"Parsimonious" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... office with regard to the freeman is managed by the freeman himself. The disorders which generally prevail in the economy of the rich, naturally introduce themselves into the management of the former; the strict frugality and parsimonious attention of the poor as naturally establish themselves in that of the latter. Under such different management, the same purpose must require very different degrees of expense to execute it. It appears, ...
— An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations • Adam Smith
... reminiscences mainly dwell on his lordship's changing moods and tempers and gymnastic exercises, his terror of interviewing strangers, his imperfect appreciation of art, his preference of fish to flesh, his almost parsimonious economy in small matters, mingled with allusions to his domestic calamities, and frequent expressions of a growing distaste to Venetian society. On leaving the city, Moore passed a second afternoon at La Mira, had a glimpse of Allegra, and the first intimation of the existence ...
— Byron • John Nichol
... L7288, and the King of the Belgians was to provide that sum, which was to be paid into a trust fund. In this and every other matter the King behaved towards Gordon in the most generous and cordial manner, furnishing a marked contrast with the grudging and parsimonious spirit of the British Government towards Gordon in China, at the Cape, and now again when destined ...
— The Life of Gordon, Volume II • Demetrius Charles Boulger
... person, of inexpensive habits, she began forthwith to save, and, perhaps, to be a little parsimonious, in favour of her boy. There were no entertainments, of course, at Fairoaks, during the year of her weeds. Nor, indeed, did the Doctor's silver dish-covers, of which he was so proud, and which were flourished all over with the arms of the Pendennises, ...
— The History of Pendennis • William Makepeace Thackeray
... 1642, which met in the spring (April, I think), but was summarily dissolved. A small quarto volume, of not unfrequent occurrence, I believe, contains some good specimens of the eloquence then prevalent—it was rich in thought, never wordy—in fact, too parsimonious in words and illustrations; and it breathed a high tone of religious principle as well as of pure-minded patriotism; but, for the reason stated above—its narrow circuit and very limited duration—the general character of the Parliamentary eloquence ...
— The Uncollected Writings of Thomas de Quincey—Vol. 1 - With a Preface and Annotations by James Hogg • Thomas de Quincey
... the Valais and even in some of the mountain districts of Italy, such as Friuli, the age of puberty for both sexes is quite as much later than in the heart of the towns, where, in order to gratify their vanity, people are often extremely parsimonious in the matter of food, and where most people, in the words of the proverb, have a velvet coat and an empty belly. It is astonishing to find in these mountainous regions big lads as strong as a man with shrill voices and smooth chins, and tall ...
— Emile • Jean-Jacques Rousseau
... young girl. For an instant the thought of confiding all to her parents entered her brain; but she rejected the idea almost as soon as she had conceived it, for she felt that her father would believe that the parsimonious Duke de Champdoce would never consent to such a marriage, and that her entire liberty would be taken from her, and that she might even be sent back ...
— The Champdoce Mystery • Emile Gaboriau
... of the noble family of that name. He passed his youth in contracted circumstances, which gave him early those parsimonious habits which in after-life never forsook him; so that, with one windfall or another, about the time I knew him he was master of four or five hundred thousand pounds; nor did he look, or walk, worth a moidore less. He lived in a gloomy house opposite the pump in Serjeant's-inn, Fleet-street. J., ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb, Volume 2 • Charles Lamb
... especially the case where each supplies what is most needed in the other. Some natures require sedatives and others tonics; and it will often be found in a happy marriage that the union of two dissimilar natures stimulates the idle and inert, moderates the impetuous, gives generosity to the parsimonious and order to the extravagant, imparts the spirit of caution or the spirit of enterprise which is most needed, and corrects, by contact with a healthy and cheerful nature, the morbid ...
— The Map of Life - Conduct and Character • William Edward Hartpole Lecky
... was parsimonious. Louise washed the caterer's dishes—he made a reduction in his price. Thus she learned that a late breakfast took the place of luncheon. She began to feel what this meant. The beds had been made; but there was work enough. She helped Mme. Remy to sponge a heap ...
— Americans All - Stories of American Life of To-Day • Various
... Curriculum includes Matrimony as a Fine Art, Post-Marriage Courtship, Elementary and Advanced Studies in Conjugal Harmony, Easy Lessons in the Gentle Craft of Eating Her Experimental Bread, Practical Analysis of the Club-Habit, with special course for wives in the Abstract Science of Honeyfugling Parsimonious Husbands. Diploma qualifies for highest positions. Our ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume IX (of X) • Various
... star. "A writ of inquisition, you might as well substitute. The act of a polluted, impecunious, parsimonious,—what shall I say? Well, I will be as simple as possible: hotel keeper. In other words, a damnation blighter, sir. Ninety-seven dollars and forty cents. For that pitiful amount he ...
— Green Fancy • George Barr McCutcheon
... positive colour will tell—as in the midst of stillness a pin falling to the ground will be heard. Cuyp has this quality in a high degree, only on another scale—a uniformity of unbroken tone, and in masses of half-tint only, like a few sparkles of light touches, dealt out with the most parsimonious pencil, producing a glitter like so many diamonds. This it is that prevents a work from being heavy, for by their fewness they require not the aid of black grounds to give them consequence, and by their being touched upon colours ...
— Rembrandt and His Works • John Burnet
... said the portly lady. "The wife of Captain Tinong is very parsimonious—she has never sent us presents, though we have been to her house. When such a person lets slip a little present of a ...
— An Eagle Flight - A Filipino Novel Adapted from Noli Me Tangere • Jose Rizal
... Thacker. "You'll have to keep close until we get the bird on you. You can live in the back room here. I do my own cooking, and I'll make you as comfortable as a parsimonious Government ...
— Roads of Destiny • O. Henry
... loopholes in a contract in a fashion to take the average backwoodsman off his feet. "Yankee tricks" became, indeed, a household phrase wherever New Englander and Southerner met. Whether the Yankee talked or kept silent, whether he was generous or parsimonious, he ...
— The Old Northwest - A Chronicle of the Ohio Valley and Beyond, Volume 19 In - The Chronicles Of America Series • Frederic Austin Ogg
... unfinished plates, then finished them, and after having used them, made some slight alterations, and thus sold the same works three or four times; producing what connoisseurs term variations in prints. By these practices, and his parsimonious manner of living, Rembrandt amassed ...
— Anecdotes of Painters, Engravers, Sculptors and Architects and Curiosities of Art (Vol. 3 of 3) • S. Spooner
... master, the King, might deem proper. The British and Nepaul governments had expressed themselves satisfied; but other parties had become deeply interested in the dispute. The King, with many good qualities, was a very parsimonious man, who prided himself upon adding something every month to his reserved treasury; and he thought, that advantage should be taken of the occasion, to get a large sum out of so wealthy a family. Three of his wives, Hoseynee Khanum, Mosahil Khanum, and Sakeena ...
— A Journey through the Kingdom of Oude, Volumes I & II • William Sleeman
... oppressed the people. His expensive taste for building almost exhausted the resources of the empire. Heavy custom tolls, taxes on the food and industry of the poor, the exercise of intolerable monopolies, were not excused or compensated for by the parsimonious saving in the salaries of court officials, and even in the pay of the soldiers. His stately edifices were cemented with the blood and treasures of his people, and the rapacity and luxury of the emperor were imitated by the ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol XI. • Edited by Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton
... aged and unaccustomed to interference, had to render accounts of his trusteeship to this young man, and was incensed. The estate was proved at over thirty-five thousand pounds. In the main, Sophia had been careful, and had even been parsimonious. She had often told Constance that they ought to spend money much more freely, and she had had a few brief fits of extravagance. But the habit of stern thrift, begun in 1870 and practised without any intermission ...
— The Old Wives' Tale • Arnold Bennett
... distance above the fall there projected from the water a rock which had, by parsimonious saving during a long course of years, hoarded a little soil, out of which a small tuft of bushes struggled to support a decent vegetable existence. The high waters had nearly submerged it, but a few slender twigs were seen above ...
— The Guardian Angel • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... the more civilised man appears. He does not shoot naturally, but he learns by patient practice. He is not so tough as the Pathan, but he delights in feats of strength—wrestling, running, or swimming. He is a much cleaner soldier and more careful. He is frequently parsimonious, and always thrifty, and does not generally feed himself as well as the Pathan. [Indeed in some regiments the pay of very thin Sikhs is given them in the form of food, and they have to be carefully watched by their officers till they get fat ...
— The Story of the Malakand Field Force • Sir Winston S. Churchill
... the old gentleman and his wife—this dispute as to which should be most parsimonious—was typical of their whole course of life. If one saved cheese-parings, the other would go without cheese at all, and be content with dry bread. They lived—indeed, harder than their own labourers, and it sometimes happened that the food they thought good enough was refused by a cottager. ...
— Hodge and His Masters • Richard Jefferies
... parsimonious phrase and copious sense, has thus compressed the result of an historical dissertation: he derives our ancient Christmas sports at once from the true, though remote, source. "Christmas succeeds the Saturnalia; the same time, the same number of holy-days; then the master waited upon the servant, ...
— Curiosities of Literature, Vol. II (of 3) - Edited, With Memoir And Notes, By His Son, The Earl Of Beaconsfield • Isaac D'Israeli
... to which they and she had been born. The only one who was self-respecting among the lot was old 'Eliza Countess' as they designated her. It struck Bridget that Eliza Countess and Colin McKeith had points of character in common—it was true they both came from Glasgow. She thought of the parsimonious rectitude—which had of course included linen sheets and fine porcelain and shining silver—of old Lady Gaverick's establishment, of its stuffy conventionality—though that had been soothing sometimes after a dose of Upper Bohemia; and Bridget ...
— Lady Bridget in the Never-Never Land • Rosa Praed
... was a searching one, for an important London newspaper had hinted that, owing to the parsimonious policy of the Admiralty, certain of their aeroplanes were not of the same stability as those owned by private individuals. Hence the authorities at Whitehall had set themselves ...
— The White Lie • William Le Queux
... rainy day, provide against a rainy day, save against a rainy day; feather one's nest; look after the main chance. cut costs. Adj. economical, frugal, careful, thrifty, saving, chary, spare, sparing; parsimonious &c.819. ...
— Roget's Thesaurus
... complacently, all the while she kept right on renovating the Little Girl's personal appearance, smoothing a wrinkled stocking, tucking up obstreperous white ruffles, tugging down parsimonious purple hems, loosening a pinchy hook, tightening a wobbly button. Very slowly, very complacently the Little Girl drowsed off to sleep with her weazened little iron-cased legs stretched stiffly out before her. "Poor little legs! Poor little legs! ...
— The White Linen Nurse • Eleanor Hallowell Abbott
... bed. It's made considerable work for nothin'." She eyed, as she spoke, the two children, who were happily eating the peach preserve. She and her brother were both quite well-to-do, but she had a parsimonious turn. ...
— Jane Field - A Novel • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... whatever she could. Prue was still aloll on a bed of ease. Even to waken her was to waken a March wind. The moment she was up she would have everybody running errands for her. She would be lavish in complaint and parsimonious of help. And yet she was a dear! She did enjoy her morning sleep so well. It would be a pity to disturb her. The rescuing thought came to Serina that Prue loved to take a long hot bath on Monday mornings, because on wash-day there was always a plenty of hot ...
— In a Little Town • Rupert Hughes
... youth of sixteen years, I fear it must be admitted that I was unnaturally parsimonious, and a good deal of what schoolboys used to call a smug and a swatter. It really was curious, because I do not recall that I had any ambition to be actually rich. Mr. Smiles and his Self Help would have left me cold if I had read that classic. I indulged no ...
— The Record of Nicholas Freydon - An Autobiography • A. J. (Alec John) Dawson
... answer the questions of the Government, and left things exactly in their previous state. He then proceeded to give his opinion as to what reforms should be made in the practice of vivisection. The greatest physiologists, he remarked, such as Harvey, Asselli, Haller, were parsimonious and discreet in their use of vivisection. To-day we have before our eyes a very different spectacle. Under pretence of experimentally demonstrating physiology, the professor no longer ascends the rostrum; he places himself before a vivisecting-table, ...
— An Ethical Problem - Or, Sidelights upon Scientific Experimentation on Man and Animals • Albert Leffingwell
... which had come to such a deplorable and dangerous end; and, for some time after, the entire community of "Penguin Castle," with the exception of the penguins themselves, feasted upon bunnies ad libitum, until they could say, as did the servants of that parsimonious nobleman who fed them ...
— The Wreck of the Nancy Bell - Cast Away on Kerguelen Land • J. C. Hutcheson
... grown to be bad (of late years the price of stock had been steadily falling; and the hay harvests had drifted from bad to worse) the widow Garstin no longer kept any labouring men; but lived, she and her son, year in and year out, in a close parsimonious way. ...
— Victorian Short Stories • Various
... is true; but, if we look into the conduct of such men in other respects, I believe we shall generally find their avarice proceeds from their prodigality;—they are lavish in the purchase of pleasures, and must therefore be parsimonious in acts of generosity and justice:—they are guilty of meanness in some things, only for the sake of making a great figure in others; and are not ashamed to be accounted niggards, where they ought to be liberal, in order to acquire the reputation of open-handedness, where ...
— Life's Progress Through The Passions - Or, The Adventures of Natura • Eliza Fowler Haywood
... they leave it in a barren condition, and resort to other parts. A competition under such circumstances resembles that of two men of equal income, one of who appears wealthy by spending a portion of his capital, the other parsimonious by living within his means. Of course, the latter has to debar himself of many enjoyments. The British farmer has lessened the produce of grain, and consequently of meat; and the nation has become dependent upon foreigners ...
— Landholding In England • Joseph Fisher
... sir." The expression of Jakoff's face and the way in which he twitched his fingers showed that this order had given him great satisfaction. He was a serf, and a most zealous, devoted one, but, like all good bailiffs, exacting and parsimonious to a degree in the interests of his master. Moreover, he had some queer notions of his own. He was forever endeavouring to increase his master's property at the expense of his mistress's, and to prove that ...
— Childhood • Leo Tolstoy
... form seemed to please him best;—perhaps because it involved the least risk; for Dammit had become excessively parsimonious. Had any one taken him up, his head was small, and thus his loss would have been small too. But these are my own reflections and I am by no means sure that I am right in attributing them to him. At all events the phrase in question grew daily ...
— The Works of Edgar Allan Poe - Volume 5 (of 5) of the Raven Edition • Edgar Allan Poe
... spots of Gold and Purple, azure and green: These as a line thir long dimension drew, 480 Streaking the ground with sinuous trace; not all Minims of Nature; some of Serpent kinde Wondrous in length and corpulence involv'd Thir Snakie foulds, and added wings. First crept The Parsimonious Emmet, provident Of future, in small room large heart enclos'd, Pattern of just equalitie perhaps Hereafter, join'd in her popular Tribes Of Commonaltie: swarming next appeer'd The Femal Bee that feeds her Husband Drone 490 Deliciously, ...
— The Poetical Works of John Milton • John Milton
... finish." In all the fighting the English showed that they had grasped the essential ideas of the new warfare, and proved themselves better sailors and better gunners, but the number of the ships they took or destroyed was insignificant. Howard was so crippled by parsimonious mismanagement on the part of his Government that he had to be content with "half-doings," instead of decisive results. But there was worse mismanagement on the Spanish side, and this led first ...
— Famous Sea Fights - From Salamis to Tsu-Shima • John Richard Hale
... there is an old proverb that says, 'Traveling trains youth.' My faith! you are not wrong after all, and life is sweet. That's the reason why I take such care you shall not deprive me of mine. There only remains, then, the question of the five shillings to be settled. You think me rather parsimonious, don't you? That's because I don't care to leave you the means of corrupting your jailers. Besides, you will always have your charms left to seduce them with. Employ them, if your check with regard to Felton has not disgusted you with attempts ...
— The Three Musketeers • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... which stirred the young observer's interest was the great man's great love. The most parsimonious and mercantile of beings, he had married a poor beauty when fair creatures with fortunes smiled upon him on every side; the most indomitable of spirits, the warrior of whom armies stood in awe, he was ...
— His Grace of Osmonde • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... he was genial and jovial, both lavish and parsimonious,—this latter characteristic being the curious survival of the trait of the ancestors to which he owed his millions. He was growing even heavier, and decidedly ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... better time, when the country was not so parsimonious and the Circumlocution Office was not so badgered. He wound and wound folds of white cravat round his neck, as he wound and wound folds of tape and paper round the neck of the country. His wristbands and collar were oppressive; his voice and manner were oppressive. He had a ...
— Little Dorrit • Charles Dickens
... visit Boston, was bewildering. This static condition of the population was a constant source of wonder to us. How could people stay all their lives in one place? Must be something the matter with them.—Their ox-teams and tipcarts amused us, their stony fields appalled us, their restricted, parsimonious lives saddened us, and so, not wishing to be a burden, we decided ...
— A Son of the Middle Border • Hamlin Garland
... with my parsimonious past that I sent word home to my mother to call in the boys of the neighbourhood and give to them all my collections. I never even cared to learn what boys got what collections. I was a man now, and I made a clean sweep of everything that bound ...
— John Barleycorn • Jack London
... men to the intolerable pride arrogance vanity and luxury of the women, who strictly adhering to the rules of modern education seem to employ their whole stock of invention in contriving new arts of profusion, faster than the most parsimonious husband can afford; and to compass this work the more effectually, their universal maxim is to despise and detest everything of the growth and manufacture of their own country, and most to value whatever comes from the very remotest ...
— The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, D.D., Vol. VII - Historical and Political Tracts—Irish • Jonathan Swift
... driving Rebecca to the Temperance station. He could not understand her sad face or the tears that rolled silently down her cheeks from time to time; for Hannah had always represented her aunt Miranda as an irascible, parsimonious old woman, who would be no loss to the world whenever she should elect ...
— Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... she was the only representative of a very old family. She was a widow with a little daughter of six, very rich, and equally parsimonious. When Doctor Pascal Rougon called on her to ask payment of his fees, he allowed himself to be put off, and even gave advice regarding the health of the child. Le ...
— A Zola Dictionary • J. G. Patterson
... of point, and the three sisters—Lady Bertram, Mrs. Norris, and Mrs. Price—are all productions of the author's most delicately barbed satire. Mrs. Norris, indeed, is an instance of her complex characters so justly praised by Macaulay. One thinks of her mainly as parsimonious; but her parsimony would be worth much less than it is, if it were not set off by her servility to Sir Thomas, her brutality to Fanny, and her undisciplined fondness for her other nieces. Lady Bertram is formed for ...
— Jane Austen, Her Life and Letters - A Family Record • William Austen-Leigh and Richard Arthur Austen-Leigh
... only to stimulate the avarice of the rapacious Barbarians, who proceeded by threats, by blows, and by tortures to force from their prisoners the confession of hidden treasure. Visible splendor and expense were alleged as the proof of a plentiful fortune; the appearance of poverty was imputed to a parsimonious disposition; and the obstinacy of some misers, who endured the most cruel torments before they would discover the secret object of their affection, was fatal to many unhappy wretches, who expired under the lash for refusing to reveal ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to Prose, Vol. IV (of X)—Great Britain and Ireland II • Various
... whole, rather worse than George the First. George the Second was born at Hanover on October {274} 30, 1683, and was therefore in his forty-fourth year when he succeeded to the throne. He had still less natural capacity than his father. He was parsimonious; he was avaricious; he was easily put out of temper. His instincts, feelings, passions were all purely selfish. He had hot hatreds and but cool friendships. Personal courage was, perhaps, the only quality becoming a sovereign which George the Second possessed. He had served as a volunteer under Marlborough ...
— A History of the Four Georges, Volume I (of 4) • Justin McCarthy
... man of genius is stamping his own character on the minds of his own people. Take one instance, from others far more splendid, in the contrast presented by FRANKLIN and Sir WILLIAM JONES. The parsimonious habits, the money-getting precepts, the wary cunning, the little scruple about means, the fixed intent upon the end, of Dr. FRANKLIN, imprinted themselves on his Americans. Loftier feelings could not elevate a man of ...
— Literary Character of Men of Genius - Drawn from Their Own Feelings and Confessions • Isaac D'Israeli
... to the colonel, that the colonel should be introduced to the reader. He was a man of nearly sixty years of age, forty-five of which, with the exception of occasional furlough, had been passed in the country. Having held several lucrative situations for many years, and, although not parsimonious, being very prudent in money concerns, he had amassed a very large fortune. More than once he had returned to England on leave, and with the full intention of remaining there, if he could be comfortable; ...
— Newton Forster • Frederick Marryat
... private conduct without restraint? Can it enter into a reasonable mind to imagine, that men of every other nation are not equally masters of their own time or houses with ourselves, and equally at liberty to be parsimonious or profuse, frolick or sullen, abstinent or luxurious? Liberty is certainly necessary to the full play of predominant humours; but such liberty is to be found alike under the government of the many or the few, in ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson in Nine Volumes - Volume IV: The Adventurer; The Idler • Samuel Johnson
... 'As to it,' she continues, 'all the flattery I ever received from everybody together would not make up his sum. He said there was no name in poetry that might not be glad to own it. All this from Johnson, that parsimonious praiser!' He wrote of it to Mrs. Thrale on April 19, 1784:—'It is in my opinion a very great performance.' Piozzi Letters, ii. 364. Dr. Beattie wrote on July 31, 1784:—'Johnson told me with great solemnity that Miss More ...
— The Life Of Johnson, Volume 3 of 6 • Boswell
... Such cares as these never seem to afflict the English costermonger. So strongly did Mr. Mayhew find these characteristics marked among the Irish, that he is at times inclined to accuse them of carrying them too far, even to the display of a sordid and parsimonious spirit. According to him, they apply to the various "unions," or to the parish, even when they have money, or sometimes go with wretched food, dwelling, or clothing, in order to have a small fund laid by, in case of ...
— Irish Race in the Past and the Present • Aug. J. Thebaud
... of womanhood, the young, handsome, and now rich Sabbatai, went his lonely, parsimonious way, and a wondering band followed him, scarcely disturbing his loneliness by their reverential companionship. When he entered the sea, morning and night, summer and winter, all stood far off; by day he would pray ...
— Dreamers of the Ghetto • I. Zangwill
... father, who was very economical by nature, was extraordinarily cautious and, I may say, even parsimonious in charitable matters. It is of course easy to understand, if one considers the unlimited confidence which he enjoyed among the subscribers and the great moral responsibility which he could not but feel toward them. So that before undertaking anything he had himself ...
— Reminiscences of Tolstoy - By His Son • Ilya Tolstoy
... nature. Mr. Templeton Thorpe ordered a new suit of clothes for himself—or, to be quite precise, he instructed Wade to order it. He was in need of a new suit anyway, he said, and he had put off ordering it for a long, long time, not because he was parsimonious but because he did not like going up town for the "try-on." He also had a new silk hat made from his special block, and he would doubtless be compelled to have his hair trimmed up a bit about the nineteenth or twentieth, if the weather turned a trifle warmer. Of course, ...
— From the Housetops • George Barr McCutcheon
... confidence, that he had entitled himself to the divine favor; while the follower of Arius must have been tormented by the secret apprehension, that he was guilty, perhaps, of an unpardonable offence, by the scanty praise, and parsimonious honors, which he bestowed on the Judge of the World. The opinions of Arianism might satisfy a cold and speculative mind: but the doctrine of the Nicene creed, most powerfully recommended by the merits of faith and devotion, was ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 3 • Edward Gibbon
... elevator, reinforcements arrived, headed by a huge man in the black leather of the Literates' guard, who swung a three-foot length of fire hose with his right hand and fired a pistol with his left, and a boy in a black-and-red jacket who was letting off a burp gun in deliberate, parsimonious, bursts. It was a second or two before Cardon recognized them as Prestonby's bodyguard, Doug Yetsko, and Claire Pelton's brother Ray. There were four Literates' guards and about a dozen boys with them, all firing with a ...
— Null-ABC • Henry Beam Piper and John Joseph McGuire
... muggy, unventilated; narrow, cramped; close-mouthed, secretive, reticent, reserved, uncommunicative, taciturn; dense, solid, compact, imporous; near, adjacent, adjoining; intimate, confidential; parsimonious, stingy, penurious niggardly, miserly, illiberal, close-fisted; exact, literal, faithful; intent, ...
— Putnam's Word Book • Louis A. Flemming
... sufficient age to make choice of a profession. Finding, then, that he was unable to resist his propensity, he resolved to divest himself of the instrument and cause of his prodigality and lavishness, to divest himself of wealth, without which Alexander himself would have seemed parsimonious; and so calling us all three aside one day into a room, he addressed us in words somewhat to ...
— Don Quixote • Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
... of Henry were not kept with the splendour which characterised those of his rival and successor, Edward IV. Henry's habits were religious, and his house expenses parsimonious—sometimes necessarily so, for he was short of money. From the introduction to the "Paston Letters" (edited by Mr. James Gairdner) it appears that the king was in such impecunious circumstances in 1451 that he had to borrow ...
— Christmas: Its Origin and Associations - Together with Its Historical Events and Festive Celebrations During Nineteen Centuries • William Francis Dawson
... residence, because he hoped by his presence to lay on her impulsive and voluptuous disposition a restraint which should compel her not to overstep the bounds of custom and decency. Lady Richmond had accepted this offer of his palace because she was obliged to; inasmuch as the avaracious and parsimonious king gave his son's widow only a meagre income, and her own means she had squandered and lavishly thrown ...
— Henry VIII And His Court • Louise Muhlbach
... than his comrades would remind them that he had seen the old squirrel wriggle under the lash of the song. And so their wretched days of starvation were often made shorter by a more or less harmless attack on the poor skipper, who might only be the instrument of a parsimonious managing owner. But that was not the only method adopted of showing their dissatisfaction. The seaman who had the most flippant tongue and legal mind was chosen (or, as frequently happened, he selected himself) to introduce a deputation of the whole forecastle. ...
— The Shellback's Progress - In the Nineteenth Century • Walter Runciman
... emotion; but his temperament, though cold at the heart, thrilled at the approach of great and perilous enterprises, amidst which he rivalled his brother in activity and resourcefulness. Accordingly, his Viceroyalty of India moved Bonaparte to envy, patriotic Britons to rapturous applause, and the parsimonious Directors of the Company to carping criticisms. Those who deny to Pitt the gift of choosing able and inspiring men, forget that he made Wellesley Governor-General of India, and supported him in his quarrels with the India ...
— William Pitt and the Great War • John Holland Rose
... comedian, a stout, heavy-looking Englishman, of grave deportment, with no signs of wit or humor, yet aiming at both in conversation, in order to support his character. Very steady and regular in his life, and parsimonious in his disposition,—worth $ 50,000, made by his profession.—A clergyman, elderly, with a white neckcloth, very unbecoming, an unworldly manner, unacquaintance with the customs of the house, and learning ...
— Passages From The American Notebooks, Volume 1 • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... impoverished humanity? The age is like wine that tastes of the earth; your work must be the filter. The age is like an epileptic body convulsed with agonies; your work must be the healing hand that one lays on the diseased brow. When will you finally give, O parsimonious mortal? when ripen, tree? when flood ...
— The Goose Man • Jacob Wassermann
... wherever the eye falls. Each section of the vast expanse is a picture of tossed crests and complicated undulations. And over the whole sea of stationary billows, light is shed like an ethereal raiment, with spare colour—blue and grey, and parsimonious green—in the near foreground. The detail is somewhat dry and monotonous; for these so finely moulded hills are made up of washed earth, the immemorial wrecks of earlier mountain ranges. Brown villages, not unlike those of ...
— New Italian sketches • John Addington Symonds
... have been due in the first place to the rapid deterioration of rolling-stock and permanent way that could not be made good during the war, and has not been made good yet, but the real causes must be traced much farther back to the parsimonious and short-sighted railway policy of the Government of India for years past. Apart from the economic consequences, it is particularly unfortunate, even from the political point of view, that such ...
— India, Old and New • Sir Valentine Chirol
... character. 'His death was a misfortune for Florence, which it would be difficult to describe. Though young, he had the qualities of virtuous maturity. He bore a real affection toward the citizens, was parsimonious of the moneys of the Commune, prodigal of his own; while a foe to vice, he was not too severe on those who erred. Though he began his military life at twenty-three, he always bore the cuirass of a man at arms upon his shoulders day and night on active service. He slept very ...
— Renaissance in Italy, Volume 1 (of 7) • John Addington Symonds
... Whatever accession of income he obtained from his marriage, he lived up to; immediately, his establishment, his expenses, surpassed his revenue. His wife would not pay or advance a shilling beyond her stipulated quota to their domestic expenses. He could not hear the parsimonious manner in which she would have had him live, or the shabby style in which she received his friends. He was more profuse in proportion as she was more niggardly; and whilst she scolded and grudged every ...
— Tales And Novels, Vol. 8 • Maria Edgeworth
... the other deeper under the surface, and exactly contrary, the latter is often neglected. This was why the rapidly spent capital of the prodigal was supposed formerly to employ more labour than the invested savings of the parsimonious, and the purchase of native goods to encourage native industry more ...
— Analysis of Mr. Mill's System of Logic • William Stebbing
... requirements of the new thrift. I think it true that the wages are spent more prudently than of old. The sight of a drunken man begins to be unusual; he who does not belong to a "club" is looked upon as an improvident fool; but to imagine the people thus parsimonious for the pleasure of it is to imagine a vain thing. Their occasional outbursts of extravagance and generosity go to show that their innermost taste has not found a suitable outlet in wage-earning economy. That miserly "thrift" which is preached to them as the whole duty of "the Poor"—what ...
— Change in the Village • (AKA George Bourne) George Sturt
... gentleman was the only one in the family who took the least of the general happiness. He had got into a habit of being fretted about everything that happened, and he could not entirely divest himself of it even upon this occasion. His parsimonious turns, too, had considerably increased; and his only criterion of judging of anything was according ...
— Marriage • Susan Edmonstone Ferrier
... for his hospitality and benevolence; he was liberal to the poor, and generous in the aid which he administered to men of genius and talent, who often found a comfortable asylum under his roof. In his domestic economy he was frugal without being parsimonious. His hospitable board was ever ready for the reception of his friends; and, though he was himself abstemious in his diet, he seems to have been a lover of good wines, of which he received always the choicest varieties out of the Grand Duke's cellar. This peculiar taste, together ...
— The Martyrs of Science, or, The lives of Galileo, Tycho Brahe, and Kepler • David Brewster
... small bays, which add greatly to the beauty of the scenery. The chief town is St. Helier's,—its principal trade is with Newfoundland: ship-building is carried on extensively. The natives are kind, but thrifty and parsimonious." ...
— The World of Waters - A Peaceful Progress o'er the Unpathed Sea • Mrs. David Osborne
... psychology in the ordinary acceptance of the term can give us any clue to these variations in individuals. Yet successful persuasion depends upon as accurate a knowledge as possible of these very differences among people. The parsimonious salesman who takes it for granted that every one's motives are the same as his own, and, therefore, talks to every prospect about the money-saving possibilities of his commodity, will most certainly fail in trying to persuade those to purchase who ...
— Analyzing Character • Katherine M. H. Blackford and Arthur Newcomb
... pleasure of authentication and he was not the monopoly of having everything. He was not parsimonious and he ...
— Matisse Picasso and Gertrude Stein - With Two Shorter Stories • Gertrude Stein
... of the unlettered son of the ship-carver, as were Horace Vernet, Walter Scott, Andersen, and Mendelssohn; his casket of decorations was the amusement of his lady visitors; and his invitations were so constant that he could not always remember the name of his host: he was at once parsimonious and charitable, cheerful and melancholy. His artistic influence was very strong, exhibiting itself in the style of Tenerani, Galli, Rauch, Drake and Bissen. The life of him by Plon is methodical and complete, ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science - April, 1873, Vol. XI, No. 25. • Various
... the occasion—The young man quits France—Madame du Barry's letter to the comtesse d'Egmont—Quarrel with the marechal de Richelieu The comtesse d'Egmont was one day observed to quit her house attired with the most parsimonious simplicity; her head being covered by an enormously deep bonnet, which wholly concealed her countenance, and the rest of her person enveloped in a pelisse, whose many rents betrayed its long service. In this strange dress she traversed the streets of Paris in search of adventures. She ...
— "Written by Herself" • Baron Etienne Leon Lamothe-Langon
... twinkled. "I expect Sadie will bear the separation. For one thing, we lost our crop and she'll save money while I'm away. She's not parsimonious, but she hates to waste dollars, and must have found me expensive now and then. Then I mean to earn something, and can imagine her surprise when I ...
— The Girl From Keller's - Sadie's Conquest • Harold Bindloss
... ornaments of style, and every fact and sentiment offers itself to the fullest and most deliberate examination. It would appear, therefore, I think, somewhat strange if such writers as these should be found extremely common; since nature hath been a most parsimonious distributor of her richest talents, and hath seldom bestowed many on the same person. But, on the other hand, why there should scarce exist a single writer of this kind worthy our regard; and, whilst there is no other branch of history (for this is history) which hath not exercised ...
— Journal of A Voyage to Lisbon • Henry Fielding
... All the provision made by the present ecclesiastical constitution, for the inhabitants of about a hundred square miles, is a prayer and sermon in a little room, once in three weeks: and even this parsimonious distribution is at the mercy of the weather; and in those Islands where the Minister does not reside, it is impossible to tell how many weeks or months may pass without any ...
— A Journey to the Western Isles of Scotland • Samuel Johnson
... the time when he was working at his own statue —I entered his work-room and bade him good morning; he appeared as if he did not wish to notice me, and I stole softly away again. At breakfast he was very parsimonious in the use of words, and when somebody asked him to say something at all events, he ...
— The True Story of My Life • Hans Christian Andersen
... old, antiquated forerunner, precursor sew, embroider unload, exonerate grave, sepulcher readable, legible tell, narrate kiss, osculate nose, proboscis striking, percussion green, verdant stroke, concussion grass, verdure bowman, archer drive, propel greed, avarice book, volume stingy, parsimonious warrior, belligerent bath, ablution owner, proprietor wrong, incorrect bow, obeisance top, summit kneel, genuflection food, nutrition work, occupation seize, apprehend shut, ...
— The Century Vocabulary Builder • Creever & Bachelor
... immortalized his name. How much stronger and nobler the claims of Washington to immortality! In the impulses of mad, selfish ambition, Alexander acquired fame by wading to the conquest of the world through seas of blood. Washington, on the contrary, was parsimonious of the blood of his countrymen, stood forth the pure and virtuous champion of their rights, and formed for them, ...
— Life And Times Of Washington, Volume 2 • John Frederick Schroeder and Benson John Lossing
... Peyster, to the general envy, had led in his entertainment; there had been whispers of another international marriage. And then, after respectful adieus, the Duke had sailed away—and within a month the papers were giving columns to his scandalous escapades with a sensational Spanish dancer of parsimonious drapery. Whereupon the rumors of Mrs. De Peyster's previously gossiped-of marriage with the now notorious Duke were revived—by the subtle instigation, and as an act of social warfare, so Mrs. De Peyster believed, of her aspiring rival, Mrs. Allistair. And there was one faint ...
— No. 13 Washington Square • Leroy Scott
... has been admitted. Some of that few make a good use of them. But the vast majority are injured. They either become less active and industrious, or more parsimonious and miserly; and not a few become prodigals or bankrupts at once. In any of these events, they are of course unfitted for the essential purposes of human existence. It is not given to humanity to bear a sudden acquisition of wealth. The best of men are endangered by it. ...
— The Young Man's Guide • William A. Alcott
... merchants, as well as of all owners of property, is not to be conceived but by those who witnessed it. This critical period drew forth many examples of great and confiding liberality, as well as some of a very opposite character. Men of great wealth and parsimonious habits came and placed their whole fortunes at the disposal of their bankers in order to support their credit. For many days the evil continued to augment so rapidly, and the demands upon the Bank were so great and increasing; ...
— The Greville Memoirs - A Journal of the Reigns of King George IV and King William - IV, Volume 1 (of 3) • Charles C. F. Greville
... with soft fires in unextinguish'd urns, Cauldron'd in rock, innocuous Lava burns; On the bright lake YOUR gelid hands distil 160 In pearly mowers the parsimonious rill; And, as aloft the curling vapours rise Through the cleft roof, ambitious for the skies, In vaulted hills condense the tepid steams, And pour to HEALTH the medicated streams. 165 —So in green vales amid her mountains bleak BUXTONIA smiles, the Goddess-Nymyh of Peak; Deep in warm ...
— The Botanic Garden - A Poem in Two Parts. Part 1: The Economy of Vegetation • Erasmus Darwin
... his reckoning, have assured me, that though the youngest and poorest, he always obtained, without exacting it, a sort of deference or even submission from the rest of the company. Though never parsimonious, he was at that period of his life extremely attentive to the details of expense, the price of provisions, and of other necessary articles, and, in short, to every branch of domestic economy. The knowledge thus early acquired in such matters, ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Vol. 2, No. 8, January, 1851 • Various
... the gate, rode slowly through the park, casting a curious and hostile eye over the signs of parsimonious neglect which it presented. Sheep and cattle were feeding in part of it; part of it was standing for hay; and everywhere the fences were ruinous, and the roads grass-grown. It was, Tatham knew, let out to various small farmers, ...
— The Mating of Lydia • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... to live upon the folly of others, than their own labour, with such thoughtless liberality, that he left a third part of his estate mortgaged. His successor, a man of spirit, scorned to impair his dignity by parsimonious retrenchments, or to admit, by a sale of his lands, any participation of the rights of his manour; he therefore made another mortgage to pay the interest of the former, and pleased himself with the reflection, that ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson - Volume IV [The Rambler and The Adventurer] • Samuel Johnson
... thought so, to see the indifference with which he treated alike the chatter of the most decided mediocrities and the conversation of the noblest minds of the day. Not an avowal, not a confidence, that shed light on his life work. Parsimonious of all he observed, he never related a typical anecdote, or offered a suggestive remark. Praise, even, did not move him, and if by chance he became animated it was to tell some practical joke, some atelier hoaxes, as if he had given himself ...
— Une Vie, A Piece of String and Other Stories • Guy de Maupassant
... buildings for the shelter of his command, and I continued the work of constructing the post as laid out by him. In those days the Government did not provide very liberally for sheltering its soldiers; and officers and men were frequently forced to eke out parsimonious appropriations by toilsome work or go without shelter in most inhospitable regions. Of course this post was no exception to the general rule, and as all hands were occupied in its construction, and I the only officer present, I was kept busily ...
— The Memoirs of General Philip H. Sheridan, Vol. I., Part 1 • Philip H. Sheridan
... benefit of his Queen and country, or for himself and those who were associated with him in his piratical enterprises, nothing was allowed to stand in his way, and, generally speaking, he paralysed all resistance to his arms into submission by an inexorable will and genius. The parsimonious Elizabeth was always slyly willing to receive the proceeds of his dashing deeds, but never unduly generous in fixing his share of them. She allowed her ships to lie rotting when they should have been kept in sound and efficient condition, ...
— Drake, Nelson and Napoleon • Walter Runciman
... to talk about a dollar, still less about a dollar sign—whatever that may be. It is exactly as if he had made me talk about the Skelt and Stevenson Toy Theatre as 'a cent plain, and two cents coloured' or condemned a parsimonious policy as dime-wise and dollar-foolish. Another interviewer once asked me who was the greatest American writer. I have forgotten exactly what I said, but after mentioning several names, I said that the greatest natural genius and artistic force was probably Walt ...
— What I Saw in America • G. K. Chesterton
... Dutch and Danish, for instance, and sometimes the prudent Scotch—feed their luckless tars in dock, with precisely the same fare which they give them at sea; taking their salt junk ashore to be cooked, which, indeed, is but scurvy sort of treatment, since it is very apt to induce the scurvy. A parsimonious proceeding like this is regarded with immeasurable disdain by the crews of the New York vessels, who, if their captains treated them after that fashion, would soon bolt ...
— Redburn. His First Voyage • Herman Melville
... in this neighbourhood. What a place for him who had been at Thagaste the guest of the magnificent Romanianus, and intimate with the Proconsul at Carthage! When he had climbed up the six flights of stairs to his lodging, and crouched shivering over the ill-burning movable hearth, in the parsimonious light of a small bronze or earthenware lamp, while the raw damp sweated through the walls, he felt more and more his poverty and loneliness. He hated Rome and the stupid ambition which had brought him there. ...
— Saint Augustin • Louis Bertrand
... advantages of comfortable rooms, adequate apparatus and competent teachers. And this assumption ought to be supported by the facts. There is no good reason why any town in Massachusetts should be negligent or parsimonious in these particulars. True economy requires liberal appropriations. With these appropriations, the best teachers, even from private schools and academies, can be secured, and all the aids and encouragements to liberal culture can be provided. ...
— Thoughts on Educational Topics and Institutions • George S. Boutwell
... generation, the suggestions and strong recommendations of educators relative to physical education in our schools been acted upon by the public? Ah! The fault was not with educational principles; they were sound. The educational forces of the country knew what was needed, but a parsimonious public would not follow intelligent leadership. We could say, all along the line, "I told you so," if we felt so inclined. Instead of being the "laughing stock" we could—if the matter were not too serious—throw the laugh upon the other fellow. The purpose of our schools has never been ...
— On the Firing Line in Education • Adoniram Judson Ladd
... countries, though in the hands of so parsimonious and so prudent a prince,—[Phillip II.]—so little answers the expectation given of it to his predecessors, and to that original abundance of riches which was found at the first landing in those new discovered countries (for though a great deal be fetched thence, yet we see 'tis nothing ...
— The Essays of Montaigne, Complete • Michel de Montaigne
... a poet of a quite different stamp. He is as heedless, gay, and prodigal of his poetical wealth, as the other is careful, reserved, and parsimonious. The genius of both is national. Mr. Moore's Muse is another Ariel, as light, as tricksy, as indefatigable, and as humane a spirit. His fancy is for ever on the wing, flutters in the gale, glitters in the sun. Every thing ...
— Lectures on the English Poets - Delivered at the Surrey Institution • William Hazlitt
... of heaven? Of bounded mind, Man, who is not omniscient, must not dare To guide the helm of destiny. 'Tis just! But why these thoughts of self. This hour is precious As life can be to man: and who can tell Whether the parsimonious hand of fate May not have measured my last ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller
... the Tory party; but he never relinquished his friendship with Addison, for whom he had profound respect and admiration. Swift's life was worldly, but moral. He was remarkably temperate in eating and drinking, and parsimonious in his habits. One of his most bitter complaints in his letters to Stella—to whom he wrote every day—was of the expense of coach-hire in his visits to nobles and statesmen. It would seem that he creditably discharged his clerical duties. He attended the daily service in the ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume VII • John Lord
... afford the commodity cheap, and at a rate not to be undersold in foreign markets. The Dutch, whose labour and manufactures are dear by reason of home excises, can notwithstanding sell cheap abroad, because this disadvantage they labour under is balanced by the parsimonious temper of their people; but in England, where this frugality is hardly to be introduced, if the duties upon our home consumption are so large as to raise considerably the price of labour and manufacture, all our commodities ...
— Essays on Mankind and Political Arithmetic • Sir William Petty
... These, as a line, their long dimension drew, Streaking the ground with sinuous trace; not all Minims of nature; some of serpent-kind, Wonderous in length and corpulence, involved Their snaky folds, and added wings. First crept The parsimonious emmet, provident Of future; in small room large heart enclosed; Pattern of just equality perhaps Hereafter, joined in her popular tribes Of commonalty: Swarming next appeared The female bee, that feeds her husband drone Deliciously, and ...
— Paradise Lost • John Milton
... rent. The corners of the room had been given over for twenty years as the happy hunting-ground of spiders. Although Bideabout had taken some pains to put his house in order before his marriage, repairs had been executed only on what was necessary, and in a parsimonious spirit. The spare room had been passed over, as not likely to be needed. To that as to every other portion of the house, Mehetabel had turned her attention, and it was now in as good condition to receive a guest as the bedrooms in ...
— The Broom-Squire • S. (Sabine) Baring-Gould
... the noblest Roman families retained a resemblance of their ancestry, not only in their shapes and features, but also in their manners, their qualities, and the distinguishing characters of their minds. Some lines were noted for a stern, rigid virtue, savage, haughty, parsimonious, and unpopular: others were more sweet and affable, made of a more pliant paste, humble, courteous, and obliging, studious of doing charitable offices, and diffusive of the goods which they enjoyed. The last of these is the proper and indelible character of your Grace's family. God Almighty ...
— The Poetical Works of John Dryden, Vol II - With Life, Critical Dissertation, and Explanatory Notes • John Dryden
... instant all stormy nightcap and fingers starving for the bell-rope. Forthwith she burst into a series of shrieks, howls, and high piercing notes that caused even the parliamentary Opposition, in the heat of an assault on a parsimonious Government, to abandon its temporary advantage and be still awhile. Yet she likewise performed her part with a certain deliberation and method, as if aware that it was a part she had to play in the ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... was a good manager of the moderate means her husband had left her, but she was not parsimonious or inhospitable. Now she was actuated by a fierce maternal jealousy. Esther, despite her pleasant ways and her helpfulness, was often overlooked in a social way. This was due to her mother. The ...
— Different Girls • Various
... starved small, And take at once to his impoverished brain The sudden element that changes things, 130 That sets the undreamed-of rapture at his hand And puts the cheap old joy in the scorned dust? Is he not such an one as moves to mirth— Warily parsimonious, when no need, Wasteful as drunkenness at undue times? All prudent counsel as to what befits The golden mean, is lost on such an one: The man's fantastic will is the man's law. So here—we call the treasure knowledge, say, Increased beyond the ...
— Men and Women • Robert Browning
... terrible adversities of her early days, as also to meet with quiet matronly dignity the extraordinary honours showered on her as the mother of the French Emperor. She was inured to habits of frugality, which reappeared in the personal tastes of her son. In fact, she so far retained her old parsimonious habits, even amidst the splendours of the French Imperial Court, as to expose herself to the charge of avarice. But there is a touching side to all this. She seems ever to have felt that after the splendour there would come again the old days of ...
— The Life of Napoleon I (Volumes, 1 and 2) • John Holland Rose
... of funds is both important and difficult. No agency of research can be really free if it depends upon annual doles from what may be a jealous or a parsimonious congress. Yet the ultimate control of funds cannot be removed from the legislature. The financial arrangement should insure the staff against left-handed, joker and rider attack, against sly destruction, and should at the same time provide for growth. The staff should be so well entrenched ...
— Public Opinion • Walter Lippmann |
