"Coyness" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... there is something charming in a girl simply because she is a girl. It is in the ring of her laugh, in her irony, in her frankness or her coyness, in the way she does the commonest things,— puts on her scarf, or catches hold of your arm,—things that only too soon disappear in conventionalities, ceremonies, and proprieties. But there is no need of this ...
— Hold Up Your Heads, Girls! • Annie H. Ryder
... thick black plaits coiling twice round her head, and a tawny tint in her complexion and especially in the color of her slender but graceful and muscular arms and neck. By the grace of her movements, by the softness and flexibility of her small limbs, and by a certain coyness and reserve of manner, she reminded one of a pretty, half-grown kitten which promises to become a beautiful little cat. She evidently considered it proper to show an interest in the general conversation by smiling, but ...
— War and Peace • Leo Tolstoy
... Gilbert Curll, the Queen's Scottish secretary, recently taken into her service. Both these were Protestants, and, like the Bridgefield family, attended service in the castle chapel. They were all at work, as was likewise their royal lady, to whom the girl, with the youthful coyness that halts in the fulfilment of its dreams, did not at first raise her eyes, having first taken in all the ladies, the several portions of one great coverlet which they were all embroidering in separate pieces, and the gentleman who was reading aloud to them from a large ...
— Unknown to History - A Story of the Captivity of Mary of Scotland • Charlotte M. Yonge
... none of these things marred his fatuous felicity. It is even probable that in his gratuitous belief that his timid attentions had been too marked and impulsive, he attributed Cressy's flight to a maidenly coyness that pleasurably increased his admiration for her and his confidence in himself. In his abstraction of enjoyment and in the gathering darkness he ran against a fir-tree very much as he had done while walking with her, and he confusedly apologized ...
— Cressy • Bret Harte
... might well have mistaken it for such. I forgot that I had come there to perform a funeral ceremony; I fancied myself a young bridegroom entering the chamber of the bride, who all modestly hides her fair face, and through coyness seeks to keep herself wholly veiled. Heartbroken with grief, yet wild with hope, shuddering at once with fear and pleasure, I bent over her and grasped the corner of the sheet. I lifted it back, holding my breath all the while through fear of waking ...
— Clarimonde • Theophile Gautier
... experience of women was great enough for him to be aware that the negative often meant nothing more than the preface to the affirmative; and it was little enough for him not to know that in the manner of the present negative there lay a great exception to the dallyings of coyness. That she had already permitted him to make love to her he read as an additional assurance, not fully trowing that in the fields and pastures to "sigh gratis" is by no means deemed waste; love-making being here more often accepted inconsiderately and for its own sweet sake than in the carking, anxious ...
— Tess of the d'Urbervilles - A Pure Woman • Thomas Hardy
... death, her lovely eyes ringed with dark shades, poor Marguerite fell upon Alain's breast, without pretence of coyness. ...
— St George's Cross • H. G. Keene
... in the words of the most authentic books, papers, and records." The design was to preserve our literary history from the Restoration. This silent labour he had been pursuing all his life, and published the first volume in his sixty-eighth year, the very year he died. But he was so sensible of the coyness of the public taste for what he calls, in a letter to a literary friend, "a tedious heavy book," that he gave it away to the publisher. "The volume, too large, brings me no profit. In good truth, the scheme was laid for ...
— Calamities and Quarrels of Authors • Isaac D'Israeli
... perhaps there had lingered in him a doubt of the quality of his reception, born of the manner of their parting; and her hesitation, while it shook his vanity, by no means bade him despair. After the first small shock, he had not failed to perceive the coyness of her; and why not? If her maiden's whim demanded a brief ritual of probationary wooing before verbally admitting him to her heart again, never fear but he would go through his paces with ...
— V. V.'s Eyes • Henry Sydnor Harrison
... just emerged from a subordinate condition; the nations had as yet known nothing of us and had not yet reflected on the relations which it might be their interest to establish with us. Most of them, therefore, listened to our propositions with coyness and reserve; old Frederic alone closing with us without hesitation. The negotiator of Portugal, indeed, signed a treaty with us, which his government did not ratify, and Tuscany was near a final agreement. Becoming sensible, ...
— Memoir, Correspondence, And Miscellanies, From The Papers Of Thomas Jefferson - Volume I • Thomas Jefferson
... attitude of warding off reveals itself as fastidiousness and as bashfulness. Budaeus hit the mark when he exclaimed jocularly: 'Fastidiosule! You little fastidious person!' Erasmus himself interprets the dominating trait of his being as maidenly coyness. The excessive sensitiveness to the stain attaching to his birth results from it. But his friend Ammonius speaks of his subrustica verecundia, his somewhat rustic gaucherie. There is, indeed, often something of the ...
— Erasmus and the Age of Reformation • Johan Huizinga
... been unable to detect any notable difference in this respect between the sexes; but during the latter part of the second period of childhood, boys are unquestionably more active. In general, the girl-child, when in love, displays far less coyness and reserve than the young woman. In this respect the difference between children and adults is most marked. A girl of eleven, for example, will not make any difficulties about the exchange of love-letters with the boy she loves, or about appointments for secret ...
— The Sexual Life of the Child • Albert Moll
... interrupt the scene before they could have time to proceed far in explanation; and he was studious in the sequel to prevent the young folks from being too intimately acquainted with each other's inclinations. Grimes, of consequence, attributed the reluctance of Miss Melville to maiden coyness, and the skittish shyness of an unbroken filly. Indeed, had it been otherwise, it is not probable that it would have made any effectual impression upon him; as he was always accustomed to consider women as made for the recreation ...
— Caleb Williams - Things As They Are • William Godwin
... and flounders. "Dree and zixpence if you like," said he. "I could a bought vour times as much vor one and zixpence coast-ways, if I'd a mind, and I'll give thee no more, and not a word of a lie." His oratory conquered the coyness of the fishy damsel; and he invited the lady to take a glass of "zomat avore he topped ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction. - Volume 19, No. 535, Saturday, February 25, 1832. • Various
... argue something for the dignity of the fair sex, who have ever claimed their prescriptive right of holding us lingering in their chains; and Lord Greville would do well to remember that his services are too important to his country to be held on the caprices of a silly girl's affected coyness. But be it so—since you are so petulant a lover, be prepared when you join her Majesty's circle to-night, ...
— Theresa Marchmont • Mrs Charles Gore
... not to be surprised when he is told that this unsophisticated being did not view Mabel's recent conduct in precisely the light in which he may be inclined to view it himself. He did not credit all that the Sergeant told him, it is true; but he began to think virgin coyness and ignorance of her own feelings might have induced Mabel to use ...
— The Pathfinder - The Inland Sea • James Fenimore Cooper
... will be settled once for all!' He admired his own decision; he was quite struck by it. 'I shall call her May before I leave her,' he thought, gazing at her, and discovering how well the name suited her, with its significances of alertness, geniality, and half-mocking coyness. ...
— Tales of the Five Towns • Arnold Bennett
... observation. When he asserts (contrary to the old metaphysics) the existence of such instincts as fear, acquisitiveness, constructiveness, play (or, properly, playfulness), curiosity, sociability, shyness, secretiveness, cleanliness, modesty, shame, love, coyness or personal isolation, jealousy, parental love, etc., he shows the spirit of science. But is it not self-evident, Mr. James, to a man of your fine intelligence, that all strong impulses (or instincts, as you call them) must have a special nervous apparatus in the psychic ...
— Buchanan's Journal of Man, October 1887 - Volume 1, Number 9 • Various
... the wooing of birds), while the male must conduct himself in such a way as to manipulate the female; and, as the more active agent, he develops a marvelous display of technique for this purpose. This is offset by the coyness and coquetry of the female, by which she equally attracts and fascinates the male and practices upon him to induce a ...
— Sex and Society • William I. Thomas
... determined to steal a march on Cubitt, wrote directly to the credulous lady, and there was much correspondence between them. At first there were some little difficulties. The man who, after a certain amount of coyness, had pleaded guilty to being the long-lost heir, still held aloof in a strange way, concealed his present name and occupation, and instead of going home at once, preferred to bargain for his return ...
— Celebrated Claimants from Perkin Warbeck to Arthur Orton • Anonymous
... Caprice and coyness of females; its cause; observations of character at schools; varieties of likings and antipathies; horror of snakes is by no means universal; the horror of blood ...
— Inquiries into Human Faculty and Its Development • Francis Galton
... fruit girl, against her as she went by the stall one evening as the sun set. "Prut! so it was no such purity after all that made you never look at the student lads and the soldiers, eh? You were so dainty of taste, you must needs pick and choose, and, Lord's sake, after all your coyness, to drop at a beckoning finger as one may say—pong!—in a minute, like an apple over-ripe! ...
— Bebee • Ouida
... a strange little laugh, and with an assumption of coyness, that was, however, still affected, stooped to pick a few ...
— Susy, A Story of the Plains • Bret Harte
... affectionately at his pet. I set it down as odd that so manly a lad should so openly show liking for a cat. The conduct of the animal in its making acquaintance with the dog; the good-humoured assurance of the one, and the cautious coyness of the other; amused us till presently Madge's voice was heard; and then we saw her coming from the garden, speaking to her father, who walked bareheaded beside her. Behind, at a little distance, came Madge's mother and little Tom. All four stopped at the gateway, and ...
— Philip Winwood • Robert Neilson Stephens
... naz (coyness ),' said her companions to her; 'you now he must be able to give an account of us, or else the curse of single life will be our fate, and we shall remain the ...
— The Adventures of Hajji Baba of Ispahan • James Morier
... after all, turned out to be but a lover's appeal to his mistress to give over coyness and use time while she might; but Dorothea wondered why its solemn language should have hit her namesake's fancy, and, turning a few more pages, discovered that this merry dead girl had chosen and copied out other verses which were more than solemn. How had she dug these gloomy gems out of Donne, ...
— The Westcotes • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... for a walk to nowhere in particular." She looked at him with an irresistible mixture of coyness and frankness and suggested, "Would you care to come for a little walk too? It's far too ...
— The Man From the Clouds • J. Storer Clouston
... from Houssa. Her hair was traced with such extraordinary neatness, that John Lander expressed a wish to examine it more minutely. The girl had never beheld such a thing as a white man before, and permission was granted with a great deal of coyness, mixed up perhaps with a small portion of fear, which was apparent as she was slowly untying her turban. No sooner, however, was the curiosity of the travellers gratified, than a demand of two hundred kowries was insisted on by her companion, ...
— Lander's Travels - The Travels of Richard Lander into the Interior of Africa • Robert Huish
... The sporting gentlemen who accepted it, however—Messrs. Prodder and Way—seemed pleased with it; though, when I suggested a sum in cash in advance of royalties, they displayed a most embarrassing coyness—and also, as events turned out, ...
— Not George Washington - An Autobiographical Novel • P. G. Wodehouse
... at her silence; he was prepared for a little coyness; in fact, for some resistance, and expected to have occasion for the specious eloquence always at his command. Of course, the result would be the same,—he had no doubt of that, and so in ...
— Madeline Payne, the Detective's Daughter • Lawrence L. Lynch
... against him and set her arms rigidly and held her head away, not with coyness, but with ...
— The Landloper - The Romance Of A Man On Foot • Holman Day
... now talk freely: 'bove merit! what is 't you doubt? her coyness! that 's but the superficies of lust most women have; yet why should ladies blush to hear that named, which they do not fear to handle? Oh, they are politic; they know our desire is increased by the difficulty of enjoying; whereas ...
— The White Devil • John Webster
... and when I am present, she says little to others. In my gloomy moments I attribute this change to indifference, aversion, what not? In my sunny intervals I give it another meaning. I say, were I her equal, I could find in this shyness coyness, and in that coyness love. As it is, dare I look for it? What could I do with it ...
— Shirley • Charlotte Bronte
... he hoped. He was pleased that she had named the very hour he had asked for the night before. That was like her good, frank way of meeting a situation, and it augured well for the unknown emergencies of their future life. He had little patience with timidity and traditional coyness in women, and great admiration for an open and fearless spirit. Melanie's note almost set his ...
— The Stolen Singer • Martha Idell Fletcher Bellinger
... her, all would be forgotten. Amine made no secret of her attachment; it was shown in every word, every look, and every gesture. When Philip would take her hand, or encircle her waist with his arm, or even when he pressed her coral lips, there was no pretence of coyness on her part. She was too noble, too confiding; she felt that her happiness was centred in his love, and she lived but in his presence. Two months had thus passed away, when Father Seysen, who often called, and had paid much attention to Amine's instruction, one day came in as ...
— The Phantom Ship • Frederick Marryat
... impossible: fain would she have stood upon form, and have kept her lover at a distance, as the custom of discreet ladies is, to frown and be perverse, and give their suitors harsh denials at first; to stand off, and affect a coyness or indifference, where they most love, that their lovers may not think them too lightly or too easily won; for the difficulty of attainment increases the value of the object. But there was no room in her case for denials, or puttings off, or any of the customary arts of delay ...
— Tales from Shakespeare • Charles and Mary Lamb
... tears and laughter was never in the wrong. The infection which had tainted lyric and didactic poetry had but slightly and partially touched the drama. While the noble and the learned were comparing eyes to burning-glasses, and tears to terrestrial globes, coyness to an enthymeme, absence to a pair of compasses, and an unrequited passion to the fortieth remainder-man in an entail, Juliet leaning from the balcony, and Miranda smiling over the chess-board, sent home many spectators, as kind and simple-hearted as the master and mistress of Fletcher's ...
— The Miscellaneous Writings and Speeches of Lord Macaulay, Vol. 2 (of 4) - Contributions To The Edinburgh Review • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... a marriage. A man of forty-five may marry a woman of twenty-five much more safely than one of thirty a girl below nineteen, because her mental sexuality is not as mature as his, and again her natural coyness requires more delicate and affectionate treatment than he is likely to bestow. A girl of twenty or under should seldom if ever marry a man of thirty or over, because the love of an elderly man for a girl is more parental ...
— Searchlights on Health - The Science of Eugenics • B. G. Jefferis and J. L. Nichols
... you from my thought * 'Vails naught and 'gainst th' obsession loses might: Couldst for thy lover feel 'twould ease his soul; * E'en thy dear Phantom would his sprite delight! Then on my weakness lay not coyness-load * Nor in such breach of troth be traitor-wight: And, weet ye well, for this your land I fared * Hoping to 'joy the union-boon forthright: How many a stony wold for this I spanned; * How oft I waked when men kept watch o'night! To fare fro' another land ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 2 • Richard F. Burton
... of wood to which pulleys are attached, through which run ropes with hooks at their ends, by means of which the water-pots are lowered. This is a great place of congregation for the young people, and is always surrounded by animated groups of young men and maidens, who, with pretty courtesies or coyness, carry ...
— Burma - Peeps at Many Lands • R.Talbot Kelly
... time appointed, and came in the carriage (pro tempore) of the suitor. They were shown into the drawing-room, and the conversation was mutually pleasing. At length our hero proposed to the lady to take a short airing in his carriage. At first she exhibited the usual coyness at such an invitation from one, to whom she was almost a stranger; but was ultimately bantered into a consent, and accordingly dressed for a ride. Having taken her seat between the two gentlemen, they engaged her on such topics as they thought ...
— Real Life In London, Volumes I. and II. • Pierce Egan
... amiable young man of fortune, who has for some time past paid his addresses to her, I think that we may consider ourselves fully justified in attributing the slightly equivocal nature of her answer to a pardonable girlish modesty and coyness, and that I shall not be premature in offering you my hearty congratulations on the successful issue of your suit—a-hem I—" And so saying, Mr. Coleman rose from his seat, and taking Lawless's unwilling hand in his own, shook it with ...
— Frank Fairlegh - Scenes From The Life Of A Private Pupil • Frank E. Smedley
... village, though real, was hardly enough to bring a serious blush to the face of coyness. Neighbours' minds had become so saturated by the abundance of showy military and regal incident lately vouchsafed to them, that the wedding of middle-aged civilians was of small account, excepting in so far that it solved the question ...
— The Trumpet-Major • Thomas Hardy
... on with a gush, "forego this virgin coyness, you have done enough and more than enough for honour, now throw aside pretence, lay down your arms and yield. No hour, I swear, of this long fight will be so happy to you as that of your sweet surrender, for remember, dear one, that I, your ...
— Lysbeth - A Tale Of The Dutch • H. Rider Haggard
... The golden fruit that worthy is Of Galatea's purple kiss; He does the savage hawthorn teach To bear the medlar and the pear. He bids the rustic plum to rear A noble trunk, and be a peach. Even Daphne's coyness he does mock, And weds the cherry to her stock, Though she refused Apollo's suit, Even she, that chaste and virgin tree, Now wonders at herself, to see That she's a mother made, and blushes ...
— Highways and Byways in Surrey • Eric Parker
... by dappled steeds, The sacred gate of orient pearl and gold, Smitten with Lucifer's light silver wand, Expanded slow to strains of harmony: The waves beneath in purpling rows, like doves Glancing with wanton coyness tow'rd their queen, Heaved softly; thus the damsel's bosom heaves When from her sleeping lover's downy cheek, To which so warily her own she brings Each moment nearer, she perceives the warmth Of coming kisses fanned by playful ...
— Gebir • Walter Savage Landor
... hear right, I sooner will find out the beds of Snakes, And with my youthful blood warm their cold flesh, Letting them curle themselves about my Limbs, Than sleep one night with thee; this is not feign'd, Nor sounds it like the coyness of ...
— The Maids Tragedy • Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher
... in the third act,[1] Hamlet is beginning with great and unfeigned tenderness; but, perceiving her reserve and coyness, fancies there are some listeners, and then, to sustain his part, breaks out into all ...
— Specimens of the Table Talk of S.T.Coleridge • Coleridge
... of about nine the girl is more aggressive than the boy in love affairs. At this age her modesty, coyness and native love for being wooed, come to the surface and thereafter characterize her attitude toward the ...
— A Preliminary Study of the Emotion of Love between the Sexes • Sanford Bell
... the portrait style, showing the mother in half length, seated under a sort of canopy. The babe clings closely to her neck, turning about at the spectator with a glance half shy and half mischievous. His coyness awakens a smile of tender amusement in the gentle, ...
— The Madonna in Art • Estelle M. Hurll
... Yet if you looked a moment longer, the woman in her shone out in every step and gesture. Her cheeks glowed with health and maidenly modesty; and her eyes, that flashed on you one moment almost defiantly, dropped the next in coyness and delicious confusion. ...
— Sir Ludar - A Story of the Days of the Great Queen Bess • Talbot Baines Reed
... caught the maiden in his arms, and attempted to return in ecstasy the salute which had broken his repose. But Catharine struggled in his embrace; and as her efforts implied alarmed modesty rather than maidenly coyness, her bashful lover suffered her to escape a grasp from which twenty times her strength could not ...
— The Fair Maid of Perth • Sir Walter Scott
... ejaculations, and whipped away from Harrington into the window. Zoe, with no motive but her own coyness, had already snatched her hand ...
— The Woman-Hater • Charles Reade
... detection; and when, towards midnight, he found the means to obtain the company of the sad inhabitant, he grew so impatient at her tears and sobs, at the delicacy with which she withheld her caresses, that he burst into bitter upbraidings at her coyness, and at length (without discovering the cause of her peculiar agitation and reserve) abruptly left her vowing "never ...
— Nature and Art • Mrs. Inchbald
... how for seven long years, in hope sometimes, sometimes in despair, yet persisting ever, I courted the fair Alice W——n; and as much as children could understand, I explained to them what coyness and difficulty and denial meant in maidens—when, suddenly turning to Alice, the soul of the first Alice looked out at her eyes with such a reality of representment that I became in doubt which of them ...
— Obiter Dicta • Augustine Birrell
... eyes to take refuge in his heart as thought it were her only haven. His brow cleared at this proof of the full extent of his mistress's attachment, coming to him as it were by accident. An inexplicable fear seemed to have overcome her coyness, and her love was visible for a moment without a veil. Unfortunately for both of them, Madame du Gua saw it all; like a miser who gives a feast, she seemed to count the ...
— The Chouans • Honore de Balzac
... BROWN. "So this is Turkish coyness, is it? You must contrive to fight it down— Come, come, sir, please ...
— The Bab Ballads • W. S. Gilbert
... is set to you; Where'er you like to wander sipping, And catch a tit-bit in your skipping, Eschew all coyness, just fall to, And may you find a ...
— Faust • Goethe
... too much for most. For none knew better than the Spaniard how much more fond women are, by the very law of their sex, of worshipping than of being worshipped, and of obeying than of being obeyed; how their coyness, often their scorn, is but a mask to hide their consciousness of weakness; and a mask, too, of which they themselves will often be the first ...
— Westward Ho! • Charles Kingsley
... The coyness thus affected by James could hardly impose on so astute a diplomatist as Noel de Caron, and the effect produced upon the policy of one of the Republic's chief allies by the Spanish marriages naturally made her statesmen shudder at the prospect of their ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... incredulous smile, which, for all his monastic subtlety, struck him as the expression of a young girl's coyness. ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... saw what he had hitherto sought not to see, the true child of a worthless mother. A mere mesalliance, if palliated by long or familiar acquaintance with the object, however it might have galled him, his heart might have pardoned; but here, without even a struggle of duty, without the ordinary coyness of maiden pride, to be won with so scanty a wooing, by a man who she knew was betrothed to another—the dissimulation, the perfidy, the combined effrontery and meanness of the whole transaction, left no force in Darrell's eyes to the common place excuses of experience ...
— What Will He Do With It, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... banter and light oppositions, to give themselves a sweeter sense of unity of heart. The child, with a cunning which only Nature has taught, will sometimes put a little honey of refusal into its kisses before giving them; the maiden adds to her virgin blooms the further attraction of virgin coyness and reserve; the civilizing dinner-table would lose all its dignity in losing its delays; and so everywhere, delicate denial, withholding reserve have an inverse force, and add a charm of emphasis to gift, assent, attraction, ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 9, No. 54, April, 1862 • Various
... "thin sown with profit or delight." Yet I must point to your notice a sonnet conceived and expressed with a witty delicacy. It is that addressed to one who hated him, but who could not persuade him to hate him again. His coyness to the other's passion—for hate demands a return as much as love, and starves without it—is most arch and pleasant. Pray, like it very much. For his theories and nostrums, they are oracular enough, ...
— The Best Letters of Charles Lamb • Charles Lamb
... mounting to meet hers. It was real business at last, the qualms of the civilian had been forgotten, and there was rising in him that joy in a scrap which had once made him one of the most daring airmen on the Western Front. The only thing that worried him now was the coyness about shooting. What on earth were his rifles and shot-guns for unless to be used? He had seen the enemy from the verandah wall, and a more ruffianly crew he had never dreamed of. They meant the uttermost business, and against such it was ...
— Huntingtower • John Buchan
... with him. To Drury Lane playhouse, but could not get in, so we went to the Robin Hood Society, and stayed till after 10. The question was, whether the increase of unmarried people was owing to the men's greater bashfulness, or women's greater coyness, than formerly. ...
— Extracts from the Diary of William Bray, Esq. 1760-1800 • William Bray
... consecrated to health and joy, to luxury and love. The vigorous youth pursued, like Apollo, the object of his desires; and the blushing maid was warned, by the fate of Daphne, to shun the folly of unseasonable coyness. The soldier and the philosopher wisely avoided the temptation of this sensual paradise: where pleasure, assuming the character of religion, imperceptibly dissolved the firmness of manly virtue. But the groves of Daphne continued for many ages to enjoy the veneration of natives and ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 2 • Edward Gibbon
... tipsy coyness was elephantine. "Lives six thous'n sev'nty four North S—South Street," and he roared ...
— A Good Samaritan • Mary Raymond Shipman Andrews
... neatly myself!" he said. "Oh, dear Miss Dobson, will you but accept my hand, all these things shall be yours—the cards, the canister, the goldfish, the demon egg-cup—all yours!" Zuleika, with ravishing coyness, answered that if he would give her them now, she would "think it over." The swain consented, and at bed-time she retired with the gift under her arm. In the light of her bedroom candle Marguerite hung not in greater ecstasy over the jewel-casket ...
— Zuleika Dobson - or, An Oxford Love Story • Max Beerbohm
... appearance they were inane, in speech laconic; they were shy in manners, and reserved, to boorishness, while in intellectual alertness they were inferior to the boisterous savage, or the shrewd, dignified white. But the woman perpetuated the shy, winning coyness of her red mother, and the arts, and somewhat of the refinements of her white father. The eye was not so dusk; it gleamed more: as if the ray from a star had been shot through it. There was the same olive cheek; but it was not so tawny, for the dawn of the white blood had appeared ...
— The Story of Louis Riel: The Rebel Chief • Joseph Edmund Collins
... The problem may be suggested to casuists how far the iniquity of a lie should be measured by its immediate purpose, or how far it is aggravated by the enormous mass of superincumbent falsehoods which it inevitably brings in its train. We cannot condemn very seriously the affected coyness which tries to conceal a desire for publication under an apparent yielding to extortion; but we must certainly admit that the stomach of any other human being of whom a record has been preserved would have revolted at the thought of wading through such a waste of falsification ...
— Hours in a Library, Volume I. (of III.) • Leslie Stephen
... to! They rushed upon me, shrieking for the brilliants and money which they had brought me as an offering. How they scolded and called me a deceiver! I was only very beautiful and coquettish, and that was no deception! I charmed them with my coyness, and they brought me the most costly presents, because I was a virtuous woman. Now they reproached me, demanding a return of them all, which they had forced upon me of their own free will. I was obliged ...
— Old Fritz and the New Era • Louise Muhlbach
... world enough and time, This coyness, Binkie, were not crime.... But at my back I always hear——"' He wiped his forehead, which was unpleasantly damp. 'What can I do? What can I do? I haven't any notions left, and I can't think connectedly, but I must do something, or I shall go ...
— The Light That Failed • Rudyard Kipling
... woman's desire for equality, at least in the matter of love. She wishes to be as free to seek a man as he is to seek her—to love him as freely and frankly as he does her. Why should she withhold her lips after her heart has surrendered? Why should she keep the pretence of coyness long after ...
— The Spinster Book • Myrtle Reed
... not; thy heat and stir The greater coyness breed in her: Yet thou may'st find, ere Age's frost, Thy long apprenticeship not lost, Learning at last that Stygian Fate Supples for him that knows to wait. The Muse is womanish, nor deigns Her love to him who pules and plains; With proud, averted face ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume V, Number 29, March, 1860 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... thou'rt good enough as thou art,' said Philip, tenderly—at least as tenderly as he durst, for he knew by experience that it did not do to alarm her girlish coyness. Either one speech or the other made Sylvia silent; neither was accordant to her mood of mind; so perhaps both contributed to ...
— Sylvia's Lovers, Vol. I • Elizabeth Gaskell
... responding to the erotic excitation of courtship is really very fundamental and—as has so often been necessary to point out in previous volumes of these Studies—it covers the whole of woman's erotic life, from the earliest age when coyness and modesty develop. A woman's love develops much more slowly than a man's for a much longer period. There is real psychological significance in the fact that a man's desire for a woman tends to arise spontaneously, while a woman's desire ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 6 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis
... attempted in their treatises and dialogues to give us an idealized image of the devouring passion— 'l'amor divino.' When they complain of the cruelty of the winged god, they are not only thinking of the coyness or hard-heartedness of the beloved one, but also of the unlawfulness of the passion itself. They seek to raise themselves above this painful consciousness by that spiritualization of love which found a support in the Platonic doctrine ...
— The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy • Jacob Burckhardt
... affection. Modesty is no exclusive property of the female sex, and there may be so much of it in a youth as to be the impediment, perhaps the unconscious impediment, to all the natural outpouring of his heart. The coyness of the virgin, the suitor, by his prayers and wooing, does all he can to overcome; but here the coyness is in the suitor himself. He has to overcome it by himself, and he cannot. He hardly knows the sort of ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - Volume 62, No. 384, October 1847 • Various
... have in my time known honest gentlemen abused by a pretended coyness in their wives, and I had a mind to try my lady's virtue. And when I could not prevail for you, gad, I pretended to be in love myself; but all in vain, she would not hear a word upon that subject. Then I writ a letter to her; I don't know ...
— The Comedies of William Congreve - Volume 1 [of 2] • William Congreve
... her a wash and brush-up, dress her in a gauzy frock, and exchange her thick woollen stockings and wooden sabots for silk and dancing slippers, she would make a very smart little fairy. Even in her native state she is a most attractive young person, of an engaging coyness. If you say: "Bonjour, Gabrielle!" she whispers: "B'jour M'sieur le Capitaine"—or, "M'sieur le Caporal"; for she knows all badges of rank—and hangs her head demurely. But presently, if you stand quite still and look the other ...
— All In It K(1) Carries On - A Continuation of the First Hundred Thousand • John Hay Beith (AKA: Ian Hay)
... for this reason or because of the proximity to English bottom, the steamer ceased her coyness, and her crew watched from the taffrail, while those implacable, purposeful men behind crept up to them. It was slow, laborious work; for the small windlass would not grip the heavy links of the chain, and they ...
— "Where Angels Fear to Tread" and Other Stories of the Sea • Morgan Robertson
... and he caught her to his breast inarticulate with joy, while she, free of artificial coyness, surrendered herself to his embrace and gave him her sweet lips ...
— Banked Fires • E. W. (Ethel Winifred) Savi
... the minstrels, if they would play a lively dance for him, and she, the May Queen, would grace him with her hand in it. Encouraged by the laughter of the bystanders, and doubtless entertaining no great dislike to the proposal, Gillian, with a little affected coyness, consented; and the mark was immediately deposited in the tambourine by Dick, who, transported by his success, sprang from his saddle, and committing his steed to the care of a youth near him, whom he promised to reward for his trouble, followed ...
— The Star-Chamber, Volume 1 - An Historical Romance • W. Harrison Ainsworth
... far more than a miracle to Hyde. As the door opened, he slowly turned his head. When he saw who was really there, he uttered a low cry of joy,—a cry pitiful in its shrill weakness. In a moment Katherine was close to his side. This was no time for coyness, and she was too tender and true a woman to feel or to affect it. She kissed his hands and face, and whispered on his lips the sweetest words of love and fidelity. Hyde was in a rapture. His joyful soul made his pale face luminous. He lay still, speechless, motionless, ...
— The Bow of Orange Ribbon - A Romance of New York • Amelia E. Barr
... figure at that period of his life, (afterwards he lost it,) made him the subject of never-ending admiration to the whole female population, gentle and simple, who passed him in the streets. In after days, he had the grace to regret his own perverse and scornful coyness. But, at that time, so foolishly insensible was he to the honor, that he used to kick and struggle with all his might to liberate himself from the gentle violence which was continually offered; and he renewed the scene (so elaborately painted by ...
— Autobiographic Sketches • Thomas de Quincey
... such an uncivil reception, a few of the party demurred; but all coyness was, at last, overcome; and finally our feet were inserted into heavy anklets of iron, running along a great bar bolted down to the deck. After this, we considered ourselves permanently established in our ...
— Omoo: Adventures in the South Seas • Herman Melville
... presence; the final yielding must surely be accompanied by heightened emotional tone. Whether we call it choice or not is merely a matter of definition of terms. The behaviour is in part determined by supplementary psychological values. Prof. Groos regards the coyness of females as "a most efficient means of preventing the too early and too frequent yielding to the sexual impulse."[179] Be that as it may, it is, in any case, if we grant the facts, a means through which male ...
— Evolution in Modern Thought • Ernst Haeckel
... to the old gardener produced no effect—not so much as to make him shut his toothless mouth. Then he remembered that the man was stone deaf. All that time the girl struggled, not with maidenly coyness, but like a pretty, dumb fury, kicking his shins now and then. He continued to hold her as if in a vice, his instinct telling him that were he to let her go she would fly at his eyes. But he was greatly humiliated by his position. At last she gave up. ...
— A Set of Six • Joseph Conrad
... give you the counsel which my own experience would suggest; but let me repeat once more from the seclusion of my valley that the viaticum of married life lies in these words—resignation and self-sacrifice. For, spite of all your tests, your coyness, and your vigilance, I can see that marriage will mean to you what it has been to me. The greater the passion, the steeper the precipice we have hewn for our fall—that ...
— Letters of Two Brides • Honore de Balzac
... employed at work, and who makes up to her, shows her a fine nosegay, and signifies to her that he is come on purpose to offer it her. The coquet immediately leaves off her work; and this pas-de-deux begins by all the little grimaces and false coyness that the coquette opposes to her acceptance of the nosegay, but which at the same time only the more betray the mind she has for it. The gardener keeps pressing her to receive it. Her companions, curious to see how this will end, advance little ...
— A Treatise on the Art of Dancing • Giovanni-Andrea Gallini
... then, which seldom fails to move, He pleads the cause of Marriage and of Love: 10 The course of Hymeneal joys he rounds, The fair one's eyes danc'd pleasure at the sounds. Nought now remain'd but 'Noes'—how little meant! And the sweet coyness that endears consent. The youth upon his knees enraptur'd fell: 15 The strange misfortune, oh! what words can tell? Tell! ye neglected sylphs! who lap-dogs guard, Why snatch'd ye not away your precious ward? Why suffer'd ye the lover's weight to fall On the ill-fated neck ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge - Vol I and II • Samuel Taylor Coleridge
... which were before The seat of virtuous, blushing modesty, Glowed with the flames of unrestrained desire. You cast away the veil of secrecy, And the flagitious daring of the man O'ercame your natural coyness: you exposed Your shame, unblushingly, to public gaze: You let the murderer, whom the people followed With curses, through the streets of Edinburgh, Before you bear the royal sword of Scotland In triumph. You begirt your parliament With armed bands; and by this shameless ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller
... it always comedy, even when played. Darwin, in his "Descent of Man," recognizes a real innate coyness, and that not merely of the female sex, which has been a great factor in improving the race. And, since we are come to the scientific standpoint, let it be admitted that marriage is a racial safeguard which does not exhaust the ...
— Without Prejudice • Israel Zangwill
... has the most comical look of anxious coyness on her jolly face, and holds her elbows squarer than ever; and a few paces off stands Montezuma, magnificent and melancholic; ...
— The Pillars of the House, V1 • Charlotte M. Yonge
... thing to spare a foe And kill his hate. And I would e'en do so! For I would kill the coyness of thy face. I would enfold thee in my spurn'd embrace And kiss the kiss that gladdens as with wine. Yea, I would wrestle with those arms of thine, And, like a victor, I would vanquish thee, And, tyrant-like, I'd teach thee ...
— A Lover's Litanies • Eric Mackay
... in these frumps; they make Heloise furious, and the airs of Victorine, her coyness and giggling, nearly drove me wild. I sat next to Monsieur Y, and although he is a Baron of very old family he ate like a pig. The food was extraordinarily good, but the proof of good service here is to get the whole dinner—of I don't ...
— The Visits of Elizabeth • Elinor Glyn
... that your Highness will rise," she enjoined him coldly, a coldness which changed swiftly to alarm as her endeavours to release her hand proved vain. For despite her struggles he held on stoutly. This was mere coyness, he assured himself, mere maidenly artifice which he must bear with until he had ...
— Love-at-Arms • Raphael Sabatini
... I could, and walked about the village, sometimes blowing the Pe-be-gwun, or flute. For some time Mis-kwa-bun-o-kwa pretended she was not willing to marry me, and it was not, perhaps, until she perceived some abatement of ardour on my part that she laid this affected coyness entirely aside. For my own part, I found that my anxiety to take a wife home to my lodge was rapidly becoming less and less. I made several efforts to break off the intercourse, and visit her no more; but a lingering inclination was too strong for me. When she perceived my growing ...
— The True Story Book • Andrew Lang
... last few days of coyness with his destiny when his engagement seemed the most negligible of circumstances, and times—and these happened for the most part at nights after Mrs. Johnson had indulged everybody in a Welsh rarebit—when it assumed so sinister and portentous an appearance as ...
— The History of Mr. Polly • H. G. Wells
... bids th' ill-natur'd Crab produce The gentle Apples Winy Juice; The golden Fruit that worthy is Of Galetea's purple Kiss; He does the savage Hawthorn teach To bear the Medlar and the Pear, He bids the rustick Plumb to rear A noble Trunk, and be a Peach, Ev'n Daphnes Coyness he does mock, And weds the Cherry to her stock, Though she refus'd Apollo's suit; Ev'n she, that chast and Virgin-tree Now wonders at her self, to see That she's a Mother made, and blushes ...
— Sylva, Vol. 1 (of 2) - Or A Discourse of Forest Trees • John Evelyn
... Tilly Ann, overcome with coyness, buried her face in her father's shoulder, and giggled, wriggling her little fat body the while, and drumming on his ...
— North, South and Over the Sea • M.E. Francis (Mrs. Francis Blundell)
... crescendo—TUM. This is unusual! A stranger? A new piece for La Belle Dame Sans Merci? Her wonted reckless dash deserts her. She is, as it were, exploring a new region, and advances with mischievous coyness, with an affectation of a faltering heart, with hesitating steps. My imagination is stimulated by these dripping notes. I see her, as it were, on an uneven pavement; here the flags are set on end, there ...
— Select Conversations with an Uncle • H. G. Wells
... effective for that. The possessor of this one, fully aware of her advantage, was displaying, for her partner's delectation, the most wonderful airs and graces. She glided about upon the points of her toes; she gave him her delicately poised finger-tips with a birdlike coyness which the glance of her beady black eyes belied. Joe was in his element, playing ...
— Peak and Prairie - From a Colorado Sketch-book • Anna Fuller
... some two hundred yards away, but they had always disappeared as we drew nearer. The beast is quick to take alarm at the slightest noise, and not only the paddles of a steamer, but even the plash of oars, will drive him into the water. For his coyness we were partly consoled by the gambols of the river-horses. All round the boat these creatures were popping up their huge snouts and shoulders, splashing about, and then plunging again into the swirling water. Fortunately none rose quite close to us, for the hippopotamus, even if he means ...
— Impressions of South Africa • James Bryce
... were invited to drink from the brandy-bottle, which they did with the relish of experts in the art of neat spirit drinking. To the hostesses was shown the consideration due to their sex, and they were offered the green concoction of peppermint. There is little of that coyness in the Dutch composition which is met with in the civilisation of the West: each lady of the household received her glass demurely and tossed off the contents, pouring it, after the manner of Dutch spirit-drinkers, ...
— On the Heels of De Wet • The Intelligence Officer
... but accomplished her work with the promptness of one who knew that no excuses would be taken from either master or mistress; Miss Lou dusted the parlor, and listened stolidly to the gallantries of her cousin. He was vastly amused by her reserve, believing it to be only maidenly coyness. ...
— Miss Lou • E. P. Roe
... pen in hand, and laughed at the confusion on the table in front of her. She was eminently practical, and quite without that self-consciousness which in a bygone day took the irritating form of coyness. Major White, with whom she shook hands en camarade, gazed at ...
— Roden's Corner • Henry Seton Merriman
... and Amour's fine Speeches coin'd, But could not utter what I well design'd. Warm'd by her Charms 'gainst Bashfulness I strove, And trembling far, and stammer'd out my Love; Told her how greatly I admir'd and fear'd, Which she 'twixt Coyness and Compassion heard, Grutch'd no Expence of Money, or of Time, And thought that not to adore her was a Crime; The more each Visit I acquainted grew, Yet every time found something in her new. Who was above her Sex so fortunate, She had a Charm for Man in every State; Beauty for the Youthful, Prudence ...
— The Pleasures of a Single Life, or, The Miseries Of Matrimony • Anonymous
... his knowledge of Audrey's character that he restrained himself so utterly: any such passionate love-making would have disturbed her serenity and destroyed her ease in his society; her inborn love of freedom, and a certain coyness that was natural to her, would have revolted against such wooing. Cyril had his reward for his unselfish forbearance when he saw how quietly she rested against his arm, how willingly she left her hand in his, as she talked to him in her frank, ...
— Lover or Friend • Rosa Nouchette Carey
... being to the service of the King of kings. Still she was a young creature, suffered to grow up according to a gracious natural growth, not forced into premature expansion, permitted to preserve to the last the sweet girlish trust and confidence, the mingled coyness and fearlessness, pensive dreams and merry laughter, which constitute the ineffable freshness and tender ...
— Life of Her Most Gracious Majesty the Queen V.1. • Sarah Tytler |
