"Behindhand" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... Louis is doing famously. Philadelphia has several experiments in progress. Baltimore has made a start. In New York there are many noteworthy movements—half a dozen at least full of life and hope. Boston was never behindhand in knowledge, and in the new education is very alert, the efforts of a single lady deserving praise of high degree. These are but signs ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 497, July 11, 1885 • Various
... Monk first giving at his residence in the Cockpit, a great supper, after which "he entertained his majesty with several sorts of musick;" Next Earl Pembroke gave a rare banquet; also the Duke of Buckingham, my Lord Lumley, and many others. Nor was my lord mayor, Sir Thomas Allen, behindhand in extending hospitality to the king, whom he invited to sup with him. This feast, having no connection with the civic entertainments, was held at good Sir Thomas's house. The royal brothers of York and Gloucester were likewise bidden, ...
— Royalty Restored - or, London under Charles II. • J. Fitzgerald Molloy
... managed to give the passengers some coffee, bread and butter and ham and eggs, though they had had to wait their turns for cups and plates. It appeared that the driver had quarreled with the Lowry people that morning because the breakfast was behindhand and he was kept waiting. So he told his passengers that there was another tavern, a few miles down the road, and that he would take ...
— Rudder Grange • Frank R. Stockton
... necessaries of our life were luxuries or were unknown to them. First of all, the luxury of freedom,—political, social, and domestic,—with the habits it creates, is the source of great and ever-increasing expense. We are still much behindhand in this matter, and shall by-and-by spend more largely upon it. But, compared with our ancestors, individual culture, to which freedom is the means, absorbs a large share of our expenditure. The noble architecture of the thirteenth century was the work of corporations, ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 10, Number 60, October 1862 • Various
... over our material productive power will be as great as ever, except for the small number of our ships that have been sunk or the small amount of damage done to us by enemy aircraft. Our railways and factories may be somewhat behindhand in upkeep, but that will soon be made good, and against that item on the debit side, we may set the great new organization for munition works, part of which, we may hope, will be available for peaceful production when the ...
— International Finance • Hartley Withers
... undertook a colloquy, and Aragon, not to be behindhand, flashed a few words across the conversation, right and left as it were, his expressions appearing to be in a different tongue from those used by the chief interpreter, and both utterly without perceptible resemblance to the rolling consonants and gutturals of the savages. Marcoy imbibed ...
— Lippincott's Magazine Of Popular Literature And Science, No. 23, February, 1873, Vol. XI. • Various
... strong spirit of opposition was aroused. Many a wary practitioner began to devise cunning means of concealment, and to invent traps to catch their adversary and turn him into ridicule. Davie Forbes was not behindhand in making remote preparations for the ganger's certain visit to him. But it was then mid-winter, and if Bonar was the canny man that he was said to be, there would be little fear of any attempted search for Davie's implements and ...
— Up in Ardmuirland • Michael Barrett
... much thought to it myself; and that is what I should like. But this constant planning about one's toilet, changing your buttons and your fringes and your bonnet-trimmings and your hats every other day, and then being behindhand! ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 102, April, 1866 • Various
... exasperated that I should do the job in an easy way. It is the only way I know to rip, but Frances knows another way that breaks your back and almost puts your eyes out, that makes you tired and behindhand and sure of a scolding. She shows me how to rip her way. The two threads of the machine, one from above and one from below, which make the stitch, must be separated. The work must be turned first on the wrong, then on the right side, the scissors must lift ...
— The Woman Who Toils - Being the Experiences of Two Gentlewomen as Factory Girls • Mrs. John Van Vorst and Marie Van Vorst
... the footman modestly, "I am called Bourguignon, and here is my comrade Comtois, whose turn for devotion will come to-morrow, and who, when the moment shall have arrived, will not be behindhand. Comtois, my friend, a slice of that pheasant, and a glass of champagne. Do you not see that, in order to reassure monsieur completely, I must taste everything; it is a severe test, I know, but where ...
— The Conspirators - The Chevalier d'Harmental • Alexandre Dumas (Pere)
... have been making these astonishing revelations, the Egyptologists have not been behindhand. Such scholars as Lepsius, Brugsch, de Rouge, Lenormant, Birch, Mariette, Maspero and Erman have perfected the studies of Young and Champollion; while at the same time these and a considerable company of other explorers, most notable of whom are Gardner Wilkinson ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 6, Slice 3 - "Chitral" to "Cincinnati" • Various
... the whole House of Laity there assembled broke into cheers; and not to be behindhand in demonstrations of loyalty, the Judges and the Bishops cheered too—a thing that none of them had done individually for years; and in their official and corporate capacity, judicial and ecclesiastical, ...
— King John of Jingalo - The Story of a Monarch in Difficulties • Laurence Housman
... also, and my two brothers, who were all fishermen, had now come to regard me as the flower of the flock. Yet they had not scrupled to knock me about, with little ceremony, in the days of my boyhood; nor do I think they would have been behindhand in finding fault with me for my folly, had I returned from my second voyage as poor and needy as from the first. But such is life, and a man must take what comes, and make the best of it and not the ...
— Adventures in Southern Seas - A Tale of the Sixteenth Century • George Forbes
... grammar, though he hain't his beat for work; But I sez ter myself, "Look out, my gal, yer a-foolin' with a Turk!" Jake bore it wonderful patient, an' said in a mournful way, He p'sumed he was behindhand with the doin's at Injun Bay. I remember once he was askin' for some o' my Injun buns, An' she said he should allus say, "them air," stid o' "them is" the ones. Wal, Mary Ann kep' at him stiddy mornin' ...
— Poems Teachers Ask For, Book Two • Various
... day I worked for myself, throughout the night for you, and nothing is behindhand. Each day adds to our internal strength, that gives us consideration abroad, and soon we shall hold our own as one of the four great European powers, mightier than in the days when the sun never set upon Austrian realms. The empire of Charles ...
— Joseph II. and His Court • L. Muhlbach
... has a lion's mouth, the heart of a hare, with ears erect and sleepless eyes. It stands 'listening its fears.' It is so in awe of its own opinion that it never dares to form any, but catches up the first idle rumour, lest it should be behindhand in its judgment, and echoes it till it is deafened with the sound of its own voice. The idea of what the public will think prevents the public from ever thinking at all, and acts as a spell on the exercise of private judgment, ...
— Table-Talk - Essays on Men and Manners • William Hazlitt
... plucked one of the roses and hid it in her bosom. Then the sparrows thought that the roses reigned here, and that the house had been built for their sake. That appeared to them to be really too much, but since all the people showed their love for the roses, they did not wish to be behindhand. "Peep!" they said sweeping the ground with their tails, and blinking with one eye at the roses, they had not looked at them long before they were convinced that they were their old neighbours. And so they really ...
— Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen • Hans Christian Andersen
... of your tenants, Mr. Browning. I am behindhand with my rent, owing to sickness in the family, and I have been ...
— Luke Walton • Horatio Alger
... might ask the Turk to give lectures upon the "Arabian Nights." Everybody else was planning something of the sort, to "raise funds" for some purpose, and she was sure they ought not to be behindhand. Mrs. ...
— The Peterkin Papers • Lucretia P Hale
... 14th, 15th, and 16th of May, the air became suddenly cold, with sharp winds from the north-west, and heavy storms of snow that nipped the young buds, and destroyed many of the early-sown vegetable seeds; fortunately for us we were behindhand with ours, which was ...
— The Backwoods of Canada • Catharine Parr Traill
... Watson and the clerk, Dave had been rather surprised because William Jarvey had not shown himself, because on the train he had said he was behindhand; and they had naturally supposed he would come to the offices without delay. Just as they were preparing to leave they heard an angry discussion going on in Mr. Watson's private office, and they heard the voices of the ...
— Dave Porter and His Double - The Disapperarance of the Basswood Fortune • Edward Stratemeyer
... supply that gentleman with a big string of dogs by a certain time; but that shameless one, the German trader Meyers, had been buying up the brutes and skimped the market. It was very necessary he should see Mr. Vanderlip, because of the shameless one he would be all of a week behindhand in filling the contract. She did know where he had gone? Up-creek? Good! He would strike out after him at once and inform him of the unhappy delay. Did he understand her to say that Mr. Vanderlip needed the dogs on Friday night? that he must ...
— The God of His Fathers • Jack London
... at the bottom of Paul's pocket, lay a bill of fifty dollars for publishing expenses. What was to be done? The bill must be paid. It would never do to let the March Hare run behindhand. To begin to run into debt was an unsafe ...
— Paul and the Printing Press • Sara Ware Bassett
... milk was brought, breakfast was still a little behindhand, but she would not let me help. Anyhow, I felt in spite of my talk that I wanted to do some other sort of service for her: I wanted to show off, to prove myself a protector, to fight for her, to knock down or drive off her foes and mine; ...
— Vandemark's Folly • Herbert Quick
... Tuscan web which connects Florence, Sienna, Pistoja, Lucca, Pisa, and Leghorn, in a roundabout way; and a few miles of Neapolitan railway, to connect Naples with Pompeii, Portici, Castel-a-mare, and Capua. Rome, behindhand in most things, is behindhand in railways. Switzerland has its little railway of twenty-five miles, from Zurich to Baden. Spain has its two small lines, from Madrid to Aranjuez, and from Barcelona to Mataro. Turkey ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 452 - Volume 18, New Series, August 28, 1852 • Various
... next had come. The peasants obliged the collectors to wring out the hard-earned copper pieces one or two at a time. The tardy were vexed with fines and distraints. Furniture, doors, the very rafters and floors were sold for unpaid taxes. In the time of Louis XV., if a whole village fell too much behindhand, its four principal inhabitants might be seized and carried off to jail. This corporal joint-liability was ended by a law passed under the ministry of Turgot, and apparently not repealed on his fall.[Footnote: Horn, 238; Vauban; Bailly, ii. 203; ...
— The Eve of the French Revolution • Edward J. Lowell
... I heard the world and his wife were stopping at the door to give a welcome to Raftery, and I thought I would not be behindhand. And here is something for the fiddler (puts money in the plate). I would sooner see that fiddler than any other ...
— Poets and Dreamers - Studies and translations from the Irish • Lady Augusta Gregory and Others
... in aeronautics is not a fact by itself. It is merely an indication that we are behindhand in our mechanical knowledge and invention M. Bleriot's aeroplane points ...
— An Englishman Looks at the World • H. G. Wells
... took care to send for Tom Lord to amuse them, for Tom was a wit and a humourist, and kept the President in a laugh. Mr. Lord ordered the dinner and chose the wines. He could be coarse enough to suit even the President's palate, and Ratcliffe was not behindhand. When the new Secretary went away at ten o'clock that night, his chief; who was in high good humour with his dinner, his champagne, and his conversation, swore with some unnecessary granite oaths, that Ratcliffe was "a clever ...
— Democracy An American Novel • Henry Adams
... for men to be wrong in their feelings concerning public misconduct; as rare to be right in their speculation upon the cause of it. I have constantly observed that the generality of people are fifty years, at least, behindhand in their politics. There are but very few who are capable of comparing and digesting what passes before their eyes at different times and occasions, so as to form the whole into a distinct system. But in books everything is settled ...
— Thoughts on the Present Discontents - and Speeches • Edmund Burke
... be private, sent for his boon-companions, with whom he was most familiar, and charged the chamberlain that he suffer none of the creatures of Almighty Allah to enter, save a man of his cup-mates, by name Abd al-Malik bin Salih, who was behindhand with them. Then they donned brightly-dyed dresses.[FN259] for it was their wont, as often as they sat in the wine-seance, to endue raiment of red and yellow and green silk, and they sat down to drink, and the cups went ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 1 • Richard F. Burton
... complete destruction of a fine rhythmical progression, by checking the onward bound of the rest of the orchestra, and destroying the unity. Almost always, the drum player, through not observing the original time given by the conductor, is somewhat behindhand in striking his first stroke. This retardment, multiplied by the number of strokes which follow the first one, soon produces—as may be imagined—a rhythmical discrepancy of the most fatal effect. The conductor,—all whose efforts to re-establish unanimity are ...
— The Orchestral Conductor - Theory of His Art • Hector Berlioz
... day. I have been over many prisons since, for I have always held that the management of such places is a pretty reliable thermometer of the moral condition of the country to which they belong. I know of some foul ones in states which set up to be very civilized. In France we are lamentably behindhand in the matter. Though we have some prisons which are model, we have a great many more which are shamefully behind the times. For my own part, I have come to the conclusion, from all I have seen and heard, that seclusion in cells at night, with work in common during the daytime in small easily ...
— Memoirs • Prince De Joinville
... of wonder, that in being so generous to some, he was forced to be unjust to others. He was still behindhand with his poor old washer-woman—owed for boarding, clothes, hats, boots, and a dozen other matters—and was, in consequence, a good deal harassed with duns. Still, he was called by some of his old cronies, "a fine, generous fellow." A few were ...
— Words for the Wise • T. S. Arthur
... seemed endless in the exposed picquets. Save for the Australian loot it looked like a fasting Christmas. Parcel mails could not be sent up, for every camel was required to convey food and fodder on to the cavalry. The cigarette ration was behindhand and most of the men were without a smoke. The officers could torture themselves with the thought of five turkeys ordered in Port Said and unlimited mess stores lying sixty miles away at Romani. But at the last moment all was changed. A parcel mail came in—and the spectre of bully ...
— The Fifth Battalion Highland Light Infantry in the War 1914-1918 • F.L. Morrison
... it was now almost midnight, to another arriero, who, after some dickering, agreed to leave at eight the following morning, charging a price something more than fifty per cent above the usual rate. Of course he was behindhand, but we actually ...
— In Indian Mexico (1908) • Frederick Starr
... sorry to interfere with your romantic embellishments, Carey, or with the credit of your beloved pond, since you are determined not to leave it behindhand with its neighbours." ...
— Henrietta's Wish • Charlotte M. Yonge
... WITH MR. PUFFINGTON'S HOUNDS,' in the imposing type here displayed. 'Well, that's quick work, however,' said he, casting his eyes up to the ceiling in astonishment, and thinking how unlike it was the Swillingford papers, which were always a week, but generally a fortnight behindhand with information. 'Splendid run with Mr. Puffington's hounds,' read he again, wondering who had done it: Bardolph, the innkeeper; Allsop, the cabinet-maker; Tuggins, the doctor, were all out; so was Weatherhog, ...
— Mr. Sponge's Sporting Tour • R. S. Surtees
... a scene with that horrible creature yesterday. It was the second week—she thought I was shamming, I know. She said she never allowed her "roomers" to get behindhand—it was her invariable rule. O God, I was so sick I could scarcely see—I did not care what she did. I told her that I had no money; that I was waiting to get some work; that I would pay her the first moment ...
— The Journal of Arthur Stirling - "The Valley of the Shadow" • Upton Sinclair
... quite a long time about it; and all the while Esther was growing more and more vexed, until, when Cousin Charlotte at last sprang up, exclaiming, "My dear children, do you know how long we have been talking? I must hurry away this minute, or I shall be behindhand all day!" the limit of poor ...
— The Carroll Girls • Mabel Quiller-Couch
... Scrooge's nephew laughed in this way: holding his sides, rolling his head, and twisting his face into the most extravagant contortions: Scrooge's niece, by marriage, laughed as heartily as he. And their assembled friends being not a bit behindhand, roared out, lustily. ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 6 • Charles H. Sylvester
... knowledge. Science made rapid progress, and in its turn showed the broad and liberal influence of the great revolution. In 1842 societies were founded in Paris and London to promote the study of ethnology. Mr. Gallatin would not be behindhand in this important work for which America offered a virgin field. Drawing about him a number of gentlemen of similar tastes with his own, he founded in New York, in 1842, the American Ethnological Society. Among ...
— Albert Gallatin - American Statesmen Series, Vol. XIII • John Austin Stevens
... monthly and quarterly reviews bestowed their longer and more careful criticism upon the new readings of that text, to elucidate which has been the devout industry of some of England's ripest scholars and profoundest thinkers; while the actors, not to be behindhand in a study especially concerning their vocation, adopted with more enthusiasm than discrimination some of the new readings, and showed a laudable acquaintance with the improved version, by exchanging undoubtedly the better ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 6, Issue 35, September, 1860 • Various
... others still, the employers advance the miners small sums to be worked out afterwards, thus binding the debtors to themselves. In the North, the custom is general of keeping the payment of wages one week behindhand, chaining the miners in this way to their work. And to complete the slavery of these enthralled workers, nearly all the Justices of the Peace in the coal districts are mine owners themselves, or relatives or friends of mine owners, and possess almost unlimited power ...
— The Condition of the Working-Class in England in 1844 - with a Preface written in 1892 • Frederick Engels
... Nye led off with a humorous description of life in the mines in the early days of California, and the others contributed anecdotes, humor and fun, in which Lincoln took the lead, "and I" (as Tod told the story), "not to be behindhand, told a story;" and so the hours flew on without any mention of the grave matters he expected to discuss with the President. When the clock announced the hour of eleven, Mr. Lincoln said he made it a habit to retire at eleven o'clock, and, turning to Tod, said: "Well, ...
— Recollections of Forty Years in the House, Senate and Cabinet - An Autobiography. • John Sherman
... stock. That was always Richard's morning task, and he always on his way thither replenished the hearth fire, that his sister Madelon might have a lighter and speedier task at preparing breakfast. Madelon usually arose a half-hour after Richard, and she was not behindhand this morning. She entered the great living-room, lit the candles, and went about getting breakfast. Human daily needs arise and set on tragedy ...
— Madelon - A Novel • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... their spring suits this very minute, and Martha was calculating to make them this week; and they'd have to have their first wear of them Sundays for a while before they start on them for school. I never was so behindhand; but what with fitting off Artemas and the spring cleaning being delayed, I didn't seem to know how to manage. Martha is good at making over, and there are two very good coats of Artemas's that she would do the right thing by; while there was a good many who could scrub and clean as well ...
— The Last of the Peterkins - With Others of Their Kin • Lucretia P. Hale
... reason," said Sheffield, "for he is sadly behindhand; but there is another cause of his steadiness which perhaps ...
— Loss and Gain - The Story of a Convert • John Henry Newman
... her son to take back the money he had received, if almost any other person in the village but Mr. Acres had been concerned. But he was well off, and influential; and, moreover, was her landlord; and, though she was behindhand with her rent, he never took the trouble to ask for it. The dog, too, would have been sent back if any one but Mr. Acres had given it to her son. As it was, she contented herself with merely reprimanding Dick for robbing the bird's nest, and enjoining ...
— Who Are Happiest? and Other Stories • T. S. Arthur
... to the national honour has been ascertained, appraised and duly exhibited by those persons whose place in the national economy it is to look after all that sort of thing, the common man will be found nowise behindhand about resenting the evil usage of which he so, by force of interpretation, ...
— An Inquiry Into The Nature Of Peace And The Terms Of Its Perpetuation • Thorstein Veblen
... Dominion guaranteed bonds of the Canadian Northern system to the extent of fifty-six millions; from 1912 to 1914, under Sir Robert Borden, it endorsed the Canadian Northern's notes for forty-nine millions more. Nor were the provinces behindhand. Mainly in the seven years from 1908, the five westernmost provinces pledged their credit on behalf of the same system to the astounding amount of over one hundred and thirty millions, British Columbia ...
— The Railway Builders - A Chronicle of Overland Highways • Oscar D. Skelton
... who go out and do such work and the authorities at home who deal with their collections. I remember a conversation in the hut during the last bad winter. Men were arguing fiercely that professionally they lost a lot by being down South, that they fell behindhand in current work, got out of the running and so forth. There is a lot in that. And then the talk went on to the publication of results, and the way in which they would wish them done. A said he wasn't going ...
— The Worst Journey in the World, Volumes 1 and 2 - Antarctic 1910-1913 • Apsley Cherry-Garrard
... which, together with the good sale of my works, enables me to live without anxiety. Everything I write, I can sell immediately five times over, and also be well paid. * * * Oh! how happy should I now be if I had my perfect hearing, for I should then hasten to you. As it is, I must in all things be behindhand; my best years will slip away without bringing forth what, with my talent and my strength, I ought to have accomplished. I must now have recourse to sad resignation. I have, it is true, resolved not to worry about all this, but how is it possible? Yes, Amenda, if, six months hence, my malady ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. VI. • Editor-in-Chief: Kuno Francke
... perfect order and with matchless speed and precision they formed in line of battle, while drums and fifes announced their high spirits. The Christian fleet was slower in falling into line; some of the galleys and most of the galleasses were behindhand. Don John let drop some pious oaths, and sent swift vessels to hurry them up. At last they began to get into order. Barbarigo, the "left guide," hugged the coast with the left wing; Don John with the centre corps de bataille kept touch ...
— The Story of the Barbary Corsairs • Stanley Lane-Poole
... Dean Swift, he could knock down booksellers and silence bargees; he was melancholy almost to madness, 'radically wretched,' indolent, blinded, diseased. Poverty was long his portion; not that genteel poverty that is sometimes behindhand with its rent, but that hungry poverty that does not know where to look for its dinner. Against all these things had this 'old struggler' to contend; over all these things did this 'old struggler' prevail. Over even the fear of death, the giving up of this 'intellectual ...
— Obiter Dicta - Second Series • Augustine Birrell
... great elephants out of the forests; the East came bringing him the rich shawls, and spices, and teas, and the effulgence of diamonds, and the gleaming purity of large pearls. The ocean, not to be behindhand with the earth, yielded up her mighty whales, that Mr. Gathergold might sell their oil, and make a profit on it. Be the original commodity what it might, it was gold within his grasp. It might be ...
— Elson Grammer School Literature, Book Four. • William H. Elson and Christine Keck
... that Simmons has given me a cheque for three hundred and fifty pounds for the two. Of course, the creatures are thoroughbred, and may turn out worth a great deal more; still, in these days no one gives a fair price for anything, and three-fifty is not to be sneezed at when your rents are always behindhand and your balance at the ...
— Red Rose and Tiger Lily - or, In a Wider World • L. T. Meade
... would,' she said eagerly; 'but I don't know what would come of it. We're dreadfully behindhand this month, and if he were to go away, people would be down on us; they'd think he wanted to ...
— The History of David Grieve • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... his return it befell that King Anguish of Ireland sent to King Mark of Cornwall for the tribute due to Ireland, but which was now seven years behindhand. To whom King Mark sent answer, if he would have it he must send and fight for it, and they would find a ...
— The Legends Of King Arthur And His Knights • James Knowles
... along with him at all. He puts me out of temper, and if we both got angry, it would be very disagreeable. For, though he is the very best fellow in the world, when he is in a rage he is untamable. I cannot think what has put him out, now; for he has shot very well to-day. It is only when he gets behindhand, that he is usually jealous in his shooting; but he has got ...
— Warwick Woodlands - Things as they Were There Twenty Years Ago • Henry William Herbert (AKA Frank Forester)
... it's a girl at last," said the village gossips. "Mis' Miller's had a hard time with them four great boys, and Mr. Miller so behindhand allers." ...
— Saxe Holm's Stories • Helen Hunt Jackson
... unsteadily has this and all the other articles which compose that fund been applied to their purposes, that they have given the state but very little even of present relief, since it is known to the whole world that she is behindhand on every one of her establishments. Since the year 1763, there has been no operation of any consequence on the French finances; and in this enviable condition is France at present with regard to ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. I. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... and that the new Congress should meet on the first Wednesday in March. The State of New York, where Anti-Federalists swarmed, did not follow the decree—with the result that that State, which had been behindhand in signing the Declaration of Independence, failed through the intrigues of the Anti-Federalists to choose electors, and so had no part in the choice of Washington as President of the United States. The other ten States performed their duty on time. They elected Washington ...
— George Washington • William Roscoe Thayer
... done no good to anyone.—I have been thinking of paying you a visit this fall, but I now think it extremely doubtful whether I shall be able to. Not being able to even attend to my hands, much less work myself, I am getting behindhand, so that I shall have to stay here and attend to my business. Cannot some of you come and pay us a visit? Jennie has not answered Julia's letter yet. Did she receive it? I was coming to the city ...
— Letters of Ulysses S. Grant to His Father and His Youngest Sister, - 1857-78 • Ulysses S. Grant
... lose an opportunity &c. 135; be kept waiting, dance attendance; kick one's heels, cool one's heels; faire antichambre[Fr][obs3]; wait impatiently; await &c. (expect) 507; sit up, sit up at night. Adj. late, tardy, slow, behindhand, serotine[obs3], belated, postliminious[obs3], posthumous, backward, unpunctual, untimely; delayed, postponed; dilatory &c. (slow) 275; delayed &c. v.; in abeyance. Adv. late; lateward[obs3], backward; late in the day; at sunset, at ...
— Roget's Thesaurus
... one's-self in doe-skins made for seven-pence a pair; but the cries of 'There's a figure! there's a shape!' must make the trowsers rather dear to any one who wishes to walk about peaceably, unmolested by this species of street-criticism.' Under the head of 'Bolsters for Behindhand Botanists,' we find these original questions and answers: 'What are the most difficult roots to extract from the ground?' The cube-root. 'What is the pistil of a flower?' It is that instrument with which the flower shoots. 'What is meant by the word stamina?' It means the pluck or courage which ...
— The Knickerbocker, or New-York Monthly Magazine, February 1844 - Volume 23, Number 2 • Various
... governed, himself, by law. Description of the Moral Exercise. Prejudice. The scholars' written remarks, and the teacher's comments. The spider. List of subjects. Anonymous writing. Specimens. Marks of a bad scholar. Consequences of being behindhand. New scholars. A ...
— The Teacher - Or, Moral Influences Employed in the Instruction and - Government of the Young • Jacob Abbott
... generally manifest great civility and respect to me in this business of my son; so did the citizens of Oxford; and the scholars were not behindhand in the expression of their favour and good opinion of me and my son, and they stood stoutly and generally for my son to be one of the knights for the county. Thus was my interest at this time sufficient to make another to be knight of the shire; yet when my condition fell, my interest fell with it, ...
— A Journal of the Swedish Embassy in the Years 1653 and 1654, Vol II. • Bulstrode Whitelocke
... grace, or a daughter were a goddess, he should take his choice. O admirable man! Paris, Paris is dirt to him, and I warrant Helen, to change, would give money to boot.' This is the language he addresses to his niece; nor is she much behindhand in coming into the plot. Her head is as light and fluttering as her heart. It is the prettiest villain, she fetches her breath so short as a new-ta'en sparrow.' Both characters are originals, and quite different from what they are in Chaucer. In Chaucer, Cressida is represented ...
— Characters of Shakespeare's Plays • William Hazlitt
... leads, far be it from me to seem behindhand," said the other, much ruffled, as she gathered her sheet about her. By the way she said it, one saw that she and Mrs. Parachute did not call. She bowed to Lady Arabel, and became satirical, even arch. "Good afternoon, Mrs.—er—, I am assured that the moment is not solemn, and therefore solemn ...
— Living Alone • Stella Benson
... occasionally some high official of the Porte appears at formal receptions; but on the whole the society is diplomatic, and depends almost entirely upon the diplomatists for its existence and for its diversions. The lead once given, the old Greek aristocrats have not been behindhand in following it; but their numbers are small, and the movement and interest in Pera, or on the Bosphorus, centre in the great embassies, as they do nowhere else ...
— Paul Patoff • F. Marion Crawford
... work on the making of "steam coaches" to travel on the highways. Captain Ogle coming here on one of his own inventing September 8th, 1832, direct from Oxford, having travelled at from ten to fourteen miles per hour. Our local geniuses were not behindhand, and Messrs. Heaton Bros., and the well-known Dr. Church brought out machines for the purpose. Both parties started joint-stock companies to carry out their inventions, and in that respect both parties succeeded, for such was the run for shares, that in June, 1833, ...
— Showell's Dictionary of Birmingham - A History And Guide Arranged Alphabetically • Thomas T. Harman and Walter Showell
... which offer'd, La Fleur had laid hold of it; and, in order to do honour to his master, had taken him into a back parlour in the auberge, and treated him with a cup or two of the best wine in Picardy; and the Count de L-'s servant, in return, and not to be behindhand in politeness with La Fleur, had taken him back with him to the Count's hotel. La Fleur's PREVENANCY (for there was a passport in his very looks) soon set every servant in the kitchen at ease with him; and as a Frenchman, whatever be his talents, has no sort of prudery in showing ...
— A Sentimental Journey • Laurence Sterne
... to be constantly dependent on his brother for defence, for his position with other boys at school,—as he grew up, for his position in life, even. Harry was the favorite always. The schoolmaster—or teacher, as we call him nowadays—liked Harry best, although he was always in scrapes, and often behindhand in his studies, while Ernest was punctual, quiet, and always knew his lessons, though his eyes looked dreamily through his books rather ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 10, No. 61, November, 1862 • Various
... that it really was a most delightful spot. In a very few minutes there were three mice tumbling about on the gravel, and then presently there were two more, for other windows opened on the flat roof also, and Nibble and Brighteyes were not the mice to be behindhand when any fun was going on. Ah! that was the way to get an appetite for breakfast. Jump, dance, run, tumble, till the rattle sounded from below; then whirr! downstairs all like a flock of pigeons. They never lost any time in getting from one ...
— Five Mice in a Mouse-trap - by the Man in the Moon. • Laura E. Richards
... was in general thought to rant dreadfully; that Mr. Yates was disappointed in Henry Crawford; that Tom Bertram spoke so quick he would be unintelligible; that Mrs. Grant spoiled everything by laughing; that Edmund was behindhand with his part, and that it was misery to have anything to do with Mr. Rushworth, who was wanting a prompter through every speech. She knew, also, that poor Mr. Rushworth could seldom get anybody to rehearse with him: his ...
— Persuasion • Jane Austen
... hear of us no oftener than we of you, you will be as much behindhand in news as my Lady Lyttelton. We have seen a traveller that saw you in your island,(356) but it sounds like hearing of Ulysses. Well! we must be content. YOU are not only not dethroned, but owe the safety ...
— Letters of Horace Walpole, V4 • Horace Walpole
... Thermometer. They are by writers engaged expressly for the respective subjects, because they will work cheaply and know but little of what they are writing about, and therefore make themselves the better understood by the equally ignorant. We do hope that they have not proved themselves behindhand in popular humbug and positive error, and that the blunders in "the Thermometer"[3] are equally as amusing as those of the then big-wig who wrote the treatise on "Animal Mechanics," published by our rival Society for ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 1, Complete • Various
... last great proverbs; and combine them in your mind. Remember that while England is, and ever will be, behindhand in metaphysical and scholastic science, she is the nation which above all others has conquered nature by obeying her; that as it pleased God that the author of that proverb, the father of inductive science, Bacon Lord Verulam, should have been an Englishman, so it has pleased ...
— Scientific Essays and Lectures • Charles Kingsley
... white whiskers. The former, I suspect, is a wig. The cheering was tremendous, but behind the royal carriage the cheers were always redoubled where the old Duke, the especial favourite hero, rode. When they got off their horses in the schoolyard, the Duke being by some mistake behindhand, was regularly hustled in the crowd, with no attendant ...
— Life of John Coleridge Patteson • Charlotte M. Yonge
... [Roosevelt wrote to Lodge on August 10th], offering to try to raise some companies of horse-riflemen out here, in the event of trouble with Mexico. Won't you telegraph me at once if war becomes inevitable? Out here things are so much behindhand that I might not hear of things for a week. I have not the least idea there will be any trouble, but as my chances of doing anything in the future worth doing seem to grow continually smaller, ...
— Roosevelt in the Bad Lands • Hermann Hagedorn
... Higgins," he said; "Higgins of Edge Farm. He has been very unfortunate. He was ill himself last autumn, and his children had scarlet fever. I can't say that he is a very good manager, but he has had ill-luck, and of course he is behindhand in many ways. He is in trouble about his rent now. Newick tells him if he doesn't pay it, he must leave the place; and of course that would be a very serious matter. His wife is ill, and he came to me yesterday to beg me to see about it, and ask you ...
— Little Lord Fauntleroy • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... have to make up at school for this long holiday," reminded Cousin Clare. "I'm afraid you'll find yourself terribly behindhand when ...
— The Princess of the School • Angela Brazil
... Paradise Street was not behindhand in the matter of entertainment: there was a wedding festival in progress, and, at the modest cafe, a thick concourse of men talking and singing and enjoying life after their own fashion; only the house ...
— The Pointing Man - A Burmese Mystery • Marjorie Douie
... desk, overlooking the pupils, or stalked about the room with a certain awful birch rod in his hand. Now came a rap over the shoulders of a boy whom Mr. Toil had caught at play; now he punished a whole class who were behindhand with their lessons; and, in short, unless a lad chose to attend constantly to his book, he had no chance of enjoying a quiet moment in the schoolroom ...
— De La Salle Fifth Reader • Brothers of the Christian Schools
... can be actually met in most cases only by the States themselves, but it would be well for the Nation to endeavor to secure and publish comprehensive information as to the conditions of the labor of children in the different States, so as to spur up those that are behindhand and to secure approximately uniform legislation of a high character among the several States. In such a Republic as ours the one thing that we cannot afford to neglect is the problem of turning out decent citizens. The future ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various
... the other, "he is not at all behindhand, and I lose nearly as many cattle as I get. But it gives me much more pleasure to kill one of his buffaloes or llamas, than it does pain me when he kills one of mine. I consider how much it will vex him, and that some ...
— A Voyage to the Moon • George Tucker
... although they are behindhand in some of their methods of cultivation, (e.g. their failure to adopt the use of the plough in the greater portion of the district); they are thoroughly aware of the uses of manures. Their system of turning the sods, allowing them to dry, ...
— The Khasis • P. R. T. Gurdon
... his friends; else we shall be apt to suspect that he has taken a sip too much of his Canary wine, in his extreme deliberation which cask it were best to broach in honor of the day! But since he is so much behindhand, I will give him ...
— The House of the Seven Gables • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... rammed it home, and discharged it upon me, Tommy, his target, but he pretends that he was always in possession of it, and made nothing of it,—that he imbibed it with mother's milk,—and that I, the wretched Tommy, am most abjectly behindhand in not having done the same. I ask, why is Tommy to be always the foil of Mr. Barlow to this extent? What Mr. Barlow had not the slightest notion of himself, a week ago, it surely cannot be any very heavy backsliding in me not ...
— The Uncommercial Traveller • Charles Dickens
... the spot, as I have set them down here. This is only a Journal in so far as it is a record of days, as faithful as I could make it in every detail, and as direct as circumstances allowed. But circumstances seldom did allow, and I was always behindhand with my Journal—a week behind with the first day of the seventeen, four months ...
— A Journal of Impressions in Belgium • May Sinclair
... scorning to be behindhand in loyalty as well as activity, he became a member of the Clerkenwell Volunteers, and was placed in the light company, in which capacity he obtained the character not only of being the cleanest man, but the ...
— Real Life In London, Volumes I. and II. • Pierce Egan
... the petrels went north-eastward, it began to blow right hard; for the old gentleman in the grey great-coat, who looks after the big copper boiler, in the gulf of Mexico, had got behindhand with his work; so Mother Carey had sent an electric message to him for more steam; and now the steam was coming, as much in an hour as ought to have come in a week, puffing and roaring and swishing and swirling, till you could not see where the sky ...
— The Water-Babies - A Fairy Tale for a Land-Baby • Charles Kingsley
... letter I received from my friend. On the morning of his death the following month he spoke of being behindhand with his December letter and of his intention to write ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 25 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... the canoe which had set out from us had arrived in their country, and that their companions, wearied by their journey, were resting, and that they would soon arrive, in fulfilment of the promise they had made; that at most they would not be more than eight days behindhand, but that there would be only twenty-four canoes, as one of their captains and many of their comrades had died of a fever that had broken out among them. They also said that they had sent many to the war, which ...
— Voyages of Samuel de Champlain V3 • Samuel de Champlain
... it for you, or go a pilgrimage to our Lady at Loretto," said Bridget, determined not to be behindhand in her curiosity. So she set her woman's wits immediately to work; yet she saw her mistress daily losing strength, and no clue was obtained by which to know the interpretation of the vision. She consulted her confessor; but he was equally at a loss with herself, ...
— Traditions of Lancashire, Volume 2 (of 2) • John Roby
... green turf, shaded by fine forest-trees, winding walks amidst sweet-scented flowering shrubs, and arbours nestling in retired corners, inviting retreats for study and meditation, comprised an ideal spot for one who loved the surroundings of Nature. Nor was the house itself behindhand in offering special attractions for the purposes of study and recreation, in addition to the more solid requirements of comfort and accommodation. The rooms were spacious and elegant, and comprised one large apartment perfectly ...
— Story-Lives of Great Musicians • Francis Jameson Rowbotham
... 'stick a bit o' holly i' yon pig's mouth, that's the way we do things i' Newcassel; but folks is so behindhand in Monkshaven. It's a fine thing to live in a large town, Sylvia; an' if yo're looking out for a husband, I'd advise yo' to tak' one as lives in a town. I feel as if I were buried alive comin' ...
— Sylvia's Lovers, Vol. I • Elizabeth Gaskell
... amidst this mass of confused, half-forgotten incidents, Pierre was conscious of the rise of a vivid vision. Ill-health, he remembered, had again compelled him to take a holiday. He had just completed his twenty-fourth year, he was greatly behindhand, having so far only secured the four minor orders; but on his return a sub-deaconship would be conferred on him, and an inviolable vow would bind him for evermore. And the Guersaints' little garden at Neuilly, whither he had formerly so often gone to play, again distinctly appeared ...
— The Three Cities Trilogy, Complete - Lourdes, Rome and Paris • Emile Zola
... seed. He did not wonder that the seeding on Los Muertos seemed to be hastily conducted. Magnus and Harran Derrick had not yet been able to make up the time lost at the beginning of the season, when they had waited so long for the ploughs to arrive. They had been behindhand all the time. On Annixter's ranch, the land had not only been harrowed, as well as seeded, but in some cases, cross-harrowed as well. The labour of putting in the vast crop was over. Now there was nothing to do but wait, while the seed silently germinated; ...
— The Octopus • Frank Norris
... one torrid day, remarked wonderingly that Mrs. Lancaster gave "nary a whimper." The latter looked up with a smile. "I don't think I'm sick enough," she said. "Other people, worse off, have a right to groan." Dallas, certain that Marylyn's heartache was the keener, would not be behindhand in restraint. And her sister's happiness, forethought, and desire to please, all drove the thrust of penitence to the hilt, and turned the knife in ...
— The Plow-Woman • Eleanor Gates
... would be no paddy to cut, none to keep in the store-room of the house. He feared that his wife would have no rice, nor Saidjah himself, who was still a child, nor his little brothers and sisters. And the district chief too would accuse him to the Assistant Resident if he was behindhand in the payment of his land taxes, for this is punished by the law. Saidjah's father then took a poniard which was an heirloom from his father. The poniard was not very handsome, but there were silver bands round the sheath, and at the end ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern — Volume 11 • Various
... Being five years behindhand for their wages (court musicians) But fit she should live where he hath a mind Gladder to have just now received it (than a promise) Most homely widow, but young, and pretty rich, and good natured No Parliament can, as he says, be ...
— Widger's Quotations from The Diary of Samuel Pepys • David Widger
... haven't. You know we're always behindhand. It's been fine, open weather for husking, too. But at least we've got rid of that miserable Jerry; so there's something to be thankful for. He had one of his fits of temper in town one day, when he was hitching up to come home, and Leonard Dawson saw him beat one ...
— One of Ours • Willa Cather
... emoluments attached to the Royal band, according to Samuel Pepys, appear to have been somewhat irregular. In the Diary, December 19, 1666, we read: "Talked of the King's family with Mr. Kingston, the organist. He says many of the musique are ready to starve, they being five years behindhand for their wages; nay, Evens, the famous man upon the Harp, having not his equal in the world, did the other day die for mere want, and was fain to be buried at the alms of the parish, and carried to his grave in the dark at night without one linke, but that Mr. Kingston met it by chance, and did ...
— The Violin - Its Famous Makers and Their Imitators • George Hart
... there and four hours back, that makes eight hours; it is now two o'clock, he'll be here at ten. No doubt he thought I was angry and sent Kutyfalvi on before. It was very nice of him to show me such respect. Well, I'll not be behindhand in expressing my regret for my hastiness—asking his pardon; and from henceforth we will be good friends and kinsmen, and I shall be able to rest in the Lord with ...
— A Hungarian Nabob • Maurus Jokai
... for an hour's delicious discussion, but she interrupted it to say soothingly, "It was her cousin, Dad, who's going to be married, and she's been trying to get hold of just the right person—she says she's fearfully behindhand—" ...
— Mother • Kathleen Norris
... for your portion, the modest fellow,' added James. 'Ay, and that's not all. There's the MacAlpin threats me with all his clan if I dinna give you to him; and Mackay is not behindhand, but will come down with pibroch and braidsword and five hundred caterans to pay his court to you, and make short work of all others. My certie, sisters seem but a cause for threats from reivers, though maybe they would not be so uncivil ...
— Two Penniless Princesses • Charlotte M. Yonge
... Hagburn been heard from?" asked Septimius, who, involved in his own pursuits, was altogether behindhand in the matters of the war,—shame to him ...
— Septimius Felton - or, The Elixir of Life • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... stinginess, which I did not deserve. I had to be economical with myself to meet my payments, which increased as the years went on, until they are so large that sometimes I have not been able to put the whole in the box at the end of the year, and I am behindhand now, but I keep an exact account, and shall make it ...
— Bessie's Fortune - A Novel • Mary J. Holmes
... consult one's pillow, sleep on it. lose an opportunity &c 135; be kept waiting, dance attendance; kick one's heels, cool one's heels; faire antichambre [Fr.]; wait impatiently; await &c (expect) 507; sit up, sit up at night. Adj. late, tardy, slow, behindhand, serotine^, belated, postliminious^, posthumous, backward, unpunctual, untimely; delayed, postponed; dilatory &c (slow) 275; delayed &c v.; in abeyance. Adv. late; lateward^, backward; late in the day; at sunset, at the eleventh ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... a prattle and titter around, wherein mingle tunes, not quite so low and sweet as the voice of Cordelia. Those energetic civilians never seem at rest or at ease; they snatch their frequent drinks, upstanding and covered, as if they were just a minute behindhand for some appointment, and bolt their food, as if dinner ...
— Border and Bastille • George A. Lawrence
... to be behindhand, having just come in for his lunch, ran out again without so much as wetting his stubbly white beard in the froth of the drawn quart of ale, and made away as fast as his stiff legs could carry him to where there was a steam ploughing engine ...
— Wood Magic - A Fable • Richard Jefferies
... I have begun too late. I am doing now what I ought to have done when I was a girl, and I have always the feeling of being behindhand." ...
— The Emancipated • George Gissing |
