"Primly" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... particle of this was there in him. Nor, for that matter, was there in him a particle of anything at all, whether good or bad: which complete negativeness of character produced rather a strange effect. In the same way, his wizened, marble-like features reminded one of nothing in particular, so primly proportioned were they. Only the numerous pockmarks and dimples with which they were pitted placed him among the number of those over whose faces, to quote the popular saying, "The Devil has walked by night to grind peas." In short, it would ...
— Dead Souls • Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol
... waters, Smooth and framed in snow-white marble, Show between their mirrored statues Gold and silver fishes playing. Slender stems of oleander Cast their prim array of shadows On the primly close-cropped greensward. Overhead, the arching branches Meet and twine to sheltering niches, Where are grouped in loving couples Stiff-limbed heroines and heroes.... Dolphins three pour splashing streamlets In three shell-shaped marble basins. Chestnut blossoms, richly fragrant, ...
— The Lonely Way—Intermezzo—Countess Mizzie - Three Plays • Arthur Schnitzler
... flooring on legs which were not more than a very few inches high, so that from his present perch the board appeared to rest on the pavement itself. Behind the table in a row, as shopkeepers might await a customer, three of the Warlockians, seated cross-legged on mats, their hands folded primly before them. And at the side a fourth, the one whom he had trapped on ...
— Storm Over Warlock • Andre Norton
... interest. The first, which beyond measure delighted me, was, that Charley was at Oxford—had been there for a year. The second was that Clara was at school in London. Mrs Wilson shut her mouth very primly after answering my question concerning her; and I went no further in that direction. I took no trouble to ask her concerning the relationship of which Mr Coningham had spoken. I knew already from my uncle that it was a fact, but Mrs Wilson did not behave in such a manner as to render me inclined ...
— Wilfrid Cumbermede • George MacDonald
... man, approaching seventy years of age, rather (as novel-writers say) below than above the middle height, somewhat inclined to corpulency, and upright in his carriage withal; with his hair most primly powdered, and nicely curled round his brow and temples: let them imagine such a person habited in sober black, with his feet thrust carelessly into a pair of unlaced half-boots, and his hands into the pockets of his "peculiars," and they ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 12, No. 341, Saturday, November 15, 1828. • Various
... "Les fleurs! C'est la vie parfumee." Waiting for the breakfast to be served, he showed us about in his apartment. In the salon, rather primly furnished, stood the grand piano. The bookshelves contained Cherubini's (his master) and his own operas, and his beloved Bach. A table in the middle of the room, covered with photographs and engravings, completed ...
— In the Courts of Memory 1858-1875. • L. de Hegermann-Lindencrone
... open; the tall columns of the portico entrance look down on you so grimly; the front of the booking-offices, in their garment of clean stucco, look so primly respectable that you cannot help feeling ashamed of yourself,—feeling as uncomfortable as when you have called too early on an economically genteel couple, and been shown into a handsome drawing-room, ...
— Rides on Railways • Samuel Sidney
... heart!" vowed Mr. Cobb solemnly, as he remounted his perch; and as the stage rumbled down the village street between the green maples, those who looked from their windows saw a little brown elf in buff calico sitting primly on the back seat holding a great bouquet tightly in one hand and a pink parasol in the other. Had they been farsighted enough they might have seen, when the stage turned into the side dooryard of the old brick house, a calico yoke rising ...
— Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... you for takin' so much interest in the children," said Miss Vilda primly, "and partic'lerly for clearin' our characters, which everybody that lives in this village has to do for each other 'bout once a week, and the rest o' the time they take for spoilin' of 'em. And the Doctor's ...
— Timothy's Quest - A Story for Anybody, Young or Old, Who Cares to Read It • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... cleared her throat. "I have always understood," she said primly, "that the sewing club was instituted to make useful garments for deserving persons, who were, perhaps, so much occupied by family cares that they had little time available ...
— The Ffolliots of Redmarley • L. Allen Harker
... have the slightest authority over you," said Eileen very primly, as she drew back in the shadows. "You have come and gone exactly as you pleased. All I ever tried to do was to keep up a decent appearance before the neighbors and make ...
— Her Father's Daughter • Gene Stratton-Porter
... not live to wish those words unsaid, miss," the woman answered primly. "You have as good as sold your birthright, as Esau did, ...
— Olive in Italy • Moray Dalton
... her. However, he had to stick grimly to the perambulator. Nellie tripped primly in black silk on one side of it. Nurse had the wayward Ralph by the hand. And Robert, taciturn, stalked alone, adding up London and making a very small ...
— The Regent • E. Arnold Bennett
... and lean officer with a smooth face entered the barn. The sentry saluted primly. The officer flashed a comprehensive glance about him. "Everything ...
— The Little Regiment - And Other Episodes of the American Civil War • Stephen Crane
... sir," replied the housekeeper primly. "And do I understand that the cook is to have a ...
— Captain Jim • Mary Grant Bruce
... sweet face in a Quaker bonnet, a white kerchief folded primly over a gown of dove-colored satin, a pure plain dress, looking very distinguished, for all its simplicity, among the gay toilet ...
— Holiday Stories for Young People • Various
... train," she said primly, and started to talk about something else. And she became most ...
— The Card, A Story Of Adventure In The Five Towns • Arnold Bennett
... sailing vessels of various sizes. Having made fast alongside a vacant space of quay, we had our dinner, and then strolled out with cigars to look for the Johannes. We found her wedged among a stack of galliots, and her skipper sitting primly below before a blazing stove, reading his Bible through spectacles. He produced a bottle of schnapps and some very small and hard pears, while Davies twitted him mercilessly about his ...
— Riddle of the Sands • Erskine Childers
... Do to Flo, and both stood primly silent till they were tumbled into another mail bag, and went rattling on again with a new ...
— Aunt Jo's Scrap-Bag VI - An Old-Fashioned Thanksgiving, Etc. • Louisa M. Alcott
... sky, slanted across with blooming peach boughs; for there was a large peach orchard on the east side of the house. Lucina watched these little pictures, athwart which occasionally a bird flew and raised them to life. She held her doll primly, and her little work-bag still dangled from her arm. She would not begin her task of knitting until her aunt appeared and her visit was ...
— Jerome, A Poor Man - A Novel • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... hated the sea, with the hatred of a woman whose ancestors had made their living on the Banks and had been drowned in storms. But she liked the captain. "I am sure you are very kind," she said, primly, "but it will have to be Saturday when ...
— Glory of Youth • Temple Bailey
... rollicking maples, and making solemn reverences to the great gray clouds that swept inland from the ocean. The straight little saplings at their feet copied the manners of their elders, and folding their fingers primly, and rustling their stiff little green petticoats decorously, sat up so silent ...
— Happy Days for Boys and Girls • Various
... beyond. Green prospects opened before them—a broad valley was disclosed, with a broad, shallow stream dividing its meadows; scattered farmhouses, orderly, prosperous, commanded their shorn acres. A mailbag was detached and left at a crossroad in charge of two little girls, primly important, smothered in identical, starched pink sunbonnets. The Greenstream stage splashed through the shallow, shining ford; the ascent on the far side ...
— Mountain Blood - A Novel • Joseph Hergesheimer
... them, and then one perhaps would come to a window for a few minutes and sit and talk to Miss Adela—one of the elder sisters, I mean; and when I caught sight of them, I used to think that it was no wonder they had taken to dressing so primly and so plain, for they must have given up all hope ...
— Begumbagh - A Tale of the Indian Mutiny • George Manville Fenn
... muslin scarf; yellow with age, a broken ivory fan, and a pair of mittens. A vision of Esther figuring as a bride in this old- world costume, rose before Peggy's quick-seeing eyes, the checked silk transforming her slim figure into Mother-Bunch proportions, the shawl folded primly round her shoulders, the fan waving to and fro in the mittened hand. Do what she would, she could not control the inward spasm of laughter; her shoulders heaved and shook, and Mrs Asplin felt the movement, and turned a quick glance ...
— More About Peggy • Mrs G. de Horne Vaizey
... aloud to them, seated in the doorway between the two rooms so that both could hear; she gave them reports of the condition of things outside; and Miss Hope said primly that she would like to meet and thank the boy who had been so kind as soon as she could be "suitably attired." Betty was thankful that she did not ask his name, but the sisters were not at all curious. ...
— Betty Gordon in the Land of Oil - The Farm That Was Worth a Fortune • Alice B. Emerson
... She was primly walking, the superlative of the miserable, past the facade of the hotel, when someone sprang out of a cab and spoke to her. And it was Mr. ...
— Tales of the Five Towns • Arnold Bennett
... Harman," the little old lady said primly. "I do wish you'd give your own Queen credit for some ability. Goodness knows you think you're ...
— That Sweet Little Old Lady • Gordon Randall Garrett (AKA Mark Phillips)
... so plainly. It was almost exactly like a cell. A low oak bed, red-blanketted, stood under the sloping roof, a prie-dieu beside it, and a cheap little French image of St. Scholastica over it. There was a table, with a sheet of white paper, a little ink-horn and two quills primly side by side upon it; and at the back stood a couple of small bound volumes in which the nun was accumulating little by little private devotions that appealed to her. A pair of beads hung on a nail by the window over which was ...
— The King's Achievement • Robert Hugh Benson
... life for thirty-five years, and to adapt them to new quarters. Their faces were weary, but flushed with expectation. The man kept looking up the line, and declaring that he heard the rumble of the engine in the distance; and whenever he said this, his wife pulled the shawl more primly about her shoulders, straightened her back, and ...
— The Delectable Duchy • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... Tag-rag had made herself very splendid, in a red silk gown and staring head-dress; in fact, she seemed on fire. As for Mr. Tag-rag, whenever he was dressed in his Sunday clothes, he looked the model of a dissenting minister; witness his black coat, waistcoat and trousers, and primly tied white neckerchief, with no shirt-collar visible. For some quarter of an hour had this interesting trio been standing at their parlor window, in anxious expectation of Titmouse's arrival; their only amusement being the numberless dusty ...
— Ten Thousand a-Year. Volume 1. • Samuel Warren
... Carver. I had some such thought myself," said Allerton rather primly, while Hopkins and Billington exchanged an irreverent grin, and Standish stroked ...
— Standish of Standish - A story of the Pilgrims • Jane G. Austin
... dear," her grandmother announced primly, "that instead of finding fault with your father's selection of a home, you had better look at ...
— One Woman's Life • Robert Herrick
... about the abolition of slavery," he remarked gloomily, "I always expect him to want to do away with marriage next—" he checked himself and coloured, as if an improper speech had slipped out in the presence of Mrs. Lightfoot. The old lady rose primly and, taking the rector's arm, led the way ...
— The Battle Ground • Ellen Glasgow
... Simplicity of manners and living was carefully inculcated. At first the ministers had almost entire control. A church reproof was the heaviest punishment, and knotty points in theology caused the bitterest discussion. A pillion was the grandest equipage, and a plain blue and white gown, with primly starched apron, was the common attire ...
— A Brief History of the United States • Barnes & Co.
... grimly rigid aspect of the silent Queen, Rebecca straightened herself primly and remarked, with her most formal air: "I s'pose you are the Queen, ma'am. You seem to be havin' a little party jest now. I hope I'm not intruding but to tell ye the truth, Mrs. Tudor, I've got into a pretty pickle and I want to ask a little ...
— The Panchronicon • Harold Steele Mackaye
... said. "If you'll come again I'll bring you something else another day." She looked back as she turned the handle of the heavy door. The cat was sitting primly upright on the step washing its face after its meal. "I expect it doesn't feel so hungry now," thought Ruth as ...
— The Kitchen Cat, and other Tales • Amy Walton
... as painted by Gilbert Stuart. The snowy kerchief folded across her bosom and the big mob cap on her head are precisely like those in the portraits of the colonial lady. The child purses her lips together primly and folds her hands in a demure attitude in her lap, as if to play her part well, but she is far too shy to look us directly in the face, and ...
— Sir Joshua Reynolds - A Collection of Fifteen Pictures and a Portrait of the - Painter with Introduction and Interpretation • Estelle M. Hurll
... Great Falls last week," she told him primly, just grazing him with one of her impersonal glances which nearly drove him to desperation. "Aunt Mary has typhoid fever—there seems to be so much of that this spring and they sent for mamma. She's such a splendid ...
— The Lure of the Dim Trails • by (AKA B. M. Sinclair) B. M. Bower
... no response. She sat in her father's study-chair as stiff and stolid as a lay-figure in a shop window, with her lips drawn primly over her teeth. ...
— The Governess • Julie M. Lippmann
... cousin from South America," Doreen answered. "He thinks grownups are stupid." She turned to Marge. "I have to go to the bathroom," she said primly. ...
— The Aggravation of Elmer • Robert Andrew Arthur
... gloominess there. The moment I turned into that path, I was supreme. It was mine. The public road, the thoroughfare leading through the heart of the town, belonged to the world. I was obliged to walk there like other people, with mincing steps, and bonnet tied primly under the chin, according to the rule and plummet line of school-girl propriety. But in my own little by-path, I could do just as I pleased. I could run with my bonnet swinging in my hand, and my hair floating like the wild vine of the woods. I could throw myself down on the ...
— Ernest Linwood - or, The Inner Life of the Author • Caroline Lee Hentz
... of God." It is hard to say which of the two was the better, or which commended itself most to the church full of people who listened. Deacon Tourtelot,—a short, wiry man, with reddish whiskers brushed primly forward,—sitting under the very droppings of the pulpit, with painful erectness, and listening grimly throughout, was inclined to the sermon of the morning. Dame Tourtelot, who overtopped her husband by half a head, and from ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 88, February, 1865 • Various
... object which now filled them all, and as a means to this end their first idea was to dress, act, and talk as correctly and unblamably as boys and girls could. So, by the time the worthy lady was heard descending, they were all in the drawing-room, seated primly on the stiffest chairs they could find, and apparently absorbed in the books they gazed at with serious faces and furrowed brows. To the trained eye the "high-water marks" around faces and wrists were rather more apparent and speaking than ...
— Kitty Trenire • Mabel Quiller-Couch
... high with wedding-presents—bales of silk, and gold and silver plate, and comfortable-looking bags suggesting bullion; and the gayest ship of all lay close up to the carpeted landing-stage. Already the bride was stepping daintily down the gangway, her ladies following primly, one by one; a few minutes more and we should all be aboard, the hawsers would splash in the water, the sails would fill and strain. From the deck I should see the little walled town recede and sink and grow dim, while every plunge of our bows brought us nearer to the ...
— Dream Days • Kenneth Grahame
... hearth, which displayed a coat of red ochre, lay a home-made rug of startling pattern. The fireplace was filled with cedar boughs and sweet-smelling myrtle. Two "boughten" rocking-chairs of painted wood confronted each other primly from opposite ends of the rug. Half a dozen straight-back chairs, also "boughten," were disposed stiffly against the walls. A large folding-leaf dining-table of real mahogany, an heirloom in the family, occupied the space ...
— Southern Lights and Shadows • Edited by William Dean Howells & Henry Mills Alden
... name—Levisa Chafin Hatfield. If you were among the many who attended her funeral you will remember how peaceful she looked in her black burying dress she'd kept so long for the occasion. Again you will see her as she lay in her coffin, hands primly folded on the black frock, the frill of lace on the black bonnet framing the careworn face. You look up suddenly to see a mountain woman in a somber calico frock and slat bonnet. She is putting new paper flowers, to ...
— Blue Ridge Country • Jean Thomas
... CAROLINE (primly). Hush, Bertram. We ought always to be polite to our visitors when they stay with us. I am sure, if Rosemary ...
— Second Plays • A. A. Milne
... but I soon discovered that the place was impossible for me. Torquay is the chosen home of the proprieties, the respectabilities, and all the conventions. Nothing could dislodge them from its beautiful hills; the very sea, as it beats primly, or with a violence that never forgets to be discreet, on the indented shore, acknowledges their sway. Aphrodite never visits there; the human race is not continued there. People who have always lived within the conventions go there to die ...
— Sacred And Profane Love • E. Arnold Bennett
... dog, came and planted himself at the very edge of the bare spot. Without giving her so much as a glance, he sat there primly and looked straight off the end of his nose at the sugar bowl in the middle. Not till this moment had Janet realized what a beautiful, intelligent-looking collie dog Mr. Brown had. His brown-buff coat, of just the right shade, seemed slightly veiled with black; his full out-arching ...
— The Wrong Woman • Charles D. Stewart
... into the apartment in stately fashion, her black silk gown crackling pleasantly as she walked, and seated herself very primly, as befitted her ancestry and bringing-up, in one of the stiff, high-backed chairs. And presently the parson, his garden clothes off and his best coat on, came in hurriedly to know his ...
— Five Little Peppers and their Friends • Margaret Sidney
... for tea and candles, sister?" asked Miss King primly.—"We have had tea of course, Hyacinthe, but we will have some infused for you ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, Vol. 22, August, 1878 • Various
... you," she answered, somewhat primly. It was evident that she was ill at ease. "I understood from Allison that you were doing all this yourself. Instead, I find you sitting on the veranda like a landed proprietor, in command of ...
— Old Rose and Silver • Myrtle Reed
... me for the first time. Nothing in it save the rickettiness of a faded rep suite arranged primly around the walls, and a few bookshelves stuffed with tattered volumes suggested Paragot. The round centre table, covered with American cloth, and the polished floor were spotless. Cheap print curtains adorned the windows and a cage containing a canary ...
— The Beloved Vagabond • William J. Locke
... Jane, who was waiting, rooted and rigid, close by. The reddish eyes of the nurse-maid fairly bulged with importance. Her lips were sealed primly. Her face was so pale that every freckle she had stood forth clearly. How strangely—even direly—the great dining-room affected her—who was so at ease in the nursery! No smile, no wink, no remark, either lively or sensible, ...
— The Poor Little Rich Girl • Eleanor Gates
... room. Miss Williams rose hurriedly, unhooked a brown silk frock from the cupboard, and put it on. Her hair was always smooth; the white line of disunion curved from brow to the braids pinned primly above the nape of the neck. As she looked into the glass to-day she experienced a sudden desire to fringe her hair, to put red on her cheeks; longing to see if any semblance of her youthful prettiness could be coaxed back. She lifted a pair of scissors, but threw them hastily ...
— The Bell in the Fog and Other Stories • Gertrude Atherton
... does not seem to have lost much of its timbre; while there is an exceedingly pretty, gentle-eyed, rather foreign-looking young lady engaged in putting flowers on the central table, which is neatly and primly laid out ...
— Prince Fortunatus • William Black
... sitting primly behind her desk, with a ruler over her shoulder, opened her gray eyes widely ...
— Short Story Classics (American) Vol. 2 • Various
... up primly. "You must really allow me to withdraw." To the young man's astonishment, she seized her parasol, and, with a youthful affectation of dignity, glided from the summer-house and was ...
— Under the Redwoods • Bret Harte
... wizard!" murmured Tom under his breath; but it was only little Una who advanced to meet them across the big, bare room, bowing primly to each of the three in turn, then turning to introduce the English governess who was seated at a ...
— The Gap in the Fence • Frederica J. Turle
... she said a little primly, in answer to his question. 'I never was there—but I never was anywhere, I have seen nothing,' she added hastily, and, as ...
— Robert Elsmere • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... It must have been at Heath's. Yes, it was. I put it on the counter while I opened this net thing. Don't you remember? You were taking some money out of your purse." Louis had a very distinct vision of his Rachel's agreeably gloved fingers primly unfastening the purse and choosing a shilling ...
— The Price of Love • Arnold Bennett
... on having been recorded, and "Very hungry" put down under Symptoms, she came back to her chair by the window, facing him. She sat down primly and smoothed her white apron ...
— Love Stories • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... their prayer-books in their hands and holding down their veils on account of the wind; they did not speak but were bursting with delight at seeing people come to their shop-doors, and they smiled primly and devoutly every time they heard anyone say as they passed that they looked very nice. Madame Boche and Madame Lorilleux lagged behind, because they were interchanging their ideas about Clump-clump, a gobble-all, whose daughter would never have been ...
— L'Assommoir • Emile Zola
... the jar in its corner. Then, as a sudden realization of the duty of a hostess seized her, she seated herself decorously in a stiff-backed chair opposite her visitor, and, adjusting primly what is technically known as a "front breadth," gave herself unreservedly to ...
— Ainslee's, Vol. 15, No. 6, July 1905 • Various
... and it is her duty to like her husband's home," said Miss Heredith a little primly. She disapproved of the speaker, whose khaki uniform, close-cropped hair, crossed legs, and arms a-kimbo struck her as everything that was modern ...
— The Hand in the Dark • Arthur J. Rees
... relieved Clapham,—whose crimes, says Kipling very wisely, are 'chaste in Martaban,'—of police and the Pax Britannica for a hundred years or so, lurid Martaban would have little pre-eminence left to brag about. The class that now goes up primly and plugly to business in the City day by day would be cutting throats a little; they would be making life quite interesting. Their descendants, I mean. It would take time; Mother Grundy would not be disthroned ...
— The Crest-Wave of Evolution • Kenneth Morris
... or Turkish Cohorn's[434] ignorance Had pallisadoed in a way you'd wonder To see in forts of Netherlands or France— (Though these to our Gibraltar must knock under)— Right in the middle of the parapet Just named, these palisades were primly set:[435] ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 6 • Lord Byron
... like some tea," she said, primly, as Bella appeared. "He has had a long journey." The captain started and eyed her fiercely; Mrs. Kingdom, her good temper quite restored by this little retort, folded her hands in her lap and gazed at him with ...
— At Sunwich Port, Complete • W.W. Jacobs
... not so admirable as her form. The features are a trifle too elongated, and their delicacy is marred by a nose a bit broad and unshapely and a mouth with thin lips primly set. Her dark eyes might be magnificent if wide open: but through the narrow slits of their lids, half hidden by long curling lashes, the eyes peer at you with a cold, watchful, intent gaze that carries a ...
— Aunt Jane's Nieces in Society • Edith Van Dyne
... had come, with the Street, after its summer indolence taking up the burden of the year. At eight-thirty and at one the school bell called the children. Little girls in pig-tails, carrying freshly sharpened pencils, went primly toward the school, gathering, comet fashion, a tail of unwilling brothers as ...
— K • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... the porch screen slam as she went out—which was only fair—and she heard the low whispers change to louder tones, and a slight movement of feet; but she was not, evidently, intruding, for Kitty and Billy were quite primly disposed in the hammock when she ...
— The Cheerful Smugglers • Ellis Parker Butler
... to see Cicely in her praiseful and godly-walking youth, as she stood primly clad in her sad-colored gown and long apron, with a quoif or ciffer covering her smooth hair, and a red whittle on her slender shoulders, a-singing in the old New England meeting-house through the long, tedious ...
— Sabbath in Puritan New England • Alice Morse Earle
... the country has very bad manners," commented Martha, puckering her lips primly. "I wouldn't put myself out for them, if I was ...
— An Alabaster Box • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman and Florence Morse Kingsley
... inquiries, though brief, were polite and kind. People generally did soften to Clover. There was such an odd and pretty contrast between her girlish appealing look and her dignified little manner, like a child trying to be stately but only succeeding in being primly sweet. ...
— Clover • Susan Coolidge
... She broke off with a very faint primly angry smile. She was perhaps the more offended with him because of that flutter at the beginning of the conversation. And in a moment with perfect tact and dignity she got up from her chair and ...
— Within the Tides • Joseph Conrad
... scent of vinegar, struck a shudder through him. The squire was sitting half idiotic and helpless, in his arm-chair. His face lighted up as Lancelot entered, and he tried to hold out his palsied hand. Lancelot did not see him. Mrs. Lavington moved proudly and primly back from the bed, with a face that seemed to say through its tears, 'I at least am responsible for nothing that occurs from this interview.' Lancelot did not see her either: he walked straight up towards the bed as if he were treading on his own ground. His heart was between his lips, ...
— Yeast: A Problem • Charles Kingsley
... little as he recognized his location. He scanned Old Post lying on its low eminence, with the white hospitals spreading over their area, New Post with its wide parade ground and its trim rows of officers' quarters staring primly at the departmental buildings built in the old Mexican fashion on the other ...
— Battling the Clouds - or, For a Comrade's Honor • Captain Frank Cobb
... had a folded handkerchief in her bony, discoloured fingers, now pressed it to her eyes, shaking her head as she did so. Lydia gave Martie a resentful look, and her mother a sympathetic one, before she said primly: ...
— Martie the Unconquered • Kathleen Norris
... change of policy and manner was revealed with distressing suddenness. At daylight one morning the door of the room in which she slept under lock and key was wide open, and on her quaintly embellished table a primly written note: ...
— Tropic Days • E. J. Banfield
... she had gone, primly grateful for the scrap of comfort, Corinna stood for a minute with her eyes on the sunbeams at the window. Outside there were the roving winds and the restless spirit of April; and feeling suddenly ...
— One Man in His Time • Ellen Glasgow
... indebted to the promiscuous charity of strangers, and Mr. Melrose was hardly more than a stranger to us," Nealie put in a little primly. Being the eldest, it was natural she should be a little ...
— The Adventurous Seven - Their Hazardous Undertaking • Bessie Marchant
... she met them, and said: "What sweets! What precious things!" And she had thought more than once how beautiful it would be to own one, sitting in its well-built perambulator with the clean white lacy covers and cushions, and the starched nurse primly wheeling it. ...
— Married Life - The True Romance • May Edginton
... Baker," he said, pleasantly, with his hat already in his hand, "I'm Harry Home, of San Francisco." As he spoke his eye swept approvingly over the neat inclosure, the primly-tied papers, and well-kept pigeon-holes; the pot of flowers on her desk; her china-silk mantle, and killing little chip hat and ribbons hanging against the wall; thence to her own pink, flushed face, bright blue eyes, tendriled clinging hair, and then—fell upon the leathern ...
— Colonel Starbottle's Client and Other Stories • Bret Harte
... Harriet was sitting primly and consciously by his side; she was a very handsome girl with bold eyes and was somewhat overdressed. She wore a big flowery hat and a white lace veil and looked at Anne ...
— Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1896 to 1901 • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... Charlotte, primly. "She may call me a respectable-looking body as much as she likes now. It's more than I can ...
— Austin and His Friends • Frederic H. Balfour
... She had been waiting for days with the revelation when he should make that old request. Now she enunciated it with every vowel and consonant correctly and primly uttered; indeed, she repeated it four or five times ...
— The Last Shot • Frederick Palmer
... thoughts so profound and delicate, and imaginations so remote from the recognized limits of the ideal, as find an orderly outlet in the pure English of Hawthorne. He has hardly a word to which Mrs. Trimmer would primly object, hardly a sentence which would call forth the frosty anathema of Blair, Hurd, Kames, or Whately, and yet he contrives to embody in his simple style qualities which would almost excuse the ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 31, May, 1860 • Various
... bedroom for a last nose-powdering, a last glance at her hair and nails, and slowly paraded to the door to let him in, while Mrs. Golden stood primly, with folded hands, like a ...
— The Job - An American Novel • Sinclair Lewis
... the little girl had divided with his profession the doctor's days. Every morning after breakfast he stood to watch the trim, sturdy, round little figure dance down the steps, step primly down the walk, turn at the gate to throw a kiss, and then march away along the street to the corner where another kiss would greet him before the final vanishing. Every day they met at noon to exchange on equal terms ...
— The Major • Ralph Connor
... said primly, "were completely successful. One must assume that the victimized laboratories also had ...
— Legacy • James H Schmitz
... broad piazza of one of the quaint old-fashioned houses, behind a needless screen of climbing woodbine, two girls are whiling away the afternoon. One of them is lounging in a lassy rocking-chair, while the other sits more primly and is ...
— A Summer Evening's Dream - 1898 • Edward Bellamy
... Raymond got there at six. She prided herself on this. She would say, primly, to her friends, "I make a point of being there when Ray gets home. Even if I have to cut a round of bridge. If a woman can't be there when a man gets home from work I'd like to know ...
— Gigolo • Edna Ferber
... bit. But horribly unhappy. I must look a sight." Then, remembering her manners, as the Street had it, she said primly:— ...
— K • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... himself opened to me—sober and something more than sober. He was primly dressed in an ancient but well-tended suit of black; he had been shaved not later than the night before; he wore a linen collar; and in his left hand he carried a pocket Bible. At first he ...
— The Thirty-nine Steps • John Buchan
... (Nick had not dared venture upon "Dear Mrs. May"; it had not even occurred to him that he might), and informed her primly that the bag had arrived. Also it inquired in stiff language whether the writer might be permitted to place ...
— The Port of Adventure • Charles Norris Williamson and Alice Muriel Williamson
... ribbon; and most proper glittering window displays appropriate to the season. In front of the grocery stores, stacked up against the edges of the sidewalks, were rows and rows of Christmas trees, their branches tied up primly, awaiting purchasers. The sidewalks were crowded with people, hurrying in and out of the shops, their lips smiling but their eyes preoccupied. Cutters, sleighs, delivery wagons on runners, dashed up and down the street to a continued merry jingling of bells. Slower farmers on sturdy ...
— The Adventures of Bobby Orde • Stewart Edward White
... young lady cousin, of pale blond complexion, neutral opinions, and irreproachable manners, smiled primly. My ...
— Castle Nowhere • Constance Fenimore Woolson
... whiteness of her arms. Her face, turned away from me, was shaded by a wide round bonnet, not quite so painfully plain as the scooplike affair of the time, but with a drooping brim from which depended a slight frilling of sheer lace. Her smooth brown hair was drawn primly down across her ears, as was the fashion of the day, and from the masses piled under the bonnet brim there fell down a curl, round as though made that moment, and not yet limp from the damp heat of Washington. Fresh and dainty and restful as a picture done on Dresden, yet strong, ...
— 54-40 or Fight • Emerson Hough
... we thought you ought to know," Celie began primly, "so Ma and I hurried right over, so as to put you ...
— Revelations of a Wife - The Story of a Honeymoon • Adele Garrison
... likely to be in here, father," said Polly primly. "I should like to catch him trying ...
— Burr Junior • G. Manville Fenn
... met him was somewhat gruesome. Everything was carefully wrapped in newspapers. Pictures enveloped in newspapers hung on the walls, newspaper chairs stood primly around a newspaper table. In the dim twilight it looked like the very ghost ...
— Sandy • Alice Hegan Rice
... miles from Nottingham. He also averred that it was forbidden to drive visitors within the gates; so we left the fly at the inn, and set out to walk from the entrance to the house. There is no porter's lodge; and the grounds, in this outlying region, had not the appearance of being very primly kept, but were well wooded with evergreens, and much overgrown with ferns, serving for cover for hares, which scampered in and out of their hiding-places. The road went winding gently along, and, at the distance of nearly a mile, ...
— Seeing Europe with Famous Authors, Volume I. - Great Britain and Ireland • Various
... Camp Ground," replied Slim, holding his voluminous bathrobe primly around him with one hand to cover the bathing suit which he wore under it, and shaking hands vigorously ...
— The Camp Fire Girls Do Their Bit - Or, Over the Top with the Winnebagos • Hildegard G. Frey
... primly. But so irresistible was the well of gaiety bubbling up in her heart that she ...
— Saturday's Child • Kathleen Norris
... everybody, transforming everybody into saints, angels, and geniuses. Her smiles and her tones were irresistible. They were like the wand of some magical princess come to break a sinister thrall. They nearly humanised the gaunt parlourmaid, who stood grimly and primly waiting until these tedious sentimental preliminaries should cease from interfering with her duties in ...
— The Lion's Share • E. Arnold Bennett
... in the bedroom for you to change your clothes by," she said, as he entered; then evading the caress which this wifely attention provoked, by bending still more primly over her book, she added, "Go at once. You're making everything ...
— The Argonauts of North Liberty • Bret Harte
... oblong book's the Album; hand it here! Exactly! page on page of gratitude For breakfast, dinner, supper, and the view! I praise these poets: they leave margin-space; Each stanza seems to gather skirts around, And primly, trimly, keep the foot's confine, Modest and maidlike; lubber prose o'er-sprawls And straddling stops the path from left to right. Since I want space to do my cipher-work, Which poem spares a corner? What comes first? 'Hail, calm acclivity, salubrious spot!' (Open the window, we burn daylight, ...
— Browning's England - A Study in English Influences in Browning • Helen Archibald Clarke
... scrambling walks, and if Ellie does get allured by our wicked ways, she is sure to be torn, or splashed, or something, and we have shrieks and lamentations, and accusations of Jock and Joe, amid floods of tears; and Jessie comes to the rescue, primly shaking her head and coaxing her little sister, while she brings out a needle and thread. I can't help it, Mary. It does aggravate me to ...
— Magnum Bonum • Charlotte M. Yonge
... as a nation, did not love Puritanism, or any thing pertaining to it, after the deep religious excitement had passed away. The people were ashamed of prayer-meetings, of speaking through their noses, of wearing their hair straight, of having their garments cut primly, of calling their children by the name of Moses, Joshua, Jeremiah, Obadiah, &c.; and, in short, of all customs and opinions peculiar to the Extreme Puritans. So general was the disgust of Puritanism, so eager ...
— A Modern History, From the Time of Luther to the Fall of Napoleon - For the Use of Schools and Colleges • John Lord
... boys were still some distance from her. The water, muddy beyond all chance of transparency, came up to their chests. To them, however, this was not enough. The excessive modesty of eight or nine made them keep even the white of their angular little shoulders primly covered. ...
— The Hickory Limb • Parker Fillmore
... than a guest myself; but Mr. Power is always glad to see whoever cares to come," replied Christie rather primly, though her eyes were dancing with amusement at the recollection of those ...
— Work: A Story of Experience • Louisa May Alcott
... slight acquaintance with that young lady I should imagine she would have had some delicacy in telling you otherwise," returned Mr. Dingwall primly. ...
— Trent's Trust and Other Stories • Bret Harte
... Mionge Lane he met his pretty truelove skipping along most lady-like and primly. She was dressed in a light blue dress with a white sash tied at the side in two knots. Her long fair hair hung down her back tied with a pink ribbon, and her fringe was fluttering in the breeze. Behind her fringe she wore a wreath ...
— Daisy Ashford: Her Book • Daisy Ashford
... was at that moment writing to Grizel in Thrums. But was it, then, all a dream? he cried, nearly convinced for the first time, and he went into the arbour saying determinedly that it was a dream; and in the arbour, standing primly in a corner, was Grizel's umbrella. He knew that umbrella so well! He remembered once being by while she replaced one of its ribs so deftly that he seemed to be looking on at a surgical operation. The old doctor had given it to her, and that was why she would not let ...
— Tommy and Grizel • J.M. Barrie
... Betty wildly, then, meeting his eye, she laughed, a twinkling little laugh. "You shouldn't ask questions like that, not so suddenly, anyway," she said primly. "It isn't fair." ...
— The Outdoor Girls in the Saddle - Or, The Girl Miner of Gold Run • Laura Lee Hope
... in his travels and installed as his housekeeper. Janet paused with her hand on the gate latch to gaze around her, at the picket fence on which he had been working when she had walked hither the year before. It was primly painted now, its posts crowned with the carved pineapples; behind the fence old-fashioned flowers were in bloom, lupins and false indigo; and the retaining wall of blue-grey slaty stone, which he had laid that spring, was finished. A wind stirred the maple, releasing a shower of ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill |
