"Daintiness" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... is a charmer in himself. His venom has graces. He is a stinging insect, but of how brilliant a hue! There are few satires in literature richer in the daintiness of malice than the Epistle to Martha Blount and the Epistle to Dr. Arbuthnot. The "characters" of women in the former are among the most precious of those railleries of sex in which mankind has always loved to indulge. The ...
— Old and New Masters • Robert Lynd
... chair, with a groan. What use? This creature, fine as silk, the heiress of all that youth had to offer in daintiness and charm, was not—could not be for such as he. He had gone too far on the road to hell, ever to find such a heaven ...
— Mavericks • William MacLeod Raine
... and ribbons and long, flowing lines. Her hair was done low on the back of her head and on the nape of her neck. The blood ebbed and flowed beneath her clear skin. A faint fragrance of cleanliness diffused itself about her—the cool, sweet fragrance of daintiness. They entered busily into conversation. Her attitudes were no longer relaxed and languidly graceful as in the easy chairs under the lamplight. She sat forward, her hands crossed on her lap, a fire smouldering deep beneath the cool surface ...
— The Riverman • Stewart Edward White
... other, with horseshoe arches; and from the arabesque network with which the upper part is diapered, a brick trellis-work against the brick walls, of the most graceful and delicate intricacy. The Giralda is almost toylike in the daintiness of its decoration. Notwithstanding its great size it is a masterpiece of exquisite proportion. At night it stands out with strong lines against the bespangled sky, and the lights of the watchers give it a magic appearance of some lacelike tower ...
— The Land of The Blessed Virgin; Sketches and Impressions in Andalusia • William Somerset Maugham
... with no daintiness upon the untidy, coloured cloth of the centre-table. He poured out a cup and took it to her. She received it with a coaxing leer in her ...
— A Sheaf of Corn • Mary E. Mann
... little red butterflies hovering in golden sunlight, they lodged in her many-braided yellow hair, or fluttered down the long curls that hung in front of her ears. She laughed again under the caressing shower. Then she tore away the remaining petals and tossed them up with an elf-like daintiness, not at the crouched and expectant kitten this time, but so that the whole red rain floated tenderly down upon her upturned face and into the folds of the white kerchief crossed upon her breast. She waited for the last feathery petal. Her hidden lover ...
— The Lions of the Lord - A Tale of the Old West • Harry Leon Wilson
... and her soft lips were innocent and fond under her lover's gaze. Her little white hand clung to his like a baby's. There was a sweet hollow under her chin, above her fine lace collar. Her soft, fair curls smelt in his face of roses and lavender. The utter daintiness of this maiden Dorothy Fair was a separate charm and a fascination full of subtle and innocent earthiness to the senses of a lover. She appealed to his selfish delight like a sweet-scented flower, like a pink or ...
— Madelon - A Novel • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... the tiny protuberances of the thorns, the soft brownness of the few strands of hair which strayed from beneath the boyish cap, the healthy glow of her complexion, the smallness of the clear-skinned hands, the daintiness of the trim little figure. Much rather would he be silent with the picture than striving for answers to questions that in their very naiveness were an accusation. Quite suddenly Barry felt cheap and mean and dishonest. He felt that he would like to talk about himself,—about ...
— The White Desert • Courtney Ryley Cooper
... habrotetos, khlides, khariton, himerou, pothou pater. Translation: "Of daintiness, delicacy, luxury, graces, ...
— Appreciations, with an Essay on Style • Walter Horatio Pater
... favorites. It should excite no surprise that all are small sizes. Nature's favorites are always small; her insect jewels outnumber her vertebrates a millionfold; and book-loving human nature takes the same delight in daintiness. ...
— The Booklover and His Books • Harry Lyman Koopman
... it pretty and comfortable in a niggly feminine way. Amateur interior decoration had always been a hobby of hers. Even in the unpromising surroundings of her bedroom at Mrs. Meecher's boarding-house she had contrived to create a certain daintiness which Sally, who had no ability in that direction herself, had always rather envied. As a decorator Elsa's mind ran in the direction of small, fragile ornaments, and she was not afraid of over-furnishing. Pictures jostled ...
— The Adventures of Sally • P. G. Wodehouse
... became an old story. Estrella's sleek nature avoided instinctively all that interfered with bodily well-being. When she was cool and well-fed and not thirsty, and surrounded by a proper degree of feminine daintiness, then she was ready to amuse herself. But she could not understand the desirability of those pleasures for which a certain price in discomfort must be paid. As for firearms, she confessed herself frankly afraid of ...
— Arizona Nights • Stewart Edward White
... delicacy, n. daintiness, fineness, frailty, refinement, fastidiousness, discrimination, sensitiveness; dainty, tidbit, junket. Antonyms: indelicacy, ...
— Putnam's Word Book • Louis A. Flemming
... three summers (every egg acquired in the most honorable manner, as he explained), had all passed into Timothy's hands that very day, in consideration of various services well and conscientiously performed. What a delight it was to handle the precious bits of things, like porcelain in their daintiness!—to sort out the tender blue of the robin, the speckled beauty of the sparrow; to put the pee-wee's and the thrush's each in its place, with a swift throb of regret that there would have been another little soft throat bursting with a song, if some one had not taken ...
— Timothy's Quest - A Story for Anybody, Young or Old, Who Cares to Read It • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... into a bedroom by the simple process of bringing the bedclothes out from their place of concealment and sliding back the curtain. The unaccustomed luxury of the dinner had awakened old memories of the comfort and daintiness which had been unknown to her in her later life, and the rejection of her sketches had shattered the dreams of acquiring them again, which had comforted her when she sent them out. And Tom, bowling ...
— Ainslee's, Vol. 15, No. 6, July 1905 • Various
... to the parlour, there came the bestowing of presents which Clarissa had brought for her friends. And they were so many and so satisfactory, that the criticisms of the past night were certainly for the present forgotten; Letitia forgave her cousin her daintiness, and Maria overlooked the gold watch. Matilda as usual said little, beyond the civil, needful words, which that little girl always ...
— What She Could • Susan Warner
... elemental greatness in proportion to the natural majesty of the huge new continent are hardly present; Walt Whitman remains an isolated phenomenon. Instead, we meet in the best American literature an almost aristocratic daintiness and feeling for the refined and select. As compared with the British school, the leading American school is marked by an increased delicacy of finesse, a tendency to refine and refine, a perhaps exaggerated dread of the platitude and the commonplace, a fondness for analysis, a preference for ...
— The Land of Contrasts - A Briton's View of His American Kin • James Fullarton Muirhead
... of nature, and that which flows from the exercise of the manly instincts and affections, is the culture implied by "Leaves of Grass." The democratic spirit is undoubtedly more or less jealous of the refinements of our artificial culture and of the daintiness and aloofness of our literature. The people look askance at men who are above them without being of them, who have dropped the traits and attractions which they share with unlettered humanity. Franklin and Lincoln are closer akin ...
— Whitman - A Study • John Burroughs
... him for the second time, and had more reason than ever for believing that, with all his daintiness and fastidiousness, he is altogether a man, hearty and generous, and his books, with all their shifting shadows, but a transcript of himself and of his unacknowledged visions and meditations. His pleasantry, too, is delightful; and, as you cannot question his ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 18, No. 106, August, 1866 • Various
... "similiter cadences" doth sound with the gravity of the pulpit, I would but invoke Demosthenes' soul to tell, who with a rare daintiness useth them. Truly, they have made me think of the sophister, that with too much subtlety would prove two eggs three, and though he may be counted a sophister, had none for his labour. So these men bringing in such a kind of eloquence, well may ...
— A Defence of Poesie and Poems • Philip Sidney
... His features were good and clearly cut; his hair and moustache were dark, thick, short and glossy; his dark eyes were quick and bright; his figure was well-made, and better developed; his shapely hands were not only clean, they were fastidiously trimmed about the nails (a daintiness common below the rank of sergeant, especially among men acting as clerks); and if the stone in his signet ring was not a real onyx, it looked quite as well at a distance, and the absence of a crest was not conspicuous. He spoke with a very good imitation of the accent ...
— Jan of the Windmill • Juliana Horatia Ewing
... grandmother in cleanness and care and thoughtfulness, the sight of it shocked her. The black dingy tray was smeared and dirty, the slice of bread rested on it, with no plate between, the knife and fork and cup were dirty too, and all was put down anyhow. Charlie probably was not accustomed to daintiness, but this was enough to check whatever appetite an invalid might have. Jessie longed to take the tray away, and set it according to her own notions, but she said nothing, for instinct told her that her mother's feelings would be hurt if she did, and that it would not be nice for a stranger to come ...
— The Story of Jessie • Mabel Quiller-Couch
... marching, shouting youngsters, scrubbed till they shone, clothed in clean though often clumsy garments and heavy shoes. No great poverty was indicated by their apparel, and some, evidently of French origin, were dressed with real taste and daintiness. These were also remarkable for a more vivacious appearance than the stolid little Anglo-Saxons. Some few were ...
— The Spanish Chest • Edna A. Brown
... her mother's outlook. Her ambition had apparently died of starvation long since, but her resentment remained. Her hand was against practically all the world, including her daughter, whose fairy-like daintiness and piquancy were so obvious a contrast to the somewhat coarse and flashy beauty that had once been hers. For all that Dinah inherited from her mother was her gipsy darkness. Mrs. Bathurst was not flashy now, and any attempt at personal adornment on Dinah's part was always very sternly repressed. ...
— Greatheart • Ethel M. Dell
... painted a dark brown color, but with the arms of an ancient and noble family shining from the panels? As it rolls past, all the shop-girls admire it, and look longingly at the yellow satin lining, the rugs from la Savonnerie, the daintiness and freshness of every detail, the silken cushions and tightly-fitting glass windows. Two liveried footmen are mounted behind this aristocratic carriage; and within, a head lies back among the silken cushions, the feverish face and hollow eyes of Raphael, melancholy and sad. Emblem of the ...
— The Magic Skin • Honore de Balzac
... escorting me. But here came another surprise. The room was of moderate size, poorly furnished, indeed, but comfortable and something more. It bore traces of many petty attentions, even—in its white dimity curtains and valances—of an attempt at daintiness. The sight of it brought quite a pleasant shock after the dirt and disarray of the corridor. Nor was the room assigned to my brother one whit less habitable. But if surprised by all this, I was fairly astounded to find in each room a pair of candles lit—and quite recently lit—beside the looking-glass, ...
— The Laird's Luck • Arthur Quiller-Couch
... poignant shyness made that impossible. She was like a fairy tale, a creature of dreams. He dared not meet her frank pitiful eyes, though he was intensely aware of them. The odor of violets brings to him even to this day a vision of girlish charm and daintiness, together with a memory of the abased reverence ...
— The Vision Spendid • William MacLeod Raine
... handsomest man in Sicily if Sicily had no King Robert. Dressed almost as richly as the monarch, he would have dazzled many if Robert himself had not been by. He was of a more powerful make than the King, though he affected with success the same almost feminine daintiness of carriage and habit; but the beauty of his face was of a coarser pattern than the King's, and his dark eyes had no gleam of the almost infantile candor which was the charm of ...
— The Proud Prince • Justin Huntly McCarthy
... sense of beauty. But look from the writer, as shown by himself, to the means by which himself is shown. You will find that for words as for colour-tones he has the same reverent care, and for phrases as for forms the same caressing sense of beauty. Fastidiousness—'daintiness,' as he would have said—dandyishness, as we might well say: by just that which marks him as a painter is he marked as a writer too. His meaning was ever ferocious; but his method, how delicate and tender! The portrait of his mother, whom he loved, was not wrought ...
— Yet Again • Max Beerbohm
... was vivid as a wild poppy on the hillsides past which they went flashing. But she had, too, a daintiness, a delicacy of coloring and contour, that suggested the fruit named by ...
— Brand Blotters • William MacLeod Raine
... puzzling it becomes. Evidently the seed must be carried above and must fall below that limit, under circumstances which, to our apprehension, seem just as favourable as those at the altitude of thirty feet. But they do not germinate. Upon the other hand, Odontoglossums show no such daintiness of growth in our houses. They flourish at any height, if the general conditions be suitable. Mr. Roezl discovered a secret nevertheless, and in good time ...
— About Orchids - A Chat • Frederick Boyle
... most of the time, and viewed the scenery and talked, for the weather was May weather, and the soft dream-pictures of hill and river and mountain and sky were clear and away beyond anything I have ever seen for exquisiteness and daintiness. ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... punctual when the time came to take the two ladies to the Amusement Club. Noreen had very dubiously donned her smartest frock which, having just been taken out of a trunk after a long journey, seemed very crushed, creased, and dowdy compared with the freshness and daintiness of Ida's toilette. Men as a rule understand nothing of the agonies endured by a woman who must face the unfriendly stares of other women in a gown that she feels ...
— The Elephant God • Gordon Casserly
... deep breath. This is a real kindergarten, and it is like a little piece of the millennium. "Everything is so very pretty and charming," says the visitor. Yes, so it is. But all this color, beauty, grace, symmetry, daintiness, delicacy, and refinement, though it seems to address and develop the aesthetic side of the child's nature, has in reality a very profound ethical significance. We have all seen the preternatural ...
— Children's Rights and Others • Kate Douglas Smith Wiggin
... shining bright and a forehead brilliant white and eyebrows which unite and eyes stained by Nature's hand black as night. If she speak, fresh young pearls are scattered from her mouth forthright and all hearts are ravished by the daintiness of her sprite; when she smileth thou wouldst ween the moon shone out her lips between and when she eyes thee, sword blades flash from the babes of her eyes. In her all beauties to conclusion come, and she is the centre of ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 5 • Richard F. Burton
... "what Sir Daintiness have ye here?" But ere his grinning captors could make reply, the ...
— The Geste of Duke Jocelyn • Jeffery Farnol
... lute, whose ribbons breathe The perfume of her touch; her gloves, Modeling the daintiness they sheathe; Her fan, a Watteau, gay with loves, ...
— Poems • Madison Cawein
... an end of her song, all who were in the assembly wept for the daintiness of her speech and the sweetness of her voice and El Abbas said to her, "Well done, O Merziyeh I Indeed, thou confoundest the wits with the goodliness of thy verses and the elegance of thy speech." All this while Shefikeh ...
— Tales from the Arabic Volumes 1-3 • John Payne
... is With nothing shall be pleas'd till he be eas'd With being nothing. Music do I hear? [Music.] Ha, ha! keep time. How sour sweet music is When time is broke and no proportion kept! So is it in the music of men's lives. And here have I the daintiness of ear To check time broke in a disorder'd string; But, for the concord of my state and time, Had not an ear to hear my true time broke. I wasted time, and now doth time waste me; For now hath time made me his numbering clock: My thoughts are minutes; and with sighs they jar Their ...
— The Tragedy of King Richard II • William Shakespeare [Craig, Oxford edition]
... their young heirs were with them, patient and placid. Others were pitifully alone. Several men were on horseback, riding in the agonized fashion of the day. There were carriages full of girls with complexions of ivory and claret, air of ineffable daintiness. Now and then a victoria would roll by in which women lolled, heavily veiled with crape. Webb wondered if they really could sorrow like common folks. Mingling with the superb turnouts were barouches unmistakably hired, occupied by ...
— The Bell in the Fog and Other Stories • Gertrude Atherton
... is perhaps the most widely known of all the essays of Elia. Its delightful drollery, its very revelling in the daintiness of sucking-pig, its wonderfully rich literary presentation, its deliberate acceptance of wild improbability as historic basis, all unite to give it special place in the regard of readers. The theme is of course ...
— Charles Lamb • Walter Jerrold
... door, had a receiving line, quite in the manner of any reception. She herself, in a blouse of marvellous daintiness and sweeping skirts, stood beside the visitor from London to present her. To this day Johnnie is uncertain as to where the wonderful blue silk frock of that lady from abroad was fastened, though she gave ...
— The Power and the Glory • Grace MacGowan Cooke
... brought home to her that those smaller beauties that it lacked, the daintiness, neatness, the order that she so yearned for, it ...
— Anxious Audrey • Mabel Quiller-Couch
... their showy costumes, the whole worn with the air of a manikin. What did these busy women order for lunch? Tea and buns, ice-cream and buckwheat cakes, apple pie a la mode and chocolate were the most serious menus. This nourishing food they ate with great nicety and daintiness, talking the while about clothes. They were in a hurry, as all of them had some shopping to do before returning to work, and they each spent a prinking five minutes before the mirror, adjusting the trash with which they had bedecked themselves exteriorly ...
— The Woman Who Toils - Being the Experiences of Two Gentlewomen as Factory Girls • Mrs. John Van Vorst and Marie Van Vorst
... young ladies beautifully dressed in fresh muslin and silk, the skimp skirt and sleeves, the shrunken waist and washed sash, seemed all at once very mean and shabby to Angela. They seemed still meaner and shabbier when two other girls appeared in yet prettier costumes of fresh daintiness; and when these two dropped their little hooded shoulder-wraps of silk and lace, and she saw that they were the two Ryder cousins, poor Angela suddenly began to feel a strange sense of awkwardness and unfitness. ...
— A Flock of Girls and Boys • Nora Perry
... Natalie Rathbawne, like a little Dresden image, with an arbutus-pink complexion, brown hair, and deep-blue eyes, now clouded thoughtfully, but oftener alight with humor, or dilating and clearing under the impetus of conversation. A doll-like daintiness of tiny pleats and ruffles, fresh bows, and fine stitching pervaded everything she wore, and if her voice inspired the hackneyed comparison of running water, it was of water running under moss, the sound whereof is as different from that of an open brook as is music from discord. ...
— The Lieutenant-Governor • Guy Wetmore Carryl
... roommate. The girl had exclaimed a little, after the manner of girls, at the attractiveness of Harlowe House, but in spite of her brief flare of enthusiasm over the house and grounds, the tasteful living room and the daintiness of the room she and Evelyn occupied, she encased herself in a curious, impenetrable shell of mystery that Evelyn's natural curiosity could find no excuse to penetrate. She listened gravely and attentively to all that Evelyn told her of Harlowe House and its lucky household, ...
— Grace Harlowe's Problem • Jessie Graham Flower
... and sound. What we had to see to in the first place was to let them have as much and as good food as circumstances permitted. As already mentioned, we had provided ourselves with dried fish for their consumption. Eskimo dogs do not suffer very greatly from daintiness, but an exclusive diet of dried fish would seem rather monotonous in the long-run, even to their appetites, and a certain addition of fatty substances was necessary, otherwise we should have some trouble with them. We had on board several great barrels of tallow or fat, but our store was not ...
— The South Pole, Volumes 1 and 2 • Roald Amundsen
... closely wrapped in her warmest furs, with face well ensconced under her close bonnet, and arms buried to the elbow in her muff, sallied from her room on the announcement that the carriage was waiting. As, with her leisurely daintiness, she tripped it down the stairs, she crossed Mr. Landale, and paused a moment, ready for the skirmish, as she noticed the cynical curiosity with which he ...
— The Light of Scarthey • Egerton Castle
... She had a nice situation at the Pharmacie de Siam, in the Rue St. Honore. She had no one dependent upon her, and all the money she earned was her own. Her dress was of cheap material perhaps, but it was cut and fitted with that daintiness of perfection which seems to be the natural gift of the Parisienne, so that one never thought of the cheapness, but admired only the effect, which was charming. She was book-keeper and general assistant at the Pharmacie, and had a little room of her own across ...
— The Face And The Mask • Robert Barr
... as if she were not quite flesh and blood. Such flaxen daintiness, femininty etherealized to angelic perfection, was new to them, but their admiration was like that given to a delicate exotic which, wonderful as it is, one is well pleased to view through the glass ...
— Judith Of The Plains • Marie Manning
... the Oakdale gardens and lawns still flaunted a few late-blooming, rich-hued chrysanthemums. Perhaps it was because of the dark season of suspense through which she and Tom had passed that Grace declared herself for the cheerful daintiness of a pink and white wedding. In contradistinction to the weddings of her chums, who with the exception of Miriam Nesbit had each been accompanied to the altar by a bevy of bridesmaids, Grace announced that she wished the services of only a maid of honor and two flower ...
— Grace Harlowe's Golden Summer • Jessie Graham Flower
... had pointed out as hers, was struck by its absolute cleanness and daintiness. The curtains were tastefully draped, tied with ribbon; there were scarfs on dresser and stand, pin-cushion and pins, little trays for trifles. The bed was made ...
— Desert Conquest - or, Precious Waters • A. M. Chisholm
... noticed the pale primroses that pushed their yellow flowers up among the withered leaves, and the faint blue sheen beneath the beech trunks not far away. There was a vein of artistic daintiness in this man, and the elusive beauty of these things curiously appealed to him. He had seen the riotous, sensuous blaze of flowers kissed by Pacific breezes, and the burnished gold of wheat that rolled in mile-long waves; but ...
— Hawtrey's Deputy • Harold Bindloss
... had ended her song, all who were in the assembly wept for the daintiness of her delivery and the sweetness of her speech and Al-Abbas said to her, "Brava, O Marziyah! Indeed, thou bewilderest the wits with the beauty of thy verse and the polish of thy speech."[FN412] All this while Shafikah abode gazing about ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 2 • Richard F. Burton
... sexual relation in the first passage, and the trivial daintiness of the second (with which cf. ...
— Shakespearean Tragedy - Lectures on Hamlet, Othello, King Lear, Macbeth • A. C. Bradley
... the Keftiu, on the walls of Rekh-ma-ra's tomb, the shoes are white, and have bindings of red and blue, and in some cases are delicately embroidered. Such examples as the shoe on an ivory figure found at Knossos, and the terra-cotta model of a shoe found at Sitia, show the daintiness with which the Minoans indulged themselves in the matter of footwear. In personal adornment the men to some extent made up for their simplicity in the matter of dress. The Cup-Bearer wears a couple of thick ...
— The Sea-Kings of Crete • James Baikie
... hundred per cent feminine. One could tell just by the way she wore her clothes, by her daintiness, by the tilt of her bonnet and by the way smiled out from under it. I can't describe a baby girl any more than I describe a sunset or moonlight or any of the wonders of God—I can only say that she was everything that a ...
— Vignettes of San Francisco • Almira Bailey
... permanent metier, though I do like to think I was born for better things, and comfort myself by remembering how mother used to say that a lady can always do everything better than a common person if she chooses to try, even menial work, because she puts her intelligence and love for daintiness into all she does. I unpacked my master's and mistress's things with the flashing speed of summer lightning and the neatness of a drill-sergeant. In a twinkling everything was in exactly the right place, and my conscience felt as ...
— The Motor Maid • Alice Muriel Williamson and Charles Norris Williamson
... supper in the evening, and at about ten in the morning she reached Mara's home by an unfrequented side street. There were those, however, who had begun to notice the regularity of her visits and among them was Owen Clancy. We have also seen that the daintiness of the ...
— The Earth Trembled • E.P. Roe
... colors, silken walls, an oriental magnificence. In here is the ballroom. But wait: what is this in the corner? A large triumphal statue—of a cat overcoming a dog. And look at this dining-room, its exquisite appointments, its—daintiness: faucets for hot and cold milk in the pantry, and ...
— This Simian World • Clarence Day Jr.
... went to the polls accompanied by a group of her boys, all ardently "for the Cause." My general impression of her was that of a fresh breeze blowing over wide moors. She was as different as possible from exquisite little Mrs. Emerson, who, in her daintiness and quiet charm, suggested ...
— The Story of a Pioneer - With The Collaboration Of Elizabeth Jordan • Anna Howard Shaw
... merry time at dinner and the children did not seem a bit afraid to talk, though they were not aggressive. But Dr. Richards thought his little ward compared very favorably with the others. Her daintiness ...
— A Modern Cinderella • Amanda M. Douglas
... substituted when the following word (i.e. B2) begins with a vowel, a guttural (c, q, g) or h, before which ac was very seldom written. — PURE ATQUE ELEGANTER: 'sinlessly and gently'. Pure implies moral stainlessness, eleganter, literally 'in choice fashion', implies daintiness combined with simplicity in regard to the external conditions of life. The same ideas are put together in Sull. 79 cum summa elegantia atque integritate vixistis. — AETATIS: see n. on 5. — PLACIDA AC LENIS: 'quiet and mild'; placida refers to the external surroundings, lenis ...
— Cato Maior de Senectute • Marcus Tullius Cicero
... the man. There was confusion in it all; links were missing. He studied her intently. She was a woman who had none of the external feminine signals in either dress or manner, no graces, no little womanly hesitations and alarms, no daintiness, yet neither anything distinctly masculine. Her charm was strong, possessing; only he kept forgetting that he was talking to a—woman; and the thing she inspired in him included, with respect and wonder, somewhere also this curious hint of ...
— Four Weird Tales • Algernon Blackwood
... she stepped out from the path to the heather his eye was quick to seize her exquisite grace. Other women arrayed themselves in loose and floating raiment, ribbons and what not; but here was one who knew her daintiness, and made no effort to cloak it. Trim, cool, and sweet, the coils of bright hair above the white frock catching the noon sun—surely a lady to pray for and toil for, one made for no ...
— The Half-Hearted • John Buchan
... middle, the effect simulating double doors. A simple, hand-tooled ovolo ornaments the jambs and architrave casings of the keyed arch. It is also repeated above the double denticulated member of the cornice, the latter enriched by a hole drilled in each dentil alternately above and below. Daintiness and simplicity characterize the fanlight ...
— The Colonial Architecture of Philadelphia • Frank Cousins
... piled them up, with a rickety bucket on top. "Wait!" I implored, stepping up on the bottom bench. "Give me your hand," and as I caught her hands, she leaped from the window to the bucket, and the bucket to the ground, with a daintiness, which I thought savored of ...
— Lords of the North • A. C. Laut
... slope of green; deer leaping shadows of tree-stems one after another as if the shadows were water, which is one of the deer's prettiest games in the sun: deer trotting off as you try to come nearer to them, with that curious quivering, shaking amble which is born of lissom daintiness and muscles like steel; deer with hot sunlight on their coats—it is the Richmond Park deer which are the creatures to come and see. How many are there? Who should count them? Sixteen hundred fallow deer and fifty red deer, the figures are given; Farnham Park, I think, comes ...
— Highways and Byways in Surrey • Eric Parker
... still no trick, nor ruse, nor feint, Avail'd to hide the cause of grief, Or bar out Time, that graceless thief. A house, when gone to wreck and ruin, May be repair'd and made a new one. Alas! for ruins of the face No such rebuilding e'er takes place. Her daintiness now changed its tune; Her mirror told her, 'Marry soon!' So did a certain wish within, With more of secrecy than sin,— A wish that dwells with even prudes, Annihilating solitudes. This maiden's choice was past belief, She soothing down her restless ...
— The Fables of La Fontaine - A New Edition, With Notes • Jean de La Fontaine
... slippers, every inch of her showed it. Now the best dressing surely avoids this effect; while there is some, and not bad dressing either, which proclaims it in every detail. The crinkles of Gertrude's hair were crisp with it; her French print dress, beautiful in itself, was made with French daintiness and worn with at least equal coquettishness; her wrists bore two or three bracelets both valuable and delicate; and Gertrude's eyes, pretty eyes too, were audacious with the knowledge of all this. Audacious in a sweet, secret way, understand; they were not bold eyes, openly. Her cousin looked ...
— Diana • Susan Warner
... London. The restaurant in Edinburgh, under the auspices of the Vegetarian Society, gave a magnificent object lesson in the possibility of a dietary excluding fish, flesh, and fowl. The sixpenny dinners, as also the plain and "high" teas, were truly a marvel of excellence, daintiness, and economy, and the queue of the patient "waiters," sometimes 40 yards long, amply ...
— Reform Cookery Book (4th edition) - Up-To-Date Health Cookery for the Twentieth Century. • Mrs. Mill
... draperies, smile in a more friendly manner than did Ruth, as she walked slowly up that aisle, with shy, modest Helen at her side. Helen looked the snowdrop to perfection, for if the pansies needed Ruth's gypsy coloring for a foil, the snowdrops needed Helen's pale blonde daintiness for theirs. The only color which relieved its pure white was the deep green of the wax-like leaves, and the contrast was perfect. The dress was of that soft silvery white only to be contrived by the combination of satin and chiffon, and ...
— Caps and Capers - A Story of Boarding-School Life • Gabrielle E. Jackson
... inkling of all the rest. In order that the sun might not annoy any of the spectators he had curtains stretched over them made of silk, according to some accounts. Now this product of the loom is a device of barbarian luxury and from them has come down even to us to satisfy the excessive daintiness of veritable women. The civilians perforce held their peace at such acts, but the soldiers raised an outcry, not because they cared about the money recklessly squandered but because they did not themselves get what was appropriated to those displays. In fact they did ...
— Dio's Rome • Cassius Dio
... most audaciously, and perhaps truly, about the St. Michael. When he learned that Emma secreted it in her den, where she rarely admitted anyone, he maintained that it had become her incorporeal spouse. The daintiness with which it fingered a golden sword-hilt, as if fearing contamination, symbolised the aloofness of her spirit. The solitary enjoyment of a great impression of art made her den a sanctuary, absolving her from commoner or shared pleasures. And ...
— The Collectors • Frank Jewett Mather
... at Harvard, and after studying with Doctor Pynchon rose to considerable eminence as a physician and particularly as a surgeon. Besides talents and genius of a sort, he was endowed with a rare poetic fancy, many of his verses being full of daintiness as well as of a very pretty wit. He was, however, somewhat extravagant in his habits, and about 1768 had built himself an elegant country house near Boston. It was to sustain this, it is believed, that he sold himself to ...
— The Romance of Old New England Rooftrees • Mary Caroline Crawford
... clear of high-sounding phrases, and writes with entire sincerity. It is the sincerity that attracts the judicious reader, and it is only by sincerity that any letter-writer can please other human creatures. Beauty of style counts for a great deal; I would not sacrifice the exquisite daintiness of epistolary style in Lamb or Coleridge or Thackeray or Macaulay for gold. But style is not everything, and the very best letter I ever read—the letter which stands first in my opinion as a model of what written communications should be—is without grammar ...
— Side Lights • James Runciman
... milk," he ordered of the trim maid, and he smiled to himself contentedly at the daintiness with which ...
— Polly and the Princess • Emma C. Dowd
... life of secret privation, to the misery of that fourth-floor apartment in which she and her mother lived as though they were camping out, keeping all their show for the street, admired the coquettish charm, the smart daintiness of the house in the Via Margutta. Mariano's friend, who had charge of the furnishing of the house, a certain Pepe Cotoner, who hardly ever touched his brushes and who devoted all his artistic enthusiasm to his worship of Renovales, had certainly ...
— Woman Triumphant - (La Maja Desnuda) • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... was greasy from the handling of black fingers. The girl spread it on the little center-table with a certain daintiness, seated herself, and held out her hand for Peter's pencil. She made rather a graceful study in cream and yellow as she leaned over the table and signed her name in a handwriting as perfect and as devoid of character as a copy- book. She began discussing the speech ...
— Birthright - A Novel • T.S. Stribling
... hotel with ravenous appetites, but, hungry as they were, could not appreciate the described daintiness of a most apparently unpalatable pie, called pate de foie gras; so they were obliged to content themselves with other ...
— Eric - or, Under the Sea • Mrs. S. B. C. Samuels
... that was his principal motive, with great daintiness he said it: but with a kiss of his hand, and a bow to my feet, he hoped, that a fine lady's being my friend did not lessen the merit of the reverence he ...
— Clarissa, Volume 3 (of 9) • Samuel Richardson
... constant attendance than any other girl in Otsego. Dr. Fuller was a favorite with two generations of young men in the village, for he had also two young daughters, who, a few years later, became noted for their qualities of mind and daintiness of apparel. Eliza and Emma Fuller were blue-stockings who knew the value of pretty bonnets and gowns. In the early days of the Presbyterian church, the sabbath splendor of their entrance at divine service, always a little late, and with the necessity of being ushered to the very front pew, divided ...
— The Story of Cooperstown • Ralph Birdsall
... like the great deer, but of a more airy grace and daintiness, are the smaller deer and antelope. The lightness of their tread, their suppleness of movement, and their spring and litheness, fill ...
— The Heart of Nature - or, The Quest for Natural Beauty • Francis Younghusband
... small and slight, with timid, brown eyes and soft, fair hair and a certain daintiness of person that singled her out for attention in spite of the shabbiness of ...
— The Beggar Man • Ruby Mildred Ayres
... privilege of remaining to help with the supper; and you may be sure every dish was served with a perfection and daintiness of touch only the French can give. Yes, it was a great success; and when, after the last guest had departed, Molly came and told her sister, almost with tears in her eyes, how happy she had been, Sara felt repaid for the sacrifice of quiet and seclusion ...
— Sara, a Princess • Fannie E. Newberry
... or literary man with fine, silken hair, fine, delicate skin, small and finely chiselled features, and a general daintiness of build will express refinement, beauty, tender sentiments, and sensitiveness in his work, while the man with coarse, bushy or wavy hair, coarse, thick skin, large, rugged features, and a general ruggedness and ...
— Analyzing Character • Katherine M. H. Blackford and Arthur Newcomb
... motioned him to, seat himself opposite. He did so without words. He felt curiously and ridiculously tongue-tied. He fell to studying the woman instead of attempting the banality of pointless speech. From the smooth gloss of her burnished hair, to the daintiness of her low, black brocaded shoes, she represented, so far as her physical and outward self were concerned, absolute perfection. No ornament was amiss, no line or curve of her figure other than perfectly graceful. Yet even the fire's glow ...
— The Evil Shepherd • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... ointment on the head of Cossette. He was all the mother she ever knew or needed to know. Heaven made her rich in such maternity as his. Mother instinct is in all good lives, and belongs to man. Maternity and paternity are met in the best manhood. The tenderness of motherhood must soften a man's touch to daintiness, like an evening wind's caress, before fatherhood is perfect. All his youthhood, which knew not any woman's lips to kiss; all his manhood, which had never shared a hearth with wife or child,—all this unused tenderness now administers to the ...
— A Hero and Some Other Folks • William A. Quayle
... clever fingers had pulled and twisted the crinkled paper into the most becoming of peasant caps, the large bead ear-rings, tied on with silk, jangled on to her neck, her paper sleeves stood out like lawn, the lace-edged apron was a triumph of daintiness, she wore Patricia's scarlet-kid dancing-slippers with Betty's ...
— A Patriotic Schoolgirl • Angela Brazil
... of the after-cabin and inspected—that was all. Now Ugly's supper consisted of two things he could never be induced to eat—ham and cold potatoes; and Harry, from mischief—he knew, however, that the dog had had a hearty dinner—prepared those things purposely, supposing that Ugly's daintiness would fail in a twelve hours fast. But no; there ...
— Captain Mugford - Our Salt and Fresh Water Tutors • W.H.G. Kingston
... hair floated, with the sun shining through it, as through a glass of claret, a bright carmine balloon which the child held by a string. Andrews looked at her for a long time, enraptured by the absurd daintiness of the figure between the big bundles of flesh of the nursemaids. The thought came to him suddenly that months had gone by,—was it only months?—since his hands had touched anything soft, since he had seen any flowers. The last was a flower ...
— Three Soldiers • John Dos Passos
... for the first time Phebe beheld the change in him, and stood gazing at him in mute surprise and sorrow. He had always been careful of his personal appearance, with a refinement and daintiness which had grown especially fastidious since his marriage. But now his coat, wet through during the night, and dried only by the keen air of the hills, was creased and soiled, and his boots were thickly covered with mud and clay. His face and hands were unwashed, and his ...
— Cobwebs and Cables • Hesba Stretton
... a tiny place; it consisted downstairs of one long low room, with a bay window at the extreme end. This room the Mainwarings called the drawing-room, and it was really furnished with great daintiness and care. At one end was the bay window, at the other were glass doors which opened directly into the garden. The kitchen was at the other end of the narrow hall, and this also looked on the garden. Hannah, the one servant, was often heard to object to this arrangement. ...
— The Palace Beautiful - A Story for Girls • L. T. Meade
... costumes showed them to be of station. The crinoline of the two filled all the body of the ample coach from seat to seat, and the folds of their figured muslins, flowing out over this ample outline, gave to the face of each a daintiness of contour and feature which was not ill relieved by the high head-dress of ribbons and bepowdered hair. Of the two ladies, one, even in despite of her crinoline, might have been seen to be of noble and queenly figure; the towering head-dress did ...
— The Mississippi Bubble • Emerson Hough
... She was sitting in Miss Aline's own room among the simple daintiness of many white linen "spreads" with raised broidery, the work of Miss Aline's own hands. Here she told him her determination to keep out of the way till the Prince and his train had left the country. The reasons ...
— Patsy • S. R. Crockett
... she wrote her letter through, delicately, sweetly, with feminine tact and feminine reticence. She told Miss Smith-Waters frankly enough all it was necessary Miss Smith-Waters should know; but she said it with such daintiness that even that conventionalized and hide-bound old maid couldn't help feeling and recognizing the purity and nobility of her misguided action. Poor child, Miss Smith-Waters thought; she was mistaken, of course, sadly and grievously mistaken; but, then, 'twas ...
— The Woman Who Did • Grant Allen
... speak falsely in praise, nor unkindly in depreciation, however much the constant play of her humour might tempt her to exalt or diminish beyond the bounds. But when, for the dispersion of nonsense about men or things, and daintiness held up the veil against rational eyesight, the gros mot was demanded, she could utter it, as from the Bench, with a like authority ...
— Letters from Egypt • Lucie Duff Gordon
... would seem out of place. Gorgeous couches, rich colors, silken walls, an oriental magnificence. In here is the ballroom. But wait: what is this in the corner? A large triumphal statue—of a cat overcoming a dog. And look at this dining-room, its exquisite appointments, its daintiness: faucets for hot and cold milk in the pantry, and a ...
— This Simian World • Clarence Day
... velvet on the small black hat had been caught in more than one shower, and the black gloves had been many times painstakingly mended. The small feet alone showed that their owner had allowed herself one luxury, that of good shoes—and the daintiness of those feet made a strong ...
— Red Pepper's Patients - With an Account of Anne Linton's Case in Particular • Grace S. Richmond
... tried to express a preference, when she was asked for one; and as she was arrayed in one delicious gown after another, she became more and more alive to the beauty of the soft stuffs, the invention and caprice with which they were combined, the daintiness of their pinks and blues, their greys and creams, their lilacs and ivories. At last Mrs. Burgoyne happened upon a dress of white crape, opening upon a vest of pale green, with thin edges of black here and there, disposed with the ...
— Eleanor • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... big, protecting arm and heart were gone forever—and now he had an early buttercup in his buttonhole, and on his lips the last of the laughter that he had just been sharing with Mary Dickey! And Mary, the picture of complacent daintiness, was sauntering on, waiting ...
— Poor, Dear Margaret Kirby and Other Stories • Kathleen Norris
... time. Durnovo had not slept for forty hours. The excitement of his escape from the plague-ridden camp had scarcely subsided. The glitter of the silver on the table, the shaded candles, the subtle sensuality of refinement and daintiness appealed to his hot-blooded nature. He was a little off his feet perhaps. He took the decanter and put it to the worst use he ...
— With Edged Tools • Henry Seton Merriman
... to breakfast to find that Caroline had cleaned the room and had set the breakfast with a certain daintiness, while leaving dust thick on the corners of the floor and under the clock on the mantel-piece. Still, it was such a relief not to have to get up and prepare the breakfast and light the fire that Miss Ethel tried to forget the dust. Of ...
— The Privet Hedge • J. E. Buckrose
... portrait answered its purpose; it provoked the curiosity and desire of the king, and the model was invited to the Parc-aux-Cerfs.[28] This was typical of the service that painting was expected to render to the society that adored it and paid for it. "All is daintiness, delicate caressing for delicate senses, even down to the external decoration of life, down to the sinuous lines, the wanton apparel, the refined commodity of rooms and furniture. In such a place and ...
— Diderot and the Encyclopaedists - Volume II. • John Morley
... true enough the day before; but hunger cures daintiness, and now I was glad of such a mouthful. I bolted it in an instant, and looked for more. He threw me one other crust, saying that was all he could spare; and, finishing the rest himself, went on his way, leaving me as hungry ...
— Cat and Dog - Memoirs of Puss and the Captain • Julia Charlotte Maitland
... affectation of excessive austerity. Augustin and his monks wore very simple clothes and shoes, but suitable for a bishop and his clerks. Like laymen, they wore the byrrhus, a garment with a hood, which seems very like the ancestor of the Arab burnous. To keep an even line between daintiness and negligence in costume, to have no exaggeration in anything, is what Augustin aimed at. The poet Rutilius Numatianus, who about that time was attacking the sordid and culture-hating monks with sombre irony, would have had a chance ...
— Saint Augustin • Louis Bertrand
... her carriage which came of the soil rather than of the city pavement. But it was a robustness in a finer than the wonted sense, a vigorous daintiness, it might be called, which gave an impression of virility with none of the womanly left out. It told of a heredity of seekers and fighters, of people that worked stoutly with head and hand, of ghosts that reached down out ...
— Moon-Face and Other Stories • Jack London
... hand fearlessly to stroke her head, just as fearlessly as if she were not armed with a beak that could bite through a boot. Greatly impressed by this daring, she gurgled in her throat, and took the great thumb delicately between her mandibles with a daintiness that would not have marred a rose-petal. Yes, she concluded at once, this was a man after her own heart, with a smell to his hands like that of MacPhairrson himself. Dropping the thumb with a little scream of satisfaction, she sidled briskly up ...
— The Backwoodsmen • Charles G. D. Roberts
... much "finicking finery" in garb and equipage and habits affected by the jeunesse doree who frequented the place in those halcyon times, and were accustomed to such details. It might be that they and Millicent approved such flimsy daintiness. He began to fume inwardly with a sense of inferiority in her estimation. One of his fingers had been frosted last winter, and with the first twinge of cold weather it was beginning to look very red and sad and clumsy, as if it ...
— The Phantoms Of The Foot-Bridge - 1895 • Charles Egbert Craddock (AKA Mary Noailles Murfree)
... of the most complimentary entertainments to which a hostess may invite her friends in the afternoon. The number of guests is limited, but the possibilities for decoration, daintiness and elegance are unlimited. The exact hour is written on the invitation, as High Tea at 4:00 o'clock (or 5:00 o'clock). The guests may number about twenty-four, but twelve or sixteen is a desirable number. They arrive exactly at ...
— Breakfasts and Teas - Novel Suggestions for Social Occasions • Paul Pierce
... both these sensitive capabilities in a very high decree. His careful choice of epithet and name have even been criticised as lending to some of his narrative-writing an excessive air of deliberation. His daintiness of diction is best seen in his earlier work; thereafter his writing became more vigorous and direct, fitter for its later uses, but never unillumined by felicities that cause a thrill of pleasure to the reader. Of the value of words he had the acutest appreciation. Virginibus Puerisque, his first ...
— Robert Louis Stevenson • Walter Raleigh
... rose from her knees to her full height, and he saw that she was slenderly tall and fashioned of gracious curves. The darkness of her clear skin was emphasized by the mass of blue-black hair from which little ears peeped with exquisite daintiness. The mouth was sweet and candid, red-lipped, with perfect teeth just showing in the full arch. The straight nose, with its sensitive nostrils, proclaimed her ...
— A Daughter of the Dons - A Story of New Mexico Today • William MacLeod Raine
... the trail. At noon they dismounted and lunched on salt-pork and pilot bread. Then off they cantered again. The tiny ponies, sure-footed as mules, made their way over the steep inclines of the hilly country with astonishing daintiness, but although they maintained a fair and even speed it was sunset when the white top of the prairie schooner came into sight, drawn up beside a stream and sheltered by a group of great trees. Several Mexican ponies were pastured near it. The curtains at the end of the wagon were parted ...
— The Story of Wool • Sara Ware Bassett
... said, What evil things are they from which I must abstain? Hearken, said he; from adultery, from drunkenness, from riots, from excess of eating, from daintiness and dishonesty, from pride, from fraud, from lying, from detraction, from hypocrisy, from remembrance of injuries, ...
— The Forbidden Gospels and Epistles, Complete • Archbishop Wake
... pale blue organdie that was a marvel of sheer daintiness. Jessica, a fetching little affair of white silk muslin sprinkled with tiny pink rosebuds; while Anne and Nora were resplendent in white lingerie gowns. Anne's frock was particularly beautiful ...
— Grace Harlowe's Sophomore Year at High School • Jessie Graham Flower
... out again that evening, but sent word by Elsie that Farley was sick and needed nursing. Lennon was only too pleased to sup and visit alone with the younger girl. Elsie's piquant daintiness was more than ever fascinating to him. He spent a delightful evening, though at times his enjoyment was dampened by remembrance of the danger that ...
— Bloom of Cactus • Robert Ames Bennet
... of formal afternoon calls. No such fashionable sight ever had been witnessed in the town as Mrs. Symes presented when, in a pair of white kid gloves and a veil, she picked her way with ostentatious daintiness across several vacant lots still encumbered with cactus and sagebrush, to the log residence of ...
— The Lady Doc • Caroline Lockhart
... rigorously enforced bed-time. An hour before, James Mesurier had been peacefully engaged on the task which had been nightly with him at this hour for twenty-five years,—the writing of his diary, in a shorthand which he wrote with a neatness, almost a daintiness, that always marked his use of pen and ink, and gave to his merely commercial correspondence and his quite exquisitely kept accounts, a certain touch of the scholar,—again an air of distinction in excess of, and unaccounted for, by the nature of ...
— Young Lives • Richard Le Gallienne
... of femininity, and at such times as this they came uppermost. Her bedroom had none of the Puritanical primness which marked her habit of dress; it was in no way suggestive of the masculine character which she so proudly paraded upon the street. On the contrary, it was a bower of daintiness, and was crowded with all the senseless fripperies of a school-girl. Carefully hidden away beneath her starched shirtwaists was much lingerie—bewildering creations to match the pink wrapper—and this she petted and talked to adoringly when no one ...
— The Iron Trail • Rex Beach
... over-decoration. The harmony began in the cheap paper on the walls, extended to bed and window draperies, and ended in the tissue-paper lamp-shade that at night lent a softened, rhythmical tone to the whole. This genial color effect was a delicate suggestion of blue, and the result was a doll-like daintiness that was altogether charming. ...
— Mlle. Fouchette - A Novel of French Life • Charles Theodore Murray
... pretty and would scarcely be a suitable vehicle for poetic expression requiring great depth or stateliness. Provencal verse in general cannot be said to possess majesty or the rich orchestral quality Brunetiere finds in Victor Hugo. Its qualities are sweetness, daintiness, rapidity, grace, a merry, tripping flow, great smoothness, and ...
— Frederic Mistral - Poet and Leader in Provence • Charles Alfred Downer
... at her slim figure, so charming in its daintiness. "What a dear little philosopher you've grown to be in a single year!" he declared. "We shall have you quoting ...
— The House of Whispers • William Le Queux
... here have I the daintiness of ear, To check time broke in a disordered string; But for the concord of my state and time, Had not an ear to ...
— The Man Shakespeare • Frank Harris
... man generally thrives in the thriving of his flock, and does not harry them. He gives them spiritual food enough to support them without daintiness, and he keeps the proper distinction between the Sunday and the poorer days. He clangs no bell of reproach upon a Monday, when the squire is leading the lady in to dinner, and the laborer sniffing at his supper pot; and he lets the world play ...
— Mary Anerley • R. D. Blackmore
... Mrs. Buck from Pleasant River came every Saturday and Monday for baking and washing. Between times Davy and his uncle did the housework together; and although it was respectably done, there was no pink-and-white daintiness about it, you may ...
— The Village Watch-Tower • (AKA Kate Douglas Riggs) Kate Douglas Wiggin
... here, and I shall go soon. Come, let me nurse you as he does," said Romola, wondering to herself for the first time what sort of Babbo he was whose wife was dressed in contadina fashion, but had a certain daintiness about her person that indicated idleness and plenty. Lillo consented to be lifted up, and, finding the lap exceedingly comfortable, began to explore her dress and hands, to see if there were ...
— Romola • George Eliot |
