"Modest" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... turn to become thoughtful. He had made a most extraordinary discovery—indeed, in his own mind he had found an heir to millions in this modest and hitherto unfortunate woman. Jack meditated for a long time, and ...
— A Successful Shadow - A Detective's Successful Quest • Harlan Page Halsey
... speaking mildly, and with a gentle nod, as to a modest Catechumen. The corporal stood silent.—You don't ask him right, said my uncle Toby, raising his voice, and giving it rapidly like the word of command:—The fifth—cried my uncle Toby.—I must begin with the first, an' please your honour, ...
— The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman • Laurence Sterne
... not fear for the modest beginnings. The tremendous wave of sympathy and love which has now swept over the Russian people can create wonders, if need be, for the success of the ...
— The New York Times Current History: the European War, February, 1915 • Various
... preferences. Designating a tall, draped figure who walks in the front rank of the poets, the lady said to me: 'This is Sidney Lanier;' and when I, despite my admiration for the poet of the marshes, ventured to offer a few modest suggestions, she went on to develop the thesis, that what exalts a man is less what he has done than what ...
— Sidney Lanier • Edwin Mims
... the gods the preservers, for the benefit of sailors.' The height of this building is stated at four hundred feet; but this, as well as many other accounts relating to it, must be an exaggeration. A more modest account, given by the historian Josephus, is likely to be accurate; but even he states that the fire which was kept constantly burning at the top was visible by seamen at a distance ...
— Smeaton and Lighthouses - A Popular Biography, with an Historical Introduction and Sequel • John Smeaton
... herself, but it was in reality only a semblance of resistance—the last faint protest of her modest nature before thoroughly surrendering herself to all the voluptuous ...
— The Power of Mesmerism - A Highly Erotic Narrative of Voluptuous Facts and Fancies • Anonymous
... often modest, almost always sensitive, and he prefers to bear dispraise rather than to tell the real reason he hesitates. His ear is closer to the ground, he feels even if he cannot express the doubt of the disinterestedness of the land-scheme promoter, of the wisdom of his father. He knows ...
— The Cost of Shelter • Ellen H. Richards
... stood before him, shy and modest, but without a trace of embarrassment, surely the sweetest and loveliest girl he had ever beheld. Some remembered trace he found in her features, perhaps the look, the shape of her eyes—all else was unfamiliar. And that all else was a white face, blue-veined, with rich ...
— The U.P. Trail • Zane Grey
... marriage to a rich man had not given her the command of much money. She and Amherst, choosing to regard themselves as pensioners on the Westmore fortune, were scrupulous in restricting their personal expenditure; and her work among the mill-hands brought many demands on the modest allowance which her husband had insisted on her accepting. In reply to Wyant's first appeal, which reached her soon after her marriage, she had sent him a hundred dollars; but when the second came, some two months later—with a fresh tale of ill-luck and ill-health—she had not been able ...
— The Fruit of the Tree • Edith Wharton
... by no means a grand repast and at which the cake did not look so like an ill-soldered silver castle as that other construction had done,—the happy couple were sent away in a modest chariot to the railway station, and not above half-a-dozen slippers were thrown after them. There were enough for luck,—or perhaps there might have been luck even without them, for the wife thoroughly respected her husband, as did the husband his ...
— The Duke's Children • Anthony Trollope
... assets, and I resolved that it should not diminish. I had experienced enough of ups and downs; I was sick of vicissitudes, of fears and uncertainties for the future. I said to my soul: "Thou hast enough laid up for many days; eat, drink and be merry," and I proceeded to invest my modest competence in such a fashion that it brought in a steady four per cent. No South African mines or other soul-agonising speculations for me; sweet security was what I craved, and I got it. I could live with great comfort, even with modest splendour, upon about half my income, ...
— Doctor Therne • H. Rider Haggard
... is shy and modest, and wants me to accompany her to Lady Cumnor to wish good-night; her father has come for her, and ...
— Wives and Daughters • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
... who had wrested from iron Fortune a great {86} deal of learning if very little of worldly wealth. Short of stature, sanguine of temperament, the ruddy, stubborn, passionate small man had fought his way step by step from the most modest if not the most humble beginnings, as zealously as if he had known of the fame that was yet to be his and the honor that he was to give to his name and hand down to a long line of honorable descendants. If the ministers ...
— A History of the Four Georges and of William IV, Volume III (of 4) • Justin McCarthy and Justin Huntly McCarthy
... vision of domestic bliss in the cold embrace of the winter's snow. Mrs. Oliphant points out the fact that, unlike most of the hermits and monks, Francis dreams not of dancing girls, but of the pure love of a wife and the modest joys of a home and children. She beautifully says: "Had he, for one sweet, miserable moment, gone back to some old imagination and seen the unborn faces shine beside the never-lighted fire? But Francis does not say a word of any such trial going on in his heart. He dissipates the dream by ...
— A Short History of Monks and Monasteries • Alfred Wesley Wishart
... of debate has raged round the name of Malthus, the great modern analyst of the population problem. He published his first essay on population in 1798, a modest pamphlet, which fed so voraciously on the criticism supplied to it, that it developed into a mighty contribution to a great social problem, second only in time and in honour to the work of his great predecessor in economic ...
— The Fertility of the Unfit • William Allan Chapple
... sciences, it is a happy hunting-ground for adventurers. Just as in the early days of British Somaliland, rascals would descend from nowhere in particular upon unfortunate villages, levy taxes and administer atrocity in the name of the Empire, and even, I am told, outface for a time the modest heralds of the government, so in this department of anthropology the public mind suffers from the imposition of theories and assertions claiming to be "scientific," which have no more relation to that organized system of criticism which is science, than a brigand at large on a mountain ...
— Mankind in the Making • H. G. Wells
... fever which the doctors declare is in the air and that it would be running too great a risk if we went. But we have perpetual sunshine in the house when we look at our dear young lovers, who are so happy, so devoted to each other, that it does one good to see it; he is so modest and unassuming that we feel as if he was one of our own children; and he is so good and amiable, has such an open honest character, such a warm heart, such high principles, and is withal so merry and aufgeweckt that I feel we have gained a ...
— The Letters of Queen Victoria, Volume III (of 3), 1854-1861 • Queen of Great Britain Victoria
... could be more gentle than the loving disposition of the slave. Her natural character was all tenderness and modest diffidence, but she had now been touched at a point where she was most sensitive. Aphiz, without the shadow of guilt, save that he was true in his love to her, had been murdered in cold blood, and the announcement of the fact by the Sultan had chilled every fountain of tenderness in her bosom. ...
— The Circassian Slave; or, The Sultan's Favorite - A Story of Constantinople and the Caucasus • Lieutenant Maturin Murray
... modest pride] Well, sir, I'm in your 'ands. I must be guided by you, with your experience. I'm glad ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... sake. Too, too many suspect the cause of my poor Caliste's illness. Oh, Dorsain, how proud I was of my two daughters! how neglectful of Victorine! and now my beautiful girls make me blush for them, and my modest Victorine by her own unobtrusiveness has attracted, it is true, but little admiration, yet nothing but respect and love can be attached to ...
— The Young Lord and Other Tales - to which is added Victorine Durocher • Camilla Toulmin
... village, founded in 1705, is situated on Bath Creek, by which modest name the broad, beautiful body of water, beside which those early settlers built their homes, is called. The banks of the creek are high and thickly wooded, rising boldly from the water, in striking contrast with the low, marshy shores of ...
— In Ancient Albemarle • Catherine Albertson
... read the story of a noble mind and a fine heart, rather undervaluing than otherwise the external advantages of beauty and station, but dignified and raised by the consciousness of purity, cultivation, and high thoughts. The same look was there, modest yet dignified, diffident yet self-possessed; and while he became convinced that there sat the bride selected by the Earl of Byerdale for his son, he was equally convinced that she was the person of all others whose fate would be the most miserable ...
— The King's Highway • G. P. R. James
... things in John's manhood, we form an idea of his childhood. We may think of him as a lovable boy. His feelings were tender. He was greatly interested in events which pleased him. He was quick and active. He was modest and generally shy, yet bold when determined to do anything. He was not ready to tell all he felt or knew. He was helpful in his father's business. He thought and felt and planned much as his mother did. He was ...
— A Life of St. John for the Young • George Ludington Weed
... in her former dress, and with it she recovered her usual ease and freedom, looking more modest and pleasing than she ever did in her gaudy finery. Her mamma did not regret the loss she had sustained in the wreck of the slip, fine shoes, and hat, since it produced the means of bringing her daughter back ...
— The Looking-Glass for the Mind - or Intellectual Mirror • M. Berquin
... several such places before I found the modest house I wanted. Then I stepped into it rather nervously and took the seat ...
— The Woman Thou Gavest Me - Being the Story of Mary O'Neill • Hall Caine
... down the gates of battle, Broken down the boarded castle, And the walls of linden shattered, When her mother's house he entered, And her father's home he entered. 110 In his care is now the duckling, In his arms behold the dovekin, At his side the modest damsel, ...
— Kalevala, Volume I (of 2) - The Land of the Heroes • Anonymous
... seat 4000 women cheered. I was the only man in the house; but being modest, I stood the strain as long as I could, and then—why, Paderewski was bowing, and I forgot all about the women and their enthusiasm ...
— Old Fogy - His Musical Opinions and Grotesques • James Huneker
... a very modest, sober-tinted wish which the Apostle here has for his brethren that the highest and best thing he can ask for them is only quiet. Very modest by the side of joy and excitement, in their coats of many colours, and yet the deepest and truest blessing that ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Ephesians; Epistles of St. Peter and St. John • Alexander Maclaren
... true Greek of the perfect type. Not only is he the most beautiful of Athenian youths; he is also temperate, modest, and subject to the laws of moral health. His very beauty is a harmony of well-developed faculties in which the mind and body are at one. How a young Greek managed to preserve this balance in the midst of the admiring crowds described by Socrates is a marvel. Modern conventions unfit our minds ...
— Sketches and Studies in Italy and Greece, Complete - Series I, II, and III • John Symonds
... of calculations for oatmeal-porridge, onion-potage, and other modest dainties, during which Mrs. Bundle constantly fell back on the "bits of things in the ...
— A Flat Iron for a Farthing - or Some Passages in the Life of an only Son • Juliana Horatia Ewing
... aristocratic members of the Peerage, with their influence and their wealth; nor even the political men who sit in St. Stephen's, who have spread abroad the fame and might and power of England. But it is these modest pioneers of "nations yet to be" who, in the wilds and deserts of South Africa, Australia and Asia, have demonstrated the realities of English civilisation and the ...
— Cecil Rhodes - Man and Empire-Maker • Princess Catherine Radziwill
... art, and let you hold it without afterthought. It was the easiest thing in the world to kiss her, for she suffered it gladly and quite innocently; it came as naturally as to a cat to rub his cheek on your chair or swinging foot. Yet the girl was as modest as a Clare. If you had presumed on your licence to make love to her, it would not have been her scorn (for she had none), but her distress that would have set you back in your place. God knows what La Fragiletta might ...
— Little Novels of Italy • Maurice Henry Hewlett
... altogether new, and rather pleasant! When one of the choir boys sang, "Oh for the wings of a dove!" a tear rolled out of one of her lovely eyes and down her smooth brown cheek. I would have given a large portion of my modest monthly income for the felicity of wiping away that teardrop with one of my new handkerchiefs, marked with a tremendous ...
— A Cathedral Courtship • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... season. But Mignon herself was counted a powerful adversary. The sympathy of the boys lay for the most part with Marjorie's squad. The Weston High lads were decidedly partial to the pretty, brown-eyed girl, whose modest, gracious ways had soon won their boyish approbation. Among the girls, however, Mignon could ...
— Marjorie Dean - High School Sophomore • Pauline Lester
... orchestra stopped dead. The house roared. "Go on!" cried encouraging voices from gallery and pit. "Go on! Go on!" And the singer thus emboldened, and accompanied by one small piping flute, a ridiculous starveling of sound after all the blare that had preceded it, sang with a modest and deprecating air a line which fell very flat indeed—a mere nothing tagged from a nursery rhyme—obviously an importation. Stalls, pit, and gallery rocked and shouted with laughter. "Try again!" roared the crowd; and with small, frightened mimminy-pimminy tones ...
— King John of Jingalo - The Story of a Monarch in Difficulties • Laurence Housman
... the matter my attention, and written a letter of recommendation to my brother-in-law, urging him to put everything right for you, in order that I may, to a certain extent, be able to give effect to my modest wishes. As for any outlay that may prove necessary, I have given proper explanation, in the letter to my brother-in-law, so that you, my brother, need not trouble yourself by giving way ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book I • Cao Xueqin
... him to his own purposes; had been detected and punished; had disappeared, after his punishment, so effectually that no one knew where he had gone; had come back, comparatively a few years later, under another name, a very rich man, and had entered Parliament and been, in a modest way, a public character without any of those who knew him in his new career suspecting that he had once worn a dress liberally ornamented with the broad arrow. Fine copy, excellent copy: some of the morning newspapers made a couple ...
— The Middle Temple Murder • J.S. Fletcher
... turn shopkeepers into barons, and schoolgirls into Juliets. Let the national mind be elevated in its character, and it will naturally become pure in its conceptions; let it be simple in its desires, and it will be beautiful in its ideas; let it be modest in feeling, and it will not be insolent in stone. For architect and for employer, there can be but one rule; to be natural in all that they do, and to look for the beauty of the material creation as they would for that of the human form, not ...
— The Poetry of Architecture • John Ruskin
... acquired more and more weight in the governance of the Empire, in proportion as his uncle's will grew weaker beneath the burden of advancing age. Thus he had succeeded in his efforts to provide Austria-Hungary with a new navy, the counterpart, on a more modest scale, of the German fleet, and to reorganize the effective army, here again taking Germany for his model. Among certain cliques, he was accused of not keeping enough in the background, of showing little ...
— World's War Events, Vol. I • Various
... freedom than for millions. In other words, the maintenance of the typical American farmer—the man who is essentially middle class, who is intelligent, who keeps a good standard of living, educates his children, serves his country, owns his medium-sized farm, and who at death leaves a modest estate—the maintenance of the typical American farmer is the ...
— Chapters in Rural Progress • Kenyon L. Butterfield
... forced a regard to him, that, without affecting my heart, insured him my fidelity, no object had yet presented that could overcome the habitual liking I had contracted for him and I was on the eve of obtaining, from the movements of his own voluntary generosity, a modest provision for life, when an accident happened which broke all the measures he had ...
— Memoirs Of Fanny Hill - A New and Genuine Edition from the Original Text (London, 1749) • John Cleland
... the title of the book that Mr. Ives dedicated to me? I never saw it, for he was so odd (I cannot call it modest, lest I should seem not so myself) as never to send it me, and I never could get ...
— Letters of Horace Walpole, V4 • Horace Walpole
... brought but meagre orders from the circulating libraries. "Typhoon" came upon the heels of "Youth," but still the sales of the Conrad books continued small and the author remained in very uncomfortable circumstances. Even after four or five years he was still so poor that he was glad to accept a modest pension from the British Civil List. This official recognition of his genius, when it came at last, seems to have impressed the public, characteristically enough, far more than his books themselves had done, and the ...
— A Book of Prefaces • H. L. Mencken
... been shown to her room by the groom of the chamber, who filled many offices besides in her ladyship's modest household, and after a proper interval, his elderly goddess Diana vouchsafed to appear to the young man. A blackamoor in a Turkish habit, with red boots and a silver collar, on which the Viscountess's arms were engraven, preceded her and bore her cushion; ...
— The History of Henry Esmond, Esq. • W. M. Thackeray
... auxiliaries, whom they had hired for their preservation. In a word, the doubts and suspicions of a people naturally blunt and jealous, were inflamed to such a degree of animosity, that nothing would have restrained them from violent acts of outrage, but the most orderly, modest, and inoffensive behaviour by which both the ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.II. - From William and Mary to George II. • Tobias Smollett
... and pleased the boy. He felt pride in the elder's confidence, but was too modest to express it. ...
— The Delight Makers • Adolf Bandelier
... a branch of comparatively modest dimensions; but it gradually developed into a huge department, employing a personnel which necessarily included large numbers of efficient linguists. The remarkable success achieved by the contre-espionage service in preventing the re-establishment ...
— Experiences of a Dug-out, 1914-1918 • Charles Edward Callwell
... all accumulated by steady toil and constant useful labour for the ultimate benefit of his fellow-men. To make a fortune is the smallest and least noble of all possible personal ambitions; but to save the first guinea which leads us on at last to independence and modest comfort is indeed an important turning-point in every prudent man's career. Geordie Stephenson was so justly proud of his achievement in this respect that he told a friend in confidence he might now ...
— Biographies of Working Men • Grant Allen
... Little Libraries, with their splendid collection of books; the archive room, with its long series of business accounts and ledgers; the private livingrooms of the Moretus family; and last, but not least, the modest little shop, where books still repose upon the shelves, which looks as though the salesman might return at any moment to his place behind the counter. England has certainly nothing like it, though London had till recently in Crosby Hall ...
— Beautiful Europe - Belgium • Joseph E. Morris
... too modest to answer. I'll answer for him. About an hour ago, we met an old wolf on the road. He was half starved and begged for help. Having nothing to give him, what do you think my friend did out of the kindness of his heart? With his teeth, he bit off the paw of his ...
— The Adventures of Pinocchio • C. Collodi—Pseudonym of Carlo Lorenzini
... prayers, their candles and their picayunes; and the little miracle chapel, perhaps despite itself, becomes with mushroom growth a church, and the church a cathedral, from whose resplendent altars the cheap, humble ex-voto tablets, the modest beginnings of its ecclesiastical fortunes, are before long banished ...
— Balcony Stories • Grace E. King
... front; one long, heavy curl rests on the left side of her neck, and is surmounted by a big butterfly bow. The costume and pose are delightful and striking at first sight, but the more the picture is studied the more the face attracts the attention it merits. It is a sweet little girl's face, modest and sensible. She is holding the arm of her seat with a sort of determination to sit that way and be looked at so long as she must, but her expression shows that she is thinking hard of something that she intends to do so soon as she can jump down and run away to ...
— Women in the fine arts, from the Seventh Century B.C. to the Twentieth Century A.D. • Clara Erskine Clement
... Salvatorish in character; then he saw the gentler elm, succeeded by the sassafras and locust—these again by the softer linden, red-bud, catalpa, and maple—these yet again by still more graceful and more modest varieties. The whole face of the southern declivity was covered with wild shrubbery alone—an occasional silver willow or white poplar excepted. In the bottom of the valley itself—(for it must be borne ...
— The Works of Edgar Allan Poe - Volume 2 (of 5) of the Raven Edition • Edgar Allan Poe
... sisterly pride, and Betty smoothed down her apron with modest satisfaction, for Bab seldom praised her, and she liked it ...
— Under the Lilacs • Louisa May Alcott
... Nora became an inmate of Aghadoe. She had no relative nearer than an uncle, who had a houseful of children of his own, so that Nora's absence must be a relief in a manner of speaking; and my grandmother never refused me anything in reason. Nora was modest and dainty in her ways, and having been brought up by the nuns she was an excellent needlewoman, so that she had so much equipment for the post of ...
— The Story of Bawn • Katharine Tynan
... have allowed myself to indulge in dreams of the future, I have pictured myself dwelling in a modest cottage, partially shrouded in ivy, not very far from the village church. My ...
— Willis the Pilot • Paul Adrien
... lineal stain on a mother's name for ever binds the chains, let no man boast of liberty. The very voice re-echoes, oh, man, why be a hypocrite! cans't thou not see the scorner looking from above? But the oligarchy asks in tones so modest, so full of chivalrous fascination, what hast thou to do with that? be no longer a fanatic. So we will bear the warning-pass from ...
— Our World, or, The Slaveholders Daughter • F. Colburn Adams
... She had grown to be seventeen; timid and retiring as her solitary life had made her, it had not embittered her. A child in innocent simplicity: a woman in her modest self-reliance and her deep intensity of feeling, both child and woman seemed at once expressed in her fair face and fragile delicacy of shape; in her thrilling voice, her calm eyes, and sometimes in a strange ethereal light that seemed ...
— Ten Girls from Dickens • Kate Dickinson Sweetser
... dish us So many rare sweets up together! Tournure absolutely delicious— Chip hat without flower or feather— Well-gloved and enchantingly boddiced, Her waist like the cup of a lily— And an air, that, while daintily modest, Repell'd both the saucy and ...
— The Humourous Poetry of the English Language • James Parton
... lieutenant then in the Third Virginia Regiment, I happened to be on the rear guard at Newark, and I counted the force under his immediate command by platoons as it passed me, which amounted to less than 3,000 men. A deportment so firm, so dignified, so exalted, but yet so modest and composed, I have never seen in any ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Section 1 (of 3) of Volume 2: James Monroe • James D. Richardson
... the high aristocracy and the daughters of our country gentry! As if they really belonged to a different world, lived on a different planet. One of them assuming the lead in politics, another bear-hunting and photographing. The third, that tall, slender, somewhat haughty, but modest girl, who had approached to admire my roses, pleased me best; and then, too, their names—"Diodora! Cenni! Flamma!" The first domineering, imposing; the second with a touch of the Bohemian or the gipsy; the third bewitching, enticing, a flame! Oh, what a moth ...
— Dr. Dumany's Wife • Mr Jkai
... lamps of flowers of every hue and breath. The meandering walks were all laid with asphalte, which presented a new and striking contrast to the gorgeous borders and the vivid green of the cleanly shaven grass. Many of the little graves were made in nests of geraniums and other modest and sweet-eyed stars ...
— A Walk from London to John O'Groat's • Elihu Burritt
... as he spoke, looked at Brittles; but that young man, being naturally modest, probably considered himself nobody, and so held that the inquiry could not have any application to him; at all events, he tendered no reply. Mr. Giles directed an appealing glance at the tinker; but he had suddenly ...
— Oliver Twist • Charles Dickens
... used to spend a Sunday afternoon with the Carlyles at their modest home in Chelsea. At such times Jeannie Welsh would usually manage to pilot the conversational craft along smooth waters; but if she were not present, hot arguments would follow, and finally a point would be reached where Carlyle ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great - Volume 12 - Little Journeys to the Homes of Great Scientists • Elbert Hubbard
... that. I should say that only a clean-shaven man could have smoked this. Why, Watson, even your modest moustache would have ...
— The Adventure of the Red Circle • Arthur Conan Doyle
... partook of our modest luncheon with him in perfect amity and brotherly love, but my mind was busy all the time. I began to wonder if Theodore suspected something; if so, I knew that I could not trust him. He would try and ferret things out, and then demand a share in my hard-earned ...
— Castles in the Air • Baroness Emmuska Orczy
... the articles that have been written on the Airedale have come from the pen of Mr. Buckley, and therefore but modest reference is made to the man who has worked so whole-heartedly, so well, and so successfully in the interests of the breed he loves. It would be ungenerous and unfair in any article on the Airedale, written by anyone but Mr. Buckley, if conspicuous ...
— Dogs and All About Them • Robert Leighton
... me as strange then that my father asked his way of no man, but went to a little ordinary in a humbler part of the town. After a modest meal in a corner of the public room, we went out for a stroll. Then, from the wharves, I saw the bay dotted with islands, their white sand sparkling in the evening light, and fringed with strange trees, ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... associate with the nobility, imitate their ways. And I do not allude to the Bourets, the Beaujons, the St. Jameses and other financial wretches whose paraphernalia effaces that of the princes; but take a plain associe des fermes, M. d'Epinay, whose modest and refined wife refuses such excessive display.[2160] He had just completed his domestic arrangements, and was anxious that his wife should take a second maid; but she resisted; nevertheless, ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 1 (of 6) - The Ancient Regime • Hippolyte A. Taine
... son and heir was a man of thirty. Numerous grandchildren were around him, for whom he manifested a true German fondness; not, however, regarding them with equal favor. He dispensed, occasionally, a liberal hospitality at his modest house, though that hospitality was usually bestowed upon men whose presence at his table conferred distinction upon him who sat at the head of it. He was fond, strange as it may seem, of the society of literary ...
— Famous Americans of Recent Times • James Parton
... I await it uneasily. It may be that I have the spleen, but though I have done with knight-errantry for distrest beauty, I wonder sometimes whether my little Anne Carew have not a happier fate than any woman of fashion. 'Tis but a modest grange in Devon; but those two simple souls will taste of happiness there and in each other, and the world will not trouble them. The seasons will come and go, and when they lie in the churchyard 'twill not be with tons of marble and scutcheons ...
— The Ladies - A Shining Constellation of Wit and Beauty • E. Barrington
... its owner is not intended to participate. I must endeavour to place before the world of Caneville, to be thence transmitted to the less civilized portions of the globe, those incidents in our Dog's life which he has been too modest to relate himself, in order that after-generations may fully appreciate all the goodness of his character. To greatness, he had no pretension, although few animals are aware how close is the ...
— The Adventures of a Dog, and a Good Dog Too • Alfred Elwes
... ever took that fatal step yet, without its entailing on her the most dire wretchedness," she replied. "It cannot be otherwise. And Lady Isabel was of a nature to feel remorse beyond common—to meet it half-way. Refined, modest, with every feeling of an English gentlewoman, she was the very last, one would have thought, to act so. It was as if she had gone away in a dream, not knowing what she was doing; I have thought so many a time. That terrible mental wretchedness ...
— East Lynne • Mrs. Henry Wood
... a minute, Miss Dow," and Kit smiled lazily at her. "I'm not over-modest about my wonderful musical genius, but somehow I couldn't believe that a stranger appreciated me so highly. I just COULDN'T believe it, and something told me that it wasn't quite all it sounded. Then, says I to myself, if it isn't a real Belle Harcourt it's most probably Patty ...
— Patty's Suitors • Carolyn Wells
... entertainment, —names there on the plates that flow from all English-speaking tongues as familiarly as and or the; entertainers known wherever good poetry and fair title-pages are held in esteem; guest a kind-hearted, modest, genial, hopeful poet, who sings to the hearts of his countrymen, the British people, the songs of good cheer which the better days to come, as all honest souls trust and believe, will turn into the prose of common life. My friend, the Poet, says you must not read such a string of verses ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 2, Number 9, July, 1858 • Various
... said: "Why, Clara, I don't know myself whether Penloe can play the piano, for he is so modest about his attainments. We have sung together many times, but I am like you, I never thought to ask him if he could play." Turning to Penloe, she said: "Now, Penloe, I do want to hear you play so much"; and when he rose ...
— A California Girl • Edward Eldridge
... of Latin. Examples are 'acid', 'tepid', 'rigid', 'horrid', 'humid', 'lurid ', 'absurd', 'tacit', 'digit', 'deposit', 'compact', 'complex', 'revise', 'response', 'acute'. Those which have the suffix -es prefixed throw the stress back, as 'honest', 'modest'. Those which have the suffix -men prefixed also throw the stress back, as 'moment', 'pigment', 'torment', and to the antepenultima, if there be one, as 'argument', 'armament', 'emolument', the penultimate ...
— Society for Pure English Tract 4 - The Pronunciation of English Words Derived from the Latin • John Sargeaunt
... the experiment of a modest appropriation ($25,000) for a reform of the civil service, and Grant placed the test in the hands of George William Curtis, a leader of the new reform. The commission breasted the whole current of politics, found that Grant would not support it in critical cases, and ...
— The New Nation • Frederic L. Paxson
... impelled successively the Assyrians, the Babylonians, and the Persians to cover Western Asia with architectural monuments, proofs at once of the wealth, and the grand ideas, of those who raised them. Parthia, compared to these pretentious empires, was retiring and modest. The monarchs, however rich they may have been, affected something of primitive rudeness and simplicity in their habits and style of life, their dwellings and temples, their palaces and tombs. It is difficult ...
— The Seven Great Monarchies Of The Ancient Eastern World, Vol 6. (of 7): Parthia • George Rawlinson
... have an idea, I might say a brilliant idea and when I say I like the idea better than any idea I can remember—you know me—I'm modest, but Al, it's a wonder. You'll like it. No, change that line, you may not like it but you'll respect it. Al, I'm going to let you in, give you the first chance. Conover would double the commission. Appleby would go wild over it. But, Al, I'm ...
— Skippy Bedelle - His Sentimental Progress From the Urchin to the Complete - Man of the World • Owen Johnson
... "Of modest poets be thou first; To silent shades repeat thy verse, Till Fame and Echo almost burst, Yet hardly dare one ...
— The Poems of Jonathan Swift, D.D., Volume I (of 2) • Jonathan Swift
... his adventures, and to receive high commendation from a large circle of epaulets; and the following day the captain invited him to dinner, and introduced him to the officers of his own squadron. Anton's modest composure made a favorable impression upon them all. At home they would probably have been restricted by their views of human greatness from becoming intimate with a young merchant, but here in the camp they were themselves wiser men than in the idle days of peace, their social prejudices ...
— Debit and Credit - Translated from the German of Gustav Freytag • Gustav Freytag
... treasures it held, leaning over the edge with a solicitude charming to see; and when he did at last cover them from sight, his black velvet cap still bobbed up and down, this way and that, as though he were taking advantage of his enforced quiet to plume himself. Precisely three minutes he allowed his modest spouse for her repast. At the expiration of that time he deserted, darted away, and began to call from the next tree, when she instantly returned. Sometimes she was at hand, and alighted on a twig on the farther side of the nest, when he bounded off and out of sight. She carefully inspected ...
— Little Brothers of the Air • Olive Thorne Miller
... expressions which would indicate that the writers were entirely loyal. They mistake loyalty to their own self-esteem, loyalty to their own dogmatic convictions, mental limitations, prejudices, and prepossessions for loyalty to truth, which is a passionless, modest, ...
— Buchanan's Journal of Man, January 1888 - Volume 1, Number 12 • Various
... again shortly, than from any delight which he taketh in foppery or ostentation. The color of his clothes is generally noted to be black rather than brown, brown rather than blue or green. His whole deportment is staid, modest, and civil. ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 14, No. 84, October, 1864 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... months passed away, and it was now the season of summer—that delicious season, fraught with more voluptuous pleasures than virgin spring, gloomy autumn or hoary winter. It was in rather an obscure street of Boston—in a modest two-story wooden house—and in an apartment plainly, even humbly furnished, that two ladies were seated, engaged in an ...
— City Crimes - or Life in New York and Boston • Greenhorn
... napkin; and there sat this roving lady, taking her tea and enjoying the prospect. As she was in the act of setting down her cup, she beheld an old man and a young child walking slowly by, and glancing at her proceedings with eyes of modest but hungry admiration. ...
— Ten Girls from Dickens • Kate Dickinson Sweetser
... opinions respecting human liberty, and as his native town was New Orleans, and his father a wealthy slaveholder, he concluded to remain in Paris. When I found him, he was living in the Latin quarter, among the students, at a cheap, though very neat hotel. He was refined, modest, and highly educated, and was busy in political writing and speculations. At that time he showed me a complete constitution for a "model republic" in France, and a code of laws fit for Paradise rather than France. The documents exhibited great ...
— Paris: With Pen and Pencil - Its People and Literature, Its Life and Business • David W. Bartlett
... reform, substantial internal and external debt, and deficient infrastructure. Aided by a firmer exchange rate and perhaps a greater confidence in the economic policy of the Duarte FRUTOS administration, the economy rebounded in 2003 and 2004, posting modest growth each year. ...
— The 2005 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency
... have predicted that the modest, gentle boy, Raphael, without either riches or noted family, would have worked his way to such renown, or that one of his pictures, but sixty-six and three-quarter inches square (the Mother of Jesus), would be sold to the ...
— How to Succeed - or, Stepping-Stones to Fame and Fortune • Orison Swett Marden
... adventures, I know not how, to great and strange happiness, and now again to great and strange sorrows; and to an adventure greater and stranger than all that has befallen me from my youth up until now. Therefore make me not proud, Uncle Brand, but keep me modest and lowly, as befits all true knights and penitent sinners; for they tell me that God resists the proud, and giveth grace to the humble. And I have that to do which do I cannot, unless God and his saints give me grace from this ...
— Hereward, The Last of the English • Charles Kingsley
... of a watering-place, one doesn't know who's who. Why Mrs. Gnu was here three summers ago, and there sat next to her, at table, a middle-aged foreign gentleman, who had only a slight accent, and who was so affable and agreeable, so intelligent and modest, and so perfectly familiar with all kinds of little ways, you know, that she supposed he was the Russian Minister, who, she heard, was at Newport incognito for his health. She used to talk with him in the parlor, and allowed him to join her upon the piazza. Nobody could find out who he was. There ...
— The Potiphar Papers • George William Curtis
... clear and genuine taste of their objects, which are all sophisticated there, and for the most part overwhelmed with their contraries. Here Pleasure looks, methinks, like a beautiful, constant, and modest wife; it is there an impudent, fickle, and painted harlot. Here is harmless and cheap plenty, there guilty ...
— Cowley's Essays • Abraham Cowley
... his reproof. At all times his conversation was apt to reveal that sudden changes of mental phase took place within him apparently without conscious volition. He now exclaimed with more modest mien, "It is, no doubt, by the will of the Lord that you are come, for I stood in sore need of comfort, for the revelation of the truth is a trial hard to endure, and at times ...
— The Mormon Prophet • Lily Dougall
... his feat in the Polar regions, and the charming Narrative he gave of it. "What a feat, what a book!" exclaimed the Parisian cultivated circles, male and female, on that occasion; and Maupertuis, with plenty of bluster in him carefully suppressed, assents in a grandly modest way. His Portraits are in the Printshops ever since; one very singular Portrait, just coming out (at which there is some laughing): a coarse-featured, blusterous, rather triumphant-looking man, blusterous, ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XI. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle
... ambitious essay in a more purely Greek style. Its colossal Ionic colonnade was, however, amere frontispiece, applied to a badly planned and commonplace building, from which it cut off needed light. The more modest but appropriate columnar faade to the Fitzwilliam Museum at Cambridge, by Bassevi, was a more successful attempt in the same direction, better proportioned and avoiding the incongruity of modern windows in several ...
— A Text-Book of the History of Architecture - Seventh Edition, revised • Alfred D. F. Hamlin
... alders, the lanes winding between hedgerows, the green common where the cricketers play, the low cottages covered to the roof with vines, and the trim gardens gay with pinks and larkspur. These villages are connected with the outside world only by the postcart and chapman. Here modest little girls like Miss Mitford's Hannah and Miss Edgeworth's Simple Susan move about their daily tasks and run on ...
— Sir Joshua Reynolds - A Collection of Fifteen Pictures and a Portrait of the - Painter with Introduction and Interpretation • Estelle M. Hurll
... everything that gives a charm to life. I'm intensely sensitive to form. But sometimes I draw back—don't you see what I mean?—I don't quite see where I shall be landed. I only want to be quiet, after all," Miss Ambient continued as if she had long been baffled of this modest desire. "And one must be good, at any rate, must not one?" she pursued with a dubious quaver—an intimation apparently that what I might say one way or the other would settle it for her. It was difficult for me to be very original in reply, ...
— The Author of Beltraffio • Henry James
... American dollars. The ricos and merchants preferred this system, and had no objections to making it permanent. Outrages were few on the part of our soldiery, and severely punished by the general. Our enemies contrasted the modest bearing of the American soldier with the conceited strut and insolent swagger of their own gold-bedizened militarios, who were wont on all occasions to "take the wall" of them. It was only outside the lines, between stragglers and leperos, that the retaliation system was carried ...
— The War Trail - The Hunt of the Wild Horse • Mayne Reid
... most modest boy. Nothing could get him to talk of his exploit, and should the subject be mentioned, he would grow very red, shuffle his feet, and turn the conversation into some other channel. The passengers drew up an address, with which they presented him, as a mark of their appreciation ...
— Here, There And Everywhere • Lord Frederic Hamilton
... resolved to devote my time, my heart, my all, to God without reserve. I do feel determined, by God's assistance, to rise early, spend no more time than is absolutely necessary, pray oftener, and more fervently, to be modest and solemn in the discharge of my public duties—to improve every leisure moment by reading or meditation, and to depend upon the assistance of Almighty God for the performance of every duty. Oh, Lord, assist an ignorant youth ...
— The Story of My Life - Being Reminiscences of Sixty Years' Public Service in Canada • Egerton Ryerson
... for him, gave him the civil office I have alluded to in this letter, and this not being open to Mr. Harness's scruples with regard to sacred sinecures, he accepted. His means were always small, his charities great, and his genial hospitality unfailing. He was one of the simplest, most modest, unpretending, honorable, high-minded, warm hearted human beings I have ever known. Goodness appeared easy to him—the best proof ...
— Records of Later Life • Frances Anne Kemble
... Reservation, which is in charge of the Bureau of Fisheries, all Government bird reservations are under the care of the Department of Agriculture, and their administration is directed by the Bureau of the Biological Survey. The National Association of Audubon Societies still contributes in a modest way to the financial support of some of the wardens. {201} Below is given a full list of the Federal bird reservations created up to January, 1917, with the dates, and in ...
— The Bird Study Book • Thomas Gilbert Pearson
... barristers are absent, attending those parties, and paying their respects to Mr. Kewsy's excellent claret, or Mr. Justice Ermine's accomplished daughters the uninvited are partaking of the economic joint and the modest half-pint of wine at the Club, entertaining themselves, and the rest of the company in the Club-room, with Circuit jokes and points of wit and law. Nobody is in chambers at all, except poor Mr. Cockle, who is ill, ...
— The History of Pendennis • William Makepeace Thackeray
... streams of water, that vanished under the brown leaves of the forest. Thus the Spirit of Winter departed, and where he had melted away, there the Indian children gathered the first blossoms, fragrant and delicately pink,—the modest Spring Beauty. ...
— Good Stories For Great Holidays - Arranged for Story-Telling and Reading Aloud and for the - Children's Own Reading • Frances Jenkins Olcott
... to see, and tyred limbes to rest, O matrone sage (quoth she) I hither came; And this good knight his way with me addrest, Led with thy prayses and broad-blazed fame, That up to heaven is blowne. The auncient Dame 95 Him goodly greeted in her modest guise, And entertaynd them both, as best became, With all the court'sies that she could devise, Ne wanted ought, to shew her bounteous ...
— Spenser's The Faerie Queene, Book I • Edmund Spenser
... on Ship Island some two or three months, his wife, a very modest, respectable little woman, came to me frequently with a piteous story of the suffering occasioned herself and her children by the prolonged absence of her husband, and begged me to intercede with the General for his pardon. ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. XII. July, 1863, No. LXIX. - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... warmth and affection of his wife, with whom he spent his whole time, and whose charming ways and manners gave him the greatest pleasure. Madonna Beatrice is, as he says, not only of a joyous nature, but of noble and elevated mind, and at the same time very pleasing and no less modest. And in May, when Cecilia's son was born, the duke himself told his wife the news, repeating his determination never again to renew the old connection. His letters to Isabella d'Este abound in the same expressions of genuine love and admiration for his young wife. ...
— Beatrice d'Este, Duchess of Milan, 1475-1497 • Julia Mary Cartwright
... who subjugates a heart, yet refuses its tender homage, one may treat as a conqueror: of modest ...
— Night and Morning, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... make any difference. I'll write them for you. You might be too modest anyhow. I can't think of a good name for the series. It ought to be 'The Autobiography of a Hero,' or 'A Modern Washington in the Cubapines,' or something like ...
— Captain Jinks, Hero • Ernest Crosby
... of the ideal, for the promotion of truth, of justice on earth.... He lives for his brothers, for opposing the forces hostile to mankind: the witches, the giants—that is, the oppressors.... Therefore he is fearless, patient; he is satisfied with the most modest food, the poorest cloth: he has other things to think of. Humble in his heart, he is great and daring in his mind.... And who is Hamlet? Analysis, first of all, and egotism, and therefore no faith. He lives entirely for himself, he is an egotist; ...
— Mother Earth, Vol. 1 No. 1, March 1906 • Various
... modesty—with forbearance. In the flashy style, all the force is expended, and visibly so; and as in that excess of power the flash of lightning is but momentary, we cannot long bear the exhibition of such a power rendered continuous. In the more modest—the subdued style—the artist conceals as much as may be the very power he has used, thereby actually strengthening it; for while you have all you want, you know not how much may be in reserve, and you feel it unseen, or may believe it to ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 62, Number 385. November, 1847. • Various
... letter to Mr Bevan, which he had already prepared. It was frankly and ingenuously written, and described their situation without the least concealment; plainly stated the miseries they had undergone; and preferred their request in modest but straightforward terms. Mark highly commended it; and they determined to dispatch it by the next steamboat going the right way, that might call to take in wood at Eden—where there was plenty of wood to spare. Not knowing how to address Mr Bevan at his own place of abode, ...
— Life And Adventures Of Martin Chuzzlewit • Charles Dickens
... and she belonged to a tribe which boasted of the fact that they were the tallest of all animals. But they were not aggressive about it at all, for giraffes are the most modest and gentle creatures to be found anywhere. They are quiet and inoffensive in all their ways and movements, shy and timid to a degree, and so cautious and wary that it is extremely difficult to get near them in their ...
— Rataplan • Ellen Velvin
... I find it hard to speak of them without a catch in my throat and moisture in my eyes. I see them before me now in the fair land of France—brave, strong, ardent; keen and quick-witted; kindly and clean and modest and wholly free from boasting; good-humored and good-natured; willingly submissive to unaccustomed discipline; uncomplainingly enduring all manner of hardships and discomforts; utterly contemptuous of danger, ...
— Winning a Cause - World War Stories • John Gilbert Thompson and Inez Bigwood
... noblesse, several of whom, never having quitted France, have preserved some of their property; and of emigrants, lately returned to their own country, and who have enough remaining to allow them to have a household establishment, but in a very modest style indeed, compared to that which their rank and fortune enabled them to support ...
— Paris As It Was and As It Is • Francis W. Blagdon
... knowing the danger that besets your daughters at this critical period, are you justified in keeping silent? Can you be held guiltless if your daughter ruins body and mind because you were too modest to tell her the laws of her being? There is no love that is dearer to your daughter than yours, no advice that is more respected than yours, no one whose warning would be more potent. Fail not in your duty. As motherhood ...
— Searchlights on Health - The Science of Eugenics • B. G. Jefferis and J. L. Nichols
... fervor and grace— From Ovid and Horace To Swinburne and Morris, They all of them take a back place, Then I sing and I play and I paint; Though none are accomplished as I, To say so were treason: You ask me the reason? I'm diffident, modest ...
— Bab Ballads and Savoy Songs • W. S. Gilbert
... working the boat had no such foolish fears. They set themselves to their task and made the trip from New York to Albany, a distance of one hundred and fifty miles, in thirty-two hours. Success had at last come to the quiet, modest, persevering Fulton. After this trial trip the Clermont was used as a regular passenger boat between New York ...
— Stories of Later American History • Wilbur F. Gordy
... that (though he was a solid business man, indeed yes, and honorable) he was a cool one, who had chosen, in wandering o'er this world so wide, the most perilous and cattle-boaty places. He tried to think of something modest yet striking to say, while Tom was arguing with Miss Mary Proudfoot, the respectable spinster, about the ethics of ...
— Our Mr. Wrenn - The Romantic Adventures of a Gentle Man • Sinclair Lewis
... beginning the reign of My knowledge of physics| | Henry VII." is punctuated by areas | | of ignorance. These | | alternate with topics | | that I think I | | understand clearly. | | | | | | Teacher D: A quiet, | Teacher D: A very | Teacher D: A very modest man. Sits back | strict teacher of | enthusiastic lecturer comfortably in his seat| English literature. He | in economics. He and asks questions on | assigns text for study,| explains the important assigned texts. The | and we must be prepared| ...
— College Teaching - Studies in Methods of Teaching in the College • Paul Klapper
... economic vulnerabilities. The most significant are debt-related: the government's largely domestic debt increased steadily from 1994 to 2003, straining government finances, while Brazil's foreign debt (a mix of private and public debt) is large in relation to Brazil's modest (but growing) export base. Another challenge is maintaining economic growth over a period of time to generate employment and make the government debt burden ...
— The 2004 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency
... perhaps he would also request permission to visit her regularly, with the ultimate purpose of asking her hand in marriage; in which case, she said, it was to be hoped her parents would not refuse his modest petition; for that the young gentleman was a very good and worthy young gentleman, a law-student of extraordinary promise, of as old and respectable a family as any other in the State, and, withal, a young gentleman ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. I, No. 1, Nov. 1857 • Various
... ones," chuckled my lord; and as there was no more to be extracted from him but foolish old jokes and dreadful smiles, I contrived to free my "pretty little hand," and sit down demurely by Tanty's side like the modest retiring ...
— The Light of Scarthey • Egerton Castle
... leave off your Drunken fits. Obsequious be and I'll recall your Wits, From perfect Madness to a modest Strain For farthings four I'll fetch you back again, Enable all your mene with tricks of State, Enter and sip and then attend your Fate; Come Drunk or Sober, for a gentle Fee, Come n'er so Mad, I'll your ...
— All About Coffee • William H. Ukers
... a masculine voice utter such a modest sentiment. But being a woman, she knew that the first word ...
— The Valley of Vision • Henry Van Dyke
... advertise on hoardings; for many years he had no signboard over his shop-front; and whereas the name of 'Bostocks,' the huge cheap drapers lower down Machin Street, on the opposite side, attacks you at every railway-station and in every tramcar, the name of 'E. Brunt' is to be seen only in a modest regular advertisement on the front page of the Staffordshire Signal. Repose, reticence, respectability—it was these attributes which he decided his shop should possess, and by means of which he succeeded. To enter Brunt's, with ...
— Tales of the Five Towns • Arnold Bennett
... way—page after page—of borrowing other people, when all the time I knew perfectly well (and everybody) that I preferred myself. At all events this calling one's self names—now one and now another,—working one's way incognito, all the way through one's own book, is not making me as modest as I had hoped. There seems to be nothing for it—with some of us, but to work through to modesty the other ...
— The Lost Art of Reading • Gerald Stanley Lee
... clever, but she has received a Continental education, and that won't do for them." Many mothers imagine, because their daughters, who are bold and free in their manners, and talk and laugh loud, are surrounded by young men, while the modest girl, who holds aloof, is apparently neglected, that their daughters are more admired; but this is a great mistake. Men like that boldness, that coquetry, that dash, if I may use the term, because it amuses for the ...
— Olla Podrida • Frederick Marryat (AKA Captain Marryat)
... instantly made me feel as a member of his family. His great talents, high professional standing, nobleness of heart and unfeigned piety, would have made him a most valuable counsellor to me: but he was too gentle, too unassuming, too modest; he looked to be taught by his juniors, and sat at the feet of one ...
— Phases of Faith - Passages from the History of My Creed • Francis William Newman
... imagined that the square resolute-looking man who as President of the Board gave the same energy and attention to consular squabbles as to the reorganization of a national fighting force, was almost daily engaged in a fierce clandestine struggle to maintain even his modest position. Jealousy, which flourishes in Peking like the upas tree, was for ever blighting his schemes and blocking his plans. He had been brought to Peking to be tied up; he was constantly being denounced; and even his all powerful ...
— The Fight For The Republic In China • B.L. Putnam Weale
... knowledge, only one definite attempt has thus far been made to gain special provision for the study of the primates. Somewhere about the year 1912 there was established on Tenerife, one of the Canary Islands, a modest station for the study of the anthropoid apes. I have already referred to it briefly on page 1. The plan and purpose of this station, which is of German origin, have been presented briefly by Rothmann (1912). From personal communications I know ...
— The Mental Life of Monkeys and Apes - A Study of Ideational Behavior • Robert M. Yerkes
... a veil over it. Such is the effect of God's grace on those who come to Church in faith and love; their mode of acting and talking, their very manner and behaviour, show they have been in God's presence. They are ever sober, cheerful, modest, serious, and earnest. They do not disgrace their profession, they do not take God's Name in vain, they do not use passionate language, they do not lie, they do not jest in an unseemly way, they do not use shameful words, they keep their mouth; they have kept their mouth in ...
— Parochial and Plain Sermons, Vol. VIII (of 8) • John Henry Newman
... have been an unusually beautiful girl, quiet, gentle, modest, womanly, and extremely sensitive. The fine feelings of a delicately organized nature may easily become either a blessing or a curse, and on account of her sensitiveness there was a rupture for which neither ...
— Threads of Grey and Gold • Myrtle Reed
... experience to have been at Ann Arbor in 1900, when Biffy Lee coached the Michigan team. It was at this time that I met Neil Snow, who was captain of the team, and when I grew to know him, I soon realized how his great, quiet, modest, though wonderful personality, made everybody idolize him. Modesty was his most noticeable characteristic. He was always the last to talk of his own athletic achievements. He believed in action, more than in words. After his playing days were over he made a great name ...
— Football Days - Memories of the Game and of the Men behind the Ball • William H. Edwards
... and handkerchiefs, a little necessary linen, a pair of shoes, and perhaps a ribbon for my hair if I meant to be very smart. On this occasion we all found that our skates occupied a terribly large proportion both of weight and space in our modest kits, but still we were much too ...
— Station Amusements • Lady Barker
... could not but experience the feeling of loneliness. I have, for the express purpose, prepared a small entertainment, and will be pleased if you will come to my mean abode to have a glass of wine. But I wonder whether you will entertain favourably my modest invitation?" Yue-ts'un, after listening to the proposal, put forward no refusal of any sort; but remarked complacently: "Being the recipient of such marked attention, how can I presume to repel your ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book I • Cao Xueqin
... expected triumphs I was assigned to the somewhat humble position of errand boy. In common with other boys who performed a like service for the firm I was known as "a pair of legs." Lodgings of a rather modest character had been secured for me in the western outskirts of the city near the banks of the Mersey. I was slow to make friends, and my evenings were spent in the perusal of some story books, which I had brought with me from London. One night, not long after the beginning of my new life in Liverpool, ...
— The Master of Silence • Irving Bacheller
... snubbed worse than we were? We sat still.' Quite reasonable—almost too convincing. There was really no need that Canada should have done other than she did—except that she was the Eldest Sister, and more was expected of her. She is a little too modest. ...
— Letters of Travel (1892-1913) • Rudyard Kipling
... That's the thing. I would die happy if I knew I had helped to detach from you one island—one little island of all the earth you have filched away, stolen, taken by force, got by lying.... Don't taunt me with your taunts of thieves. What weapons better worthy of you could I use? Oh, I am modest. I am modest. This is a little thing, this Jamaica. What do I care for the Separationist blatherskite more than for the loyal fools? You are all English to me. If I had my way, your Empire would die of pin-pricks all over ...
— Romance • Joseph Conrad and F.M. Hueffer |
