"Circumlocution" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... whole nervous system, to discharge some temper before he returns to work. I do not care how much or how well he works, this fellow is an evil feature in other people's lives. They would be happier if he were dead. They could easier do without his services in the Circumlocution Office, than they can tolerate his fractious spirits. He poisons life at the well-head. It is better to be beggared out of hand by a scapegrace nephew, than daily hag-ridden by ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition - Vol. 2 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... Squeers, Mrs. Squeers, Fanny Squeers, Wackford and all, to Dickens's indignation against the nefarious school pirates of his time. If he is less successful in attacking the Court of Chancery, and very much less successful still with the Red Tape and Circumlocution Office affairs, that may be merely because he was less in the humour, and not because he had a purpose in his mind. Every one of a man's books cannot be his masterpiece. There is nothing in literary talk so annoying ...
— Essays in Little • Andrew Lang
... believe to be duty," she said. She wished that, by some circumlocution or some tenderness in the tone, she could have softened the words that she spoke, but all her forces had to be rallied to utter the decision, and there was no power left to qualify the bare words which sounded to Millard ...
— The Faith Doctor - A Story of New York • Edward Eggleston
... though it was, the letter had a certain noble simplicity. "Tres gentil," I remarked as I returned it to Jeanne, and thought the matter at an end. But Jeanne had not done, and, with much circumlocution and many hesitations, she at last preferred a simple request. I was going to visit the battlefield of the Marne—yes? I assented. Well, perhaps, perhaps Monsieur would visit Paul's grave, and perhaps if he found it ...
— Leaves from a Field Note-Book • J. H. Morgan
... without any circumlocution, "laces have been missed from your department, and suspicion rests on you. I hope you ...
— Without a Home • E. P. Roe
... mind he is benumbed; he can only mutter, "If this is madness, there is method in it." What little portable wisdom was given to him in the first Act is soon withdrawn—he stammers in his deceit, and the old indirectness having no material of thought to work upon becomes a circumlocution of truisms. As the play proceeds he is made, as if with a second intention, more and more the antithesis, as he is the antipathy, of the prince. It is the careful portrait of what Hamlet would hate—a remnant of senile craft in the method with folly in the matter—a shy look in the dull ...
— The Contemporary Review, January 1883 - Vol 43, No. 1 • Various
... her at once, or as soon as possible." And at this opportune moment Dora came down the stairs. Theodore advanced to meet her, and feeling almost certain of the character with which he had to deal, came to the point at once without hesitation or circumlocution. ...
— Three People • Pansy
... into North and South—and the Clarion had warned the "inert and muddling Government" of the colony "that unless the just and courteous request of the telegraphic staff of the Bowen Repeating Office for a punkah is acceded to without further circumlocution, the growing movement in favour of Separation will be openly advocated by this journal. Already (of this we have private knowledge) has Lord Kimberley expressed himself astonished at the heartless refusal of our benighted Colonial Secretary and Treasurer ...
— Tom Gerrard - 1904 • Louis Becke
... came back, she learnt, after various interruptions from Mrs Belfield, and much delay from his own slowness and circumlocution, that he had pursued the two gentlemen to ...
— Cecilia vol. 3 - Memoirs of an Heiress • Frances (Fanny) Burney (Madame d'Arblay)
... weight of it any longer. I can't give you all the details, but you may rely on what I say being correct." He looked away from Larry out of the window. The car was running swiftly up the smooth levels of the long avenue; he knew he had no time for circumlocution. "My father told me," he began, "that in some way, between himself and the Major a lot of money had passed. The Major was greatly pressed for money—he wasn't getting his rents, and there were many liabilities—my father got hold of them all. I ...
— Mount Music • E. Oe. Somerville and Martin Ross
... preserve the happy medium, for there is such a thing as being too systematic. There are men and women, for instance, who put away things so carefully that they can never find them again. It is too much like the "red-tape" formality at Washington, and Mr. Dick-ens' "Circumlocution ...
— A Unique Story of a Marvellous Career. Life of Hon. Phineas T. • Joel Benton
... wickedness of the tinker has been greatly overcharged, and it is taking the language of self-accusation too literally to pronounce of John Bunyan, that he was at any time depraved. The worst of what he was in his worst days is to be expressed in a single word, the full meaning of which no circumlocution can convey; and which, though it may hardly be deemed presentable in serious composition, I shall use, as Bunyan himself (no mealy-mouthed writer) would have used it, had it in his days borne the same acceptation in which it is ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... compel a man to wind about a tale, swaddling clothes about an infant when it should run about stark naked. May the great devil give them a clyster with his red-hot three-pronged fork. I am going on with my story now without further circumlocution. ...
— Droll Stories, Volume 3 • Honore de Balzac
... to ask me, Mr. Cleggett," said the Captain, with less than his usual circumlocution, "I'd say the boys here ain't flattered by what you've just said. The boys here DOES consider themselves friends of yours, and if you was anxious to hear my opinion of it I'd say you've hurt their feelin's ...
— The Cruise of the Jasper B. • Don Marquis
... feel no other love than that which he cherishes for his own worthy person, and the purses of all others. Let him explain now, quickly and without circumlocution, if he really wishes my pardon, why, after going to Nurnberg to marry a bag of gold, containing a few millions, he has now ...
— Berlin and Sans-Souci • Louise Muhlbach
... off balance by a strategy of ironical indirection. Sometimes this took the form of omission or the presentation of an argument in so fragmentary or slanted a fashion that Collins's "Enemies" could debate neither his implications nor his conclusions. At other times he used this artful circumlocution to create his favorite mask, that of the pious Christian devoted to scripture or of the moralist perplexed by the divisions among the orthodox clergy. Finally, his rhetoric was shaped by deistic predecessors ...
— A Discourse Concerning Ridicule and Irony in Writing (1729) • Anthony Collins
... to his master's tricks of circumlocution, the bravo was so far from expecting this question, that at first he stood mute, and only after a few moments' pause was ...
— Celebrated Crimes, Complete • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... been wondering a good deal what she would say, how she would accede, and then he perceived that her dignity knew no circumlocution. 'I will send the man for your horse.' She said it with hardly ...
— A Dozen Ways Of Love • Lily Dougall
... Pepper Burns. "I don't really mean to be, but the only way I can find out the things I need to know is to ask straight questions. I never could stand circumlocution. If you want that, Cooly; if you want what are called 'tactful' methods, you'll have to go to some other man. What I mean by asking you that one is to prove to you that though you may have something to do, you have no job to work at. As it happens ...
— Red Pepper's Patients - With an Account of Anne Linton's Case in Particular • Grace S. Richmond
... adapted to wifely duties, does it follow that the best thing he can do is to blurt out, without form or ceremony, all the criticisms and corrections which may occur to him in the many details of household life? He would not dare to speak with as little preface, apology, or circumlocution, to his business-manager, to his butcher, or his baker. When Enthusius was a bachelor, he never criticized the table at his boarding-house without some reflection, and studying to take unto himself acceptable words whereby to soften the asperity of the criticism. The laws of society require that ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 88, February, 1865 • Various
... must be remembered that the author's line is much shorter than the Anglo-Saxon line,—there are four words beginning with p; in the second, three beginning with cl, and so on. This, of course, necessitates much not merely of circumlocution, but of contrivance, involving ...
— England's Antiphon • George MacDonald
... opinion of Jenifer's father about himself and the engagement, as to find out her present whereabouts. From the first moment of their meeting he knew that he did not stand in the Archbishop's good graces; but that hardly concerned him; and so it was almost without circumlocution that he asked for ...
— King John of Jingalo - The Story of a Monarch in Difficulties • Laurence Housman
... Cazalette?" I asked, though I knew well enough what it was. I wanted him to say, and have done with it; his circumlocution was getting wearisome. But he was one of those old men who won't allow their cattle to be hurried, and he went on in ...
— Ravensdene Court • J. S. (Joseph Smith) Fletcher
... family conclave that was once summoned, in order, if possible, to communicate the fact to one of the circle that he was in danger of becoming a bore; the head of the family was finally deputed to convey the fact as delicately as possible to the erring brother. He did so, with much tender circumlocution. The offender was deeply mortified, but endeavoured to thank his elderly relative for discharging so painful a task. He promised amendment. He sate glum and tongue-tied for several weeks in the midst of cheerful gatherings. Very gradually the old habit prevailed. Within six months he ...
— From a College Window • Arthur Christopher Benson
... Bishop Berkeley, were once clothed with a "brief authority;" but Berkeley ended his metaphysical theory with a treatise on the healing properties of tar-water, and Hegel was an inveterate snuff-taker. The circumlocution and cold categories of Kant fail to improve the conditions of mortals, morally, spiritually, or physically. Such miscalled metaphysical systems are reeds shaken by the wind. Compared with the inspired wisdom and infinite meaning of the ...
— No and Yes • Mary Baker Eddy
... tenderness to a Brother's feelings, I would have communicated the sad event to you by degrees, and have prepared you to hear it with fortitude. My measures are broken through: This order commands me to deliver up to you the Sister Agnes without delay; I am therefore obliged to inform you without circumlocution, that ...
— The Monk; a romance • M. G. Lewis
... must be short, so I smother what remnant of modesty I have, covering nothing with the veil of circumlocution, but telling you plainly what I know you want to hear. I love only you and am true to you in every thought, word, and deed. I long for you, yearn for you, pray for you, and be your fortune good or ill, I would share it and give you a part of the bliss of life ...
— The Touchstone of Fortune • Charles Major
... something. If we are only here to make speeches, and not to arrive at conclusions, our mission is useless. The greater portion of the debate hitherto has been made up of set speeches, all like the circumlocution office in one of Dickens' novels, showing "how not to do it." I am not in favor of pursuing this course any longer. Let us talk the subject over like business men, in a sensible way, and then come to a vote. I think we may do something which will prove effectual, and I hope we shall. My political ...
— A Report of the Debates and Proceedings in the Secret Sessions of the Conference Convention • Lucius Eugene Chittenden
... European languages into Active and Passive, seems to be useless in Slavic; for their being active or passive has no influence upon their flexion; and the forms of the Latin Passive and Deponent must in Slavic be expressed by a circumlocution. A division of more importance and springing from the peculiarity of the language itself, is that into verbs Perfect and Imperfect. Neither the Greek, nor the Latin, nor the German, nor any of the languages derived from them, admits ...
— Historical View of the Languages and Literature of the Slavic - Nations • Therese Albertine Louise von Jacob Robinson
... hot for them; indeed, it is no wonder that he should believe that there was something dazzling about his person: he had half a million of eager testimonies to this idea. Who was to tell him the truth?—Only in the last years of his life did trembling courtiers dare whisper to him, after much circumlocution, that a certain battle had been fought at a place called Blenheim, and that Eugene and Marlborough had stopped his ...
— The Paris Sketch Book Of Mr. M. A. Titmarsh • William Makepeace Thackeray
... appropriate to the merits)—thus at once realizing two rational purposes: namely, giving a useful function to a word, which at present has none; and also providing an intelligible expression for an idea which otherwise is left without means of uttering itself, except through a ponderous circumlocution. Precisely in the same circumstances of idle and absurd sequestration stands the term polemic. At present, according to the popular usage, this word has some fantastic inalienable connection with controversial ...
— Memorials and Other Papers • Thomas de Quincey
... remonstrance the merchant, without any ceremony or circumlocution, answered, that though he was ignorant of the nature of his offence, he was very certain, that it must have been something very flagrant that could irritate his niece to such a degree, against a person for whom she had formerly a most particular regard. He owned, she had declared her intention ...
— The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle, Volume I • Tobias Smollett
... to pervert the doctrine of Scripture relative to the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, probably led to the appearance of the word Trinity in the ecclesiastical nomenclature; for, when controversy commenced, some such symbol was required to prevent the necessity of constant and tedious circumlocution. One of the most noted of the parties dissatisfied with the ordinary mode of speaking respecting the Three Divine Persons, and desirous of changing the current creed, was Praxeas, a native of Asia Minor. After having acquired much credit by his fortitude and courage in a time of persecution, ...
— The Ancient Church - Its History, Doctrine, Worship, and Constitution • W.D. [William Dool] Killen
... complexion and eyes expressive of anything but holiness; he was a desperate votary of the fair sex, and swaggered about paying his homage right and left. Will it be believed, this gay apostle actually told me, without circumlocution, that in the monastery of Tor di Specchi there dwelt a young lady who was in love with me? I, who of course desired no better, took the hint instantly, and had her pointed out to me. Then began an interchange of silly messages, of languishing looks, and ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol 3 • Various
... This kind of circumlocution is employed on several occasions in the old texts to designate royalty. It was contrary to etiquette to mention directly, in common speech, the Pharaoh, or anything belonging to his functions or his family. Cf. pp. 28, 29 of ...
— History Of Egypt, Chaldaea, Syria, Babylonia, and Assyria, Volume 2 (of 12) • G. Maspero
... had an ugly pilgrimage; but whether of love or of necessity who could tell? And that precisely was what I should have liked to get at. This was not however a question to be asked point-blank, and I could not think of any effective circumlocution. It occurred to me too that she might conceivably know nothing of it herself—I mean by reflection. That young woman had been obviously considering death. She had gone the length of forming some conception of it. But as to its companion fatality—love, she, I was ...
— Chance - A Tale in Two Parts • Joseph Conrad
... weedy, Sir! in worthless phrases, 125 A sedulous eschewer of the popular And the colloquial—one who seeketh dignity I' th' paths of circumlocution! It would have Surpris'd you tho', to hear how nat'rally He squeak'd when Curio had him by ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge - Vol I and II • Samuel Taylor Coleridge
... happiness at Cambridge. The hint had been somewhat superfluous; but the question remained, what was necessary? With a view of getting some light on this delicate subject we paid a visit the next evening to our former friends and schoolmates, whose advice was conveyed with a masterly circumlocution that impressed us both. There are some things that may not be discussed directly, and the conduct of life at a modern university—which is a reflection of life in the greater world—is one of these. Perry Blackwood and Ham did most of the talking, while Ralph, characteristically, lay ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... Seas' thus spoke, he drew, with the calmness of a man who saw no use in circumlocution, a heavy bag of gold from beneath his frock, and deposited it, without a second look at the treasure, on the table. When this offering was made, he turned aside, less by design than by a careless movement of the ...
— The Water-Witch or, The Skimmer of the Seas • James Fenimore Cooper
... of course; that goes without saying. Whatever you care to tell me about your son will be mentioned to no one. Pray proceed, without further circumlocution, for my time ...
— The Triumphs of Eugene Valmont • Robert Barr
... a thing as being too systematic. There are men and women, for instance, who put away things so carefully that they can never find them again. It is too much like the "red tape" formality at Washington, and Mr. Dickens' "Circumlocution Office,"—all theory and ...
— The Art of Money Getting - or, Golden Rules for Making Money • P. T. Barnum
... to be hoped for is included in the definition of faith, because the proper object of faith, is something not apparent in itself. Hence it was necessary to express it in a circumlocution by ...
— Summa Theologica, Part II-II (Secunda Secundae) • Thomas Aquinas
... circumlocution told her of the difficulty in which the King's Council was placed, and would have discoursed for long upon the situation, only that in his first pause the Maid spoke, ...
— A Heroine of France • Evelyn Everett-Green
... Wilhelm received an unusual visitor. It was a leader of the workingmen of Altona, who told him, without further circumlocution, that the Socialists had kept their eye upon him, had found out where he was living, and now sent him, the Altona man, to see if anything could be ...
— The Malady of the Century • Max Nordau
... ideas he expressed with the utmost freedom; or, as it then seemed, audacity. The colonists he treated as an operator, who indeed pities the sufferings of his patient, but disregards a natural outcry, while expounding in the language of science both the symptoms and the cure. Without circumlocution or reserve, he spoke of the officers concerned in convict management as blinded by habit—as empirics who could patch and cauterise a wound, but were involved in the hopeless prejudices of a topical practice, and much too far gone to comprehend improvements founded ...
— The History of Tasmania , Volume II (of 2) • John West
... circumstances—thought I, as I walked up the hill, on which I accidentally encountered my official friend—under these circumstances of the men having successfully opposed themselves to the Pagoda Department of that great Circumlocution Office on which the sun never sets and the light of reason never rises, the Pagoda Department will have been particularly careful of the national honour. It will have shown these men, in the scrupulous good faith, not to say the generosity, of its dealing with them, that great ...
— The Uncommercial Traveller • Charles Dickens
... always requires large quantities," exclaimed Thugut, laughing. "But speak now rapidly, briefly, and plainly. No circumlocution, no tirades! Tell me the naked truth. What ...
— LOUISA OF PRUSSIA AND HER TIMES • Louise Muhlbach
... well known. It is a Memoir of King William IV., purporting to be drawn up by himself, and extending over the eventful years of 1830-35 'King William's style,' says the uncourtly biographer, "abounds to overflowing in what is called in England Parliamentary circumlocution, in which, instead of direct, simple expressions, bombastic paraphrases are always chosen, which become in the end intolerably prolix and dull, and are enough to drive a foreigner to despair." The style is indeed august; ...
— Lectures and Essays • Goldwin Smith
... construction of the sentence take the place of these pronouns. Such at least seems to be the usage of the ko[u]dan writers, and in the present book the example has been followed, as far as possible. In a few instances the use of a pronoun will relieve the strain of a lengthy sentence or involved circumlocution in the western tongue. At times the closer style can be abandoned—as in the direct narration of the Tale of the Baryufu Kwannon. So also with the translations of the gidayu and the ko[u]dan attached. These ...
— The Yotsuya Kwaidan or O'Iwa Inari - Tales of the Tokugawa, Volume 1 (of 2) • James S. De Benneville
... however, what it ought to have been. The reader will understand at once, and save me a world of moralising circumlocution, when he learns, bluntly and nakedly, that, among all my comforts and ...
— J. S. Le Fanu's Ghostly Tales, Volume 4 • Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu
... brought in a host of Republican cattle; and when almost simultaneously with this announcement two proclamations were issued from Lennox Street, it was more than hoped, it was assumed, that the meat ordinance was to be relaxed. But it was not so. The first of these monuments to circumlocution had a final rap at the canteen. There were a few bars and canteens outside the barriers of the town; the Colonel said they should be closed, and closed they were—the proprietors, strange to say, assenting with a will. ...
— The Siege of Kimberley • T. Phelan
... Browne, Mr. Gosse says, 'encouraged Johnson, and with him a whole school of rhetorical writers in the eighteenth century, to avoid circumlocution by the invention of superfluous words, learned but pedantic, in which darkness was concentrated without being dispelled.' Such is Mr. Gosse's account of the influence of Browne and Johnson upon the later eighteenth-century ...
— Books and Characters - French and English • Lytton Strachey
... boiling; the second she could not finish for her tears; the third dried her eyes with the fires of fierce resentment. It was not so much what they said; it was what they were obviously afraid to say. It was their circumlocution, their innuendo, their mild surprise, their perfunctory congratulations, their assumption of chivalry and their lack of its essence, that wounded and stung the subject of these effusions. As she raised her flushed face from the last of them, Mr. Steel stood before her ...
— The Shadow of the Rope • E. W. Hornung
... with imperturbable sang froid, in a dry manner, and with perfect naturalness and simplicity. He spoke as a man of the world, without circumlocution; his adventures were numerous and perhaps singular, but only such as might have been expected to happen to a man of so much experience. A smile never traversed his face as he related the least credible of his tales, which the ...
— The Surprising Adventures of Baron Munchausen • Rudolph Erich Raspe
... Georgia, who entered into a long wrangle with the administration on the constitutional points involved. He denied the right of Congress to pass such an act, and of the Executive to carry it out within the limits of a sovereign state; averred—with much circumlocution and turgid bombast—that such attempt would be an infringement of the State Rights of Georgia, which ...
— Four Years in Rebel Capitals - An Inside View of Life in the Southern Confederacy from Birth to Death • T. C. DeLeon
... will the young ones help their mother out of the scrape? How will they get out themselves: for I suppose they don't leave the nest till they are pretty well grown? Come! good shikaree; let us have no more circumlocution about the matter, but explain all ...
— The Cliff Climbers - A Sequel to "The Plant Hunters" • Captain Mayne Reid
... evening Lady Bernard's shabby one-horse-brougham stopped at Mr. Morley's door. She asked to see Mrs. Morley, and through her had an interview with her husband. Without circumlocution, she told him that if he would lay his affairs before her and a certain accountant she named, to use their judgment regarding them in the hope of finding it possible to serve him, they would wait upon him for that purpose at any time and place ...
— The Vicar's Daughter • George MacDonald
... trick rapidly developed into something nearly approaching a habit; and as it did so, the whispers as rapidly changed into plain, open speech, and the words which were interchanged lost their original air of confidential mysteriousness, until, finally, people told each other without very much circumlocution that there was, in their opinion, more in the strange deaths of Tiahuana and Motahuana than met the eye. And if they were asked to express themselves more plainly they reminded each other that the two priests, who had died under such really remarkable circumstances, were the men ...
— Harry Escombe - A Tale of Adventure in Peru • Harry Collingwood
... it comes to pass that at the beginning of this chapter—which we have only just got to, after all this circumlocution!—Sally and one of the Julius Bradshaws were sitting talking on the beach in the shadow of a breakwater, while the other Julius Bradshaw (the original one) was being taken for a walk to the extremely white lighthouse three miles off, or nearly ...
— Somehow Good • William de Morgan
... I have been living out of the world so long, and never seeing any women but Indian squaws"—so there were no Spanish girls!—"that I'm afraid I say what comes into my mind without circumlocution. And then—I did ...
— When a Man Marries • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... person upon earth could not have tired poor Clarence's patience more than good-natured Lord Delacour contrived to do, with the best intentions possible, by his habitual circumlocution. ...
— Tales and Novels, Vol. III - Belinda • Maria Edgeworth
... know there's no need of circumlocution and feminine wiles when you want anything of me, Princess. You have but to speak, and, as the Frenchman said, 'If it is possible, it shall be done: if it is impossible, I can only regret that I can't do it.' What do you want ...
— A Pessimist - In Theory and Practice • Robert Timsol
... to cut short all useless circumlocution, suffer me to ask at once an explanation of the system of enumeration by which you indicate individuals? You are ...
— The Monikins • J. Fenimore Cooper
... Alban tried to make the discovery. Polite circumlocution would be evidently thrown away on Mrs. Ellmother. "Is your new mistress one of the ...
— I Say No • Wilkie Collins
... very different notions to others as to what is an insult," said the officer, with a sneer, intended to excite Morton's anger. "My friend Maguire is exceedingly sensitive as to his honour. Not to lose time, sir, by any circumlocution in my remarks, you are, sir, I am led to understand, Lieutenant Morton, ...
— Ronald Morton, or the Fire Ships - A Story of the Last Naval War • W.H.G. Kingston
... use of words and phrases is that which is termed circumlocution, a going around the bush when there is no occasion for ...
— How to Speak and Write Correctly • Joseph Devlin
... person what to talk about. Advice on that subject is valueless. There are some things we may do, however, to make ourselves agreeable in conversation. We may study the art of expressing ourselves clearly,—saying what we wish to say without circumlocution. Some people seem to begin in the middle of a subject and talk ...
— Mother's Remedies - Over One Thousand Tried and Tested Remedies from Mothers - of the United States and Canada • T. J. Ritter
... meaning or dissimulation vnder couert and darke intendments: one while speaking obscurely and in riddle called AEnigma: another while by common prouerbe or Adage called Paremia: then by merry skoffe called Ironia: then by bitter tawnt called Sarcasmus: then by periphrase or circumlocution when all might be said in a word or two: then by incredible comparison giuing credit, as by your Hyperbole, and many other waies seeking to inueigle and appassionate the mind: which thing made the graue iudges Areopagites ...
— The Arte of English Poesie • George Puttenham
... came up to Hatboro' the next day, to see Putney on his father's behalf, and to express the wish of his family that Mr. Putney would let them do anything he could think of for his clients. He got his message out bunglingly, with embarrassed circumlocution and repetition; but this was what it came to ...
— The Quality of Mercy • W. D. Howells
... words of polite circumlocution, or of cautious diplomacy, shall we say, or hint, that the deceased ambassador's papers were found in shameful disorder. His excellency's executor, Sir James Brooke, however, was indefatigable in his researches. He and Lord ...
— The Absentee • Maria Edgeworth
... offenses for which the statutes do not provide adequate penalties; because the people insist that when a heinous crime is committed punishment follow fast upon the offense instead of being delayed by a costly circumlocution office and perhaps altogether defeated by skillful attorneys—men ready to put their eloquence and tears on tap in the interest of worse criminals. I will not take issue with so distinguished an authority as Mr. Johnson regarding ...
— Volume 10 of Brann The Iconoclast • William Cowper Brann
... the intelligence; for he feared his wife, and public censure at the meeting. After some weeks of deliberation had elapsed, I in continual fear that my altered shape would be noticed, my master gave me a medicine in a phial, which he desired me to take, telling me, without any circumlocution, for what purpose it was designed. I burst into tears, I thought it was killing myself—yet was such a self as I worth preserving? He cursed me for a fool, and left me to my own reflections. I could not resolve to take this infernal potion; but I wrapped it up in an old ...
— Posthumous Works - of the Author of A Vindication of the Rights of Woman • Mary Wollstonecraft
... execute my plans for obtaining a decent livelihood, as I could not think of burdening Thomas and Martha any longer, loath as they were for me to leave them. Some pleasant weeks, I say, had thus glided away, when Mr Budge, with much ceremony and circumlocution, as if he had deeply pondered the matter, and considered it very weighty and important, made a communication which materially changed and brightened my prospects. It was to the effect, that an intimate friend of his, whom he had known, he said, all ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 448 - Volume 18, New Series, July 31, 1852 • Various
... buttered her bread. She answered nothing to the chatter which Annie tried to make lively and entertaining, and made no sound but that of a broken and suppressed breathing. Annie had forgotten to ask her name of Mrs. Bolton, and she asked it in vain of the child herself, with a great variety of circumlocution; she was so unused to children that she was ashamed to invent any pet name for her; she called her, in what she felt to be a stiff and school-mistressly fashion, "Little Girl," and talked on at her, growing more and more nervous herself without perceiving that the child's ...
— Annie Kilburn - A Novel • W. D. Howells
... different kinds of possessors of the same degree, the Grand Lodge of England has long since distinguished them as "virtual" and as "actual" Past Masters. The terms are sufficiently explicit, and have the advantage of enabling us to avoid circumlocution, and ...
— The Principles of Masonic Law - A Treatise on the Constitutional Laws, Usages And Landmarks of - Freemasonry • Albert G. Mackey
... them, and how disposed they are at all times to take part in what is grotesque and malicious. One day they arrived, attended by a Gypsy jockey whom I had never previously seen. We had scarcely been seated a minute, when this fellow, rising, took me to the window, and without any preamble or circumlocution, said - 'Don Jorge, you shall lend me two barias' (ounces of gold). 'Not to your whole race, my excellent friend,' said I; 'are you frantic? Sit down and be discreet.' He obeyed me literally, sat down, and when the rest departed, followed with them. We did not ...
— The Zincali - An Account of the Gypsies of Spain • George Borrow
... you feared him; and promised to put us in possession of the entire facts this morning. When we returned at the hour appointed, he had absconded, having received his discharge. We then went to his house and saw his wife, who asserted, after some circumlocution, that you had been concerned in speculations with her husband, that at your request she had burnt most of the letters you had written to herself and her husband, and that all were in a disguised ...
— The Conqueror • Gertrude Franklin Atherton
... were in pretty good order, to do their mother justice, and she in great delight at the sight of her visiters. There was no room for silence here—or at least no silence in the room, for Mrs. Ling was never at a loss for words. And there was no need of much circumlocution in presenting the turkey,—nothing but pleasure could come of it, let it enter on which foot it would; and the train of potatoes, and tea, and bread, and other things, fairly made Mrs. Ling's eyes shine,—though she talked away as fast ...
— Say and Seal, Volume II • Susan Warner
... arrived at Mr. Barlow's, she asked immediately for her brother Frank, whom she wished to consult; but he was out, and she then desired to speak to Mr. Barlow himself. She was shown into his office, and she told him her business, without any circumlocution, with the plain language and ingenuous ...
— Tales & Novels, Vol. 2 • Maria Edgeworth
... of the Benga, the Bakele, and the Mpongwe dialects is as follows: "The Mpongwes have a great partiality for the use of the passive voice, and avoid the active when the passive can be used. The Bakele verb delights in the active voice, and will avoid the passive even by a considerable circumlocution. The Benga takes an intermediate position in this respect, and uses the active and passive very much ...
— Two Trips to Gorilla Land and the Cataracts of the Congo Volume 1 • Richard F. Burton
... old town, as it is remarked by one of the Guide Books, 'want animation'—an amiable circumlocution. Nothing so deserted or lonely can be conceived, and the phenomenon of 'grass literally growing in the streets' is here to be seen in perfection. There appeared to be no vehicles, and the few shops carry on but a mild business. A few English families ...
— A Day's Tour • Percy Fitzgerald
... "Circumlocution is another very long word, Dagaeoga. It is the first time that I have heard it used since we left the care of our teacher in Albany. But I came to the solution by a circular road, because I wished you to see it before ...
— The Rulers of the Lakes - A Story of George and Champlain • Joseph A. Altsheler
... the Mohammedan Indians were not in this respect far behind them. It is true that the drinking of wine is forbidden by the tenets of their religion; but in respect of champagne, they understand how to evade this commandment by christening it by the harmless name of "sparkling lemonade," a circumlocution which of course did not in the slightest counteract its exhilarating effects. The Indians who were less proof against the effects of alcohol were much more quickly intoxicated than their new European friends; and under the influence of the ...
— The Coming Conquest of England • August Niemann
... had arrived the evening before, with an old aunt, to remain for the whole spring! Monsieur de Langevy, who was not addicted to circumlocution in his mode of talk, told his son point-blank, that his cousin was a pretty girl, and what was more, a considerable heiress—so that it was his duty—his, Hector de Langevy—the owner of a great name and a very small fortune, to marry the said cousin—or ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - April 1843 • Various
... connected with the seminary, but they are all transferable. The prelate here puts clearly and categorically the question of the transfer of livings. In his measures there is neither hesitation nor circumlocution. He does not seek to deceive the sovereign to whom he is about to submit his regulation. For him, in the present condition of New France, there can be no question of fixed livings; the priests must be by right removable, ...
— The Makers of Canada: Bishop Laval • A. Leblond de Brumath
... corresponded. The Hofrath, after much quite extraneous matter, began dilating largely on the "agitation and attention" which the Philosophy of Clothes was exciting in its own German Republic of Letters; on the deep significance and tendency of his Friend's Volume; and then, at length, with great circumlocution, hinted at the practicability of conveying "some knowledge of it, and of him, to England, and through England to the distant West:" a work on Professor Teufelsdrockh "were undoubtedly welcome to the Family, the National, or any other of those patriotic Libraries, at present the glory ...
— Sartor Resartus - The Life and Opinions of Herr Teufelsdrockh • Thomas Carlyle
... scientific atrocity, seemed rather to belong to a fiend than to the most depraved of men. Principles which the most hardened ruffian would scarcely hint to his most trusted accomplice, or avow, without the disguise of some palliating sophism, even to his own mind, are professed without the slightest circumlocution, and assumed as the fundamental ...
— Critical and Historical Essays Volume 2 • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... argued the point, but in vain. Brian would not even allow him to feel his pulse. But the doctor knew very well what was amiss, and told Mrs. Wendover, with delicate circumlocution, that her husband was suffering from an imprudent use of ...
— The Golden Calf • M. E. Braddon
... to New York, he wrote three pamphlets which were marvels of circumlocution, as far as reform was concerned, and masterpieces of political writing, as far as his own interests were concerned. He had borrowed freely, and without credit, from the speeches of every orator from Everett to Choate, and ...
— Rope • Holworthy Hall
... is very common where the husband is a man of broad humor—one who calls a spade a spade, with no circumlocution about an agricultural implement. The wife of such a man is generally one of the ultra-refined kind, according to the odd law of compensation which regulates so much of human action, and thinks herself obliged to stand as the enduring censor of her husband's speech. As this is an example ...
— Modern Women and What is Said of Them - A Reprint of A Series of Articles in the Saturday Review (1868) • Anonymous
... insistence on affording every facility for merit to rise from the ranks, embodied in measures against promotion by Purchase; his advocacy of State-aided Emigration, of administrative and civil service Reform,—the abolition of "the circumlocution office" in Downing Street,—of the institution of a Minister of Education; his dwelling on the duties as well as the rights of landowners,—the theme of so many Land Acts; his enlarging on the superintendence of labour,—made practical in Factory and Limited Hours ...
— Thomas Carlyle - Biography • John Nichol
... has a way of getting right at the heart of things with everyone except Bolum. For Isaac, he regards circumlocution as necessary, taking the ground that with him the quantity and not the quality of the words counts. So when he had silenced the company, and with a sweep of his cane had driven them into close order about the walls, he said: "Mr. Thomas is anxious ...
— The Soldier of the Valley • Nelson Lloyd
... production of one than of the other? Historically it would be interesting to trace the rise of this notion of woman as an enigma. The savage races do not appear to have it. A woman to the North American Indian is a simple affair, dealt with without circumlocution. In the Bible records there is not much mystery about her; there are many tributes to her noble qualities, and some pretty severe and uncomplimentary things are said about her, but there is little affectation of not understanding her. She may be a prophetess, or a consoler, or a snare, but she is ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... sins of omission and commission alike, were permissible in the Chapel-Room and in the presence of her late companions. The subject, unhappily, had called for too frequent mention, by now, for any circumlocution to be incumbent in the discussion of it. But here, in the brooding quiet of this bedchamber, and in Lady Calmady's presence, all that was changed. Trenchant statements of opinion, words of blame, were proscribed. The sinner, if spoken of at all, must be spoken of with due reticence and respect, ...
— The History of Sir Richard Calmady - A Romance • Lucas Malet
... thenceforth until his death Mr. Greeley was well known at the National Capital. He was a man of intense convictions and indomitable industry, and he wielded an incisive, ready pen, which went straight to the point without circumlocution or needless use of words. Although he was a somewhat erratic champion of Fourierism, vegetarianism, temperance, anti-hanging, and abolition, there was a "method in his madness," and his heretical views were evidently the honest convictions of his heart. Often ...
— Perley's Reminiscences, Vol. 1-2 - of Sixty Years in the National Metropolis • Benjamin Perley Poore
... he turned to the others, "and as they're both dead it's no contravention of the club etiquette against talking of women, to speak of her. I can't very well give the instance—the sign—that Rulledge is seeking without speaking of her, unless I use a great deal of circumlocution." We all urged him to go on, and he went on. "I had the facts I'm going to give, from Mrs. Ormond. You know that the Ormonds left New York a couple of ...
— Questionable Shapes • William Dean Howells
... Standard could have the effect of Medusa's head. Her face went stony in a moment—her eyes—her limbs. The most terrible thing was that being stony she remained alive. One was conscious of her palpitating heart. I hope she forgave me the delay of my clumsy circumlocution. It was not very prolonged; she could not have kept so still from head to foot for more than a second or two; and then I heard her draw a breath. As if the shock had paralysed her moral resistance, and affected the firmness of her muscles, the contours of her face seemed ...
— Under Western Eyes • Joseph Conrad
... Well, then, I will be a benefactor to my race, if I cannot be to one single member of it, whom I love better than most men. What I have discovered I will make known; there shall be no shilly-shallying work here, no circumlocution, no bottle-conjuring business. But oh! I wish for all our sakes that I had had an opportunity to impart the secret to one or two persons only; for, after all, but one or two can live in the manner I would suggest. And when the discovery is made known, I am sure ten thousand ...
— The Fitz-Boodle Papers • William Makepeace Thackeray
... strengthening mirth. It was his mission to make people happy. Words of good cheer were native to his lips, and he was always doing what he could to lighten the lot of all who came into his beautiful presence. His talk was simple, natural, and direct, never dropping into circumlocution nor elocution. Now that he is gone, whoever has known him intimately for any considerable period of time will linger over his tender regard for, and his engaging manner with, children; his cheery "Good Day" to poor people he happened to be passing in the road; ...
— Yesterdays with Authors • James T. Fields
... message correctly, and his wife went the next day to Andrew's, as usual; and, seating herself by his bedside, said, without circumlocution, "I have something to say to you, Andrew. Are you inclined to ...
— Rico And Wiseli - Rico And Stineli, And How Wiseli Was Provided For • Johanna Spyri
... position at a respectful distance, Lord Clowes without circumlocution plunged at once into the object of the interview. "That I have long wished ye for my wife, Miss Meredith," he said with frank bluffness, "is scarce worth repeating. That in one or two instances I have given ye cause to ...
— Janice Meredith • Paul Leicester Ford
... to a great extent evaporated. Bronchitis was not of the ailments which spring from a broken heart, and she was inclined to hold it as a grievance against him that she had been so wastefully touched with pity. Her sympathy disappeared altogether when with little circumlocution he broached the subject of the Boruwimi expedition, and dropped a mention of Mrs. Willoughby's relative. There was something at the back ...
— The Philanderers • A.E.W. Mason
... he ran across the President, who was looking for him. With much courtesy and circumlocution he was told the thing he had been waiting to hear: the board, likewise, had discovered that Saint Margaret's had suddenly grown too small to hold both the Senior Surgeon and himself. Strangely enough, this troubled him little; there are times in a man's life when even the ...
— The Primrose Ring • Ruth Sawyer
... person a circumlocution in English is necessary in translation (as "let", "must", "are to", "is ...
— A Complete Grammar of Esperanto • Ivy Kellerman
... rushed back upon her truant son and seized her long-forgotten empire. The frost and reserve of office melted like snow in summer before the sun of religion and humanity. How unreal and idle appeared now the twenty years gone in tape and circumlocution! Away went his life of shadows—his career of watery polysyllables meandering through the great desert into the Dead Sea. He awoke from his desk and saw the corpse of an Englishman murdered by routine, and the tears of a man ...
— It Is Never Too Late to Mend • Charles Reade
... beg you also to send a few lines to Kurnberger to tell him that I have given you his manuscript? It would be discourteous if I were to leave him without any answer, and, as I cannot say anything further to him, we should save useless circumlocution if you would be so good as to ...
— Letters of Franz Liszt, Volume 1, "From Paris to Rome: - Years of Travel as a Virtuoso" • Franz Liszt; Letters assembled by La Mara and translated
... yo' mean, Captain Hazzard,—no, sir, der was no circumlocution ob de objec', in fac', sah, it ...
— The Boy Aviators' Polar Dash - Or - Facing Death in the Antarctic • Captain Wilbur Lawton
... to escape by some means or other. He knew the engineer-officer by reputation; he knew with what impatience that determined man chafed under his restraint. On this day he did not, therefore, hesitate to accost him, saying, without circumlocution, "Have you had enough ...
— The Mysterious Island • Jules Verne
... 58: Just as much as nothing)—Ver. 434. "AEque quidquam nunc quidem." This is a circumlocution for "nothing at all:" somewhat more literally perhaps, it might be rendered "just as much as before." Perizonius supplies the ellipsis with a long string of Latin words, which translated would mean, "Now, indeed, he says equally as much as he says then, when ...
— The Comedies of Terence - Literally Translated into English Prose, with Notes • Publius Terentius Afer, (AKA) Terence
... this young man, the son of her family solicitor. Mark was invariably sent down by his father when there was any business to be transacted at Stoke Revel. The older man was fond of a good dinner, and hated circumlocution about affairs, and it was only when a death in the family, or some other crucial event, made his presence absolutely necessary that he came down himself. Mark was sacrificed instead, and many a wearisome hour had he spent in that house. However on this occasion ...
— Robinetta • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... and with no perceptible manifestation of any such "fear and trembling" as he professed, Isaacs at once began to speak in his native tongue, and dropping all forms of ceremony or circumlocution plunged boldly into business. He did not hesitate to explain to the maharajah the strength of his position, dwelling on the fact that, by a word to the English of the whereabouts of Shere Ali, he could plunge Baithopoor ...
— Mr. Isaacs • F. Marion Crawford
... seems to go out of the way to make fresh labours for himself. He writes long and careful despatches to his Minister on matters of general policy; some of them so carefully thought out and so clearly expressed that they may still be looked on as models. He is entirely free from that circumlocution and involved style which makes so much diplomatic correspondence almost worthless. His arguments are always clear, complete, concise. He used to work long into the night, and then, when in the early morning the post to Berlin ...
— Bismarck and the Foundation of the German Empire • James Wycliffe Headlam
... always had poor luck in South Africa, and never worse than on that occasion. Through no bad faith, but simply through preoccupation and delay, the promises made were not instantly fulfilled. Simple primitive men do not understand the ways of our circumlocution offices, and they ascribe to duplicity what is really red tape and stupidity. If the Transvaalers had waited they would have had their Volksraad and all that they wanted. But the British Government had some other local matters to set right, the rooting out of ...
— The Great Boer War • Arthur Conan Doyle
... congregation are about as innocent as men and women can well be in a world where natural temptations are so rife, and so many social adjustments discountenance heroic saintliness" [3]—the latter a truly admirable feat of circumlocution. And sometimes, as we have seen, sin and evil are themselves in essence negated—generally in virtue of some pseudo-philosophic or pseudo-scientific "doctrine of a universe"—as when we read that ...
— Problems of Immanence - Studies Critical and Constructive • J. Warschauer
... truthfulness of John. The first is its straightforwardness, the second is its unconsciousness, and the last its unselfishness. The straightforwardness is remarkable in this circumstance, that there is no indirect coming to the point. At once, without circumlocution, the true man speaks. "It is not lawful for thee to have her." There are some men whom God has gifted with a rare simplicity of heart, which make them utterly incapable of pursuing the subtle excuses which can be made for evil. There is in John no morbid sympathy for the offender: "It is not ...
— Sermons Preached at Brighton - Third Series • Frederick W. Robertson
... brother, one day, into the smoking-room, and there, with much tact and circumlocution, gave him to understand that she thought Hadria was becoming more sensible; that she was growing more like other people, less opinionated, wiser, and better in ...
— The Daughters of Danaus • Mona Caird
... of happy security! Alfred deemed it most kind and wise to tell her of it himself; but he dreaded it worse than death. He expected she would swoon; he even feared it might kill her. But love made her stronger than he thought. When, after much cautious circumlocution, he arrived at the crisis of the story, she pressed her hand hard upon her forehead, and seemed stupefied. Then she threw herself into his arms, and they wept, wept, wept, till their heads seemed cracking with ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. II, No. 8, June 1858 • Various
... Indians all met me in council, as I had desired, and I then told them that the men who had taken part in shooting the woman would have to be delivered up for punishment. They were very stiff with me at the interview, and with all that talent for circumlocution and diplomacy with which the Indian is lifted, endeavored to evade my demands and delay any conclusion. But I was very positive, would hear of no compromise whatever, and demanded that my terms be at once complied with. No one was with me but a sergeant ...
— Memoirs of Three Civil War Generals, Complete • U. S. Grant, W. T. Sherman, P. H. Sheridan
... the Odyssey, l. 439, the time of day expressed by the rising of the judges; in [Greek: D] of the Iliad, l. 86, by the dining of the woodman. When we recollect that the ancients had not the inventions that we have whereby to measure their time, we shall cease to consider the circumlocution as absurd ...
— The Tragedies of Euripides, Volume I. • Euripides
... with xiv. 19). Those who see the Mal'akh Yahweh say they have seen God.[8] The Mal'akh Yahweh (or Elohim) appears to Abraham, Hagar, Moses, Gideon, &c., and leads the Israelites in the Pillar of Cloud.[9] The phrase Mal'akh Yahweh may have been originally a courtly circumlocution for the Divine King; but it readily became a means of avoiding crude anthropomorphism, and later on, when the angels were classified, the Mal'akh Yahweh came to mean an angel of distinguished rank.[10] The identification of the Mal'akh Yahweh with the Logos, or Second Person of the ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 2, Part 1, Slice 1 • Various
... a cutaneous eruption, chicken-pox, etc., etc., none daring to give it its true denomination. Bordeu and Lemonnier pursued this cautious plan, but La Martiniere, who had first of all pronounced his decision on the subject, impatient of so much circumlocution on the part of those around him, could no longer repress his indignation. "How is this, gentlemen!" exclaimed he, "is science at a standstill with you? Surely, you cannot be in any doubt on the subject of the king's illness. His majesty ...
— "Written by Herself" • Baron Etienne Leon Lamothe-Langon
... supper. I defended myself as best I could, but my excuses were rather tame, about which I did not trouble myself. I was told that all was known, and this amused me as I was aware that nothing was known. The marquis's mistress took hold of my arm, and told me, without any circumlocution, that I had the reputation of being inconstant, and by way of reply I observed politely that I was wrongfully accused, but that if there was any ground for the remark it was because I had never served so sweet a lady as herself. She was flattered by my ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... on the Richardson-McFarland case, I feel disinclined to be associated with her in editorial work. I want to say this very gently; but I have no time for circumlocution.... ...
— The Life and Work of Susan B. Anthony (Volume 1 of 2) • Ida Husted Harper
... the old truth became new! and how it came home with a meaning never felt before! He laid his finger how gently yet how powerfully on some inner place in the hearer's heart, and told him things about himself he had never known till then. Subtlest truths, which would have taken philosophers pages of circumlocution and big words to state, were dropped out by the way in a sentence or two of the most transparent Saxon." Of greater interest to the general reader are The Idea of a University, discourses delivered at Dublin, and his two works of fiction, Loss and Gain, treating of a man's conversion ...
— English Literature - Its History and Its Significance for the Life of the English Speaking World • William J. Long
... save any further circumlocution, sir, and in order that we may fully understand each other, I will say at once, ...
— Round the Block • John Bell Bouton
... is this good news, Mr. Crackenfudge? Will you be kind enough, without any unnecessary circumlocution, to favor your friends ...
— The Black Baronet; or, The Chronicles Of Ballytrain - The Works of William Carleton, Volume One • William Carleton
... confusion and circumlocution, and for the sake of greater precision of expression than I can otherwise obtain, I have deliberately considered the subject with two friends, and with their assistance and concurrence in framing them, I purpose henceforward ...
— Experimental Researches in Electricity, Volume 1 • Michael Faraday
... him," returned Callard; adding to Johnson, "We are in luck's way; the English adviser does his best to lessen the inconveniences of the Circumlocution Office." ...
— Round the World in Seven Days • Herbert Strang
... go up in our searching from external obedience all alongst, till we arrive at the inward fountain of Christ dwelling in us by faith, and then have ye found true religion indeed. Now, ye may think possibly, we have used too much circumlocution: what is all this to the present purpose? Yes, very much. Ye shall find the Lord rejecting this people's public worship and solemn ordinances upon these three grounds,—either they did not join with them the observation of weightier commands, or they did not worship him in them ...
— The Works of the Rev. Hugh Binning • Hugh Binning
... who the gentleman was to whom I had the honour of addressing myself, and under what authority I was considered amenable to his inquisition. "Answer my enquiries, Sir," he replied, "without the impertinency of idle circumlocution, otherwise I shall consider you as a spy, and my provost-marshal shall instantly perform on your person the duties of his office!" I now resorted to my letters; I had no other alternative between existence and annihilation. Explaining, therefore, who I was, and by ...
— Real Life In London, Volumes I. and II. • Pierce Egan
... come in and met her in walking-dress, was almost as expensively equipped. Mrs. Bulstrode was a feminine smaller edition of her brother, and had none of her husband's low-toned pallor. She had a good honest glance and used no circumlocution. ...
— Middlemarch • George Eliot
... dialect; and his is an undefined, unclassifiable mixture. Eastern farm-hand and Western ranchman, prospector, who knows what? His real language is in his eye and his rare, pure smile. And just as his countenance expresses his thoughts without circumlocution or attempt at effect, so his body informs his clothing. Wind and rain have moulded his hat to his head, his shoes grip the ground like paws; his buckskins have a surface like a cast after Rodin. They are repousseed by the ...
— The Desert and The Sown • Mary Hallock Foote
... fool are you!' was on Dixon's lips, but he did not utter it, because he wanted to propitiate him; and after some more circumlocution, Guy succeeded in discovering that he had been gambling, and had lost an amount which, unless he could obtain immediate assistance, would become known, and lead to the loss of his character and situation. Guy stood and considered. He had an impulse, ...
— The Heir of Redclyffe • Charlotte M. Yonge
... am skeptical. Twenty-two hours after they were due my missing bearers made their appearance. Arrived at Ghazeepore, I addressed a complaint to the postmaster-general. Thereupon two sides of a large sheet of paper were spread for me with base official circumlocution, through the darkness of which I groped out, after some labor, the audacious libel that the blame, if there were any, rested entirely with myself. This stuff, signed by the functionary aforesaid, but doubtless concocted without his privity ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 15, - No. 87, March, 1875 • Various
... South. James Redpath recognised the justice of this assumption, and furnished the following instance in support of it. During a short stay in East Tennessee he was in a citizen colonel's tent one day, talking, when a big private appeared at the door, and without salute or other circumlocution said ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... was a laugh at his outspokenness; for he seemed to be still in love with Socrates. You are sober, Alcibiades, said Socrates, or you would never have gone so far about to hide the purpose of your satyr's praises, for all this long story is only an ingenious circumlocution, of which the point comes in by the way at the end; you want to get up a quarrel between me and Agathon, and your notion is that I ought to love you and nobody else, and that you and you only ought ...
— Symposium • Plato
... The girl suffered very keenly during this period, and her eyes were always reddened by tears. But when New Year came, and still Pista did not bestir himself, the strong, noble girl, after violent conflicts in her artless mind, formed a great resolution, went to Pista herself, and said without circumlocution, excitement, ...
— How Women Love - (Soul Analysis) • Max Simon Nordau
... will not deny that I fear you have made a mistake and honoured my poor house by inadvertence; for, to speak openly, I cannot at all remember your appearance. Let me put the question without unnecessary circumlocution - between gentlemen of honour a word will suffice - Under whose roof do you suppose ...
— New Arabian Nights • Robert Louis Stevenson
... determined to cast prudence and circumlocution to the winds. On the morning following the episode in the mountains he was waiting to meet her when she came down to breakfast. "I've seen that boy, Miss Madison, and ...
— Taken Alive • E. P. Roe
... clearly, and without circumlocution. I am convinced it is only some gossiping or slander you wish to retail. You come as a salaried family spy who has snapped up some greasy morsels of scandal. Your eyes are glowing with malicious pleasure, as they always do when you are about to commit some base ...
— Frederick The Great and His Family • L. Muhlbach
... impossible to extract from Mr. Bishopriggs any clearer description of the man who had been with Anne at the inn than this, Blanche approached the main object of the interview. Too anxious to waste time in circumlocution, she turned the conversation at once to the delicate and doubtful subject of the ...
— Man and Wife • Wilkie Collins
... she says afterwards—her strong expressions, which are calculated to strike a shuddering horror through the nerves—the reflections she interposes—her delays and circumlocution to give time for any latent feeling of commiseration to display itself—all, all are premeditated and tend in the same manner to the object ...
— Characteristics of Women - Moral, Poetical, and Historical • Anna Jameson
... "We must strike them! We must never let them pass us again!" On the thirtieth he was horrified at getting from Beauregard (who was then between Richmond and Petersburg) a telegram which showed that the Confederate Government was busy with the circumlocution office in Richmond while the enemy was thundering at the gate. "War Department must determine when and what troops to order from here." Lee immediately answered: "If you cannot determine what troops you can spare, the Department cannot. The result ...
— Captains of the Civil War - A Chronicle of the Blue and the Gray, Volume 31, The - Chronicles Of America Series • William Wood
... without a shadow of circumlocution, and in a matter-of-fact way, as if all respect for the peculiar genius of the house of Pole had vanished: "I sent for you to talk a word or two about this woman, who, I see, troubles you a little. I'm sorry ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... fluting voice, with a preciseness of enunciation akin to the more feebly clerical, and with smiles which became almost lachrymose in their expressiveness as he dropped from phrase to phrase of embarrassed circumlocution. And his long bony hands writhed together till the ...
— The House of Cobwebs and Other Stories • George Gissing
... leaked out, but the whole thing was known in the village before a week had passed, with the result that fifteen women visited the vicar, one after the other, and after much circumlocution intimated that "If so be as 'e would be so kind, they'd be glad if 'e'd 'int to the ladies as they 'adn't nearly wore out last Christmas petticoat, and, if it were true wot they'd 'eard as they was talkin' of givin' ...
— The Ffolliots of Redmarley • L. Allen Harker
... of pure mathematics. For this word location, see Bailey, Johnson, Sheridan, Walker, &c. But if dictionaries are to be the arbiters of language, in which of them shall we find neologism? No matter. It is a good word, well sounding, obvious, and expresses an idea, which would otherwise require circumlocution. The reviewer was justifiable, therefore, in using it; although he noted at the same time, as unauthoritative, centrality, grade, sparse; all which have been long used in common speech and writing. I am a friend to neology. ...
— Memoir, Correspondence, And Miscellanies, From The Papers Of Thomas Jefferson - Volume I • Thomas Jefferson
... frightening and bewildering the poor priest more and more with every fresh word I said to him. The idea of a dueling-party and a dead man seemed to scare him out of his senses. He bowed, fidgeted, cast his eyes up to heaven, and piteously shrugging his shoulders, told me, with rapid Italian circumlocution, that he had not the faintest idea of what I was talking about. This was my first failure. I confess I was weak enough to feel a little dispirited when I rejoined Monkton ...
— The Queen of Hearts • Wilkie Collins
... of more cargo. Come, good woman," turning to Biddy, with whom he did not think it worth his while to use much circumlocution, "your turn is next. It's the maid's duty ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII No. 1 January 1848 • Various
... where his associates were to meet him. They were already in waiting when he arrived, and without ceremony or circumlocution, he accosted them ...
— Eveline Mandeville - The Horse Thief Rival • Alvin Addison
... everything. Language, like number, is intermediate between the two, partaking of the definiteness of the outer and of the universality of the inner world. For logic teaches us that every word is really a universal, and only condescends by the help of position or circumlocution to become the expression of individuals or particulars. And sometimes by using words as symbols we are able to give a 'local habitation and a name' to the infinite ...
— Theaetetus • Plato
... perceived that this was meant for Miss Bentley, though it was spoken to herself; and Miss Bentley seemed to take the same view of the fact. She said: "We needn't use any circumlocution with Mrs. March, mother. She knows just how the affair stands. You can say whatever you wish, though I don't know why you should wish to say anything. You have made your own terms with us, and we are keeping them to the letter. What more ...
— A Pair of Patient Lovers • William Dean Howells
... your reported magnanimity and generosity to oblige, I will divest myself of tedious circumlocution, and fervently exhort you to make a second exhibition of your skill; which, there can be no doubt, will be highly successful to you, and as interesting to ...
— Music and Some Highly Musical People • James M. Trotter
... "it will be very agreeable to me, and as soon as possible. In the mean time I will go to the archduchess, show her the miniature, and tell her plainly that it is that of her future husband. It is better to tell her so without circumlocution. The princess will not dare to oppose my wishes; she knows that it is the duty of an obedient daughter to accept the husband her father has selected for her. Go to the empress, Metternich; I shall go to the Archduchess ...
— Napoleon and the Queen of Prussia • L. Muhlbach
... Mars the use of compliment and circumlocution; and until I concluded, their looks of mild perplexity showed that neither Zulve nor her husband caught my purpose. I fancied—for, not daring to look them in the face, I had turned my downcast ...
— Across the Zodiac • Percy Greg
... with some circumlocution, described the appalling occurrence of the previous night,—how Mr Wentworth had walked home with little Rosa Elsworthy from his own house to hers, as had, of course, been seen by various people. The tale had been told with variations, which did credit ...
— The Perpetual Curate • Mrs [Margaret] Oliphant
... Minister was looking over his tortoiseshell. spectacles at somebody behind him, Mr. Lavender turned and went out. In the corridor he thought, "What terseness! How different from the days when Dickens wrote his 'Circumlocution Office'! Punch!" And opening the wrong door, he found himself in the presence of six little girls in brown frocks, sitting against the walls with their thumbs ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... in a passage of his shortcoming comments on Bacon's "Essays," uses preparedness. Albeit that brevity is a cardinal virtue in writing, a circumlocution would, we think, be better than a gawky word like this, so unsteady on its long legs. In favor of indebtedness over others of like coinage, this is to be said—that it imports that which in one form or other comes home to ...
— Essays AEsthetical • George Calvert
... with Johnson. Like the Tartar horse, if he does not conquer you in front, his kick from behind is sure to be fatal."' Forster's Goldsmith, ii. 167. 'In arguing,' wrote Sir Joshua Reynolds, 'Johnson did not trouble himself with much circumlocution, but opposed directly and abruptly his antagonist. He fought with all sorts of weapons—ludicrous comparisons and similies; if all failed, with rudeness and overbearing. He thought it necessary never to be worsted in argument. He had one virtue which I hold one of the most difficult to practise. ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 2 • Boswell |
