"Pastime" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... day I was with him againe and so continued there till night, and he shewed me his house with pastime in ducking with water-Spaniels, and baiting buls ...
— The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques, and Discoveries of - The English Nation, Vol. 11 • Richard Hakluyt
... remarkable. It turned out that he played football admirably, and except for his rather scornful indolence he might easily have got his blue. He sneered at the popular enthusiasm for games, and was used to say that cricket was all very well for boys but not fit for the pastime of men. (He was then eighteen!) He talked grandiloquently of big-game shooting and of mountain climbing as sports which demanded courage and self-reliance. He seemed, indeed, to like football, but he played it with a brutal savagery which the other persons concerned ...
— The Magician • Somerset Maugham
... you, Mate, living up to being a mother is no idle pastime, particularly if it means reviving the lost art of managing love-smitten youths and elderly male coquettes. There is a specimen of each opposite Sada and me at table who are so generous with their company on deck, before and after meals, I have almost run out of excuses and am short on plans to avoid ...
— The Lady and Sada San - A Sequel to The Lady of the Decoration • Frances Little
... as his word. He sacrificed a day of his loved pastime to look for his old friend's ...
— Reginald Cruden - A Tale of City Life • Talbot Baines Reed
... she met delighted in drawing her out—it was a pastime that took the lead at dinner-parties, to an extent which her hostess often thought preposterous—and she responded with naivete and vigour, perfectly aware that she was scoring all along the line. Upon many charming people she made the impression that she was ...
— The Pool in the Desert • Sara Jeannette Duncan
... that thou hast wavered too long. It is a great foolishness to let the cherry knock against the lips too often or too long. A pretty pastime, perhaps, to will, and not will, to dare, and not dare; but at last the knock comes that drops the cherry—it may be into some ...
— The Maid of Maiden Lane • Amelia E. Barr
... at the executive desk. Who told you that this was to be, or that, long before it came to pass? In all the successful intrigues of Russia in this country, whom have you to thank? Me. Ordinarily a woman does not do these things as a pastime. There must be some strong motive behind. You asked me why I have stirred you so. Perhaps it is because I am neither two-and-twenty nor you two-score. It is these little barbs that remain in a woman's heart. ...
— The Man on the Box • Harold MacGrath
... it would come fluttering down to them at last. Now they are tired of trying, knowing that to try were foolish and of no avail. Yet it is pleasant for them to see, as here, others intent on the old pastime. Perhaps—who knows?—some day the bird will be trapped... Ah, look! Monsieur Le Duc almost touched its wing! Well for him, after all, that he did not more than that! Had he caught it and caged it, and hung the gilt cage in the boudoir of Madame la Duchesse, doubtless the bird would have turned ...
— Yet Again • Max Beerbohm
... we don't go in for that sort of thing extensively in Canada," put in Horrocks, as the representative of the law. "The peaceful pastime of the police would soon be taken from them. Why, the handling of ...
— The Story of the Foss River Ranch • Ridgwell Cullum
... even of future hope! Various of these little conversations extremely touched me nor was I unmoved, though not with such painful emotion, on the sight of the Sunday night dance, in a little village through which we passed, where there seemed two or three hundred peasants engaged in that pastime all clean and very gaily dressed, yet all so decent and well behaved, that, but for the poor old fiddlers, we might have driven on, and not have ...
— The Diary and Letters of Madame D'Arblay Volume 3 • Madame D'Arblay
... replied she, "they will not profit thee with aught of aid." Said he, "I will rise at once and go to them and knock at their doors; it may be I shall get from them somewhat wherewith I may trade and leave pastime and pleasuring." So he rose without stay or delay, and repaired to a street wherein all his ten friends lived. He went up to the nearest door and knocked; whereupon a handmaid came out and asked him, "Who art ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 2 • Richard F. Burton
... Watson's poem, and breathing the fresh air, which an official of the bath-house told me was made in Germany (meaning thereby that the wind was blowing from the east), the thought struck me that it would be a pardonable pastime to employ the spare time I had before the boat started for Lerwick, in writing a Sonnet to Mr. William Watson. In such exercitations it is necessary to employ the ...
— Literary Tours in The Highlands and Islands of Scotland • Daniel Turner Holmes
... be a pleasant pastime to find suitable names for the hundred varieties which go to a single heap at the cider-mill. Would it not tax a man's invention,—no one to be named after a man, and all in the lingua vernacula?[13] Who shall stand god-father at the christening of the wild apples? It would exhaust the Latin ...
— Wild Apples • Henry David Thoreau
... this delightful Silas Foster) by rinsing your fingers and the front part of your face in a little tin pan of water at the doorstep, and teasing your hair with a wooden pocket-comb before a seven-by-nine-inch looking-glass. Your only pastime will be to smoke some very vile tobacco in the ...
— The Blithedale Romance • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... the pastime of life is the whole business of it; sickness and death and misfortune,—to say nothing of cares and duties—are the interruptions, to be got rid of ...
— Real Folks • Mrs. A. D. T. Whitney
... with a new pastime planned by Tom, for each day. And most of these pleasures included the other girls, as well as Polly. So the enjoyment was general, and Polly could not say that Tom tried to get her company for himself, by leaving her friends ...
— Polly's Business Venture • Lillian Elizabeth Roy
... when it first appears in C major (see motive). But Bluebeard's exits are many —partly because his entrances are so numerous—and for every exit this motive conveys a new meaning. Blue-beard is always getting ready to go, but with what different purposes in mind! He goes for pastime and for passion; he goes for wooing and for wantoning; for marriage and for murder. He goes in D sharp with pomp, pride, and power, and we can distinguish the tread of his servants' feet, the clatter of arms, and the hurrying together of his escort and retinue. He goes again in B flat ...
— Bluebeard • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... first and at all times its chief purpose in England was to show to later ages what kind of men had directed the affairs and shaped the fortunes of the nation. In France it was to be practised as a mere pastime; to sketch well-known figures in society, or to sketch oneself, was for some years the fashionable occupation of the salons. In England the character never wholly lost the qualities of its origin. It might be used on occasion as a record of affection, ...
— Characters from 17th Century Histories and Chronicles • Various
... would work in the fields with father and brother Barnes. There was excellent trout fishing, I remember, in the brooks; and that, with bee hunting and watching the forest fires, was his only amusement; for shooting was a pastime ...
— The Story of a Summer - Or, Journal Leaves from Chappaqua • Cecilia Cleveland
... longer the bitter misanthrope, hating your species, and snarling at all things—no longer the gay cavalier rushing to battle as a pastime—that you were altered, entirely changed, rather—that your character was elevated and purified—and that now, you were a patriotic soldier, fit to live or die ...
— Mohun, or, The Last Days of Lee • John Esten Cooke
... towered higher peaks, black with pine forests, only a path here and there cutting their primeval gloom. Betty stepped into a boat and rowed beyond sight of her house and the hotel. Then she lay down, pushed a cushion under her head, and drifted. It had been a favourite pastime of hers since childhood, but this morning her mind for the first time opened to the danger of a wild and brooding solitude, still palpitating with the passions which had given it birth, for ...
— Senator North • Gertrude Atherton
... an impracticable sentiment for her. If you take my advice, you will found your marriage upon mutual respect and industry. Select a wife who is not afraid of work, and who expects no folderol of romance. Love-making, I've always maintained, should be the pastime of the leisure ...
— The Deliverance; A Romance of the Virginia Tobacco Fields • Ellen Glasgow
... heaped up in some cool, damp place, where they will not freeze, and should be sprinkled plenteously every day. The boys make frames in the form of crosses, stars, wreaths, or letters, and the girls find a pretty pastime in tying on the greens. As fast as the designs are finished they must also be laid away and kept damp until Christmas. Woodland mosses, holly leaves and scarlet berries, and dried everlasting flowers are pretty to mix with the green. Branches of hemlock and young firs for ...
— Harper's Young People, December 23, 1879 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various
... hill was rough, rocky, barren, and in some places quite steep. In the clefts of the rocks, generally far above our reach, the bright red columbines stood in groups, drooping their graceful heads. Some of the rocks were worn to a perfect polish by the feet of daring sliders. It was a dangerous pastime even to the most experienced. A loss of balance, a slight deviation from the beaten track, a trip in a hollow, or a momentary entanglement in your dress,—and you are lost! I declined joining in the diversion ...
— Autumn Leaves - Original Pieces in Prose and Verse • Various
... I am convinced, both by faith and experience, that to maintain one's self on this earth is not a hardship but a pastime, if we will live simply and wisely; as the pursuits of the simpler nations are still the sports of the more artificial. It is not necessary that a man should earn his living by the sweat of his brow, unless he ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to Prose, Vol. X (of X) - America - II, Index • Various
... hackish idle pastime is to apply letter-based Dissociated Press to a random body of text and {vgrep} the output in hopes of finding an interesting new word. (In the preceding example, 'window sysIWYG' and 'informash' show some promise.) Iterated applications of Dissociated ...
— The Jargon File, Version 4.0.0
... hymns was not only a pastime, but a pleasure which it would have been almost cruel to deprive me of. It did not seem to me as if I learned them, but as if they just gave themselves to me while I read them over; as if they, and the unseen things they sang about, became ...
— A New England Girlhood • Lucy Larcom
... bright, and silvery-gray lump which very much resembled silver-ore. I looked at the mass thoughtfully for some time: an idea germinated, and there and then I planned a new amusement which became our most delightful pastime during ...
— The Story of a Child • Pierre Loti
... truly is it not a sweet surprise? For I myself unwillingly have worn My faded suit, as you, my child, have yours, And howsoever patient, Yniol his. Ah, dear, he took me from a goodly house, With store of rich apparel, sumptuous fare, And page, and maid, and squire, and seneschal, And pastime both of hawk and hound, and all That appertains to noble maintenance. Yea, and he brought me to a goodly house; But since our fortune swerved from sun to shade, And all thro' that young traitor, cruel need Constrain'd us, but a better time has come; So ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 5 • Charles Sylvester
... russet put on, And the skies seem in mourning for loss of the sun. The winds make the tree, where thou sitt'st, shake its head; Yet tho' with dry leaves mother earth's lap is spread, Her bosom, to cheer it, is verdant with wheat, And the woods can supply us with pastime ...
— Cavalier Songs and Ballads of England from 1642 to 1684 • Charles Mackay
... to my lot on this occasion, though I thought that some of them, when sufficiently near my face, grinned at me as they parted company. Yet none of them were over half a pound, and most of them much less. You can see that this healthful pastime does not produce its usual demoralizing effect on me. When we reached a flat piece of ground, the water would become quiet and the manners of the fish more humane, so that they would come out like chubs. ...
— A Pessimist - In Theory and Practice • Robert Timsol
... brethren dwells; From him grief snatches every coming joy Ere it doth reach his lip. His yearning thoughts Throng back for ever to his father's halls, Where first to him the radiant sun unclosed The gates of heav'n; where closer, day by day, Brothers and sisters, leagued in pastime sweet, Around each other twin'd love's tender bonds. I will not reckon with the gods; yet truly Deserving of lament is woman's lot. Man rules alike at home and in the field, Nor is in foreign climes without resource; Him conquest crowneth, him possession gladdens, And ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, • Editor-in-Chief: Kuno Francke
... oftener than any woman in Bursley. Her employers were so accustomed to an interesting announcement that for years they had taken to saying naught in reply but 'Really, Maggie!' Engagements and tragic partings were Maggie's pastime. Fixed otherwise, she might have studied the ...
— The Old Wives' Tale • Arnold Bennett
... nineteenth century, in bad odour with Europe; and Germany was able to earn in 1897 the lasting gratitude of the infamous Sultan Abdul Hamid by standing between him and the other European powers, who were trying to interfere with his indulgence in the pastime of massacring the Armenians. Turkey had had many protectors among the European powers. She had never before had one so complaisant about the murder of Christians. From that date Germany was all-powerful in Turkey. ...
— The Expansion of Europe - The Culmination of Modern History • Ramsay Muir
... solitude, is not the Earth With various living creatures, and the Aire 370 Replenisht, and all these at thy command To come and play before thee, know'st thou not Thir language and thir wayes, they also know, And reason not contemptibly; with these Find pastime, and beare rule; thy Realm is large. So spake the Universal Lord, and seem'd So ordering. I with leave of speech implor'd, And humble deprecation thus repli'd. Let not my words offend thee, Heav'nly Power, My Maker, be propitious while I ...
— The Poetical Works of John Milton • John Milton
... hundred other pieces of knavery, but it must not be supposed that having begun by murder, Derues would draw back and remain contented with theft. Two fraudulent bankruptcies would have sufficed for most people; for him they were merely a harmless pastime. Here we must place two dark and obscure stories, two crimes of which he is accused, two victims whose ...
— Celebrated Crimes, Complete • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... "He never gave himself the pastime of going to parties where there was drinking and card-playing, having always had ...
— Pictures Every Child Should Know • Dolores Bacon
... arranged according to geometric pattern. I used many a rare flower, too shy of bloom to recommend itself to florists; I combined tints almost as numerous as the flowers were, and perfumes to which city bouquets are utter strangers. Arranging flowers is a favorite pastime of mine, but upon this particular occasion I enjoyed my work more than I had ever done before. Not that I was in love with Miss Mayton; a man may honestly and strongly admire a handsome, brilliant woman without being in love with her; he can delight ...
— Helen's Babies • John Habberton
... pastime, to poor men a treat, To all a true tonic most bracing and sweet, To talent a pleasure, to genius a joy, To workmen a comfort, to none an alloy, The tyrant it softens; it soothes him if mad, The king who may rule if he ...
— Tobacco; Its History, Varieties, Culture, Manufacture and Commerce • E. R. Billings
... scorned of maid and wife, For leading such a wicked life; Both sucking babes and children small, Did make their pastime at my fall. ...
— Old and New London - Volume I • Walter Thornbury
... down by Lucy, asked if he had ever told her of the tricks that he and il Principe Odorico Moretti used to play at Ems on the old Baron Sprawlowsky, while Mr. Ferrars, leaning over his sister's chair, said aside, 'I beg your pardon, Albinia; I should not have yielded to Willie. This "rural pastime" is only ...
— The Young Step-Mother • Charlotte M. Yonge
... aloft to "knock off work and come shark-fishing, all you sea-dogs aloft there," as soon as he had placed a sufficiently respectful distance between himself and his skipper. There is no sport or pastime in which sailors will engage more eagerly than in the attempt to capture a shark; they regard the creature as their worst and most relentless enemy, and never willingly let slip an opportunity to catch and destroy one, frequently venting their hatred upon the unfortunate fish, when caught, in the ...
— The Voyage of the Aurora • Harry Collingwood
... fallow for seeds of discord the Big Trouble was not long in making itself manifest. All over the country the Bumping of the Bumpkins apparently became the favorite pastime of elevator men. Certain persons with most of their calluses on the inside cracked the whip and the three-ring circus began. Excessive dockage, short weights, depressed prices! The farmers grew more and more bitter as time passed. To begin with, they resented being compelled by the railway to ...
— Deep Furrows • Hopkins Moorhouse
... of the second day following they arrived at the homestead, pitched a tent, and set to work. That night they unloaded the lumber. Next morning they cleared a space for the cabin. By the end of August the camp was finished. The Mormon boys, to whom freighting over the rugged hills was more of a pastime than real work, brought in a few pieces of furniture—iron beds, a stove, cooking-utensils, and the hardware and provisions incidental to the maintenance of a home ...
— Jim Waring of Sonora-Town - Tang of Life • Knibbs, Henry Herbert
... playmate is stretching beside, As loath to be vanquished in love or in pride, While upward he glances his eyeball of jet, Half dreading thy fleetness may distance him yet. Ah, Marco, poor Marco—our pastime to-day Were reft of one pleasure if ...
— Personal Recollections • Charlotte Elizabeth
... manner ill calculated to arouse any feeling warmer than respectful esteem, so that there remained only Blanche and Violet, both young, pretty, and agreeable, to act as recipients of all the ardent emotions of the bachelor mind. Although the art, science, or pastime— whichever you will—of love-making has many difficulties to contend with on board ship, in consequence of the lamentable lack of privacy which prevails there, it is doubtful whether it ever flourishes so vigorously anywhere ...
— The Pirate Island - A Story of the South Pacific • Harry Collingwood
... tried to draw her from memory! for she would not be photographed. It became a common pastime to draw her profile; some attained the greatest proficiency in the art. With a broomhandle in the snow, with a match in cigar ashes, with skates ...
— Captain Mansana and Mother's Hands • Bjoernstjerne Bjoernson
... Hartlepool, who had been a sailor, used to render Psalm civ. 26, as "There go the ships and there is that lieutenant whom Thou hast made to take his pastime therein." ...
— The Parish Clerk (1907) • Peter Hampson Ditchfield
... for the violin and Leander's music, though, as she always made haste to say, some pious people misdoubted whether it were not a sinful pastime. On such occasions it went hard with Leander not to divulge his late experiences and the connection of the pious Uncle Nehemiah therewith. But he always remembered in time Laurelia's disability to receive confidences, being a woman, and consequently ...
— The Moonshiners At Hoho-Hebee Falls - 1895 • Charles Egbert Craddock (AKA Mary Noailles Murfree)
... the present time as coming from a class of society with whom are my earliest pleasurable associations. I may be allowed, perhaps, to say that in my boyhood it was my delight, during my vacations, to seek my pastime in the operations of the printing-office. I solicited of my father to take the corrected proofs of his Geography to the printing-office, and there, through the day for weeks, I made myself practically acquainted with all the operations of the printer. At 9 years of age I compiled a small volume ...
— Samuel F. B. Morse, His Letters and Journals - In Two Volumes, Volume II • Samuel F. B. Morse
... him and again became intent on their pastime. Pasquale rowed faster than before, and he passed close under the stern of the Greek vessel. The mate was leaning over the taffrail under the poop awning. He was dressed in baggy garments of spotless white, his big blue ...
— Marietta - A Maid of Venice • F. Marion Crawford
... and collection of decapitated human heads, belonging generally to personal enemies of the collector; it is a sport common in Borneo, and among other interesting, if primitive, nationalities. This pastime is, I understand, a favourite one with some students of the college. It is practised, I need hardly say, under the very strictest supervision; there must be a certificate signed by the British Resident, and a special written recommendation from the Director ...
— The Casual Ward - academic and other oddments • A. D. Godley
... followed by loud voices and laughter reminded him he had promised, at that hour, and in that sequestered place, to decide a bet respecting pistol-shooting, to which the titular Lord Etherington, Jekyl, and Captain MacTurk, to whom such a pastime was peculiarly congenial, were parties as well as himself. The prospect this recollection afforded him, of vengeance on the man whom he regarded as the author of his sister's wrongs, was, in the present state of ...
— St. Ronan's Well • Sir Walter Scott
... not the framing of a deathless lay The pastime of a drowsy summer day; But gather all thy powers And wreak them on the verse that thou dost weave. ...
— The Poet's Poet • Elizabeth Atkins
... French are not usually the best qualified to do so; and it is not to be forgotten that Balzac was a real countryman of Rabelais and a legitimate inheritor of Gauloiserie. Unluckily no man can "throw back" in this way, except now and then as a mere pastime. And it is fair to recollect that as a matter of fact Balzac, after a year or two, did not waste much more time on these things, and that the intended ten dizains never, as a matter of ...
— The Human Comedy - Introductions and Appendix • Honore de Balzac
... enjoyment of the abundance of the vanquished, who, in their turn, with their accustomed versatility, submitted patiently, and even cheerfully, to a yoke which, after the first onslaught was over, pressed lightly; the Voizins, to whom fighting was a pastime, bearing no malice, and passing imperceptibly ...
— The Forest of Vazon - A Guernsey Legend Of The Eighth Century • Anonymous
... Illingworth excused himself from giving an immediate explanation on the ground that he had not had time to check the facts. No doubt he hopes that in the interim other Members will follow Colonel Guinness's example and, by joining in the new pastime, bring grist ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 159, July 21, 1920 • Various
... momentous Christmas Day, our two young people had out their Latin books and began industriously to polish up their somewhat rusty acquirements in that classic tongue. A year ago they might not have regarded this as precisely a holiday pastime, but their ideas had undergone a ...
— A Bookful of Girls • Anna Fuller
... reached the engine-room he said to Murgatroyd, who was indulging in his usual pastime of cleaning and ...
— A Honeymoon in Space • George Griffith
... passionately fond of the chase, and used to neglect attendance on divine worship for this amusement. While he was once engaged in this pastime, a stag appeared before him, having a crucifix bound betwixt his horns, and he heard a voice which menaced him with eternal punishment if he did not repent of his sins. He retired from the world and took ...
— Quentin Durward • Sir Walter Scott
... theory that the earth was round, and Columbus at once entered into correspondence with him on the subject, and was greatly impressed with the views of the Florentine scientist, both as to the sphericity of the world and the wonders of the Asiatic region. Heresy-hunting was then a favorite pastime, and Columbus in accepting these theories ran no small risk of losing his life. Portugal and France in turn rejected his offers to add to their dependencies by his discoveries; and, though his brother found many in England ...
— Christopher Columbus and His Monument Columbia • Various
... with all the others, its life as a mission, and the province itself torn from the grasp of Mexico, to become a member of the greatest republic in the world—her unheeding mind knew nothing of all this. Her favorite pastime, after the railroad was built through the little town of San Gabriel, was to wander down to the station, when time for the trains, which she quickly learned, and to greet them with the snatches of song that remained with her—sole ...
— Old Mission Stories of California • Charles Franklin Carter
... 1567, and is described in the title-page, as "not only godly, learned, and fruitful, but also well furnished with pleasant mirth and pastime, very delectable for those which shall hear or read the same: Made by the learned clerk, Lewis Wager." It bears clear internal evidence of having been written after the Reformation; and the prologue ...
— Shakespeare: His Life, Art, And Characters, Volume I. • H. N. Hudson
... The pastime of "tailing" a bull is somewhat singular. Two or three horsemen single out an animal upon which to practise it, and secure a lasso about its horns. Another lasso, deftly thrown about its hind legs, is fastened to a tree, and the strongest of the party then seizes the bellowing beast by its ...
— Atlantic Monthly Vol. 3, No. 16, February, 1859 • Various
... were received by motherly Mrs Dean, with her ever warm welcome; but after the usual greeting a mischievous smile was seen lurking on her face, and she archly told us that she had a very attractive addition to her family, in the persons of two bachelor boarders. This served but as a pastime of the moment, and I gave it little further thought, until I was presented to Mr. Arms, a gentleman of medium height, head of noble mould and fine poise, dark hair and luxuriant beard, large brown eyes expressive and scintillating, quiet, ...
— The World As I Have Found It - Sequel to Incidents in the Life of a Blind Girl • Mary L. Day Arms
... Leviathan; and I promise thee that thou shalt long continue with me among the sweet vapours of this place, and scourge the shades of the great princes of the earth for thy pastime. Hem! a fine fellow, and seems to have had quite enough of men and things. Despair, audacity, hate, rancour, agony, and pride, have torn deep furrows in his soul. He looks even at us and hell without trembling. Faustus, art thou become dumb ...
— Faustus - his Life, Death, and Doom • Friedrich Maximilian von Klinger
... jumping the net, so as to take it on the other side, following up his return by another leap over the net, and so on till either he or the ball came to grief. On an ordinary day the exertion involved in this pastime would be quite enough for any ordinary individual, but on a day like the present, with the thermometer at ninety in the shade, it was a trifle too much even ...
— Reginald Cruden - A Tale of City Life • Talbot Baines Reed
... scenes Sacred to neatness and repose, the alcove, The chamber, or refectory, may die. A necessary act incurs no blame. Not so when, held within their proper bounds And guiltless of offence, they range the air, Or take their pastime in the spacious field. There they are privileged; and he that hunts Or harms them there is guilty of a wrong, Disturbs the economy of Nature's realm, Who, when she formed, designed them an abode. The sum is this: if man's convenience, health, ...
— The Task and Other Poems • William Cowper
... part," went on Sir Charles in a somewhat disappointed tone, "I am one who views with regret the decadence of a great national pastime." ...
— Half A Chance • Frederic S. Isham
... slaying for the day, have stropped our gory sabres, hung our horses up to dry and are sitting about after mess, girths slackened and pipes aglow, it is a favourite pastime of ours to discuss what we are going to do ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 152, June 6, 1917 • Various
... were by Queen Elizabeth united with the Spurriers, or makers of spurs. The motto of the Bowyers' Company, "Crecy, Poictiers, Agincourt," tells of the prowess of our English archers when archery was the national pastime of Englishmen, as well as their support in war. Other allied crafts were connected with the bowyers' art, including the Stringers, or long-bow string makers, and the Fletchers, who made the arrows. The guild of the latter still exists, and forms one of our minor companies. The ...
— Memorials of Old London - Volume I • Various
... Thaddeus in the "noble pastime of snooping," as he called it. The house was searched by him in a casual sort of way from top to bottom for a clew to the mystery, but without avail. Several times he went below to the cellar, ostensibly to inspect his coal supply, really to observe the demeanor of Margaret, the ...
— Paste Jewels • John Kendrick Bangs
... brows. "My grandfather Mike induced my great-grandfather Noriaga to build it way back in the 'Forties. The Indians and vaqueros used to run scrub races in those days—in fact, it was their main pastime." ...
— The Pride of Palomar • Peter B. Kyne
... quarter. "This is one of your sanctified ones!" cried they. "This was all the good that Sunday-schools did! For their parts, they never saw any good come by religion. Sunday was the only day for a little pastime; and if poor boys must be shut up with their godly books, when they ought to be out taking a little pleasure, it was no wonder they made ...
— Stories for the Young - Or, Cheap Repository Tracts: Entertaining, Moral, and Religious. Vol. VI. • Hannah More
... intention and purpose of these gay gentlemen was not the courteous entertainment of their hostess. Like so many men of all times and all nations in this world, they were ready enough to enjoy what she provided for them—the illicit pastime which they could not get elsewhere—but they despised her for giving it them, and cared naught for the heavy risks she ran in keeping up this house ...
— The Nest of the Sparrowhawk • Baroness Orczy
... and a clergyman, consequently a Republican and a Christian—the hero of the Russian Campaign, of Waterloo, etc., after his retirement to the Rock, became deeply interested in theology, fighting being no longer a pastime he could indulge in unless by pugilistic assault on the British guards, which, contrary to his past experience, would have been entirely at his own expense, hence uncomfortable. And here we find ...
— Burl • Morrison Heady
... daybreak the avian concert began with the shrieking of the western wood-pewees—a vocal performance that they, in their innocence, seriously mistake for melody—and continued until night had again settled on the vale. In this place I spent three or four days, giving myself up to my favorite study and pastime, and a list of all the birds that I saw in the neighborhood would surprise the reader. However, a mere catalogue would be of slight interest, I apprehend, and therefore mention will be made only of those species ...
— Birds of the Rockies • Leander Sylvester Keyser
... me to know how the human stomach can bear to be tormented in this frightful way. Per Baccho! I would as soon be shot in the hand with an escopette ball as drink the quantity of wine and eat the quantity of food that I have seen even women and children dispose of, as if it were mere pastime, on these railway journeys. I think it must be either this or the frost that accounts for the extraordinary prevalence of red noses in Russia, and it even occurred to me that the stations are painted a fiery red, so that when travelers come within range of ...
— The Land of Thor • J. Ross Browne
... his mother went to milk the cow; and so, with his oak-leaf hat, he got caught in the cow's one mouthful. After other strange adventures he arrived at King Arthur's court where he became the favorite. His feats at tilts and tournaments give a glimpse of English court life, with its pastime of hunting; and fighting with the sword brings in the knight element. The story has little plot, being a succession of many episodes and a repetition of some. It shows little constructive ability, promises ...
— A Study of Fairy Tales • Laura F. Kready
... have no objection to our continuing the pursuit of our favourite pastime, providing no "element of danger," such ...
— Chatterbox, 1906 • Various
... not monsters; we are slaves who drove our lingering flocks for pasture through the country. But while we took our pastime in gentle sports, our flock chanced to stray and went into far-off fields. And when our hope of finding them, our long quest failed, trouble came upon the mind of the wretched culprits. And when sure tracks of our kine were nowhere to be seen, dismal panic filled ...
— The Danish History, Books I-IX • Saxo Grammaticus ("Saxo the Learned")
... upon a time a king who had a son who was very fond of hunting. He often allowed him to indulge in this pastime, but he had ordered his grand-vizir always to go with him, and never to lose sight of him. One day the huntsman roused a stag, and the prince, thinking that the vizir was behind, gave chase, and rode so hard that he ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments • Andrew Lang.
... gesture of impatience, for he felt that his appeal had availed nothing, and he had no heart for a battle of words. His wit had been tempered in many fires, his nature was non-incandescent to praise or gibe. He had had his share of pastime; now had come his share of toil, and the mood for give and take of words ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... up, we found all the inhabitants and guests assembled in the yard witnessing a cock-fight, their eager countenances and excited exclamations showing the interest they took in the brutal pastime. The birds, armed with steel spurs, flew at each other and fought desperately. When one was killed or hopelessly wounded, the owner tore his hair and swore fearfully at his misfortune—by which, probably, he had ...
— In New Granada - Heroes and Patriots • W.H.G. Kingston
... liked to have his amusement as well as did the others, and went up resolutely into the cardroom. Here they were joined by Lord Grasslough, and were very quickly at work, having chosen loo as their game. Mr Fisker made an allusion to poker as a desirable pastime, but Lord Nidderdale, remembering his poetry, shook his head. 'Oh! bother,' he said, 'let's have some game that Christians play.' Mr Fisker declared himself ready for any ...
— The Way We Live Now • Anthony Trollope
... is preserved. Under such shades were preserved wool-work baskets filled with artificial flowers, among which were often small porcelain figures, butterflies and birds. Sometimes a Parian vase has been filled with wax flowers, the making of which was a favourite pastime half a century ago. The dried plant called "honesty" was frequently covered with a glass shade. Glass ships were exceedingly popular in seaport towns, and little miniature replicas of household furniture in glass are met with; indeed, there seems to have ...
— Chats on Household Curios • Fred W. Burgess
... had been unable to get any rest, any pastime in his distant castle, so at last he had hit upon the idea of knocking up the landlord of the "Break-'em-tear-'em" csarda, and picking a quarrel with him at any price. The insult would be all the more venomous if he woke ...
— A Hungarian Nabob • Maurus Jokai
... fact is that Bannockburn was fought on a point of chivalry, on a rule in a game. England must "touch bar," relieve Stirling, as in some child's pastime. To the securing of the castle, the central gate of Scotland, north and south, England put forth her full strength. Bruce had no choice but to concentrate all the power of a now, at last, united realm, ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 07 • Various
... walk before breakfast, went into the theatre to see its progress, and found Lord Curryfin swinging over the stage on a seat suspended by long ropes from above the visible scene. He did not see her. He was looking upwards, not as one indulging in an idle pastime, but as one absorbed in serious meditation. All at once the seat was drawn up, and he disappeared in the blue canvas that represented the sky. She was not aware that gymnastics were to form part of the projected entertainment, and went away, associating the idea of his ...
— Gryll Grange • Thomas Love Peacock
... busily engaged in {p.141} taking possession, by small bodies of from 100 to 250 men, of the undefended towns and villages in Griqualand West—the thinly peopled district to the west of Kimberley. This pleasant but useless pastime occupied them agreeably, and diverted them from molesting the British at Orange ...
— Story of the War in South Africa - 1899-1900 • Alfred T. Mahan
... adds so much sunshine and cheer to the rooms of a house besieged by winter and all his dreary encampment of snow and ice, as the greenery, color and fragrance of blossoming plants. There is no pastime quite so full of pleasure and constant interest as this sort of horticulture; the rooting of small slips, the repotting and watering and watching, as new growth develops, and buds unfold. Some have the magic gift, ...
— Gardening Indoors and Under Glass • F. F. Rockwell
... horse-racing, which for more than two centuries has made the sport a national one in England, cannot be said to exist in France, and the introduction of this "pastime of princes" into the latter country has been of comparatively recent date. Mention, it is true, has been found of races on the plain of Les Sablons as early as 1776, and in the next year a sweepstakes of forty horses, followed by one of as many asses, was run at Fontainebleau in the ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 26, September 1880 • Various
... others are sure to follow. It was wonderful how many of the prisoners discovered a talent for music after Punchard and Runnles had thus led the way. Our jailers encouraged this pastime; it was not merely harmless in itself, but it had a quietening effect on the temper of the men, and the squabbles and brawls among them notably diminished. One of the Frenchmen unearthed an old fiddle, and though one of its strings was wanting, ...
— Humphrey Bold - A Story of the Times of Benbow • Herbert Strang
... inclined to charge him with being above his business, and more anxious to be accounted a person of taste and learning than to be valued as a painter. Just as Congreve disclaimed the character of a poet, declaring he had written plays but for pastime, and begged he might be considered merely as a gentleman. There was no one to say to Ramsay, however, as Voltaire—nothing, if not literary—said to Congreve, 'If you had been merely a gentleman, I should not have come to see you.' On the contrary, the world in general ...
— Art in England - Notes and Studies • Dutton Cook
... so many and such fair flowers, wherein thy people were wont to take their pastime, ...
— Chronicle Of The Cid • Various
... we all know how far private suffering goes to influence a man's public opinions. Besides, the principle upon which the advocates for the sacredness of private property proceed, is erroneous. Every one will allow that, in absolute monarchies, where war is more properly the pastime of kings than the desire of subjects, non-combatants ought to be dealt with as humanely as possible. Not so, how ever, in States governed by popular assemblies. By compelling the constituents to experience the real hardships and miseries of warfare, ...
— The Campaigns of the British Army at Washington and New Orleans 1814-1815 • G. R. Gleig
... she took his arm, and they advanced to meet the whelp. He was idly beating the branches as he lounged along: or he stooped viciously to rip the moss from the trees with his stick. He was startled when they came upon him while he was engaged in this latter pastime, and his colour changed. ...
— Hard Times • Charles Dickens*
... formal occasions, which seemed to have neither warmth nor mirth in them to the two children, who had been accustomed so long to a daily gleeful, careless, happy interchange of greeting, speech, and pastime, with no other watcher of their sports or auditor of their fancies than Patrasche, sagely shaking the brazen bells of his collar and responding with all a dog's swift sympathies to their every ...
— Stories of Childhood • Various
... passion for great societies, balls, masquerades, and all kinds of public and private amusements, as well as her subsequent attachment to the Duchesse de Polignac, who so much encouraged them for the pastime of her friend and sovereign. Though naturally averse to everything requiring study or application, Marie Antoinette was very assiduous in preparing herself for the parts she performed in the various comedies, farces, and cantatas given at her private theatre; and their acquirement seemed to ...
— The Memoirs of Louis XV. and XVI., Volume 3 • Madame du Hausset, and of an Unknown English Girl and the Princess Lamballe
... sort of missionary in detecting the pretended wisdom of mankind; and this occupation had quite absorbed him and taken him away both from public and private affairs. Young men of the richer sort had made a pastime of the same pursuit, 'which was not unamusing.' And hence bitter enmities had arisen; the professors of knowledge had revenged themselves by calling him a villainous corrupter of youth, and by repeating the commonplaces ...
— Apology - Also known as "The Death of Socrates" • Plato
... the discovery had something to do with the kindness they always showed me, that I was a good hand at spinning a yarn: the nautical phrase had got naturalized in the school. We had no chance, if we would have taken it, of spending any part of school-hours in such a pastime; but it formed an unfailing amusement when weather or humour interfered with bodily exercises. Nor were we debarred from the pleasure after we had retired for the night,—only, as we were parted in three rooms, I could ...
— Wilfrid Cumbermede • George MacDonald
... a twopenny ride at the Zoo, few Europeans ever mount or ride a camel, thereby missing an art or a pastime or sport, which to the novice, until he has been thoroughly and literally broken in, is the most back, heart, and nerve-wearing means of locomotion he could possibly choose in ...
— Desert Love • Joan Conquest
... in such descriptions as that of the progress of Isabella to the camp of Ferdinand after the capture of Loxa, and of the picturesque pageantry which imparted something of gayety to the brutal pastime of war:— ...
— Washington Irving • Charles Dudley Warner
... temporarily deprives such a country and its few misguided prophets whose monomania is dread of that chimera, the "Colossus of the North," of the pastime of nestling up to Europe in the hope of annoying us. It postpones, too, the hope of the morbid ones that we shall come to war with a powerful enemy. Now, perhaps, even these will appreciate the remark of a diplomatist of a certain weak country in contact with European powers, who ...
— New York Times Current History; The European War, Vol 2, No. 2, May, 1915 - April-September, 1915 • Various
... single-trigger double-barrel hammer-less ejectors are as flintlocks! "Murderous weapon, and bloodthirsty shooter"—some old-fashioned gunners of to-day will say, just as our grandfathers spoke when breechloaders came in, and that delightful pastime with ramrod and wads, powder flask and shot belt went out. So it ever has been! Since the day some horrid fellow used a bronze sword instead of a stone on a stick, and since Richard of the Lion Heart took to that "infernal instrument," the cross bow, because of ...
— From Edinburgh to India & Burmah • William G. Burn Murdoch
... the novice are even more noticeable in a much longer story, Le Roi Flore et la Belle Jehane, which is found not only in the same printed volume, but in the same original MS. The fault of this is curious, and—if not to a mere reader for pastime, to a student of fiction—extremely interesting. It is one not at all unknown at the present day, and capable of being used as an argument in favour of the doctrine of the Unities: that is to say, the mixture, by arbitrary and violent ...
— A History of the French Novel, Vol. 1 - From the Beginning to 1800 • George Saintsbury
... My favourite pastime is to listen to others speaking. I never seem able to think of any topics worthy of conversation myself, but I am almost inclined to say that my ability to listen amounts to an art. I can remain silent with an air of ...
— Seven Icelandic Short Stories • Various
... with horror upon the lifeless body of the otter and cried out, "This creature which you mistook for an otter, and which you have robbed and killed, is my son, Oddar, who for mere pastime had taken the form of the furry beast. You are ...
— Hero Tales • James Baldwin
... received all his commissions and warrants by the name of master of the king's pastimes. Which gentleman so well supplied his office, both in show of sundry sights and devices of rare inventions, and in act of divers interludes and matters of pastime played by persons, as not only satisfied the common sort, but also were very well liked and allowed by the council, and other of skill in the like pastimes; but best of all by the young king ...
— Memoirs of the Court of Queen Elizabeth • Lucy Aikin
... girl, ready always to heed her father and her "Daddy Crisp," ready to obey her kindly stepmother, and try to exchange for practical occupations her pet pastime of scribbling. ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Vol. 7 • Various
... brutal pastime, Cashel Byron's counsel said; but a fair, stand-up fight between two unarmed men, though doubtless technically a breach of the peace, had never been severely dealt with by a British jury or a British judge; and the case would be amply met by binding over ...
— Cashel Byron's Profession • George Bernard Shaw
... time supplies were checked by the whirlwind of "Fairs." The Woman's Central, issued a Circular urging its Auxiliaries to continue their regular contributions, and to make their working for Fairs a pastime only. In no other way could it meet the increased demands upon its resources, for the sphere of the Sanitary Commission's usefulness had now extended to remotest States, and its vast machinery for distribution had ...
— Woman's Work in the Civil War - A Record of Heroism, Patriotism, and Patience • Linus Pierpont Brockett
... place of his own, a small, nondescript joint called "Louie's Crab House" up the Choptank River, near the town of Denton. There, on wooden trestle tables covered with brown wrapping paper, he introduced them to a favorite Chesapeake Bay pastime ...
— The Flying Stingaree • Harold Leland Goodwin
... that the recital of these old myths and legends among Oriental nations was for the mere pastime of the crowds, it is well to bear in mind that many of them were used as a means to convey great truths or to reprove error. Hence the recital of them was not confined to a merely inquisitive audience that desired to be amused. We have a good example of this in ...
— Algonquin Indian Tales • Egerton R. Young
... making of confections, and of candy in particular, is both a useful and a delightful pastime that can be indulged in even by those who are only slightly skilled. In fact, with a certain amount of knowledge of the methods used and a little practice, surprising results can be obtained by the amateur candy maker. Then, too, it is a comparatively simple matter to copy the confectioner's ...
— Woman's Institute Library of Cookery, Vol. 5 • Woman's Institute of Domestic Arts and Sciences
... do the family washing, ironing, etc., and the men cut fire wood, or worked in the garden, and special truck crops. Christmas? Christmas was a holiday, but the fourth of July meant very little to the slave people. Dances? There was lots of dancing. It was the pastime of the slave race. The children played shimmy and other games, imitating the white children, sometimes ...
— Slave Narratives: a Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves • Works Projects Administration
... scarcely aware of Bertrand's departure. He was plainly engrossed in the pleasant pastime of conversing with her. Chris began to give him more of her attention. No, she certainly did not like the man. His sneer and his self-assurance disturbed her. He made her uncomfortably conscious of her ...
— The Rocks of Valpre • Ethel May Dell
... he invited over certain leading Irishmen in order to discuss details. About the middle of October he had two interviews with the Earl of Clare, Lord Chancellor of Ireland. These important conferences took place at Holwood, where he was then occupied in marking out a new road; for his pastime every autumn was to indulge his favourite pursuit of planting trees and otherwise improving his grounds. The two ablest men in the sister kingdoms must have regarded one another with interest. They ...
— William Pitt and the Great War • John Holland Rose
... we wandered and wondered, longing for a fuller comprehension of their contents, yet unable to linger, and almost sated with the numerous beautiful objects demanding our attention on every side. Sight-seeing of this kind is the most fatiguing pastime both to body and brain that any one can indulge in; it is only possible to note the more important objects. We were much struck by the Scala Regia, a fine staircase by Bernini, in the centre of which is a gigantic equestrian statue of Constantine, so placed that a fine ray of light falls on ...
— Fair Italy, the Riviera and Monte Carlo • W. Cope Devereux
... tulip-grower. In bitter anguish Boxtel foresaw that he had a rival who, with all the resources at his command, might equal and possibly surpass the famous Boxtel creations. He almost choked with envy, and from the moment of his discovery lived under continual fear. The healthy pastime of tulip growing became, under these conditions, a morbid and evil occupation for Boxtel, while Van Baerle, on the other hand, totally unaware of the enmity brewing, threw himself into the business with the keenest zest, taking for his motto the old ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol III • Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton, Eds.
... polite books in the last century used to be written, by 'various hands,' and the anxiety expressed in the upturned faces of those officers,— something between the anxiety attendant on the balancing art, and that inseparable from the pastime of kite-flying, with a touch of the angler's quality in landing his scaly prey,—much impressed me. Suddenly, too, a banner would shiver in the wind, and go about in the most inconvenient manner. ...
— The Uncommercial Traveller • Charles Dickens
... pursuit of harmony is a dangerous pastime for young lawyers cannot be questioned, although a long list might be given of cases where musical barristers have gained the confidence of many clients, and eventually raised themselves to the bench. A piano is a treacherous ...
— A Book About Lawyers • John Cordy Jeaffreson
... there's Celestial Sport and Pastime; the Musick of the Dogs, the Harmony o' the Butchers, to see, a Mastiff tear a Bull by the Throat, the Bull once wounded, goring o'er the Ground, cants a fat Woman higher than the Monument—I love Reality in my Diversions; but at a Play-House I never laugh'd but once, ...
— The Fine Lady's Airs (1709) • Thomas Baker
... lake beneath the castle walls. On the surface of the lake were little boats, painted and gilt, so pretty and dainty that the princess challenged the ambassadors to a voyage. None hesitated to do so, for they thought it was all a gay pastime, and a merry prelude to the marriage festivities. But no sooner had they embarked than boats, fountains, and lake vanished, and the ...
— Old-Time Stories • Charles Perrault
... will. Did the bloodthirsty soul of Tiberius comprehend the stainless innocence of the victims he crushed for pastime on the rocks below Villa Jovis? There is but one arbiter for your hatred, the hang-man, to whom you would so gladly hurry me. Hunting a woman to the gallows is fit sport for men of ...
— At the Mercy of Tiberius • August Evans Wilson
... worthy citizen, "we have had our permitted hour of honest and hospitable pastime, and now I would fain delay you for another and graver purpose, as it is our custom, when we have the benefit of good Mr. Windsor's company, that he reads the prayers of the church for the evening before we separate. Your excellent father, my lord, would not have departed before family ...
— The Fortunes of Nigel • Sir Walter Scott
... magical operations, which were, in fact, self-hypnotism, a perfect fast is insisted on with reason. This is all so self-evident that I need not dwell on it. It will be needless for anyone to take up this subject as a trifling pastime, or attempt self-suggestion and development of will with as little earnestness as one would give to a game of cards; for in such a half-way effort time will be lost and nothing come of it. Unless entered on with the most serious ...
— The Mystic Will • Charles Godfrey Leland
... son," he said, "is not of so much use in your case as you represent. Salamanders do not want their amours to be kept secret, they are not ashamed of them. One of those nymphs who loves me does not know of a sweeter pastime than to engrave my initials enlaced with hers on the bark of trees, as you can see for yourself by examining the stems of five or six Scotch firs, the exquisite tops of which you can see from yonder windows. But have you not, my son, learned that that kind of amour, truly sublime, far from leaving ...
— The Queen Pedauque • Anatole France
... alive, and boiling women, dashing out the brains of many a cherub boy and prattling girl, was the pleasing and satisfactory pastime with which Pope Gregory, Catherine de Medicis, and her congenial son gladdened their Christian hearts. The blood of their victims still cries to us from the ground of their Golgotha; for on the south side of the town there is a large green field, called Le ...
— Le Morvan, [A District of France,] Its Wild Sports, Vineyards and Forests; with Legends, Antiquities, Rural and Local Sketches • Henri de Crignelle
... grew older I became peevish and morose. I was full of conceits, moods and whims. This was not due to actual sickness, for all my functions were normal and I was reasonably well nourished. One sort of play or pastime soon palled on me. I think this was mainly due to the fact that I had been humored to death and had enjoyed every sensation and surprise that it was possible for me to experience. When I played with other children, things had to go my way or there was ...
— Confessions of a Neurasthenic • William Taylor Marrs
... has happened in this year!" said the Kammerjunker. "Come soon to me, and you shall see what I have had made for pastime—a bowling-green! Miss Sophie has tried ...
— O. T. - A Danish Romance • Hans Christian Andersen
... all the "oh's" and "ah's" that indicate the perfect visitor. Abner took their host's various amateurish doings in glum silence. It was all very well to indulge in these costly contraptions as a pastime, but if the man had to get his actual living from the soil where would he be? Almost anybody could stand on two legs. How ...
— Under the Skylights • Henry Blake Fuller
... And learned the lore of the ancients, and how the knave and the fool Have been mostly the masters of earth: yet the earth seemed fair and good With the wealth of field and homestead, and garden and river and wood; And I was glad amidst it, and little of evil I knew As I did in sport and pastime such deeds as a youth might do, Who deems he shall live for ever. Till at last it befel on a day That I came across our Frenchman at the edge of the new-mown hay, A-fishing as he was wont, alone as he always was; So I helped the dark old man to bring a chub to grass, And ...
— The Pilgrims of Hope • William Morris
... Friday, the day before her contemplated visit to her father, and for some reason connected with cleaning the school the children had been given this Friday afternoon for pastime, in ...
— Under the Greenwood Tree • Thomas Hardy
... popular pastime; the demand for morning cocktails had unaccountably fallen off; the bar-keeper would fall asleep at the club-room from sheer lack of employment during the afternoons and early evenings, for many of the married ...
— Marion's Faith. • Charles King
... uncontrollably. On these occasions Luck Cullison was usually "deviling" him, the only diversion that had been open to the ranchman for some days past. Because of its danger—for he could never be quite sure that Blackwell's lust for swift vengeance would not over-power discretion—this pastime made a peculiar appeal to the audacious temper of the owner of ...
— Crooked Trails and Straight • William MacLeod Raine
... wife laughed her rippling laughter that had in it all the music of falling waters. "Shed no tears over that, ladybird! Would I be apt to let such an odious bear as Rothgar Lodbroksson rob me of my newest plaything? Whence to my dulness a pastime but for your help? Though he were the King's blood-brother, he should tell for naught. You do not guess half the entertainment your wild ways will be to me. I expect it will be more pleasant for me to have you than that Norman ...
— The Ward of King Canute • Ottilie A. Liljencrantz
... century B.C., by perfecting the techniques of making bark-cloth and felt. Unfortunately nothing remains of the actual works that were the first examples of what the Chinese everywhere were beginning to call "art". "People", that is to say the gentry, painted as a social pastime, just as they assembled together for poetry, discussion, or performances of song and dance; they painted as an aesthetic pleasure and rarely as a means of earning. We find philosophic ideas or greetings, emotions, and experiences ...
— A history of China., [3d ed. rev. and enl.] • Wolfram Eberhard
... Stockie produced liberal supplies of the desired article. No doubt most of it belonged to the boy whose innocent pastime was that of flying kites during recess. Paul wound this string firmly and tightly around the Chinese cracker until it had assumed considerable proportions. He argued on the principle that, if paper resisted the ...
— The Story of Paul Boyton - Voyages on All the Great Rivers of the World • Paul Boyton
... them up, and in a few minutes the innocent, unsuspecting boy was covered with yellow jackets. Of course, he ran to the house screaming, and they had a time in getting them off of him. He was badly stung, but we made it appear that we had gone down there to fight them, which was a favorite pastime with us, and that he got too near the nest. Thus we escaped a ...
— Autobiography of Frank G. Allen, Minister of the Gospel - and Selections from his Writings • Frank G. Allen
... Lionel. She had been grumbling and complaining all that time. It was half the pastime of Lady Verner's life to grumble in the ears of Lionel and Decima. Bitterly mortified had Lady Verner been when she found, upon her arrival from India, that Stephen Verner, her late husband's younger brother, had succeeded to Verner's Pride, ...
— Verner's Pride • Mrs. Henry Wood
... Piero, in his youth, being fanciful and extravagant in invention, was much employed for the masquerades that are held during the Carnival; and he became very dear to the young noblemen of Florence, having improved their festivals much in invention, adornment, grandeur, and pomp. As to that kind of pastime, it is said that he was one of the first to contrive to marshal them in the form of triumphal processions; at least, he improved them greatly, by accompanying the invention of the story represented, not only with music and with words suited to the subject, but also with a train ...
— Lives of the Most Eminent Painters Sculptors and Architects - Vol. 04 (of 10), Filippino Lippi to Domenico Puligo • Giorgio Vasari
... of the green, attracted the attention of the bulk of the spectators, and drew them away from other sports. The actors in the miracle play threw off their dresses to come and witness this delightful pastime, and hardly any of those present seemed to regard for a moment the sufferings of the poor brute, or the savage nature of the ...
— The Secret Chamber at Chad • Evelyn Everett-Green
... King was devoted to hunting, and often indulged in his favourite pastime, attended by the noblest youths in his kingdom. One day, after a long morning's chase he stopped to rest near a brook in the shade of a little wood, where a splendid tent had been prepared for him. Whilst at luncheon he suddenly spied a little monkey of the ...
— The Yellow Fairy Book • Leonora Blanche Alleyne Lang
... exhibited in every company. Young men, who make it their diversion, dance naked amidst drawn swords and presented spears. Practice has conferred skill at this exercise; and skill has given grace; but they do not exhibit for hire or gain: the only reward of this pastime, though a hazardous one, is the pleasure of the spectators. What is extraordinary, they play at dice, when sober, as a serious business: and that with such a desperate venture of gain or loss, that, when everything else is ...
— The Germany and the Agricola of Tacitus • Tacitus
... to accompany her, though there would be no small danger on the journey, both from the proximity of the English in some parts, and the greater danger from roving bands of Burgundians, whose sole object was spoil and plunder, and their pastime the slaughter ...
— A Heroine of France • Evelyn Everett-Green
... favourite pastime was getting up hot lunches and serving afternoon tea, and most of the soldiers became expert at this. Our cookstove consisted of an old bully-beef can with holes punched in it. In the bottom of this can we placed ...
— Into the Jaws of Death • Jack O'Brien
... truly said that such words as 'pastime' and 'diversion' applied to our pleasures are among the most melancholy in the language, for they are the confession of human nature that it cannot find happiness in itself, but must seek for something that will fill ...
— The Map of Life - Conduct and Character • William Edward Hartpole Lecky
... the deed and does his will. In fancy I can see him to the end— The duke, perchance, already breathes his last, And for Bernardo—he will join him soon; And for Rosalia, she will take the veil, To which she hath been heretofore inclined; And for my master, he will take again To alchemy—a pastime well enough, For aught I know, and honest Christian work. Still it was strange how my poor mistress died, Found, as she was, within her husband's study. The rumor went she died of suffocation; Some cursed crucible which had been left, By Giacomo, aburning, filled the room, And when ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII. No. 3. March 1848 • Various
... given it to him. I went over and over again the same succession of topics, in the intervals of standing still. How the day had been warm, and the evening kept up its character; the hotels were full now; the cadets well off to have so many ladies; dancing a pleasant pastime, and West Point a nice place. I got so accustomed to the remarks I might expect, that my mouth was ready with an assenting "yes" before the speaker began. But the talking was a small part of the business, after all; and the evening went merrily for me, till on a sudden a shrill piercing ...
— Daisy • Elizabeth Wetherell
... been recently made in our Law Courts, concerning the free and easy conduct of a certain set of hunting men and women, may prejudice many mothers against hunting as a fitting pastime for their daughters; but the indiscretions of a few idle fast people should not be taken as a sample of the behaviour of an entire field. In the crowd and bustle of hunting, the large majority of ...
— The Horsewoman - A Practical Guide to Side-Saddle Riding, 2nd. Ed. • Alice M. Hayes
... track. A greater part of his time went to the cultivation of his one hobby—the track and horses—for by reason of his financial standing, having large cotton and real-estate holdings in the State, he could afford to use business as a pastime. ...
— Garrison's Finish - A Romance of the Race-Course • W. B. M. Ferguson
... unable to sleep, and too tired to read. He had no disposition to talk; the only pastime left was to think. He wondered if Frankie still cared for him; if his parents would be impressed with his knowledge of banking, and if the bankboys of Hometon would acknowledge him a pal. Selfish as it may seem, his thoughts of Frankie were indefinite, and confused ...
— A Canadian Bankclerk • J. P. Buschlen
... "Neo-Latin" and "Neo-Greek" words are extraordinary in themselves and obscure in their origin, though not through antiquity. In his Student's Pastime, at p. 293, Dr. Skeat says "Nowhere can more ignorant etymologies be found than in works on Botany and 'scientific' subjects. Too often, all the science is reserved for the subject, so that there is none to ...
— A Dictionary of Austral English • Edward Morris
... park at Grantoun when I was a child. A fly had stung it, so it tried to kill me. This struck me as unreason run riot, and ever since then I have wished the Spaniards would go a step farther and make cow-fights the national pastime. I ...
— The Woman With The Fan • Robert Hichens
... years ago I was roaming through the Western provinces with a couple of old friends who persist—against my advice, I assure you—in the childish pastime of safe-blowing. We got pinched en bloc, and as I was broke I had to sponge on the yeggs to get ...
— The Madness of May • Meredith Nicholson
... go to the palace, on the eighth day of the moon, as that day is reckoned unlucky. On the day of the new moon, the king runs about the palace with two javelins in his hand, as if fighting, all the great men being present at this pastime. When this is ended, a pot full of maize, boiled whole, is brought in, which the king scatters about, desiring the nobles to eat, and every one strives to gather most to please him, and eat it greedily as if it were the most savoury ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume VI - Early English Voyages Of Discovery To America • Robert Kerr
... Eton school phrase, is another term for a Cad, a fellow who lurks about college, and assists in all sprees and sports by providing dogs, fishing tackle, guns, horses, bulls for baiting, a badger, or in promoting any other interdicted, or un-lawful pastime. A dozen or more of these well known characters may be seen loitering in front of the college every morning, making their arrangement with their pupils, the Oppidans, for a day's sport, to commence the moment school is over. They formerly used to ...
— The English Spy • Bernard Blackmantle |
