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More "Varlet" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... to tell over your kindred, you could not name even your father's name. You know it not, nor shall learn it ever; for how may a son tell his father's name when a father he has never had?" Now the king's messengers, who were in quest of such a sireless man, when they heard this bitter jibe of the varlet, asked of those around concerning the youth who had never seen his sire. The neighbours answered that the lad's father was known of none, yea, that the very mother who had borne him in her womb, knew nothing of the husbandman who had sown the seed. But if his father ...
— Arthurian Chronicles: Roman de Brut • Wace
... for to laugh—pitiful, I call it, at 'er aige—and me always givin' the old rip to know as it was no use 'is 'angin' round where I was—as if I'd marry agyne, and me a widda, as you might sye, from my crydle—and if I did, it wouldn't 'a been a wicked old varlet what I always suspected 'e was leadin' a double life—and now to see them two fyces together—why, I says, 'ere's the explanytion as plyne ...
— The Dust Flower • Basil King
... waterfall. Lint, flax. Lint-white, flax-colored. Lintwhite, the linnet. Lippen'd, trusted. Lippie, dim. of lip. Loan, a lane, Loanin, the private road leading to a farm. Lo'ed, loved. Lon'on, London. Loof (pl. looves), the palm of the hand. Loon, loun, lown, a fellow, a varlet. Loosome, lovable. Loot, let. Loove, love. Looves, v. loof. Losh, a minced oath. Lough, a pond, a lake. Loup, lowp, to leap. Low, lowe, a flame. Lowin, lowing, flaming, burning. Lown, v. loon. Lowp, v. loup. Lowse, louse, to untie, ...
— Poems And Songs Of Robert Burns • Robert Burns
... wisdom; but for your virtue and good temper I am glad, and your dogs will be the better for it, for you will no longer strike them lame. Now however that you are thought so much of at home, you won't dare to talk to a poor painter in the street any more; to be seen with the painter varlet would be ...
— Albert Durer • T. Sturge Moore
... him in speechless wrath. It would have liked him well to bring this contumelious varlet to his knees. But how? It was a byword that Vigo minded no man's ire but the duke's. The King of France could not ...
— Helmet of Navarre • Bertha Runkle
... the King's highroad, You saucy varlet, get out of my way." Then he gave the fool a cut with his whip And leaving him smarting, he ...
— A Dome of Many-Coloured Glass • Amy Lowell
... I.—(Macaulay) Pour, varlet, pour the water, The water steaming hot! A spoonful for each man of us, Another for the pot! We shall not drink from amber, No Capuan slave shall mix For us the snows of Athos With port at thirty-six; Whiter than snow the crystals Grown sweet 'neath tropic fires, More rich the herb ...
— The Home Book of Verse, Vol. 4 (of 4) • Various
... thou to me of halfpence! Know that thou art a mercenary varlet; yes, knave, mark that, a mercenary varlet." The sleepy Ganymede replied not, and the wrath of Mr. Gordon subsided into a low, interrupted, internal muttering of strange oaths, which rolled and grumbled, and rattled in his throat, like ...
— Pelham, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... head, foul Spank, on a spike from Temple Bar, if ever I hear of the like again. Vile varlet, what art thou paid for? Thou hast swindled the money thyself, foul Spank; I know thee, though thou art new to me. Bitter is the day for thee that ever I came across thee. Answer me not—one word more and I will have thee on a hurdle." And he swung himself to ...
— Lorna Doone - A Romance of Exmoor • R. D. Blackmore
... love him, I'll be hang'd; it could not be else: I have drunk medicines.— Pointz!—Hal!—a plague upon you both!—Bardolph!—Peto!—I'll starve, ere I'll rob a foot further. An 'twere not as good a deed as drink, to turn true man, and to leave these rogues, I am the veriest varlet that ever chewed with a tooth. Eight yards of uneven ground is threescore and ten miles a-foot with me; and the stony-hearted villains know it well enough: a plague upon't, when thieves cannot be true one to another! [They whistle.] Whew!—A plague upon you all! Give me my horse, you rogues; ...
— King Henry IV, The First Part • William Shakespeare [Hudson edition]
... Boris, the great wolfhound. Lord Almeric had ridden far, and was tired, and the gloominess of his ancestral home weighed on his spirits, which were naturally buoyant and high. Flinging himself from his gaily comparisoned horse, and tossing the rein with a muttered, 'Here, varlet!' to the waiting groom, he opened the massive doors and entered the hall. What ...
— The Slowcoach • E. V. Lucas
... are not all alive?' 'Yea, yea, thou trifling varlet, Though here we number only five,— Two caught ...
— Blue Bonnet's Ranch Party • C. E. Jacobs
... of Huon's adventures after he had left the island. At one time he took service with a minstrel and was his varlet. At another time he was forced to play chess for the hand of a king's daughter, but refused to marry her when he had won the game. Unknowingly, he once fought with Gerames, and only found out who he was in the course of the battle. ...
— The Red Romance Book • Various
... already dead and buried? The very children are afraid of their friends, when they see them masked; and so are we. The maske must as well be taken from things as from men, which being removed, we shall find nothing hid under it, but the very same death, that a seely[Footnote: weak, simple] varlet, or a simple maid-servant, did latterly suffer without amazement or feare. Happie is that death which takes all leasure from the ...
— Literary and Philosophical Essays • Various
... And wherever one of them came the people fell back in dread, and no one would touch it. It made him laugh, and he scoffed at the people and called them cowards and old women. Then he turned and saw the tight-rope, and said foolish people were daily wasting their money to see a clumsy and ignorant varlet degrade that beautiful art; now they should see the work of a master. With that he made a spring into the air and lit firm on his feet on the rope. Then he hopped the whole length of it back and forth on one foot, with his hands clasped over his eyes; ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... be advisable," suggested Bumpo, "while the varlet is still sleepy, to strike him on the head with some heavy object and push him through a port-hole ...
— The Voyages of Doctor Dolittle • Hugh Lofting
... wild with wrath. 'Thy unmannerly varlet tricks shall cost thee dear. Thou a soldier? A juggler with a mountebank jade—a vile hackney which thou hast taught ...
— St. George and St. Michael • George MacDonald
... his looks. If then the fruit may be known by the tree, as the tree by the fruit, then peremptorily I speak it, there is virtue in that Falstaff: him keep with, the rest banish. And tell me now, thou naughty varlet, tell me, where hast thou ...
— Hazlitt on English Literature - An Introduction to the Appreciation of Literature • Jacob Zeitlin
... matter which we are now stirring. You shall see the name of duke changed into king. Yea, a king shall I be, who hitherto have been but duke.' Then he crossed himself and straightway took his hauberk, stooped his head, and put it on aright, and laced his helmet, and girt on his sword, which a varlet brought him. Then the Duke called for his good horse—a better could not be found. It had been sent him by a king of Spain, out of very great friendship. Neither arms nor the press of fighting men did it fear, if its lord spurred it on. Walter Giffard brought it. The ...
— The Fifteen Decisive Battles of The World From Marathon to Waterloo • Sir Edward Creasy, M.A.
... and Wecherus, of all whom notices may be found in the pages of Haller and Vanderlinden; also, Reed's Surgery, and Nicholas Culpeper's Practice of Physic and Anatomy, the last as belonging to Samuel Seabury, chirurgeon, before mentioned. Nicholas Culpeper was a shrewd charlatan, and as impudent a varlet as ever prescribed for a colic; but knew very well what he was about, and badgers the College with great vigor. A copy of Spigelius's famous Anatomy, in the Boston Athenaeum, has the names of Increase and Samuel Mather written in it, and was doubtless early overhauled by the ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)
... "sweetheart; the butler, the chaplain, the treasurer, the equerry, the farrier, the bailiff, even the Sire de Montsoreau, the young varlet whose name is Gauttier and bears my banner, with his men at arms, captains, followers, and beasts—all are yours, and will instantly obey your orders under pain of being ...
— Droll Stories, Volume 1 • Honore de Balzac
... bear a Papist to be our principal bard," said one class. "No Tory for our translator of Homer," cried the zealous Whigs, "Poets should be poor, and Pope is independent," growled Grub Street. The ancients could not endure that a "poet should build an house, but this varlet has dug a grotto, and established a clandestine connexion between Parnassus and the Temple of Plutus." "Pope," said others, "is hand-in-glove with Lords Oxford and Bolingbroke, and it was never so seen before in any genuine child of genius." "He is a little ugly ...
— Poetical Works of Pope, Vol. II • Alexander Pope
... perjured varlet Stands on strongly-planted heel, In his left a strip of scarlet, In his right a streak of steel; Ah! the monster topples over, Till his haunches strike the plain!— Low-born clown and lying lover, Thou hast ...
— Poems • Adam Lindsay Gordon
... he suffered the torments of this awakening. Shame buffeted him on the right cheek and the left; he looked about like one who slinks from merited chastisement. Oh, thrice ignoble varlet! To pose with unctuous hypocrisy before people who had welcomed him under their roof, unquestioned, with all the grace and kindliness of English hospitality! To lie shamelessly in the face of his old fellow-student, ...
— Born in Exile • George Gissing
... half-opened doors; while from the gallery the fair daughters of the Knight leaned gracefully forward, eying the youthful prisoner with that pity "that dwells in womanhood." Who would have thought that this poor varlet, thus trembling before the brief authority of a country Squire, and the sport of rustic boors, was soon to become the delight of princes; the theme of all tongues and ages; the dictator to the human mind; and was to confer immortality ...
— Seeing Europe with Famous Authors, Volume I. - Great Britain and Ireland • Various
... and thinkest, thou trifling boy, thou Varlet, and without all reverence, that thou art most worthy and excellent, and that I am not able by reason of myne age to have another son, which if I should have, thou shouldst well understand that I would beare a more worthier than thou. But to worke thee a greater despight, I do determine ...
— The Golden Asse • Lucius Apuleius
... outcast, pariah, pilgarlic, vagabond, knave, rogue, scoundrel, caitiff, miscreant, scapegrace, villain, rascal, renegade, reprobate, rake, scullion, poltroon, varlet, ronion, ...
— Putnam's Word Book • Louis A. Flemming
... so anxious to discover. He sent for some prisoners he had made in the country, and said to them, "right courteously," according to Froissart, "'Is there here any man who knows of a passage below Abbeville, where-by we and our army might cross the river without peril?' And a varlet from a neighboring mill, whose name history has preserved as that of a traitor, Gobin Agace, said to the king, 'Sir, I do promise you, at the risk of my head, that I will guide you to such a spot, where you shall cross the River Somme without peril, you and your army.' 'Comrade,' said the king ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume II. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot
... introduced to Mr. Mason, then in residence. On my first visit, he was sitting in an attitude of much attention to a drawing, pinned up near the fire-place; and another gentleman, whom I afterwards found to be a Mr. Varlet, a miniature painter, who has since settled at Bath, had evidently been in conversation with him about it. My friend begged leave to ask whom it was intended to represent. Mr. Mason hesitated, and looked earnestly at Mr. Varlet. ...
— Lives of the English Poets - From Johnson to Kirke White, Designed as a Continuation of - Johnson's Lives • Henry Francis Cary
... "cure" prescribed by certain Artful Dodgers of the medical profession who take handfuls of guineas from credulous patients for what Mother Nature willingly gives gratis. And he was beginning to understand the joys of "loafing,"—so much so indeed that he felt a certain sympathy with the lazy varlet who prefers to stroll aimlessly about the country begging his bread rather than do a stroke of honest work. The freedom of such a life is self-evident,—and freedom is the broadest and best way of breathing ...
— The Treasure of Heaven - A Romance of Riches • Marie Corelli
... words on the spoil of a Navarrese village. My present leader, Sir William Felton, is as free and easy as d'Albret, or Aymerigot Marcel himself. And is not yon ungainly varlet the hope of ...
— The Lances of Lynwood • Charlotte M. Yonge
... could be truer than you proved Yourself in self-forgetting, nor more brave Than in foregoing knighthood for a knight. You will be far more valiant, if you bear This sorrow without murmur or complaint, Than you could prove in any battle won. The meanest varlet often wins by chance. It needeth valour like our blessed Lord's To forfeit glory, and to suffer pain Unhonoured and unknown—ah, Christalan, True knight within my heart I ...
— Under King Constantine • Katrina Trask
... Nilus. The courtier talked of the fair lady who gave him the glove which he wore in his hat as a favour; the poet of the last satire of Marston or Ben Jonson, or volunteered to read a trifle thrown off of late by 'Faith, a learned gentleman, a very worthy friend,' though if we were to enquire, this varlet poet might turn out, after all, to be the mere decoy duck of the hostess, paid to draw gulls and fools thither. The mere dullard sat silent, playing with his glove or discussing at what apothecary's the best tobacco was ...
— Old and New London - Volume I • Walter Thornbury
... Lord Rolf: "Sir varlet, they tell me that thou art a mighty hunter, and of mickle guile in woodcraft; wilt thou then hunt somewhat for me, and bring me home a ...
— Child Christopher • William Morris
... press the sod About the quiet weedy moat, Where unscared did the great fish float; Because men dreaded there to see The uncouth things of faerie; Nathless by some few fathers old These tales about the place were told That neither squire nor seneschal Or varlet came in bower or hall, Yet all things were in order due, Hangings of gold and red and blue, And tables with fair service set; Cups that had paid the Caesar's debt Could he have laid his hands on them; Dorsars, with pearls in every hem, And fair embroidered ...
— The Earthly Paradise - A Poem • William Morris
... very angrie Voices in the Courtyard, my Father's especiallie, louder than common; and distinguished the Words "Knave," and "Varlet," and "begone." Lookt from my Window and beheld a Man, booted and cloaked, with two Horses, at the Gate, parleying with my Father, who stood in an offensive Attitude, and woulde not let him in. I could catch such Fragments as, "But, Sir?" "What! ...
— Mary Powell & Deborah's Diary • Anne Manning
... the forbidden precincts. With as much anger as he was capable of feeling, or perhaps of assuming, the Laird commanded them to descend;—they paid no attention to his mandate: he then began to pull them down one after another;—they resisted, passively at least, each sturdy bronzed varlet making himself as heavy as he could, or climbing up as fast as ...
— Guy Mannering • Sir Walter Scott
... if the little varlet mocked at me as he flew by in full song, and sought to taunt me with his happier lot. Oh, how I envied him! No lessons, no task, no school; nothing but holiday, frolic, green fields, and fine weather. Had I been then more versed in poetry, I might have addressed him in the words ...
— McGuffey's Fifth Eclectic Reader • William Holmes McGuffey
... remorse: the highest joy every infernal nymph, of this worse than infernal habitation, could have known, would have been to reduce this proud beauty to her own level.—And as to my villain, who also had charge of her, he is such a seasoned varlet, that he delights in mischief for the sake of it: no bribe could seduce him to betray his trust, were there but wickedness in it!—'Tis well, however, he was out of my way when the cursed news was imparted to me!—Gone, the villain! in quest of ...
— Clarissa, Volume 5 (of 9) • Samuel Richardson
... news for me from Unterwald? What of my father? 'Tis not to be borne, Thus to be pent up like a felon here! What have I done so heinous that I must Skulk here in hiding, like a murderer? I only laid my staff across the fists Of the pert varlet, when before my eyes, By order of the governor, he tried To drive away ...
— Wilhelm Tell - Title: William Tell • Johann Christoph Friedrich von Schiller
... fist and grinned horribly at the broad-mouthed, innocent yellow flower, down whose throat the varlet had leaped—but chancing at that moment to catch a glimpse of her own face in a little bit of mica, which served her for a toilet-mirror, she uttered the least bit of a little shriek in the world and fainted—her companions, who had by this time gathered round ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXIII No. 4 October 1848 • Various
... her wimple and displayed her face: "Sir, may God bless the best of kings! I come to implore a boon, which it shall cost you nothing to grant." "Damsel, even it should cost me dear, you should not be refused; what is it you would have me do?" "Sir, dub this varlet a knight, and array him in the arms he bringeth, whenever he desireth." "Your mercy, damsel! to bring me such a youth! Assuredly, I will dub him whenever he will; but it shameth me to abandon my ...
— Tales of the Enchanted Islands of the Atlantic • Thomas Wentworth Higginson
... Bhang eater, that thy stroke hath missed the mark and thou hast not known thy familiar from this youth who kneeleth before thee? Smite him without delay!" Hereupon the Linkman again raised his hand to obey his lord, but the blow fell upon the neck of his varlet and the head flew off and rolled at the feet of the Caliph and his Chief Councillor. At this second mishap the wits of all present were bewildered and the King cried, "What business is this, O Wazir, whereto the other made answer, "O Caliph of the Time and rare gift of the Age and the Tide, ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 6 • Richard F. Burton
... "Heaven save me, what a helpless varlet!" So saying, he laid hold of a kettle, and sousing it into one of the half-jars, he fished out three pullets and a couple of geese, and said to Sancho, "Eat, friend, and make your breakfast of this scum, to stay your stomach ...
— Wit and Wisdom of Don Quixote • Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
... this successful conveyance, he shifted his eyes alternately from the young gentleman to the broker for a considerable pause, during which he in silence reproached the last for introducing such a beggarly varlet to his acquaintance; then taking the pipe from his mouth, "Sir," said he, addressing himself to the Count, "if I had all the inclination in the world to comply with your proposal, it is really not in my power. My correspondents abroad have remitted such a number of bad bills ...
— The Adventures of Ferdinand Count Fathom, Complete • Tobias Smollett
... the stones, he shouted in the Burgundian French he had learnt in his campaigns, to demand the cause of the attack. The stones ceased, and the head man of the village, a stout peasant, came forward and complained that the varlet, as he called Ringan, had been stealing the village geese on their pond, and when they were about to do justice on him, yonder man-at-arms had burst in, knocked down and hurt ...
— Two Penniless Princesses • Charlotte M. Yonge
... had a gift or no, this was an annoying, disconcerting fact. The white, puffy mother, with the high forehead, in the corner there, looked more like a lady; but if she were one, it was all the more shame to her to have mated with such a varlet, Ransom said to himself, making use, as he did generally, of terms of opprobrium extracted from the older English literature. He had seen Tarrant, or his equivalent, often before; he had "whipped" him, as he believed, controversially, again and again, at political meetings ...
— The Bostonians, Vol. I (of II) • Henry James
... say; like master, like dog! But fetch the portmanteau, you Dutch varlet!" Entering the house, while the coachman drove the tired horses toward the barn. "There's something in it I want. Bring it here." As he passed into the library. "Yes; I put it in there, I am sure. Ah, here we have it!" And ...
— The Strollers • Frederic S. Isham
... winter it might be suffered to grow a little below the ear for warmth. Personal pride and dignity were appealed to, that no Christian gentleman would wish to look like "every Ruffian, every wild-Irish, every hangman, every varlet and vagabond." By Sewall's time, however, Puritan though he were, we see his white locks flowing long over his doublet collar, and forming a fitting frame ...
— Customs and Fashions in Old New England • Alice Morse Earle
... our day Mustafa bin Ism'ail who succeeded "General Khayru 'l-Din" as Prime Minister to "His Highness Mohammed al-Sadik, Bey of Tunis," began life as apprentice to a barber, became the varlet of an officer, rose to high dignity and received decorations from most ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 5 • Richard F. Burton
... townsmen. Item, How my brave Lord Innocent fell down dead—with grief, some say, or with being poisoned with the stinking breath of one Ill-pause, as say others—at the hearing of his just Lord and rightful prince Shaddai so abused by the mouth of so filthy a Diabolian as that varlet Ill-pause was. The messenger further told, that after this Ill-pause had made a short oration to the townsmen, in behalf of Diabolus, his master, the simple town believing that what was said was true, with one consent did ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... didn't seem as romantic as a sword. Malone pictured himself saying: "Take that, varlet." Was varlet what you called them? he wondered. Maybe ...
— That Sweet Little Old Lady • Gordon Randall Garrett (AKA Mark Phillips)
... young and light. As things go now, the butterfly cannot tilt against the beef barrel when both are trussed into armour. But with the bare sword I will fight all day and be hungry for more. Aye, or rattle a merry rally with the quarter-staff like any common varlet. But at both Sholto there is my master, and doth ofttimes swinge me ...
— The Black Douglas • S. R. Crockett
... to a low-born suitor's stalwart charms. And more will follow, when that lady's brother, furious Francesco Maria della Rovere, shall stab the bravo in torch-litten palace rooms with twenty poignard strokes twixt waist and throat, and their Pandarus shall be sent down to his account by a varlet's coltellata through the midriff. Imagination shifts the scene, and shows in that same loggia Rome's warlike Pope, attended by his cardinals and all Urbino's chivalry. The snowy beard of Julius flows down upon his breast, where jewels clasp the crimson mantle, as in Raphael's ...
— New Italian sketches • John Addington Symonds
... varlet as thou art, dost thou recite this ill accident to a father! and to one who has not dined! Bring ...
— Imaginary Conversations and Poems - A Selection • Walter Savage Landor
... "'Twas the varlet whom we all took to be such a fool," cried Johnie; "the rascal who came here last night whining for his precious cows. A thousand pities but we had done as I said, and hanged ...
— Tales From Scottish Ballads • Elizabeth W. Grierson
... Varlet, Sirrah, Sirrah, thank my Lady here I do not cudgel thee.—Well, I will settle the rest of my Estate upon her to morrow, I will, Sir; and thank God you have what you have, ...
— The Works of Aphra Behn - Volume IV. • Aphra Behn
... into the darkened apartment, and approaching with a cup of tea that the poor invalid has barely to reach out his hand to. Round our little camp I look, noting trifles with a keen enjoyment. Shall I ever submit to that varlet again? No, never! I will leap from my bed and wrestle with him on the floor. I will anoint him with my shaving soap and duck him in the bath he meant for me. Do you know the emancipated feeling yourself? Do you know the sensation when your glance is like a sword-thrust ...
— With Rimington • L. March Phillipps
... Douglas preaches against idolatry, and he remits to my conscience forsooth, gif that be heresy—and he preaches against adulteries and fornications too—was ever sic varlet terms written in ony nobleman's letter afore this apostate's time—and he refers ...
— Ringan Gilhaize - or The Covenanters • John Galt
... indeed," Mrs. Nancy repeated; "young master and be saved to us. A parish brat rather. No man's child but his that to hit you must throw a stone over Bridewell Wall. Up to your chamber, little varlet, and learn thy chapter. There are to be no more counting of beads or mumblings over hallowed beans in this house. Up ...
— The Strange Adventures of Captain Dangerous, Vol. 1 of 3 • George Augustus Sala
... managed easily enough," the soldier said with a laugh. "He is an ill favoured looking varlet; and is, I doubt not, a pestilent heretic. It would be a pleasure to cuff him even without your ...
— By Pike and Dyke: A Tale of the Rise of the Dutch Republic • G.A. Henty
... He is with the Marquis. But in madness comes out truth; and that long hook-nosed body-varlet of his has told ...
— Hereward, The Last of the English • Charles Kingsley
... name that's given me, For, as you all can plainly see, My hair is red as red can be— In fact it's fiery scarlet! And as my hair, my temper is; So if a page my hair should quiz, I waste no time, but straight pull his, And thrash the saucy varlet! So that is why the name I've got, And as, when I am waxing hot I frequently dismiss the lot, They can't ...
— Christmas Entertainments • Alice Maude Kellogg
... to his mercy. My Lord and father said the Lord King looked calmly on them, and gave them the kiss of peace. But my fair father himself was so much struck by the manner in which our Lord had repaid him his good deeds, that, as his varlet Adam told us, he clasped his hands, and looked up to Heaven, and he said,—'O Jesus, crucified Saviour, I once when sleeping saw Thee on the cross, pierced with bloody wounds, and on the following day, according to Thy warning, I spared Thy image and worshipped it: and now Thou hast, in Thy ...
— Earl Hubert's Daughter - The Polishing of the Pearl - A Tale of the 13th Century • Emily Sarah Holt
... "excuse my interrupting you, but I perceive you are rather given to prose. I would ask the fate of an author who was making some noise just as I left the world. His reputation, however, was considered quite temporary. The learned shook their heads at him, for he was a poor, half-educated varlet, that knew little of Latin, and nothing of Greek, and had been obliged to run the country for deer-stealing. I think his name was Shakespeare. I presume he soon ...
— The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, Gent. • Washington Irving
... have many wise and good men to serve him, only because he has a great heap of that metal; and that if it should happen that by some accident or trick of law (which, sometimes produces as great changes as chance itself) all this wealth should pass from the master to the meanest varlet of his whole family, he himself would very soon become one of his servants, as if he were a thing that belonged to his wealth, and so were bound to follow its fortune! But they much more admire and detest the folly ...
— Utopia • Thomas More
... grace is to me fortuned, it is the goodness of God that lent to me my strength. Now am I better pleased, said Priamus, than thou hadst given to me all the Provence and Paris the rich. I had liefer to have been torn with wild horses, than any varlet had won such loos, or any page or priker should have had prize on me. But now sir knight I warn thee that hereby is a Duke of Lorraine with his army, and the noblest men of Dolphiny, and lords of Lombardy, with the garrison of Godard, and Saracens ...
— Le Morte D'Arthur, Volume I (of II) - King Arthur and of his Noble Knights of the Round Table • Thomas Malory
... not their valor for can I give surety for it. For Holy Grail, every varlet, let alone those of true blood, would give his life and count it more ...
— In the Court of King Arthur • Samuel Lowe
... harm on Charles Town," Jack assured her. "I know him too well for that. You saw what he did to the base varlet who annoyed you at the wharf,—felled him ...
— Blackbeard: Buccaneer • Ralph D. Paine
... him a fierce delight. The hour had struck; let the whole city go up in flame, let its people be cleansed by the fiery purification! But a sight that he saw presently filled him with surprise: a band of five or six men came hurrying out of the building, headed by a tall varlet in whom he recognized Chouteau, his former comrade in the squad of the 106th. He had seen him once before, after the 18th of March, wearing a gold-laced kepi; he seemed by his bedizened uniform to have risen in rank, was probably on the staff of some ...
— The Downfall • Emile Zola
... as a varlet who has no fear of a larruping before his eyes: how the rapscallion gloried in taking advantage of his position! Taking-off his hat while putting his foot on my neck! If ever I can be even with you, my worthy scrivener, you'll ...
— CELEBRATED CRIMES, COMPLETE - LA CONSTANTIN—1660 • ALEXANDRE DUMAS, PERE
... privileged character, and the protection he enjoyed from the sovereign, that any of the courtiers resented his remarks; but Sir Thomas Wyat's feelings being now deeply interested, he turned sharply round, and said, "How now, thou meddling varlet, what business hast ...
— Windsor Castle • William Harrison Ainsworth
... for reminding me. I have many a knight and varlet here to pay you off for Laupen, and for the ill turn you did me at Morgarten; now you must wait here till ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 10, No. 57, July, 1862 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... England, though not intentionally, in the course of one of these voyages, being driven into Shoreham and Falmouth by adverse weather. It was in 1425 that he was taken into the service of Philip III., Duke of Burgundy, as painter and "varlet de chambre," shortly after which he went to Lille. In the following year he was sent on a pilgrimage as the Duke's proxy, and again on two secret missions. In 1428 he went with the Duke's Embassy to the King of Portugal which was ...
— Six Centuries of Painting • Randall Davies
... uncertain, wavering footsteps, and fury in his heart. He meant to kill if he could. It was in Simon's mind to make a sudden, desperate attack. An unexpected stroke from his poniard might free him from me, and his prize might yet be his. As for the varlet—Simon gave Pierrebon not a thought. But as he went on his wounded arm began to sting and bleed afresh. A faintness came upon him, and, overcome by the pain and loss of blood, he sank down all dizzy behind the high privet, a cold sweat on his forehead. In impotent fury he struck his dagger to ...
— Orrain - A Romance • S. Levett-Yeats
... estate.[123] Seest thou what great ignominy dignities heap upon evil men? For their unworthiness would less appear if they were never advanced to any honours. Could so many dangers ever make thee think to bear office with Decoratus,[124] having discovered him to be a very varlet and spy? For we cannot for their honours account them worthy of respect whom we judge unworthy of the honours themselves. But if thou seest any man endued with wisdom, canst thou esteem him unworthy of that respect or wisdom which ...
— The Theological Tractates and The Consolation of Philosophy • Anicius Manlius Severinus Boethius
... quarters. Yet fain to leave them as I became, there was but one way. It involved the slaying of my gaoler, a step which was, I confess, to me distasteful. I was getting on in life, and had grown tired of killing people. Yet, to mature deliberation, the life of a graceless varlet, void of all gentleness and with no bowels of compassion, and deaf to suggestions of bribery, appeared ...
— Jurgen - A Comedy of Justice • James Branch Cabell
... "Thou inquisitive varlet, I said no name," replied the gentleman, with a smile, "In these times men do not lightly give their names to each other, when the land is swarming with Jacobite plotters and government spies, disguised ...
— The International Monthly Magazine, Volume 5, No. 1, January, 1852 • Various
... roll up your eyes, but I mean it, you varlet! So be off with you! Go! I don't care if you should be drowned in the rain, or blown off the horse, or struck by lightning. I hope you may be, you knave, and I shall be rid of one villain! Off, you varlet, or——" Old Hurricane ...
— Capitola's Peril - A Sequel to 'The Hidden Hand' • Mrs. E.D.E.N. Southworth
... Within this hower, she will, &c. with the rest in so vncleanly termes, as might not now become me by the rule of Decorum to vtter writing to so great a Maiestie, but the king tooke them in so euill part, as he bid Flamock auaunt varlet, and that he should no more be so neere vnto him. And wherein I would faine learne, lay this vndecencie? in the skurrill and filthy termes not meete for a kings eare? perchance so. For the king was a wise ...
— The Arte of English Poesie • George Puttenham
... characteristic of my friend Harry to have selected this piece of Yorkshire oddity as his especial body servant; but if the choice were queer, it was at least successful, for an honester, more faithful, hard-working, and withal, better hearted, and more humorous varlet never drew curry-comb over horse-hide, or clothes-brush ...
— Warwick Woodlands - Things as they Were There Twenty Years Ago • Henry William Herbert (AKA Frank Forester)
... glared at him in speechless wrath. It would have liked him well to bring this contumelious varlet to his knees. But how? It was a byword that Vigo minded no man's ire but the duke's. The King of France ...
— Helmet of Navarre • Bertha Runkle
... knight could be truer than you proved Yourself in self-forgetting, nor more brave Than in foregoing knighthood for a knight. You will be far more valiant, if you bear This sorrow without murmur or complaint, Than you could prove in any battle won. The meanest varlet often wins by chance. It needeth valour like our blessed Lord's To forfeit glory, and to suffer pain Unhonoured and unknown—ah, Christalan, True knight within my heart ...
— Under King Constantine • Katrina Trask
... acquaint her with the affront thou puttest upon the whole sex, by asking, Whether I think my reward, when I have subdued the most charming woman in the world, will be equal to my trouble?— Which, thinkest thou, will a woman of spirit soonest forgive; the undervaluing varlet who can put such a question; or him, who prefers the pursuit and conquest of a fine woman to all the joys of life? Have I not known even a virtuous woman, as she would be thought, vow everlasting antipathy ...
— Clarissa, Volume 4 (of 9) - History Of A Young Lady • Samuel Richardson
... Latin In lecture-room, garden, and quad. They stand in the silent Sheldonian— Our orators, waiting—for you, Their style guaranteed Ciceronian, Their subject—'the Ladies in Blue.' The Vice sits arrayed in his scarlet; He's pale, but they say he dissem- -bles by calling his Beadle a 'varlet' Whenever ...
— Green Bays. Verses and Parodies • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... to affront and contradict me, said the prince in a great rage, and to tell me to my face that what I have told you is a dream. You are an unbelieving varlet! cried he; and at the same time took him by the beard, and loaded him with so many blows, that he was hardly able to ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments Volume 1 • Anonymous
... I better pleased," said Prianius, "than if thou hadst given me all the province of Paris the rich. I had rather have been torn by wild horses than that any varlet should have won such victory over me as thou hast done. But now, Sir knight, I warn thee that close by is the Duke of Lorraine, with sixty thousand good men of war; and we had both best flee at once, for he will find ...
— The Legends Of King Arthur And His Knights • James Knowles
... smooth varlet's neck that sold me mine," shouted Denys, in huge wrath, and confirmed the threat with singular oaths peculiar to the mediaeval military. The landlady put her fingers in her ears, thereby exhibiting the hand ...
— The Cloister and the Hearth • Charles Reade
... convincingly a man of God, that the most wicked (to whom he was a terror) had a kindness for him, and sometimes spoke very favourably of him, as one who wished their souls well; insomuch as one time, some persons of quality calling him a varlet, another person of quality (whom he had often reproved for his wickedness) being present, said, he was sure if he was a varlet he was one of God's varlets, &c. At another time, when a certain gentleman, from whose house he was going home, sent one of the rudest of his servants, well furnished, ...
— Biographia Scoticana (Scots Worthies) • John Howie
... pleased at being called brave, and somehow it made him feel brave. He passed over the "varlet." It was the way people talked in historical romances for the young, he knew, and it was evidently not meant for rudeness. He only hoped he would be able to understand what they said to him. He had not ...
— Five Children and It • E. Nesbit
... regarding the Calle de Plateros affair—private, however, before Santa Anna himself, the world not being made the wiser for it. Its results were all in their favour, thanks to the stern, stubborn fidelity of Jose, who lied like a very varlet. Such a circumstantial story told he, no one could suspect him of complicity in the escape of the forsados; far less that his mistress, or the Condesa Almonte ...
— The Free Lances - A Romance of the Mexican Valley • Mayne Reid
... walls, had not the monk covered his broad mouth with his hand just as the roar was issuing forth.—"Peace, and get thee down to the under bayley," said he;—"thou deservest death, by all the policies of war—but, look ye, varlet, and see who has saved your worthless neck, by watching while you were dreaming of swine's ...
— The Betrothed • Sir Walter Scott
... for your virtue and good temper I am glad, and your dogs will be the better for it, for you will no longer strike them lame. Now however that you are thought so much of at home, you won't dare to talk to a poor painter in the street any more; to be seen with the painter varlet would be a great disgrace ...
— Albert Durer • T. Sturge Moore
... the patient I had taken to Spring Hill after the battle of the Tchernaya, and who took my part at once, and ordered them to release me. Although I rather weakened my cause, it was most natural that, directly I was released, I should fly at the varlet who had caused me this trouble; and I did so, using my bell most effectually, and aided, when my party ...
— Wonderful Adventures of Mrs. Seacole in Many Lands • Mary Seacole
... me reflect, how vain an attempt it is for a man to endeavour to do himself honour among those who are out of all degree of equality or comparison with him. And yet I have seen the moral of my own behaviour very frequent in England since my return; where a little contemptible varlet, without the least title to birth, person, wit, or common sense, shall presume to look with importance, and put himself upon a foot with the ...
— Gulliver's Travels - into several remote nations of the world • Jonathan Swift
... a coin were forthwith presented to the functionary. "Bow, wow, wow," or something like it, uttered by our Mahometan friend, made us look up, and we saw him unaccepting and unsmiling. "Why, thou greedy varlet," (friend, the words were innocuous, because unintelligible,) "'tis by so much ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCLXXVI. February, 1847. Vol. LXI. • Various
... these dear precious scenes again, and I'll finish your career myself by a coup-de-main. No, no; change churlish dreams and braving trumpets to mellifluous flutes. I am to be married. Varlet, wish me joy. ...
— The Mirror of Taste, and Dramatic Censor - Volume I, Number 1 • Stephen Cullen Carpenter
... think that I shall. I can quite believe that he is a mischievous young varlet, he shows it in his face; but I am sure that he is shrewd, and I believe that he will be faithful. At any rate I think that we took to each other, and that he has made up his mind to try for once to stay in a place. He really seemed in earnest about it, and if he keeps to ...
— Won by the Sword - A Story of the Thirty Years' War • G.A. Henty
... warfare: for a warfare it has truly been; and far, very far, from an amorous warfare too. Doubts, mistrusts, upbraidings, on her part; humiliations the most abject, on mine. Obliged to assume such airs of reformation, that every varlet of ye has been afraid I should reclaim in good earnest. And hast thou not thyself frequently observed to me, how awkwardly I returned to my usual gayety, after I had been within a mile of her father's garden-wall, although I had not ...
— Clarissa, Volume 3 (of 9) • Samuel Richardson
... 'Yes, I am, an please your noble honour (answered the man) but necessity has no law, as the saying is — And more than that, it was an accident. My breeches cracked behind, after I had got into the saddle' 'You're an impudent varlet (cried Mrs Tabby) for presuming to ride before persons of fashion without a shirt' — 'I am so, an please your worthy ladyship (said he) but I am a poor Wiltshire lad — I ha'n't a shirt in the world, that I can call my own, nor a rag of clothes, and please your ladyship, but what you see — I ...
— The Expedition of Humphry Clinker • Tobias Smollett
... thou saucy Varlet, Sirrah, Sirrah, thank my Lady here I do not cudgel thee.—Well, I will settle the rest of my Estate upon her to morrow, I will, Sir; and thank God you have what you have, ...
— The Works of Aphra Behn - Volume IV. • Aphra Behn
... good deal of Arabic and is friends with everyone. It is Salaam aleykoum ya maris on all sides. A Belgian has died here, and his two slaves, a very nice black boy and an Abyssinian girl, got my little varlet, Darfour, to coax me to take them under my protection, which I have done, as there appeared a strong probability that they would be 'annexed' by a rascally Copt who is a Consular agent at Keneh. I believe the Belgian has left money for them, which of course they would never get ...
— Letters from Egypt • Lucie Duff Gordon
... the fact that it was extraordinarily good of him to do so. Uncle Chris affected the rank and file of his fellow-men much as a genial knight of the Middle Ages would have affected a scurvy knave or varlet if he had cast aside social distinctions for awhile and hobnobbed with the latter in a tavern. He never patronized, but the mere fact that he abstained from patronizing ...
— The Little Warrior - (U.K. Title: Jill the Reckless) • P. G. Wodehouse
... the trembling crowd below. All ran to prayers, both priests and laity, To pacify this angry deity; When Jove, in pity to the town, With real thunder knock'd him down. Then what a huge delight were all in, To see the wicked varlet sprawling; They search'd his pockets on the place, And found his copper all was base; They laugh'd at such an Irish blunder, To take the noise of brass for thunder. The moral of this tale is proper, Applied to Wood's adulterate copper: Which, ...
— Poems (Volume II.) • Jonathan Swift
... "Profane varlet!" said the president, now turning his attention to the worthy Hugh, "profane and execrable wretch!—we have said, that in consideration of those rights which, even in thy filthy person, we feel no inclination to violate, we have condescended to make reply to thy rude and unseasonable ...
— The Works of Edgar Allan Poe - Volume 3 (of 5) of the Raven Edition • Edgar Allan Poe
... for me from Unterwald? What of my father? 'Tis not to be borne, Thus to be pent up like a felon here! What have I done so heinous that I must Skulk here in hiding, like a murderer? I only laid my staff across the fists Of the pert varlet, when before my eyes, By order of the governor, he tried To drive away my ...
— Wilhelm Tell - Title: William Tell • Johann Christoph Friedrich von Schiller
... vandal; felon, (convicted criminal); criminal; convict, prisoner, inmate, jail bird, ticket of leave man; multiple offender. blackguard, polisson^, loafer, sneak; rapscallion, rascallion^; cullion^, mean wretch, varlet, kern^, ame-de-boue [Fr.], drole^; cur, dog, hound^, whelp^, mongrel^; lown^, loon, runnion^, outcast, vagabond; rogue &c (knave) 941; ronian^; scum of the earth, riffraff; Arcades ambo^. Int. sirrah!^, Phr. Acherontis ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... you obstruct the King's highroad, You saucy varlet, get out of my way." Then he gave the fool a cut with his whip And leaving ...
— A Dome of Many-Coloured Glass • Amy Lowell
... a mile further to see his sweetheart. The desire to pay a visit to his Bonnie Jean was the sole cause of his gibes at the poet. Back he came in an hour, chanting merrily, and we drove to Bruar. I found the varlet had lied most expansively: the Falls are gloriously fine, and worth walking a good many miles to see. On the homeward road, I could see he was ill at ease: he was dreadfully afraid that his amorous flight would be discovered by his master. He said to me once every minute, ...
— Literary Tours in The Highlands and Islands of Scotland • Daniel Turner Holmes
... .44 Magnum Colt didn't seem as romantic as a sword. Malone pictured himself saying: "Take that, varlet." Was varlet what you called them? he wondered. Maybe ...
— That Sweet Little Old Lady • Gordon Randall Garrett (AKA Mark Phillips)
... one of the postman bringing loads and loads of parcels. You have all Christmas in those four pictures. But there is room for another page—let it be a coloured page, of half a dozen sketches, the period and the lettering very early English. "Ye Baron de Marchebankes calleth for hys varlet." "Ye varlet cometh righte hastilie—-" You know ...
— Not that it Matters • A. A. Milne
... Ay, thou varlet! Laugh away! All the world's a holiday! Laugh away, and roar and shout Till thy hoarse tongue lolleth out! Bloat thy cheeks, and bulge thine eyes Unto bursting; pelt thy thighs With thy swollen palms, ...
— Afterwhiles • James Whitcomb Riley
... perpetrator, perp [coll.]; disorderly person, misdemeanant[Law]; outlaw; scofflaw; vandal; felon[convicted criminal]; convict, prisoner, inmate, jail bird, ticket of leave man; multiple offender. blackguard, polisson[obs3], loafer, sneak; rapscallion, rascallion[obs3]; cullion[obs3], mean wretch, varlet, kern[obs3], ame-de- boue[Fr], drole[obs3]; cur, dog, hound|!, whelp|!, mongrel|!; lown|!, loon, runnion[obs3], outcast, vagabond; rogue &c. (knave) 941; ronian[obs3]; scum of the earth, riffraff; Arcades ambo[obs3]. ...
— Roget's Thesaurus • Peter Mark Roget
... for a saucy varlet, and turned him out of the room at once, saying to me when he had gone, 'that the fool didn't know what was the meaning of a hundred-pound bill, which was in the pocket-book ...
— Barry Lyndon • William Makepeace Thackeray
... was at last overthrown, and another was gained by a bold "varlet," named Bogis, who was lifted on the shoulders of his comrades, till he could climb in at an undefended window, where he drew up sixty more with ropes. They burnt down the doors, and entered the ...
— Cameos from English History, from Rollo to Edward II • Charlotte Mary Yonge
... Peter. Inconsiderate and barbarous varlet as thou art, dost thou recite this ill accident to a father! and to one who has not dined! Bring ...
— Imaginary Conversations and Poems - A Selection • Walter Savage Landor
... destination, I might not now be scribbling these pages. As it turned out, this poor injured rough was placed hors de combat, and was afterwards conveyed to the hospital, and I only had to tackle his friend, a stubborn varlet, who, after knocking me about a good deal and also receiving some rough treatment at my hands, ran away. He was "wanted" by the police for some time, but was ...
— Broad-Sword and Single-Stick • R. G. Allanson-Winn
... him laugh, and he scoffed at the people and called them cowards and old women. Then he turned and saw the tight-rope, and said foolish people were daily wasting their money to see a clumsy and ignorant varlet degrade that beautiful art; now they should see the work of a master. With that he made a spring into the air and lit firm on his feet on the rope. Then he hopped the whole length of it back and forth on one foot, with his hands ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... leudnesse, as by the wicked behauiour of outlandish mariners, often times doe leade a badde and dishonest life) notwithstanding we are in this place more manifestly wronged through the knauery of this one varlet, and desperate sycophant by his defaming of the whole nation (as others also vsually do) then that it should neede any refutation at all. Of which thing strangers themselues, who are not a little conuersant in our Iland, may be most ...
— The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques and Discoveries - of the English Nation, v. 1, Northern Europe • Richard Hakluyt
... moral power of this solitary work lies in the fact that it is a series of terrific and fascinating tableaux, embodying the idea of inflexible poetic justice impartially administered upon king and varlet, pope and beggar, oppressor and victim, projected amidst the unalterable necessities of eternity, and moving athwart the lurid abyss and the azure cope with an intense distinctness that sears the gazer's eyeballs. The Divina Commedia, with a wonderful truth, also reflects ...
— The Destiny of the Soul - A Critical History of the Doctrine of a Future Life • William Rounseville Alger
... sought, whereupon she drew him aside and said to him, 'Sir, an it please you, a gentlewoman of this city would fain speak with you.' Andreuccio, hearing this, considered himself from head to foot and himseeming he was a handsome varlet of his person, he concluded (as if there were no other well-looking young fellow to be found in Naples,) that the lady in question must have fallen in love with him. Accordingly, he answered without further deliberation that he was ready and asked the girl when and where the lady would speak with ...
— The Decameron of Giovanni Boccaccio • Giovanni Boccaccio
... but so radical was the transformation of him that, as the distance from his harrowing overlord increased, the playwright beheld another kind of creature. In place of the placative, middle-aged varlet, troubled and hurrying to serve, there stepped out of the elevator, at the street level, a deep-chested, assertive, manly adventurer, about thirty, kindly eyed, picturesque, and careless. The green hat belonged to ...
— Harlequin and Columbine • Booth Tarkington
... holdin' out on us!" hissed Jean Lafitte, as I approached. "Time and again I seen the varlet make false moves. Let him have a care! The eye of Jean Lafitte is ...
— The Lady and the Pirate - Being the Plain Tale of a Diligent Pirate and a Fair Captive • Emerson Hough
... faith," said Robin, "thou art a right saucy varlet, sirrah; yet I will stoop to thee as I never stooped to man before. Good Stutely, cut thou a fair white piece of bark four fingers in breadth, and set it fourscore yards distant on yonder oak. Now, stranger, hit that fairly with a gray goose shaft and call ...
— The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood • Howard Pyle
... seemed as if the little varlet mocked at me as he flew by in full song, and sought to taunt me with his happier lot. Oh, how I envied him! No lessons, no task, no school; nothing but holiday, frolic, green fields, and fine weather. Had I been then more versed in ...
— McGuffey's Fifth Eclectic Reader • William Holmes McGuffey
... vacation he lies imbogued behind the lattice of some blind drunken, bawdy ale-house, and if he spy his prey, out he leaps like a freebooter, and rifles, or like a ban-dog worries. No officer to the city keeps his oath so uprightly; he never is forsworn, for he swears to be true varlet to the city, and he continues so to his dying day. Mace, which is so comfortable to the stomach in all kind of meats, turns in his hand to mortal poison. This raven pecks not out men's eyes as others ...
— Character Writings of the 17th Century • Various
... Hausmaerchen, vol. I. p. 29. In the notes to this story, vol. III. p. 15, Grimm says, "In Pomerania this is told of a child who when his mother had gone out was swallowed by the child-spectre, resembling the varlet Ruprecht. But the stones which he swallows with the child make the spectre so heavy that he falls to the earth, and the child unhurt springs out of him." See, too, the demons at p. 99 of these stories, who swallow the Princess ...
— Indian Fairy Tales • Anonymous
... ribands, lace, embroidery, scarlet, Are things immortal to immortal man, As purple to the Babylonian harlot;[hy] An uniform to boys is like a fan To women; there is scarce a crimson varlet But deems himself the first in Glory's van. But Glory's glory; and if you would find What that is—ask the pig ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 6 • Lord Byron
... with the young man for his courage and loyalty to others. "Fair youth," said he, "ye shall go with me to Camelot, and if ye prove you brave and just in all your doings, ye shall be of my Round Table." But to Sir Damas he said sternly: "Ye are a mean-spirited varlet, unworthy of the degree of knighthood. Here I ordain that ye shall yield unto your brother the moiety of the lands that ye had of your father and, in payment for it, yearly ye shall receive of Sir Ontzlake a palfrey; for that will befit you better to ride than the ...
— Stories from Le Morte D'Arthur and the Mabinogion • Beatrice Clay
... Hast thou not heard that vintage of the vine Since Caesar hath th' imperial crown assumed Is now become the only proper draught For those who in his favor high would stand? Hence "grape juice" bring, and speed thee, or the back Shall feel the stripes thy varlet hide demands. Muchacho: I beg, Senor, my feeble speech be heard: Methought that "grape juice" were a childish pap, But I will bring it and an orangeade, Thus heaping honors on two noble men. (Exit muchacho) Quezox: But thought hath strayed like an unbridled steed, And I must harness it ...
— 'A Comedy of Errors' in Seven Acts • Spokeshave (AKA Old Fogy)
... seven are not all alive?' 'Yea, yea, thou trifling varlet, Though here we number only five,— Two ...
— Blue Bonnet's Ranch Party • C. E. Jacobs
... bloody news! cried a newsman; The Devil said, Stop, let me see! Great news? bloody news? thought the Devil, The bloodier the better for me. So he bought the newspaper, and no news At all for his money he had. Lying varlet, thought he, thus to take in old Nick! But it's some satisfaction, my lad, To know thou art paid beforehand for the trick, For the sixpence ...
— The Book of Humorous Verse • Various
... harlot, Who put me to death; My father, the varlet, Who eaten me hath! Little sister, so good, Laid my bones in the wood, In the damp moss and clay: Then was I a beautiful bird o' the wood; Fly away! ...
— Faust • Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe
... thou object of my first love! thou shalt not escape an invocation, although perchance at this very moment some varlet sonnetteer is prating of "the boy Endymion" and "thy silver bow." Here to thee, Queen of the Night! in whatever name thou most delightest! Or Bendis, as they hailed thee in rugged Thrace; or Bubastis, ...
— Vivian Grey • The Earl of Beaconsfield
... Lorimer in a tremendous passion, "what says the varlet? He is a heathen Turk, and no Christian. How dares he talk so of the church?" The old man rose as he spoke, and, suddenly catching hold of the enormous ebony walking-stick, which generally reposed at the side of his chair, he aimed a blow with all his force at the ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. 341, March, 1844, Vol. 55 • Various
... wimple and displayed her face: "Sir, may God bless the best of kings! I come to implore a boon, which it shall cost you nothing to grant." "Damsel, even it should cost me dear, you should not be refused; what is it you would have me do?" "Sir, dub this varlet a knight, and array him in the arms he bringeth, whenever he desireth." "Your mercy, damsel! to bring me such a youth! Assuredly, I will dub him whenever he will; but it shameth me to abandon my custom, for 'tis my wont to furnish ...
— Tales of the Enchanted Islands of the Atlantic • Thomas Wentworth Higginson
... secret closet. But if it have, it is my kinsman's. To break into that wall, would be to break into his breast. And that wall-breaking wish of Momus I account the wish of a churchrobbing gossip and knave. Yes, wife, a vile eavesdropping varlet ...
— I and My Chimney • Herman Melville
... and good men to serve him, only because he has a great heap of that metal; and that if, by some accident or trick of law (which sometimes produces as great changes as chance itself), all this wealth should pass from the master to the meanest varlet of his whole family, he himself would very soon become one of his servants, as if he were a thing that belonged to his wealth, and so was bound to follow ...
— Revolution and Other Essays • Jack London
... it, at 'er aige—and me always givin' the old rip to know as it was no use 'is 'angin' round where I was—as if I'd marry agyne, and me a widda, as you might sye, from my crydle—and if I did, it wouldn't 'a been a wicked old varlet what I always suspected 'e was leadin' a double life—and now to see them two fyces together—why, I says, 'ere's the explanytion as plyne as ...
— The Dust Flower • Basil King
... sharp words on the spoil of a Navarrese village. My present leader, Sir William Felton, is as free and easy as d'Albret, or Aymerigot Marcel himself. And is not yon ungainly varlet the hope of some ...
— The Lances of Lynwood • Charlotte M. Yonge
... De Carteret of St. Ouen's out of his stockings over this," answered Lempriere. "Trust me for knowing weights and measures! Look you, varlet, thy sins be forgiven thee. I care not about the fleeces, if there be no more stealing. St. Ouen's has no head—I said no one man in Jersey could have done it—I'm heavier by three stone than any man in the island." Thereafter ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... protection he enjoyed from the sovereign, that any of the courtiers resented his remarks; but Sir Thomas Wyat's feelings being now deeply interested, he turned sharply round, and said, "How now, thou meddling varlet, what business hast thou ...
— Windsor Castle • William Harrison Ainsworth
... Gloucester, and he took them to his mercy. My Lord and father said the Lord King looked calmly on them, and gave them the kiss of peace. But my fair father himself was so much struck by the manner in which our Lord had repaid him his good deeds, that, as his varlet Adam told us, he clasped his hands, and looked up to Heaven, and he said,—'O Jesus, crucified Saviour, I once when sleeping saw Thee on the cross, pierced with bloody wounds, and on the following day, according to Thy warning, I spared Thy image and worshipped it: and now ...
— Earl Hubert's Daughter - The Polishing of the Pearl - A Tale of the 13th Century • Emily Sarah Holt
... Merry trick played by the varlet of an apothecary at Alencon on the Lord de la Tireliere and the lawyer Anthony Bachere, who, thinking to breakfast at his expense, find that they have stolen from him something very different to a ...
— The Tales Of The Heptameron, Vol. V. (of V.) • Margaret, Queen Of Navarre
... I'll plug my ears, for one," said still another sulky varlet, with the toes out of his sea-boots, while all the rest with one roar of ...
— Israel Potter • Herman Melville
... Admiral cried. "Citizeness, ponder your treatment by this varlet, who has deceived you, besmirched your life, and contaminated your hand. Another career is yours; ...
— The False Chevalier - or, The Lifeguard of Marie Antoinette • William Douw Lighthall
... and Varlet Vinegar is what Kit there calls them," said Stephen, looking up from the work he was carrying on over a pan of ...
— The Armourer's Prentices • Charlotte M. Yonge
... inhabitants, there was no getting him to utter an ill-natured word concerning us. His whole conversation and deportment illustrated old Isaac's maxims as to the benign influence of angling over the human heart.... I ought to mention that he had two companions—one, a ragged, picturesque varlet, that had all the air of a veteran poacher, and I warrant would find any fish-pond in the neighborhood in the darkest night; the other was a disciple of the old philosopher, studying the art under him, and was son and heir apparent to the ...
— Washington Irving • Charles Dudley Warner
... "this is the burgher-bred, burgher-fed varlet, that calls himself of Adlerstein! Boy, thou had best be warned. Wert thou true-blooded, it were worth my while to maintain my rights against thee. Craven as thou art, not even with spirit to accept my feud, I would fain not have the trouble of ...
— The Dove in the Eagle's Nest • Charlotte M. Yonge
... impudint, ye varlet. As if Teddy McFadden would let go hook and line, bob and sinker, whin he had got hold of a sturgeon. Be aisy now; I'll squaze the gizzard and liver iv ye togither, ...
— The Lost Trail - I • Edward S. Ellis
... was pulled down, and from a recess behind it, in which had formerly stood a clock, they hauled forth a round-shouldered, black-bearded varlet, with a knife as long as my arm, but trembling all ...
— Tales of a Traveller • Washington Irving
... "I am no traitor to my lord! I am his man, blood and body, and his will is my law and his faith is my faith. I have served him loyally, and so shall I continue to serve. What is this you would have me do? Turn rascal, even as you? Holy gods, I'll show you, knave and varlet—" ...
— Nicanor - Teller of Tales - A Story of Roman Britain • C. Bryson Taylor
... the inn-keeper, up before the magistrate and fined for selling liquor in opposition to law. He proclaimed it highly immoral to sell liquor at all, and told Bright to his teeth that no honest man would do it. For this he had been twice kicked out of the inn by Bright, who damned him as a meddling varlet, not to be tolerated in a peaceable village. Again he had Bright up before the magistrate, who justified the aggression, but fined the aggressor ten dollars a kick, which Bright considered cheap enough considering ...
— The Von Toodleburgs - Or, The History of a Very Distinguished Family • F. Colburn Adams
... medicines to make me love him, I'll be hang'd; it could not be else: I have drunk medicines.— Pointz!—Hal!—a plague upon you both!—Bardolph!—Peto!—I'll starve, ere I'll rob a foot further. An 'twere not as good a deed as drink, to turn true man, and to leave these rogues, I am the veriest varlet that ever chewed with a tooth. Eight yards of uneven ground is threescore and ten miles a-foot with me; and the stony-hearted villains know it well enough: a plague upon't, when thieves cannot be true one to another! [They whistle.] ...
— King Henry IV, The First Part • William Shakespeare [Hudson edition]
... foul play And mischief in the market. Preaching varlet! I'll find him out—I'll dog ...
— The Works of Christopher Marlowe, Vol. 3 (of 3) • Christopher Marlowe
... Hilarius walked delicately and strove to shut eyes and ears to the sights and sounds of sin. He delivered the purse, only to hear mine host curse roundly because it was lighter than the reckoning; and after being hustled and jeered at for a milk-faced varlet by the men who stood drinking, he sought with scarlet cheeks for ...
— The Gathering of Brother Hilarius • Michael Fairless
... shrieked Sir Godfrey, and uttered much more horrible language entirely unfit for general use. "What the Jeofailes does the varlet mean by threatening an Englishman in his own house? I should like to know who lives here? I should like to know ...
— The Dragon of Wantley - His Tale • Owen Wister
... his cheeks, and feeling that his host was finally awake to the seriousness of the situation, he cried out once more: "My horse stands outside by the post. He has been hard ridden, for I have come on an important mission. Varlet, go out and wash his mouth, dry him down, and don't give him water until he has cooled off. Are you finally awake, ...
— The Ghost Breaker - A Novel Based Upon the Play • Charles Goddard
... me in the village, on the Cob, on the links, and pass by as if I were the Invisible Man. And why? Because of the reptile, Hawk. The worm, Hawk. The dastard and varlet, Hawk. ...
— Love Among the Chickens • P. G. Wodehouse
... hold the very presence of Christ's body and blood to be in the sacrament of the altar?' To whom I—'My Lord, I do believe verily, as Christ hath said, that where two or three be gathered together in His name, there is He in the midst of them.'—'Ho, thou crafty varlet!' quoth he, 'wouldst turn the corner after that manner? By Saint Mary her kirtle, but it shall not serve thy turn. Tell me now, thou pestilent companion; when the priest layeth the bread and wine upon ...
— Robin Tremain - A Story of the Marian Persecution • Emily Sarah Holt
... frowns before me Lies one whom blinded love, not guilt, brought low! Thou lingerest, in hope to grow bolder! Thou fearest again to behold her! On! Thy shrinking slowly hastens the blow! [He grasps the key. Singing from within.] My mother, the harlot, That strung me up! My father, the varlet, That ate me up! My sister small, She gathered up all The bones that day, And in a cool place did lay; Then I woke, a sweet bird, at a magic ...
— Faust • Goethe
... be lewdly given, he deceiveth me; for, Harry, I see virtue in his looks. If then the fruit may be known by the tree, as the tree by the fruit, then peremptorily I speak it, there is virtue in that Falstaff: him keep with, the rest banish. And tell me now, thou naughty varlet, tell me, where hast ...
— Hazlitt on English Literature - An Introduction to the Appreciation of Literature • Jacob Zeitlin
... Francis, smiling, "thou art a pert varlet. I will do my best on Sunday to turn you to a ...
— Winning His Spurs - A Tale of the Crusades • George Alfred Henty
... to tell of Huon's adventures after he had left the island. At one time he took service with a minstrel and was his varlet. At another time he was forced to play chess for the hand of a king's daughter, but refused to marry her when he had won the game. Unknowingly, he once fought with Gerames, and only found out who he was in the course of the battle. He afterwards entered the city with him, and visited Esclaramonde, ...
— The Red Romance Book • Various
... Lord how I lov'd this woman, how I worshipt this prettie calf with the white face here: as I live, you were the prettiest fool to play withall, the wittiest little varlet, it would talk: Lord how it talk't! and when I angred it, it would cry out, and scratch, and eat no meat, and it would say, ...
— The Scornful Lady • Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher
... which he had a right to do, and the house must not on any account be molested. While the parley was in progress, old Doctor Cooper himself appeared at one of the upper windows and excitedly cautioned the crowd not to listen to that blatant young rapscallion Hamilton, as he was a rogue and a varlet and a vagrom. The good Doctor then slammed the window and escaped ...
— Little Journeys To the Homes of the Great, Volume 3 (of 14) • Elbert Hubbard
... vindictive Storri in an exultant crow, "did you little people believe you were to laugh at Storri and pass unpunished? Did you think to insult him and escape his vengeance? Bah! the super-fine Dorothy is to spurn Storri for a varlet like this Storms! She is to laugh at Storri's love, and tell how she refused a nobleman! Excellent; we shall see her laugh when her father—Mr. Harley—Mr. John Harley—the great Mr. John Harley—brother-by-law of the still greater ...
— The President - A novel • Alfred Henry Lewis
... next day the door-bell of the castle rang, and soon a varlet came to fast inform my lord the dwarf that in the parlor waited now a giant, and on the card he gave his name was written, "S.T. Mate." The dwarf unto his parlor quick repaired, and there, upon some dozen chairs the giant ...
— Punchinello, Vol. 1, No. 2, April 9, 1870 • Various
... prince and stalwart Hebrew!" cried the jovial chief in a loud voice, "I began to fear that you had got lost—as folk seem prone to do in this region—or had forgotten all about us! Come in and sit ye down. Ho! varlet, set down the victuals. After all, you are just in the nick of time. Well, Beniah, what think you of our search to-day? Has it been close? Is it likely that we have missed any of the caves or cliffs where ...
— The Hot Swamp • R.M. Ballantyne
... apparently clever too, whether she had a gift or no, this was an annoying, disconcerting fact. The white, puffy mother, with the high forehead, in the corner there, looked more like a lady; but if she were one, it was all the more shame to her to have mated with such a varlet, Ransom said to himself, making use, as he did generally, of terms of opprobrium extracted from the older English literature. He had seen Tarrant, or his equivalent, often before; he had "whipped" him, as he believed, controversially, ...
— The Bostonians, Vol. I (of II) • Henry James
... handfuls of guineas from credulous patients for what Mother Nature willingly gives gratis. And he was beginning to understand the joys of "loafing,"—so much so indeed that he felt a certain sympathy with the lazy varlet who prefers to stroll aimlessly about the country begging his bread rather than do a stroke of honest work. The freedom of such a life is self-evident,—and freedom is the broadest and best way of breathing on earth. To "tramp the road" ...
— The Treasure of Heaven - A Romance of Riches • Marie Corelli
... all names in this article are entirely fictitious) made our village. It was drizzling at the time, and the Field Officer in charge was getting most of it in the neck. He howled for his batman, and told the varlet that if there wasn't a drizzle-proof bivouac ready to enfold him by the time he had put the ponies to bye-byes there would be no leave for ten years. The batman scratched his head, then slid softly away into ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 153, Sept. 5, 1917 • Various
... he was leaving the front door his favourite hound mistook him for a tramp—or a varlet, or a scurvy knave, or whatever they used to call them at that time—and bit him in the ...
— Indiscretions of Archie • P. G. Wodehouse
... a rescue! A way, inhuman varlet. Come, come, I never relish above one jest at most; do not disgust me, Sirrah; do not, rogue! I tell thee, ...
— The Poetaster - Or, His Arraignment • Ben Jonson
... being willing to be entreated, we tippled and chopined together most theologically. In the meantime came Cyrus to beg one farthing of him for the honour of Mercury, therewith to buy a few onions for his supper. No, no, said Epictetus, I do not use in my almsgiving to bestow farthings. Hold, thou varlet, there's a crown for thee; be an honest man. Cyrus was exceeding glad to have met with such a booty; but the other poor rogues, the kings that are there below, as Alexander, Darius, and others, stole it away from him ...
— Gargantua and Pantagruel, Complete. • Francois Rabelais
... hastily, "the varlet, when I asked whose lodging it should be, answered, mine! holding forth his long skinny paw that I might ...
— Traditions of Lancashire, Volume 2 (of 2) • John Roby
... Arriving in a town one day, He on his string began to play; And mounted on a brandy cask With noisy speech went through his task. The barrel on whose head he stood At length gave vent in warmth of blood: "Ungracious varlet—stay thy hand: "What! run down those on whom you stand?" Then, utterance-choked, he tumbled o'er, Casting the speaker on the floor. And as he rolled along the street— "Let me consistent teachers ...
— The Death of Saul and other Eisteddfod Prize Poems and Miscellaneous Verses • J. C. Manning
... wonder, whither this varlet can possibly have betaken himself to any distance from here; unless perhaps he has returned home ...
— The Comedies of Terence - Literally Translated into English Prose, with Notes • Publius Terentius Afer, (AKA) Terence
... trivial but really important, which comes from the naming of the personages. Both in the earlier fabliaux and in these Nouvelles themselves, by far the larger number of the actors are simply called by class-names—a "knight," a "damsel," a "merchant and his wife," a "priest," a "varlet." It may seem childish to allow the mere addition of a couple of names like Gerard and Katherine to make this difference of interest, but the fact is that there is a good deal of childishness in human nature, ...
— A History of the French Novel, Vol. 1 - From the Beginning to 1800 • George Saintsbury
... like master, like dog! But fetch the portmanteau, you Dutch varlet!" Entering the house, while the coachman drove the tired horses toward the barn. "There's something in it I want. Bring it here." As he passed into the library. "Yes; I put it in there, I am sure. Ah, here we have it!" And ...
— The Strollers • Frederic S. Isham
... A hart of the second year, which was in the same cover with the proper object of their pursuit, chanced to be unharboured first, and broke cover very near where the Lady Emma and her brother were stationed. An inexperienced varlet, who was nearer to them, instantly unloosed two tall greyhounds, who sprung after the fugitive with all the fleetness of the north wind. Gregory, restored a little to spirits by the enlivening scene around him, followed, encouraging the hounds with a ...
— Waverley, Or 'Tis Sixty Years Hence, Complete • Sir Walter Scott
... well as debauch, they had great sway with the multitude. If any one pretended to assert the innocence of the duchess, they interrupted him with a loud ha! ha! of derision. "A pretty story, truly," would they cry, "about a wolf and a dragon, and a young widow rescued in the dark by a sturdy varlet who dares not show his face in the daylight. You may tell that to those who do not know human nature, for our parts, we know the ...
— The Crayon Papers • Washington Irving
... their full equipments, a band of archers with their bows over their shoulders, and a long train of barefoot monks, who had been permitted to attend, set out from the abbey. Behind them came a varlet with a paper mitre on his head, and a lathen crosier in his hand, covered with a surcoat, on which was emblazoned, but torn and reversed, the arms of Paslew; argent, a fess between three mullets, sable, pierced of the field, a crescent for difference. After him came another varlet bearing ...
— The Lancashire Witches - A Romance of Pendle Forest • William Harrison Ainsworth
... For, as you all can plainly see, My hair is red as red can be— In fact it's fiery scarlet! And as my hair, my temper is; So if a page my hair should quiz, I waste no time, but straight pull his, And thrash the saucy varlet! So that is why the name I've got, And as, when I am waxing hot I frequently dismiss the lot, ...
— Christmas Entertainments • Alice Maude Kellogg
... one eye blue, and both are glazed and dull as the knobs on earthen tea-pot covers. His ears are round, and stick forward like a weasel's; his form is square and supple, and he stands more than perpendicular. Ready and sharp is he for a joke, cold and unfeeling in manner, and troublesome as the varlet blackbirds that sit on a tree and gabble and moot, while other ...
— Summerfield - or, Life on a Farm • Day Kellogg Lee
... but the next morning returned to the chapel in the forest. Mourning over the body of his lady-love, he was surprised to observe that the colour still remained in her cheeks and lips. Again and again he visited the chapel, and his wife, marvelling whither he went, bribed a varlet to discover the object of his repeated absences. The man watched Eliduc and saw him enter the chapel and mourn over the body of Guillardun, and, returning, acquainted his lady with what ...
— Legends & Romances of Brittany • Lewis Spence
... an occasion to cross himself and to do a few turns on a little rosary of amber beads, came and went in a kind of dazed mood while the storm was at its height. Just as a blow was struck among the hills which seemed to make the earth quiver to its centre, the varlet approached and modestly inquired if the "honorable society"—myself and chance companions—would visit that very afternoon the famous chapel in which the crown of Hungary lies buried. I glanced curiously at him, thinking that possibly the thunder had addled his brain. "Oh, ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, Vol. 22, August, 1878 • Various
... is with the Marquis. But in madness comes out truth; and that long hook-nosed body-varlet of his has ...
— Hereward, The Last of the English • Charles Kingsley
... how my brave Lord Innocent fell down dead (with grief, some say, or with being poisoned with the stinking breath of one Ill-Pause, as say others) at the hearing of his just lord and rightful prince, Shaddai, so abused by the mouth of so filthy a Diabolian as that varlet Ill-Pause was. The messenger further told, that after this Ill-Pause had made a short oration to the townsmen in behalf of Diabolus, his master; the simple town, believing that what was said was true, ...
— The Holy War • John Bunyan
... Antony!" Then recollecting herself, "two crowns! what, when mine costs but half! Thou presumptuous, lavish varlet—no, no, wench! what right hast thou to wear gowns finer than thy liege?—I'll teach you." Wherewith, erecting all her talons, and clawing frightfully with them in the air, the supposed Queen Bess leapt at the unfortunate maid of honour, ...
— Unknown to History - A Story of the Captivity of Mary of Scotland • Charlotte M. Yonge
... involved the slaying of my gaoler, a step which was, I confess, to me distasteful. I was getting on in life, and had grown tired of killing people. Yet, to mature deliberation, the life of a graceless varlet, void of all gentleness and with no bowels of compassion, and deaf to suggestions of bribery, appeared of ...
— Jurgen - A Comedy of Justice • James Branch Cabell
... comes Bailie Craigdallie at last, with that poor, creeping, cowardly creature the pottingar. They have brought two town officers with their partizans, to guard their fair persons, I suppose. If there is one thing I hate more than another, it is such a sneaking varlet as ...
— The Fair Maid of Perth • Sir Walter Scott
... effluvia. Aroint[T] thee, Comptroller and Accountant-General with all thy grisly crew! Thou art worse than the blind Fury with the abhorred shears; for thou slittest my thin-spun pay-wearing spectacles, thrice branded varlet! [There is a lily on my brow with anguish moist and fever-dew, and on my cheeks a fading rose fast withereth too, and for these emblems of woe thou shalt ...
— Twenty-One Days in India; and, the Teapot Series • George Robert Aberigh-Mackay
... Osmond? I deemed you carried a cooler brain than to miscall one who was true to Rollo's race before you or yon varlet were born!" said the ...
— The Little Duke - Richard the Fearless • Charlotte M. Yonge
... me." To Otun and Gebouin beckoned he, To Tybalt of Rheims, and Milo the count. "Guard the battle-field, vale, and mount— Leave the dead as ye see them lie; Watch, that nor lion nor beast come nigh, Nor on them varlet or squire lay hand; None shall touch them, 'tis my command, Till with God's good grace we return again." They answered lowly, in loving strain, "Great lord, fair sire, we will do your hest," And a thousand warriors ...
— The Harvard Classics, Volume 49, Epic and Saga - With Introductions And Notes • Various
... linn. Linn, a waterfall. Lint, flax. Lint-white, flax-colored. Lintwhite, the linnet. Lippen'd, trusted. Lippie, dim. of lip. Loan, a lane, Loanin, the private road leading to a farm. Lo'ed, loved. Lon'on, London. Loof (pl. looves), the palm of the hand. Loon, loun, lown, a fellow, a varlet. Loosome, lovable. Loot, let. Loove, love. Looves, v. loof. Losh, a minced oath. Lough, a pond, a lake. Loup, lowp, to leap. Low, lowe, a flame. Lowin, lowing, flaming, burning. Lown, v. loon. Lowp, v. loup. ...
— Poems And Songs Of Robert Burns • Robert Burns
... his gaberdine of scarlet And wrapped it round the aged varlet, Who clutched at the folds with a muttered curse, Quaking and ...
— Fairies and Fusiliers • Robert Graves
... Stated in a note to allude to Walpole. See also, first Dialogue, where Chatturton is called, "That varlet bright." The note to which passage is "'I am the veriest varlet that ever chew'd,' says Falstaff, in Henry IV. Part 1. Act. 2. Mr. Horace Walpole, now Lord Orford, did not, however, seem to think it necessary that this varlet Chatterton ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole, Volume 1 • Horace Walpole
... "Ye ride after ME, varlet," cried Norman of Torn, "an' lest ye should forget again so soon who be thy master, take that, as a reminder," and he struck the red giant full upon the mouth with his clenched fist—so that the fellow ...
— The Outlaw of Torn • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... 'of course! of course!' you villain? Demmy! I'll swear she took care of herself, you varlet; and if any man dares to hint otherwise, I'll ram his falsehood down his throat with the point of my walking stick and ...
— Hidden Hand • Emma Dorothy Eliza Nevitte Southworth
... to him. This may be true or merely rumour, but it is generally believed. Everyone is talking of the fight at the gate of St. Denis. Some say that it was forced open by order of the Duke of Burgundy, while others affirm that Caboche, and that mischievous varlet John de Troyes, went in great haste to the duke when they received the news, that he declared to them that he knew nothing whatever of the affair, and that whatever was done was certainly done without his orders. Most of my men have already left; it were better that they should go off one by one ...
— At Agincourt • G. A. Henty
... and strong, and they could see nothing. Still cautiously pursuing their way — cautiously because upon the opposite bank of the river they saw a large gathering of archers and footmen all belonging to the enemy — they lighted presently upon a peasant varlet cutting willow wands not far from the river's brink. The boys entered into talk with him, and Raymond's kindly questioning soon elicited the information that the man's name was Gobin Agace, that he was a poor man with little hope of being anything else all his days, and that he knew ...
— In the Days of Chivalry • Evelyn Everett-Green
... in distress, Thou'lt laugh and chuckle ne'er the less; Nor e'en with sympathy be smitten, Tho' all are sad but thee and kitten; Yet little varlet that thou art, Thou ...
— Poems, &c. (1790) • Joanna Baillie
... V.i.19 (119,3) Male-varlet] HANMER reads male-harlot, plausibly enough, except that it seems too plain to require the explanation ...
— Notes to Shakespeare, Volume III: The Tragedies • Samuel Johnson
... band shall go instantly to McIntyre's Academy and simply compel a conflict. Dunc went into his father's regiment and fell at Tel-el-Kebir, and there is one Seminary man at least who keeps the portraits of the two captains—Peter McGuffie, the Scot, the horsedealer's son, and a very vulgar varlet indeed, and Duncan Robertson, the Celt, a well-born man's son, and a gentleman himself from head to foot—in remembrance of a school which was rough and old-fashioned, where, indeed, softness and luxury were impossible, but where men were made who ...
— Young Barbarians • Ian Maclaren
... from over-feeding. Give him a dose of strong waters and capsicum," said the elder compassionately; and Standish with a grim smile remarked, "Truly the man hath been an apt scholar in the ways of civilization. He minds me of a varlet of mine own, whose colics I effectually cured after a while by mingling a certain drug with the strong waters he craved. 'T was better than a ...
— Standish of Standish - A story of the Pilgrims • Jane G. Austin
... Dick, "he is as young as I. 'Good boy' doth he call me? An I had known, I should have seen the varlet hanged ere I had told him. Well, if he goes through the fen, I may come up with him and ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 8 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... the honour of England and our brave General the Earle of Pembrooke! [Exeunt soldiers.] So I have discharg'd my selfe of these. Hot shot![121] now to my love. Some may say the tale of Venus loving Mars is a fable, but he that is a true soldier and a Gent. as Dick Bowyer is, & he do not love some varlet or other, zounds he is worse then a gaping Oyster without liquor. There's a pretty sweet fac't mother[122] that waits on the princesse that I have some mind to; but a whorson Architophel, a parasite, a rogue, one whose face looks worse then a Tailors cushen of old shreds ...
— A Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. III • Various
... appearing to think inquiry, in his case, unnecessary. While moving through the passage in stately silence, Nicklaus Wagner was occupied in securing the strings of a well filled purse, which he had just lightened of a small copper coin, to reward the varlet of the hostelry in which he had passed the night, and who had been obliged to follow him to the port to obtain even this scanty boon; and the Genevese was fain to believe that, in the urgency of this important concern, he had overlooked those forms which all were, ...
— The Headsman - The Abbaye des Vignerons • James Fenimore Cooper
... stones, he shouted in the Burgundian French he had learnt in his campaigns, to demand the cause of the attack. The stones ceased, and the head man of the village, a stout peasant, came forward and complained that the varlet, as he called Ringan, had been stealing the village geese on their pond, and when they were about to do justice on him, yonder man-at-arms had burst in, knocked down and hurt ...
— Two Penniless Princesses • Charlotte M. Yonge
... Alexandre, the military tribune of this quarter of Paris, in which he commanded a battalion, was to place himself at its head on the place, before daybreak, to concentrate the people, and then give them the impulse that should lead them to the quays and the Tuileries. Varlet, Gonchon, Ronsin, and Siret, the lieutenants of Santerre, who had been employed in this system of tactics since the first agitations of '89, were charged with the execution of similar manoeuvres in the faubourg St. Antoine. The streets of this quarter, full of manufactories and ...
— History of the Girondists, Volume I - Personal Memoirs of the Patriots of the French Revolution • Alphonse de Lamartine
... world that more rejoiced his heart than to hear the pleasant sound of war, and see the soldiers brandish forth their steeled weapons." Casting his eye more kindly, therefore, upon the sturdy Van Corlear, and finding him to be a jovial varlet, shrewd in his discourse, yet of great discretion and immeasurable wind, he straightway conceived a vast kindness for him, and discharging him from the troublesome duty of garrisoning, defending and alarming ...
— Little Masterpieces of American Wit and Humor - Volume I • Various
... unscared did the great fish float; Because men dreaded there to see The uncouth things of faerie; Nathless by some few fathers old These tales about the place were told That neither squire nor seneschal Or varlet came in bower or hall, Yet all things were in order due, Hangings of gold and red and blue, And tables with fair service set; Cups that had paid the Caesar's debt Could he have laid his hands on them; ...
— The Earthly Paradise - A Poem • William Morris
... to Lady Lake's; a circumstance that added considerable zest to the comedy. But I see it does not divert you so much as I expected, and therefore, to relieve your mind, I may tell you that the jealous varlet soon repented of his rash determination, and pursuing his mistress, whom Do Gondomar had considerately taken under his protection, prevailed upon her to give the amorous ambassador the slip, and return with him to her ...
— The Star-Chamber, Volume 1 - An Historical Romance • W. Harrison Ainsworth
... Giguet lost the two younger children, a son named Simon alone surviving. A Bonapartist and Liberal, the colonel was, during the Restoration, president of the committee at Arcis, where he came in touch with Grevin, Beauvisage and Varlet, notables of the same stamp. He abandoned active politics after his ideas triumphed, and, during the reign of Louis Philippe, he became a noted horticulturist, the creator of the famous Giguet rose. Nevertheless the colonel continued to be the god of his sister's very influential salon ...
— Repertory Of The Comedie Humaine, Complete, A — Z • Anatole Cerfberr and Jules Franois Christophe
... Lanternier, barber and varlet of the chamber, for delivering to a certain person for certain causes and for secret matters of which Monseigneur does not wish further declaration to be made, ...
— Charles the Bold - Last Duke Of Burgundy, 1433-1477 • Ruth Putnam
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