"Paying attention" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... fright of being brought to account for the head, and the words which he had to pronounce, it is said that he made so strange a jumble, that some of the stricter Mussulmans, his neighbours, who were paying attention to the call, professed themselves quite scandalized at his performance. He descended with all haste, and locking the door after him which leads up the winding staircase, he met Mansouri in the street. ...
— The Adventures of Hajji Baba of Ispahan • James Morier
... agony of seeing them suffer. That, at the worst, would be an hour's anguish, to be followed by an eternity of happy rest: but the other might mean the loss of all things—body and soul alike. Little Will did not enter into the matter. He might have understood something if he had been paying attention, but he was not attending, and therefore he did not. But Cissy, to whom her father was the centre of the world, and who knew his voice by heart, understood his looks as ...
— The King's Daughters • Emily Sarah Holt
... The red-headed beast did not have the papers. That little fool, Chord, has misled both your father and me. I could wring his neck for him, and now he is palavering your father in the library and saying he will get the papers himself or die in the attempt. It serves us right for paying attention to a babbling idiot like him. I said in the first place that that Irish baboon of an O'Ruddy was not likely to give them to the ape that ...
— The O'Ruddy - A Romance • Stephen Crane
... of place. He answered, "He had never thought of that." In fact, difficulties almost innumerable must invariably crop up if we attempt to represent plays without appropriate costume and scenery, the aim of which is to realize the locale of the action. Some people may hold that paying attention to such matters necessitates inattention to the acting; but the majority think it does not, and I believe that they are right. What would Alma-Tadema say, for instance, if it were proposed to him that in a picture of the Roman Amphitheatre the figures should be painted in the costume ...
— The Drama • Henry Irving
... study to avoid all the jerky and abrupt movements which disfigure the address of the timid and deprive them of all the assurance that they should possess, for the reason that they can not help paying attention to their own lack ...
— Poise: How to Attain It • D. Starke
... within the inner ring, and to be careful in striking planets that they fall into the orbits where the forfeitures are small. By thus thinking of what he is about and exercising forethought and prudence, he will soon become expert, and by paying attention to the game he ...
— The Book of Sports: - Containing Out-door Sports, Amusements and Recreations, - Including Gymnastics, Gardening & Carpentering • William Martin
... "I have been paying attention to the solid capitalists," replied Karozitch; "we have made our debut in the role of practical actors. Well, what about him?" he continued, indicating Prince Shadursky ...
— The Most Interesting Stories of All Nations • Julian Hawthorne
... I'm horrid," she admitted; "but—well, I went off for a ride with Tilly yesterday after school, instead of paying attention to his Imperial Highness, Caesar; and that's what was the trouble. But, Harold, it was so perfectly glorious out I had to—I just had to! I tell you, every bit of me was tingling to go! Now what do you suppose Miss Hart knows of a feeling ...
— The Sunbridge Girls at Six Star Ranch • Eleanor H. (Eleanor Hodgman) Porter
... it to you, Mordan, whether, admitting that what I say about Sylvia is true—and you may take it from me that it is true—whether it would be very kind or fair on my part to allow you to go on paying attention to her at the rate of—say to-day's. Do you think it would be wise or kind of me to allow it? I say nothing about your side in the matter, because—well, because I still have some recollection of how a young fellow feels in such a case. But would ...
— The Message • Alec John Dawson
... with Northern people and his readiness to bury the past. The morning visitor had not only learned of a new proof of his objectionable tendencies, but also—so do stories grow as they travel—that he was paying attention to a New York belle and heiress. Mrs. Hunter was soon possessed of these momentous rumors, and when, at last, weary from her morning labors, Mara sat down to their simple dinner, she saw that her aunt was preternaturally solemn and dignified. The girl ...
— The Earth Trembled • E.P. Roe
... influence, one about which there cannot be two opinions!" You sum up a discussion by declaiming: "England, sir, will always get the better of us!" or you make an answer to some one whom you have heard speak for a long time without paying attention to him: "We are advancing towards an abyss, we have not yet passed through all the evolutions of the evolutionary phase!" You say to a representative of labor: "Sir, I think there is something to be done in this ...
— Mercadet - A Comedy In Three Acts • Honore De Balzac
... sort of thing sometimes. Of course I've been in love with other people, too; I can't deny that. Flaten was very nice, and took me out driving sometimes, or to a dance or something like that. And of course I was proud of his paying attention to me in spite of my having lost my post. I think I could have got a job in his father's shop but—anyhow, I'm looking ...
— Look Back on Happiness • Knut Hamsun
... than any one to feel, every day of my life, the value of the blood which flows in my veins, and it is only from prudence that at times I abstain from showing how proud I am of it.... I never neglect any mode of paying attention to the king, and of anticipating his wishes as far as I can. I hope that he is pleased with me. It is my duty to please him, my duty and also my glory, if by such means I can contribute to maintain the ...
— The Life of Marie Antoinette, Queen of France • Charles Duke Yonge
... Titmarsh," he was saying, "to allow the politicians to meddle in this racket. We want men of genius, whose imaginations carry them beyond the facts of the moment. This is too big a thing for those blasted politicians. They haven't shown a sign so far of paying attention to what I've been telling them all this time. We must keep them out, Titmarsh. Machinery without mechanism, and a change of heart in the world. It's very simple. A single man of genius from each country, no pettifogging opposition, ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... contents of one upon the ground near the side of the tower, and the other by the hinder face. The thick black layer on the snow would have told its tale instantly to a soldier, but Malcolm had little fear of the peasants in their haste paying attention to it. When his task was completed he crawled back again to the door and laid a train from the foot of the ...
— The Lion of the North • G.A. Henty
... of view; she succumbed at once, not without enjoyment, to the necessity for diplomacy. Under its rush of suggestions her conscience was only vaguely restive. To-morrow it would assert itself; unconsciously she put off paying attention to it until then. Elfrida must come back to her. For the moment the need was to ...
— A Daughter of To-Day • Sara Jeannette Duncan (aka Mrs. Everard Cotes)
... a nod and a smile. "Where you brought down the wrath of the lady champion upon your head the other night when you were letting your mind wander across to Lutha and the Old Forest, instead of paying attention ...
— The Mad King • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... which branch off from every path of research, delude their explorer with vain hopes and finally bring him face to face with a blank wall. In a word the inquirer consults his authorities and when he finds them worthy of reliance, he limits his freedom by paying attention to them. He does not say: "How am I held in bondage by this assertion that the earth goes round the sun," but accepting that fact, he rejects such of his conclusions as are obviously irreconcilable ...
— Science and Morals and Other Essays • Bertram Coghill Alan Windle
... Cobbett has been sent to look after old Desmond in particular, don't you think, if you entertain him, it will be to old Desmond, and not Her Majesty, you will be paying attention, ...
— Rossmoyne • Unknown
... Concentration Is Paying Attention to a Chosen Thought. Everything that passes before the eye makes an impression on the subconscious mind, but unless you pay attention to some certain thing you will not remember what you saw. For instance if you walked down a busy street without seeing anything ...
— The Power of Concentration • Theron Q. Dumont
... a twinkle in his eye. "In other words, he repudiated the suggestion that he was jealous, swore that he had already told Miss Briggerland that he could not marry her, and he did not even know that Bulford was paying attention to ...
— The Angel of Terror • Edgar Wallace
... the mind, I yet can admit without envy the superior knowledge evinced by the honorable manager. Indeed, upon my soul, I believe he is aware of an astronomical fact of which many professors of that science are wholly ignorant. Nevertheless, while some of his honorable colleagues were paying attention to an unoccupied and unappropriated island on the surface of the seas, Mr. Manager Boutwell, more ambitious, had discovered an untenanted and unappropriated region in the skies reserved, he would have us think, ...
— Something of Men I Have Known - With Some Papers of a General Nature, Political, Historical, and Retrospective • Adlai E. Stevenson
... Mr. Pertell. "I can see you all looking around nervously, instead of paying attention to the play, if ...
— The Moving Picture Girls at Oak Farm - or, Queer Happenings While Taking Rural Plays • Laura Lee Hope
... their visits. Many like stories are extant. It is said that the nightly visitors expected water to be provided for them, and if this were not the case they resented the slight thus shown them and punished those who neglected paying attention to their wants. But tradition says the house-wives were ever careful of the Fairy wants; and, as it was believed that Fairy mothers preferred using the same water in which human children had been washed, the human mother left this water in the bowl ...
— Welsh Folk-Lore - a Collection of the Folk-Tales and Legends of North Wales • Elias Owen
... powers of perception, and greatly aids the exercise of the perceptive faculties. By "paying attention" to something seen or heard, one is enabled to observe the details of the thing seen or heard, and where the inattentive mind acquires say three impressions the attentive mind absorbs three times three, ...
— A Series of Lessons in Raja Yoga • Yogi Ramacharaka
... the time of Bennett's expulsion was that some of their travelling elders in the Eastern states discovered that the general had a wife and family there while he was paying attention to young ladies in Nauvoo; but a very slight acquaintance with Smith's ideas on the question of morality at that time is needed to indicate that this was an afterthought. The course of the church authorities showed that they were ready to every ...
— The Story of the Mormons: • William Alexander Linn
... of little arms and legs being duly considered. Polite manners, and the correct use of language were taught by precept and example. More than all, the juvenile minds were, directly and indirectly, drilled to acquire the habit of paying attention. ...
— My Friends at Brook Farm • John Van Der Zee Sears
... and boxes in which to shut her up if they were not able to kill her. They declared that her white plumage was really put on to hide her black feathers—in fact there was nothing they did not do in order to prevent the king from seeing the bird or from paying attention to her words if ...
— The Orange Fairy Book • Andrew Lang
... of a certain charming girl is well known in this town as "a very tight old gentleman." When dad recently received a young man, who for some time had been "paying attention" to the daughter, it was the old gentleman ...
— Best Short Stories • Various
... way of paying attention has struck others differently. They think I'm one who doesn't listen—who doesn't want to listen. It's a terrible thing, Tumulty, when one sees and knows the truth so absolutely, but cannot convince others. That's been my fate: to be so sure that I was right (I'm ...
— Angels & Ministers • Laurence Housman
... a good officer and a kind-hearted man, and doubtless the son inherited not only the instincts of a soldier, but a certain nobility of character which was conspicuous in the father. When the father held a high command at Corfu, he made a point of seeking out and paying attention to the forlorn and uninteresting, who are usually overlooked by others. Those who have been richly endowed by Nature have little difficulty in gaining the smiles of society; but in all classes there are a few unfortunate ones, who are not specially gifted ...
— General Gordon - A Christian Hero • Seton Churchill
... with a sufficiency of meat for some days, and they pushed steadily forward without paying attention to the game, which happened to be very plentiful in that district, as their great desire was to get out of the unhealthy region as quickly as possible. Sometimes, however, they were compelled ...
— Hunting the Lions • R.M. Ballantyne
... it is read," said Sir Godfrey, contemptuously. "I see there are two of our men paying attention to you. Rein ...
— Crown and Sceptre - A West Country Story • George Manville Fenn
... squadron from Portsmouth. During two days the royalists offered[a] him battle; by different manoeuvres he eluded their attempts; and on the third day the want of provisions compelled the prince to steer for the coast of Holland, without paying attention to the request of his royal father. Warwick, who had received his reinforcements, followed at a considerable distance; but, though he defended his conduct on motives of prudence, he did not escape the severe censure of the Independents and Levellers, ...
— The History of England from the First Invasion by the Romans - to the Accession of King George the Fifth - Volume 8 • John Lingard and Hilaire Belloc
... had seen a badger-bait, and occasionally at fairs in the country a dancing bear, had never before seen a bear-bait, stood up most of the time, observing those around him, and paying attention to their proceedings while entertaining sentiments somewhat ...
— Real Life In London, Volumes I. and II. • Pierce Egan
... Hester, "he must have had his revelation either from God, from a demon, or from his own heart: it could not be from God, because it made the idea of a God an impossibility; it must come from a demon or from himself, and in neither case was worth paying attention to.—I think," she went on, "my own feeling or imagination must be better worth my own heeding than that of another. The essential delight of this world seems to me to lie in ...
— Weighed and Wanting • George MacDonald
... not paying attention to the prince's exprest desire, unrolled his manuscripts and began reading an interminable ode without noticing the signs of impatience ...
— Common Sense - - Subtitle: How To Exercise It • Yoritomo-Tashi
... girls, of these little foxes, for they are worse than bears and big foxes, because they look so small and harmless, and slip by when you are not paying attention, but which destroy your character as readily as ...
— Fifty-Two Story Talks To Boys And Girls • Howard J. Chidley
... and girls—young men and women, they almost thought themselves—were packed in like sardines. Something like self-reproach smote Holcroft even now, remembering how he had allowed his fancy much latitude at this period, paying attention to more than one girl besides Bessie, and painfully undecided which he ...
— He Fell in Love with His Wife • Edward P. Roe
... man rather absently; for he was paying attention to the dog, which seemed to have found the track of the bear again. He was just going to add, "Good-bye!" but when he looked at her she was blushing; cheeks, neck, and ...
— The Bridal March; One Day • Bjornstjerne Bjornson
... man of business and the man of law. If Mary had been paying attention she would have seen that the judge was slowly but surely getting the worst ...
— Mary Minds Her Business • George Weston
... that everyone was looking at her, and that all were amazed at the momentous step she had taken, that everyone was expecting something special of her, and it would have been impossible to convince her that no one was paying attention to people so petty and insignificant as she ...
— The Chorus Girl and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov
... increasing severity that very day, and never dreamed of the gulf of distress in which poor Bayard was plunged. He had gone at once to his library and thrown himself in the easy-chair in an attitude of profound dejection, barely paying attention when Chloe entered to say that Miss Nellie begged to be excused from coming down to dinner, as she felt too ill. Then Robert entered to ask should he serve dinner or wait until Mr. Holmes came in. "Wait!" said Bayard, bluntly. ...
— 'Laramie;' - or, The Queen of Bedlam. • Charles King
... as ever. He didn't allow any fuss that was made on shore to upset him; he just shut his lips tight, and let people screech. It was bad enough to have lost his ship, and all he was worth besides, without paying attention to the hard names they called him. That's the man for me." He lifted his arm for a signal to some one down the street. "He's got a little money, so I had to let him into my thing. Had to! It would ...
— Lord Jim • Joseph Conrad
... the pleased Max; "I never thought you'd notice such things. Owen and myself were talking about it; but when you get to paying attention to such small matters it shows that you're just bound to make a good ...
— The Strange Cabin on Catamount Island • Lawrence J. Leslie
... paying attention any longer, either to me or to Jose; his white teeth were showing in a grin for all his pain; her eyes were fixed ...
— Dead Men Tell No Tales • E. W. Hornung
... It's impossible for you to know everything, dear benefactress. And it's not worth while for you, in your gentility, to trouble yourself about every low-lived person. And though they do complain, what's the use of paying attention; are they worth your notice? Since you do so many good deeds for others, God will ...
— Plays • Alexander Ostrovsky
... more to the sound of her voice than to the words she was saying, and all the while paying attention to the road, which passed now through the forest, and avoiding places where she might ...
— Anna Karenina • Leo Tolstoy
... though he cordially hated his lady, was glad, for his own sake, to be relieved from her fits of crossness; and was pleased by Alfred's paying attention to her, as this was a sort of respect to himself, and what he seldom met with from those young men who had been his companions before his marriage—they usually treated his lady with a neglect or ridicule which ...
— Tales And Novels, Vol. 8 • Maria Edgeworth
... something about the honorable estate of knighthood, and the Queen's list. Malone began paying attention when she came to:"—and I hereby dub thee—" She stopped suddenly, turned and said: "Sir Kenneth, ...
— Brain Twister • Gordon Randall Garrett
... raison I cautions ye to be riddy for a fall," said Mickey, after referring to some of the peculiarities of these steeds of the Southwest. "The minute he gits it into his head that we ain't paying attention, he'll rear up on his fore-feet, and walk along that way for half a mile. Not having any saddle, we'll have to slide over his neck, unless I can brace me feet agin his ears, and ride along ...
— The Cave in the Mountain • Lieut. R. H. Jayne
... negotiations of these natives were generally illegal, each one paying attention to how he might better his ...
— History of the Philippine Islands Vols 1 and 2 • Antonio de Morga
... of bacon and cabbages, you invariably throw away the liquor in which they have been boiled, or, at the best, give it to the pigs, if you possess any; this is wrong, for it is easy to turn it to a better account for your own use, by paying attention to the following instructions, viz.:—Put your piece of bacon on to boil in a pot with two gallons (more or less, according to the number you have to provide for) of water, when it has boiled up, and has been well skimmed, add the ...
— A Plain Cookery Book for the Working Classes • Charles Elme Francatelli
... a nervous laugh and, without paying attention to her words, undid her girdle and took off her garment. As he advanced toward her, she protected herself with her ...
— Eastern Shame Girl • Charles Georges Souli
... Without paying attention to Judith's exclamation she took a newspaper out of the pocket of her top-coat, and handed it to ...
— Mount Music • E. Oe. Somerville and Martin Ross
... uncontrolled or where good care is lacking. The experiments furnish several examples of inertness, ineffectiveness or failure to produce profit when the fertilizers were applied under any of the conditions named. They emphasize the importance of paying attention to all of the factors on which plant growth is dependent. Moisture, soil temperature, aeration, the texture of the soil, freedom from pests, cold and frosts, as well as the supply of food may ...
— Manual of American Grape-Growing • U. P. Hedrick
... have received your letter of the 23d. I can assure you, I have always the greatest pleasure in paying attention to the representations of the masters of merchant ships; who, at this distance, act for their owners in Great Britain. I can have no difficulty in granting you a convoy to Leghorn; but it is my duty to again point out to you the ...
— The Life of the Right Honourable Horatio Lord Viscount Nelson, Vol. II (of 2) • James Harrison
... that," said Sangster quietly, "I should keep away from them, and I should most certainly give up paying attention to Miss Wyatt." ...
— The Second Honeymoon • Ruby M. Ayres
... very kind to take so much pains with you; and I trust you will show that you are obliged to her, by paying attention to all she tells you. When you see how much more grown people know than you, you ought to be anxious to learn all you can from those who teach you; and as there are so many wise and good things written in Books, ...
— The Life of John Sterling • Thomas Carlyle |
