"Valet" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... the cup. He received his boots from Paris, but they were made by a Swiss boot-maker, the same one who provided the foot-gear of Edward of England; he counted his trousers by the dozen, and never wore one pair more than eight or ten times; his linen was given to his valet almost before it was used, his hats all came from London. He had eight frock-coats made every year, that often grew old without ever being worn, of different colors to suit the circumstances and the hours when he must wear them. One in particular, ...
— Woman Triumphant - (La Maja Desnuda) • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... country to resume his old life. Yet that seemed impracticable. There was no opening there unless he accepted one of the two offers already made him. But he was neither inclined to enter the employ of Deacon Pitkin, nor to become the valet and servant of Sam Sturgis. He was not quite sure whether he would not prefer to become a ...
— The Young Explorer • Horatio Alger
... had been the celebrated Madame St. Hubert of the Paris opera-house, and was the only woman ever known to have inspired Bonaparte to break forth into verse. Both the Count and Countess were murdered by their valet at Barnes, July 22, 1812. (Un agent secret sous la Revolution et l'Empire: Le Comte d'Antraigues, ...
— Jane Austen, Her Life and Letters - A Family Record • William Austen-Leigh and Richard Arthur Austen-Leigh
... his valet, his groom—tiger, we should have called him,—"and many a change of clothes besides," says his biographer, "with which he appeared more like a lord than a highwayman." And what more, we should like ...
— Rookwood • William Harrison Ainsworth
... those diplomatic Carlists of the gandin order, who are Carlists because it makes them interesting in the sight of the ladies, but whose campaigning is confined to an occasional three days' incursion on Spanish territory, with a cook and a valet, saddle-bags full of potted lobster and pate de foie gras, and a dressing-case newly packed with au Botot and essence of Jockey Club. There are personages of this class not unknown to society ...
— Romantic Spain - A Record of Personal Experiences (Vol. II) • John Augustus O'Shea
... and the newcomers handed over their bags to George, the baronet's valet—who at that moment mysteriously appeared upon the ...
— With Airship and Submarine - A Tale of Adventure • Harry Collingwood
... perpetual miracle that he did not set himself on fire reading a- bed, as was his constant custom, when exceedingly unable even to keep clear of mischief with our best help; and accordingly the fore-top of all his wigs were burned by the candle down to the very net work. Mr. Thrale's valet de chambre, for that reason, kept one always in his own hands, with which he met him at the parlour-door when the bell had called him down to dinner, and as he went upstairs to sleep in the afternoon, the same man constantly followed ...
— Anecdotes of the late Samuel Johnson, LL.D. - during the last twenty years of his life • Hester Lynch Piozzi
... beget conjectures ... Byron held himself aloof, and sat on the rail, leaning on the mizzen shrouds, inhaling, as it were, poetical sympathy from the gloomy rock, then dark and stern in the twilight. There was, in all about him that evening, much waywardness. He spoke petulantly to Fletcher, his valet, and was evidently ill at ease with himself, and fretful towards others. I thought he would turn out an unsatisfactory shipmate; yet there was something redeeming in the tones of his voice, and when, some time after having indulged his sullen meditation he again addressed Fletcher; so ...
— The Works Of Lord Byron, Letters and Journals, Vol. 1 • Lord Byron, Edited by Rowland E. Prothero
... Duke of Cumberland and King of Hanover, fifth son of George III., was gazetted as Field-Marshal November 27, 1813. His "wounds," which, according to the Duke's sworn testimony, were seventeen in number, were inflicted during an encounter with his valet, Joseph Sellis (? Slis), a Piedmontese, who had attempted to assassinate the Prince (June 1, 1810), and, shortly afterwards, was found with his throat cut. A jury of Westminster tradesmen brought in a verdict of felo de se against Sellis. The event ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Vol. 7. - Poetry • George Gordon Byron
... meal; but at several meals all of them, which makes them both the more healthy and dine more pleasant; not so rich garments nor so frequent changes, but as warm and as comely, and so frequent change, too, as is every jot as good for the master, though not for the tailor or valet-de-chambre; not such a stately palace, nor gilt rooms, nor the costlier sorts of tapestry, but a convenient brick house, with decent wainscot and pretty forest-work hangings. Lastly (for I omit all other particulars, and will end with that which I love most in both conditions), not whole woods ...
— Cowley's Essays • Abraham Cowley
... emergency. As there were but one or two stations of any importance between Okhotsk and Yakutsk, and as a week might pass without the shelter of so much as a hut, it was necessary to take tents and bearskin beds for the Chamberlain, his Cossack guard, valet-de-chambre, cook and other servants, one set of fine blankets and linen, cooking utensils, axes, arms, tinder-boxes, provisions for the entire trip, besides a ...
— Rezanov • Gertrude Atherton
... long before I managed to scrape acquaintance with this restless personage. I soon found out that my friend with the shirt-frill was the confidential servant, butler, valet, factotum, what you will, of a sick gentleman, a Mr. Oswald Strange, who had recently come to inhabit the house opposite, and concerning whose history my new acquaintance, whose name I ascertained was Masey, seemed disposed ...
— Mugby Junction • Charles Dickens
... had two servants only in his modest establishment—a coachman, who did a certain amount of indoor work, and a valet, who knew enough of cookery to prepare a bachelor breakfast. This valet Mascarin had seen once, and the man had then produced so unpleasant an impression on the astute proprietor of the Servants' Registry Office that he had set every means at work to discover ...
— The Champdoce Mystery • Emile Gaboriau
... the chance of such promotion on any frivolous pretext of religion. Beyond this request, which, coming from the mouth of Mrs. Bunce, became very imperative, the Earl hardly ever interfered with his domestics. His own valet had attended him for the last thirty years; but, beyond his valet and the butler, he hardly knew the face of one of them. There was a gamekeeper at Scroope Manor, with two under-gamekeepers; and yet, for, some years, ...
— An Eye for an Eye • Anthony Trollope
... unto that height of honour where it now is: I see not one of these petty ballad-makers, or prentise dogrell rymers, that doth not bombast his labours with high-swelling and heaven-disimbowelling words, and that doth not marshall his cadences verie neere as they doe. Plus sonat quam valet. [Footnote: Sen, Epist. xl.] "The sound is more than the weight or worth." And for the vulgar sort there were never so many Poets, and so few good: but as it hath been easie for them to represent their rymes, so come ...
— Literary and Philosophical Essays • Various
... the high road? Those cottages belong to Mr. Varick. They're quite comfortable, and we thought it best to put all the servants together there. When I say all the servants"—she corrected herself quickly—"the ladies' maids and Mr. Tapster's valet all sleep in the house. But Mr. Varick and I agreed that it would be better to put the whole of the temporary staff down together in ...
— From Out the Vasty Deep • Mrs. Belloc Lowndes
... him to breakfast the next day at the Cafe de Paris, but he was now engaged in a matter which did not allow him to receive his cousin at the present moment. Gazonal, like a true Southerner, recounted all his troubles to the valet. ...
— Unconscious Comedians • Honore de Balzac
... Slater, and Fortnum and Mason; Billiard, ecarte, and chess tables; Water in vast marble basin; Luminous books (not voluminous) To read under beech-trees cacuminous; One friend, who is fond of a distich, And doesn't get too syllogistic; A valet, who knows the complete art Of service—a maiden, his sweetheart: Give me these, in some rural pavilion, And I'll envy no Rothschild ...
— The Book of Humorous Verse • Various
... composed of eight persons, who could he worsted by five men; that in the third she said that if he could not save her from the men who were taking her away, he should at least approach the commissary, and killing his valet's horse and two other horses in his carriage, then take the box, and burn ...
— CELEBRATED CRIMES, COMPLETE - THE MARQUISE DE BRINVILLIERS • ALEXANDRE DUMAS, PERE
... poverty. He practises this poverty in his house, in his manner of living, and in the matter of furniture and servants; for he has but one gardener, whom he lends to poor people when they have need of him, and a valet who formerly served ...
— The Makers of Canada: Bishop Laval • A. Leblond de Brumath
... round-headed man, smartly dressed, and evidently rather proud of a large gilt pin in his figured silk tie. Another was tall and not ill-looking; he might have been a valet, for there was a certain imitation gentility about his cut—a valet whose master had been rather addicted to the turf, and this had been reflected on his man to the extent of trousers rather too tight, short hair, and a horseshoe pin with pearl nails. The third was rather ...
— The Dark House - A Knot Unravelled • George Manville Fenn
... were interrupted by the entrance of a valet, who came to offer his services. Voules, supposing from his appearance that he was one of the other guests who had mistaken his room, made him a polite bow, and said something to that effect. The valet, uncertain whether the young gentleman was a lord or a commoner, ...
— The Rival Crusoes • W.H.G. Kingston
... excitements of the chase, for the main theme is the tracking down of a coarse capitalist who defrauded the hero of his fortune and did something very low against England. With the assistance of a new character in fiction, a super-valet, justice is done and we are all (except the coarse capitalist and his son) extremely happy. Mr. MACKAIL has invented some excellent scenes and he carries them off with gaiety and spirit. In his second book (and for the answer to What Next? we shall not, I imagine, have long to wait) he will amend ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 159, December 1, 1920 • Various
... another night, to see these Puppets act a play called 'St. Helena, or the Death of Napoleon.' It began by the disclosure of Napoleon, with an immense head, seated on a sofa in his chamber at St. Helena; to whom his valet entered with ...
— Pictures from Italy • Charles Dickens
... had the prince and his followers got on board the prize, when his own ship foundered. Sir Robert de Namur having grappled with a huge ship was carried by her out from among the fleet; the two combatants were rapidly leaving the rest of the ships astern, when Sir Robert's valet, Hannekin, bravely cutting the halliards of the principal sail, the English, taking advantage of the confusion, boarded and drove the Spaniards into the sea. Thus the Spanish fleet was completely beaten, ...
— How Britannia Came to Rule the Waves - Updated to 1900 • W.H.G. Kingston
... flared out. "What do you think you are? I didn't engage you for a kowtowing valet in waiting, sir! I asked you, sir, to come under my roof as an intellectual co-worker, as one gentleman asks another, and here you are making these niggery motions! They are disgusting! They are defiling! They are beneath the dignity of one gentleman to another, sir! What makes it more degrading, ...
— Birthright - A Novel • T.S. Stribling
... painters, and musicians were my intimates. I found the world of artificial greatness founded on convention and money so repugnant and contemptible by comparison that I had no sympathetic understanding of it. People are fond of blaming valets because no man is a hero to his valet. But it is equally true that no man is a valet to his hero; and the hero, consequently, is apt to blunder very ludicrously about valets, through judging them from an irrelevant standard of heroism: heroism, remember, having its faults as well as its qualities. ...
— The Irrational Knot - Being the Second Novel of His Nonage • George Bernard Shaw
... tinsel of external advantages—and where others have the opportunity of coming in contact with us, they generally find the means to establish a sufficiently marked degree of degrading equality. No man is a hero to his valet-de-chambre, is an old maxim. A new illustration of this principle occurred the other day. While Mrs. Siddons was giving her readings of Shakespear to a brilliant and admiring drawing-room, one of the servants in the hall below was saying, 'What, I find the ...
— Table-Talk - Essays on Men and Manners • William Hazlitt
... little, he went to attend to his friend Patience. The disturbed state of my mind and my remnant of uneasiness were not proof against the generous appetite of youth. Had it not been for the respectful assiduity of a valet much better dressed than myself, who stood behind my chair, and whose politeness I could not help returning whenever he hastened to anticipate my wants, I should have made a terrific breakfast; as it was, the green coat and silk breeches embarrassed me considerably. ...
— Mauprat • George Sand
... and his lordship got up, and proceeded to wash his face and hands, ordering Cosmo about after the things he wanted, as if he had been his valet. ...
— Warlock o' Glenwarlock • George MacDonald
... Chaucer accompanied the English army to France and was taken prisoner. Edward III. thought enough of the youth to pay for his ransom a sum equivalent to-day to about $1200. After his return he was made valet of the king's chamber. The duties of that office "consisted in making the royal bed, holding torches, and carrying messages." Later, ...
— Halleck's New English Literature • Reuben P. Halleck
... ago, and I may decide to give her the place as a wedding present. I must go to New York from Kidd's Pines to-morrow morning, and fix this business up. I will call on you at your office at five o'clock P. M. for a consultation, and should be glad if you would secure the presence of Stanislaws' old valet whom you have discovered. I should like to talk to him before he comes with me to ...
— The Lightning Conductor Discovers America • C. N. (Charles Norris) Williamson and A. M. (Alice Muriel)
... parks about them and fine gardens, you can travel luxuriously to any part of the civilized world and live sumptuously there. All things are done for you, all ways are made smooth for you. A skilled maid or valet saves you even the petty care of your person; skilled physicians, wonderful specialists intervene at any threat of illness or discomfort; you keep ten years younger in appearance than your poorer contemporaries and twice as splendid. ...
— New Worlds For Old - A Plain Account of Modern Socialism • Herbert George Wells
... the infantry and right wing; but he refused to act without the order of his highness, and said things were come to such a pass that they must either conquer or die. He continued to animate his men with his voice and example, until he received a shot in the thigh. His valet seeing him fall, ran to his assistance, and called for quarter, but was killed by the enemy before he could be understood. The duke being taken at the same instant, was afterwards dismissed upon his ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.II. - From William and Mary to George II. • Tobias Smollett
... pack-saddles and packages for the journey, but who proved in other respects very poor travellers. He also secured the services of that now well-known hero, Bombay, captain of Speke's faithfuls, and five of his other followers, Uledi, Grant's valet, and the bull-headed Mabruki, who had in the mean time lost one of his hands, but, notwithstanding, was likely to prove useful. They were the only remains of the band to be found, the rest having died or gone elsewhere. These ...
— Great African Travellers - From Mungo Park to Livingstone and Stanley • W.H.G. Kingston
... among the gods on account of the marvellous cures they performed every day. Not that any one should despise a doctor who has not given back health to his patient, since health does not altogether depend on his remedies or his knowledge: interdum docta plus valet arte malum. Sir, I am afraid I am importunate; I must leave you, with the hope that next time we meet I shall have the honour of conversing with you at greater length. Your time is ...
— The Flying Doctor - (Le Medecin Volant) • Jean Baptiste Poquelin de Moliere
... and Pembroke's valet came in. He handed a card to me, and I read upon it, "Count von Walden." I cast it ...
— Arms and the Woman • Harold MacGrath
... that cruelty grows and feeds upon itself; that there were ladies and gentlemen there who flogged their slaves—men, women, and children—nearly to the death; that one gentleman of an irascible disposition, when irritated by some slight oversight on the part of the unfortunate boy who acted as his valet, could find no relief to his feelings until he had welted him first into a condition of unutterable terror, and then into a state of insensibility. Neither did he inform them that a certain lady in the town, who seemed at most times to be possessed of a reasonably quiet spirit, was ...
— Black Ivory • R.M. Ballantyne
... send no more to you, Campbell," Chavigny said as they moved off, leaving the count, whose valet now ran up, to obtain a vehicle and carry his dead ...
— Won by the Sword - A Story of the Thirty Years' War • G.A. Henty
... sought the Prince's head valet, and made herself so charming to him that he lost his head altogether, and was more than willing to fulfil ...
— Edmund Dulac's Fairy-Book - Fairy Tales of the Allied Nations • Edmund Dulac
... was her old nurse, who had brought her up. John, who drove me, was coachman-gardener, and the cook was his wife—both Catholics. Everything went on very quiet and regular and it was hoped that the new upstairs maid wouldn't be one for excitement and gaiety. The inside man had been valet to Mr. Childress and was much trusted and liked by the family. I could see that old John was a ...
— The Strange Cases of Dr. Stanchon • Josephine Daskam Bacon
... When the valet drew his blind in the morning the cold room was filled with a balmy warmth. A glance through the window, however, dispelled a germ of hope that Helen and he might start on the promised walk to Vicosoprano. The snow lay deep in the pass, and probably ...
— The Silent Barrier • Louis Tracy
... be endurable, were there any thing gay in this nonsense; but it is most stupidly dull and monotonous. There is in Italy no more comedy than tragedy; and here again we stand foremost. The only species of comedy peculiar to Italy is harlequinade. A valet, at once a knave, a glutton, and a coward; an old griping, amorous dupe of a guardian, compose the whole strength of these pieces. I hope you will allow that Tartuffe, and the Misanthrope, require a little more genius ...
— Corinne, Volume 1 (of 2) - Or Italy • Mme de Stael
... towards the fire on which there were set to heat curling-tongs of all sizes, while in the contiguous laboratory, separated from the room by a curtain of Algerian tapestry, the Marquis de Monpavon gave himself up to the manipulations of his valet. Odours of patchouli, of cold-cream, of hartshorn, and of singed hair escaped from the part of the room which was shut off, and from time to time, when Francis came to fetch a curling-iron, Jenkins caught sight of a huge dressing-table laden with a thousand ...
— The Nabob • Alphonse Daudet
... position, she was strict, almost haughty in her deportment. She came of a long line of house serfs. Her father, Arefy, had been a butler for thirty years, while her grandfather, Stepan had been valet to a prince and officer of the Guards long since dead. She dressed neatly and was vain over her hands, which were certainly very beautiful. Dunyasha made a show of great disdain for all her admirers; she listened to their compliments with a self-complacent little smile and if she answered ...
— Knock, Knock, Knock and Other Stories • Ivan Turgenev
... now I can scarcely say I know you," said D'Artagnan, "and because, in point of fact, I return to the opinion which, for a moment, I had formed of you that day at Boulogne, when you strangled, or did so as nearly as possible, M. de Wardes's valet, Lubin; in plain language, Planchet, that you are a ...
— Louise de la Valliere • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... is there any other wit in the article. This is surely a mere assumption of superiority from his Lordship's rank, and is the sort of quizzing he might use to a person who came to hire himself as a valet to him at Long's—the waiters might laugh, the public will not. In like manner, in the controversy about Pope, he claps Mr. Bowles on the back with a coarse facetious familiarity, as if he were his chaplain whom he had invited to ...
— Hazlitt on English Literature - An Introduction to the Appreciation of Literature • Jacob Zeitlin
... minutes the faithful valet, who had then made quite sure that there was no leopard in the drain and that he had shown himself a coward, unwillingly and slowly returned to the charge and picked ...
— Corea or Cho-sen • A (Arnold) Henry Savage-Landor
... Castrillon, meanwhile, was pirouetting sublimely before the long mirror in his dressing-room, while his valet, a sour-faced individual, looked on in great but gloomy interest. The Marquis was superbly dressed in a Louis Seize costume—an exact reproduction of the one worn by that monarch on his wedding-day—and he presented a very fine figure. In features, ...
— Robert Orange - Being a Continuation of the History of Robert Orange • John Oliver Hobbes
... his demand. He locked up everything valuable, and left the house. Soon a sister of charity came, and sought alms for the poor. Madame Lamartine tried the desk for money—it was locked. She called the valet and had it broken open, and gave the sister eight hundred francs. Lamartine smiled, and kissed her for the generous act. The friend returned and found that there was not money ...
— Paris: With Pen and Pencil - Its People and Literature, Its Life and Business • David W. Bartlett
... the servants' hall, I make a sudden sally, And with the parlourmaid I brawl Or bicker with the valet. ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 156, May 14, 1919 • Various
... snuff-box. It was in his bed-room, and his bed-room was locked by the servant, who had taken the key and gone out. The consequence was, that B— had to wait some time, and until the man came back. I have always had a great aversion to a valet when constantly moving about on the Continent, as a single man; and, although I do not now, as I used to do when a midshipman, brush my own clothes and black my own shoes, yet I like independence, in every thing, and infinitely prefer doing anything myself, to being waited ...
— Olla Podrida • Frederick Marryat (AKA Captain Marryat)
... nothing, massa,' says my black valet 'I kill him in a minute, massa.' Which he does with his naked heel. Only an 'arana peluda;' in plain English, a spider of gigantic proportions, whose lightest touch will draw you like a poultice. I let the 'cucurrachos' pass, for I recognise in them my old ...
— The Pearl of the Antilles, or An Artist in Cuba • Walter Goodman
... wishing to betray his excellency's incognito to the fisher-people, who would certainly have tormented so powerful a person by all sorts of petitions. Two local watch men, who had happened to be on the hillside at the moment of the crime, gave evidence that confirmed the valet's lengthy statement; hidden by some under wood, they had seen Gabriel rush upon the prince, and had distinctly heard the last words of the dying man; calling "Murder!" All the witnesses, even those summoned at the request of the prisoner, ...
— CELEBRATED CRIMES, COMPLETE - NISIDA—1825 • ALEXANDRE DUMAS, PERE
... people, the blackest of Negro nurses and valets are given food and shelter in all first-class hotels, and occasion neither disgust, nor surprise in the Pullman cars. Here again the heart of the race problem is laid bare. The black nurse with a white baby in her arms, the black valet looking after the comfort of a white invalid, have the label of their inferiority conspicuously upon them; they understand themselves, and everybody understands them, to be servants, enjoying certain privileges for the ...
— The Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, 1995, Memorial Issue • Various
... fame as an expert swordsman, his fame in that respect spreading throughout the countryside. Years after he had retired from the service, while sitting in his study one forenoon intently perusing a religious work, his valet announced the arrival of a stranger who wished to see him. The servant was ordered to show him into the apartment, and in stalked a strong muscular-looking man with a formidable Andrea Ferrara sword hanging by his side, and, making ...
— From John O'Groats to Land's End • Robert Naylor and John Naylor
... the subversive tendency of economic principles by association and mutuality, the capitalist exaggerates it unnecessarily and with evil design; he abuses the senses and the conscience of the workman; he makes him a valet in his intrigues, a purveyor of his debaucheries, an accomplice in his robberies; he makes him in all respects like himself, and then it is that he can defy the justice of revolutions to touch him. Monstrous thing! ...
— The Philosophy of Misery • Joseph-Pierre Proudhon
... says the valet de chambre, 'one of the officers who was sitting on the floor got up, and, putting a revolver to my mistress' temple, shot her dead. The officer was obviously drunk. The other officers continued to drink and sing, and they did not pay any great attention to the killing of my mistress. The ...
— History of the World War - An Authentic Narrative of the World's Greatest War • Francis A. March and Richard J. Beamish
... France, devise a system of government that has never yet been tried? Surely not. And can they say of any system tried that it proved other than a failure in the end? My dear Philippe, the future is to be read with certainty only in the past. Ab actu ad posse valet consecutio. Man never changes. He is always greedy, always acquisitive, always vile. I am speaking of Man in ...
— Scaramouche - A Romance of the French Revolution • Rafael Sabatini
... factotum, a bullet-headed creature with scarcely anything on but his shirt, leading the last of several horses into the shadowy depths of the stable. Opposite, the cook looked out smiling from the kitchen, where she lived with her solemn husband, the valet-de-chambre. He, in apron and sabots, was now in the act of carrying the first dishes across to ...
— Angelot - A Story of the First Empire • Eleanor Price
... already been accomplished for him by Tom's valet, and the man apparently proposed to stay and help him change, murmuring something about a hot bath ...
— To Love • Margaret Peterson
... times.... She was eating some of those champagne-colored rose leaves that are crystallized by the firm of Demitrof at Moscow and sold as confections to the ladies of the Court!... What does it mean?... Furthermore, if that sentry is not the same man who acted as valet to Prince Galitzyn at Monte Carlo when Delcasse, Grey and Galitzyn (otherwise "Count Techlow") were gliding about ...
— Rescuing the Czar - Two authentic Diaries arranged and translated • James P. Smythe
... of Castle Brady used to sneer, because on these occasions a certain Tim, who used to be called my valet, followed me and my mother to church, carrying a huge prayer-book and a cane, and dressed in the livery of one of our own fine footmen from Clarges Street, which, as Tim was a bandy-shanked little fellow, did not exactly become him. But, though poor, we were gentlefolks, and not to be sneered ...
— Barry Lyndon • William Makepeace Thackeray
... this was a letter to the Landhofmeisterin, wherein he suggested that he should summon a Privy Council on his estates in Alsace, composed of his valet, his gardener, his lackey, and the village fiddler. That he proposed, as President of this Council, to condemn her to death; and should she not joyfully repair for her execution, he would have her hanged in effigy, head downwards, over the pig-stye. Probably ...
— A German Pompadour - Being the Extraordinary History of Wilhelmine van Graevenitz, - Landhofmeisterin of Wirtemberg • Marie Hay
... journeys in the interior of the country. In General Montero's case it enabled him to rise from the ranks. Pedrito, the younger, incorrigibly lazy and slovenly, had drifted aimlessly from one coast town to another, hanging about counting-houses, attaching himself to strangers as a sort of valet-de-place, picking up an easy and disreputable living. His ability to read did nothing for him but fill his head with absurd visions. His actions were usually determined by motives so improbable in themselves as to escape the penetration of a ...
— Nostromo: A Tale of the Seaboard • Joseph Conrad
... life before now, she had remembered her father doing what she considered a strangely hard thing. A valet in whom he had always reposed full confidence had robbed him of one hundred pounds. He had broken open his master's desk at night and taken from thence notes to that amount. The deed had been clumsily done, and detection was very ...
— How It All Came Round • L. T. Meade
... in Scripturis valet, quidquid in eis spiritualiter sentit, maxime in silvis et in agris meditando et orando se confitetur accepisse, et in hoc nullos aliquando se magistros habuisse nisi quercus et fagos joco illo suo ...
— The Poetical Works of William Wordsworth - Volume 1 of 8 • Edited by William Knight
... and its costly furniture, and considering the tea service, a smart little French-woman came to him and asked him in French, whether he would stay to breakfast; as he knew something of the language he replied in the affirmative. Then appeared an equally smart and fascinating French valet, who begged to be allowed the honour of conducting Monsieur to a bedroom, ...
— Gladys, the Reaper • Anne Beale
... she has left. The Parisian shopkeepers had made everything for her from measures and models sent from Vienna. Napoleon had had these models shown him, and taking one of the shoes, which were remarkably small, he had sportively stroked his valet's cheek with it, and said, "See there, Constant; here's a shoe that will bring good luck with it. Did you ever see feet ...
— The Happy Days of the Empress Marie Louise • Imbert De Saint-Amand
... to the Artillery, ...readily undertook to accompany her, and with one female servant, and the Major's valet-de-chambre (who had a ball, which he had received in the late action, then in his shoulder), she rowed down the river to meet the enemy. But her distresses were not yet to end. The night advanced before ...
— Devon, Its Moorlands, Streams and Coasts • Rosalind Northcote
... At this time Riccio—a valet de chambre of the Queen in 1561-62—"began to grow great in Court," becoming French Secretary at the end of the year. By June 3, 1565, Randolph is found styling Riccio "only governor" to Darnley. His career might have rivalled that of the ...
— John Knox and the Reformation • Andrew Lang
... we prevented it from swamping as it touched the water. It contained, when afloat, the captain and his wife, Mr. Wyatt and party, a Mexican officer, wife, four children, and myself, with a negro valet." ...
— At Whispering Pine Lodge • Lawrence J. Leslie
... Marchand 1 Valet de Chambre. Gilli Valet de Chambre. St Denis Valet de Chambre. Novarra ...
— The Surrender of Napoleon • Sir Frederick Lewis Maitland
... "Mr. Rockamore's valet, sir, and his father's before him. I loved him as if he were my own son, if you will pardon the liberty I take in saying so, and when he came to this country I accompanied him. He was always good to me, ...
— The Crevice • William John Burns and Isabel Ostrander
... asked some minister, who was with him, how much the egg at the end of the bell-rope should cost? "J'ignore," was the answer. "Eh bien! nous verrons," said he, and then cut off the ivory handle, called for a valet, and bidding him dress himself in plain and ordinary clothes, and neither divulge his immediate commission or general employment to any living soul, directed him to inquire the price of such articles at several shops ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Vol. 2, No. 8, January, 1851 • Various
... was a sunbonnet on her head, and she had pinned the poppies on her breast. (Why? I couldn't tell you, unless when all is said and done, be he king or valet, a man is always a man; and if perchance he is blessed with good looks, a little more than a man. You will understand that in this instance I am trying to view things through a woman's eyes.) With ...
— The Man on the Box • Harold MacGrath
... John F. Taylor owes everything he has or is to the Irish National Party; nor is he slow to confess it where the acknowledgment will serve his personal interests. His sneers are all anonymous, and, like Mr. Fagg, the grateful and deferential valet in The Rivals, "it hurts his conscience to be found out." There is no honesty or sincerity in the man. His covert gibes are the spiteful emanation of personal disappointment; his lofty morality is ...
— Ireland Under Coercion (2nd ed.) (2 of 2) (1888) • William Henry Hurlbert
... this valet's a friend of his, too," says the Kid. "I'll bet he'll turn out to be another one of them sweet ...
— Kid Scanlan • H. C. Witwer
... Sam—and he pointed to a name on the passenger list. It was: "The Earl of Deptford, and valet." "And because ...
— The Red Cross Girl • Richard Harding Davis
... work of the day was over to the cultivation of a knowledge of Spanish, being fortunate enough, in their pursuit of this acquirement, to make the acquaintance of a young and very intelligent negro, who had been for many years valet to his master, but, being unlucky enough to incur that gentleman's displeasure, had been sent in disgrace into the field-gang. With him as a tutor their progress was rapid, and in little over six months they were able to converse in ...
— The Voyage of the Aurora • Harry Collingwood
... I have faith in ghosts," retorted the landlady obstinately. "Haven't you heard of the haunted house in a West End square, where a man and a dog were found dead in the morning, with a valet as ...
— The Silent House • Fergus Hume
... far as I'm concerned," said Walter, coolly. "If I can't go any other way I'll go as a valet to Mr. Robinson, or courier to the rest of the family. I can speak the language—habe Espanola? Oh, you simply can't get along without me—especially as I'll pay my own fare. And, Jack'll need me, too. It's ...
— The Motor Girls on Waters Blue - Or The Strange Cruise of The Tartar • Margaret Penrose
... too fast. My sports won't take any more time than rowing or baseball. They'll be a little more expensive, because I'll have to keep some wild cattle constantly on hand, and perhaps a vaquero or two; but a vaquero won't cost any more than a valet.' ...
— A Summer in a Canyon: A California Story • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... 'Talk to my valet!' said the Colonel, putting up his eye-glass to look at the dishes on the side table—he spoke with suavity, but there was an ominous pucker in the brow—'what should I do that for? I don't pay the fellow for his conversation, I presume, but to button my ...
— The History of David Grieve • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... think Mr. Collier so formidable an enemy that we should shun him. He has lost ground at the latter end of the day by pursuing his point too far, like the Prince of Conde at the battle of Senneffe: from immoral plays to no plays—ab abusu ad usum, non valet consequentia. [Footnote: From the fact that there are immoral plays to the inference that there should be no plays the argument does not follow.] But being a party, I am not to erect myself into a ...
— English literary criticism • Various
... we'd better pose as a rich man traveling with his chauffeur and valet," said Tom. "I'll be the rich man, Dick can be the chauffeur, and Bert can be ...
— Bert Wilson on the Gridiron • J. W. Duffield
... and tidy at all times for messages. We have seen many of them in our young days; and even the waif has been picked up by a good master, and began in the stables and worked his way up to be a respected valet in the same household, and often and often told the story of his waif life in the ...
— Introduction to the Science of Sociology • Robert E. Park
... continued, "His French valet, Victor, who travelled with him in Europe, told brother Will all about it. Seven or eight years ago they were spending the summer upon the banks of the Rhine, and in a cottage near them was an American with a Swedish wife and baby. The man, it seems, was a dissipated fellow, much older than his wife, ...
— Darkness and Daylight • Mary J. Holmes
... Barnes to be "done" by the silent, swift-moving valet. Dabson was young and vigorous and exceedingly well-trained. He made short work of "doing" the visitor; barely fifteen minutes elapsed ...
— Green Fancy • George Barr McCutcheon
... poor author of the sport was slowly dying. The demands upon his animal spirits at the Savage Club, the bodily fatigue of "getting himself up to it," the "damnable iteration" of the lecture itself, wore him out. George, his valet, whom he had brought from America, had finally to lift him about his bedroom like a child. His quarters in Picadilly, as I have said, were just opposite the Hall, but he could not go backward and forward without assistance. It was painful in the extreme to see the man who was undergoing ...
— Marse Henry, Complete - An Autobiography • Henry Watterson
... must bundle out of here posthaste. They sail tomorrow morning. Your duties as valet have been light and short-lived; but I can give you an excellent recommendation should you desire to take service with ...
— The Mucker • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... out, my photographs were on the dressing-table. I took up, mechanically, the evening newspaper, but I could not read it; I thought of Maude, of the children, memories flowed in upon me,—a flood not to be dammed.... Presently the club valet knocked at my door. ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... right is disputed.[35] He is sensible, that his superiority is merely that of situation, and he, therefore, exerts his dormant prerogatives with jealous insolence. No master is so likely to become the tyrant of his valet-de-chambre, as he who is conscious that he never can appear to him a hero. No servant feels the yoke of servitude more galling, than he who has been partially emancipated, who has lost his habits of "proud subordination, and his taste ...
— Practical Education, Volume I • Maria Edgeworth
... valet-de-chambre, two lords, a customhouse-officer, five half-pay captains, and a baronet, (all noted gamesters,) came publicly into a church at Westminster, and deposited a very considerable sum of money in the minister's hands; the parties, ...
— The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, D. D., Volume IV: - Swift's Writings on Religion and the Church, Volume II • Jonathan Swift
... entirely removed, and formed a couch like the one below it. On the other side of the apartment was a toilet-room, with all conveniences required for washing and other purposes, including a water-cooler. In this compartment the traveller takes his servant, and often a cook, for the valet cannot meddle with culinary matters; and they sleep on the floor wherever they can find a place. A reasonable additional price is charged for accommodations ...
— Across India - Or, Live Boys in the Far East • Oliver Optic
... with the help of a valet, who is of course a slave, dresses himself. His household barber—another slave—shaves him, trims his hair in the approved style and cleans his nails. At this date clean shaving was the rule. Every emperor from Augustus to Hadrian, fifty years later than Nero, was ...
— Life in the Roman World of Nero and St. Paul • T. G. Tucker
... literally tasted nothing. He did not care so much for his occasionally leaning on the table with both his elbows, but that he should pass by every dish was distressing. So Mr. Brancepeth whispered to his own valet—a fine gentleman, who stood by his master's chair and attended on no one else, except, when requisite, his master's immediate neighbor—and desired him to suggest to St. Aldegonde whether the side-table might not provide, under the difficulties, some sustenance. St. Aldegonde seemed quite gratified ...
— Lothair • Benjamin Disraeli
... are at last!" said Miss Verepoint, querulously. "The valet told us you were expected back this morning, so we waited. Where on earth have you been to, running away ...
— A Man of Means • P. G. Wodehouse and C. H. Bovill
... step was to obtain for the brothers an invitation from Lady Eleanor to quarter themselves at Penford-bourne. Once he had settled them there, he obtained, through Frank Masterton's valet, a puritanical knave called Gabriel Jones, complete information as to their plans, which he was thus able ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Volume V. • Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton, Eds.
... confess I must be of a very placid temper, very peaceable, very gentle, to permit a valet to entertain me ...
— Amphitryon • Moliere
... the Prince. He was the old man's godchild. The old man's left eye was bleeding, and there was a scratch on his cheek as if made by a fingernail. To Obry the Prince attributed these wounds to the spite of the Baronne de Feucheres. Half an hour later he told his valet he had hit his head against a night-table. Later again in the day he gave another version still: he had fallen against the door to a secret staircase from his bedroom while letting the Baronne de Feucheres out, the secret staircase being ...
— She Stands Accused • Victor MacClure |
