"Custom" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... plants will, contrary to their usual custom, bloom twice in the same season; this usually arises from the premature development of buds which, under ordinary circumstances, would not unfold till the following spring. In these instances of what the French term "fleuraison anticipee," the position of ...
— Vegetable Teratology - An Account of the Principal Deviations from the Usual Construction of Plants • Maxwell T. Masters
... man struggling for months to recover a debt, and getting nothing but an exchange of waste paper. The very storekeepers are averse to asking for cash payments, and are more surprised than pleased when they are offered. They fear there must be something under it, and that you mean to withdraw your custom from them. I have seen the enterprising chemist and stationer begging me with fervour to let my account run on, although I had my purse open in my hand; and partly from the commonness of the case, partly from some remains of that ...
— Across The Plains • Robert Louis Stevenson
... a man of slow step would come within the circle of the street lamp, the muzzle of his gun gleaming. Others were lying in ambush among the mountains of cargo. They were custom-house men and guardians of ...
— Mare Nostrum (Our Sea) - A Novel • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... see a very pretty French custom of submission to parents," said Madame Gratiot. "And afterwards ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... transform appearances which he has introduced on the scene, that we render agreeable what at first displeased us. But who cannot see that the true reason is, that application and attention to the object and custom change our disposition and consequently our natural appetites? Once we become used to a rather high degree of cold or heat, it no longer incommodes us as it formerly did, and yet no one would ascribe ...
— Theodicy - Essays on the Goodness of God, the Freedom of Man and the Origin of Evil • G. W. Leibniz
... passed away, when, one evening, the hunter was abroad later than usual. The moment he came in and laid down his day's hunt, as was his custom, before his wife, the two females seized upon the deer and began to tear off the fat in so unceremonious a way that her anger was excited. She constrained herself, however, in a good degree, but she could not conceal her feelings, though she said ...
— The Indian Fairy Book - From the Original Legends • Cornelius Mathews
... length Enter'd the grotto; nor the lovely nymph 90 Him knew not soon as seen, for not unknown Each to the other the Immortals are, How far soever sep'rate their abodes. Yet found he not within the mighty Chief Ulysses; he sat weeping on the shore, Forlorn, for there his custom was with groans Of sad regret t' afflict his breaking heart. Looking continual o'er the barren Deep. Then thus Calypso, nymph divine, the God Question'd, from her resplendent throne august. 100 Hermes! possessor of the potent rod! Who, though by me ...
— The Odyssey of Homer • Homer
... la Corne, with his pretty daughter, Agathe La Corne St. Luc; the Lady de Tilly and Amelie de Repentigny, with the brothers de Villiers. The brothers had overtaken the Chevalier La Corne upon the road, but the custom of the highway in New France forbade any one passing another without politely asking ...
— The Golden Dog - Le Chien d'Or • William Kirby
... that in California fibrous-rooted plants, such as wheat and barley, may descend in sandy soils from four to seven feet. Orchard trees in the arid West, grown properly, are similarly observed to send their roots down to great depths. In fact, it has become a custom in many arid regions where the soils are easily penetrable to say that the root system of a tree corresponds in extent and branching to the part ...
— Dry-Farming • John A. Widtsoe
... ball with one of her young friends. A man well known for his bluntness, whose acquaintance she is to make later in life, but whom she now sees for the first time, Monsieur Foullepointe, has commenced a conversation with Caroline's friend. According to the custom of society, Caroline listens to this ...
— Petty Troubles of Married Life, Second Part • Honore de Balzac
... gloriously-wooded track, all hill, dale, and mountain, and amidst whose trees the glasses showed us plenty of birds, the inhabitants began to cluster on the shore, and when once or twice my uncle said that we would go in nearer and see, the same custom was invariably observed: the people came shouting and dancing about the beach holding out birds and bunches of feathers and shells, making signs for ...
— Nat the Naturalist - A Boy's Adventures in the Eastern Seas • G. Manville Fenn
... Washington then went to the officer and received the terrible news. He returned to the table as though nothing had happened, and everything went on as usual. After dinner there was a reception in Mrs. Washington's drawing-room and the President, as was his custom, spoke courteously to every lady in the room. By ten o'clock all the visitors had gone and Washington began to pace the floor at first without any change of manner, but soon he began to show emotional excitement and he broke out suddenly: "It's all over! St. ...
— Washington and His Colleagues • Henry Jones Ford
... 'Tis the custom of pedagogues to be eternally thundering in their pupil's ears, as they were pouring into a funnel, whilst the business of the pupil is only to repeat what the others have said: now, I would have a tutor to correct this ...
— Classic French Course in English • William Cleaver Wilkinson
... looked coldly at Pilate and said, "We have only one king: Caesar." Pilate looked down at the ground. There was one more possibility. This innocent Galilean might yet go free. Pilate remembered that custom allowed him to set free one prisoner at Passover time—a prisoner whom the people chose. Amid the commotion in the courtyard, Pilate stared at the Latin words on the pavement before him. If only the people would ask that Jesus ...
— Men Called Him Master • Elwyn Allen Smith
... not return on board without examining to the bottom the idea he had discovered. Now, we know that when D'Artagnan did examine, according to custom, daylight pierced through. As to the officer, become mute again, he left him full measure to meditate. Therefore, on putting his foot on board his vessel, moored within cannon-shot of the island, the captain of the ...
— The Vicomte de Bragelonne - Or Ten Years Later being the completion of "The Three - Musketeers" And "Twenty Years After" • Alexandre Dumas
... towns in Japan, it was formerly the custom of the people, especially of the younger, to assemble on moonlight nights in the streets or open spaces near the castle gates, and dance a sort of subdued dance, moving round in circles and clapping their hands. These dances often continued during the entire night, the following ...
— Child-Life in Japan and Japanese Child Stories • Mrs. M. Chaplin Ayrton
... public establishments of America, the utmost courtesy prevails. Most of our Departments are susceptible of considerable improvement in this respect, but the Custom-house above all others would do well to take example from the United States and render itself somewhat less odious and offensive to foreigners. The servile rapacity of the French officials is sufficiently contemptible; but there is a surly boorish incivility about our men, alike ...
— American Notes for General Circulation • Charles Dickens
... where is the proof that he is? That is my trouble. They tell me that this covenanting with God for a child, and sealing it with an ordinance, ceased with Abraham, who was a Jew; that it was a Jewish custom, ...
— Bertha and Her Baptism • Nehemiah Adams
... known far and wide, and made generally popular by his generous and charitable actions. He was formerly Wakl, or agent,' to the Fort el-Wijh, until that office was abolished. The port will presently have its custom-house; and I propose forwarding to her Britannic Majesty's Government my notes upon the subject of the Quarantine-station, which has imprudently been transferred from Arabia to Tor, in the Sinaitic ...
— The Land of Midian, Vol. 2 • Richard Burton
... proceeding aroused great curiosity. The legionaries were inured to the sight of blood, but the citizens and their wives turned away when the goat was sacrificed to Dionysus. People sought to find the reason for Julian's wish to reintroduce this custom in his laudable attempt to mingle all religions together, and to discover a deeper meaning in the ceremonies of all. The offering indeed was a gift, a sacrifice, and an expression of gratitude, but Maximus the mystic had also persuaded the Emperor that ...
— Historical Miniatures • August Strindberg
... on their hind-legs, and on every dish was a fricassee of pistols, pistol-bullets, sauce of gunpowder, and aqua-vitae. This entertainment seemed rather indigestible by even an ostrich's stomach, when the governor addressed us, and informed me that it was ever his custom to strangers to offer them for the first course a service similar to that before us; and if they were inclined to accept the invitation, he would fight them as much as they pleased, but if they could not relish ...
— The Surprising Adventures of Baron Munchausen • Rudolph Erich Raspe
... prayer, and she was endeavouring, as was her custom, to commit her trouble to One above, when she was distinctly conscious of stealthy footsteps treading the gravel path below her window. It was a bright moonlight night, and she had no light burning. For one moment she hesitated; then quietly she walked to the window, which ...
— The Carved Cupboard • Amy Le Feuvre
... must be mere gossip and spite at not having the custom. It quite accounts for what she may say, and indeed you brought it all on yourself by not having asked me for a note. You must restrain yourself. What you may say to me is of no importance, but you must not go and attack those who are doing the ...
— The Clever Woman of the Family • Charlotte M. Yonge
... wives have a beautiful custom of keeping the twenty-fifth anniversary of their marriage by a festival, which they call the "Silver Wedding." And thus Major Warfield and Marah resolved to keep this first of August, and further to honor the occasion by uniting the hands of ...
— Capitola the Madcap • Emma D. E. N. Southworth
... people, who were required to attend these services and to join in the responses. Images of himself were also sent to all the provincial towns for reverence to be offered. He also followed the Chinese custom of erecting a temple to his ancestors, and the coins that passed current bore his effigy. Thus did Kublai more and more identify himself with his Chinese subjects, and as he found his measures crowned with success ...
— China • Demetrius Charles Boulger
... said the King. "You must know that in the town of Champaka there is a college for the devotees. Unto this resorted daily a beggar-priest, named Chudakarna, whose custom was to place his begging-dish upon the shelf, with such alms in it as he had not eaten, and go to sleep by it; and I, so soon as he slept, used to jump up, and devour the meal. One day a great friend of his, named Vinakarna, also a mendicant, came to visit him; and observed ...
— Hindu Literature • Epiphanius Wilson
... hill above Nauders; while the hills, richly clad with masses of dark foliage, and rising to a height of two or three thousand feet, more nearly resembled those of the Cinnamon Isle. There is a fort near the summit of the pass with a few hundred soldiers, and a sort of custom-house, at which two sentries are placed for the purpose of levying a tax amounting to about sixpence upon every bundle passing either in or out of the Nepaul dominions; whether it be a bundle of grass or a bale of the valuable fabric manufactured from the ...
— A Journey to Katmandu • Laurence Oliphant
... little men as they stood there in red jerseys and blue corduroy knickers. My friend's custom of snatching open the piano and heralding dinner with a furious tornado of chords ...
— Aliens • William McFee
... MAXIMS of various times, but all seemingly drawn from custom cited or implied by ...
— The Danish History, Books I-IX • Saxo Grammaticus ("Saxo the Learned")
... money value, for Murguia stifled his wrath, again drew out the belt, and more Napoleons changed hands. Murguia was then for remounting, leaving the flask of brandy with the two imperialist emissaries, as had become his custom. But the jovial Tiburcio stopped him. "What must you think of us, Don Anastasio?" he exclaimed contritely. "We haven't offered you a drink yet." Murguia dared not refuse, and he paused for the return of hospitality ...
— The Missourian • Eugene P. (Eugene Percy) Lyle
... the same time, among the Caffres they very often do enter the huts of the natives, and occasionally devour children and infirm people. But this is greatly owing to the encouragement they receive from the custom of the Caffres leaving their dead to be devoured by these animals, which gives them a liking for human flesh, and makes them ...
— The Mission • Frederick Marryat
... The names of the Eries, the Andastes, and the Neutral Nation do not appear in any treaty with the United States. Many, doubtless, from all these tribes fled to Canada. Considerable numbers were also, according to the custom of the Five Nations, adopted by the conquerors to make ...
— The Indian Question (1874) • Francis A. Walker
... of pea-soup, and here a little lady of the party ordered unfermented Muscat wine. The good Jew may not touch shell-fish or any fish without scales, so we were next served with fried soles and fried plaice, of which Rachel took both, following, apparently, the custom of the country. Although the menu consists of seven courses, each item contains two, and sometimes three or four, dishes; and the correct diner tastes every one. Roast veal, served in the form of stew, followed, and then came roast fowl and tongue. There were also salads, and sauerkraut, ...
— Nights in London • Thomas Burke
... and put him on his guard. He himself joined in the game, contrary to his custom, and even charged himself with collecting in the basket the small notes as ...
— Monsieur de Camors, Complete • Octave Feuillet
... MEDIATOR, and his brother, Wilfred Collingwood, in the RATTLER, actively co-operated with Nelson. The custom-houses were informed that after a certain day all foreign vessels found in the ports would be seized; and many were, in consequence, seized, and condemned in the Admiralty Court. When the BOREAS arrived at Nevis, she found ...
— The Life of Horatio Lord Nelson • Robert Southey
... him a hundred miles away, and it had seemed as if nothing could move in the weighty heat outside save the writhing sea. It had always seemed appropriate to their relationship that he should come to her thus, suddenly and without warning and against the common custom. Thus had he ...
— The Judge • Rebecca West
... several others whom he believed to have loyal intentions, all of whom he found disposed to second him in executing the enterprize which he had in view. In the prosecution of this purpose, they all assembled one Sunday morning, according to custom, at the house of Almendras, under pretence of accompanying him to church. When all were assembled, although Almendras had a considerable guard, Ceuteno went up to him as if to converse on some affair of moment, and stabbed him repeatedly with his dagger. The conspirators ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 5 • Robert Kerr
... that their previous habits on the journey had hardened their feet and enabled them to travel without shoes, with but little less hardship than their black companions. This they had acquired by the custom on coming into camp, of going out with the boys opossum and "sugar bag" hunting. With stout hearts and naked legs, therefore they faced forward driving the horses and cattle before them, and by the end of the day placed ten miles between them and "Poison ...
— The Overland Expedition of The Messrs. Jardine • Frank Jardine and Alexander Jardine
... I do, then, and that is a fact!" answered Milsom. "Just exactly when she went, or how she went, I know no more than you do; but we missed her a fortnight ago. As you know, it has been our custom to keep about a foot of water in the boat which concealed the submarine, to keep her bottom tight; and, as you may also remember, that water was changed once a week—namely, every Saturday morning. Well, a fortnight ago last Saturday, when the canvas cover was taken off ...
— The Cruise of the Thetis - A Tale of the Cuban Insurrection • Harry Collingwood
... chiefly by circumstances purely personal, and she had unconsciously found walks of usefulness apart from the organized church work. But she was a devout worshipper and a careful listener to the truth. It had been her custom to ride to the morning service, and, as they resided some distance from the church, to remain at home in the evening, giving all in her employ a chance ...
— A Knight Of The Nineteenth Century • E. P. Roe
... Custom, Sir, to pray an Hour or two in my Chamber, before I go to Bed; and having pray'd that drousy Slave asleep, the Thieves broke in upon us unawares, I ...
— The Works of Aphra Behn, Vol. II • Aphra Behn
... we will finish talking and go to his funeral dinner. Don't be put out at our eating pancakes—it's a very old custom and there's something nice in that!" laughed Alyosha. "Well, let us go! And now ...
— The Brothers Karamazov • Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... choked full of this great cockle only. You will see hundreds of them in every cove for miles this day; a seeming waste of life, which would be awful, in our eyes, were not the Divine Ruler, as His custom is, making this destruction the means of fresh creation, by burying them in the sands, as soon as washed on shore, to fertilize the strata of some future world. It is but a shell-fish truly; but the great Cuvier thought it remarkable ...
— Glaucus; or The Wonders of the Shore • Charles Kingsley
... discussion has taken place as to the countries in which this Decree is in force. No one was surprised to hear that Germany was exempt. Archbishop Walsh, the Roman Catholic Archbishop of Dublin, in an elaborate discussion, gives the opinion that the Decree is abrogated under British law by the custom of the country, which has in the past rendered impossible the observance of the strict ecclesiastical rule in this matter, but is careful to add that this is only his opinion as a canonist, and is subject to the decision of the Holy See. When this plea is examined, it is found to mean simply ...
— Against Home Rule (1912) - The Case for the Union • Various
... of the stopping places I had been separated from my companions by entering a car in which were a number of East Tennesseeans, captured in the operations around Knoxville, and whom the Rebels, in accordance with their usual custom, were treating with studied contumely. I had always had a very warm side for these simple rustics of the mountains and valleys. I knew much of their unwavering fidelity to the Union, of the firm steadfastness with which they endured persecution for their ...
— Andersonville, complete • John McElroy
... ceremonies to be matters of so small importance that we need not stand much upon them, for, as Hooker(20) observeth, a ceremony, through custom, worketh very much with people. Dr Burges allegeth(21) for his writing about ceremonies, that the matter is important for the consequence of it. Camero(22) thinketh so much of ceremonies, that he holdeth our simplicity to notify that we have the true religion, and that ...
— The Works of Mr. George Gillespie (Vol. 1 of 2) • George Gillespie
... the natural wages of your laziness; if any one offers you a victim or a garland nowadays, it is only at Olympia as a perfunctory accompaniment of the games; he does it not because he thinks it is any good, but because he may as well keep up an old custom. It will not be long, most glorious of deities, before they serve you as you served Cronus, and depose you. I will not rehearse all the robberies of your temple—those are trifles; but they have laid hands on your person at Olympia, my lord High-Thunderer, ...
— Works, V1 • Lucian of Samosata
... civilized men to enter the happy country. On account of their ignorance of Christ, unhappy, miserable, wretched. Some of them think good deal of their improvement, national, naval, but if the Government will not adopt the Christianity and put behind their ancestor and evil ways and the wicked custom, they will not be very flourishing what they look for." For himself he says, "I hope I will have a good opportunity while I am working for the Lord and looking for some souls to bring to the Lord, as His ...
— American Missionary, Volume 43, No. 1, January, 1889 • Various
... before I left the ship, but I did not expect him to make any use of it. I thought that I had seen the last of him when I crossed the gangway and got caught in the whirlpool of fuss which eddied round the custom house shed. I was very much surprised when he walked in on me at breakfast time on the second morning after our arrival. I was eating an omelette at the time. I offered him a share of it and a cup of coffee. ...
— Gossamer - 1915 • George A. Birmingham
... just she should know his; and though at the same time he had only known her circumstances by common fame, yet he had made so many protestations of his passion for her, that he could ask no more but her hand to his grand request, and the like ramble according to the custom of lovers. In short, he left himself no room to ask any more questions about her estate, and she took the advantage of it like a prudent woman, for she placed part of her fortune so in trustees, without letting him know anything of it, ...
— The Fortunes and Misfortunes of the Famous Moll Flanders &c. • Daniel Defoe
... breath thus not being allowed to remain naked may be taken as a mere glorification of the act of rinsing. And as ordinary rinsing of the mouth, subsequent to eating, is already established by Smriti and custom, we must conclude that the text means to enjoin rinsing of the mouth of a different kind, viz. as auxiliary to the meditation on prna.—To this the Stra replies that what the text enjoins is the new' thing, i.e. the previously non-established meditation on water as forming ...
— The Vedanta-Sutras with the Commentary by Ramanuja - Sacred Books of the East, Volume 48 • Trans. George Thibaut
... while his son was still very young. At the grammar school of Aberdeen, then under the rectorship of Dr Melvin, the boy began his classical education, and subsequently, according to the ridiculous Scottish custom, the folly of which he has done his best to expose, he became, in his twelfth year, a student in Marischal College. He was a student of arts for five years in Aberdeen and Edinburgh—and then he attended theological classes for three years. In 1829 he proceeded to the Continent, and ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel, Volumes I-VI. - The Songs of Scotland of the Past Half Century • Various
... think her mate is dead," said the Doctor; "he is merely staying away, after a custom of his family. The bird whose nest we see there is called the Ruby-throated Hummingbird, because he has a patch of glittering ruby-red feathers under his chin, at the top of his buttoned-up vest that ...
— Citizen Bird • Mabel Osgood Wright and Elliott Coues
... natural now to Lord Fordyce to shape his days according to the plans of the American party, and when they met at the Schlossbrunn in the morning at half-past seven, and he and Mr. Cloudwater and the Princess had drunk their tumblers of water together, their custom was to go on down to the town and there find Sabine, who had bought their slices of ham and their rolls, and awaited them at the end of the Alte Weise with the pink paper bags, and then the four proceeded to walk to the ...
— The Man and the Moment • Elinor Glyn
... by any other nation. Fifty-five millions of American people (in 1884), over an area nearly as large as the entire continent of Europe, carry on their exchanges by ocean, by lake, by river, by rail, without the exactions of the tax-gatherer, without the detention of the custom house, without even the recognition of State lines. In these great channels, the domestic exchanges represent an annual value perhaps twenty-five times as great as the total of exports and imports. It is the enjoyment of free-trade and protection ...
— Twenty Years of Congress, Vol. 1 (of 2) • James Gillespie Blaine
... The custom has been, since woman learnt to kill time with the needle, to think of embroidery too much as an idle accomplishment. It is more than that. At the very least it is a handicraft: at the best it is an art. This contention may be to take it ...
— Art in Needlework - A Book about Embroidery • Lewis F. Day
... modest, and do not care to take too great credit to yourself, but I shall not rest till I have done something to express my sense of your noble courage. Now, I am a man of business, and it is my custom to come to the point directly. Is there any way in which I can ...
— Hector's Inheritance - or The Boys of Smith Institute • Horatio Alger
... walk to the boarding house but before they had reached it Bannon was nervous. It was not a custom with him to leave his work on such an errand. He bade her a brusque good-night, and hurried back, pausing only after he had crossed the tracks, to cast his eye over the timber. There was no sign of activity, though ...
— Calumet 'K' • Samuel Merwin
... Judith Mandon, for refusing to change her religion, and embrace popery, was fastened to a stake, and sticks thrown at her from a distance, in the very same manner as that barbarous custom which was formerly practised on Shrove-Tuesday, of shying at rocks, as it was termed. By this inhuman proceeding, the poor creature's limbs were beat and mangled in a terrible manner, and her brains were at last dashed out by one ...
— Fox's Book of Martyrs - Or A History of the Lives, Sufferings, and Triumphant - Deaths of the Primitive Protestant Martyrs • John Fox
... came out warmly at sight of Kilmeny. It was her custom always to appropriate the available man. Toward this bronzed young fellow with the splendid throat sloping into muscular shoulders she felt very kindly this morning. He had stood between her and trouble. He was so patently an admirer of Joyce Seldon. And on his own merits the ...
— The Highgrader • William MacLeod Raine
... You don't dream of that, do you? Have all our friends closing their doors on her, the greater part of her relatives lost to her! Divorced! Come, come! in spite of your new law, that has not yet come into our custom and shall not come in so soon. Religion forbids it; the world accepts it only under protest; and when you have against you ...
— A Comedy of Marriage & Other Tales • Guy De Maupassant
... Passes (1841) are ail exquisite works of art. The one on the King had been printed in the Monthly Repository in 1835; the others appeared for the first time in the published drama. All of them are vitally connected with the action of the plot, differing in this respect from the Elizabethan custom of simple interpolation. The song sung in the early morning by ...
— Robert Browning: How To Know Him • William Lyon Phelps
... the 'Pied Merlin,'" shouted another. "Ho there, Dame Eliza! Here is fresh custom come to the house, and not a drain for ...
— The White Company • Arthur Conan Doyle
... women, even to those who believe in freedom of divorce and in forgiveness for youthful transgressions of the accepted moral code. Sexual morality has had changeable standards, and in other times and countries custom has made polygamy and promiscuity acceptable as moral; but the monogamic ideal of morality now prevails in ...
— Sex-education - A series of lectures concerning knowledge of sex in its - relation to human life • Maurice Alpheus Bigelow
... to go to sleep. The men he at last provided were very faithful and easily satisfied. Here we found the headman, Kawa, of Mpalapala, quite as hospitable. In addition to providing a supper, it is the custom to give breakfast before starting. Resting on the 8th to make up for the loss of rest on Sunday; we marched on Tuesday (the 9th), but were soon brought to a stand by Gombwa, whose village, ...
— The Last Journals of David Livingstone, in Central Africa, from 1865 to His Death, Volume I (of 2), 1866-1868 • David Livingstone
... old-fashioned gentleman, Mr. Yule preserved in his family the pleasant custom of hand-shaking, which gives such heartiness to the morning and evening greetings of a household. Moor liked and adopted it; Warwick had never done so, but that night he gave a hand to Prue and Mark with his most cordial expression, and Sylvia felt both her own taken in a warm lingering grasp, ...
— Moods • Louisa May Alcott
... banned. They considered war a heathen invention—merely "assassination on a large scale"—and though, when forced into military service, they did their duty as soldiers in peace-time, the moment war was in view it was their custom to throw away their arms and quietly desert. There were no beggars and no poor among them, for all helped one another, the richer setting aside one-tenth of their income ...
— Modern Saints and Seers • Jean Finot
... occasion of dispersing the plague. And that no company or person be suffered to remain or come into any tavern, alehouse, or coffeehouse, to drink, after nine of the clock in the evening, according to the ancient law and custom of this city, upon ...
— History of the Plague in London • Daniel Defoe
... right in their attitude. Art is Individualism, and Individualism is a disturbing and disintegrating force. Therein lies its immense value. For what it seeks to disturb is monotony of type, slavery of custom, tyranny of habit, and the reduction of man to the level of a machine. In Art, the public accept what has been, because they cannot alter it, not because they appreciate it. They swallow their ...
— The Soul of Man • Oscar Wilde
... fruits of such an education are too horribly apparent to need explanation. Every fallen woman is a perpetual monument to the infamy of a religion and a social custom that narrow her life to the possibilities of but one function, and provide her no escape—a system that trains her to depend wholly on one physical characteristic of her being, and to ...
— Men, Women, and Gods - And Other Lectures • Helen H. Gardener
... three now, with my full-bodied cousin for whipper-in—change their course as I leapt a brook and headed for the crowded enclosure. A somnolent fat man, bulging, like a feather-bed, on a three-legged stool, dozed at the receipt of custom, with a deal table and a bowl of sixpences before him. I dashed on him with ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 20 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... of life—the cheerless gloom of a hermit, with the unceasing moil of a galley-slave, brought me to my sixteenth year; a little before which period I first committed the sin of rhyme. You know our country custom of coupling a man and woman together as partners in the labours of harvest. In my fifteenth autumn, my partner was a bewitching creature, a year younger than myself. My scarcity of English denies me the power of doing her justice in that language, but you know the Scottish idiom: she was ...
— The Complete Works of Robert Burns: Containing his Poems, Songs, and Correspondence. • Robert Burns and Allan Cunningham
... to shew the impudence of the rebel soldiers, which occurred at this time. The very next day after the flight of Francisco Hernandez Giron, as my father Garcilasso de la Vega was at dinner with eighteen or twenty soldiers, it being the custom in time of war for all men of estates to be hospitable in this manner according to their abilities; he observed among his guests a soldier who had been with Giron from the beginning of this rebellion. This man was by trade a blacksmith, yet crowded to ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 5 • Robert Kerr
... means of kindling fire were available it became the custom in some cases to maintain a fire burning continuously in a public place. Around this pyrtaneum the various civil, political, and religious affairs were carried on by the light and warmth of the public fire. Many quaint ...
— Artificial Light - Its Influence upon Civilization • M. Luckiesh
... which had, of late years, come to be considered the most sacred, was called The Book of Nations, and consisted of proverbs, and history traced through custom: from it the first priest chose his text; and his text was, 'Honesty Is the Best Policy.' He was considered a very eloquent man, but I can offer only a few of the larger bones of ...
— The Princess and the Curdie • George MacDonald
... efficiency in all public offices. Every public servant who has violated the trust placed in him has been proceeded against with all the rigor of the law. If bad men have secured places, it has been the fault of the system established by law and custom for making appointments, or the fault of those who recommend for Government positions persons not sufficiently well known to them personally, or who give letters indorsing the characters of office seekers without a proper sense of the grave responsibility ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents: Ulysses S. Grant • James D. Richardson
... ancient and modern writers were put on the stage with great pomp. The fame of the scenic arrangements (apparati) brought spectators from far and near. Nowadays, performances are given by private individuals in their own houses, and the custom has long been fixed of passing the carnival in comedies and other cheerful entertainments.' In other words, scenic display ...
— The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy • Jacob Burckhardt
... Vienna, at the Custom House, Wolfgang, after a brief chat with the official there, took out his violin, and played to the official, who was so delighted with the boy and his music, that the family had no trouble with examination of their luggage, as they would ...
— Ten Boys from History • Kate Dickinson Sweetser
... behind a bank of cloud, and her dim light melting through the darkness filled the night with a dream of the day. Richard was no more of a poet or dreamer of dreams than is any honest youth so long as love holds the bandage of custom away from his eyes. The poets are they who all their life long contrive to see over or through the bandage; but they would, I doubt, have but few readers, had not nature decreed that all youths and maidens shall, for a period, be it long or short, become aware that they too are of the ...
— St. George and St. Michael • George MacDonald
... the communal property and the jurisdiction over foreigners, exempted freemen from servile tasks, suppressed arbitrary imposts, and restored the tribunes and other Byzantine magistrates, whom the people were allowed to select freely according to the ancient custom. In 952 Istria became a German fief by gift of Otho I. of Germany (who had conquered Italy the year before) in feud to his brother Henry, duke of Bavaria, together with Verona and Friuli. Documents show the ...
— The Shores of the Adriatic - The Austrian Side, The Kuestenlande, Istria, and Dalmatia • F. Hamilton Jackson
... when, as had become her custom, the Louchoux girl dressed hurriedly and made her way to the kitchen to help Lena in the preparation of breakfast. To her surprise she found that the fire had not been lighted nor was Big Lena in the little room which had been built ...
— The Gun-Brand • James B. Hendryx
... when he heard. "Ashley is just the man to restore prosperity to the old inn. Let us go and seek him there, Humphrey. A stout-hearted English-speaking host will be right welcome at the inn, and our fellows will bring him plenty of custom." ...
— French and English - A Story of the Struggle in America • Evelyn Everett-Green
... the lees, ornamented their heads with chaplets made of the vine branches, and then danced, singing songs in chorus to Bacchus all the while round the animal destined for their banquet. A feast so very agreeable was not likely to go unrepeated; and it was soon reduced to a custom which was pretty generally observed in Attica, during the vintage. On those occasions the peasants, absolved from all reserve by intoxication, gave a loose to their animosities against the opulent, and in token of defiance of their supposed ...
— The Mirror of Taste, and Dramatic Censor - Vol I, No. 2, February 1810 • Samuel James Arnold
... order led. This was a frequent rite at funerals. The Romans had the same custom, which they called decursio. Plutarch states that Alexander, in after times, renewed these same honours to the memory ...
— The Iliad of Homer • Homer
... Slocum, and entitled, "Sailing Alone Round the World," there is a part wherein the adventurous American seaman relates how he protected himself from night attacks by the savages by a simple, but efficient precaution. It was his custom, when he anchored for the night off the snow-clad and inhospitable shores of Tierra del Fuego, to profusely sprinkle his cutter's deck with sharp tacks, and then calmly turn in and sleep the sleep of the just; for even the ...
— Yorke The Adventurer - 1901 • Louis Becke
... and the earth became pregnant. Salevao, the god of the rocks, observed motion in the moa or centre of the earth. The child was born and named Moa, from the place where it was seen moving. Salevao ordered the umbilicus to be laid on a club, and cut with a stone; and hence the custom ever after on the birth ...
— Samoa, A Hundred Years Ago And Long Before • George Turner
... he closed his door, and locked himself in; double locked himself in, which was not his custom. Thus secured against surprise, he took off his cravat; put on his dressing-gown and slippers, and his nightcap; and sat down before the fire ...
— A Christmas Carol • Charles Dickens
... change; and it seemed to be very popular with the Stoneborough people, and to carry on a brisk trade. The only languor was in Lady Leonora's quarter—the articles were too costly, and hung on hand; nor were the ladies sufficiently well known, nor active enough, to gain custom, excepting Meta, who drove a gay traffic at her end of the stall, which somewhat ...
— The Daisy Chain, or Aspirations • Charlotte Yonge
... off my hat altogether, and made several most polite bows. I had a suspicion, however, from the expression on the countenances of the midshipmen, with the suppressed titter among them, together with the grin on the faces of the men and boys, that I was doing something not altogether according to custom. Perhaps, I thought to myself, I hadn't bowed low enough, so I turned, now to my right, now to my left, and, not seeing where I was going to, should have pitched right down the ladder had not one of the men standing there caught ...
— Paddy Finn • W. H. G. Kingston
... not know that the first actress who ever faced the public told her friends that the profession was not all paint and glitter, because being a pioneer, and so treading on the corns of custom, she was held as an unwomanly creature, and had unpleasant things thrown at her, as well as words. So her impressions are not recorded. But when women had settled down into the work, and were allowed to represent themselves in the theatre (a privilege not as yet accorded to them elsewhere), ...
— Women Workers in Seven Professions • Edith J. Morley
... the feast of Pentecost, when by old custom every maiden chose her love and every knight his leman. Guy, clad in a new silken dress, being made cup-bearer at the banquet table, saw for the first time the beautiful Felice, as, kneeling, he ...
— Legends That Every Child Should Know • Hamilton Wright Mabie
... school for promoting satanic laughter, while he heaped upon him the most monstrous accusations. M. de Lamartine ventured to say of Byron things which even his greatest enemies never dared to utter at that time when in England it was the custom to revile him. Although the time has not yet come when Lord Byron's life should be written, since the true sources of collecting information respecting him are unattainable so long as the people live to whom his letters were ...
— My Recollections of Lord Byron • Teresa Guiccioli
... midnight in his own private oratory. For the first time in his life he saw that of which he had heard so often, the wonderful old-world Pontifical procession, lit by torches, going through the streets from the Lateran to St. Anastasia, where the Pope for the last few years had restored the ancient custom discontinued for nearly a century-and-a-half. The little basilica was reserved, of course, in every corner for the peculiarly privileged; but the streets outside along the whole route from the Cathedral to the church—and, indeed, the other two sides ...
— Lord of the World • Robert Hugh Benson
... join up with the laggard inattention of custom. With himself each man brings his rifle, his pouches of cartridges, his water-bottle, and a pouch that contains a lump of bread. Volpatte is still eating, with protruding and palpitating cheek. Paradis, ...
— Under Fire - The Story of a Squad • Henri Barbusse
... When she found she was entrapped she threw her ring into the sea, which the fish caught. When the king proposed to the princess, she first demanded her ring, which Mohammed immediately presented to the king. Then she said it was the custom of her country on the occasion of a marriage to dig a trench from the palace to the river, which was filled with wood, and set on fire. The bridegroom was required to walk through the trench to ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 6 • Richard F. Burton
... now the custom in this land, as men are called Christians therein, that ill-doers, and folk riotous, and thieves shall go their ways in peace and become free by trials; yea, and what would the evil man do but save his life ...
— The Story of Grettir The Strong • Translated by Eirikr Magnusson and William Morris
... It isn't curiosity. It's just a custom that has sprung up. All the merchants and well-to-do people hire a Gazetteer. It may be useful to them—but I think the King regards it more as a duty than ...
— King Arthur's Socks and Other Village Plays • Floyd Dell
... my custom to call a halt, lock my study door (stowing away my pastoral cares in a drawer) and go away for five or six weeks, and sometimes a little longer. A sea voyage was undertaken during half a dozen vacations, but during a portion of forty-two summers I "pitched my ...
— Recollections of a Long Life - An Autobiography • Theodore Ledyard Cuyler
... addressing it, and the Turk seemed ignorant on that point, or else stupid. Perhaps he was wilfully ignorant, hoping that the peculiar form of the address might cause suspicion and investigation. But what with Tugendheim's familiarity with German military custom, and Ranjoor Singh's swift thought, an address was devised that served the purpose, judging ...
— Hira Singh - When India came to fight in Flanders • Talbot Mundy
... climb of half an hour, they emerged on the tableland, not far from one of those little cabins, dug out of the soil itself, which serve as shelters for the excisemen. And, as it happened, two minutes later, at a turn in the path, one of these custom-house officials appeared. ...
— The Hollow Needle • Maurice Leblanc
... a very good dinner, and contrary to his custom drank the best part of a bottle of old port after it. He had an unpleasant business to face that evening, and felt as though his nerves required bracing. About ten o'clock he took his leave, and getting into a hansom bade the cabman drive ...
— Colonel Quaritch, V.C. - A Tale of Country Life • H. Rider Haggard
... to the white light of beauty; wives won't stand for it, either. There are places where no girl can get work unless she's pulchritudinous. Catch the idea? A pretty London barmaid can't draw more beer than an ugly one, but draws more custom. What's a Princess to do with such jobs? You'd be like the man who wouldn't be fool enough to marry any woman who'd be fool enough to have him—in getting work, I mean. This is the other side of all that rot about Woman's Century and Woman's Widening Sphere. ...
— The Bacillus of Beauty - A Romance of To-day • Harriet Stark
... potatoes, maize, mandioca-roots, and various kinds of wild fruits; one or two drinking vessels; the hollow trunk of a tree, used for pounding maize in; and several dishes which contained the colours used by the Indians in painting their naked bodies,—a custom which was very prevalent amongst them. Besides these things, there were bows, arrows, spears, and blow-pipes in abundance; and hammocks hung from various posts, elevated about a foot from the ground. These hammocks were made of cotton ...
— Martin Rattler • R.M. Ballantyne
... manufacturing arms and ammunition—had the power of building forts in Canada—and had the power of declaring and carrying on war against the American Indians, or, in case of insult, the Colonial Englishmen of New England, or the Manhattanese Dutch. Justice was to be administered according to the Custom of Paris. All Colonists of, and converts to the Roman Catholic faith, had the same rights in France as Frenchmen born and resident in France had. And for four years the king himself agreed to advance a tenth of the whole stock of ...
— The Rise of Canada, from Barbarism to Wealth and Civilisation - Volume 1 • Charles Roger
... her hand to the ribbon around her neck and drew from her bosom an old-fashioned oval gold locket, as big as any ordinary watch but thinner. She opened the front of the ease and kissed her mother's picture, as was her nightly custom. Then she opened the back and drew out a tightly folded wad of paper. This she carefully spread out before her, when it proved to be the old letter she ...
— Mary Louise • Edith van Dyne (one of L. Frank Baum's pen names)
... these epistles did she mention the fact that a rejected suitor had threatened her with another appeal. Of a Sunday afternoon all good Romans (and the best Romans are often the northern barbarians) follow the custom of going to vespers at Saint Peter's; and it had been agreed among our friends that they would drive together to the great church. After lunch, an hour before the carriage came, Lord Warburton presented himself at the Hotel de Paris and paid a visit to the two ladies, Ralph Touchett ...
— The Portrait of a Lady - Volume 1 (of 2) • Henry James
... going to rest, on a sudden the Moon, which was then at full and very high, began to be darkened, and after changing into various colours, was at last totally eclipsed. The Romans, according to their custom, made a great noise by striking upon vessels of brass and held up lighted faggots and torches in the air in order to recall her light; but the Macedonians did no such thing; horror and astonishment seized their ...
— The Story of Eclipses • George Chambers
... The custom of giving a piece of silver to an individual in recognition of service or in appreciation of accomplishment probably began as soon as man developed the fashioning of that metal into objects. Such a presentation piece was a ...
— Presentation Pieces in the Museum of History and Technology • Margaret Brown Klapthor
... their own ground. He, of all men, could not be disobedient to official orders. But if he could promote a movement beyond the walls of the Weights and Measures; if he could make Pharisees of those benighted publicans in the Strand; if he could introduce conic sections into the Custom House, and political economy into the Post Office; if, by any effort of his, the Foreign Office clerks could be forced to attend punctually at ten; and that wretched saunterer, whom five days a week he saw lounging into the Council Office—if ...
— The Three Clerks • Anthony Trollope
... sometimes to help out the meager financial returns of literary work, but more often because they would bring honor to these positions. Hawthorne successively filled the offices of weigher and gauger in the Boston Custom House, collector of customs at Salem, and American consul at Liverpool, having been appointed as consul by his old friend President Pierce. After four years' residence in England he resigned his consulship and spent several years in travel on the continent, spending ...
— Elson Grammer School Literature, Book Four. • William H. Elson and Christine Keck
... the story to its rightful ending. Now as at this time King Arthur abode in Britain, and held high court, that his fame might wax the greater; and as the noble folk sat at the board and ate, there came riding a knight; for 'twas the custom in Arthur's days that while the king held court no door, small nor great, should be shut, but all men were free to come and go ...
— The Romance of Morien • Jessie L. Weston
... of his knights, bidding them seek for such an one as was Sir Tristram and bring him to the court. So they departed, each his own way, and searched for many days, but in vain. Then it chanced, at last, as Sir Launcelot rode on his way, he espied Sir Tristram resting beside a tomb; and, as was the custom of knights errant, he called upon him to joust. So the two ran together and each broke his spear. Then they sprang to the ground and fought with their swords, and each thought that never had he encountered so stout or so skilled a knight. ...
— Stories from Le Morte D'Arthur and the Mabinogion • Beatrice Clay
... sixteen, upon the throne of Turkey, Abdul Medjid announced it to be his intention to change nothing that his father Mahmood had established, and declared himself a partisan of the system of reform commenced by that sovereign. Notwithstanding the custom, rendered almost sacred by tradition, he renounced the turban and was crowned with the fez. Contrary to the usage of former Sultans, who on their accession put to death or closely imprisoned all their brothers, ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 61, No. 380, June, 1847 • Various
... "God has combined such corporeal and intellectual beauty as not merely to surprise but astound all men.... His face is angelic (nine years before a Frenchman had called it "feminine"), rather than handsome; his head imperial and bold; and he wears a beard, contrary to the English custom. Who would not be amazed, when contemplating such singular beauty of person, coupled with such bold address, adapting itself with the greatest ease to every manly exercise?"[681] But Henry's physique ...
— Henry VIII. • A. F. Pollard
... It was the custom to mark a purchased slave with the caste of her purchaser. Umballa, still not recognizing her, waved her aside toward the Brahmin caste markers, one of whom daubed her forehead with a yellow triangle. Her blue eyes pierced the curious ...
— The Adventures of Kathlyn • Harold MacGrath
... we all are sometimes by our comforts. The dreams of the pioneers that haloed the heads of those who came to Harvey in those first days—those dreams are gone. Here and there one is trapped in brick or wood or stone or iron; and another glows in a child or walks the weary ways of man as a custom or an institution or as a law that brought only a part of the ...
— In the Heart of a Fool • William Allen White
... and moving to L. of table). It is not my custom to propose in the presence of a third party. It is true that on the occasion you mention a man called Baxter was on the lawn, but I regarded him no more than the old apple-tree or the flower- beds, or any other ...
— Belinda • A. A. Milne
... racial tension in the area. His conclusions, no doubt shared by commanders in many parts of the country, summed up the problem of finding assignments for black marines: any racial incident which might arise out of disregard for local racial custom, he wrote, ...
— Integration of the Armed Forces, 1940-1965 • Morris J. MacGregor Jr.
... mumbled an' stammered, an' couldn't hardly speak at all. "It ain't my custom to play with strangers," sez Jabez, an' he was fast gettin' into the dangerous stage, "but you are my guest. I won't take my money back, but if Dick is willin', I'll write him a check for yours an' you can take your condemned filthy gold ...
— Happy Hawkins • Robert Alexander Wason
... Ruth wrote, could a woman do, tied up by custom, and cast into particular circumstances out of which it was almost impossible to extricate herself? Philip thought that he would go some day and extricate Ruth, but he did not write that, for he had the instinct to know ...
— The Gilded Age, Part 3. • Mark Twain (Samuel Clemens) and Charles Dudley Warner
... King's peace dies with the King. The custom then is that all laws are outlaw, and men do what they will till the new King ...
— Rewards and Fairies • Rudyard Kipling
... in their minds. Rawdon and his wife had the very best apartments at the inn at Brighton; the landlord, as he brought in the first dish, bowed before them as to his greatest customers: and Rawdon abused the dinners and wine with an audacity which no grandee in the land could surpass. Long custom, a manly appearance, faultless boots and clothes, and a happy fierceness of manner, will often help a man as much as a ...
— Vanity Fair • William Makepeace Thackeray
... lookin' for the Bug in the Tub of Blood S'loon. The Bug don't happen to be vis'ble no whar in the scen'ry when Mike comes clatterin' in. By way of a enterin' wedge Mike subscribes for a drink. As the Tub barkeep goes settin' out the glasses Mike, with his custom'ry gifts for gettin' himse'f in wrong, starts fomentin' trouble. An' at that it's simply his ignorance, an' a conceited deesire to show off among them ...
— Faro Nell and Her Friends - Wolfville Stories • Alfred Henry Lewis
... white and trembling, under guard in a corner of the entrance hall, waiting for the arrival of the police, the valet breathlessly gave the sensational particulars to the rapidly growing crowd of curious onlookers. He had taken his usual Sunday out and on returning home at midnight, as was his custom, he had let himself in with his latchkey. To his astonishment he had found this man, the prisoner, about to leave the premises. His manner and remarks were so peculiar that they at once aroused his suspicion. He hurried into the apartment and found his master lying dead on the floor in a pool of ...
— The Third Degree - A Narrative of Metropolitan Life • Charles Klein and Arthur Hornblow
... comptoir ducked and re-ducked, the people looked round, Peter and Nick got up, there was a shuffling of chairs—Julia had come. Peter was relating how he had stopped at her hotel to bring her with him and had found her, according to her custom, by no means ready; on which, fearing his guests would arrive first at the rendezvous and find no proper welcome, he had come off without her, leaving her to follow. He had not brought a friend, ...
— The Tragic Muse • Henry James
... her yet!" he exclaimed, as he relaxed his hold upon his bridle and let his horse go on slowly, while he sat with his brows gathered over his thin nose, his long chin buried in his neckcloth and his nails between his teeth, gnawing like a wild beast, as was his custom ...
— Capitola the Madcap • Emma D. E. N. Southworth
... about with his hands in his pockets, smoking large cigars with an air of reserved criticism that vastly impressed the waiters, acquiescing in strawberry jam for breakfast, for example, in a manner which said that, although this might be to him a new and complex custom, he was acquainted with Chicago ones much more recondite. His air was superior, but modestly so, and if he said nothing you would never suppose it was because he had nothing to say. He meant to give Great Britain a chance before he pronounced anything distinctly unfavourable even to her steaks, ...
— A Voyage of Consolation - (being in the nature of a sequel to the experiences of 'An - American girl in London') • Sara Jeannette Duncan
... invalids—but, as we have said, there were a good number of the surrounding gentry, their wives and daughters, so that the fete was expected to come off with great eclat. Topertoe was dressed, as was then the custom, in full canonical costume, with, his silk cassock and bands, for he was a doctor of divinity; and Manifold was habited in the usual dress of the day—his falling collar exhibiting a neck whose thickness took ...
— The Evil Eye; Or, The Black Spector - The Works of William Carleton, Volume One • William Carleton
... altogether odious. It was not so smothering. The atmosphere was less strained. One's personality could come a bit to the front without incurring penalties, and one met one's own kind on a social plane—subject to discipline, it was true, but still mildly enjoyable. It was his custom to linger here until the classes gathered, but to-day the Whipple pony cart was driven up by the Whipple stepmother and the girl with her hair cut off. Apparently no one made these two go to church, but they had come to Sunday-school. And the Wilbur twin fled within at sight of them. The ...
— The Wrong Twin • Harry Leon Wilson
... have on the contrary a manner of life as follows:—they neither kill any living thing nor do they sow any crops nor is it their custom to possess houses; but they feed on herbs, and they have a grain of the size of millet, in a sheath, which grows of itself from the ground; this they gather and boil with the sheath, and make it their food: and whenever any of them ...
— The History Of Herodotus - Volume 1(of 2) • Herodotus
... of a fortune, in the Argentine, in Uruguay, and had ended by becoming a slave in Brazil. Yes, the poor old man was a voluntary slave. He had borrowed from his employer and was unable to repay. He was therefore a slave in the true sense of the word, as his employer could, according to local custom, sell him to any ...
— Across Unknown South America • Arnold Henry Savage Landor
... coincidence of the above circumstances, and it may therefore happen that, if you compare different periods with one another, the situation of the working class in the later century or generation (seeing that now the minimum of necessities of life demanded by custom is somewhat increased) has improved somewhat in comparison with the situation of the working class in the previous century ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. X. • Kuno Francke
... who asks a woman to take his name obeys a tradition and a custom, to be sure, and the woman who accepts it does not display any especially heroic trait. Therefore, what you demand of your lover is a far greater proof of devotion than what he asks of you. No woman who fully understood ...
— A Woman of the World - Her Counsel to Other People's Sons and Daughters • Ella Wheeler Wilcox
... and still looking doubtful, went down the steps of Rose Villa, a quaint little house, covered with tinted plaster, as is the pretty custom of the Channel Islands, and appearing even to a masculine ignorance of details much more neat and ...
— The Spanish Chest • Edna A. Brown |
