"Curious" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... sister, and was for falling on my neck, and calling me his brother, the saviour of his cherished sister,—I know not what wild nonsense,—Mme. de Lalange cut his expressions short. "M. le Marquis," she said, and she put a curious emphasis on the title, I thought; "M. le Marquis, it will be well, believe me, for you to leave this gentleman with me for a short time. He has suffered a shock, more violent than he yet realises. His hands are painfully burned, yet I hope to relieve his sufferings in a few minutes. ...
— Rosin the Beau • Laura Elizabeth Howe Richards
... the honest pastor is the most curious and the most powerful thing of the kind which the last century produced. . . . . Paine and Voltaire had reserves, but Jean Meslier had none. He keeps nothing back; and yet, after all, the wonder is not that there should have been one priest who left that ...
— Superstition In All Ages (1732) - Common Sense • Jean Meslier
... manner. The recurrence of this burden no doubt caused copyists to lose their place, and so the stanza came to be omitted in other copies. Its omission, however, spoils the ballad. Both it and the curious lines ...
— Caxton's Book of Curtesye • Frederick J. Furnivall
... me to accompany you, mademoiselle? I am very curious to know whether the person now asking for you is identical with the person who asked for you a little ...
— Messengers of Evil - Being a Further Account of the Lures and Devices of Fantomas • Pierre Souvestre
... Madchen found one day A curious something in her play, That was not fruit, nor flower, nor seed; It was not anything that grew, Or crept, or climbed, or swam, or flew; Had neither legs nor wings, indeed; And yet she was not sure, she said, Whether it was ...
— The Home Book of Verse, Vol. 1 (of 4) • Various
... Hall, the present library building, the books of the College were kept in Harvard Hall. In the same building, also, was the Philosophy Chamber, where the chair usually stood for the inspection of the curious. Over this domain, from the year 1793 to 1800, presided Mr. Samuel Shapleigh, the Librarian. He was a dapper little bachelor, very active and remarkably attentive to the ladies who visited the Library, especially the ...
— A Collection of College Words and Customs • Benjamin Homer Hall
... into the pond, full of horrible black mud. The gentlemen heard the scream and dragged her out, and it would have all been fun and a good story if she had not been so much afraid of the French lady's maid. It is curious how the sight of those brown eyes brought the whole scene back to me. We all grew so fond of Mysie Merrifield in the few days we spent together, and she is very ...
— Modern Broods • Charlotte Mary Yonge
... advice. He still made fire engines, and a brook in a meadow presented irresistible temptation to water-wheels and machinery. One of his tilt-hammers made a very good ghost, haunting the meadow and keeping off trespassers. He had a foundry, where he cast miniature cannon, kettles and curious things, and his rifle-practice was a neighborhood wonder. He brought water from the cellar, and did other chores which Pennsylvania rules assigned to women, and when boys ridiculed him, he flogged them, and did it quite as effectually as he rendered them ...
— Half a Century • Jane Grey Cannon Swisshelm
... eyes full on Mrs. Pat. They were of the curious green blue that is sometimes seen in the eyes of a grey collie, and with all Mrs. Pat's dislike and suspicion of the couple, she knew that he ...
— All on the Irish Shore - Irish Sketches • E. Somerville and Martin Ross
... being the new life springing forth from the old one, typified by the oak. The Druids traveled into Ancient Britain and Ireland, and many traces of their religious rites may still be found there, not only in the shape of the stone places-of-worship, but also in many curious local customs among the peasantry. Many a bit of English folk-lore—many an odd Irish fancy concerning fairies and the like; symbols of good-luck; banshees and "the little-folk"—came honestly to these people from the days of the Druids. And from the same source came the many whispered tales ...
— Reincarnation and the Law of Karma - A Study of the Old-New World-Doctrine of Rebirth, and Spiritual Cause and Effect • William Walker Atkinson
... words hesitatingly as if she feared to touch a wound. The woman's eyes suddenly filled again and a curious little quiver came ...
— The Search • Grace Livingston Hill
... in the big top, less than an hour before, had already traveled to the cook tent, and many curious glances were directed to the slim, modest, boy as he passed among his friends quietly, giving them ...
— The Circus Boys Across The Continent • Edgar B. P. Darlington
... Dyke sat gripping the saddle tightly with his knees, feeling a curious quiver pass into him from the horse's excited nerves, as the swift little beast stood gazing before it at the ragged shrubs, ready to spring away on the slightest sign of danger. The rein lay upon its neck, ...
— Diamond Dyke - The Lone Farm on the Veldt - Story of South African Adventure • George Manville Fenn
... officers of the government, and one service is held each week in the chapel. It is really wonderful in the minuteness and splendid finish of its ornamentation. Here is seen an endless amount of jasper, marble, ivory, ebony, and tortoise-shell, in the form of carved and inlaid work, curious beyond description. Most of theses ornamentations, as well as the paintings, were the work of brothers of the order, who must have spent half a life-time in their consummation. The cloisters are surrounded by a wretched series of life-size paintings ...
— Due West - or Round the World in Ten Months • Maturin Murray Ballou
... Sounds gain a curious distinctness and meaning in the hour of the break of the dawn; in such an hour they seem even more significant than sounds heard in the dead of night. When she had gone to the window she had fancied that she heard something ...
— The Shuttle • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... at work; onwards they press with eager spirit, disentangling the line, double or treble, as the case may be. (23) To and fro they weave a curious web, (24) now across, now parallel with the line, (25) whose threads are interlaced, here overlapped, and here revolving in a circle; now straight, now crooked; here close, there rare; at one time clear enough, at another dimly owned. Past one ...
— The Sportsman - On Hunting, A Sportsman's Manual, Commonly Called Cynegeticus • Xenophon
... Matilda called after him. She slid off Mrs. Laval's lap and rang for it, and when it came up on the dumb waiter, she did York's work in setting it on the table with a particular pleasure. She began to have a curious feeling of being at ...
— Opportunities • Susan Warner
... six seals, on which a similar inscription was written. In this were twenty-seven pieces of paper on each of which was written: 'Sundry curious secrets.' ...
— CELEBRATED CRIMES, COMPLETE - THE MARQUISE DE BRINVILLIERS • ALEXANDRE DUMAS, PERE
... origin, one perceives then that he comes from the land of Mozart, Raphael, and Goethe, his true fatherland is the dream-realm of poesy. When he sits at the piano and improvises I feel as though a countryman from my beloved native land were visiting me and telling me the most curious things which have taken place there during my absence...Sometimes I should like to interrupt him with questions: And how is the beautiful little water-nymph who knows how to fasten her silvery veil so coquettishly ...
— Frederick Chopin as a Man and Musician - Volume 1-2, Complete • Frederick Niecks
... straight, round stem, only a few feet in height. Each was about the height of a full-grown man, while the stem itself, or trunk as it should more properly be called, was full as thick as a stout man's body; and what was curious in a tree, it was even thicker at the top than at the base, as if it had been taken out of the ground and re-planted wrong end upwards! Upon this clumsy-looking trunk there was not a single branch—not ...
— Ran Away to Sea • Mayne Reid
... discuss Irish labor with AE. I climbed up to that most curious of all magazine offices—the Irish Homestead office up under the roof of Plunkett House. It is a semi-circular room whose walls are covered with the lavender and purple people of AE's brush. AE was ambushed behind piles of newspapers, and behind him in a grate filled with smouldering ...
— What's the Matter with Ireland? • Ruth Russell
... things,—when he does take the trouble to do so—not sticking to one point of view but observing his subject from all round, as it were, with a good deal of philosophical humour that is of great help to him in all he undertakes; and it is curious to see how fast and thoroughly the younger Persians of better families can adapt themselves to European ways of thought and manner without the least embarrassment or concern. In this, I think, they surpass any other Asiatic nation, ...
— Across Coveted Lands - or a Journey from Flushing (Holland) to Calcutta Overland • Arnold Henry Savage Landor
... surprised to find him so near me, and the contents of the letter were very perplexing. My father entreated me to meet him on the river-side pathway, between Malsham station and this house. He had been informed of my habits, he said, and that I was accustomed to walk there. That was curious, when, so far as I knew, he had sever been near this place; but I hardly thought about the strangeness of it then. He begged me so earnestly to see him; it was a matter of life or death, he said. What could I do, Nelly? He was my father, and I felt that ...
— Fenton's Quest • M. E. Braddon
... was thus seeking how he could make himself useful to every one in many ways—for a purpose of usefulness finds many paths—his attention was called to a very curious discovery that had been made in the Dutch city of Leyden, in November, 1745. It was an electrical bottle called the ...
— True to His Home - A Tale of the Boyhood of Franklin • Hezekiah Butterworth
... advanced in life. To the close of her life, she had the finest eyes and teeth I ever saw, and though she could be sufficiently sharp when she had a mind, her general behavior was genteel and ladylike. However this might be, I derived a great deal of curious information from George Constable, both at this early period, and afterwards. He was constantly philandering about my aunt, and of course very kind to me. He was the first person who told me about ...
— Memoirs of the Life of Sir Walter Scott, Volume I (of 10) • John Gibson Lockhart
... this detail of her part against her will; she began by making a curious attempt, due to her ignorance. She fancied, as children do, that being imprisoned meant the same thing as solitary confinement. But this is the superlative degree of imprisonment, and that superlative is the ...
— Poor Relations • Honore de Balzac
... Maud and Ethel Hardy at home would have scarcely recognized them now in the sunburnt-looking lassies, who sat upon their horses as if they had never known any other seat in their lives. Their dress, too, would have been most curious to English eyes. They wore wide straw hats, with a white scarf wound round the top to keep off the heat. Their dresses were very short, and made of brown holland, with a garibaldi of blue-colored flannel. They wore red flannel ...
— On the Pampas • G. A. Henty
... a long time it was supposed to be lost; so much did those who possessed it keep it carefully concealed, and so constantly did they refuse to allow a copy to be taken. The manuscripts, indeed, were so scarce, even in the libraries of the curious, that the late M. De Boze, whose pleasure it was to collect the rarest works belonging to every species of literature, could never succeed in acquiring a copy of the Letters to Eugenia, and in his time there were ...
— Letters to Eugenia - or, a Preservative Against Religious Prejudices • Baron d'Holbach
... with stalls for cattle, a magazine for provisions, &c. The dwelling appropriated to the use of the master of the raft and the principal super-cargoes was conspicuous for its size and commodiousness. It is curious to observe these rafts, on their passage, with their companies of rowers stationed at each end, making the shores ring again to the sound of their ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 10, Issue 264, July 14, 1827 • Various
... were both timid and curious, and were quite content to obey Esther Ann's suggestion to "follow on." Edna, it may be said, was not inspired with that wholesome dread of old Nathan which possessed the others, for she had not been brought up under the shadow of his ogre-like ...
— A Dear Little Girl's Thanksgiving Holidays • Amy E. Blanchard
... specimens of comparative anatomy and natural history. He was much liked, was a man of lively and simple humor, and loved to tell his observation of nature in homely verse; and in 1788 he communicated to the Royal Society his curious paper on the cuckoo. At the same time he carried to London a drawing of the casual disease, as seen on the hands of the milkers, and showed it to Sir Everard Home and to others. John Hunter had alluded ...
— Great Men and Famous Women. Vol. 6 of 8 • Various
... there. It's a mighty curious thing where she could have got to, though. Look here, young man, are you sure you've no ...
— Anne Of Avonlea • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... Sprague, a maiden lady, who took a profound interest in the affairs of her neighbors. She seldom went beyond the limits of Groveton, which was her world. She had learned the business of dressmaking, and often did work at home for her customers. She was of a curious and prying disposition, and nothing delighted her more than to acquire the knowledge ...
— Struggling Upward - or Luke Larkin's Luck • Horatio Alger
... felt that he was in the presence of one who tried to understand his position, to estimate his arguments at their full worth, to find some common ground of agreement. If it were possible in a bitter controversy to arrive at reasonable compromise, Lord Derby was most likely to effect it. He had a curious talent of making speeches with which everyone must agree, and which at the same time were never commonplace. Their secret lay in the habit of mind that led him always to seek out the common grounds of principle or fact that underlie every controversy, and ...
— Historical and Political Essays • William Edward Hartpole Lecky
... believe that mysel'! It's hard for a man like me to know what he can do, and say so when the time comes, wi'oot making thoughtless folk think he's conceited. An artist's feeling aboot such things is a curious one, and hard for any but artists to understand. It's a grand presumption in a man, if ye look at it in one way, that leads him to think he's got the right to stand up on a stage and ask a thousand people, or five thousand, to ...
— Between You and Me • Sir Harry Lauder
... human's current state by any means. "Foodp?" "T!" "OK, finger Lisa and see if she's idle." 4. Any picture (composed of ASCII characters) depicting 'the finger'. Originally a humorous component of one's plan file to deter the curious fingerer (sense 2), it has entered the arsenal ...
— The Jargon File, Version 4.0.0
... smiling benevolently. "Of course you know—there's a romance, or rather was—long ago. My mother knew all about it. Since old Marsham's death, Lady Lucy's never done a thing without Ferrier to advise her. Why she hasn't married him, that's the puzzle.—But she's a curious woman, is Lady Lucy. Looks so soft, but—" He pursed up his ...
— The Testing of Diana Mallory • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... least fifteen minutes and no air could have reached it. It seems likely that the child was born asphyxiated and was buried in this state, and only began to assume independent vitality when for the second time exposed to the air. This curious case was verified to English correspondents by Dr. Wagner, and is of unquestionable authority; it became the subject of a thorough criminal ...
— Anomalies and Curiosities of Medicine • George M. Gould
... believe in a Supreme Being; but they have a curious tradition respecting the creation, which has prevailed among them from the earliest period of their history. They believe that, in the beginning of the world, God, having created three white and three black men, with an equal number of women of each ...
— The World of Waters - A Peaceful Progress o'er the Unpathed Sea • Mrs. David Osborne
... The ancient Romans, it is curious to note, would walk in the open air after the bath; and both the Frigidarium of the Romans and the Mustaby of the Turks were, and are, ...
— The Turkish Bath - Its Design and Construction • Robert Owen Allsop
... Michael whose blank face plainly showed he had no part in making way with the outlaw. The men behind him looked sharply round and finished with a curious gaze at Starr. Starr, rightly interpreting the scene, ...
— Lo, Michael! • Grace Livingston Hill
... "I'm glad you spoke—about Neale," he said, and there was a curious softness in his voice. "I owe him a great deal. I like him ... Ancliffe will get you out of here—and ...
— The U.P. Trail • Zane Grey
... Moslem historians delight in the obscurity which hangs over her last resting-place, as if it were an honour even for the receptacle of her ashes to be concealed from the eyes of men. Her repute is a curious ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 8 • Richard F. Burton
... were young? Nor are you young, that's true. 55 How your plump arms, that were, have dropped away! Why, I can span them. Cecco beats you still? No matter, so you keep your curious hair. I wish they'd find a way to dye our hair Your color—any lighter tint, indeed, 60 Than black—the men say they are sick of black, Black eyes, ...
— Selections from the Poems and Plays of Robert Browning • Robert Browning
... to the Dii Involuti! Fortunate provision of fate, which leaves us at least liberty to deify, you perhaps family pride, Venus, or even avaricious Pluto; I possibly ambition or revenge. We all have our veiled gods, shrouded close from curious gaze; 'the heart knoweth his own bitterness, and the stranger doth not intermeddle ...
— Infelice • Augusta Jane Evans Wilson
... showed me a very fine collection of ancient and curious weapons, and for a time I was full of that idea. I gathered several interesting ...
— Literary Lapses • Stephen Leacock
... more comfortable than Rebecca's own at Sunnybrook Farm, nor the lack of view, nor yet the long journey, for she was not conscious of weariness; it was not the fear of a strange place, for she adored new places and new sensations; it was because of some curious blending of uncomprehended emotions that Rebecca stood her beloved pink sunshade in the corner, tore off her best hat, flung it on the bureau with the porcupine quills on the under side, and stripping down the dimity ...
— The Flag-raising • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... boy eyed them; and they, alert from their game, slightly dazed by the darkness of the carriage, peered back at him, frankly curious. When they had left the compartment he had been a huddled figure demanding no attention; now he was awake and an individual, ...
— Max • Katherine Cecil Thurston
... had drawn a crowd of curious people about the booth devoted to that purpose, in which were piled dozens of packages of various shapes and sizes, all done up in white tissue paper and tied ...
— Grace Harlowe's Senior Year at High School - or The Parting of the Ways • Jessie Graham Flower
... present a quaint and picturesque appearance, especially along the High Street, where is located the old Guild Hall, a ponderous stone building, with a curious front projecting over the footway and supported by columns; it was built in the sixteenth century. Sir Thomas Bodley, who founded the Bodleian Library of Oxford, was born in Exeter, and also Richard Hooker the theologian. Among its famous bishops was Trelawney ...
— England, Picturesque and Descriptive - A Reminiscence of Foreign Travel • Joel Cook
... object of so much praise and censure, was a native of Side in Pamphylia; and his genius, like that of Bacon, embraced as his own all the business and knowledge of the age. Tribonian composed, both in prose and verse, on a strange diversity of curious and abstruse subjects; a double panegyric of Justinian and the life of the philosopher Theodotus; the nature of happiness and the duties of government; Homer's catalogue and the four-and-twenty sorts of metre; the astronomical canon of Ptolemy; the changes of the months; ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 4 • Various
... we have not done it; and we shall not do it if we do not hurl some masses of granite on the soil of France." [Footnote: This passage is extracted from M. Thibaudeau's Memoires of the Consulate. There are in these Memoires, which are extremely curious, some political conversations of Bonaparte, details concerning his internal government and the principal sittings of the council of state, which throw much light upon this epoch.] By these words ...
— History of the French Revolution from 1789 to 1814 • F. A. M. Mignet
... walked in the direction of his mother's house, in company with Joe, he scanned with a curious eye the houses, the shops, and the people that he passed. Nothing appeared changed; the same signs indicated an unchanging hospitality on the part of the same landlords, the same lumpers were standing at the same corners—it seemed as if he had been gone only a day. With the old sights ...
— The Three Brides, Love in a Cottage, and Other Tales • Francis A. Durivage
... Many curious customs prevailed in the middle ages in this old town; and one was formerly portrayed on the walls of a chapel in the church of the Holy Trinity. It was the representation of an execution: the delinquent had injured a child, by disfiguring its face and arms, and suffered in consequence. The culprit ...
— Barn and the Pyrenees - A Legendary Tour to the Country of Henri Quatre • Louisa Stuart Costello
... the Latin version of Busy, curious, thirsty fly, be so kind as to transcribe and send it; but you need not be in haste, for I shall be I know not where, for at least five weeks. I wrote the following tetastrick on ...
— Life of Johnson - Abridged and Edited, with an Introduction by Charles Grosvenor Osgood • James Boswell
... encountered, ranging thence through the temperate zone up to the exceeding cold of the mountains. The state as a whole is healthy, and the mountain breezes bracing, but the coast is subject to the usual paludismo or malarial fevers of Western America generally. Pinto, the curious mottled skin disease, is encountered in some of the ...
— Mexico • Charles Reginald Enock
... remember it? It was that one after 'The Zingara' started, way back in August. I showed it to you here one evening. I thought maybe Mayer had read it and that was what brought him to see me—got him sort of curious. But Charlie thinks he wasn't bothering about papers just then. He had it on him and used it to wrap up the money and that piece got ...
— Treasure and Trouble Therewith - A Tale of California • Geraldine Bonner
... one circumstance in this case which might open a very curious psychological question; it is this: F.'s victims have not in general been the frank, open, free-giving, or trustful class of men; on the contrary, they have usually been close-fisted, cold, cautious people, who weigh carefully what they ...
— Cornelius O'Dowd Upon Men And Women And Other Things In General - Originally Published In Blackwood's Magazine - 1864 • Charles Lever
... a moment in silence. Sir Arthur was sitting near the window, and had just turned on an electric light beside him. Douglas was struck by something strange in his father's attitude and look—a curious irresponsibility and remoteness. The deep depression of their earlier weeks together had apparently disappeared. This mood of easy acquiescence—almost levity—was becoming permanent. Yet Douglas could not ...
— Lady Connie • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... panting they lag Behind inglorious; or else shivering creep Benumbed and faint beneath the sheltering thorn. For hounds of middle size, active and strong, Will better answer all thy various ends, And crown thy pleasing labours with success. As some brave captain, curious and exact, By his fixed standard forms in equal ranks His gay battalion, as one man they move 270 Step after step, their size the same, their arms Far gleaming, dart the same united blaze: Reviewing generals his merit own; How regular! how ...
— The Poetical Works of Addison; Gay's Fables; and Somerville's Chase • Joseph Addison, John Gay, William Sommerville
... You curious chanters of the wood, That warble forth Dame Nature's lays, Thinking your passions understood By your weak accents; what's your praise, When Philomel ...
— The Hundred Best English Poems • Various
... this, seated within a curious circular affair, which was once a mould for sewer pipe, are two operators busy with clicking instruments. The floor is a foot deep with clay. There are no doors. There are no windows which boast of glass or covering of any kind. The lookout embraces the ...
— The Johnstown Horror • James Herbert Walker
... had come into his possession by a curious chance not long before, and he treasured it, not so much for its sturdy philosophy, as because it was in some sort a link to the shadowy past ...
— The Little Red Chimney - Being the Love Story of a Candy Man • Mary Finley Leonard
... There was a curious power in the words, as he lingered over them, like half-comprehended music,—as simple and tender as if they had come from the depths of a woman's heart: it touched him deeper than his power of control. Pah! it was a dream of Faust's; ...
— Margret Howth, A Story of To-day • Rebecca Harding Davis
... was in one of the suburbs far from the main street. "You needn't say as you're coming to me," Lefroy had said to him; "nor need you let on as you know anything of Mrs. Jones at all. People are so curious; and it may be that a gentleman sometimes likes to lie perdu." Mr. Peacocke, although he had but small sympathy for the taste of a gentleman who likes to lie perdu, nevertheless did as he was bid, and found his way to Mrs. Jones's boarding-house without ...
— Dr. Wortle's School • Anthony Trollope
... been found dead on a dark street and brought by curious and ennuied citizens to the drug store. The late human being had been engaged in terrific battle—the details showed that. Loafer and reprobate though he had been, he had been also a warrior. But he had lost. His hands were yet ...
— Strictly Business • O. Henry
... yeomen sitting in silence, waiting his coming; likewise the landlord was there, for he was curious to know what Master Partington had to do with the fellow in blue. "Up, my merry men!" quoth Robin, "this is no place for us, for those are after us with whom we will stand but an ill chance an we fall into their hands. So we will go forward once more, nor will we stop this night till we reach ...
— The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood • Howard Pyle
... in the bright light, I was not long in discovering that my feats of the previous day had by no means been forgotten, and that I was the center of general attention; but I stood bravely this cross-fire of curious and ironical glances, intrenched on the one hand behind a mountain of flowers that ornamented the center of the table, and on the other assisted in my defensive position by the ingenious kindness of my neighbor. Madame de Malouet is one of those rare old ...
— Led Astray and The Sphinx - Two Novellas In One Volume • Octave Feuillet
... a desire for the public welfare, he bequeathed it in high charitable sort; or whether, fame taking a less enviable turn with him, he just simply was hanged there, has afforded matter of heated controversy to the curious in questions of suburban nomenclature and topography. But in this case, as in so many other and more august ones, the origins defy discovery. Suffice it, therefore, that the name remains, as does the open space—the latter forming one of those minor "lungs of London" which offer such amiable oases ...
— The Far Horizon • Lucas Malet
... passed on ahead. But it was mid-afternoon before anything happened. Jacqueline meantime had shown some pettish ill-humor. Those who had fought to be her escort were now singularly indifferent. Driscoll was idly curious and quietly contemptuous, but he detected no fright in her manner. "Fretting for her silver-braided Greaser," he said to himself. "A pretty scrape she's got herself into, too! Now I wonder why a girl can't have any sense." But as the answer was going to take ...
— The Missourian • Eugene P. (Eugene Percy) Lyle
... day on the 19th. We had lunch in a curious cup-shaped hollow, estimated to be two miles wide and one hundred and fifty feet deep. Webb obtained here an approximate dip of 88 degrees 44',** a very promising increase from ...
— The Home of the Blizzard • Douglas Mawson
... expressions denoting communication of religious knowledge, signify ocular exhibition. The first teachers of mankind borrowed this method of instruction; and it comprised an endless store of pregnant hieroglyphics. These lessons of the olden time were the riddles of the Sphynx, tempting the curious by their quaintness, but involving the personal risk of the adventurous interpreter. "The Gods themselves," it was said, "disclose their intentions to the wise, but to fools their teaching is unintelligible;" and the King of the Delphic Oracle was said not to declare, nor ...
— Morals and Dogma of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite of Freemasonry • Albert Pike
... which seemed to pervade the homestead. The blinds were taken off, windows taken out, carpets taken up, and where so lately physicians, clergymen, and death had officiated, were now seen carpenters, masons, and other workmen. Many were the surmises as to the cause of all this; and one old lady, more curious than the rest, determined upon a friendly call, to ascertain, if possible, ...
— Homestead on the Hillside • Mary Jane Holmes
... that her young mistress was so securely closeted with Dona Maria that morning as to be inaccessible to curious eyes and ears, she saw fit to bewail to her fellow-servants this further evidence of the decay of the old feudal and patriarchal mutual family confidences. "Time was, thou rememberest, Pepita, when an affair of this kind was openly ...
— Maruja • Bret Harte
... Every object pleases. A rail fence, running athwart the hills, now in sunshine and now in shadow,—how the eye lingers upon it! Or the strait, light-gray trunks of the trees, where the woods have recently been laid open by a road or clearing,—how curious they look, and as if surprised in undress! Next year they will begin to shoot out branches and make themselves a screen. Or the farm scenes,—the winter barnyards littered with husks and straw, the rough-coated horses, the cattle sunning themselves ...
— Winter Sunshine • John Burroughs
... returned with equal vigour, but without the curious sounds; Maria was hugged as well and set upon her feet; while Judy, having already been sufficiently hugged, pushed the arm-chair closer up to the fire and waited patiently for the proper business of ...
— The Extra Day • Algernon Blackwood
... it has been forced back upon my attention in a curious if not providential way. I was over in Sutherlandtown for the first time since my illness, and having some curiosity about my unfortunate but honest debtor, went to the hotel and asked to see the room ...
— Agatha Webb • Anna Katharine Green
... a very fit place for the following curious observations on the formation of the low islands spoken of in the text. "All the low isles seem to me to be a production of the sea, or rather its inhabitants, the polype-like animals forming the lithophytes. These animalcules raise their habitation gradually from a small ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 14 • Robert Kerr
... rhetoric nor of such gay terms as now be said in these days and used," and that his only desire is to be understood by his readers. The prologue to the Eneydos, however, tells a different story. According to this he has been blamed for expressing himself in "over curious terms which could not be understood of the common people" and requested to use "old and homely terms." But Caxton objects to the latter as being also unintelligible. "In my judgment," he says, "the common terms that be daily used, are lighter to be understood than the ...
— Early Theories of Translation • Flora Ross Amos
... four of her guests had still to arrive: Count and Countess Stefanovitch, and two others whose presence was to be the surprise of the evening. "I will tell you only this," she laughed, in her pretty English, when Di pretended to be wildly curious; "like Stefan they have both come back from the front, and they are the most exciting heroes! I won't dream of spoiling my great coup by letting you guess their names until they are announced; but ...
— Secret History Revealed By Lady Peggy O'Malley • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... curious crowd had gathered about "Deemer's." It was composed partly of those who had run away the night before, but now had the courage of sunshine, partly of honest folk going to their daily toil. The door of the store stood open; ...
— Can Such Things Be? • Ambrose Bierce
... their breasts, mouth, ears, eyes, and other open passages of the body. The inside of the buildings in this lower court stood upon great pillars of chalcedony stone and porphyry marble made archways after a goodly antique fashion. Within those were spacious galleries, long and large, adorned with curious pictures, the horns of bucks and unicorns: with rhinoceroses, water-horses called hippopotames, the teeth and tusks of elephants, and other things well worth the beholding. The lodging of the ladies, for so we may call those gallant ...
— Gargantua and Pantagruel, Complete. • Francois Rabelais
... her attentively for some time. She seemed to be making very little headway. All in all, Madden made little of the craft, so he handed the glass to Smith. The Englishman was likewise puzzled, and the binoculars went down the line of curious men. ...
— The Cruise of the Dry Dock • T. S. Stribling
... two letters when they came," went on Mrs. Mills. "Many a woman in my position would have been curious enough to open them; I didn't. I simply put them in a drawer where they can be found when the trouble's all over. No one can blame ...
— Love at Paddington • W. Pett Ridge
... of lungs, and 2,000 pores to a square inch of surface; so you see what quantities of air we must have, and what care we should take of our skin so all the little doors will open and shut right. And brains, auntie, you've no idea how curious they are; I haven't got to them yet, but I long to, and uncle is going to show me a manikin that you can take to pieces. Just think how nice it will be to see all the organs in their places; I only wish they could be made to ...
— Eight Cousins • Louisa M. Alcott
... a person to whom he might talk without arousing suspicion, and so he turned into an inn at the corner of the street and ordering beer sat himself upon a bench along the wall before a long wooden table. The few men who sat drinking and smoking gave him a curious glance, and the proprietor of the establishment, aware of a stranger, felt it to be his duty to learn something of his mission to this small town and of his identity. This was what Renwick wanted, and as ...
— The Secret Witness • George Gibbs
... when we have gone through Young's seven Satires, we seem to have made but an indifferent meal. They are a sort of fricassee, with some little solid meat in them, and yet the flavor is not always piquant. It is curious to find him, when he pauses a moment from his satiric sketching, recurring to ...
— The Essays of "George Eliot" - Complete • George Eliot
... That indelible brand of blood which it has left on English history was all but unfelt in Ireland. There had been few Protestant converts, and those few were not apparently emulous of martyrdom. No Smithfield fires were lighted in Dublin, indeed it is a curious fact that in the whole course of Irish history—so prodigal of other horrors—no single execution for heresy is, it is said, recorded. A story is found in the Ware Papers, and supported by the authority of Archbishop Ussher, which, if true, shows that this reproach to Irish Protestantism—if indeed ...
— The Story Of Ireland • Emily Lawless
... persons marooned in the second stories of their homes appealed to passing boats for food, fuel and water. Fishermen seized some of the boats and were taking the curious sightseeing. Persons who appropriated boats and ...
— The True Story of Our National Calamity of Flood, Fire and Tornado • Logan Marshall
... pictures the republican portrait found a place, and the name of Franklin was printed at length in the catalogue,—a circumstance which did not pass unobserved at the time; for the "Espion Anglais," in recording it, treats it as "announcing that he began to come out from his obscurity."[37] The same curious authority, describing a festival at Marseilles, says, under date of March 20th, 1779,—"I was struck, on entering the hall, to observe a crowd of portraits representing the insurgents; but that of M. Franklin especially drew my ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 12, No. 73, November, 1863 • Various
... aloof, still held his trophy concealed from her curious eyes. She tried to grasp his hand, missed it, then succeeded. Then she tried to ...
— The Brentons • Anna Chapin Ray
... packs on dey backs filled wid everythin' from needles an' thimbles to bed spreads an' fryin' pans. One day a peddler stopped at Mis' Fanny's house. He was de uglies' man I ever seed. He was tall an' bony wid black whiskers an' black bushy hair an' curious eyes dat set way back in his head. Dey was dark an' look like a dog's eyes after you done hit him. He set down on de po'ch an' opened his pack, an' it was so hot an' he looked so tired, dat Mis' Fanny ...
— Slave Narratives: a Folk History of Slavery in the United States • Various
... have tried to make him understand how to light the lamp, he can no more use the matches than at first, and puts them in his mouth, or throws them away if given to him; and when it has been lighted he pokes his paws into the flame to see what the curious red thing is just sprung out ...
— The Three Lieutenants • W.H.G. Kingston
... a political strategist, Poulett Thomson prepared his alternative system, a curious kind of despotism, based, however, simply on his own powers of influencing opinion in the House. It was plain to him that the previous governments had wantonly neglected public opinion.[16] It was also plain that the populace had regarded these governments as consisting not of the governor ...
— British Supremacy & Canadian Self-Government - 1839-1854 • J. L. Morison
... higher and the more ideal conditions. An ideal once revealed is meant to be realized. That is the sole reason for its being revealed at all, and the way of life is to unfalteringly work toward its realization. It is a curious fact that there can be no achievement of life so improbable or so impossible that it cannot be realized by the power—the absolutely invincible power—of mental fidelity. Let one hold his purpose in thought, and the unseen forces thus generated are working for it day and night. Like one of the ...
— The Life Radiant • Lilian Whiting
... account of the state of the south of France at this time is curious. On the high road near Lyons he frequently passed corpses fastened to posts. "These," he says, "were the bodies of highwaymen, or rather of soldiers, sailors, mariners and even galley slaves, disbanded after the ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 5 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... there is contained siliceous crystals; a case which is not so common. I have them also attended with circumstances of concretion and crystallization, which, besides being extremely rare, are equally curious and interesting. ...
— Theory of the Earth, Volume 1 (of 4) • James Hutton
... memory, her weaknesses were effaced and her virtues were exalted in the minds of the living. Their judgment was softened by a vague feeling of awe, but they were not troubled, while they stood in a solemn and curious row around her grave, by any sense of the pathetic futility of individual suffering in the midst of a universe that creates and destroys in swarms. The mystery aroused no wonder in their thoughts, for the ...
— The Miller Of Old Church • Ellen Glasgow
... across Rupert. "Well, sir, a rather curious thing has happened in the last few days. There has been a woman about here, and it appears she asked one of the boys which were the Clintons; and we have seen her every time we have been out, and we both noticed that she has stared at us in a very strange way. ...
— The Dash for Khartoum - A Tale of Nile Expedition • George Alfred Henty
... or four couples, Lilly marking time with the toe of her white-kid slipper. The elixir of the dance could rush to her head like wine, but she was not sought after as a partner, due to her reserve against a too locked embrace and a curious tendency ...
— Star-Dust • Fannie Hurst
... joined him, shot curious and admiring glances toward him. Harris leaned over the bench and talked with him about the incidents of old college games. And the boys near by listened, while the curly-haired instructor grew before their eyes into ...
— The New Boy at Hilltop • Ralph Henry Barbour
... with furze and fern, except on their tops, which were clothed with purple heath; they were also covered with patches of broom, and studded with gray rocks, which sometimes rose singly or in larger masses, pointed or rounded into curious and fantastic shapes. Exactly between these hills the sun went down during the month of June, and nothing could be in finer relief than the rocky and picturesque outlines of their sides, as crowned with thorns and clumps of wild ash, they appeared ...
— Phelim O'toole's Courtship and Other Stories • William Carleton
... a French settler's wife crossed the river to buy maple-sugar and deer-meat at the Ottawa village. She saw the warriors busy filing at their gun-barrels—shortening the guns to scarce a yard of length. This was a curious thing to do. When she went back to the post ...
— Boys' Book of Indian Warriors - and Heroic Indian Women • Edwin L. Sabin
... blue eyes upon her. Imogen was considered a beauty, pink and white, golden-haired, and dimpled, with a curious calculating hardness of character and a sharp tongue, so at variance with her appearance that people doubted the evidence ...
— The Copy-Cat and Other Stories • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... and curious notes, local biographies, &c., issued by Mr. Eliezer Edwards, the well-known "S.D.R." First sent out ...
— Showell's Dictionary of Birmingham - A History And Guide Arranged Alphabetically • Thomas T. Harman and Walter Showell
... also, and here, though he may not have been very much more successful, he talked with more knowledge and competence. He must have given himself immense trouble in reading the papers, foreign as well as French; he had really mastered a good deal of the political religion of a French publicist. It is curious to read, sixty years after date, his grave assertion that "La France a la conquete de Madagascar a faire," and with certain very pardonable defects (such as his Anglophobia), his politics may be pronounced not unintelligent ...
— The Human Comedy - Introductions and Appendix • Honore de Balzac
... judging from my somewhat unconventional appearance, I might be one of the dangerous class of whom he had been reading in the papers, namely, a "hanarchist." I write the word as he pronounced it, for here comes the curious thing. This man, so flawless, so well instructed in some respects, had a fault which gave everything away. His h's were uncertain. Three of them would come quite right, but the fourth, let us say, would be conspicuous either by its utter absence ...
— The Ivory Child • H. Rider Haggard
... curious and unexpected denouement awaits the reader. When Sir Eustace's condition, as he describes it, seems most hopeless, its alleviation arrives through a religious conversion. There has been throughout present to him the conscience of "a soul defiled with every stain." ...
— Crabbe, (George) - English Men of Letters Series • Alfred Ainger
... as far as Mount Hermon Cemetery, and extending from the St. Louis or Grand Allee road, opposite Spencer Wood, down to the St. Foye road, which it crosses, is bounded to the north by the cime du cap, or St. Foye heights. For those who may be curious to know its original extent to an eighth of an inch, I shall quote from Major Holland's title-deed, wherein it is stated to comprise "in superficies, French measure, two hundred and six arpents, one perch, seven feet ...
— Picturesque Quebec • James MacPherson Le Moine
... merchants Birkin lay before us, an establishment of curious aspect, since it constituted, rather, a conglomeration of appendages to a main building of ground floor and attics, with four windows facing on to the street, and a series of underpropping annexes. That series extended to the wing, and was solid and ...
— Through Russia • Maxim Gorky
... answering calls; They blandly smile and come again! Nay, even bring within my walls More curious strangers in their train, "Who wished so much your home to see!" Why do ...
— Poems • John L. Stoddard
... Washington's presence, a curious mood had taken its place. A foolish mood, I thought it, but one ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... is a very curious tradition, or legend, connected with the family of Mr. Lindsay's wife: have you ...
— The Evil Eye; Or, The Black Spector - The Works of William Carleton, Volume One • William Carleton
... wind. Although in the very opening of that scene they speak of the waterfall and listen to it, nobody thought of its mysterious music. I could make it, with a good stage carpenter, in an hour. Is it not a curious thing that they want to make me a governor of the Foundling Hospital, because, since the Christmas number, they have had such an amazing ...
— Yesterdays with Authors • James T. Fields
... But curious instruments were heaped in the corners; and in one stood a skeleton, half-leaning against the wall, half-supported by a string about its neck. One of its hands, all of fingers, rested on the heavy pommel of a great sword that stood ...
— Phantastes - A Faerie Romance for Men and Women • George MacDonald
... Hares, Rabbits, Pidgeons, Pheasants, Grouse; and Partridge; wild Duck, Plover, Snipe, &c. Lake, River, Shell and Sea Fish, of all Kinds; the Produce of the Garden, (Horticulture having of late Years so vastly improved among us, that we now have many curious Plants, Fruits, and Flowers, not only not known, but never even heard of, in former Times) and all in such Plenty and Perfection, as demonstrate Ireland happier than most other Countries, in regard of the Necessaries and even of the Delicacies of Life; to which may be added, the great Number ...
— An Essay on the Antient and Modern State of Ireland • Henry Brooke
... The man, a sallow, precise fellow, crossed deliberately and poked the half dead fire; with scrupulous care he selected two great chunks of wood from the hopper near by and laid them on the coals, the others watching his movements with curious interest. There was nothing about the fellow to indicate that he was other than ...
— Truxton King - A Story of Graustark • George Barr McCutcheon
... strange to say, something of a rara avis. There were then in the Green Isle no less than eighteen separate and distinct working railways, varying from four to nearly 500 miles in length, and amongst them all only four had a general manager. The system that prevailed was curious. With the exception of these four general managers (who were not on the larger lines) the principal officer of an Irish railway was styled Manager or Traffic Manager. He was regarded as the senior official, but over the Traffic Department only had he absolute control, ...
— Fifty Years of Railway Life in England, Scotland and Ireland • Joseph Tatlow
... general a dozen men Joan saw every day. Kells was of a different stamp. Until he looked at her he reminded her of someone she had known back in Missouri; after he looked at her she was aware, in a curious, sickening way, that no such person as he had ever before seen her. He was pale, gray-eyed, intelligent, amiable. He appeared to be a man who had been a gentleman. But there was something strange, intangible, ...
— The Border Legion • Zane Grey
... a boat's crew and such a boat had never been seen in those seas before. A young Savage as captain, a tame seal as boatswain, and a flock of gannets as sailors, certainly made up as curious a set of adventurers as ever floated upon ...
— The Little Savage • Captain Frederick Marryat
... air; but Pablo was so pitiful in his entreaties, and seemed so resolutely bent upon remaining behind in the valley and dying there with his dear friend rather than go on without him, that I opened the matter to Rayburn and joined my plea to Pablo's that this curious effort should be made. And in addition to the sentimental reason for taking the ass with us, I pointed out to Rayburn—as, indeed, he understood without my telling him—how practically valuable El Sabio was to us in ...
— The Aztec Treasure-House • Thomas Allibone Janvier
... your Majesty, and those who are envious and fearful of your greatness—who clearly recognize that, if they could possess that archipelago without opposition, it would be worth more to them than eight millions clear (as I will demonstrate to whomsoever may be curious or may desire to know it), through the profit which they can make in spices, drugs, and the trade with Great China, Japon, and the ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898 • Emma Helen Blair
... this nave and two rich aisles required also, for your complete present comfort, walls at both ends, and a roof on the top. It is just possible, indeed, you may have been struck, on entering, by the curious disposition of painted glass at the east end;—more remotely possible that, in returning down the nave, you may this moment have noticed the extremely small circular window at the west end; but the chances are a thousand to one ...
— Mornings in Florence • John Ruskin
... It was very curious in its reality, and so clear before me that I could hardly believe it true, when the man who was coming toward us suddenly stooped, picked up something, and then turned and went back to his position in ...
— Blue Jackets - The Log of the Teaser • George Manville Fenn
... purchase outright, but why he should have had this mad infatuation against the most beneficent Act that was passed for Ireland in our generation, I am at a loss to know, if it is not that he allowed his personal feeling against Mr O'Brien to cloud the operations of his intellect. It is a curious commentary, however, on the good faith of the Party leaders, that whilst Mr Dillon was making the speech I have quoted to his constituents at Swinford, his bosom friend and confidant, Mr T.P. O'Connor, who was seeking the shekels in New York, ...
— Ireland Since Parnell • Daniel Desmond Sheehan
... and population, magnificent edifices, celebrated national establishments of learning and science, rich libraries, curious cabinets, where lessons of knowledge and genius present themselves to those who have a taste for them, together with its theatres and other places of public entertainment, have long rendered Paris deserving of the admiration ...
— Paris As It Was and As It Is • Francis W. Blagdon
... part of this curious old city of Chester is no doubt the "Rows," above referred to. These arcades, which certainly form a capital shelter from the hot sun or rain, were, according to one authority, originally built as a refuge for the people in case of sudden attack by the Welsh; but according to others ...
— England, Picturesque and Descriptive - A Reminiscence of Foreign Travel • Joel Cook
... them from the beech-trees as they went by, and the rabbits scudded away through the brushwood and over the mossy knolls, with their white tails in the air. As they entered the avenue of Canterville Chase, however, the sky became suddenly overcast with clouds, a curious stillness seemed to hold the atmosphere, a great flight of rooks passed silently over their heads, and, before they reached the house, some big drops of rain ...
— Humorous Ghost Stories • Dorothy Scarborough
... very curious device for fishing by night commonly employed by some anglers, and sometimes known as the "lantern, or fish trap." Many kinds of fish are attracted by a light, but to use a light as a bait, submerged beneath the water, certainly seems odd. It may be ...
— Camp Life in the Woods and the Tricks of Trapping and Trap Making • William Hamilton Gibson
... housewives do from criminals who never come. Not quite opposite, but still only a few doors off, on the other side of the street, lived the celebrated ex-detective, Grodman, and, illogically enough, his presence in the street gave Mrs. Drabdump a curious sense of security, as of a believer living under the shadow of the fane. That any human being of ill-odor should consciously come within a mile of the scent of so famous a sleuth-hound seemed to her highly improbable. Grodman had retired (with a competence) and was only a sleeping dog now; ...
— The Big Bow Mystery • I. Zangwill
... A curious remark to come from a person who had no knowledge or suspicion of the criminal and his character; and I would have pushed the conversation further, but the secretary, who was a man of few words, drew off at this, and could be induced to say no more. Evidently it was my business ...
— The Leavenworth Case • Anna Katharine Green
... more sticks and branches to Grey Beaver. It was evidently an affair of moment. White Fang came in until he touched Grey Beaver's knee, so curious was he, and already forgetful that this was a terrible man-animal. Suddenly he saw a strange thing like mist beginning to arise from the sticks and moss beneath Grey Beaver's hands. Then, amongst the sticks themselves, ...
— White Fang • Jack London
... extremity there ran a little stream of clear and unfailing water, which made its entrance at an angle, so that the rim of the hills seemed scarcely nicked by its ingress. This stream crossed the floor of the valley, serving to water the farms, and, making its way out of the lower end by a similar curious angle, broke off sharply and hid itself among the rocks on its way out and down from the mountains—last trace of a giant geology which once dealt in continental terms, rivers once seas, valleys a thousand miles in length. Thus, at first sight, one set down in the valley ...
— The Purchase Price • Emerson Hough
... we will not amuse ourselves now by discussing a question more curious than necessary, since we have shown sufficiently that there is no such necessity in voluntary actions. Nevertheless it was well to show that imperfect freedom alone, that is, freedom which is exempt only from constraint, would suffice as foundation for chastisements and rewards of the kind ...
— Theodicy - Essays on the Goodness of God, the Freedom of Man and the Origin of Evil • G. W. Leibniz
... mean,' quoth Raikes, serenely; but a curious glance being directed on him, and pursuing him pertinaciously, it was as if the pediment of the lofty monument he topped were smitten with violence. He stammered an excuse, and retreated somewhat as it is the fashion to do from the presence of royalty, followed by ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... of the Arapahoes is so difficult, and its pronunciations so harsh and guttural, that no white man, it is said, has ever been able to master it. Even Maxwell the trader, who has been most among them, is compelled to resort to the curious sign language common to most of the prairie tribes. With this Henry Chatillon ...
— The Oregon Trail • Francis Parkman, Jr.
... were there to meet them. No wonder the children did not recognize each other, for they had been so young when last they met; and when Gladys's curious eyes fell upon the country girl, she felt like a princess who comes to honor ...
— Jewel's Story Book • Clara Louise Burnham
... twenty-fifth anniversary of our marriage, and a very happy day to us both. My dear husband wrote me a letter that made me tremble, lest he should get such hold of me as no human being must have. I have a very curious feeling about life; a satisfied one, and as if it could not possibly give me much more than I now have. "I have lived, I have loved." [4] People often say they have so much to live for; I can't feel so, though I am not only willing, but glad to live while my husband ...
— The Life and Letters of Elizabeth Prentiss • George L. Prentiss
... A new and curious emotion spread freezingly over me as I took and examined it. The blade was scraped down all over, beautifully scraped, as though someone had sand-papered it with care, making it so thin that the first vigorous stroke must have snapped it off at ...
— The Willows • Algernon Blackwood
... passenger's face. Moving on, he secured seats at a table for two. As they sat down facing each other he noticed that the man, who had paid the cashier for his meal and was waiting for his change, was eying him and Irene with a curious, almost bold stare. ...
— The Desired Woman • Will N. Harben
... sight he did look to be sure! Sick, half-crazy, on the very verge of the grave himself, and wanting to kill a poor man already dying. Aren't some people too curious? ...
— Laddie • Gene Stratton Porter
... morning De Martens, Low, Holls, and myself had a very thoroughgoing discussion of the Russian, British, and American arbitration plans. We found the eminent Russian under very curious misapprehensions regarding some minor points, one of them being that he had mistaken the signification of our word "publicist"; and we were especially surprised to find his use of the French word ...
— Autobiography of Andrew Dickson White Volume II • Andrew Dickson White
... of the talking. He entertained me with stories of some curious weddings which he said had recently been celebrated in his dance-halls, and, as usual, it was not easy to draw a line of demarkation between fact and fiction. Of one bridegroom, who had agreed to the marriage under threats of violence from the girl's father, he said: "You should have seen the ...
— The Rise of David Levinsky • Abraham Cahan
... It was a curious correspondence in many ways. Some of my long, wordy epistles were indited from the reporters' room at the Daily Gazette office, in the midst of noisy talk and the hurried production of "copy." Others, again, were produced, long after—for my health's sake—I should have been in bed; and ...
— The Message • Alec John Dawson
... whining and a great scratching at the door. "Here comes that Indian, Jem," cried Tom, and as he spoke the door flew open, and in rushed old Whino, the tall black and tan foxhound, and Bonnybelle, and Blossom, and another large blue-mottled bitch, of the Southern breed. It was a curious sight to observe by how sudden and intuitive an instinct the hounds rushed up to Archer, and fawned upon him, jumping up with their forepaws upon his knees, and thrusting their bland smiling faces almost into his face; as he, nothing ...
— Warwick Woodlands - Things as they Were There Twenty Years Ago • Henry William Herbert (AKA Frank Forester)
... can venture to fix the precise moment at which either distinction ceased. Some faint traces of the old Norman feeling might perhaps have been found late in the fourteenth century. Some faint traces of the institution of villenage were detected by the curious so late as the days of the Stuarts; nor has that institution ever, to this hour, been ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 1 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... saying something infinitely flattering, and at the same time with a lurking smile on his countenance, at the idea of the ease and certainty with which this offer would induce Mr. Percy to recant all he had said against patrons and patronage. He was curious to hear how the philosopher would change his tone; but, to his surprise, Mr. Percy did not alter it ...
— Tales and Novels, Vol. VII - Patronage • Maria Edgeworth
... a resting-place between these Northern Parts, and the East-Indies, and so remote from other places, that could there be good Wine made there, it would be of great help and assistance to the Ships that sail that way: But I am informed by a curious Gentleman, who has had many good Accounts of that Place, that the Vines which have been planted there, are of such sorts, as bring the Grapes ripe and rotten on one side of the Bunch, and green on the other at the same time, which surely can never make good Wine. But upon ...
— The Country Housewife and Lady's Director - In the Management of a House, and the Delights and Profits of a Farm • Richard Bradley
... Durward; "for if they be shut up in the swallows' nests all night, they must needs have a curious ...
— Quentin Durward • Sir Walter Scott
... of the seventeenth century it still survived, as we shall see from a quaint and curious picture that is of especial interest to all Americans, because it portrays what took place in that community of pious souls who furnished us the men we delight to honor as the Pilgrim Fathers. A number of these heroic souls, who could ...
— Deaconesses in Europe - and their Lessons for America • Jane M. Bancroft
... cent. One Indian was lying right up close, and while dying tried to shoot an arrow, but his strength failed so fast that the arrow only barely left the bowstring. One of the Rangers in that fight was a curious fellow—when young he had been captured by Indians, and had lived with them so long that he had Indian habits. In that fight he kept jumping around when loading, so as to be a bad target, the same as an Indian ...
— Crooked Trails • Frederic Remington
... him by weeks of danger and hard riding. The vast crowd that had followed him had begun to disperse as soon as it was known that he was not going before the King, and only three or four hundred of the more curious stood and moved in groups around the open space where the tent was being pitched. Many of his acquaintance came and spoke to him, and he rose and shook their hands and spoke a few words to each; but none of the greater nobles who had sought ...
— Via Crucis • F. Marion Crawford
... the captain remained on the green; then the justice of the peace made his appearance, curious to obtain information, and after him came M. Marescot in a velvet cap and ...
— Bouvard and Pecuchet - A Tragi-comic Novel of Bourgeois Life • Gustave Flaubert
... bicycle corps stand silent at the entrance to the village; the prisoners in their midst, infantrymen in uniform or in rapidly donned civil garb—the tell-tale red of the trousers shows under the short vest of one of them. In the streets lie curious bundles, the corpses of those who have fallen here. A wounded soldier drags wearily up to the subaltern officer's post, with hands raised above his head; it is a Frenchman who has thrown away his blue coat, but still wears his cap. The steps of the incoming ...
— Current History, A Monthly Magazine - The European War, March 1915 • New York Times
... higher in lodgings the lower in pocket, were applicable here. However, the aspect of the room, though homely, was cheerful, a somewhat contradictory group of furniture suggesting that the collection consisted of waifs and strays from a former home, the grimy faces of the old articles exercising a curious and subduing effect on the bright faces of the new. An oval mirror of rococo workmanship, and a heavy cabinet-piano with a cornice like that of an Egyptian temple, adjoined a harmonium of yesterday, and a harp that was almost as new. Printed music of the last century, and manuscript ...
— The Hand of Ethelberta • Thomas Hardy
... life at Tunbridge Wells had been a curious preparation for the violent changes of the last few months. How often when walking in the old-world garden with Miss Wickham she had had the sensation of stifling, oppressed by those vine-covered walls, and inwardly had likened ...
— The Land of Promise • D. Torbett
... eager character, as an excuse for long periods of indolence, broken only by fits of casual exertion: with him it was but a new incitement to improve and develop them. The Ideal Man that lay within him, the image of himself as he should be, was formed upon a strict and curious standard; and to reach this constantly approached and constantly receding emblem of perfection, was the unwearied effort of his life. This crowning principle of conduct, never ceasing to inspire his energetic mind, introduced a consistency into his actions, a firm coherence ...
— The Life of Friedrich Schiller - Comprehending an Examination of His Works • Thomas Carlyle
... bare. And along with the thickening smoke they began to notice another circumstance, a strange, pungent odor. They were not sure that it was unpleasant, this odor; some might have called it sickening, but their taste in odors was not developed, and they were only sure that it was curious. Now, sitting in the trolley car, they realized that they were on their way to the home of it—that they had traveled all the way from Lithuania to it. It was now no longer something far off and faint, that you caught in whiffs; you could literally taste it, as well as smell it—you could take ...
— The Jungle • Upton Sinclair
... born in London; a man of curious learning; earned the reputation of being a sorcerer; was imprisoned at one time, and mobbed at another, under this imputation; died in poverty; left 79 works, the majority of which were never printed, though still extant in MS. in ...
— The Nuttall Encyclopaedia - Being a Concise and Comprehensive Dictionary of General Knowledge • Edited by Rev. James Wood
... reflections and character. "Estos hijos!" said she to Molina—which means, "These children!" words full of meaning on a mother's lips—words full of terrible significance in the mouth of a queen who, like Anne of Austria, hid many curious secrets ...
— Louise de la Valliere • Alexandre Dumas, Pere |
