor of the wilderness is blended with the courtly atmosphere ...
— Torchy As A Pa • Sewell Ford
... air of courtly politeness, by alleging a business appointment. Very elegantly dressed, tightly buttoned up in clothes of an English cut, he had the carriage of a man about town, relieved by the retention of a touch of artistic free-and-easiness. Immediately on sitting ...
— His Masterpiece • Emile Zola
... words of the young prince—for Charles Stuart, though despicable as a king, was ever loving and loyal as a friend—were as oil upon the troubled waters. The ruffled temper of the ambassador of Spain—who in after years really did work Raleigh's downfall and death—gave place to courtly bows, and the King's quick anger melted away before the dearly loved ...
— The Children's Book of Christmas Stories • Various
... This mighty stream of courtly magnificence had now flowed by, and had left in me no other longing than after those tapestries of Raffaelle, which I would willingly have gazed at, revered, nay, adored, every day and every hour. Fortunately, my passionate endeavors succeeded in interesting several persons of ...
— Autobiography • Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
... weak. If he had been rich and strong, he would probably have refused his daughter to a Gond, even though complaisant bards might invent a Rajput genealogy for the bridegroom. The story about the army of fifty thousand men cannot be readily accepted as sober fact. It looks like a courtly invention to explain a mesalliance. The inducement really offered to the proud but poor Chandel was, in all likelihood, a large sum of money, according to the usual practice in such cases. Several indications exist of ...
— Rambles and Recollections of an Indian Official • William Sleeman
... beyond, And thou 'rt a friend right potent, my lord Gui, So to thy will I willingly comply. Thus, since thy friendship I hold passing dear, Thou need but ask—and lo! I am not here." Thus having said, low bowed this courtly knight, Then turned about and hasted ...
— The Geste of Duke Jocelyn • Jeffery Farnol
... with courtly grace stretched out his hand to the conquered youth, saying, "Thank the noble lady of Montfaucon for your life and liberty. But if you are so totally devoid of all goodness as to wish to resume the combat, here am I; let ...
— Sintram and His Companions • Friedrich de la Motte Fouque
... car-window; the operator's bald head was visible on a line with the sill, and I made motions at him. He bowed with courtly grace, as though I ...
— In Search of the Unknown • Robert W. Chambers
... were his trophies—not of spear and shield, But leaps, and bursts, and sometimes foxes' brushes; Yet I must own,—although in this I yield To patriot sympathy a Briton's blushes,— He thought at heart like courtly Chesterfield, Who, after a long chase o'er hills, dales, bushes, And what not, though he rode beyond all price, Ask'd next day, 'If men ever ...
— Don Juan • Lord Byron
... upon the throne-room and let down the curtain before the door, so she might see and not be seen. She did this and he summoned them to his presence; and, when they stood before him, they kissed ground to do him honour, and showed forth their courtly breeding and magnified his dignity. He ordered them to sit, but they refused, till he conjured them by their lord Al-Abbas: accordingly they sat down and he bade set before them food of various kinds and fruits and sweetmeats. Now within the Lady Afifah's palace was a souterrain communicating with ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 2 • Richard F. Burton
... Denis!" gaily exclaimed the Governor to a tall, courtly gentleman, who was super-intending the labor of a body of his censitaires from Beauport. "'Many hands make light work,' says the proverb. That splendid battery you are just finishing deserves to be called ...
— The Golden Dog - Le Chien d'Or • William Kirby
... up and down Valladolid, A man of mark, to know next time you saw. His very serviceable suit of black Was courtly once and conscientious still, And many might have worn it, though none did: The cloak, that somewhat shone and showed the threads, Had purpose, and the ruff, significance. He walked, and tapped the pavement with his cane, {10} Scenting ...
— Introduction to Robert Browning • Hiram Corson
... the first of the clergy, who violated the rules of fasting and the vow of celibacy. He had done both in the assurance of evangelical right and Christian liberty; and when the landvogt spoke to him about it, he made answer not in the most courtly terms: The landvogt ought to punish the lewd and adulterous persons who swarm in his neighborhood, instead of him and his virtuous wife. He was bound rather to protect him, and compel the other clergy to marry. The special sanctity of the priesthood was ...
— The Life and Times of Ulric Zwingli • Johann Hottinger
... was like the real world of other mortals. She met Don Hernan Escalante, and at once clothed him with all the attributes and perfections with which a romantic girl could endow the object of her fancy. He, too, at the moment he entered the hall, and found her seated in courtly style to receive him, was struck by her rare and exquisite beauty. He had never seen any being so lovely, and, man of the world as he thought himself, he at once yielded to the influence of that beauty. She herself was scarcely aware of the power she might have ...
— Ronald Morton, or the Fire Ships - A Story of the Last Naval War • W.H.G. Kingston
... thou seest, though courtly pleasures want, Yet country sport in Sherwood is not scant: For the soul-ravishing, delicious sound Of instrumental music we have found The winged quiristers with divers notes Sent from their quaint recording[201] ...
— A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. VIII (4th edition) • Various
... dignity and grace, he values his subject, and treats him with a certain courtly reverence, yet never once sinks into the panegyrist, and while apparently most frank—so frank, that the reticent English people may feel the intimacy of his domestic narratives almost painful—he is never once betrayed into a momentary indiscretion. ...
— Fungi: Their Nature and Uses • Mordecai Cubitt Cooke
... pleasant party; but I was out of spirits; I think partly on Johnnie's account, partly from fatigue. There was William Henry Lyttelton amongst others; much of his oddity has rubbed off, and he is an honoured courtly gentleman, with a great deal of wit; and not one of the fine people who perplex you by shutting their mouths if you begin to speak. I never fear quizzing, so am not afraid of this species of lying-in-wait. Lord have mercy on me if ...
— The Journal of Sir Walter Scott - From the Original Manuscript at Abbotsford • Walter Scott
... gravely. "I cannot tell you, being but poorly trained in courtly ways, what I should like to tell you, that you might know how much your friendship means to me. Goodbye, Bertrade de Montfort," and he bent to one knee, as he raised her ...
— The Outlaw of Torn • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... near, that this Sabbath day's journey did not scandalise Betty, and her father eagerly welcomed his kinsman, and insisted that he should go no farther. Sir Amyas accepted the invitation, nothing loth, only asking, with a little courtly diffidence, if it might not be convenient for him to sleep at the Great House, and begging the ladies ...
— Love and Life • Charlotte M. Yonge
... scene at the historic surrender at Appomattox. Lee had come to discuss terms with him, and now stood awaiting his arrival, erect, courtly, handsome—the typical Southern gentleman that he was. Down the road came riding a gaunt-looking man, with the familiar stoop-shoulders, and mud-bespattered trousers and boots. It was the general-in-chief on his way to ...
— Boys' Book of Famous Soldiers • J. Walker McSpadden
... his bland courtly way, "I am so unfortunate as to have any prejudices left, you cannot do me a greater kindness than by offending them—or by any other means, however severe—to make me conscious of the locality of such a ...
— Alton Locke, Tailor And Poet • Rev. Charles Kingsley et al
... I went as often as ever I could. M. Picot took me upstairs to a sort of hunting room. It had a great many ponderous oak pieces carved after the Flemish pattern and a few little bandy-legged chairs and gilded tables with courtly scenes painted on top, which he said Mistress Hortense had brought back as of the latest French fashion. The blackamoor drew close the iron shutters; for, though those in the world must know the ways of the world, worldling practices were a sad offence to New England. Shoving the ...
— Heralds of Empire - Being the Story of One Ramsay Stanhope, Lieutenant to Pierre Radisson in the Northern Fur Trade • Agnes C. Laut
... Esther was on the floor, beside the same box, and the colonel was on his sofa. Mrs. Dallas did take the effect of the picture for that moment before the colonel sprang up to receive her. Then she had to do with a somewhat formal but courtly host, and the picture was lost. The lady sat there, stately in her silks and laces, carrying on a stiff conversation; for she and Colonel Gainsborough had few points of sympathy or mutual understanding; and for a while she forgot Esther. Then her eye again fell ...
— A Red Wallflower • Susan Warner
... anxious - almost angry, and yet full of solicitude. The Signor Dellombra was a courtly gentleman, and spoke with great respect and sympathy of mistress's being so ill. The African wind had been blowing for some days (they had told him at his hotel of the Maltese Cross), and he knew that it was often ...
— To be Read at Dusk • Charles Dickens
... take offense where none was intended. At his invitation I acted as one of the receiving party. The carriage drove up at the appointed hour, and its occupant was welcomed by the admiral at the door with courtly dignity. The visitor had no time to spend in preliminaries; he wished to look through the ...
— The Reminiscences of an Astronomer • Simon Newcomb
... evening, after a lecture, at the house of Professor Goodrich. He was most courtly and considerate to students and invited questions. While I was charmed, even captivated, by his eloquence, I had at that time very little sympathy with his views. I said to him: "Mr. Phillips, your attack to-night ...
— My Memories of Eighty Years • Chauncey M. Depew
... love-poems, so far as I know,—showing least of that air of earnestness which he has contrived to impart to almost all,—is this little ode or madrigal. It is interesting to see, from this, that he could be almost conventional and courtly in moments when he held Laura farthest aloof; and when it is compared with the depths of solemn emotion in his later sonnets, it seems like the soft glistening of young birch-leaves ...
— Oldport Days • Thomas Wentworth Higginson
... blundered from the jasmine outside into the open window, and snored loudly at the panes. But the colonel heeded it not, and remained abstracted and silent until the door opened to Miss Tish and Pansy—in her best frock and sash, at which the colonel started and became erect again and courtly. ...
— Trent's Trust and Other Stories • Bret Harte
... your influence above everything, madame," was Hammerfeldt's courtly answer, but my mother watched his retreating figure with a rather bitter smile. Then she turned to ...
— The King's Mirror • Anthony Hope
... his hat, the old man took it off and swept it round with a courtly deliberation. Then replacing it, he sat with his face raised, as though to one standing near, his whole attitude full of a careful ...
— The History of David Grieve • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... which he spoke to me concerning some of the great political secrets of his Government. On seeing me come out Rapp observed, "You have had a long audience."—"Yes, not amiss;" and this circumstance procured for me a courtly salutation from all persons ...
— The Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte • Bourrienne, Constant, and Stewarton
... generally popular among the undergraduates, though it always seemed to me that what was set down as pride was really an attempt to cover extreme natural diffidence. In appearance he was a man of an exceedingly aristocratic type, thin, high-nosed, and large-eyed, with languid and yet courtly manners. He was indeed a scion of one of the very oldest families in the kingdom, though his branch was a cadet one which had separated from the Northern Musgraves some time in the sixteenth century, and ...
— The Strand Magazine, Volume V, Issue 29, May 1893 - An Illustrated Monthly • Various
... he replied in a courtly tone, "that in the interests of the King and of the noble lady whose care for her child hath led her to such sacrifices, we ought to put a limit to the pride and insolence of ...
— The Black Douglas • S. R. Crockett
... honour. I regret that the Courtly Circularist did not tell us what Mr. NICHOLL sang before the QUEEN and Royal Family, and also what the QUEEN and Royal Family sang (solo and chorus?) after Mr. NICHOLL. But suppose "before" does not here relate to time, but to position. It would have been a novelty indeed, and one well worth ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 99, November 15, 1890 • Various
... Juliette, and with the consummate grace which the elaborate etiquette of the times demanded, he made her a courtly bow. ...
— I Will Repay • Baroness Emmuska Orczy
... scarcely have quitted the turf that day without a pang. He had become the lord paramount of that strange world, so difficult to sway, and which requires for its government both a stern resolve and a courtly breeding. He had them both; and though the blackleg might quail before the awful scrutiny of his piercing eye, there never was a man so scrupulously polite to his inferiors as Lord George Bentinck. The turf, too, was not merely ...
— Lord George Bentinck - A Political Biography • Benjamin Disraeli
... about you. I knew you could ride when I saw you, and rarely you have conquered. But women don't understand us. Good-bye, John; I am proud of you, and I hoped to have done you pleasure. And indeed I came full of some courtly tales, that would have made your hair stand up. But though not a crust have I tasted since this time yesterday, having given my meat to a widow, I will go and starve on the moor far sooner than eat the best supper that ever was cooked, in a place that ...
— Lorna Doone - A Romance of Exmoor • R. D. Blackmore
... bag-wig, and a broad-skirted coat, trimmed with tarnished lace; and who was girded with a sword, in compliance with the laws of the Institution regulating the introduction of candidates, which required them to assume this courtly dress, and kept it constantly in lavender, for their convenience. One of the conductors of this novice held a rusty blunderbuss pointed towards his ear, and the other a very ancient sabre, with which he carved imaginary offenders as he came along in a sanguinary ...
— Barnaby Rudge • Charles Dickens
... spring, his spurs jingling as he went. A sailor on guard behind the rock would have aided him to fill them, but he told the man to keep his station, and dipped for himself. He brought them back brimming and with a courtly bow inquired of Patsy if she had any further commands for him, because if not he must go about the duties ...
— Patsy • S. R. Crockett
... in all the bliss of being a young lady nearly eighteen, he exerted all his most courtly politeness and gallant manners, and she wondered how she had ever ...
— Six Girls - A Home Story • Fannie Belle Irving
... this is!" exclaimed Mrs. Carey as they entered the dining-hall. "Jawkins does this sort of thing so well! How perfectly he reproduces the courtly state of the last century ...
— The King's Men - A Tale of To-morrow • Robert Grant, John Boyle O'Reilly, J. S. Dale, and John T.
... according to Farnese, for want of funds. The time for doing the deed had arrived, and he declared himself incapacitated by poverty. He expressed his disgust and resentment in language more energetic than courtly; and protested that he was not to blame. "I always thought," said he bitterly, "that your Majesty would provide all that was necessary even in superfluity, and not limit me beneath the ordinary. I did not suppose, when it was most important to have ready money, that I should be kept ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... by the style in which he composed, and which was in every respect that of the tragedians of the era of Louis XIV. A brilliant surface without depth; prosaic sentiments and thoughts decked out with a choice poetical language; a courtly moderation throughout, whether in the display of passion, or in the exhibition of misfortune and crime; observance of the proprieties, and an apparent morality, for in these dramas voluptuousness is but breathed, never named, and the heart is always in every ...
— Lectures on Dramatic Art and Literature • August Wilhelm Schlegel
... speak! I should be finding Something alter'd in thy courtly tone. Sit—sit by me! I will think, we've lived so In the green ...
— Poetical Works of Matthew Arnold • Matthew Arnold
... two individuals, and they are submitted to definitely contrary circumstances of education, an approximation to evidence may be obtained. Thus Bacon and Pascal appear to be men naturally very similar in their temper and powers of mind. One, born in York House, Strand, of courtly parents, educated in court atmosphere, and replying, almost as soon as he could speak, to the queen asking how old he was—"Two years younger than Your Majesty's happy reign!"—has the world's meanness and cunning ...
— Modern Painters, Volume IV (of V) • John Ruskin
... presentable; conventional &c (customary) 613; genteel; well-bred, well mannered, well behaved, well spoken; gentlemanlike^, gentlemanly; ladylike; civil, polite &c (courteous) 894. polished, refined, thoroughbred, courtly; distingue [Fr.]; unembarrassed, degage [Fr.]; janty^, jaunty; dashing, fast. modish, stylish, chic, trendy, recherche; newfangled &c (unfamiliar) 83; all the rage, all the go^; with it, in, faddish. in court, in full dress, in evening dress; ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... His bearing is so courtly-delicate; And yet methinks he falters: their two Graces Do so dear-cousin and royal-cousin him, So press on him the duty which as Legate He owes himself, and with ...
— Queen Mary and Harold • Alfred Lord Tennyson
... favourite city, threatened to revenge himself on God, by robbing Him of that thing—i.e., the soul—He desired most in him; and whose very last words were an echo of Job's curse upon the day that he was born. Marie's phrases may be regarded, perhaps, as a courtly flourish, rather than as conveying truth with mathematical precision. If not, we should be driven to suggest an alternative to the favourite simile of lying like an epitaph. But I think it unlikely that Marie suffered with a morbidly sensitive conscience. There is little enough real devotion ...
— French Mediaeval Romances from the Lays of Marie de France • Marie de France
... Mr. King, as he settled his courtly old figure in the chair Jasper had put for him beside the desk, "to see you about my son; I am not satisfied with his appearance, nor, I am sorry to ...
— Five Little Peppers Grown Up • Margaret Sidney
... from the inner room to meet Mme. la Duchesse, he seemed a perfect presentation or rather resuscitation of the courtly and vanished epoch of the Roi Soleil. He held himself very erect and walked with measured step, and a stereotyped smile upon his lips. He paused just in front of Mme. la Duchesse, then stopped and lightly touched with his lips the hand which she ...
— The Bronze Eagle - A Story of the Hundred Days • Emmuska Orczy, Baroness Orczy
... and with courtly politeness bowed as Senora Mendez presented two friends of Senor Torreon, Senor Kennedy and Senor Jameson. We were introduced in turn to Senor and Senora Alvardo, Senor Gonzales, Senorita Reyes, and ...
— The Silent Bullet • Arthur B. Reeve
... Constantinople in great state and splendour, in palaces lined with porphyry and hung with purple, and filled with gold and silver. The Greeks of the east had faults the very contrary to those of the Teutons of the west. Instead of being ignorant, rude, and savage, they were learned, courtly, and keen-witted; but their sharpness was a snare to them, for what they were afraid to do by force, they did by fraud, and their word was not to be trusted. In matters of faith too, they were too fond of talking philosophy, and explaining away the hidden ...
— The Chosen People - A Compendium Of Sacred And Church History For School-Children • Charlotte Mary Yonge
... "long centuries ago this valley was peopled by those who escaped the great cataclysm which ended the mother country. Later came another race, barbarian wanderers like thyself." He bowed for all the world like a courtly English gentleman. "But methinks thou art in need of food ...
— Astounding Stories, February, 1931 • Various
... still larger army of volumes, which have seen service under the eye of a great commander. For here the noble collection of him so freshly remembered as our silver-tongued orator, our erudite scholar, our honored College President, our accomplished statesman, our courtly ambassador, are to be reverently gathered by the heir of his name, himself not unworthy to be surrounded by that august assembly of the wise of all ages and of various ...
— The Poet at the Breakfast Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... cleared with his own hands, and the beautiful wild country he lived in, telling her he hoped her future life would be free from all care. All this, and even more, dear reader, he told her—in plain, homely words, it is true; but love's language is always sweet, be it in courtly tongue or homely phrase. ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII. No. 3. March 1848 • Various
... mysteriously, that it seems to me almost as though I had been led hither that I might know him. He is an old and lonely man, a great invalid, who lives at a little manor-house a mile or two away. Maud knew him by name, but had never seen him. He wrote me a courtly kind of note, apologising for being unable to call, and expressing a hope that we might be able to go and see him. The house stands on the edge of the village, looking out on the churchyard, a many-gabled building of grey stone, a long flagged terrace in front of it, terminated ...
— The Altar Fire • Arthur Christopher Benson
... not to find Pauline at home, and she was going to call on Mrs. Carter when Mr. Thornton invited her in with such a courtly bow that she could not refuse. She noticed that he gave an uneasy glance at the ...
— Peggy in Her Blue Frock • Eliza Orne White
... infinitely better than the man for whom I repulsed, nay insulted him. He was poor, unpolished, but at that time he would have died to defend me from harm. It was reserved for his courtly, high-bred, elegant rival to betray the trust he won! The storm that followed Peleg's revelation was fierce, and availing herself of his jealous surveillance, grandmother allowed me no more stolen interviews. ...
— Infelice • Augusta Jane Evans Wilson
... I cannot but regret. You have just rendered me an inestimable service. I have learnt, too, that you saved my life the night of the storming of the Manor House. I beg to apologize to you, sir, for any offense I may have given you by word or deed." And he held out his hand with his most courtly smile. ...
— Prisoners of Hope - A Tale of Colonial Virginia • Mary Johnston
... Jem Hearn," said Martha, by way of an introduction; and so out of breath was she that I imagine she had had some bodily struggle before she could overcome his reluctance to be presented on the courtly scene of ...
— Cranford • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
... assured personal position in the life of the British capital. He had long since demonstrated his qualifications for a post, which, in the distinction of the men who have occupied it, has few parallels in diplomacy. The scholarly Lowell, the courtly Bayard, the companionable Hay, the ever-humorous Choate, had set a standard for American Ambassadors which had made the place a difficult one for their successors. Though Page had characteristics in common ...
— The Life and Letters of Walter H. Page, Volume II • Burton J. Hendrick
... descendant of eminent men, and the parent of eminent men. He was the grandson of one of the ablest of Scottish politicians; the son of one of the bravest and most truehearted of Scottish patriots; the father of one Mac Callum More renowned as a warrior and as an orator, as the model of every courtly grace, and as the judicious patron of arts and letters, and of another Mac Callum More distinguished by talents for business and command, and by skill in the exact sciences. Both of such an ancestry and of such a progeny Argyle ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 4 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... entirely free from sundry qualms of conscience as to her husband's condition and the rightfulness of concealing it altogether from Cleer's accepted lover. Trevennack himself was so perfectly sane in every ordinary relation of life, so able a business head, so dignified and courtly an English gentleman, that Eustace never even for a moment suspected any undercurrent of madness in that sound practical intelligence. Indeed, no man could talk with more absolute common sense about his daughter's future, or the duties and functions of an Admiralty official, than Michael Trevennack. ...
— Michael's Crag • Grant Allen
... not do everything in Ansbach, however, the sacristans being men, as the Marches found when they went to complete their impression of the courtly past of the city by visiting the funeral chapel of the margraves in the crypt of St. Johannis Church. In the little ex-margravely capital there was something of the neighborly interest in the curiosity of ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... "Servus!" in their great voices, and were shown out by the old Marina, abhorrent of their uniforms and doubtful of the consul's political sympathies. Only yesterday she had called him up at an unwonted hour to receive the visit of a courtly gentleman who addressed him as Monsieur le Ministre, and offered him at a bargain ten thousand stand of probably obsolescent muskets belonging to the late Duke of Parma. Shabby, hungry, incapable exiles of all nations, religions, and politics beset him for places of honor and emolument in ...
— A Foregone Conclusion • W. D. Howells
... wish took the maidens' breath away. They looked from one to the other without a word; and the Bishop, in more courtly language, explained that amid all these contending parties he could not but judge it wiser to put the King's two marriageable sisters out of reach, either of a violent abduction, or of being the cause of a savage contest, in either case ending in demands ...
— Two Penniless Princesses • Charlotte M. Yonge
... sat as a judge in his courts. To his undoing he had a wife, as fair a dame as any in the duchy of Brittany. "Her eyes," says the old lay, "were blue, her face was warm in colour, her mouth fragrant and her nose dainty." She was ever tastefully dressed and courtly in demeanour, and soon attracted the attention of such an admirer of the fair sex as Equitan, who desired to speak with her more intimately. He therefore, as a subterfuge, announced that a great hunt would take place in that part of his domains in which his seneschal's ...
— Legends & Romances of Brittany • Lewis Spence
... is made of a certain "Bay Tarrall that won the Cup at Newmarket." We find also an allusion to the "great ship" (III. 3), which was built in 1637. Of Mr. Adson's "new ayres" (IV. 1) I know very little. He brought out in 1621 a volume of "Courtly Masquing Ayres," but published nothing later,—although, of course, he may have continued writing long afterwards. Hawkins and Mr. Chappell are altogether ...
— A Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. II • Various
... that Johnson said of an actor who played Sir Harry Wildair at Lichfield, "There is a courtly vivacity about the fellow;" when, in fact, according to Garrick's account, "he was the most vulgar ruffian that ever went upon boards."' ...
— Life Of Johnson, Volume 5 • Boswell
... the porch of Don Andres, his saddle-galled person reclining at ease in a great armchair behind the passion vines, with the fragile stem of a wine-glass twirling between his white, sensitive, gambler-fingers while he listened to the don's courtly utterances as translated faithfully by Dade (Jack being absent on some philandering mission of his own), big Bill Wilson opened his eyes to the other side of the question and frankly owned himself ...
— The Gringos • B. M. Bower
... the courtly grace Of the old Colonial school, From the curtain-shadowed corner Forth he ...
— The Haunted Hour - An Anthology • Various
... evidence; if Grotius should be convicted of exaggerating the merit and sufferings of the Reformers; we shall be naturally led to inquire what confidence can be placed in the doubtful and imperfect monuments of ancient credulity; what degree of credit can be assigned to a courtly bishop, and a passionate declaimer, * who, under the protection of Constantine, enjoyed the exclusive privilege of recording the persecutions inflicted on the Christians by the vanquished rivals or disregarded predecessors ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 2 • Edward Gibbon
... Lysidice, "the King is ever a good friend to us. We shall sit in the royal quarter and see as well as any of the courtly wantons. It is a warm day, but I swear I shall feel a cold at my heart till I can warm my palms at the ...
— The Proud Prince • Justin Huntly McCarthy
... utterance would have suspected it. But he was far more than a great preacher. By his broad tolerance, his lofty character and immense personal influence, he became, in a way, a national figure, the common property of the nation which felt itself the richer for possessing him. A gracious and courtly figure, with a heart as wide as the human race, he lives, somehow, as the true type of clergyman, whose concern is humanity ...
— American Men of Mind • Burton E. Stevenson
... Grandfather's chair in the Province House, he was struck with its noble and stately aspect, but was of opinion, that age and hard services had made it scarcely so fit for courtly company, as when it stood in the Earl of Lincoln's hall. Wherefore, as Governor Belcher was fond of splendor, he employed a skilful artist to beautify the chair. This was done by polishing and varnishing it, and by gilding the carved work of the elbows, and likewise ...
— True Stories from History and Biography • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... editor of The New Standard (there were indeed altogether new standards of efficiency, mentality and hospitality in that rather imaginative newspaper office of the First Act). Mr. FISHER WHITE gave us the courtly-obstinate old man to the life (this player has a way of removing straw). In the dramatic passage in which, returning after being broken in a German prison, he relates some of the horrors of which it is good for us to be reminded, he ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 153, Nov. 28, 1917 • Various
... pour to East Lynne, to pay the wedding visit, as it is called, to Mr. and Lady Isabel Carlyle. Of course they displayed themselves in their most courtly state. Mr. Carlyle, always a popular man, had gained double his former importance by his marriage with the daughter of the late Earl of Mount Severn. Among the earliest visitors went Justice and ...
— East Lynne • Mrs. Henry Wood
... the Arthuriad itself the substance of the Chevalier a la Charette. He varied and dressed them up with pleasant etceteras, and in especial, sometimes, though not always, embroidered the already introduced love-motive with courtly fantasies and with a great deal of detail. I should not be at all disposed to object if somebody says that he, before any one else, set the type of the regular verse Roman d'aventures. It seems likely, again, from the pieces referred to above, that he may ...
— A History of the French Novel, Vol. 1 - From the Beginning to 1800 • George Saintsbury
... smile at sight of her. She was a little thing—sixteen or seventeen years old, he judged—a fluffy, blond girl quivering with vivacity; the type of girl who is desperately reaching for maturity, entirely forgetful of the charms of her adolescence. He rose and bowed in a serious, courtly manner. ...
— Midnight • Octavus Roy Cohen
... livery of the Lyndon family, came driving into the courtyard of the house which they inhabited; and in that carriage, by her Ladyship's side, sat no other than the 'vulgar Irish adventurer,' as she was pleased to call him: I mean Redmond Barry, Esquire. He made the most courtly of his bows, and grinned and waved his hat in as graceful a manner as the gout permitted; and her Ladyship and I replied to the salutation with the utmost politeness and ...
— Barry Lyndon • William Makepeace Thackeray
... the Count Juan de Montalvo. But as a young man, Dirk was singularly diffident and so easily confused that on the spur of the moment it was quite possible for a person of address to make him say what he did not mean. Thus, on the present occasion, when he saw this courtly Spaniard bowing low to him, a humble Dutch tradesman, he was overwhelmed, and ...
— Lysbeth - A Tale Of The Dutch • H. Rider Haggard
... the outer world now and again. Yes—yes, now and again, and when they are cheering echoes I rejoice greatly. But let us be seated and hear the wonderful news which will cause an explosion presently unless the safety-valves are opened," he concluded, placing chairs for Mrs. Harold and Polly with courtly grace. ...
— Peggy Stewart: Navy Girl at Home • Gabrielle E. Jackson
... evening melody, is as the clatter of pots and kettles beside the tone of a flute. I love his note and ways better even than those of the orchard starling or the Baltimore oriole; yet his nest, compared with theirs, is a half-subterranean hut contrasted with a Roman villa. There is something courtly and poetical in a pensile nest. Next to a castle in the air is a dwelling suspended to the slender branch of a tall tree, swayed and rocked forever by the wind. Why need wings be afraid of falling? ...
— Wake-Robin • John Burroughs
... concreteness and descriptiveness and realism hitherto unknown to symphonic art, to characterize briefly, sparingly, justly, a personage, a situation, an event. He could be pathetic, ironic, playful, mordant, musing, at will. He was sure in his tone, was low-German in "Till Eulenspiegel," courtly and brilliant in "Don Juan," noble and bitterly sarcastic in "Don Quixote," childlike in "Tod und Verklaerung." His orchestra was able to accommodate itself to all the folds and curves of his elaborate programs, to find equivalents for individual traits. It is not ...
— Musical Portraits - Interpretations of Twenty Modern Composers • Paul Rosenfeld
... However the good Lady, who, by the Privilege of her Sex, must be allow'd the most competent Judge of Inequalities, out of an Excess of Condescension and Goodness, came running to the Relief of oppressed poor Tony; and, in courtly Language, rated her own oppressive Dogs for their great Incivility to Strangers. The Dogs, in the Middle of their insulting Wrath, obey'd the Lady with a vast deal of profound Submission; which I could not much wonder at, when I understood, that it ...
— Military Memoirs of Capt. George Carleton • Daniel Defoe
... mostly either sentimental or philosophical, or courtly or political; and I do not remember to have read any who describe the manner of living among the gentry and middle ranks of life in France. I will, therefore, relieve your attention for a moment from our ...
— A Residence in France During the Years 1792, 1793, 1794 and 1795, • An English Lady
... the Hirschvoegel, from old Veit downwards," said a fat gres de Flandre beer-jug: "I myself was made at Nuernberg." And he bowed to the great stove very politely, taking off his own silver hat—I mean lid—with a courtly sweep that he could scarcely have learned from burgomasters. The stove, however, was silent, and a sickening suspicion (for what is such heart-break as a suspicion of what we love?) came through the mind of ...
— The Nuernberg Stove • Louisa de la Rame (AKA Ouida)
... suited to her purpose, desired to be made acquainted with the man, on whom she already began to ground her hopes of success. She found him to exceed her most sanguine expectations; so comely did he appear in his person, so graceful in his air, so courtly in his address, so full of docility and good sense in his behavior and conversation. The lessons necessary to be taught him, in order to his personating the duke of York, were soon learned by a youth of such quick apprehension; but as the season seemed not then favorable for their ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part C. - From Henry VII. to Mary • David Hume
... a medical man, for his use till I came of age, when it was to be given to me. It was all the fortune that ever I inherited. That watch has regulated imperial interests in its time—the stately ceremonial, the courtly assignation, pompous travels, and lordly sleeps. Now it ...
— Far from the Madding Crowd • Thomas Hardy
... thou shalt be as proudly encountered. Know then, that I have supported my pretensions to your hand in the way that best suited thy character. It is meeter for thy humour to be wooed with bow and bill, than in set terms, and in courtly language." ...
— Ivanhoe - A Romance • Walter Scott
... scene in a very bad temper. She was met by Lennox with his beautiful smile and courtly manner. He welcomed her kindly, and gave her his arm to enter the great central hall. Miss Delacour sniffed as she went in. She sniffed more audibly as her small, closely set brown eyes encountered the fixed gaze of five little girls, who, to judge from their manners, ...
— Hollyhock - A Spirit of Mischief • L. T. Meade
... The scholarly and courtly editor of the "Weekly Lard Journal and Literary Companion," Professor A. J. Lyvely, criticised Sappho very freely as he stood at the corner of Clark and Madison Streets, waiting for the superb gold chariot drawn by twenty milk-white ...
— Second Book of Tales • Eugene Field
... since the visit of Captain Hall, whose remarks upon the former state of this room may have hastened its decoration; but there are a few anomalies in some parts of the entertainment, which are not very courtly. The company are about as select as that of an Easter-day ...
— Domestic Manners of the Americans • Fanny Trollope
... alive; learned, mystical, poetical, in much sympathy with the Modernists, yet deterred by the dread of civil war within the Church, a master of the Old Latin Versions, and too apt to address schoolgirls on the charms of textual criticism; the Bishop of F——, courtly, peevish and distrusted; the Dean of Markborough, with the green shade over his eyes, and fretful complaint on his lips of the "infection" generated by every Modernist incumbent; and near him, Professor Vetch, ...
— The Case of Richard Meynell • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... or Lyric way, it will be hard for them to shew us one such amongst them, as we have many now living, or who lately were so. They can produce nothing so Courtly writ, or which expresses so much the conversation of a gentleman, as Sir JOHN SUCKLING; nothing so even, sweet, and flowing, as Mr. WALLER; nothing so majestic, so correct, as Sir JOHN DENHAM; nothing so elevated, so copious, and full ...
— An English Garner - Critical Essays & Literary Fragments • Edited by Professor Arber and Thomas Seccombe
... melting shades. When next we looked the court of Napoleon had vanished, and the Bourbon period was, literally, in full swing. A frou-frou of laces, coats with deep skirts, and beribboned trousers would be fluttering airily in the soft May air. Once, in fine contrast to these courtly splendors, was a wondrous assortment of flannel petticoats. They were of every hue—red, yellow, brown, pink, patched, darned, wide-skirted, plaited, ruffled—they appeared to represent the taste and requirement of every climate and country, if ...
— In and Out of Three Normady Inns • Anna Bowman Dodd
... With a courtly bow he was gone, and Georgina went into the house to look for the little blank book in which she had started to keep her two lists of Club members, honorary and real. The name of Milford Norris Locke she wrote in both lists. If there had been ...
— Georgina of the Rainbows • Annie Fellows Johnston
... people pleased, and pleased under his influence. He had a belief, not without foundation, that every thing was done better under his roof than under that of any other person. The banquet in the air on the present occasion could only be done justice to by the courtly painters of the reign of Louis XV. Vanloo, and Watteau, and Lancres, would have caught the graceful group and the well-arranged colors, and the faces, some pretty, some a little affected; the ladies on fantastic chairs of wicker-work, gilt ...
— Lothair • Benjamin Disraeli
... la Rose had made fashionable in both countries. But even here such personified abstractions as Langland's Fair-speech and Work-when-time-is, remind us less of the Fraunchise, Bel-amour, and Fals-semblaunt of the French courtly allegories than of Bunyan's Mr. Worldly Wiseman, and even of such Puritan names as Praise-God Barebones, and Zeal-of-the-land Busy. The poem is full of English moral seriousness, of shrewd humor, the hatred of a lie, the homely English love ...
— Brief History of English and American Literature • Henry A. Beers
... malicious and ready to do any mischief. He whose hair arises in the corners of the temples, and is gross and rough withal, is a man highly conceited of himself, inclined to malice, but cunningly conceals it, is very courtly and a lover of new fashions. He who hath much hair, that is to say, whose hair is thick all over his head, is naturally vain and very luxurious, of a good digestion, easy of belief, and slow of performance, of a weak memory ...
— The Works of Aristotle the Famous Philosopher • Anonymous
... Prioress that his men had spied a lad accompanying the shepherd who escorted the lady, and who, he thought, had a certain twang of south country speech; and no sooner had he carved for the ladies, according to the courtly duty of an esquire, than the inquiry began as to who had found the maiden and where she had been lodged. Prioress Agnes, who had already broken her fast, sat meantime with the favourite hawk on her wrist ...
— The Herd Boy and His Hermit • Charlotte M. Yonge
... ceased, and the yellow and scarlet lanterns had been plucked from the autumnal hangings. The laughing, smiling, dancing women, like so many Cinderellas, had disappeared, and with them the sparkle of jewels; and the gallant officers had ridden away to the jingle of bit and spur. Throughout the courtly revel all faces had revealed, besides the happiness and lightness of spirit, a suppressed eagerness for something yet to come, an event surpassing any they ...
— The Puppet Crown • Harold MacGrath
... bound, at the foot of a great wooden cross planted opposite the entrance of the chief building. It was my dear love—I knew him on the instant by the proud poise of his head and shoulders. He was speaking in his usual calm and courtly tones to the circle of half-naked savages, who seemed to hear him with respectful consideration, though they made no motion to ...
— Margaret Tudor - A Romance of Old St. Augustine • Annie T. Colcock
... Peter gondoled to Lord Evelyn Urquhart's residence, a rather exquisite little old palace called Ca' delle Gemme, and were received affectionately by the tall, slim, dandified-looking young-old man, with his white ringed hands and high sweet voice and courtly manner. He had aged since Peter remembered him; the slim hands were shakier and the near-sighted eyes weaker and the delicate face more deeply lined with the premature lines of dissipation and weak health. He put his monocle in his ...
— The Lee Shore • Rose Macaulay
... have done so, if it had not been for the news from Jurand. "But fear of the judgment of God...." On this occasion, and for mutual entertainment, they recalled the names of Mazovian and more often of Polish knights, who, either in courtly jousts or hunting, had gained numerous victories over the western knights; above all they mentioned Zawisza of Garbow, with whom no knight of the Christian kingdom could cope. But there were also those who cherished great hopes of Zbyszko: ...
— The Knights of the Cross • Henryk Sienkiewicz
... him, found herself strangely moved. For it was very startling to see this so familiar figure under so unfamiliar an aspect—to see Julius March, her everyday companion and assistant, his reticence, his priestly aloofness, his mild and courtly calm, swept under by a tide of personal emotion. Lady Calmady was drawn to him by deepened sympathy. Yet regret arose in her that this man proved to be, after all, but as other men. She was vaguely disappointed, having derived more security than she had quite realised from his apparent detachment ...
— The History of Sir Richard Calmady - A Romance • Lucas Malet
... stopped instantly as Ralph came among them, and had lowered their hoods with their accustomed courtly deference to a guest; and as he turned from his momentary pause at the refectory door in the full blaze of light that shone from it, he met ...
— The King's Achievement • Robert Hugh Benson
... so much," he replied; "yes, I know where it is," and with a genial and courtly salutation he moved off in the direction ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 159, October 13, 1920 • Various
... said "Hah!" and "Hum!" in tones of omniscience which would have converted a Christian Scientist; and, when feeling one's pulse, they produced the largest and most audibly-ticking gold watches producible by the horologist's art. They had what were called "the courtly manners of the old school"; were diffuse in style, and abounded in periphrasis. Thus they spoke of "the gastric organ" where their successors talk of the stomach, and referred to brandy as "the domestic stimulant." When attending families where religion was held in honour, ...
— Fifteen Chapters of Autobiography • George William Erskine Russell
... upon it than your minister has ever told you. And, then, in what did you so wrong him? Name the wrong also. Give it its Bible name, its newspaper name, its brutal, vulgar, ill-mannered name. Do not be too soft, do not be too courtly with yourself. Keep your own evil name ever before you. When you hear any other man outlawed and ostracised by that same name, say to yourself: Thou, sir, art the man! Put out a secret and a painful skill upon yourself. ...
— Bunyan Characters - Third Series - The Holy War • Alexander Whyte
... us our lives, we are obliged to serve you," he answered. He was a courtly old man. "Captain Annawan and his people are camped under a great rock in the midst of the swamp, north from here. Come and ...
— Boys' Book of Frontier Fighters • Edwin L. Sabin
... of the King, he was carried to the Alcaza and presented to his Majesty. Charles received him with great kindness, inquired how he had borne the fatigues of his journey, and expressed his joy at finding him much younger in appearance than he had been taught to expect. The painter, with his usual courtly tact, replied, that the journey he had undertaken to enter the service of so great a monarch, had revived his youth, and that in the presence of his Majesty, he felt as if he were twenty again. "Then," said ...
— Anecdotes of Painters, Engravers, Sculptors and Architects, and Curiosities of Art, (Vol. 2 of 3) • Shearjashub Spooner
... knight might well doubt Buckingham's sincerity; he replied to all his courtly speeches in similar terms, and the greatest cordiality appeared to subsist between them. Enchanted with this show of friendship, the King endeavoured to promote it by keeping them near him throughout the evening, leading them to converse together, and fawning upon them, as was his way with those ...
— The Star-Chamber, Volume 2 - An Historical Romance • W. Harrison Ainsworth
... If such your rites, no LEVITE here I view, But BAAL'S PRIESTS may leap and shout with you.[B] O whither urge these bodings of my breast? Let hope, let charity their flight arrest! In Britain's SARDIS, surely some remain Whose courtly robes yet bear no wilful stain! PRINCES! and PEERS! once more on you I call— Save! save your tottering glory ere it fall! If truth, if virtue, to your hearts be dear; If sounds of sweet content you love to hear; If generous ...
— The Ghost of Chatham; A Vision - Dedicated to the House of Peers • Anonymous
... the engineer's arrest. He knew that Downey expected to return to the post—but there was Jean to consider. Jean—the girl of his fondest dreams, who had forsaken him and fallen under the spell of the courtly manners of the suave soldier-engineer. What would Jean think? If she loved the man she would never believe in his guilt. She would believe, with a woman's irrational loyalty, that he, Hedin, had in some manner contrived to place ...
— The Challenge of the North • James Hendryx
... a spirit brooding o'er these walls That tells the record of a bygone day, When 'mid the splendour of these courtly halls, A pageant shone, whose gorgeous array Like ...
— Heiress of Haddon • William E. Doubleday
... been accustomed to pay the homage which slaves render their masters. The laborers, the humble artisans, the toil-worn peasants, could not appear with any thing like equality in the presence of the high-born men and courtly dames who, through their ancestry of many generations, had been accustomed to wealth and rank and power. Thus, to the lower orders, the dress of a gentleman, the polite bearing of the prince, the courtly manner of the noble, excited suspicion, ...
— Louis Philippe - Makers of History Series • John S. C. (John Stevens Cabot) Abbott
... a courtly bow enough, and went back to his seat, and then Ina bade Owen see to his lodgment, and after that the thralls carried out the body. I went quietly and walked along the lower tables, bidding my men see if more Welshmen were present, but finding ...
— A Prince of Cornwall - A Story of Glastonbury and the West in the Days of Ina of Wessex • Charles W. Whistler
... thousand carved columns reaching high To silver rafters in an azure sky, And palaces and temples round it rise With lofty turrets glowing to the skies, And massive walls far spreading o'er the plains, Here live and move Accadia's courtly trains, And see! the pit-u-dal-ti[4] at the gates, And masari[5] patrol and guard the streets! And yonder comes a kis-ib, nobleman, With a young prince; and see! a caravan Winds through the gates! With men the streets are filled! And chariots, a people ...
— Babylonian and Assyrian Literature • Anonymous
... went to the Mairie. The Maire, a courtly little fellow in top-hat and frock-coat, welcomed us in charming terms. Two fat old women rushed up to us and besought us to allow them to do something for us. We set one to make us tea, and the other to bring us ...
— Adventures of a Despatch Rider • W. H. L. Watson
... celebrated not only by the Companies, or rather, Confraternities, but also in the private houses of gentlemen, who were wont to form certain associations and societies, and to meet together at certain times to make merry; and among them there were ever many courtly craftsmen, who, besides being fanciful and amusing, served to make the preparations for such festivals. Among others, four most solemn public spectacles took place almost every year, one for each quarter of the city, with ...
— Lives of the Most Eminent Painters Sculptors and Architects - Vol. 3 (of 10), Filarete and Simone to Mantegna • Giorgio Vasari
... in their best clothes. Noyon had not seen anything so gay in years. There was bustle and business and running up and down stairs. The poste, usually clamorous with the hoarse dialect of northern France, hummed and rippled with polite conversation and courtly greetings. The bride appeared. The bridegroom's face lost its perturbed expression in his unaffected happiness at seeing her. Photographs were taken; she, gracious and bending in a cloud of tulle; he, stiffly upright but smiling resolutely. They were off in a string ...
— Where the Sabots Clatter Again • Katherine Shortall
... offer'd up his patriot zeal, And flaming Harangues for BRITANNIA'S weal; And Oaths[d] by which he swore to stem the tide Of Courtly Sway and Ministerial Pride; Which thro' the ecchoing Isle were frequent heard, When he a Northern Candidate appear'd. But FOLLY gave him, with satiric look, A Dispensation from the Oaths he took; Suspicious that, the patriot frenzy o'er, These pious ...
— The First of April - Or, The Triumphs of Folly: A Poem Dedicated to a Celebrated - Duchess. By the author of The Diaboliad. • William Combe
... again where seated was, The angry lover, 'twixt her friends and lords, For in that troop much talk he thought would pass, Each great assembly store of news affords, He sided there a lusty lovely lass, And with some courtly terms the wench he boards, He feigns acquaintance, and as bold appears As he had known that ...
— Jerusalem Delivered • Torquato Tasso
... of life and giftes liberall, Not lesse vertuous then the said princes all. And Henry the eyght moste hye and triumphant, No gifte of vertue nor manlines doth want, Mine humble spech and language pastorall If it were able should write his actes all: But while I ought speake of courtly misery, Him with all suche I except vtterly. But what other princes commonly frequent, As true as I can to shewe is mine intent, But if I should say that all the misery, Which I shall after rehearse and specify Were in the court of our moste ...
— The Ship of Fools, Volume 1 • Sebastian Brandt
... the surface, and breaking the whole into babbling music. There is a ceremoniousness in the mental habits of these ancients. Their intellectual garniture is picturesque, like the garniture of their bodies. Their thoughts are courtly and high mannered. A singular analogy exists between the personal attire of a period and its written style. The peaked beard, the starched collar, the quilted doublet, have their correspondences in the high sentence and elaborate ornament (worked upon the thought like ...
— Dreamthorp - A Book of Essays Written in the Country • Alexander Smith
... Lion-Hearted of England, and his political rival, Philip Augustus of France, all took part. The accounts of the enterprise show that while the several Christian leaders hated one another heartily enough, the Christians and Saracens were coming to respect one another. We find examples of the most courtly relations between the representatives of the opposing religions. In 1192 Richard concluded a truce with Saladin, by the terms of which the Christian pilgrims were allowed to visit the holy places with ...
— An Introduction to the History of Western Europe • James Harvey Robinson
... loud, not observing, as he pronounced his last words, that the music had ceased; the name Gabriel Nietzel, therefore, rang like a loud call through the vast apartment, and the brilliant, courtly assemblage laughed, although they understood not the connection between the loud call and the hushing of the music. Chamberlain von Lehndorf laughed too, and turned smiling to the count to apologize for his ...
— The Youth of the Great Elector • L. Muhlbach
... shape into Saxon sufficiently polite and courtly his profound and indignant disdain of the counsel, his sense of the impertinence with which his shoulder had been profaned, and his mother's son had been warned, the nuncius was again summoned into the presence-chamber. Nor did he ...
— Harold, Complete - The Last Of The Saxon Kings • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... With a courtly flourish Don Luis wheeled about to face young Hazelton. But the sound of deep breathing was all that came from Harry. Fatigued by the long, rough automobile ride, that young engineer had dropped fast asleep ...
— The Young Engineers in Mexico • H. Irving Hancock
... eyes embracing every one and everything within the range of his vision, his courteous smile seeming intended for each separate individual, and yet overlooking none, nor resting long on any, his high brow serene and unbent, his flowing robes falling back from his courtly figure, as with his red hat in his hand he bowed his way through the bowing crowd. His departure, which was quickly followed by that of several other cardinals and prelates, was the signal that ...
— Saracinesca • F. Marion Crawford
... peevish voice: "Tush, Squire, the day is too far spent for soft and courtly speeches; what was good there is nought so good here. Withal, I know more of thine ...
— The Wood Beyond the World • William Morris
... song is to the ear; it is visible harmony. This bird cannot do an ungraceful thing. It has the bearing of a bird of fine breeding. Its cousin the robin is much more masculine and plebeian, harsher in voice, and ruder in manners. The wood thrush is urban and suggests sylvan halls and courtly companions. Softness, gentleness, composure, characterize every movement. In only a few instances among our birds does the male assist in nest-building. He is usually only a gratuitous superintendent of the work. The male oriole visits the half-finished structure of his mate, looks it over, tugs ...
— The Wit of a Duck and Other Papers • John Burroughs
... ancient barbarism. Men steeped in antique learning, pale with the close breath of the cloister, here spent the noon and evening of their lives, ruled savage hordes with a mild, parental sway, and stood serene before the direst shapes of death. Men of courtly nurture, heirs to the polish of a far-reaching ancestry, here, with their dauntless hardihood, put to shame the boldest sons ...
— Pioneers Of France In The New World • Francis Parkman, Jr.
... off on the "long trail" bound for the boundless East. We have a charming drawing-room, a sympathetic porter and a courtly conductor descended from one of the first Spanish conquerors of California. We arranged the being late for lunch problem by having dinner at five and cutting the lunch out. Bruce and Nan came over for dinner and we had a very jolly time. They all asked after you all, and drank ...
— Adventures and Letters • Richard Harding Davis
... intrusion, saluted him profoundly as he entered the precincts of her garden Court. But for once he did not pause as usual, on his way to where she sat,—but lightly acknowledging the deep curtseys of the ladies in attendance, he advanced towards her and raising her hand in courtly homage to his lips, seated himself carelessly in a low chair at ...
— Temporal Power • Marie Corelli |
