"Waistcoat" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... ostensible weaknesses of his kind, would claim regard for the strength that he knew not. He occupied a costly apartment in St. James's Street; his morning dress was a crimson damask banjam, a silk shag waistcoat, trimmed with lace, black velvet breeches, white silk stockings, and yellow morocco slippers; but since his magnificence added no jot to his courage, it was rather mean than admirable. Indeed, his whole career was marred by the provincialism of his ...
— A Book of Scoundrels • Charles Whibley
... the contemplation of a suit of clothes, adapted to the season, which had been sent home from the tailor's just before Mr. Waters came in. The coat was of the lightest serge, the trousers of a pearly grey tending to lavender, the waistcoat of cool white duck. On his way home from Palazzo Pinti he had stopped in Via Tornabuoni and bought some silk gauze neckties of a tasteful gaiety of tint, which he had at the time thought very well ...
— Indian Summer • William D. Howells
... intelligent-looking man, with a magnificent head, was busy writing upon a dirty piece of paper with a pencil, his table furnished by his knee, and his desk the cover of his closed but well worn Bible. He rose as we drew near him, and bowing politely, gave us a couple of poems which he drew from his waistcoat pocket. ...
— Life in the Clearings versus the Bush • Susanna Moodie
... added various sums from benefactors from time to time, and the number of recipients was increased gradually, until in 1855 there were 100 boys and 45 almsmen. At that date the men's clothing consisted of a body coat, breeches, waistcoat, hat, pair of boots, stockings, and shirt one year, and the next, great-coat, breeches, pair of boots, stockings, shirt, and hat. The boys received coat, waistcoat, and trousers, cap, pair of stockings, shirt, ...
— Hammersmith, Fulham and Putney - The Fascination of London • Geraldine Edith Mitton
... shaped being attached to each stirrup. His rider appears in a short leather jacket, bedizened with silver buttons, tight pantaloons of the same material, also heavy with silver buttons, being partially opened at the side and flaring at the bottom. He does not wear a waistcoat, but has a mountain of frills on the linen bosom of his shirt, set off by a red scarf tied about the waist. The spurs upon his heels are of silver, weighing at least half a pound each, while the rowels are an inch long. On his head is a sombrero of yellow or brown felt, the brim of ...
— Aztec Land • Maturin M. Ballou
... acquainted with the Dictator's habits—and he at once installed himself in bed. He took off his outer clothing, his coat and waistcoat, kicked off his dress-shoes, and keeping on his trousers he settled himself down among the bed-clothes. He left his coat and waistcoat and shoes ostentatiously lying about. If there was to be a murderous attack, ...
— The Dictator • Justin McCarthy
... that was what he was. Yes! he had the loveliest eyes in the world, without any exception; and his ears were a dream of perfection, and, as for his coat and waistcoat, words fail her to describe them. Now if he will sit still, she will tell him something; no, not on her dress; a little farther ...
— Fernley House • Laura E. Richards
... to him unmoved, his little eyes blinking under his fat forehead, the gold chain of hollow links clicking against the pearl buttons of his waistcoat ...
— The Octopus • Frank Norris
... awkwardness of taking the instrument with the left hand made her design perceived before it could be executed;—the king started back, scarce believing the testimony of his own eyes; and the woman made a second thrust, which just touched his waistcoat before he had time to prevent her;—and at that moment one of the attendants, seeing her horrible intent, wrenched ...
— The Diary and Letters of Madame D'Arblay Volume 1 • Madame D'Arblay
... the native temperament. On the ecclesiastical side he was conscientiously uncompromising, but personally he was as simple-mannered as he was simple-hearted. He was a tall lean man in rusty black, with a clerical waistcoat that buttoned high, and scholarly glasses, but with a belated straw hat that had counted more than one summer, and a farmer's tan on his face and hands. He pronounced the church-letter, though quite outside of his own church, ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... hand, giving reasons for acknowledging the Confederacy without delay. There were even hints at intervention by the European powers as desirable. I sat amazed as at last I tied up the papers, and placing them again within my waistcoat, lay down on a lounge before the fire to rest, for sleep was not for me. I lay quiet, thinking of what had become of Merton and Alphonse, and wondering at the amazing good fortune of my first attempt ...
— A Diplomatic Adventure • S. Weir Mitchell
... kink in her character. At any rate, it existed, and she gazed in sickened silence at Geoffrey. He had turned again now, and she was enabled to get a full and complete view of him. He was not merely stout. He was gross. The slim figure which had haunted her for a year had spread into a sea of waistcoat. The keen lines of his face had disappeared altogether. ...
— A Damsel in Distress • Pelham Grenville Wodehouse
... surly voice, "I said that nothing which walks could reach you, Macumazana, but this yellow snake has crawled between us on his belly. Look at the new mud that stains his waistcoat." ...
— Allan and the Holy Flower • H. Rider Haggard
... who spoke not a word of English, to fetch a certain object from the next room. It would be useless for you to say "watch," because he would not know what the word meant. Probably you would tap your waistcoat pocket, pretend to take out a watch, wind it, look at the hands, etc., in your endeavour to convey to him your meaning. If this was not recognized, for any reason, you would have the utmost difficulty in conveying your meaning to him—and equal difficulty in telling ...
— The Problems of Psychical Research - Experiments and Theories in the Realm of the Supernormal • Hereward Carrington
... took it kindly, but it's proper to explain He was sent to catch a pirate out upon the Spanish Main; And he played, with variations, an imaginary tune On the buttons of his waistcoat, like a ...
— The Admiral's Caravan • Charles E. Carryl
... to live decently in this damnable city of fog and filth! And when the world-madness comes on him nobody knows anything about this particular form of mania—the poor wretch must get into a stiff shirt or a strait waistcoat and converse sanely with that innocent woman, his wife. If he doesn't there's a scandal, and the ...
— The Tysons - (Mr. and Mrs. Nevill Tyson) • May Sinclair
... mouth. Interminable minutes followed, and at length Mrs. McRankine entered with my ball suit from the tailor's. I carried it into the next room, and disposed it on the bed—olive-green coat with gilt buttons and facings of watered silk, olive-green pantaloons, white waistcoat sprigged with blue and green forget-me-nots. The survey carried me on to midday and the ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 20 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... evidently an intimation that she is to open the folding-doors, and he makes an effective entrance into the dining-room, his thumb in his waistcoat. There is a delicious clapping of hands from the committee, and the door closes. Not till then does MAGGIE, who has grown thoughtful, tell her maid to admit ...
— What Every Woman Knows • James M. Barrie
... therefore reprimanded her. They then passed on along the passage and came to one of the divans, where a man about forty was sitting smoking his pipe. He stopped the crier, and took the girl by the hand, felt all up her arm to the shoulder, then drew her a little nearer and opened her waistcoat, which exposed a beautiful white bosom, and the effect seemed electric, for he immediately bid 1300 piastres, and after pulling down the lower part of her veil so as to show the whole of her face, and looking ...
— The Surrender of Napoleon • Sir Frederick Lewis Maitland
... years old. Though small and slight like all the Kakisas, he had a comely face that somehow suggested race. He was better dressed than the majority, in expensive "moleskin" trousers from the store, a clean blue gingham shirt, a gaudy red sash, and an antique gold-embroidered waistcoat that had originated Heaven knows where. On his feet were fine white moccasins lavishly embroidered ...
— The Woman from Outside - [on Swan River] • Hulbert Footner
... unrolled a Havana cigar from its lead-foil covering, and calmly cutting off the end, I proceeded to light it. The bull saw it. With a bound he was upon me, and as I turned to leap aside his horns passed clean under my waistcoat and shirt, and ripped them open to the flesh. Hurled aside by the impact, I lost my balance and staggered wildly, but faced the brute again, whilst deafening yells—whether of delight at possible disaster or encouragement ...
— Mexico • Charles Reginald Enock
... were altogether too insignificant to be introduced to them. So they had to talk to each other. It was on a very warm Sunday afternoon in the season, and Whistler, by the by, was wearing a white 'duck' waistcoat and trousers, and a fabulously long frock-coat, made, I think, of black alpaca, and carrying a brass-tipped stick about four feet long in his right hand, and a wonderful new paint-box, of which he was proud, ...
— Whistler Stories • Don C. Seitz
... voice they wondered to hear me. Quickly after, many of my neighbours came in, and one Mr. Peter Vanden-Anchor, a Dutchman, that selleth Rhenish wine, he came in and unbound me; and so after I was unbound I went down to the warehouse as I was, without clothes about me, only my waistcoat and shirt, and saw that they had been there. I considered those that had done the thing, were very privy to my house; they knew where to fetch the key of my cash, in a drawing-box, taking the money there, which was about one thousand and odd pounds; some plate there ...
— State Trials, Political and Social - Volume 1 (of 2) • Various
... up to his attic to change his clothes. Inside the waistcoat was a worn envelope, which he carefully opened, and took from it a letter much creased from many foldings. It was the old letter from Jennie, written when the comical mistake had been made of making him the teacher of the Woodruff school. It still contained her rather ...
— The Brown Mouse • Herbert Quick
... the man who wrote that letter to you is as big a blackguard as there is from this to hisself." And Mr. Moulder in the excitement of the moment puffed hard at his pipe, took a long pull at his drink, and dragged open his waistcoat. "I don't know whether Kantwise has anything to say upon ...
— Orley Farm • Anthony Trollope
... hands, Each in a waistcoat pocket, (so that all Might yet repose that could) was seen one morn Eating a wondering ...
— Flowers and Flower-Gardens • David Lester Richardson
... had untied his parcel, and flattening the paper on his knees began to put the contents on the table. There were some field-glasses, a breast pin, and a few other such things; when he had put them all out he felt in his waistcoat-pocket for ...
— The Good Comrade • Una L. Silberrad
... as the additional bedroom was at his disposal, he went in and began to undress. When he had taken off coat and waistcoat he paused to telephone to the office a call for eight o'clock. As he finished and hung up the receiver, a sound from the direction of the sitting room made him glance in there. On the threshold of the other bedroom stood ...
— The Grain Of Dust - A Novel • David Graham Phillips
... so surely looked like Somebody—though Mrs. Hawthorne had very likely asked because, merely, in her eyes he was queer. It was an oldish man, dressed with marked elegance, white tie, white waistcoat, white flower at his lapel. The whole of worldly wisdom dwelt in his weary eye. He had yellow and withered cheeks, black hair with a dash of white above the ears, and a mustache whose thickest part curved over his mouth like a black lacquer box-lid, while its long ends, stiff as thorns of ...
— Aurora the Magnificent • Gertrude Hall
... half an hour's amusement, followed by a long evening of boredom, from the sight of Mrs. Hicks, vast and jewelled, seated between a quiet-looking professor of archaeology and a large-browed composer, or the high priest of a new dance-step, while Mr. Hicks, beaming above his vast white waistcoat, saw to it that the champagne flowed more abundantly than the talk, and the bright young secretaries industriously "kept up" with the dizzy cross-current of prophecy and erudition. But a change had come over Lansing. Hitherto ...
— The Glimpses of the Moon • Edith Wharton
... insult was offered to any one, save one Captain Conner, who had ripped up the linings of his coat and waistcoat, and, watching his opportunity, had filled them with tea. But, being detected, he was handled pretty roughly. They not only stripped him of his clothes, but gave him a coat of mud, with a severe bruising into the bargain. Nothing but their desire not to make a disturbance ...
— Good Stories For Great Holidays - Arranged for Story-Telling and Reading Aloud and for the - Children's Own Reading • Frances Jenkins Olcott
... the four or five women who were of the field, but one wore a habit with any pretensions to conformity with the sacred laws of fashion, and its colour was a blue that, taken in connection with a red, brass-buttoned waistcoat, reminded the severe critic from Royal Meath of the head porter at the Shelburne Hotel. So she informed Major Booth in one of the rare intervals permitted to her by Pilot ...
— All on the Irish Shore - Irish Sketches • E. Somerville and Martin Ross
... in a hen's nest for the hen to lay a new one to; a very little will do, but even the boys know that there must be a germ of increment left, and when they stole the coppers from the Ecce Homo chapel not long since, they still left one centesimo and a waistcoat button on ...
— Ex Voto • Samuel Butler
... 15 minutes after 12. Thurtell is by this time a good way on his journey, baiting at Scorpion perhaps, Ketch is bargaining for his cast coat and waistcoat, the Jew demurs at first at three half crowns, but on consideration that he, may get somewhat by showing 'em in the ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb (Vol. 6) - Letters 1821-1842 • Charles and Mary Lamb
... are," said Arthur, determined to be beforehand with the stranger, whoever he might be. "I'll take the bed." And he handed the five shillings to the landlord, who nodded, dropped the money carelessly into his waistcoat pocket, and ...
— The Queen of Hearts • Wilkie Collins
... showed nothing that was distinctive of the new order of civilization. Their long hair fell upon the collar of a round jacket with square pockets, which reached to the hips only, a garment peculiar to the peasantry of western France. Beneath this jacket, which was worn open, a waistcoat of the same linen with large buttons was visible. Some of the company marched in wooden shoes; others, by way of economy, carried them in their hand. This costume, soiled by long usage, blackened with sweat and dust, and less original than that of the ...
— The Chouans • Honore de Balzac
... idly with a paper knife. His gaze seemed to be directed to the lower buttons of his head clerk's waistcoat. "Interference?" he repeated. "Interference? Mr. Grump, you have a reputation for humor, or so I judge. I've been listening to you trying to bedevil that man out there, but I'm afraid your humor is a little on the slap-stick order. And so"—the ...
— Wide Courses • James Brendan Connolly
... his chair and stared at it. The plaster cast stretched out in front of him, and was covered by a grey blanket. With the exception of the trifling formality of trousers, he was well dressed in a sack coat, a shirt, waistcoat, and a sort of college-boy collar and tie, which one of the orderlies had purchased for him. His other things were in that extremely expensive English car which the ...
— Love Stories • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... waistcoat, chaleco to wait for, esperar to wait upon, visitar to wake up, despertar walk, paseo to walk, andar to want, necesitar, querer to be wanted, hacer falta to be wanting, faltar want of foresight, imprevidencia war, guerra ...
— Pitman's Commercial Spanish Grammar (2nd ed.) • C. A. Toledano
... changing his place. His errand, however, was in vain. The train, it seemed, was crowded. He returned to his compartment to find already installed there one of the most complete and absolute types of Germanism he had ever seen. A man in a light grey suit, the waistcoat of which had apparently abandoned its efforts to compass his girth, with a broad, pink, good-humoured face, beardless and bland, flaxen hair streaked here and there with grey, was seated in the vacant place. He had with him a portmanteau covered with a ...
— The Double Traitor • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... the jacket and waistcoat from a potato and put it in a saucepan. Add three quarts of boiling water. Get a map of Ireland and hang it on the wall directly in front of the saucepan. This will furnish the local color for the stew. Let it boil two hours. When the potato begins to moult it ...
— The Silly Syclopedia • Noah Lott
... as well as any genlmn in service; and this I can tell you, he's genrally a hapier, idler, handsomer, mor genlmnly man than his master. He has more money to spend, for genlmn WILL leave their silver in their waistcoat pockets; more suxess among the gals; as good dinners, and as good wine—that is, if he's friends with the butler: and friends in corse they will be if they know ...
— Memoirs of Mr. Charles J. Yellowplush - The Yellowplush Papers • William Makepeace Thackeray
... excuse for going about with naked arms 'and legs and feet thrust into slippers,' but to adopt fine thin stockings; 'and,' says our author, 'although the tenue du lever for a gentleman is a cotton or silk night-cap, a waistcoat with sleeves, or a dressing-gown, he is recommended to abandon cette mise matinale as early as may be, that so attired he may receive none but intimate friends.' Unmarried women, until they pass thirty, are debarred from wearing diamonds or expensive ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 462 - Volume 18, New Series, November 6, 1852 • Various
... part, he puts on a cravat well folded, a very long coat, and a very short waistcoat. He combs down his hair till it is quite straight, rouges the tip of his nose, takes a whip, puts on gaiters and a little pointed hat, and studies himself in the glass in order to give himself a stupid and insolent air, ...
— A History of the French Novel, Vol. 2 - To the Close of the 19th Century • George Saintsbury
... intent to astonish the vision, In garments whose 'set' was the pink of precision;— His chain was of workmanship costly and cunning, And the stone on his bosom was really stunning. The taste of which no one could doubt his possession, Had found in his waistcoat a fitting expression; Nor less in his neck tie, 'a neat institution,' And collar, which threatened to do execution. A marvel, indeed—from the soles of his boots To the hair, that was scented and greased to its roots— A something ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 4, No. 1, July, 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... church-gates and set the belfry door ajar. Candles are lighted in the room above, and jugs of beer stand ready for the ringers. Up they bustle one by one, and listen to the tickings of the clock that tells the passing minutes. At last it gives a click; and now they throw off coat and waistcoat, strap their girdles tighter round the waist, and each holds his rope in readiness. Twelve o'clock strikes, and forth across the silent city go the clamorous chimes. The steeple rocks and reels, and far away the night is startled. Damp turbulent ...
— Sketches and Studies in Italy and Greece, Complete - Series I, II, and III • John Symonds
... be something cosmic, something transcending the bounds of the visible and tangible universe, in the desires and cravings of this same human heart; this little human heart beating blindly beneath a waistcoat or a blouse. Its owner is little bigger than a beetle or an ant, and the habitat of that owner is a speck in space; a pygmy in comparison with Sirius or Arcturus, and invisible from the ultra-telescopic ...
— Hints for Lovers • Arnold Haultain
... thing without at least some attempt to defend himself; and judging it of the highest importance to disable his adversary in the most effectual manner before the latter had time to carry out his offensive designs, he turned sharply round and hit him a very severe blow in the lower part of his waistcoat. ...
— Vice Versa - or A Lesson to Fathers • F. Anstey
... laced coat and waistcoat, chapeau, boots, lace ruffles, sash, and rapier of the period—a martial costume befitting brave and handsome men. Their names were household words in every cottage in New France, and many of them as frequently ...
— The Golden Dog - Le Chien d'Or • William Kirby
... coat and felt in the pocket of his waistcoat (which he had retained when he had changed his clothes in the fo'c'sle) for his watch. He drew it out. It was just nine o'clock. All at once an idea occurred to him. He fumbled in another pocket of the waistcoat and brought out one ...
— Moran of the Lady Letty • Frank Norris
... putting his watch into his waistcoat-pocket. "You're laughing at some one, but this time I don't think it's ...
— The Portrait of a Lady - Volume 2 (of 2) • Henry James
... ultimate disposition of my invention. Its secret is now known to no living soul but myself, and is so simple that it requires no written record to preserve it, and would die with me. It is the result, it is true, of many years of hard work, but the finished product I can and often do carry in my waistcoat pocket. ...
— L. P. M. - The End of the Great War • J. Stewart Barney
... off his hat, and produced his stethoscope from its interior with the air of a conjurer upon the stage. "Which of these gentlemen am I to examine?" he asked, blinking from one to the other of them. "Ah, it is you! Only your waistcoat! You need not undo your collar. Thank you! A full breath! Thank you! Ninety-nine! Thank you! Now hold your breath for a moment. Oh, dear, dear, what is this ...
— Beyond the City • Arthur Conan Doyle
... three-and-sixpence had to be subtracted from his winnings on Silver Braid. These amounted to more than five pounds. William's face flushed with pleasure, and the world seemed to be his when he slipped four sovereigns and a handful of silver into his waistcoat pocket. Should he put a sovereign of his winnings on Silver Braid for the Chesterfield? Half-a-sovereign was enough! ...The danger of risking a ...
— Esther Waters • George Moore
... about the St. Leger? I need only say that my own Surefoot has brought me Alloway Heaume. Whilst in Russia I heard about plenty of Serfs, but they were not saints. Anybody who proposes to wear a Blue-green waistcoat on the Queen's Birthday ought to eat Sainfoin for the rest of his life, and be taken Right Away. Finally, if The Field is to Memoir as a window-sash is to a Duchess's flounces, what chance ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 99, September 6, 1890 • Various
... and fierce and uncontroulable temper: these say, that the young gentleman's passion was abated on seeing his blood gush plentifully down his arm; and that he received the generous offices of his adversary (who helped him off with his coat and waistcoat, and bound up his arm, till the surgeon could come,) with such patience, as was far from making a visit afterwards from that adversary, to inquire after his health, ...
— Clarissa, Volume 1 (of 9) • Samuel Richardson
... might a took a fit o' madness, as she did fifteen years befoore, and was buckled up, many a time, in a strait-waistcoat, which was the very leathern jerkin I sid in the closet, ...
— Madam Crowl's Ghost and The Dead Sexton • Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu
... she said: "Stuff!", but without conviction. Her exclamation had no apparent effect on him until he had buttoned his waistcoat and arranged his watch-chain. Then he glanced at a sheet of pink paper which lay on the mantelpiece. She snatched it at once; opened it; stared incredulously at it; and said, "Pink paper, and scalloped edges! How filthily vulgar! I thought she was not much of ...
— The Irrational Knot - Being the Second Novel of His Nonage • George Bernard Shaw
... his forefinger in his waistcoat-pocket reflectively, a man at his elbow said, with ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... seldom found himself alone. When he did, he generally indulged himself in a little healthy relaxation. With two hours' run to Southampton before him, free from all possibility of intrusion, Prince Blank let loose the buttons of his powerfully built waistcoat, rested his bald head on the top of his chair, stretched his great legs across another, and closed ...
— Tommy and Co. • Jerome K. Jerome
... before the whole family sat down to tea. But both tea and ablutions were forgotten, so long as the owner of Ferth Place and the new Lady Tressady were in sight. The village eyes took note of everything; of the young man's immaculate serge suit and tan waistcoat, his thin, bronzed face and fair moustache; of the bride's grey gown, the knot of airy pink at her throat, the coils of bright brown hair on which her hat was set, and the buckles on her pretty shoes. Then the village retreated within doors again; and each house buzzed and gossiped its ...
— Sir George Tressady, Vol. I • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... that the Boss of North Dakota was no sluggard. He discarded coat and waistcoat and tackled the documents which Struve laid before him, going through them like a whirlwind. Gradually he infected the others with his energy, and soon behind the locked doors of Dunham & Struve there were only haste and fever and plot ...
— The Spoilers • Rex Beach
... imitation of it himself, and then into an angry self-examination. He knew that he loathed that long-skirted, womanlike garment, that dangling, ostentatious symbol, that air of secrecy and mystery, and he inflated his chest above his loosely tied cravat and unbuttoned waistcoat with a contrasted sense of freedom. But he was conscious the next day of weakly avoiding a recurrence of this meeting, and in his self-examination put it down to his self-disciplined observance ...
— Selected Stories • Bret Harte
... his temper that he repressed the retort on his lips. He contented himself, however, with producing a small white object from his waistcoat pocket, and handed it to Theydon. It was a bit of ivory, hollow, and very light, and ...
— Number Seventeen • Louis Tracy
... passions of the actors;—those passions common to men in all stages of society, and which have alike agitated the human heart, whether it throbbed under the steel corselet of the fifteenth century, the brocaded coat of the eighteenth, or the blue frock and white dimity waistcoat of the present day. [Alas! that attire, respectable and gentlemanlike in 1805, or thereabouts, is now as antiquated as the Author of Waverley has himself become since that period! The reader of fashion ...
— Waverley • Sir Walter Scott
... slowly across the field till he was close to the figure on the ground. Then he quietly removed his jacket and waistcoat and laid them ...
— Facing Death - The Hero of the Vaughan Pit. A Tale of the Coal Mines • G. A. Henty
... leant back in his chair, thrust his thumbs into the arm-holes of his waistcoat, and said: "Well, we've come about the advertisement we saw in the RENNES ADVERTISER, that M. Gournay-Martin wanted to get rid of a motor-car; and my son is always saying to me, 'I should like a motor-car which rushes the hills, papa.' He ...
— Arsene Lupin • Edgar Jepson
... as you say," replied Mr. Tutt, replacing the bottle and tumbler within the lower drawer and flicking a stogy ash from his waistcoat, "the honorable justice who handed it to us is no friend ...
— Tutt and Mr. Tutt • Arthur Train
... accompany me to the Exhibition of Pictures. Heavens, sir, how I dressed on that day! The Day and Martin of my boots reflected on the shady side of the street. I took half an hour in tying and retying my neckcloth en mode. My handkerchief smelt of lavender, and my hair of oil of thyme—my waistcoat of bergamot, and my inexpressibles of musk. I was a perfect civet for perfumery. My coat, cut in the jemmy fashion, I buttoned to suffocation; but 'pon honour, believe me, sir, no stays, and my shirt neck had been starched per order, to the consistence of tin. In short, to be brief, ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 12, No. 339, Saturday, November 8, 1828. • Various
... always there was a new rope provided, and its dependability must be ascertained by prolonged and exhaustive tests before Uncle Tobe would approve of it. Seeing him at his task, with his coat and waistcoat off, his sleeves rolled back, and his intent mien, one realised why, as a hangman, he had been a success. He left absolutely nothing to chance. When he was through with his experimenting, the possibility of an exhibition of the proneness of inanimate ...
— From Place to Place • Irvin S. Cobb
... attention in Cunjee. He was dressed entirely in skins—wallaby skins, Norah guessed, though there was an occasional section that looked like 'possum. They didn't look bad, either, she thought—a kind of sleeved waistcoat, and loose trousers, that were met at the knee by roughly-tanned gaiters, or leggings. Still, ...
— A Little Bush Maid • Mary Grant Bruce
... throw the scarf in," the genial salesman would concede cheerily. "And the waistcoat? One-and-three—a good waistcoat, as clean as new, and dirt cheap, so ...
— Dreamers of the Ghetto • I. Zangwill
... find out the science of their achievements afterwards, like the mathematical law in the Greek column. The stiffness rather than firmness of mind, the surrender of all spontaneous action in the strait-waistcoat of a preconceived plan, to which we have before alluded, unfitted him for that rapid change of combinations on the great chess-board of battle which enabled General Rosecrans at Murfreesboro to turn defeat into victory, an achievement without parallel ...
— The Writings of James Russell Lowell in Prose and Poetry, Volume V - Political Essays • James Russell Lowell
... riding-habit of hunting scarlet cloth; her black hat was tipped forward by piled-up masses red-golden hair. Round her neck was a white lawn scarf in the fashion of a man's hunting-stock, close fitting, and sinking into a gold-buttoned waistcoat of snowy twill. As she sat with the long skirt across her left arm her tiny black top-boots appeared underneath. Her gauntleted gloves were of white buckskin; her riding-whip was plaited of white leather, topped with ivory ...
— The Man • Bram Stoker
... be very nice," said Mr. Bickford, daintily flecking cigar ash from his glorious white waistcoat. "Er—by the way—I see that you customarily wear a silk hat, ...
— The Skipper and the Skipped - Being the Shore Log of Cap'n Aaron Sproul • Holman Day
... station, but the early train had beaten me, so Fitch had gone with the car. Indeed, it was not yet eight o'clock, and Daphne was still abed. That had not prevented us from following Berry into her room, any more than had the fact that no one of us was ready for breakfast. I had no coat or waistcoat: so far as could be seen, Jonah was attired in a Burberry and a pair of trousers: a glance at Adele suggested that she was wearing a fur coat, silk stockings, and a tortoise-shell comb, while Jill was wrapped in a kimono, with her fresh fair hair ...
— Jonah and Co. • Dornford Yates
... middle of the bench, and at this he pushed away from the young man, who had dropped himself sociably beside him. He wore a pair of black pantaloons, very tight in the legs, and widening at the foot so as almost to cover his boots. His coat was deeply braided, and his waistcoat was cut low, so that his plastron- scarf hung out from the shirt-bosom, which it would have done ...
— The Minister's Charge • William D. Howells
... underskirt was made of the plaid material, quite plain, and the overskirt of the bordered part was draped above it in simple straight long folds, the plaid part being at the lower edge of the overskirt. The bodice was of the plain, and it had a plastron, or waistcoat front, of the plaid. The buttons (as are many in use this year) are of smoked pearl, and are very small for the fronts of gowns and larger for the jacket-bodices. Bretelles of velvet are used as trimmings to the bodices of these rough woollens, and the collars and ...
— The Girl's Own Paper, Vol. VIII: No. 356, October 23, 1886. • Various
... half-open cupboard revealed bottles, glasses, and a dry-looking cheese. To the corresponding cupboard, on the other side of the fire, which had lost a corner by the descent of the roof, Mr Cupples now dragged his slippers, feeling in his waistcoat pocket, as he went, for the key.—There was another door still, partly sunk in the slope ...
— Alec Forbes of Howglen • George MacDonald
... the envelope which he had cut from Chauvenet's coat pinned into an inner pocket of his waistcoat, and since boarding the King Edward he had examined it twice daily to see that it was intact. The three red wax seals were in blank, replacing those of like size that had originally been affixed to the envelope; and at once after the attack on the dark deck he opened the ...
— The Port of Missing Men • Meredith Nicholson
... friend, and retained by later generations in mute protest against the disfiguring edifices which had made a millionaire's highway of Park Lane. Dominey, who was first scrutinised by an individual in buff waistcoat and silk hat at the porter's lodge, was interviewed by a major-domo in the great stone hall, conducted through an extraordinarily Victorian drawing-room by another myrmidon in a buff waistcoat, and finally ushered into a tiny little boudoir leading out of a larger apartment ...
— The Great Impersonation • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... name of the wonderful English actress on the bill-boards in front of Abbey's Theatre, and he had been told that Miss Terrell was English, and confused the two names. As he passed Van Bibber he drew his waistcoat into shape with a proud shrug of his shoulders, and said, anxiously, "I gave your friend a ...
— Cinderella - And Other Stories • Richard Harding Davis
... the man with the soft-pleated shirt-front and white waistcoat smeared with cigarette-ash. "What have you ...
— The House of Whispers • William Le Queux
... face was streaming with perspiration, and when he took off his overcoat there rose the sweetish sourish scent of a hot goatskin waistcoat. It reached below his waist, and would have kept cold out from a man standing in a blizzard, and he had been carrying a baby, a rifle, a bundle, a basket, and running, on ...
— Tatterdemalion • John Galsworthy
... a brave man, this gardener, and again he faced me. Ah, my friends, the hour of my triumph had come! It was a red waistcoat that he wore, and at this I hurled the ball. You would have said that I was a gunner, not a hussar, for never was so straight an aim. With a despairing cry—the cry of the brave man who is beaten—he fell upon the wooden ...
— The Adventures of Gerard • Arthur Conan Doyle
... back, with his forefingers in the arm-holes of his waistcoat, pursed his lips "We couldn't get them read," he said. "It takes a well-established reputation to carry essays. People will stand them from a Lang or a Stevenson or that 'Obiter Dicta' fellow—not from an unknown ...
— A Daughter of To-Day • Sara Jeannette Duncan (aka Mrs. Everard Cotes)
... hair-powder was not heroism, and that long tails were only an imitation of the monkey; that muskets did not fire the worse for having brown barrels, and that the cuirass was a better defence for the body of the dragoon than a cloth waistcoat, however covered with embroidery. But why shall not improvement go a little farther? Why shall not the arm of the dragoon be a little protected as well as his body? A slight and simple covering of steel rings would effect the purpose, and it is an important one; for a slight ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 364, February 1846 • Various
... With Wesleyan-Methodists he has something in common, but his soul trembles in agony at the iniquities of the Puseyites. His aversion is carried to things outward as well as inward. His gall rises at a new church with a high-pitched roof; a full-breasted black silk waistcoat is with him a symbol of Satan; and a profane jest-book would not, in his view, more foully desecrate the church seat of a Christian than a book of prayer printed with red letters and ornamented with a cross on the back. Most active clergymen have their ...
— Barchester Towers • Anthony Trollope
... man," said the olive-skinned young fellow at the wheel, with a forefinger and thumb searching a waistcoat pocket as the car began slowly to ...
— The Iron Furrow • George C. Shedd
... These I stowed by themselves, there being no need to put them into the chest, nor any room for them. While I was doing this, I found the tide began to flow, though very calm; and I had the mortification to see my coat, shirt, and waistcoat, which I had left on shore upon the sand, swim away. As for my breeches, which were only linen, and open-kneed, I swam on board in them and my stockings. However, this put me upon rummaging for clothes, of which I found enough, but took no more than I wanted ...
— The Century Vocabulary Builder • Creever & Bachelor
... told, and eleven officers, and hunted the fox thrice a week during the winter months under Lord Eliot, Captain and M.F.H. The Looe Volunteers, however, started well in the matter of dress, which consisted of a dark-blue coat and pantaloons, with red facings and yellow wings and tassels, and a white waistcoat. The officers' sword-hilts were adorned with prodigious red and blue tassels, and the blade of Captain Pond's, in particular, bore the inscription, "My Life's Blood for the Two Looes!"—a legend which we must admit to be touching, even while we reflect that the purpose of the weapon ...
— Wandering Heath • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... evening the two had started for the village fair. A velveteen shooting-jacket, a pair of corduroy trousers, and a waistcoat, furnished by Tregarva, covered with flowers of every imaginable hue, tolerably disguised Lancelot, who was recommended by his conductor to keep his hands in his pockets as much as possible, lest their delicacy, which was, as it happened, not very remarkable, might betray him. As they ...
— Yeast: A Problem • Charles Kingsley
... small bag[1] from her bosom, and placing it in the open front of my waistcoat, she reached out her long, skinny arm, and placing her skeleton hand on the top of my head, chanted a low song. The words were mostly English, and the few I ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol 3 No 3, March 1863 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... unfortunately his foot slipped, and down he rolled into a wet ditch, which was full of mud and water; there poor Tommy tumbled about for some time, endeavouring to get out; but it was to no purpose, for his feet stuck in the mud, or slipped off from the bank; his fine waistcoat was dirtied all over, his white stockings covered with mire, his breeches filled with puddle water; and, to add to his distress, he first lost one shoe and then the other—his laced hat tumbled off from his head and ...
— The History of Sandford and Merton • Thomas Day
... dressed—that is, when his hair is brushed; but as yet his shirt is guiltless of a waistcoat—he cannot refrain from looking forth again, to see if she may yet be there, and, looking, ...
— Molly Bawn • Margaret Wolfe Hamilton
... a cordwainer in the town ran away in 1764, or, as it was worded on the police notice, "did elope from service." He was described as a "lusty young fellow, wearing a light-coloured surtout coat, a snuff-coloured undercoat, a straw-coloured waistcoat, newish leather breeches, and wears his own dark brown hair tied behind," so it appeared to us that he had not left his best clothes at home when he "did elope," and would be easily recognised by his smart appearance. We also noticed that about the same period "Florists' Feasts" were held at Abingdon, ...
— From John O'Groats to Land's End • Robert Naylor and John Naylor
... Italy. The costume of the man from St Pol is, like that of the Granville women, soberer than most others of Brittany. Save for his buttons, the buckle on his hat, and the clasps of white metal fastening his leather shoes, his dress, including spencer, waistcoat, trousers, and stockings, is of black, and his hair is worn falling on his shoulders, while he rarely carries the pen-bas—an indication, perhaps, of his rather meditative, ...
— Legends & Romances of Brittany • Lewis Spence
... will consider this mode of bringing the canto to a conclusion of more than doubtful taste. The poet evidently aims a stroke at the pedantic and narrow-minded criticism to which original genius, emancipated from the strait-waistcoat of ...
— Eugene Oneguine [Onegin] - A Romance of Russian Life in Verse • Aleksandr Sergeevich Pushkin
... contributed liberally without prejudice to both political parties. This, however, W.M.P. did not know, and assumed that he was allowed to keep his four-thousand-dollar salary because the county could not get on without him. He was slender, wore a mouse-colored waistcoat, fawn tie and spats, and plastered his hair neatly down on each side of a glossy cranium that was an almost ...
— By Advice of Counsel • Arthur Train
... was yesterday brought up to answer a charge of having eaten a hackney-coachman for having demanded more than his fare; and another was accused of having stolen a small ox out of the Bath mail; the stolen property was found in his waistcoat pocket." ...
— The Olden Time Series, Vol. 6: Literary Curiosities - Gleanings Chiefly from Old Newspapers of Boston and Salem, Massachusetts • Henry M. Brooks
... victim." I suppose M. Rochefort does, but I am obliged to confess that I have not the least idea, unless indeed M. Lullier means by "machinations" the order that was given him to bring Mont Valerien in his waistcoat pocket. "Imprisoned without motive," he continues, "by order of the Central Committee, I was thrown ..." (Oh! you should not have thrown M. Lullier) "into the Prefecture of Police," (the ex-Prefecture, if you please), "and put in solitary confinement at the very moment when Paris ...
— Paris under the Commune • John Leighton
... that was for engaged couples only. He recommended a pair of skis, or a bobsleigh; he could put a fine fall of snow into the negative. But as I had arrayed myself in a black coat, with one of those white waistcoat slips, and a flowing tie with a pearl pin, I refused this offer, and we decided we wouldn't have ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 146., January 21, 1914 • Various
... do violence to every rule of art and law of taste. Usually when an oriental—for it is equally true of China, Japan and Turkey—adopts European dress he selects the same colors he would wear in his own, and he looks like a freak, as you can imagine, in a pair of green trousers, a crimson waistcoat, a purple tie, a blue negligee ...
— Modern India • William Eleroy Curtis
... not say that a man was properly dressed with only a coat on! You would expect him to have on a coat, waistcoat and trousers!" And the day was won for the ...
— The Recent Revolution in Organ Building - Being an Account of Modern Developments • George Laing Miller
... a Jerusalem," Chateaubriand tells of a little man "powdered and frizzed in the old-fashioned style, with a coat of apple green, a waistcoat of drouget, shirt-frill and cuffs of muslin, who scraped a violin and made the ...
— Godfrey Morgan - A Californian Mystery • Jules Verne
... neither Blifil nor Jones gave any answer; but Thwackum said surlily, "I believe the cause is not far off; if you beat the bushes well you may find her."—"Find her?" replied Western: "what! have you been fighting for a wench?"—"Ask the gentleman in his waistcoat there," said Thwackum: "he best knows." "Nay then," cries Western, "it is a wench certainly.—Ah, Tom, Tom, thou art a liquorish dog. But come, gentlemen, be all friends, and go home with me, and make final peace over a bottle." "I ask your pardon, sir," says Thwackum: "it ...
— The History of Tom Jones, a foundling • Henry Fielding
... mortals, dressed in tight- fitting, and yet, somehow, ill-fitting, pantaloons, usually about three sizes too short, a small apron of blue ducking-an unbecoming garment that can only be described as a cross between a short jacket and a waistcoat - and a narrow-rimmed, prosy-looking billycock hat. The peasant women are the poetry of Austria, as of any other European country, and in their short red dresses and broad-brimmed, gypsy hats, they look picturesque and interesting in spite ...
— Around the World on a Bicycle V1 • Thomas Stevens
... generally wears a coarse blue jacket, a red or yellow shag waistcoat, stout blue worsted stockings, tall laced ankle-boots, and corduroy breeches or trowsers. A red handkerchief round his neck is his delight, with two good long ends dangling in front. In many other parts ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 4, September, 1850 • Various
... difference between the contents of the pockets of scarecrows and the pockets of well-to-do squires. Ere donning his present habiliments, Israel had not omitted to withdraw his own money from his own coat, and put it in the pocket of his own waistcoat, ...
— Israel Potter • Herman Melville
... conclusion after the Crimean campaign was that flannel shirts answer better than cotton on the whole. If the shirt is cotton, there must be a flannel waistcoat; and the flannel shirt answers the purpose of both, while it is as easily washed as any material. Every man should have a flannel bandage for the body, in case of illness, or unusual fatigue, or sudden changes of temperature. ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 8, Issue 49, November, 1861 • Various |
