"Tittle-tattle" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... out of materials on which men can agree, not upon subjects which try the passions. But this good lady wants to see men chatting together upon the Pelagian heresy— to hear, in the afternoon, the theological rumours of the day—and to glean polemical tittle-tattle at a tea-table rout. All the disciples of this school uniformly fall into the same mistake. They are perpetually calling upon their votaries for religious thoughts and religious conversation in every thing; inviting them to ride, ...
— Famous Reviews • Editor: R. Brimley Johnson
... Jesuits, an order which, by devotion, genius, and courage, has excited that fear from all men which is the highest homage this world can offer to integrity. His personal sorrow, therefore, was not degraded by any foolish additional worry about the tittle-tattle of this, that, or the other personage. Tongues might wag; for himself, he could but do his duty and keep his account straight with God. He hoped that a public law-suit would be avoided. Baron Zeuill was using his influence, ...
— Robert Orange - Being a Continuation of the History of Robert Orange • John Oliver Hobbes
... for nonsense!—I beg your pardon, sister—but it always provokes me to see a person afraid to do what they think right, because, truly, 'the world will say it is wrong.' What signifies the uneasiness we may suffer from the idle blame or tittle-tattle of the day, compared with the happiness of a young girl's whole life, ...
— Tales And Novels, Volume 1 • Maria Edgeworth
... somewhat lively and frivolous woman, accustomed to the amusements and stir of Paris, used to sit all day long, day after day, and for the most part of the time alone, though she received tiresome and inane visits which led her to think her loneliness preferable to empty tittle-tattle. If she permitted herself the slightest gleam of intelligence, it gave rise to interminable comment and embittered her condition. She occupied herself a great deal with her children, not so much from taste as for the sake of an interest in her almost solitary life, ...
— The Collection of Antiquities • Honore de Balzac
... my reader, must be your writer, and let me know if such tittle-tattle as I can collect serves to divert some of those many moments of languor and weariness that creep between pain and ease, and that call more for mental food than for bodily medicine. Your love to your Fannikin, I well ...
— The Diary and Letters of Madame D'Arblay Volume 1 • Madame D'Arblay
... For, in the first place, the identification of the personages in the framework of the Heptameron depends upon the merest and, as it seems to me, the idlest conjecture; and, in the second, the interest of the actual tittle-tattle, whether it could be fathered on A or B or not, is the least part of the interest of the book. Indeed, the stories altogether are, as I think, far ...
— The Tales Of The Heptameron, Vol. I. (of V.) • Margaret, Queen Of Navarre
... found quite A1. Whilst for five o'clock tea, Madame Bouzoum has deservedly gained a reputation as great as that of Rumpelmayer on the Riviera. But again a word of warning! Be discreet as to repeating any local tittle-tattle you may possibly overhear. So much ...
— The Gourmet's Guide to Europe • Algernon Bastard
... woman with your eyes and your mouth ever yet lived a loveless life!—never forget that it is the biggest thing in the world, the one altogether good and perfect gift. Don't let any twopenny-halfpenny considerations of worldly advantage influence you, nor the tittle-tattle of other folks, and even if it seems that something insurmountable lies between you and the fulfillment of love, go over it, or round it, or through it! If it's a real love, your faith must be big enough to remove the mountains in the way—or ...
— The Hermit of Far End • Margaret Pedler
... cultivate your acquaintance. Now as to Shekels, whenever you want to know about any private thing that is going on at this post or in White Cloud's camp or Thunder-Bird's, he can tell you; and if you make friends with him he'll be glad to, for he is a born gossip, and picks up all the tittle-tattle. Being the whole Seventh Cavalry's reptile, he doesn't belong to anybody in particular, and hasn't any military duties; so he comes and goes as he pleases, and is popular with all the house cats and other authentic sources of private ...
— A Horse's Tale • Mark Twain
... former admirers; cultivate no suspicions; in a moment of bad temper do not rush out and tell the neighbors; do not let any of those gad-abouts of society unload in your house their baggage of gab and tittle-tattle; do not stand on your rights; learn how to apologize; do not be so proud, or so stubborn, or so devilish that you will not make up. Remember that the worst domestic misfortunes and most scandalous divorce cases started from little infelicities. The whole piled-up train ...
— The Wedding Ring - A Series of Discourses for Husbands and Wives and Those - Contemplating Matrimony • T. De Witt Talmage
... Kirkbank liked to make her friends laugh. It was all she could do now in order to be admired. And there is nothing like audacity for making people laugh nowadays. Lady Kirkbank was a close student of all those delightful books of French memoirs which bring the tittle-tattle of the Regency and the scandals of Louis the Fifteenth's reign so vividly before us: and she had unconsciously founded her manners and her ways of thinking and talking upon that easy-going but elegant age. She did not want to seem better than women who had been so altogether charming. ...
— Phantom Fortune, A Novel • M. E. Braddon
... there never was anything between Joan and that Hugh Alston. It was some foolish tittle-tattle, some nonsense, probably hatched by that stupid ...
— The Imaginary Marriage • Henry St. John Cooper
... cheered up by a letter from the editor of that lively and not too finicky publication, Tittle-Tattle. The interview with Miss Raleigh was acclaimed with almost rapturous delight. It was precisely the sort of thing wanted. Proof had already been sent to Miss Raleigh, who was equally pleased. Would Mr. Banneker kindly read and revise enclosed proof and return ...
— Success - A Novel • Samuel Hopkins Adams
... formed against him. Explanations the most minute and confidential thereupon ensued between them. It was now more than ever compulsory for her to "raise the mask,"[2] to sacrifice to a manifest necessity the circumspection she was studious of preserving—to brave somewhat further the tittle-tattle of a few devotees of either sex, and at all events to permit her Prime Minister to defend his life. Up to this moment Anne of Austria had hesitated, for reasons which may be readily comprehended. But Madame de ...
— Political Women (Vol. 1 of 2) • Sutherland Menzies
... appearance; the world of letters, in the same way, triturates the most disgusting things to get them swallowed without raising your gorge. There is an incessant manipulation of neighbours' gossip and play-box tittle-tattle, all wrapped up in perfidious good taste to ...
— The Cathedral • Joris-Karl Huysmans
... admiring this great loyalty, the sublime resignation to his oath, and the extreme sufferings of this internal passion. But as she still kept her love in the recesses of her heart, she died when Lavalliere fell before Metz, as has been elsewhere related by Messire Bourdeilles de Brantome in his tittle-tattle. ...
— Droll Stories, Complete - Collected From The Abbeys Of Touraine • Honore de Balzac
... was peculiar. Knowing that there was no Court of Criminal Appeal, he set the rules of procedure at defiance. Any tittle-tattle was admitted, and postmen and servants were allowed to swear as to the directions on unproduced documents alleged to have been addressed to me. When, several weeks later, I was tried a third time in the Court of Queen's Bench, I heard Lord Coleridge rebuke the prosecuting counsel for attempting ...
— Prisoner for Blasphemy • G. W. [George William] Foote
... a most devout Baud, a precise Procurer; A Saint in the Spirit, and Whore in the Flesh; A Doer of the Devil's Work in God's Name. Is she your Informer? nay, then the Lye's undoubted— I say once more, adone with your idle Tittle-Tattle, —And to divert me, bid Betty sing the Song which Wilding made To his last Mistress; we may judge by that, What little Haunts, and what low Game he follows. This is not like the Description of a rich Citizen's Daughter and Heir, but some ...
— The Works of Aphra Behn, Vol. II • Aphra Behn
... 'Kil wa kal"lit. "it was said and he said;" a popular phrase for chit chat, tittle-tattle, ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 4 • Richard F. Burton
... than that. Give me of your wisdom on the subject and I'll write an interview with you for Tittle-Tattle." ...
— Success - A Novel • Samuel Hopkins Adams
... surprise friends and enemies alike; and the latter should be found so unprepared and disunited, that they should not find time to attack him. We feared more from his friends than from his enemies. The lies and tittle-tattle sent over to St. Germains by the Jacobite agents about London, had done an incalculable mischief to his cause, and wofully misguided him, and it was from these especially, that the persons engaged in the present venture were anxious to defend ...
— The History of Henry Esmond, Esq. • W. M. Thackeray
... care of the colonel and little Roger. And Lichfield, long before the lettering on Patricia's tombstone had time to lose its first light dusty gray, had accredited Cousin Lucy Fentnor with illimitable willingness to become Mrs. Rudolph Musgrave, upon proper solicitation, although such tittle-tattle is neither here nor there; for at worst, a widowed, childless and impoverished second-cousin, discreetly advanced in her forties, was entitled to keep house for the colonel in his bereavement, as a jointly beneficial arrangement, ...
— The Rivet in Grandfather's Neck - A Comedy of Limitations • James Branch Cabell
... mad as to regard her foolish Idle prate, or to leave thee for twenty such as she is. No, never think I have so little Wit, I gave her such a Reprimand as soon as she had spoke, that cool'd her Courage in an instant: for I let her know her Tittle-Tattle would be all in vain; and that I was resolv'd I would be absolute. Shall I be ty'd by such a one as she? No, Love, I scorn it. And for her Tongue, let me alone to tame it: Winter is coming on and then ...
— The London-Bawd: With Her Character and Life - Discovering the Various and Subtle Intrigues of Lewd Women • Anonymous
... After all, this is Asquith's own affair. I do not for one moment believe Mr. Asquith would employ such agencies and for sure he will turn Murdoch and his wares into the wastepaper basket. I have reassured Tyrrell. Tittle-tattle will effect no lodgment in the ...
— Gallipoli Diary, Volume 2 • Ian Hamilton
... to them and had protected them, but it was preposterous to suppose that without force they would obey any big boy who might choose to order them. It was some time before this scheme became known to Ernest Bracebridge and his friends. As he never listened to the tales and tittle-tattle of the school—indeed, he found that the current stories were generally absurd exaggerations of the truth—he might have remained some time longer ignorant, had not Bouldon come to him one afternoon, after school, in a state of great indignation, saying ...
— Ernest Bracebridge - School Days • William H. G. Kingston
... consulted, in consequence (Batchelor thinks) of some petty intrigue in some quarter. This O'Reilly, who has gradually insinuated himself into the King's confidence, and by constantly attending him at Windsor, and bringing him all the gossip and tittle-tattle of the neighbourhood (being on the alert to pick up and retail all he can for the King's amusement), has made himself necessary, and is not now to be shaken off, to the great annoyance of Knighton, who cannot bear him, as well as of all ...
— The Greville Memoirs - A Journal of the Reigns of King George IV and King William - IV, Volume 1 (of 3) • Charles C. F. Greville
... bury myself in this hole!" growled Almayer, unamiably. "If she had anything to do with Hudig—that wife—then she can't be up to much. I would be sorry for the man," added Almayer, brightening up with the recollection of the scandalous tittle-tattle of the past, when he was a young man in the second capital of the Islands—and so well informed, so well informed. He laughed. Lingard's ...
— An Outcast of the Islands • Joseph Conrad
... nothing," Ying Ch'un smiled. "What I do detest is her fondness for tittle-tattle! I've never seen any one who, even when asleep, goes on chatter-chatter; now laughing, and now talking, as she does. Nor can I make out where she gets all those idle ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book II • Cao Xueqin
... mean time, I, who had private thoughts of my own, was much concerned, to know why the boar was brought in with a cap upon his head; and therefore having run out my tittle-tattle, I told my interpreter what troubled me: To which he answered, "Your boy can even tell ye what it means, for there's no riddle in it, but all as clear as day. This boar stood the last of yester-nights supper, and dismiss'd ...
— The Satyricon • Petronius Arbiter
... future to be thick-skinned, and when Gashmu's tongue is whispering, and whenever some busybody like Sanballat repeats Gashmu's words to us, let us act as Nehemiah did. Let us take no notice of the repeated tittle-tattle. ...
— The King's Cup-Bearer • Amy Catherine Walton
... I love the jolly rattle Of an orde-al by battle, There's an end of tittle-tattle When your enemy is dead. It's an arrant molly-coddle Fears a crack upon his noddle And he's only fit to ...
— The Complete Plays of Gilbert and Sullivan - The 14 Gilbert And Sullivan Plays • William Schwenk Gilbert and Arthur Sullivan
... est in proverbio, by which it appears that barbers and their shops were as remarkable for gossiping and tittle-tattle in ancient as they are in modern times. Aristophanes mentions them in his "Plutus," they are recorded also by Plutarch, and Theophrastus ...
— Trips to the Moon • Lucian
... privileges have been denied the keeper's and the assistant's servants,' I read in one case, and the eminently Scots periphrasis means neither more nor less than excommunication, 'on account of the discordant and quarrelsome state of the families. The cause, when inquired into, proves to be tittle-tattle on both sides.' The tender comes round; the foremen and artificers go from station to station; the gossip flies through the whole system of the service, and the stories, disfigured and exaggerated, return to their own birthplace ...
— Records of a Family of Engineers • Robert Louis Stevenson
... Dom Manuel and the Queen were the only persons qualified to speak of these matters with authority, and this was Dom Manuel's account of them. For the rest, he was sustained against tittle-tattle by the knowledge that he had performed a charitable deed in England, for the Queen's popularity was enhanced, and all the English, but particularly their King, were delighted, by the fine son which the stork duly brought to Alianora the ...
— Figures of Earth • James Branch Cabell
... tittle-tattle place as Hollingford! Really, Molly, you are either very stupid or very obstinate, or else you don't care what hard things may be said about me: and all for a selfish fancy of your own! No! I owe myself the justice of acting in this matter as I please. Every one shall know I'm not a common ...
— Wives and Daughters • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
... that it will all be printed in the newspapers, for men to snigger at in their cafes, for women to cackle over in their boudoirs? Have you reflected that you will make yourself a nine-days' wonder, a subject for tittle-tattle with all the gossip-mongers of Europe? Are you without ...
— The Lady Paramount • Henry Harland
... done by keeping the cork in; but few ever think of keeping the cork of their own conversation in. See a Frenchman—how light and buoyant he trips into a drawing-room, fresh from the satisfactory scrutiny of the looking-glass, with all the news, and jokes, and tittle-tattle of the day, in full bloom! How sparkling and radiant he is, with something smart and pleasant to say to every one! How thoroughly happy and easy he is; and what a contrast to phlegmatic John Bull, who stands with his great red fists ...
— Mr. Sponge's Sporting Tour • R. S. Surtees
... palaver-house, which I have before described. In this house, or under the shade of some venerable tree, all ranks occasionally assemble in groups, from sun-rising to sun-set, and pass the time in chit-chat, or in conversation on public affairs. Their subjects are inexhaustible, and their tittle-tattle is carried on with surprising volubility, gaiety, and delight; their time thus occupied is so seducing, that they separate with great reluctance, sometimes passing the entire day in this, pratling, smoaking, and diversion: night, however, terminates these amusements: They assemble in the ...
— Observations Upon The Windward Coast Of Africa • Joseph Corry
... crotchet of day-to-day working. If a joint starts "blowing" ever so little away up in some obscure corner of our kingdom, we know of it within an hour or two. One would think we were a mothers' meeting discussing our babies, to hear the grave tittle-tattle concerning the inevitable weakness of babies and engines which passes over ...
— An Ocean Tramp • William McFee
... signifying unmistakably that there was no willingness to buy, I hastened to withdraw my hand, and, retying my little package, restored it to its place of security. After I had adjusted my waistband, again we spoke some tittle-tattle of the hour before I arose and, with a courteous salaam, took ...
— Tales of Destiny • Edmund Mitchell
... the so-called social journals, and absorb the gossip, tittle-tattle, and personalities—absorb it because they have no means of comparison or of checking the impression it produces of the general loose tone of society. They know all about it, much more than you do. No turn of the latest divorce case or great social exposure has escaped ...
— Hodge and His Masters • Richard Jefferies
... wife both declared that they minded what the bailiff said, and never let a word escape from them about the old man's suspicions; but rumour is a sad spreader of news, and the result of some bit of tittle-tattle turns up in places least expected, ...
— A Life's Eclipse • George Manville Fenn
... her approvingly and yet something in him held back. He longed to spare her all the low tittle-tattle of her neighbours, the coarse jests of the hired men among themselves, and the ...
— The Wind Before the Dawn • Dell H. Munger
... dead. I heard that Lady Louisa had died a few months before, and I wouldn't ask any direct questions out of respect for her. If she had managed to keep the whole pitiful story a secret, to bury it in oblivion, what right had I to drag it to light again—to make her and him the subject of idle tittle-tattle, for that was what it amounted to? She was at rest beyond the reach of tongues, and in a way that made it worse, for she wasn't there to guard ...
— East of the Shadows • Mrs. Hubert Barclay
... "My dear Martha, in a few days they and their tittle-tattle will pass out of my existence, admitting that they have ever entered it. I repeat, my life is all my own, and that I am concerned only with those whom I wish to retain as my friends. Gossip is the shibboleth of the mediocre, and, thank heaven, I ...
— Parrot & Co. • Harold MacGrath
... restless night, dreaming of the debtor's jail and a starving family. On Hari Babu's return, next morning, he related the purport of his conversation with Ramanath. His host said: "You should not attach too much importance to such tittle-tattle. Ramanath has had a quarrel with his brother about family matters, and he is not at all averse to doing him a bad turn." Sham Babu was not satisfied with this explanation. ...
— Tales of Bengal • S. B. Banerjea
... made this an additional subject of annoyance, and there were not wanting those who had the amazing bad taste to repeat to him some of their speeches. There are some who seem to think that a man must rather enjoy hearing all the low tittle-tattle ...
— Julian Home • Dean Frederic W. Farrar
... downright sort of person. After her fashion she was kind to Ermie, but it never entered into her head to flatter her. She was a gossiping sort of body, and she wanted the child to recount to her all the tittle-tattle she knew about Glendower. Ermengarde had neither the power nor the inclination to describe the goings on at Glendower graphically. The stout lady soon got tired of her short answers, and ...
— The Children of Wilton Chase • Mrs. L. T. Meade
... sister have most agreeable and new conversation—not old, trumpery literature over again, and reviews, but new circumstance worth telling, apropos to every subject that is touched upon: frank observations on character, without either ill-nature or the fear of committing themselves: no blue-stocking tittle-tattle, or habits of worshipping, or being worshipped: domestic, affectionate, good to live with, and, without fussing continually, doing what is most obliging, and whatever makes us feel most at home. Breakfast is very pleasant ...
— The Life And Letters Of Maria Edgeworth, Vol. 1 • Maria Edgeworth
... respecting it which may find their way into print. I am not ashamed of the Methodists of Cadiz; their conduct in many respects does them honour, nor do I accuse any one of fanaticism amongst our dear and worthy friends; but I cannot answer for the tittle-tattle of Madrid. Far be it from me to reflect upon any one: I am but too well aware of my own multitudinous imperfections and follies. I am going instantly to write to Mr. Rule, and I would also to our other friend did I but know his address. ...
— Letters of George Borrow - to the British and Foreign Bible Society • George Borrow
... moreover, the country of gossip and scandal. From five to seven o'clock you can see people wandering about in quest of scandal, which they retail from group to group. As you remarked to me, my dear aunt, tittle-tattle is the mark of petty individuals and petty minds. It is also the consolation of women who are no longer loved or sought after. It is enough for me to observe the women who are fondest of gossiping to be persuaded ...
— Maupassant Original Short Stories (180), Complete • Guy de Maupassant
... of all this tittle-tattle, and laughed at it. This did not, however, prevent many of his tenants from seeking his society and paying court to him. They would invite him to dinner, but he almost ...
— The Widow Lerouge - The Lerouge Case • Emile Gaboriau
... about that "laughing nymph" [Footnote: Heine. SALOON-CHOPIN.] of whom he demanded news: "If she still continued to drape her silvery veil around the flowing locks of her green hair, with a coquetry so enticing?" Familiar with the tittle-tattle and love tales of those distant lands he asked: "If the old marine god, with the long white beard, still pursued this mischievous naiad with his ridiculous love?" Fully informed, too, about all the exquisite fairy scenes to be seen DOWN THERE—DOWN THERE, he ...
— Life of Chopin • Franz Liszt
... scolding and backbiting on a large scale, and in a way that relieves the individual from responsibility. The old women of the past have been royally revenged for all the sneers and slights put upon their spectacled talks, and tea parties; for back-door tittle-tattle of the meanest, most reckless sort, has been made a business, has become the staple of some journals. That people read such stuff does not seem to me reason enough for printing it. Shall we not have a daily paper some ...
— Buchanan's Journal of Man, November 1887 - Volume 1, Number 10 • Various
... scribble such jingles as I am ashamed to read, because I must write something. . . ." Paul Vanderhoffen shrugged, and continued, in tones more animated: "There will be no talk of any grand-duke. Instead, there will be columns of denunciation and tittle-tattle in every newspaper—quite as if you, a baronet's daughter, had run away with a footman. And you will very often think wistfully of Lord Brudenel's fine house when your only title is—well, Princess of Grub Street, and your realm is a garret. And for a while even to-morrow's ...
— The Certain Hour • James Branch Cabell
... rejects you not, but only the Convent. No place is less fit for you. You have a high spirit, and high religious sentiments: both would be mortified and shocked in a nunnery. Think you that convent-walls can shut out temptation? I know them better than you: they are strongholds of vanity, folly, tittle-tattle, and all the meanest vices of your sex. Nay, I forbid you to think of it: show me now your faith by ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 100, February, 1866 • Various
... Scott brought back from his voyages have turned into dead leaves according to custom; and the curiosities, upon which he set so extravagant a price, savour more of Wardour Street than of the genuine mediaeval artists. Nay, there are scoffers, though I am not of them, who think that the tittle-tattle which Miss Austen gathered at the country-houses of our grandfathers is worth more than the showy but rather flimsy eloquence of the 'Ariosto of the North.' Scott endeavoured at least, if with indifferent success, to invest his scenes ...
— Hours in a Library, Volume I. (of III.) • Leslie Stephen
... may come near though I am rich and eligible"—and that arranging and rearranging of seats, that shameless match-making and that eternal tittle-tattle and pretence; those rules—with whom to shake hands, to whom only to nod, with whom to converse (and all this done deliberately with a conviction of its inevitability), that continual ennui in the blood passing on from generation to generation. Try to understand or believe just ...
— The Cossacks • Leo Tolstoy
... together and circulate all sorts of foolish stories about your late squire, and about his dear son, your present squire, and some of these stories probably to the discredit of one or both. Now I have given you the true account of all, so that you can safely put down all slanderers' gossip and tittle-tattle on the subject. And further, I have gone thus particularly into my story, because it will show you what rare jewels there were in your late squire's character, and how brightly those shone out when the black crust of evil habits had fallen ...
— Working in the Shade - Lowly Sowing brings Glorious Reaping • Theodore P Wilson
... At the offices of the diligencias in various towns on the great road from Cordova to Madrid he left word for Concepcion Vara to follow, should the spirit of travel be still upon him, knowing that at these places where travellers were ever passing, the tittle-tattle of the road was on the tongue of every ostler and stable help. And truly enough there followed one who made careful inquiries as to the movements of the Englishman, and heard his messages with a grim smile. But ...
— In Kedar's Tents • Henry Seton Merriman
... great minds, where the air is quick with thought, knowledge stands still, taste is corrupted like stagnant water, and passion dwindles, frittered away upon the infinitely small objects which it strives to exalt. Herein lies the secret of the avarice and tittle-tattle that poison provincial life. The contagion of narrow-mindedness and meanness affects the noblest natures; and in such ways as these, men born to be great, and women who would have been charming if they had fallen ...
— Two Poets - Lost Illusions Part I • Honore de Balzac
... brusque outspokenness, my disregard for their social laws, my impatience of all constraint. Among my books and my drugs in my lonely den at Mansie I could let the great drove of the human race pass onwards with their politics and inventions and tittle-tattle, and I remained behind stagnant and happy. Not stagnant either, for I was working in my own little groove, and making progress. I have reason to believe that Dalton's atomic theory is founded upon error, and I know that mercury ...
— The Captain of the Pole-Star and Other Tales • Arthur Conan Doyle
... nothing from what philologists say about philology: it is all mere tittle-tattle—for example, Jahn's[6] "The Meaning and Place of the Study of Antiquity in Germany." There is no feeling for what should be protected and defended: thus speak people who have not even thought of the possibility that any one could ...
— We Philologists, Volume 8 (of 18) • Friedrich Nietzsche
... world be truly represented, as it is not, in the swarms of so-called fashionable novels, gleaned from the sloppy conversation of footmen's ordinaries, or the retail tittle-tattle of lady's-maids in waiting at the registry-offices, how little is it to the credit of the mass of the reading public that they peruse such stuff; or would it be perused at all, but for that vulgar love, so prevalent about town, of imitation of the Lady Fannys ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. 327 - Vol. 53, January, 1843 • Various
... farewell; fair weather after you. Your blessing, quotha? I'll not give a single halfpenny for't. Who would live under a mother's nose and a granam's tongue? A maid cannot love, or catch a lip-clip or a lap-clap, but here's such tittle-tattle, and Do not so, and Be not so light, and Be not so fond, and Do not kiss, and Do not love, and I cannot tell what; and I must love, ...
— A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. IX • Various
... birds in the universe. A grasshopper remained a week with St. Francis during the absence of the Virgin Mary, and pittered on his head. He grew so companionable with a nightingale, that when a nest of swallows began to babble, he hushed them by desiring them not to tittle-tattle of their sister, the nightingale. Attacked by a wolf, with only the sign-manual of the cross, he held a long dialogue with his rabid assailant, till the wolf, meek as a lap-dog, stretched his paws in the hands of the saint, followed ...
— Curiosities of Literature, Vol. 1 (of 3) • Isaac D'Israeli
... invited to be private with her, and they passed the light hours eating and drinking in company and he lay the night with her. The Wali feigned not to believe a word of this story, but he summoned the watchmen of the quarter one night and questioned them of this tittle-tattle. Quoth one of them, "As for me, O my lord, I saw none save a Jew[FN45] enter the street in question one night; but I have not made certain to whom he went in;" and quoth the Chief, "Keep thine eye on him from this time forward and note what place he entereth." ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 2 • Richard F. Burton
... she'd far better hold her tongue," continued Folliot. "Tittle-tattle of that sort is apt to lead to unpleasantness. And when it came to it, it turned out that all she had seen was this stranger strolling across the Close as if he'd just left your house. If—there's always some if! ...
— The Paradise Mystery • J. S. Fletcher
... gossip, no one knew better than himself, and he has incurred the censure of Sir George Trevelyan for repeating tittle-tattle, as he calls it, about Fox and his gambling. But posterity desires to see the real Fox, not an ideal statesman—to see a man as he lived, not only a political figure. Looking back for more than a century we may very well appreciate to the full Fox's great qualities ...
— George Selwyn: His Letters and His Life • E. S. Roscoe and Helen Clergue
... these efforts to an admiring circle, he betakes himself with infinite zest to the discussion of aesthetic tittle-tattle over a cup of tea and a toasted bun. "Dear fellow," his friends will say of him at such a moment, "he is so etherial; and his eyes, did you observe that far-away, rapt look in them?" They will then take pleasure in persuading ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 98, March 22, 1890 • Various
... of modern conversation. And as it is not to be denied that, if their neighbours left them nothing to guess at, three-fourths of civilized humankind, male or female, would have nothing to talk about; so we cannot too gratefully encourage that needful curiosity termed by the inconsiderate tittle-tattle or scandal, which saves the vast majority of our species from being reduced to the ...
— What Will He Do With It, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... business to do, we must first be seen particular together, to give suspicion, and create Jealousies 'mongst the rest of your Admirers; then it must be whisper'd to the Countess of Intelligence, to carry about Town, or the Tea-Tables will drop for want of Tittle-tattle; and afterwards your Ladyship's absolutely denying it, confirms ev'ry body in the truth of it: As for Cloaths, Equipage and Furniture, they are soon got ready, and if your Ladiship dislikes living i'the City, we'll ...
— The Fine Lady's Airs (1709) • Thomas Baker
... of those about her to be the first essentials to happiness, felt no weakness, no lack of self-reliance, now that she was in some measure pitted against the many. She resented the conduct of the passengers in making her the subject of their tittle-tattle with a bitterness she had never felt before. In overlooking her actions and assuming a right to influence her in a purely personal matter, these people were guilty of an insolence to which she would not submit. She thought she discovered a certain antagonism amongst those ...
— In the Roaring Fifties • Edward Dyson
... he has come to New France to mend his fortunes. How he planned to do it one may guess from his career at Louisburg; but Quebec offered better field, and it was to Bigot's interest to ply Montcalm and Vaudreuil with such tittle-tattle of enmity as would foment jealousy, keep their attention on each other, and their eyes off his own doings. As he had done at Louisburg, so he now did at Quebec. The King was requisitioned for enormous ...
— Canada: the Empire of the North - Being the Romantic Story of the New Dominion's Growth from Colony to Kingdom • Agnes C. Laut
... was proper to tell Gus (who, between ourselves, is rather curious, and inclined to tittle-tattle) all the particulars of the family quarrel of which I had been the cause and witness, and so just said that the old lady—("They were the Drum arms," says Gus; "for I went and looked them out that minute in the 'Peerage'")—that the old lady turned out to be a cousin ...
— The History of Samuel Titmarsh - and the Great Hoggarty Diamond • William Makepeace Thackeray
... less—could hardly be reduced to order. All those people had seen one another the day before, and they were all going to see one another the day to follow, yet talk they would and must and did. Engagements, marriages, acceptances, excuses, compliments, tittle-tattle, personalities—a rolling flood of chatter and gossip. Mrs. Pence took her people for what they were, apparently, and kept up with the best of them herself. Now and then her husband would do a little feeble something to quiet the tempest, and ...
— Under the Skylights • Henry Blake Fuller
... sounds that come from five thousand keyholes. It catches a whisper from the other side the room, and can understand the scratch of a pen. It has one ear open toward the east and the other toward the west, and hears everything in both directions. All the tittle-tattle of the world pours into those ears like vinegar through a funnel. They are always up and open, and to them a meeting of the sewing society is a jubilee and a ...
— Around The Tea-Table • T. De Witt Talmage
... colloquy, converse, confabulation, talk, discourse, verbal intercourse; oral communication, commerce; dialogue, duologue, trialogue. causerie, chat, chitchat; small talk, table talk, teatable talk^, town talk, village talk, idle talk; tattle, gossip, tittle-tattle; babble, babblement^; tripotage^, cackle, prittle-prattle^, cancan, on dit [Fr.]; talk of the town, talk of the village. conference, parley, interview, audience, pourparler; tete-a-tete; reception, conversazione [It]; congress &c (council) ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... say, I did all in my power to prevent it; but I saw your ladyship was angry; and it is not the business of us upper servants to hinterfear on these occasions." "And was it not you, audacious wretch!" cried the lady, "who made me angry? Was it not your tittle-tattle, in which I believe you belyed the poor fellow, which incensed me against him? He may thank you for all that hath happened; and so may I for the loss of a good servant, and one who probably had more merit than all of you. Poor fellow! I am charmed with his goodness ...
— Joseph Andrews, Vol. 2 • Henry Fielding
... to hear La Cibot's tittle-tattle. Schmucke, Mme. Cibot, and Dr. Poulain meant all humanity to him now, when his sickroom became the universe. If invalid's thoughts, as a rule, never travel beyond in the little space over which his eyes can wander; if their selfishness, in its ...
— Cousin Pons • Honore de Balzac
... contemptuously. "She's hopelessly behind the times. Why, she's a perfect child. She takes no interest in anything beyond the tittle-tattle of the county. We had quite a scene the other day because I gave expression to my opinion that young people should be properly instructed in life by means of explanatory handbooks, instead of being left to gather their knowledge haphazard. I have never ...
— Cleo The Magnificent - The Muse of the Real • Louis Zangwill
... making it a club of the lowest species. Here, in advance, we contemplate the ways of the future revolutionary inquisition. They welcome burlesque denunciations; enter into petty police investigations; weigh the tittle-tattle of porters and the gossip of servant-girls; devote an all-night session to the secrets of a drunkard.[2218] They enter on their official report and without any disapproval, the petition of M. Hure, "living at Pont-sur-Yonne, ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 3 (of 6) - The French Revolution, Volume 2 (of 3) • Hippolyte A. Taine
... have made up, and they will guess we are going to make a match of it. Then, again," 'Zekiel continued, "Huldy says she's bound to have it out with the one that started the stories. There's no use mincing matters between us, because you know as well as I do who is at the bottom of all this tittle-tattle. Since I refused to join hands with him to try and drive you out of town, he has talked about me almost as bad as he has about you. 'So,' says Huldy to me, 'you know he is the only teacher of music in Eastborough. ...
— Quincy Adams Sawyer and Mason's Corner Folks - A Picture of New England Home Life • Charles Felton Pidgin
... he hesitates, stops in his utterance, and always expresses himself inelegantly. His actions are all ungraceful; so that, with all his merit and knowledge, I would rather converse six hours with the most frivolous tittle-tattle woman who knew something of the world, than with him. The preposterous notions of a systematical man who does not know the world, tire the patience of a man who does. It would be endless to correct his mistakes, nor would he take it kindly: for he has considered everything deliberately, ...
— The PG Edition of Chesterfield's Letters to His Son • The Earl of Chesterfield
... interrupted him scornfully. "Ah, what is my manner of life! Do you fancy that I am deaf as a post and blind as a bat? Do you think that I do not know some of the things that are spoken of me, by Mrs. Ames, for instance, or Horace Penfield, or even Edith Symmes? Do you fancy any word of that tittle-tattle escapes me? Sometimes it is repeated, or hinted in malice; sometimes as from Bea or Kitty in fright, as a warning, almost a prayer. I know that I lay myself open to gossip; but I can not help it, at least at present. It is impossible for me ...
— The Silver Butterfly • Mrs. Wilson Woodrow
... eagerly expecting a reply, but Cardan took no notice of the attack. Then one day some tale-bearer, moved either by the spirit of tittle-tattle or the love of mischief, brought to Julius Caesar the news that Jerome Cardan had sunk under his tremendous battery of abuse, and was dead. It is but bare charity to assume that Scaliger was touched by some stings of regret when he ...
— Jerome Cardan - A Biographical Study • William George Waters
... Polsue rallied. "I was saying that this War didn't surprise me. The wonder to me is, the Almighty's wrath hasn't descended on this nation long before. He must be more patient than you or me, Charity Oliver; or else more blind, which isn't to be supposed. Take Polpier, now. The tittle-tattle that goes about, as you've just been admitting; and the drinking habits amongst the men— I saw Zeb Mennear come out his doorway, not fifteen minutes since, wiping his mouth with the back of his sleeve; and him just ...
— Nicky-Nan, Reservist • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch (Q)
... of the Left; the people belonged to it. The downfall of the protege of the palace, of a ministeralist, an incorrigible royalist who on the 13th Vendemiaire had insulted the cause of liberty by fighting against the glorious French Revolution,—such a downfall excited the applause and tittle-tattle of the Bourse. Pillerault wished to learn and study the state of public opinion. He found in one of the most animated groups du Tillet, Gobenheim-Keller, Nucingen, old Guillaume, and his son-in-law Joseph Lebas, Claparon, Gigonnet, Mongenod, Camusot, Gobseck, ...
— Rise and Fall of Cesar Birotteau • Honore de Balzac
... internal unlikeness; not rhyming, but strongly alliterative, and in every case with a change of the interior vowel from a weak into a strong, generally from i into a or o; as 'shilly-shally', 'mingle-mangle', 'tittle-tattle', 'prittle-prattle', 'riff-raff', 'see-saw', 'slip-slop'. No one who is not quite out of love with the homelier yet more vigorous portions of the language, but will acknowledge the life and strength which there is often in these and in others still current ...
— English Past and Present • Richard Chenevix Trench
... visits at Fairoaks will cease of themselves, and there will be no need to bother the widow. She has trouble enough on her hands, with the affairs of that silly young scapegrace, without being pestered by the tittle-tattle of this place. It is all an invention of that ...
— The History of Pendennis • William Makepeace Thackeray
... this at a tea-table, it could not be expected would be long a secret; it ran from one tittle-tattle society to another; and in every company, snow-ball like, it was far from lessening, and it went on, till at length it began to meet with some contradiction, and the tradesman found himself obliged to trace it as far and ...
— The Complete English Tradesman (1839 ed.) • Daniel Defoe
... a natural distaste for pedants and tale-bearers. She did what we all would have done in her place; at first she did not listen to them but as they again began to repeat their tittle-tattle, she ended by believing them and decided to send Francoeur away. However, to give him an honourable exile, she sent him to Rome to obtain the blessing of the Pope. This journey was all the longer for Francoeur the squire because a great many taverns much frequented by musicians ...
— Honey-Bee - 1911 • Anatole France
... of the honest Doctor enabled him to despise this sort of tittle-tattle, though the secret knowledge of its existence could not be agreeable to him. He went his usual rounds with his usual perseverance, and waited with patience until time should throw light on the subject and history of his lodger. ...
— The Surgeon's Daughter • Sir Walter Scott
... but one of the exiles from Athens," volunteered Dion, who kept all the tittle-tattle of the little city in stock ...
— A Victor of Salamis • William Stearns Davis
... baffled from the parson's wife. Disdainful of all artificial adjuncts of mystery, to all appearance a woman like other women, packing her little sick-baskets, balancing the coal-club accounts, teaching in her Sunday-school, the centre of religion, of charity, and of tittle-tattle, woman in orders fronts calmly the inquirer, a being fearfully and wonderfully ...
— Modern Women and What is Said of Them - A Reprint of A Series of Articles in the Saturday Review (1868) • Anonymous
... written into a snake. Thou wilt not, or thou canst not? Any of these things ought to be easy to thee; they relate much more wondrous miracles of thine." Then turning to the courtiers Herod said, "He does not stir. Ah, I see well that what has made him so notorious was only idle tittle-tattle. He knows nothing and ...
— King of the Jews - A story of Christ's last days on Earth • William T. Stead
... turned upside down. Less than twenty-four hours ago it was money and madness, bankruptcy and divorce courts, the automobile pace—the devil's own. Now, it was quiet and gentility, easy-living and refinement. Had he been in Hampton a little longer, he would have added: gossip and tittle-tattle, small-mindedness and silly vanity. ...
— In Her Own Right • John Reed Scott
... your part, Friar Ange," replied the philosopher, "and as you're afraid of the devil, don't offend him too much and do not excite him against you by inconsiderate tittle-tattle. You know that this old Adversary, this powerful Contradictor, has kept, in the spiritual world, such a power, that God Almighty Himself reckons with him. I'll say more, God, who was in fear of him, made him His business man. Be on your guard, little ...
— The Queen Pedauque • Anatole France
... and of plays, But more of players and their private lives; Related tittle-tattle of their words and ways, Their lightning change of husbands and of wives. And there was chat of garments and their price, Of operas and balls and all that gives ...
— Hello, Boys! • Ella Wheeler Wilcox
... that it is impossible to show one's nose in this hateful town without knocking against some vulgarity, stupidity, tittle-tattle, or some horrible injustice. One ...
— Virgin Soil • Ivan S. Turgenev
... said, when she followed, that she ate herself to death; but I mention the rumour in order to deny it, for I am sure it was grief that killed her. It is a pity some dogs will repeat everything they hear, without considering the mischief such tittle-tattle may occasion—although it has been asserted by many that in this case the false intelligence came from the Cats, who had no great affection for poor Lady Bull. Whatever the cause, she died, and with her the employment of poor Nip and myself. The young Bulls who came into possession of the estate, ...
— The Adventures of a Dog, and a Good Dog Too • Alfred Elwes
... came the little legends—things about Charlotte when she was a governess herself at Mrs. Sidgwick's, and the tittle-tattle of the parish. One of the three curates whom Charlotte made so shockingly immortal avenged himself for his immortality by stating that the trouble with Charlotte was that she would fight for mastery in the parish. Who can believe him? If there is one thing that seems more certain than ...
— The Three Brontes • May Sinclair
... are also women, even girls, who are of such pure eyes they cannot discern obliquity anywhere. And there are others just as pure—the lily's own heart isn't purer—who, nevertheless—but why waste time or type. In short, Johanna first, and then Barbara, had seen how easily Daphne Jane's tittle-tattle might be serious news to John March; which it certainly was if the dark cloud on his ...
— John March, Southerner • George W. Cable
... establishment in the Rue Saint-Jacques, at which time he became acquainted with Florent and Quenu. In 1856 he retired from this business, and to amuse himself took a stall in the poultry-market. "Thenceforth he lived amidst ceaseless tittle-tattle, acquainted with every little scandal in the neighbourhood." Gavard was a leading spirit in the revolutionary circle which met in Lebigre's wine-shop, and was the means of bringing Florent to attend the meetings there. He was arrested at the same time as Florent and was ...
— A Zola Dictionary • J. G. Patterson
... influence, they could not have done better. The chronic jealousy and distrust of the time were deepened. And all this was aggravated by what went on in private. A system of espionage, whisperings, backbitings, and miserable tittle-tattle, sometimes of the most slanderous or the most ridiculous kind, was set going all over Oxford. Never in Oxford, before or since, were busybodies more truculent or more unscrupulous. Difficulties arose between Heads of Colleges and their tutors. Candidates for ...
— The Oxford Movement - Twelve Years, 1833-1845 • R.W. Church
... this of being married. Even this conquest would appear valuable in her eyes. As to any thing superior for you, I suppose she is quite in the dark. The attentions of a certain person can hardly be among the tittle-tattle of Highbury yet. Hitherto I fancy you and I are the only people to whom his looks and manners have ...
— Persuasion • Jane Austen
... made light of her friend's statements, and in part declined to believe her. But when she found herself alone she felt disquieted by what she had heard. Perhaps she would have treated the matter as mere idle tittle-tattle, if she had not already regretted that she herself had no second child. On the day when the unhappy Morange had lost his only daughter, and had remained stricken down, utterly alone in life, she had experienced a vague ...
— Fruitfulness - Fecondite • Emile Zola
... family found open to him a vista of such licence as had been unknown to any since the barbatuli of the Roman Empire. To spend the early morning with his valet, gradually assuming the rich apparel that was not then tabooed by a hard sumptuary standard; to saunter round to Whites for ale and tittle-tattle and the making of wagers; to attend a 'drunken dejeuner' in honour of 'la tres belle Rosaline or the Strappini; to drive some fellow-fool far out into the country in his pretty curricle, 'followed by two well-dressed and well-mounted grooms, of singular ...
— The Works of Max Beerbohm • Max Beerbohm
... a time before; but she was always intently interested in music; and she had more than once expressed in Brand's hearing her opinion of the conduct of the ladies and gentlemen who make an opera, or a concert, or a play a mere adjunct to their own foolish laughter and tittle-tattle. She recognized the serious aims of a great artist; she listened with deep attention and respect; she could talk idly elsewhere and at other times. And so there was scarcely a word said—except of involuntary admiration—as the opera ...
— Sunrise • William Black
... more imitators; and secondly because you are one of those gentlemen of the chamber who have not considered themselves offended by the new decree concerning the ranks allotted to courtiers, which is causing so much gossip and tittle-tattle." ...
— War and Peace • Leo Tolstoy
... flocked thither to leave cards, and express their sympathy for the unfortunate mischance that had overtaken the bright creature who had been the cynosure of all eyes for her beauty and grace on the morning of the first fox-hunt of the year. All the ill-natured gossip, all the slanderous tittle-tattle which had been started by Lord Roxmouth and fostered by Miss Tabitha Pippitt, ebbed and died away in the great wave of honest regret and kindly pity that pervaded the whole neighbourhood. Even Sir Morton Pippitt, smitten by compunction for certain selfish motives which ...
— God's Good Man • Marie Corelli
... is very simple. When I visit people whom I like, such as Madame de Sallus and yourself, I do not expect to meet the Paris that flutters from house to house in the evening, gossiping and scandalizing. I have had my experience of gossip and tittle-tattle. It needs only one of these talkative dames or men to take away all the pleasure there is for me in visiting the lady on whom I happen to have called. Sometimes when I am anchored perforce upon my seat, I feel lost; I do not know how to get away. I have to take part in the whirlpool ...
— A Comedy of Marriage & Other Tales • Guy De Maupassant
... in strict accordance with the family arms, the liveries should have been not "yellow," but white and blue—must be taken for what they are worth. On the whole, the probability is, that Murphy's words were only the careless repetition of local tittle-tattle, of much of which, as Captain Booth says pertinently in Amelia, "the only basis is lying." The squires of the neighbourhood would naturally regard the dashing young gentleman from London with the same distrustful hostility that Addison's "Tory Foxhunter" exhibited to those ...
— Fielding - (English Men of Letters Series) • Austin Dobson
... there was more tittle-tattle, I think, than in any place on God's earth; and she knew that well enough; and understood that she had said something which unless she prevented it, would go straight to Charles' ears. It is true that she ruled him absolutely; but he kicked under her yoke a little now and then; and if there ...
— Oddsfish! • Robert Hugh Benson
... many other instances, was rather too effeminate in his disposition, had a pretty strong inclination to tittle-tattle. He had no sooner, therefore, received a full liberty of speaking from Jones, than he entered upon a long narrative concerning the lady; which, as it contained many particulars highly to her dishonour, we have too great a tenderness for all women of condition to repeat. We would cautiously ...
— The History of Tom Jones, a foundling • Henry Fielding
... "English Club," Frequented now by Lords and Princes, Where every snobling likes to rub His elbows with a Peer, who winces; The tittle-tattle of the cliques, Some half-proposals for our daughters— Such is the life that makes for weeks A fortune—for the ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 103, September 3, 1892 • Various
... very dark, small, with hair which the Shepherd calls black, Lockhart dark brown; her features not regular, but her complexion, figure, and so forth 'unusually attractive.' Not very much is said about her in any of the authentic accounts, and traditional tittle-tattle may be neglected. She does not seem to have been extremely wise, and was entirely unliterary; but neither of these defects is a causa redhibitionis in marriage; and she was certainly a faithful and affectionate ...
— Sir Walter Scott - Famous Scots Series • George Saintsbury
... that singular fancy of his for describing complicated legal and commercial undertakings came in too. Nor did he spare, in this wide-ranging book, to bring in other favorite matters of his, the hobereau—or squireen—aristocracy, the tittle-tattle of the ...
— Lost Illusions • Honore De Balzac
... landing. The light was growing. Already he had been seen from the post. On his hallooing, a small boat shoved off toward him, dancing its way against the current. Old Michael was not in it, only his citizen helpers. Fearing their tittle-tattle, Lounsbury curbed his impatience to ask about the shack. Landed, he made for the ...
— The Plow-Woman • Eleanor Gates
... have Albany saying that you believe its tittle-tattle," she argued; and he deferred for the hundredth time to her superior perception of the mental processes of ...
— The Henchman • Mark Lee Luther
... together in one corner of the playground, told tittle-tattle and ate their lunch, but the boys ran all over the place like swallows in aimless flight. A big boy was standing crouching close to the gymnastic apparatus, with his arm hiding his face, and munching. They whirled about him excitedly, now one and now another making the circle narrower ...
— Pelle the Conqueror, Complete • Martin Andersen Nexo
... this charge of writing histories is committed unto base, ignorant, and mechanicall kind of people, only for this consideration that they can speake well; as if we sought to learne the Grammer of them; and they have some reason, being only hired to that end, and publishing nothing but their tittle-tattle to aime at nothing else so much. Thus with store of choice and quaint words, and wyre drawne phrases, they huddle up and make a hodge-pot of a laboured contexture of the reports which they gather in the market places or such other assemblies. The only good histories are those ...
— Literary and Philosophical Essays • Various
... you,' the cup said to the saucer. 'I fear I've been here all the afternoon.' 'Spare excuses,' said the saucer; 'you have sat on me before, sir.' 'Oh, I'll stir him up directly,' said the spoon. 'Stop your clatter! Stop your clatter!' cried the bread-and-butter platter 'Tittle-tattle!' sneered the tea-pot, with a shrug; 'Now, the most important question is my chronic indigestion.' 'Ah, you've taken too much tannin,' jeered the jug. 'Hey, hey, hey!' sang the silver-plated tray, 'It's time you had your faces washed. I've ...
— A Book for Kids • C. J. (Clarence Michael James) Dennis |
