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Wont   Listen
noun
Wont  n.  Custom; habit; use; usage. "They are... to be called out to their military motions, under sky or covert, according to the season, as was the Roman wont." "From childly wont and ancient use."






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Wont" Quotes from Famous Books



... lower in the water than usual," Ned said. "Does not it seem to you that we are not so high above the sea as we are wont to be?" ...
— Under Drake's Flag - A Tale of the Spanish Main • G. A. Henty

... of this system that it was not unusual for the villagers to cut down their fruit-trees in order to avoid the tax upon them, for the tax-farmer, against whom an appeal would be worse than useless, was wont to appear with gendarmes and estimate, according to his fancy, the amount of any crop.[78] Another tax very frequently imposed upon the helpless peasant was the tribute to some Albanian chief, who in return undertook to protect the village. And if the village was outside ...
— The Birth of Yugoslavia, Volume 1 • Henry Baerlein

... crew on the south coast of England and raiding gentlemen's houses. The first he ever pillaged was that of a Mr. Sturt, in Sussex. In those days, when banks were almost unknown, the houses of the rich often contained great sums of money. De Graves was wont to sail along the Devonshire coast, sometimes landing and robbing a house, sometimes taking a ship, which he would carry to Rotterdam and sell. He made several daring raids into Cowes and Lowestoft, getting off ...
— The Pirates' Who's Who - Giving Particulars Of The Lives and Deaths Of The Pirates And Buccaneers • Philip Gosse

... silence. It was a charming change, and I was as happy as Robinson Crusoe in the desert island before Friday made his appearance. One day in June—"it was the poet's leafy month of June"—I took my way, as was my Wont, through the park to the Wilderness. The shadows of the broad thick-foliaged oaks lay in gigantic masses on the smooth turf, (of which the gardeners were a few relics of the former herds of deer, in the shape of wide-antlered stags and dappled roes;) all the sights and sounds of summer beauty ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - Volume 55, No. 343, May 1844 • Various

... Chichester was not wont to give vent to open emotion. It shows a lack of breeding. So she always suppressed it. It seemed to grow inwards. To find her weeping—and almost audibly—impressed Alaric that something of more ...
— Peg O' My Heart • J. Hartley Manners

... in which all animal, social, and moral interests are fused together, speaks a language of incomparable force. Thus the Hebrew prophets, in their savage concentration, poured into one torrent all that their souls possessed or could dream of. What other men are wont to pursue in politics, business, religion, or art, they looked for from one wave of national repentance and consecration. Their age, swept by this ideal passion, possessed at the same time a fresh and homely vocabulary; and the result was an eloquence so elemental and combative, so imaginative ...
— The Life of Reason • George Santayana

... part of his story. That he should address her thus and that she thus should listen had in it nothing unusual for them. For years it had been his wont to traverse with her the ground of his lectures, and she shared his thought before it reached others. It was their high and equal comradeship. Wherever his mind could go hers went—a ...
— Bride of the Mistletoe • James Lane Allen

... conquests, and gloried in his power. At one time, under the ancient monarchy, the French felt a sort of satisfaction in the sense of their dependence upon the arbitrary pleasure of their king, and they were wont to say with pride: "We are the subjects of the most powerful king ...
— American Institutions and Their Influence • Alexis de Tocqueville et al

... observe, in looking over the returns, thirty wooden legs, and two hundred crutches, for the relief of the unfortunate heroes, a boring apparatus to sink pumps, if water should run short, and a balloon, with two aeronauts, to reconnoitre the enemy's position, in case, as was represented to be their wont, they should entrench themselves under the ...
— The Pirates Own Book • Charles Ellms

... down, very low into some horrible pit where he would never see the light of day again. But by-and-bye he came to himself, and found old Oliver sobbing in short, heavy sobs, and swaying himself to and fro, while Beppo was licking Dolly's hand, and barking with a sharp, quiet bark, as he had been wont to do when he wanted her to play with him. The child's small features were quite still, but there was an awful smile upon them such as there had never been before, and Tony could not bear to look upon it. He crossed her tiny hands lightly over one another ...
— Alone In London • Hesba Stretton

... from Sweden and attacked him. They both coveted sway, and the keenest contest for the sovereignty began between them; but it was cut short by the flight of Hother. He retired to Jutland, and caused to be named after him the village in which he was wont to stay. Here he passed the winter season, and then went back to Sweden alone and unattended. There he summoned the grandees, and told them that he was weary of the light of life because of the misfortunes wherewith Balder had ...
— The Danish History, Books I-IX • Saxo Grammaticus ("Saxo the Learned")

... brother of Isaac Penington's, a Friend and merchant in London, at whose house, before I came to live in the city, I was wont to lodge, having been at his brother's that day upon a visit, escaped this storm, and so was at liberty; and understanding when he came back what had been done, bethought himself of me, and upon inquiry hearing where I was, came ...
— The History of Thomas Ellwood Written by Himself • Thomas Ellwood

... leaked out that a fight was on, and Saturday afternoon found at least twenty cadets in the secret and on their way to witness the "mill," as those who had read something about prize-fighting were wont to ...
— The Rover Boys at School • Arthur M. Winfield

... every means possible he strove to reduce his body to servitude. When he came, years later, to his deathbed, it was his sole regret that it was a bed where he was to die, instead of the bare boards on which he was wont to sleep. ...
— The Story of the Innumerable Company, and Other Sketches • David Starr Jordan

... corded wood, through the favoring winter air, to wintry cellars, to underlie the summer there. It looks like solidified azure, as, far off, it is drawn through the streets. These ice-cutters are a merry race, full of jest and sport, and when I went among them they were wont to invite me to saw pit-fashion with them, ...
— Walden, and On The Duty Of Civil Disobedience • Henry David Thoreau

... gowns enough and to spare. Oh, sister! have you come so far to talk of gowns? And that odious woman too! What brought her here?" Angela asked, with more temper than she was wont ...
— London Pride - Or When the World Was Younger • M. E. Braddon

... heroic chorus of the Marseilles hymn, with the tears and the fire of enthusiasm in their eyes. Those days are gone; but there is still a mournful pleasure in their remembrance. They recall to us many of those who were wont to join with us in those celebrations, but who can join with us no more. They recall those visions of glory which then surrounded France, but which were, afterwards, so mournfully overcast. They attest the universality, the sincerity, the depth of ...
— Celebration in Baltimore of the Triumph of Liberty in France • William Wirt

... resolutely and started downstairs. As he entered his father's room, his mother was passing out She looked at her son with apprehension, as she closed the door. His father was sitting by a window, reading, as was his Sunday wont, the Bible. He had once written to David that his had always been a religious people; it was true. A grave, stern man—sternest, gravest on Sunday. When it was not possible to go to church, the greater ...
— The Reign of Law - A Tale of the Kentucky Hemp Fields • James Lane Allen

... He called his name every few rods, but got no answer nor could he discover him, and so returned home again, still calling and searching, but no boy was discovered. Then he built a large fire and put lighted candles in all the windows, then took his lantern and wont out in the woods calling and looking for the boy. Sometimes he thought he heard him, but on going where the sound came from nothing could be found. So he looked and called all night, along the trail and all ...
— Death Valley in '49 • William Lewis Manly

... knee, ran the wild beast through with his hunting sword. The spear flew harmless over his head, unseen and unheard, and lost itself in the dead leaves twenty yards beyond him. On another day, Raymond, riding along, hawk on wrist, ten lengths before the others, as was his wont, did not notice that they gradually fell behind, until he halted in a narrow path of the forest, looked round, and found himself alone. He turned his horse's head and rode back a few yards, when suddenly three masked men, whom he took for robbers, sprang up in his path and fell upon him with long ...
— Via Crucis • F. Marion Crawford

... his fetters and his perilous plight, Guy looked as blithe and gay as he was wont to do in the tiltyard ...
— The Boy Crusaders - A Story of the Days of Louis IX. • John G. Edgar

... and wider things, the workaday grind speedily set such dreams to rout. When the gnawing of lonely unrest was too acute for bovine endurance—and when he could spare the time or the money—he was wont to go to the mile-off hamlet of Hampton and there get as nearly drunk as ...
— His Dog • Albert Payson Terhune

... renaissance. Nor did this extend in any particular direction. A better thought came to be held of God and man's relation to him. Instead of being an arbitrary, domineering creature, he had become in the minds of the people rational and law-loving; instead of being vindictive and fickle, as he was wont to be pictured, he had been endowed with benevolence toward his creatures. The result of all this was that religion itself became more spiritual and the conscience more operative. There was less of formality and conventionality in religion and more of ...
— History of Human Society • Frank W. Blackmar

... Babu placed himself near the end of the jetty to keep guard. The two Mysoreans struck off thence obliquely for a few yards until they came to a rude open shed in which the Pirate's carpenters were wont to work during the rains. From a heap of shavings they drew a small but heavy barrel. Carrying this between them they made their way with some difficulty back towards the jetty, where they rejoined ...
— In Clive's Command - A Story of the Fight for India • Herbert Strang

... three delightful weeks at the home of Mr. and Mrs. Little, a dear old couple who had been married long enough to have celebrated their "Golden Wedding." The old gentleman was wont to say, that these fifty years were all links in the "honey-moon," but that he had not as yet reached the end of the first "honey-moon." So these two old lovers, like "John Anderson my Joe," and his devoted companion, had climbed the hill and were standing "thegither at its foot" in happy contentment, ...
— The World As I Have Found It - Sequel to Incidents in the Life of a Blind Girl • Mary L. Day Arms

... to me that he was still a senator, a citizen, nay, a free man; and that he never beheld wife, home, or country without beholding the fruits of my conduct. In short: that whole topic, which I am wont to paint in various colours in my speeches (of which you are the Aristarchus), the fire, the sword—you know my paint-pots—he elaborated to the highest pitch. I was sitting next to Pompey. I noticed that he was agitated, either at Crassus earning the gratitude which he had himself neglected, ...
— The Letters of Cicero, Volume 1 - The Whole Extant Correspodence in Chronological Order • Marcus Tullius Cicero

... and innocent, he came one Sabbath to a rocky crest of the Sierras—the last tattered and frayed and soiled fringe of civilization on the opened tract of a great highway. And here he was to "testify," as was his wont. ...
— The Bell-Ringer of Angel's and Other Stories • Bret Harte

... in foughten battles were wont to remain among them (who were their footmen) as the French kings did amongst their horsemen, the prince thereby shewing where his chief ...
— Chronicle and Romance (The Harvard Classics Series) • Jean Froissart, Thomas Malory, Raphael Holinshed

... Sergeant saluted divers of the little crowd, and, wheeling sharply, strode along beside Bellew, rather more stiff in the back, and fixed of eye than was his wont, and jingling his imaginary spurs rather more loudly ...
— The Money Moon - A Romance • Jeffery Farnol

... "The snow and cold are wont to be great," Coronado remarks in his relation, "for so say the inhabitants of the country; and it is very likely so to be, both in respect of the manner of the country and of the fashion of their houses, ...
— Houses and House-Life of the American Aborigines • Lewis H. Morgan

... nation, has certainly been far less successful as applied to cities. Accordingly our cities have come to furnish topics for reflection to which writers and orators fond of boasting the unapproachable excellence of American institutions do not like to allude. Fifty years ago we were wont to speak of civil government in the United States as if it had dropped from heaven or had been specially created by some kind of miracle upon American soil; and we were apt to think that in mere republican forms there was some kind ...
— Civil Government in the United States Considered with - Some Reference to Its Origins • John Fiske

... to perish in this dreadful forest. Oh! wherefore dost thou not answer me? This terrible lord of the forest, of grim visage and gaping jaws, and famishing with hunger, filleth me with fright. Doth it not behove thee to deliver me? Thou wert wont to say always, 'Save thee there existeth not one dear unto me.' O blessed one, O king, do thou now make good thy words so spoken before. And, O king, why dost thou not return an answer to thy beloved wife bewailing and bereft of sense, although ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 1 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli

... 'Ha, John, that wont do!' said I; 'your mind was never so unsteady. Tell me the truth, for old times' sake; and if there is anything in the story that should not be made public, you know I was always a capital secret-keeper. Maybe it was a love-matter, John: are ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 436 - Volume 17, New Series, May 8, 1852 • Various

... boundless influence which my country had come to exercise over all the people of the world, and I turned to look at the man to whose genius this uprising of the earth was due. But Mr. Edison, after his wont, appeared totally unconscious of the fact that he was personally responsible for what was going on. His mind, seemingly, was entirely absorbed in considering problems, the solution of which might be essential to our success in the terrific struggle which ...
— Edison's Conquest of Mars • Garrett Putnam Serviss

... his blood: one, flowing through the veins of the old Puritans, chilled by the creed of Calvin; the other, of a more expansive strain perpetually mocking the strenuousness of its companion mood. Flint's friends were wont to say, "Flint will do something some day." His enemies, or rather his indifferents, scoffingly asked, "What has Flint ever done anyway?" Flint himself would have answered, "Nothing, my friends, less than nothing; ...
— Flint - His Faults, His Friendships and His Fortunes • Maud Wilder Goodwin

... himself, a man with what Valetta was wont to call a grisly beard, met them a little within the gate, and did the honours of the place with great politeness. He answered all the boy's questions, and seemed much pleased with his intelligence and interest, letting him see what he wished, and even having ...
— Beechcroft at Rockstone • Charlotte M. Yonge

... Doctor went on, "he says you went to see a prize-fight and then sat up playing cards for money till twelve o'clock and came home singing, 'We wont get—'" ...
— The Voyages of Doctor Dolittle • Hugh Lofting

... improvements"; there is an illusion about them; there is not always a positive advance. The devil goes on exacting compound interest to the last for his early share and numerous succeeding investments in them. Our inventions are wont to be pretty toys, which distract our attention from serious things. They are but improved means to an unimproved end, an end which it was already but too easy to arrive at; as railroads lead to Boston or New York. We are in great haste to construct a magnetic ...
— Walden, and On The Duty Of Civil Disobedience • Henry David Thoreau

... the further welcome discovery that the moon would shine into it, she vowed eagerly that there would be no lights at all in her music room at those times. Afterwards she told a funny story of how Schumann had been wont to improvise under such circumstances, until his next-door neighbor was so struck by the romance of it that he proceeded to imitate it, and to play somebody or other's technical studies whenever the moon rose; at which narrative Helen and the architect laughed very heartily, and Mr. Harrison ...
— King Midas • Upton Sinclair

... of God and nature. Finally, they endeavored to represent the school as one of the incendiary proceedings of the Anti-Slavery Society; and they appealed to the Colonization Society, as an aggrieved child is wont to appeal to ...
— An Appeal in Favor of that Class of Americans Called Africans • Lydia Maria Child

... embarrassing. He did not know what to say to his little wife when they were alone. The presence of the Dowager and Jock had freed him from any necessity of explanation, had kept him in his usual easy way; but now that Lucy alone sat opposite to him, he was more silent than his wont, and with no longer any of the little flow of simple observations which had once been so delightful to her. Sir Tom was more uneasy than if she had been a stern and jealous Eleanor, a clear-sighted critic seeing through and through him. The contest was so unequal, ...
— Sir Tom • Mrs. Oliphant

... in the face of his female audience, and a certain surprise in that of his male, he rose and stood on the hearth, with one hand in his waistcoat, as was his wont when about to philosophize in more detail than ...
— The Caxtons, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... mountayne of Seynt Kateryne, that is more highe then the mount of Moyses. And there, where Seynt Kateryne was buryed, is nouther chirche ne chapelle, ne other duellynge place: but there is an heep of stones aboute the place, where the body of hire was put of the aungeles. There was wont to ben a chapelle: but it was casten downe, and zit lyggen the stones there. And alle be it that the collect of Seynte Kateryne seye, that it is the place where oure Lord betaughten the Ten Comandementes to Moyses, and there where the ...
— The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques and Discoveries - of the English Nation. v. 8 - Asia, Part I. • Richard Hakluyt

... are the friends of your childhood, and urge that they shall be brought back to you. As far as I am able to learn, those of your friends who are not in jail are still right there in your native village. You point out that they were wont to share your gambols. If so, you are certainly ...
— Literary Lapses • Stephen Leacock

... trust you, you alone; Your eyes glow bright; I know you speak the truth. Yet go; the priestesses will soon appear; Their wont it is to ...
— Early Plays - Catiline, The Warrior's Barrow, Olaf Liljekrans • Henrik Ibsen

... [Footnote: The Isthmus of Perekop.] hauing sea on the East and West sides therof, insomuch that there is a ditch made from one sea vnto the other. In the same plaine (before the Tartars sprang vp) were the Comanians wont to inhabite, who compelled the foresayd cities and castles to pay tribute vnto them. But when the Tartars came vpon them, the multitude of the Comanians entred into the foresaid prouince, and fled all of them, euen vnto the sea shore, being in such extreame famine, that they ...
— The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques, and Discoveries - Vol. II • Richard Hakluyt

... about Pythagoras, according to which the philosopher was wont to declare that in an earlier state he had visited Hades, and had there seen Homer and Hesiod tortured because of the absurd things they had said about the gods. Apocrypbal or otherwise, the tale suggests that Pythagoras was an agnostic as regards the current Greek religion of his time. The same ...
— A History of Science, Volume 1(of 5) • Henry Smith Williams

... that they are, but I do not know. Having Anglican tendencies, I have been wont to contradict my countrymen when they have told me of the narrow exclusiveness of your nobles. Having found your nobles and your commoners all alike in their courtesy,—which is a cold word; in their hospitable friendships,—I would ...
— The Duke's Children • Anthony Trollope

... attention by pretending to show them a geometrical problem and seizes the opportunity to steal something for supper. The young men who gathered together in the palaestra, or gymnastic school, were wont there to offer sacrifices to the gods before beginning the exercises. The offerings consisted of smaller victims, such as lambs, fowl, geese, etc., and the flesh afterwards was used for their meal (vide Plato ...
— The Eleven Comedies - Vol. I • Aristophanes et al

... the old man seemed to cling to Innocent, and to rely upon her ever tender care of him, the question arose as to whether there might not be an heiress after all, instead of an heir. And the rustic wiseacres gossiped, as is their wont, watching with no small degree of interest the turn of events which had lately taken place in the frank and open admiration and affection displayed by Robin for his illegitimate cousin, as it was thought she was, and ...
— Innocent - Her Fancy and His Fact • Marie Corelli

... sermons, and every three months the holy communion, till their minister died"; and after that "prayers daily, with an homily on Sundays, two or three years, till more preachers came." The sturdy and terrible resolution of Captain Smith, who in his marches through the wilderness was wont to begin the day with prayer and psalm, and was not unequal to the duty, when it was laid on him, of giving Christian exhortation as well as righteous punishment, and the gentle Christian influence of the Rev. Robert Hunt, were ...
— A History of American Christianity • Leonard Woolsey Bacon

... was not only with intense interest, but with feelings of self-reproach, that we drew nigh with hostile intentions to birds which in the days of our boyhood, when visiting Mr. Wombwell's menagerie, had filled us with awe and reverence, as creatures that were wont to evince the depth of parental devotion by feeding their young with ...
— The Bushman - Life in a New Country • Edward Wilson Landor

... for a short time, and no sooner had Sir David, and the other gentleman taken leave of each other in the most polite and friendly manner, as border chiefs are wont to do, since border feuds ceased, and had departed to a sufficient distance, than the clan, armed with bludgeons, pitch-forks, and such other hostile weapons as they could find, rushed down in a body; and before ...
— A Historical Survey of the Customs, Habits, & Present State of the Gypsies • John Hoyland

... the possessor of such unlimited power—such unbounded wealth. He was partly stripped and plundered, as were those who lay round him. His body was pierced with several wounds, inflicted by various weapons. His sword was still in his hand, and the singular ferocity which was wont to animate his features in battle, still dwelt on his stiffened countenance. Close behind him, as if they had fallen in the act of mutual fight, lay the corpse of Count Albert of Geierstein; and that of Ital Schreckenwald, ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 13, - Issue 373, Supplementary Number • Various

... Coronation Hymnal, a book into whose making went five years of prayer, was Dr. A.J. Gordon, late Pastor of the Clarendon St. Baptist church, Boston. While the volume was slowly taking form and plan he was wont to hum to himself, or cause to be played by one of his family, snatches and suggestions of new airs that came to him in connection with his own hymns, and others which seemed to have no suitable music. ...
— The Story of the Hymns and Tunes • Theron Brown and Hezekiah Butterworth

... sedulous attention to her needle. Her eyes were fixed upon the little doorway, not expecting that any one would be seen there, but full of remembrance of the figure of him who had stood there and had kissed his hand. Her aunt, as was her wont on every Saturday, was leaning over a little table intent on some large book of devotional service, with which she prepared herself for the Sabbath. Close as was her attention now and always to the volume, she would not on ordinary occasions have allowed Linda's eyes to stray for so long a time ...
— Linda Tressel • Anthony Trollope

... charged them to bring him an answer without delay, as otherwise he would be obliged to go to their town, but not to do any harm. He then returned to the ships, and the messengers delivered their message to all the chief men of the tribe who were wont to be consulted on great affairs, who determined that peace were better than war. They immediately sent, therefore, a number of Indians to the ships, loaded with roasted fish, hens, several sorts of fruit, and the bread of the country, all of which they placed ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. III. • Robert Kerr

... The door was carefully barred, and then Sandy Flash, throwing off a heavy overcoat, such as the drovers were accustomed to wear, sat down by the fire. His face was redder than its wont, from cold and exposure, and all its keen, fierce lines were sharp and hard. As he warmed his feet and hands at the blaze, and watched Deb. Smith while she set the meat upon the coals, and cut the bread with a heavy hunting-knife, the wary, defiant look of a hunted animal ...
— The Story Of Kennett • Bayard Taylor

... hot-tempered gentleman came to visit the Skratdjs. A tall, sandy, energetic young man, who carried his own bag from the railway. The bag had been crammed rather than packed, after the wont of bachelors; and you could see where the heel of a boot distended the leather, and where the bottle ...
— Last Words - A Final Collection of Stories • Juliana Horatia Ewing

... toward his office to-day somewhat later than was his wont, he diverged from his usual custom: instead of entering his own doorway, he went across the street to Cater's after a moment's hesitation. Now that Cater's cooeperation was at the consummating point, it was wiser not to run the risk of its sagging back. Leverich and Martin ...
— McClure's Magazine, Vol. 31, No. 1, May 1908 • Various

... was my wont, to see Blanche. She was radiant: she was wild with spirits: a saucy triumph blazed in her blue eyes. She talked, she rattled in her childish way. She uttered, in the course of her rhapsody, a hint—an intimation—so terrible that the truth flashed across ...
— The Lock and Key Library • Julian Hawthorne, Ed.

... the date of each letter carefully. Aunt Aggie's according to her wont had only the day of the week on it, just Tuesday, or it might be Thursday—but Colonel Bellairs's and Lady Blore's were fully dated, and about a fortnight apart. Colonel ...
— Prisoners - Fast Bound In Misery And Iron • Mary Cholmondeley

... must be, if what he and the master said was true. By and by the steady beat of feet under him, the swift notes of the banjo, the calls of the prompter and the laughter fused, became inarticulate, distant—ceased. And Chad, as he was wont to do, journeyed on to "God's Country" in ...
— The Little Shepherd of Kingdom Come • John Fox

... lectures at the Metropolitan University. During vacations the professor pursued, with some degree of passion, experiments which added luster and selected portions of the alphabet to his name. Twice a week he walked down-town to the Cosmic Club, where he was wont to dine and express destructive and anarchistic views upon the nature, conduct, motives and personality of the ...
— Average Jones • Samuel Hopkins Adams

... it, and all the lovely things for which it can be exchanged. So all her new things, whatever their source, seemed to her like presents, like unexpected enrichments. She had basked among her new acquisitions, silent as was her wont when she was happy, sunning herself in the warmth of her prosperity. Best of all, she never need wear kimonos again in public. Her fiance had acceded to this, her most immediate wish. She could dress now like the girls around her. She would no longer be stared at like a curio in a shop window. ...
— Kimono • John Paris

... journey had been suddenly arranged. Mrs. Pargeter had just come back from England, where she had gone to pay some family visits and to see her little son, who was at a preparatory school; and the American diplomatist, as was so often his wont, had come to escort her to one of those picture club shows in which Parisian ...
— The Uttermost Farthing • Marie Belloc Lowndes

... captain reprimanded him sternly for conduct so unworthy of the office which he filled, and desired to know what motive he could have for hunting a bear. 'Sir,' said he, pouting his lip, as he was wont to do when agitated, 'I wished to kill the bear, that I might carry the ...
— Heads and Tales • Various

... decency in that euery man should talke of the things they haue best skill of, and not in that, their knowledge and learning serueth them not to do, as we are wont to say, he speaketh of Robin hood that neuer shot in his bow: there came a great Oratour before Cleomenes king of Lacedemonia, and vttered much matter to him touching fortitude and valiancie in the warres: the king laughed: why laughest thou quoth the learned man, since thou art a king thy ...
— The Arte of English Poesie • George Puttenham

... Statute of 1351, 25 Edw. III, Stat. 2, c. 1, states that the servants had paid no regard to the ordinance regulating wages, 'but to their ease and singular covetise do withdraw themselves unless they have livery and wages to the double or treble of that they were wont to take'. Accordingly, it was again laid down that they were to take liveries and wages as before the Black Death, and 'where wheat was wont to be given they shall take for the bushel 10d. (6s. 8d. a quarter),[116] or wheat at the will of the giver. ...
— A Short History of English Agriculture • W. H. R. Curtler

... somewhere in Mons. Rapin's Reflections sur la Poetique, that a certain Venetian nobleman, Andrea Naugeria by name, was wont every year to sacrifice a Martial to the manes of Catullus: In imitation of this, a celebrated poet, in the preface before the Spanish Friar, is pleased to acquaint the world, that he has indignation enough to burn a Bussy D'Amboys, annually, to the memory of Ben Jonson. ...
— The Works of John Dryden, Vol. 6 (of 18) - Limberham; Oedipus; Troilus and Cressida; The Spanish Friar • John Dryden

... the sweete delights of learning's treasure That wont with Comick sock to beautefie The painted Theaters, and fill with pleasure The listners eyes and eares with melodie; In which I late was wont to raine as Queene, And maske in mirth with ...
— Spenser - (English Men of Letters Series) • R. W. Church

... Shines down from the heights to the depths: will the watchword of dawn be July When to-morrow acclaims November? The stern salutation of sorrow to death or repentance to shame Was all that the season was wont to accord her of grace or acclaim; No lightnings of love and of laughter. But here, in the laugh of the loud west wind from around and above, In the flash of the waters beneath him, what sound or what light but of love Rings round him ...
— Astrophel and Other Poems - Taken from The Collected Poetical Works of Algernon Charles - Swinburne, Vol. VI • Algernon Charles Swinburne

... fed her well, but scarce meddled with her else for a long while; so she wandered well-nigh as she had will, and much in the wood; for she had no fear thereof, nor indeed of aught else save of the dame. She learned of the ways and the wont of all the creatures round about her, and the very grass and flowers were friends to her, and she made tales of them in her mind; and the wild things feared her in no wise, and the fowl would come to her hand, and play with her and love her. A lovely child ...
— The Water of the Wondrous Isles • William Morris

... seeing that keen, beautiful, intense face bending over these Rosenmuellers, and Ernestis, and Storrs, and Kuinoels—the fire out, and the gray dawn peering through the window; and when he heard me move, he would speak to me in the foolish words of endearment my mother was wont to use, and come to bed, and take me, warm as I ...
— Spare Hours • John Brown

... taken by warrant of supreme authority which the poor subjects dare not gainsay?' Another member, Sir Andrew Hobby, on the opposite side, started up, and said, 'that betwixt Michaelmas and St Andrews tide, where salt before the patent was wont to be sold for 16d. a bushel, it is now sold for 14d. ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 440 - Volume 17, New Series, June 5, 1852 • Various

... wont to declare that the Admirable Crichton lived again in that kaleidoscopic creature; but he was so dazzling, so bewildering, so dangerous, that to converse with him was like ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 2, Issue 12, October, 1858 • Various

... that gave the Tuscan Order of building better form than any other architect had yet achieved, and the Doric Order they enriched with better measures and proportions than their predecessors, following the rules and canons of Vitruvius, had been wont to use. They collected in their houses at Florence an infinite number of most beautiful antiquities in marble, which adorned Florence, and still adorn her, no less than those masters honoured themselves and their art. Giuliano brought from Rome ...
— Lives of the Most Eminent Painters Sculptors and Architects - Vol. 04 (of 10), Filippino Lippi to Domenico Puligo • Giorgio Vasari

... with a glass of spirits and water. It is to be desired that the ignorants who write about "that filthy tobacco" would take the trouble to observe its effects on a large scale, and not base the strongest and extremest opinions, as is the wont of the Anglo-Saxon Halb-bildung, upon the narrowest and shakiest of bases. In Egypt, India and other parts of the Eastern world they will find nicotiana used by men, women and children, of all ranks and ages; and the study of these millions would ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 5 • Richard F. Burton

... He married, and his wife soon after died of fever. Another physician took the house, and within a few months came near dying of erysipelas. He deserved it. The house, meanwhile, received no treatment; the doctors, according to their usual wont, even in their own families, were satisfied to deal with the consequences, and leave the ...
— The Easiest Way in Housekeeping and Cooking - Adapted to Domestic Use or Study in Classes • Helen Campbell

... horror of a vision by night, when deep sleep is wont to hold men, fear seized upon me, and trembling, and all my bones were affrighted; and when a spirit passed before me, the hair of my flesh stood ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - Volume 62, No. 384, October 1847 • Various

... Eucharist, nevertheless, when the heresy arose which taught that both forms were necessary, the Holy Church, which is directed by the Holy Ghost, forbade both forms to laymen. For thus the Church is sometimes wont to extinguish heresies by contrary institutions; as when some arose who maintained that the Eucharist is properly celebrated only when unleavened bread is used, the Church for a while commanded that it be administered with leavened bread; and when Nestorius wished to establish that the perpetual ...
— The Confutatio Pontificia • Anonymous

... desired to be allowed to point our prow towards the West, or watching the retiring beams of the setting sun, envied that orb the privilege that action gave, of kissing eyelids and gazing into eyes, on which we were wont to gaze "lang syne," nor under the influence of such thoughts that we should give them vent in ...
— Kathay: A Cruise in the China Seas • W. Hastings Macaulay

... mass in a church not far off, where, upon her knees, she recognized with a grateful heart that she owed the life of her infant to God and St. Thomas. Her devotion ended, she returned home, and the child, feeling no pain at all, walked as he was wont to do up and down the house, though a little scar still continued in one cheek, which after a few days, quite ...
— Three Thousand Years of Mental Healing • George Barton Cutten

... structure. The prophet told the stone not to be disappointed, for he would cause it to be more honoured than any stone in the building, by commanding all the faithful to kiss it as they went in procession. The faithful people were wont to meet at the place which they supposed was Adam and Eve's trysting place after the expulsion, for it is related in one of their legends that the first man and woman wandered about the world, separately, hundreds of years after ...
— The Mysteries of All Nations • James Grant

... man, in virtue of his intellectual superiority, is to adjudge to himself a larger share than others of the goods of this world, what right have we to censure the sturdy barbarian, who, in virtue of his physical superiority, was wont to take the lion's share to himself? We have changed the basis on which the tyranny rested—the tyranny remains. The St Simonians, it is true, justify their formula on the grounds of public utility; it is well, say they, to stimulate talent by recompense. ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 56, Number 347, September, 1844 • Various

... end down within reach, and then he went up hand over hand, in true sailor fashion, for Tom had been a first-class climber from early childhood, "Always getting into mischief," as his Aunt Martha had been wont to say. ...
— The Rover Boys in Southern Waters - or The Deserted Steam Yacht • Arthur M. Winfield

... him more kindly than was his wont. "My boy," he said, "I know something about you outside of business, though not much. And I think you'll do. Mind you, your missionary work will be tools and hardware, not the Methodist Church. You will have to show people who have their own ideas about tools ...
— John Wesley, Jr. - The Story of an Experiment • Dan B. Brummitt

... us," said Aunt Hildy, "but if the poor critter knows he's been mean, perhaps he'll see his way through better. I'll go over if it wont ...
— The Harvest of Years • Martha Lewis Beckwith Ewell

... as was their wont, and then went to his own apartment, and sat up to await the return of the genie, ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments • Anonymous

... "safe harbor" was made so by rocky bluffs projecting into the river; that on the south being known to the Dutch as Call Rock, though it did not sound like that in the vernacular. From this rock old Baltus Van Kleeck and his neighbors were wont to hail passing sloops ...
— The New York and Albany Post Road • Charles Gilbert Hine

... the Almighty's neck who said, Let there be hell, and there was hell—on earth. But not for that may men forget their worth— Nay, but much more remember them—who led The living first from dwellings of the dead, And rent the cerecloths that were wont to engirth Souls wrapped and swathed and swaddled from their birth With lies that bound them fast from heel to head. Among the tombs when wise men all their lives Dwelt, and cried out, and cut themselves with knives, These men, being foolish, and of saints ...
— A Midsummer Holiday and Other Poems • Algernon Charles Swinburne

... at last to escape these gloomy thoughts. Alves followed him without a word. He did not offer her his arm, as he was wont to do when they walked out here beyond the paths where people came. She respected his mood, and falling a step behind, followed the winding road that led around the ruined Court of Honor to the esplanade. As they gained the road by a little footpath in the sandy bank, a victoria ...
— The Web of Life • Robert Herrick

... ever reveal their own share in the responsibility for that wild adventure. My impression is that the idea of the Raid was started among the entourage of Rhodes and spoken of before him at length. He would listen in silence, as was his wont when he wished to establish the fact that he had nothing to do with a thing that had been submitted to him. Thus the Raid was tacitly encouraged by him, without his ever having pronounced himself either for ...
— Cecil Rhodes - Man and Empire-Maker • Princess Catherine Radziwill

... waist is measured by the zone The Graces long were wont to wear; And none but Love the comb can own, That smooths the ringlets of ...
— Barn and the Pyrenees - A Legendary Tour to the Country of Henri Quatre • Louisa Stuart Costello

... down again, for she laughed and blushed, a good deal more than her wont; and at last replied that "it depended on how far people went in—she ...
— Say and Seal, Volume I • Susan Warner

... dames do who dote upon a passion which they feel convinced will be returned, but which still waits for a response. Arundel Dacre would yield her a smile from a face more worn by thought than joy; and Arundel Dacre, who was wont to muse alone, was now ever ready to join his cousin and her friends in the ride or the promenade. Miss Dacre, too, had noticed to her a kindly change in her cousin's conduct to her father. He was more cordial to his ...
— The Young Duke • Benjamin Disraeli

... but a young girl upon the verge of womanhood. Such knowledge began to reveal much that came before him as new, changing the entire nature of their present relationship, as well as the scope of his own plain duty. It was his wont to look things squarely in the face, and unpleasant and unwelcome as was the task now confronting him, during the long night hours he had settled it once for ...
— Bob Hampton of Placer • Randall Parrish

... language, and hardly surpassed by those of the French,—from which latter, it is fair to suppose, much of his inspiration is drawn, since his style is undisguisedly that of modern French romancers, though often made the vehicle of thoughts far nobler than any they are wont to convey. His portraits of character are capital, especially those of feminine character, which are peculiarly vivid and spirituels. He represents infantile imagination with Pre-Raphaelitic accuracy. And his descriptions are frequently of enormous ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 4, No. 21, July, 1859 • Various

... am right glad of it, my Lord. You'll cheer up poor Miss Clara a bit, I hope—for—Bless me! wont those Frenchmen never learn to carry that box ...
— Dynevor Terrace (Vol. II) • Charlotte M. Yonge

... home faster than was his wont. He caught his father just as the latter was leaving the ...
— The High School Pitcher - Dick & Co. on the Gridley Diamond • H. Irving Hancock

... discussing the value of certain minute points of law that he wished to go to Jerusalem. At which Joseph was astonished that his father should have asked him such a thing.... Yet why not? For awhile back he was discussing such very points with some young gossips. His tongue wagged as was its wont on all occasions, though his mind was away and he suddenly stopped speaking; and when the stirring of his father's feet on the floor awakened him, he saw his father sitting pen in hand watching him and no doubt asking himself of what great and wonderful thing ...
— The Brook Kerith - A Syrian story • George Moore

... of her father's lively nature; but she had also a kind of impetuosity, which one of her governesses had called defiance. When she grew up she showed, therefore, the stronger nature of the two, and her father, as was his wont, gave way. He laughed at his little tyrant, whose great delight was to ruffle his thick curling hair. When, in his half-abstracted way, the old gentleman would tell her stones which threatened to end unpleasantly, she would scold him well; but when, from some cause or other, he was really displeased ...
— Garman and Worse - A Norwegian Novel • Alexander Lange Kielland

... when Tarling of Scotland Yard was the victim of a murderous assault, Mr. Milburgh unlocked the gate and passed through, locking and double-locking the gate behind him. He was alone, and, as was his wont, he was whistling a sad little refrain which had neither beginning nor end. He walked slowly up the stone pathway, unlocked the door of his cottage, and stood only a moment on the doorstep to survey the growing thickness of the night, before he closed and bolted ...
— The Daffodil Mystery • Edgar Wallace

... Betty was a senior and took the course in Elizabethan tragedies, she always thought of the visit of Jim Watson as a perfect example in real life of the comic interlude, by which the king of Elizabethan dramatists is wont to lighten, and at the same time to accentuate, his analyses of the bitter consequences of wrong-doing. For close upon her first great relief at finding her decision made, followed a sudden realization ...
— Betty Wales, Sophomore • Margaret Warde

... own. In writing, he probably felt the want of some such reverberation of the pulpit under strong hands as he was wont to emphasise his spoken utterances withal; there would seem to him a want of passion in the orderly lines of type; and I suppose we may take the capitals as a mere substitute for the great voice with which he would have given it forth, had we heard it from his own lips. Indeed, as it is, in this ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 3 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... traditions that cluster around age and foster these sentiments are wanting. This may be to a certain extent true. But I cannot believe but that Canadians are as loyal to their country as any other people under the sun. The life-long struggle of those men whom the old land was wont "to put a mark of honour upon," are too near to us not to warm our hearts with love and veneration; they were too sturdy a race to be lightly over-looked by their descendants. Their memory is too sacred a trust to be forgotten, and their lives too worthy of our imitation not to bind ...
— Life in Canada Fifty Years Ago • Canniff Haight

... me he and several others had been sent in as unfit for the veldt, and so were to act as hospital orderlies. When I inquired how he liked the idea, he said it was all right, as he was clear of the horrible "hundred-and-fifty," and he laid his hands significantly where the pouches are wont to decorate the ...
— A Yeoman's Letters - Third Edition • P. T. Ross

... unto Balaam, Am not I thine ass, upon which thou hast ridden ever since I was thine unto this day? was I ever wont to do so unto thee? And ...
— The Woman's Bible. • Elizabeth Cady Stanton

... the activities of her discretion. She was sorry that she had allowed so trifling a matter to mar the serenity of the family; her conscience upbraided her that she had not besought him to avoid the blacksmith's shop, where certain men of the neighborhood were wont to congregate and drink deep into the night. Above all, her mind went back to the enigmatical message, and she wondered that she could have been so forgetful as to fail to urge him to forbear angering Purdee, for this would have a cumulative effect upon all the rancors of ...
— The Riddle Of The Rocks - 1895 • Charles Egbert Craddock (AKA Mary Noailles Murfree)

... Wilts, and also in Devon, it is believed that cats born in the month of May will catch no mice nor rats, but will, contrary to the wont of all other cats, bring in snakes and slow-worms. Such cats are called "May cats," ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 63, January 11, 1851 • Various

... large red face, partially freckled. Her voice was loud and coarse. She seemed to be one of the "nouveau riche," as Ethel's mother was wont to say of people grown suddenly wealthy and prosperous. Yet Ethel was not alone in her dislike of the girl. No one seemed to care for her, although each member treated ...
— How Ethel Hollister Became a Campfire Girl • Irene Elliott Benson

... down the street past the houses that had been familiar all his life, meeting people who had never been wont to notice him before; and they smiled upon him from afar now; greeted him with enthusiasm, and turned to look after him as he passed on. It gave him a curious feeling to have so much attention from people who had never known him before. It made him feel strangely small, yet filled with ...
— The Search • Grace Livingston Hill

... Spring eve, their daily work being done, Mother and child, according to their wont, Went, hand in hand, their chosen evening walk. A pleasant wind rose from the sea, and blew Light flakes of waving silver o'er the fields Ready for mowing, and the golden West Warmed half the sky: the low sun flickered through The hedge-rows, as they passed; while hawthorn trees Scattered ...
— The Germ - Thoughts towards Nature in Poetry, Literature and Art • Various

... the stage of first passion, to any disposition to think of them in general terms. A love such as this (so the lover feels) has never existed before, nor is there anything to be compared with our passion for the beloved person. An estrangement is wont, whether as cause or as result it is difficult to decide, to set in at that moment in which the sentiment of uniqueness disappears from the connection. A scepticism of its value in itself and for us fastens itself to the very thought that after ...
— Introduction to the Science of Sociology • Robert E. Park

... James Lewis, a venerated elder and local preacher of the Methodist Episcopal Church, then nearly eighty years of age. He died in 1855, universally beloved and lamented. He entered upon his work in 1800. During most of those fifty-five years he was wont to preach every Sabbath, often three times, rarely losing an appointment by sickness, and still more rarely by storms in summer or winter. He lived in Gorham, Maine, and his labors were pretty equally divided ...
— The Life and Letters of Elizabeth Prentiss • George L. Prentiss

... the salt water will be jolly good for your ankle, in reality, though Aunt Juliet will say it wont She's bound to say that, of course, on account of her principles. All the same it may. Peter Walsh was telling me the other day that it's perfectly splendid for rheumatism. I shouldn't wonder a bit if ...
— Priscilla's Spies 1912 • George A. Birmingham

... in a little orphan girl whom she was bringing up. At this time she herself was almost a childless mother, all her Indian-born infants having been victims to the climate; but a few months later Mr. Martyn christened her little daughter Lucy, a child of such gentle, gracious temper that he was wont to call her Serena. Mrs. Sherwood gives a pretty picture of this little creature, when about eighteen months old, creeping up to Mr. Martyn as he lay on a sofa with all his books about him, and perching herself on his Hebrew Lexicon, which ...
— Pioneers and Founders - or, Recent Workers in the Mission field • Charlotte Mary Yonge

... streams of people met on that day. The one poured out from the city, and as they came through the gardens whose clusters of palms rose on the south-eastern corner of Olivet, they cut down the long branches, as was their wont at the Feast of Tabernacles, and moved upwards towards Bethany with loud shouts of welcome. From Bethany streamed forth the crowds who had assembled there on the previous night, and who came testifying to the great event at the sepulchre of Lazarus. The road soon loses sight of Bethany. ...
— Memories of Bethany • John Ross Macduff

... desired to come unknown, and appear among His children, just when the bones of the heretics, sentenced to be burnt alive, had commenced crackling at the flaming stakes. Owing to His limitless mercy, He mixes once more with mortals and in the same form in which He was wont to appear fifteen centuries ago. He descends, just at the very moment when before king, courtiers, knights, cardinals, and the fairest dames of court, before the whole population of Seville, upwards of a hundred wicked heretics ...
— "The Grand Inquisitor" by Feodor Dostoevsky • Feodor Dostoevsky

... gaily, and yet proudly; legends of happy love crowded upon her memory, and minstrel songs echoed in her ear; she bounded lightly into the wood, and as some one, darting from behind a tree, caught her while she passed, Amable, with the stifled scream of alarm, which maidens are wont to give when they wish it unheard by all save one, found herself in the arms of Guillaume. * ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 17, No. 476, Saturday, February 12, 1831 • Various

... were heavy with sleepless nights and many tears; her movements were slower and more languid than of wont, and her face was pale ...
— Vera Nevill - Poor Wisdom's Chance • Mrs. H. Lovett Cameron

... plan was so contagious that I was not long in finding that farmers in all directions were beginning to go to their labors with much less food in their stomachs than had been their wont, and in all cases with ...
— The No Breakfast Plan and the Fasting-Cure • Edward Hooker Dewey

... do very often euen vnto dronckennesse, wherein thei glorie muche. Their dwellyng is neither in tounes ne Bouroughes. But in the fieldes abrode, aftre the maner of thauncient Scithians in tentes. And the ratherso, for that thei are all moste generally catteill mastres. In the wintre time thei are wont to drawe to the plaines, and in the Somer season, to the mounteignes and hillie places for the better pasture. Thei make theim Tentes, or elles rounde cotages of wickres, or of Felte vndersette with smothe poles. In the middes thei make a round windowe that giueth them ...
— The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques, and Discoveries - Vol. II • Richard Hakluyt

... the Fronde? If they were as impertinent then, at least they had wit in their levity. We are monkeys in conduct, and as clumsy as bears when we try to gambol. Oh! my lord! I have no patience with my country! and shall leave it without regret!—Can we be proud when all Europe scorns us? It was wont to envy us, sometimes to hate us, but never despised us before. James the First was contemptible, but he did not lose an America! His eldest grandson sold us, his younger lost us—but we kept ourselves. Now we have run to meet the ruin—and ...
— Letters of Horace Walpole, V4 • Horace Walpole

... her what she meant to do; she was not in a mood for answering questions. She took my hand as we walked, and held it tightly, and we went along as children do when they are going through the green wood in quest of May flowers, only our steps were more fearful, and our faces paler than children's are wont to be. We went on very silently and bravely, till we were about half-way, deep in the wood, when a cheerful shout came across our ears, and there was a swaying and crackling of bushes; and Arthur Noble's handsome genial ...
— The Late Miss Hollingford • Rosa Mulholland

... not willingly hurt ye, man, e'en on the causeway, that is free to us baith, because I mind your kindness of lang syne, and partly consider ye as a poor deceived creature. But deil d—n me, sir, and I am not wont to swear, but if you touch my Scotch shouther with that shule of yours, I will make six inches of my Andrew Ferrara deevilish intimate with ...
— The Fortunes of Nigel • Sir Walter Scott

... the mixture, suddenly dropped off, and Sainte-Croix dropped to the ground as though felled by a lightning stroke. At supper-time, his wife finding that he did not come out from his closet where he was shut in, knocked at the door, and received no answer; knowing that her husband was wont to busy himself with dark and mysterious matters, she feared some disaster had occurred. She called her servants, who broke in the door. Then she found Sainte-Croix stretched out beside the furnace, ...
— CELEBRATED CRIMES, COMPLETE - THE MARQUISE DE BRINVILLIERS • ALEXANDRE DUMAS, PERE

... took the thought, And a royal cage was brought; Cushion made of scarlet bright,— For our Dicky, pure and white, Thus was wont to perch and sit,— And a collar blue we fit To his neck, when loyal, true, He presents ...
— Mother Truth's Melodies - Common Sense For Children • Mrs. E. P. Miller

... very head amongst the great "show pieces" of France; but it is in connection with Le Mans, scarcely eighty miles away and so little known, that it ought really to be studied and considered; which as a matter of fact it seldom is. The city is hardly in keeping with what we are wont to associate with the environment of a great cathedral, though this of itself in no way detracts from its charms. The weekly cattle-market takes place almost before its very doors, and the battery of hotels which flank the open square present ...
— The Cathedrals of Northern France • Francis Miltoun

... unable to say to Granny Marrable:—"I heard your invalid move in the bedroom, and I think you had better go and see if she wants you," but he must have gone very near it. For Gwen heard the old lady's step come quicker than her wont along the passage, and she reached the kitchen-door just in time to see her pass into the room opposite. "Is she all ...
— When Ghost Meets Ghost • William Frend De Morgan

... every one admitted. One morning soon after the Stanleys' arrival he appeared in saddle on his stylish bay, accompanied by an orderly leading another horse, side-saddled; and then, as by common impulse, all the girls promenading the piazzas, as was their wont, with arms entwining each other's waists, came flocking about the south steps. When Miss Stanley appeared in her riding-habit and was quickly swung up into saddle by her cavalier, and then, with a bright nod and smile ...
— Starlight Ranch - and Other Stories of Army Life on the Frontier • Charles King

... that it was the perfection of a Western journey to travel in early spring by an Ohio River steamboat,—such steamboats as they had forty years ago, comfortable, roomy, and well ordered. The company was social, as Western emigrants were wont to be when there were not so very many of them, and the shores of the river, then only thinly populated, were a constantly shifting panorama of wilderness beauty. I have never since seen a combination of spring ...
— A New England Girlhood • Lucy Larcom

... girl seemed to be turning the thing over in her mind, as was her wont with any new proposition, "there seem to be in history a good many women who never ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner

... from my elders, who said that, in like manner, they, when boys, had heard from old men, that Caius Fabricius was wont to wonder that when he was ambassador to King Pyrrhus, he had heard from Cineas the Thessalian that there was a certain person at Athens who profest himself a wise man, and that he was accustomed to say ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to prose. Volume II (of X) - Rome • Various

... objected decidedly to his becoming a sailor, that he might go and look for her brother Jack; an announcement which the young lady received with much dignity, and an expression of contempt on her pretty countenance which it was not wont to wear. ...
— Washed Ashore - The Tower of Stormount Bay • W.H.G. Kingston

... the least wish of his astonished wife and daughter; in spite of the tender care which Eugenie lavished upon her mother,—Madame Grandet rapidly approached her end. Every day she grew weaker and wasted visibly, as women of her age when attacked by serious illness are wont to do. She was fragile as the foliage in autumn; the radiance of heaven shone through her as the sun strikes athwart the withering leaves and gilds them. It was a death worthy of her life,—a Christian death; and is not that sublime? ...
— Eugenie Grandet • Honore de Balzac

... string," said Aileen, laughing outright at Freckles' eloquence—the eloquence of one who was wont to be slow of speech before matrimony loosened her tongue and home love taught her the right ...
— Flamsted quarries • Mary E. Waller

... stimulus of the bracing early morning air. A new inspiration seemed to fire him, altogether dissimilar to the glow which he was wont to feel when plunging into a dangerous phase of a professional case. He slowly drew from his pocket the typed note-paper which had nestled in such enviable intimacy with that courageous heart. The faint fragrance of her exquisite flesh clung to it still. ...
— The Voice on the Wire • Eustace Hale Ball

... She had written, but not in verse, the young lover owned, and he gave his breast-pocket the benefit of a squeeze with his left arm, which the Major remarked, according to his wont. ...
— The History of Pendennis • William Makepeace Thackeray

... evening, when Lucien, lounging in an armchair, was mechanically contemplating the hues of the setting sun through the trees in the garden, blowing up the mist of scented smoke in slow, regular clouds, as pensive smokers are wont, he was roused from his reverie by hearing a deep sigh. He turned and saw the Abbe standing ...
— Scenes from a Courtesan's Life • Honore de Balzac

... was Anna wont to rove While Harland told his love in many a sigh, But stern on Harland roll'd her brother's eye, They fought, they fell—her ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge - Vol I and II • Samuel Taylor Coleridge

... thee not, as my father understood not thine," he replied. "My father was wont to say that Mar Shalmon was strange and peradventure not possessed of all his senses to neglect his store of wealth ...
— Jewish Fairy Tales and Legends • Gertrude Landa

... example of devotion to the dead, in the saintly Empress Eleanor, who, after the death of her husband, the Emperor Leopold, in 1705, was wont to pray two hours every day for the eternal repose of his soul. Not less touching is an account given by a Protestant traveller of an humble pair, whom he encountered at Prague during his wanderings there. They were ...
— Purgatory • Mary Anne Madden Sadlier



Words linked to "Wont" :   custom, wont to, tradition, habit



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