"Primly" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... primly, though her eyes danced. "After this, you will kindly answer when you are spoken to, Miss Ford, and at ...
— The Outdoor Girls at the Hostess House • Laura Lee Hope
... inquiries, though brief, were polite and kind. People generally did soften to Clover. There was such an odd and pretty contrast between her girlish appealing look and her dignified little manner, like a child trying to be stately but only succeeding in being primly sweet. ...
— Clover • Susan Coolidge
... about the people here," he asked after a pause, in which he plucked idly at the red-topped orchard grass through which they were passing. Behind them the six little negroes walked primly in single file, Mary Jo in the lead and a chocolate-coloured atom of two toddling at the tail of the procession. From time to time shrill squeaks went up from the rear when a startled partridge whirred over the pasture or a ...
— The Miller Of Old Church • Ellen Glasgow
... the cloth and laid a hot, cushiony hand over both of hers, where they lay primly clasped on the ...
— The Dark Star • Robert W. Chambers
... into the quaint little barn, which appeared to wear its big north light rather primly, as a girl her first low-necked gown. It was unfurnished, save for a table and easel, several canvases, and an old arm-chair. ...
— The Nest Builder • Beatrice Forbes-Robertson Hale
... have not had the pleasure of casting my optics upon the individual of Nancy Ellen's choice," said Agatha primly, "but Miss Amelia Lang tells me he is a very distinguished person, of quite superior education in a medical way. I shall call him if I ever have the misfortune to fall ill again. I hope you will tell Nancy Ellen that we ...
— A Daughter of the Land • Gene Stratton-Porter
... until Charlotte had given a final shake to the bed in the corner, upon which her bonnet and shawl had been lying. She put them on neatly and primly; and when she was ready to go she spoke again in a constrained and ...
— Alone In London • Hesba Stretton
... opened to me—sober and something more than sober. He was primly dressed in an ancient but well-tended suit of black; he had been shaved not later than the night before; he wore a linen collar; and in his left hand he carried a pocket Bible. At first he did ...
— The Thirty-nine Steps • John Buchan
... says Miss Jacksonville primly. "I don't know much about her history, but she looks to me as though she had been on the stage. She's frightfully frivolous—not at all one ...
— American Adventures - A Second Trip 'Abroad at home' • Julian Street
... to be like our highest ideas," Peace answered primly, recalling a little lecture she had received that morning. "You are Dr. Shumway, ain't you? Pastor of ...
— Heart of Gold • Ruth Alberta Brown
... sniffed Aunt Charlotte, primly. "She may call me a respectable-looking body as much as she likes now. It's more than I can ...
— Austin and His Friends • Frederic H. Balfour
... their model. She was posed in a nun's dress, pensive gray, with virginal white bound primly across her brow. Marietta is a capital model, and her sad face and tender eyes were upturned with exactly the desired expression to the grinning mask in the centre of the ceiling. Silentia kindly consented to pose for the cross to which the nun ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Volume 26, July 1880. • Various
... children came with Mrs. Featherfew, Wilhelmine and Victorine. They spoke very primly and politely, and seemed to our little folks like grown-up ladies cut down short. But when after dinner they all went out into the grounds to play, Mine and Rine, as they called each other, could play as merrily ...
— Five Happy Weeks • Margaret E. Sangster
... allow you to use this pump!" said a crisp voice primly. "This is not," with capital letters, "a ...
— Up the Hill and Over • Isabel Ecclestone Mackay
... attempts," Rak said primly, "were completely successful. One must assume that the victimized laboratories also had been ...
— Legacy • James H Schmitz
... like to give that impression," she said, almost primly. Then, with a change of tone, "But I can't—I won't stay at the hotel where I am. To-night at her house Lady Dauntrey invited me to come and stay there. I was asked before, to Christmas dinner. I could ...
— The Guests Of Hercules • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... as he recognized his location. He scanned Old Post lying on its low eminence, with the white hospitals spreading over their area, New Post with its wide parade ground and its trim rows of officers' quarters staring primly at the departmental buildings built in the old Mexican fashion on the other ...
— Battling the Clouds - or, For a Comrade's Honor • Captain Frank Cobb
... ignorance, selfishness, cant, and conceit. He knew nothing on earth except the price of his goods, and how to make the most of his business. He was of middle size, with a tendency to corpulence; and almost invariably wore a black coat and waistcoat, a white neck handkerchief very primly tied, and gray trousers. He had a dull, gray eye, with white eyelashes, and no eyebrows; a forehead which seemed ashamed of his face, it retreated so far and so abruptly back from it; his face was pretty deeply pitted with the small-pox; his nose—or rather semblance of a nose—consisted ...
— Ten Thousand a-Year. Volume 1. • Samuel Warren
... Dorcas, starting up primly. "You must really allow me to withdraw." To the young man's astonishment, she seized her parasol, and, with a youthful affectation of dignity, glided from the summer-house and ...
— Under the Redwoods • Bret Harte
... know she had a cold," said Patty, primly, trying to act as she thought a companion ought ...
— Patty's Success • Carolyn Wells
... An old lady, very primly dressed in black, and wearing a curious cap with long white strings, bustled me away. As Feurgeres opened the door of the room, in front of which we had been standing, the air seemed instantly sweet with the perfume of flowers. The old lady ...
— The Master Mummer • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... looked after him with a sigh. "When I hear a man talking about the abolition of slavery," he remarked gloomily, "I always expect him to want to do away with marriage next—" he checked himself and coloured, as if an improper speech had slipped out in the presence of Mrs. Lightfoot. The old lady rose primly and, taking the rector's arm, led the way ...
— The Battle Ground • Ellen Glasgow
... She said it so primly, so correctly, and with such detachment, that they might have been in church, and she saying: "Will you kindly let me ...
— Helen with the High Hand (2nd ed.) • Arnold Bennett
... the porch screen slam as she went out—which was only fair—and she heard the low whispers change to louder tones, and a slight movement of feet; but she was not, evidently, intruding, for Kitty and Billy were quite primly disposed in the hammock when she ...
— The Cheerful Smugglers • Ellis Parker Butler
... so still, so open; the tall columns of the portico entrance look down on you so grimly; the front of the booking-offices, in their garment of clean stucco, look so primly respectable that you cannot help feeling ashamed of yourself,—feeling as uncomfortable as when you have called too early on an economically genteel couple, and been shown into a handsome drawing-room, on a frosty day, without a fire. You ...
— Rides on Railways • Samuel Sidney
... caught a glimpse of them, and then one perhaps would come to a window for a few minutes and sit and talk to Miss Adela—one of the elder sisters, I mean; and when I caught sight of them, I used to think that it was no wonder they had taken to dressing so primly and so plain, for they must have given up all hope of getting ...
— Begumbagh - A Tale of the Indian Mutiny • George Manville Fenn
... boys were still some distance from her. The water, muddy beyond all chance of transparency, came up to their chests. To them, however, this was not enough. The excessive modesty of eight or nine made them keep even the white of their angular little shoulders primly covered. ...
— The Hickory Limb • Parker Fillmore
... she had gone, primly grateful for the scrap of comfort, Corinna stood for a minute with her eyes on the sunbeams at the window. Outside there were the roving winds and the restless spirit of April; and feeling suddenly that she could stand the close walls and the familiar ...
— One Man in His Time • Ellen Glasgow
... may not live to wish those words unsaid, miss," the woman answered primly. "You have as good as sold your birthright, as Esau ...
— Olive in Italy • Moray Dalton
... consent to Sarah's going, and then gave her full attention to showing her company the house. "You musn't look at the dirt everywhere, ladies," began she, waving a hand at the immaculate corners and primly-ordered furniture. ...
— Polly's Business Venture • Lillian Elizabeth Roy
... can't look after his 'orse and cart," he said, primly, as he watched it along the road, ...
— Odd Craft, Complete • W.W. Jacobs
... last week," she told him primly, just grazing him with one of her impersonal glances which nearly drove him to desperation. "Aunt Mary has typhoid fever—there seems to be so much of that this spring and they sent for mamma. She's such a splendid nurse, ...
— The Lure of the Dim Trails • by (AKA B. M. Sinclair) B. M. Bower
... square, where there were some brave and pretty trees doing their best to be green, despite London soot and smoke. Innocent stepped out, and seeing a bell-handle pulled it timidly. The summons was answered by a very neat maid-servant, who looked at her in primly ...
— Innocent - Her Fancy and His Fact • Marie Corelli
... transforming everybody into saints, angels, and geniuses. Her smiles and her tones were irresistible. They were like the wand of some magical princess come to break a sinister thrall. They nearly humanised the gaunt parlourmaid, who stood grimly and primly waiting until these tedious sentimental preliminaries should cease from interfering with her duties ...
— The Lion's Share • E. Arnold Bennett
... you for takin' so much interest in the children," said Miss Vilda primly, "and partic'lerly for clearin' our characters, which everybody that lives in this village has to do for each other 'bout once a week, and the rest o' the time they take for spoilin' of 'em. And the Doctor's wife is very kind, but I shouldn't think o' sendin' the baby ...
— Timothy's Quest - A Story for Anybody, Young or Old, Who Cares to Read It • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... tea and candles, sister?" asked Miss King primly.—"We have had tea of course, Hyacinthe, but we will have some infused for ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, Vol. 22, August, 1878 • Various
... "Sir," said the lawyer primly, "you are thinking of criminal cases; but if a man be unfortunate enough to get into debt, that is quite a different thing:—we are harder to poverty than ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 19, No. - 537, March 10, 1832 • Various
... vowed Mr. Cobb solemnly, as he remounted his perch; and as the stage rumbled down the village street between the green maples, those who looked from their windows saw a little brown elf in buff calico sitting primly on the back seat holding a great bouquet tightly in one hand and a pink parasol in the other. Had they been farsighted enough they might have seen, when the stage turned into the side dooryard of the old brick house, a calico yoke rising and falling ...
— Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... Baker," he said, pleasantly, with his hat already in his hand, "I'm Harry Home, of San Francisco." As he spoke his eye swept approvingly over the neat inclosure, the primly-tied papers, and well-kept pigeon-holes; the pot of flowers on her desk; her china-silk mantle, and killing little chip hat and ribbons hanging against the wall; thence to her own pink, flushed face, bright blue eyes, tendriled clinging hair, and then—fell upon the leathern mailbag ...
— Colonel Starbottle's Client and Other Stories • Bret Harte
... She had been waiting for days with the revelation when he should make that old request. Now she enunciated it with every vowel and consonant correctly and primly uttered; indeed, she repeated it four or five times ...
— The Last Shot • Frederick Palmer
... it's only middle-class people who let children dine late," said Vic, primly, "I shan't come down to ...
— Great Uncle Hoot-Toot • Mrs. Molesworth
... speak to Miss Lesley, ma'am; my mistress said I must," said Sarah, primly. Then, forgetting her loyalty to her employers in her desire to be communicative, she went on—"Maybe you haven't heard what's happened, ma'am. Mr. Brooke's been taken up on ...
— Brooke's Daughter - A Novel • Adeline Sergeant
... the custom," she replied primly. Would he expect her to say "Sir?" Anyhow, she wouldn't! She compromised with a dainty meekness which might be interpreted as respect for a superior. Mr. Meggison fixed her with a sharp look which would have detected the impudence of ...
— Winnie Childs - The Shop Girl • C. N. Williamson
... Dodo, proudly, settling his necktie and folding his wings primly. "I have my gloves; ...
— Dick, Marjorie and Fidge - A Search for the Wonderful Dodo • G. E. Farrow
... some improving books," said Jean primly. "I wish I had your chance. If Mrs. Jarvis had taken a fancy to me I'd be a Ph.D. ...
— 'Lizbeth of the Dale • Marian Keith
... walls of the kitchen proper are many plate-racks, containing shells; there are rows of these of one size and shape, which mark them off as dinner plates or bowls; others are as obviously tureens. They are arranged primly as in a well-conducted kitchen; indeed, neatness and cleanliness are the note struck everywhere, yet the effect of the whole is romantic ...
— The Admirable Crichton • J. M. Barrie
... Secretary primly, "that if one has regard for strict historical accuracy there is but one Secretary of State, and that I ...
— The Lost Naval Papers • Bennet Copplestone
... fancy and yet reach the heart— Must we displace her? And instead advance The goddess of the woful countenance— The sentimental Muse!—Her emblems view, The Pilgrim's Progress, and a sprig of rue! View her—too chaste to look like flesh and blood— Primly portray'd on emblematic wood! There, fix'd in usurpation, should she stand, She'll snatch the dagger from her sister's hand: And having made her votaries weep a flood, Good heaven! she'll end her comedies in blood— ...
— The Rivals - A Comedy • Richard Brinsley Sheridan
... is a fine school with a half-century reputation," Bobby, who had studied the catalogue, informed her sister primly. ...
— Betty Gordon at Boarding School - The Treasure of Indian Chasm • Alice Emerson
... indebted to the promiscuous charity of strangers, and Mr. Melrose was hardly more than a stranger to us," Nealie put in a little primly. Being the eldest, it was natural she should be a little ...
— The Adventurous Seven - Their Hazardous Undertaking • Bessie Marchant
... in cold blood—the coward—in the very moment when you were staking your life for love of her? I remember, if you do not—'You have deceived me,' she wrote, and her hand never trembled, for the words ran as neatly and primly as ever they did in her convent copy books. 'You are not what you represented yourself to be—You have taken advantage of the inexperience of an ignorant girl, I have been deluded and deceived. I never wish to see you, ...
— The Light of Scarthey • Egerton Castle
... went down the road with the bead bag on her arm. She toed out primly, for she had on her best shoes. A little girl, whom she knew, stood at the gate in every-day clothes, and Ann Lizy bowed to her in the way she had seen the parson's wife bow, when out making calls in her best black silk and worked lace veil. The ...
— Young Lucretia and Other Stories • Mary E. Wilkins
... high, so that from his present perch the board appeared to rest on the pavement itself. Behind the table in a row, as shopkeepers might await a customer, three of the Warlockians, seated cross-legged on mats, their hands folded primly before them. And at the side a fourth, the one whom he had ...
— Storm Over Warlock • Andre Norton
... still mine!" she said passionately.—And in the hours it took to reassure her, his primly reasoned conclusions were blown ...
— Maurice Guest • Henry Handel Richardson
... very primly in her best silk, holding a parasol and wearing a pair of lace mits that had appeared on state occasions for the past twenty years, ...
— Hiram The Young Farmer • Burbank L. Todd
... been addressed as Clara, sat with work primly folded upon her lap, and her hands lying clasped together on her work, and never stirred when Robert spoke of his friend's death. He could not distinctly see her face, for she was seated at some distance from him, and with her ...
— Lady Audley's Secret • Mary Elizabeth Braddon
... aloud to them, seated in the doorway between the two rooms so that both could hear; she gave them reports of the condition of things outside; and Miss Hope said primly that she would like to meet and thank the boy who had been so kind as soon as she could be "suitably attired." Betty was thankful that she did not ask his name, but the sisters were not at all curious. They had been so ill and were still weak, and the fact that their household and ...
— Betty Gordon in the Land of Oil - The Farm That Was Worth a Fortune • Alice B. Emerson
... Run on home to your mother and don't get dirty on the way. (The two children start primly off down the street but just out of sight one of them utters ...
— The Mule-Bone: - A Comedy of Negro Life in Three Acts • Zora Hurston and Langston Hughes
... anything but pleased, but she dared not refuse. Arabella seemed quieter than ever when she came down the stairway, her wet garments exchanged for dry ones, and her straight hair primly braided, thanks to ...
— Dorothy Dainty at Glenmore • Amy Brooks
... and so on having been recorded, and "Very hungry" put down under Symptoms, she came back to her chair by the window, facing him. She sat down primly and smoothed her white apron in ...
— Love Stories • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... believe she kept any letters," he repeated, then glanced uncertainly at the lady's-maid who stood primly by. ...
— The Uttermost Farthing • Marie Belloc Lowndes
... checking his blastoff ticket, as if he didn't remember the number primly typed on it. Frank Nelsen had GO-12. GO—Ground-to-Orbit. But it might as well mean go! glory, or ...
— The Planet Strappers • Raymond Zinke Gallun
... there's no one I'd rather have," said Big Bill, honestly, and so Father Neptune strode majestically to his seat at the head of the table, and at his right sat primly, fluttering Aunt Adelaide, instead of the witching sprite he had expected ...
— Patty's Butterfly Days • Carolyn Wells
... two, returning from taking their morning airing with their governesses. The Princesses were quite as good as the Prince was bad, and there could certainly have been no prettier sight than that of the twelve royal little girls walking along so properly and primly. Each had a green velvet pelisse, a neat Leghorn bonnet, and a green fringed parasol; each wore nice buff mitts and a good-tempered smile, and each had a complexion like pink and white ice-cream, and eyes like pretty blue beads. It was therefore ...
— Prince Vance - The Story of a Prince with a Court in His Box • Eleanor Putnam
... hath often said that there has been scarce a day without a visitor at Swarthmoor since he first brought you here as its mistress,' she began primly, 'but in all these years, mother, I doubt you have never set eyes on such an one as our guest of to-day. Priest ...
— A Book of Quaker Saints • Lucy Violet Hodgkin
... must repeat," answered Miss Quiney primly, smoothing down the front of her creased grey satin skirt, "is—will be—our capital mistake. For me, I need in this weather but an additional shawl. I am ready. . . . Go to your room . . . and let me enjoin a certain deliberation ...
— Lady Good-for-Nothing • A. T. Quiller-Couch
... Allardice family gave me my invitation to Tibbie's wedding. I was taking tea and cheese early one wintry afternoon with the smith and his wife, when little Joey Todd in his Sabbath clothes peered in at the passage, and then knocked primly at the door. Andra forgot himself, and called out to him to come in by; but Jess frowned him into silence, and, hastily donning her black mutch, received Willie on the threshold. Both halves of the door were open, and the visitor had looked us over carefully before knocking; ...
— Auld Licht Idyls • J.M. Barrie
... "The doctrine of Election compatible with the infinite goodness of God." It is hard to say which of the two was the better, or which commended itself most to the church full of people who listened. Deacon Tourtelot,—a short, wiry man, with reddish whiskers brushed primly forward,—sitting under the very droppings of the pulpit, with painful erectness, and listening grimly throughout, was inclined to the sermon of the morning. Dame Tourtelot, who overtopped her husband by half a head, and from ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 88, February, 1865 • Various
... many lines that could be spared from the book you were reading," she said, her voice primly firm ...
— Martin Eden • Jack London
... Simplicity of manners and living was carefully inculcated. At first the ministers had almost entire control. A church reproof was the heaviest punishment, and knotty points in theology caused the bitterest discussion. A pillion was the grandest equipage, and a plain blue and white gown, with primly starched apron, was the common attire of ...
— A Brief History of the United States • Barnes & Co.
... we thought you ought to know," Celie began primly, "so Ma and I hurried right over, so as to put ...
— Revelations of a Wife - The Story of a Honeymoon • Adele Garrison
... scruples and their social delicacy, and were giving of their best, albeit to one whose ways were not their ways. But Nancy herself was the centre and light of the room,—so frail, so clean, with her plain nightcap and coarse white nightgown, and the small checked shawl folded primly over her shoulders. Thin as she was, she looked scarcely older than when I had seen her, five years ago; yet since then she had walked through a blacker valley than the ...
— Meadow Grass - Tales of New England Life • Alice Brown
... CAROLINE (primly). Hush, Bertram. We ought always to be polite to our visitors when they stay with us. I am sure, if Rosemary wants ...
— Second Plays • A. A. Milne
... by-road, where there were some old-fashioned, semi-detached cottages, sheltered by a row of sycamores, and shut in by wooden palings. I opened the low gate before the third cottage, and went into the garden,—a primly-kept little garden, with a grass-plat and miniature gravel-walks, and with a grotto of shells and moss and craggy blocks of stone in a corner. Under a laburnum-tree there was a green rustic bench; and here I found a young lady sitting reading ...
— Henry Dunbar - A Novel • M. E. Braddon
... Dora said primly that she liked school; but she was very quiet, even for her; and when at twilight Marilla bade her go upstairs to bed she ...
— Anne Of Avonlea • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... the hot fit of Swinburne, which was of a feverish sort: he had set out to break down without having, or even thinking he had, the rudiments of rebuilding in him; and he effected nothing national even in the way of destruction. The Tennysonians still walked past him as primly as a young ladies' school—the Browningites still inked their eyebrows and minds in looking for the lost syntax of Browning; while Browning himself was away looking for God, rather in the spirit of a truant boy from their school ...
— The Victorian Age in Literature • G. K. Chesterton
... primly down the room in the wake of a waiter and with a murmured word or two with the Mariposa, handed her a telegram. The latter, still with an expression of perplexity, requested Mrs. Ames' permission to open it, acquainted herself with its contents, and then ...
— The Silver Butterfly • Mrs. Wilson Woodrow
... "Oh!" said Carmen primly. "That's what mamma doesn't like, to have my muscles all lumpy and developed. She wants to keep me ...
— The Campfire Girls at Camp Keewaydin • Hildegard G. Frey
... gone for a drive with somebody or other and didn't want me," said Miss Pringle primly. "You ...
— The Land of Promise • D. Torbett
... response. She sat in her father's study-chair as stiff and stolid as a lay-figure in a shop window, with her lips drawn primly ...
— The Governess • Julie M. Lippmann
... cried Betty wildly, then, meeting his eye, she laughed, a twinkling little laugh. "You shouldn't ask questions like that, not so suddenly, anyway," she said primly. "It ...
— The Outdoor Girls in the Saddle - Or, The Girl Miner of Gold Run • Laura Lee Hope
... than a guest myself; but Mr. Power is always glad to see whoever cares to come," replied Christie rather primly, though her eyes were dancing with amusement at the recollection of those love passages ...
— Work: A Story of Experience • Louisa May Alcott
... will strike us, after this love of clouds, is the love of liberty. Whereas the mediaeval was always shutting himself into castles, and behind fosses, and drawing brickwork neatly, and beds of flowers primly, our painters delight in getting to the open fields and moors; abhor all hedges and moats; never paint anything but free-growing trees, and rivers gliding "at their own sweet will"; eschew formality down to the smallest detail; break and ...
— Selections From the Works of John Ruskin • John Ruskin
... for your kind of life, thanks," said Andrew primly, "and I repeat that I am not going to have my business—enlivened, if that's how you choose to put it, and my family disgraced, and my reputation lost; and if I let you go on another day as you've been going, ...
— The Prodigal Father • J. Storer Clouston
... both silent while the water boiled. She shoved her table nearer the fire, so near that I found myself looking down at the writing things that were arranged so primly at one end. There was an ink bottle on a gray blotter, a pewter tray for pens and a queer shaped lump of bronze, a paper weight I supposed. I wouldn't have been human if I could have kept my fingers off that bit of metal. I pretended to pick it up accidentally ...
— Little Miss By-The-Day • Lucille Van Slyke
... slipped down from the stiff chair and crossed to her mother's side. Her little hands were folded, and her small toes pointed primly ahead. ...
— Unfinished Portraits - Stories of Musicians and Artists • Jennette Lee
... He was no inveterate talker, like Sydney Smith; no clever dissimulator, like Mr. Hook. Calmly, almost sanctimoniously, he uttered those neat and telling sayings which the next day passed over England as 'Selwyn's last.' Walpole describes his manner admirably—-his eyes turned up, his mouth set primly, a look almost of melancholy in his whole face. Reynolds, in his Conversation-piece, celebrated when in the Strawberry Collection, and representing Selwyn leaning on a chair, Gilly Williams, crayon ...
— The Wits and Beaux of Society - Volume 2 • Grace & Philip Wharton
... house, fanning herself with a certain stateliness, and carrying her handkerchief primly, by the exact centre of it. In her wake was a little old gentleman, with a huge bundle, surrounded by a shawl-strap, a large valise, much the worse for wear, a telescope basket which was expanded to its full height, ...
— Lavender and Old Lace • Myrtle Reed
... raciness of the original. Let the reader imagine a smug, elderly, sleek, and venerable-looking man, approaching seventy years of age, rather (as novel-writers say) below than above the middle height, somewhat inclined to corpulency, and upright in his carriage withal; with his hair most primly powdered, and nicely curled round his brow and temples: let them imagine such a person habited in sober black, with his feet thrust carelessly into a pair of unlaced half-boots, and his hands into ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 12, No. 341, Saturday, November 15, 1828. • Various
... returned Mendenhall primly. He had not relished the roughness with which the other had snatched the check from him, though making allowance for the natural annoyance of one who had been betrayed into a ...
— The Desire of the Moth; and The Come On • Eugene Manlove Rhodes
... for themselves. The sun shone warmly upon the great, latticed porch, screened by the passion vines that hid one end completely from view. To the left, a wing stretched out generously, with windows curtained primly with some white stuff that flapped desultorily in the fitful breeze from the south. At the right, so close that they came near being a part of the main structure and helped to give the general effect of a hollow, open-sided square, stood a row of small adobe huts; two of them were tiled like ...
— The Gringos • B. M. Bower
... and mentioning that David was at that moment writing to Grizel in Thrums. But was it, then, all a dream? he cried, nearly convinced for the first time, and he went into the arbour saying determinedly that it was a dream; and in the arbour, standing primly in a corner, was Grizel's umbrella. He knew that umbrella so well! He remembered once being by while she replaced one of its ribs so deftly that he seemed to be looking on at a surgical operation. The old doctor had given it to her, ...
— Tommy and Grizel • J.M. Barrie
... terrace part way down this lawn, and when a white-painted balustrade was set some fifteen years ago upon its brink, it seemed always to have been there. Long verandas stretched on either side of the mansion; and behind was an old-fashioned garden with beds primly edged with box after a design of the poet's own. Longfellow had a ghost story of this quaint plaisance, which he used to tell with an artful reserve of the catastrophe. He was coming home one winter night, and as he crossed the garden he ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... Mionge Lane he met his pretty truelove skipping along most lady-like and primly. She was dressed in a light blue dress with a white sash tied at the side in two knots. Her long fair hair hung down her back tied with a pink ribbon, and her fringe was fluttering in the breeze. Behind her fringe she wore a wreath of green ivy. In one hand she carried a leghorn hat with red ...
— Daisy Ashford: Her Book • Daisy Ashford
... said. "Les fleurs! C'est la vie parfumee." Waiting for the breakfast to be served, he showed us about in his apartment. In the salon, rather primly furnished, stood the grand piano. The bookshelves contained Cherubini's (his master) and his own operas, and his beloved Bach. A table in the middle of the room, covered with photographs and engravings, completed son ...
— In the Courts of Memory 1858-1875. • L. de Hegermann-Lindencrone
... Ground," replied Slim, holding his voluminous bathrobe primly around him with one hand to cover the bathing suit which he wore under it, and shaking hands ...
— The Camp Fire Girls Do Their Bit - Or, Over the Top with the Winnebagos • Hildegard G. Frey
... into them," sighed Mollie primly, handing over the box with an air of resignation. "Betty, what was it you ...
— The Outdoor Girls in Army Service - Doing Their Bit for the Soldier Boys • Laura Lee Hope
... began. I couldn't even turn and say good night to the chauffeur, as I walked primly into the hotel, laden with ...
— The Motor Maid • Alice Muriel Williamson and Charles Norris Williamson
... the sea, with the hatred of a woman whose ancestors had made their living on the Banks and had been drowned in storms. But she liked the captain. "I am sure you are very kind," she said, primly, "but it will have to be Saturday when there isn't ...
— Glory of Youth • Temple Bailey
... "Nellie is breaking the news to her now," she said primly. "I am afraid she is going to find it very hard. But, as sister says, there are times when one has to follow one's own judgments. When mother sees that we all stand together ...
— Quin • Alice Hegan Rice
... feelings in their clothes, and don't like our scrambling walks, and if Ellie does get allured by our wicked ways, she is sure to be torn, or splashed, or something, and we have shrieks and lamentations, and accusations of Jock and Joe, amid floods of tears; and Jessie comes to the rescue, primly shaking her head and coaxing her little sister, while she brings out a needle and thread. I can't help it, Mary. It does aggravate ...
— Magnum Bonum • Charlotte M. Yonge
... (undoubtedly hopeful). We mustn't be too sure, but I think that is it. (Primly.) What is it exactly ...
— Dear Brutus • J. M. Barrie
... sitting half idiotic and helpless, in his arm-chair. His face lighted up as Lancelot entered, and he tried to hold out his palsied hand. Lancelot did not see him. Mrs. Lavington moved proudly and primly back from the bed, with a face that seemed to say through its tears, 'I at least am responsible for nothing that occurs from this interview.' Lancelot did not see her either: he walked straight up towards the bed as if he were treading on his own ground. His heart was between ...
— Yeast: A Problem • Charles Kingsley
... stood straighter than ever when they heard her voice, and new ones came from their burrows and sat up to watch her, with their fore paws held primly in front of them, their tails lying out motionless behind, and their slender heads poised pertly—with no movement except the twinkle of sharp, black eyes and ...
— The Biography of a Prairie Girl • Eleanor Gates
... name—Levisa Chafin Hatfield. If you were among the many who attended her funeral you will remember how peaceful she looked in her black burying dress she'd kept so long for the occasion. Again you will see her as she lay in her coffin, hands primly folded on the black frock, the frill of lace on the black bonnet framing the careworn face. You look up suddenly to see a mountain woman in a somber calico frock and slat bonnet. She is putting new paper flowers, to take the place of the faded ones, in ...
— Blue Ridge Country • Jean Thomas
... primly, "I must take this occasion to inform you that Mrs. Sawyer and I spend Christmas quietly—very quietly. We have never had a Christmas tree, and personally I consider that holly is most suitable and decorative ...
— Jimsy - The Christmas Kid • Leona Dalrymple
... Susan primly. But so irresistible was the well of gaiety bubbling up in her heart that she made ...
— Saturday's Child • Kathleen Norris
... leisurely southward, under a scorching sky, but still bearing up, though aflame with fever. The guns thundered continuously behind, and the narrow roads were filled, all the way, with hurrying teams, cavalry, cannon, and foot soldiers. I stopped, a while, by a white frame church,—primly, squarely built,—and read the inscriptions upon the tombs uninterestedly. Some of the soldiers had pried open the doors, and a wounded Zouave was delivering a mock sermon from the pulpit. Some of his comrades broke ...
— Campaigns of a Non-Combatant, - and His Romaunt Abroad During the War • George Alfred Townsend
... her change of policy and manner was revealed with distressing suddenness. At daylight one morning the door of the room in which she slept under lock and key was wide open, and on her quaintly embellished table a primly written note: ...
— Tropic Days • E. J. Banfield
... shining black buttons on his neat white waistcoat; his clawhammer coat had a velvet collar and fitted him about the shoulders as if it had been constructed for a man who possessed much more of a figure than he; and his trousers were primly pressed. Not the same old Bingle outwardly, you will say, but you are wrong. He was, and always will be, like ...
— Mr. Bingle • George Barr McCutcheon
... forget is to be neat! Not primly so, but daintily so. The girl well got up, with irreproachable gloves, and shoes that fit, though her gown be only cotton, yet if it be well turned out, may compete with the richest, while the slovenly dresser, who scorns or forgets to give attention to details, is passed over by the ...
— How to Marry Well • Mrs. Hungerford
... older and taller ones looking stiffly over the heads of the rollicking maples, and making solemn reverences to the great gray clouds that swept inland from the ocean. The straight little saplings at their feet copied the manners of their elders, and folding their fingers primly, and rustling their stiff little green petticoats decorously, sat up so silent ...
— Happy Days for Boys and Girls • Various
... blooming peach boughs; for there was a large peach orchard on the east side of the house. Lucina watched these little pictures, athwart which occasionally a bird flew and raised them to life. She held her doll primly, and her little work-bag still dangled from her arm. She would not begin her task of knitting until her aunt appeared and her ...
— Jerome, A Poor Man - A Novel • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... little room that he already knew so well Ambrose found all the defenders gathered. The only one strange to him was little Pringle, the missionary, who sat primly on the sofa. It had much the look of an ordinary evening party, but the row of guns by ...
— The Fur Bringers - A Story of the Canadian Northwest • Hulbert Footner
... sight, their groans were in her ears; and if she turned away, they took her by the elbow, and called her a backslider herself. Forrester whispered in the ears of Ralph, as his eye encountered the form of Miss Munro, who sat primly amid a flock ...
— Guy Rivers: A Tale of Georgia • William Gilmore Simms
... river with frank interest at the Cot, the Dinky House, the Mascot, and the rest of the tiny shanties. She liked the houseboats, too, with their gaily-striped awnings, their hanging baskets filled with gaudy pink geraniums and bright lobelia. Their primly-curtained little windows amused her; and in the evenings she would lure Owen out on to the terrace to look down the river to where the Chinese lanterns hung on their poles like globes of magic light ...
— The Making of a Soul • Kathlyn Rhodes
... she said, primly, "if I were mistaken in my private estimate of the Princess Ziska's character, but I must believe my own eyes and the evidence of my own senses, and surely no one can condone the extremely fast way in which she behaved with that new man—that French ...
— Ziska - The Problem of a Wicked Soul • Marie Corelli
... him was somewhat gruesome. Everything was carefully wrapped in newspapers. Pictures enveloped in newspapers hung on the walls, newspaper chairs stood primly around a newspaper table. In the dim twilight it looked like the ...
— Sandy • Alice Hegan Rice
... comfortable-looking bags suggesting bullion; and the gayest ship of all lay close up to the carpeted landing-stage. Already the bride was stepping daintily down the gangway, her ladies following primly, one by one; a few minutes more and we should all be aboard, the hawsers would splash in the water, the sails would fill and strain. From the deck I should see the little walled town recede and sink and grow dim, while every plunge of our bows brought us nearer to the happy island—it ...
— Dream Days • Kenneth Grahame
... of those," she answered primly, "who do not know how to behave in a sick room. He foolishly wanted to talk to you of affairs—when you are not well ...
— Dross • Henry Seton Merriman
... sentiments so fantastic and preternatural, thoughts so profound and delicate, and imaginations so remote from the recognized limits of the ideal, as find an orderly outlet in the pure English of Hawthorne. He has hardly a word to which Mrs. Trimmer would primly object, hardly a sentence which would call forth the frosty anathema of Blair, Hurd, Kames, or Whately, and yet he contrives to embody in his simple style qualities which would almost excuse the verbal extravagances ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 31, May, 1860 • Various
... mean," he added hastily, "don't be a fool. There are some things one can't bet on. As you ought to have known," he said primly. ...
— A Wodehouse Miscellany - Articles & Stories • P. G. Wodehouse
... of interest. The first, which beyond measure delighted me, was, that Charley was at Oxford—had been there for a year. The second was that Clara was at school in London. Mrs Wilson shut her mouth very primly after answering my question concerning her; and I went no further in that direction. I took no trouble to ask her concerning the relationship of which Mr Coningham had spoken. I knew already from my uncle that it was a fact, but Mrs Wilson did not behave in such a manner as to ...
— Wilfrid Cumbermede • George MacDonald
... still moved slowly, eyed him intently, gauging the man's strange and masked quality, probing the mildness of his address for the thing it veiled. He saw the mate of the Etna as a spare man of middle-age, who would have been tall but for the stoop of his shoulders. His shaven face was constricted primly; he had the mouth of an old maid, and stood slack-bodied with his hands sunk in the pockets of his jacket. Only the tightness of his clothes across his chest and something sure and restrained in his gait as he walked hinted of the ...
— Those Who Smiled - And Eleven Other Stories • Perceval Gibbon
... people!" whispered Do to Flo, and both stood primly silent till they were tumbled into another mail bag, and went rattling on again with a new set ...
— Aunt Jo's Scrap-Bag VI - An Old-Fashioned Thanksgiving, Etc. • Louisa M. Alcott
... over her that she had had enough of him—more than was good for her, and she sat up straight, primly ...
— The Firing Line • Robert W. Chambers
... is being greatly blamed," said Mrs. Atwater primly. "He really ought to have known better than to put such an instrument as a printing-press into the hands of an irresponsible boy of that age. Of course it simply encouraged him to print all kinds of things. We none of us think Uncle Joseph ever dreamed that Herbert would publish, anything exactly ...
— Gentle Julia • Booth Tarkington
... stick somewhere. It must have been at Heath's. Yes, it was. I put it on the counter while I opened this net thing. Don't you remember? You were taking some money out of your purse." Louis had a very distinct vision of his Rachel's agreeably gloved fingers primly unfastening the purse and choosing a shilling ...
— The Price of Love • Arnold Bennett
... 1450. The 28. was Lewis ab Ellerichshausen. Vnder this man there arose a dangerous sedition in Prussia betweene the chiefe cities and the knights of the Order. The citizens demanded libertie, complaining that they were oppressed with diuers molestations. Whereupon they primly made sute vnto Casimir then king of Polonia. The Master of the Order seeing what would come to passe began to expostulate with the king, that he kept not the peace which had bene concluded betweene them to last for euer. Also Frederick the Emperour commaunded ...
— The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques, - and Discoveries of The English Nation, v5 - Central and Southern Europe • Richard Hakluyt
... young lady cousin, of pale blond complexion, neutral opinions, and irreproachable manners, smiled primly. My idyl ...
— Castle Nowhere • Constance Fenimore Woolson
... comfortable sleigh of the old-fashioned pattern. Although it had once been very handsome, it was now faded and ancient. A man who almost looked as if he had gone into service along with the sleigh and the other belongings of his mistress, sat primly upon the front seat. He expressed as much pleasure at seeing the little Peppers coming, as his stoical countenance would allow, but he didn't move a muscle of face or figure. At any other time Joel would ...
— The Adventures of Joel Pepper • Margaret Sidney
... McCormick, aged twelve; Miss Betty Ordway, aged eleven, was Josephine; Miss Mary Wilson, aged ten, was charming as Little Buttercup; Willie Wilson, aged eleven, was Captain Corcoran; Dick Wallack, aged eleven, was a good Ralph Rackstraw, and Daisy Ricketts, demurely attired as Aunt Ophelia, was primly "splendid." The sisters, the cousins, and the aunts, the sailors, and especially the marine guard, were all represented. The singing was tolerable and the acting generally bad, but the performance was nevertheless enjoyed by the crowded audience. The little ...
— Perley's Reminiscences, Vol. 1-2 - of Sixty Years in the National Metropolis • Benjamin Perley Poore
... somewhat when we finally came to a halt. I confess that just at that minute even Sunnyside seemed a cheerful spot. We had paused at the edge of a level cleared place, bordered all around with primly trimmed evergreen trees. Between them I caught a glimpse of starlight shining down on rows of white headstones and an occasional more imposing monument, or towering shaft. In spite of myself, I drew my breath in sharply. We were on the edge of ...
— The Circular Staircase • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... Wallis's bonnet was brought out and tied on her, and the poor old woman blushed like a girl when she stood with meek hands folded at her waist and looked primly about on the family for their approval at Margaret's request. But that was nothing to the way she stared when Margaret got out the threefold mirror and showed her herself in the new headgear. She trotted away at last, the wonderful bonnet in one hand, the box in the other, ...
— A Voice in the Wilderness • Grace Livingston Hill
... figure by a blue ribbon, and her Leghorn hat was drawn around her oval cheek by a bow of the same color. She had a Southern girl's narrow feet, encased in white stockings and kid slippers, which were crossed primly before her as she sat in a chair, supporting her arm by her faithful parasol planted firmly on the floor. A faint odor of southernwood exhaled from her, and, oddly enough, stirred the Colonel with a far-off recollection ...
— Openings in the Old Trail • Bret Harte
... been a wordy falling-out between Mrs. Halloran and Mrs. Donohue; there had been words; nay, more, there had been language. Mrs. Halloran had gone to church early in the morning, had fulfilled the duties of her religion, and was returning primly home, when Mrs. Donohue spied her, and, still smouldering with volcanic fire, sent a broadside of lava at Mrs. Halloran. The latter heard, flushed, opened her lips—and then suddenly checked herself. After a moment she spoke: "Mrs. Donohue, I've just been to ...
— Toaster's Handbook - Jokes, Stories, and Quotations • Peggy Edmund & Harold W. Williams, compilers
... within narrow limits, and pride, which aimed at no grander equipage than a pillion, could exult only in the common splendor of the blue and white linen gown, with short sleeves, coming down to the waist, and in the snow-white flaxen apron, which, primly starched and ironed, was worn on public days. There was no revolution except from the time of sowing to the time of reaping, from the plain dress of the week to the more trim attire of Sunday. Every family was taught to look to the ...
— The Real America in Romance, Volume 6; A Century Too Soon (A Story - of Bacon's Rebellion) • John R. Musick
... lean officer with a smooth face entered the barn. The sentry saluted primly. The officer flashed a comprehensive glance about ...
— The Little Regiment - And Other Episodes of the American Civil War • Stephen Crane
... efficient and appallingly neat widow, whom Insall had discovered somewhere in his travels and installed as his housekeeper. Janet paused with her hand on the gate latch to gaze around her, at the picket fence on which he had been working when she had walked hither the year before. It was primly painted now, its posts crowned with the carved pineapples; behind the fence old-fashioned flowers were in bloom, lupins and false indigo; and the retaining wall of blue-grey slaty stone, which he had laid that spring, was finished. A wind stirred the maple, releasing a shower ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... six o'clock, he rang the bell of her lodgings in the MOZARTSTRASSE. This was a new street, the first blocks of which gave directly on the Gewandhaus square; but, at the further end, where she lived, a phalanx of redbrick and stucco fronts looked primly across at a similar line. In the third storey of one of these houses, Madeleine Wade had a single, large room, the furniture of which was so skilfully contrived, that, by day, all traces of the ...
— Maurice Guest • Henry Handel Richardson
... Jane, who was waiting, rooted and rigid, close by. The reddish eyes of the nurse-maid fairly bulged with importance. Her lips were sealed primly. Her face was so pale that every freckle she had stood forth clearly. How strangely—even direly—the great dining-room affected her—who was so at ease in the nursery! No smile, no wink, no remark, either lively or sensible, ever melted the ice of her countenance. And it was ...
— The Poor Little Rich Girl • Eleanor Gates
... the Album; hand it here! Exactly! page on page of gratitude For breakfast, dinner, supper, and the view! I praise these poets: they leave margin-space; Each stanza seems to gather skirts around, And primly, trimly, keep the foot's confine, Modest and maidlike; lubber prose o'er-sprawls And straddling stops the path from left to right. Since I want space to do my cipher-work, Which poem spares a corner? What comes first? 'Hail, calm acclivity, salubrious spot!' ...
— Browning's England - A Study in English Influences in Browning • Helen Archibald Clarke
... gravely shook the hand she held out primly, keeping a certain distance from him lest he should attempt to ...
— A Prisoner in Fairyland • Algernon Blackwood
... the bottom of a carriage, unadorned by an imposing flounce that almost covered the robe; a little later, the one sober flounce was driven into obscurity by twenty coquettish small ones; and these were displaced by primly puffed bands; which gave way to fanciful "keys" running up the sides of the dress (where they seemed to have no possible right); and those vanished when double skirts commenced their brief reign; to be dethroned ...
— Fairy Fingers - A Novel • Anna Cora Mowatt Ritchie
... in the bedroom for you to change your clothes by," she said, as he entered; then evading the caress which this wifely attention provoked, by bending still more primly over her book, she added, "Go at once. You're making ...
— The Argonauts of North Liberty • Bret Harte
... time,' said Rose, primly. 'I like variety very well, but I don't seek it by running away the moment ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... a folded handkerchief in her bony, discoloured fingers, now pressed it to her eyes, shaking her head as she did so. Lydia gave Martie a resentful look, and her mother a sympathetic one, before she said primly: ...
— Martie the Unconquered • Kathleen Norris
... primly out of the store; it always made her feel funny to be called young lady. But the minute she was out of the clerk's sight she ran as fast as ever she could, ...
— Mary Jane: Her Book • Clara Ingram Judson
... Cohorn's[434] ignorance Had pallisadoed in a way you'd wonder To see in forts of Netherlands or France— (Though these to our Gibraltar must knock under)— Right in the middle of the parapet Just named, these palisades were primly set:[435] ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 6 • Lord Byron
... Harold chasing me across Bursley with a besom,' said Maud primly. 'But what you say is quite right, you dear old uncle. Men are queer—I mean husbands. You can't argue with them. You'd much better ...
— The Grim Smile of the Five Towns • Arnold Bennett
... miles n.e. of Hallettsville. She was a slave of Washington Greenlee Foley and his grandson, John Woods. The Foley plantation consisted of several square leagues, each league containing 4,428.4 acres. Adeline is tall, spare and primly erect, with fiery brown eyes, which snap when she recalls the slave days. The house is somewhat pretentious and well furnished. The day was hot and the granddaughter prepared ice water for her grandmother and the interviewer. House and ...
— Slave Narratives: a Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves - Texas Narratives, Part 1 • Works Projects Administration
... Fanny primly sipped her coffee, looking from time to time at her mother, who never once ceased praising her beauty and goodness, and would have compelled her to eat up every bit of breakfast if she could have ...
— A Hungarian Nabob • Maurus Jokai
... means to this end their first idea was to dress, act, and talk as correctly and unblamably as boys and girls could. So, by the time the worthy lady was heard descending, they were all in the drawing-room, seated primly on the stiffest chairs they could find, and apparently absorbed in the books they gazed at with serious faces and furrowed brows. To the trained eye the "high-water marks" around faces and wrists were rather more apparent and speaking than their interest in their ...
— Kitty Trenire • Mabel Quiller-Couch
... barracks, where, escorted by their military hosts, they ascended the staircase, banked with evergreens, and lined by motionless soldiers to the ante-room, which, of course, looked as unattractive as the cordial but mistaken exertions of its proprietors could make it—all the laissez-aller comfort primly tidied away, and such a roasting fire as speedily drove every one to remote ...
— Bluebell - A Novel • Mrs. George Croft Huddleston
... early. Gray went for a spin in his motor. Cecile, mischievously persuaded that Hamil desired to have Shiela to himself for half an hour, stifled her yawns and bedward inclinations and remained primly near them ...
— The Firing Line • Robert W. Chambers
... bed, With shadowing folds of marble lace, And quilt of marble, primly spread And folded round a ...
— Verses • Susan Coolidge
... was forbidden to drive visitors within the gates; so we left the fly at the inn, and set out to walk from the entrance to the house. There is no porter's lodge; and the grounds, in this outlying region, had not the appearance of being very primly kept, but were well wooded with evergreens, and much overgrown with ferns, serving for cover for hares, which scampered in and out of their hiding-places. The road went winding gently along, and, at the distance of nearly a mile, brought us to a second gate, through which we likewise ...
— Seeing Europe with Famous Authors, Volume I. - Great Britain and Ireland • Various
... we shan't any of us be tempted to do anything dishonest," said Helen primly. "Doesn't it seem to you as if the girls were getting more particular lately about saying whether they got their ideas from books and giving their authorities at the end of ...
— Betty Wales Senior • Margaret Warde
... the bedroom for a last nose-powdering, a last glance at her hair and nails, and slowly paraded to the door to let him in, while Mrs. Golden stood primly, with folded hands, like a cabinet ...
— The Job - An American Novel • Sinclair Lewis
... sitting primly behind her desk, with a ruler over her shoulder, opened her gray eyes widely at ...
— Selected Stories • Bret Harte
... the five sober little faces as they sat upon their red-painted stools with their paws folded primly in their laps. Then he winked slyly at Mother Graymouse. "Oh, well, if you are going to feel as bad as all that, perhaps I might manage to tell you one more story," he chuckled. "But I think Silver Ears will hardly call it exciting. And I wonder if ...
— The Graymouse Family • Nellie M. Leonard
... their life for thirty-five years, and to adapt them to new quarters. Their faces were weary, but flushed with expectation. The man kept looking up the line, and declaring that he heard the rumble of the engine in the distance; and whenever he said this, his wife pulled the shawl more primly about her shoulders, straightened her back, and nervously re-arranged ...
— The Delectable Duchy • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... dance, because they are paid," said Sadako primly. Her pose was no longer cordial and sympathetic. She set herself up as mentor to this young savage, who did not know ...
— Kimono • John Paris |
