"While away" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... coming. What can such conduct mean, when she arranged everything so nicely for me after my own desire, that she might drink her medicine properly? Still I am not up; but nobody will let me rest for fear of the queen; so, to while away the time, I order Bombay to call upon her, give the quinine, and tell her all that has happened; at which she flies into a towering rage, says she will never touch medicine administered by any other hands but mine, and will ...
— The Discovery of the Source of the Nile • John Hanning Speke
... sleepless hours of sentry duty there was nothing to do but think; nothing wherewith to while away the time but an orgy of introspection. First came the almost paralysing sense of responsibility. He must keep, not only awake, but alert to the slightest sound, the slightest movement. Lives of men ...
— The Rough Road • William John Locke
... twenty campaigns, ten wounds, and a business man, to while away the hours. I hob-nob with the big capitalists, and frequently serve as intermediary between them and the ...
— A Cardinal Sin • Eugene Sue
... to write good poetry. It must be lots of fun, Mrs. March, to dash off a rhyme just to while away the time—ha, ha, ha! My wife often writes poetry when she feels tired and lazy. I know that whirling this way through this beautiful country is inspiring you right now to write half a dozen poems. I'd like to see you on one of those lovely ...
— John March, Southerner • George W. Cable
... compartment, and sat moodily watching the panorama of wood and river as we slowly wound up the tortuous ascents and descended the steep gradients. I had not even a newspaper with which to while away the time, only my own apprehensive thoughts of whither my helpless ...
— The Czar's Spy - The Mystery of a Silent Love • William Le Queux
... And to while away the time Yergunov began to think about Bogalyovka. It was a big village and it lay in a deep ravine, so that when one drove along the highroad on a moonlight night, and looked down into the dark ravine and then up at the sky, it seemed as though the moon were hanging over a bottomless abyss and it ...
— The Horse-Stealers and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov
... run away from home on several occasions and slept in hallways for a night or two at a time. She had not been sexually immoral until just previous to our seeing her. Then while away from home she had gone with a man to a hotel, and probably had also been with boys. These were her first and last experiences of the sort, but how much these affairs had been on her mind we obtained some ...
— Pathology of Lying, Etc. • William and Mary Healy
... envied him as Leonora's lover, say if they knew she was treating him as an insignificant friend, a good little boy who helped her while away the hours in the solitude ...
— The Torrent - Entre Naranjos • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... bring to the invalid to while away the time? "The Three Musketeers" or "Cyrano"? Jack seemed to know his "Cyrano" so well that a copy could be only a prompt. He settled deeper in his chair and, more to the sky than to Jasper Ewold, repeated Cyrano's address to his cadets, set to a tune of his own. His body might be in the ...
— Over the Pass • Frederick Palmer
... whose large, dark, and very brilliant eyes she had also inherited, will explain the misconception of the Proveditore as well as that of Dansowich, who had never seen his daughter in a disguise worn only at Venice or other places of peril, and while away from her father ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXLII. Vol. LV. April, 1844 • Various
... a cigarette to help while away the time. Doves were cooing on the arches, breaking the long silences with their tender calls. Jaime had cast, one after another, three cigarette stubs on the ground near his feet before a long drawn out murmur came from within the church, as from a thousand suspended ...
— The Dead Command - From the Spanish Los Muertos Mandan • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... Well, that is about as hard a place as a man can be called to stand in. Idleness in itself is hard. It is a burden even to those who have wealth and all the luxuries and amusements that can be devised to while away their leisure. It is the very nature of a man who is good for anything to do. Idleness is as unnatural and trying to the mind as sickness is to the body. But to see those you love in need, to see them threatened with suffering, to know that you could amply provide for ...
— The Chief End of Man • George S. Merriam
... quitted the canon I saw the most beautiful sight. It seemed as if we were driving through a golden haze. The violet shadows were creeping up between the hills, while away back of us the snow-capped peaks were catching the sun's last rays. On every side of us stretched the poor, hopeless desert, the sage, grim and determined to live in spite of starvation, and the great, bare, desolate buttes. The beautiful colors turned to amber and rose, and then to the general tone, ...
— Letters of a Woman Homesteader • Elinore Pruitt Stewart
... Crystal Palace! Aunt used to superintend. It was always a bitterly cold day, and we always got into the wrong train, and travelled half the day before we got there. We never had any dinner. It never occurs to a woman that anybody can want their meals while away from home. She seems to think that nature is in suspense from the time you leave the house till the time you get back to it. A bun and a glass of milk was her idea of lunch for a school-boy. Half her time was taken up in losing us, and the ...
— The Second Thoughts of An Idle Fellow • Jerome K. Jerome
... more matronly, yet there was much of the old Isabella left, and Verdayne was glad to see her. Lady Henrietta gave her a cordial invitation to visit Verdayne Place, which she readily accepted, passing many pleasant hours with the friend of her youth and helping to while away the long days that Verdayne found so tiresome when the Boy ...
— One Day - A sequel to 'Three Weeks' • Anonymous
... light-house in the first bloom of my youth. I did not want to be a monk—I could not be a man—and so I did what fate and my father laid out for me to do. Through the fine autumn weather I enjoyed my retirement. I had taken plenty of books and magazines with me to while away the time; there was a lovely promenade along the sea-wall on which the tall tower stood, and I could walk there for hours without my pulse being disturbed by visions of parasols, loves of bonnets, and pretty faces under them. I communed ...
— The Blunders of a Bashful Man • Metta Victoria Fuller Victor
... when a person takes a walk along the quay. We had occasion to do so several times, as we were expecting friends from England, who were to arrive by the packet, not long established between Southampton and Bordeaux, and, on one occasion, on reaching the village of Bacalan, we hoped to be able to while away the time of waiting, by a walk into fields, or by some path near the river; but our hopes were in vain; there seem never to be any walks or paths in fields, lanes, or by rivers, in France, except in Normandy; no one cares, or is expected to care, ...
— Barn and the Pyrenees - A Legendary Tour to the Country of Henri Quatre • Louisa Stuart Costello
... religious feeling, no disinterested love for men. He was simply a man of the world, a bon vivant, a horse jockey and sportsman, who consoled himself in the summer and autumn for his exile in that barbarous region, by filling his house with provincial friends, who helped him while away the time in fishing, hunting, and racing. The winter months, he usually spent at Fredericton, and during that interval no service was held in the chapel. Of late, the few, who were in the habit of attending the formal worship there, had forsaken ...
— Adele Dubois - A Story of the Lovely Miramichi Valley in New Brunswick • Mrs. William T. Savage
... went upstairs again the band soon began to play and helped to while away the time. Some of the passengers read papers, others read books and magazines, while others from the outer decks watched the progress of the large boat as it swiftly coursed over the waves. In this ...
— Robert Coverdale's Struggle - Or, On The Wave Of Success • Horatio, Jr. Alger
... tried to while away the time till Ransome's return; but he could not command his attention. The conversation about Grace had excited a ...
— Put Yourself in His Place • Charles Reade
... therethrough to spy once and again till such time as she should see the youth aforesaid and find an occasion of speaking with him and bestowing on him her love, so he would accept thereof, purposing, if a means could be found, to foregather with him bytimes and on this wise while away her sorry life till such time as the demon [of jealousy] should take leave ...
— The Decameron of Giovanni Boccaccio • Giovanni Boccaccio
... her sentence was but justice, and attacked the dinner with an appetite which no sorrow could diminish. Then he tramped slowly up to his room and threw himself down on his bed with a book to while away the weary stretch ...
— A Son of the City - A Story of Boy Life • Herman Gastrell Seely
... mind what's been! Of course one does have some fun with a cook now and then to while away the time. One plays the concertina and gets her to dance. What ...
— The Power of Darkness • Leo Tolstoy
... she met the major-domo, who informed her that the master had gone out in his boat about five o'clock. The day was clear and the waters calmer. There was no reason for either surprise or uneasiness, and Anne, who expected vagaries of every sort until the poem was finished, endeavoured to while away the long day with a new novel sent her by Medora Ogilvy. But she had instinctively taken a chair by a window facing the sea, and as the day wore on and she saw no sign of boat of any sort, she finally renounced the attempt to keep ...
— The Gorgeous Isle - A Romance; Scene: Nevis, B.W.I. 1842 • Gertrude Atherton
... passed; the usual round of pastimes inseparable from house parties served to while away the hours; other guests arrived, one or two went. Lord Ronsdale had greeted John Steele perfunctorily; the other's manner was likewise mechanically courteous. It could not very well have been otherwise; a number ...
— Half A Chance • Frederic S. Isham
... who his rival was, nor did Harold come to his mind, so sure was he that an engagement existed between him and Maude. Probably it was some one whom she had met while away at school; and if so, Nina would know, and he would sound her cautiously, but never let her know, if he could help it, the heart-wound he ...
— Tracy Park • Mary Jane Holmes
... he saw his cousin off from King's Cross. He had engaged a sleeper for her, and acted the part of dutiful relative to the life, supplying her with masses of literature to while away the sleepless hours ...
— Bones in London • Edgar Wallace
... souls can be contented to while away precious hours in a manner so useless, and withal so displeasing to the God who gave them their time for the improvement of themselves and others, is to me absolutely inconceivable! Yet it is certainly done; and that not merely by a few solitary individuals ...
— The Young Man's Guide • William A. Alcott
... as elsewhere, we must do something to while away the time. What with walking on the verdant shores of the bay within which nestles the little town, exploring the thick woods which make it look like a nest embowered amongst thick foliage, admiring the villas, each provided with a little bathing house, and moving about ...
— A Journey to the Interior of the Earth • Jules Verne
... have transpired before, without knowledge of the persons concerned, without a suspicion of the needs of the situation and its possibilities, they judge the peoples of the earth and divide the world. Stupid talk, with which irreverent officiousness seeks to while away and shorten the period of anxious waiting for customers; but to prepare quietly and wisely and mightily in advance for terms of peace, that is the duty ...
— New York Times Current History: The European War, Vol 2, No. 1, April, 1915 - April-September, 1915 • Various
... especially in a sparsely peopled countryside. You unconsciously take your dispositions from the atmosphere, and you cannot be certain always where you may either begin or end. Thus a simple Highland ball which we soldiers organized at Corgarff Castle, to while away a night, and be a token of friendliness towards our neighbours, developed a deep import in ...
— The Black Colonel • James Milne
... and repaired to the reception-room, where he drew forth his morning paper to while away the time until ...
— Mona • Mrs. Georgie Sheldon
... think what I thought on that matchless night. There was just a breath of wind. The mountains and hills rose all around us, Lykabettos, Kolonos—the home of Sophocles—Hymettos, and Pentelikon with its marble quarries, made an undulating line of gray against the horizon, while away at the left was the Hill of Mars. How still it was! How wonderful! The rows of lights from the city converged towards the foot of the Acropolis like the topaz rays in a queen's diadem. The blue waters of the harbor ...
— As Seen By Me • Lilian Bell
... of New Place. Ben Jonson was at the very height of his fame, the favorite alike of Court and Commons. Bacon was just rising to power and greatness, his Novum Organum still to come. Raleigh, in prison, was eating his heart out in the desire for freedom, trying to while away the dreary hours with chemical experiments, his great history not yet begun. Of the crowd of lyric writers some were boys at college, some but children in the nursery, and some still unborn. Yet in spite of the many writers who lived at or about the ...
— English Literature For Boys And Girls • H.E. Marshall
... a pattern of tireless and sagacious activity of a high order and breeding.... Thus a high respect for true womanhood was implanted in me. On the other hand I was as a boy made so accustomed to this rle by several young women, who entertained themselves with me and considered me as their lover to while away their time, that I later retained the inclination to play this part and considered a friendly advance as an invitation which I in turn held as a sacred claim of honor and an agreeable ...
— Sleep Walking and Moon Walking - A Medico-Literary Study • Isidor Isaak Sadger
... diversions which serve to while away the tediousness of those winter nights are included the narration of personal adventures passed through by the different hunters in their wild life. Tales of narrow escapes, of Indian fights, of desperate encounters with beasts of the forests; and through the rough ...
— Woman on the American Frontier • William Worthington Fowler
... she rested serenely in the dark—only half undressed in view of the ever-possible accident—cheek to pillow, face turned to the window that endlessly screened the sweeping mysteries of that dark glimmering countryside, quite resigned so to while away the night, persuaded it was inevitable that one with so much to ponder should be ...
— Nobody • Louis Joseph Vance
... intended to put his threat in execution. For a moment he thought of rushing out after him to protect his pet kitten; but a glance at the stern brow of the master, as he sat at his desk reading, restrained him; so, crushing down his feelings of mingled fear and anger, he endeavoured to while away the time by watching the boys as they played in the fields before the ...
— Martin Rattler • Robert Michael Ballantyne
... solemn stately personage, tant soit peu declassee, and the other potentates whispered and joked at her expense. Chateaubriand says that when the Duke of Wellington was bored with the meetings of the Congress, he would while away the time in the company of the Orsini, who scribbled on the margin of intercepted French despatches, "Pas pour Mariee." Not for ...
— The Works of Lord Byron - Poetry, Volume V. • Lord Byron
... dividends that night, and the Chinese fishermen were richer by the nets and ropes we did not get. I was bankrupt, unable just then to pay sixty-five dollars for a new mainsail. I left my boat at anchor and went off on a bay-pirate boat on a raid up the Sacramento River. While away on this trip, another gang of bay pirates raided my boat. They stole everything, even the anchors; and later on, when I recovered the drifting hulk, I sold it for twenty dollars. I had slipped back the one rung I had climbed, and never again ...
— Revolution and Other Essays • Jack London
... actually arrived did the girls in the big hall know what had happened. There had been singing and music and a funny recitation by one girl, to while away the time until Mrs. Tellingham appeared. Just as Ruth came in, her chum had her violin under her chin and was drawing sweet sounds from the strings, holding the other ...
— Ruth Fielding in Moving Pictures - Or Helping The Dormitory Fund • Alice Emerson
... I do for you, sir?" He expected to be presented with letters of introduction, and to while away a half-hour in the agreeable ...
— Parrot & Co. • Harold MacGrath
... with Mr. and Mrs. Gerrish and with Miss Houghton, to co-operate with you as advisers. Since the first establishment of the office, Miss Houghton has so often volunteered to assist me, that she is now familiar with the routine work. Finally, I shall at all times while away, be within reach by phone or wire; by which I wish you to consult me whenever occasion may demand. What say you, George! Can you ...
— Solaris Farm - A Story of the Twentieth Century • Milan C. Edson
... not discouraged. Since Toolooah had found the inscription scratched on a clay stone on the monument erected by Captain Hall over the remains near Pfeffer River, he had always been watchful, and often, while away from camp hunting, he has come upon a stone near a demolished cairn, or on some conspicuous place which had marks on that he thought might be writing. These he invariably brought into camp, though ...
— Schwatka's Search • William H. Gilder
... the velvety lawn dotted with the darker green of shrubbery, while away through the trees glimmered and gleamed the water of Lake Molata. The day was warm for autumn, and a gentle breeze played among the leaves of the great trees bordering the lake, coming to the girls in a soft, rustling whisper. The picture ...
— Billie Bradley at Three Towers Hall - or, Leading a Needed Rebellion • Janet D. Wheeler
... youth and the magic of Indian simples, Donald's recovery was certain and rapid. Atoka was his constant companion, and, to while away the slow hours, each taught the other his own language. One day the Indian lad made mention of his sister Ah-mo, and Donald caught eagerly at the name. At once it was connected with his vision and with a long ago day of sunshine on ...
— At War with Pontiac - The Totem of the Bear • Kirk Munroe and J. Finnemore
... happened about this time, which appeared greatly to favour the schemes of Annie and Lord Alphingham, and expose Caroline more powerfully to temptation. The Duchess of Rothbury had invited a select number of friends to while away the remaining weeks of the London season at her elegant seat, which was situated in a lovely spot, about twenty miles from the metropolis. Amongst the number she, of course, included Mrs. Hamilton, and expressed herself very much disappointed when that lady tendered excuses. ...
— The Mother's Recompense, Volume I. - A Sequel to Home Influence in Two Volumes. • Grace Aguilar
... doctored by the fierce gendarme, who put a handful of tobacco on the wound, so that the driver had to keep his mouth shut. For the remainder of the afternoon our mule went at a walking pace, and presently, to while away the time, we begged the gendarme and a merchant of Alessio, who was travelling with us, to repeat the song of some old hero, such as Skanderbeg. They stared—their mouths were also shut. And finally the gendarme ...
— The Birth of Yugoslavia, Volume 2 • Henry Baerlein
... tufts on their chins, toothpicks in their mouths, hands in their pockets, rumination in their jaws and diamond pins in their shirt-fronts, who looked as if they had sauntered over from Pennsylvania Avenue to while away half an hour, forsaking for that interval their various slanting postures in the porticoes of the hotels and the ...
— Pandora • Henry James
... not a young man who cared for much nursing. Had Gerty been his nurse it would doubtless have been all so different. However, it was very pleasant for Jack to while away the next month or two down at Grantley Hall, and to be treated like an interesting invalid and made a hero of by old maids and young ones too. The curate of the parish had not a ...
— As We Sweep Through The Deep • Gordon Stables
... the summit, exposed to wind and rain, he spent the forty days of Lent. From here he could look down on to one of the most beautiful bays in Ireland, down on to the hundred little islands in the glancing waters below, while away to the north and south stretched the rugged coast-line. And he tells us how the great white birds came and sang to him there. It would take too long to tell how he returned to Tara and started again with a train of thirteen ...
— A Book of Discovery - The History of the World's Exploration, From the Earliest - Times to the Finding of the South Pole • Margaret Bertha (M. B.) Synge
... mountaineers: for the standards of living in the Cove—so it seemed—were no farther below the standards in the Gap than they in turn were lower than the new standards to which she had adapted herself while away. Indeed, even that Bluegrass world where she had spent a year was too narrow now for her vaulting ambition, and with that thought she looked down again on the little town, a lonely island in a sea of mountains ...
— The Trail of the Lonesome Pine • John Fox, Jr.
... ten o'clock the Bois de Boulogne is filled with pedestrians, who take their breakfast on the grass to while away the time of waiting. The restaurants Madrid and the Cascade, where the tables are spread amidst flowers and shaded by trees—a feature that is duly remembered in the bills, like an hors d'oeuvre—are turning visitors away. Toward half-past two the enclosure of the paddock ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 26, September 1880 • Various
... forth at evening clad in the property of a comrade. Being paid to cultivate suspicion had soured the guardian angels' tempers. One had a novel by Laura Jean Libbey, the other an old-fashioned tale by Mary J. Holmes, to while away odd minutes of leisure; but it appealed to the imagination of neither that any or all of the girls flitting in and out might be eligible heroines for their favourite authors, stolen at birth from parent millionaires, qualifying through pathetic struggles with poverty to become the brides ...
— Winnie Childs - The Shop Girl • C. N. Williamson
... whole affair is so strange that one more strange act like this intrusion of mine is quite of apiece. I ask you therefore to listen to me. The listening pledges you to nothing, and at the worst, I can promise you, my story will while away a sleepless hour. If when you have heard, you can give us your advice, I shall be very glad. For we are sunk in such a quandary that a new point of view ...
— Ensign Knightley and Other Stories • A. E. W. Mason
... heard a lady of the Court tell this tale: King Francis having chosen and gathered a few of his Court whom he called "the little band of Court ladies," which included the handsomest, daintiest and most favoured, often escaped from the Court and went to other estates to hunt deer and while away the time, sometimes staying thus in retreat eight days, ten days, sometimes more, sometimes less, just as the ...
— Memoirs And Historical Chronicles Of The Courts Of Europe - Marguerite de Valois, Madame de Pompadour, and Catherine de Medici • Various
... Gray, "I think I should like to go up at least as far as there. I can take a book to read, to while away the time while you are up the mountain; or I can ramble about, I suppose. Is it a pleasant place to ramble about, around ...
— Rollo in Naples • Jacob Abbott
... said Lady Earle, "we have flowers in profusion. You have not been through the conservatories. It would while away the morning pleasantly for you all. Beatrice, select what flowers you will, and have ...
— Dora Thorne • Charlotte M. Braeme
... "to while away the time till the bright moon goes down, let us each tell a tale, or relate what we have done or learned this day. I will begin with you, Sunny Lock," added she, turning to a lovely little Elf, who lay among the fragrant leaves ...
— Flower Fables • Louisa May Alcott
... received it, but cherished it, revelled in it, as giving him that which he had long desired, a good foundation for dislike and jealousy, a well-founded pretence for every species of annoyance and revenge. The Earl of Fife, who had, in fact, merely spoken, as he had said, to while away the time, and for the pleasure of seeing his brother-in-law enraged, thought as little of his words after as he had before they were uttered. A licentious follower of pleasure in every form himself, he imagined, as such thoughtless characters ...
— The Days of Bruce Vol 1 - A Story from Scottish History • Grace Aguilar
... for the key-position at M. San Gabriele, but heavy Austrian reinforcements from Russia prevented the Italians from mastering the crest. On the 5th they were again driven back from the Hermada and San Giovanni, while away in the north they failed to take the heights of Lom. This held up their further advance across the Bainsizza plateau, and its eastern half, containing peaks a thousand feet higher than any the ...
— A Short History of the Great War • A.F. Pollard
... strolled out after dinner to the Chaussee des Etats-Unis to while away the time before going to bed. Ships and sailors, with the lights and sights and sounds of a busy port, had for him the fascination they exert over most men who lead rather sedentary lives. At that ...
— The Street Called Straight • Basil King
... many weary hours still to wait through. To while away the time, I looked at my letters. Among them was a letter ...
— The Moonstone • Wilkie Collins
... son of twenty years), grew up a model reprobate who cared nothing save for three things, "to drink the dark-red wine foaming as the water mixeth with it, to urge into the fight a broad-backed steed, and to while away the dull day with a young beauty." His apology for wilful waste is ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 6 • Richard F. Burton
... happy to have her as a companion whenever she could be spared from her domestic duties; and further, that it would afford her the greatest possible pleasure to sit and listen to her, whenever she could find a moment's time to either read for her or while away a few minutes in friendly conversation. This condescension seemed to light up the face of the interesting young creature with a flush of gratitude the most ardent; and with a lighter step than that with which she had entered the chamber, she tripped away, for the ...
— Ridgeway - An Historical Romance of the Fenian Invasion of Canada • Scian Dubh
... his death. I have kept two en souvenir. I knew a man once who had formed a large collection of such relics. There was a cigar which he had received from Louis Napoleon, and one from Bismarck, and so forth. But, alas! once while away on his travels, the whole museum was smoked up by a reckless under-graduate younger brother. In ...
— Memoirs • Charles Godfrey Leland
... there, and complained at their club in the evenings that they had been driven off their legs; but Mr Harding had no occupation. Once or twice he suggested that he might perhaps return to Barchester. His request, however, was peremptorily refused, and had nothing for it but to while away his ...
— Barchester Towers • Anthony Trollope
... world more beautiful and dear Than any she ever even dreamed of here, Where time is changed, does she await the day She longed for, and so little a while away, When all the love we watered with our tears Shall bloom, transplanted by the kindly years? Dreaming through her new garden does she go, Remembering the old garden, long ago, Tending new flowers more fair than those that grow In this sad garden where such sad flowers blow; ...
— The Rainbow and the Rose • E. Nesbit
... settlement, the Company's officers and their families, though, of course, cut off from the outer world, lead, if somewhat monotonous, by no means irksome lives. Books, music, cards and dances serve to while away spare time, and an occasional wedding, lasting, as it generally does, for several days, stirs the little community to its core. But sport, in a region abounding with game of all kinds, is the great time-killer, giving the longed-for excitement, and ...
— Through the Mackenzie Basin - A Narrative of the Athabasca and Peace River Treaty Expedition of 1899 • Charles Mair
... I while away the moments of digestion by drawing you a faithful picture of my morning. When I had done writing as above it was time to clean our house. When I am working, it falls on my wife alone, but to-day we had it between us; she did the bedroom, ...
— Vailima Letters • Robert Louis Stevenson
... at this mode of treating his story. But, in spite of himself, he gradually became familiar with the companions thus forced upon him, and, in a day or two, began to engage with them in their various sports, to while away the weary hours. Sometimes they sat and told stories, to amuse one another; and thus Rodney heard tales of wickedness and depredation and cunning, that almost led him to doubt whether there was any honesty among men. They talked of celebrated thieves and robbers, burglars and pirates, ...
— The Runaway - The Adventures of Rodney Roverton • Unknown
... patriots, and particularly of all such persons as had incurred his displeasure. The thought of the baffled Rougons and their yellow drawing-room, of all that clique entreating him for mercy, thrilled him with exquisite pleasure. In order to while away the time he resolved to issue a proclamation to the inhabitants of Plassans. Four of his party set to work to draw up this proclamation, and when it was finished Macquart, assuming a dignified manner in the mayor's arm-chair, had ...
— The Fortune of the Rougons • Emile Zola
... Dr. Baptista Damiotti, Lady Bothwell and her sister Lady Forester see the wedding ceremony of Sir Philip Forester and a young girl in a foreign city interrupted by Lady Forester's brother, who is slain in the duel that ensues. Scott regarded these two stories as trifles designed to while away a leisure hour. On Wandering Willie's Tale—a masterpiece of supernatural terror—he bestowed unusual care. The ill fa'urd, fearsome couple—Sir Robert with his face "gash and ghastly as Satan's," and "Major Weir," the jackanape, in his red-laced coat and wig—Steenie's ...
— The Tale of Terror • Edith Birkhead
... on and the two skyscrapers stood with their feet among the policemen and the taxicabs, the people buying and selling,—the customers with parcels, packages and bundles—while away high on their roofs stood the goat and the goose looking out on silver blue lakes like blue porcelain breakfast plates and silver snakes of rivers winding ...
— Rootabaga Stories • Carl Sandburg
... side, on the top of the scraggy corn-field fence, would these three worthies, so strikingly different one from the other, while away the warm summer hours; often, too, long after old Cornwallis, there dozing so contentedly in the shade of the overleaning wood, had dried off and recovered the breath he had not lost. Perhaps, at such times, instead of keeping his eyes on some invisible point in the atmosphere, Kumshakah ...
— Burl • Morrison Heady
... Mouse been all this time?" said the old man. "She has been a long while away. I find that it's impossible for me to get on without Mouse. I—where's my son William?—I fancy ...
— The Haunted Man and the Ghost's Bargin • Charles Dickens
... Bremner, I have heard you say that you had read all about that business. Let's hear the story; it will help to while away the time, for there's no chance of anyone gettin' to sleep with such ...
— The Lighthouse • R.M. Ballantyne
... ceremony is concluded, a supper is provided for all. General conversation and levity while away the hours, the talk consisting principally, however, of sage advice from relatives to both husband and wife as to how they should conduct themselves in future. At dawn the party disperses, the young man taking his ...
— The North American Indian • Edward S. Curtis
... There was tolerant contempt in Zehru's ringing voice. "I will explain some of the things that puzzle you. There is no reason why I should trouble myself to do so, yet it may while away the tedium of the short wait yet remaining before my apparatus becomes charged to the required point. Listen carefully, Earthling, for at best you will find many of my thoughts beyond the feeble limits of the word forms with which you ...
— Zehru of Xollar • Hal K. Wells
... having informed him of the fact. He had sauntered into Chickasaw Pete's place as was his wont, soon after breakfast on the same morning that Pearl had walked in the mesquite alleys with Flick. This he selected as the most agreeable place in which he could while away the time until a suitable hour for either seeking Pearl, or else hastening to keep an appointment with her. And Jimmy, with the same instinct that a squirrel hides nuts, hoarded such chance bits of gossip as came his way and brought them out one by one for the delectation ...
— The Black Pearl • Mrs. Wilson Woodrow
... they came to a large pond outside the farm-house. Very near the water there was a pretty green bank, and there the Princesses said they would sit down and while away an hour, for they thought that it would be pleasant to sit and look out over the ...
— The Red Fairy Book • Various
... interesting the evening paper, perhaps I'll have a look at it, and bless me, if by that time it isn't already half-past ten or eleven, and it seems useless to tackle archaeology then. And I just—just while away the time till I'm sleepy. But there seems to be a sort of legend among the ladies here, that I'm a great student of local topography and Roman roads, and all sorts of truck, and I find it better to leave it at that. Tiresome to go into long ...
— Miss Mapp • Edward Frederic Benson
... communication is to procure a concert in the general plan of action, as it is extremely desirable that Virginia and Kentucky should pursue the same track on this occasion. Besides, how could you better while away the road from hence to Kentucky, than in meditating this very subject and preparing something yourself, than whom nobody will do it better. The loss of your brother, and the visit of the apostle ——— ...
— Memoir, Correspondence, And Miscellanies, From The Papers Of Thomas Jefferson - Volume I • Thomas Jefferson
... her place she might easily command it. Miss Martineau, in a book of hers, has given us a most valuable and interesting account of the way in which, during a tedious and most trying illness, her active spirit confined to one place, she used to amuse herself, and while away the time by looking out of her window through her telescope and watching all that was going on. This old lady did much the same, minus the good telescope, which she had not. Her son, however, had presented her with an old-fashioned opera-glass, which he had picked up at ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 3, August, 1850. • Various
... fight and a pursuit had taken place. When day broke such indeed proved to be the case; we could descry in the camp a row of tents thrown down and dismantled, also dead or wounded men being brought in from the country beyond, while away on a distant ridge was a considerable body of ...
— Tales of Destiny • Edmund Mitchell
... through the Chinese city to while away the hours in between, but the girl demurred, and amended the suggestion to a street-car ride to Causeway Bay. He consented, and they caught a car in front of the hotel, and climbed to seats on ...
— Peter the Brazen - A Mystery Story of Modern China • George F. Worts
... you?" cried Dan Murdock. "Say, them fellers are swindlers, they are! They came in to git out of the hail and then they started to play cards, just to while away the time, so they said. They asked me to play, and as I couldn't work just then, I consented, and then they got me to put up some money,—just to make it interestin', they said. They let me win a little at first, and then they got me to put up more and more, and then they cheated me ...
— The Rover Boys in the Air - From College Campus to the Clouds • Edward Stratemeyer
... is said to while away the time, in his retirement, by knitting garters. It seems very strange that such a usurpation of Woman's Rights should be carried into effect by one of the stoutest ...
— Punchinello, Vol. 1, No. 11, June 11, 1870 • Various
... automatically turning a benighted community into the latest thing in culture. When Mrs. Bradlaugh, wife of the deacon, and president of the Ladies' Aid Society, was confined to the house with a cold, she sent over to the library, as was her wont in such cases, for some entertaining story to while away her tedious convalescence. Miss Martin sent back one of Henry James's novels, and was surprised that Mrs. Bradlaugh made no second attempt to use the library. When the little girls in school asked for the Elsie books, she answered with a glow of pride ...
— Hillsboro People • Dorothy Canfield
... door, his diffident fingers evoked from the bell but a single chirp—a sound that would by no means have gained him admission had Peter not been sitting up in bed, reading to while away the ...
— The Day of Days - An Extravaganza • Louis Joseph Vance
... but an hour earlier; the sailor hangs about the port when he is ashore, the shopman cannot resist the temptation to spend an hour among his wares on Sunday, the farmer is irresistibly drawn to the field to while away the time on holidays between dinner and supper. We all of us see more and understand better what we see, in those surroundings most familiar to us, and it is a general law that the average intelligence likes the best that which it ...
— A Cigarette-Maker's Romance • F. Marion Crawford
... one of those long, ugly, shapeless boats, which are to be seen congregating in the neighbourhood of Brentford. So seated, they are carried along at the rate of a mile and a half an hour, and usually while away the time in gentle converse with the man at the rudder, or in silent abstraction ...
— The Three Clerks • Anthony Trollope
... But when it was midnight Shahrazad awoke and signalled to her sister Dunyazad who sat up and said, "Allah upon thee, O my sister, recite to us some new story, delightsome and delectable, wherewith to while away the waking hours of our latter night."[FN39] "With joy and goodly gree," answered Shahrazad, "if this pious and auspicious King permit me." "Tell on," quoth the King who chanced to be sleepless and restless and therefore was pleased with the prospect of hearing her story. So Shahrazad ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 1 • Richard F. Burton
... Levee. Still smarting from the wound his pride had received, his cheeks burning with the flush of anger, and his heart heavy at the remembrance of his unkind words to Guly, the youth looked anxiously about for something to divert his thoughts, and while away the hours till church was out, when he hoped to rejoin his brother, and with ...
— The Brother Clerks - A Tale of New-Orleans • Xariffa
... Herdholt all that summer, and had gained much honour from his journey; all his kinsfolk and acquaintances set great store by his valiant bearing; he had, moreover, brought home with him a great deal of wealth. He would often go over to Laugar and while away time talking to Gudrun. One day Bolli asked Gudrun what she would answer if he were to ask her in marriage. Gudrun replied at once, "No need for you to bespeak such a thing, Bolli, for I cannot ...
— Laxdaela Saga - Translated from the Icelandic • Anonymous
... the wise king of Ithaca appears under the guise of a red-hosed Italian youth with flowing hair; while his wife sits at her "web" in a Florentine blue dress. In Greene, Penelope is represented telling stories to while away the time, which, unless we endow her with a prophetical gift, are impossibilities. Her first story begins thus: "Saladyne the Souldan of AEgipt, who by his prowesse had made a generall conquest of the south-east part of ye world tooke to wife ...
— The English Novel in the Time of Shakespeare • J. J. Jusserand
... to him that she was married to another man. He felt secure in his own attractions. He had ever been able to while away the time with whom he chose, why should a simple village maiden resist him? And this was an unusual one, the contour of her head was like ...
— Marcia Schuyler • Grace Livingston Hill Lutz
... not sleep, nor on the spring-bed, nor on the floor. It is two hours past midnight now, and I shall try to while away the time by scrawling this to you. My brother, I can not long support this sort of life, being no more fit for rough, ignominious labor. 'But why,' you will ask, 'did you undertake it?' Yes, why? Strictly speaking, I made a mistake. ...
— The Book of Khalid • Ameen Rihani
... the fire cheered him, somewhat; and he attacked the jug and the meat-pie provided by the thoughtful landlord. Revived by the food, he lit his pipe, and taking up his violin, commenced to play. He went over all the tunes he knew, played them in different keys and with variations, to while away the evening; and every time he felt his courage deserting him he turned to his jug for moral support. As you can guess, he did this pretty frequently until, just as he was draining the last drop, he heard ...
— The Girl Scouts' Good Turn • Edith Lavell
... boy, these things are nothing. They look large of course—they look large to a novice, but to a man who has been all his life accustomed to large operations—shaw! They're well enough to while away an idle hour with, or furnish a bit of employment that will give a trifle of idle capital a chance to earn its bread while it is waiting for something to do, but—now just listen a moment—just let me give ...
— The Gilded Age, Complete • Mark Twain and Charles Dudley Warner
... Victor began to compile a book on Indian lore. He took up the work the very first night of his arrival; took it up as eagerly as if it were a gift from the gods, as indeed it was, promising as it did to while away many a long night. He depended wholly upon Father Chaumonot's knowledge of the tongue and the legends; and daring the first three nights he and Chaumonot divided a table between them, the one to scribble his lore and the other ...
— The Grey Cloak • Harold MacGrath
... came to Wellesley. About a month after her arrival I was obliged to leave on a two months' trip and Mrs. Babson invited her up to dine the night before I left. I told her that I was going to speak while away on "America's Undeveloped Resources." After dinner she went to my desk and took her pen and scribbled these ...
— Fundamentals of Prosperity - What They Are and Whence They Come • Roger W. Babson
... informed you of his intention, as was certainly his place to do. And even if I had written to you on any other occasion, I should assuredly have alluded to the marriage. But, you see, I never wrote to any one while away," Cora explained. ...
— For Woman's Love • Mrs. E. D. E. N. Southworth
... have loved to be a troubadour, or a trouvere, Frank; that was my true metier, to travel from castle to castle singing love songs and telling romantic stories to while away the tedium of the lives of the great. Fancy the reception they would have given me for bringing a new joy into their castled isolation, new ideas, new passions—a breath of gossip and scandal from the outside world to ...
— Oscar Wilde, Volume 2 (of 2) - His Life and Confessions • Frank Harris
... fields of quiet blue were once more visible. By next morning the weather had cleared up, with a brisk westerly wind; but the sea still rolled heavily; and Eric, unable to bear the motion, kept below, loth to trust himself on his feet. Electra strove to while away the tedious time by reading aloud to him; but many a yearning look was cast toward the deck, and finally she left him with a few books, and ran ...
— Macaria • Augusta Jane Evans Wilson
... To while away the time, and by way of a little adventure, I determined at night to climb the mizen-mast with a fellow-passenger. While leaving the deck I was chalked by a middy, in token that I was in for my footing, so as to be free of the mizen-top. I succeeded ...
— A Boy's Voyage Round the World • The Son of Samuel Smiles
... given as to her condition, but he was to be shown at once into the drawing-room. He impressed these points upon them with the utmost earnestness. Finally he led the way into the drawing-room with the remark that the business was now out of our hands, and that we must while away the time as best we might until we could see what was in store for us. The doctor had departed to his patients, and only ...
— The Return of Sherlock Holmes - Magazine Edition • Arthur Conan Doyle
... of mother and daughter, kissing the hand of each in turn. It had just occurred to him that to while away his time he also might call for a moment at Silviane's, where, like the others, he had his entrees. On reaching the cold and solemn courtyard he said to the priest, "Ah! it does one good to breathe a little cool air. ...
— The Three Cities Trilogy, Complete - Lourdes, Rome and Paris • Emile Zola
... disposed of that important business," resumed the young Greek, "I went out to saunter through the streets of Florence, and while away an hour or two in viewing the splendid appearance of that charming city, when lighted up with the innumerable lamps of its palaces and casinos. At length I entered a dark and obscure street, which I knew must lead toward the river. I had not proceeded ...
— Wagner, the Wehr-Wolf • George W. M. Reynolds
... friend again the next day, endeavouring to support her spirits and while away the many tedious hours before the delivery of the letters; a needful exertion, for as the time of reasonable expectation drew near, Isabella became more and more desponding, and before the letter arrived, had worked herself into a state of real distress. But when it did come, where could distress ...
— Persuasion • Jane Austen
... me during the night, and which effectually deprived me of sleep. Next morning, at breakfast, Pleyel related an event which my disappearance had hindered him from mentioning the night before. Early the preceding morning, his occasions called him to the city: he had stepped into a coffee-house to while away an hour; here he had met a person whose appearance instantly bespoke him to be the same whose hasty visit I have mentioned, and whose extraordinary visage and tones had so powerfully affected me. On an attentive survey, however, he proved, likewise, to be one with whom my friend had had some intercourse ...
— Stories by Modern American Authors • Julian Hawthorne
... took to late hours and brandy-and-water; others got sentimental, and wrote journals and novels and poetry; some made acquaintances among the townspeople, and out in to a quiet rubber to pass the evening; while another detachment, among which I was, got up a little love affair to while away the tedious hours, ...
— Charles O'Malley, The Irish Dragoon, Volume 1 (of 2) • Charles Lever
... been constantly with her mother—and when she was even a short while away the elder woman anxiously called for her. Sometimes she and Hamilton had met, but at these times there was no syllable of surrender from the lips of either; only a tacit sort of truce such as might have existed where ...
— Destiny • Charles Neville Buck
... mountain range, had melted the snow, and so bright streams of water came rushing down the mountain sides, laughing as if in glee. The cottagers sat outside their doors, singing in the sun. The vine-covered hills, although not yet clothed with their green garment, were still beautiful, while away in the distance spread a broad Italian plain, dotted with villages, out of whose midst a modest church ...
— Weapons of Mystery • Joseph Hocking
... industrial peace, says a sporting paper, is more entertainment for the masses. We have often wondered what our workers do to while away the time between strikes. ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 159, September 29th, 1920 • Various
... piano in the drawing-room! At such times, always, though, if he did feel impatient, he immediately demanded of himself: "Are you, then, the kind of husband that begrudges your wife young companions of her own age and tastes to help her while away the hours that you cannot possibly spend with ...
— Miss Billy Married • Eleanor H. Porter
... Thus pleasantly did Robin while away the time with his future shipmate until he arrived at the end of his journey, when he parted from Jim Slagg and was ...
— The Battery and the Boiler - Adventures in Laying of Submarine Electric Cables • R.M. Ballantyne |
