"Spoilt" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... Have you held that child upon your knee, kissed his face, and seen him grow up to manhood, without a particle of love for him in your heart? Did you send him away from you with bitter reproaches, because of the accident which he would have given his own life to prevent? You have spoilt his life, and you do not care. Your heart is hard then, and God will not let that hardness go unpunished. Mother, pray that his judgments may not descend upon ...
— Under False Pretences - A Novel • Adeline Sergeant
... of fashionable life, united to a very aristocratic set of boarders; and Mrs. Stone, herself, is an extremely fascinating lady. Indeed, I have been spoilt; I don't think I could endure the drudgery of housekeeping, now; though I once told Alonzo, if he would give me a four-story house, up town, with a marble ...
— Elinor Wyllys - Vol. I • Susan Fenimore Cooper
... help, but that she must speak. No, sympathy was not what she wanted. He suddenly hated Bethel—the selfishness of it, the hopeless egotism. It was, Harry decided, the fools and not the villains who spoilt life. ...
— The Wooden Horse • Hugh Walpole
... misfortune," she exclaimed passionately. "Another minute and I should have been in time. Why did I not drive up to the house? My over-caution has spoilt it all. I am sure that was ...
— The Slave of Silence • Fred M. White
... here," I said with a relieved sigh. "I was afraid they'd have spoilt the dear old heath for a certainty. Only don't say it's Down Wood they've gone to, for that'd be more than I could stand. I thought there were fairies there long after I ought to have been a hard-headed ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 153, Oct. 17, 1917 • Various
... (not below them) on the posts, again without ceremony. The hanging up of the taro is left to the last, and, in fact, is not done till it is known that the guests are on their way, as the taro would be spoilt by bad weather. ...
— The Mafulu - Mountain People of British New Guinea • Robert W. Williamson
... Lucy had feared it would be, from his harsh opinions, quoted by Stella, in regard to the poor. All the rest of the family she had already seen, Edwin being the only son who had survived, and on that account, probably, a good deal spoilt. ...
— Lucy Raymond - Or, The Children's Watchword • Agnes Maule Machar
... plain language, we have no good writers in London who make a specialty of that kind of thing. Our common reporter is a dull dog; every story that he has to tell is spoilt in the telling. His idea of horror and of what excites horror is so lamentably deficient. Nothing will content the fellow but blood, vulgar red blood, and when he can get it he lays it on thick, and considers that he has produced a telling ...
— Masterpieces of Mystery In Four Volumes - Mystic-Humorous Stories • Various
... see that the petticoat was nothing short of a portrait of her, and that any one learned in the physiognomy of clothes would have been able to pick Sylvia out of a thousand by that spirited, spoilt, and petted garment. ...
— The Quest of the Golden Girl • Richard le Gallienne
... compunction o'er thee at the thought of pumpkin pies? Could not all our chicken fixings into silence fix thy scorn? Did not all our cakes rebuke thee,—Johnny, waffle, dander, corn? Could not all our care and coddling teach thee how to draw it mild? Well, no matter, we deserve it. Serves us right! We spoilt the child! You, forsooth, must come crusading, boring us with broadest hints Of your own ...
— The Bon Gaultier Ballads • William Edmonstoune Aytoun
... Christmas present; and, so far, nobody had given me one. So I had paid the money and driven back into the dark, soughing country with the diamond hoop loose in my pocket. I had felt so very pleased.... And now those two cursed words "stage jewel" had come and spoilt it all. ...
— Hortus Vitae - Essays on the Gardening of Life • Violet Paget, AKA Vernon Lee
... would get no more service of Brownie; but he, being better instructed from that book, which was Brownie's eyesore and the object of his wrath, when he brewed, would not suffer any sacrifice to be given to Brownie; whereupon the first and second brewings were spoilt, and for no use; for though the wort wrought well, yet in a little time it left off working, and grew cold; but of the third broust, or brewing, he had ale very good, though he would not give any sacrifice to Brownie, with whom afterwards ...
— Letters On Demonology And Witchcraft • Sir Walter Scott
... way. She set her face with a sulky determination against any intimacy between herself and the baronet's young wife; and amiable as that lady was, she found it quite impossible to overcome Miss Alicia's prejudices and dislike; or to convince the spoilt girl that she had not done her a cruel injury by marrying Sir Michael Audley. The truth was that Lady Audley had, in becoming the wife of Sir Michael, made one of those apparently advantageous matches which ...
— Lady Audley's Secret • Mary Elizabeth Braddon
... the same way time after time, and it is so difficult to think of new things to say that are interesting and not frivolous,—for aunt Lindsay wouldn't permit that. Sometimes we really get low-spirited over our efforts, and I'd be ashamed to tell how many sheets of paper and envelopes are spoilt in the undertaking. Once, in a fit of desperation, Felix bought a "Complete Letter-Writer," and we hunted through it; but there seemed to be nothing in it suitable for an occasion such as ours, and besides, the language used in the "Letter-Writer" ...
— We Ten - Or, The Story of the Roses • Lyda Farrington Kraus
... Charteris, 'I'm glad, at least, that there is some one to have pity on the poor things! There's my brother's wife, she doesn't say no, but she talks of convenience and spoilt children—Sandbrook was quite right after all; I would not tell him how she answered me! Spoilt children to be sure they are, poor things, but she might recollect they have no mother—such a fuss as she used to make with poor Lucilla too. Poor Lucilla, she would never have believed ...
— Hopes and Fears - scenes from the life of a spinster • Charlotte M. Yonge
... months, or a year at a time in order to have some operation performed in hospital, or to go to a convalescent home, or because of an attack of illness. Both branches of the special schools are faced with the peculiar difficulty of the "spoilt" child—the lame girl who, by reason of her helplessness, has been indulged and waited on by the healthy members of her family; the ill-balanced boy whose brain-storms have been so disturbing that any opposition to his will has been shirked. It must not ...
— Women Workers in Seven Professions • Edith J. Morley
... not know, his handwriting might have been spoilt, he had never thought very much ...
— The Aspirations of Jean Servien • Anatole France
... received by Johnny from his father would very likely be repeated—and in the next, although Mrs Easy thought that she never could have survived the parting with her own son, she soon found out that she was much happier without him. A spoilt child is always a source of anxiety and worry, and after Johnny's departure Mrs Easy found a quiet and repose much more suited to her disposition. Gradually she weaned herself from him, and, satisfied with seeing him occasionally, and hearing the reports of Dr Middleton, she, ...
— Mr. Midshipman Easy • Frederick Marryat
... ambition and energy, lost not an hour in proclaiming the succession of her son, Feodor. The officers of the army were promptly summoned to take the oath of allegiance to the new sovereign. Feodor was but fifteen years of age, a thoroughly spoilt boy, proud, domineering, selfish and cruel. There was now a revolt in the army of the late tzar. Several of the officers embraced the cause of Griska, declaring their full conviction that he was the Prince Dmitri, and, they carried over to his ranks a large ...
— The Empire of Russia • John S. C. Abbott
... sorry about it, because he had often longed for a little chicken of his own; besides his Mother had told him that when it grew up it would be a swimming chicken. It was a pity too he dropped the chalk, because it got trodden on and spoilt, and it ...
— Humpty Dumpty's Little Son • Helen Reid Cross
... Mrs. Moncreiff. Materially, I've everything a man can want, I suppose. But I'm not happy. You may laugh and say it's my liver. But it isn't. You're a woman of the world; you know what life is; and yet experience hasn't spoilt you. I could say anything to you; anything! And you wouldn't ...
— The Lion's Share • E. Arnold Bennett
... said, "I found this in one of my husband's drawers. I tell it you, that you may not think that that has been in any way the cause of my spoilt life." ...
— The Pilot and his Wife • Jonas Lie
... self-command, neither laughed nor was discomposed; and all that the maiden gained by her frolic was a severe rebuke from her companion, taxing her with mal-address and indecorum. Catherine replied not, but sat pouting, something in the humour of a spoilt child, who watches the opportunity of wreaking upon some one or other its resentment for a ...
— The Abbot • Sir Walter Scott
... from exposure to the weather. A hundred cows under shelter will yield the same quantity of milk through the winter as five hundred in the open air, at half the cost. A large portion of the hay we strew about the pastures for the cattle, is trodden underfoot and spoilt instead of being eaten; and if rain falls, the whole is spoilt. Calculate the loss of milk, the cost of cartage over a wide range of land, the damage done to the pastures by the trampling of heavy cattle in wet weather, all caused by the want of a few sheds, which it is impossible ...
— The Roman Question • Edmond About
... running no little risk of being spoilt, and I don't say that I have come off uninjured. In Melbourne I was told by the Dean (the Bishop is in England) and by Judge Pohlman (an excellent good man) that they remembered no occasion during the twenty-two years of sojourn (before Melbourne was more than a village) when so much interest ...
— Life of John Coleridge Patteson • Charlotte M. Yonge
... Pleasure never is at home: At a touch sweet Pleasure melteth, Like to bubbles when rain pelteth; Then let winged Fancy wander Through the thought still spread beyond her: Open wide the mind's cage door, She'll dart forth, and cloudward soar. O, sweet Fancy! let her loose; Summer's joys are spoilt by use, And the enjoying of the Spring Fades as does its blossoming: Autumn's red-lipp'd fruitage too, Blushing through the mist and dew, Cloys with tasting: What do then? Sit thee by the ingle, when The sear ...
— A Day with Keats • May (Clarissa Gillington) Byron
... special desire, as I was afterwards informed, of the latter, who, during dinner, drank out of her neighbor's (Sydney Smith's) glass, and otherwise behaved herself with the fantastic, despotic impropriety in which she frequently indulged, and which might have been tolerated in a spoilt beauty of eighteen, but was hardly becoming in a woman of her age and "personal appearance." When first I came out on the stage, my father and mother, who occasionally went to Holland House, received an invitation to dine there, which included me; after some discussion, ...
— Records of Later Life • Frances Anne Kemble
... lets down the bed. She says no more; an effect like this would be spoilt by language. Fortunately he is not ...
— Echoes of the War • J. M. Barrie
... for a successful feast of joy its internal equipment counts for more than the external. This is the chief lesson which his infant state has to teach to man. There his possessions are few and trivial, yet he needs no more for his happiness. The world of play is spoilt for the unfortunate youngster who is burdened with an ...
— My Reminiscences • Rabindranath Tagore
... the sake of my bibi!" said Mrs. Creighton. "It is the prettiest little hat I have had these three years; it would be distressing to have it spoilt before it has ...
— Elinor Wyllys - Vol. I • Susan Fenimore Cooper
... gathered from what precedes that Hinduism has little room for the Devil[72]. Buddhism being essentially an ethical system recognizes the importance of the Tempter or Mara, but still Mara is not an evil spirit who has spoilt a good world. In Hinduism, whether pantheistic or polytheistic, there is even less disposition to personify evil in one figure, and most Indian religious systems are disposed to think of the imperfections of the world as suffering ...
— Hinduism and Buddhism, Vol I. (of 3) - An Historical Sketch • Charles Eliot
... the orphan of Fiddler's Ranch, to be always the spoilt child of prosperity and the creature of modern life, with more aspirations than he saw how to fulfil, hampered as he was by duties, ...
— The Long Vacation • Charlotte M. Yonge
... say that he never meant to go to a country where people spoke a language that sounded like cracking walnuts; that he hated steamers; had no fancy for tumble-down castles; that it was so common to travel; there was more distinction in staying at home; that the field of Waterloo had been spoilt, and was not worth seeing; his ideas of glaciers would be ruined by the reality; and he did not care to see Cologne Cathedral till it ...
— Scenes and Characters • Charlotte M. Yonge
... me lightly each time we swung over to the left on the outside edge. I saw Andrew Smallie once or twice. Once he winked at me, knowingly, as I passed him with Lisa—and I hated him for it. That man almost spoilt Gottingen for me. Britons are no friends of mine out of their own country. They never get over the fallacy that everywhere except London is an out-of-the-way ...
— Tomaso's Fortune and Other Stories • Henry Seton Merriman
... sometimes, but not always, what it seems (Chapter XXI). With it we may put Leathes, from an obsolete Scandinavian word for barn (see quot. Chapter XIII), to which we owe also the names Leatham and Latham. Mr. Oldbuck's "ecstatic description" of the Roman camp with its praetorium was spoilt by ...
— The Romance of Names • Ernest Weekley
... nearly losing the results of Mr Banks's labours. For greater security he had placed his collection of plants in the bread-room, into which the water ran, and covered them completely. By great care most of them were dried, but many were entirely spoilt. ...
— Captain Cook - His Life, Voyages, and Discoveries • W.H.G. Kingston
... words in return. I had been attracted, nevertheless, not only by her grace and beauty, but by the peculiar sweetness of her voice and the gentleness of her manner and bearing when engaged in pacifying dispute or difficulty among the children, and particularly in dealing with the half-deformed spoilt infant of which I have spoken. This evening that little brat was more than usually exasperating, and having exhausted the patience or repelled the company of all the rest, found itself alone, and ...
— Across the Zodiac • Percy Greg
... different. I have been spoilt early. I can not live out of the world, out of excitement. I could have done so, but it is too late. If I can not have emotions, I must have the world. You would offer me neither one nor the other. You are blase in every thing, even in ambition. ...
— The History of Pendennis, Vol. 2 - His Fortunes and Misfortunes, His Friends and His Greatest Enemy • William Makepeace Thackeray
... of the open doorway, caught sight of her husband striding down the platform, closely followed by an army of coolies, two bearers, and two pessimistic-looking dogs on chains. "Theo," she called, "do leave that eternal luggage to Amar Singh, and come and be spoilt! ...
— The Great Amulet • Maud Diver
... to gain them; he preferred to yield to the stream, and direct the current, which he could not stop, of science, literature, art, and fashion, and to sweeten and to sanctify what God had made very good and man had spoilt. ...
— The Idea of a University Defined and Illustrated: In Nine - Discourses Delivered to the Catholics of Dublin • John Henry Newman
... the Army as a cornet of Hussars in 1819, to the tragic close of his life, Lord George always cut a conspicuous and brilliant figure in the world. He was the spoilt child of Fortune; and, like all such spoilt children, was constantly getting into hot water—and out of it again. As a subaltern, for instance, he showed such little respect for his seniors that, one day on parade, a Captain Kerr ...
— Love Romances of the Aristocracy • Thornton Hall
... cherish admiration for the doings of the "patriots." Many of us have to come in contact with some one or other belonging to this class and if he be known to favour anything against the great figures of the city-politics, his business is sure to be spoilt. ...
— Indian Unrest • Valentine Chirol
... think she is EXCLUSIVE?" I asked Hilda as we strolled on towards the stern, out of the spoilt child's hearing. ...
— Hilda Wade - A Woman With Tenacity Of Purpose • Grant Allen
... of the design is spoilt by the broken and curly volutes which sprawl across the aisles, by ugly finials at the corners, and by a rather clumsy balustrading ...
— Portuguese Architecture • Walter Crum Watson
... his father," said Abel Baragar, with dry emphasis. "Phenie Tyson was extravagant—wanted this and that, and nothin' was too good for her. Abner spoilt his life gettin' her what she wanted; and it broke ...
— Northern Lights • Gilbert Parker
... wasn't true to his appointment the moment I wanted to go back; and I, to pay him out, I determined I'd walk it where he shouldn't overtake me, and on came the storm . . . And my gown spoilt, and such a bonnet!' ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... and Athletes had not left her very far, Ere again he puffed the odours of a casual cigar; But he oftentimes lamented, as to manhood's years he grew, 'What a pity such a stunner was so spoilt by being blue!' ...
— Sagittulae, Random Verses • E. W. Bowling
... business men who perceive behind their business a goal, an ideal, in which there is something more than their own personal wealth and glory, the be-diamonding of a fat wife, and the expensive upbringing of a spoilt family. They make their wealth, but they seek to make it justly, to make it cleanly, and, having amassed their fortune, strive to benefit the lot of those by whose labour they amassed it, and whose future, and the future of whose children, are at once their ...
— Over the Fireside with Silent Friends • Richard King
... to our ears just an octave too high. There is some truth in it, but the truth is spoilt by being exaggerated. Joinville's book is very pleasant to read, because he gives himself no airs, and tells us as well as he can what he recollects of his excellent King, and of the fearful time which they spent ...
— Chips From A German Workshop. Vol. III. • F. Max Mueller
... to do anything till I have had my breakfast," said the captain. "They've spoilt my morning snooze, but I aren't going to let them spoil my morning meal, ...
— The Ocean Cat's Paw - The Story of a Strange Cruise • George Manville Fenn
... I'd lost me leave paper. I was afraid to go and report it in case it had been picked up, and they'd run me in for this murder job. That's how I come to desert, gentlemen, and spoilt a eighteen years' conduct sheet without a entry over this murderin' ...
— Okewood of the Secret Service • Valentine Williams
... much better fellow than I am, chevalier," said he—" and that's no lie," he added under his breath. "De Tournay was a fiery, ambitious, youngster with bad companions. De Tournay told me he repented of coming with Rullecour, and he felt he had spoilt his life—that he could never return to France again or to ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... friendship with the brotherhood of wits, and was treated by them like a spoilt child, was born at Barnstaple in 1685, and left an orphan at the age of ten. He was educated at the free grammar school in the town, and was afterwards, to his discontent, apprenticed to a mercer in London. He escaped from this uncongenial employment to be dependent on ...
— The Age of Pope - (1700-1744) • John Dennis
... spoilt our Eden; I hope the rhinoceros will catch him," said Rachel viciously. "Look, he has seen it and is running to ...
— The Ghost Kings • H. Rider Haggard
... herself up to her full height. There was something haughty in her demeanor, occasioned, perhaps, by the careless way in which he asked the question. She felt that he was treating her rather like a spoilt child, while she felt ...
— Princess Maritza • Percy Brebner
... fishing was unrivalled, especially on the Kootenay River. Very large bags could be got, though the fish were not quite as large as in the Thompson. But it is unfortunately true that since this district became a mining centre the fishing has been largely spoilt. Professional fishermen have fished for the market, sawmills have been allowed to empty their sawdust into the rivers, and probably alien miners and others have massacred wholesale with dynamite. In the coast district, of which Vancouver is the centre, there are plenty of rivers and lakes. This part ...
— Fishing in British Columbia - With a Chapter on Tuna Fishing at Santa Catalina • Thomas Wilson Lambert
... begin like that.—Fool, we wanted to have a jolly evening all to ourselves, and you have spoilt it." ...
— Debts of Honor • Maurus Jokai
... very frequently found in the homes of the English middle classes, as well as in the mansions of the wealthier and more aristocratic; and we take this to be one evidence, that we are on the right road to an improvement in our system of cookery. One great cause of many of the spoilt dishes and badly-cooked meats which are brought to our tables, arises, we think, and most will agree with us, from a non-acquaintance with "common, every-day things." Entertaining this view, we intend to preface the ...
— The Book of Household Management • Mrs. Isabella Beeton
... the reading public by the vigour of his thoughts, put forth in the quaintest language. He cannot write English, said the critics. No matter, said the public; we can read what he does write, and that without yawning. And so Dr Pessimist Anticant became popular. Popularity spoilt him for all further real use, as it has done many another. While, with some diffidence, he confined his objurgations to the occasional follies or shortcomings of mankind; while he ridiculed the energy of the squire ...
— The Warden • Anthony Trollope
... fills me with many happy memories. Mamma laughingly said he always did whatever I wanted, but he answered: "Well, why not? She is the Queen!" Then he would lift me on to his shoulder, and caress me in all sorts of ways. Yet I cannot say that he spoilt me. I remember one day while I was swinging he called out as he passed: "Come and kiss me, little Queen." Contrary to my usual custom, I would not stir, and answered pertly: "You must come for it, Papa." He refused quite rightly, and went away. Marie was there and scolded me, saying: ...
— The Story of a Soul (L'Histoire d'une Ame): The Autobiography of St. Therese of Lisieux • Therese Martin (of Lisieux)
... deep the remorse which they both felt for their injustice and unkindness towards the friendless lad, that there was considerable danger of their falling into the opposite extreme, and ruining him by sudden and excessive indulgence. Jesse, however, was not of a temperament to be easily spoilt. He had been so long an outcast from human society that he had become as wild and shy as his old companions of the fields and the coppice, the beasts of the earth and the birds of the air. The hare which he had himself given to Phoebe was easier to ...
— Jesse Cliffe • Mary Russell Mitford
... thatdo for a BAThrooM wallpaper? it could be produced verery cheaply and itcould be calld the CHER RYdesigN damn, imeant to put all that in capitals. iam afraid this articleis spoilt now but butt bUt curse . But perhaps the most excitingthing aLout this macLine is that you can by presssing alittle switch suddenly writein redor green instead of in black; I donvt understanh how Lt is done butit is very jollY? busisisness men us e the device a ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 159, July 28th, 1920 • Various
... stole to satisfy the cravings of hunger." Berka the liberated slave of Makouran, and Said's intimate friend, now came in, dressed up in his holiday clothes. He asked for Said. "He is gone to The Desert, run away, for he has broken our cooking-pot; see here are the pieces, here's the meat spoilt; what am I to do for dinner?" I added, "He ought to have a good beating." The poor old negro stared and looked really grieved. At last he muttered, "Why, Christian, that breaking comes from God, and not Said." "The truth," said the taleb laughing. Said now came in, having borrowed another ...
— Travels in the Great Desert of Sahara, in the Years of 1845 and 1846 • James Richardson
... placidly. "Wonder where he's put that there fiddle of his. Why that fiddle cost thirty shillings, and good words besides. Somewhere in the damp, without doubt; that instrument will be unglued and spoilt in ...
— Under the Greenwood Tree • Thomas Hardy
... Mr. Mole here nearly spoilt his exhibition of his marvellous power of endurance, for pricking his finger accidentally with a pin, he sang out lustily, much to the astonishment ...
— Jack Harkaway's Boy Tinker Among The Turks - Book Number Fifteen in the Jack Harkaway Series • Bracebridge Hemyng
... he was always thinking of her; which were in fact a caress, breathing a subtle and restrained devotion, more appealing than anything more open. And Cicely seemed to see Nelly yielding—unconsciously; unconsciously 'spoilt,' and learning to depend on the 'spoiler.' Why did Hester seem so anxious always about Farrell's influence with Nelly—so ready to ward him off, if she could? For after all, thought Cicely, easily, however long it might take for Nelly to recover her hold ...
— Missing • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... about twenty. A fair girl with rich brown hair hanging free in natural ringlets. A lovely girl, with a frank face, and wonderful eyes; so large, so soft, so bright, set to such perfection in her kind good head. She was round and fresh and dimpled and spoilt, and there was in Pet an air of timidity and dependence which was the best weakness in the world, and gave her the only crowning charm a girl so pretty and pleasant ...
— Little Dorrit • Charles Dickens
... revolt fixed for the 22nd May. The letter ran; 'In whatever way you can manage it, come into Peshawar on the 21st instant. Thoroughly understand that point! In fact, eat there and drink here.' The rapidity with which the disarmament had been carried through spoilt the Subadar-Major's little game; he had, however, gone too far to draw back, and on the night of the 22nd he deserted, taking with him 250 men of the regiment. His hopes were a second time doomed to disappointment. However welcome 250 muskets might have been to the Afridis, 250 unarmed sepoys ...
— Forty-one years in India - From Subaltern To Commander-In-Chief • Frederick Sleigh Roberts
... I was tired,' she said. 'No, I am thrifty; and I want to save as much of my finery as I can. I can go very well on naked feet. These shoes are no protection; they would be worn out in half-a-day, and spoilt for decent ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... asked, moving a step towards him. "It was a foolish promise. It has done neither of us any good. It has spoilt a part of my life. Why should I keep silence, and let it go on to the end? Do you know what it has made of ...
— A Lost Leader • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... do,' he said in a sleepy voice, with those peculiar twitchings of the head and shoulders which I have always noticed in spoilt and conceited young men. 'I meant to go to the University, but here I am. Sort of oppression on my chest. Give us a cigar.' He walked right across the room, listlessly dragging his feet, and keeping his hands in his trouser-pockets, and sank heavily ...
— The Jew And Other Stories • Ivan Turgenev
... while," said Pete, "to ging atower to the T'nowhead an' see. Ye'll mind the closed-in beds i' the kitchen? Ay, weel, they're a fell spoilt crew, T'nowhead's litlins, an' no that aisy to manage. Th' ither lasses Lisbeth's hae'n had a michty trouble wi' them. When they war i' the middle o' their reddin' up the bairns wid come tumlin' about the floor, but, sal, I assure ye, Bell didna ...
— Auld Licht Idyls • J.M. Barrie
... was an active and intelligent woman, and knew how to get out of difficulties. She returned to her former workroom where her daughter Pauline was already apprenticed, and she next placed Leonie there; so that Hortense, the youngest girl, who was a spoilt child, prettier and more delicate than her sisters, was alone left at school. And, later on,—after Pauline had married Labitte the stonemason, and Leonie, Salvat the journeyman-engineer,—Hortense, while serving as assistant at a confectioner's in the Rue des Martyrs, there became ...
— The Three Cities Trilogy, Complete - Lourdes, Rome and Paris • Emile Zola
... And although my sister instantly boxed my ears, it was highly gratifying to me to see that the answer spoilt his joke, and brought him to ...
— Great Expectations • Charles Dickens
... like a murderer, but it had to be. Poor girl! I wanted to pick her up like a baby an' kiss her. It wasn't that I loved Lizzie less but Rome more. She wasn't to blame. Every spoilt woman stands for a fool-man. Most o' them need—not a master—but a frank counsellor. I locked the door. She grew calm an' leaned on my table, her face covered with her hands. My clock shouted the seconds in the silence. Not a word was said for ...
— Keeping up with Lizzie • Irving Bacheller
... find how entirely she trusted him. He brimmed with deep feeling as he replied in a steady voice, the steadiness of which was spoilt by the palpableness of his great effort to ...
— Far from the Madding Crowd • Thomas Hardy
... in the very moment of danger—for where danger is, there is no fear that the poor will be despised by the rich—and very likely the wiry sunburnt poor man may be placed in battle at the side of a wealthy one who has never spoilt his complexion and has plenty of superfluous flesh—when he sees such an one puffing and at his wits'-end, how can he avoid drawing the conclusion that men like him are only rich because no one has the courage to despoil them? And when they meet in private will not people be ...
— The Republic • Plato
... said before, seeing the son thus deformed and spoilt in character for want of teaching, exhorted him to study, and to use all his entreaties to persuade Plato, the first of philosophers, to visit him in Sicily, and; when he came, to submit himself ...
— Plutarch's Lives • A.H. Clough
... old ladies are as dear as ever; if I am not wholly spoilt, it will not be their fault, bless their kind hearts! The niece ...
— Geoffrey Strong • Laura E. Richards
... continued to gain by Cornish ignorance for a considerable time. The first discoverer of the ore was called Poder (it long went by his name), who actually abandoned the mine in consequence; and we find that it was for some time considered that "the ore came in and spoilt the tin." In the year 1822 the produce of the Cornish copper mines amounted to 106,723 tons of ore, which produced 9,331 tons of copper, and 676,285 l. in money. In the same year, the quantity of tin ore ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. XVII. No. 469. Saturday January 1, 1831 • Various
... "But it would have spoilt my credit," continued the Doctor; "and there, I don't want to see a lot of blow-flies with lights in their tails; so, once for all, ...
— Trapped by Malays - A Tale of Bayonet and Kris • George Manville Fenn
... the Panaumbe and Penaumbe Cycle, which I do not trust myself to reconstruct from memory at this distance of time. Many precious hours were likewise wasted, and much material rendered useless, by the national vice of drunkenness. A whole month at Hakodate was spoilt in this way, and nothing obtained from an Aino named Tomtare, who had been procured for me by the kindness of H. E. the Governor of Hakodate. One can have intercourse with men who smell badly, and who suffer, as almost all Ainos do, from lice and from a variety of disgusting skin-diseases. It ...
— Aino Folk-Tales • Basil Hall Chamberlain
... taste of cabbages!" Her heart beat with affright, however, and as soon as the servant maid had left the room, she ran in great terror to the wine cellar. "What the servant said must have been true," thought she; "and Wise Peter will never forgive me when he finds out that I have spoilt the well. I will, therefore, pour some wine into the water, to take away the taste of the cabbages." So saying, she seized one of the wine barrels, and in the strength of terror she managed, with great difficulty, to push it up the cellar stairs, and roll it through the kitchen out ...
— Funny Big Socks - Being the Fifth Book of the Series • Sarah L. Barrow
... to Lunnun town; The king and queen they gain'd a crown; Dolly spoilt her bran-new gown, To her mortification. I'll drink our king and queen wi' glee, In home-brewed ale, and so will she; But Doll and I ne'er ...
— Old and New London - Volume I • Walter Thornbury
... awning, thanking her with a smile; and the people, laughing, shuffled unwillingly aside and let him paint on in peace. It was only little Bebee, but they had spoilt the child from her infancy, and ...
— Bebee • Ouida
... circumstances of Lams' death; not within it, like the report of the Pythian games in Electra, or the man's having come to Mysia from Tegea without uttering a word on the way, in The Mysians. So that it is ridiculous to say that one's Plot would have been spoilt without them, since it is fundamentally wrong to make up such Plots. If the poet has taken such a Plot, however, and one sees that he might have put it in a more probable form, he is guilty of absurdity as well as a fault of art. Even in ...
— The Poetics • Aristotle
... Bateman to Sheffield, when they were gone, "you and White, each in his own way, are so very rash in your mode of speaking, and before other people, too. I wished to teach Freeborn a little good Catholicism, and you have spoilt all. I hoped something would have come out of this breakfast. But only think of White! it will all out. Freeborn will tell it to his set. It is very bad, very bad indeed. And you, my friend, are not much better; never serious. What could ...
— Loss and Gain - The Story of a Convert • John Henry Newman
... nice thing would be to give a dinner to this artist push and to the people that Dorothy give me a letter to, and I'm going to do it. Lucius will look out for the whole thing. You should see the way the waiters tend. I reckon Lucius has told 'em we're made of money. I'm afraid we're getting spoilt, Muzz. It would be pretty tough to go back to ...
— Money Magic - A Novel • Hamlin Garland
... slightest indignation; rather did a tone of amusement and even of triumph strike through his speech; and now he laughed good-humouredly like an indulgent parent who is watching the naturally cruel antics of a spoilt boy. ...
— El Dorado • Baroness Orczy
... brick dressings. A broad terrace more than five hundred yards long, with a balustrade in red granite, and decked with parterres of flowers, becomes a delightful walk in autumn. M. Derblay's ironworks may have somewhat spoilt the beauty of the landscape, but Beaulieu ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol VI. • Various
... strongest impression of the Eternal City was one of disillusion. Her hero, a Berrichon artist on his travels, confesses to a feeling of uneasiness and regret rather than of surprise and admiration. The ancient ruins, stupendous in themselves, seemed to her spoilt for effect by their situation in the center of a modern town. "Of the Rome of the past not enough exists to overwhelm me with its majesty; of the Rome of the present not enough to make me forget the first, and much too much to allow ...
— Famous Women: George Sand • Bertha Thomas
... E—- and I went to Mount Vernon, Washington's residence and tomb. H—- somehow missed us, which quite spoilt my day. The air in the steamer was delightful, and the Potomac is mildly pretty. We were left at Mount Vernon, and I was disgusted with the shabbiness and untidiness of the tomb of the great patriot; that even in his case such a want of sentiment ...
— The British Association's visit to Montreal, 1884: Letters • Clara Rayleigh
... tobacco, and a nest of hen eggs for her "son's" breakfast. When this was over, the Mukonderi, another dancing-tune, with instruments something like clarionets, was ordered; but it had scarcely been struck up, before a drenching rain, with strong wind, set in and spoilt the music, though not the playing—for none dared stop without an order; and the queen, instead of taking pity, laughed most boisterously over the exercise of her savage power as the unfortunate musicians were nearly beaten down by the ...
— The Discovery of the Source of the Nile • John Hanning Speke
... the heel, expressive of impatience, the spoilt boy exclaimed: "Oh, how long a time to wait! Where's the use of a feller's ...
— The Red Moccasins - A Story • Morrison Heady
... quietly, but none the less Jimmy realised what the memory meant to this man whom he had always thought a little dull and prosaic. "When I let them ship me away—I was only a youngster at the time—I thought they would help her to get a fresh start, but they didn't. It's spoilt my life, and that's why I don't want yours spoilt. At least give her the chance to go right." He drew a packet of bank-notes from his pocket. "Here's fifty to go on with. Come to me when you want some more. Only, send her right away, where you won't ...
— People of Position • Stanley Portal Hyatt
... that you have eaten too much, or by some other means have spoilt your powers of interpretation," said Leif with a laugh, as the puzzled interpreter shook his head for the fifth time at an energetic young savage with a red spot on his chin, and a blue stripe on his nose, who had been gesticulating—we might almost ...
— The Norsemen in the West • R.M. Ballantyne
... beautiful and merited reputation out of him; shows the man inside the military toggery, and makes us laugh and cry, and exult with feeling. There was a man in New South Wales—a shepherd—who went raving mad when he learnt that the heavy black dust which spoilt his pasture was tin, and that he had waked and slept for years without discovering the gigantic fortune which was all about him. I will not go mad, if I can help it, but I do think it rather hard lines on me that I hadn't the ...
— My Contemporaries In Fiction • David Christie Murray
... general thing these unequal matches don't work, and had better not be thought on. S'posin' you should think you was in love with somebody, and in a few years, when you got older, be sick of him. It might do him a sight of harm. That's what spoilt your poor Great-uncle Joseph, who's been in the hospital at Worcester ...
— Aikenside • Mary J. Holmes
... whether any writer of the first rank has ever perpetrated so disastrous a literary failure as this scene; but the main cause of that failure appears to me not doubtful at all. The artist has no business within the frame of the picture, and his intrusion into it has spoilt it. The method adopted from the commencement is ostentatiously objective: we are taken straight into Maria's presence, and bidden to look at and to pity the unhappy maiden as described by the Traveller who met her. No attempt is made to place us at the outset in sympathy with him; he, until ...
— Sterne • H.D. Traill
... true also that outside the Circus and the Fat Sisters and Battling Edwardes there were flaming pictures with reds and yellows thrown about like temperance tracts, but the modern figures in these pictures spoilt the colour, the photography spoilt it—too much reality where there should have been mystery, too much ...
— The Cathedral • Hugh Walpole
... Stranger (rising).—"You have spoilt my sleep: you had a right, since you paid for the lodging. Let me walk with you a few paces; you need not fear, ...
— The Caxtons, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... These raids spoilt German chances from the nearest ports to Britain. But they did not stop the submarine campaign; and there was still plenty of work for camouflage, ...
— Flag and Fleet - How the British Navy Won the Freedom of the Seas • William Wood
... best part of this story, half spoilt, however, by euhemeristic tone and lack of epic dignity. He woos as a victorious warrior, and receives a cuff; as a generous goldsmith, and gets a buffet; as a handsome soldier, earning a heavy knock-down blow; but in the garb ...
— The Danish History, Books I-IX • Saxo Grammaticus ("Saxo the Learned")
... to know what else I did?" Her voice grew hard and unfamiliar. "I'll tell you. I went to my sister Eliza, and I said: 'Some way or another, you've spoilt my life. I'll forgive you just as soon as I can—maybe before you die, maybe not. You come with me!' and I went up garret, where she kept the chest with things in it that belonged to them that had died. There it sets now. I stood over it with her. 'I'm going to put my ...
— Tiverton Tales • Alice Brown
... take it for granted he was responsible. It is in the classical style, utterly out of keeping with the architecture near. The arch and jambs of the Norman window above it were replaced; but this again is spoilt by the insertion of rude unadorned mullions. The corresponding window over the eastern aisle is original and unaltered. The north end of the transept has also Norman lights, larger than those below, on ...
— Bell's Cathedrals: The Cathedral Church of Ely • W. D. Sweeting
... "a light morning-coat? Are you mad? Do you think it is a tea-cup I am inquiring about?" This light morning-coat came most inopportunely; it spoilt the whole man for me such as I had ...
— Hunger • Knut Hamsun
... good for me to try and persuade him," thought Walter; "it 'ud only make him go the other way. I wish I hadn't gone with him; it's quite spoilt my day. I didn't get a holiday and come all this way from home just to spend the afternoon in a stuffy public-house, nor on the pavement outside, neither. It's six o'clock—there's the clock striking.—Chris, we shall only just get back ...
— Archie's Mistake • G. E. Wyatt
... pale and tired, child; you must have something to eat, and then go to bed. Girls can't stand racketing about as boys can. You look quiet and nice, child, and I have no doubt we shall suit very well. It is very creditable to you that you have not been spoilt by your brothers. Boys generally make their sisters almost as noisy and ...
— The Young Buglers • G.A. Henty
... as you know, your own self, she ain't the least little bit spoiled." Then she eased her mind with this retort: "Marse Tom, she makes you do anything she wants to, and you can't deny it; so if she could be spoilt, she'd been spoilt long ago, because you are the very WORST! Look at that pile of cats in your chair, and you sitting on a candle-box, just as patient; ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... not suit the official masters of the ceremonies, and put out all their preparations for an ovation. The arrival had been planned to be by sea, and by sea it must be, or everything would be spoilt. So the poor Duchesse was taken quietly by a roundabout road to the old wet dock, where she was put on board, and after a slight detour, she arrived in approved nautical fashion, and disembarked at the foot of the Cannebiere "amidst a scene of indescribable enthusiasm," ...
— Memoirs • Prince De Joinville
... thorough spring-cleaning of the home. Remnants of cocoons, dirt consisting of spoilt honey, bits of plaster from broken partitions, remains of dried Mollusc at the bottom of a shell: these and much other insanitary refuse must first of all disappear. Violently the Osmia tugs at the offending object and tears it out; and then off she goes in a ...
— The Wonders of Instinct • J. H. Fabre
... being able to see him as in the flesh. By an inexplicable chance, there was lying on the ground, among some stones, a plaster cast taken from his face immediately after his death for the use of the sculptors of his funeral furniture; with it were the spoilt rough blocks of granite ushabtis for his tomb. The cast is in almost perfect condition, and we can now really study his face, which is full of character. There is no trace of passion in it, but a philosophical calm with great obstinacy and impracticability. ...
— The American Journal of Archaeology, 1893-1 • Various
... are only bad comparatively. Much of the soil in them is better by far than that of many productive farms at home; only our colonial pioneer-farmers have no notion of any scientific methods in agriculture. They have been spoilt by the wondrous fertility of the rich black forest mould, and the virgin volcanic soils. They will continue to regard manuring and draining and so forth as a folly and a sin almost, until the population becomes numerous, and all the ...
— Brighter Britain! (Volume 1 of 2) - or Settler and Maori in Northern New Zealand • William Delisle Hay
... don't want to be sp'akin' ill of the dead, but look at it now. There was ould Mazarine, breakin' the poor child's heart, as fine a fella as iver trod the wurruld achin' for her, and his life bein' spoilt by the goin's on at Tralee. Then in steps the Chinky and with stren'th of mind and stren'th of ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... of our modern consciousness, and may be based on all previous social experiments. This matter is of great importance to us, on account of our large number of paupers. The weaker characters among us, discouraged by external pressure, spoilt by the soft-hearted charity of our rich men, easily sink ...
— The Jewish State • Theodor Herzl
... is laid with only a plate and chalice, and instead of the breaking of bread among the disciples, Christ stands apart elevating a wafer. Now, all religious controversy aside, most minds will feel that, by thus substituting a fiction for a recorded fact, the subject is spoilt in point of art. And herein I cannot but recall a saying of Coleridge to the effect that he who begins by loving his Creed more than Christianity will end "by loving his Church more ...
— Overbeck • J. Beavington Atkinson
... face so droll—oh, so droll, that you could not look at him without laughing! When he returned home after work he did nothing but sing, make faces, and gambol like a child. He made me dance, and jump upon his knees; he played with me as if he were my own age, and his wife entirely spoilt me. Both required of me but one thing—to be good-humored; and in that, thank God! I never disappointed them; so they baptized me, Dimpleton (not Simpleton, neighbor!) and the cap fitted. As to gayety, they set me the example: never did I see them sad. If they uttered reproaches ...
— The Mysteries of Paris V2 • Eugene Sue
... have your beauty spoilt, Charley,' Mr. Hardy said, as he bandaged up his son's face. 'A few more fights, and you will be as seasoned with scars as any ...
— Out on the Pampas - The Young Settlers • G. A. Henty
... no more pleasure for him now during the rest of the entertainment. He did indeed obtain a momentary distraction from his resolution to ascertain the name of the person who had so spoilt his afternoon. It helped him very little to be told the gentleman was "a Mr. Ryfe." Nobody seemed to know any more, and even this information he extracted with difficulty from Lady Goldthred, who added, in ...
— M. or N. "Similia similibus curantur." • G.J. Whyte-Melville
... sung in a voice as good as some that have made great fortunes, but with a depth of emotion which occasionally spoilt the notes; and I can say little more than that the singing, in that strange setting, with muttering thunder for an undertone, was a thing I ...
— Mad Shepherds - and Other Human Studies • L. P. Jacks
... with something. They live but for their bellies, and aside from eating, drinking, sleeping and moaning they can do nothing. And all they accomplish is the soul's decay. They are in your way and you trip over them. A good man among them—like fresh apples among bad ones—may soon be spoilt, and no one will profit by it. You are young, that's the trouble. You cannot comprehend my words. Help him who is firm in misery. He may not ask you for assistance, but think of it yourself, and assist ...
— Foma Gordyeff - (The Man Who Was Afraid) • Maxim Gorky
... watched her opportunity and carried her next favor to Alec; but Kitty was ahead of her. The rest of the evening was spoilt for her. She had hurt Alec; and Alec was going away to-morrow—for two years! Two years seemed ...
— Blue Bonnet in Boston - or, Boarding-School Days at Miss North's • Caroline E. Jacobs
... to be shy before the young men, but at the beggar's request drew from her pocket a gold piece, and gave it him, evidently much against her will. He put it in his pocket, and turning to his companions, said: "This girl is the spoilt child of her mother; she is bad-tempered and naughty, while her heart is hardened against the poor. It is easy to understand why, for the first time in her life, she has been so generous to-day. Tell me what gifts you would wish me to ...
— Fairy Tales of the Slav Peasants and Herdsmen • Alexander Chodsko
... with us—a dangerous and difficult operation. As long as he believed that he might go where he pleased, we could induce him to take a few steps, forward, but the moment he understood what we were driving at, he took the sulks, like an enormous spoilt child, and refused to move. The koonkies were therefore brought up, and Raj Mungul, going behind, gave him a shove that was irresistible. He lost temper and turned furiously on Raj, but received such an awful whack on the exposed flank from Isri Pershad, that he felt his case to be hopeless, ...
— The Eagle Cliff • R.M. Ballantyne
... spoilt by an over-indulgent mother, who stuffed him with sweetmeats till he was sick, and then thought him too delicate to study, so that at twelve years old, he was a pale, puffy boy, dull, fretful, and ...
— Little Men - Life at Plumfield With Jo's Boys • Louisa May Alcott
... way, I hope that those two sword cuts are not going to leave bad scars, Drummond. It would be hard to have your beauty spoilt for life, and you only nineteen; though, fortunately, everyone thinks you two or three years older. However, they will be honourable scars, and women don't mind any disfigurement in a man, if it is got in battle. It is a pity, ...
— With Frederick the Great - A Story of the Seven Years' War • G. A. Henty
... red cloak suddenly appeared on the bank. In an instant the beast was round and you may imagine what my feelings were, being in charge of your fair kinswoman, for I thought to a certainty that we should be over. What is more, it quite spoilt my chance of the race, for after he has shied like that, the black turns sulky, and won't let ...
— Lysbeth - A Tale Of The Dutch • H. Rider Haggard
... with her," thought Martha, for Rosy looked really buried in gloom; "perhaps her mamma's been telling her what she told me this morning. I was sure Miss Rosy wouldn't like it, and perhaps it's natural, so spoilt as she's been, having everything her own way for so long. One would be sorry for her if she'd only let one," and her voice was kind and gentle as she asked the little girl if she wouldn't like ...
— Rosy • Mrs. Molesworth
... polypus—looking as red as Iupiter Miniatus. Believe me, you won't dare. Before I arrive the fame of my new magnificence will reach you: and you will be awestruck at it. Yet it is no use building any hope on your hors d'aeuvre. I have quite abolished that: for in old times I found my appetite spoilt by your olives and Lucanian sausages. But why all this talk? Let me only get to you. By all means—for I wish to wipe away all fear from your heart—go back to your old cheese-and-sardine dish. The ...
— Letters of Cicero • Marcus Tullius Cicero
... is another spoilt child of Jargon, especially in Committee's Rules—'Co-opted members may be eligible as such; such members to continue to serve for such time as'—and ...
— On the Art of Writing - Lectures delivered in the University of Cambridge 1913-1914 • Arthur Quiller-Couch
... The two-and three-part contrapuntal singing which is done in the sight-singing classes is admirable for this, as the whole effect is blurred or entirely spoilt in such clear-cut ...
— Music As A Language - Lectures to Music Students • Ethel Home
... would have given a dozin bunnets trimmed to kill ef I could only have been back moilin' in my old kitchen with the children hangin' round me and Lisha a comin' in cheerful from his work as he used to 'fore I spoilt his home for him. How sing'lar it is folks never do know when they are ...
— Work: A Story of Experience • Louisa May Alcott
... older than Helene. She was fair like her father. There was no resemblance between her and his wife, but the intimacy between them had been spontaneous and had never lapsed. She had grown up quite unrestrained and spoilt, and broken three engagements, and was always rushing about proclaiming in one breath, that California was the greatest place on earth and in the next that she should go mad if she didn't get out and have a change. Another grievance ...
— The Avalanche • Gertrude Franklin Horn Atherton
... first halt was called, but the rest was of short duration, for at ten the column was again plodding along through the miry roads in hourly dread lest the whole scheme should be spoilt, and the Boers suddenly arrest the ...
— South Africa and the Transvaal War, Vol. 2 (of 6) - From the Commencement of the War to the Battle of Colenso, - 15th Dec. 1899 • Louis Creswicke
... dissatisfied with and in their own wisdom sacrificed for that of 1884. It is just possible that that presumptuous act of wanting to improve upon the Lord's work will result in trouble and prove to our sorrow that we have simply tampered and tinkered with a good thing and spoilt it to our hurt. ...
— Origin of the Anglo-Boer War Revealed (2nd ed.) - The Conspiracy of the 19th Century Unmasked • C. H. Thomas
... not prove entirely convincing. She might be unhappy because she repented of her promise; well, in any event he intended to keep her to it! She could scarcely think of breaking her engagement on Jimmy's account! She had spoilt herself for that. Colonel Faversham, as she must know, was not the man to stand silently by while she transferred herself to a younger aspirant. She had sense enough to understand, too, that Jimmy had only to hear of the existing engagement to retire from ...
— Enter Bridget • Thomas Cobb
... down to Hap House to see what he could make out of the hitherto unconscious heir. It had been matter of great doubt with Mr. Prendergast, when he first heard young Mollett's name mentioned, whether or no he would allow him to make his attempt. He, Mr. Prendergast, could by a word have spoilt the game; but acting, as he was forced to act, on the spur of the moment, he resolved to permit Mr. Mollett junior to play out his play. He would be yet in time to prevent any ill result to Mr. Fitzgerald, should that gentleman be weak enough to succumb to any such ...
— Castle Richmond • Anthony Trollope |
