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More "Wit" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... seemed in very high spirits; she was full of anecdote and wit; she talked and laughed freely. Her companions noticed her unusual gayety; but they ascribed it to the exhilarating effects of her morning drive, and to the anticipations of her mask ball, which now formed the principal subject of ...
— Cruel As The Grave • Mrs. Emma D. E. N. Southworth
... Lover's wit was spontaneous, and bubbled over in his ordinary conversation with friends. An English lady friend, deeply interested in Ireland, once said to him—"I believe I was intended for an Irishwoman." Lover gallantly replied—"Cross over to Ireland and they will swear ...
— The Life Story of an Old Rebel • John Denvir
... eyes dwelt contemplatively on the girl before him. She was very slim and young, and plainly very nervous. There was no beauty about Ernestine Cardwell, only a certain wild grace peculiarly charming, and a quick wit that some people found too shrewd. When she laughed she was a child. Her laugh was irresistible, and there was magic in her smile, a baffling, elusive magic too transient to be defined. Very sudden and very fleeting ...
— The Swindler and Other Stories • Ethel M. Dell
... knows; but see here. Who planned this thing all out? Timothy. Who took that baby up in his own arms and fetched her out o' that den o' thieves? Timothy. Who stood all the resk of gittin' that innocent lamb out o' that sink of iniquity, and hed wit enough to bring her to a place where she could grow up respectable? Timothy. And do you ketch him say in' a word 'bout himself from fust to last? Not by no manner o' means. That ain't Timothy. And what doos the lovin' gen'rous, faithful little soul git? He gits his labor for his pains. ...
— Timothy's Quest - A Story for Anybody, Young or Old, Who Cares to Read It • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... things about men and marriage of which the recollection now, as an affianced woman, was very disturbing to her. However, she did not care. She did not understand how Simon Loggerheads had had the wit to perceive that she would be an ideal wife. And she did not care. She did not understand how, as a result of Simon Loggerheads falling in love with her, she had fallen in love with him. And she did not care. She did not care a fig for anything. She was in love ...
— The Matador of the Five Towns and Other Stories • Arnold Bennett
... been an acquaintance of my father, and no one who met him, bubbling over with animation and lively wit, could easily forget him. He had a full face and long, straight, dark hair hanging on his short neck, while intellect and kindness beamed from his twinkling eyes. When he tossed me up and laughed, I laughed too, and it seemed as if all Nature must ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... Audaine, to cite one instance only, had vented some particularly egregious speech that exquisite wife of his would merely smile, in a fond, half-musing way. She had twice her husband's wit, and was cognizant of the fact, beyond doubt; to any list of his faults and weaknesses you could have compiled she indubitably might have added a dozen items, familiar to herself alone: and with all this, it was clamant that she preferred Audaine to any ...
— Gallantry - Dizain des Fetes Galantes • James Branch Cabell
... the truth, there are few things impossible to me when I once set about them. Heaven has bestowed on me a fair enough share of genius for the making up of all those neat strokes of mother wit, for all those ingenious gallantries to which the ignorant and vulgar give the name of impostures; and I can boast, without vanity, that there have been very few men more skilful than I in expedients and intrigues, and who have acquired a greater reputation in the noble profession. ...
— The Impostures of Scapin • Moliere
... than she can possibly help." The reader must remember that forks were not used until the reign of Henry III. The author also cautions the ladies to be very careful not to drink to excess, observing that a lady loses talent, wit, beauty, and every charm, when she is elevated with wine; they are also recommended not ...
— How to Enjoy Paris in 1842 • F. Herve
... time that the worship aforesaid is to be performed in; which time the law of nature as such supposes, but the God of nature chooses. And this time as to the churches of the Gentiles, we have proved is not that time which was assigned to the Jews, to wit, THAT seventh day which was imposed upon them by the ministration of death; for, as we have shewed already, that ministration indeed is done away by a better and more glorious ministration, the ministration of the spirit; which ministration ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... house, and wanted to make me a slave; but I escaped, and traveled through the woods, and swam the rivers, till I came to my own country. He thought the Dyak had no eyes except in the jungle; he thought he had no ears except to listen to the bird of omen; he thought he had no wit except to grow rice; but the Dyak saw, and heard, and understood, that while his words were sweet, his heart was crooked, and that, whether they were men of the sea or Dyaks, he deceived them with fair sayings; he said ...
— The Expedition to Borneo of H.M.S. Dido - For the Suppression of Piracy • Henry Keppel
... must be prepared for slight variations in the form of the same key-syllable. Consider these words: wise, wiseacre, wisdom, wizard, witch, wit, unwitting, to wit, outwit, twit, witticism, witness, evidence, providence, invidious, advice, vision, visit, vista, visage, visualize, envisage, invisible, vis-a-vis, visor, revise, supervise, improvise, proviso, provision, view, review, survey, vie, envy, clairvoyance. ...
— The Century Vocabulary Builder • Creever & Bachelor
... like days had passed it seemed from the interest and friendliness of these women that he might have lived long among them. He was possessed of wit and eloquence and information, which he freely gave, and not with selfish motive. He liked these women; he liked to see the somber shade pass from their faces, to see them brighten. He had met the girl Mary at the spring and along the path, but he had not yet seen her face. He was ...
— The Rainbow Trail • Zane Grey
... putting his hands behind the tails of his frock-coat, stood smiling radiantly on the hearthrug. A wit much less alert than my irresponsible friend's would have instantly appreciated the fact that the real Simon Pure ...
— The Joyous Adventures of Aristide Pujol • William J. Locke
... gentle eccentricities seldom provoke laughter, but they are continually awakening the pleasantest smiles. Perhaps what he has seen of the world, its sins, its sorrows, its death-beds, its widows and orphans, has tamed his spirit and put a tenderness into his wit. I do not think I have ever encountered a man who so adorns his sacred profession. His pious, devout nature produces sermons just as naturally as my apple-trees produce apples. He is a tree that flowers every ...
— Dreamthorp - A Book of Essays Written in the Country • Alexander Smith
... octosyllabic couplet (which by this time had become the standing metre of France for everything but historical poems, and for some of these) with remarkable precision, lightness, and harmony. Moreover, the Owl and the Nightingale conduct their debate with plenty of mother-wit, expressed not unfrequently in proverbial form. Indeed proverbs, a favourite form of expression with Englishmen at all times, appear to have been specially in favour just then; and the "Proverbs of Alfred"[96] ...
— The Flourishing of Romance and the Rise of Allegory - (Periods of European Literature, vol. II) • George Saintsbury
... equal to anyone, let him be who he may." Of his musical talents he makes no mention whatever, though undoubtedly these, as well as his other social accomplishments, his handsome person, his winning address, his wit and eloquence, recommended him to the notice of the prince, by whom he was greatly beloved, and in whose service he remained for about seventeen years. It is not necessary, nor would it be possible here, to give a particular account of all the works in which ...
— Great Men and Famous Women, Vol. 8 (of 8) • Various
... his own body as in flying. One log will be used for many years, though not by the same drummer. It seems to be a sort of temple and held in great respect. The bird always approaches on foot, and leaves it in the same quiet manner, unless rudely disturbed. He is very cunning, though his wit is not profound. It is difficult to approach him by stealth; you will try many times before succeeding; but seem to pass by him in a great hurry, making all the noise possible, and with plumage furled he stands as immovable as a knot, allowing you ...
— Bird Stories from Burroughs - Sketches of Bird Life Taken from the Works of John Burroughs • John Burroughs
... the deadliest moments, the wit of the man is to the front. At the battle of Neuve Chapelle, at the beginning of March, a bomb-thrower, rushing through the village, came upon a cellar full of Germans in hiding. Putting his head in at the door, at the risk of his life he cried: 'How many of ...
— With The Immortal Seventh Division • E. J. Kennedy and the Lord Bishop of Winchester
... back an' forrad, in an' out, His elbow it gaas silting,(3) An' to an' fro, an' round about, The dancers they are lilting. Some dance wi' ease i' splendid style, Wi' tightly-fitting togs on, Whal others bump about all t' while, Like drainers wit their clogs on, Sae numb'd ...
— Yorkshire Dialect Poems • F.W. Moorman
... ever since historian writ, And ever since a bard could sing, Doth each exalt with all his wit The ...
— Ballads • William Makepeace Thackeray
... I never could see the wit of,' said Mrs. Gibson, who had come into the room after the conversation had begun; and did not understand what it was aiming at. Molly fidgeted; she wanted to go on with her questions and keep her father to definite and matter-of-fact answers, ...
— Wives and Daughters • Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
... gave they both started to their feet; she stood motionless for a second, horrified at this discovery, and then fled to her room; and when Julien, at his wit's end, called "Jeanne!" she was seized with an overmastering terror of seeing him, of hearing his voice, of listening to him explaining, lying, of meeting his gaze; and she darted toward the ...
— Une Vie, A Piece of String and Other Stories • Guy de Maupassant
... for neuralgia of the head and face on the right side. It is certainly remarkable that though the fanciful theory of choosing curative plants by their signatures has been long since exploded, yet doctors of to-day select several yellow medicines for treating biliary disorders—to wit, this greater Celandine with its ochreous juice; the Yellow Barberry; the Dandelion; [94] the Golden Seal (Hydrastis); the Marigold; Orange; Saffron; and Tomato. Animals poisoned by the greater Celandine have developed active and pernicious congestion of the lungs and liver. ...
— Herbal Simples Approved for Modern Uses of Cure • William Thomas Fernie
... were the "quarters," where "Uncle Remus" conducted a whole university of history and zooelogy and philosophy and ethics and laughter and tears. Down in the cabins at night the printer's boy would sit and drink in such stores of wit and wisdom as could not lie unexpressed in his facile mind, and the world is the richer for every moment he spent in that primitive, child-mind community, with its ancient traditions that made it one with the ...
— Literary Hearthstones of Dixie • La Salle Corbell Pickett
... under a clouded countenance, put on to deceive spectators into a notion of his philosophy who wears it; and what is worse, who wears it chiefly as a mark of distinction cheaply obtained; for neither science, wit, nor courage are now found necessary to form a man of fashion, or the ton, to which may be said as justly as ever Mr. Pope affirmed it ...
— Observations and Reflections Made in the Course of a Journey through France, Italy, and Germany, Vol. I • Hester Lynch Piozzi
... Collins had received from Bentley. But the comparison scarcely does justice either to Horsley or Priestley. From a purely intellectual point of view it would be a compliment to any man to compare him with 'Phileleutherus Lipsiensis,' but the brilliant wit and profound scholarship displayed in Bentley's remarks on Collins were tarnished by a scurrility and personality which, even artistically speaking, injured the merits of the work, and were quite unworthy of being addressed by one gentleman (not to say clergyman) to another. ...
— The English Church in the Eighteenth Century • Charles J. Abbey and John H. Overton
... these will be constrained by the others to return to their duty. What would, in my opinion, be very necessary, would be to prevail upon the zealous Catholics to change that belief which they are so anxious to have embraced by all the rest, to wit, that they of the religion are all damned. There are certainly, also, some ministers and other obtrusive spirits amongst the Huguenots who would fain persuade us of the same as regards Catholics; for my own part, I believe nothing of the kind; I hold it, on the contrary, as ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume V. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot
... review of the 'Vestiges of Creation' in the 'Edinburgh Review,' July, 1845.) though I find it far from popular with our scientific readers. I think some few passages savour of the dogmatism of the pulpit, rather than of the philosophy of the Professor's Chair; and some of the wit strikes me as only worthy of — in the 'Quarterly.' Nevertheless, it is a grand piece of argument against mutability of species, and I read it with fear and trembling, but was well pleased to find that I had not overlooked ...
— The Life and Letters of Charles Darwin, Volume I • Francis Darwin
... object of the entertainment was eating. The songs that were sung in Hungarian as well as German, the poems that were recited, the burlesques of actors and acting, the imitations that were inimitable, the take-off of table-tipping and of prominent musicians, the wit and constant flow of fun, as constant as the good-humor and free hospitality, the unconstrained ease of the whole evening, these things made the real supper which one remembers when the grosser meal has vanished, as all substantial ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... with all the forms it had acquired under Louis XIV.; dignity alone was wanting. As to gaiety, there was none. Versailles was not the place at which to seek for assemblies where French spirit and grace were displayed. The focus of wit and intelligence ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre
... idle, but go always round; Hast labored, but with purpose; hast become Laborious, persevering, serious, firm— For this thy track across the fretful foam Of vehement actions without scope or term, Call'd history, keeps a splendor, due to wit, Which saw one clue ...
— Marie Gourdon - A Romance of the Lower St. Lawrence • Maud Ogilvy
... distinction to be noted here, to-wit: a thing may be OUTSIDE of the usual pattern, rule, or type, in the sense of being INFERIOR TO or UNDER the ordinary standard, and in this case is known as "ABNORMAL," the latter term being employed ...
— Genuine Mediumship or The Invisible Powers • Bhakta Vishita
... possess beauty, but they are celebrated for discretion, modesty, and unfeigned diffidence, as well as wit, vivacity, and good nature. Whoever heard of a Philadelphia lady setting up for a reformer, or standing out for woman's rights, or assisting to man the election grounds, raise a regiment, command a legion, or address a jury? Our ladies glow with a higher ambition. They soar ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume I • Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and Matilda Joslyn Gage
... risen every morning at the chaste hour of seven, breakfasted hurriedly, tidied the tiny two-room apartment, and sat down in the unromantic morning light to wrestle with her stick of a hero. She had made her heroine a creature of grace, wit, and loveliness, but thus far the hero had not once clasped her to him fiercely, or pressed his lips to her hair, her eyes, her cheeks. Nay (as the story-writers would put it), he hadn't even devoured her ...
— Buttered Side Down • Edna Ferber
... to pause a few seconds now and then to chaff a facetious cabby, or make a politely sarcastic remark to a bobby. His connection with what he termed "'igh life" had softened him down considerably, and given a certain degree of polish to his wit, but it had in no ...
— My Doggie and I • R.M. Ballantyne
... refreshed, and left the Byingtons equally so. Her buoyancy had been as prettily restrained, her sympathies as sweet, her dimple as unconscious, her belief in everybody's wit and wisdom except her own as genuine, and her timid dissimulations as kindly meant and as transparent, as ever. Yet there was an unspoken compassion for her when she was gone, for in the parting words with which she ...
— Bylow Hill • George Washington Cable
... derivatives, the author wishes to call special attention: the Latin and the Greek roots are, as key-words, given in this book in the form of the present infinitive,—the present indicative and the supine being, of course, added. For this there is one sufficient justification, to wit: that the present infinitive is the form in which a Latin or a Greek root is always given in Webster and other received lexicographic authorities. It is a curious fact, that, in all the school etymologies, the present indicative ...
— New Word-Analysis - Or, School Etymology of English Derivative Words • William Swinton
... thought and so he said; and the satellites round his throne chimed in; for there is no place where a great man's word is echoed with more parrot-like precision than in a petty court. And no doubt they considered it a great stroke of wit, well worthy of applause, when Herod, before sending Him back to Pilate, cast over His shoulders a gorgeous robe—probably in imitation of the white robe worn at Rome by candidates for office. The suggestion was that Jesus was a candidate for the throne of the country, but ...
— The Trial and Death of Jesus Christ - A Devotional History of our Lord's Passion • James Stalker
... the latter rather carried the thing to excess, and seemed to make it a point to wallow in the miriest part of the sty, and otherwise to outdo the original swine in their own natural vocation. When men once turn to brutes, the trifle of man's wit that remains in them adds ...
— Tanglewood Tales • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... intolerable, had fled from her husband, had abandoned her vast wealth, and, after having astonished Rome and Piedmont by her adventures, had fixed her abode in England. Her house was the favourite resort of men of wit and pleasure, who, for the sake of her smiles and her table, endured her frequent fits of insolence and ill humour. Rochester and Godolphin sometimes forgot the cares of state in her company. Barillon and Saint ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 1 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... Christian, and who grew sick with the sight of the daily slaughter and outrage of my kin, strove to escape from you, although you had warned me that the price of this crime was death; and in the end, through the wit and sacrifice of another woman, I ...
— The Brethren • H. Rider Haggard
... man—help me in this great straight, and thou shalt find thou dost it for a thankful master;" with other sad expressions. Moore leaves the king in that passion, but assures him he will prove the utmost of his wit to serve his majesty—and was really rewarded with a suit worth ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 441 - Volume 17, New Series, June 12, 1852 • Various
... if in danger of fire, three pieces presently one after another; but if there be time between we will know by your second piece that you doubt that we do not hear your first piece, and therefore you shoot a second, to wit by night, and ...
— Fighting Instructions, 1530-1816 - Publications Of The Navy Records Society Vol. XXIX. • Julian S. Corbett
... whose wit and preeminent graces of style were especially devoted to the extirpation of almost every sort of popular folly of the day, could declare: 'When I hear the relations that are made from all parts of the ...
— The Superstitions of Witchcraft • Howard Williams
... interest of Hazel's case, to wit, that with proper discipline and the development of new interests her fabricating tendencies have been reduced to a minimum. She has made a wonderful improvement and has long been a self-supporting and self-respecting young woman with her own relation to the world realized ...
— Pathology of Lying, Etc. • William and Mary Healy
... la Comtesse," replied the lawyer, whose tact and wit failed him excepting in his chambers and in presence of ...
— Scenes from a Courtesan's Life • Honore de Balzac
... youth, possessed of wealth— Had manly beauty and the best of health; In learning he excelled—was quite a wit— And oft indulged in a deep musing fit. Of very warm and truly tender heart, He did his best to act a proper part; Which made him much respected all around— Against him, filled with envy, none were found. His widowed mother, then, might well be proud Of ...
— The Emigrant Mechanic and Other Tales In Verse - Together With Numerous Songs Upon Canadian Subjects • Thomas Cowherd
... sinfully. "I haven't time," says the farmer, the banker, the professor, with a kind of disdain for the spirit of life, when, as a matter of fact, he has all the time there is, all that anybody has—to wit, this moment, this great and golden moment!—but knows not how to employ it. He creeps when he might walk, walks when he might run, runs when he might fly—and lives like a woodchuck in the ...
— Great Possessions • David Grayson
... for a young lady to do, is it?" queried the gambler. "Havin' truck wit' my kind o' people. Me—I'll do anything, but ...
— The Long Chance • Peter B. Kyne
... choking and by stark terror, Lady had not the wit to realize what Lad was attempting. All she knew was that he had seized her roughly by the neck, and had leaped in air with her; and had then brought her bangingly down upon the torturing hot boards. And her panic was augmented by ...
— Further Adventures of Lad • Albert Payson Terhune
... made sensible of many more. Ratia, always devising delights for her, took her on the river, rode with her, set her dancing, opened the world to her, and enjoyed her pleasures, amused by her precocious vivacity, fostering her sauciness, extolling the wit of her audacious speeches, and extremely resenting all poor Honora's attempts to counteract this terrible spoiling, or to put a check upon undesirable diversions and absolute pertness. Every conscientious interference on her part was regarded as duenna-like harshness, and her restrictions ...
— Hopes and Fears - scenes from the life of a spinster • Charlotte M. Yonge
... had no originality, no wit, and Babbitt fell into a great silence and devoted himself to the game of beating trolley cars to the corner: a spurt, a tail-chase, nervous speeding between the huge yellow side of the trolley and the jagged row of parked motors, shooting past just as the trolley stopped—a ...
— Babbitt • Sinclair Lewis
... this stranger from Europe might have opinions quite opposed to Japanese conventions—but that there were very few adequately qualified suitors. Indeed, in the direct line of succession there was only young Mr. Fujinami Takeshi, the youth with the purple blotches, who had distinguished himself by his wit and his savoir vivre on the night of ...
— Kimono • John Paris
... standing by one of my empirical selves and relinquishing the rest. Not that I would not, if I could, be both handsome and fat, and well dressed, and a great athlete, and make a million a year; be a wit, a bon vivant, and a lady-killer, as well as a philosopher; a philanthropist, statesman, warrior, and African explorer, as well as a 'tone poet' and saint. But the thing is simply impossible. The millionaire's work would run counter ...
— The Mind and Its Education • George Herbert Betts
... too, and did not hoard the money, either; he loved his pipe and his pot too well; and at last he left off farming, and gave himself to them altogether. Many a jolly booze he and I have had, I can tell you. Brian was an awful passionate man, and, when the liquor was in, and the wit was out, as savage and as quarrelsome as a bear. At such times there was no one but Ned Layton dared go near him. We once had a pitched battle, in which I was conqueror; and ever arter he yielded a sort of sulky obedience to all I said to him. Arter being on the spree for a week or two, he ...
— Roughing it in the Bush • Susanna Moodie
... peerless Princess thou shalt be, Through wit of love's rare sorcery: To crown the crown of thy gold hair Thou shalt have rubies, bleeding there Their crimson splendor midst the marred Pulp of ...
— The Book of Joyous Children • James Whitcomb Riley
... knee-band and shoe- strap,—his scented handkerchief, and chapeau beneath his arm, even such a dainty figure need not have disdained to glance at these old yellow pages, while they were the mirror of passing times. For his amusement, there were essays of wit and humor, the light literature of the day, which, for breadth and license, might have proceeded from the pen of Fielding or Smollet; while, in other columns, he would delight his imagination with the enumerated items of all sorts of finery, and with the rival advertisements of half a dozen ...
— Old News - (From: "The Snow Image and Other Twice-Told Tales") • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... meeting and lost a number of friends because he shone at both ends but not in the middle. If he had taken a glittering coin or two from his vest-pocket on behalf of the noble working-men there assembled in great numbers and spirituous mood, they would have forgiven him his wit and patent-leather shoes—and so it went. Perkins was nightly hauled hither and yon by the man he called his "Hagenbeck," the manager of the wild animal he felt himself gradually degenerating into, and his wife and home and ...
— The Booming of Acre Hill - And Other Reminiscences of Urban and Suburban Life • John Kendrick Bangs
... continuing his career as the expounder of the Constitution in accordance with Federalist ideals; John Randolph, his old eccentricities increased by disease and intemperance, remained to proclaim the extreme doctrines of southern dissent and to impale his adversaries with javelins of flashing wit. A maker of phrases which stung and festered, he was still capable of influencing public opinion somewhat in the same way as are the cartoonists of modern times. But "his course through life had been like that of the arrow which Alcestes shot to heaven, ...
— Rise of the New West, 1819-1829 - Volume 14 in the series American Nation: A History • Frederick Jackson Turner
... Lord's duty, as Moses saw it, to punish them. And this Moses proposed that the Lord should do in a prompt and awful manner: the lesson being pointed by the immunity of Joshua and Caleb, the two spies who had had the wit to divine the will of Moses. Therefore, all ten of these men died of the plague while the congregation lay encamped at Kadesh, though Joshua ...
— The Emancipation of Massachusetts • Brooks Adams
... cloud dost bind us, That our worst foes cannot find us, And ill fortune, that would thwart us, Shoots at rovers, shooting at us; While each man, thro' thy height'ning steam, Does like a smoking Etna seem, And all about us does express (Fancy and wit in richest dress) A ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb IV - Poems and Plays • Charles and Mary Lamb
... was like a plucked eagle tarrying in the midst of a group of lesser birds. He would sweep the assembly with that searching glance, as much as to say, 'What is all this buzzing and chirping about?' Holmes was as brilliant and scintillating as ever; sparks of wit would greet every newcomer, flying out as the sparks fly from that log. Whittier was there, too, looking nervous and uneasy and very much out of his element. But he stood next to Emerson, prompting ...
— Our Friend John Burroughs • Clara Barrus
... at his wit's ends that he had no alternative but to take her hand and smilingly ask: "What's the matter with you, after all, that I've had to ask you something time ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book I • Cao Xueqin
... Patriot, a little newspaper published on a press traveling in a wagon with the Western army until a month since, when it had come over to the Army of Northern Virginia. The Patriot was "little" only in size. The wit, humour, terseness, spontaneous power of expression, and above all of phrase-making, which its youthful editor showed in its columns, already had made Raymond a power in the Confederacy, as they were destined in his maturity to win him fame in ...
— Before the Dawn - A Story of the Fall of Richmond • Joseph Alexander Altsheler
... wealth, when he had at that very time, in his little desk, poems for which the world has since paid millions of pounds. But the future is often unseen, even by those highest in learning and deepest in wit; and it is little wonder that the unsophisticated family were unable to know even the pecuniary value ...
— Great Men and Famous Women, Vol. 7 of 8 • Charles F. (Charles Francis) Horne
... Mercury was come To the quaint margin of his courtly sphere, And bid us eloquent welcome to his home. Scarce could we pass, so great a crowd was there Of points and lines; and nimble Wit beside Upon the back of thousand shapes ...
— Specimens with Memoirs of the Less-known British Poets, Complete • George Gilfillan
... his symbol was well or ill chosen. The particular customs might go. But to challenge the new claims of civil power at that moment was to save the Church. A movement was afoot which might have then everywhere accomplished what was only accomplished in parts of Europe four hundred years later, to wit, a dissolution of the unity and ...
— Europe and the Faith - "Sine auctoritate nulla vita" • Hilaire Belloc
... subject to diseases; which left unto themselves, are most free from any such encumbrances. An idle dog will be mangy, and how shall an idle person think to escape? Idleness of the mind is much worse than this of the body; wit without employment is a disease [1549]Aerugo animi, rubigo ingenii: the rust of the soul, [1550]a plague, a hell itself, Maximum animi nocumentum, Galen, calls it. [1551]"As in a standing pool, worms and filthy creepers increase, (et vitium capiunt ni moveantur aquae, the ...
— The Anatomy of Melancholy • Democritus Junior
... him deep in the eyes and stretched out her hand, which he seized in confusion and pressed. Suddenly he let it drop. The countess looked up in surprise, and following Wilhelm's gaze, she caught sight of the hotel wit and his lady coming along the deep pathway that ran round the foot of the wooded hill, on the slope of which they ...
— The Malady of the Century • Max Nordau
... .. < chapter xlix 15 THE HYENA > There are certain queer times and occasions in this strange mixed affair we call life when a man takes this whole universe for a vast practical joke, though the wit thereof he but dimly discerns, and more than suspects that the joke is at nobody's expense but his own. However, nothing dispirits, and nothing seems worth while disputing. He bolts down all events, all creeds, and beliefs, and persuasions, all hard things visible and ...
— Moby-Dick • Melville
... exhibited his tender-hearted gaiety. Even when he weeps, you see the ray of sunlight in his tears. Though simple as a child in ordinary life, he displayed in his writings the pathos and satire of the ancient Troubadours, with no small part of the shrewdness and wit attributed to persons ...
— Jasmin: Barber, Poet, Philanthropist • Samuel Smiles
... allied to pride, which often "goes before, destruction, and a haughty spirit before a fall." Praised by their companions as persons of distinguished genius, or admired for a natural wit, they sacrifice every thing to flattery. They have been stimulated to believe that the possession of religion is a decisive proof of intellectual inferiority; or at least, that a punctilious observance ...
— Female Scripture Biographies, Vol. I • Francis Augustus Cox
... aunt Lindsay would, as Phil vulgarly puts it, "smell a mice." So that had to be given up, and finally, after many and great struggles, with the help of the whole family, we would manage to write something that Miss Marston allowed us to send. On the principle that brevity is wit, some of these productions of ...
— We Ten - Or, The Story of the Roses • Lyda Farrington Kraus
... Dere one can get up to make a speech what ain' got no learnin en dey can just preach de finest kind of speech. Say dey ain' know one thing dey gwine say fore dey get up dere. Folks claim dem kind of people been bless wid plenty good mother wit. Den another time one dat have de learnin widout de mother wit can get up en seem like dey just don' know whe' to place de next word. Yes, mam, ...
— Slave Narratives Vol. XIV. South Carolina, Part 1 • Various
... historical material—the wars of Henry VIII. in French Flanders—into something premonitory (with a little kindness on the part of the premonished) of the great and long missed historical novel; still more for something else. Nash, with his quick wit, seems to have been really the first to perceive the capabilities of that foreign travel and observation of manners which was becoming common, stripped of the special atmosphere of pilgrimage which had formerly enveloped it. Even here, he had had the "notion of the notion" ...
— The English Novel • George Saintsbury
... has Patzenes laid his complaint upon us, to wit that while he was absent on the recent successful expedition[400] your wife Procula fell upon his wife [Regina], inflicted upon her three murderous blows, and finally left her for dead, the victim having only escaped by the supposed impossibility ...
— The Letters of Cassiodorus - Being A Condensed Translation Of The Variae Epistolae Of - Magnus Aurelius Cassiodorus Senator • Cassiodorus (AKA Magnus Aurelius Cassiodorus Senator)
... vaine labours of terrestriall wit, That buildes so stronglie on so frayle a soyle, As with each storme does fall away and flit, And gives the fruit of all your travailes toyle 515 To be the pray of Tyme, and Fortunes spoyle, I saw this towre fall sodainlie to dust, That nigh with griefe thereof ...
— The Poetical Works of Edmund Spenser, Volume 5 • Edmund Spenser
... manner in which diseases of the body arise; the disorders of the soul, which depend upon the body, originate as follows. We must acknowledge disease of the mind to be a want of intelligence; and of this there are two kinds; to wit, madness and ignorance. In whatever state a man experiences either of them, that state may be called disease; and excessive pains and pleasures are justly to be regarded as the greatest diseases to which the soul is liable. For a man who is in great joy or in great pain, in his unreasonable ...
— Timaeus • Plato
... one of those mortal combats between man's will and woman's wit. Winny meant to circumvent Ranny and to ...
— The Combined Maze • May Sinclair
... will consist of five great divisions, to wit: 1. A Colonial exhibition. 2. A General Export exhibition. 3. A Retrospective exhibition of Fine Arts and of Arts applied to the Industries. 4. Special exhibitions. 5. Lectures and ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 363, December 16, 1882 • Various
... of wit," said the Abbe Brigaud in that bantering tone, thanks to which it was impossible to know whether ...
— The Conspirators - The Chevalier d'Harmental • Alexandre Dumas (Pere)
... Golden Fish. The worst company in Verona, Excellency—the most brazen, the most case-hardened. But the story is the same from their mouths as from the lads'; not a detail is wanting; not one point gives the lie to another. Excellency, I would bow to your wit in any case but this. The affair is ...
— Little Novels of Italy • Maurice Henry Hewlett
... after a sacrifice. To this all from twenty years upward are admitted, and each one is asked separately to say what is wanting in the State, and which of the magistrates have discharged their duties rightly and which wrongly. Then after eight days all the magistrates assemble, to wit, Hoh first, and with him Power, Wisdom, and Love. Each one of the three last has three magistrates under him, making in all thirteen, and they consider the affairs of the arts pertaining to each one of them: ...
— The City of the Sun • Tommaso Campanells
... mimic of the woods! thou motley fool! Who shall thy gay buffoonery describe? Thine ever-ready notes of ridicule Pursue thy fellows still with jest and gibe. Wit—sophist—songster—Yorick of thy tribe, Thou sportive satirist of Nature's school, To thee the palm of scoffing we ascribe, Arch scoffer, and mad Abbot of Misrule! For such thou art by day—but all night long Thou pour'st a soft, sweet, pensive, solemn strain, As if thou didst in this, ...
— Birds and Poets • John Burroughs
... they never make me pay for it." "For all that," I answered, "take care you don't lose my umbrella: it cost three dollars." Since then, nothing can exceed Jose's attention to that article. He is at his wit's end how to secure it best. It appears sometimes before, sometimes behind him, lashed to the saddle with innumerable cords; now he sticks it into the alforja, now carries it in his hand, and I verily believe ...
— The Lands of the Saracen - Pictures of Palestine, Asia Minor, Sicily, and Spain • Bayard Taylor
... articles of faith. The only moderns who apostrophise love with any genuine success are those who smack their lips sensuously at his flesh and blood, because they are too blind to see the lovely soul that is enshrined therein, and they have too little wit to understand that soul and ...
— Doctor Claudius, A True Story • F. Marion Crawford
... see," answered Giovanni, accepting the means of escape Zorzi offered him. "You were paying me back in my own coin! Well, well! It served me right, after all. You have a ready wit." ...
— Marietta - A Maid of Venice • F. Marion Crawford
... innocent creature, who enjoys a fine flush of health, and cuckolds her husband with a simplicity that has infinitely more merit than the witty malice of the most experienced ladies. This play cannot indeed be called the school of good morals, but it is certainly the school of wit and true humour. ...
— Letters on England • Voltaire
... every face he saw, which he used to teach to certain friends of his, when they joined him over his coffee. These friends were all young enough to be his sons, and wise enough to be his fathers; but they were always glad to be with him, for he had so cheery a wit and so good a heart that neither his years nor his follies could make any one sad. His kind face beamed with smiles, when Pennellini, chief among the youngsters in his affections, appeared on the top ...
— A Fearful Responsibility and Other Stories • William D. Howells
... Sovereign, and tho' his Fortunes too depended upon the Court, being Captain of the Queen's Guards, yet so true to his Honour, that he scorn'd to sacrifice his Principle to his Interest; had too much Courage to be bully'd, and too much Honesty to be brib'd; too much Wit to be wheedl'd and too much Warmth to forbear telling it in the Teeth of those that try'd all those ways to bring him into ...
— Atalantis Major • Daniel Defoe
... shall vindicate the right. Crime shall be meted with its proper pain, Motes shall be taken from the doubter's sight, And fortune's general justice rendered plain. Of honest laughter there shall be no dearth, Wit shall shake hands with humor grave and sweet, Our wisdom shall not be too wise for mirth, Nor kindred follies want a fool to greet. As sometimes from the meanest spot of earth A sudden beauty unexpected starts, So you shall find some germs of hidden ...
— War Poetry of the South • Various
... How to get away with it! On what we'd get for that diamond, Tom and I—when his time is up—could live for all our lives and whoop it up besides. We could live in Paris, where great grafters live and grafting pays—where, if you've got wit and fifty thousand dollars, and happen to be a "darn sight prettier," you can just spin the world around ...
— In the Bishop's Carriage • Miriam Michelson
... station,—Canon of St. Asaph, Preacher at Lincoln's Inn, Select Preacher before the University. He was beloved by all ranks: by the poor for his boundless charity and sympathy; and by his equals, not only for these qualities, but for his sunny temper, bright wit, and playfulness, which showed in his conversation, his letters, and in many a droll, elegant, and scholarly jeu d'esprit, thrown off by a mind that could do nothing without gracefulness. All this prosperity was alloyed only by such domestic ...
— Pioneers and Founders - or, Recent Workers in the Mission field • Charlotte Mary Yonge
... been used as a medium of much amusing legal wit and humour, although law and law cases do not offer very easy subjects for turning into rhyme. But a good illustration is afforded by Mr. Justice Powis, who had a habit of repeating the phrase, "Look, do you see," and "I humbly conceive." At York Assize Court on ...
— Law and Laughter • George Alexander Morton
... It would supply a gaudy mess to the hungriest litter; but it would turn them from whelps into wolvets. 'T is pity to throw the best of thee away. Nothing comes out of thy mouth that is not savoury and solid, bating thy wit, thy sermons, ...
— Citation and Examination of William Shakspeare • Walter Savage Landor
... "a native of Florence, who passed for the finest wit of his time in Italy, met with a fate which punished his criminal love. Being professor of eloquence at Florence, he unhappily became enamoured of one of his young scholars who was of an illustrious family, but whom ...
— The Love Affairs of Great Musicians, Volume 1 • Rupert Hughes
... averse to trembling at the sight of the total. The tenth of November, you purchased a thimble: some men have skill enough to mend their clothes at their leisure moments. A few days ago I paid a visit to a charming literary man, who writes articles full of life and wit for the newspapers. I opened the door so suddenly, he blushed as he threw a pair of pantaloons into the corner. He had a thimble on his finger. Ah! wretched cits, who refuse to give your daughters in marriage to literary men, you would be full of admiration for them, could you see them ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 12, No. 74, December, 1863 • Various
... write to you once more, but, after that—I swear by all the saints—I am silent and supercilious. I have met Curran [1] at Holland House—he beats every body;—his imagination is beyond human, and his humour (it is difficult to define what is wit) perfect. Then he has fifty faces, and twice as many voices, when he mimics—I never met his equal. Now, were I a woman, and eke a virgin, that is the man I should make my ...
— The Works of Lord Byron: Letters and Journals, Volume 2. • Lord Byron
... Andrews, why your children do not make their appearance? I am sure you need not fear a repetition of the sarcastic rebuke of that wit who, when dining at a house where the children were noisy and unruly, lifted his glass, bowed to the troublesome little ones, and drank to the memory of King Herod. I am very certain 'the murder of the innocents' would never be recalled here, unless—forgive me, Miss Earl! but from the sparkle ...
— St. Elmo • Augusta J. Evans
... a favourite term with Chuang Tzu for the exercise of his wit. Light asked Nothing, saying: "Do you, sir, exist, or do you not exist?" But getting no answer to his question, Light set to work to watch for the appearance of Nothing. Hidden, vacuous—all day long he looked but ...
— The Civilization Of China • Herbert A. Giles
... wouldn't trust me, but Toby wasn't so perticular. He hid this here stockin' under a log, an' bein' afeared that the hogs might come along an' root it up an' carry it away, I jest thought I'd take keer on it for him," added Bud, laughing loudly at his own wit. ...
— True To His Colors • Harry Castlemon
... soon became the best story-teller among his companions; and even the slight training gained from his studies greatly broadened and strengthened the strong reasoning faculty with which he had been gifted by nature. His wit might be mischievous, but it was never malicious, and his nonsense was never intended to wound or to hurt the feelings. It is told of him that he added to his fund of jokes and stories humorous imitations of ...
— The Boys' Life of Abraham Lincoln • Helen Nicolay
... original libellers, but are, in fact, adopting the second-hand malignity of others. Such cases, with respect to libels that are quickened into popularity by interesting circumstances, or by a personal interest attached to any of the parties, or by wit, or by extraordinary malice, or by scenical circumstances, or by circumstances unusually ludicrous, are but too likely to occur; and, with every fresh repetition, the keenness of the original provocation is renewed, and in an accelerated ratio. Again, with reference to my ...
— The Uncollected Writings of Thomas de Quincey, Vol. 2 - With a Preface and Annotations by James Hogg • Thomas de Quincey
... that they should go into the committee without delay, and without accounts, in order to examine with great order and regularity things that could not possibly come before them. After this stroke of orderly and Parliamentary wit and humor, they went into the committee; and very ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. I. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... provided and its installation was directed by the 1st of January. This has entailed upon the Post Office Department a great deal of very heavy labor, but the Postmaster General informs me that on the date selected, to wit, the 1st of January, near at hand, the department will be in readiness to meet successfully the requirements ...
— State of the Union Addresses of William H. Taft • William H. Taft
... witty, or wise, or learned? Be frank. Is it not, honestly, a mere noise and interruption—a musical cackling of geese, and silvery braying of tiny asses? Well, say I, out of my large acquaintance, there are not many men to whom I would go for wisdom; learning is better found in books, and, as for wit, is it always pleasant? The most companionable men are not always the greatest intellects. They laugh, and though they don't converse, they make a cheerful noise, and show ...
— Wylder's Hand • J. Sheridan Le Fanu
... in Switzerland had been free from abuses not all the wit and eloquence of Erasmus and his followers could have produced a revolt, but unfortunately, the influences that led to the downfall of religion in other countries were also at work in the Swiss cantons. The cathedral chapters ...
— History of the Catholic Church from the Renaissance to the French • Rev. James MacCaffrey
... the chit! I refuse to submit to the whimsical wheeze of a servant Just because Araminta's away and the weather is fervent, So I said to her, "Wench, do you fancy you're taking my money For work or for wit? ...
— Punch or the London Charivari, Vol. 147, July 8, 1914 • Various
... Melbourne at that time was approaching sixty, and the respect which her Majesty gave to his years was heightened by the quick recognition of the fact that the Prime Minister was one of the most experienced statesmen which the country at that moment possessed. He was also a man of ready wit, and endowed with the charm of fine manners, and under his easy nonchalance there lurked more earnest and patriotic conviction than he ever cared to admit. 'I am sorry to hurt any man's feelings,' said Sydney Smith, 'and to brush aside the magnificent ...
— Lord John Russell • Stuart J. Reid
... with his eyes on the ground, things began to clear a little. The fact was that, as he had become more enthralled by the girl's witcheries, the more helpless and stupid he had become. Marjorie's nimble wit had played about his that afternoon like a humming-bird around a sullen sunflower. He hardly knew that every word, every glance, every gesture was a challenge, and when she began stinging into him sharp little arrows of taunt and sarcasm ...
— The Heart Of The Hills • John Fox, Jr.
... look back upon our late interview, it appears to me to have answered expectation better than almost any scheme of happiness that I ever put in execution. My Journal is stored with wisdom and wit[593]; and my memory is filled with the recollection of lively and affectionate feelings, which now, I think, yield me more satisfaction than at the time when they were first excited. I have experienced this ...
— The Life Of Johnson, Volume 3 of 6 • Boswell
... same strain of Roland will I tell Things unattempted yet in prose or rhyme, On whom strange madness and rank fury fell, A man esteemed so wise in former time; If she, who to like cruel pass has well Nigh brought my feeble wit which fain would climb And hourly wastes my sense, concede me skill And strength my daring ...
— Orlando Furioso • Lodovico Ariosto
... shrugged Kate, wearily. "Why don't you ask my opinion sometimes? It seems to me that in this case a woman's wit might ...
— Miss Billy • Eleanor H. Porter
... deceitfully; but the raven, anxious to refute the reflection cast upon her voice, set up a loud caw, and dropped the cheese. The fox quickly picked it up, and thus addressed the raven: "My good raven, your voice is right enough, but your wit is wanting." ...
— Boys and Girls Bookshelf (Vol 2 of 17) - Folk-Lore, Fables, And Fairy Tales • Various
... seen Done at the Mermaid! heard words that have been So nimble and so full of subtle flame, As if that any one from whence they came Had meant to put his whole wit in a jest, And has resolved to live a fool the rest Of his ...
— Keats: Poems Published in 1820 • John Keats
... the American party met the Russian Baron at a ball in the New Continental Hotel. They were charmed with his handsome face, his refinement of manner, his intelligence and wit. They met him again at the American Minister's, and, to Fisher's unspeakable consternation, the acquaintance thus established began to make rapid progress in the direction of intimacy. Baron Savitch became a frequent visitor ...
— Stories by American Authors, Volume 10 • Various
... merely an application of a principle comprised in the preceding articles, is declared by the express words of the article, to wit, dans l'exemption ci-dessus est nommement compris, &c: 'In the above exemption is particularly comprised the imposition of one hundred sols per ton, established in France on foreign vessels.' Here then is at once an express declaration, that ...
— Memoir, Correspondence, And Miscellanies, From The Papers Of Thomas Jefferson - Volume I • Thomas Jefferson
... Journey. 'Between ourselves,' he tells Temple, 'he is not apt to encourage one to share reputation with him.' Yet he felt, as he wrote to Percy on 20th March 1785, that it was a great consolation to him now that he had, as it was, collected so much of the wit and the wisdom of that wonderful man. 'I do not expect,' he adds, 'to recover from it. I gaze after him with an eager eye; and I hope again to be ...
— James Boswell - Famous Scots Series • William Keith Leask
... the climate, to be more easily changed in one latitude, into a temporary passion which engrosses the mind, without enfeebling it, and excites to romantic achievements: by a farther progress to the north, it is changed into a spirit of gallantry, which employs the wit and the fancy more than the heart; which prefers intrigue to enjoyment; and substitutes affectation and vanity where sentiment and desire have failed. As it departs from the sun, the same passion is farther composed into ...
— An Essay on the History of Civil Society, Eighth Edition • Adam Ferguson, L.L.D.
... Delicate allusions to sexual matters and somewhat lascivious conversation excite eroticism as much as looks and touch. According to the education of the persons concerned, this talk may be coarse and vulgar, or on the contrary refined and full of wit, managed with more or less skill, or clumsily. Here the natural finesse of woman plays a considerable part. Men wanting in tact are clumsy and offensive in their attempts at flirtation, and thus extinguish instead of exciting the woman's eroticism. The manner in which alcoholic ...
— The Sexual Question - A Scientific, psychological, hygienic and sociological study • August Forel
... and greedily from the gourd dipper, so long that Sally Madeira turned to him laughingly at last. "Well, Piney, son, got Texas fever?" she began, and then, being quick of wit, saw at once that the boy's pallor, his thirst, his absorption meant something especial. "I'm glad you came, Piney," she went on capably, and gave the batter paddle to Chloe. "I've been wanting to see you all day to have a little talk with you. ...
— Sally of Missouri • R. E. Young
... may not be of a very pure water, but the best of men are unequal at all times, and more especially in their wit." ...
— Home as Found • James Fenimore Cooper
... to the rap he had given the Papists, even on their own exclusive ground. When the platform of the Col was attained, he checked the mule and continued his address, for want of wind had nipped his wit, as it ...
— The Headsman - The Abbaye des Vignerons • James Fenimore Cooper
... see."—At that moment an old she-dragon came up to him and said, "What wilt thou give me, O man, if I chase this ox back again into the egg for thee?"—And the archer replied, "What can I give?"—The dragon said to him, "Give me what thou hast at home without thy will and wit!"—"Done!" said the archer. Then the dragon chased the ox nicely into the egg again, patched it up prettily and gave it into the man's hand. Then the archer went home, and when he got home he found a son had been born to him there, ...
— Cossack Fairy Tales and Folk Tales • Anonymous
... championship golf game, and, the crime having been detected by Viola's father, the chauffeur had been given twenty-four hours in which to return the money or be exposed. He was in financial straits, and, as developed later, had stolen elsewhere, so that he feared arrest and exposure and was at his wit's end. He had spent much of the money on Mazi, whom he induced to go through a secret marriage ceremony ...
— The Golf Course Mystery • Chester K. Steele
... to realize once for all the great qualities of French prose could do better than turn straight to the Lettres Provinciales. Here he will find the lightness and the strength, the exquisite polish and the delicious wit, the lambent irony and the ordered movement, which no other language spoken by man has ever quite been able to produce. The Lettres are a work of controversy; their actual subject-matter—the ethical ...
— Landmarks in French Literature • G. Lytton Strachey
... saying that the requirements of good morals are a heavy burden for the natural man, that is, for man left, in the midst of seductions and allurements, to the purely human resources of his own unaided wit and strength; so heavy a burden is this, in fact, that according to Catholic doctrine, it cannot be borne without assistance from on high, the which assistance we call grace. This supernatural aid we believe essential to the shaping of a good moral life; for ...
— Explanation of Catholic Morals - A Concise, Reasoned, and Popular Exposition of Catholic Morals • John H. Stapleton
... systematically corrupt a very corruptible race, (for some time a growing nuisance amongst you,)—a set of pert, petulant literators, to whom, instead of their proper, but severe, unostentatious duties, they assign the brilliant part of men of wit and pleasure, of gay, young, military sparks, and danglers at toilets. They call on the rising generation in France to take a sympathy in the adventures and fortunes, and they endeavor to engage their sensibility on ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. IV. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... a great actress can never be anything but a great vagabond, then the dear old thing has tantrums, and we have scenes—the most grotesque: they'd make the fortune, for a subject, of some play-writing rascal, if he had the wit to guess them; which, luckily for us perhaps, he never will. She usually winds up by protesting—devinez un peu quoi!" Miriam added. And as her companion professed his complete inability to divine: "By declaring that rather than take it that way ...
— The Tragic Muse • Henry James
... touchy. She was not disposed to play the second part without a murmur like Dora. She was not content, with her art as a balance to Annie's beauty and May's budding scholarship. Rose desired everybody to acknowledge her mother-wit and trustworthiness. ...
— A Houseful of Girls • Sarah Tytler
... with shrewd, ready wit and certain judgment. I cannot imagine myself in a tighter corner than at the bridge, and your device had the effective simplicity of genius. Your plan here was, to be sure, commonplace, but it, too, required caution and good acting, and you and Jane supplied both. It was nicer than ...
— The Yeoman Adventurer • George W. Gough
... a loss. He had come to the end of his resourcefulness in the art of probing for facts. He was about to take his departure, with the secret realization that he had learned nothing new—unless an increased admiration of Mrs. Brace's sharpness of wit might ...
— No Clue - A Mystery Story • James Hay
... warfare as this, waged ceremoniously and without rancor on the side of the Antiquities, while du Croisier's faction went so far as to use the poisoned weapons of savages—in this warfare the advantages of wit and delicate irony lay on the side of the nobles. But it should never be forgotten that the wounds made by the tongue and the eyes, by gibe or slight, are the last of all to heal. When the Chevalier ...
— The Jealousies of a Country Town • Honore de Balzac
... to arrest you in the Queen's name—er, no, I mean the King's (that's right, old Vic is dead now),—to arrest you in the King's name for the following high crimes and misdemeanors, contrary to the statutes made and in such cases provided, to wit: Burglary, Robbery, Conspiracy, Assault and Battery, and Attempted Murder! It is also my duty to inform you that anything you may say will be used against you, as usual, you know! Now come with ...
— The Adventures of the Eleven Cuff-Buttons • James Francis Thierry
... hand for the sketch, trying to bethink herself as she did so in what least uncivil way she could refuse the present. She took a moment to look at it collecting her thoughts, and as she did so her woman's wit came to ...
— The Courtship of Susan Bell • Anthony Trollope
... embrace, in addition to vigorous and fearless comments on the events of the times, genial gossip with the reader on all current topics, and also devote abundant space to those racy specimens of American wit and humor, without which there can be no perfect exposition of our national character. Among those who will contribute regularly to this department may be mentioned the name of CHARLES F. BROWNE ("Artemus Ward"), from whom we shall present in the MARCH number, the first ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. I. February, 1862, No. II. - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... was, as Dulcie expressed it, "rather a dear, quaint thing." But she was more than that, I thought. She had such a pungent wit, her sayings were at times so downright—not to say acrid—that many stood in terror of her and positively dreaded her quick tongue. I rather liked Aunt Hannah myself, perhaps because, by the greatest ...
— The Four Faces - A Mystery • William le Queux
... "smell a mice." So that had to be given up, and finally, after many and great struggles, with the help of the whole family, we would manage to write something that Miss Marston allowed us to send. On the principle that brevity is wit, some of these productions ...
— We Ten - Or, The Story of the Roses • Lyda Farrington Kraus
... very cautious attitude in this matter, but when Gligorievi['c] sent him petition after petition he was finally so touched by the recital of their woes that he permitted them to cross the river; and one night, with the help of the Serbian authorities, the whole island crossed over, to wit 57 families, with 186 oxen, 70 horses, 694 sheep and 87 pigs. Milo[vs] made them a free grant of land for the building of a village, together with a vast stretch of territory for pasture and stock-raising; at his own expense he built them a church and extended to them all the liberties ...
— The Birth of Yugoslavia, Volume 2 • Henry Baerlein
... hereafter. This thought made her brave and resolute; it gave her courage to defy her enemies with serene brow and smiling lip; it enabled her to sit with bright eye and rosy cheeks at the side of her dreaded and severe husband, and, with cheerful wit and inexhaustible good-humor, jest away the frown from his brow, and vexation from ...
— Henry VIII And His Court • Louise Muhlbach
... insist upon it, that the horse was as good as the rider deserved;—that they were, centaur-like,—both of a piece. At other times, and in other moods, when his spirits were above the temptation of false wit,—he would say, he found himself going off fast in a consumption; and, with great gravity, would pretend, he could not bear the sight of a fat horse, without a dejection of heart, and a sensible alteration in his pulse; and that he had made choice of the lean one he rode upon, not only ...
— The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman • Laurence Sterne
... opponents tormented the ministry, and when, on the 15th of May, the French ambassador suddenly left London, a perfect storm of hostility fell upon the cabinet. Lord Palmerston defended the policy of the foreign office throughout with candour, courtesy, and yet with a satirical wit, which keenly annoyed the opposition, while no excuse was left them to impeach the veteran minister's politeness, or constitutional respect for the house. The ministry were not apprised that the French ambassador had been withdrawn from any dissatisfaction with ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... many, after they had fallen into such a calamitous accident, esteemed this indignity less supportable than the loss of their own lives, in such sort that, if they have not been able by force of arms nor any other means, by reach of wit or subtlety, to stop them in their course and restrain their fury, they have fallen into desperation, and utterly deprived themselves of this light. It is therefore no wonder if King Grangousier, my master, be full of high displeasure and much disquieted in mind upon thy outrageous ...
— Gargantua and Pantagruel, Complete. • Francois Rabelais
... him till daybreak. All the yearnings of my own nature, all the romance of my fiery youth, I poured out in this appeal to a siren whom I had never seen, and whose name I did not know. I was distraught, pathetic, humorous, and sublime by turns. Subtle gleams of wit flashed artistically across the lurid landscape of despair. I reminded her of scenes of happiness—vaguely, because I had no details to elaborate; the reminiscences, however, were so touching that I came near to believing in them. Mindful of her solitary blemish, I referred to 'embarrassments ...
— A Chair on The Boulevard • Leonard Merrick
... and we were seated, a party of eight, when he came in. They all chaffed him about Paris, and he took it quite good-humoredly—he even seemed pleased. He has no wit, but he looks like a gentleman, and I dare say as husbands go ...
— Red Hair • Elinor Glyn
... were there in Hardhack who did not determine, in their innermost hearts, to strive as hard as Yankee wit and maiden modesty would allow for ...
— Romance of California Life • John Habberton
... wore a white tie, and lived among people who might laugh at his owning any conscience in the matter, as the solemn folly of taking himself too seriously?—that bugbear of circles in which the lack of grave emotion passes for wit. From such cowardice before modish ignorance and obtuseness, Deronda shrank. But he also shrank from having his course determined by mere contagion, without consent of reason; or from allowing a reverential ...
— Daniel Deronda • George Eliot
... has been so poor. If the peasant acquires riches by chance or by emigration, he sees as the poet that all he can have is as nothing, so short is the time he may hold it. Irish writers of the past have made this peasant only the jarvey wit; but if you read the old romances, or listen to the folk-tales still alive, you will learn that Mr. Yeats is at one with his countryman in ...
— Irish Plays and Playwrights • Cornelius Weygandt
... the Queen has already been sufficiently described to enable any one to select her out from among her subjects. If any further description is desired, the observer can easily satisfy himself by the use of a microscope.—Every swarm of bees is composed of three classes or sorts, to wit: one Queen or female, drones or males, and neuters or workers. The Queen is the only female in the hive, and lays all the eggs from which all the young bees are raised to replenish their colony. She possesses no authority over them, other than that of influence, ...
— A Manual or an Easy Method of Managing Bees • John M. Weeks
... they struck through the first cross street toward Lexington Avenue: "It's a privilege for a fellow to know that sort of a girl—so many surprises in her—the charmingly unexpected and unsuspected!—the pretty flashes of wit, the naive egotism which is as amusing as it is harmless. . . . I had no idea how complex she is. . . . If you think you have the simple feminine on your hands—forget it, Boots!—for she's as ...
— The Younger Set • Robert W. Chambers
... thus settled things in the famous town of Mansoul, he proceeded to give to the elders of the corporation a necessary caution, to wit, how they should carry it to the high and noble captains that he had, from his Father's court, sent or brought with him, to ...
— The Holy War • John Bunyan
... the twenty-second day of September, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-two, a proclamation was issued by the President of the United States, containing, among other things, the following, to wit: ...
— A Short Life of Abraham Lincoln - Condensed from Nicolay & Hay's Abraham Lincoln: A History • John G. Nicolay
... scarcely probable, for was not the Count de Montalvo notoriously dead and buried? Time and accident had changed him; moreover, he could bring art to the assistance of nature. In Leyden, too, he had confederates—Black Meg to wit, for one; also he had funds, for was he not the treasurer of the company that this very morning had achieved so ...
— Lysbeth - A Tale Of The Dutch • H. Rider Haggard
... collateral satisfaction ran through the empire. All England and her dependencies felt the state of cousinship with the fruits of energy; and it was an agreeable sentiment, coming opportunely, as it did, at the tail of articles that had been discussing a curious manifestation of late—to-wit, the awakening energy of the foreigner—a prodigious apparition on our horizon. Others were energetic too! We were not, the sermon ran, to imagine we were without rivals in the field. We were possessed of certain positive advantages; ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... you could only have dined with me the other night, you would have met her. I had such a perfect little dinner. Just think! A poet, an actor, a journalist, a painter, a wit, and a new beauty. I'll tell you how I found her. She really belongs at present to Lady Islington and myself; but of course, now we have started her, all the other people will snap her up. We found that we both owed that vulgar upstart, Mrs Houndsley, a visit, ...
— Fashionable Philosophy - and Other Sketches • Laurence Oliphant
... world and has never perceived anything, and the echoes of her education respond awfully to the rash footfall—I mean the casual remark—in the cold Valhalla of her memory. Mrs. Wimbush delights in her wit and says there's nothing so charming as to hear Mr. Paraday draw it out. He's perpetually detailed for this job, and he tells me it has a peculiarly exhausting effect. Every one's beginning—at the end of two days—to sidle obsequiously away from her, and Mrs. Wimbush pushes him again and again ...
— The Death of the Lion • Henry James
... which you were wont to ply is forgotten; because the days of patient digging are past and your poor brain is unable to work back. To do a second time what has been done already is beyond your wit. For all your meditative air, you cannot solve the problem of how to reconstruct that which ...
— The Life of the Spider • J. Henri Fabre
... nineteen, and shone with every charm peculiar to her sex. But I have no mind to weary you with poetical rhodomontades till, as most lovers do, I have proven her a paragon and myself an imbecile: it suffices to say that her face, and shape, and mien, and wit, alike astounded and engaged all those who had the happiness to know her; and had long ago rendered her the object of my entire adoration and the target of my daily rhapsodies. Now I viewed her with a dissension ...
— Gallantry - Dizain des Fetes Galantes • James Branch Cabell
... in truth, in a situation in which, for the first time in his life, he coveted nothing. The peril was one, also, from which, thus far, his mother-wit, which seldom failed before, could suggest no means of evasion or escape. His prospect was a dreary one; though with the wonderful capacity for endurance, and the surprising cheerfulness, common to the class to which he belonged, he beheld it without dismay ...
— Guy Rivers: A Tale of Georgia • William Gilmore Simms
... exciting sport, Enjoyed the idle pleasures of the court, Whiling away the time with games of chance, With music and the more voluptuous dance, The hollow paths of vanity pursued, Laughed, jested, swore, drank, danced, and even wooed; No tongue more prone to questionable wit, Nor chaste, when time and place demanded it; His basso voice, both voluble and strong, Excelled in wassail mirth and ribald song; He swore with oaths most impious and unblest; Ate much, drank more, on these lines did his best; Caroused by day, caroused by candle light, In fact behaved ...
— Mountain idylls, and Other Poems • Alfred Castner King
... Eagles' Nest Campers was of the highest value to me at this time. Without them Chicago would have been a desert. Henry Fuller's gay spirit, Lorado's swift wit and the good fraternal companionship of Charles Francis Browne were of daily comfort; but above all others I depended upon my wife whose serenely optimistic spirit carried me over many a deep slough of despond. How I leaned upon her! Her ...
— A Daughter of the Middle Border • Hamlin Garland
... drink themselves to death require years and wit to complete the task. Others save time by catching pneumonia through exposure due to drink. Billy Folsom was one of the pneumonia class. He "slept off" the effects of a long lark in an area-way belonging to a total stranger. A policeman took him to ...
— Tales From Bohemia • Robert Neilson Stephens
... already done it, and I see them resting on the dead limbs of a plum-tree across the road. But more are to follow, and parental anxiety is still rife. I shall be sorry when the spacious hayloft becomes silent. That affectionate "Wit, wit" and that contented and caressing squeaking and chattering give me a sense of winged companionship. The old barn is the abode of friendly and delicate spirits, and the sight of them and the sound of them surely bring a suggestion of poetry ...
— Under the Maples • John Burroughs
... Good and Evil confounded, Prophaneness, Irreligion, and Unlawful Love, made the masterly Stroaks of the fine Gentleman; Swearing, Cursing, and Blaspheming, the Graces of his Conversation; and Unchristian Revenge, to consummate the Character of the Hero; Sharpness and Poignancy of Wit exerted with the greatest Vigor against the Holy Order; in short, Religion and all that is Sacred, Burlesqu'd and Ridicul'd; To see this, I say, and withall, to reflect upon the fatal Effects which these things have already had, and how much ...
— Representation of the Impiety and Immorality of the English Stage (1704); Some Thoughts Concerning the Stage in a Letter to a Lady (1704) • Anonymous
... on Mr. Woodwell to-morrow, and, making himself known to Miss Power as the visiting architect of whom she had heard from Miss De Stancy, have had the pleasure of attending her to the castle? 'That's what any other man would have had wit enough to do!' ...
— A Laodicean • Thomas Hardy
... house for de niggers and preachin' in de afternoon, and on into de night lots of times. Dey have de cullud preacher. He couldn't read. He jes' preach from nat'ral wit and what he larn from white folks. De whole outfit ...
— Slave Narratives: a Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves. - Texas Narratives, Part 2 • Works Projects Administration
... hastened to the door to scarify him. The clock had given only two ticks when she was upon him, but in that time she had completely changed her plan of action. She welcomed him with smiles of pride. Thus is the nimbleness of women's wit measured once and for all. They need two seconds if they are to do the ...
— Tommy and Grizel • J.M. Barrie
... Holy Roman Empire, and, above all, because he had robbed her of Silesia; Madame de Pompadour, because when she sent him a message of compliment, he answered, "Je ne la connais pas," forbade his ambassador to visit her, and in his mocking wit spared neither her nor her royal lover. Feminine pique, revenge, or vanity had then at their service ...
— Montcalm and Wolfe • Francis Parkman
... trade run highest and widest, there and then You shall behold him, edging with equal strides Along the kerb; hawking in either hand Some artful nothing made of twine and tin, Cardboard and foil and bits of rubber band: Some penn'orth of wit-in-fact that, with a grin, The careful City marvels at, and buys For nurselings ...
— Hawthorn and Lavender - with Other Verses • William Ernest Henley
... essays of a man of real genius are such, in all their grand and most important features, as no subsequent assiduity can amend. Add to this, that Mr. Fuseli is somewhat of a caustic turn of mind, with much wit, and a disposition to search, in every thing new or modern, for occasions of censure. I believe Mary came something more a cynic out of the school of Mr. Fuseli, than she ...
— Memoirs of the Author of a Vindication of the Rights of Woman • William Godwin
... Bashful, a woman of spirit, taste, sense, wit, and beauty. She loves her husband, and repels with scorn an attempt to shake her fidelity because he treats her with cold indifference.—A. Murphy, The Way to Keep ...
— 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.
... nature of processes, ejectments, custodiams, injunctions, replevins, etc., is perfectly known to them, and the terms as familiar to them as to any attorney. They all love law. It is a kind of lottery, in which every man, staking his own wit or cunning against his neighbour's property, feels that he has little to ...
— Castle Rackrent • Maria Edgeworth
... gun, left him by his father, rested against the wall. The young man, for all his quietude, his conscientious ways, his daily work with children, his love of flowers, and his dreams of books, inherited from frontiersmen—whose lives had depended upon watchfulness—quickness of wit, accuracy of eye, and steadiness of aim. He rarely missed his mark, and he read intuitively and easily the language of wood, sky, and road. On the bed lay his slouch hat, his haversack, knapsack, and canteen, ...
— The Long Roll • Mary Johnston
... people—to Governor Yates, etc. Mr. Clinton's son called on me and invited me to their house.... I have been introduced to Senor Rocafuerto, the Spaniard who made so excellent a speech before the Bible Society last May. He is a very handsome man, very intelligent, full of wit and vivacity. He is a great favorite with the ladies and is a man of wealth and a zealous patriot, studying our manners, customs, and improvements, with a view of benefiting his own countrymen in Peru.... I long to be with you again and to see you all at home. I ...
— Samuel F. B. Morse, His Letters and Journals - In Two Volumes, Volume I. • Samuel F. B. Morse
... Sondershausen, where Berlioz' "Harold," a new Oboe Concerto by Stein, Schumann's "Genoveva" Overture, the Introduction to "Tristan and Isolde," and my "Mazeppa" will be given. The latter piece is popular to wit...in Sondershausen!— ...
— Letters of Franz Liszt, Volume 1, "From Paris to Rome: - Years of Travel as a Virtuoso" • Franz Liszt; Letters assembled by La Mara and translated
... scholarship the accepted text of Cato's version of this immemorial epigram is a model of the brevity which is the test of wit, "Frons occipitio prior est." Pliny probably quoting from memory, expands it to "Frons domini plus prodest quam occipitium." Palladius (I, 6) gives another version: "Praesentia domini provectus est agri." It ...
— Roman Farm Management - The Treatises Of Cato And Varro • Marcus Porcius Cato
... following tract of land, situate at Gayhead, on the western part of Marthas Vineyard, in Dukes County, State of Massachusetts, is designated as the land ceded to the United States by the aforesaid act of the legislature of Massachusetts for the purpose of erecting a lighthouse, to wit: Beginning at a stake and heap of stones (1 rod from the edge of the cliff of said head), thence east 11 degrees south 18 rods to a stake and heap of stones; thence south 11 degrees west 18 rods to a stake ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents, - Vol. 2, Part 3, Andrew Jackson, 1st term • Edited by James D. Richardson
... or Tansies which be pleasant in taste and goode for the Stomache," wrote quaint old Gerarde. That these were popular dainties in the seventeenth century we further know through Pepys, who made a "pretty dinner" for some guests, to wit: "A brace of stewed carps, six roasted chickens, and a jowl of salmon, hot, for the first course; a tansy, and two neat's tongues, and cheese, the second." Cole's "Art of Simpling," published in 1656, assures maidens that tansy leaves laid to soak in buttermilk ...
— Wild Flowers, An Aid to Knowledge of Our Wild Flowers and - Their Insect Visitors - - Title: Nature's Garden • Neltje Blanchan
... pseudonym of comte Amedee de Noe, a peer of France, a great wit, and the political caricaturist of Charivari (the French Punch). The count was one of the founders of the French Republic in 1875. As Cham or Ham was the second son and scapegrace of Noah, so Amedee was the second son and scapegrace of the comte ...
— 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.
... the dear Contessa was undeniably plain: that was something, but in these short days, tea would be conducted by artificial light, and by artificial light she was not so like a rabbit. What was worse was that by any light she had a liveliness which might be mistaken for wit, and a flattering manner which might be taken for sincerity. She hoped men were not so easily duped as that, and was sadly afraid that ...
— Miss Mapp • Edward Frederic Benson
... palatable, the butt of his little pleasantries; my mysterious saunter up that glen, my sobriety of demeanour, my now silence-all those things, whose meaning he knew very well, were made the text for his amusement for the lady. As for me, I took it all weakly, striving to meet his wit with careless smiles. ...
— John Splendid - The Tale of a Poor Gentleman, and the Little Wars of Lorn • Neil Munro
... is by no means applicable to your Lordship; nothing is in this respect so fallible as the parish register. Why should any man retire from society whilst he is capable of contributing to the pleasures of it? Wit, vivacity, good-nature, and politeness, give an eternal youth, as stupidity and moroseness a premature old age. Without a thousandth part of your Lordship's shining qualities, I think myself much younger than half the boys about me, ...
— The History of Emily Montague • Frances Brooke
... could run fast enough to cotch her," said Candace; and then her portly person shook with the impulse of her own wit. ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 4, No. 25, November, 1859 • Various
... Selwyn stepped into a doorway. On the opposite side of the street a theatrical sign announced that 'Lulu' was 'the biggest, most stupendous, comedy of the season.' He wondered what constituted largeness in a comedy. Surely not the author's wit! Before he could formulate a solution of the mystery, a great overhead sign suddenly ignited with ...
— The Parts Men Play • Arthur Beverley Baxter
... Black was remarkable not only for his wit and humor, which often enlivened the dry logic of law and fact, but also for flashes of unique eloquence. In presenting a certain brief before the United States Supreme Court he had occasion to animadvert upon some of our great men. Among other things he ...
— Brave Men and Women - Their Struggles, Failures, And Triumphs • O.E. Fuller
... an old saying which I have often heard and I believe in it to a certain extent, and it runs as follows: The more you live at your wit's end, the more the wit's ...
— The Century Handbook of Writing • Garland Greever
... closed his life in this town." According to another, "He was a classical scholar, a good lawyer, a wit, and a poet." We saw his old gray house just below Great Nesenkeag Brook.—Under the head of Merrimack: "Hon. Mathew Thornton, one of the signers of the Declaration of American Independence, resided many years in this town." His house too we saw from the river.—"Dr. ...
— A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers • Henry David Thoreau
... snuffed a candle five times out of six at ten paces, and that he could hit any button in a man's coat he wanted to. In other words, as in all such cases, all the common feats were ascribed to him, as the current jokes of the day are laid at the door of any noted wit, however innocent ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)
... justice, and keep his own solemn oaths. But no—the terror of the Lord came upon them. He most truly cut them in sunder. They were every man of a different mind, and none of them in the same mind a day together; they became utterly conscience-stricken, terrified, perplexed, at their wit's end, not having courage or determination to do anything, or even to do nothing, and fled shamefully away one after another, to their everlasting disgrace. And those of them who have got back their power since are showing sadly enough, by their obstinate folly and wickedness, that the Lord ...
— Sermons on National Subjects • Charles Kingsley
... which was the first step towards a cosmos. There was a certain playful naivete about Charley's manner and speech, when he was happy, which gave him an instant advantage with women, and even made the impression of wit where there was only grace. Although he was perfectly capable, however, of engaging to any extent in the badinage which has ever been in place between young men and women since dawning humanity was first aware of a lovely difference, there was always a certain indescribable ...
— Wilfrid Cumbermede • George MacDonald
... collection, and whom he regarded as a model story-teller. I am tempted to quote his account at length. "Anything but beautiful," he says, "she has facile speech, efficacious phrases, an attractive manner of telling, whence you divine her extraordinary memory and the sallies of her natural wit. Messia already reckons her seventy years, and is a mother, grandmother, and great grandmother. As a child, she was told by her grandmother an infinity of tales which she had learned from her mother, and she in turn from her grandfather; she had a good memory and never ...
— The Science of Fairy Tales - An Inquiry into Fairy Mythology • Edwin Sidney Hartland
... was her quick thought; — "to have been brought up a farmer's boy, and to know enough and to dare enough to put me on this seat, and then to have the wit to go off and stand there ...
— Hills of the Shatemuc • Susan Warner
... come when the interest of the one would compel him openly to denounce or boldly to expose the other, the odds were that the brilliant and audacious reprobate would master the weaker nerve but superior wit of the furtive traitor. Randal was startled; but rising ...
— My Novel, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... of England seemed a name worth dying for. Beauty, in its hothouse variety (which is none of the worst), flowered in box after box; and though nothing was said of profound importance, and though it is generally agreed that wit deserted beautiful lips about the time that Walpole died—at any rate when Victoria in her nightgown descended to meet her ministers, the lips (through an opera glass) remained red, adorable. Bald distinguished men with gold-headed ...
— Jacob's Room • Virginia Woolf
... practice, which derived from the days not yet wholly passed away when he might, and often did, have to refit his vessel in scenes far distant from any help other than his own, and without any resources save those which his ready wit could adapt from materials meant for quite different uses. How to make a jib-boom do the work of a topsail-yard, or to utilize spare spars in rigging a jury-rudder, were specimens of the problems then presented to the aspiring ...
— From Sail to Steam, Recollections of Naval Life • Captain A. T. Mahan
... himself that but for the lack of means, he would make a perfect home for Sabina; worship and cherish her; fill her life with happiness; pander to her every whim; devote a large portion of his own time to her; do all that wit and love could devise for her pleasure—all but ...
— The Spinners • Eden Phillpotts
... they only glowed more fiercely radiant; and Want and Privation, instead of weakening, only seemed to make them more strong;—strong to endure, strong to foresee plots and avert perils and oppose wit to cunning, and strategy to deceit; so strong that, by reason of their strength, that little frontier town became a fortress of Titans. And their names, other than those I have given them in this story, shall go ringing down the grooves of Time, until Time ...
— The Dop Doctor • Clotilde Inez Mary Graves
... morbid. He had the inevitable pensiveness and gravity of a person who possessed what a friend of his called "the awful power of insight"; but his mood was always cheerful and equal, and his mind peculiarly healthful, and the airy splendor of his wit and humor was the light of his home. He saw too far to be despondent, though his vivid sympathies and shaping imagination often made him sad in behalf of others. He also perceived morbidness, wherever it existed, instantly, as if by the illumination ...
— Passages From the English Notebooks, Complete • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... inaccuracies in Tarde's account—the statement, to wit, that Talbot was buried on the spot where he fell, whereas his body was carried from the field and taken to England. The ecclesiastical chronicler must have accepted the story in circulation among the common people, which is repeated to this ...
— Two Summers in Guyenne • Edward Harrison Barker
... who rambled over Scotland cross the border to the Emerald Isle, and again they sharpen their wits against new conditions, and revel in the land of laughter and wit. ...
— Overland Red - A Romance of the Moonstone Canon Trail • Henry Herbert Knibbs
... of revolution there is no chance. Yet the same wit and will that would thrive in revolutions should thrive in this commonplace life. Knowledge is power. Well, then, shall I have no power to oust this blockhead? Oust him—what from? His father's halls? Well, but if he were dead, who would be the heir of Hazeldean? Have ...
— The International Magazine, Volume 2, No. 2, January, 1851 • Various
... Walter, that you, being of such experience and wit, should stand on this point; for so many horse-stealers may escape, if they may not be condemned without witnesses. If one should rush into the king's Privy Chamber, whilst he is alone, and kill the king (which God forbid), and this man be met coming with his sword all bloody; ...
— State Trials, Political and Social - Volume 1 (of 2) • Various
... the absurd irrelevant particularities, the wit, wisdom, folly, humour, eloquence and bathos, each startling in its kind, and yet all luminous in the admired disorder of their combination. A talker of a different calibre, though belonging to the same school, is Burly. Burly is a man of great presence; he ...
— English Prose - A Series of Related Essays for the Discussion and Practice • Frederick William Roe (edit. and select.)
... somebody. What was it? He asked himself the question over and over again. They listened with interest to the stories of his prowess and adventures. He flattered them collectively and individually, and they responded sometimes in praise as fulsome as has own. All the knowledge, the tact, the wit, of which he was possessed, he used to gain time. If only he could hold them until the sun rose. But why had they brought him there? With all his adroitness and subtlety, he could get no inkling of their intentions. The suspense got on Smith's nerves, though he gave no outward sign. The first ...
— 'Me-Smith' • Caroline Lockhart
... Adv. with an unsparing hand; money burning a hole in one's pocket. Phr. amor nummi [Lat.]; facile largiri de alieno [Lat.]; wie gewonnen so zerronnen [G.]; les fous font les festins et les sages les mangent [Fr.]; spendthrift alike of money and of wit [Cowper]; squandering wealth was ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... fifteen million inhabitants dwell. I inspect the well-ventilated walls, for numerous open chinks are left. "The wind will come in," I say. "Yes, senor," Jose, my peon-constructor, replies with unconscious wit, "it will not only come in but it will go out"—and he proceeds to remedy ...
— Mexico • Charles Reginald Enock
... of Desire. To wit, to the Kameshwar Temple, sacred to Shiva as the Lord of Desires. Arrange for yours there. And if you like to look at idols among the pack and jam of temples, there you will find enough to stock a museum. You will begin to commit sins now with a fresh, new vivacity; therefore, it will be well to ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... his election to the clerkship he had rashly promised to bury the poor for nothing; Kelly was thinking he would be the first to carry the news to Christian Balla-whaine; and Black Tom was varying the exercise of pounding rock-sugar for his bees with that of breaking his playful wit ...
— The Manxman - A Novel - 1895 • Hall Caine
... particular form of zeal for God which consists in putting the criminal law in force against others, that, no doubt, does more to create a sympathy with the defendant than with the prosecutor. And if it should be done by those who enjoy the wit of Voltaire, and who do not turn away from the sneers of Gibbon, and rather relish the irony of Hume, our feelings do not go with the prosecutors, and we are rather disposed to sympathise with the defendant. It is still worse if the person ...
— Annie Besant - An Autobiography • Annie Besant
... were pretty well known in the army, where there were parties of all politics, and of plenty of shrewdness and wit; but there existed such a perfect confidence in him, as the first captain of the world, and such a faith and admiration in his prodigious genius and fortune, that the very men whom he notoriously cheated of their pay, the chiefs whom he used and injured—for ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to Prose, Vol. VI (of X)—Great Britain and Ireland IV • Various
... her cousin—ostensibly for criticism, really for admiration. If Phoebe had said exactly what she thought, it would have been that her ear was cruelly outraged: but Phoebe was not accustomed to the sharp speeches which passed for wit with Rhoda. She fell back on ...
— The Maidens' Lodge - None of Self and All of Thee, (In the Reign of Queen Anne) • Emily Sarah Holt
... wonder at nothing more, than how a man can be idle; but, of all other, a Scholar; in so many improvements of reason, in such sweetness of knowledge, in such variety of studies, in such importunity of thoughts. . . . To find wit, in poetry; in philosophy, profoundness; in mathematics, acuteness; in history, wonder of events; in oratory, sweet eloquence; in divinity, supernatural light and holy devotion; as so many rich metals in their proper mines, whom ...
— Three Centuries of a City Library • George A. Stephen
... 'common sense' doctrine. That name, as he observes, lends itself to an equivocation. Common sense is generally used as nearly synonymous with 'mother wit,' the average opinion of fairly intelligent men; and he would prefer to speak of the 'fundamental laws of belief.'[159] There can, however, be no doubt that the doctrine derived much of its strength from ...
— The English Utilitarians, Volume I. • Leslie Stephen
... recalls Bunbury to our thought both in its humour and treatment. This latter artist had thoroughly appreciated James Gillray's genius, and said of his great contemporary that "he was a living folio, every page of which abounded with wit." ...
— The Eighteenth Century in English Caricature • Selwyn Brinton
... presence. And Bess not only tolerated but encouraged him. Not that her manner was in the least degree effusive: she rather extended a rough protection to her admirer, and displayed a tendency to fight his battles and employ her sharper wit as a ...
— "Seth" • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... was swift. So it went on for the most part of that day, till sixty-and-two women and girls had been slaughtered. But at last a maiden was brought before the king, and to this one her snake had given a ready wit; for when Chaka asked her whether or no there was a cat in her hut, she answered, saying that she did not know, "but that there was a half a cat upon her," and she pointed to a cat's-skin which was bound ...
— Nada the Lily • H. Rider Haggard
... of us could! What would happen if everything depended on me? You remind me, and keep me up to the mark, and help me out of scrapes. I should be at my wit's end without you. Mother consults you about everything, and the girls obey you, and the boys pay more attention to you than they do to anyone else. Ruth, ...
— The Fortunes of the Farrells • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... composing is thoroughly modern; he has learnt much from Wagner and Liszt and not least from Verdi's "Falstaff"; nevertheless he is always original, fresh and so {358} amusing, so sparkling with wit and genius, that I am tempted to call Donna Diana the modern comic opera par excellence. Sometimes the orchestra is almost too rich for Moreto's playful subject, but this is also quite modern, and besides it offers coloristic surprises very rare ...
— The Standard Operaglass - Detailed Plots of One Hundred and Fifty-one Celebrated Operas • Charles Annesley
... human novel," you may be absolutely sure that the said novel consists chiefly of ridiculous twaddle. Mr. Whitten is not a humanist in that sense. He has no sentimentality, and a very great deal of both wit and humour. ...
— Books and Persons - Being Comments on a Past Epoch 1908-1911 • Arnold Bennett
... apparently been crossing the path in some mystic travel when to his sense there came the knowledge of the coming of his foes. The dull vibration perhaps informed him, and he flung his body to face the danger. He had no knowledge of paths; he had no wit to tell him to slink noiselessly into the bushes. He knew that his implacable enemies were approaching; no doubt they were seeking him, hunting him. And so he cried his cry, an incredibly swift jangle of tiny bells, as burdened with pathos as the hammering upon quaint cymbals by the ...
— Men, Women, and Boats • Stephen Crane
... "Wit. Primitive Power. Perception of the disjunction or incongruity of ideas; the analytical faculty. Uses: Separation of compound or general ideas into those that are elementary or more simple; knowledge of characteristic differences and discrepance. Abuses: A disposition to jest ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. 12, Issue 346, December 13, 1828 • Various
... The Dutchess of Mazarine. Hortense Mancini, niece of the great Cardinal, was born at Rome in 1646. Her beauty and wit were such that Charles II (whilst in exile) and other princes of royal blood sought her hand. She married, however, 28 February, 1661, Armand-Charles de la Meilleraye, said to be 'the richest subject in Europe'. The union was unhappy, ...
— The Works of Aphra Behn - Volume V • Aphra Behn
... of Canterbury was reading at twilight on the Eve of St. Mark, Keats might have been describing "Fors." Among its pages, fascinating with their golden broideries of romance and wit, perplexing with mystic vials of wrath as well as all the Seven Lamps and Shekinah of old and new Covenants commingled, there was gradually unfolded the plan of ...
— The Life of John Ruskin • W. G. Collingwood
... reason's farthing candle, Doubt. I've wished her healthy, wealthy, wise, What more can godfather devise? But since there's room for countless wishes In these old-fashioned posset dishes, I'll wish her from my plenteous store Of those commodities two more, Her father's wit, veined through and through With tenderness that Watts (but whew! Celia's aflame, I mean no stricture On his Sir Josh-surpassing picture)— I wish her next, and 'tis the soul Of all I've dropt into the bowl, Her mother's beauty—nay, but two So fair ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of James Russell Lowell • James Lowell
... So she had to earn her wisdom, and to work hard, and suffer much ere she attained it. And in attaining she endured strange adventures and great sorrows; and yet they would not have given her the wisdom had she not had something in herself which gave her wit to understand her lessons, and skill and courage to do what they taught her. There had been many names for that something before she was born, there have been many names for it since, but her father and mother called it the Grace ...
— Daily Thoughts - selected from the writings of Charles Kingsley by his wife • Charles Kingsley
... with a laugh, "if it be true that 'brevity is the soul of wit,' you must be the wittiest ...
— The Lifeboat • R.M. Ballantyne
... back, blushing first scarlet then crimson with blissful confusion. All her ready wit fled from her and left her quivering with the sweet agitation of ...
— Out of the Primitive • Robert Ames Bennet
... Didst thou not find I did quip thee? "Psyllus. No, verily; why, what's a quip? "Manes. We great girders call it a short saying of a sharp wit, with a bitter sense in a sweet word." Alexander and Campaspe, Old Plays, vol. ii. ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 34, June 22, 1850 • Various
... favourite wife when visiting the bazaars. In this opportune removal of a greedy hireling and possible traitor I once more recognized the hand of Providence working for the noble woman whose quick wit had aided mother ...
— Tales of Destiny • Edmund Mitchell
... by Mr Sawbridge that our hero was a lad who would inherit a large property, argued differently, and considered that Captain Wilson had very good reason for being so lenient—and among them was the second lieutenant. There were but four who were well inclined towards Jack—to wit, the captain, the first lieutenant, Mr Jolliffe, the one-eyed master's mate, and Mephistopheles, the black, who, having heard that Jack had uttered such sentiments, loved him with all his ...
— Mr. Midshipman Easy • Captain Frederick Marryat
... rather sorry stuff; but then in purely rural places, untouched by that great civiliser, the railroad, a little wit goes a great way, as we may see by the following story told in Pasquil's "Jests," 1604. "There was some time an old knight, who, being disposed to make himself merry on a Christmas time, sent for many of his tenants and poore neighbours, ...
— A Righte Merrie Christmasse - The Story of Christ-Tide • John Ashton
... according to their wont, with columns of sensational speculation and misinformation regarding the merits of the team and the work they were performing. Out of the mass of clashing "facts" contained in the daily journals but one thing was absolutely apparent: to wit, the work of the Harwell Eleven was known only to the men and the coaches, and neither would tell ...
— The Half-Back • Ralph Henry Barbour
... her tone. "I'd give something it was. I've been all but at my wit's end; for you know, Mis' Rossitur aint no hand about anything I couldn't say a word to her; and ever since he went away, we have been just winding ourselves up. I thought I should clear out, when Mis' Rossitur said, maybe you wa'n't a-coming ...
— Queechy, Volume I • Elizabeth Wetherell
... with shouts of incredulous laughter. What a versatile people we are! And how adoration and laughter, and reverence and sarcasm, move side by side in our character, apparently on good terms with each other. Will the time come when the laughter and the wit, grown rampant, will rudely jostle aside all the reverential elements in our nature, and mount upwards to those fatal heights which other nations have scaled like Satan,—and thence have ...
— My New Curate • P.A. Sheehan
... and myself. In the performance of the duties of conviviality, over which the learned sergeant, as head of the circuit, presided, he found in Fielding a powerful auxiliary. He was the son of the author of Tom Jones, and inherited to a great degree the wit and ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 20, - Issue 573, October 27, 1832 • Various
... think you are troubled with overmuch wit yourself, judging by the style of your jokes," was ...
— Boyhood in Norway • Hjalmar Hjorth Boyesen
... Despair had a wife, and her name was Diffidence. So when he was gone to bed, he told his wife what he had done; to-wit, that he had taken a couple of prisoners and cast them into his dungeon, for trespassing on his grounds. Then he asked her also what he had best to do further to them. So she asked him what they were, whence they came, and whither they were bound; and he told her. Then she counselled ...
— Journeys Through Bookland - Volume Four • Charles H. Sylvester
... India free? and does she wear her plumed And jewelled turban with a smile of peace, Or do we grind her still? The grand debate, The popular harangue, the tart reply, The logic and the wisdom and the wit And the loud laugh—I long to know them all; I burn to set the imprisoned wranglers free, And give them voice and ...
— The Task and Other Poems • William Cowper
... to enter his bosom for any character of the piece: it being, from beginning to end, a scene of unmixed rascality performed by persons who never deviate into good feeling. And although he doth not pretend to equal the great modern authors, whom he hath mentioned, in wit or descriptive power; yet, in the point of moral, he meekly believes that he has been their superior; feeling the greatest disgust for the characters he describes, and using his humble endeavour to cause the public ...
— Catherine: A Story • William Makepeace Thackeray
... tell thee, for it is a strange tale—I heard of this philosopher, and waited for him when he came to fetch his food, and returned with him hither, though greatly did I fear to tread the gulf. Then did I beguile him with my beauty and my wit, and flatter him with my tongue, so that he led me down and showed me the Fire, and told me the secrets of the Fire, but he would not suffer me to step therein, and, fearing lest he should slay me, I refrained, knowing that the man was very old, and soon would ...
— She • H. Rider Haggard
... years, though not by the same drummer. It seems to be a sort of temple, and held in great respect. The bird always approaches it on foot, and leaves it in the same quiet manner, unless rudely disturbed. He is very cunning, though his wit is not profound. It is very difficult to approach him by stealth; you will try many times before succeeding; but seem to pass by him in a great hurry, making all the noise possible, and with plumage furled he stands as immovable as a knot, allowing you a good ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 104, June, 1866 • Various
... old codgers are having a good time at the tea-table, and wit is flowing free. As you can see by their everyday garments, and by their pails and mops (which are having a little tea-party by themselves in the corner), it is not a gathering by invitations stretching away into yesterday, ...
— Echoes of the War • J. M. Barrie
... friend to Dickie, had the wit to see that the child was not lying when he said that the box and the bag and the gold pieces had been given ...
— Harding's luck • E. [Edith] Nesbit
... the hills echo with their appreciative applause. Then came Foraker. It seemed as if the great meeting had been magnetized with an electric power of ten thousand volts. There were continuous shouts of approbation and applause from his beginning to the close. His mingling of wit and wisdom, a burgoo combination of powerful and telling arguments, with sandwiches of solid facts, completed a political barbecue which will be a historical memory that will be almost as famous as the gathering of the people of this splendid valley in 1842, when Henry Clay ...
— Recollections of Forty Years in the House, Senate and Cabinet - An Autobiography. • John Sherman
... critic, foreseeing the full-winged soar of writers still half-fledged—the "Aeneid" in Virgil's "Eclogues," the "Odes" of Horace in his "Epodes"—he would not only gather round his board the men whom we know to have been his equals, whose wit and wisdom Horace has embalmed in an epithet, a line, an ode; Varius, and Sulpicius, and Plotius, and Fonteius Capito, and Viscus; but he saw also and utilized for himself and for his master the social influence which a rising poet might wield, the effect with ...
— Horace • William Tuckwell
... compliments to the lovely and unfortunate marquise. Desgrais had just the manner of the younger son of a great house: he was as flattering as a courtier, as enterprising as a musketeer. In this first visit he made himself attractive by his wit and his audacity, so much so that more easily than he had dared to hope, he got leave to pay a second call. The second visit was not long delayed: Desgrais presented himself the very next day. Such eagerness was flattering to the marquise, so Desgrais was received ...
— CELEBRATED CRIMES, COMPLETE - THE MARQUISE DE BRINVILLIERS • ALEXANDRE DUMAS, PERE
... under the influence of artistic example at home, and of his admiration of Hogarth, he had acquired a remarkable skill in graphically delineating whatever his close observation of men prompted. Like Hogarth, his artist-wit, his fun, and his moral teachings took the shape of series. These were handed around the circle of his intimate friends; yet he had thoughts only of his own amusement and of that of his companions, and did not contemplate offering ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 16, No. 97, November, 1865 • Various
... the preface to the boy's wit), shall I get a jay down off the barn to stick into your ...
— The Stokesley Secret • Charlotte M. Yonge
... over their heads. To be sure, Mme de Girardin's pictures were given twelve years ago; but we believe they would require little change, at least up to the conclusion of the Orleans reign in 1848. The volume from which these last extracts are made, is entitled Lettres Parisiennes. It has all the wit and talent of the cleverest of fashionable Frenchwomen. The tone is sometimes extremely good—better than we were led to expect; but the picture it presents is about as mournful a one as pictures of French frivolity usually are. We will, however, leave them to make their ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 445 - Volume 18, New Series, July 10, 1852 • Various
... moreover the joke in a story which often used to occur to T. "A lady invited to a reception, where there were also young girls, a Hungarian [accentuated now, on account of what follows] (the typical Vienna joker), who is feared on account of his racy wit. She enjoined him at the same time, in view of the presence of the girls, not to treat them to any of his spicy jests. The Hungarian agreed and appeared at the party. To the amazement of the lady, he proposed the following riddle: ''One can enter from in front, or from behind, only one ...
— Hidden Symbolism of Alchemy and the Occult Arts • Herbert Silberer
... returned slowly toward the hollow. He knew that the fire would soon reach a prairie somewhat farther on, where it would probably die out, but he knew also that his triumph was achieved. Circumstances and the presence of the animals and the birds had helped him greatly, but his own quick wit and infinity of resource had put the capstone on success. He began to feel now the effect of the immense exertions he had made with both body and mind, and, before he reached the hollow, he turned ...
— The Eyes of the Woods - A story of the Ancient Wilderness • Joseph A. Altsheler
... smart rappee, And reach Sir Fopling's brain (if brain there be), He shines in dedications, poems, plays, Soars in Pindarics, and asserts the bays; Thus dost thou every taste and genius hit— In smoke thou'rt wisdom, and in snuff thou'rt wit. ...
— Tobacco; Its History, Varieties, Culture, Manufacture and Commerce • E. R. Billings
... of his fortunes. He was then no longer the hot and heady satirist; he had become the sly and subtle scorner. No man said so many cutting things, yet so few of which any one could take advantage: he anatomized human character without the appearance of inflicting a wound; he had all the pungency of wit without its peril, and reigned supreme by a terror which every one pretended not to feel. The change, after all, was only one of weapons; in the first period it was the knife, in the second the razor—and perhaps the latter was the ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - Volume 55, No. 343, May 1844 • Various
... found fitter place For courtly wit and modish grace, Than by the Indus. There right well His facile talent served his Chief; And England hears with genuine grief That sudden-sounding ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 101, December 5, 1891 • Various
... stubborn she should be subjected to the peine forte et dure, for that the defensio she had set up did not suffice, and that there were indicia legitima, praegnantia et sufficientia ad torturam ipsam; to wit—1. Mala sama. ...
— Sidonia The Sorceress V2 • William Mienhold
... eclectically upon these commentaries, investing their judgments with a new popularity and authority. Although Dryden condemned Persius for obscurity and other defects, he agreed with Casaubon that Persius excels as a moral philosopher and that "moral doctrine" is more important to satire than wit or urbanity. Dryden knew, moreover, that the satirist's inculcation of "moral doctrine" meant a dual purpose, a pattern of blame and praise—not only "the scourging of vice" but also "exhortation to virtue"—long recognized as a definitive characteristic of formal ...
— An Essay on Satire, Particularly on the Dunciad • Walter Harte
... beauty, faith in youth, she surely loves him much; and much more above her sex she is capable of love, by how much more her soul is form'd of a softer and more delicate composition; by how much more her wit's refin'd and elevated above her duller sex, and by how much more she is oblig'd; if passion can claim passion in return, sure no beauty was ever so much indebted to a slave, as Sylvia to Philander; none ever lov'd like me: judge then my pains of love, my joys, my fears, my impatience ...
— Love-Letters Between a Nobleman and His Sister • Aphra Behn
... language and of wit! the old decaying ramparts of the deserted fortification are now the last visible mementos of thy childhood's home. When the sun is sinking, their shadows fall upon the spot where stood the house in which thine eyes first opened on the light. ...
— The Sand-Hills of Jutland • Hans Christian Andersen
... ambassador suddenly left London, a perfect storm of hostility fell upon the cabinet. Lord Palmerston defended the policy of the foreign office throughout with candour, courtesy, and yet with a satirical wit, which keenly annoyed the opposition, while no excuse was left them to impeach the veteran minister's politeness, or constitutional respect for the house. The ministry were not apprised that the French ambassador ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... strong capabilities which had been illy balanced or allowed to run to waste in others. It might be said that the materials for a fine specimen of humanity accumulate through several generations, until a child appears who is the heir of all the family wit and attractiveness and common sense, just as one person may inherit the worldly wealth of ...
— A Country Doctor and Selected Stories and Sketches • Sarah Orne Jewett
... Mister Officer, as how you're mighty cute upon a fallen man—but tarnation seize me, if I don't expect you'll find some one cuter still afore long. The sogers all say," he continued with a low, cunning laugh, "as how you're a bit of a wit, and fond of a play upon words like. If so, I'll jist try you a little at your own game, and tell you that I had a thousand to one rather be troubled with my small bores than with such a confounded great bore as you are; and now, ...
— The Canadian Brothers - or The Prophecy Fulfilled • John Richardson
... as we must needs infer From such belief our reasoning, all respect To other view excluded, hence of proof Th' intention is deriv'd." Forthwith I heard: "If thus, whate'er by learning men attain, Were understood, the sophist would want room To exercise his wit." So breath'd the flame Of love: then added: "Current is the coin Thou utter'st, both in weight and in alloy. But tell me, if thou hast ...
— The Divine Comedy, Complete - The Vision of Paradise, Purgatory and Hell • Dante Alighieri
... might my wit may not suffice; Foolish men he can make them out of wise;— For he may do all that he will devise; Loose livers he can make abate their vice, And proud hearts can make ...
— The Poetical Works of William Wordsworth, Vol. II. • William Wordsworth
... promise to breathe not a word of this to any woman I may marry hereafter, here's a dead snip for you. Listen! When you come to the words "to love, cherish and to obey," you simply drop the second "to" (nobody will miss it) and run the "d" of the "and" into the "obey," and lo! we have a French word, to wit, dauber, meaning to cuff, drub or belabour. What say you to that, my bonny bride? I think that deserves an extra large slice of cake, to put under my pillow. And I say, Muriel, I do hope there won't ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 146., January 14, 1914 • Various
... Yorker. "Two more of the same. It is acknowledged by every one that our city is the centre of art, and literature, and learning. Take, for instance, our after-dinner speakers. Where else in the country would you find such wit and eloquence as emanate from ...
— Sixes and Sevens • O. Henry
... so persistently made merry. It has been a stock subject with them. It is as if they had said to themselves, 'When at a loss, revile the connubial condition.' Married life has been the sport of every wit, and, sorrowful to relate, society has been well content to join in the pastime. There is nothing so common as sarcasm on matrimony, and nothing, apparently, so welcome, even ...
— By-ways in Book-land - Short Essays on Literary Subjects • William Davenport Adams
... am not joking," replied the duchess, "and I shudder with fear for myself when I coolly consider people whom I have known in other times. Wit always has a sparkle which wounds us, and the man who has much of it makes us fear him perhaps, and if he is a proud man he will be capable of jealousy, and is not therefore to our taste. In fact, we prefer to raise a man to our own height rather than to have to climb up to his. Talent ...
— Analytical Studies • Honore de Balzac
... traverse sailing, quadrature and Gunter's scales, were all crowded together, in a brain which had not capacity to receive the rule of three. "Too much learning," said Festus to the apostle, "hath made thee mad." Mr Tallboys had not wit enough to go mad, but his learning lay like lead upon his brain: the more he read, the less he understood, at the same time that he became more satisfied with his supposed acquirements, and could not ...
— Mr. Midshipman Easy • Captain Frederick Marryat
... to let the piston slide up through it, and at the same time so water-tight as to withstand the internal force of the pump. These two conditions seemed so conflicting that Bramah was almost at his wit's end, and for a time despaired of being able to bring the machine to a state of practical efficiency. None but those who have occupied themselves in the laborious and often profitless task of helping the world to new and useful machines can have any idea ...
— Industrial Biography - Iron Workers and Tool Makers • Samuel Smiles
... and even vague. It had begun well. Sir Bruce had met the beauty at a ball, and they had danced together more than once. Sir Bruce had attractions other than his old baronetcy and his coal-mines. He was a good-looking person, with a laughing brown eye and a nice wit. He had danced charmingly and paid gay compliments. He would have done immensely well. Agatha had liked him. Emily sometimes thought she had liked him very much. Her mother had liked him and had thought he was attracted. But after a number of occasions of agreeable meetings, ...
— Emily Fox-Seton - Being The Making of a Marchioness and The Methods of Lady Walderhurst • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... joys and pains which may come from any of these sources. Where beauty is lacking, wit may brilliantly shine; where health is failing, a talent may console; where the family life is unhappy, the ambitions for a career may be fulfilled. Much inequality will thus result, but the chances for a certain evenness of human joy and sorrow will be ...
— Psychology and Social Sanity • Hugo Muensterberg
... suit of clothes, mostly one color, and voyage paid, and a large house ashore waiting for you; and the governor's gig will come alongside for you, provided they can't find the convicts' barge," and the official was pleased with himself and his wit and ...
— It Is Never Too Late to Mend • Charles Reade
... was pretty I would say, 'My dear, make the very most of your looks and of your time. Don't try to be clever, because you are probably a fool, but that doesn't matter. Keep your mouth shut, and look all the brilliant things you haven't the wit to say.' And if she were ugly I would say, 'For heaven's sake be amusing, and cultivate the gift of patience, and don't hope for the impossible.'" Isabella smiled. "Why did no one give me any good advice when I was young, I wonder? ...
— East of the Shadows • Mrs. Hubert Barclay
... intensified, as I have already noted, that we read some of the letters of the early fathers—those grave and hallowed figures seen through a mist of centuries—and find them jesting at one another in the gayest and least sacerdotal manner imaginable. "Who could tell a story with more wit, who could joke so pleasantly?" sighs St. Gregory of Nazienzen of his friend St. Basil, remembering doubtless with a heavy heart the shafts of good-humored raillery that had brightened their lifelong intercourse. ...
— Masterpieces Of American Wit And Humor • Thomas L. Masson (Editor)
... Arthur asked that question, and among them Dolly, who with a woman's quick wit, sharpened by something she accidentally saw, divined the truth, which she wrung at last from her husband. There was a fierce quarrel—almost their first—a sick headache which lasted three days, and a month or more of ...
— Tracy Park • Mary Jane Holmes
... I have said, of grave but urbane deportment, became curious to know what it was that our neighbours had been conversing about, and which had occasioned so much hilarity. He very politely expressed this wish to me. If it was not an indiscretion, he should like to partake, he said, in the wit that was flowing round him; adding, perhaps superfluously, that he ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - Volume 55, No. 344, June, 1844 • Various
... pluck off with his teeth any rare or common flower within his reach that was described to him by the same means. Spoken to or commanded by others, he was simply a good-natured intelligent Newfoundland; but under the authority of Heliobas, he became more than human in ready wit and quick obedience, and would have brought in a golden harvest to any great ...
— A Romance of Two Worlds • Marie Corelli
... still standing. He failed to grasp his friend's purpose. His wit was unequal to the rapid process of the other's swiftly ...
— The Man in the Twilight • Ridgwell Cullum
... Adams, eyeing the lad with a twinkling expression, "d'ye know, I have heard it said or writ somewhere, that brevity is the soul of wit. If that sayin's true, an' I've no reason for to suppose that it isn't, I should say that that observation of yours was wit without either soul or body, it's so uncommon short; too witty, in short. Couldn't you manage to add something more ...
— The Lonely Island - The Refuge of the Mutineers • R.M. Ballantyne
... Indians, Their Animosities are Turned to Friendliness, Through Ryus' Wit and Ingenuity—"Hail ...
— The Second William Penn - A true account of incidents that happened along the - old Santa Fe Trail • William H. Ryus
... a woman of wit and beauty. Prescott often had remarked it, but never with such a realizing sense. She was young, graceful, and with a face sufficiently supplied with natural roses, and above all keen with intelligence. She wore a shade of light green, a colour that harmonized wonderfully with ...
— Before the Dawn - A Story of the Fall of Richmond • Joseph Alexander Altsheler
... a Fellow-lodger's care Had left it, to be watch'd and fed, Till he came back again; and there I found it when my Son was dead; And now, God help me for my little wit! I trail it with me, Sir! he took so much delight ...
— Poems In Two Volumes, Vol. 1 • William Wordsworth
... statutes or enactments of the government shall pass the ordeal of any number of separate tribunals, before it shall be determined that they are to have the force of laws. Our American constitutions have provided five of these separate tribunals, to wit, representatives, senate, executive,[2] jury, and judges; and have made it necessary that each enactment shall pass the ordeal of all these separate tribunals, before its authority can be established by the punishment of those who choose to transgress it. And there is no more absurdity ...
— An Essay on the Trial By Jury • Lysander Spooner
... for a rencontre with our hero under such circumstances. But they saw Wildney pointing to them, and, from the fits of laughter which followed his remarks, they had little doubt that they were the subject of the young gentleman's wit. This is never a pleasant sensation; but they observed that Eric made a point of not looking their way, and ...
— Eric, or Little by Little • Frederic W. Farrar
... began gravely, and not until he had made several sales did he venture on a joke or a witticism, although he had a plentiful stock of cheap wit, such as ...
— Golden Days for Boys and Girls - Volume VIII, No 25: May 21, 1887 • Various
... signs and tokens of the ages past Must of necessity their impress leave Upon our brightly dawning age of gold: Because society from Nature still Receives a thousand principles and aims, Diverse, discordant; which to reconcile, No wit or power of man hath yet availed, Since first our race, illustrious, was born; Nor will avail, or treaty or gazette, In any age, however wise or strong. But in things more important, how complete, Ne'er seen, till now, will be our happiness! ...
— The Poems of Giacomo Leopardi • Giacomo Leopardi
... does not hear how he's beating! He swings his great fists, as if he's asleep. And there's no possibility of pacifying him; and for why? Why, because, as you know yourself, Gavrila Andreitch, he's deaf, and what's more, has no more wit than the heel of my foot. Why, he's a sort of beast, a heathen idol, Gavrila Andreitch, and worse ... a block of wood; what have I done that I should have to suffer from him now? Sure it is, it's all over with me now; I've knocked about, I've had ...
— The Torrents of Spring • Ivan Turgenev
... in the world, unless it be Paris, loves to be amused, thrilled and surprised all at the same time; and will accept with outstretched hand any one who can perform this astounding feat. Do not underestimate the ability that can achieve it: a scintillating wit, an arresting originality, a talent for entertaining that amounts to genius, and gold poured literally like rain, are ...
— Etiquette • Emily Post
... no originality, no wit, and Babbitt fell into a great silence and devoted himself to the game of beating trolley cars to the corner: a spurt, a tail-chase, nervous speeding between the huge yellow side of the trolley and the jagged row ...
— Babbitt • Sinclair Lewis
... wit! What, think you I am a fool? Let us see! By my own cunning I have had fashioned this Tarnhelm which makes me invisible to all. Then who shall find me when I sleep?" ...
— Operas Every Child Should Know - Descriptions of the Text and Music of Some of the Most Famous Masterpieces • Mary Schell Hoke Bacon
... westward of these there is a large one which is not to be regarded. Having the capes thus opposite each other, you are in the middle of the channel and by the first buoy. The current runs outside along the shore, east and west, to wit: the ebb tide westerly, and the flood easterly, and also very strong. The ebb runs until it is half flood. There are still two other channels, the old one which is the middle one, and the Spanish Channel stretching to the east. We had reached the middlemost ...
— Journal of Jasper Danckaerts, 1679-1680 • Jasper Danckaerts
... "Attic (or Athenian) salt" to describe a very refined wit or humour. The Romans used the word sal, or "salt," in this sense of wit, and their expression sal Atticum shows the high opinion they had of the Athenians, from whom, indeed, they learned much in art and in literature. It is this same expression which we use to-day, ...
— Stories That Words Tell Us • Elizabeth O'Neill
... the gentleman of the cigarette and I. He was an Englishman from a London newspaper. He was counting on his luck to get him into Calais and his wit to get him out. He told me his name. Just before I left France I heard of a highly philanthropic and talented gentleman of the same name who was unselfishly going through the hospitals as near the front as he could, ...
— Kings, Queens And Pawns - An American Woman at the Front • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... of age, mulatto, spare made, but not lacking in courage, mother wit or perseverance. He was born in Fauquier county, Va., and, after experiencing Slavery for a number of years there—being sold two or three times to the "highest bidder"—he was finally purchased by a cotton ...
— The Underground Railroad • William Still
... phrases, soft temptations To glorious beggary: Here let them hand This Booke; here studie, reade, and vnderstand: Then shall they find varietie at Home, As curious as at Paris, or at Rome. For my part I confesse, hadst not thou writ, I had not beene acquainted with more wit Than our old English taught; but now I can Be proud to know I have a Countryman Hath strugled for a fame, and what is more, Gain'd it by paths of Art, vntrod before. The benefit is generall; the crowne Of praise particular, and thats thine owne. What should I say? thine owne deserts ...
— The evolution of English lexicography • James Augustus Henry Murray
... The entree which follows the fish should be eaten with the fork only. A mouthful of meat is cut as required; it is never buried in potato or any vegetable and then conveyed to the mouth. Vegetables are no longer served in "birds' bath-tubs," as some wit once called the individual vegetable dishes, but are cooked sufficiently dry to be served on the plate with the meat. All vegetables are eaten with the fork, so also jellies, chutney, etc., served with the ...
— Mother's Remedies - Over One Thousand Tried and Tested Remedies from Mothers - of the United States and Canada • T. J. Ritter
... sinuous paths made by the wandering currents, the subtle, smiling, silent sea, holding in suspense its unfathomable restlessness, waiting to surge and spring again. That was what she wanted from him—not his embraces, not even his adoration, his wit, or his queer, lithe comeliness touched with felinity; no, only that in his soul which escaped through his fingers into the air and dragged at her soul. If, when he came in, she were to run to him, throw her arms round his ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... the same treatment as Collins had received from Bentley. But the comparison scarcely does justice either to Horsley or Priestley. From a purely intellectual point of view it would be a compliment to any man to compare him with 'Phileleutherus Lipsiensis,' but the brilliant wit and profound scholarship displayed in Bentley's remarks on Collins were tarnished by a scurrility and personality which, even artistically speaking, injured the merits of the work, and were quite unworthy of being addressed by one gentleman (not to say clergyman) ...
— The English Church in the Eighteenth Century • Charles J. Abbey and John H. Overton
... much wit as all those put together who were assembled at the court to laugh at him. His speech, therefore, was so well turned, that in spite of the great wish felt by the courtiers to laugh, they could find no point on which to vent their ridicule. He concluded ...
— Twenty Years After • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... bell. Only it appeared to him that the priest held up the Body for a great space, and in that long time Master Richard understood many things that had been dark to him before. Of some of the things I have neither room nor wit to write; but they were such ...
— The History of Richard Raynal, Solitary • Robert Hugh Benson
... sent John Mackenzie of Tollie to inform him of these wrongs, whereupon he made a speedy return to an affair so urgent, and so suitable to his genius, for as he never offered wrong so he never suffered any. His heat did not overwhelm his wit, for he took a legal procedure, obtained a commission of fire and sword against Glengarry and his complices, which he prosecuted so bravely as in a short time by himself and his brother he soon forced them to retreat from his lands, and following them to their own bills, he soon dissipated and ...
— History Of The Mackenzies • Alexander Mackenzie
... translation by Canon Roberts, while Caesar, Tacitus, Thucydides and Herodotus are not forgotten. "You only, O Books," said Richard de Bury, "are liberal and independent; you give to all who ask." The delightful variety, the wisdom and the wit which are at the disposal of Everyman in his own library may well, at times, seem to him a little embarrassing. He may turn to Dick Steele in The Spectator and learn how Cleomira dances, when the elegance of her motion is unimaginable and "her eyes are chastised with the simplicity and ...
— Translations of Shakuntala and Other Works • Kaalidaasa
... years did stray In desarts but of small extent, Bacon like Moses led us forth at last, The barren Wilderness he past, Did on the very Border stand Of the blest promised land, And from the Mountain Top of his Exalted Wit Saw it himself and shew'd us it. But Life did never to one Man allow Time to discover Worlds and conquer too; Nor can so short a line sufficient be To fadome the vast depths of ...
— The Life and Times of John Wilkins • Patrick A. Wright-Henderson
... about the middle of the fifteenth century, was an eminent wood-carver. Very little is known about him. His name is sometimes said to be Wit Stwosz, and Cracow and Nuremberg both claim to have been his birthplace. But it is now believed that he was born in Nuremberg, as it is known that in 1477 he gave up his citizenship there and ...
— A History of Art for Beginners and Students - Painting, Sculpture, Architecture • Clara Erskine Clement
... expressed or understood, and those of all her other admirers, who had built up a sort of cloud-world around her, so that her little feet never rested on the soil of reality. Sally was shrewd and keen, and had a native mother-wit in the discernment of spirits, that made her feel that somehow this was all false coin; but still she counted it over, and it looked so pretty and bright that she sighed to ...
— The Pearl of Orr's Island - A Story of the Coast of Maine • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... just going away, proud at heart to have made some return already to the man who had done him so many kindnesses. He had saved Pons' friend from a trap, by a stratagem from that world behind the scenes in which every one has more or less ready wit. And within himself he vowed to protect a musician in his orchestra from future snares set ...
— Poor Relations • Honore de Balzac
... a Report of the Secret Committee of your Right Honourable House, and which Report appears to your petitioner, as far as his humble powers of disentanglement have enabled him to analyse the same, to submit to your Right Honourable House, as solemn truths, the following assertions; to wit: ...
— Memoirs of Henry Hunt, Esq. Volume 3 • Henry Hunt
... I did! Wasn't he my brother's boy?" Pennold hunched over the table, and continued eagerly: "Mame kept him clean an' fed, an' we sent him to public school, just like any other kid. But it wasn't no use. He had it in him to go wrong, without the wit to get away with it. He was caught pinchin' lead piping when he was sixteen, an' sent to Elmira for three years. Them three years was his finish. When he came out he'd had what you'd call a graduate course in every ...
— The Crevice • William John Burns and Isabel Ostrander
... I: words said or sung Help me no more than hand is helped of tongue: Yet, would some better wit than mine, I wis, Help mine, I fain ...
— Locrine - A Tragedy • Algernon Charles Swinburne
... not, you Man or you Nation, love the Truth enough, but try to make a Chapman-bargain with Truth, instead of giving yourself wholly soul and body and life to her, Truth will not live with you, Truth will depart from you; and only Logic, "Wit" (for example, "London Wit"), Sophistry, Virtu, the AEsthetic Arts, and perhaps (for a short while) Bookkeeping by Double Entry, will abide with you. You will follow falsity, and think it truth, you unfortunate man or nation. You will right surely, you for one, stumble to the Devil; and ...
— History Of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. III. (of XXI.) - Frederick The Great—The Hohenzollerns In Brandenburg—1412-1718 • Thomas Carlyle
... intervals into high imagination, and making him a genuine child of that nation from whom came forth the loftiest, richest, and most impassioned songs the earth has ever witnessed—the nation of Isaiah, Ezekiel, Solomon, and Job. He has little humor, but a vast deal of diamond-pointed wit."[E] ...
— The Menorah Journal, Volume 1, 1915 • Various
... have been exterminated by the effects of the 'firewater' and the vicious habits brought in by more civilised men. The Red man is usually proud and reserved; serious, if not gloomy, in his views of life; comparatively indifferent to wit or pleasantry; vain of personal endowments; brave and fond of war, yet extremely cautious and taking no needless risks; fond of gambling and drinking; seemingly indifferent to pain; kind and hospitable to strangers, yet revengeful ...
— From Slave to College President - Being the Life Story of Booker T. Washington • Godfrey Holden Pike
... Tom was always harum scarum, and you must make allowances for this daughter of his. Her very name is—ah—disconcerting. I haven't seen him for years, and as for her...." A shrug epitomised his apprehension. He smiled with an effort at wit. "Just the same, they're as much your family as mine. If he is my brother, he is your uncle. And if she's my niece, ...
— The Turtles of Tasman • Jack London
... by a million sterling, personified in one old man. Paralysed, fascinated, overcome. All those three. Only having no final control over his own make-up, he could not drive himself into the money-making or even into the money-having habit. And he had just wit enough to threaten Sir William's golden king with his own ivory queen and knights of wilful ...
— Aaron's Rod • D. H. Lawrence
... yeares paste there was at Bologna a notable Phisition, renowmed throughe out the whole worlde, called Maister Alberto, whoe beinge old, almost LX. yeares of age, had such an excellent wit, that although naturall heate was expired in his bodie, yet hee disdayned not to conceiue some amorous flames of loue. Seing at a banket a verye fayre gentlewoman a widowe called (as some saye) Madonna Margherita de Ghisilieri, she pleased his fansie so well, that he ...
— The Palace of Pleasure, Volume 1 • William Painter
... for the inspection of passers-by as a sample of the aristocracy within, he made several attempts to air his grievances to passing members touching the question of the expectant Jorrocks and the missing purse. Beyond, however, eliciting many sallies of wit from the younger spirits, for it was part of the major's policy to lay himself open to be a butt, his laudable perseverance was entirely thrown away. At last he gave it up in disgust, and raising his stick hailed a passing 'bus, into which he sprang, taking a searching glance round to see ...
— The Firm of Girdlestone • Arthur Conan Doyle
... had joined the army as correspondent for his paper, and Betty had been his companion on many tours of inspection through camp, hospitals and drill grounds. Her quick wit and brilliant mind were an inspiring stimulus. She was cool and self-possessed and it rested him to be near her. She was the only restful woman he had ever encountered at short range. He was delighted that she seemed content without love-making. There was never a moment when he could ...
— The Southerner - A Romance of the Real Lincoln • Thomas Dixon
... thing were possible, we dined more extravagantly than on the previous night. Madame's wit was at its keenest; she was truly brilliant. Pedro, from the big bouffet at the end of the room, supervised this feast of Lucullus, and except for odd moments of silence in which Madame seemed to be listening for some distant sound, there was nothing, I think, which could have told a casual ...
— Bat Wing • Sax Rohmer
... any more drags on the wheels of its merry-making. Mrs. Nat told funny stories, and the boys gave impromptu imitations of classmates and professors; Margaret Howes sparkled with quaint tales of the remote mountain village where she had been spending the summer. Elinor's gentle wit flashed; and Bruce's ready laughter followed every one of his own clever jokes, while Patricia and Marian made their mark as an appreciative audience, enjoying everything that was meant for humor ...
— Miss Pat at Artemis Lodge • Pemberton Ginther
... been so stupid? Stupid? It was easy! He had wanted to be stupid! And how could the Mr. Eumenes-or-otherwise have used such obvious giveaway names? It was a measure of their contempt for the humans around them and of their own grim wit. Look at all the double entendres the salesman had given his father, and his father had never suspected. Even the head of the Bureau of Health and Sanity had been terrifyingly blase ...
— They Twinkled Like Jewels • Philip Jose Farmer
... pavements began to quake with heat, I determined to fly to the country. As delights are doubled when shared with those we care for, I determined to take Peter with me, so I packed him up in a specially constructed travelling saloon of his own, to wit, a flannel-lined basket containing all the necessary comforts for the journey, such as air-holes and feeding-bottles, and off we started in the highest of spirits. Peter found a new world opened to him, and the thousand and one beauties of the country fascinated us both. ...
— The Junior Classics Volume 8 - Animal and Nature Stories • Selected and arranged by William Patten
... full of danger. Only the ready wit and courage of the king saved the lives of his followers,—perhaps ...
— Historical Tales, Vol. 4 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris
... sentiment impart; Thy outward form adorn'd with ev'ry grace; With beauty's softest charms thy heav'nly face, Where sweet expression beaming ever proved The index of that soul, by all beloved; Thy wit so keen, thy genius form'd to soar, By fancy wing'd, new science to explore; Thy temper, ever gentle, good, and kind, Where all but guilt an advocate could find: To those who know this character was thine, (And in this truth assenting numbers join) How vain th' ...
— The Eventful History Of The Mutiny And Piratical Seizure - Of H.M.S. Bounty: Its Cause And Consequences • Sir John Barrow
... Agnes' innocence imposed on the wit of the various narratives, and on the philosophy of the comments often became painfully irksome, and on noticing Harding's embarrassments Mrs. Lahens would suggest that Agnes went to her room. Agnes gladly availed herself of the permission, and without the slightest admission ...
— Celibates • George Moore
... sally. The Maggid's wit was relished even when not coming from the pulpit. To the outsider this disparagement of the Dutch nose might have seemed a case of pot calling kettle black. The Maggid poured himself out a glass ...
— Children of the Ghetto • I. Zangwill
... of zat squid isn't more zan two feet long, an' yet if he'd got a hold of you in ze water, specially with ze bigger suckers on ze t'ick part of ze arms, you might have had some trouble. Zose big fellows wit' bodies twenty feet long an' arms t'irty feet, mus' be one horrible t'ing to meet ...
— The Boy With the U. S. Fisheries • Francis Rolt-Wheeler
... somewhat disaffected to Bannon's authority, but had not expected him to make so frank an avowal of it. That was almost as much in his favor as the necessity for hurry. These, with the hoist accident to give a color of respectability to the operation, ought to make it simple enough. He had wit enough to see that Bannon was a much harder man to handle than Peterson, and that with Peterson restored to full authority, the only element of uncertainty would be removed. And he thought that if he could get Peterson to help him it might be possible to secure ...
— Calumet 'K' • Samuel Merwin
... hollow pretence, than this? Keep the Sicilians from breaking an armistice enforced to save them from utter and final destruction! Keep the beaten Sicilian rebel from overpowering his victorious masters! Keep the felon convicted from rushing to the gallows in spite of the respite granted him! Can human wit imagine a more ridiculous pretext than this, of affecting to hold the balance even, when you are preventing the conqueror from improving his victory, and only preventing the vanquished from attempting ...
— Selected Speeches on British Foreign Policy 1738-1914 • Edgar Jones
... see that everything was overthrown; but one could not see any power that was to raise the ruins. Over the confused wrecks and remains of the Past, the powerful intellectual life of the Present-Progress—the collision of ideas—the flame of French wit, criticism and the sciences—threw a brilliant light, which, like the sun of earlier ages, illuminated the chaos without making it productive. The phenomena of Life and of Death were commingled in one huge fermentation, ...
— Monsieur de Camors, Complete • Octave Feuillet
... only stowed away my original impedimenta but had also managed to find room for various articles of vertu which had enriched my private collection, to wit: ...
— Leaves from a Field Note-Book • J. H. Morgan
... he had the wit to echo her then, and in a loud voice, that any eye-witness or passer-by might be struck with the genuine severity of their loss. But there had been no eye-witness who thought it worth while to rally them on the occurrence, and the busy townsfolk hastening past were all too much engrossed ...
— The Camera Fiend • E.W. Hornung
... who helped to impress them. His friend Mr Wordsworth, in the vivacity of his admonitions to hasty complaints of evil, has gone so far as to say that "Carnage is God's daughter," and thereby subjected himself to the scoffs of a late noble wit. He ...
— Captain Sword and Captain Pen - A Poem • Leigh Hunt
... "Tristram Shandy" came to town, and was received with more than Roman triumph. Wealth, wit, genius, nobility, thronged his door, sought his friendship, proffered favors. Sterne revelled in this new life. London offered him a cup of the most intoxicating quality, and he drank and drank again of its sparkling fountain without ever ...
— A History of the Four Georges, Volume II (of 4) • Justin McCarthy
... a long mark with a pen over the manuscript of the king, took a new sheet of paper, and commenced to write the first lines. He criticised every word with bitter humor, with flashing wit, with mocking irony. Inexorable in his censure, indifferent in his praise, his tongue seemed to be armed with arrows, every one of which was intended to ...
— Berlin and Sans-Souci • Louise Muhlbach
... and unusually depressing literary habit. This poor soul fancied his vein was humour, and from him I have often endured the reading aloud of the dreariest laboured pages of japes and jests, which to his thinking were sparkling with wit. My patient, long-suffering listening only brought bitter derision for my alleged lack of humorous perception, but my criticism inspired the young man to write a cynical article on 'Women and Humour,' of the kind that editors—being ...
— Modern marriage and how to bear it • Maud Churton Braby
... Jamie talked so much about," she said; "the doctor whom the family met in Paris," dwelling so long on Dr. Grant and discussing him so volubly that Phillips and the other servants lost sight entirely of what had struck them a little oddly, to wit: that Mrs. Wilford should leave Father Cameron's if she ...
— Family Pride - Or, Purified by Suffering • Mary J. Holmes
... weather.{HORIZONTAL ELLIPSIS} They are right, how could these German youths—in their present condition,—miss what we others, we halcyonians, miss in Wagner? i.e.: la gaya scienza; light feet, wit, fire, grave, grand logic, stellar dancing, wanton intellectuality, the vibrating light of the South, ...
— The Case Of Wagner, Nietzsche Contra Wagner, and Selected Aphorisms. • Friedrich Nietzsche.
... I suppose," said the yard-man grimly, pleased at his own generosity, well satisfied with his wit, and fairly so with Albert's tribute ...
— Boy Woodburn - A Story of the Sussex Downs • Alfred Ollivant
... do not doubt, is there Who unveiled my idol fair! And I thank him, grateful much, Though his end was none of such. He from shapely lips of wit Let the fire-flakes lightly flit, Scorching as the snow that fell On the damned in Dante's hell; With keen, gentle opposition, Playful, merciless precision, Mocked the sweet romance of youth Balancing on spheric truth; He on sense's firm set plane Rolled the unstable ball amain: With ...
— Poetical Works of George MacDonald, Vol. 2 • George MacDonald
... they belong, have either in themselves experienced, or heard recorded by intimate associates whose veracity they accept as indisputable in all ordinary transactions of life, phenomena which are not to be solved by the wit that mocks them, nor, perhaps, always and entirely, to the contentment of the reason or the philosophy that explains them away. Such phenomena, I say, are infinitely more numerous than would appear ...
— A Strange Story, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... restraining the "liberty of the Press which will be a long stride towards the destruction of Liberty itself"; he pointed out that a Minister who has merited the esteem of the people will neither fear the wit nor feel the satire of the theatre; he denounced the subjugation of the stage under "an arbitrary Court license" which would convert it into a canal for conveying the vices and follies of "great men and ...
— Henry Fielding: A Memoir • G. M. Godden
... (the year Lady Fanny's diaries begin), the Duke of Wellington resigned, having emphatically declared that the system of representation ought to possess, and did possess, the entire confidence of the country. He had gone so far as to say that the wit of man could not have devised a better representative system than that which Lord John Russell, in the previous session, had attempted to alter by proposing to enfranchise Manchester, Leeds, and Birmingham. ...
— Lady John Russell • Desmond MacCarthy and Agatha Russell
... some patent inaccuracies in Tarde's account—the statement, to wit, that Talbot was buried on the spot where he fell, whereas his body was carried from the field and taken to England. The ecclesiastical chronicler must have accepted the story in circulation among the common people, ...
— Two Summers in Guyenne • Edward Harrison Barker
... bloody flag against all patience] That is, declare war against patience. There is not wit enough in this satire ...
— Notes to Shakespeare, Volume III: The Tragedies • Samuel Johnson
... antiquarians. In our own country, the movement initiated by Chatterton, Cowper, and Burns, was carried out by two classes of great writers. They agreed in opposing freedom to formality; in substituting for the old, new aims and methods; in preferring a grain of mother wit to a peck of clerisy. They broke with the old school, as Protestantism broke with the old Church; but, like the sects, they separated again. Wordsworth, Southey, and Coleridge, while refusing to acknowledge ...
— Byron • John Nichol
... Enterprise compositors was one by the name of Stephen E. Gillis (Steve, of course—one of the "fighting Gillises"), a small, fearless young fellow, handsome, quick of wit, with ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine
... time, and the food had evidently been good and satisfying. The music too in the minstrels' gallery had been sweet and pleasant to the ear. The Court jester had for a wonder excelled himself in his strong endeavours to put the King in a good humour, and uttered no less than three samples of his wit which had made the King roar, inasmuch as in the tail of each joke there was a slightly poisoned sting which had gone home to the three noblemen for whom they were intended, my Lord Hurst, the King's chamberlain, getting ...
— The King's Esquires - The Jewel of France • George Manville Fenn
... companion. Her wavy, jet-black hair, the only color in the world that could hold its own with Dorothy's auburn glory, framed features self-reliant and strong, yet of womanly softness; and in this genial atmosphere her quick tongue had a delicate wit and a facility of expression that delighted all three. Dorothy, after the manner of Southern women, became the hostess of this odd "party," as she styled it, and unconsciously adopted the attitude of a lady in ...
— The Skylark of Space • Edward Elmer Smith and Lee Hawkins Garby
... 'and we had a glorious set-to-on Homer, Shakespeare, Milton, and Virgil. Lamb got exceedingly merry, and exquisitely witty, and his fun, in the midst of Wordsworth's solemn intonations of oratory, was like the sarcasm and wit of the fool in the intervals of Lear's passion.' Although the specimens of wit recorded no longer seem inspired, we can well believe Haydon's statement that it was an immortal evening, and that in all his life he never passed a more delightful time. We have abundant testimony ...
— Little Memoirs of the Nineteenth Century • George Paston
... saying of Geronimo's, that courage grows with peril. Happen what might, there he was, and he knew no fear. The only perceptible exit from the room was by the large, folding-doors through which he had entered. He tried them—they were fastened. His mother-wit suggested to him that his retreat had perhaps been thus cut off, that he might seek another outlet. He did so, and presently perceived hinges under the tapestry. A silver handle protruded from the wall; ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 61, No. 379, May, 1847 • Various
... More. His theology, though he made a greater mark on the world by it than even by his scholarship, he derived almost without change from Colet. But his combination of vast learning with keen observation, of acuteness of remark with a lively fancy, of genial wit with a perfect good sense—his union of as sincere a piety and as profound a zeal for rational religion as Colet's with a dispassionate fairness towards older faiths, a large love of secular culture, and a genial ...
— History of the English People, Volume III (of 8) - The Parliament, 1399-1461; The Monarchy 1461-1540 • John Richard Green
... and prisoner. There is no enjoyment so keen to certain minds as that of looking upon the slow torture of a human being on trial for life, except it be an execution; there is no display of human ingenuity, wit and power so fascinating as that made by trained lawyers in the trial of an important case, nowhere else is exhibited such subtlety, ...
— The Gilded Age, Complete • Mark Twain and Charles Dudley Warner
... brilliant interpreter in Aeschines, who, after having been a tragic actor and a clerk to the assembly, had entered political life with the advantages of a splendid gift for eloquence, a fine presence, a happy address, a ready wit and a facile conscience. While his opponents had thus suddenly become warlike, Demosthenes had become pacific. He saw that Athens must have time to collect strength. Nothing could be gained, meanwhile, by going on with the war. Macedonian sympathizers at Athens, of whom Philocrates was the ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 8, Slice 2 - "Demijohn" to "Destructor" • Various
... investigation." (20.) Part II of the Platform, the "Synodical Disclaimer," contains a list of the symbolic errors with extracts from the Lutheran symbols, "which are rejected by the great body of the American Lutheran Church," to wit: I. Ceremonies of the mass (A. C., Art. 24; Apology, Art. 12). 2. Exorcism (Luther's Taufbuechlein). 3. Private confession and absolution (A. C., Art. 11. 25. 28). 4. The denial of the divine institution and obligation ...
— American Lutheranism - Volume 2: The United Lutheran Church (General Synod, General - Council, United Synod in the South) • Friedrich Bente
... to keep these two people apart," she struck in. She had recovered. I admired the quickness of women's wit. Mental agility is a rare perfection. And aren't they agile! Aren't they—just! And tenacious! When they once get hold you may uproot the tree but you won't shake them off the branch. In fact the more you shake ...
— Chance • Joseph Conrad
... lord. The wives of many young French officers, The mistresses of more—in male attire. Yon elegant hussar is one, to wit; She so disguised is of a Spanish house,— ...
— The Dynasts - An Epic-Drama Of The War With Napoleon, In Three Parts, - Nineteen Acts, And One Hundred And Thirty Scenes • Thomas Hardy
... may be one of the funniest possible for a house party. The players sit around the room or in a circle. One player who has ready wit is chosen to be ringmaster, or there may be different showmen or ringmasters for each group of animals. The ringmaster takes his place in the center, and will be more effective if furnished with ...
— Games for the Playground, Home, School and Gymnasium • Jessie H. Bancroft
... preface to the Chronicles of the Canongate, 1827, that he received from an anonymous correspondent an account of the incident upon which the following story is founded. He is now at liberty to say, that the information was conveyed to him by a late amiable and ingenious lady, whose wit and power of remarking and judging of character still survive in the memory of her friends. Her maiden name was Miss Helen Lawson, of Girthhead, and she was wife of Thomas Goldie, Esq. of ...
— The Heart of Mid-Lothian, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott
... Toomey was finally at his wit's end, and complained to Cowperwood, who at once sent for those noble beacons of dark and stormy waters, General Van Sickle and the Hon. Kent Barrows McKibben. The General was now becoming a little dolty, and Cowperwood was thinking of pensioning ...
— The Titan • Theodore Dreiser
... with newly-washed embroidery in raspy woollens and starched linen thread. There had also been a tablecloth, and upon it (neatly arranged by Mrs. Craven's daughter Amelia) a selection of the family "good books"—to wit, the Holy Bible containing entries of the Craven family, with the dates of birth altered or erased, Josephus with steel pictures, the Saint's Rest and some others. These had at once been removed, according to agreement made before taking possession, ...
— The Dew of Their Youth • S. R. Crockett
... and style of the old scholastic philosophy. It was also one of the last blows aimed at scholasticism, which, long undermined by the Saxon Reformation, received its coup de grace a century later from the pen of an English wit. "Cornelius," says the author of "Martinus Scriblerus," told Martin that a shoulder of mutton was an individual; which Crambe denied, for he had seen it cut into commons. 'That's true,' quoth the Tutor, 'but you never saw it cut into shoulders of mutton.' 'If it could be,' quoth Crambe, ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. II, No. 8, June 1858 • Various
... daring woman has been the Joan of Arc of a perfectly hopeless cause, taken it up where men shrank, carried it through where they had failed, and conquered by weapons which men would never have thought of using, and would have lacked faith to employ even if put into their hands? The wit, the resources, the audacity of women, have been the key to history and the staple of novels, ever since that larger novel called ...
— Women and the Alphabet • Thomas Wentworth Higginson
... various, in so many vital respects utterly unsympathetic and even incapable of sympathy with his own, is one of the most noteworthy phenomena in the history of literature. That he has had the most inadequate of editors, that, as his own Falstaff was the cause of the wit, so he has been the cause of the foolishness that was in other men, (as where Malone ventured to discourse upon his metres, and Dr. Johnson on his imagination,) must be apparent to every one,—and also that ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 3, Issue 15, January, 1859 • Various
... is heathen to the core. The Arian Christ is nothing but a heathen idol invented to maintain a heathenish Supreme in heathen isolation from the world. Never was a more illogical theory devised by the wit of man. Arius proclaims a God of mystery, unfathomable to the Son of God himself, and goes on to argue as if the divine generation were no more mysterious than its human type. He forgets first that metaphor would cease to be metaphor ...
— The Arian Controversy • H. M. Gwatkin
... to that vivacity which fascinates, or to that wit which dazzles, and frequently imposes on the understanding-More solid than brilliant, judgment, rather than genius, constituted the most prominent feature of ...
— The Life of George Washington, Vol. 5 (of 5) • John Marshall
... the Swedish army were very ingenious in expedients, as well as bold and energetic in action, and they often gained an advantage over their enemy by their wit as well as by their bravery. One instance of this was their contrivance for rendering their prisoners helpless on their march homeward after the battle of Narva, by cutting their clothes in such a manner as to compel the men to keep both hands employed, ...
— Peter the Great • Jacob Abbott
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