"Skittles" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... choose Farrell, to pay my attentions to him. If the gods had paid me the compliment of sending along the late Mr. Gladstone, or the present Archbishop of Canterbury (whoever he may be), or General Booth (if he's alive), to knock out eight years of my life like so many skittles in an alley, I'd have felt flattered, of course. But they didn't: they sent along Farrell, and I bow my head before a higher wisdom which, you'll allow, has been justified of its child. Could the late Mr. Gladstone—since we've instanced him—have ...
— Foe-Farrell • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... following century the Duke Louis d'Orleans ordered billes et billars to be bought for the sum of eleven sols six deniers tournois (about fifteen francs of our money), that he might amuse himself with them. There were several games of the same sort, which were not less popular. Skittles; la Soule or Soulette, which consisted of a large ball of hay covered over with leather, the possession of which was contested for by two opposing sides of players; Football; open Tennis; Shuttlecock, &c. It was Charles V. who first thought of giving a more serious ...
— Manners, Custom and Dress During the Middle Ages and During the Renaissance Period • Paul Lacroix
... sweetly." We went straight onward—towards the Observatoire, the residence of the Astronomer Royal. In our way thither we could not avoid crossing the Rue d' Enfer, where Marshal Ney was shot. The spot, which had been stained with his blood, was at this moment covered by skittles, and groups of stout lads were enjoying themselves in all directions. It should seem that nothing but youthful sports and pastimes had ever prevailed there: so insensibly do succeeding occupations wear away all traces of the past. ...
— A Bibliographical, Antiquarian and Picturesque Tour in France and Germany, Volume Two • Thomas Frognall Dibdin
... "'Skittles!' he says (that was a great word of his), 'you'll take parole, and go back to America and invent another Zigler, a trifle heavier in the working parts—I would. We've got more prisoners than we know what to do with as it is,' he says. 'You'll only be an additional ...
— Traffics and Discoveries • Rudyard Kipling
... seek, kiss in the ring; snapdragon; cross questions and crooked answers.; crisscross, hopscotch; jacks, jackstones[obs3], marbles; mumblety-peg, mumble-the-peg, pushball, shinney, shinny, tag &c. billiards, pool, pingpong, pyramids, bagatelle; bowls, skittles, ninepins, kain[obs3], American bowls[obs3]; tenpins [U.S.], tivoli. cards, card games; whist, rubber; round game; loo, cribbage, besique[obs3], euchre, drole[obs3], ecarte[Fr], picquet[obs3], allfours[obs3], quadrille, ...
— Roget's Thesaurus
... in the middle. I'll be only too glad to get away on the long trail myself. So you come with me," and he smiled winningly. "I hate to see you ruined by women and likker. Mule-skinnin' ain't all beer and skittles, as they say; but this job'll tide you over, anyhow, and you'll come out at the end with money in your pocket, if you choose, and no doctor's bill ...
— Desert Dust • Edwin L. Sabin
... drinking, and at 4 p.m. there were many spectators in the crowd who had not taken their customary lunch! A much more significant fact, even the national passion for gaming was allayed by the general emotion. Thimbles, skittles, and cards were left in their wrappings, and testified that the great event of the ...
— The Moon-Voyage • Jules Verne
... was pleased with her own appearance. Sir Marmaduke de Chavasse and the mistress were seeing company this afternoon, and the neighboring Kentish squires who had come to play skittles and to drink sack-posset might easily find a less welcome sight than that of the serving ...
— The Nest of the Sparrowhawk • Baroness Orczy
... referred to, shortly after Dave had gone on a visit to the tenant of the belted Earl, Uncle Mo having gone away for an hour, to spend it in the parlour of The Rising Sun, a truly respectable house where there were Skittles, and Knurr and Spell. He might, you see, be more than an hour: there ...
— When Ghost Meets Ghost • William Frend De Morgan
... Lord has a deal to plan, For he's, chief of all, the Transport man. He finds the Fleet in coal and victuals (Supplying the beer—if not the skittles); He sees to the bad'uns that get imprisoned, And settles what uniform's worn (or isn't).... Even the stubbornest own the sway Of the Lord of Food and the Lord ...
— Punch or the London Charivari, Vol. 147, December 9, 1914 • Various
... and potatoes and, in general, food for the men. The younger ones occupied themselves as before, some playing cards (there was plenty of money, though there was no food), some with more innocent games, such as quoits and skittles. The general trend of the campaign was rarely spoken of, partly because nothing certain was known about it, partly because there was a vague feeling that in the ...
— War and Peace • Leo Tolstoy
... it is, but one wholly forgets the danger one is in, and thinks only of the effect of one's own bullets, rejoicing like a child at the sight of the enemy falling like skittles, and having scarcely a compassionate glance to spare for the comrade falling at one's side. One ceases to be a human being, and turns into ...
— The Duel Between France and Germany • Charles Sumner
... nose with the thumb, and, at the same time to extend his mouth, with the fingers, thereby giving him a sort of lion-like countenauce. To tip the velvet; tonguing woman. To tip all nine; to knock down all the nine pins at once, at the game of bows or skittles: tipping, at these gaines, is slightly touching the tops of the pins with the bowl. Tip; a draught; ...
— 1811 Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue • Captain Grose et al.
... after a little conversation, in which he blended his former duty as a Collegian with his present privilege as a humble outside friend, qualified again by his low estate as a plasterer, took his leave; making the tour of the prison before he left, and looking on at a game of skittles with the mixed feelings of an old inhabitant who had his private reasons for believing that it might be his destiny to ...
— Little Dorrit • Charles Dickens
... rowing, skating, cricket, quoits, foot-ball, rackets, single-stick, bandy, bowls, skittles, and all gymnastic exercises. Such games bring the muscles into proper action, and thus cause them to be fully developed. They expand and strengthen the chest; they cause a due circulation of the blood, making ...
— Advice to a Mother on the Management of her Children • Pye Henry Chavasse
... hand, as I told you. That has never happened before. It means that he is strong enough—but you think it skittles, Colonel Creighton—to make anyone do anything he wants. And that is three years ago. I have taught him a good deal since, Colonel Creighton. I ...
— Kim • Rudyard Kipling
... a profession better paid and of a higher social status. Tom Mortlake—the hero of a hundred strikes—set up in print on a poster, was unmistakably superior to Tom Mortlake setting up other men's names at a case. Still, the work was not all beer and skittles, and Mrs. Drabdump felt that Tom's ...
— The Grey Wig: Stories and Novelettes • Israel Zangwill
... you, when roaming afield, Loved you, when Life was metheglyn and skittles, Wished you the spell of remembrance to wield, Calling the scenery back and the victuals; Still, when it blows and it rains, and it irks, Here in apartments adjoining a seaview, After a meal that would terrify Turks, Somehow I feel I ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 103, September 17, 1892 • Various
... the faith of a good Catholic, that he had heard, when occasionally in the church, alone, a strange rattling noise proceed from the vaults beneath it. "What this could be," he remarked, "was past comprehension, unless it were ghosts playing at skittles with their own dead bones." Some people laughed at this idea, and some sapiently shaking their heads, declared with ominous looks, that Morel was no fool, but knew what he knew, whilst every one agreed that some foundation, at least there must be, for the fearful tale. At length, in ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 17, Number 489, Saturday, May 14, 1831 • Various
... precisely similar, but not being more than five feet in height, and weighing at least fifteen stone, the dress he wore did not become him quite so much as slimmer and taller men. Flanked by his tall Majors, Thrupp and Gutch, he looked like a stumpy skittle-ball between two attenuated skittles. The plump little Colonel received me with vast cordiality, and I speedily became a prime favorite with himself and the other officers of the corps. Jowler was the most hospitable of men; and gratifying my appetite and my love together, I continually partook of his dinners, and feasted ...
— Burlesques • William Makepeace Thackeray
... you go, the whole damn lot of you!" cried my lord. These not being familiar military words of command, the men stuck there like skittles. "Ground arms, or whatever it is!" he continued. "About ...
— The Yeoman Adventurer • George W. Gough
... pleasure of individuals, without fee or reward from those who employ them. Nor are they cooped up, so as to be excluded from the benefit of fresh air, there being an open area, of a considerable extent, adjacent to the building, on which they may exercise themselves in walking, skittles, bowls, and a variety of other diversions, according to ...
— The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle, Volume I • Tobias Smollett
... soiled garments had faded into insignificance, and assumed a most trivial aspect when I reviewed the journey as a whole. They were part of the game. To again quote "Trilby," tramping "is not all beer and skittles." Your true tramp learns to take things as he finds them and never to expect or ask or the impossible. He will drink the wine of the country, even when sour, without a grimace; pass without grumbling a sleepless night; plod through dust ankle deep, without ...
— A Tramp Through the Bret Harte Country • Thomas Dykes Beasley
... fortress, mainly, I should judge, the work of the Servian kings, all that remained to accomplish was the bombardment of its walls, which became a sort of spectacle, to which we went day after day to watch the effect of the fire, as we should have done with a game of skittles. I climbed up on the top of a neighboring mountain, and, with my field-glass, inspected the town. Women went and came with their water-pitchers on their heads, moving in serene tranquillity, without quickening a step, and the life of the place seemed absolutely undisturbed by the danger, ...
— The Autobiography of a Journalist, Volume II • William James Stillman
... present. Galors never answered him a word. Prosper divined him at this; he was to climb the hill, and so be at the double disadvantage of having no spear and of being below him that had one. "The pale rascal means to make this a game of skittles," he thought to himself. "We shall see, my man. In the mean time I wish I knew your shield." So saying he forded the brook, stayed, called out again, "Whose shield is that, Galors?" and again got no reply. "Black dog!" cried he in a rage, "take your vantage and expect no more." Whereupon ...
— The Forest Lovers • Maurice Hewlett
... about it," said Uncle Richard. "One has struck the other, and the great elms have gone down like skittles." ...
— The Vast Abyss - The Story of Tom Blount, his Uncles and his Cousin Sam • George Manville Fenn
... There's, nothing they can't do," says Tommy, who is plainly revelling in the storm he has raised. Her open fright is beer and skittles to him. "Why did you stir? He was as good as gold, until then; and there wasn't anything to be afraid of. I was watching him. When he got to your ear I'd have told you. I wouldn't like him to make you deaf, but I wanted to see if he would go to ...
— April's Lady - A Novel • Margaret Wolfe Hungerford
... musical director. They passed the morning of the day which Chopin and Hiller spent in the town at Mendelssohn's piano, and in the afternoon took a walk, at the end of which they had coffee and a game at skittles. In this walk they were accompanied by F. W. Schadow, the director of the Academy of Art and founder of the Dusseldorf School, and some of his pupils, among whom may have been one or more of its brightest stars—Lessing, Bendemann, Hildebrandt, ...
— Frederick Chopin as a Man and Musician - Volume 1-2, Complete • Frederick Niecks
... upon any such doctrine as a sinful crime," said Sennacherib. "The fiddle is a recrehation, and was gi'en us for that end. So, in a way, for them as likes it, is skittles. So is marvils, or kite-flyin', or kiss-i'-the-ring. But to talk of a man sittin' on his hinder end, and draggin' rosined hosshair across catgut hour by hour and day by day for 'ears, is a doctrine as I should like to hear Parson Hales's opinion on, if ...
— Aunt Rachel • David Christie Murray
... rich or poor. To ordinary Socialists the reform means a fairer distribution of the joint product of capital and labour; higher wages for the workingman, shorter hours, better food and more of it, better clothes, better houses, more amusements—in short, "beer and skittles" in reasonable amount. The Socialism of Ruskin and Morris was an outcome of their aesthetic feeling. They liked to imagine the work people of the future as an intelligent and artistic body of handicraftsmen, ...
— A History of English Romanticism in the Nineteenth Century • Henry A. Beers
... altogether there was a very vast assemblage. It was arranged that, having walked about a little, and seen some of the views which the wood afforded, and some old ruins within its borders, the party should dine, and then that various sports should take place, pony races, archery, quoits, nine-pins, skittles, throw-sticks or batons, single-stick; indeed, more than I can well remember; while swings were hung up between the trees, and two or three long planks had been placed on some felled trees, to serve ...
— Ernest Bracebridge - School Days • William H. G. Kingston
... John, however, she became more reconciled to her lot. "'E's got a temper, your brother has, or I'm very much mistaken. It won't be all beer and skittles for 'er ladyship. For Jinn hasn't a scrap of spunk in 'er, Polly. She got so mopey the last year or two, there was no doing anything with 'er. Now it was just the other way round with me. No matter how black things looked, I always ...
— Australia Felix • Henry Handel Richardson
... laughed and fell in for their first march when they began to realize that a soldier's life was not all beer and skittles. They were much impressed with the size and bestial ferocity of the niggers whom they had now learned to call "Paythans," and more with the exceeding discomfort of their own surroundings. Twenty old soldiers in the corps would have taught them ...
— Indian Tales • Rudyard Kipling
... china vase all the time on a slippery floor! Am I any happier now than I was before I married? Well, I am! There's more worry in one way, but there's less in another. And of course I've got Bobbie! But it isn't all beer and skittles, and I let 'em know it, too. I can't do what I like! And I'm just a sort of exile, you know. I used to enjoy being on the stage and showing myself off. A hard life, but one does enjoy it. And one gets used to it. One gets to need it. Sometimes I ...
— The Regent • E. Arnold Bennett
... tart, nor clean a straw hat, because she simply would not have the time. You don't know much about young babies, do you? I should not divorce you, and should have no evidence on which I could get a divorce. In fact, the whole thing's skittles. By the way, when did Effie ...
— If Winter Don't - A B C D E F Notsomuchinson • Barry Pain
... left alone to contemplate the novel and strange scene which presented itself on all sides. There were two quadrangles, each of sufficiently limited dimensions. In the first, there were several young Monks playing at skittles in the centre of the lawn. Both the bowl and pins were of unusually large dimensions, and the direction of the former was confined within boards, fixed in the earth. These athletic young Benedictins (they might be between twenty and thirty years of age) took ...
— A Bibliographical, Antiquarian and Picturesque Tour in France and Germany, Volume Three • Thomas Frognall Dibdin
... plenty of malicious spirits about still, and now that an heir is coming to Rush they are keener than ever to try and work some mischief. No use saying anything to Tom (his brother). He will only laugh, and say it is all skittles. But tell my little sister-in-law to PRAY—PRAY—PRAY. That is all they need and ...
— Seen and Unseen • E. Katharine Bates
... cock-fighting, and such games as quoits, football, skittles, wrestling, dancing, jumping in sacks, ...
— A Cotswold Village • J. Arthur Gibbs
... MacGreegor." I held out against the inanity as long as I decently could, but at last, in a lapse of good-nature, I consented to masquerade as a book, only I warned them that it would take some time to carry out. They waited for the best part of forty minutes, while I went and played wineglass skittles with the page-boy in the pantry; you play it with a champagne cork, you know, and the one who knocks down the most glasses without breaking them wins. I won, with four unbroken out of seven; I think William suffered from over-anxiousness. They were rather mad in the drawing-room ...
— Reginald • Saki
... before I leave the subject of the Staff. There has been of late a good deal of pestilential gossip by luxurious gentlemen at home about the Staff and its work. It is, they say, very bad—mostly beer and skittles. I have already referred to these charges elsewhere; here I will only add one word. A Staff is known by its chief. He it is who sets the pace. During the time I was attached to it, the G.H.Q. Staff had two chiefs in succession. The first was a brilliant soldier of high intellectual ...
— Leaves from a Field Note-Book • J. H. Morgan
... he could no longer be a man. He had come back because the Furies had driven him with their whip of knotted snakes, and he could do nothing but yield to their hounding. If Lois thought that traveling in the West was beer and skittles when hunted and scourged by yourself like that—well, she had ...
— The Side Of The Angels - A Novel • Basil King
... should not be all beer and skittles with us, and therefore apt to pall, my cousins and I had to work pretty hard. In the first place, my dear mother did all she could to make me an infant prodigy of learning. She tried to teach me Italian, which she ...
— Peter Ibbetson • George du Marier et al
... 'appy an' free—'appy an' free. Just like you might have noticed to-night, I noticed a knot of Chinks scrappin' on the ground all amongst the dust right in front of me. I rammed in, windmillin' all round and knocking 'em down like skittles. Seemed to me there was about ten of 'em, but allowin' for Jimmy's whisky, maybe there wasn't more than three. Anyway, they all shifted and left me standin' there in the empty street with this ...
— Tales of Chinatown • Sax Rohmer
... up very fresh and alert, with zest for every moment of life. He worked and rode and drove to market, he went out with companions and got tipsy occasionally and played skittles and went to the little travelling theatres. Once, when he was drunk at a public house, he went upstairs with a prostitute who seduced him. He ...
— The Rainbow • D. H. (David Herbert) Lawrence
... One will tell you he sees nothing in billiards or pool or golf or tennis, but will grow enthusiastic over the scientific possibilities of mumble-peg; you agree with him, only you substitute "skittles" for "mumble-peg." ...
— The Fifth String, The Conspirators • John Philip Sousa
... to be concluded that it is all beer and skittles for Eve. With a pay envelope and a vote come responsibilities. Public sympathy has backed up laws cutting down long hours of work for women. The trade unions, with a thought to possible competitors, have favored protecting them from night work. Has Eve been a bit spoiled? Has she let herself too ...
— Mobilizing Woman-Power • Harriot Stanton Blatch
... ride, if I chose; and I am vain enough to be glad that you know it. But useless are your coaxings, solicitations, wavings of honest right hands. 'Life,' as my friend Tom Brown says, 'is not all beer and skittles;' it is past two now, and I have four old women to read to at three, and an old man to bury at four; and I think, on the whole, that you will respect me the more for going home and doing my duty. That I should like to see this fox fairly killed, or even fairly lost, I deny not. That I should like ...
— Prose Idylls • Charles Kingsley
... think!" said Gerald, cheerfully. "That's what it was made for, you see. A door that does not fulfil its destiny might just as well be something else, skittles, or a pump, or—other ...
— Fernley House • Laura E. Richards
... thinking of Captain Marryat,' said he, laughing. 'But times have changed sadly for the middy since then. It isn't all beer and skittles now. Nowadays, the poor chap can scarcely call his soul his own; and if he is going in ...
— The Beautiful Wretch; The Pupil of Aurelius; and The Four Macnicols • William Black
... smashing everybody as come near her, she burst a blood-vessel one mornin', and died too; and a happy release it was, both for herself and the old paupers, male and female, which she used to tip over in all directions, as if they were so many skittles, and she the ball. ...
— Sketches by Boz - illustrative of everyday life and every-day people • Charles Dickens
... weatherbeaten chalet, with a crazy barn to keep it company, dilapidated and tottering as if in the bankruptcy court, standing abruptly on the borders of the black fir wood, the air filled with the odor of concentrated pigstye; dark male figures playing at skittles on the path, and having to stop the game to enable us to reach the door; black male figures playing at cards and drinking wine in the dusky, close old parlor or stube, made still more gloomy by the large, projecting brick stove, unlighted at this ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. XII, No. 28. July, 1873. • Various
... the ladies less of the Miss Browns. Now, then, for a polka!—the rattling "Post knock Polka!"—Off! away they go, after a great deal of reluctance and playful diffidence as to who should lead off—Miss Charmer with Arthur Beau, twirling round and round, in and out (like an eel among skittles); followed by Mr. Latimer and Miss Jemima, who evidently intended to do great things, but only cause confusions and contusions, until they get knocked into the open space, in the centre of the human vortex—the Charmer spinning, as a top that could ...
— Christmas Comes but Once A Year - Showing What Mr. Brown Did, Thought, and Intended to Do, - during that Festive Season. • Luke Limner
... strong), enables me to discourse brilliantly on the deepest subjects during the day; and, thank goodness, virtue is rewarded in the evening with a little bridge. If I am ever Lady Pendragon (sounds well, doesn't it?) it shall be all bridge and skittles, for me—and devil take politics, military science, history, the classics, Herbert Spencer, Robert Browning, Shakespeare, and all other boring or out-of-date things and writers (if he hasn't already taken them) on which I am now ...
— Set in Silver • Charles Norris Williamson and Alice Muriel Williamson
... smile as I thought of her words. Did she indeed think me a creature so weak as to pile gloom on the top of sorrow, to shut my eyes to all the joys of life, because supreme happiness was denied me, to play skittles with my self-respect, and—marry a kitchen-maid? I, who had turned over great pages in the book of life! I, who had known Feurgeres! Wallace had left the room for a moment, and I raised my glass full of clear amber wine, and drank silently my evening toast. I drank ...
— The Master Mummer • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... the Fr: allee, a walk), a narrow passageway between two buildings available only for foot passengers or hand-carts, sometimes entered only at one end and known as a "blind alley,'' or cul-de-sac. The name is also given to the long narrow enclosures where bowls or skittles are played. ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia
... Wyatt's for a little pistol practice, or to indulge in the exciting amusement of rifle-shooting at empty bottles, or to practise, on the leaping and swinging poles, the lessons he was learning at MacLaren's, or to play at skittles with Mr. Bouncer (who was very expert in knocking down three out of the four); or to kick football until he became (to use Mr. Bouncer's expression) "as stiff ...
— The Adventures of Mr. Verdant Green • Cuthbert Bede
... have dared to make the attempt. Women for the most part are prone to love-making—as nature has intended that they should be; but there are women from whom all such follies seem to be as distant as skittles and beer are distant from the dignity of the Lord Chancellor. Such ...
— Orley Farm • Anthony Trollope
... with the koil. Pagett was cool and gay, Called me a "bloated Brahmin," talked of my "princely pay." March went out with the roses. "Where is your heat?" said he. "Coming," said I to Pagett, "Skittles!" ...
— The Works of Rudyard Kipling One Volume Edition • Rudyard Kipling
... of it, the more he was satisfied of its feasibility, and he trotted over, the next day, to the Old Duke of Cumberland, to see his friend on the subject. Viney, like most victuallers, was more given to games of skill—billiards, shuttlecock, skittles, dominoes, and so on—than to the rude out-of-door chances of flood and field, and at first he doubted his ability to grapple with the details; but on Mr. Watchorn's assurance that he would keep ...
— Mr. Sponge's Sporting Tour • R. S. Surtees
... climbed. I have done fairly well—heaven and earth! if anyone had told me twenty years ago that I should be where and what I am to-day—well, I'd have sold my chances for a bottle of ale. You smile. Mr. Howard, it was anything but beer and skittles for me then. I want to leave my boy a—title. Smile again, Mr. Howard; ...
— At Love's Cost • Charles Garvice
... enough to play if any of you are ready to pay my losses and take my winnings; I am tired of being as good as an annuity to you all,' for that is what you have been for the last ten years. Why, it would be cheaper for you to send home to England for skittles, and ...
— Rujub, the Juggler • G. A. Henty
... together, or scattered about in isolated grandeur; some pitched on their sides, others standing erect, still others suspended, as it were, in mid-air. It seemed to him that these boulders had formerly served for the games of bacchanalian Titans, who, after having used them as skittles or jack-stones, had ended by hurling them at one another's heads. It is most probable that He who constructed the Albula Pass, alarmed and confused by the hideous aspect of his work, did justice to it by breaking it into fragments ...
— Samuel Brohl & Company • Victor Cherbuliez
... of her prefaces she said: "Poetry has been to me as serious a thing as life itself,—and life has been a very serious thing; there has been no playing at skittles for me in either. I never mistook pleasure for the final cause of poetry, nor leisure for the hour of the poet. I have done my work, so far, as work,—not as mere hand and head work, apart from the personal being, but as the completest expression ...
— Lives of Girls Who Became Famous • Sarah Knowles Bolton
... to her as serious a thing as life itself. "There has been no playing at skittles for me in either poetry, or life," she said; "I never mistook pleasure for the final cause of poetry; nor leisure, for the hour ...
— The Brownings - Their Life and Art • Lilian Whiting
... "our mutual friend" takes aim, Long odds may be laid on the rising game, And against your gaiters level; There's danger even where fish are caught, To those who a wetting fear; For what's worth having must aye be bought, And sport's like life and life's like sport, "It ain't all skittles ...
— Poems • Adam Lindsay Gordon
... somewhat moderate his assaults on the drum. Another hand portrays him seven years later, as armed with a porte crayon he rides his hobbyhorse at an easel which does duty for a hurdle, Jerrold is playing skittles, Thackeray holds the bat at a game of cricket, and Mark Lemon is engaged ...
— English Caricaturists and Graphic Humourists of the Nineteenth Century. - How they Illustrated and Interpreted their Times. • Graham Everitt
... lad came and made signs to him to follow him silently. Peter ascended some steps, and, crossing a walled court, came to a glade surrounded by rocky cliffs, into which a sort of twilight made its way through the thick-leaved branches. Here he found twelve grave old knights playing at skittles, at a well-levelled and fresh plot of grass. Peter was silently appointed to set up the ...
— Folk-lore and Legends: German • Anonymous
... life' is a round of strife, And of ceaseless hunger and fear; And the life in the wild of the animal child Is not all skittles and beer." ...
— The Minds and Manners of Wild Animals • William T. Hornaday
... the inhabitants keep carriages for their own private use; and near fifty have country houses. The relaxations of the humbler class, are fives, quoits, skittles, ...
— An History of Birmingham (1783) • William Hutton
... was chiefly conversational. Then the children made the square their playground, or were driven into it because it was the safest place for them, and every Sunday afternoon the young men of Roc-Amadour met there to play at skittles. ...
— Wanderings by southern waters, eastern Aquitaine • Edward Harrison Barker
... gentleman means having nothing to do,' said he, smiling, 'I can certainly lay no claim to the title. Life isn't all beer and skittles with me, any more than it is with you. Which is the better reason for enjoying the present moment, don't you think? Suppose, now, like a kind little girl, you were to show me the way to Beacon Point, which you ...
— Victorian Short Stories of Troubled Marriages • Rudyard Kipling, Ella D'Arcy, Arthur Morrison, Arthur Conan Doyle,
... paper, as you call it, cost us the hard savings of years, it cost us weeks and months in the bush and amongst the swamps—it cost a man's life, not to mention the niggers we lost. Come, I'm not here to play skittles. Are you on for a deal or not? If you're doubtful about it I've another market. Say the word and we'll drink and part, but if you want to do business, here are my terms. Five thousand ...
— A Millionaire of Yesterday • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... to use an expression of Alois's, "Saint Florian had left off playing at skittles, and Saint Leonhard had driven his hay over the heavenly bridge." The warring elements were still, but the earth seemed smouldering with heat, and we panted and gasped after the lofty mountain-slopes which lay on all sides. At the same time it came most opportunely to our knowledge ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science - Vol. XI, No. 27, June, 1873 • Various
... 'It's all skittles, I tell you,' said Clarence, still more angrily, though he was paler again now. 'What should ...
— The Talking Horse - And Other Tales • F. Anstey
... along the narrow lane. A huge van-load of Cockney tourists, singing a boisterous chorus of the last music-hall song, passed Vixen at a turn of the road, and made a blot on the serene beauty of the scene. They were going to eat lobsters and drink bottled beer and play skittles at Le Tac. Vixen rejoiced when their raucous voices died away on the ...
— Vixen, Volume III. • M. E. Braddon
... on arriving at the residence of Mr. Norton, I met with a court chaplain, who was looking on at a party playing at skittles, and an old servant who named me, bursting into tears, and who was as near and as certainly killing me by his fidelity as another might have been by treachery. Then I will tell of my terrors—yes, sire, of my terrors—when, at the house of Colonel Windham, a farrier who came to shoe ...
— Ten Years Later - Chapters 1-104 • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... manner, his love for her went on increasing, if that were possible: such were the virtues, the good sense and beauty of his Preciosa. Whenever the gipsies engaged in athletic games, he carried off the prize for running and leaping: he played admirably at skittles and at ball, and pitched the bar with singular strength and dexterity. In a short while, his fame spread through all Estramadura, and there was no part of it where they did not speak of the smart young gitano Andrew, and his graces and accomplishments. As his fame extended, so did ...
— The Exemplary Novels of Cervantes • Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
... jubilant were Mackenzie's men, one may guess from the fact that they chased whales all the next day in their canoes. The whales dived below, fortunately; for one blow of a finback or sulphur bottom would have played skittles with the canoes. Coming back from the whale hunt, triumphant as if they had caught a dozen finbacks, the men erected a post, engraving on it the date, July 14, 1789, and ...
— Pathfinders of the West • A. C. Laut
... fool you are! That fellow's a millionaire—he's a nephew of old Van Skittles himself. And he was talking on the level, too. Have you ...
— The Trimmed Lamp and Others • O Henry
... quite made up my mind that it was the dullest little out-of-the-way corner in England, and that there would be some credit in being jolly under such circumstances. But, Lord, there's no dullness at the Dragon! Skittles, cricket, quoits, nine-pins, comic songs, choruses, company round the chimney corner every winter's evening. Any man could be jolly at the Dragon. There's ...
— Life And Adventures Of Martin Chuzzlewit • Charles Dickens
... SKITTLES' chair—with the sun in my eyes. He has not begun to read my character yet; he is still measuring—with tape this time. I must say he takes great pains. Blazer contingent has moved up closer; they pretend ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 93, September 24, 1887 • Various
... beer." Now a joke about our flags and mottoes, which one vowed to be mere jack-acting; then a learned disquisition on raising the devil, which one of the party declared he had seen done, one Sunday afternoon, for the purpose of borrowing some cash to play skittles with. In fact, care and thought were thrown to the winds; and, tired as we were, sleep often overtook us, still laughing at the men's witticisms. And then such dreams,—they seemed as if an angel had sent ...
— Stray Leaves from an Arctic Journal; • Sherard Osborn
... in an allegorical sense only. And my father said reproachfully: "Barbe, you're a holy and worthy woman, but many a time I have noticed that you have a peevish liking to throw yourself thoughtlessly into serious conversation like a dog into a game of skittles." ...
— The Queen Pedauque • Anatole France
... cord at her elbow, then stood looking me straight in the face as the ball went rolling along a set of tramway lines over our heads to the other end of the shop. That was the most melancholy game at skittles I ever took part in. It seemed an age before the ball came back to us, whereupon the young lady took out the bill and my change—a halfpenny. "We haven't a farthing in the place," she said innocently, "What else will you take for it?" "Oh, it doesn't matter at all," I ...
— Successful Recitations • Various
... his own devices," said Mr. Gibney indulgently. "Mac's just as Irish as if he'd been born in Dublin instead of his old man. Nobody yet overcome the prejudice of an Irishman so we'll do the honours ourself, Scraggsy, old skittles, and leave Mac ...
— Captain Scraggs - or, The Green-Pea Pirates • Peter B. Kyne
... you, go on, arr['e], I say, And now you're going all askew As one who would at skittles play: Come up, my mule, arr['e], arr['e]. 370 But if I once begin with you I'll make you groan upon your way. By my Theresa, you'd lose your load, You would, would you, upon the road? But I'll not give you any rest Nor leave flies leisure ...
— Four Plays of Gil Vicente • Gil Vicente
... than this to happen. Even more than this. Sir Joseph Bowley, Baronet and Member of Parliament, was to play a match at skittles—real skittles—with his tenants! ...
— The Chimes • Charles Dickens
... love!" he cried, and devoured her hands with ghostly kisses. "It seems an eternity that I've been struggling back to you through the outer void and what-not. Sometimes, I confess I all but despaired. Life is not, I assure you, all beer and skittles for the disembodied." ...
— Humorous Ghost Stories • Dorothy Scarborough
... for the boy. Life not having been all beer and skittles to him, he knew that Joe was suffering, and was marvelously patient ...
— K • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... wery thing, Sir,' rejoined Sam, 'they don't mind it; it's a reg'lar holiday to them—all porter and skittles. It's the t'other vuns as gets done over vith this sort o' thing; them down-hearted fellers as can't svig avay at the beer, nor play at skittles neither; them as vould pay if they could, and gets low by being boxed up. I'll tell you wot it is, sir; them as is always a-idlin' in public-houses ...
— The Pickwick Papers • Charles Dickens
... of his crime is the loss of fairy intercourse; perhaps the mildest form which punishment could take. But sometimes the chevalier d'industrie is lucky enough to secure his spoils. It is related that certain white ghosts were in the habit of playing by night at skittles on a level grass-plot on the Lueningsberg, near Aerzen, in North Germany. A journeyman weaver, who was in love with a miller's daughter, but lacked the means to marry her, thought there could be no harm in robbing the ghosts ...
— The Science of Fairy Tales - An Inquiry into Fairy Mythology • Edwin Sidney Hartland
... find out that they are no better off for the change, and that a Republic does not mean beer and skittles, or, as they would like, unlimited absinthe and public workshops, with short hours and high pay, they will begin to get savage, and then there will be trouble. The worst of it is one can never rely upon the troops, and discipline is certainly more relaxed ...
— A Girl of the Commune • George Alfred Henty
... became a point of professional honour with him to despoil it; at all events he was presumedly attracted by an undertaking that promised not only glory but very solid profit. The first part of the plot was, to the most skilful criminal 'impersonator' in the States, mere skittles. Spreading over those months he appeared at 'The Safe' in twelve different characters and rented twelve safes of different sizes. At the same time he made a thorough study of the methods of the place. As soon as possible he got the keys back again into legitimate use, having ...
— Four Max Carrados Detective Stories • Ernest Bramah
... it was all beer and skittles even then. The 14th Brigade was still holding Missy over the river, and there were some serious alarms on one or two nights, necessitating troops being sent down to the river at Rupreux, in case ...
— The Doings of the Fifteenth Infantry Brigade - August 1914 to March 1915 • Edward Lord Gleichen
... you have made me," said Jin Vin; "since I have given up skittles and trap-ball for tennis and bowls, good English ale for thin Bordeaux and sour Rhenish, roast-beef and pudding for woodcocks and kickshaws—my bat for a sword, my cap for a beaver, my forsooth for a modish ...
— The Fortunes of Nigel • Sir Walter Scott
... and rushed, and for the only time in my life I hit a woman. Without hesitancy or compunction, only revolted at the thought of such contact with such matter, I smashed her down. The Boss and Mick freed themselves together and embraced each other willingly. Twinetoes was playing skittles with the remaining dock rats. There was surprisingly little noise. No one shouted. There was no howling hounding on of each other. All but the girl were absorbed in the immediate business of giving or ...
— The Best British Short Stories of 1922 • Edward J. O'Brien and John Cournos, editors
... in the battle of life outweighs the "beer and skittles"; as does the interest. Johnny McLean found interest in masses, in the drab-and-dun village on the prairie. He found pleasure, too, and as far as he could reach he tried to share it; buoyancy and ...
— The Courage of the Commonplace • Mary Raymond Shipman Andrews
... tide of Irish immigration to America. And England fanned and favored this exodus, for it was very certain that there were too many mouths to feed in Ireland—half the number would not so jeopardize the beer and skittles of the landlords. ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Vol. 13 - Little Journeys to the Homes of Great Lovers • Elbert Hubbard
... places the inn gardens are used as dining-rooms from morning till night, and you may if you choose have everything you eat and drink brought to you out of doors. Most inns have a skittle alley, for skittles are still played in Germany by all classes. The peasants play it on Sunday afternoons, and the dignified merchant has his skittle club and spends an evening there once a week. The favourite card game of Germany is still Skat, but bridge has ...
— Home Life in Germany • Mrs. Alfred Sidgwick
... is complete, 'how is it possible to suppose that you have there, on your shelves— the actual facts of history—a true record of what men, dead long ago, felt and thought?' Yet, if we have not, I for one, though of a literary turn, would sooner spend my leisure playing skittles with boors than in reading sonorous lies ...
— Obiter Dicta • Augustine Birrell
... beer and skittles, is it?" I said to Prince ARTHUR just now, trying to put the best face ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Volume 102, March 19, 1892 • Various
... and the groom from the great house, and the publican, and even the two skittle-players (and here note that, howsoever busy all the rest of village human-kind may be, there will always be two people with leisure to play at skittles, wherever village skittles are), what encouragement would be on us to plait and weave! No one looks at us while we plait and weave these words. Clock-mending again. Except for the slight inconvenience of carrying a clock under our arm, and the monotony of making the bell go, ...
— The Uncommercial Traveller • Charles Dickens
... inspected his garments, and showed the sacred necessity there was for him to refit in London, under the hands of scientific tailors. Evan wrote him an introduction to Mr. Goren, counted out the contents of his purse (which Jack had reduced in his study of the pastoral game of skittles, he confessed), and calculated in a niggardly way, how far it would go to supply the fellow's wants; sighing, as he did it, to think of Jack installed at Beckley Court, while Jack, comparing his luck with Evan's, had discovered it ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... of Rutgers's orchard, whose remaining noble elms yet shade the green vista of the City Hospital, and which was a place for rifling bird's-nests in the boyhood of his pensive companion, whose father played at skittles on the Bowling Green, hard by the Governor's house, while the Dutch householders sat smoking long pipes in their broad porticos, cosily discussing the last news from Antwerp or Delft, their stout rosy daughters meanwhile taking a twilight ramble, with their stalwart ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 18, No. 110, December, 1866 - A Magazine of Literature, Science, Art, and Politics • Various
... permanently enlarged by this tremendous experience. Materially and spiritually she will have been forced to witness and partake of the life, thought, culture, and troubles of the old world. She will have, unconsciously, assimilated much, been diverted from the beer and skittles of her isolated development in a great new country. Americans will find themselves suddenly grown up. Not till a man is grown up does he see and feel things deeply enough to venture into the ...
— Another Sheaf • John Galsworthy
... gambling in every form—but in these thinly-populated outlying agricultural parishes, where money is scarce and wages low, there never existed any temptation to allure skittle-sharpers and similar cheaters to the spot. The game at skittles was a legitimate game—a fair and honest struggle of skill and strength. Nine times out of ten it was played only for a quart of ale, to be drunk by the loser as well as the winner in good fellowship. Why deprive the man who labours all day in wet and storm of so simple a pleasure in the evening? ...
— The Toilers of the Field • Richard Jefferies |
