"Maypole" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... white man cud get to th' North Pole. What he'd do if he got there no wan has anny thought. Accordin' to what I hear, th' North Pole ain't like a tillygraft pole, a barber pole, a fishin' pole, a clothes pole, a poll-tax, a Maypole, a Russhyan Pole, or annything that ye can see, smell or ate. Whin ye get to it, it is no diff'rent fr'm bein' annywhere on th' ice. Th' on'y way ye know ye're there is be consultin' a pocket arithmetic, a watch an' a compass. Don't get it into ye'er head that if me frind Baldwin or Peary ...
— Observations by Mr. Dooley • Finley Peter Dunne
... always be kissing everyone else under the mistletoe. And what is right as regards Christmas is right as regards all other so-called anniversaries. The time will come when we shall dance round the Maypole every morning before breakfast—a meal at which hot-cross buns will be a standing dish—and shall make April fools of one another every day before noon. The profound significance of All Fool's Day—the glorious lesson that we are all fools—is too apt at present to be lost. Nor is justice done ...
— A Christmas Garland • Max Beerbohm
... the severe Puritans of New Plymouth at this outbreak of licentiousness, was great indeed. In their eyes almost every amusement was looked upon as a sin; and the most innocent village dance round a maypole was regarded as nearly allied to the heathenish games in honor of the Goddess Flora. The conduct, therefore, of the disorderly settlers of Quincy filled them with shame and grief; and they felt humbled, as well as indignant, when they reflected on ...
— The Pilgrims of New England - A Tale Of The Early American Settlers • Mrs. J. B. Webb
... fourteen years Dryden was known as a dramatic poet. There is little need to tell you anything about his plays, for you would not like to read them. During the reign of Puritanism in England the people had been forbidden even innocent pleasures. The Maypole dances had been banished, games and laughter were frowned upon. Now that these too stern laws had been taken away, people plunged madly into pleasure: laughter became coarse, merriment became riotous. Puritan England had lost the sense of where innocent pleasure ends and wickedness begins. ...
— English Literature For Boys And Girls • H.E. Marshall
... of Chigwell appears in the Domesday survey. The pleasant scenery of the neighbourhood, which attracts large numbers both of visitors and of residents from London, is described in Dickens's novel, Barnaby Rudge, and the King's Head Inn, Dickens's "Maypole," still stands. The old grammar school, founded by Samuel Harsnett, archbishop of York (d. 1631), whose fine memorial brass is in St Mary's church, has become one of the minor modern institutions of the English public school type. ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 6, Slice 2 - "Chicago, University of" to "Chiton" • Various
... thou canst play the maker [old Scottish for poet] yet?" said the glover. "What, shall we have our ballets and our roundels again? our lusty carols for Christmas, and our mirthful springs to trip it round the maypole?" ...
— The Fair Maid of Perth • Sir Walter Scott
... green-thatched cottage was May's sweet home With velvet moss for a floor, And a clambering vine in the gay sunshine, And a Maypole set by the door. And May herself, with a dimple and curl, Dressed in a flouncy gown, Was filling baskets—the prettiest girl In all of ...
— Zodiac Town - The Rhymes of Amos and Ann • Nancy Byrd Turner
... a Maypole gay with garlands and with fluttering ribbons, the grass had been closely mown, for there were to be foot-races and wrestling bouts for the amusement of the guests. Beneath a spreading tree a dozen fiddlers put their instruments in tune, while behind ...
— Audrey • Mary Johnston
... my rhymes as thick as flies in the sun; I think there be never an alehouse in England, not any so base a maypole on a country green, but sets forth some poet's petronels or demi-lances to the paper wars ...
— A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. IX • Various
... powers, such as that of commanding rain, or that of causing fertility in plants or in animals. From the tree-spirit, again, the tree-god was further formed, a being who was able to quit the sacred tree or who presided over many trees. Of these beliefs the fast-decaying usages of the Maypole and the Harvest May still ...
— History of Religion - A Sketch of Primitive Religious Beliefs and Practices, and of the Origin and Character of the Great Systems • Allan Menzies
... millionaire husband if he looked like a man in a hair-shirt on every occasion when you asked for a moment of his time? And what's the good of life if you can't crowd a little affection into it? I was just thinking we're all terribly like children in a Maypole dance. We're so impatient to get our colored bands wound neatly about a wooden stick, a wooden stick that can never be ours, that we make a mad race of what really ought to be a careless and leisurely joy. We don't remember ...
— The Prairie Mother • Arthur Stringer |
