"Dainty" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... the news of Rome, you must write and tell me the news of the country. How are your shrubs getting on, your vines and your crops, and those dainty sheep of yours? In short, unless you send me as long a letter I am sending you, you mustn't expect anything more than the scrappiest note from ...
— The Letters of the Younger Pliny - Title: The Letters of Pliny the Younger - - Series 1, Volume 1 • Pliny the Younger
... side. As Phyllis flashed the torch about in a general survey, Leslie noticed that the cottage was obviously dismantled for the winter. The furniture stood huddled against the walls; there were no dainty draperies at the shuttered windows, and the rugs were rolled up, tied, and heaped in ...
— The Dragon's Secret • Augusta Huiell Seaman
... came then, sheerly, whole yokes of it for crepe de Chine nightgowns and dainty scalloped edges ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1921 and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various
... "A dainty song," said Wamba, when they had finished their carol, "and I swear by my bauble, a pretty moral!—I used to sing it with Gurth, once my playfellow, and now, by the grace of God and his master, no less than a freemen; and we once came by the cudgel for being ...
— Ivanhoe - A Romance • Walter Scott
... Simmon,' said that lady, smiling. She was standing on the eastern balcony, buttoning a dainty grey glove, while Manisty a few paces from her was lounging in a deck-chair, ...
— Eleanor • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... many rhymes enumerated by Moros, which he claims were taught to him by his mother, occur: "Broome on the hill," "Robin lend me thy bow," "There was a maid came out of Kent," "Dainty love, dainty love," "Come o'er the bourne, ...
— A History of Nursery Rhymes • Percy B. Green
... a chair for her in the least cluttered and dusty part of the room. There she sat, looking up at him earnestly, a dainty contrast to the den in which Garrick was working out the capture of criminals, ...
— Guy Garrick • Arthur B. Reeve
... this structure. So successful were the Troubadours in using it that sometimes their compositions were over a hundred lines in length. The short but brilliant Arabian lyrics, called "Maouchah," or embroidery, were well imitated by dainty and sparkling lyrics of the Troubadours. The Oriental mourning song became the Planh, or dirge. The evening tribute of the Arabian minstrels to their chosen loves became the serenade, while the Troubadours went still further in this vein by originating the aubade, ...
— Woman's Work in Music • Arthur Elson
... last for everyday entrance and exit, the former opened only on great occasions, such as births, deaths, and marriages. The gardens are as peculiar as the houses. The paths are hardly wide enough to walk in. One could put his arms around the flower beds. The dainty arbors would barely hold two persons sitting close together. The little myrtle hedges would scarcely reach to the knees of ...
— Composition-Rhetoric • Stratton D. Brooks
... stalk stood poised the figure of a girl so exquisitely formed and colored and so lovely in the expression of her delicate features that Dorothy thought she had never seen so sweet and adorable a creature in all her life. The maiden's gown was soft as satin and fell about her in ample folds, while dainty lace-like traceries trimmed the bodice and sleeves. Her flesh was fine and smooth as polished ivory, and her poise expressed both dignity ...
— Dorothy and the Wizard in Oz • L. Frank Baum.
... a fair proposition," he agreed. He reached for her hand and for a moment her soft, bright coloring, her dainty completeness, framed in the green of the little glade, were all he saw. Then, as his eyes lingered on the cool little pond and the waving pine boughs dark against the blue ...
— While Caroline Was Growing • Josephine Daskam Bacon
... Italian cathedrals possess art-objects of a higher order; perhaps no other one is so rich in these treasures. The great masters are disappointing here. Raphael, as the co-laborer of Pinturicchio, is dainty, rather than great, and Michelangelo passes unnoticed in the huge and coldly elaborate altar-front of the Piccolomini. But Marrina, with his doors of the library; Barili, with his marvelous casing of the choir-stalls; Beccafumi, with his bronze ...
— Seeing Europe with Famous Authors, Vol VIII - Italy and Greece, Part Two • Various
... backward in asking for more. Jack protested against such a waste. There was "enough to victual him a week," he said; "the brute never would know when he was full." But Charley was determined to give him a chance to know, and at last he poked over a dainty morsel with his cold nose, left it, went back to it, left it again, unable to ...
— Baby Pitcher's Trials - Little Pitcher Stories • Mrs. May
... gone! She has fled! Sina! Sina, for whom the warriors decked their shining hair, Wreathing with pearls their bosoms brown and bare, Flinging beneath her dainty feet Mats crimson with the feathers of the parrakeet. Ho, Samoans! rouse your warriors full soon, For Sina is across the rippling wave, With Tigilau, the bold and brave. Far, far upon the rising tide! ...
— An Anthology of Australian Verse • Bertram Stevens
... them hither, Ariel," said Prospero: "if you, who are but a spirit, feel for their distress, shall not I, who am a human being like themselves, have compassion on them? Bring them quickly, my dainty Ariel." ...
— Types of Children's Literature • Edited by Walter Barnes
... away from me. He had stolen to the little, dainty rooms that were sunk in the cockpit or cabin of our boat, and I was standing alone in the light of the midnight moons in Mars, a waif from the far earth, incomprehensibly born after death into this human presentiment and renewal in youth, and again instinct ...
— The Certainty of a Future Life in Mars • L. P. Gratacap
... Muecke sat in the centre, between the wall and the Commander, then the officers, and around them the forty-four mates, superior mates, sailors, firemen. At one pillar stood the color bearer with his flag. They took dainty coffee cups into their big hands, and told one another that the Turks were very good to them. None of them wishes to extend the feasts that are everywhere being prepared for them. All want to return to Germany; and when I saw them march ...
— New York Times Current History; The European War, Vol 2, No. 4, July, 1915 - April-September, 1915 • Various
... possible to fare in a more costly manner, she told him that the dinner of the next day should cost ten thousand ses-tertia, or three hundred thousand dollars. This he would not believe, and laid her a wager that she would fail in her promise. When the day came the dinner was as grand and dainty as those of the former days; but when Antony called upon her to count up the cost of the meats and wines, she said that she did not reckon them, but that she should herself soon eat and drink the ten thousand sestertia. She wore in her ears two pearls, the largest ...
— History Of Egypt From 330 B.C. To The Present Time, Volume 10 (of 12) • S. Rappoport
... would all like to get a letter from someone who cares for us, and so, I will first draw the envelope and then see if there is a message in it for us. [Draw the envelope on the paper in black outline and then, with the broad side of your crayon give it an even tinting of pink, light blue or other dainty color. Then, with your black crayon, address the envelope to your own school, by revising the wording as here shown. Add the stamp in brown, and the postmark in ...
— Crayon and Character: Truth Made Clear Through Eye and Ear - Or, Ten-Minute Talks with Colored Chalks • B.J. Griswold
... the beggar would be glad of dog's meat. 'And desiring to be fed with the crumbs which fell from the rich man's table.' The rich man fares well every day, but the beggar must be glad of a bit when he can get it. O! who would not be in the rich man's state? A wealthy man, sorts of new suits and dainty dishes every day; enough to make one who minds nothing but his belly, and his back, and his lusts, to say, O that I were in that man's condition! O that I had about me as that man has! Then I should live a life indeed; then should I have heart's-ease good ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... this second couple, Riger continued his journey until he came to a hill, upon which was perched a stately castle. Here he was received by Fadir (father) and Modir (mother), who, delicately nurtured and luxuriously clad, received him cordially, and set before him dainty ...
— Myths of the Norsemen - From the Eddas and Sagas • H. A. Guerber
... sparsely furnished yet dainty and homelike, for the small, deal table hid its bare nakedness beneath a dainty cloth; the two rickety armchairs veiled their faded tapestry under chintz covers, cunningly contrived and delicately tinted to match the cheap but soft-toned drugget ...
— The Definite Object - A Romance of New York • Jeffery Farnol
... about such results, I call it the good luck of little Lily De Koven that she had been born in a lovely home, to kind parents, and was growing up with all the most pleasant things of life around her. She had a little maid to braid her pretty yellow hair, lace her dainty boots, go up stairs and down stairs, or stay in her little lady's chamber dressing and making over the dresses of Lily's ...
— Harper's Young People, December 16, 1879 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various
... glowing fire, and he bristles the hair on his mane and around his neck—like him the son of Zeus leaped from his horse-chariot. And when the dark-winged whirring grasshopper, perched on a green shoot, begins to sing of summer to men—his food and drink is the dainty dew—and all day long from dawn pours forth his voice in the deadliest heat, when Sirius scorches the flesh (then the beard grows upon the millet which men sow in summer), when the crude grapes which Dionysus gave to men—a joy and a sorrow ...
— Hesiod, The Homeric Hymns, and Homerica • Homer and Hesiod
... diverse dainty arms, A purple girdle and a coat of mail? And yet to win the maid of peerless charms For whom thou dar'st ...
— Poems • Denis Florence MacCarthy
... was set in band of fold Some dainty hand to grace, Ne'er shone in diadem to deck A brow ...
— Debris - Selections from Poems • Madge Morris
... Literally "mare's skin." Apricot paste in dried sheets, cut into convenient sizes. A great dainty among ...
— The Flying Legion • George Allan England
... it's sure I am that she could not have flew away. Oh! here it is again, and begorra I belave it's the thrack of a white woman, for sure I am that no dhurty spalpeen of an Injun could iver make such a dainty thrack as that. Sure and I'll look in that bunch of brush, perhaps it's there she ...
— Thirty-One Years on the Plains and In the Mountains • William F. Drannan
... ecstatic sigh, she drops into an armchair. Then she takes out a dainty cigarette-case, pulls off her right-hand glove, exhibiting her rings, and chooses a cigarette. The BARON, seeing this, ...
— The Melting-Pot • Israel Zangwill
... would, when returning, manage to secure a wild duck, perhaps, or a couple of sea magpies, or a few young gulls. Nothing came amiss to the young Coombers at any time, and just now a tough stringy gull was a dainty morsel. ...
— A Sailor's Lass • Emma Leslie
... report which he had just prepared for the eye of Sir Lionel Smith, and which he was kind enough to read to us. This was a fine report, truly, to come from a special justice. To say nothing of the short time in which the fence might be repaired, those were surely very dainty-mouthed cattle that would consume those roots only which were so small that several months would be requisite for their maturity. The report concluded with a recommendation to his Excellency to take seminary vengeance upon ...
— The Anti-Slavery Examiner, Omnibus • American Anti-Slavery Society
... shoes had once been the shoes of one who lay here, a princess, dead thousands of years, and once very beautiful, as these carven symbols told. They were small and dainty and threaded with fine gold, and laced across with care about the feet of her who was once a woman and a princess and owner of much beauty, and who was in her life beloved, and in her death mourned; as these graven symbols said. A thousand years this love reached out its arms to her to-day; although ...
— The Singing Mouse Stories • Emerson Hough
... expectation vain Of idle hopes, which still do fly away, Like empty shadows, did afflict my brain,) Walkt forth to ease my pain Along the shore of silver-streaming Thames; Whose rutty bank, the which his river hems, Was painted all with variable flowers, And all the meads adorned with dainty gems Fit to deck maidens' bowers, And crown their paramours Against the bridal day, which is not long: Sweet Thames! run softly, ...
— Spenser - (English Men of Letters Series) • R. W. Church
... opportunity for a hunting expedition in the nearest patch of forest, or for a party to go down to the lagoon, cross it to the reef, and spend the time with better or worse luck fishing with lines, or collecting the abundant molluscs which formed a dainty addition ...
— Fire Island - Being the Adventures of Uncertain Naturalists in an Unknown Track • G. Manville Fenn
... Kestrel, his Britannic majesty's cutter, lying on and off the south coast on the lookout for larks, or what were to her the dainty little birds that the little falcon, her namesake, would pick up. For the Kestrel's wings were widespread to the soft south-easterly breeze that barely rippled the water; and mainsail, gaff topsail, staysail, and jib were ...
— In the King's Name - The Cruise of the "Kestrel" • George Manville Fenn
... be found, but there is an unkempt servant in the kitchen, who probably does not see any use in making her toilet more than once a week. To this fearful creature is intrusted the dainty duty of preparing breakfast. Her indifference is equal to her lack of information, and her ability to convey information is fettered by her use of Gaelic as her native speech. But she directs us to the stable. There we find ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... defend himself, or select some person to plead for him, such residents of the section as choose to do so acting as jurors. The prisoner, if found guilty, is sentenced at the discretion of the court,—generally, to treat the company to some specified drink or dainty. These courts often give occasion for a great deal of fun, and sometimes call out ...
— A Collection of College Words and Customs • Benjamin Homer Hall
... d'argent o de seda and brocats d'or e d'argent, a difference which is readily perceived, upon comparing for instance cloths of gold, Indian kincobs, with Lyons silks that are broches with threads of gold, silk or other material. Notwithstanding this, many Indian kincobs and dainty gold and coloured silk-weavings of Persian workmanship, both without floating threads, are often called brocades, although in neither is the ornamentation really broche or brocaded. Contemporary in use with the Spanish brocats is the word brocado. In addition to ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 4, Part 3 - "Brescia" to "Bulgaria" • Various
... linen and cotton in separate piles, and those of the same size together. Washcloths and towels, heavy, fine, bath and hand, have each their own pile on shelf or in drawer, according to room. Shams and other dainty bed accessories go into the drawers, one of which may be dedicated to the neat strips and tight rolls of old linen and cotton cloth, worn-out underclothing, etc., as they gradually accumulate. Where no provision is made for a linen closet, a case ...
— The Complete Home • Various
... her shorn locks in a piece of spotless white paper and tied it up with narrow white ribbon in the dainty fashion dear to druggists' clerks. As he handed it to her she felt in her pocket and produced a ...
— Under the Redwoods • Bret Harte
... of Richard Bullen! Sing, O Muse of chivalrous men! the sacred quest, the doughty deeds, the battery of low churls, the fearsome ride and grewsome perils of the Flower of Simpson's Bar! Alack! she is dainty, this Muse! She will have none of this bucking brute and swaggering, ragged rider, and I must fain ...
— Mrs. Skaggs's Husbands and Other Stories • Bret Harte
... and handed Luke fully three-quarters of the toothsome dainty. It pleased him to see the half-famished boy enjoy the feast. Luke poked a good-sized piece of the sake under the cage cover. There ...
— Andy the Acrobat • Peter T. Harkness
... yellow bird has the longest tail and can use it more prettily. Her tail is as much to her, both as ornament and to express emotions, as a fan to any flirtatious Spanish senora. One always thinks of these dainty feathered creatures as females. It would seem quite natural to call the wagtail "lady-bird," if that name had not been registered by a diminutive podgy ...
— Afoot in England • W.H. Hudson
... the glowing circle of the shaded lamp, sat Marie, Cyril's wife, a dainty sewing-basket by her side. Her hands, however, lay idly across the ...
— Miss Billy Married • Eleanor H. Porter
... This makes a dainty, soft little garment. If one likes, treble stitch may be alternated with star-stitch, on the return rows; that is, after making a row of stars, instead of breaking the wool, turn, chain 3, and make trebles across, or the trebles may be crossed to give a more fancy effect, making ...
— Handbook of Wool Knitting and Crochet • Anonymous
... off, I would come around the pulpit and help. Bless you, I wouldn't have gone for the world, as I was already more than satisfied with what I had found. She said I needn't trouble myself, as she guessed she could take off her shoes without my help. I heard her unlacing her shoes, and pretty soon two dainty shoes and two very long stockings, came over the pulpit, the heel of one shoe hitting me in the ear. As I picked up the shoes I heard the crumpling of a letter behind the pulpit, and I told her I must have all the messages she had. She said it was only a letter to one she ...
— How Private George W. Peck Put Down The Rebellion - or, The Funny Experiences of a Raw Recruit - 1887 • George W. Peck
... the dainty picture which the dark-haired lady made as she moved down the flower bordered path in the sunshine, her morning gown clinging gracefully about her slender figure, were alike lost on the engrossed Paul. With his eyes glued to the criticism of a sharpened writer on ...
— High Noon - A New Sequel to 'Three Weeks' by Elinor Glyn • Anonymous
... with his share in the provender, which he must have taken as a dainty addition to the vast quantities of jungle grass and leafage which formed his real support, the elephant swung off, bowing his huge head and muttering softly, to overtake his companions, while Peter gave his ...
— Trapped by Malays - A Tale of Bayonet and Kris • George Manville Fenn
... faint smile pursed her lips And shook her dainty finger-tips, As breezes shake the boughs; And then a quick, impetuous frown Came gathering from her ringlets down, And ...
— When hearts are trumps • Thomas Winthrop Hall
... great hospital I visited was Mound City, twelve miles from Cairo. It contained twelve hundred beds, furnished with dainty sheets, and pillows and shirts, from the Sanitary Commission, and ornamented with boughs of fresh apple blossoms, placed there by tender female nurses to refresh the languid frames of their mangled inmates. As I took my slow and solemn walk through this congregation of suffering humanity, ...
— Woman's Work in the Civil War - A Record of Heroism, Patriotism, and Patience • Linus Pierpont Brockett
... The dainty tea-table was a great change after the barrack-room. The pretty china cups seemed wonderfully small and fragile compared with the familiar basin; and once Jack found himself absent-mindedly stuffing his serviette into his sleeve, under the impression ...
— Soldiers of the Queen • Harold Avery
... goods in Southampton, or to sell the produce of their farms; she was intimate with their sturdy skippers, and she delighted in their airs of self-importance. She loved the fishing boats that went out in all weathers, and the neat yachts that fled across the bay with such a dainty grace. She loved the great barques and the brigantines that came in with a majestic ease, all their sails set to catch the remainder of the breeze; they were like wonderful, stately birds, and her soul rejoiced at the sight of them. But best of all she loved the tramps that plodded with ...
— The Explorer • W. Somerset Maugham
... this direction, when he was much surprised to perceive fresh footprints on a border which had been soaked with the recent rain. And he could see that these footprints had been made by a woman's boots, a pair of elegant and dainty boots. ...
— The Teeth of the Tiger • Maurice Leblanc
... unity of spirit. There is something especially isolating in that form of self-conceit. There are few greater curses in the Church than little coteries of superior persons who cannot feed on ordinary food, whose enlightened intelligence makes them too fastidious to soil their dainty fingers with rough, vulgar work, and whose supercilious criticism of the unenlightened souls that are content to condescend to lowly Christian duties, is like an iceberg that brings down the temperature wherever it floats. That temper indulged in, breaks the unity, reduces to ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture: Romans Corinthians (To II Corinthians, Chap. V) • Alexander Maclaren
... Miss Taylor was musing. She had been invited to spend the summer with Mrs. Grey at Lake George, and such a summer!—silken clothes and dainty food, motoring and golf, well-groomed men and elegant women. She would not have put it in just that way, but the vision came very close to spelling heaven to her mind. Not that she would come to it vacant-minded, but rather as a trained woman, starved for companionship and wanting something ...
— The Quest of the Silver Fleece - A Novel • W. E. B. Du Bois
... spruce up, and be on the alert. Don't wait too long to get one much more perfect than you are; but settle on some one soon. Remember that your unsexed state renders you over-dainty, and easily disgusted. So ...
— Searchlights on Health: Light on Dark Corners • B.G. Jefferis
... at her steadfastly. She was dressed in white muslin, and she wore a big black hat without any touch of colour. Her clothes were those which her uncle had ordered in New York. She was slim and dainty and elegant, and he found it hard indeed to keep his heart steeled ...
— The Governors • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... corn yonder upon the flat, which I have watched since the day when it first shot up its little dainty spears of green, until now it spindles has been faithfully ploughed and fed and tilled; but how gross appliances all these, to the fine fibrous feeders that have been searching, day by day, every cranny of the ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 12, No. 73, November, 1863 • Various
... as not to waken him, and went through into the room beyond. There she found by the half-extinguished fire an iron saucepan filled with cold boiled potatoes, which she put upon a broken chair with a pint-cup of ale. Placing the old candlestick beside this dainty repast, she untied her bonnet, which hung limp and wet over her face, and prepared to eat her supper. It was the first food that had touched her lips since morning. There was enough of it, however: there is not always. She was hungry,—one could see that easily enough,—and ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 7, Issue 42, April, 1861 • Various
... took up the chopsticks. "Even the chickens in this place are fine," she went on to add, pretending, she did not hear what was going on; "the eggs they lay are small, but so dainty! How very pretty they are! Let me help ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book II • Cao Xueqin
... wooden stand with its thick, white crockery seemed ill substitute for the dainty white bath-room at home. She had known she would not have her home luxuries, of course, but she had not realized until set down amid these barren surroundings what a difference ...
— A Voice in the Wilderness • Grace Livingston Hill
... greater care. When he had finished with it he handed it to Ricardo to put away, and stood for a moment or two thoughtful and absorbed. Ricardo in his turn examined the petticoat. But he could see nothing unusual. It was an attractive petticoat, dainty with frills and lace, but it was hardly a thing to grow thoughtful over. He looked up in perplexity and saw that Hanaud was watching his investigations with a ...
— At the Villa Rose • A. E. W. Mason
... affair. "And though they shot at us from the town we carried our prize to the Isle of Victuals. Here we cured our wounded men and refreshed ourselves in the goodly gardens which we found there abounding with great store of dainty roots and fruit. There were also great plenty of poultry and other fowls, no less ...
— Famous Privateersmen and Adventurers of the Sea • Charles H. L. Johnston
... fool. These discoveries are common in life; but they generally follow marriage, which gives ample opportunities for study. Before marriage man and maid meet but at intervals; and then both are alike on their best behaviour. The slattern is no slattern now; she is always dainty and nice and neat; the golden youth is generous to a fault, and noble in all his ways; and if either or both should be somewhat foolish, or even downright stupid, the lack of wisdom is concealed by a tender smile or a soft ...
— The Beautiful Wretch; The Pupil of Aurelius; and The Four Macnicols • William Black
... had scholars learned of my retreat than they began to flock thither from all sides, leaving their towns and castles to dwell in the wilderness. In place of their spacious houses they built themselves huts; instead of dainty fare they lived on the herbs of the field and coarse bread; their soft beds they exchanged for heaps of straw and rushes, and their tables were piles of turf. In very truth you may well believe that they were like those philosophers of old of whom Jerome ...
— Historia Calamitatum • Peter Abelard
... fantastic figure in a public fountain. Who has not paused, for instance, beside Tacca's famous bronze boar in the Florentine market-place without noting an incident of this kind? If we ourselves are too dainty to place our own aristocratic lips where our fellow-mortals have pressed theirs, not so are the abstemious descendants of the ancient Romans, the Italians, whose minds remain untroubled by any ...
— The Naples Riviera • Herbert M. Vaughan
... to work, these water-men, And made their nether robes—but when They drew with dainty touch The kerseymere upon their tails, They found it scraped against their scales, And hurt them ...
— Fifty Bab Ballads • William S. Gilbert
... young and old, small boys and the men, all smoked, and the day became historic with them because, of the extra smokes they were able to have. The 'suckers' were the largest specimen of 'bulls' eyes' we could find—not those dainty specimens sold at the West-end or in the Strand, but real whoppers, almost the size of pigeons' eggs; and yet there was no baby whose mouth was not found equal to the reception and the hiding of the largest; and we noticed as a strange ...
— Gipsy Life - being an account of our Gipsies and their children • George Smith
... result was two very attractive wardrobes that were really right for fifteen-year-old girls. Afternoon dresses of voile or thin silk, and one pretty party dress for each of dainty chiffon and lace. Morning frocks of linen and a tailored street suit seemed to be ...
— Two Little Women on a Holiday • Carolyn Wells
... with its white linen tucker, now gathered to her plump throat and vanishing beneath the trim bodice of blue homespun, and its reddish-brown skirt bordered with black. The knitted woolen mitts and the dainty cap showing her hair, which generally was hidden, made her seem almost like a princess to Gretel, while Master Hans grew staid and well-behaved ...
— Hans Brinker - or The Silver Skates • Mary Mapes Dodge
... present her in. With suspicion of haughtiness she was drawn for the traditional marchioness; but she lifted her eyes and you saw that she appealed instead. There was an art in the doing of her hair, a dainty elaboration that spoke of the most approved conventions beneath, yet it was impossible to mistake the freedom of spirit that lay in the lines of her blouse. Even her gracefulness ran now and then into a downrightness of movement which suggested the assertion of a primitive sincerity ...
— Hilda - A Story of Calcutta • Sara Jeannette Duncan
... She saw every dainty bit of color, every charming detail of the furnishings, she saw the river as she looked from the windows, and the vines peeping in at the windows, and she wondered how it had happened that she now possessed such ...
— Princess Polly's Gay Winter • Amy Brooks
... the little one stayed to the banquet, and was given the place of honour beside the Maid. But neither of these twain had any relish for the dainty meats and rich dishes served for us. As on the march, so now in the walls of the city, the Maid fared as simply as the rudest of her soldiers. She mixed water with her wine, took little save a slice or two of bread, and though to please her hosts she just touched one or two specially ...
— A Heroine of France • Evelyn Everett-Green
... had made an end of reciting his verses, he bore up his burden and was about to fare on, when there came forth to him from the gate a little foot-page, fair of face and shapely of shape and dainty of dress who caught him by the hand saying, "Come in and speak with my lord, for he calleth for thee." The Porter would have excused himself to the page but the lad would take no refusal; so he left his load with the doorkeeper ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 6 • Richard F. Burton
... fragrant rose was blooming still, And green grass covered field and hill, And, free as ever, flowed the rill— Had come in answer to the call Of friends who at the North had staid, By stern old Winter undismayed, To see the dainty snow-flakes fall. These kindly greeted, with small head Held on one side, a sparrow said, "To choose a gift for Cecily We've met to-night. What shall it be?" A flute-like trill, in graceful pride, A thrush sang sweetly, then replied, "What better than the gift ...
— Harper's Young People, December 23, 1879 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various
... and honest emulation, and enjoy the favourite national sport in perfection. The 'Waler' race, for imported Australians, brings out fine, tall, strong-boned, clean-limbed horses, looking blood all over. The country breds, with slender limbs, small heads, and glossy coats, look dainty and delicate as antelopes. The lovely, compact Arabs, the pretty-looking ponies, and the thick-necked, coarse-looking Cabools, all have their respective trials, and then comes the great event—the race of ...
— Sport and Work on the Nepaul Frontier - Twelve Years Sporting Reminiscences of an Indigo Planter • James Inglis
... could not help stealing a sidelong glance at this bewitching creature. Her dainty and vivacious face, just now a trifle sunburnt, was fixed resolutely upon the vehicles ahead. On the rim of the big steering wheel her small gloved hands gave an impression of great capability. Bleak thought that her ...
— In the Sweet Dry and Dry • Christopher Morley
... beautiful goddess prepared the hero a bath and gave him new garments fragrant with perfumes. She went down to the boat with him and put on board a skin of dark-red wine, a larger one full of water, and a bag of dainty food. Then she bade Odysseus a kind farewell, and sent a gentle and friendly wind to waft ...
— Odysseus, the Hero of Ithaca - Adapted from the Third Book of the Primary Schools of Athens, Greece • Homer
... upon the floor on my back and be trampled upon by her. This curious desire is seldom present unless the object of my admiration is really a lady, and of fine proportions. She must be richly dressed—preferably in an evening gown, and wear dainty high-heeled slippers, either quite open so as to show the curve of the instep, or with only one strap or 'bar' across. The skirts should be raised sufficiently to afford me the pleasure of seeing her feet and a liberal amount of ankle, but ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 5 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis
... perfect models of simple, natural, eloquent prose in our language." For its introduction of French words, this work occupies a prominent place in the development of the English language. Among the words of French origin found in it, we may instance: "dainty," "cruelty," "vestments," ...
— Halleck's New English Literature • Reuben P. Halleck
... tangled box-planted walks she strolled, swinging her dainty hat of straw and old lace in her hand; on through the small gate that bound the first yard, then through the shaded lawn, unkept now and rank with weeds, but still holding the old trees which, in other days, looked down over the well kept lawn of grass beneath. Now gaunt hogs had rooted ...
— The Bishop of Cottontown - A Story of the Southern Cotton Mills • John Trotwood Moore
... so unfortunate as to be associated with all the prison rogues; it quite overcomes him; he has a taste for nothing, eats nothing, and is growing thinner every day. I saw that, and I said to myself, 'He is not hungry; I will make him a nice little dainty bit, which he liked so much when he was my neighbor; that will give him an appetite.' When I say a dainty bit, just understand me, it was just some nice potatoes, mashed up with a little milk and sugar; I filled a pretty cup with it, and just now I took ...
— The Mysteries of Paris V2 • Eugene Sue
... poor Sintram. At last he shouted, "Good luck to you, she-bear! good luck to your whelps! There is a glorious meal for you! Now you will feed upon the fear of Heathendom, him at whose name the Moorish brides weep, the mighty Baron of Montfaucon. Never again, O dainty knight, will you shout at the head of your troops, 'Mountjoy St. Denys!'" But scarce had this holy name passed the lips of the little Master, than he set up a howl of anguish, writhing himself with horrible contortions, and ...
— Sintram and His Companions • Friedrich de la Motte Fouque
... privacy. Lois was tired, she was hungry; this sudden escape from din and motion and dust, to refreshment and stillness and a soft atmosphere, was like the changes in an Arabian Nights' enchantment. And the place was splendid enough and dainty enough to fit into one of those stories too. Lois sat back in her chair, quietly but intensely enjoying. It never occurred to her that she herself might be a worthy ...
— Nobody • Susan Warner
... not be touched by the whitewash on each edge. Once outside, she straightened herself up with the lithe grace of a young willow, released her skirts, and balancing herself on the point of her parasol, closed the gate with her toe: she was too dainty ...
— The Mettle of the Pasture • James Lane Allen
... charmingly furnished in the prim Chippendale style, a style dainty, but not luxurious, that seemed peculiarly suited ...
— Love at Second Sight • Ada Leverson
... of memory, putting poppies in her hair. The potter sat in his shed, and, flower-like from the silent wheel, the vase rose up beneath his hands. He decorated the base and stem and ears with pattern of dainty olive-leaf, or foliated acanthus, or curved and crested wave. Then in black or red he painted lads wrestling, or in the race: knights in full armour, with strange heraldic shields and curious visors, leaning from ...
— Intentions • Oscar Wilde
... me "Little girl," Tiptoeing, as she spoke, to kiss me there! And I stood dazed and dumb for very stress Of my great happiness. She plucked me by the gown, nor saw how mean The raiment—drew me with her everywhere: Smothered her face in tufts of grasses green: Put up her dainty hands and peeped between ...
— Riley Love-Lyrics • James Whitcomb Riley
... mounted the steps. He was a quick, energetic, spare man, with lean cheeks, a bristling, clipped moustache, and a slight stoop to his shoulders. She was small, piquant, almost child-like, with a dainty up-turned nose, a large and lustrous eye, a constant, bird-like animation of manner—the Folly of artists, the adorable, lovable, harmless Folly standing tiptoe ...
— The Riverman • Stewart Edward White
... marriage, and then when wealth and opportunity came to him the desire was past. But with rigid determination he looked in other directions for compensation. At first it was his younger sister, Caroline. Like so many self-made men, the fine, dainty things of life attracted him. He had dreams of costly oil paintings and rare china, but in the meantime he devoted himself to his sisters. He and Matilda were of one mind: after their parents' death ...
— A Son of the Hills • Harriet T. Comstock
... (INFORMAL). An afternoon tea is a simple entertainment. Refreshments are generally served to the guests. An innovation lately introduced has become quite popular —namely, young women, invited for the purpose, wait upon the guests, bringing in one dainty ...
— The Book of Good Manners • W. C. Green
... soon be wide-awake and up, In dainty robes arrayed, Blue violet, gold buttercup, And quaker-lady staid. Wild eglantine and clustering thorn Will grace the byway lanes, Whilst woodland flowers the dells adorn And daisies cheer ...
— The Mountain Spring And Other Poems • Nannie R. Glass
... were busy making a dress for Ruth. It was of white linen that Aunt Deborah had woven herself, and brought as a present to Ruth, and Mrs. Pennell was hemstitching the broad collar and dainty cuffs. ...
— A Little Maid of Old Philadelphia • Alice Turner Curtis
... choicest fruits, herbs, roots and flowers; with all sorts of tame and wild fowl, with the rarest fish and venison, and with every kind of butcher's meat, among which Banstead-down mutton is the most relishing dainty. Thus, to see the fresh and artless damsels of the plain, either accompanied by their amorous swains or aged parents, striking their bargains with the nice court and city ladies, who, like queens in a tragedy, display ...
— Highways and Byways in Surrey • Eric Parker
... tan-brown, trimmed with a darker shade of the same color. Upon her head she wore a jaunty hat of fine brown straw, with a wreath of pink apple-blossoms partially encircling it, and fastened on one side with a pretty bow of glossy satin ribbon, also of brown. A dainty pair of bronze boots incased her small feet, and her hands were faultlessly gloved in long suede gauntlets. A small, brown velvet bag, with silver clasps, hung at her side, and in her lap lay an elegant music-roll ...
— His Heart's Queen • Mrs. Georgie Sheldon
... prepares the little drawing-room for tea. All the furniture is shaken and dusted, the portraits of Mr. and Mrs. Snagsby are touched up with a wet cloth, the best tea-service is set forth, and there is excellent provision made of dainty new bread, crusty twists, cool fresh butter, thin slices of ham, tongue, and German sausage, and delicate little rows of anchovies nestling in parsley, not to mention new-laid eggs, to be brought up warm in a napkin, ...
— Bleak House • Charles Dickens
... store, Grown on the trees that shade our door; Come, if thou wilt, kind Hermit, haste The produce of our grove to taste; And let, O good Ascetic, first This holy water quench thy thirst." They spoke, and gave him comfits sweet Prepared ripe fruits to counterfeit; And many a dainty cate beside And luscious mead their stores supplied. The seeming fruits, in taste and look, The unsuspecting hermit took, For, strange to him, their form beguiled The dweller in the lonely wild. Then round his neck fair arms were flung, ...
— The Ramayana • VALMIKI
... Cowell. The letter begins with a reference to M. Garcin de Tassy and his "annual oration," and continues with some passages of great interest concerning the Rubaiyat and Attar's "Birds." (Dr. Aldis Wright's Eversley Edition of Letters, II, 100.) Then from a delicate and dainty piece of criticism the poet turns to his herring business. "I have come here to wind up accounts for our Herring-lugger: much against us as the season has been a bad one. My dear Captain [Posh], who looks in his Cottage like King Alfred in the Story, was rather saddened by ...
— Edward FitzGerald and "Posh" - "Herring Merchants" • James Blyth
... would keep all dainty bits for himself, leaving the scraps for his devoted mate, who would wait meekly to eat what he chose to leave. She made up for this wifely self-abnegation by frequenting the hen houses. She would watch patiently by the side of ...
— Adopting An Abandoned Farm • Kate Sanborn
... through the lens, and it seemed full of a great white light that blazed into my eyes, so that I fell back through the inner fan of water and was well soused by it; but my sight presently recovering, I stood forward in the scoop of rock admiring the dainty hollow curve the fan took in its fall. By-and-by I became aware that I was looking out through a smaller lens upon the great one, and that strange whirling mists seemed to be sweeping across a huge disc, within touch ...
— At a Winter's Fire • Bernard Edward J. Capes
... black are the eyes that I bring ye, O brave in your jewels, and dainty. But a draggle-tail, dirty-foot slattern Would dub me ill-favoured and sallow. Nay, many a maiden has loved me, Thou may of the glittering armlet: For I've tricks of the tongue to beguile them And turn them from ...
— The Life and Death of Cormac the Skald • Unknown
... earnestly to discover whom this queen might be, and saw advancing up the room an exquisite wax doll, dressed in dainty fluffs and ruffles and spangled gown. She was almost as big as Button-Bright, and her cheeks and mouth and eyebrow were prettily painted in delicate colors. Her blue eyes stared a bit, being of glass, yet the expression upon her Majesty's face was quite pleasant and decidedly winning. ...
— The Road to Oz • L. Frank Baum
... bewitching music. Then they twain, to wit the bride and bridegroom, sat down at meat, ever and anon delaying to indulge in toyings and bashful love-play and chaste caresses. Peri-Banu with her own hands passed the choicest mouthfuls to Prince Ahmad and made him taste of each dish and dainty, telling him their names and whereof they were composed. But how shall I, O auspicious King Shahryar, avail to give thee any notion of those Jinn-made dishes or to describe with due meed of praise the delicious flavour ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 3 • Richard F. Burton |
