"Decorum" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... stranger? (It startled me to reflect how rapidly we had passed that stage of civil commonplace which was the normal condition of my intercourse with the gentlemen of the town.) I was certainly innocent of any intentional transgression of those bounds of reticence and decorum which are a young lady's best friends, but as to the length of my conversation with the merchant I felt ...
— Mrs. Overtheway's Remembrances • Juliana Horatia Ewing
... the capstan, he addressed them briefly, and not without influence. Such was the power of his simple and manly bearing over these distracted souls, that even the wildest listened with decorum. ...
— Sea and Shore - A Sequel to "Miriam's Memoirs" • Mrs. Catharine A. Warfield
... in the corner of the sofa, with her legs tucked up under her, and the light playing a game of magic amid the reds and golds and browns of her hair, while she cheerily discoursed to us of Hamdi's villainy, I never noticed the dull decorum of this room. I was struck with the ...
— The Morals of Marcus Ordeyne • William J. Locke
... himself with a few improper jests, such as dissolute sailors so abound with, and a volley of good, round, solid, satisfactory, and heaven-defying oaths! It was not so much a better principle as partly his natural good taste, and still more his buckramed habit of clerical decorum, that carried him safely through ...
— The Scarlet Letter • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... de Sevigne; "he was with him; he administered the supreme unction. The duke was in a beautiful state of grace. M, Vinet, you remember, said of him that he died with 'perfect decorum.'" ...
— In and Out of Three Normady Inns • Anna Bowman Dodd
... Mabel left the table as soon as decorum would permit, and betook herself up-stairs to her own sanctum to nurse her ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, November 1885 • Various
... empty chair at home. So we got up and walked down Piccadilly. Jonathan was holding me by the arm, the way he used to in the old days before I went to school. I felt it very improper, for you can't go on for some years teaching etiquette and decorum to other girls without the pedantry of it biting into yourself a bit. But it was Jonathan, and he was my husband, and we didn't know anybody who saw us, and we didn't care if they did, so on we walked. I was looking at a very beautiful girl, in a big cart-wheel ...
— Dracula • Bram Stoker
... been spared, are enabled to report that many natives have turned unto the Lord their God. Every Sabbath morning, public worship is celebrated in the chapel at Cape Coast Town, when the beautiful liturgy of our Church is read; and the decorum which is observed by the natives, who read the responses, appears in striking opposition to the wild irrational service which they formerly offered at ...
— The World of Waters - A Peaceful Progress o'er the Unpathed Sea • Mrs. David Osborne
... work. The little girl, who would fain exercise her young limbs by manifold rude sprawlings and rushing hither and thither, and single combats with her brothers, is tricked out in ribbons and gay frocks, and bid sit still in solemn decorum. With every year of her growth this principle of attention to outside trickeries and fineries is more rigidly pursued. Less and less every year are the nerves and muscles, the restless activities of arms and legs, exercised and made to purvey new vigor to ...
— Modern Women and What is Said of Them - A Reprint of A Series of Articles in the Saturday Review (1868) • Anonymous
... anxious that the passing of his unprofitable servant should be marked by decorum if not by grief, mentally classed the event with election day, in that he refused to sell any liquor until the sheriff and coroner arrived. He also, after his first bewilderment had passed, conceived the idea that Saunders had committed suicide, and explained to everyone who ...
— Good Indian • B. M. Bower
... no priest with them in their desert, they had as little knowledge of religious ceremonies as of religion itself. They were not even capable of conducting themselves in a place of worship with ordinary decorum, but would interrupt the service with scandalous cries and warlike shouts. Such is the account the Latins give of them, but I have never heard the other side of the question. These wild fellows, notwithstanding their entire ignorance of ...
— Eothen • A. W. Kinglake
... without having in my thoughts any occurrence of special good fortune, I have enjoyed a perfect exhilaration. I am glad to the brink of fear. In the woods, too, a man casts off his years as the snake his slough, and at what period soever of life is always a child. Within these plantations of God a decorum and sanctity reign, a perennial festival is dressed, and the guest sees not how he should tire of them in a thousand years. Standing on the bare ground, my head bathed in the blithe air, and uplifted into infinite space, all mean egotism vanishes. I become a transparent ...
— The Worlds Greatest Books, Volume XIII. - Religion and Philosophy • Various
... party is an object of too much importance to go to pieces. Indeed, Burke, you have more merit than any man in keeping us together." It was the character of the party, almost as much as their principles, that secured Burke's zeal and attachment; their decorum, their constancy, their aversion to all cabals for private objects, their indifference to office, except as an instrument of power and a means of carrying out the policy of their convictions. They might easily have had office if they would ...
— Burke • John Morley
... his face. The other was our old friend, listening with his old forbearing expression and owlish eyes, the strong sunlight gleaming on his glasses as the lamplight had gleamed the night before, when the boisterous Basil had rallied him on his studious decorum. But for one thing the figure of this morning might have been the identical figure of last night. That one thing was that while the face listened reposefully the legs were industriously dancing like the legs of a marionette. ...
— The Club of Queer Trades • G. K. Chesterton
... experience as a horseman, but truth to tell, never before in his life had Jean Paul's legs crossed anything livelier than one of the gymnasium "side horses." Now, however, the cat was about to escape from the bag, for Robin Adair, flinging decorum and heels behind him, set forth on a mad gallop to overhaul Roy, who had elected to set the pace for the others. Whinnying, prancing, cavorting, away Roy tore in the lead, Robin Adair hot-foot upon him, Jean Paul striving manfully to keep his pitching ...
— Peggy Stewart at School • Gabrielle E. Jackson
... very difficult," he said, seeking to diminish the tension so often felt by a journalist, even at the moment of a highly appreciated occasion, "to break into graceful license after so long a life of decorum; therefore you must excuse me if my egotism doesn't run very free or my complacency find quite ...
— New York Times Current History; The European War, Vol 2, No. 2, May, 1915 - April-September, 1915 • Various
... of good liquor as those four gentlemen from beyond the Atlantic. They drank the strong red Cyprus as if it had been spring-water. "The dust of your Italian roads takes some cleansing, Mr. Townshend," was their only excuse, but in truth none was needed. The wine seemed only to thaw their iron decorum. Without any surcease of dignity they grew communicative, and passed from lands to peoples and from peoples to constitutions. Before we knew it we ...
— The Moon Endureth—Tales and Fancies • John Buchan
... even noblemen and gentlemen, put their hand to the work, and deemed the most abject employment to be dignified by the sanctity of the cause. Women, too, of rank and condition, forgetting the delicacy of their sex and the decorum of their character were intermingled with the lowest rabble, and carried on their shoulders the rubbish requisite ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part E. - From Charles I. to Cromwell • David Hume
... early on Wednesday morning, the 30th of August, and sent at once for Mrs. Blenkinsop, matron and midwife to the Westminster Lying-in Hospital. Godwin says that, "influenced by ideas of decorum, which certainly ought to have no place, at least in cases of danger, she determined to have a woman to attend her in the capacity of midwife." But it seems much more in keeping with her character that the engagement ...
— Mary Wollstonecraft • Elizabeth Robins Pennell
... intentions. He had cared for her as if he occupied the place of her own brother who fell in the battle of Marchfield. It would have given him most pleasure—he had said so himself—to dance everything with her, but decorum and the royal dames who kept him in attendance would not permit it. However, he came to her in every pause to exchange at least a few brief words and a glance. During the longest one, which lasted more than an hour and was devoted to the refreshment of the guests, he led her into a side ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... "The decorum of the visitors has been excellent, and it is remarkable, in view of such a very large number of persons visiting the room, that so few mutilations and injuries occur to the periodicals and books, and that so few books, probably not more than half a dozen in the course of a year, and those ...
— Peter Cooper - The Riverside Biographical Series, Number 4 • Rossiter W. Raymond
... craft, while they swam alongside. Rafts with men and women, half-floating as they held by the sides, and chattered and basked in the sun. All this difficult interlude on dry-land manners was conducted with perfect decorum, a telling lesson ...
— The Voyage Alone in the Yawl "Rob Roy" • John MacGregor
... dropping his unaccustomed air of chill disapproval, he appealed to his friend's better taste. A confession of sheer physical loathing crept into his face as he let fall two or three little sentences about these women's offence against public decorum. 'Why, it is as hideous as war!' he wound ...
— The Convert • Elizabeth Robins
... him it was school time, and he must set off, as she did not like him to run in out of breath and flurried, just when the schoolmaster was going to begin; but she wished him to come in decently and in order, with quiet decorum, and thoughtfulness as to what he was going to do. So Tom got his cap and his bag, and went off with a light heart, which I suppose made his footsteps light, for he found himself above half way to school while it wanted yet a quarter to the time. ...
— The Grey Woman and other Tales • Mrs. (Elizabeth) Gaskell
... cursory acquaintance with his work, not recently renewed. Of the presence of the man I have a vivider remembrance: a slight, short, ecclesiasticized figure in black; with a white neckcloth and a silk hat of strict decorum, and between the two a square face with square features, intensified in their regard by a pair of very large glasses, and the prominent, myopic eyes staring through them. He was a type of out-dated New England scholarship in these aspects, but in the hospitable ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... his best to preserve the fame which the place had acquired under his predecessors, and amply has he fulfilled the pledge. We are led to understand that, alike in lecture-room and laboratory, everything is carried on with spirit, decorum, and order, and that what with the efficiency of the prelections and examinations, aided as these are by a profusion of admirably executed pictorial illustrations, many of them drawn by the lecturer himself, the place is, in point of usefulness, outstripped ...
— Western Worthies - A Gallery of Biographical and Critical Sketches of West - of Scotland Celebrities • J. Stephen Jeans
... exceedingly banal interview with Helen, and another with Andrew. And an interval having elapsed, Andrew was observed to approach Helen and ask her for a polka. Helen punctiliously accepted. And he led her out. The outraged gods of social decorum were appeased, and the reputations of Mrs. Prockter and her parties stood as high as ever. It was ...
— Helen with the High Hand (2nd ed.) • Arnold Bennett
... objects as they are discerned and described by other men. I reason without prejudice, can endure contradiction, and, as the company perceives, even bear impertinent censure without passion or resentment. I quarrel with none but the foes of virtue and decorum, against whom I have declared perpetual war, and them I will everywhere attack as the natural ...
— The Adventures of Sir Launcelot Greaves • Tobias Smollett
... of that in this case, though. Neither Gus, nor Dan, was of the drinking set, and Lucy had a horror of the stuff, so would not have it in the house. All was decorum over the body of the man who had been ...
— Joyce's Investments - A Story for Girls • Fannie E. Newberry
... ankles in spotless white, their black boots looking blacker by comparison, they proceeded in the general direction of the distant village, with the order and decorum of sea lords descending on a dockyard for inspection purposes. The trackless sand proved hot and sharp; the dog proved in poor condition from the voyage and the morning's incidental martyrdom, and Byng was generous-hearted. He picked up the dog and carried him; and Scamp displayed ...
— Told in the East • Talbot Mundy
... Mr. HARRISON lamenting from The Forum, Imagination done to death by latter-day decorum! "Good boys and girls" we've all become, and modern men and maidens see The world with such prosaic eyes, Romance is ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 104, May 13, 1893 • Various
... and graduated with honors at sixteen. College life had its temptations, but he conducted himself with unusual decorum, and upon graduation went to study with an eminent clergyman. Apparently he expected to enter the ministry, but the theology of Dr. Bellamy did not commend itself to him, and even less did the spirit with which the theologian met his queries, so that ...
— Jukes-Edwards - A Study in Education and Heredity • A. E. Winship
... are of the same religion as the Russians, and, like that nation, have monks and nuns. Great decorum is visible in their churches, the females being excluded from the sight of the males by means of lattices. Their bishops lead a life of great simplicity, as will be seen from the following account of a dinner given by the bishop of Salona to Mr. Dodwell:—"There ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 10, Issue 265, July 21, 1827 • Various
... tragic misfeasance. In that city, where, if it may be said with respect, there has existed from of old a fashionable circle not convinced of its own gentility and insisting the more rigorously on minor decorum, Lincoln went to the opera, and history still deplores that this misguided man went there and sat there with his large hands in black kid gloves. Here perhaps it is well to say that the educated world of the Eastern States, including those ...
— Abraham Lincoln • Lord Charnwood
... Petronilla and Basil and Decius. Though kneeling, the senator's daughter held herself proudly. Though tears were on her face, she hardly disguised an air of triumph. Nor was the head of Petronilla bent; her countenance looked hard and cold as marble. Leander, a model of decorum, stepped with grave greeting towards the prelate, and whispered a word or two. In the stillness that followed there quivered a deep breath. Flavius Anicius Maximus ...
— Veranilda • George Gissing
... they were humbugs, almost without an exception,—rats that nibble at the honest bread and cheese of the community, and grow fat by their petty pilferings, yet often gave them what they asked, and privately owned myself a simpleton. There is a decorum which restrains you (unless you happen to be a police-constable) from breaking through a crust of plausible respectability, even when you are certain that there is ...
— Our Old Home - A Series of English Sketches • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... ardour and excitement were no small contrast to the sober, matter-of-fact demeanour of the Teutonic knight, who comported himself with the mechanical decorum of an ecclesiastic, but quite as one who meant to keep his word. Maximilian served the mass in his royal character as sub-deacon. He was fond of so doing, either from humility, or love of incongruity, or both. No one, however, ...
— The Dove in the Eagle's Nest • Charlotte M. Yonge
... surprise, and some begged me to be seated, and to consider the matter calmly.—"Gentlemen," quo' I, "dinna mistake me. I never was in more composure all my life.—It's indeed no on my own account that I feel on this occasion. The gross violation of all the decent decorum of magisterial authority, is not a thing that affects me in my own person; it's an outrage against the state; the prerogatives of the king's crown are endamaged; atonement must be made, or punishment must ensue. It's a thing that by no possibility can be overlooked: it's an offence committed ...
— The Provost • John Galt
... Adjournment. Amendment. Apology. Assembly, Deliberative. Assembling. Blanks, filling of. Chairman, preliminary election of. Committees. Committee of the Whole. Commitment. Communications. Consent of the assembly. Contested Elections. Credentials. Debate. Decorum, Breaches of. Disorderly Conduct. Disorderly Words. Division. Elections and Returns. Expulsion. Floor. Forms of Proceeding. Incidental Questions. Introduction of Business. Journal. Judgment of an aggregate body. Lie on the Table. List of members. Main Question. Majority. ...
— Timar's Two Worlds • Mr Jkai
... was her mirror aloe that told her she was fairer than all the ladies around, for none durst invade the serene decorum of her manners, with so light a whisper. Such was her state, when she first heard of the rise of Sir William Wallace, and when she thought that her husband might not only lose his life, but risk the forfeiture of his family ...
— The Scottish Chiefs • Miss Jane Porter
... the same individuals who had recently been in the deadly breach; but now all was tranquillity, elegance, and ease. Parties were formally introduced to each other with an appearance of the greatest decorum. The dogs intended to represent ladies were dressed in silks, gauzes, laces, and gay ribbons. Some wore artificial flowers, with flowing ringlets; others wore the powdered and pomatumed head-dress, with caps and ...
— Anecdotes of Dogs • Edward Jesse
... things that might be funny and unrefined, and things which were merely coarse and gross. The fact was that he had a perfectly simple manliness about him, and an infallible tact, which was wholly unaffected, as to the limits of decorum. The result was that one could talk to him with the utmost plainness and directness. His was not a cloistered and secluded temperament. He knew the world, and had no fear of ...
— Hugh - Memoirs of a Brother • Arthur Christopher Benson
... there was any of that rancour and animosity which later characterized the proceedings of the Assembly of Lower Canada. 'The remains of the old French politeness, and a laudable deference to their fellow subjects, kept up decorum in the proceedings of the majority,' testified a political annalist of that time. Even as late as 1807, it appears that 'party spirit had not yet extended its effects to destroy social intercourse and good neighbourhood.' It was not until ...
— The 'Patriotes' of '37 - A Chronicle of the Lower Canada Rebellion • Alfred D. Decelles
... Regions fall infinitely short of the majesty of the holy Scriptures when describing heaven and hell, so that in comparison they are childish and trifling;" and yet, perhaps, he had the most regular and best governed imagination of any man, and observed the greatest decorum in his descriptions. "There are I know," said the elegant Joseph Addison, "men of heavy temper and without genius, who can read the words of Scripture with as much indifference as they do other papers; however, I will not despair to bring men of wit into a love and admiration of the sacred writings, ...
— Museum of Antiquity - A Description of Ancient Life • L. W. Yaggy
... find any answer to it, she put away her work and went to call upon the dean's wife, Mrs Merridew. If anything could change the current of her thoughts it would be a visit to the deanery, which she considered both a pleasure and a privilege. Everything there pleased her sense of fitness and decorum, from the gravity of the servants to the majestic, ponderous furniture of the rooms, and she thought all the arrangements admirable. It is true that she did not understand Dr Merridew's portly jokes, and was rather afraid of his wife, but her approval ...
— Penelope and the Others - Story of Five Country Children • Amy Walton
... masquerades, mechanics, Argyle Street Institution and aquatic races, love and lotteries, Brookes's and Buonaparte, opera-singers and oratorios, wine, women, wax-work, and weather-cocks, can't accord with your insulated ideas of decorum and other silly expressions not inserted in ...
— Life of Lord Byron, Vol. I. (of VI.) - With his Letters and Journals. • Thomas Moore
... on in the newspapers, and much talked of. At length, at the end of January, Elizabeth entered her mother's house in a wretched condition—emaciated and exhausted, and with scarcely a sufficiency of clothes on her person for mere decorum. She was, of course, asked eagerly to give an account of her misfortunes. Her narrative by degrees resolved itself into this shape: She set out on her visit at eleven o'clock in the day, and stayed with her uncle till nine o'clock in the evening. Her uncle ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 450 - Volume 18, New Series, August 14, 1852 • Various
... began; but he did not hear. He had passed for the moment beyond decorum, and his eyes began to roll in a manner expressive of inward rapture, but not ...
— Two Sides of the Face - Midwinter Tales • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... and she returns the compliment. Hence at a time like this, when people live for society and in society, there is no place for conjugal intimacy.—Moreover, when a married couple occupy an exalted position they are separated by custom and decorum. Each party has his or her own household, or at least their own apartments, servants, equipage, receptions and distinct society, and, as entertainment entails ceremony, they stand towards each other in deference to their rank on the footing of polite strangers. They are ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 1 (of 6) - The Ancient Regime • Hippolyte A. Taine
... are, Jim, don't you?" said the Colonel, laughing, and taking no notice of his breach of decorum in wedging black ideas into ...
— Among the Pines - or, South in Secession Time • James R. Gilmore
... about this girl after all? Why not make up his mind to accept her as his predecessor had done? Why was it necessary for him to find her inconsistent with his ideas of duty to his little flock and his mission to them? Was he not assuming a sense of decorum that was open to misconception? The absurdity of her school costume, and any responsibility it incurred, rested not with him but with her parents. What right had he to point it out to them, and above all how was he to do it? He halted irresolutely at what he believed was his sober ...
— Cressy • Bret Harte
... were generally carried on in Trimmer's presence, but, although the old man frequently referred to Trimmer in his arguments and quarrels, the valet acutely avoided asserting himself beyond the bounds of the strictest decorum while visitors were present. But, when they were gone, Trimmer's iron personality showed itself in a quiet hectoring, which made him the other's master. Mr. Trimmer was financially quite independent of his employer's ill humors. He was wealthy, and his name was mentioned by the other servants ...
— The Scarlet Feather • Houghton Townley
... her French associations could never be tolerated at the home of Dr. Johns. For herself, she had a reputation for propriety to sustain; and while Miss Maverick made a portion of her household, she must comply with the rules of decorum; and if Miss Maverick were ignorant of those rules, she had ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 101, March, 1866 • Various
... and prose Shakespeare observes very nice distinctions according to the ranks of the speakers, but still more according to their characters and disposition of mind. A noble language, elevated above the usual tone, is suitable only to a certain decorum of manners, which is thrown over both vices and virtues and which does not even wholly disappear amidst the violence of passion. If this is not exclusively possessed by the higher ranks, it still, however, belongs naturally ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. IV • Editor-in-Chief: Kuno Francke
... bird beguiling my sad fancy into smiling, By the grave and stern decorum of the countenance it wore, "Though thy crest be shorn and shaven, thou," I said, "art sure no craven, Ghastly grim and ancient Raven wandering from the Nightly shore— Tell me what thy lordly name is on the Night's Plutonian ...
— Selections From American Poetry • Various
... stranger's manner assumed a kind and degree of decorum which, under the circumstances, seemed almost coldness. After some words, not over ardent, and yet not exactly inappropriate, he took leave, making a bow which had one knows not what of a certain chastened independence about it; ...
— The Confidence-Man • Herman Melville
... his Bartholomew Fair, acted at the Hope in October, 1614, remarks: "And though the Fair be not kept in the same region that some here perhaps would have it, yet think that therein the author hath observed a special decorum, the place being as dirty as Smithfield, ...
— Shakespearean Playhouses - A History of English Theatres from the Beginnings to the Restoration • Joseph Quincy Adams
... father, which, inasmuch as there was no point to it, need not be rehearsed here; but I noticed that Bennoch was for some reason hugely diverted by it, and found difficulty in keeping his hilarity within due bounds of decorum, Hall's tone being all the while of the most earnest gravity. Later I took occasion to ask Bennoch the secret of his mirth; was the tale a fiction? "Not a bit of it," Bennoch replied; "it's every word of it true; but what tickled me was that it was myself and not Hall who was in the adventure with ...
— Hawthorne and His Circle • Julian Hawthorne
... But, notwithstanding all Jack's decorum and his discipline, to say nothing of his natural inclination, when duly encouraged, to reflect seriously and properly on any subject, as he is made of ordinary flesh and bones, his eyes will sometimes refuse to keep open under the infliction of a dull or ill-delivered discourse; so ...
— The Lieutenant and Commander - Being Autobigraphical Sketches of His Own Career, from - Fragments of Voyages and Travels • Basil Hall
... were immersed in play, or devoted to politics: the same spirit carried them into both. The Sabbath was disregarded, spent often in cards, or desecrated by the meetings of partisans of both factions; moral duties were neglected and decorum outraged. The fact was, that a minor court had become the centre of all the bad passions and reprehensible pursuits in vogue. Carlton House, in Pall Mall, which even the oldest of us can barely remember, with its elegant open screen, the pillars in ...
— The Gaming Table: Its Votaries and Victims - Volume I (of II) • Andrew Steinmetz
... proceedings were conducted with due decorum. As, however, the speakers grew accustomed to the presence of the Padishah, the spirit of dissension began to work. One evening it led to an uproar; learned men reviled each other before the Padishah. ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 9 • Various
... Moderation, decorum, and neatness distinguish the gentleman; he is at all times affable, diffident, and studious to please. Intelligent and polite, his behaviour is pleasant and graceful. When he enters the dwelling of an inferior, he endeavours to hide, if possible, the difference ...
— Enquire Within Upon Everything - The Great Victorian Domestic Standby • Anonymous
... Freycinet gave his consent, and endeavoured to make the proceeding as solemn as possible, all the more because Rio Rio requested permission to be present at it with all his suite. Every one behaved with the utmost decorum and reverence while the ceremony was taking place; but immediately on its close there was a general rush to the collation which the commandant had ordered to be prepared. It was wonderful to see how rapidly the ...
— Celebrated Travels and Travellers - Part III. The Great Explorers of the Nineteenth Century • Jules Verne
... what I want. We must decide to-day one way or the other. Now is the accepted time; now is the day of salvation. I couldn't let you wait, and slip by degrees into some vague arrangement we hardly contemplated definitely. To do that would be to sin against my ideas of decorum. Whatever we do we must do, as the apostle says, decently and in order, with a full sense of the obligations it imposes upon us. We must say to one another in so many words, 'I am yours; you are mine;' or we must part forever. I have told you my whole soul; I have ...
— The Woman Who Did • Grant Allen
... lines, there is also another moral, couched under every one of the principal parts and characters, which a judicious critic will observe, though I point not to it in this preface. And there may be also some secret beauties in the decorum of parts, and uniformity of design, which my puny judges will not easily find out: let them consider in the last scene of the fourth act, whether I have not preserved the rule of decency, in giving all the advantage to the royal character, and in making ...
— The Works Of John Dryden, Vol. 7 (of 18) - The Duke of Guise; Albion and Albanius; Don Sebastian • John Dryden
... has pervaded every other part of my narrative. If there ever were any motives of prudence or delicacy, that could impose a qualification upon the story, they are now over. They could have no relation but to factitious rules of decorum. There are no circumstances of her life, that, in the judgment of honour and reason, could brand her with disgrace. Never did there exist a human being, that needed, with less fear, expose all their actions, and call upon the universe to judge them. An event of the most deplorable ...
— Memoirs of the Author of a Vindication of the Rights of Woman • William Godwin
... rate of eighty thousand piastres. Besides these there are several civil appointments in the town, which are sold every year at Constantinople to the highest bidder: the Janissaries are in the possession of the most lucrative of them, and remit regularly to the Porte the purchase money. The outward decorum which the Janissaries have never ceased to observe towards the Porte is owing to their fear of offending public opinion, so as to endanger their own security. The Porte, on the other hand, has not the means of subduing these rebels, ...
— Travels in Syria and the Holy Land • John Burckhardt
... some lilac bushes, she enjoyed the great decorum of the arrest, and heard the dialogue of the two men die away along the path. Soon after, the rolling of a carriage and the beat of hoofs arose in the still air of the night, and passed speedily farther and fainter into silence. The Prince ...
— Prince Otto • Robert Louis Stevenson
... comfortable old schoolroom, and as Miss Nelson looked just as usual, just as orderly, just as neat and prim as she did yesterday, and as she would again to-morrow, her presence had a certain calming effect upon the rioters. They ate their meal with some decorum, and not more than three children spoke at ...
— The Children of Wilton Chase • Mrs. L. T. Meade
... the young soldier had told so much, even while it left so much unsaid, that she could almost kneel and implore Mike to be explicit. The reserve of a woman, notwithstanding, taught her how to preserve her sex's decorum, and to maintain appearances. ...
— Wyandotte • James Fenimore Cooper
... crimson, white and blue, these small scions stand up in their ruffs and fardingales in dimpled serenity, squaring their infantine stomachers at the spectator with an innocence, a dignity, a delightful grotesqueness, which make the picture a thing of close truth as well as of fine decorum. You might kiss their hands, but you certainly would think twice before pinching their cheeks—provocative as they are of this tribute of admiration—and would altogether lack presumption to lift them off the ground or the higher level or dais on which they stand so sturdily planted by right ...
— Italian Hours • Henry James
... that hypocrite, he went on to relate, could not help laughing at the parti-coloured costume, sacerdotal above, soldier-like below; but the cardinal was greatly offended—not with the absence of decorum, but with the dangerous wit, that could laugh in public at the cowl and shaven crown, points which constituted the greatest portion ...
— The Wits and Beaux of Society - Volume 1 • Grace Wharton and Philip Wharton
... a self-reliance from her condition, that might otherwise have been wanting in one so young, and of a native disposition so truly gentle. An aunt had impressed on her mind the lessons of female decorum; and her uncle, who had abandoned the world on account of a strong religious sentiment, had aided in making her deeply devout and keenly conscientious. The truth of her character rendered her indisposed to the deception which Raoul was practising, while feminine weakness inclined ...
— The Wing-and-Wing - Le Feu-Follet • J. Fenimore Cooper
... went to bed, ate his meals, and went to his bath, rejoiced or was wroth (both very rarely, it is true), even smoked his pipe and played cards (two great innovations!), not after his own fancy, not in a way of his own, but according to the custom and ordinance of his fathers—with due decorum and formality. He was tall, well built, and stout; his voice was soft and rather husky, as is so often the case with virtuous people in Russia; he was scrupulously neat in his dress and linen, and wore white cravats and full-skirted snuff-coloured coats, but his noble ...
— A Desperate Character and Other Stories • Ivan Turgenev
... said, 'I pray you speak no more words, not at all till I bid you speak. I am a very great lord here; you shall observe gravity and decorum or never will I bring you to the King. You are not made ...
— Privy Seal - His Last Venture • Ford Madox Ford
... named D'wiri, who knew every step of every dance, saw this and said in his stern way that it was shameless. But he was old and was, moreover, in fear for the decorum of his own obsequies if these outrageous departures from custom were approved or allowed ...
— The Keepers of the King's Peace • Edgar Wallace
... gathering the grey sky into their white arms. Mr. Gregg, at the back of the stand, forgetting for once decorum, white and trembling, was hoarse ...
— The Prelude to Adventure • Hugh Walpole
... come, one's race is run, one's doom is sealed; Death knocks at the door, Death stares one in the face; the breath is out of the body; the grave closes over one; sic itur ad astra [Lat][Vergil]; de mortuis nil nisi bonum[Lat]; dulce et decorum est pro patria mori [Lat][Horace]; honesta mors turpi vita potior [Lat][Tacitus]; "in adamantine chains shall death be bound" [Pope]; mors ultima linea rerum est [Lat][Girace];; ominia mors aequat [Lat][Claudianus]; "Spake the grisly Terror" [Paradise ...
— Roget's Thesaurus
... daughter of the Tsar; Czar, Czarevich, and Czarevna being the modern form, and Czarina instead of Tsaritsa. The historian may for convenience omit the surname thus created, but in Russia it would be a great breach of decorum to do so. ...
— A Short History of Russia • Mary Platt Parmele
... nevertheless as generous as she was virtuous, fell into deep thought how she might save her Christian brethren. She soon came to her resolve. She delayed the execution of it a little, only out of a sense of virgin decorum, which, in its turn, made her still more resolute. She issued forth by herself, in the sight of all, not muffling up her beauty, nor yet exposing it. She withdrew her eyes beneath a veil, and, attired neither ...
— Stories from the Italian Poets: With Lives of the Writers, Vol. 2 • Leigh Hunt
... attention to missionaries was often the result of their rules of politeness, as it is a part of the Indian's code. Their councils are eminent for decorum, and no person is interrupted during a speech. Some Indians, after respectfully listening to a missionary, thought they would relate to him some of their legends, but the good man could not restrain his indignation, but pronounced them foolish fables, while what he ...
— Legends, Traditions, and Laws of the Iroquois, or Six Nations, and History of the Tuscarora Indians • Elias Johnson
... with decorum, Harry being appointed to prosecute him, and George to defend the prisoner. George did it vigorously, too, but it was a plain and palpable case, and he was found guilty. This proceeding was another entirely new manner of treating an offender, and the people marveled at the attempt to defend ...
— The Wonder Island Boys: Conquest of the Savages • Roger Thompson Finlay
... Camlachie, though sorely agitated for the integrity of that important borough, threatened by the Dreep-daily Extension with immediate intersection, yet preserve a becoming decorum of feature. The senior bailie bows a dignified assent to the protestations of the Parliamentary solicitor, that it is quite impossible the bill can pass—such an interference with vested rights never can be sanctioned by a British House of Commons, &c. &c.; and then, with a shrewd eye to future ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 58, Number 358, August 1845 • Various
... formal England, she had grown up to be such as she was, so without manner, so without art, yet so capable of doing and thinking for herself. She had no reserve, apparently, yet never seemed to sin against decorum; it never appeared to restrain her that anything she might wish to do was contrary to custom; she had nothing of what could be called shyness in her intercourse with him; and yet he was conscious of ...
— Sketches and Studies • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... things like that to her, because she had promised Selina, who made a great point of this, that she would never be too familiar with her. Selina was not without her ideas of decorum—very far from it indeed; only she erected them in such queer places. She was not familiar with her children's governess; she was not even familiar with the children themselves. That was why after all ...
— A London Life; The Patagonia; The Liar; Mrs. Temperly • Henry James
... Virginia Reel, put a slight intoxicating vibration into the air, and healthy youth at last asserted itself in a score of freckled but buxom girls in white muslin, with romping figures and laughter, at the lower end of the room. Still a rigid decorum reigned among the elder dancers, and the figures were called out in grave formality, as if, to Brooks's fancy, they were hymns given from the pulpit, until at the close of the set, in half-real, half-mock despair, he turned desperately ...
— Under the Redwoods • Bret Harte
... to say a few words about the action of the Woman's Suffrage Convention just held here. It is everywhere spoken of as a complete success, both in point of numbers and the orderly decorum with which its proceedings were conducted. But I desire to call special attention to the resolutions adopted. When I framed them, I looked beyond the action of this Convention. These resolutions place the cause of equal rights far in advance of any position heretofore taken. ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume II • Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and Matilda Joslyn Gage
... housekeeper will keep house for the art's sake and will resent any domestic event which upsets her housekeeping sense of decorum, even though the event may have splendid home-making possibilities. The mother with the home-making instincts will invite, and aid, and will conceive events, which, though they upset her housekeeping routine, will contribute ...
— The Eugenic Marriage, Vol. 3 (of 4) - A Personal Guide to the New Science of Better Living and Better Babies • W. Grant Hague
... their uniformity of behaviour throughout the world which makes them so uninteresting from a spectacular point of view. A place does not receive its tone from them (save possibly Bournemouth) but from their inferiors; and here, in this matter of public decorum, the comparison is to the credit of Italy. It is beside the point to say that the one lies relatively remote, while the other is convenient for cheap trips from a capital. Set Viareggio down at the very gate of Rome and fill it with the scum of Trastevere: the difference would still be there. ...
— Alone • Norman Douglas
... tenderly by the critical Jack Ketch. Mr. Channing must be hung, that's true. He must be hung in terrorem —and for this there is no help under the sun; but then we shall do him all manner of justice, and observe every species of decorum, and be especially careful of his feelings, and hang him gingerly and gracefully, with a silken cord, as Spaniards hang their grandees of the blue blood, their ...
— The Art Of Writing & Speaking The English Language - Word-Study and Composition & Rhetoric • Sherwin Cody
... de Societe, where a boudoir decorum is, or ought always to be, preserved; where sentiment never surges into passion, and where humour never overflows into boisterous merriment."—Frederick Locker's Preface ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 103, September 10, 1892 • Various
... to the search under stress of persuasive argument from Mr. Troy) resented this ingenious idea as an insult. She declared that if Isabel was watched the girl should know of it instantly from her own lips. The police listened with perfect resignation and decorum, and politely shifted their ground. A certain suspicion (they remarked) always rested in cases of this sort on the servants. Would her Ladyship object to private inquiries into the characters and proceedings ...
— My Lady's Money • Wilkie Collins
... from the writings of Francis Audaine, since in the happenings which now concern us he plays but a subsidiary part. The Captain had an utter faith in decorum, and therefore it was, as he records, an earth-staggering shock when the following day, on the Pantiles, in full sight of the best company at the Wells, Captain Audaine was apprehended. He met disaster like an old acquaintance, and hummed a scrap of song—"O, gin I were a bonny bird,"—and ...
— Gallantry - Dizain des Fetes Galantes • James Branch Cabell
... her toward Judge Thayer's office, whither she was bound with the mail. Behind them the loafers snickered and passed quips of doubtful humor and undoubted obscenity, but careful to present the face of decorum until Morgan was well beyond their voices. No matter what doubt they had of his luck holding with Seth Craddock, they were not of a mind to make a ...
— Trail's End • George W. Ogden
... before you some of the circumstances of this plague of hunger: of all the calamities which beset and waylay the life of man, this comes the nearest to our heart, and is that wherein the proudest of us all feels himself to be nothing more than he is: but I find myself unable to manage it with decorum; these details are of a species of horror so nauseous and disgusting, they are so degrading to the sufferers and to the hearers, they are so humiliating to human nature itself, that, on better thoughts, I find it more advisable to throw a pall over this hideous object, and ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. III. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... breaches of decorum, Katty would raise her arm in a threatening attitude, shake her head at them, and look up at the clergy, intimating more by her earnestness of gesticulation than met the ear. Several songs again went round, of which, truth to tell, Father Philomy's ...
— The Station; The Party Fight And Funeral; The Lough Derg Pilgrim • William Carleton
... black-eyed Tartar with four very miserable little fox-terriers, who shivered and trembled and jumped reluctantly through hoops. The audience liked this, and cried and shouted and threw paper pellets at the dogs. A stout perspiring Jew in a shabby evening suit came forward and begged for decorum. Then there appeared a stout little man in a top hat who wished to recite verses of, I gathered, a violent indecency. I was uncomfortable about Vera Michailovna, but I need not have been. The indecency was of no importance to her, and she was interested in the human tragedy of the ...
— The Secret City • Hugh Walpole
... infrequent. In company with the devoted widow, whose evidence had almost saved her from an adverse verdict, she arranged placid tea-parties at which the casual observer might have imagined that the rules of social decorum were more strictly enforced than in the household of an archbishop. Inquiry, however, might have revealed the fact that a large proportion of the ladies present at these gatherings had either shaken off the matrimonial shackles, or proposed to do so, whether ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 99., October 11, 1890 • Various
... being over, breakfast and classes proceeded as usual, a more than ordinary atmosphere of decorum pervading the establishment, for Miss Gibbs had announced that the afternoon's excursion depended upon the mark-book, and the girls knew that she would keep her word. The veriest slackers paid attention to lessons that morning, and even Raymonde for once ...
— The Madcap of the School • Angela Brazil
... introduced this incident to show the tender side of George's heart. His gravity, decorum, and thoughtful habit were such as almost to preclude the possibility of his being captivated by a "lowland beauty." But this incident shows that he was much like the average boy of Christendom ...
— From Farm House to the White House • William M. Thayer
... appearance of modesty be any thing else than the custom of the country; and allege that, notwithstanding so much decency and decorum, they have their peculiar modes of intriguing, and embrace every possible opportunity of putting them in practice; and that, in these intrigues, they frequently scruple not to stab the paramour they had invited to their arms, as the surest method of preventing ...
— Sketches of the Fair Sex, in All Parts of the World • Anonymous
... Adam; Eve; personal memories; Adam's eulogy of Eve, criticised by Raphael; Milton's philosophy of love and beauty; the opinions of Raphael, of Satan, and of Mrs. Millamant; the comparative merits of Adam and Eve; Milton's great epic effects; his unity and large decorum; morning and evening; architectural effects; the close of Paradise Lost; Addison and Bentley; Paradise Regained; the choice of subject; Milton's favourite theme—temptation; other possible subjects; the Harrying of Hell; Samson Agonistes; ...
— Milton • Sir Walter Alexander Raleigh
... with whatever she was pleased to give. While he was speaking, she took off a string of pearls which she wore round her neck, and gave it to Juan Ortiz the interpreter to present it in her name to Soto, as she could not deliver it with her own hands without transgressing the rules of decorum[160]. Soto stood up and received it with much respect, and presented her in return with a ruby which he wore on his finger. Thus peace was ratified with this princess, who now returned to the other side of the river, all the Spaniards ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 5 • Robert Kerr
... outpouring of prayer without the dew of happy tears to bear witness in her eyes to her riven heart? Her piety was, indeed, her great indulgence, so eager, so luxurious, pursued with such appetite as I have never seen in England or France, nor (assuredly) in Padua, where there is no zest, but much decorum, in the practice of religion. To see her in church was, as it were, to see a child in her mother's lap—able to laugh, to play, to sulk and pout, ah, and to tell a fib, being so sure of forgiveness! No secret too childish to be kept back, ...
— The Fool Errant • Maurice Hewlett
... good, but not wise. He offended the Russian demand for decorum in a czar by riding through the streets on a furious stallion, like a Cossack of the Don. In religion he was lax, favoring secretly the Latin Church. He chose Poles instead of Russians for his secretaries. And he ...
— Historic Tales, Vol. 8 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris
... feelings, as solicitous for the credit of the family, as aristocratic in her ideas of what was due to them, as anybody of sense and honesty could well be. She was a benevolent, charitable, good woman, and capable of strong attachments, most correct in her conduct, strict in her notions of decorum, and with manners that were held a standard of good-breeding. She had a cultivated mind, and was, generally speaking, rational and consistent; but she had prejudices on the side of ancestry; she had a value for rank and consequence, which blinded her ...
— Persuasion • Jane Austen
... yet her manner was marked by a quiet, grave dignity, and a peculiar reticence, at variance with the prevailing type of young ladyhood, now alas! too dominant; whose premature emancipation from home rule, and old-fashioned canons of decorum renders "American girlhood" synonymous with flippant pertness. Moulded by two women who were imbued with the spirit of Richter's admonition: "Girls like the priestesses of old, should be educated only in sacred places, and never hear, much less see, what is rude, immoral ...
— At the Mercy of Tiberius • August Evans Wilson
... mixed with them were a good many soldiers, in lean, lank, and dinnerless undresses, and sporting attenuated rattans. These troops belonged to the various regiments then in town. Police officers, also, were conspicuous in their uniforms. At first perfect silence and decorum prevailed. ...
— Redburn. His First Voyage • Herman Melville
... rest their opposition on the points of decorum and prudence, but went so far as to deny the authority of the House in this respect, and said that it was an usurpation assumed in bad times, in the year 1641; that while their privileges and authority were used in defense of the rights of ...
— The Spirit of American Government - A Study Of The Constitution: Its Origin, Influence And - Relation To Democracy • J. Allen Smith
... Fred sprang to their feet as he entered the door, and Joe actually shouted, so great was his joy and relief; but he was speedily made to understand by the officers that another breach of decorum as flagrant would result in his expulsion ...
— Down the Slope • James Otis
... allusion to his sister, that could be construed into a desire she should awaken any unusual or extraordinary sentiment of preference. Much and fervently as he desired such an event, there was an innate sense of decorum, and it may be secret pride, that caused him to abstain from any observation having the remotest tendency to compromise the spotless delicacy of his adored sister; and such he would have considered any expression ...
— Wacousta: A Tale of the Pontiac Conspiracy (Complete) • John Richardson
... in the dress Dwindling the clothes to nothingness Saving, for due decorum placed, A huckaback about the waist, Or wanton towel-et, whose touch Haply may spare to chafe o'ermuch: A languid frame, from head to feet Prankt in the arduous prickle-heat: An erring fly, that here and there Enwraths the crimsoned sufferer: An upward toe, whose skill enjoys The slipper's ...
— Rhymes of the East and Re-collected Verses • John Kendall (AKA Dum-Dum)
... their origin, there was some terrible stain on Harold, and that society could not admit them; so that if I persisted in casting in my lot with them, I should share the ban. Indeed, he would have thought my own good sense and love of decorum would have taught me that the abode of two such youths would be no fit place for the daughter of such respected parents, and there was a good deal more that I could not understand about interceding with his sister, and her overlooking my offence in consideration ...
— My Young Alcides - A Faded Photograph • Charlotte M. Yonge
... gold, a blade clasped to his body by the left forearm, the hilt above his shoulder; and spacious as the chamber was, a row of dignitaries civil, military, and ecclesiastical lined the walls each in prescribed regalia. The hush already noticed was observable here, indicative of rigid decorum and awful reverence. "Rise, Prince of India," ...
— The Prince of India - Or - Why Constantinople Fell - Volume 1 • Lew. Wallace
... difficult to answer this question with due regard to the laws of God and man, and at the same time give Galatea a lesson in social decorum. "I suppose," he said slowly, "you'll just have to follow ...
— The Guests Of Hercules • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... with a garden of a couple of acres, shaded by a noble cedar in its midst. There were four children, but he was the only boy. His mother belonged to an old and very religious family, and inherited all its traditions of Calvinistic piety and decorum. Her love for this boy was boundless, and she had a double ambition for him, which was that he might become a minister of God's Word, and in due time might marry Jane Berdoe, the only daughter of the Reverend Charles Berdoe, M.A., and Euphemia, her dearest friend. ...
— Catharine Furze • Mark Rutherford
... chaffers and chaffed, testified to recognized conditions; and there is about a hoary institution a saving grace which cannot be transferred to parvenus. Practised in a modern Cis-Atlantic seat of learning, as I have seen it done, without the historical background, the same disregard of normal decorum becomes undraped rowdyism—boxing without gloves. The scene and its concurrences at Oxford have been witnessed by too many, and too often described, for me to attempt them. I shall narrate only my particular experiences. ...
— From Sail to Steam, Recollections of Naval Life • Captain A. T. Mahan
... mirth," called out the marchesa from the sofa; "it is most indecent. Let the act that buries a great name at least be conducted with decorum." ...
— The Italians • Frances Elliot
... conclusion. She said to him that the one was not intended to represent the other, and that any identification of the two would be protested against as not only false in fact and tending to perpetuate false notions about art, but also as a gross breach of social decorum. Yet these declarations concerning Elizabeth Evans have been repeated, and to them has been added the assertion that she actually copied in Adam Bede the history and sermons of Dinah Morris. [Footnote: "Dinah Morris and Elizabeth Evans," an article by L. Buckley in The Century for August, 1882.] ...
— George Eliot; A Critical Study of Her Life, Writings & Philosophy • George Willis Cooke
... than savages. When murder and crimes of all sorts are committed without scruple, without even thought. Latterly things have changed, and these orgies are less frequent among the Breeds, or, at least, conducted with more regard for decorum. But we are talking of some years ago, at a time when the Breeds had to learn the meaning of civilization—before good order and government were thoroughly established in this great Western country; in the ...
— The Story of the Foss River Ranch • Ridgwell Cullum
... assembled in the dining-room. Under the circumstances, we were naturally not a cheerful party. The reaction after a shock is always trying, and I think we were all suffering from it. Decorum and good breeding naturally enjoined that our demeanour should be much as usual, yet I could not help wondering if this self-control were really a matter of great difficulty. There were no red eyes, no signs of secretly ...
— The Mysterious Affair at Styles • Agatha Christie
... faciunt id lutea russaque vela 75 Et ferrugina, cum magnis intenta theatris Per malos volgata trabesque trementia flutant; Namque ibi consessam caveai subter et omnem Scaenai speciem, patrum coetumque decorum Inficiunt ...
— Helps to Latin Translation at Sight • Edmund Luce
... remember that he was in a strange house with an unknown lady, and did not trouble himself with decorum. He strode up and down the room, scowled and nervously fingered his waistcoat. The fact that the Jewess had lowered herself in his eyes by her dishonest action, made him feel bolder ...
— The Duel and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov
... not happy now? Art thou not mine? Am I not thine? There lives within my soul A lofty courage—'tis love gives it me! 40 I ought to be less open—ought to hide My heart more from thee—so decorum dictates:[651:1] But where in this place could'st thou seek for truth, If in my mouth thou did'st not ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge - Vol I and II • Samuel Taylor Coleridge
... well as of others. While the dregs of the nation elevate the flatterers and corrupters of the people to station—while cut-throats swear, drink, and clothe themselves in rags, in order to fraternize with the populace, Buzot possesses the morality of Socrates, and maintains the decorum of Scipio. So they pull down his house, and banish him as they did Aristides. I am astonished that they have not issued a decree that his name should ...
— Madame Roland, Makers of History • John S. C. Abbott
... we want a lift," cries a brisk voice, and the couple of great steeds—they might have been Flanders mares or Clydesdale horses, so powerful were they over the shoulders, so mighty in the flanks—almost swerved out of their direct line and their decorum. Two fellows suddenly started up from a couch where they had lain at length on a hay-stack, slid down the height, crashed over an intervening bit of waste land, and arrested the waggoner in his smock-frock ...
— Girlhood and Womanhood - The Story of some Fortunes and Misfortunes • Sarah Tytler
... grave, but her mouth twitched. The sense of the ludicrous overcame her sense of decorum, and again she laughed until the tears ...
— The Baronet's Bride • May Agnes Fleming
... of Rome became every day more deplorable. The city swarmed with Spanish adventurers, assassins, prostitutes and informers; murder and robbery were committed with impunity, heretics and Jews were admitted to the city on payment of bribes, and the pope himself shamelessly cast aside all show of decorum, living a purely secular and immoral life, and indujging in the chase, dancing, stage plays and indecent orgies. One of his boon companions was Jem, the brother of the sultan Bayezid, detained as ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia
... the handle of the door, when she immediately rose and stood before him, an awful politeness and decorum on her face, but the fire of Bruenhilde the warrior maiden ...
— The Galaxy - Vol. 23, No. 1 • Various
... person, who shall be nameless, filled the situation of Plumian Professor of Astronomy at Oxford. He was a great stickler for decorum, and all due respect to his office. One day he received a letter by the post, directed to himself, as the Plumbian Professor. He shook with indignation. What an insult! Plumbian professor! Leaden professor! Was it meant to insinuate that there was any thing of a leaden quality ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 14, No. 379, Saturday, July 4, 1829. • Various
... intimacy which appeared to subsist between him and our enemies. When he left home, it was averred, he was attended by troops of them obedient to his beck and call, and spies had observed him banqueting them at his counter, the rats sitting erect and comporting themselves with perfect decorum. I resolved to investigate the matter for myself. Looking into his house through an unshuttered window, I perceived him in truth surrounded by feasting and gambolling rats; but when the door was opened in obedience to my attendants' ...
— The Twilight of the Gods, and Other Tales • Richard Garnett
... Two years later the elder Churchill died, and the son was elected to succeed him in his curacy and lectureship. His emoluments amounted to less than L100 a year, and he increased his income by teaching in a girls' school. He fulfilled his various duties with decorum for a while, but his marriage proved unfortunate, and he spent much of his time in dissipation in the society of Robert Lloyd. He was separated from his wife in 1761, and would have been imprisoned for debt but for the timely help of Lloyd's ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 6, Slice 3 - "Chitral" to "Cincinnati" • Various
... all assembling to public worship astonished the natives greatly, though they always behaved with the utmost decorum when admitted into the house where the ceremony takes place. On the day in question the minister endeavoured to explain the sacred mysteries of our religion to a number of the chiefs who were present. They listened attentively to all he said, and expressed no doubts ...
— A Narrative of a Nine Months' Residence in New Zealand in 1827 • Augustus Earle
... on man, derived from their close intimacy with him. Maida deported himself with a gravity becoming his age and size, and seemed to consider himself called upon to preserve a great degree of dignity and decorum in our society. As he jogged along a little distance ahead of us, the young dogs would gambol about him, leap on his neck, worry at his ears, and endeavor to tease him into a frolic. The old dog would keep on for a long time ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to Prose, Vol. IX (of X) - America - I • Various
... he would, when between eighty and ninety years of age, commence a regular, and, in point of style, most finished composition. Besides, independent of everything else, what man would so outrage all decorum as to call himself the admiration of the age? for so is Grammont extolled in the Memoirs, with a variety of other encomiastic expressions; although, perhaps, such vanity has not been without example. Hamilton, it is true, says that he acts as Grammont's secretary, and only ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre
... than that, to the part of the house it stood in. Maggie never had this, nor did she recognize it in me. Her fear was a perfectly simple although uncomfortable one, centering around the bedrooms where, in each bed, she nightly saw dead and gone Bentons laid out in all the decorum of ...
— The Confession • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... use, in time the rod Becomes more mock'd than fear'd; so our decrees, Dead to infliction, to themselves are dead; And liberty plucks justice by the nose; The baby beats the nurse, and quite athwart Goes all decorum. ...
— Measure for Measure • William Shakespeare [Collins edition]
... discipline. I am not willing to say that our young people or even our older ones, are better than those of other places, but from the very beginning everybody was given to understand that they had to live up to a certain decorum, that is, men and boys have to take off their hats and disturbing conversation ...
— Library Work with Children • Alice I. Hazeltine
... then. The birds were singing in the sunshine, and the rural aspect was dear to the hearts of the older people. They rose and walked about in the fragrant air. Now and then some one bowed gravely to Stephen. There was a Sunday decorum over all. ...
— A Little Girl in Old New York • Amanda Millie Douglas
... seem to have enjoyed from early times a reputation for rough manners and deceit (Stein, Ancient Khotan, p. 49 n). Stein, p. 70, recalls Hiuan Tsang's opinion: "The disposition of the men is fierce and impetuous, and they are mostly false and deceitful. They make light of decorum and politeness, and esteem learning but little." Stein adds, p. 70, with regard to Polo's statement: "Without being able to adduce from personal observation evidence as to the relative truth of the latter statement, I believe that the judgements recorded by both those great travellers ...
— The Travels of Marco Polo, Volume 2 • Marco Polo and Rustichello of Pisa
... both sides of the Channel, the British journals complaining of the Napoleonic dictatorship in Continental affairs, while the "Moniteur" bristled with articles whose short, sharp sentences could come only from the First Consul. The official Press hitherto had been characterized by dull decorum, and great was the surprise of the older Courts when the French official journals compared the policy of the Court of St. James with the methods of the Barbary rovers and the designs of the Miltonic ...
— The Life of Napoleon I (Volumes, 1 and 2) • John Holland Rose
... us, if we look at them with imaginative and sympathetic eye, and we owe much to the art that reveals to us the tragedy of the parlour and the frockcoat, and analyses the bitterness and sorrow and high passion that may underlie a life of outer smoothness and decorum. Still, criticism cannot accept this as the final and exclusive limitation of imaginative work. Art is nothing if not catholic and many-sided, and it is certainly not exhausted by mere domestic possibilities. Goethe's fine and luminous ...
— Studies in Literature • John Morley
... his habit of public decorum in his persecution of the Duke; and he tells how on one occasion at a ball at Bedford House he and Brand and George Selwyn plagued the pitiful old creature, who "wriggled, and shuffled, and lisped, and winked, and spied" his way through the company, with a conversation at ...
— The Art of Letters • Robert Lynd
... his client should abstain from any appearance of attempting to deceive the Judge, and informed him, as the fact was, that his lordship was scrupulously particular in all points of etiquette and decorum. Moreover, I added as a last word, "The Judge is too shrewd to ...
— The Reminiscences Of Sir Henry Hawkins (Baron Brampton) • Henry Hawkins Brampton
... quite beside herself. She knew that decorum required that she should say something stiff and stately to repress such language, but if all her future character for propriety had depended on it, she could not bring herself to say a word. She knew that Gertrude, when ...
— The Three Clerks • Anthony Trollope
... free intoxicating air of poetry and nature. Men and women no longer exchange dull speeches; they converse with easy spontaneity and delight us by the beauty of their language. A poet may be a dramatist at last without feeling that his imagination must be held back like a restive horse lest the decorum of human ...
— The Growth of English Drama • Arnold Wynne
... a period of about fifty steps somewhere in the middle of the three hundred and fifteen where the patient, abandoning the comparative decorum of the earlier movements, whizzes about till she looks like a ...
— A Man of Means • P. G. Wodehouse and C. H. Bovill
... elderly councillor, who was constantly scandalised by Denis Quirk's want of municipal decorum. ...
— Grey Town - An Australian Story • Gerald Baldwin
... popular, but he lacked in discipline. His rule was lax, and there can be no doubt that from the commencement of his administration there had been a decline in what may be termed the morale of the House. Something of its reputation for dignity and decorum ...
— Reminiscences of Sixty Years in Public Affairs, Vol. 2 • George S. Boutwell
... was the order of the day within our hut, the elements without seemed desirous of celebrating the occasion with equal emphasis and greater decorum. The eastern sky was massed with swaying auroral light, the most vivid and beautiful display that I had ever seen—fold on fold the arches and curtains of vibrating luminosity rose and spread across the sky, to slowly fade and yet again ...
— Scott's Last Expedition Volume I • Captain R. F. Scott
... humour of which delighted all those lively revellers. And when with adroit mimicry their slight arms and mincing steps mocked that grand and masculine measure so associated with images of Spartan austerity and decorum, the exhibition became so humorously ludicrous, that perhaps a Spartan himself would have been compelled to laugh at it. But the merriment rose to its height, when the Egyptian, who had withdrawn for a few minutes, reappeared with a Median robe and mitred cap, and calling out in his barbarous African ...
— Pausanias, the Spartan - The Haunted and the Haunters, An Unfinished Historical Romance • Lord Lytton
... ranks of worshippers to-night, though for myself I have no faith in worship, . . the gods I ween are deaf, and care not a jot whether we mortals weep or sing. Nevertheless I shall look on with fitting gravity, and deport myself with due decorum throughout the ceremonious Ritual, though verily I tell thee, reverend Zel, 'tis tedious and monotonous at best, . . and concerning the poor maiden-sacrifice, it is a shuddering horror ...
— Ardath - The Story of a Dead Self • Marie Corelli |
