"Unostentatious" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... appointed day drew near, Isora's despondency seemed to vanish, and she listened, with her usual eagerness in whatever interested me, to my Continental schemes of enterprise. I resolved that our second wedding, though public, should be modest and unostentatious, suitable rather to our fortunes than our birth. St. John, and a few old friends of the family, constituted all the party I invited, and I requested them to keep my marriage secret until the very day for ...
— Devereux, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... listened, knowing Veale for a queer rustic character of poor repute, gave him sixpences to assist in his efforts to quench an abnormal thirst. Talking together, they decided that the hero of the tale had done rather a fine thing in a very unostentatious way, and it occurred to several of them that pluck ought to be rewarded. If the chance came they would encourage Dale. The M.F.H. in fact made up his mind to reconsider matters, and see if he could not before long let Dale have ...
— The Devil's Garden • W. B. Maxwell
... the richest suitor; still, he took it for granted, that if Theodore St. Leger had not a fortune at the time, being a merchant, he would, of course, make one in a few years. But Mr. Taylor's son-in-law was a man of very different character from himself; he was a quiet, prudent, unostentatious young man, of good abilities, who had received by education excellent principles, and moderate views, and who had fallen in love with Adeline's pretty face. Mr. Hopkins, his uncle and adopted father, was a very ...
— Elinor Wyllys - Vol. I • Susan Fenimore Cooper
... measures, each of which supplemented the other: military and naval efficiency on the one hand and pacific interpenetration on the other. The former has been often and adequately described; the latter has not yet attracted the degree of attention it merits. For one thing, it was unostentatious and invariably tinged with the colour of legitimate trade and industry. Practically every country in Europe, and many lands beyond the seas, were covered with networks of economic relations which, without ...
— England and Germany • Emile Joseph Dillon
... uninscribed examples. Although few of us are likely to possess treasures of the XIIIth century, signed and dated pieces of our great-grandmothers' embroideries are interesting personal landmarks in family history, so for this reason, amongst others, unostentatious marks of identification are by no means out of place. Descriptive names or verses are also a means of amplifying the story and so enlivening ...
— Embroidery and Tapestry Weaving • Grace Christie
... was interrupted by Sam Spooner from Boston, who sat at his left, and with a gentle touch on the arm, reminded him in a careless whisper, that Citizen Peabody, although a very unostentatious man, was no democrat; nor was it certain the ladies would all be inclined to father ...
— The Adventures of My Cousin Smooth • Timothy Templeton
... to see. So we went with him through the shop, up stairs, into the private part of his establishment; and, really, it was one of the rarest adventures I ever met with, to stumble upon this treasure of a man, with his treasury of antiquities and curiosities, veiled behind the unostentatious front of a bookseller's shop, in a very moderate line of village business. The two up-stair rooms into which he introduced us were so crowded with inestimable articles, that we were almost afraid to stir ...
— Our Old Home - A Series of English Sketches • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... "In this unostentatious manner does he conduct himself, despising all pomp, and seems rather more intent upon inspecting the charitable, useful, and ornamental establishments of this country, with a view, probably, of benefiting his own dominions by his observations, ...
— Samuel F. B. Morse, His Letters and Journals - In Two Volumes, Volume I. • Samuel F. B. Morse
... supplies again—and again. They made six trips, carrying each time a capacity cargo of apples, and still Whitey ate in a famished manner. They were afraid to take more apples from the barrel, which began to show conspicuously the result of their raids, wherefore Penrod made an unostentatious visit to the cellar of his own house. From the inside he opened a window and passed vegetables out to Sam, who placed them in a bucket and carried them hurriedly to the stable, while Penrod returned in a casual manner through the house. Of his sang-froid under ...
— Penrod and Sam • Booth Tarkington
... permitted himself to be led away, expatiating as he went, upon the unrivaled location and glorious future of his mining property. From time to time, Dr. Surtaine jotted down an unostentatious note. ...
— The Clarion • Samuel Hopkins Adams
... in commerce or in mining had raised into eminence—the persons who feel most umbrage from the overshadowing aristocracy, and are usually the most vehement in defence of what they hold to be their rights. Their dress was in general studiously simple and unostentatious, or only remarkable by the contradictory affectation of extreme simplicity or carelessness. The dark colour of their cloaks, varying from absolute black to what was called sad-coloured—their steeple-crowned hats, with their broad shadowy brims—their long swords, ...
— Peveril of the Peak • Sir Walter Scott
... place larger than England. And other people talked of Italy, the spiritual fatherland of us all. Perhaps Italy would prove marvellous. But at present he conceived it as something exotic, to be admired and reverenced, but not to be loved like these unostentatious fields. He drew out a book, it was natural for him to read when he was happy, and to read out loud,—and for a little time his voice disturbed the silence of that glorious afternoon. The book was Shelley, and it opened at a passage that he had cherished greatly two years ...
— The Longest Journey • E. M. Forster
... me for many months on subsequent occasions, from the scorching plains to the everlasting snows. Ever foremost in the forest or on the bleak mountain, and ever ready to help, to carry, to encamp, collect, or cook, they cheer on the traveller by their unostentatious zeal in his service, and are spurs to ...
— Himalayan Journals (Complete) • J. D. Hooker
... other extreme, and affects the odd; pretends, poses, parades, and at last succeeds half in duping himself, half in deceiving other people. But with Far Orientals the case is different. Their love has all the unostentatious assurance of what has received the sanction of public opinion. Nor is it still at that doubtful, hesitating stage when, by the instrumentality of a third, its soul-harmony can suddenly be changed from the jubilant major key into the despairing minor. No ...
— The Soul of the Far East • Percival Lowell
... distress. He was one of the very few people in Bridgeport who had never received any aid from Mr. Barnum, but he was ready to join in any expression of sympathy, and saw no reason why it should not assume a material form [loud applause]. He would only allude to Mr. Barnum's unostentatious benevolence. To one of the churches of the city Mr. Barnum gave $500—to one of their churches in which he felt no interest beyond his interest for Bridgeport, and this was but a specimen of his munificence. Nobody could say that Mr. Barnum had not made the best and most benevolent ...
— A Unique Story of a Marvellous Career. Life of Hon. Phineas T. • Joel Benton
... Never was a subaltern given a more friendly welcome than that which Major Brighten extended to me. I was made at home at once. Padre Newman, who seemed little more than a young undergraduate with a gay and affable countenance, but with that unselfish and utterly unostentatious heroism depicted in every feature—a typical example of the kind of hero which our public schools, with all their failings, have sent forth in hundreds and thousands during the last five years—was placing jolly records on a gramophone when I entered the little cell; and the mess-waiters were preparing ...
— At Ypres with Best-Dunkley • Thomas Hope Floyd
... barrels? And that question once answered, pirates straightway steer apart, for they are infernal villains on both sides, and don't like to see overmuch of each other's villanous likenesses. But look at the godly, honest, unostentatious, hospitable, sociable, free-and-easy whaler! What does the whaler do when she meets another whaler in any sort of decent weather? She has a Gam, a thing so utterly unknown to all other ships that they never heard of the name even; and ...
— Moby-Dick • Melville
... conversation. And though it is a matter of no importance, I may mention that he employs a reviewer who, referring to the map in my book, A Difficult Frontier (Yugoslavs and Albanians)—a map which is most conspicuously printed opposite the title-page—observes that it "is hidden in one unostentatious page, which at first sight escapes the ...
— The Birth of Yugoslavia, Volume 2 • Henry Baerlein
... the city was quiet and unostentatious and so devoid of the pomp and pageantry of a victorious general as to cause question in the minds of some as to whether or not this was the man expected. His dress was plain in the extreme, and bore upon it no insignia of rank; yet those there were, of insight, ...
— How the Flag Became Old Glory • Emma Look Scott
... to his situation. His natural endowments were strong, and had enjoyed all the advantage of cultivation. His demeanour was grave, and thoughtful, and compassionate. He appeared not untinctured with religion; but his devotion, though unostentatious, was of ...
— Edgar Huntley • Charles Brockden Brown
... I thought five would be an unostentatious number and make it clear that I was not trying to ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 159, December 29, 1920 • Various
... is forced to see her innocent son corrupted by the dark influence of political crime, drawn within the vortex of secret confederacy, and subsequently yielding up his life to the outraged laws of that country which he assisted to distract. It is in scenes like these that the unostentatious magnanimity of the pious Irish wife or mother may be discovered; and it is here where, as the night and storms of life darken her path, the holy fortitude of her heart shines with a lustre proportioned to the depth ...
— Fardorougha, The Miser - The Works of William Carleton, Volume One • William Carleton
... immediately above. They gathered round them men of merit representing science, art, literature, law, politics, military notables, and fashion. They set up, in fact, a little Court, but lived a quiet, unostentatious life, so far as ...
— The Tragedy of St. Helena • Walter Runciman
... songs of the Delectable Duchy. He is a patriotic Cornish-man sure enough ... as good as anything of the kind written by the dialect-poets of Lancashire or Dorset ... it is a thing to rejoice over, this little easy-going, unostentatious book." ...
— A Cluster of Grapes - A Book of Twentieth Century Poetry • Various
... Those who knew him best loved him most; and, in the hard, early days of the university, he especially made good his title to the gratitude of every Cornellian, not only by his university work, but by his unostentatious devotion to ...
— Volume I • Andrew Dickson White
... of the Secretary of War exhibits several gratifying results attained during the year by wise and unostentatious methods. The percentage of desertions from the Army (an evil for which both Congress and the Department have long been seeking a remedy) has been reduced during the past year 24 per cent, and for the months of August and September, during which time the favorable effects of the act of June 16 were ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents, Volume IX. • Benjamin Harrison
... line first—the lair of Battalion Headquarters and its appurtenances. Much of our time here, as elsewhere, is occupied in unostentatious retirement to our dug-outs, to avoid the effects of a bombardment. But a good amount—an increasing amount—of it is devoted to the contemplation of our own shells bursting over the Boche trenches. Gone are the days ...
— All In It K(1) Carries On - A Continuation of the First Hundred Thousand • John Hay Beith (AKA: Ian Hay)
... His simple, unostentatious, and even ascetic life during these years was noted. He was known as a man of extremely refined tastes and sensitive though not querulous nature. A commentator says ...
— Cosmic Consciousness • Ali Nomad
... when higher claims called for her undivided care. Whatever is worth doing at all is worth doing well; and the robin will doubtless be repaid for the unwearied patience with which she performs her unostentatious duties. Some people are inclined to think domestic labour dishonourable, and the cares of house-keeping a burden; but our feathered friend is wiser than they. She does with her might what she finds to do, ...
— The Nest in the Honeysuckles, and other Stories • Various
... he stretched out his hand for his gun, and began to examine it carefully, a proceeding that was imitated by the others, but in a quiet unostentatious way, so as not to take ...
— Rob Harlow's Adventures - A Story of the Grand Chaco • George Manville Fenn
... retiring. His life was simple and unostentatious. He had a kindly disposition, which endeared him to his students, to which fact many American chemists who were students at Goettingen during the time of Woehler's activity can cordially testify. In short, it may be said deliberately that Woehler, as a chemist and as a man, was a fit ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 365, December 30, 1882 • Various
... human being the perpetual object of whose life was so unremittingly to do good. It was a necessity of her nature. Yet so unostentatious, so unconscious even of her own excellence that even the objects of her kindness often knew not whence it came. She had seen the world—its glories without being dazzled; its vices and follies without being infected by them. She had suffered ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to Prose, Vol. IX (of X) - America - I • Various
... inventor. His duty has been well performed. The success of Mr. Felt's undertaking is due scarcely less to the pecuniary aid of all his patrons than to the counsel and encouragement of this wise, liberal, and steadfast friend. Thus aided, he has triumphed over all obstacles. Proceeding in a most unostentatious manner, he has submitted his device to the inspection of practical printers, and men of science, in various cities of the United States and Great Britain, and has everywhere won approval. His first patent was issued in 1854,—proceedings to obtain it having been commenced in the ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 13, No. 79, May, 1864 • Various
... government which they had established. It was easy to ridicule what they did not always understand, and very rarely met with. But men of far higher genius than this monarch, Selden, Usher, and Milton, must first be condemned before this odium of pedantry can attach itself to the plain and unostentatious writings of James I., who, it is remarkable, has not scattered in them those oratorical periods, and elaborate fancies, which he indulged in his speeches and proclamations. These loud accusers of the pedantry of James were little aware that the king has expressed himself with energy and ...
— Literary Character of Men of Genius - Drawn from Their Own Feelings and Confessions • Isaac D'Israeli
... quiet, peaceful, and christian way of doing such a thing, would have been, for those who were interested in the plan, to furnish the money necessary, and then to have selected a retired place, where there would be the least prejudice and opposition to be met, and there, in an unostentatious way, commenced the education of the youth to be thus sustained. Instead of this, at a time when the public mind was excited on the subject, it was noised abroad that a college for blacks was to be founded. Then a city was selected for its location, where was another college, ...
— An Essay on Slavery and Abolitionism - With reference to the duty of American females • Catharine E. Beecher
... architecture in Folkestone. But Folkestone, like other towns, is just as full of architecture as a wood is full of trees. As the train winds on its causeway over the sloping town you perceive below you thousands of squat little homes, neat, tended, respectable, comfortable, prim, at once unostentatious and conceited. Each a separate, clearly-defined entity! Each saying to the others: "Don't look over my wall, and I won't look over yours!" Each with a ferocious jealousy bent on guarding its own individuality! Each a stronghold—an island! And all careless of the general effect, but ...
— The Author's Craft • Arnold Bennett
... acquaintance was formed between us which lasted till my venerable friend departed this life. Peace to his ashes! He was a person of singular habits and eccentric opinions; but the chief part of his time was occupied in acts of quiet and unostentatious goodness. He was an enthusiast in the duties of the Samaritan; and as his virtues were softened by the gentlest charity, so his hopes were based upon the devoutest belief. He never conversed upon his own origin and history, nor have I ever been able to penetrate ...
— Zanoni • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... to the people of Dry Bottom he had announced in a quiet, unostentatious paragraph that while he had not come to Dry Bottom for a free fight, he would permit no one to tread on his toes. His readers' comprehension of the metaphor was complete—as was evidenced by the warm hand-clasps which he received from citizens who were not in sympathy with the Dunlavey ...
— The Coming of the Law • Charles Alden Seltzer
... confidence, and while he lived secured their general support of his Administration. Herein President Lincoln exhibited those peculiar qualities and attributes of mind which made him a leader and manager of men, and enabled him in a quiet and unostentatious way to exercise his executive ability in administering the Government during the most troublesome ...
— The Galaxy, Volume 23, No. 2, February, 1877 • Various
... these pages he oft unbended his vigorous mind from his severe and brilliant discoveries. We can now only lament the (almost) premature death of this high-ranked philosopher, this great benefactor to the arts, and deep promoter of science, whose mortal remains were consigned to his unostentatious tomb, at Geneva, in one of the finest evenings of summer, followed by the eloquent and amiable historian, De Sismondi, and by other learned and illustrious men. One may apply to his last moments at Geneva, (where he had arrived only one day ...
— On the Portraits of English Authors on Gardening, • Samuel Felton
... and plumed heads towered with grave dignity above the meaner crowd; their inscrutable eyes returned no response to the timid glances directed towards them. They stood by themselves, alone and impassive,—yet their presence filled the room with the sense of kings. The unostentatious, simple republican court suddenly seemed to have become royal. Even the interpreter who stood between their remote dignity and the nearer civilized world acquired the status ...
— Tales of Trail and Town • Bret Harte
... covert, came to the riders assembled at the cross roads on the outskirts of the wood in gusts, fitful indeed, but not so fitful that Nora, on the distrained foxy mare, was not able to gauge to a nicety the state of his temper. From the fact of her unostentatious position in the rear it might safely be concluded that it, like the wind, was still rising. The riders huddled together in the lee of the trees, their various elements fused in the crucible of Sir Thomas's wrath into a compact and anxious mass. There had been an unusually large entry ...
— All on the Irish Shore - Irish Sketches • E. Somerville and Martin Ross
... chance-comer, about whom they know nothing. Who is not open to flattery? and if he seems not to be exposed to it, is it not that he is too shrewd or too refined to be beguiled by any but what is delicate and unostentatious? A man never considers who it is who praises him. But the most dangerous, perhaps, of all kinds of vanity is to be vain of our personal appearance, most dangerous, for such, persons are ever under temptation—I may say, ever sinning. Wherever they go they ...
— Parochial and Plain Sermons, Vol. VIII (of 8) • John Henry Newman
... little known on the continent, and he travelled in a quiet, unostentatious manner. He went to dine with his old friends, but avoided introductions, and remained at Florence nearly two months after other Americans had departed for Rome. The reason he alleged for this was that Rome was a mouldy place and the ruins made him feel melancholy; also, ...
— Cambridge Sketches • Frank Preston Stearns
... civil wars betwixt Stephen and the Empress Maude, or Matilda. The Constable had never before been known to use it; for although wealthy and powerful, Hugo de Lacy was, on most occasions, plain and unostentatious; which, to those who knew him, made his present conduct seem the more remarkable. At the hour of noon he arrived, nobly mounted, at the gate of the castle, and drawing up a small body of servants, ...
— The Betrothed • Sir Walter Scott
... her outer duster and entered the room, she glanced at the clock on the mantel-shelf and threw herself with an air of resigned abstraction in an armchair in the corner. Her traveling-dress, although unostentatious, was tasteful and well-fitting; a slight pallor from her fatiguing journey, and, perhaps, from some absorbing thought, made her beauty still more striking. She gave even an air of elegance to the faded, worn adornments of the room, ...
— The Three Partners • Bret Harte
... greater perfection. As Oakland is pre-eminently a city of roses, so is this Mormon Saints' Rest a city of lilacs and tulips. The flowers, at least, are saintly, and they are surely loved. Scarce a home, however obscure, is without them, and the simple, unostentatious manner in which they are planted and gathered in pots and boxes about the windows shows how truly ...
— Steep Trails • John Muir
... constantly crowd his yard. There they sit, in almost perfect silence, receiving their goods, and making payment in gold-dust and ivory. Towards us Mr. Bannerman showed himself most hospitable, yet in a perfectly unostentatious manner. ...
— Journal of an African Cruiser • Horatio Bridge
... tranquillity—a spirit stoic rather than epicurean, ascetic rather than hedonic, yet generous, spacious, nobly reasonable, giving ample scope for very sincere, if soberly-clad pleasures, and for activities by no means despicable or unmanly, though of a modest, unostentatious sort. Dickie had tried not a few desperate adventures, had conformed his thought and action to not a few glaring patterns, rushing to violences of extreme colour, extreme white and black. All that had proved preeminently unsuccessful, a most poisonous ...
— The History of Sir Richard Calmady - A Romance • Lucas Malet
... the simple domestic virtues, by the daily, quiet, self-denying trials, by the observance of the thousand decencies, the unaffected proprieties, the unostentatious efforts to bless and comfort,—by the elevating influence of personal example,—by the breathing atmosphere of a holy spirit,—the family is to be made the household of faith, the nursery of ...
— Notable Women of Olden Time • Anonymous
... or covetous desire: aiming to restrain the tongue and in quietness to find rest from wordy contentions, not seeking in the multitude of religious duties to condone for a worldly principle in action, but aiming to benefit the world by a liberal and unostentatious charity; the heart without any contentious thought, but resolved by goodness to subdue the contentious; desiring to mortify the passions, and to destroy every enemy of virtue; not multiplying coarse or unseemly ...
— Sacred Books of the East • Various
... had very little room to move about in his dugout. I was very much impressed with the unostentatious way in which he said, "If you want to say your prayers, Padre, you can kneel over in that corner first, because there is only room for one at a time. I will say mine afterwards"—and he did. He was a Roman Catholic, and had lived in India, and was a very ...
— The Great War As I Saw It • Frederick George Scott
... were far from affluent. The professor had nothing but his salary, and his wife, one of a large family, brought no increase to their income. But the traditional hospitality of Virginia was a virtue by no means neglected. He was generous but unostentatious in his mode of living, and nothing gave him more pleasure than to bid his friends ...
— Stonewall Jackson And The American Civil War • G. F. R. Henderson
... July the 4th, the following occurrences, in the house of commons, marked at once the estimation in which Sir Robert was held by public men, and his own singular and unostentatious character. Lord John Russell introduced to the house the circumstance of the honourable baronet's decease, and said:—"It is impossible not to lament that hereafter this house will be no longer guided ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... which particularly endeared this brave and justly-famous Boer officer to us were his straightforwardness and unostentatious manner, his truthfulness, and the utter absence of affectation that distinguishes him. I am certain that he has written his simple narrative with candour and impartiality, and I feel equally certain, from ...
— My Reminiscences of the Anglo-Boer War • Ben Viljoen
... in which the lesser nobility, the clergy, and the magistracy meet together, exerts a great influence. The judgment and mind of the region reside in that solid, unostentatious society, where each man knows the resources of his neighbor, where complete indifference is shown to luxury and dress,—pleasures which are thought childish in comparison to that of obtaining ten or twelve acres of pasture ...
— The Jealousies of a Country Town • Honore de Balzac
... first bibliographers in Europe are also, for the first time in a English publication, subjoined; so that the lover of curious, as well as of valuable, editions may be equally gratified. The authorities, exceedingly numerous as well as respectable, are referred to in a manner the most unostentatious; and a full measure of text, and to be really useful, was my design from the beginning to the end of it. To write a long and dull homily about its imperfections would be gross affectation. An extensive sale has satisfied my publishers ...
— Bibliomania; or Book-Madness - A Bibliographical Romance • Thomas Frognall Dibdin
... on the south, or left-hand side, of the main Fulham road, behind a pair of carriage gates, connected by a brick wall, stands the mansion of Lord Ravensworth; in outward appearance small and unostentatious, without the slightest attempt at architectural decoration, but sufficiently spacious and attractive to have received the highest honour that can be conferred on the residence of a subject, by her Majesty and Prince Albert having visited ...
— A Walk from London to Fulham • Thomas Crofton Croker
... old school of gentlewomen. Her quiet, black gown with its crepe trimmings, gave, even to my masculine eye an effect of correct and fashionable, yet quiet and unostentatious ...
— The Gold Bag • Carolyn Wells
... ever become the sad duty of this biographer to write of disappointed love, I am sure he would not have any sensational story to tell of the Young Lady. She is one of those women whose unostentatious lives are the chief blessing of humanity; who, with a sigh heard only by herself and no change in her sunny face, would put behind her all the memories of winter evenings and the promises of May mornings, and give her life to some ministration of human kindness with ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... with a curve of her pretty red lip, "is the protest of the child against insanitary and artificial treatment. In its upright, unostentatious cradle it is protected against that injudicious fondling and dangerous promiscuous osculation to which, as an infant in human arms, it is so often subjected. Above all, it is kept from that shameless and mortifying ...
— Stories in Light and Shadow • Bret Harte
... name might have been preserved. Such, too, fail to appear in the Jewish annals, which contain but few women's names of any kind. Inspired devotion of strength and life to Judaism was as natural with a Jewess as quiet, unostentatious activity in her home. No need, therefore, to make mention of act ...
— Jewish Literature and Other Essays • Gustav Karpeles
... Catholics were no longer hanged or tortured for declining the ministrations of the Established Church, but still were penalised in many lesser ways. But the spirit of the eighteenth century made for toleration, and the Whigs were as unostentatious in their own piety as they were indifferent to ...
— The Rise of the Democracy • Joseph Clayton
... than twenty years rector of Foston, and for fully fifteen actually resided there. During this time he made the acquaintance of Lord and Lady Grey, next to Lord and Lady Holland his most constant friends, visited a little, entertained in his own unostentatious but hearty fashion a great deal, wrote many articles for the Edinburgh Review, found himself in a minority of one or two among the clergy of Yorkshire on the subject of Emancipation and similar matters, but was on the most friendly terms possible with his diocesan, ...
— Essays in English Literature, 1780-1860 • George Saintsbury
... the impulse to confess with the mouth[865] what was believed in the heart. At Rouen, the earnest request of the authorities, seconded by the prudent advice of the ministers, might prevail upon the Protestant community still to be content with an unostentatious and almost private worship, upon promise of connivance on the part of the Parliament of Normandy. But Caen, St. Lo, and Dieppe witnessed great public assemblies,[866] and Central and Southern France copied the example of Normandy. The time for secret gatherings and a timid worship ...
— The Rise of the Hugenots, Vol. 1 (of 2) • Henry Martyn Baird
... microbe was getting in some unostentatious but clever work. A week later Shoeblossom began to feel queer. He had occasional headaches, and found himself oppressed by a queer distaste for food. The professional advice of Dr. Oakes, the school doctor, ...
— Mike • P. G. Wodehouse
... suddenly and quite abruptly, and generally with the unostentatious efficiency with which Nature manages such things in the tropics, night fell. It ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science, June, 1930 • Various
... purity of Priestley's life, the strictness of his performance of every duty, his transparent sincerity, the unostentatious and deep-seated piety which breathes through all his correspondence, are in themselves a sufficient refutation of the hypothesis, invented by bigots to cover uncharitableness, that such opinions as his must arise from moral defects. And his statue will do as ...
— Science & Education • Thomas H. Huxley
... and her aged companion were distinguished also for a piety which was blameless. It is possible to merit blame even in our very acts of religious obedience. How seldom do we attain that purity of motive, that unostentatious simplicity of manner, that uniformity of conduct, which constitute a blameless piety! In this respect we have daily reason, at the footstool of mercy, to deplore our deficiency, our lanquor, our ...
— Female Scripture Biographies, Vol. II • Francis Augustus Cox
... situation for us—very trying. There seemed to be no answer. We looked around for the two young men who had done this thing, but they had left the house in an unostentatious manner immediately after the end ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 5 • Charles Sylvester
... to render a service when wanted. Some of us know too how much civilians have been encouraged in their endurance of a long siege by Colonel Dartnell's cheery example. Nothing disheartens him. He is always the same whether the day's news be good or bad, and perhaps his unostentatious services will be adequately recognised in the end. If they had been taken advantage of in the beginning there would ...
— Four Months Besieged - The Story of Ladysmith • H. H. S. Pearse
... a most enjoyable one to all, but it was especially delightful to three couples who early paired off together, and in a quiet unostentatious fashion dropped into the rear. Captain and Mrs Staunton had naturally much to say to each other upon matters interesting only to themselves; while as for Violet and Rex, Blanche and Lance, this was their first opportunity for an exchange of these sweet nothings ...
— The Pirate Island - A Story of the South Pacific • Harry Collingwood
... learned to know and admire him," says Dr. Busey[13], "for his simple and unostentatious manners, kind-heartedness, and amusing jokes, anecdotes, and witticisms. When about to tell an anecdote during a meal he would lay down his knife and fork, place his elbows upon the table, rest his face ...
— McClure's Magazine, Vol. VI., No. 6, May, 1896 • Various
... of the arrival of him whose face we have so long sought The hour is at hand when he joins his military family at an unostentatious and very frugal dinner. In about half an hour there is a sudden cessation in the hum of conversation, the guard is ordered to stand to arms, and in a moment more, amid profound silence, Garibaldi has passed through the antechamber, leaving the place, as it ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 7, Issue 42, April, 1861 • Various
... Conspicuous among the anti-slavery leaders of New England, his voice always had been heard in defense of human rights. His loyalty to the union was equaled only by his devotion to the interests of the soldiers. He lived a quiet, unostentatious life, at the hotel, where his well-known face and figure could be seen when the senate was not in session. He was a man of strong mentality, of sturdy frame and marked individuality. As chairman of the committee on military affairs he had been able to make himself extremely useful to the government ...
— Personal Recollections of a Cavalryman - With Custer's Michigan Cavalry Brigade in the Civil War • J. H. (James Harvey) Kidd
... sofa, large enough for two to sit upon comfortably. He paused to open the door across from the telephone table and found that it opened into a closet, whose hangers and hat forms now held the outdoor clothing belonging to Nita's guests. Nice clothes—the smart but unostentatious hats and coats of moneyed people of good taste, he observed a little enviously, before he opened the door which led into the main hall which bisected the main floor of the house until it ...
— Murder at Bridge • Anne Austin
... most unpretending of human beings. She moved about the house with a step as stilly as the falling dews. Indeed, such was her walk through life. She seemed born to teach mankind unostentatious charity. Yet, under this mild, calm exterior, she had a strong, controlling will, which all around her felt and acknowledged. From the moment she drew the fan from my hand, at my mother's bedside, to the hour I left her dwelling, she acted upon me with ...
— Ernest Linwood - or, The Inner Life of the Author • Caroline Lee Hentz
... clothes, rode unattended down to Congress, dismounted, hitched his horse, and went into the chamber to read his fifteen-minutes inaugural. Some of the sentences of that short but memorable address have passed into proverbs. The unostentatious example thus set by the nation's President was wise in its effects. Soon the public debt was diminished, the treasury was replenished, and the army and navy were reduced. A man of such marked character necessarily made bitter enemies, but Jefferson commanded ...
— A Brief History of the United States • Barnes & Co.
... enjoy a holiday, while they are unbending their minds with verse, it may be expected that such Readers will resemble their former selves also in strength of prejudice, and an inaptitude to be moved by the unostentatious beauties of a pure style. In the higher poetry, an enlightened Critic chiefly looks for a reflection of the wisdom of the heart and the grandeur of the imagination. Wherever these appear, simplicity accompanies them, Magnificence herself, when legitimate, depending upon ...
— Prefaces and Prologues to Famous Books - with Introductions, Notes and Illustrations • Charles W. Eliot
... consideration the whole of those amounts—the whole of this unparalleled munificence on the part of many manufacturers which never appears in any account whatever—I will throw out everything done in private and unostentatious charity—the supplies of bedding, clothing, food, necessaries of every description, which do not appear as public subscriptions, and will appeal to public subscriptions alone; and I will appeal to an authority which cannot, I think, be disputed—the authority of the commissioner, Mr Farnall ...
— Home-Life of the Lancashire Factory Folk during the Cotton Famine • Edwin Waugh
... little to tell—it was principally charm. He was one of the most unostentatious, unselfish, high-minded, consistent men I ever knew. Completely a gentleman in the finest sense of that ...
— The Law-Breakers and Other Stories • Robert Grant
... life. Austere in manner, severe in his administration of justice, Major Grantham might have been considered a harsh man, had not these qualities been tempered by his well known benevolence to the poor, and his staunch, yet, unostentatious, support of the deserving and the well intentioned. And, as his life was a continuous illustration of the principles he inculcated, no one could be unjust enough to ascribe to intolerance or oppression, the rigour with which he exacted obedience, to those ...
— The Canadian Brothers - or The Prophecy Fulfilled • John Richardson
... recited clearly indicate the character of the man. He was a bold and original thinker. With him mere precedent was without weight. By nature he was a democrat, plain, simple, and unostentatious. He not only believed in the capacity of the people for self-government, but in their honest wish to govern aright. In the struggle of the Revolution his devotion to the rights of the people against English tyranny took the form of religious enthusiasm. In ...
— Great Men and Famous Women. Vol. 4 of 8 • Various
... charming summer morning that we quitted Frankfort on this mission. General Grant was at Bingen, where he had arrived the evening before from Cologne. He was accompanied by Mrs. Grant, his son Jesse Grant, and General Adam Badeau, then Consul-General at London. Their arrival at Bingen had been so unostentatious that their presence in the town was scarcely known outside of the hotel in which they had taken rooms. Their departure was ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, October 1885 • Various
... some jewels which had been presented to her by the Prince Regent; but which, it was discovered, belonged to the Crown, and could not be alienated. Sir Benjamin was created a Peer, and sent to Stockholm as ambassador, where his affable manners and his unostentatious hospitality rendered him exceedingly popular; and he became as great a favorite with Bernadotte as he had been with the Prince Regent. The name of Bloomfield is at this day respected ...
— Reminiscences of Captain Gronow • Rees Howell Gronow
... the marriage had been probably regarded, thus far, only as a mere matter of form. Caesar was now about fifty-two. He had a wife, named Calpurnia, to whom he had been married about ten years. She was living, at this time in an unostentatious and quiet manner at Rome. She was a lady of an amiable and gentle character, devotedly attached to her husband, patient and forbearing in respect to his faults, and often anxious and unhappy at the thought of the difficulties ...
— Cleopatra • Jacob Abbott
... despite the lateness of the hour, albeit with misgivings justified in the issue, he hailed a taxicab and had himself driven to the headquarters of the British Secret Service in America, an unostentatious dwelling on the northwest corner of West End Avenue ...
— The False Faces • Vance, Louis Joseph
... I find it hard to interpret in words actuated me to leave the house in a quiet and unostentatious fashion—by the back door, in fact—and to proceed on my way to the parish house, two blocks distant, along a rather obscure side street. I was perhaps halfway there when through the falling dusk I discerned, approaching from the opposite direction, ...
— Fibble, D. D. • Irvin Shrewsbury Cobb
... It is an unostentatious home, with simple gables and plain windows, and is but a story high. In front are some old trees, and a convenient porch to the door, in which to sit and look forth upon the road, a few paces in advance of ...
— The International Monthly, Volume 2, No. 4, March, 1851 • Various
... tongues of malice and envy had found something hard to say of her, but we never hear of the shadow of a suspicion of any kind having rested upon her fair name. She possessed in herself the three Graces—Faith, Hope, and Charity. She was tender and pure. She impressed all who knew her by the unostentatious faithfulness of her spirit, and purity of her life. She seems to have been actuated every day by the one desire, to do her duty. She wished to serve God, obey her parents, and do any good work that ...
— Grace Darling - Heroine of the Farne Islands • Eva Hope
... their sentences in that sequence which shall secure for each its proper emphasis and its determining influence on the others—influence reflected back and influence projected forward. As an example of the charm that lies in unostentatious antiphony, consider this passage from Ruskin:—"Originality in expression does not depend on invention of new words; nor originality in poetry on invention of new measures; nor in painting on invention of new colours ...
— The Principles of Success in Literature • George Henry Lewes
... unostentatious means. Andrew lost him in Drury Lane and found him again in Piccadilly. He was generally alone, never twice with the same person. His business was scattered, or it was his pleasure that kept him busy. He struck the observer as always being on the outlook for ...
— Better Dead • J. M. Barrie
... Yes, it was a simple thing, an unostentatious remembrance; no breaking, surely, of his father's conditions. Rodney loyally kept away and manfully stuck to his business, but every spire and frond and leaf of green in this winter wreath shed off the secret, magnetic meaning with which ...
— The Other Girls • Mrs. A. D. T. Whitney
... drove direct to 3A Bucklersbury. Mr. Pertwee was an unpretentious-looking gentleman, who had an unostentatious office on the third floor. He showed me a picture in water-colours of the Rogue flying before the wind. The deck was at an angle of 95 to the ocean. In the picture no human beings were represented on the deck; I suppose they had slipped off. Indeed, I do not ...
— Three Men on the Bummel • Jerome K. Jerome
... "Miss M.E. FRANCIS" will take it as a compliment when I say that Beck of Beckford (ALLEN AND UNWIN) should form part of the holiday equipment of all of us whose brows are not too exalted to enjoy it. In her unostentatious way Miss FRANCIS knows how to provide ample entertainment, and she has nothing to learn in point of form. When we are introduced to the Becks they are proud and poor, having impoverished themselves in the ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 159, July 7th, 1920 • Various
... thought as he watched her, was that rare type of woman who could defy all the current conventions of style and carry it off successfully; her type of beauty was unostentatious and yet vibrant. She was dressed impeccably in black and silver, her hair was authentic honey-blonde in a coronet braid, and her face possessed that pure line of profile together with the quality of translucence one sees in rare porcelain.... Sheila Carmack was thirty-five, and she paid her ...
— We're Friends, Now • Henry Hasse
... his wife and daughter and Miss Dodge ('Gail Hamilton') left at noon yesterday in anticipation of the rush. Before going the Senator did a very gracious and kindly deed in an unostentatious way. Sending for Flipper, the colored ...
— Henry Ossian Flipper, The Colored Cadet at West Point • Henry Ossian Flipper
... struts about, as though he were lord of the play-ground. Now, every body who sees this, says, it is a proof that the boy has not much mind. He is a simple boy. If he had good sense he would perceive that others of his playmates, in many qualities, surpassed him, and that it became him to be humble and unostentatious, The mind that is ...
— The Child at Home - The Principles of Filial Duty, Familiarly Illustrated • John S.C. Abbott
... may presume to call them), I shall not pretend to ascertain; but that of his Majesty's ministers it were vain to deny. It is, to be sure, a little like the wind, "no one knows whence it cometh or whither it goeth," but they feel it, they enjoy it, they boast of it. Indeed, modest and unostentatious as they are, to what part of the kingdom, even the most remote, can they flee to avoid the triumph which pursues them? If they plunge into the midland counties, there will they be greeted by the manufacturers, ...
— Life of Lord Byron, Vol. 6 (of 6) - With his Letters and Journals • Thomas Moore
... cheeks they are as soft as a kitten's fur, and lie against the skin closer than tired eyelids. They are the common people of the flower world, yet have, in virtue of that fact, the beauty and simplicity of the common people. They own a subdued and unostentatious strength, are humble and ignored, are walked upon, unnoticed, rarely thought about and never praised; they are cut off in early youth by mowing machines; yet their pain in fading is unreported, their little sufferings ...
— The Extra Day • Algernon Blackwood
... slightly, for I had no mind to have complications arising from this gardener's eyes. I think a little disguise is plenty unless one stalks mysteriously and stops and peers here and there. A little unostentatious minding of one's own affairs is a good way to remain undiscovered. Then nobody looks at you and demands: "Who is this fellow?" My father always said that when he wished to disguise himself he dressed as a common man, and although this gained him ...
— The O'Ruddy - A Romance • Stephen Crane
... was an unostentatious kind of Bayard. There was nothing romantic nor picturesque about him—he was too thoroughly commonplace. His ways of living were those of a well-to-do man. Although he had nothing beside his pay, and his pension was all that he had to look to in the future, ...
— The Country Doctor • Honore de Balzac
... behind the mushrabieh screens. The niceties of his dress were Parisian, punctilious, perfect. In his right lapel was the unostentatious button ...
— The Lighted Match • Charles Neville Buck
... the means to gratify his feelings of public spirit, and in consequence the town of DeKalb has benefited greatly at his hands. Its leading hotel and many other buildings are the work of his enterprise. Mr. Glidden has never lost the simple manners of the farm. He is unostentatious, quiet, genial, and at his hotel makes everybody feel as much at home as though enjoying the hospitalities of his private house. His kindly, firm, and intelligent face is well shown in the accompanying ...
— Prairie Farmer, Vol. 56: No. 1, January 5, 1884. - A Weekly Journal for the Farm, Orchard and Fireside • Various
... mind, also, that every holy service of unostentatious love exercises a hallowed influence on those around us. We may not be conscious of such. But, if Christians indeed, the sphere in which we move will, like the Bethany home, be redolent with the ointment perfume. A holy ...
— Memories of Bethany • John Ross Macduff
... the priesthood. He took no pains to conceal his birth and lineage in the most aristocratic country of the world. Considering that he was only second in power and dignity to an absolute monarch, his life was unostentatious ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume II • John Lord
... kindness; the rigorous observance of reciprocal justice; the unconquerable soul of conscious integrity. Worldly fame has been parsimonious of her favor to the memory of those generous companions. Their numbers were small; their stations in life obscure; the object of their enterprise unostentatious; the theatre of their exploits remote; how could they possibly be favorites of worldly Fame—that common crier, whose existence is only known by the assemblage of multitudes; that pander of wealth and greatness, ...
— Orations • John Quincy Adams
... "'We ought to be ashamed of doing wrong. We must forgive other people's trespasses if we hope forgiveness of our own.' His voice sunk low as he spoke, and he bowed his honest head reverently." How unostentatious his bravery, and riches puffed him up not a trifle! How alert to love, how open to enjoyment, how young his heart and how pure! What simplicity and what grave courtesy, particularly to women! How wide those windows ...
— A Hero and Some Other Folks • William A. Quayle
... tea-table between them. The air was heavy with the smoke of cigarettes, which clung to the oriental curtains and hung in clouds about the rare palms and plants. Everything in the San Giacinto house was large, comfortable and unostentatious. There was not a chair to be seen which might not have held the giant's frame. San Giacinto was a wonderful judge of what was good. If he paid twice as much as Montevarchi for a horse, the horse turned out to ...
— Don Orsino • F. Marion Crawford
... hand, had he made wealth his object, he might have secured it. On the other hand, he has befriended many a poor client to his own cost; and, while failing in many cases to collect the fees which were his due, he has contributed to public and private charities with a liberal, but unostentatious hand. Though he has never posed as a "working-men's candidate" for official preferment, the laboring people of his city and section have long known him as the true and sympathetic friend of every honest son ...
— The Bay State Monthly, Volume II. No. 2, November, 1884 • Various
... and that the government is "of the people, for the people, and by the people." Anyone with ordinary intelligence and with open eyes, who should visit any city, town or village in America, could not but be impressed with the orderly and unostentatious way in which it is governed by the local authorities, or help being struck by the plain and democratic character of the people. Even in the elementary schools, democracy is taught and practised. I remember visiting a public school ...
— America Through the Spectacles of an Oriental Diplomat • Wu Tingfang
... included in the Scotch teams who never lost a match with England. In the 1885 contest he kept goal in his best form, and was frequently cheered for the manner in which he got out the ball and dodged the English forwards. Mr. Macaulay was very quiet and unostentatious in his manner, and did his work brilliantly. He returned to Scotland the other day from abroad, and may yet play for some of ...
— Scottish Football Reminiscences and Sketches • David Drummond Bone
... two deacons deposited it in the glass case of a fashionable jeweller, of whom it was purchased by the humble rehearser of this legend, in the hope that it may be allowed to sparkle on a fair lady's finger. Purified from the foul fiend, so long its inhabitant, by a deed of unostentatious charity, and now made the symbol of faithful and devoted love, the gentle bosom of its new possessor need fear ...
— Other Tales and Sketches - (From: "The Doliver Romance and Other Pieces: Tales and Sketches") • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... stipulation which was made in connection with the burial at Westminster Abbey was that the clause in his will which read: "I emphatically direct that I be buried in an inexpensive, unostentatious and and strictly private manner," should be strictly ...
— My Father as I Recall Him • Mamie Dickens
... the gay visitor at the Casino. These simple and unostentatious funerals are very impressive. The priests always walk bareheaded through the streets on these occasions, and on many others. Indeed, the priestly head seems impatient ...
— Manners and Social Usages • Mrs. John M. E. W. Sherwood
... to denominate repose; but, in the ease of the two former, this repose is attained rather by the absence of novel combination, or of originality, than otherwise, and consists chiefly in the calm, quiet, unostentatious expression of commonplace thoughts, in an unambitious, unadulterated Saxon. In them, by strong effort, we are made to conceive the absence of all. In the essays before me the absence of effort is too obvious to be mistaken, and a strong ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to Prose, Vol. X (of X) - America - II, Index • Various
... day for me when Simon Newcomb met me at the door of the Cosmos Club, of which he was then president, and presented me as his guest to one and another of the select company of men who formed its membership. He moved among them as unostentatious and simple-mannered as he had been as a boy, with a catholic interest in all the varying topics which held the sympathies of the crowd, and able well to hold his own whatever might be the field of the conversation. Bishop, poet, scientist, historian, he had common ground ...
— The Last Leaf - Observations, during Seventy-Five Years, of Men and Events in America - and Europe • James Kendall Hosmer
... Washington street, and the young lady was assisted to alight; entering the house, she was received by an elderly female, who immediately conducted her to a private room, which contained a bed and furniture of a neat but unostentatious description. The carriage drove away, and Julia remained several hours in the house. At about nine o'clock in the evening, the carriage returned, and she was assisted to enter, being apparently in a very feeble and unwell condition. She reached her ...
— City Crimes - or Life in New York and Boston • Greenhorn
... peculiarity was his admiration of, and devotion to, the military profession, which he unduly exalted. An ensign in his army ranked higher than a counsellor of legation or a professor of philosophy. His ordinary mode of life was simple and unostentatious, and his favorite residence was the palace of Sans Souci, at Potsdam. He was very fond of music, and of the society of literary men; but he mortified them by his patronizing arrogance, and worried them by his practical ...
— A Modern History, From the Time of Luther to the Fall of Napoleon - For the Use of Schools and Colleges • John Lord
... true and unostentatious philosophy thou didst accommodate thyself to the greatest change thy quiet, harmless life had known since it had passed out of the brief, burning cycle of the passions! Lost was the home endeared to thee by so many noiseless victories of the mind, so many mute histories of the heart; for ...
— The Caxtons, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... somewhat disappointed in the quiet, unostentatious general rooms. The suite assigned them—at a hundred and twenty francs a day—was comfortable, was the most comfortable assemblage of rooms either had ever seen. But there was nothing imposing. This impression did not last long, however. They had been misled by their American passion for looks. They ...
— Susan Lenox: Her Fall and Rise • David Graham Phillips
... Folco Corbario's mourning was unostentatious and quiet, but none of the few persons who saw him, whether detectives or servants, could doubt that he was profoundly affected. He grew paler and thinner every day, until his own man even began to fear that his health was failing. ...
— Whosoever Shall Offend • F. Marion Crawford
... an accident, to which I may refer on some future occasion. Mr. Miles was once a very rich merchant; but receiving a severe shock in the death of his wife, he retired from business, and devoted himself to a quiet, unostentatious life. He is an excellent man, of thoroughly sterling character: not of quick apprehension, and not without some amusing prejudices, which I shall leave to their own development. He holds us all in profound veneration; but Jack Redburn he esteems ...
— Master Humphrey's Clock • Charles Dickens
... church, which is well filled every Sabbath.... Now the owner of all this property lives in a very humble cottage, embowered in dense shrubbery and making no show.... He and his family are as plain and unostentatious in their manners as the house they live in.... Nearly all the land has been reclaimed and the buildings, except the house, erected new within the twenty years that Governor Aiken has owned the island. I fully believe that he is more concerned ...
— American Negro Slavery - A Survey of the Supply, Employment and Control of Negro Labor as Determined by the Plantation Regime • Ulrich Bonnell Phillips
... told Billy, meant nothing to her. Her aunt, living and giving generously, had furnished her with a background of comfortable, unostentatious well being, against which the rather vivid elements that went to make up her intimate social circle—she was a creature of intimates—stood out in alluring relief. She had literally never wanted ...
— Outside Inn • Ethel M. Kelley
... something of interest in the view which a great man takes of old age and death. It is the practical test of how far the philosophy of his life has been a sound one. Hume saw death afar, and met it with unostentatious calm. Johnson's mind flinched from that dread opponent. His letters and his talk during his latter years are one long cry of fear. It was not cowardice, for physically he was one of the most stout-hearted men that ever lived. There were no limits to his courage. It was ...
— Through the Magic Door • Arthur Conan Doyle
... the Union—men who held positions in both the executive and legislative branches of the government, and whose characters had been for years blemishless, both at home and at the capital. These gentlemen and their households were unostentatious people; they were educated and refined; they troubled themselves but little about the two other orders of nobility, but moved serenely in their wide orbit, confident in their own strength and well aware of the potency of their influence. They had no troublesome ...
— The Gilded Age, Part 4. • Mark Twain (Samuel Clemens) and Charles Dudley Warner
... cause and origin of the revolutionary movement and its subsequent history, which sparkled with heroic deeds, was told in a quiet, unostentatious manner. I had just come from Russia. I had been much in that country, and thought I knew a great deal about it and the sinister system of government that breeds revolutionaries; but the tales of cruel, senseless despotism told by these people made me shudder with horror. I ...
— Looking Seaward Again • Walter Runciman
... paid by the government. In regulating these expenses, he was as careful to avoid extravagance as if his private purse had to be drawn upon to pay. In New York he lived frugally,[30] and he resolved to continue, in Philadelphia, the same unostentatious way of living, not only on his own account, but for the benefit of those connected with the government who could not afford to spend more than their salaries. His example had a most salutary effect. An illustrative ...
— Washington and the American Republic, Vol. 3. • Benson J. Lossing
... Mr. and Mrs. Estlin, of Bristol, and a lady friend, Mr. and Mrs. Richard Webb, of Dublin, and a son and daughter, Mr. McDonnell, (a most influential member of the Executive Committee of the National Reform Association—one of our unostentatious, but highly efficient workers for reform in this country, and whose public and private acts, if you were acquainted with, you would feel the same esteem and affection for him as is felt towards him by Mr. Thompson, myself and many others)—these ladies ...
— The Underground Railroad • William Still
... now, mamma! Suppose you begin. I've been perfectly honest with myself, and I've been honest with Mr. Beaton. I don't care for him, and I've told him I didn't; so he may be supposed to know it. If he comes here after this, he'll come as a plain, unostentatious friend of the family, and it's for you to say whether he shall come in that capacity or not. I hope you won't trifle with him, and let him get the notion that he's ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... man, that Father Philip, by the way," he went on, looking round the table. "In his quiet, unostentatious way, in his little room up there in the old house of Our Lady of Rest, as they used to call it, he has done more real work for the Church than, I am afraid, a good many of us have done with all our ...
— The Missionary • George Griffith
... does, even a wicked man who makes one happy at the expense of making a hundred miserable: and thence arise all our calamities. The most exalted virtues are negative: they are hardest to attain, too, because they are unostentatious, and rise above even that gratification dear to the heart of man,—sending another person away pleased with us. If there be a man who never injures one of his fellow-creatures, what good must he achieve for them! What fearlessness, what vigor of mind he requires for it! Not by reasoning about this ...
— Emile - or, Concerning Education; Extracts • Jean Jacques Rousseau
... It was the hand of Marcus alone that threw the crown so carefully and skillfully that it invariably alighted upon the head of the statue of the god. The entire ritual he knew by heart. The great Emperor Antoninus Pius lived in the most simple and unostentatious manner; yet even this did not satisfy the exacting, lofty spirit of Marcus. At twelve years of age he began to practice all the austerities of Stoicism. He became a veritable ascetic. He ate most sparingly; slept ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol 3 • Various
... tell the rich from the poor in their camouflage, but the really rich in character are easily discernible, arrayed in modest garbs as unostentatious and serviceable as those of the nightingale or the thrush. Like all great people the melody of their lives eclipses their array until only the soul-thrilling memories of what they are or were remain to gladden the weary pilgrim on life's ...
— See America First • Orville O. Hiestand
... fleets navigated the Northern Ocean; his armies reduced the Pannonians and Illyrians. He added to the material glories of his capital, and sought to secure peace throughout the world. He was both munificent and magnificent, and held the reins of government with a firm hand. He was cultivated, unostentatious, and genial; but ambitious, and versed in all the arts of dissimulation and kingcraft. But he was a great monarch, and ruled with signal ability. After the battle of Actium, his wars were chiefly with the barbarians, and his greatest generals were members of the imperial family. ...
— Ancient States and Empires • John Lord
... the family estate had always attended to its cultivation, and was properly called a gentleman farmer. Unostentatious and frugal, he never lacked means, in spite of bad harvests or unexpected losses, to assist the younger members of the family in starting in life, or to help forward any good ...
— The Cruise of the Mary Rose - Here and There in the Pacific • William H. G. Kingston
... were occupied with the preceding conversation, Col. Malcome had donned his fur-lined overcoat and stepped across the yard to Deacon Allen's cottage. The good people were quite embarrassed to behold so smart a visitor in their unostentatious little parlor, but the colonel, by his gentlemanly grace, soon placed them at their ease. After a few moments' conversation on general topics, he asked, casually enough, who was the owner of the fine mansion he had noticed in his ...
— Eventide - A Series of Tales and Poems • Effie Afton
... great,—the bitterest trial of the literati of the eighteenth century, which drove Cowper mad, and sent Rousseau to attics and solitudes,—so that, in his humble but pleasant home, with his young wife, with whom he lived amicably, he could see his friends, the great men of the age, and bestow an unostentatious charity, and maintain his literary rank and ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume IX • John Lord
... quiet enough, and the winner in this great game of chance maintained the same unostentatious silence in victory as that which, in the hour of humiliation, ...
— Barlasch of the Guard • H. S. Merriman |
