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More "Piquet" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... young woman, resuming her seat and her reading; "he is in the back room, playing piquet with Peppino, ...
— Monte-Cristo's Daughter • Edmund Flagg
... moment occurred until the 20th of November, when the Captain of the day, or rather of the night, as it was only three in the morning, noticed the enemy fording the river Lacolle. Retracing his steps, he had only time to warn the piquet of their danger, when a volley was fired by the Americans, who had surrounded the log guard-house, at so inconsiderable a distance that the burning wads set fire to the birch covering of the roof, until the guard-house was consumed. But long before that happened, the militia and Indians ...
— The Rise of Canada, from Barbarism to Wealth and Civilisation - Volume 1 • Charles Roger
... mess tent when cold compels. At times the conversation lasts till midnight; and, when cognac or whisky is plentiful, I have heard it abut upon the Battle of Waterloo and the Immortality of the Soul. Piquet and cart are reserved for life on board ship. Our only reading consists of newspapers, which come by camel post every three weeks; and a few "Tauchnitz," often odd volumes. I marvel, as much as Hamlet ever did, to ...
— The Land of Midian, Vol. 1 • Richard Burton
... Fourtou's challenge, and authorizes me to propose Plessis-Piquet as the place of meeting; tomorrow morning at daybreak as the time; and axes ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... the Languedoc, his flagship, a regularly appointed envoy, Girard de Rayneville, who had full power to recognize the independence of the States, Silas Deane, one of the American commissioners, and such well-known officers as the comte de la Motte-Piquet, the Bailli de Suffren, De Guichen, D'Orvilliers, De Grasse and others. The history of this first expedition is a short and disastrous one. The voyage was long, owing to the ships being unequally matched in speed, and ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 26, September 1880 • Various
... Placenza were all assembled in the salon, while the First Consul was writing in his cabinet. Haydn's oratorio was to be performed that evening; the ladies were anxious to hear the music, and we also expressed a wish to that effect. The escort piquet was ordered out; and Lannes requested that Napoleon would join the party. He consented; his carriage was ready, and he took along with him Bessieres and the aide de camp on duty. I was directed to attend the ladies. Josephine had received a magnificent shawl from Constantinople ...
— Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte, Complete • Louis Antoine Fauvelet de Bourrienne
... in order to perfect themselves in Military Exercises. No Woman was to be married till she had killed her Man. The Ladies of Fashion used to play with young Lions instead of Lap-dogs, and when they made any Parties of Diversion, instead of entertaining themselves at Ombre or Piquet, they would wrestle and pitch the Bar for a whole Afternoon together. There was never any such thing as a Blush seen, or a Sigh heard, in the Commonwealth. The Women never dressed but to look terrible, to which ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele
... of gaiety continues. After I had written to you yesterday, the brain being wholly extinct, I played piquet all morning with Graham. After lunch down to call on the U.S. Consul, hurt in a steeple-chase; thence back to the new girls' school which Lady J. was to open, and where my ladies met me. Lady J. is really an orator, with a voice of gold; the rest of us played our unremarked parts; ...
— Vailima Letters • Robert Louis Stevenson
... a rather amusing incident in the Hutt Valley during the time of the fighting. . . . A strong piquet was turned out regularly about an hour before daybreak. On one occasion the men had been standing silently under arms for some time, and shivering in the cold morning air, when they were startled by a solemn request for 'more pork.' The officer in command of the piquet, who had only ...
— A Dictionary of Austral English • Edward Morris
... fire of their artillery. At sun set, and during the greatest part of the night, this diversion was seconded by a feigned attack of the Corsicans: which so effectually deceived the enemy, that they withdrew a considerable piquet from the spot where the principal battery was to be constructed, in order to support the Mollinochesco; and, directing the whole of their fire to that point, enabled the troops to ...
— The Life of the Right Honourable Horatio Lord Viscount Nelson, Vol. I (of 2) • James Harrison
... something that rang through and startled the entire nation. We gamble in the funds. We gamble in endless companies (limited)—all resulting from the same passion of our nature, which led to the gambling of former times with cards, with dice, at Piquet, Basset, Faro, Hazard, E O, Roulette, and Rouge et Noir. At a recent memorable trial, the Lord Chief Justice of England exclaimed—'There can be no doubt—any one who looks around him cannot fail to perceive—that a spirit of speculation ...
— The Gaming Table: Its Votaries and Victims - Volume I (of II) • Andrew Steinmetz
... military chest, the officers, upon halting, would spread their ponchos on the ground, and play until it was time to resume the march; and this was frequently done even on the eve of a battle. Soldiers on piquet often gambled within sight of an enemy's ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 13, No. 363, Saturday, March 28, 1829 • Various
... heav'n b' another way — repentance. 940 Love's arrows are but shot at rovers; Though all they hit, they turn to lovers; And all the weighty consequents Depend upon more blind events, Than gamesters, when they play a set 945 With greatest cunning at piquet, Put out with caution, but take in They know not what, unsight, unseen, For what do lovers, when they're fast In one another's arms embrac't, 950 But strive to plunder, and convey Each other, like a prize, ...
— Hudibras • Samuel Butler
... for suspicion. I went back with Selincourt to his rooms and we sat up the rest of the night smoking and playing auction piquet. He won about five pounds off me. Ask ...
— Nightfall • Anthony Pryde
... players seated among the shaded gleams falling decorously on dark-wood tables, on the backs of chairs, on cards and tumblers, the little gilded coffee-cups, the polished nails of fingers holding cigars. A crony challenged him to piquet. He sat down listless. That three-legged whist—bridge—had always offended his fastidiousness—a mangled short cut of a game! Poker had something blatant in it. Piquet, though out of fashion, remained for him the ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... bridle-path, being bound for Major Robert Beverly's plantation, he being supposed to know naught of it, and indeed after his issuing of orders he had ridden to Jamestown, to see Sir Henry Chichely, and keep him quiet with a game at piquet, which he ...
— The Heart's Highway - A Romance of Virginia in the Seventeeth Century • Mary E. Wilkins
... drawing-room Guy sat down to piquet with his uncle. Raymond liked to utilize his evenings, and never played for nominal stakes. He was the beau ideal of a card-player, certainly; no revolution or persistence of luck could ruffle the dead calm of his courteous face. He would win the ...
— Guy Livingstone; - or, 'Thorough' • George A. Lawrence
... a Play of Moliere's of three Acts, called Les Fascheux, upon which I wrote a great part of this before I read that." He borrowed, after reading it, the first scene in the second act, and Moliere's story of Piquet, which he translated into Backgammon, and says, "that he who makes a common practice of stealing other men's wit, would if he could with the same safety, steal anything else." Shadwell mentions, however, nothing of borrowing from The Misanthrope and The Forced ...
— The Bores • Moliere
... behind his colleague in the antechamber. The king could be heard distinctly, speaking aloud to Colbert, in the same cabinet where Colbert might have heard, a few days before, the king speaking aloud with M. d'Artagnan. The guards remained as a mounted piquet before the principal gate; and the report was quickly spread through the city that monsieur le capitaine of the musketeers had just been arrested by order of the king. Then, these men were seen to be in motion, as, in the good old times of Louis XIII., and M. de Treville; ...
— The Vicomte de Bragelonne - Or Ten Years Later being the completion of "The Three - Musketeers" And "Twenty Years After" • Alexandre Dumas
... you are!" Harietta cried delightedly, rising from her sofa and throwing herself into his arms. "I've packed Stanislass off to the St. James' to play piquet. I have been all alone waiting for you for the last hour—I began to fear you ...
— The Price of Things • Elinor Glyn
... sir, I have never seen her do otherwise than she does every day, that is to say, walk in the valley, play piquet with her aunt, and visit the poor. The peasants call her Brigitte la Rose; I have never heard a word against her except that she goes through the woods alone at all hours of the day and night; but that is when engaged ...
— The Confession of a Child of The Century • Alfred de Musset
... waving of handkerchiefs was going on Anne stood between the two brothers, who protectingly joined their hands behind her back, as if she were a delicate piece of statuary that a push might damage. Soon the King had passed, and receiving the military salutes of the piquet, joined the Queen and princesses at Gloucester Lodge, the homely house of red brick in which he ...
— The Trumpet-Major • Thomas Hardy
... limit! I turned the corner and came upon Major B. and F. seated on the ledge, quietly playing cards by the brilliant moonlight. As their tiny retreat could not accommodate four players, they were solacing themselves with a game of piquet. ...
— In the Field (1914-1915) - The Impressions of an Officer of Light Cavalry • Marcel Dupont
... de Chabrillane—who in reality occupied towards the Marquis a position akin to that of gentleman-in-waiting—sat opposite to him in the enormous travelling berline. A small folding table had been erected between them, and the Chevalier suggested piquet. But M. le Marquis was in no humour for cards. His thoughts absorbed him. As they were rattling over the cobbles of Nantes' streets, he remembered a promise to La Binet to witness her performance that night in "The Faithless ...
— Scaramouche - A Romance of the French Revolution • Rafael Sabatini
... a ravine opening into Clemmens Creek, about 4 miles south of Dixon, near the Piquet orchards, is a cavern with an entrance 55 feet wide and 40 feet high. The depth is 110 feet to loose rocks and clay, partly from the sides and roof, partly washed in through side caves and crevices. There is a small amount of cave earth ...
— Archeological Investigations - Bureau of American Ethnology, Bulletin 76 • Gerard Fowke
... things which are to be done "when Mr. George comes home." Mrs. Mountain is constantly on the whimper when George's name is mentioned, and Harry's face wears a look of the most ghastly alarm; but his mother's is invariably grave and sedate. She makes more blunders at piquet and backgammon than you would expect from her; and the servants find her awake and dressed, however early they may rise. She has prayed Mr. Dempster to come back into residence at Castlewood. She is not severe or haughty ...
— The Virginians • William Makepeace Thackeray
... was much more dictatorial and pedantic, for which reason she displeased me excessively: and, out of spite to her, I often resumed those unmannerly habits from which the other had already weaned me. Nevertheless she always had patience enough with me, taught me piquet, ombre, and similar games, the knowledge and practice of which ...
— Autobiography • Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
... suis bien tente de te bailler une quinte major. Quinte major is a term of piquet. It is here employed figuratively. Compare its use in 'Les ...
— The Jealousy of le Barbouille - (La Jalousie du Barbouille) • Jean Baptiste Poquelin de Moliere
... supposed to be the wickedest old card-player in all Littlebath, and there were strange stories afloat of the things she had done. There were Stumfoldians who declared that she had been seen through the blinds teaching her own maid piquet on a Sunday afternoon; but any horror will get itself believed nowadays. How could they have known that it was not beggar-my-neighbour? But piquet was named because it is supposed in the Stumfoldian world to be the wickedest of ...
— Miss Mackenzie • Anthony Trollope
... trifling with the happiness of this young life, like a princess accustomed to play with objects more precious than a simple knight. In fact, her husband risked the whole kingdom as you would a penny at piquet. Finally it was only three days since, at the conclusion of vespers, that the constable's wife pointed out to the queen this follower ...
— Droll Stories, Complete - Collected From The Abbeys Of Touraine • Honore de Balzac
... piquet, was much teased by a looker-on who was short-sighted, and, having a very long nose, greatly incommoded the player. To get rid of the annoyance, the player took out his handkerchief, and applied it to the nose of his officious neighbor. "Ah! sir," said he, "I beg your pardon, but I really took ...
— The Jest Book - The Choicest Anecdotes and Sayings • Mark Lemon
... observations that were retailed in the atmosphere of the play-houses, and had all the good things of the high wits by rote, long before they made their way into the jest-books. The intervals between conversation were employed in teaching my daughters piquet, or sometimes in setting my two little ones to box, to make them sharp, as he called it; but the hopes of having him for a son-in-law, in some measure blinded us to all his imperfections. It must be owned, that my wife laid a thousand schemes to entrap him; or, ...
— The Ontario High School Reader • A.E. Marty
... yet when the day drew nigh on which he was to go to London, on his way to Buston, he did bethink himself where these places were to be found. His throat was parched, and the thirst upon him was extreme. Cards were the weapons he had used. He had played ecarte, piquet, whist, and baccarat, with an occasional night of some foolish game such as cribbage or vingt-et-un. Though he had always lost, he had always played with men who had played honestly. There is much that is, in truth, dishonest ...
— Mr. Scarborough's Family • Anthony Trollope
... 'lamenting the folly of his friends.' He, like Lovat, was really 'sitting on the fence.' His clan was out; his second son AEneas led it at Falkirk. Alastair was in France. At the close of 1745, Alastair, conveying a detachment of the Royal Scots, in French service, and a piquet of the Irish brigade to Scotland, was captured on the seas and imprisoned in the Tower of London. {150d} In January 1746 we find him writing from the Tower to Waters, the banker in Paris, asking for money. Almost at this very time Young ...
— Pickle the Spy • Andrew Lang
... accommodating divine, who was always most obligingly ready to take a dinner and a bed at the house of any country gentleman in distress for a companion. Nothing came amiss to him,—a game at billiards, at chess, at draughts, at backgammon, at piquet, or at all-fours in a tete-a-tete,—or any game on the cards, round, square, or triangular, in a party of any number exceeding two. He would even dance among friends, rather than that a lady, even if she were on the wrong side of thirty, should sit still for want of a partner. ...
— Nightmare Abbey • Thomas Love Peacock
... from the two at the piquet-table, but in nine cases out of ten the game had been designed with an eye upon the clock, and hardly any delay followed. Mrs. Baxter kissed her son, and passed her arm through Maggie's. Laurie followed; gave them candles, ...
— The Necromancers • Robert Hugh Benson
... to bed, the cocks and hens follow suit," said Crevel. "Madame Marneffe disappeared, and her adorers departed. Will you play a game of piquet?" added ...
— Poor Relations • Honore de Balzac
... return to my Lady of Chelsey, who, when her son Esmond announced to her ladyship that he proposed to make the ensuing campaign, took leave of him with perfect alacrity, and was down to piquet with her gentlewoman before he had well quitted the room on his last visit. "Tierce to a king," were the last words he ever heard her say: the game of life was pretty nearly over for the good lady, and three months afterwards she took to her bed, where ...
— The History of Henry Esmond, Esq. • W. M. Thackeray
... the inn. Gay, animated, conscious of his attractions, the fop hovered over the young girl, an all-pervading Hyperion, with faultless ruffles, white hands, and voice softly modulated. That evening the soldier played piquet with the wiry old lady, losing four shillings to that antiquated gamester, and, when he had paid the stakes, the young girl was gone and the buoyant beau had sought diversion ...
— The Strollers • Frederic S. Isham
... taken as much wine as Belmont could prevail on me to drink, and he was very urgent, he asked if I played Piquet? ...
— The Adventures of Hugh Trevor • Thomas Holcroft
... with such bewitching grace that perforce I smiled back at her, and if she had but asked me this evening, as she had on many others, to linger in her cozy cabin for a game of piquet, I would not have had the courage to say no. But she did not ask me, and, much as I longed to stay, there was nothing for me to do but to pick up my hat and say, with the best ...
— The Rose of Old St. Louis • Mary Dillon
... hear a word or two and, thinking it was some game of which they spoke, said: "Piquet or a game of ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... last chance that an indulgent destiny had given him, that the ruined fop of the Regency, the sometime member of the Beef-steak Club, the man who in his earliest youth had worn a silver gridiron at his button-hole, and played piquet in the gilded saloons of Georgina of Devonshire, found himself laid on a bed of sickness in dingy London lodgings, and nearer death than he had ever been in the course of his brief military career; so nearly gliding from life's swift-flowing river into eternity's ...
— Birds of Prey • M. E. Braddon
... suppose they have mouths, and can laugh, and chat, and so, egad I'll make the best of them; it is one comfort, we shall all understand religion then, and need not plague our heads about it any further. But, in the mean time, suppose we have a game of piquet." ...
— The International Magazine, Volume 2, No. 2, January, 1851 • Various
... It makes no difference in the case, Nor is complexion honour's place. But, lest we should for honour take The drunken quarrels of a rake: Or think it seated in a scar, Or on a proud triumphal car; Or in the payment of a debt We lose with sharpers at piquet; Or when a whore, in her vocation, Keeps punctual to an assignation; Or that on which his lordship swears, When vulgar knaves would lose their ears; Let Stella's fair example preach A lesson she alone can teach. In points of honour to be tried, All passions must be laid aside: Ask no advice, ...
— Poems (Volume II.) • Jonathan Swift
... rise to a rather amusing incident in the Hutt Valley during the time of the fighting. . . . A strong piquet was turned out regularly about an hour before daybreak. On one occasion the men had been standing silently under arms for some time, and shivering in the cold morning air, when they were startled by a solemn request for 'more pork.' The officer in command of the piquet, who had ...
— A Dictionary of Austral English • Edward Morris
... round of gaiety continues. After I had written to you yesterday, the brain being wholly extinct, I played piquet all morning with Graham. After lunch down to call on the U.S. Consul, hurt in a steeple-chase; thence back to the new girls' school which Lady J. was to open, and where my ladies met me. Lady J. is really an orator, with a voice of gold; the rest of us played our unremarked parts; missionaries, ...
— Vailima Letters • Robert Louis Stevenson
... to lighten the military chest, the officers, upon halting, would spread their ponchos on the ground, and play until it was time to resume the march; and this was frequently done even on the eve of a battle. Soldiers on piquet often gambled within sight of an ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 13, No. 363, Saturday, March 28, 1829 • Various
... at the Mansion-House all night, and helped to board up the smashed windows; but at daylight Colonel Brereton came and insisted on withdrawing the piquet on guard—not, however, sending a relief for them, on the plea that they only collected a crowd. The instant they were withdrawn, down came the mob in fresh force, so desperate that all the defences were torn down, and they swarmed ...
— Chantry House • Charlotte M. Yonge
... Fusiliers, to strengthen a column which was pushed out on October 13th towards Tintwa Pass to get touch with the enemy. This column[88] failed, however, to observe even patrols of the enemy, and the Dublin Fusiliers returned to Dundee by train the same night. On this day the enemy fell upon a piquet of Natal Policemen posted at De Jager's Drift, and made them prisoners. A patrol of the 18th Hussars proceeding to reconnoitre the spot next day, the 14th, came upon a scouting party of forty of the enemy ...
— History of the War in South Africa 1899-1902 v. 1 (of 4) - Compiled by Direction of His Majesty's Government • Frederick Maurice
... dinner. No letters as yet come from Ireland. Lord Egremont tells me that Digby is sent after La Motte Piquet.(159) I went to Miss Gunning's to carry her a parcel of francs, but I did not find her at home. I expect to see Mitchel back in a few days; the wind, as I am told, is favourable for ...
— George Selwyn: His Letters and His Life • E. S. Roscoe and Helen Clergue
... respectable. Didn't they like it here? It was as comfortable as being at home. You could even take a nap here without being embarrassed. He called for the newspaper, spread it out open before him, and looked through it, frowning the while. Coupeau and My-Boots had commenced a game of piquet. Two bottles of wine and five glasses were ...
— L'Assommoir • Emile Zola
... vigilance was kept up by the settlers throughout the night; but the out-piquet having imprudently ventured, in violation of their orders, to leave their station at the dawn of day, were immediately followed by the native force; who, suddenly presenting a front of ten yards in width, fired a volley, and then rushing forward, took ...
— A Voyage Round the World, Vol. I (of ?) • James Holman
... "He deals pardons as he would cards at piquet, by twos, without so much as a look at their faces. A glance at either would have shown both to be rapscallion Whigs. However, 't is done, and not to be undone. Release them, but keep eye on each, ...
— Janice Meredith • Paul Leicester Ford
... is probably a reference to the card game now called piquet, usually played for a hundred points. It is one of the oldest of its kind. See Rabelais' Gargantua, ...
— The Tales Of The Heptameron, Vol. V. (of V.) • Margaret, Queen Of Navarre
... profligate French women, who ruled the councils of Europe in the middle of the last century, were clever women; and that philosopheress Madame du Chatelet, who managed, at one and the same moment, the thread of an intrigue, her cards at piquet, and a calculation in algebra, was a very clever woman! If Portia had been created as a mere instrument to bring about a dramatic catastrophe—if she had merely detected the flaw in Antonio's bond, ...
— Characteristics of Women - Moral, Poetical, and Historical • Anna Jameson
... all assembled in the salon, while the First Consul was writing in his cabinet. Haydn's oratorio was to be performed that evening; the ladies were anxious to hear the music, and we also expressed a wish to that effect. The escort piquet was ordered out; and Lannes requested that Napoleon would join the party. He consented; his carriage was ready, and he took along with him Bessieres and the aide de camp on duty. I was directed to attend the ladies. Josephine had received a magnificent shawl from Constantinople and she that ...
— The Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte • Bourrienne, Constant, and Stewarton
... masterpiece I was about to execute, and though I found much joy in renewed intercourse with my beloved lady and my master, I took no particular note of their relations. We met at meals, sometimes in the afternoons, and always of evenings, when I played dutiful piquet with Mrs. Rushworth, while Joanna made music on the piano, and Paragot read Jane Austen in an arm-chair by the fire. To me the quietude of the secluded English home had an undefinable charm like the smell of lavender, for which I have always had a cat-like affection. Not ...
— The Beloved Vagabond • William J. Locke
... you ever play piquet? I have fallen a victim to this debilitating game. It is supposed to be scientific; God save the mark, what self-deceivers men are! It is distinctly less so than cribbage. But how fascinating! There ...
— Letters of Robert Louis Stevenson - Volume 2 • Robert Louis Stevenson
... afternoons. Since his engagement to Trina he had discontinued this habit. However, he still dropped into Frenna's one or two nights in the week. He spent a pleasant hour there, smoking his huge porcelain pipe and drinking his beer. He never joined any of the groups of piquet players around the tables. In fact, he hardly spoke to anyone ...
— McTeague • Frank Norris
... story of the tenor, the pork butcher, who was heard giving out such a volume of sound that the sausages were set in motion above him; he was fed, clothed, and educated on the five francs a day earned in the music hall in the Avenue de la Motte Piquet; and when he made his debut at the Theatre Lyrique, thou wert in the last stage of consumption and too ill to go to hear thy pupil's success. He was immediately engaged by Mapleson ...
— Confessions of a Young Man • George Moore
... (A piquet of the National Guard passes across the square; some shop-keepers go home; at the corner of the street the chestnut-seller does a thriving trade; the old clothes dealer fills her barrel with clothes, and goes away with ...
— La Boheme • Giuseppe Giacosa and Luigi Illica
... promises of amendment. And, in fact, for the first two days of his stay under my roof Misha not merely justified my expectations but surpassed them, while the ladies of the household were simply enchanted with him. He played piquet with the old lady, helped her to wind her worsted, showed her two new games of patience; for the niece, who had a small voice, he played accompaniments on the piano, and read Russian and French poetry. He told both the ladies lively but discreet ...
— A Desperate Character and Other Stories • Ivan Turgenev
... confidence, whether hot roast fowl and bread-sauce were compatible with the earliest state of weeds; or of that other lady,—a royal lady she,—who was much comforted in the tedium of her trouble when assured by one of the lords about the Court that piquet ...
— Can You Forgive Her? • Anthony Trollope
... told to Florence Crewden his experiences in exploring Southern Greenland by aeroplane with the Schliess-Banning expedition. At bruncheon Bobby Winslow, now an interne, talked baseball with Carl. At bruncheon Phil Dunleavy regarded cynically all the people he did not know and played piquet in a ...
— The Trail of the Hawk - A Comedy of the Seriousness of Life • Sinclair Lewis
... introduced cards, and the kind inventors of piquet and cribbage, for they employed six hours at least of her ladyship's day, during which her family was pretty easy. Without this occupation my lady frequently declared she should die. Her dependants one after another relieved guard—'twas rather a dangerous post to play with her ladyship—and ...
— Henry Esmond; The English Humourists; The Four Georges • William Makepeace Thackeray
... little group around her; for the aged Marquise and her son Alain—dead a year since—had been picturesque figures in their own circle where politics and art, literature and religion, met and crossed swords, or played piquet! And now she was coming back, not only to Paris, but to society; had in fact, arrived, and the card Madame Choudey held in her white dimpled hand announced the first reception at ...
— The Bondwoman • Marah Ellis Ryan
... Bayard obeyed his master, returning from his run with his horse completely under control. Afterwards, Pierre's fine horsemanship won for him the nickname "Piquet"—a spur. ...
— With Spurs of Gold - Heroes of Chivalry and their Deeds • Frances Nimmo Greene
... nature. As they went, they talked of history, or politics, or chemistry, of literature, or physics, or morality. At sundown they returned, to find lights and cards on the tables, and they made parties of piquet, interrupted by supper. At half-past ten the game ends, they chat until eleven, and in half an hour more they are all fast asleep.[202] Each day was like the next; industry, gaiety, bodily comfort, mental activity, diversifying the ...
— Diderot and the Encyclopaedists (Vol 1 of 2) • John Morley
... envied the quiet existence of this old bachelor, spent on whist, boston, backgammon, reversi, and piquet, all well played, on dinners well digested, snuff gracefully inhaled, and tranquil walks about the town. Nearly all Alencon believed this life to be exempt from ambitions and serious interests; but no man has a life as simple as envious neighbors attribute to him. You will find in ...
— An Old Maid • Honore de Balzac
... To a man without a taste for partridge-shooting the ordeal was a trying one. Sir Patrick got through the day with the help of his business and his books. In the evening the rector of a neighboring parish drove over to dinner, and engaged his host at the noble but obsolete game of Piquet. They arranged to meet at each other's houses on alternate days. The rector was an admirable player; and Sir Patrick, though a born Presbyterian, blessed the Church of England from ...
— Man and Wife • Wilkie Collins
... the greatest pride. Opposite his residence at Rennes there dwelt a worthy pair of venerable citizens, who were the sole occupants of a small house, which was their only possession. Once a week this honest couple were in the habit of dining, and having a little game of piquet with a relation, who resided at some distance from their abode. On these occasions they were usually regaled with curds and whey, which they moistened with sparkling cider; and not unfrequently a ...
— The Knickerbocker, or New-York Monthly Magazine, January 1844 - Volume 23, Number 1 • Various
... else was the cause why you were suddenly turned out of doors? Yes, you are shut out by your own tittle-tattle. I do not know whether you play often at piquet, but you at least throw your cards away in an ...
— The Blunderer • Moliere
... at midnight, on our arrival at the handsome little town of Arruda, which was destined to be the piquet post of our division, in front of the fortified lines. The quartering of our division, whether by night or by day, was an affair of about five minutes. The quarter-master-general preceded the troops, accompanied by the brigade-majors and the quarter-masters of regiments; and after ...
— Adventures in the Rifle Brigade, in the Peninsula, France, and the Netherlands - from 1809 to 1815 • Captain J. Kincaid
... good thing when you go out not to be exposed to meet eyes which seem to say to you, 'My dear fellow, your father has swindled me.' Papa has but one passion: from five to seven every day he plays piquet at his club, at ten sous a point, and as he is an excellent player, he wins seven times out of ten. He keeps an account of his games with the same scrupulous exactitude he has in all things, and he was telling the day before yesterday that ...
— Parisian Points of View • Ludovic Halevy
... TRAVELLING PIQUET. A mode of amusing themselves, practised by two persons riding in a carriage, each reckoning towards his game the persons or animals that pass by on the side next them, ...
— 1811 Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue • Captain Grose et al.
... Exchequer, but he never goes near the Treasury, never reads a State Paper or troubles his head with facts or figures. When he is not inspiring our Foreign Policy—for which Sir EDWARD GREY so unfairly gains the credit—he is generally to be found playing piquet with Mr. T. P. O'CONNOR, or four-ball foursomes with Mr. MASTERMAN, Mr. DEVLIN and ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 146, March 25, 1914 • Various
... influence there was so complete, that they might fairly be said to give one seat to any one they chose. With such double barrels George Selwyn was, of course, a great gun in the House, but his interest lay far more in piquet and pleasantry than in politics and patriotism, and he was never fired off with any but the blank cartridges of his two votes. His parliamentary career, begun in 1747, lasted more than forty years, yet ...
— The Wits and Beaux of Society - Volume 2 • Grace & Philip Wharton
... me an invitation to share his dinner, and proposed a game of piquet afterwards, but from the very beginning he saw that I was no match for him; he told me so, and he warned me that the officer who would relieve him the next day was a better player even than he was himself; I lost ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... and body; but his intervals of ease seem to have been passed in the society of those who were well disposed to cheat him, as far as they could, into a forgetfulness of his fallen condition. He played much at chess, whist, piquet, and ombre; he took exercise for awhile on horseback, latterly, on account of weakness, in his carriage; he even walked, when at Blenheim, unattended about his own grounds, and took great delight in the performance of private theatricals. We have the best ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. 19, Issue 550, June 2, 1832 • Various
... the king and queen played piquet or backgammon; not because they could enjoy at present any amusement of the kind, but because they found means, while bending their heads together over the board, to say a few words unheard by the guard. At four o'clock, the ladies and children left the king, as it was his custom to sleep ...
— The Peasant and the Prince • Harriet Martineau
... take shelter behind the Infantry outposts, the most must be made of the opportunity, and only the more distant patrolling service be left to the Cavalry. Outpost service makes far less demands on the Infantry soldier than on the Cavalry horse, for the former is allowed to sleep when on piquet, the Cavalry ...
— Cavalry in Future Wars • Frederick von Bernhardi
... her father, old Cheriton. I knew him at the club—one of the old sort of squires; married his second wife at sixty and buried her at eighty. Old 'Claret and Piquet,' they called him; had more children under the rose than any man in Devonshire. I saw him playing half-crown points the week before he died. It's in the blood. What's George's ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... de Chateaudun was there, he who, nine years later, went to the guillotine on that cold September morning, his hair dressed in the latest fashion, the finest Mechlin lace around his wrists, playing a final game of piquet with his younger brother, as the tumbril bore them along through the hooting, yelling crowd of the half-naked starvelings ...
— I Will Repay • Baroness Emmuska Orczy
... The sentence, signed in blank, was already in their hands. The Governor of Vincennes, Harel, appeared at the gate carrying a light. He had formerly delivered to Bonaparte the conspirators of the plot of Arena and Topino-Lebrun; to-day he preceded in the sombre corridors the prisoner, escorted by a piquet of troops. The prince did not pale; he reiterated his request for an audience, which was harshly denied. Already the grave was dug in the ditch of the chateau; a detachment of gendarmes waited ...
— Worlds Best Histories - France Vol 7 • M. Guizot and Madame Guizot De Witt
... nature. The movement to and fro and the excitement is extraordinary. While the populace basks in the sun the destiny of the city is being decided.—"M. Desmarest is elected for the 9th Arrondissement," says some one close to me.—"Lesueur is capital in the 'Partie de Piquet,'" says another. Oh! people ...
— Paris under the Commune • John Leighton
... come all the way up the hill in the wet, while it was but a step from the Major's door to her own. So there was little or nothing in the way of winter-bridge as far as Miss Mapp and the Major were concerned. Piquet with a single sympathetic companion who did not mind being rubiconned at threepence a hundred was as much as he was up to ...
— Miss Mapp • Edward Frederic Benson
... in at a glance and found revealed to him in a flash the colossal mendacity of all the Camerons, Macgregors, and Macdonalds who had implied, if they had not deliberately stated, over many games of piquet or lansquenet at Cammercy, the magnificence of the ...
— Doom Castle • Neil Munro
... should for honour take The drunken quarrels of a rake, Or think it seated in a scar, Or on a proud triumphal car, Or in the payment of a debt, We lose with sharpers at piquet; Or, when a whore in her vocation, Keeps punctual to an assignation; Or that on which his lordship swears, When vulgar knaves would lose their ears: Let Stella's fair example preach A lesson she ...
— The Battle of the Books - and Other Short Pieces • Jonathan Swift
... dry sponge that swells at the first drop of sentiment. If you pay court to a young girl whose existence is a compound of loneliness, despair, and poverty, and who has no suspicion that she will come into a fortune, good Lord! it is quint and quatorze at piquet; it is knowing the numbers of the lottery before-hand; it is speculating in the funds when you have news from a sure source; it is building up a marriage on an indestructible foundation. The girl may come in for millions, and she will fling them, as if they were so many pebbles, at your ...
— Father Goriot • Honore de Balzac
... for them, and in that they were disappointed. As I was quite independent, I did not care for their criticism. A great part of the day I was occupied with my children; in the evening I worked, played piquet with my father, or played on the piano, ...
— Personal Recollections, from Early Life to Old Age, of Mary Somerville • Mary Somerville
... not let you call them in for more reasons than one. Ah! you begin to believe me. Let me see now, can I give you a little corroborative evidence? You don't want it, but I will. Did the admiral ever tell you what an excellent player I was at piquet?" ...
— Witness to the Deed • George Manville Fenn
... upon himself the command of the rear-guard, left that city, which was immediately after inundated by the Cossacks of Platof, who massacred all the poor wretches whom the Jews threw in their way. In the midst of this butchery, there suddenly appeared a piquet of thirty French, coming from the bridge of the Vilia, where they had been left and forgotten. At sight of this fresh prey, thousands of Russian horsemen came hurrying up, besetting them with loud cries, and ...
— History of the Expedition to Russia - Undertaken by the Emperor Napoleon in the Year 1812 • Count Philip de Segur
... New Holland was discovered upon the 27th of May. It was low, barren, and sandy. Geography Bay, Naturalist Cape, Depuch Creek, and Piquet Point, were successively sighted and named. In the last-named spot the naturalists landed, and reaped a rich harvest of ...
— Celebrated Travels and Travellers - Part 2. The Great Navigators of the Eighteenth Century • Jules Verne
... unapproachable all the winter, so that she could only hear of them through Mr. Dutton, whom she continued to see occasionally whenever there was anything to communicate. Mr. Egremont rather liked him, and on meeting him in the street, would ask him casually in to dinner, or to make up a rubber, or play piquet, for he excelled in these arts, and still more in chess, and an evening with Mr. Dutton was quite a red-letter time with Nuttie. It gave her an indefinable sense of safety and protection; but it was not always to be had, for her friend ...
— Nuttie's Father • Charlotte M. Yonge
... evening of his fourth day in Mrs Gabbon's rooms. He had finished a modest dinner and was dealing himself hands at piquet with an old pack of cards, when he heard the rattle of a cab coming up the street. The usual faint flicker of hope rose: the cab stopped below him, the flicker burned brighter, and in an instant ...
— The Lunatic at Large • J. Storer Clouston
... thought, "Now then, make haste and let me have this card and I'll take my cap and drive home to supper with Denisov, Natasha, and Sonya, and will certainly never touch a card again." At that moment his home life, jokes with Petya, talks with Sonya, duets with Natasha, piquet with his father, and even his comfortable bed in the house on the Povarskaya rose before him with such vividness, clearness, and charm that it seemed as if it were all a lost and unappreciated bliss, long past. He could not conceive that a stupid chance, letting the seven be ...
— War and Peace • Leo Tolstoy
... I found Tiverton playing piquet with Brocton. A heap of guineas was by his side, and he was flushed and excited with success. The bout had attracted some attention, for the stakes were running high, and eight or nine men were gathered round the players, among them Sir Patrick Gee. ...
— The Yeoman Adventurer • George W. Gough
... deep in a game of piquet at the other end of the room, whispered to Martin Burney to ask if Junius would not be a fit person to invoke from the dead. 'Yes,' said Lamb, 'provided he would agree to ...
— Old and New London - Volume I • Walter Thornbury
... at piquet, and was greatly annoyed by a short-sighted man with a long nose. To get rid of it he took his pocket handkerchief and wiped his troublesome neighbour's nose. "Ah, sir," said he immediately, "I really beg your pardon, I took it ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 12, - Issue 343, November 29, 1828 • Various
... myself; and I should have no scruples of staying as late as Mrs. Weston, but on your account. I am only afraid of your sitting up for me. I am not afraid of your not being exceedingly comfortable with Mrs. Goddard. She loves piquet, you know; but when she is gone home, I am afraid you will be sitting up by yourself, instead of going to bed at your usual time—and the idea of that would entirely destroy my comfort. You must promise me not ...
— Persuasion • Jane Austen
... round the sanctuary of the Tuilleries, a ring of steel discipline; let every gunner have his match burning, and all men stand to their arms. Lepelletier has seized the Church of Saint Roche; has seized the Pont Neuf, our piquet there retreating thence without fire. Stray shots fall from Lepelletier, rattle down on the very Tuilleries' stair-case. On the other hand, women advance dishevelled, shrieking peace; Lepelletier behind them ...
— The Knickerbocker, or New-York Monthly Magazine, May 1844 - Volume 23, Number 5 • Various
... of these two men, it was mechanically and at random that M. de Tregars and Maxence threw their cards on the table, and uttered the common terms of the game of piquet, ...
— Other People's Money • Emile Gaboriau
... "At eleven, a piquet of mounted gendarmerie and infantry took their station upon the place before the prison, where a great concourse of people had already assembled. An open car was at the door. Before he went out Peytel asked the gaoler for a looking-glass; and having examined ...
— The Paris Sketch Book Of Mr. M. A. Titmarsh • William Makepeace Thackeray
... feeling the impulse which drives us, in certain excited conditions of the mind, to take refuge in movement and change. The remedy had failed; my mind was as strangely disturbed as ever. My wisest course would be to go home, and keep my good mother company over her favorite game of piquet. ...
— The Two Destinies • Wilkie Collins
... had been canonized. "What!" cried he, "M. de Geneve, my old friend? I am delighted at his good fortune; he was a gallant man, an amiable man, and an honest man, too, although he would sometimes cheat at piquet, at which we have often played together."—"But, sir," said some one present, "is it possible that a saint could be a sharper at play?"—"No," replied the Archbishop, "he said, as a reason for it, that he gave all his winnings to the ...
— The Memoirs of the Louis XIV. and The Regency, Complete • Elizabeth-Charlotte, Duchesse d'Orleans
... anybody who pleased coming in, as if he had been the most insignificant of men; and when his body was taken to be interred, I suppose, to his duchy of Luynes, instead of priests to pray for him, I saw some of his valets playing piquet on his bier whilst they ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume V. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot
... now, for the first time, in some perplexity. To add to it, one of the young gentlemen who frequented Mr. Fitzsimons's boarding-house had received from me, in the way of play, an IOU for eighteen pounds (which I lost to him at piquet), and which, owing Mr. Curbyn, the livery-stable keeper, a bill, he passed into that person's hands. Fancy my rage and astonishment, then, on going for my mare, to find that he positively refused to let me have her out of the stable, except under payment ...
— Barry Lyndon • William Makepeace Thackeray
... and accompanied him in all his drives; she even persuaded him that she liked the smell of tobacco, and read him his favorite paper La Quotidienne in the midst of clouds of smoke, which the malicious old sailor intentionally blew over her; she learned piquet to be a match for the old count; and this fantastic damsel even listened without impatience to his periodical narratives of the battles of the Belle-Poule, the manoeuvres of the Ville de Paris, M. de Suffren's first expedition, ...
— The Ball at Sceaux • Honore de Balzac
... meaning, it must be supposed, "as clear as mud." Dr. Rollinson chuckled to himself, and they continued their game of piquet. ...
— Archibald Malmaison • Julian Hawthorne
... terrestrial globe. At night Mr. HERSCHEL, by the king's command, came to exhibit to His Majesty and the royal family the new comet lately discovered by his sister, Miss HERSCHEL; and while I was playing at piquet with Mrs. SCHWELLENBURG, the Princess AUGUSTA came into the room and asked her if she chose to go into the garden and look at it. She declined the offer, and the princess then made it to me. I was glad to accept it for all sorts of reasons. We found him at his telescope. The comet was very small, ...
— Sir William Herschel: His Life and Works • Edward Singleton Holden
... two days Kenelm was observed to be unusually pleasant. He yawned much less frequently, walked with his father, played piquet with his mother, was more like other people. Sir Peter was charmed: he ascribed this happy change to the preparations he was making for Kenelm's travelling in style. The proud father was in active correspondence ...
— Kenelm Chillingly, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... trial we went through, was the Ordeal of Servants. Mary Anne's cousin deserted into our coal-hole, and was brought out, to our great amazement, by a piquet of his companions in arms, who took him away handcuffed in a procession that covered our front-garden with ignominy. This nerved me to get rid of Mary Anne, who went so mildly, on receipt of wages, that I was surprised, until I found out about ...
— David Copperfield • Charles Dickens
... his taste: some men prefer to play At mystery, as others at piquet. Some sit in mystic meditation; some Parade the street with tambourine and drum. One studies to decipher ancient lore Which, proving stuff, he studies all the more; Another swears that learning is but good To darken things already understood, Then writes upon Simplicity so well That ...
— Shapes of Clay • Ambrose Bierce
... a German mile above and below Prague, at Branig and Podbaba. The greatest alarm began about two o'clock, when the enemy hoped to have come silently and unexpectedly upon the miners, but they had left work about a quarter of an hour before. At the report of the first piece which they fired, the piquet of the third battalion of Prussian guards, to the number of an hundred men, who marched out of the camp to sustain the body which covered the works, was thrown into some confusion, from the darkness of the night, which prevented their distinguishing ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.II. - From William and Mary to George II. • Tobias Smollett
... were played in many Jamestown homes were tick-tack, backgammon, Irish, and cards. Card games were popular, especially primero, trump, piquet, saint, and decoy. ...
— New Discoveries at Jamestown - Site of the First Successful English Settlement in America • John L. Cotter
... there. Quartered in the high-perched keep of Dover where "the winds rattle pretty loud" and cut off from the world without, as he says, by the absence of newspapers or coffee houses, he employs the tedious hours in reading while his officers waste them in piquet. The ladies in the town below complain through Miss Brett to Mrs. Wolfe of the unsociality of the garrison. "Tell Nannie Brett's ladies," Wolfe replies, "that if they lived as loftily and as much in the clouds as we do, their appetites for dancing or anything else would not be so keen. ...
— Lectures and Essays • Goldwin Smith
... more accurately respecting the circumstances of his quarrel with Fitzgerald. It arose from some dispute respecting the application of a rule of piquet, at which game they had been playing, each interpreting it favourably to himself, and O'Connor, having lost considerably, was in no mood to conduct an argument with temper—an altercation ensued, and that of rather a pungent nature, and the result was that he left Fitzgerald's ...
— The Purcell Papers - Volume I. (of III.) • Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu
... Christian theology of the third and fourth centuries. She had planned the new flower-garden,—though Lady Fawn thought that she had done that herself. She had been invaluable during Clara Fawn's long illness. She knew every rule at croquet, and could play piquet. When the girls got up charades they had to acknowledge that everything depended on Miss Morris. They were good-natured, plain, unattractive girls, who spoke of her to her face as one who could easily do anything to which she ...
— The Eustace Diamonds • Anthony Trollope
... side-road without meeting a man. Then a small foraging party halted them, and Sergius showed the seal and spoke in Gallic to its Numidian leader. A little farther on was stationed another band, and here the delay was longer ere his halting Punic convinced the Spanish piquet, and they again rode forward unsuspected. All had bowed low to the horse and the palm tree, and no one dared question what weighty mission urged on the man in the torn and blood-stained tunic and the ...
— The Lion's Brood • Duffield Osborne
... remained before the gong would sound the summons to luncheon; an hour and a half of solitude beneath the shadow of the trees! Last night there had been another tete-a-tete while Madame and Captain Guest played piquet at the end of the room; this morning there had been yet another, when Elma was first installed in the garden, and Madame was interviewing her staff. Astonishing how intimate two people can become in two long conversations! Marvellous in what unison two separate minds may move! Geoffrey ...
— Flaming June • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... only when I have my morning qualms, and a cheerful heart; I score two on that. I can dance saraband, minuet, or corranto; fence, ride, and sing French chansons. Good Lard! who ever heard a valet urge such accomplishments? I can play the best game of piquet in London. So said Sir George Etherege when I won a cool thousand off him at the Groom Parter. But that won't advance me much, either. What is there, then, to commend me? Why, marry, I can brew a bowl of punch, and I can broil a devilled fowl. ...
— Micah Clarke - His Statement as made to his three Grandchildren Joseph, - Gervas and Reuben During the Hard Winter of 1734 • Arthur Conan Doyle
... and it was impossible to venture out. My friend and I passed the time playing piquet, and listening to our natives, who talked earnestly together, going over many of their strange and thrilling hunting experiences. We understood but little Russian and Aleut, yet their expressive gestures made ...
— American Big Game in Its Haunts • Various
... well; the king feasted on delicacies which were a triumph of art; Louis was satisfied; Vatel triumphed; so far the fete was a success. In the evening the king played at piquet, the cavaliers and ladies promenaded through the splendidly-furnished and richly-lighted saloons, some cracked jokes on sofas, some made love in alcoves, still ...
— Historical Tales, Vol. 6 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality. French. • Charles Morris
... men to the fire of their artillery. At sun set, and during the greatest part of the night, this diversion was seconded by a feigned attack of the Corsicans: which so effectually deceived the enemy, that they withdrew a considerable piquet from the spot where the principal battery was to be constructed, in order to support the Mollinochesco; and, directing the whole of their fire to that point, enabled the troops to ...
— The Life of the Right Honourable Horatio Lord Viscount Nelson, Vol. I (of 2) • James Harrison
... a Friday's errand. They shuddered over a seven-times sneeze or at a howling dog at midnight. And the gentle sex, especially, would and did tell fortunes almost as jealously as play quadrille and piquet. Let us be courteous to them. Let us remember that Esoteric Buddhism, Faith Healing, and Psychic Phenomena were not yet enjoying systematic cultivation and solemn propagandism; and that relatively few dying folk were allowed to "go on with their dying" as part of a process of healing ...
— The Square of Sevens - An Authoritative Method of Cartomancy with a Prefatory Note • E. Irenaeus Stevenson
... Loyal's regiment is at Petersburg, and Col. Cole's at Manchester; each about five hundred strong; and there is a piquet ...
— Southern Literature From 1579-1895 • Louise Manly
... attempt to gallop back to look for them, we shall have another volley," said Roy. "I will ride forward slowly. That must be a piquet of the Indian regiment stationed outside the town. They mistake us for the enemy, and they may aim better the next time they fire." Without waiting for his companions' reply, Roy rode forward, shouting, "Friends, friends! English, English!" At length ...
— The Three Admirals • W.H.G. Kingston
... the word seems to mean posts or uprights whereto the chains were attached. ["Sakk," pl. "Sikk" and "Sukk," is nail, and "Sikkah," pl. "Sikak," has amongst many other meanings that of "an iron post or stake" (Bocthor: piquet de fer).—ST.] ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 5 • Richard F. Burton
... same does sentence To heav'n b' another way — repentance. 940 Love's arrows are but shot at rovers; Though all they hit, they turn to lovers; And all the weighty consequents Depend upon more blind events, Than gamesters, when they play a set 945 With greatest cunning at piquet, Put out with caution, but take in They know not what, unsight, unseen, For what do lovers, when they're fast In one another's arms embrac't, 950 But strive to plunder, and convey Each other, like a prize, away? To change ...
— Hudibras • Samuel Butler
... knew a famous Italian chemist at Rome—such a nice old man! He and my father used to play piquet; and I looked at them, and tried to learn—and I was too stupid. But I had plenty of opportunities of noticing our old friend's hands. They were covered with stains; and he caught me looking at them. He was not in the least offended; he told ...
— Heart and Science - A Story of the Present Time • Wilkie Collins
... were all assembled in the salon, while the First Consul was writing in his cabinet. Haydn's oratorio was to be performed that evening; the ladies were anxious to hear the music, and we also expressed a wish to that effect. The escort piquet was ordered out; and Lannes requested that Napoleon would join the party. He consented; his carriage was ready, and he took along with him Bessieres and the aide de camp on duty. I was directed to attend the ladies. Josephine had received a magnificent shawl from Constantinople ...
— Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte, Complete • Louis Antoine Fauvelet de Bourrienne
... Lady Corisande. When her impassioned tones sounded, there was a hushed silence in every chamber; otherwise, many things were said and done amid accompanying melodies, that animated without distracting even a whistplayer. The duke himself rather preferred a game of piquet or cart with Captain Mildmay, and sometimes retired with a troop to a distant, but still visible, apartment, where they played with billiard-balls games which ...
— Lothair • Benjamin Disraeli
... a fancy; and I felt now, for the first time, in some perplexity. To add to it, one of the young gentlemen who frequented Mr. Fitzsimons's boarding-house had received from me, in the way of play, an IOU for eighteen pounds (which I lost to him at piquet), and which, owing Mr. Curbyn, the livery-stable keeper, a bill, he passed into that person's hands. Fancy my rage and astonishment, then, on going for my mare, to find that he positively refused to let me ...
— Barry Lyndon • William Makepeace Thackeray
... sanctuary of the Tuilleries, a ring of steel discipline; let every gunner have his match burning, and all men stand to their arms. Lepelletier has seized the Church of Saint Roche; has seized the Pont Neuf, our piquet there retreating thence without fire. Stray shots fall from Lepelletier, rattle down on the very Tuilleries' stair-case. On the other hand, women advance dishevelled, shrieking peace; Lepelletier behind them waving his hat in sign that we shall fraternize. Steady! The artillery officer ...
— The Knickerbocker, or New-York Monthly Magazine, May 1844 - Volume 23, Number 5 • Various
... continues. After I had written to you yesterday, the brain being wholly extinct, I played piquet all morning with Graham. After lunch down to call on the U.S. consul, hurt in a steeplechase; thence back to the new girls' school which Lady J. was to open, and where my ladies met me. Lady J. is really an orator, with a voice of gold; the rest of us played our unremarked ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 25 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... all night, and helped to board up the smashed windows; but at daylight Colonel Brereton came and insisted on withdrawing the piquet on guard—not, however, sending a relief for them, on the plea that they only collected a crowd. The instant they were withdrawn, down came the mob in fresh force, so desperate that all the defences were torn down, and they swarmed in so that there was nothing for it but to escape ...
— Chantry House • Charlotte M. Yonge
... was the cause why you were suddenly turned out of doors? Yes, you are shut out by your own tittle-tattle. I do not know whether you play often at piquet, but you at least throw your cards away ...
— The Blunderer • Moliere
... king and queen played piquet or backgammon; not because they could enjoy at present any amusement of the kind, but because they found means, while bending their heads together over the board, to say a few words unheard by ...
— The Peasant and the Prince • Harriet Martineau
... First foreign salute to the Stars and Stripes. John Paul Jones entered Quiberon Bay, near Brest, France, and received a salute of nine guns from the French fleet, under Admiral La Motte Piquet. Jones had previously saluted the French fleet ...
— The Little Book of the Flag • Eva March Tappan
... mind; it is a matter of absorbing interest, hence I do not forget myself. Heaven knows the excitement of nursing an innocent deceit and of seeing it grow and flower under my care will be most welcome, for the monotony of this abominable confinement—But I must inquire, do you play piquet?" ...
— The Net • Rex Beach
... opportunity of interviewing the Governor all day, but at night I visited him by invitation to play a game of piquet. ...
— At a Winter's Fire • Bernard Edward J. Capes
... Abenaquais of the East, and his confrere, La Richardie, from the wild tribes of the Far West; but conspicuous among the able and influential missionaries who were the real rulers of the Indian nations allied with France was the famous Sulpicien, Abbe Piquet, "the King's missionary," as he was styled in royal ordinances, and the apostle to the Iroquois, whom he was laboring to convert and bring over to the side of France in the great dispute raised between France and England for supremacy ...
— The Golden Dog - Le Chien d'Or • William Kirby
... Companies, in order to perfect themselves in Military Exercises. No Woman was to be married till she had killed her Man. The Ladies of Fashion used to play with young Lions instead of Lap-dogs, and when they made any Parties of Diversion, instead of entertaining themselves at Ombre or Piquet, they would wrestle and pitch the Bar for a whole Afternoon together. There was never any such thing as a Blush seen, or a Sigh heard, in the Commonwealth. The Women never dressed but to look terrible, to which ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele
... particularly acquainted. He could repeat all the observations that were retailed in the atmosphere of the play-houses, and had all the good things of the high wits by rote, long before they made their way into the jest-books. The intervals between conversation were employed in teaching my daughters piquet, or sometimes in setting my two little ones to box, to make them sharp, as he called it; but the hopes of having him for a son-in-law, in some measure blinded us to all his imperfections. It must be owned, that my wife laid a thousand schemes to entrap him; or, to speak it ...
— The Ontario High School Reader • A.E. Marty
... me to entertain and keep a gay house for them, and in that they were disappointed. As I was quite independent, I did not care for their criticism. A great part of the day I was occupied with my children; in the evening I worked, played piquet with my father, or played on the piano, ...
— Personal Recollections, from Early Life to Old Age, of Mary Somerville • Mary Somerville
... fire, which is built inside the mess tent when cold compels. At times the conversation lasts till midnight; and, when cognac or whisky is plentiful, I have heard it abut upon the Battle of Waterloo and the Immortality of the Soul. Piquet and cart are reserved for life on board ship. Our only reading consists of newspapers, which come by camel post every three weeks; and a few "Tauchnitz," often odd volumes. I marvel, as much as Hamlet ever did, ...
— The Land of Midian, Vol. 1 • Richard Burton
... what Donna Emilia says is true, I know not," replied I; "but, that it was not Donna Teresa who met you, I can certify, for I was in her room with her that night till she went to bed, playing at piquet ...
— The Pacha of Many Tales • Captain Frederick Marryat
... Advanced Guard, Telling off of an Advanced Guard, Duties of Commander of the Vanguard, Disposition of a Small Advanced Guard, Disposition of a Flank Guard, Distribution of Outposts, Duties of Outpost Company Commander, Duties of Piquet Commander, Telling off and Posting a Piquet, etc. By LIEUT. R. STUPART. Second edition, revised and greatly enlarged, with 3 sketches. Stiff paper cover, 1s. ...
— Five Months at Anzac • Joseph Lievesley Beeston
... he good humouredly, 'the children sing, we all work, Francois and I play at draughts or piquet; the worst of it is, we are sometimes interrupted; a knock comes, we must go down, get a stone ready, undress the new comer and register him: that spoils the game; we forget ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 19, - Issue 549 (Supplementary issue) • Various
... head of a ravine opening into Clemmens Creek, about 4 miles south of Dixon, near the Piquet orchards, is a cavern with an entrance 55 feet wide and 40 feet high. The depth is 110 feet to loose rocks and clay, partly from the sides and roof, partly washed in through side caves and crevices. There is a small amount ...
— Archeological Investigations - Bureau of American Ethnology, Bulletin 76 • Gerard Fowke
... encyclopedia for the description of an intellectual game of cards, arranged as a duet, and found one. It is piquet! Now I can wait developments peacefully, for are there not also in reserve ...
— People of the Whirlpool • Mabel Osgood Wright
... at home. You could even take a nap here without being embarrassed. He called for the newspaper, spread it out open before him, and looked through it, frowning the while. Coupeau and My-Boots had commenced a game of piquet. Two bottles of wine and five glasses were scattered about ...
— L'Assommoir • Emile Zola
... Patrick got through the day with the help of his business and his books. In the evening the rector of a neighboring parish drove over to dinner, and engaged his host at the noble but obsolete game of Piquet. They arranged to meet at each other's houses on alternate days. The rector was an admirable player; and Sir Patrick, though a born Presbyterian, blessed the Church of England from the bottom of ...
— Man and Wife • Wilkie Collins
... put himself under my charge. He is exceedingly particular as to his food and drink, and is one of the best card-players in London. He used to make a fine income from his cards; indeed, he does now in I. O. U.'s. By the way, he inquired whether you played 'piquet' or 'bezique,' from which I infer that he is looking for an ...
— The King's Men - A Tale of To-morrow • Robert Grant, John Boyle O'Reilly, J. S. Dale, and John T.
... was deep in a game of piquet at the other end of the room, whispered to Martin Burney to ask if Junius would not be a fit person to invoke from the dead. 'Yes,' said Lamb, 'provided he would agree to lay ...
— Old and New London - Volume I • Walter Thornbury
... on the Bay of Biscay, a small town and peninsula about twenty-two miles south-east of Lorient, convoying some American vessels, and placing them under the protection of the French fleet commanded by Admiral La Motte Piquet. The story represented in this picture he tells in his own language in a letter to the Naval Committee, dated February 22, 1778: "I am happy to have it in my power to congratulate on my having seen the American flag for the first time recognized in the fullest ...
— Thirteen Chapters of American History - represented by the Edward Moran series of Thirteen - Historical Marine Paintings • Theodore Sutro
... Bird appeared; and M'Dougal, after setting fire to the remaining stores and barracks, retired into the strong grounds in the rear of Peekskill. The British detachment completed the conflagration, and returned to New York. During their short stay, a piquet guard was attacked by Colonel Willet, and driven in with the loss of a few men; a circumstance, believed by General M'Dougal, to have hastened ...
— The Life of George Washington, Vol. 2 (of 5) • John Marshall
... this card and I'll take my cap and drive home to supper with Denisov, Natasha, and Sonya, and will certainly never touch a card again." At that moment his home life, jokes with Petya, talks with Sonya, duets with Natasha, piquet with his father, and even his comfortable bed in the house on the Povarskaya rose before him with such vividness, clearness, and charm that it seemed as if it were all a lost and unappreciated bliss, long past. He could not conceive that a stupid chance, ...
— War and Peace • Leo Tolstoy
... communities are free to tax themselves and where they might be expected to show some consideration for the poor, "most of the towns, and notably Aix, Marseilles and Toulon,[5271] pay their impositions," local and general, "exclusively by the tax called the "piquet." This is a tax "on all species of flour belonging to and consumed on the territory;" for example, of 254,897 livres, which Toulon expends, the piquet furnishes 233,405. Thus the taxation falls wholly on the people, while the bishop, the marquis, the president, ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 1 (of 6) - The Ancient Regime • Hippolyte A. Taine
... when I get to the cartes," he answered in his brogue, and we fell to piquet. Now my Scot wore a very fine coat, and on the same very large smooth silver buttons, well burnished. Therefore, perceiving such an advantage as a skilled player may enjoy, I let him win a little to whet his appetite, but presently used his buttons as a mirror, wherein I readily detected the ...
— Old Friends - Essays in Epistolary Parody • Andrew Lang
... If Piquet or Bezique cards are used, i.e., packs with the 2, 3, 4, 5 and 6 of each suit omitted—leaving but 32 cards in the set—the ordinary rules are observed. When playing with this smaller pack the hands will apparently be of far [15] greater value than usual. This arises from ...
— Round Games with Cards • W. H. Peel
... of Whist, and numerous guide-books on games, as Bezique, Piquet, Ecarte, Billiards, etc. Henry Jones, editor of "Pastimes" in The Field and ...
— Character Sketches of Romance, Fiction and the Drama, Vol 1 - A Revised American Edition of the Reader's Handbook • The Rev. E. Cobham Brewer, LL.D.
... delighting in nature. As they went, they talked of history, or politics, or chemistry, of literature, or physics, or morality. At sundown they returned, to find lights and cards on the tables, and they made parties of piquet, interrupted by supper. At half-past ten the game ends, they chat until eleven, and in half an hour more they are all fast asleep.[202] Each day was like the next; industry, gaiety, bodily comfort, mental activity, diversifying the hours. Grimm was often there, "the most French of all the ...
— Diderot and the Encyclopaedists (Vol 1 of 2) • John Morley
... mouths, and can laugh, and chat, and so, egad I'll make the best of them; it is one comfort, we shall all understand religion then, and need not plague our heads about it any further. But, in the mean time, suppose we have a game of piquet." ...
— The International Magazine, Volume 2, No. 2, January, 1851 • Various
... Nantes was no longer there; but the Louvre had been erected instead. Fougas employed a quarter of an hour in regarding this monument of architecture, and half an hour in contemplating two Zouaves of the guard who were playing piquet. He inquired if the Emperor was in Paris; whereupon his attention was called to the flag floating over ...
— The Man With The Broken Ear • Edmond About
... I counted on his promises of amendment. And, in fact, for the first two days of his stay under my roof Misha not merely justified my expectations but surpassed them, while the ladies of the household were simply enchanted with him. He played piquet with the old lady, helped her to wind her worsted, showed her two new games of patience; for the niece, who had a small voice, he played accompaniments on the piano, and read Russian and French poetry. He told both the ladies lively but discreet anecdotes; in fact, he showed them every ...
— A Desperate Character and Other Stories • Ivan Turgenev
... indeed," replied madame. "Messieurs les Cannibales are very polite, and leur Catzique plays an excellent hand at piquet." ...
— The Nameless Castle • Maurus Jokai
... loophole for suspicion. I went back with Selincourt to his rooms and we sat up the rest of the night smoking and playing auction piquet. He won about five pounds off me. Ask him: he'll ...
— Nightfall • Anthony Pryde
... were in a house about a quarter of a mile distant and that he would conduct me thither, but that he himself could not presume to let us pass, from not knowing the tenor of our passport. I went accordingly with the sergeant to this house, There I found the officer commanding the piquet and several others sitting at table, carousing with beer and tobacco and nearly invisible from the clouds of smoke which pervaded the room. I explained to the officer who we were and requested him to put on the passport ...
— After Waterloo: Reminiscences of European Travel 1815-1819 • Major W. E Frye
... have no fears at all for myself; and I should have no scruples of staying as late as Mrs. Weston, but on your account. I am only afraid of your sitting up for me. I am not afraid of your not being exceedingly comfortable with Mrs. Goddard. She loves piquet, you know; but when she is gone home, I am afraid you will be sitting up by yourself, instead of going to bed at your usual time—and the idea of that would entirely destroy my comfort. You must promise me ...
— Persuasion • Jane Austen
... Lady Malmaison, meaning, it must be supposed, "as clear as mud." Dr. Rollinson chuckled to himself, and they continued their game of piquet. ...
— Archibald Malmaison • Julian Hawthorne
... ended at midnight, on our arrival at the handsome little town of Arruda, which was destined to be the piquet post of our division, in front of the fortified lines. The quartering of our division, whether by night or by day, was an affair of about five minutes. The quarter-master-general preceded the troops, accompanied by the brigade-majors and the quarter-masters ...
— Adventures in the Rifle Brigade, in the Peninsula, France, and the Netherlands - from 1809 to 1815 • Captain J. Kincaid
... for leaving them as soon as their cigars were alight. He had business to attend to, as was natural. Bill would look after his friend. Bill was only too willing. He offered to beat Antony at billiards, to play him at piquet, to show him the garden by moonlight, or indeed to do anything else with him ...
— The Red House Mystery • A. A. Milne
... abound in the present day we have undeniable proof—many as clever, no doubt, as that famous philosopheress Madame du Chatelet, who managed at one and the same moment the thread of an intrigue, her cards at piquet, and a calculation in algebra, but who may still lack the qualifications indispensably necessary to make clever politicians. Perhaps, therefore, we might be allowed to suggest that it would be well for ladies who are ambitious of figuring in either or ...
— Political Women (Vol. 1 of 2) • Sutherland Menzies
... praise Patritio's high desert, His hand unstained, his uncorrupted heart, His comprehensive head! all interests weighed, All Europe saved, yet Britain not betrayed. He thanks you not, his pride is in piquet, Newmarket-fame, and judgment at a bet. What made (say Montagne, or more sage Charron) Otho a warrior, Cromwell a buffoon? A perjured prince a leaden saint revere, A godless regent tremble at a star? The throne a bigot keep, a genius quit, ...
— Essay on Man - Moral Essays and Satires • Alexander Pope
... swells at the first drop of sentiment. If you pay court to a young girl whose existence is a compound of loneliness, despair, and poverty, and who has no suspicion that she will come into a fortune, good Lord! it is quint and quatorze at piquet; it is knowing the numbers of the lottery before-hand; it is speculating in the funds when you have news from a sure source; it is building up a marriage on an indestructible foundation. The girl may come in for millions, and she will fling them, ...
— Father Goriot • Honore de Balzac
... at whist, the old idiot, and can no more play than an old baby. He pretends to teach me billiards, and I'll give him fifteen in twenty and beat his old head off. Why do they let such fellows into clubs? Let's have a game at piquet till dinner, Heavyside. Hallo! That's my uncle, that tall man with the mustachios and the short trousers, walking with that boy of his. I dare say they are going to dine in Covent Garden, and going to the play. How-dy-do, Nunky?"—and so the worthy ...
— The Newcomes • William Makepeace Thackeray
... noon. It is followed by another sitting round the fire, which is built inside the mess tent when cold compels. At times the conversation lasts till midnight; and, when cognac or whisky is plentiful, I have heard it abut upon the Battle of Waterloo and the Immortality of the Soul. Piquet and ecarte are reserved for life on board ship. Our only reading consists of newspapers, which come by camel post every three weeks; and a few "Tauchnitz," often odd volumes. I marvel, as much as Hamlet ever did, to see the passionate influence ...
— The Land of Midian, Vol. 1 • Richard Burton
... carelessness!" swore Howe. "He deals pardons as he would cards at piquet, by twos, without so much as a look at their faces. A glance at either would have shown both to be rapscallion Whigs. However, 't is done, and not to be undone. Release them, but keep eye on each, and if they give the slightest cause, to ...
— Janice Meredith • Paul Leicester Ford
... so soon wt as to fall in discourse of Mr. Douglas. He hes told me his mind of him severall tymes, that he ever had a evill opinion of him; that he never heard him pray in his tyme; all 16 month he was wt him, he was not 3 or 4 tymes at Quatre Piquet [the church],[141] and when he went it was to mock; that he was a violent, passionate man; that he spak disdainefully of all persones; that he took the place of all the other Scotsmen, that he had no religion, ...
— Publications of the Scottish History Society, Vol. 36 • Sir John Lauder
... above and below Prague, at Branig and Podbaba. The greatest alarm began about two o'clock, when the enemy hoped to have come silently and unexpectedly upon the miners, but they had left work about a quarter of an hour before. At the report of the first piece which they fired, the piquet of the third battalion of Prussian guards, to the number of an hundred men, who marched out of the camp to sustain the body which covered the works, was thrown into some confusion, from the darkness of the night, which prevented their distinguishing the Austrian troops from their own. Lieutenant ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.II. - From William and Mary to George II. • Tobias Smollett
... any other; and yet when the day drew nigh on which he was to go to London, on his way to Buston, he did bethink himself where these places were to be found. His throat was parched, and the thirst upon him was extreme. Cards were the weapons he had used. He had played ecarte, piquet, whist, and baccarat, with an occasional night of some foolish game such as cribbage or vingt-et-un. Though he had always lost, he had always played with men who had played honestly. There is much that is, in truth, dishonest even in honest play. A man who can keep himself ...
— Mr. Scarborough's Family • Anthony Trollope
... runaways. Some hundreds of wounded men were allowed access, however, in order that they might, if possible, get away in one of the many trains which were being sent off as rapidly as possible. This service was in charge of an official named Piquet, who acted with the greatest energy and acumen. Of the five railway-lines meeting at Le Mans only two were available, that running to Rennes via Laval, and that running to Angers. I find from a report drawn up by M. Piquet a little later, that he managed ...
— My Days of Adventure - The Fall of France, 1870-71 • Ernest Alfred Vizetelly
... bickering age than this. Count Victor took all in at a glance and found revealed to him in a flash the colossal mendacity of all the Camerons, Macgregors, and Macdonalds who had implied, if they had not deliberately stated, over many games of piquet or lansquenet at Cammercy, the magnificence ...
— Doom Castle • Neil Munro
... her garden, thinking of Ian who had done so great wrong, and Alexander who cried, "My enemy!" She stayed in the garden an hour, and then she turned and went to play piquet with the lonely, ...
— Foes • Mary Johnston
... a shyness which made him dislike people who were not quite of his kidney. He judged others, naively, by their language, and if it was free from the oaths and the obscenity which made up the greater part of his own conversation, he looked upon them with suspicion. In the evening the two men played piquet. He played badly but vaingloriously, crowing over his opponent when he won and losing his temper when he lost. On rare occasions a couple of planters or traders would drive over to play bridge, and then Walker showed himself in what Mackintosh considered a characteristic light. He played ...
— The Trembling of a Leaf - Little Stories of the South Sea Islands • William Somerset Maugham
... Papa isn't fair to me, but I'm fair to him. When you have a father in business, it's a good thing when you go out not to be exposed to meet eyes which seem to say to you, 'My dear fellow, your father has swindled me.' Papa has but one passion: from five to seven every day he plays piquet at his club, at ten sous a point, and as he is an excellent player, he wins seven times out of ten. He keeps an account of his games with the same scrupulous exactitude he has in all things, and ...
— Parisian Points of View • Ludovic Halevy
... hopefulness in her youngest daughter, spurred him to think of his duties, and see what was going on. He gave Richard half-an-hour's start, and then put on his hat to follow his own keen scent, leaving Hippias and the Eighteenth Century to piquet. ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... call them in for more reasons than one. Ah! you begin to believe me. Let me see now, can I give you a little corroborative evidence? You don't want it, but I will. Did the admiral ever tell you what an excellent player I was at piquet?" ...
— Witness to the Deed • George Manville Fenn
... bien tente de te bailler une quinte major. Quinte major is a term of piquet. It is here employed figuratively. Compare its use in 'Les ...
— The Jealousy of le Barbouille - (La Jalousie du Barbouille) • Jean Baptiste Poquelin de Moliere
... not only the pretty Miss Higbee, but the winning Miss Bines, whose dot, the baron has been led to understand, would permit his beloved father unlimited piquet at his club, to say nothing of regenerating the family chateau. Yet these are hardly matters to be gossiped of. It is enough to know that the Baron Ronault de Palliac when he discovers himself at table between Miss ...
— The Spenders - A Tale of the Third Generation • Harry Leon Wilson
... however, Rose was no doubt loath to enter into conversation with the old maid, for the latter at last turned round, apparently with the intention of approaching Monsieur Lebigre, who was playing piquet with a customer at one of the bronzed tables. Creeping quietly along, Mademoiselle Saget had at last managed to install herself beside the partition of the cabinet, when she was observed by ...
— The Fat and the Thin • Emile Zola
... is constantly on the whimper when George's name is mentioned, and Harry's face frequently wears a look of the most ghastly alarm; but his mother's is invariably grave and sedate. She makes more blunders at piquet and backgammon than you would expect from her; and the servants find her awake and dressed, however early they may rise. She has prayed Mr. Dempster to come back into residence at Castlewood. She is not severe or haughty, as ...
— Boys and girls from Thackeray • Kate Dickinson Sweetser
... my body very narrowly. They often had asked me where I concealed all my implements? My answer was, "Gentlemen, Beelzebub is my best and most intimate friend; he brings me everything I want, supplies me with light: we play whole nights at piquet, and, guard me as you please, he will finally deliver ...
— The Life and Adventures of Baron Trenck - Vol. 2 (of 2) • Baron Trenck
... for honour take The drunken quarrels of a rake, Or think it seated in a scar, Or on a proud triumphal car, Or in the payment of a debt, We lose with sharpers at piquet; Or, when a whore in her vocation, Keeps punctual to an assignation; Or that on which his lordship swears, When vulgar knaves would lose their ears: Let Stella's fair example preach A lesson she ...
— The Battle of the Books - and Other Short Pieces • Jonathan Swift
... the king who introduced cards, and the kind inventors of piquet and cribbage, for they employed six hours at least of her ladyship's day, during which her family was pretty easy. Without this occupation my lady frequently declared she should die. Her dependants one after another relieved guard—'twas rather a dangerous post to ...
— Henry Esmond; The English Humourists; The Four Georges • William Makepeace Thackeray
... played in many Jamestown homes were tick-tack, backgammon, Irish, and cards. Card games were popular, especially primero, trump, piquet, saint, and decoy. ...
— New Discoveries at Jamestown - Site of the First Successful English Settlement in America • John L. Cotter
... retreat as a humiliation to which they were unaccustomed Lord Keppel had to appear before a court-martial. In France, after the first burst of enthusiasm, fault was found with the inactivity of the Duke of Chartres, who commanded the rear-guard of the fleet, under the direction of M. de La Motte-Piquet; the prince was before long obliged to leave the navy, he became colonel-general of the hussars. A fresh sally on the part of the fleet did not suffice to protect the merchant-navy, the losses of which were considerable. The English vessels ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume VI. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot
... the invader—in the improbable event of his drawing so near—or that might stand within the zone of our gun-fire, had been ruthlessly levelled to the ground. A high barbed wire fence surrounded the various camps, and the vigilant piquet had orders to shoot down anybody who attempted to cross it. Every imaginable precaution had been taken to hold the fort at all costs. The rumour-monger had formally made his debut, and was busy drawing upon the reservoirs of his excellent ...
— The Siege of Kimberley • T. Phelan
... his covetousness, which on some occasions became too hard for his discretion. At this period of time it was, by the circumstances of his situation, inflamed to a degree of rapacity. He was now prevailed upon to take a hand at whist or piquet, and even to wield the hazard-box; though he had hitherto declared himself an irreconcilable enemy to all sorts of play; and so uncommon was his success and dexterity at these exercises, as to surprise his acquaintance, and arouse the suspicion ...
— The Adventures of Ferdinand Count Fathom, Complete • Tobias Smollett
... what right have I to expect!—you will scarce believe the excess of my folly. I went after dinner to Major Melmoth's; I found Emily at piquet with Sir George: can you conceive that I fancied myself ill used, that I scarce spoke to her, and returned immediately home, though strongly pressed to spend the evening there. I walked two or three times about my room, took my hat, and went to visit the handsomest Frenchwoman at Montreal, whose ...
— The History of Emily Montague • Frances Brooke
... touch with the enemy. This column[88] failed, however, to observe even patrols of the enemy, and the Dublin Fusiliers returned to Dundee by train the same night. On this day the enemy fell upon a piquet of Natal Policemen posted at De Jager's Drift, and made them prisoners. A patrol of the 18th Hussars proceeding to reconnoitre the spot next day, the 14th, came upon a scouting party of forty of the enemy a mile on the British side of the Buffalo. On the 16th a fugitive ...
— History of the War in South Africa 1899-1902 v. 1 (of 4) - Compiled by Direction of His Majesty's Government • Frederick Maurice
... royalists, and pay has been issued to lighten the military chest, the officers, upon halting, would spread their ponchos on the ground, and play until it was time to resume the march; and this was frequently done even on the eve of a battle. Soldiers on piquet often gambled within sight of an ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 13, No. 363, Saturday, March 28, 1829 • Various
... good manners, the bad practices of the wine-dealer won insensibly upon the worthy notary; and before he was aware of it, he found himself weaned from domino and sugar-water, and addicted to piquet and spiced wine. Indeed, it not unfrequently happened, that, after a long session at the Estaminet, the two friends grew so urbane that they would waste a full half-hour at the door in friendly dispute which should ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume VII. (of X.) • Various
... and talking of what we read; they did my father good, and me too; but they were few, and often cut short. As soon as mamma joined us, our books had to be laid aside. They bored her, she said, or hindered her own reading; and she and papa played draughts and chess and piquet. Mamma was not in a bored state at other times; for she was busy with letters and plans and arrangements, always in a leisurely way, but yet busy. It was a sort of business with which I had no sympathy, and which ...
— Daisy in the Field • Elizabeth Wetherell
... expostulations from the two at the piquet-table, but in nine cases out of ten the game had been designed with an eye upon the clock, and hardly any delay followed. Mrs. Baxter kissed her son, and passed her arm through Maggie's. Laurie followed; gave them candles, ...
— The Necromancers • Robert Hugh Benson
... Languedoc, his flagship, a regularly appointed envoy, Girard de Rayneville, who had full power to recognize the independence of the States, Silas Deane, one of the American commissioners, and such well-known officers as the comte de la Motte-Piquet, the Bailli de Suffren, De Guichen, D'Orvilliers, De Grasse and others. The history of this first expedition is a short and disastrous one. The voyage was long, owing to the ships being unequally matched in speed, and it was ninety days after leaving Toulon before they anchored ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 26, September 1880 • Various
... don't think cards so unpardonable an amusement as some do," replied the other; "and now and then, about this time of the evening, when my eyes begin to fail me for my book, I divert myself with a game at piquet, without finding my morals a bit relaxed by it. Do you play piquet, sir?" (to Harley.) Harley answered in the affirmative; upon which the other proposed playing a pool at a shilling the game, doubling the stakes; adding, that he never played higher ...
— The Man of Feeling • Henry Mackenzie
... make sure of their presence and to inspect their rooms; and Clery remarked that the queen never broke her disdainful silence to him, though Louis often spoke to him, generally to receive some answer of brutal insult. After dinner, Louis and Marie Antoinette would play piquet or backgammon; as, while they were thus engaged, the vigilance of their keepers relaxed, and the noise of shuffling the cards or rattling the dice afforded them opportunities of saying a few words in whispers to one another, which ...
— The Life of Marie Antoinette, Queen of France • Charles Duke Yonge
... drawn bills on you in favour of Messrs. Van Cash and Co. as per margin. I have taken up your note to Col. Piquet, and discharged your debts to my Lord Lurcher and Sir Harry Rook. I herewith enclose you copies of the bills, which I have no doubt will be immediately honoured. On failure, I shall empower some lawyer in your country to recover ...
— The Contrast • Royall Tyler
... companies. "Yes," said the mid; "I'll convince you in a jiffy." Away he flew into the bushes, and in about five minutes returned, with his hat swarming with them, which produced a pale, bright light equal to several candles. The adventure produced much laughter at the expense of the piquet who had given the alarm, and the ...
— A Sailor of King George • Frederick Hoffman
... kept up by the settlers throughout the night; but the out-piquet having imprudently ventured, in violation of their orders, to leave their station at the dawn of day, were immediately followed by the native force; who, suddenly presenting a front of ten yards in width, fired a volley, and then rushing forward, ...
— A Voyage Round the World, Vol. I (of ?) • James Holman
... had chanced to hear a word or two and, thinking it was some game of which they spoke, said: "Piquet or a game of ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... subscription. Law himself was quietly sitting in his library, writing a letter to the gardener at his paternal estate of Lauriston about the planting of some cabbages! The earl stayed for a considerable time, played a game of piquet with his countryman, and left him, charmed with his ease, ...
— Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds • Charles Mackay
... Tiverton playing piquet with Brocton. A heap of guineas was by his side, and he was flushed and excited with success. The bout had attracted some attention, for the stakes were running high, and eight or nine men were gathered round the players, among them Sir Patrick Gee. I waited ...
— The Yeoman Adventurer • George W. Gough
... towards him like biting adders, trifling with the happiness of this young life, like a princess accustomed to play with objects more precious than a simple knight. In fact, her husband risked the whole kingdom as you would a penny at piquet. Finally it was only three days since, at the conclusion of vespers, that the constable's wife pointed out to the queen this follower of ...
— Droll Stories, Complete - Collected From The Abbeys Of Touraine • Honore de Balzac
... days Kenelm was observed to be unusually pleasant. He yawned much less frequently, walked with his father, played piquet with his mother, was more like other people. Sir Peter was charmed: he ascribed this happy change to the preparations he was making for Kenelm's travelling in style. The proud father was in active correspondence with his great London friends, seeking letters of introduction for Kenelm to all ...
— Kenelm Chillingly, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... and eight per cent. for your money ruled a cheery roost. Made partner in his shipping firm well before he was thirty, he had sailed with a wet sheet and a flowing tide; dancers, claret, Cliquot, and piquet; a cab with a tiger; some travel—all that delicious early-Victorian consciousness of nothing save a golden time. It was all so full and mellow that he was forty before he had his only love affair of any depth—with the daughter of one of his own clerks, a liaison so awkward as to necessitate a ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... probably a reference to the card game now called piquet, usually played for a hundred points. It is one of the oldest of its kind. See Rabelais' ...
— The Tales Of The Heptameron, Vol. V. (of V.) • Margaret, Queen Of Navarre
... impulse which drives us, in certain excited conditions of the mind, to take refuge in movement and change. The remedy had failed; my mind was as strangely disturbed as ever. My wisest course would be to go home, and keep my good mother company over her favorite game of piquet. ...
— The Two Destinies • Wilkie Collins
... de Bienville announced when he returned from the Ohio in 1750, "is that all the nations of these countries are very ill-disposed toward the French, and devoted to the English." And in the next year Pere Piquet complained that Oswego "not only spoils our trade, but puts the English into communication with a vast number of our Indians far and near. It is true that they like French brandy better than English rum; but they prefer English goods to ours, and can buy for two beaver skins at Oswego ...
— Beginnings of the American People • Carl Lotus Becker
... the detriment of the other amateurs of the game; and when asked for the board, they only answer, 'Some one is reading it, call tomorrow.' Thus the Bosquet party find themselves reduced to playing piquet, or talking about ...
— Bohemians of the Latin Quarter • Henry Murger
... engagement to Trina he had discontinued this habit. However, he still dropped into Frenna's one or two nights in the week. He spent a pleasant hour there, smoking his huge porcelain pipe and drinking his beer. He never joined any of the groups of piquet players around the tables. In fact, he hardly spoke to anyone but ...
— McTeague • Frank Norris
... No letters as yet come from Ireland. Lord Egremont tells me that Digby is sent after La Motte Piquet.(159) I went to Miss Gunning's to carry her a parcel of francs, but I did not find her at home. I expect to see Mitchel back in a few days; the wind, as I am told, is favourable ...
— George Selwyn: His Letters and His Life • E. S. Roscoe and Helen Clergue
... brigade to make a night march, and the battalion paraded about 9.30 p.m. on Sunday evening, the 29th October. It formed the rear of the brigade, to which was attached a brigade of artillery. 'F' and 'B' companies were left behind on piquet duty. ...
— The Second Battalion Royal Dublin Fusiliers in the South African War - With a Description of the Operations in the Aden Hinterland • Cecil Francis Romer and Arthur Edward Mainwaring
... by the sharp shot of Dr. Horne of Oxford's wit, in the character of One of the People called Christians, is still prefixed to Mr. Hume's excellent History of England, like a poor invalid on the piquet guard, or like a list of quack medicines sold by the same bookseller, by whom a work of whatever nature is published; for it has no connection with his History, let it have what it may with what are called his Philosophical Works. A worthy friend of mine in London was lately consulted by a lady ...
— Life Of Johnson, Volume 5 • Boswell
... his second visit to Mentone gave him no regular lessons, but "merely talked to him in French, teaching him piquet and card tricks, introducing him to various French people and taking him to concerts and other places; so, his mother remarks, like Louis' other teachers at home I think they found it pleasanter to talk to him then ...
— The Life of Robert Louis Stevenson for Boys and Girls • Jacqueline M. Overton
... in reality occupied towards the Marquis a position akin to that of gentleman-in-waiting—sat opposite to him in the enormous travelling berline. A small folding table had been erected between them, and the Chevalier suggested piquet. But M. le Marquis was in no humour for cards. His thoughts absorbed him. As they were rattling over the cobbles of Nantes' streets, he remembered a promise to La Binet to witness her performance that night in "The Faithless Lover." And now he was running away from her. The thought was repugnant ...
— Scaramouche - A Romance of the French Revolution • Rafael Sabatini
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