"Feign" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... at! Juve, who had been congratulating himself on his prisoner's frankness, grew angry with what he believed was a culpable reservation. Why did the corporal, who, up to this, had spoken so freely, now feign ignorance of the gun piece affair?... Well, he would find out his prisoner's reasons presently.... Not wishing to scare him, Juve changed the subject.... He had any number of questions to ask the culprit. Did he not know Vagualame, ...
— A Nest of Spies • Pierre Souvestre
... him that now there is a Custom amongst us of making an Entertainm't at husking of Indian Corn whereto all the neighboring Swains are invited and after the Corn is finished they like the Hottentots give three Cheers or huzza's but cannot carry in the husks without a Rhum bottle; they feign great Exertion but do nothing till Rhum enlivens them, when all is done in a trice, then after a hearty Meal about 10 at Night ...
— Home Life in Colonial Days • Alice Morse Earle
... loosening from me swift she said: "O why, why feign to be The one I had meant!—to whom I have sped To fly with, being so sorrily wed!" - 'Twas thus and thus ...
— Late Lyrics and Earlier • Thomas Hardy
... cornered either to dodge or to lie flat and feign death. So we practiced dodging, our running being more for the purpose of gaining endurance and to follow ...
— Hunting with the Bow and Arrow • Saxton Pope
... vigilance of his guards, and to make his way from Hyrcania towards the frontiers of his own kingdom; but each time he was pursued and caught without effecting his purpose. The Parthian monarch was no doubt vexed at his pertinacity, and on the second occasion thought it prudent to feign, if he did not even really feel, offence: he banished his ungrateful brother-in-law from his presence, but otherwise visited his crime with no severer penalty than ridicule. Choosing to see in his attempts to change the place of his ...
— The Seven Great Monarchies Of The Ancient Eastern World, Vol 6. (of 7): Parthia • George Rawlinson
... there was mischief in the wind Rushbrook felt sure, and his heart misgave him the more so, as occasionally the eyes of both were turned towards him. After a little reflection, Rushbrook determined to feign intoxication, as he had so often done before: he called for another pint, for some time talked very loud, and at last laid his head on the table; after a time he lifted it up again, drank more, and then fell back on the ...
— The Poacher - Joseph Rushbrook • Frederick Marryat
... severance made his reason vainest vain. How dread the day I came to her abode * And saw the writ they wrote on doorway lain! I wept, till gave I earth to drink my grief; * But still to near and far[FN49] I did but feign: Then strayed I till in waste a lion sprang * On me, and but for flattering words had slain: I soothed him: so he spared me and lent me aid, * He too might haply of love's taste complain. O devotee, that idlest in ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 5 • Richard F. Burton
... not candor; a little sympathy, if not confidence. But you keep yourself intrenched in a pretended which paralyzes me. Oh, not for the reason you think; for, ignorant as you may be, or indifferent as you feign to be, you are none the less what you are, monseigneur, and there is nothing—nothing, mark me! which can cause you ...
— The Man in the Iron Mask • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... fifty-first birthday, and the double festival was celebrated by a dinner at Mr. Cadell's, when complimentary verses from that wretched poet, Hayley, made the great man with the button-hole mouth blush or feign to blush. That was a proud day for Gibbon, and a proud day for Messrs. ...
— Old and New London - Volume I • Walter Thornbury
... dome Towering o'er Saxony, rises to the skies; In which thy fearful mind confines the tempest. Which agitates at the court, a nation of enviers. Look at this fragile grandeur, And cease at last to admire The pompous shining of a city Where all feign to adore thee." ...
— Frederick The Great and His Family • L. Muhlbach
... conscience is not entirely abolished. Dr. Kerzhenzev kills his friend, obeying a mental suggestion, which now forbids him to do it, now urges him on. Then, like the "half-insane" or those sick people who feign madness in order more easily to attain their end, this man suggests to himself that he is in reality insane. This idea gets a hold on him after the murder and fills his soul with mortal terror, the exposure of ...
— Contemporary Russian Novelists • Serge Persky
... almost unceasingly, wearying not of each other's discourse, and sustaining the interests and the enjoyment of that interchange of thoughts by flying from topic to topic just as their unshackled imagination suggested. But Fernand never questioned Nisida concerning the motive which had induced her to feign dumbness and deafness for so many years; she had given him to understand that family reasons of the deepest importance, and involving dreadful mysteries from the contemplation of which she recoiled with horror, ...
— Wagner, the Wehr-Wolf • George W. M. Reynolds
... men can dream of may be accomplished; all men may accept Christianity, and all the reforms desired by the Bellamys may be brought about with every possible addition and improvement, but if the hypocrisy which rules nowadays still exists, if men do not profess the truth they know, but continue to feign belief in what they do not believe and veneration for what they do not respect, their condition will remain the same, or even grow worse and worse. The more men are freed from privation; the more telegraphs, telephones, books, papers, and journals there are; the more means ...
— The Kingdom of God is within you • Leo Tolstoy
... boy from his Father, they having both followed the women up to London, they were both taken and put into several prisons asunder. Whereupon shortly after the Boy confessed that he was taught and suborned to devise, and feign those things against them, and had persevered in that wickedness by the counsel of his Father, and some others, whom envy, revenge and hope of gain had prompted on to that devillish design and villany; ...
— Discovery of Witches - The Wonderfull Discoverie of Witches in the Countie of Lancaster • Thomas Potts
... to escape ducking in a horse-pond. Soft, here be some of them coming. Yestere'en I committed sacrilege in a knapsack, and stole a small Bible from amid great plunder for my salvation. Now will I feign to read it, and I doubt not the sin will be pardoned, for self-preservation is the second law of nature, as I have generally observed fornication to be ...
— Cromwell • Alfred B. Richards
... the mosaic of book-spines in the tall cases, the sunlight splashed on the faded pastel colors of the carpet, the soft-tinted autumn landscape outside the French windows, the trophies of Indian and Filipino and German weapons on the walls. He could easily feign relaxation here in the library of "Greyrock," as long as he looked only at these familiar inanimate things and avoided the five people gathered in the room with him, for ...
— Dearest • Henry Beam Piper
... father has no coat!" she sobbed. "Poor man, he fears disgrace and dreads the loss of preferment and of a royal decoration, perhaps. He will have to feign sickness as an excuse for his absence; but I hope he realizes now how degraded and unhappy I must feel with my last year's gowns and made-over millinery—and your poor sister's ancient bonnets, I dare not look at ...
— Tales of Aztlan • George Hartmann
... of view; Sure, if they catch, to spoil the toy at most, To covet flying, and regret when lost: At last, to follies youth could scarce defend, It grows their age's prudence to pretend; Ashamed to own they gave delight before, Reduced to feign it, when they give no more: As hags hold Sabbaths, less for joy than spite, So these their merry, miserable night; Still round and round the ghosts of beauty glide, And haunt the places where their honour died. See how the world its ...
— English Poets of the Eighteenth Century • Selected and Edited with an Introduction by Ernest Bernbaum
... powder, and long baths, late hours, and sleep at day-time, in a darkened room. Her face was utterly devoid of expression. One might have fancied that its muscles had become relaxed after terrible efforts to feign or to conceal some violent emotions; and there was something melancholy, almost terrifying in the eternal, and perhaps involuntary smile, which curved her lips. She wore a dress of black velvet, with slashed sleeves and bodice, a new design of ...
— The Count's Millions - Volume 1 (of 2) • Emile Gaboriau
... cast off every appearance of anxiety and to feign easy indifference, for the station people were showing somewhat too much curiosity about this train, whose crew were strangers, and concerning which the telegraph had sent them no advices. The practised spy was full of resources, but their ...
— Historic Tales, Vol. 1 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris
... an Inn. Heraud tended him there, and learned how it was for the sake of Felice that Guy renounced so fair a bride, dowered with so rich a kingdom. But after a fortnight, when he could no longer feign illness because of the watchfullness of the Emperor and the Princess after his health, he was forced to return to court, and delay his marriage from day to day by one excuse and another, until at length fortune delivered him from the strait. The lion which Sir Guy had tamed ...
— Legends That Every Child Should Know • Hamilton Wright Mabie
... is enough, these debates overwhelm me." He tried to distract his thoughts from these subjects, and would feign to break the obsession, betake himself to Paris; but five minutes had not passed before his ...
— En Route • J.-K. (Joris-Karl) Huysmans
... Italy to Greece, the tales Which poets of an elder time have feign'd To glorify their Tempe, bred in me Desire of visiting Paradise. To Thessaly I came, and living private, Without acquaintance of more sweet companions Than the old inmates to my love, my thoughts, I day by day frequented silent groves ...
— Our Village • Mary Russell Mitford
... now come to the end of my long labours. 'There are few things not purely evil,' wrote Johnson, 'of which we can say without some emotion of uneasiness, this is the last[50].' From this emotion I cannot feign that I am free. My book has been my companion in many a sad and many a happy hour. I take leave of it with a pang of regret, but I am cheered by the hope that it may take its place, if a lowly one, among the works of men who have laboured patiently but not unsuccessfully ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 1 • Boswell, Edited by Birkbeck Hill
... I speak. I know the mirrored glass Called friendship, and the shadow shapes that pass And feign them a King's friends. I have known but one— Odysseus, him we trapped against his own Will!—who once harnessed bore his yoke right well ... Be he alive or dead of whom I tell The tale. And for the rest, touching ...
— Agamemnon • Aeschylus
... Crocus, and hyacinth, with rich inlay Broider'd the ground, more colour'd than with stone Of costliest emblem other creature here, Beast, bird, insect, or worm, durst enter none, Such was their awe of man. In shadier bower More sacred and sequester'd, though but feign'd, Pan or Sylvanus never slept, nor nymph Nor Faunus haunted. Here, in close recess, With flowers, garlands, and sweet smelling herbs, Espoused Eve deck'd first her nuptial bed, And heavenly quires the ...
— Flowers and Flower-Gardens • David Lester Richardson
... one hand-to feign sleep and sang her two words sweetly, "By-O! By-O!" and Molly joined her. Thus they rocked and hummed, a picture ...
— The Woman Who Toils - Being the Experiences of Two Gentlewomen as Factory Girls • Mrs. John Van Vorst and Marie Van Vorst
... down, he perceived Father Rielle enter the barn, lantern in hand, and with thin, high-nosed, sour countenance depicting intense surprise, eagerly explore the place for Pauline. Ringfield held his breath, but had enough sense to lie down again in the straw, and feign slumber; happily the priest did not concern himself with the loft, but the absence of the bird he had expected to find, caged and waiting, seemed to mystify him. He remained for several minutes lost in thought, then setting the lantern ...
— Ringfield - A Novel • Susie Frances Harrison
... have come, after all!—Wasn't it splendid?—wasn't it magnificent? Isn't it grand to have such great gifts, and to use them to such good purpose?—Speak, Sydney! Don't feign a coolness which is foreign ...
— The Beetle - A Mystery • Richard Marsh
... (as all men do) speak boldlier, better In their friends cause still, than in your own; But speak your utmost, yet you cannot feign, 274] I will stand by, and blush to witness it. Tell him, since I beheld him, I have lost The happiness of this life, food, and rest; A quiet bosome, and the state I went with. Tell him how he has humbled the proud, And made the ...
— The Laws of Candy - Beaumont & Fletcher's Works (3 of 10) • Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher
... song incline, The last that shall assail thine ear. None other cares my strains to hear, And scarce thou feign'st thyself therewith delighted! Nor know I well if I am loved or slighted; But this I know, thou radiant one and sweet, That, loved or spurned, I die before thy feet! Yea, I will yield this life of mine ...
— The World's Best Poetry, Volume 3 - Sorrow and Consolation • Various
... first step to secure the money was for him to feign death and thus get rid of Anne. Then he came to London, and as Wilson stopped with Mrs. Benker in order to spy on the Ashers through Alexander. As soon as he knew for certain that Powell was dead and that the money was coming to Daisy, he came down to Rickwell on ...
— A Coin of Edward VII - A Detective Story • Fergus Hume
... told me men are false, Will flatter, feign, and make an art of love: Is Chamont so? no, sure, he's more than man; Something that's near divine, and truth ...
— The Orphan - or, The Unhappy Marriage • Thomas Otway
... Pretender, then resident in Rome, his advice is; never meet a Stuart at all if you can help it; but if you must, feign ignorance of him and his grievances. If he begins to talk politics, disavow any knowledge of events in England, and escape as soon ...
— English Travellers of the Renaissance • Clare Howard
... were on exhibition in the large cities of the United States some thirty or forty years ago. These little creatures had been taught to perform military evolutions, to dance, to draw miniature carts, to feign death, etc., at the command or signal of their owner and trainer. The mere fact that they possessed memory enough to learn, retain, and remember their lessons is not proof positive of reason, but the fact of their having restrained their natural ...
— The Dawn of Reason - or, Mental Traits in the Lower Animals • James Weir
... had apparently succeeded far better with Cabalah than I, and had even gathered a following, but the new and obscure movement had not touched our out-of-the-way village, which was wholly given over to the old Sabbatian controversy, and so my knowledge of it was but shadowy. I thought it better to feign absolute ignorance, and thus draw ...
— Dreamers of the Ghetto • I. Zangwill
... Feign not an ignorance of what I speak You could not miss my meaning were it Greek: 'Tis the same language Belgium utter'd first, The same which from admiring Gallia burst. True sentiment a like expression pours; Each country says the same to ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole Volume 3 • Horace Walpole
... the tidings of their peril. But the slightest unwary movement would have led the suspicious Indians so to redouble their vigilance as to render escape utterly impossible. So skilfully did he conceal the emotions which agitated him, and so successfully did he feign entire contentment with his lot, that his captors, all absorbed in the enterprise in which they were engaged, remitted their ...
— Daniel Boone - The Pioneer of Kentucky • John S. C. Abbott
... death, which God by curse Created evil, for evil only good, Where all life dies, death lives, and nature breeds, Perverse, all monstrous, all prodigious things, Abominable, inutterable, and worse Then Fables yet have feign'd, or fear conceiv'd, Gorgons and Hydra's, and Chimera's dire. Mean while the Adversary of God and Man, Satan with thoughts inflam'd of highest design, 630 Puts on swift wings, and toward the Gates of ...
— The Poetical Works of John Milton • John Milton
... me? On forfeit of thy Life that word no more; the very Name of Friend from thee, shall be a Quarrel: How can I tell but that thou lovest my Wife, and therefore feign'd this damn'd Design to draw me from ...
— The City Bride (1696) - Or The Merry Cuckold • Joseph Harris
... our long journey. I had some misgivings about his going, for I was afraid that the villagers might suspect his character, and might ill-treat him. For myself I had no fear as long as I could continue to feign dumbness, as my character was easily kept up. He had told the Sheikh's people that I was a Nazarene lad, who was ignorant of their language. Being dumb, they considered me under the peculiar care ...
— Salt Water - The Sea Life and Adventures of Neil D'Arcy the Midshipman • W. H. G. Kingston
... with no feign'd delight Had woo'd the Maiden, day and night Had luv'd her, night and morn; What could he less than love a Maid Whose heart with so much nature play'd So ...
— Lyrical Ballads with Other Poems, 1800, Vol. 2 • William Wordsworth
... blood-red rainbows canopied the land. Spirit! no year of my eventful being Has pass'd unstain'd by crime and misery, Which flows from God's own faith. I've marked his slaves With tongues whose lies are venomous, beguile The insensate mob, and whilst one hand was red With murder, feign to stretch the other out For brotherhood and peace; and that they now Babble of love and mercy, whilst their deeds Are marked with all the narrowness and crime That freedom's young arm ...
— Percy Bysshe Shelley as a Philosopher and Reformer • Charles Sotheran
... place?" she said, with a smile of sweet confusion and arch reproach. "And yet, Federico, best beloved, why should I feign indifference, or conceal that ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 61, No. 379, May, 1847 • Various
... Vagabonds, [Sidenote: 1510] written by Matthew Huetlin of Pfortzheim, describes twenty-eight varieties of beggars, exposes their tricks, and gives a vocabulary of their jargon. Some of these beggars are said to be dangerous, threatening the wayfarer or householder who will not pay them; others feign various diseases, or make artificial wounds and disfigurations to excite pity, or take a religious garb, or drag chains to show that they had escaped from galleys, or have other plausible tales of woe and {559} of adventure. All contemporaries testify to the alarming numbers ...
— The Age of the Reformation • Preserved Smith
... subterfuges? One more wrestle, and he would have tamed her to his wish, wild falcon that she was. Then—pleasure and brave living! And she also should have her way. She should breathe into him the language of those great illusions he had found it of late so hard to feign with her; and they two would walk and rule a yielding world together. Action, passion, affairs—life explored and exploited—and at last—"que la mort me treuve plantant mes choulx—mais nonchalant d'elle!—et encore ...
— Marcella • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... flirtation. It made me very angry when I heard that; but now that I have asked you, I am quite satisfied, for it seems impossible to mix the two things together. You can't flatter a person when you have agreed to tell him his faults; you can't feign a sentiment which is real. I knew I was right, though I could not argue it out; but for the future I sha'n't mind a bit when you say nasty things to me, for I shall feel they are a proof of friendship; and I shall find fault with you on every possible occasion, just to show that I am not flirting, ...
— A Houseful of Girls • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... Pamela's majesty And her sweet sisters modesty Are fixt in each of you; you are, Distinct, what these together were; Divinest, that are really What Cariclea's feign'd to be; That are ev'ry one the Nine, And brighter here Astreas shine; View our Lucippe, and remaine In her, ...
— Lucasta • Richard Lovelace
... spousal-troth; For Aphrodite made all fade away, She who subdueth all immortal hearts And mortal. Yet even so he lifted up From earth his sword, and made as he would rush Upon his wife but other was his intent, Even as he sprang: he did but feign, to cheat Achaean eyes. Then did his brother stay His fury, and spake with pacifying words, Fearing lest all they had toiled for should be lost: "Forbear wrath, Menelaus, now: 'twere shame To slay thy wedded wife, for whose sake we Have suffered much affliction, ...
— The Fall of Troy • Smyrnaeus Quintus
... of friends or heirs be there,[33] To weep, or wish, the coming blow: No maiden, with dishevelled hair, To feel, or feign, decorous woe. ...
— The Works Of Lord Byron, Vol. 3 (of 7) • Lord Byron
... to feign sleep. His one desire was that Fontenoy should not talk to him. Fontenoy, however, was not easily taken in, and no sooner did George make his first restless movement under the rug he had drawn over him, than ...
— Sir George Tressady, Vol. I • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... art of cheating and imposture; you have converted religion into a traffic of cupidity and avarice. You pretend to hold communications with spirits, and they give for oracles nothing but your wills. You feign to read the stars, and destiny decrees only your desires. You cause idols to speak, and the gods are but the instruments of your passions. You have invented sacrifices and libations, to collect for your own profit the ...
— The Ruins • C. F. [Constantin Francois de] Volney
... At me stretch out their necks, and gobble! No, by the powers! I'll give them trouble." He verified his words. The moon, that shined full on the oak, Seem'd then to help the turkey folk. But fox, in arts of siege well versed, Ransack'd his bag of tricks accursed. He feign'd himself about to climb; Walk'd on his hinder legs sublime; Then death most aptly counterfeited, And seem'd anon resuscitated. A practiser of wizard arts Could not have fill'd so many parts. In moonlight he contrived to raise His tail, and make it seem a blaze: And countless other tricks ...
— A Hundred Fables of La Fontaine • Jean de La Fontaine
... no more I can feign patience, This heart of mine has held none dear but thee! And if mine eye hath gazed on other's beauty, Ne'er be it joyed again with sight of thee! I've sworn an oath I'll ne'er forget to love thee, And sad's this breast that pines to meet with thee! Thou'st ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 8 • Richard F. Burton
... and though it cannot exceed that original stock of ideas furnished by the internal and external senses, it has unlimited power of mixing, compounding, separating, and dividing these ideas, in all the varieties of fiction and vision. It can feign a train of events, with all the appearance of reality, ascribe to them a particular time and place, conceive them as existent, and paint them out to itself with every circumstance, that belongs to any historical ...
— An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding • David Hume et al
... without being found out, and she thought she could do so now. She planned the whole thing rather cleverly. She had a room to herself; which of course made it easier for her, and there were always the leisure hours. She made up her mind to feign headache or some slight indisposition, to go downstairs by the back way, and sell her brooch on a certain afternoon during the leisure hours. She must do it quickly, for the girls had proposed to put the necessary money for the entertainment into a bag on ...
— The School Queens • L. T. Meade
... you feign ignorance: Why, of you and Melantha; here have I staid these two hours, waiting with all the rage of a passionate, loving wife, but infinitely jealous, to take you two in the manner; for hither I was ...
— The Works Of John Dryden, Volume 4 (of 18) - Almanzor And Almahide, Marriage-a-la-Mode, The Assignation • John Dryden
... municipality, "either overawed or in complicity," makes no interference until all is over. There is no way of pursuing the guilty ones; the foreman of the jury, who goes, escorted by a thousand men, to hold an inquest, can get no testimony. The municipal officers feign to have heard nothing, neither the general alarm nor the guns fired under their windows. The other witnesses say not a word; but they declare, sotto voce, the reason for their silence. If they should testify, "they would be sure of being killed as soon as the troops should have ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 3 (of 6) - The French Revolution, Volume 2 (of 3) • Hippolyte A. Taine
... pearl, which, poets feign, Sails the unshadowed main,— The venturous bark that flings On the sweet summer wind its purpled wings In gulfs enchanted, where the siren sings, And coral reefs lie bare, Where the cold sea-maids rise to sun ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)
... sables in the wearied eye, That turns disgusted from the pompous scene, Proud without grandeur, with profusion, mean The tear for kindness past affection owes; For worth deceased the sigh from reason flows E'en well feign'd passion for our sorrows call, And real tears for mimic miseries fall: But this poor farce has neither truth nor art, To please the fancy or to touch the heart; Unlike the darkness of the sky, that pours On the dry ground its fertilizing showers; Unlike to that which ...
— The Parish Register • George Crabbe
... my own, ah! too short seemed the day For a jaunt to Downpatrick, or a trip on the sea; To express what I felt, then all language was vain, 'Twas in truth what the poets have studied to feign. ...
— James Boswell - Famous Scots Series • William Keith Leask
... wife liked you. (The time will come when I must not, dare not, you know.) But for circumstances, she would have urged you to become our guest, or even in-dweller; but you know how it all was! I need not feign any longer, ...
— Sea and Shore - A Sequel to "Miriam's Memoirs" • Mrs. Catharine A. Warfield
... after you were gone, I grew acquainted with my heart, and search'd What stir'd it so, Alas I found it love, Yet far from lust, for could I have but liv'd In presence of you, I had had my end, For this I did delude my noble Father With a feign'd Pilgrimage, and drest my self In habit of a boy, and, for I knew My birth no match for you, I was past hope Of having you. And understanding well That when I made discovery of my Sex, I could not stay with you, I made a vow By all the most religious things a Maid ...
— Philaster - Love Lies a Bleeding • Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher
... in his Journey, thus beautifully describes his situation here:—'I sat down on a bank, such as a writer of romance might have delighted to feign. I had, indeed, no trees to whisper over my head; but a clear rivulet streamed at my feet. The day was calm, the air soft, and all was rudeness, silence, and solitude. Before me, and on either side, were high hills, which, by hindering the ...
— Life Of Johnson, Volume 5 • Boswell
... cruelty with cruelty, cunning with cunning. But it was the Princes of Moscow who proved themselves masters in these Oriental arts. Their cunning was not of the vulgar sort which works for ends that are near; it was the cunning which could wait, could patiently cringe and feign loyalty and devotion, with the steady purpose of tearing in pieces. Added to this, they had the intelligence to divine the secret of power. Certain ends they kept steadily in view. The old law of succession ...
— A Short History of Russia • Mary Platt Parmele
... Cromwell a little impatiently, "that is it. He is no fool, and will not talk. This is what I thought of. That you should go to him from me, and feign that you are on his side in the matter. But will he believe that?" he ended gloomily, looking at ...
— The King's Achievement • Robert Hugh Benson
... the Sword or with the Hand, to lower the Body or to volt; therefore as in the other Guards you must make a false Time, or half Thrust, and if he parrys with the Sword, thrust where you see Light, if he parry with the Hand, you must feign a strait Thrust in order to bring his Left-hand to the Parade, at the same time raising your Point with a little Circle, pushing at the left Side with the Hand in Seconde, the Body low, whereby you baulk his Left-hand, ...
— The Art of Fencing - The Use of the Small Sword • Monsieur L'Abbat
... Syrinx, in thy flight malign, A reed once more beside our trysting-lake. Proud of my music, let me often make A song of goddesses and see their rape Profanely done on many a painted shape. So when the grape's transparent juice I drain, I quell regret for pleasures past and feign A new real grape. For holding towards the sky The empty skin, I blow it tight and lie Dream-drunk till evening, eyeing it. Tell o'er Remembered joys and plump the grape once more. Between the reeds I saw their bodies gleam Who cool no mortal fever in the stream Crying to ...
— The Defeat of Youth and Other Poems • Aldous Huxley
... had to feign inattention or yield her own. She had not the effrontery to pretend not to see, and she yielded it. He pressed it, and whenever it shrunk a quarter inch to withdraw, he shook it up and down, as an instrument that had been lent him for ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... doubt the liking is mutual," said Moore. "If she professes friendship, be certain she is sincere. She cannot feign; she scorns hypocrisy. And, Caroline, are we never to see you ...
— Shirley • Charlotte Bronte
... So well did she feign happiness that her husband heard no change in her voice as she bade him welcome, and, having travelled far that day, he soon laid himself down on the couch and fell sound asleep. Then Psyche seized the lamp and snatched off the covering, but by its light she saw stretched ...
— The Red Romance Book • Various
... guest) to me; I am contemn'd, And my rebellious subjects lift their hands Against my head: and would they aim'd no farther, Provided that I fell a sacrifice To gain you safety: that this is not feign'd, The boldness of my innocence may confirm you: Had I been privy to their bloody plot, I now had led them on, and given fair gloss To their bad cause, by being present with them: But I that yet taste of the punishment, ...
— The False One • Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher
... social creature, but merely as a spectator, who entertains himself with the grimaces of a jack-pudding, and banquets his spleen in beholding his enemies at loggerheads. That I may enjoy this disposition, abstracted from all interruption, danger, and participation, I feign myself deaf; an expedient by which I not only avoid all disputes and their consequences, but also become master of a thousand little secrets, which are every day whispered in my presence, without any suspicion of their being overheard. You saw how I handled that shallow politician ...
— The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle, Volume I • Tobias Smollett
... thoroughness necessary to cleansing. Before undertaking the operation, therefore, in order that they might be made to feel the benefit to be derived therefrom, they would need to have the matter brought home to them in a very gentle way, lest they might feign to fear taking cold, not having been used ...
— The Underground Railroad • William Still
... words of sweetness to restrain Our angry Lord, and his great wrath allay. Felon is he who shall her love betray Which is pure truth, and falsehood cannot feign, While all the rest is lie and ...
— Mont-Saint-Michel and Chartres • Henry Adams
... fees extravagant. She knew no other bliss like having Bartley sit down in their own room with her; it did not matter whether they talked; if he were busy, she would as lief sit and sew, or sit and silently look at him as he wrote. In these moments she liked to feign that she had lost him, that they had never been married, and then come back with a rush of joy to the reality. But on his club nights she heroically sent him off, and spent the evening with Mrs. Nash. ...
— A Modern Instance • William Dean Howells
... man who cheats at cards may hold a good hand by accident. In the same way, if such wonders can happen (as so much world-wide evidence declares), they may have happened at Woods Farm, and Emma, "in a very nervous state," may have feigned then, or rather did feign ...
— The Book of Dreams and Ghosts • Andrew Lang
... then, Ramsey told himself, she was a tri-di actress. She could feign an emotion—or hide one. She merely asked: "Is it true that there's no such thing as time ...
— Equation of Doom • Gerald Vance
... very rich man too many avaricious, commonly he was travel at a horse, and single for to avoid all expenses. In the evening at to arrive at the inn did feign to be indispose, to the end that one bring him the supper. He did ordered to the stable knave to bring in their room some straw, for to put in their boots he made to warm her bed and was go lo sleep. When the servant was draw again, he come ...
— English as she is spoke - or, A jest in sober earnest • Jose da Fonseca
... thrillful boy, prepared to follow the dingy lady upon the white horse, or the band in its faded chariot. He saw the yellow road, the lines of expectant people, and the sober houses. He particularly remembered an old fellow who used to sit upon a cracker box in front of the store and feign to despise such exhibitions. A thousand details of color and form surged in his mind. The old fellow upon the cracker box appeared ...
— The Red Badge of Courage - An Episode of the American Civil War • Stephen Crane
... a trifle rheumatic, and have your own blessed daughter, sweet and stately, comb your thinning gray locks, help you on with your overcoat, find your cane, and go trooping with you, hand in hand, down the lane on merciful errand bent. It's a temptation to grow old and feign sciatica; and if you could only know that, some day, like old King Lear, upon your withered cheek would fall Cordelia's tears, the thought would be ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Vol. 2 of 14 - Little Journeys To the Homes of Famous Women • Elbert Hubbard
... and not imitate those enemies of America who sometimes feign to put on mourning for her, sometimes jest at her distress, and find in the present situation of the disunited States (for thus they style them) an agreeable subject for pleasantry, forgetting that this disunion has a serious cause, which is certainly of importance enough to make itself understood; ...
— The Uprising of a Great People • Count Agenor de Gasparin
... ark, Where all the race of reptiles might embark: A verier monster than on Afric's shore The sun e'er got, or slimy Nilus bore, Or Sloane or Woodward's wondrous shelves contain, 30 Nay, all that lying travellers can feign. The watch would hardly let him pass at noon, At night, would swear him dropp'd out of the moon. One whom the mob, when next we find or make A Popish plot, shall for a Jesuit take, And the wise justice, starting from his chair, Cry, By ...
— The Poetical Works Of Alexander Pope, Vol. 1 • Alexander Pope et al
... streams, and birds and bees, The moss-lain Dryads shall be lulled to sleep; And in the midst of this wide quietness, A rosy sanctuary will I dress With the wreathed trellis of a working brain, With buds and bells and stars without a name, With all the gardener Fancy e'er could feign, Who, breeding flowers, will never breed the same; And there shall be for thee all soft delight, That shadowy thought can win, A bright torch and a casement ope at night, To ...
— The Treasure of Heaven - A Romance of Riches • Marie Corelli
... much need to feign to be subdued; but I counterfeited to be older than I was in all respects (Heaven knows! my heart being all too young the while), and feigned to be more of a recluse and bookworm than I had really become, and gradually set up more and more of a ...
— George Silverman's Explanation • Charles Dickens
... too, that though he did not believe in charms, he would feign belief, so as to magnify his own suffering, and take vengeance on some one, finally, to escape the suspicion that the gods had begun to punish him for crimes. Petronius did not think that Caesar could love really and deeply even his own child; though he loved her passionately, he felt certain, ...
— Quo Vadis - A Narrative of the Time of Nero • Henryk Sienkiewicz
... remember'd kisses after death, And sweet as those by hopeless fancy feign'd On lips that are for others; deep as love, Deep as first love, and wild with all regret; O Death in Life, the days that are ...
— The Hundred Best English Poems • Various
... of Parliament, it appears, that it was from their own representation of being Egyptians, they were so denominated in England; and that they did not on their arrival in this country, feign themselves, as in Germany, to be pilgrims; or as in France, to be penitents; neither of which impositions would have been well adapted to the temper of the government of Henry VIII; or to his subversion of papal power, and abolition of monastic influence. The character they assumed, was the ...
— A Historical Survey of the Customs, Habits, & Present State of the Gypsies • John Hoyland
... lacked a virtue he could feign it, anyhow—but there was no doubt about it, Miss Kitty was putting his rodeo on the bum. There had never been so many men to feed and so few calves to brand in the history of Hidden Water. Even old Bill Johnson had got the fever from hearing the boys talk and was hanging ...
— Hidden Water • Dane Coolidge
... boast of favours shown, Where your service is applied: But my pleasures are mine own, And to no man's humour tied. You oft flatter, sooth, and feign; I such baseness do disdain; And to none be slave I would, Though ...
— Pastoral Poems by Nicholas Breton, - Selected Poetry by George Wither, and - Pastoral Poetry by William Browne (of Tavistock) • Nicholas Breton, George Wither, William Browne (of Tavistock)
... and Devrient therefore altered it and in their version the two female lovers are put to the test, but midway in the plot it is revealed to them that they are being tried—, with the result that they feign faithlessness, play the part out and at the close declare their knowledge, turning the sting against the authors of the unworthy comedy. The contents may be ...
— The Standard Operaglass - Detailed Plots of One Hundred and Fifty-one Celebrated Operas • Charles Annesley
... dear fellow, it would be ridiculous to feign with you, since you happened to see me this morning. Oh, it's a stupid affair! I'm quite of that opinion; but, ...
— Fruitfulness - Fecondite • Emile Zola
... Some such-like lie the baronet might have told, I thought; but when I saw him walk abroad with Margery on his arm, pacing back and forth beneath the oaks and bending low to catch her lightest word with grave and courtly deference that none knew better how to feign, I knew wherefore he stayed—knew and raged afresh at my own impotence, and for the thought that Margery was wholly at the mercy ...
— The Master of Appleby • Francis Lynde
... what I was Ere we met; (Such can not be, but because Some forget Let me feign it)—none would notice That where she I know by rote is Spread a strange and withering change, Like a drying of the ...
— Wessex Poems and Other Verses • Thomas Hardy
... the gods, originating in heaven and glowing upon earth. This heavenly and earthly love unites in one flame. Again, I say, Charlotte, banish this hypocritical word 'friendship!' It is only love which I feel for you, let this sentiment enter at every avenue of your heart, and do not feign ignorance of it, sweet hypocrite. Surprise has torn away the mask! The passionate kiss, which still burns upon my lips, was not given by a friend or sister; but overcome by joy, ...
— Old Fritz and the New Era • Louise Muhlbach
... help me! now I call To my pretty witchcrafts all; Old I am, and cannot do That I was accustomed to. Bring your magics, spells, and charms, To enflesh my thighs and arms. Is there no way to beget In my limbs their former heat? AEson had, as poets feign, Baths that made him young again: Find that medicine, if you can, For your dry decrepit man Who would fain his strength renew, Were it ...
— The Hesperides & Noble Numbers: Vol. 1 and 2 • Robert Herrick
... her friend. It seemed horribly false not to mention her own talk with Amherst, yet she felt it wiser to feign ignorance, since Bessy could never be trusted to interpret rightly ...
— The Fruit of the Tree • Edith Wharton
... motives and principles, and it suggests a mental and a moral philosophy nobler in themselves and truer to humanity and religion. The pathos, too, is more genuine; for it is not based upon the mere utterance of grief or of entreaty,—which the eloquent and the artful may, indeed, feign,—but it is found in that skilful combination of material circumstance and spiritual influence which impresses upon the feeling, more than it proves to the reason, that the hour of heart-break is at hand, and which depends less for its effect upon the dramatic power of the imagination than upon ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 32, June, 1860 • Various
... said Ganymede, "I will feign myself to be Rosalind, and you shall feign to court me in the same manner as you would do if I was Rosalind, and then I will imitate the fantastic ways of whimsical ladies to their lovers, till I make you ...
— Tales from Shakespeare • Charles and Mary Lamb
... what does a young man love like that? And there was a great compliment in it for me—that I should be the one man they had for the affair. Yet it did not sound to me very like work for a gentleman—to feign to be a conspirator—to win confidence and then to betray it, in however ...
— Oddsfish! • Robert Hugh Benson
... the golf tournament was clear and fine. I shouldered my bag of clubs and walked through the lane toward the first tee. I never felt less like playing or more inclined to feign illness and remain at home. But I had promised Lady Carey and the promise must ...
— Kent Knowles: Quahaug • Joseph C. Lincoln
... accustomed voice as near as he could feign it. "What do you mean by coming here at ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 6 • Charles H. Sylvester
... would seem to prove, did not a passage in Night Eight appear to show that he had something in his eye for the groundwork, at least, of the painting. Lovelace or Lorenzo may be feigned characters; but a writer does not feign a name of which he only gives ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson, LL.D. in Nine Volumes - Volume the Eighth: The Lives of the Poets, Volume II • Samuel Johnson
... replied Thamar, "although there are women clever enough to feign all these symptoms, for some reason or another, so skilfully as to deceive the most clear-sighted. I believe that the maiden had swooned, as ...
— The Works of Theophile Gautier, Volume 5 - The Romance of a Mummy and Egypt • Theophile Gautier
... of waters, south and west Lonelier lands than dreams in sleep would feign to be, When the soul goes forth on travel, and is prest Round and compassed in with clouds that flash and flee Dells without a streamlet, downs without a tree, Cirques of hollow cliff that crumble, give their guest Little hope, till hard at hand he pause, to see Where the small town ...
— A Midsummer Holiday and Other Poems • Algernon Charles Swinburne
... was fillin' wid men at the ind av the day. I made feign to be far gone in dhrink, an', wan by wan, all my roomful came in wid Vulmea. I wint away, walkin' thick an' heavy, but not so thick an' heavy that any wan cud ha' tuk me. Sure and thrue, there was a kyartridge gone from my pouch an' lyin' snug in my rifle. I was hot wid rage against thim all, ...
— Indian Tales • Rudyard Kipling
... duties and in sufferings too, My Lord I feign would trace, As he hath done, so would I do, Sustained by ...
— Hymns for Christian Devotion - Especially Adapted to the Universalist Denomination • J.G. Adams
... poet, and he is asked to grapple with the common complexity of cause and effect, with life in its practical realisation, of which he knows nothing, not with life in its ideal essence, of which he knows so much. He has no conception of what to do, and his folly is to feign folly. Brutus used madness as a cloak to conceal the sword of his purpose, the dagger of his will, but the Hamlet madness is a mere mask for the hiding of weakness. In the making of fancies and jests he sees ...
— De Profundis • Oscar Wilde
... play the game on his conditions, and feign ignorance of all that he does n't tell," she reminded herself. "But fancy his ...
— The Lady Paramount • Henry Harland
... first, do not let us quarrel with the second. A pest on the priests and all their bigotry, say I! Christ sought to convert the Jews, not to kill them; and for my part I can honour the man who clings to his own faith, aye, and forgive him because they forced him to feign to belong to ours. Pray then that neither of us may live to commit a greater sin, and that we may soon be wed and dwell in peace away from London, where we ...
— Fair Margaret • H. Rider Haggard
... M. de Bernires, a gentleman of high rank, great wealth, and zealous devotion. She wrote to him, explained the situation, and requested him to feign a marriage with her. His sense of honor recoiled: moreover, in the fulness of his zeal, he had made a vow of chastity, and an apparent breach of it would cause scandal. He consulted his spiritual director and a few intimate friends. All agreed that the glory of God was concerned, ...
— The Jesuits in North America in the Seventeenth Century • Francis Parkman
... N'gori must feign agreement. He watched the departing army—paddlers sitting on swathes of filched spears. Once Bosambo was out of sight, N'gori collected all the convertible property of his city and sent it in ten canoes to the edge ...
— Bones - Being Further Adventures in Mr. Commissioner Sanders' Country • Edgar Wallace
... enormously swollen bladder. There are instances of a similar character in old romances, where great armies are long kept at bay by the arts of necromancers, who build airy towers and battlements, and muster warriors of terrible aspect, and thus feign a defence of seeming impregnability, until some bolder champion of the besiegers dashes forward to try an encounter with the foremost foeman, and finds him melt away in the death-grapple. With such heroic adventures let the march upon Manassas be hereafter reckoned. The whole business, ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 10, No. 57, July, 1862 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... collecting flow'rs around, To make a nosegay for his better half, Whose birth-day 'twas:—he soon began to laugh, And while the ranging of the flow'rs he prais'd, The servant's neckerchief he slyly rais'd. Who, suddenly, on feeling of the hand, Resistance feign'd, and seem'd to make a stand; But since these liberties were nothing new, They other fun and frolicks would pursue; The nosegay at the fond gallant was thrown; The flow'rs he kiss'd, and now more ...
— The Tales and Novels, Complete • Jean de La Fontaine
... not what to do. Lo! here be these barbarians come upon us to slay us and destroy the land." "To escape death," answered Aridius, "thou must appease the ferocity of this man. Now, if it please thee, I will feign to fly from thee and go over to him. So soon as I shall be with him, I will so do that he ruin neither thee nor the land. Only have thou care to perform whatsoever I shall ask of thee, until the Lord in his goodness deign to make thy cause triumph." ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 4 • Various
... no Law. And the Occasion overpowers affection. Insomuch that after a thousand pondrous considerations, he resolves to deny his dearly beloved Wife a little of that same; and to that purpose will somtimes in an evening feign to have the headake, or that he is very dull and sleepy, (which is no absolutely;) and thereby commands his man to call him up somtimes very early in the morning, as if there were forsooth Customers in the Shop, &c. and hunts up and down among the Chocolate Dealers to get of the very best, preparing ...
— The Ten Pleasures of Marriage and The Confession of the New-married Couple (1682) • A. Marsh
... the summerwind, Joy of the summerplain, Life of the summerhours, Carol clearly, bound along. No Tithon thou as poets feign (Shame fall 'em they are deaf and blind) But an insect lithe and strong, Bowing the seeded summerflowers. Prove their falsehood and thy quarrel, Vaulting on thine airy feet. Clap thy shielded sides and carol, Carol clearly, chirrup sweet. Thou art a mailed warrior in youth and strength ...
— The Early Poems of Alfred Lord Tennyson • Tennyson
... food. When set at liberty it would lie waiting in the grass for mynas and sparrows, springing upon them from the cover like a cat, and when sparrows, as it frequently happened, ventured into its cage to steal the boiled rice, it would feign sleep, retire into a corner, and dart on them with unerring aim. It preferred birds, thus taken by ...
— Natural History of the Mammalia of India and Ceylon • Robert A. Sterndale
... truly into giant-size. And Bud was apt in make-believes—would hear His Grandma talk or read, with such an ear And memory of both subject and big words, That he would take the book up afterwards And feign to "read aloud," with such success As caused his truthful elders real distress. But he must have big words—they seemed to give Extremer range to the superlative— That was his passion. "My Gran'ma," he said, One evening, after listening as she read ...
— A Child-World • James Whitcomb Riley |
