"Amuse" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... the Saracens embraced every topic that can amuse or edify the mind. In later times, it was their boast that they had produced more poets than all other nations combined. In science their great merit consists in this, that they cultivated it after the ...
— History of the Conflict Between Religion and Science • John William Draper
... lecturer of Rome, in 1767; by Odier, a Geneva physicist, in 1773, who states in a letter to a lady, that he conceived the idea on hearing a casual remark, while dining at Sir John Pringle's, with Franklin, Priestley, and other great geniuses. 'I shall amuse you, perhaps, in telling you,' he says,'that I have in my head certain experiments by which to enter into conversation with the Emperor of Mogol or of China, the English, the French, or any other people of Europe... You may intercommunicate all that you wish at a distance of four or five thousands ...
— Heroes of the Telegraph • J. Munro
... performed in the theatre; and when those performances are closed, the company who are assembled, whilst they are under the same roof, are ushered into an elegant and well-furnished ball room, where they amuse themselves for the remainder of the evening; refreshments being provided upon the spot. These performances are conducted in such a superior style, that great numbers of the nobility and gentry who reside at a considerable ...
— A Description of Modern Birmingham • Charles Pye
... implies no imagination, no real envisaging of its object. It does not illuminate a subject, it extinguishes it, clamping upon every topic the same grotesque mould. That is why it does not really much amuse the English. For the English are accustomed to Shakespeare, and to the ...
— Appearances - Being Notes of Travel • Goldsworthy Lowes Dickinson
... impulse to which she had given no second thought till too late. She ought to have ignored it. But since she had taken the first step she might as well take the second. She was lonely; the people she knew were out of town; and the jest might amuse her. ...
— The Lure of the Mask • Harold MacGrath
... Marie," said the other, argumentatively, "as to my good duke regent, that is otherwise. It goes about that he will change all things. One is to amuse one's self now and then, and not to work forever for the taxes and the conscription. Long live the regent, ...
— The Mississippi Bubble • Emerson Hough
... go up-stairs? You might easily imagine that the sound of your steps would alarm those below, who would be puzzled to guess who it was that had thought proper to amuse himself in this manner." ...
— Edgar Huntley • Charles Brockden Brown
... or wrote or sewed or embroidered if she could avoid it, and had nothing on earth else to occupy or amuse her; so her passion for dress had to be gratified with the sight of jewels, shawls and mantles, laces, silks and satins, even though she durst ...
— Victor's Triumph - Sequel to A Beautiful Fiend • Mrs. E. D. E. N. Southworth
... happen to you is to be excluded from the councils of the great family of despots. Besides, what is to be done to amuse these 400,000 bayonets, his masters as well as ours? Crosses, promotions, honours, gratuities, are already showered on the army of Paris. It has already received a thing unheard of in our history—the honours ...
— Correspondence & Conversations of Alexis de Tocqueville with Nassau William Senior from 1834 to 1859, Vol. 2 • Alexis de Tocqueville
... men who look upon psychology as "blue-sky" theorizing or "new thought." There are others who have a hazy idea that it is a sort of unfathomable mystery intended to amuse long-haired scientists. The truth is that every one of these same business men, if he is getting ahead, is unconsciously using psychological principles to the profit of his own business ...
— Initiative Psychic Energy • Warren Hilton
... "Amuse!" exclaimed the other. He threw himself back in his chair and, sternly checking its inclination to twirl again, sought for a flaw in the armour of this paragon. "And what else do you do ...
— Salthaven • W. W. Jacobs
... suppose you are beginning to wonder when I am coming to the Hunter Cats! I am coming to them just the way Mr. Connor did,—by degrees. I want you to know about the place he lived in, and how he used to amuse himself, before he decided to build his house; and then I must tell you about the house, and then about the children that came to live with him in it, and then about the Chinamen that came to do his work, and about his ...
— The Hunter Cats of Connorloa • Helen Jackson
... surely she knows why I have come to her, and she was Milly's friend; yet she fawns upon me. I thought her a great person, but now I know she's eager to rise by hanging at my skirts, and I amuse myself with her joy that I've rejected Ned, as she thinks; with her talk of Strathay, her dismay at ...
— The Bacillus of Beauty - A Romance of To-day • Harriet Stark
... hundred men were marched out, forced to seat themselves in rows along the top of the trenches, beheaded, and then tumbled into a long gaping grave. Meanwhile, the Prophet looked on until, tiring of the monotonous spectacle, he departed to amuse himself with a Jewess whose ...
— The Necessity of Atheism • Dr. D.M. Brooks
... ever been proved, nor perhaps even been charged, against him; but as one of his countrymen, from whom I have just now quoted, remarks, "He is fond of showing to demonstration that a man does not keep two hundred horses in training just to amuse ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 26, September 1880 • Various
... for wit may sometimes appear masculine and flippant, but the cause must be sought elsewhere than in nature, who disclaims all such. Hence the witty and intellectual ladies of our comedies and novels are all in the fashion of some particular time; they are like some old portraits which can still amuse and please by the beauty of the workmanship, in spite of the graceless costume or grotesque accompaniments, but from which we turn to worship with ever new delight the Floras and goddesses of Titian—the saints and the virgins of Raffaelle and Domenichino. So the Millamants and Belindas, the ...
— Characteristics of Women - Moral, Poetical, and Historical • Anna Jameson
... continued to preach for half an hour. The alcalde snored, and Maria Clara nodded, for the poor child could no longer keep from sleeping, since she had no more paintings or images to study, nor anything else to amuse her. On Ibarra the words and allusions made no more impression, for he was thinking of a cottage on the top of a mountain and saw Maria Clara in the garden; let men crawl about in their miserable towns in the depths of ...
— The Social Cancer - A Complete English Version of Noli Me Tangere • Jose Rizal
... wrong-dealing." They thereupon carried their baggage forth, and built a hut, above the sea, on the bank of the lake, and put all in order about it; while Freydis caused wood to be felled, with which to load her ship. The winter now set in, and the brothers suggested, that they should amuse themselves by playing games. This they did for a time, until the folk began to disagree, when dissensions arose between them, and the games came to an end, and the visits between the houses ceased; ...
— The Northmen, Columbus and Cabot, 985-1503 • Various
... reason that you ought not to be bothered with them week days," observed Mr. Dyce. "Now why can't you sit down here and amuse me?" He pushed up an easy-chair into a cosy-corner, then drew up an ottoman, on ...
— Five Little Peppers and their Friends • Margaret Sidney
... on the other hand, proposes to give us an accurate picture of life, must carefully eschew any concatenation of events which might seem exceptional. His aim is not to tell a story to amuse us, or to appeal to our feelings, but to compel us to reflect, and to understand the occult and deeper meaning of events. By dint of seeing and meditating he has come to regard the world, facts, men, and things in a way peculiar to himself, which is the outcome of the sum total of his studious ...
— The Works of Guy de Maupassant, Volume VIII. • Guy de Maupassant
... description, the love of Jew above the love of Palestine, all these combine to render your volumes valuable additions to the small stock of good Jewish literature in English. It is not only that you teach, while talking so pleasantly; that you instruct while you interest and amuse; that you have your own personality in the stories; that you convey the charm of Eretz Israel, and the beauty of holiday spirit; but because your stories help us to feel the depth of faith and the height of ideal as the self-evident, normal ...
— Pictures of Jewish Home-Life Fifty Years Ago • Hannah Trager
... the tears from Clarissa's cheek, and shaking Anthony warmly by the hand, the young master of the mansion sprang to his saddle and was gone, leaving Anthony and Clary to amuse themselves in ...
— Mark Hurdlestone - Or, The Two Brothers • Susanna Moodie
... very much perplexed, and at a loss how to act. At length he said, 'Miss Phoebe, I must go to the village for a couple of hours; I think Mr. Alfred will sleep until my return, but if not, will you try and amuse him?' ...
— Winter Evening Tales • Amelia Edith Huddleston Barr
... image to my memory, and amidst airy visions of the past, of my father, earlier days, and of youthful pleasures mixed with pain, fell asleep—BUT—with a determination. To carry it out,—on the morrow I began this sketch. You must judge how I have performed my self-imposed task, and wishing it may amuse you, and encourage young aspirants who shall chance to read it, not to give way under difficulties, but strenuously to persevere, seeing how much may be achieved by diligence and a determination not to yield, remembering ever the good advice ...
— A Sketch of the Life of the late Henry Cooper - Barrister-at-Law, of the Norfolk Circuit; as also, of his Father • William Cooper
... the tendency to exaggerate legislation and to neglect enforcement of law. Instead of harnessing the whole army of workingmen to the crusade and strengthening civic agencies such as factory, health, and tenement departments, houses are built and given to men, clubs are formed to amuse factory girls, amateur theatricals are organized. All this is called "welfare work." "What is welfare work?" reads the pamphlet of a large national association. "It is especial consideration on the part of the ...
— Civics and Health • William H. Allen
... belle Paris offers so many attractions, that I have decided not to make up my mind in the matter, for I always am seduced into staying a much longer time than I had previously intended; there is always so much to amuse one." ...
— A Heart-Song of To-day • Annie Gregg Savigny
... bartender. This good-looking chap was rather a puzzle to him. He wasn't waiting for anybody, and he wasn't trying to get drunk. Five ales in an hour and not a dozen words; just an ordinary Britisher who didn't know how to amuse himself in Gawd's ...
— The Voice in the Fog • Harold MacGrath
... of M. Michelet's fury against us poor English, are four which will be likely to amuse the reader; and they are the more conspicuous in collision with the justice which he sometimes does us, and the very indignant admiration which, under some aspects, ...
— Miscellaneous Essays • Thomas de Quincey
... about them. If a person is able to read some easy book, he is apt to suppose he has no more to learn respecting the letters; or he neglects the minute study of these elements, because he sees what words they make, and can amuse himself with stories of things more interesting. But merely to understand common English, is a very small qualification for him who aspires to scholarship, and especially for a teacher. For one may do this, and even be a great reader, without ever being able to name the letters properly, or ...
— The Grammar of English Grammars • Goold Brown
... divided into two general classes: Those who worked because they needed to earn their living, and those who came to the factories to be more independent than at home, to exercise their coquetry and amuse themselves, to make pin money for luxuries. The men formed a united class. They had a purpose in common. The women were in a class with boys and with children. They had nothing in common but their physical inferiority to man. The children ...
— The Woman Who Toils - Being the Experiences of Two Gentlewomen as Factory Girls • Mrs. John Van Vorst and Marie Van Vorst
... Knights of the Round Table; repeating historical poems of the great Emperor Charlemagne and his followers. These minstrels were always accompanied by jugglers and instrumentalists, who formed a travelling troop (Fig. 49), having no other mission than to amuse and instruct their feudal hosts. After singing a few fragments of epics, or after the lively recital of some ancient fable, the jugglers would display their art or skill in gymnastic feats or conjuring, which were the ...
— Manners, Custom and Dress During the Middle Ages and During the Renaissance Period • Paul Lacroix
... far-away countries there are many sheep, and they require shepherds. These shepherds, as they can rest while their sheep feed, sometimes amuse themselves by cutting oat straws and making them into little flutes. They cut holes in the straws, just as you see holes in flutes or in tin whistles. They learn to play very pretty tunes. David, king of Israel, was, in his ...
— Ontario Teachers' Manuals: Literature • Ontario Ministry of Education
... of me, and Nurse does not care about playing at things. Sometimes I try to persuade her; but if she is in a good temper she says she has got a bone in her leg, and if she isn't she says that when little boys can't amuse themselves it's a sure and certain sign they've got "the worrits," and the sooner they are put to bed with a Gregory's powder "the better for ...
— Brothers of Pity and Other Tales of Beasts and Men • Juliana Horatia Gatty Ewing
... apparently tired of Calprenede and Scuderi, of Cleopatre and Cyrus, and has turned to travels to amuse her. Fernando Mendez Pinto did, I believe, actually visit China, and is said to have landed in the Gulf of Pekin. What he writes of China seems to bear some resemblance to what later writers have said. It is hard to say how and where ...
— The Love Letters of Dorothy Osborne to Sir William Temple, 1652-54 • Edward Abbott Parry
... rich marriage, a prosperous future would be assured to him. Old M. de Balzac did not specify the nature of the service which was to meet with so rich a reward; and as he was a gentleman with a distinct liking for talking of his own doings, we may amuse ourselves by supposing that it had to do with those Red Republican days which he was not fond ...
— Honore de Balzac, His Life and Writings • Mary F. Sandars
... it to win the game, Miss van Huysman," he replied with a gentle smile; "I only desired to amuse you and the other guests of Professor Marmion. Now, it may be that some excellent but ignorant people here may think that that ball is bewitched, as they would call it, so if you will give it to me, I will ...
— The Mummy and Miss Nitocris - A Phantasy of the Fourth Dimension • George Griffith
... Hill was fired only when the burghers were in the mood, but occasionally the artillery youths desired to amuse themselves, and then they operated the gun as rapidly as its mechanism would allow. When the big gun had been discharged, the young Boers were wont to climb on the top of the sandbags behind which it was concealed, and ...
— With the Boer Forces • Howard C. Hillegas
... I will tear him out of my heart!" she exclaimed passionately. "He never deserved my love. He did not care. I was a little fool to let him amuse himself with me. He went away and forgot. I ...
— Betty Zane • Zane Grey
... John in vision, with all the redeemed in acts of solemn worship offered directly to the Lamb.—"Many angels," how many? Some divines have actually attempted, by arithmetical rules, to compute the number! Such employment may amuse, but it cannot edify. The definite here mentioned for indefinite numbers, may be easily computed; (as in Dan. vii. 10; Ps. lxviii. 17;) but still we would labor in vain "to find out the account;" for we are expressly told that they ...
— Notes On The Apocalypse • David Steele
... man who dares to avow himself a Radical should be promptly branded as the bitter and malignant enemy of the South; every man who presumes to aspire to office through Republican votes should be saturated with stench. As for the negroes, let them amuse themselves, if they will, by voting the Radical ticket. We have the count. We have a thousand good and true men in Horsford whose brave ballots will be found equal to those of ...
— Bricks Without Straw • Albion W. Tourgee
... please the general public; the style is sometimes stilted, yet passages of great beauty may be found in it. Moreover the jealousy expressed by Don Garcia is neither sufficiently terrible to frighten, nor ridiculous enough to amuse the audience; he always speaks and acts as a prince, and hence, he sometimes ...
— Don Garcia of Navarre • Moliere
... wrath at once. "It is well," he replied; "let the Pasha rest; to-morrow he shall have nothing more to ask." The Egyptian, and the few Mameluke officers of his staff, were tranquilly smoking towards evening, entertained by some dancing-girls, whom the Tiger had sent to amuse them; when they observed that a huge pile of dried stalks of Indian corn was rising rapidly round the tent. "What means this?" inquired Ismael angrily; "am not I Pasha?"—"It is but forage for your highness's horses," replied the Nubian; ...
— The Book of Enterprise and Adventure - Being an Excitement to Reading. For Young People. A New and Condensed Edition. • Anonymous
... such times, Christie's voice, singing or reading, had, now and then, a power to soothe, sometimes to quiet, sometimes even to put him to sleep. And, indeed, she grew very skilful in her efforts to soothe and amuse him; and at any hour of the night or day a movement of his would bring her to his side. A softly-spoken word, or the loving touch of his hand upon her head, was enough to make her forget all her weakness and weariness; and ...
— Christie Redfern's Troubles • Margaret Robertson
... sentences, and confound his pleasure! I don't go into a shop to give a shopman pleasure. But your ordinary shopman must needs pretend you delight and amuse him. I say, trying to display my dislike as plainly as possible, "Gloves." "Gloves, yessir," he says. Why should he? I suppose he thinks I require to be confirmed in my persuasion that I want gloves. "Calf—kid—dogskin?" ...
— Certain Personal Matters • H. G. Wells
... so happened that a couple of days later, Uncle Richard was going out on business in the nearest town, leaving Tom to amuse ...
— The Vast Abyss - The Story of Tom Blount, his Uncles and his Cousin Sam • George Manville Fenn
... down into the deep sea, where all sorts of queer and lovely things were to be seen. Great fishes came and looked at her; dolphins played near to amuse her; the pretty nautilus sailed by in its transparent boat; and porpoises made her laugh with their rough play. Mermaids brought her pearls and red coral to wear, sea-apples to eat, and at night sung her to sleep with their ...
— The Louisa Alcott Reader - A Supplementary Reader for the Fourth Year of School • Louisa M. Alcott
... calling of an extraordinary session of Congress], and, as every good citizen ought to do, conform to whatsoever the ruling powers shall decide. To make and sell a little flour annually, to repair houses (going fast to ruin), to build one for the security of my papers of a public nature, and to amuse myself in agricultural and rural pursuits, will constitute employment for the few years I have to remain on this terrestrial globe. If, also, I could now and then meet the friends I esteem, it would fill the measure and add zest to my enjoyments; but if ever this happens, it must be ...
— Washington and the American Republic, Vol. 3. • Benson J. Lossing
... of them rushed into the house one morning shouting that the boy was out in the barn swinging himself on the farm horses' tails and in momentary danger of being kicked to pieces; but Mrs. Grant received the announcement with perfect calmness, feeling sure that Ulysses would not amuse himself in that way unless he knew the animals thoroughly understood ...
— On the Trail of Grant and Lee • Frederick Trevor Hill
... kennel of his own, he would'nt have took it so coolly; and, whether it was their nature so to do or not, he wouldn't have let the little beggars, that he fork'd out thirteen bob a-year for to the government, amuse themselves by biting each other, or tearing out each other's eyes; he'd have turn'd them over, don't you see, to his neighbours' dogs, and have let them do the biting department on them. And, altogether, Giglamps, I'd advise you to let Filthy Lucre's Vermin alone, and have nothing ...
— The Adventures of Mr. Verdant Green • Cuthbert Bede
... He advocated the simple reaffirmance of the Cincinnati platform. If it had suffered a double interpretation, so had the Bible and the Constitution of the United States. But beyond serving to consume time and amuse the convention, Mr. Butler's speech made no impression. The real tournament of debate followed, between William L. Yancey, of Alabama, and Senator ...
— Abraham Lincoln, A History, Volume 2 • John George Nicolay and John Hay
... us fall on some jest to amuse people; for surely, brother Sigurd, all people are well pleased ...
— Cameos from English History, from Rollo to Edward II • Charlotte Mary Yonge
... descriptions and seen pictures of those sallow, flat-faced, narrow-eyed, round-headed hobgoblins who, under the name of Tartars (a wrong one, too, for it should be Tatare), used to amuse themselves by conquering Eastern Europe every now and then some hundreds of years ago. But it is not every one who has had the pleasure of travelling alone with one of these fellows over nearly a thousand miles of Asiatic desert in time of war—a pleasure which I enjoyed ...
— Harper's Young People, March 16, 1880 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various
... in the water?—When Wright and Vernon left the others, they walked along the coast, following the direction of the boat, and agreed to amuse themselves in collecting eggs. They were very successful, and, to their great delight, managed to secure some rather rare specimens. When they had tired themselves with this pursuit, they lay on the summit of one of the cliffs which ...
— Eric • Frederic William Farrar
... beard, and hooked nose; and yet she could hardly believe that this was the same man who once showed her such ruffianly manners on the wharf in Chicago. He was fondling and feeding the child, and talking to it, and drumming on the table with his knife to amuse it and still its ...
— The Young Surveyor; - or Jack on the Prairies • J. T. Trowbridge
... shady banks of the Madelina there grows a climbing plant which the botanists call Aristolochia, the flowers of which are four feet in circumference, and children amuse themselves with covering their heads with them ...
— Peter Parley's Tales About America and Australia • Samuel Griswold Goodrich
... blamed her for not taking him. He liked music, singing, especially female singing; when there was so little to amuse him, he was surprised that Lady Maud had not been careful that he should have been present. His sister-in-law reminded him that she had particularly requested him to drive her over to Mowbray, and he had declined the honour ...
— Sybil - or the Two Nations • Benjamin Disraeli
... the car was taken out, and occasionally Deede Dawson would come into the garden and chat with him idly for a few minutes on indifferent subjects. When it was fine he would often bring out a little travelling set of chessmen and board and proceed to amuse himself, ...
— The Bittermeads Mystery • E. R. Punshon
... sit in a row and the first begins by saying, "I am going on a journey to Athens," or any place beginning with A. The one sitting next asks, "What will you do there?" The verbs, adjectives, and nouns used in the reply must all begin with A; as "Amuse Ailing Authors with Anecdotes." If the player answers correctly, it is the next player's turn; he says perhaps: "I am going to Bradford." "What to do there?" "To Bring Back Bread and Butter." A third says: "I am going to Constantinople." "What ...
— Games For All Occasions • Mary E. Blain
... the phases of human nature which it touched. It is best to find that all men are of the same make, and that there are certain universal things which interest them as much as the supernal things, and amuse them even more. There was a saying of Lowell's which he was fond of repeating at the menace of any form of the transcendental, and he liked to warn himself and others with his homely, "Remember the ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... gently turn aside, and avert my eyes from the stormy and cloudy sky I have before me, which, thanks be to God, I regard without fear, but not without meditation and study, and amuse myself in the remembrance of my ...
— Classic French Course in English • William Cleaver Wilkinson
... slept at my father's) he would pick up my books and amuse himself with talking to me about them, laugh at my crude enthusiasms, clear up some difficult passage, prune away remorselessly the trash that had crept into my little collection, until, one day, returning from Cincinnati, where business had called him, he brought with him a store of books inexhaustible ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 13, No. 76, February, 1864 • Various
... the rooms were empty for some months, and the Lion and the Unicorn were forced to amuse themselves with the beautiful ladies and smart-looking men who came to Prentiss to buy flowers and "buttonholes," and the little round baskets of strawberries, and even the peaches at three shillings each, which looked so tempting as they lay in the window, wrapped up ...
— The Lion and the Unicorn and Other Stories • Richard Harding Davis
... appeared; no entreaties, however urgent, on the part of his subjects, could induce the Elector to risk the remainder of his army to the chances of a battle. Shut up in Ratisbon, he awaited the reinforcements which Wallenstein was bringing from Bohemia; and endeavoured, in the mean time, to amuse his enemy and keep him inactive, by reviving the negociation for a neutrality. But the King's distrust, too often and too justly excited by his previous conduct, frustrated this design; and the intentional delay of Wallenstein ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller
... We see in ordinary life how some great king, ruling this earth with its seven dvpas, and possessing perfect strength, valour, and so on, has a game at balls, or the like, from no other motive than to amuse himself; hence there is no objection to the view that sport only is the motive prompting Brahman to the creation, sustentation, and destruction of this world which is easily fashioned ...
— The Vedanta-Sutras with the Commentary by Ramanuja - Sacred Books of the East, Volume 48 • Trans. George Thibaut
... to doubt that people were similarly affected to the fiction of the Renaissance and the seventeenth century, at least in its longer examples—for the smaller novelle could amuse in their own way sometimes, though they could hardly absorb. It is equally impossible to imagine any one being "enthralled" by Euphues. Admiration, of a kind, must have been the only passion excited by it. In the Arcadia there is a certain charm, but it belongs ...
— The English Novel • George Saintsbury
... new-found specimens to the workmen; but though they always took the trouble of looking at them, and wondered at times how the shells and plants had "got into the stones," they seemed to regard them as a sort of natural toys, which a mere lad might amuse himself in looking after, but which were rather below the notice of grown-up people like themselves. One workman, however, informed me, that things of a kind I had not yet found—genuine thunderbolts—which in his father's times were much sought for the cure of bewitched cattle—were to ...
— My Schools and Schoolmasters - or The Story of my Education. • Hugh Miller
... as his gaze rested in turn on each of the four, and then travelled sharply round the room. "So you will not be thwarted by any man in Paris, to-night, eh? Have you considered, my dear Coadjutor, what a large number of people there are in Paris? It would amuse me very greatly now—and I'm sure it would the ladies too, who must pardon my abrupt entrance—to see you put to the test; pitted against—shall we say the Duke of Anjou? Or M. de Guise, our great man? Or the Admiral? Say the ...
— The House of the Wolf - A Romance • Stanley Weyman
... boy who a little later was to light with rosy cheer the air which, as Wendell Phillips said, was still black with sermons; who was to give to our literature its first distinctly humorous strain, and innocently to amuse the world, was somehow or other, as he said, "taught to feel that everything pleasant ...
— Literary and Social Essays • George William Curtis
... evoked them, and therefore not without many seemingly arbitrary transitions, many links of connexion to be supposed by the reader, constituting their characteristic difficulty, the Essays owed their actual publication at last to none of the usual literary motives—desire for fame, to instruct, to amuse, to sell—but to the sociable desire for a still wider range of conversation with others. [86] He wrote for companionship, "if but one sincere man would make his acquaintance"; speaking on paper, as he "did to the first person he met."—"If there be any ...
— Gaston de Latour: an unfinished romance • Walter Horatio Pater
... good master; the work is not hard," thought Yvon, when the giant was gone. "I have plenty of time to sweep the stable. What shall I do meanwhile to amuse myself? Shall I look about the house? Since I am forbidden to do so, it must be because there is ...
— Laboulaye's Fairy Book • Various
... you," she replied. "Your invention may amuse if it does not edify. But, I pray you, ...
— Arthur Mervyn - Or, Memoirs of the Year 1793 • Charles Brockden Brown
... by the neck and the movement of his back and arms. In any case I could not mistake the hands which I had had some many opportunities of studying. I was at first interested and somewhat amused, for it is wonderful how small a matter will interest and amuse a man when he is a prisoner. But my very feelings changed to repulsion and terror when I saw the whole man slowly emerge from the window and begin to crawl down the castle wall over the dreadful abyss, face down with his cloak spreading out around ...
— Dracula • Bram Stoker
... come in perfectly satisfied, 'n' I may in confidence remark as I was satisfied too for I was n't overpleased to have him meddlin' with the porch-vine. I will remark, though, as his cuttin' Virginia creeper for grape-vines did amuse me some, for it's been a well-known fact for years as Mrs. Ely was Mr. Ely in everythin' but the clothes he wore, 'n' they say the way she managed to figger-head him through plantin' 'n' harvest, 'n' pasture 'n' punkins, was nothin' short of genius, bred in the bone 'n' bustin' ...
— Susan Clegg and Her Neighbors' Affairs • Anne Warner
... afraid," he reiterated. "Eustace is too much of a sportsman to amuse himself at the expense of ...
— Greatheart • Ethel M. Dell
... cursed Alenka!" she cried. "No doubt she's gone off somewhere to amuse herself." Then she slipped in through the window, opened the door, and let in her guests. They all sat down to table, and the witch opened the oven, took out Alenka's baked body, and served it up. They all ate their fill and ...
— Russian Fairy Tales - A Choice Collection of Muscovite Folk-lore • W. R. S. Ralston
... shop was shut up at night, used to amuse himself with reading some little books which the schoolmaster who formerly taught him arithmetic was so good as to lend him. Amongst these he one evening met with a little book full of the history of birds and beasts; he looked immediately to see whether ...
— The Parent's Assistant • Maria Edgeworth
... tolerably good scenes can be had, it is almost better to content oneself with what served in the days of Shakespeare—a written placard of what the scene is supposed to be. Shakespeare scenery, as we may call it, will amuse people of itself, and a good piece and good actors will not suffer from its use. Thus, if The Barmecide is being played, Alnaschan and Ina will be "discovered" standing in an empty room, at the back of which a placard will bear ...
— The Peace Egg and Other tales • Juliana Horatia Ewing
... trait of taking a chance for possible gain led the colonists to amuse themselves at games and sports, in which they invariably added a wager to lend zest to the occasion. This practice, generally prevalent in England, quite naturally was extended to the Colony, as the English established themselves with all their customs and habits in the new land. Betting was general ...
— Domestic Life in Virginia in the Seventeenth Century - Jamestown 350th Anniversary Historical Booklet Number 17 • Annie Lash Jester
... went back to the French court, leaving Marguerite at Nerac, they could boast of a few Huguenot gentlemen won over to their designs, but I was not one of the few. I do not say that I did not amuse myself where charming women abounded, but I kept my heart to myself. I had not resolved to become invulnerable to woman, but I had determined that she by whom I would let myself be wounded should be one vastly unlike any in Catherine's train. When I should find the woman pure as beautiful, incapable ...
— An Enemy To The King • Robert Neilson Stephens
... meant was, is this silence to be permanent, or are you going to begin shortly to amuse, elevate, and instruct? Something's happened to you, Jimmy. There was a time when you were a bright little chap, a fellow of infinite jest, of most excellent fancy. Where be your gibes now; your gambols, your songs, your flashes of merriment that were wont to set the ...
— The Intrusion of Jimmy • P. G. Wodehouse
... pools for the birds there are corridors and galleries to which Muteczuma resorts, and from which he can look out and amuse himself with the sight of them. There is an apartment in the same palace, in which are men, women, and children, whose faces, bodies, hair, eyebrows, and eyelashes are white from birth. The cacique has another very beautiful palace, with a large courtyard, paved ...
— South American Fights and Fighters - And Other Tales of Adventure • Cyrus Townsend Brady
... which did not a little amuse the merchandisers was, that these pilgrims set very light by all their wares. They cared not so much as to look upon them; and if they called upon them to buy, they would put their fingers in their ears, and cry, "Turn away mine eyes from beholding vanity," ...
— Bible Stories and Religious Classics • Philip P. Wells
... be wanting for his diversion. When all was ready, his majesty embraced the prince, and having recommended the care of him to Marzavan, left them. Prince Camaralzaman and Marzavan were soon mounted, when, to amuse the two grooms who led the fresh horses, they made as if they would hunt, and so got as far from the city and out of the road as was possible. Night approaching, they alighted at a caravansera or inn, where they supped, and slept till ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments Volume 1 • Anonymous
... generous, good-natured friend of the dean's, whom she also much loved and honoured. There my informer often saw her; and, I have reason to believe, used his utmost endeavours to relieve, support, and amuse ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson, LL.D. in Nine Volumes - Volume the Eighth: The Lives of the Poets, Volume II • Samuel Johnson
... religious associations, they made of it a secular drink to be sipped publicly in kaveh kanes, the first coffee houses. Here the idle congregated to drink coffee, to play chess and other games, to discuss the news of the day, and to amuse themselves with singing, dancing, and music, contrary to the manners of the rigid Mahommedans, who were very properly scandalized by such performances. In Medina and in Cairo, too, coffee became as common a drink ...
— All About Coffee • William H. Ukers
... satisfy your wishes. We have much money, many ribbons for orders, and as for titles, they are the cheapest and most convenient of all, as they cost absolutely nothing. Ah, a jest just now occurs to me. We will amuse ourselves a little to-day. We will have a title-auction. Call our courtiers, attendants, and servants. We shall have a gay time of it! We will have a game at dice. Bring the dice! I will at each throw announce the ...
— The Daughter of an Empress • Louise Muhlbach
... I shall be quite happy with him," said Mrs. Howland. "I really do. He is awfully kind, and his funny little ways amuse me." ...
— The School Queens • L. T. Meade
... "To amuse Lady Monica, who's not pleased with him so far," explained the Cherub. "And as he's a good Catholic, at least in appearance, to-night or the night after will be his last chance to entertain till Semana Santa ...
— The Car of Destiny • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... found opportunities for wild enjoyment; and numerous beggars, stimulated by vice and misery, availed themselves of this new complaint to gain a temporary livelihood. Girls and boys quitted their parents, and servants their masters, to amuse themselves at the dances of those possessed, and greedily imbibed the poison of mental infection. Gangs of idle vagabonds, who understood how to imitate to the life the gestures and convulsions of those really affected, roved from place to place ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 07 • Various
... bunch uh men camped up the creek and the Pilgrim to close-herd 'em—and I'm busy wondering what he's going to do with that ditch. Brown don't do things just to amuse himself; yuh can gamble he aims to make that ditch pack dollars into his jeans—and if yuh can tell me how, I'll be a whole lot obliged." Dill shook his head, and Billy went on. "Did yuh happen to find out, when yuh was bargaining for the Double-Crank, how much ...
— The Long Shadow • B. M. Bower
... assumed by Eastern Virginia and Maryland was of consequence only so far as it might facilitate a sudden raid on Washington, and the policy of both these States was to amuse the Government by imaginary negotiations till the plans of the conspirators were ripe. In both States men were actively recruited and enrolled to assist in attacking the capital. With them, as with the more openly rebellious States, the new theory ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 7, No. 44, June, 1861 • Various
... not only an excellent story-teller but naturally very jovial, and M. de Hanski suffered from ennui and wished to be amused, they became friends. On his return to Paris, they exchanged a few letters, and Balzac introduced stories to amuse him in his letters to Madame Hanska. He wrote most graciously to the Marechal, apologizing for the two love letters he had written his wife, and this letter was answered. The novelist was invited by him to visit them in Wierzchownia—an invitation ...
— Women in the Life of Balzac • Juanita Helm Floyd
... these that he intimated to me that I was pardoned, and reinstated—as the Fool of the Court of Pesaro. That was to be the sum of his clemency. We were precisely where we had been. Once before had he granted me my life on condition that I should amuse him; he did no more than repeat that mercy now. I stared at him in wonder, ...
— The Shame of Motley • Raphael Sabatini
... a night or two before, but I was wise enough not to talk too much and to behave myself. She promised to meet me again and made the appointment. She was a school-teacher and engaged to be married to some one else. She meant to amuse herself her own way before she married. The second night I met her she allowed me to kiss her as much as I liked and promised all her favors for the third night. We took a long walk, and in the dark she gave herself to me, but I hurt her ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 4 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis
... life, when free to choose for herself, she was reconciled in the meantime to take things as they came, and to make herself happy and add to the happiness of her grandmother in the ordinary way. So we find her enjoying the visit of one of her school friends, getting up little plays to amuse the elders, practicing the harp, receiving from her brother Hippolyte—now a noisy hussar—during his brief visit home, her first initiation into the arts of riding—for the future her favorite exercise—and of pistol-shooting; ...
— Famous Women: George Sand • Bertha Thomas
... from an arena worthy of your great talents, to appropriate those talents to a sphere so much more limited. Be that as it may, I will indulge the hope, so long as you do not forbid it. In the meantime, could you not take a leave of absence for a few weeks during the coming Autumn Assizes, and amuse yourself with holding some briefs on some of them here? We have now five Circuits—the Eastern, Midland, Home, Niagara, and Western. Mr. Justice Jones takes the Eastern, Mr. Justice McLean the Midland, the Chief Justice the Niagara, ...
— The Story of My Life - Being Reminiscences of Sixty Years' Public Service in Canada • Egerton Ryerson
... the natural man takes a hand, but he is seen through civilized spectacles, not, as in your delightful books, with the eyes of the sympathetic sportsman. If Why-Why and Mr. Gowles amuse you a little, let this be my Diomedean exchange of bronze for gold—of the new Phaeacia for Kukuana land, or for that haunted city of Kor, in which your fair Ayesha dwells undying, as yet unknown to the future ...
— In the Wrong Paradise • Andrew Lang
... wild and feeling quite as savage. Presenting me to each and all of the splendid crowd which an idle curiosity, easily excited and as soon satisfied, had gathered round us, she prefaced every introduction with a little exordium which seemed to amuse every one but its object: 'Lord Erskine, this is the Wild Irish Girl whom you are so anxious to know. I assure you she talks quite as well as she writes.—Now, my dear, do tell my Lord Erskine some of those Irish stories you told us the other evening. Fancy yourself among your own set, and take ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Volume 22. October, 1878. • Various
... repeat yourself; either by telling the same story again and again or by going back over details of your narrative that seemed especially to interest or amuse your hearer. Many things are of interest when briefly told and for the first time; nothing interests when too long dwelt upon; little interests that is told a second time. The exception is something very pleasant that you have heard about A. or more especially A.'s ...
— Etiquette • Emily Post
... grateful to God that he rescued you. This you have accomplished, you poor armless man, that hundreds, though they had two arms, perished, while you are privileged to appear on the stage this evening as if nothing had occurred. We must enjoy ourselves; and it is better that you who entertain and amuse us with your thousands of tricks should have been saved than any Tom, Dick, or Harry. Besides we want to reimburse you for all the troubles you have been through. What is more, because of your ...
— Atlantis • Gerhart Hauptmann
... Parliament. Sir W. Coventry answered, and the Duke of York merrily agreed to it, that it was very hard to know what it was that the Parliament would call conformity at this time, and so it stopped, which I only observe to see how the Parliament's present temper do amuse them all. Thence to several places to buy a hat, and books, and neckcloths, and several errands I did before I got home, and, among others, bought me two new pair of spectacles of Turlington, who, it seems, is famous for them; ...
— Diary of Samuel Pepys, Complete • Samuel Pepys
... runaways and lubras, or collapsed, doubled up with uncontrollable laughter, at the squawk of amazement from fowls which, having gained their old haunt, had found Jimmy there waiting to receive them. As for ourselves, I doubt if we ever enjoyed anything better. A simple thing, perhaps, to amuse grown-up white folk—a fat, perspiring Chinaman, and eight or ten lubras chivying fowls; but it is this enjoyment of simple things that makes life in ...
— We of the Never-Never • Jeanie "Mrs. Aeneas" Gunn
... which my old friend objected to, come in as something admissible.—I love to get a tierce or a quatorze, though they mean nothing. I am subdued to an inferior interest. Those shadows of winning amuse me. ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb, Volume 2 • Charles Lamb
... sacred, and not to be trodden upon, so the gods might by this let him know the city should not be taken. Pyrrhus replied, that all these things were but idle talk, full of uncertainty, and only fit to amuse the vulgar; their thought, with their swords in their hands, ...
— Plutarch's Lives • A.H. Clough
... having come to see her, and he had above all hit on a happy thought for causing Waymarsh's tension to relax. Something might possibly be extracted for the latter from the idea of his success with that lady, whose quick apprehension of what might amuse her had given Strether a free hand. What had she meant if not to ask whether she couldn't help him with his splendid encumbrance, and mightn't the sacred rage at any rate be kept a little in abeyance ...
— The Ambassadors • Henry James
... juggler of inferior dexterity while exhibiting his tricks in a public house in Botchergate, kept by a person named Purdy, actually accomplished the sad reality of one of those feats, with the semblance only of which he intended to amuse his audience. Having introduced into his throat a common table knife which he was intending to swallow, he accidentally slipped his hold, and the knife passed into his stomach. An alarm was immediately given, and surgical aid procured, but the knife had passed beyond the reach ...
— The Miracle Mongers, an Expos • Harry Houdini
... its nearest neighbor on the boulevard side was an empty tenement, a despondent ghost to-day, though once it had rivaled the flaunting tankard. Its frayed finery told of gay sparks extinguished. A flamboyant legend declared, "Ici on chante, on boit, on s'amuse(?)" Joan always smirked a little at that suggestive note of interrogation, which lent a world of meaning to the half-obliterated statement that Madame Lucette would appear "tous les soirs ...
— A Son of the Immortals • Louis Tracy
... whether she was married or not, but have always regarded her action in relieving me from a silent dinner as the highest mark of politeness. She was bright and attractive, and I certainly did and said all I could to amuse her, so what I expected to be a dull dinner turned out to be a ...
— Recollections of Forty Years in the House, Senate and Cabinet - An Autobiography. • John Sherman
... very little going on in Mexico at present, I amuse myself very well; there is so much to see, and the people are so kind and friendly. Having got riding-horses we have been making excursions all round the country, especially early in the morning, before the sun is high, when the air is delightfully ...
— Life in Mexico • Frances Calderon de la Barca
... which most of the dishonourable actions of politicians are to be ascribed. He valued power little and money less. Of fear he was utterly insensible. If he sometimes stooped to be a villain,—for no milder word will come up to the truth,—it was merely to amuse himself and to astonish other people. In civil as in military affairs, he loved ambuscades, surprises, night attacks. He now imagined that he had a glorious opportunity of making a sensation, of producing a great commotion; and the temptation was irresistible to ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 4 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... playgrounds were thrown open to the children during the long vacation, with kindergarten teachers to amuse them, and vacation schools tempted the little ones from the street into the cool shade of the classrooms. They wrought in wood and iron, they sang and they played and studied nature,—out of a barrel, to be sure, that came twice a week from Long Island filled with "specimens"; but later on ...
— The Battle with the Slum • Jacob A. Riis
... story would amuse you so much, grandfather, I would have told it you three months ago; but I was afraid it would be disagreeable to you to hear ...
— Major Frank • A. L. G. Bosboom-Toussaint
... in the Pergottan river, this amiable prince and friend of Europeans, impatient to seize his prey, came immediately to the point from his country house, and sending for the nacodah of the proa, ordered him to land me and all my goods instantly. An invitation now came for me to go on shore and amuse myself with shooting, and look at some rare birds of beautiful plumage which the rajah would give me if I would accept of them; but knowing what were his intentions, and being well aware that I should be supported by all the Bugis' proas from Coti, I feigned sickness, and ...
— The Pirates Own Book • Charles Ellms
... a very little child, I used to amuse myself and my brothers with inventing stories, such as I read. Having, as I suppose, naturally a restless mind and busy imagination, this soon became the chief pleasure of my life. Unfortunately, my brothers were always fond of encouraging this propensity, and I found ...
— Father and Son • Edmund Gosse
... I appeal to you," Tom said, as Miss Carter entered the room. "Is this fair? These two Comanche Indians hold me helpless on the sofa, extract a promise that I will never go home, and now they want me to amuse them besides." ...
— Phyllis - A Twin • Dorothy Whitehill
... of the Doctor's appearance he had a tolerably respectable auditory, and the following incidents may amuse your readers, as they occasioned much laughter at the moment. Among the company was the Rev. Mr. P., a minor canon. The conjuror, in the course of his tricks, desired a card to be drawn from the pack, by ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 17, No. 477, Saturday, February 19, 1831 • Various
... immortal John in the character of the Great Vance; and that joy for ever, Uncle Joseph, with his deathless thirst for popular information and instruction—these personages, this "educated insolence," never cease to amuse. Uncle Joseph is no caricature. But the world likes its sensational novels to be written with becoming seriousness; in short, "The Wrong Box" is aimed at a small but devoted ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition - Vol. 1 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... departure Beth had many a lonely hour, and the time hung heavy on her hands. Mildred, her senior by four years, was of a simpler disposition, and always able to amuse herself, playing with the Baby Bernadine, or with toys which were no distraction to Beth. Mildred, besides, was fond of reading; but books to be deciphered remained a wonder and a mystery ...
— The Beth Book - Being a Study of the Life of Elizabeth Caldwell Maclure, a Woman of Genius • Sarah Grand
... and I think, Maggie, you might find some better things to amuse yourself with than such fancies," said ...
— A Christmas Posy • Mary Louisa Stewart Molesworth
... would have saved the French Empire, and who seemed to him of greater weight than thousands of soldiers; a man to whom nature, as a rare privilege, had given a heart in a frame of bronze; mirthful and kind at midnight amid women, and next morning manipulating Europe as a young girl might amuse herself by splashing water in her bath! Hypocritical and generous; loving tawdriness and simplicity; devoid of taste, but protecting the arts; and in spite of these antitheses, really great in everything by instinct or by temperament; Caesar ...
— Another Study of Woman • Honore de Balzac
... well-founded alarm, there were some moments in which we sought to amuse ourselves, or, to use a common expression, to kill time. Cards afforded us a source of recreation, and even this frivolous amusement served to develop the character of Bonaparte. In general he was not fond of cards; but if he did play, ...
— Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte, Complete • Louis Antoine Fauvelet de Bourrienne
... thought I'd furnish a really interesting name for you to amuse yourself with. I'm sorry ...
— Little Miss Grouch - A Narrative Based on the Log of Alexander Forsyth Smith's - Maiden Transatlantic Voyage • Samuel Hopkins Adams
... wrath, they pass their time there, crowned with the fruition of every wish. Persons of righteous deeds, possessed of fame, sport there in happiness, moving from place to place, O Bharata, on delightful vehicles of great beauty. Auspicious deed, bands of Apsaras always amuse them there, with music and dance. Indeed O Yudhishthira, a person goes to such regions as the reward of his making gifts of kine. Those regions which have for their lords Pushan, and the Maruts of great puissance, are attained to ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 4 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... stands around and tells each other that the old man must have a good heart at that, because look how he goes out of his way to amuse the baby. Father growls up at 'em and prays that they'll all go to bed, includin' the one that's just learnin' to walk, so's he can be let alone to ...
— Kid Scanlan • H. C. Witwer
... not get well as fast as she expected, and the little girl found it rather tiresome to lie on a lounge all day, although her mamma read to her, and tried to amuse her. Bubbles, too, was as obedient a nurse as could be, and, because she had been the cause of the accident, considered it her first and only duty ...
— A Sweet Little Maid • Amy E. Blanchard
... we assert the duty of the imagination to be that of following and finding out the work that God maketh. Her part is to understand God ere she attempts to utter man. Where is the room for being fanciful or riotous here? It is only the ill-bred, that is, the uncultivated imagination that will amuse itself where it ought to ...
— A Dish Of Orts • George MacDonald
... whom he refurnished his castle at an expense of a hundred thousand crowns. His marriage was the signal for new extravagance, and he launched out more madly than ever he had done before; sending for fine singers or celebrated dancers from foreign countries to amuse him and his spouse; and instituting tilts and tournaments in his great court-yard almost every week for all the knights and nobles of the province of Brittany. The Duke of Brittany's court was not half so splendid as that of the Marechal de Rays. His utter disregard for ...
— Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds • Charles Mackay
... preparations as she made, and were the instruments in surprising her and her father by some tasteful decorations in their honour, unknown to them. Owen and Gladys worked very hard at floral and evergreen mottoes for the tent, whilst Rowland gave his advice as he sat with his mother, and tried to amuse her during the ...
— Gladys, the Reaper • Anne Beale
... all the publications for little boys and girls, GOLDEN DAYS stands most conspicuous to the front, while its columns abound with stories and tales well calculated to entertain, amuse and please the youthful reader. There is a moral in its articles well calculated to make the young reader better for having read its columns. The subscription price is $3 per year, two copies for $5. Send for specimen copy, and you will be sure to ...
— Golden Days for Boys and Girls, Vol. XIII, Nov. 28, 1891 • Various
... to pass a great deal of time by himself; but, as if to make up for his coldness in one way, he was most indulgent in every other, and seemed to have made it a rule never to discountenance any thing which could amuse her. His behavior to her, in Mercy's eyes, seemed to resemble servility; "it was that of the most attentive courtier," and was carried so far as to treat with marked distinction persons whose character he was known to disapprove, solely ...
— The Life of Marie Antoinette, Queen of France • Charles Duke Yonge
... continued, nevertheless, to amuse itself at the expense of the cavalry, and either asserted or intimated, on every favorable occasion, that the real fighting was done by themselves. This flattering assumption might be natural under the circumstances, but it was now about to be shown to be wholly unfounded. A campaign was ...
— A Life of Gen. Robert E. Lee • John Esten Cooke
... mind again extricated him from danger. Under the pretence of sickness, he dismounted in the night, and was allowed to step aside from the troop: he planted in the ground his long staff, clothed it with his cap and upper garment; and, stealing into the wood, left a phantom to amuse, for some time, the eyes of the Walachians. From Halicz he was honorably conducted to Kiow, the residence of the great duke: the subtle Greek soon obtained the esteem and confidence of Ieroslaus; his character could assume the manners of every climate; and the Barbarians ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 4 • Edward Gibbon
... up her cap this time—perhaps she had seen a little of that laughter before—but she claps her hands joyfully, and pats Rylton's arm afterwards in a bon camarade fashion that seems to amuse him. And is she tired? There is no sense of fatigue, certainly, in the way she runs up the slope again, and flings herself gracefully upon the rug beside Mr. Gower. Mr. Gower has not stirred from that rug since. ...
— The Hoyden • Mrs. Hungerford
... good lad, Jan," said he, "but ye've fagged yourself out. Take the dog with ye to-morrow for company, and your sketch- book, and amuse yourself. I'll not expect ye at school. And get away to your bed now. I told Master Lake I shouldn't let ye ...
— Jan of the Windmill • Juliana Horatia Ewing |
