"Ostler" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... into the stable, which was a duty that devolved on the guests at this little change-house, from its mistress having no ostler, she entered the only apartment which the house afforded, and demanded some refreshment. "Sit down at the end of that table," said the old woman, "for the best I have to give you is there already; and be pleased, my bonny man, to make ...
— Fifty-Two Stories For Girls • Various
... fellow about seventeen, dressed like an ostler, with leather cords and gaiters. He lay upon his back, his knees drawn up, a terrible cut upon his head. He was insensible, but alive. A glance at his wound told me that it had not ...
— The Return of Sherlock Holmes - Magazine Edition • Arthur Conan Doyle
... services will also bring intelligent ingredients to these suburban nuclei, these restorations of the old villages and country towns. And the sons of the cottager within the affected area will develop into the skilled vegetable or flower gardeners, the skilled ostler—with some veterinary science—and so forth, for whom also there will evidently be work and a living. And dotted at every convenient position along the new roads, availing themselves no doubt whenever possible of the picturesque inns that ...
— Anticipations - Of the Reaction of Mechanical and Scientific Progress upon - Human life and Thought • Herbert George Wells
... A glimpse of the ostler's darkening countenance decided Pitman. 'All right,' he said desperately, 'you drive. I'll ...
— The Wrong Box • Robert Louis Stevenson and Lloyd Osbourne
... means. Post. And I hope your honour will order me something for myself. Fash. To be sure; bid them give you a crown. Lory. Yes, yes—my master doesn't care what you charge them—so get along, you— Post. And there's the ostler, your honour. Lory. Psha! damn the ostler!—would you impose upon the gentleman's generosity?—[Pushes him out.] A rascal, to be so cursed ready with his change! Fash. Why, faith, Lory, he had nearly posed me. Lory. Well, sir, we are ...
— Scarborough and the Critic • Sheridan
... side-street and alley, at once carried us along with it and constrained us to a walking pace. My father, finding the throng on the Market Strand too dense for our horses, turned aside to the Three Cups Inn across the street, gave them over to the ostler, and led us upstairs to a ...
— Sir John Constantine • Prosper Paleologus Constantine
... starting like a guilty thing, seemed hesitating whether to approach or to run away; and when he determined on the former, it was to assail me with a loud, clamorous, and exaggerated report of the anxiety of all at the Shepherd's Bush for my personal safety; how my landlady had wept, how Sam and the ostler had not the heart to go to bed, but sat up all night drinking—and how he himself had been up long before daybreak to go in ...
— Redgauntlet • Sir Walter Scott
... on this occasion, for the coming of no market-day; indeed, the journey into the city was altogether special, and he was desirous that she should know that such was the case. He drove at a great pace into the inn-yard, threw his reins to the ostler, took just one glass of cherry-brandy at the bar, and then marched off across the market-place to the Close, ...
— Can You Forgive Her? • Anthony Trollope
... somewhat dazzled. Sam, the tall ostler, was polishing a curb-chain with sand; the lantern at his feet letting up spouts of candle-light through the holes with which ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson, Volume XXI • Robert Louis Stevenson
... interview, which, though, now in his power, was so sedulously shunned by the other party, he decided in the negative; and contenting himself with writing upon a slip of paper the hasty words,—"You are known by the villagers,—be upon your guard,"—he gave it to the ostler, with instructions to deliver it instantly to the owner of the horse he pointed out, and pursued ...
— Jack Sheppard - A Romance • William Harrison Ainsworth
... of the same nature, but it made as great an impression on the King's mind. It was a duel I had with Coutenau, captain of a company of the King's Light-horse, brave, but wild, who, riding post from Paris as I was going there, made the ostler take off my saddle and put on his. Upon my telling him I had hired the horse, he gave me a swinging box on the ear, which fetched blood. I instantly drew my sword, and so did he. While making our first thrusts his foot slipped, and his sword ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre
... drove through Clavering, the ostler standing whistling under the archway of the Clavering Arms winked to the postilion ominously, as much as to say all was over. The gardener's wife came and opened the lodge-gates and let the travellers through with a silent shake ...
— Boys and girls from Thackeray • Kate Dickinson Sweetser
... an inn; the horses were changed; the flight was resumed. Wogan had not moved during this delay, neither had Misset nor O'Toole come to the door. But an ostler had flashed a lantern into the berlin, and for a second the light had fallen upon Wogan's face and open eyes. Clementina, however, did not cease; she sang on until the lights had been left behind and the darkness was about them. Then she ...
— Clementina • A.E.W. Mason
... standing alone by the wayside under nodding pines, with its streamlet and water-tank; its backwoods, toll-bar, and well trodden croquet ground; the ostler standing by the stable door, chewing a straw; a glimpse of the Chinese cook in the back parts; and Mr. Hoddy in the bar, gravely alert and serviceable, and equally anxious to lend or borrow books;—dozed all ...
— The Silverado Squatters • Robert Louis Stevenson
... reins to the ostler, I strode into the inn, swaddled in my cloak, and called for the hostess. The place was empty, as indeed all Cagli had seemed when I rode up. She came forward—a woman with a brown, full face, and large kindly eyes—and I asked her whether a lady had arrived ...
— The Shame of Motley • Raphael Sabatini
... was before him; it had no place for idlers, and he must get work. The contents of the basket were not yet exhausted, and he took it to a retired corner to eat his breakfast. While he was thus engaged, Joe Flint, the ostler, happened to see him. ...
— Try Again - or, the Trials and Triumphs of Harry West. A Story for Young Folks • Oliver Optic
... moment, pert) you are Warden here. It is your duty, even your privilege, to GUARD. Is it not? Well, I grant you the adage that it is useless to bolt the stable door when the horse has been stolen. But what shall be said of the ostler who doesn't know—won't even 'inquire' whether—the ...
— Zuleika Dobson - or, An Oxford Love Story • Max Beerbohm
... had their last drain before arriving at their destination, being a cold night, they kindly sent Mrs. Cox a drop of something warm. The servant-girl who brought out the glass, not being able to reach the lady, the ostler very imprudently left the horses' heads to do the polite. The animals hearing some one getting on the coach, doubtless concluded that it was the coachman; at the same time finding themselves free, and being, probably, anxious to get home, started off at their usual pace, and performed the seven ...
— Hints on Driving • C. S. Ward
... zealot's creed; Shook by a dream, he next for truth receives What frenzy teaches, and what fear believes; And this will place him in the power of one Whom we must seek, because we cannot shun." Wisp had been ostler at a busy inn, Where he beheld and grew in dread of sin; Then to a Baptists' meeting found his way, Became a convert, and was taught to pray; Then preach'd; and, being earnest and sincere, Brought other sinners ...
— Tales • George Crabbe
... Elizabethan Age several comic incidents occurred at court; particularly when any of the courtiers were guilty of personal impertinence to their virgin queen. It must have been very comical to see Shakspere holding stirrups like an ostler, or performing the part of the Ghost, in his own play of Hamlet. The dress worn in Queen Anne's time, and that of the first Georges, was very comical indeed— but enough of this. Our concern is with the present time— the funniest epoch, beyond ...
— The Comic Latin Grammar - A new and facetious introduction to the Latin tongue • Percival Leigh
... I wish you would just step across the yard, and see if that stupid ostler has rubbed them dry, as I told him. You understand those things, I know, Hurst—the fellows won't humbug you very easily; as to Hawthorne, I wouldn't trust him to see to any thing of the sort. Flora here knows more about a horse ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 363, January, 1846 • Various
... up, which in those early days used to set off from the George, Mr. Foker flung the coffee-room window open, and called the guards and coachmen by their Christian names, too, asking about their respective families, and imitating with great liveliness and accuracy the tooting of the horns as Jem the ostler whipped the horses' cloths off, and the carriages drove ...
— The History of Pendennis • William Makepeace Thackeray
... steel through my clothes on the right side. I felt a slight sting, but did not mind, and by wrenching myself half round I tore the sabre from his hand. Then I closed, and held him, in spite of his struggles and frothing curses, until the landlord and ostler burst in and ...
— The Chequers - Being the Natural History of a Public-House, Set Forth in - a Loafer's Diary • James Runciman
... a little tea-room, and Dick went to the stables to see to the feeding of Smart. In face of the significant twitches of feature that were visible in the ostler and labouring men idling around, Dick endeavoured to look unconscious of the fact that there was any sentiment between him and Fancy beyond a tranter's desire to carry a passenger home. He presently entered the inn and opened the door of ...
— Under the Greenwood Tree • Thomas Hardy
... in the dark old inn-yard a stable-wicket creaked Where Tim the ostler listened; his face was white and peaked; His eyes were hollows of madness, his hair like mouldy hay, But he loved the landlord's daughter, The landlord's red-lipped daughter, Dumb as a dog he listened, and he heard the ...
— Collected Poems - Volume One (of 2) • Alfred Noyes
... shrewd Metcalf discerned in the proposed enterprise the first of a series of public roads of a similar kind throughout the northern counties, for none knew better than he did how great was the need of them. He determined, therefore, to enter upon this new line of business, and offered to Mr. Ostler, the master surveyor, to construct three miles of the proposed road between Minskip and Fearnsby. Ostler knew the man well, and having the greatest confidence in his abilities, he let him the contract. Metcalf sold his stage-waggons and his interest in the carrying business between York and ...
— The Life of Thomas Telford by Smiles • Samuel Smiles
... sight it was to see these forty nobles tearing off their clothes and littering the deck with velvets and satins, whilst the squire of each, as busy as an ostler before a race, stooped and pulled and strained and riveted, fastening the bassinets, the legpieces, the front and the back plates, until the silken courtier had become the man of steel. When their work was finished, there stood ...
— Sir Nigel • Arthur Conan Doyle
... honour's ladyship," he began, with a glance at the hotel ostler, who was standing near cleaning a bit in industrious and sarcastic silence, "it is a fact, no doubt, that I mentioned here this morning that this young mare was of the Government hackney stock. But, according as I understand from this poor man that owns her, he bought ...
— All on the Irish Shore - Irish Sketches • E. Somerville and Martin Ross
... shillings in money which were given me at Richmond, and after travelling nearly twenty-four hours from the time I crossed the line, I ventured to call at a tavern, and buy a dinner. On reaching Carlisle, I enquired of the ostler in a stable if he knew of any one who wished to hire a house servant or coachman. He said he did not. Some more colored people came in, and taking me aside told me that they knew that I was from Virginia, by my pronunciation of certain words—that I was probably a ...
— The Anti-Slavery Examiner, Omnibus • American Anti-Slavery Society
... soon as I reached London, and I had to make shift to pay my fare down here. It is a long story to tell how I found you out. I went to the old place first, and they sent me on here. I had a drop of beer and a crust at the Three Loaves, and old Giles, the ostler, knew me and told me a long yarn ...
— Lover or Friend • Rosa Nouchette Carey
... the wheelbarrow after a little delay came forth. The trunk was bestowed on it by the united efforts of the Irishman and the ostler. ...
— Hills of the Shatemuc • Susan Warner
... genius. I scarcely know a face on canvas that expresses the poetical sense in a higher degree than this one. The likeness must be perfect, and I can imagine the delight of the Rev. Joseph Spence hobbling into his presence on the 4th of September, 1735, after "a ragged boy of an ostler came in with a little scrap of paper not half an inch broad, which contained the following words: 'Mr. Pope would be very glad to see Mr. Spence at the Cross ...
— Yesterdays with Authors • James T. Fields
... hers, I wat. Ye wad hae thocht she had been gaein' to The Bothie; but gin she had been that, there wad hae been a cairriage to meet her,' said Crookit Caumill, the ostler. ...
— Robert Falconer • George MacDonald
... BOSWELL. 'Mr. Burke has a constant stream of conversation.' JOHNSON. 'Yes, Sir; if a man were to go by chance at the same time with Burke under a shed, to shun a shower, he would say—"this is an extraordinary man." If Burke should go into a stable to see his horse drest, the ostler would say—we have had an extraordinary man here[852].' BOSWELL. 'Foote was a man who never failed in conversation. If he had gone into a stable—' JOHNSON. 'Sir, if he had gone into a stable, the ostler ...
— Life Of Johnson, Volume 4 (of 6) • Boswell
... is that servant of Captain Jones; but then they all are. Valet, cook, porter, boots, chambermaid, ostler, carpenter, upholsterer, mechanic, inventor, needlewoman, coal-heaver, diplomat, barber, linguist (home-made), clerk, universal provider, complete pantechnicon and infallible bodyguard, he is also a soldier, if a very old soldier, ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 152, January 3, 1917 • Various
... the inseparable friend and ally of William Godwin. Holcroft's vivid and masterful personality stands out indeed as the most attractive among the abler members of the circle. The son of a boot-maker, he had earned his bread as cobbler, ostler, village schoolmaster, strolling player and reporter. His insatiable passion for knowledge had given him a mastery of French and German. He went in 1783 to Paris as correspondent of the Morning Herald, on the modest salary of a guinea-and-a-half a week. It was there that he acquired ...
— Shelley, Godwin and Their Circle • H. N. Brailsford
... the first on the list, and as it was well known that he was an ostler at a little auberge in the middle of the square, a corporal and a couple of soldiers was despatched to the house of entertainment to capture him; and the trio soon found that they would not have far to search, for Peter was standing at the gate of the ...
— La Vendee • Anthony Trollope
... would do, but the highwayman was my favourite dish. I can still hear that merry clatter of the hoofs along the moonlit lane; night and the coming of day are still related in my mind with the doings of John Rann or Jerry Abershaw;[4] and the words "postchaise," the "great North road,"[5] "ostler," and "nag" still sound in my ears like poetry. One and all, at least, and each with his particular fancy, we read story-books in childhood; not for eloquence or character or thought, but for some quality of the brute incident. That quality was not mere bloodshed or wonder. Although ...
— Essays of Robert Louis Stevenson • Robert Louis Stevenson
... to the care of the ostler, and went to visit the fine old church adjacent, where many ancient families lie buried; the principal object of interest was the magnificent chancel, which has been described as "one Gallery of Light and Beauty," the whole structure being known as the Cathedral of the Peak. ...
— From John O'Groats to Land's End • Robert Naylor and John Naylor
... told me, in 1859, that it had been built eighty years before by a then well-known character in those parts, one Stevens, father-in-law of Henslow the Cambridge professor of botany. Stevens, who could only with much difficulty manage to write his name, had begun life as ostler at an inn; had become husband to the landlord's widow; then a brewer; and finally, as he subscribed himself on one occasion, "mare" of Rochester. Afterwards the house was inhabited by Mr. Lynn (from some of the members of whose ...
— The Life of Charles Dickens, Vol. I-III, Complete • John Forster
... of a place that would just suit you," the ostler at the Greyhound at Streatham said to him, on the occasion of his third visit there; "but it is let; my old mother is the gentleman's housekeeper. He took the place through me, for he rode up just as you have done, one afternoon, nigh a year ago. He was from town, he was; he told me that ...
— Colonel Thorndyke's Secret • G. A. Henty
... This growth has since then been largely destroyed by fire, or has yielded to the woodman’s axe, and at the present time there are left not more than forty acres of the original “forest,” the rest being chiefly open moor, the whole going by the name of “Ostler’s Plantations,” Mr. Ostler being the agent employed in the work and becoming himself (as will be seen) eventually the proprietor. Thus of two eggs which Mr. Parkinson brooded over, and desired to hatch, one may be said to have been addled, ...
— Records of Woodhall Spa and Neighbourhood - Historical, Anecdotal, Physiographical, and Archaeological, with Other Matter • J. Conway Walter
... as ugly as sin, but beautiful in my eyes after Pozieres—you understand—and accompanied her to her poor lodging—in a most verminous place, sir—where we discoursed upon the problems of life and love. O youth! O war! O hell!... My horse, that brute who resented me, was in charge of an 'ostler, whom I believe verily is a limb of Satan, in the yard without. It was late when I left that lair of Circe, where young British officers, even as myself, are turned into swine. It was late and dark, and I was drunk. Even now I am very ...
— Now It Can Be Told • Philip Gibbs
... down about their ears. Up came the padrona to see the fun; up came her fat husband, in his shirt-sleeves and slippers; and her long-legged sons, and her tousle-headed daughters, and the maid-servant, and the cook, and the ostler—the whole establishment, in fact, collected at the open folding-doors, and watched with delight the progress of this battle of words. Last of all, a poor little trembling figure, with pale face and eyes big with fright, ...
— Stories By English Authors: Italy • Various
... forced its way in at the kitchen-door, which stood ajar. And at last there was such a pressure of air that the doors in the other end of the stable also burst open; and now the west wind rushed triumphantly right through the building, swinging the lantern that hung from the roof, whisking the ostler's cap out into the darkness, blowing the rugs over the horses' heads, and sweeping a white hen off the roost into the watering-trough. And the cock raised a frightful screech, and the ostler swore, and ...
— Norse Tales and Sketches • Alexander Lange Kielland
... The ostler had required no instructions to give the horse a feed of corn. Evan mounted, and rode out of the yard to where Jack was standing, bare-headed, in his old posture against the pillar, of which the shade had rounded, and the evening ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... described in a manner quite inimitable. She had grown up in New York, before her father's death, in the most select of Knickerbocker circles, but there was not a trace of aristocracy in her ways. She was sociable with the ostler and the office-boy, and agreeable to the neighboring farmers, talking with them with a spirit that quite delighted them. And yet there was nothing free and easy in her ways that encouraged undue familiarity. It was merely natural ease and good ...
— That Mother-in-Law of Mine • Anonymous
... his arm to Dorothea. Her brothers had dismounted and handed their horses over to the ostler who waited by the porch daily to lead them to the ...
— The Westcotes • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... dismount before the door, give the horse to the sleepy Barala ostler, and let himself into the bar. She heard him clink among the glasses and bottles. She heard his foot upon the three-step stair, and on the landing. It did not pass by. It stopped at the locked door of the ...
— The Dop Doctor • Clotilde Inez Mary Graves
... Eglan. (to the ostler) Well, Dick, what sort of a stud, hey? any thing rum, a ginger or a miller, three legs or five, got by Whirlwind out of Skyscraper? Come, fig ...
— The English Spy • Bernard Blackmantle
... wide berth. It would be no joke to have old Murdock topple over on to you. I left them 'wug-an-tooreying,' and went out to look after the trap, which was ordered to be at the door at half-past ten. I found Murdock's ostler very drunk, but sober compared with that rascally help whom we had been fools enough to take with us. They had got the trap out and the horses in, but that old rascal Satan was standing so quiet that I suspected something wrong. Sure enough, when ...
— Tom Brown at Oxford • Thomas Hughes
... people to whom he was totally a stranger, not knowing whether the next man he should meet would prove good or bad; but seeing an inn of a good appearance, he rode resolutely into the yard; and knowing that respect is often paid in proportion as it is claimed, delivered his injunctions to the ostler with spirit, and entering the house, called vigorously ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson in Nine Volumes - Volume IV: The Adventurer; The Idler • Samuel Johnson
... amain. That I had chosen wisely was proved when some twenty minutes later. I clattered into the hamlet of Mirepoix, and drew up before an inn flaunting the sign of a peacock—as if in irony of its humbleness, for it was no better than a wayside tavern. Neither stable-boy nor ostler was here, and the unclean, overgrown urchin to whom I entrusted my horse could not say whether indeed Pere Abdon the landlord would be able to find me a room to sleep in. I thirsted, however; and so I determined to alight, if it were only ...
— Bardelys the Magnificent • Rafael Sabatini
... be found, and a woman who was alone in the kitchen came up to him and whispered, "The boys (the rebels) are hid in the potato furrows beyond." He was rather startled at this intelligence, but took no notice. He found an ostler who lent him a wheel, which they managed to put on, and we drove off without being stopped by any of the boys. A little farther on I saw something very odd on the side of the road before us. "What is that?"—"Look ...
— The Life And Letters Of Maria Edgeworth, Vol. 1 • Maria Edgeworth
... he had not returned, and Sadie sat in the office at the hotel, making futile efforts to fix her attention on a newspaper. The guests had gone to bed and the building was very quiet, but she had kept the ostler up. He might be needed and she could trust him ...
— The Girl From Keller's - Sadie's Conquest • Harold Bindloss
... Two minutes later appeared the ostler and chambermaid, who were man and wife. The inn, as has been stated, was a quaint old building, and as inflammable as a bee-hive; it overhung the base at the level of the first floor, and again overhung at the eaves, which were finished ...
— Desperate Remedies • Thomas Hardy
... that he determined to know all about it in the morning. "I was pretty sure at the first sight, said he, that thee wert Jack Meadowcroft; but still I was not quite certain till I heard thee chattering with the folks at breakfast: so being ostler, I called thee out to the stable to speak to thee in private: for I'll tell thee what Jack, I will not betray thee." Hodgkinson then told him that though he loved music and acting, and should be glad ...
— The Mirror of Taste, and Dramatic Censor, Vol. I, No. 4, April 1810 • Various
... rubbing himself as if he ached, after throwing the reins to the ostler. 'And I never was ...
— The Mystery of Edwin Drood • Charles Dickens
... asked me what I intended to do, and I told him frankly that I did not know; whereupon he observed that, provided I had no objection, he had little doubt that I could be accommodated for some time at his inn. "Our upper ostler," said he, "died about a week ago; he was a clever fellow, and, besides his trade, understood ...
— The Romany Rye • George Borrow
... Jacobite would do, but the highwayman was my favourite dish. I can still hear that merry clatter of the hoofs along the moonlit lane; night and the coming of day are still related in my mind with the doings of John Rann or Jerry Abershaw; and the words "post-chaise," the "great North road," "ostler," and "nag" still sound in my ears like poetry. One and all, at least, and each with his particular fancy, we read story-books in childhood, not for eloquence or character or thought, but for some quality of the brute incident. That quality was not mere bloodshed or wonder. Although each of these ...
— Memories and Portraits • Robert Louis Stevenson
... walking across the bowling-green, we will see what has taken place outside the inn. Tom's presentiments of danger were not, it appeared, without foundation. Scarcely had the ostler brought forth our two highwaymen's steeds, when a post-chaise, escorted by two or three horsemen, drove furiously up to the door. The sole occupant of the carriage was a lady, whose slight and pretty figure ...
— Rookwood • William Harrison Ainsworth
... us in and across her threshold. As for Major Favraud, he had turned to leave us on the door-sill, to see to the comfort and safety of his horses; not liking, perhaps, the appearance of the superannuated ostler, who lounged near the stable of the inn, if such might be called this rustic retreat without sign, lodging, ...
— Miriam Monfort - A Novel • Catherine A. Warfield
... the inn, with his ostler on his left-hand, read his also in the same stile—under the portico or gateway of his stable-yard—his wife, hers more privately in a back room: all flocked to their lectures; not promiscuously—but to this or that, as is ever the way, as faith and credulity ...
— The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman • Laurence Sterne
... her head!" cried he to the ostler, and with a snap, a crack, and a jingle, away we went upon ...
— Rodney Stone • Arthur Conan Doyle
... more by instinct than aim, I wandered into the stable-yard of one of the principal inns, where I was brought nearer to my senses by hearing the ostler sing out sharply, "Hullo, my man, what is your business?" I told him I was a friendless boy in search of some employment by which I might get a livelihood, as I was very hungry and had no money, or something to that effect; to which he replied that if I would brush about a bit, ...
— The Autobiography of Sergeant William Lawrence - A Hero of the Peninsular and Waterloo Campaigns • William Lawrence
... and the waiter remembered, and the ostler not forgotten, and the chambermaid taken into consideration,—in a word, the whole house bribed into a state of contempt and animosity, and Estella's purse much lightened,—we got into our post-coach and drove away. Turning into Cheapside and rattling ...
— Great Expectations • Charles Dickens
... his ease in his inn, and took his sip of punch so comfortably, that I, for my part, thought he never would be gone. I was out in the stables and looking at the horses, and talking to the ostler who was rubbing his nags down. I dare say I had a peep into the kitchen, and at the pigeons in the inn-yard, and at all things which were to be seen at "The Bell," while my two companions were still at their interminable punch. It ...
— A Book of English Prose - Part II, Arranged for Secondary and High Schools • Percy Lubbock
... balance against a huge bunch of keys which rattled in the other, he pulled out his watch, and finding they had a quarter of an hour to spare, proposed to chaperon the Yorkshireman on a tour of the hunting stables. Jorrocks summoned the ostler, and with great dignity led the way. "Humph," said he, evidently disappointed at seeing half the stalls empty, "no great show this morning—pity—gentleman come from a distance—should like to have shown him some good nags.—What sort of a devil's this?" "Oh, sir, he's a good 'un, and nothing but ...
— Jorrocks' Jaunts and Jollities • Robert Smith Surtees
... Huggins stood when he was rubb'd By help and ostler kind, And when they cleaned the clay ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. 14, Issue 393, October 10, 1829 • Various
... be true, and she looked up every now and then in the midst of her feast, with a mild wonder. Away she and I bowled down the sleeping village, all overrun with sunshine, the dumb idiot man and the birds alone up, for the ostler was off to his straw. There was the S. Q. N. and her small panting friend, who had lost the cat, but had got what philosophers say is better—the chase. "Nous ne cherchons jamais les choses, mais la recherche des choses," says Pascal. The Duchess would substitute for ...
— Spare Hours • John Brown
... close to whom is Mr. Roebuck, and behind him again Mr. Hume. Sir Roger Gresley addresses himself to the insides, and the person holding up his paper to the special notice of John Bull is the Marquis of Londonderry. The driver of the coach is Lord Melbourne, and the ostler ...
— English Caricaturists and Graphic Humourists of the Nineteenth Century. - How they Illustrated and Interpreted their Times. • Graham Everitt
... stable of the Red Dragon three men stooped in conclave over the hind foot of a horse. Deio, the ostler, and Roberts, the farrier, agreed in their verdict for a wonder; and Caradoc Wynne, the owner of the horse, straightened himself from his stooping posture with ...
— By Berwen Banks • Allen Raine
... Thanky, ma'am. I'll look up the concern and try my chance. Would you call it too great a come-down to have father an 'ostler after being first rider in the 'Great Golden Menagerie, Circus, and Colosseum,' hey Ben?" asked Mr. Brown, quoting the well-remembered show-bill ...
— St. Nicholas Magazine for Boys and Girls, Vol. 5, October 1878, No. 12 • Various
... endure the strokes like anvils or hard steel, Till pain itself make us no pain to feel. Who shall do me right now? is this the end of service? I'd rather go weed garlic; travel through France, and be mine own ostler; wear sheep-skin linings, or shoes that stink of blacking; be entered into the list of the forty thousand pedlars in Poland. [Enter Savoy Ambassador.] Would I had rotted in some surgeon's house at Venice, built upon the pox as well as one pines, ere ...
— The White Devil • John Webster
... contest was ruinous to the principles of the stables connected with the mails. This whole corporation was constantly bribed, rebribed, and often surrebribed; a mail-coach yard was like the hustings in a contested election; and a horse-keeper, ostler, or helper, was held by the philosophical at that time to be the most corrupt character ...
— The English Mail-Coach and Joan of Arc • Thomas de Quincey
... chapel in Richmond, where the congregation were singing a hymn, but beyond this no accident occurred; nor was Mr. Eglantine in the least stiff or fatigued by the time the party reached Richmond, where he arrived time enough to give his steed into the charge of an ostler, and to present his elbow to the ladies as they alighted ...
— Men's Wives • William Makepeace Thackeray
... The ostler of the inn at which we put up, understanding I was bound for London, advised me to take my passage in a collier which would be both cheap and expeditious and withal much easier than to walk upwards of three hundred miles ...
— The Adventures of Roderick Random • Tobias Smollett
... Joe froth aght o' t'maath, He sooin tuke to his heels, Fer asteead o' t'Ostler's Monument, He'd shown 'em ...
— Revised Edition of Poems • William Wright
... away the ostler helped himself to a quart of the strongest ale, which, by a singular faculty that he had acquired, he poured down his throat without any effort at swallowing, holding his head back, and the jug at a little distance from ...
— Varney the Vampire - Or the Feast of Blood • Thomas Preskett Prest
... upon the table began to whisper in Welsh to his professional adviser. Not wishing to hear any of their conversation I finished my breakfast as soon as possible and left the room. Going into the inn-yard I had a great deal of learned discourse with an old ostler about the glanders in horses. From the inn-yard I went to my own private room and made some dottings in my note-book, and then went down again to the parlour, which I found unoccupied. After sitting some time before the fire I got up, and strolling out, presently came to a kind of marketplace, ...
— Wild Wales - Its People, Language and Scenery • George Borrow
... particularly the religious societies; but many others, from being pushed too far, have done great mischief, and have very much assisted to demoralise the community. I remember once hearing a story of an ostler who confessed to a Catholic priest; he enumerated a long catalogue of enormities peculiar to his profession, and when he had finished, the priest inquired of him "whether he had ever greased horses' teeth to prevent their eating their corn?" ...
— Diary in America, Series One • Frederick Marryat (AKA Captain Marryat)
... of his successes, but at this distance of time and places I can keep no chronological count of them. Robson has always alternated the serio-comic burlesque with pure farce, and after Jem Baggs his brightest hits have been in the deaf ostler in "Boots at the Swan" and the discharged criminal in "Retained for the Defence." In the burlesque of "Masaniello," he had an opportunity—which some thought would prove a magnificent one to him—of showing the grotesque side of insanity; but, for some reason ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 13, No. 80, June, 1864 • Various
... and brother magistrate, one Squire Mountmeadow, an important personage in his way, the terror of poachers, and somewhat of an oracle on the bench, as it was said that he could take a deposition without the assistance of his clerk. Although, in spite of the ostler's lanterns, it was very dark, it was impossible ever to be unaware of the arrival of Squire Mountmeadow; for he was one of those great men who take care to remind the world of their dignity by the attention which ...
— Venetia • Benjamin Disraeli
... first edition, from the recitation of a gentleman, who professed to have forgotten some verses. These have, in the present edition, been partly restored, from a copy obtained by the recitation of an ostler in Carlisle, which has also furnished some ...
— Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border, Vol. II (of 3) • Walter Scott
... she asked in fluent Spanish, of the ostler, who stared with open-mouthed surprise at this apparition of a fine lady ...
— The Thin Red Line; and Blue Blood • Arthur Griffiths
... great trust and dependence; and he seems to have a good understanding with every bright-eyed country lass. The moment he arrives where the horses are to be changed, he throws down the reins with something of an air, and abandons the cattle to the care of the ostler; his duty being merely to drive from one stage to another. When off the box, his hands are thrust in the pockets of his greatcoat, and he rolls about the inn-yard with an air of the most absolute lordliness. ...
— Old Christmas From the Sketch Book of Washington Irving • Washington Irving
... Heigh-ho! an't be not four by the day, I'll be hang'd: Charles' wain is over the new chimney, and yet our horse' not pack'd.—What, ostler! ...
— King Henry IV, The First Part • William Shakespeare [Hudson edition]
... conspiracies, which appeared in a pretended correspondence written from Spain, France, Italy, or Denmark: they had their amusing literature, mixed with their grave politics; and a dialogue between "a Dutch mariner and an English ostler," could alarm the nation as much as the last letter from their "private correspondent." That the wildest rumours were acceptable appears from their contemporary Fuller. Armies were talked of, concealed under ground by the king, to cut the throats of all the Protestants in a night. He assures ...
— Calamities and Quarrels of Authors • Isaac D'Israeli
... He was expectant by six in the morning. By nine horrible fears oppressed him that his quest had escaped him, and he had to reconnoitre the Angel yard in order to satisfy himself. There he found the ostler (How are the mighty fallen in these decadent days!) brushing down the bicycles of the chase, and he returned relieved to Mrs. Wardor's premises. And about ten they emerged, and rode quietly up the North Street. He watched them until they turned ...
— The Wheels of Chance - A Bicycling Idyll • H. G. Wells
... brush to begin polishing the buttons, now in a neat row, when a couple of hands were passed round him—one taking his jacket and button-stick, the other the brush, which was briskly applied, accompanied by a loud, hissing noise, such as an ostler makes, to blow away the ...
— The Queen's Scarlet - The Adventures and Misadventures of Sir Richard Frayne • George Manville Fenn
... "That shall be the last of your taunts, old man." He turned to the ostler: "Bill, give Black Dick his oats at sunrise; and in ten days at furthest I'll pay every shilling this house and farm do owe. Now, Master White, you'll put in hand a new sign-board for this inn; a fresh 'Packhorse,' and paint him jet black, with one white hoof (instead of chocolate), ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 18, No. 105, July 1866 • Various
... Inn wrapped in slumber, like every house or cottage they had passed; but a lantern shone within an open door in the quadrangle round which house and stables were built. One of the Fareham grooms was there, with an ostler to wait upon him, and three horses were brought out of their stable, ready saddled, as the travellers rode under ...
— London Pride - Or When the World Was Younger • M. E. Braddon |
