"Dance" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... with as much firmness and decision as had marked him in the field, it was her care that nature and art should lend all their graces to what the Italians soon learnt to call the Court of Montebello. Whatever talent Milan contained, was pressed into her service. Music and dance, and festival upon festival, seemed to occupy every hour. The beautiful lakes of Lombardy were covered with gay flotillas; and the voluptuous retreats around their shores received in succession new life and splendour from ...
— The History of Napoleon Buonaparte • John Gibson Lockhart
... people drop outside to smoke and chat. Perhaps we go along to visit our friends at the other end of the village, where there is always a good welcome and a good talk, and perhaps some pickled oysters and white wine to close the evening. Or a dance is organised in the dining-room, and the piano exhibits all its paces under manful jockeying, to the light of three or four candles and a lamp or two, while the waltzers move to and fro upon the wooden floor, and sober men, who are not ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. XXII (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... might have been. They praise the Actual and still more the Potential—the infinite possibilities to which Man is born and which imagination alone can anticipate; and joining hands with Apollo in a delirious dance, proclaim the discovery of the lost secret: Fancy compounded ...
— A Handbook to the Works of Browning (6th ed.) • Mrs. Sutherland Orr
... the warriors came from the dance, and staggered toward the hut of the captives. They were armed with knives and hatchets. One had an arquebuse, which he fired at the trees as often as the uncertain hands of all of them could load it. He caught sight ...
— The Road to Frontenac • Samuel Merwin
... the back room and draws the curtains. A short pause. Suddenly she is heard playing a wild dance on the piano. ...
— Hedda Gabler - Play In Four Acts • Henrik Ibsen
... I bar that cast, Child; no, I'm none of those Spirits that can be conjur'd into a Wedding-ring, and dance in the dull matrimonial Circle ...
— The Works of Aphra Behn, Vol. I (of 6) • Aphra Behn
... to stroll; on the terraces of the tourist hostelries, where, on summer afternoons, men in white flannels and women in dainty frocks chattered over their tea, now lounge Italian officers in field uniforms of gray; the blare of dance music and the popping of champagne corks has been replaced by the blare of bugles and ...
— Italy at War and the Allies in the West • E. Alexander Powell
... of leaden skies; that could snap and crackle points of fire like those which sparkle from a whirling sword; that could grow chill as an arctic landscape, and yet again, that could warm and soften and be all a-dance with love-lights, intense and masculine, luring and compelling, which at the same time fascinate and dominate women till they surrender in a gladness of joy and ...
— The Sea-Wolf • Jack London
... should of right Leap and dance and sing; Thus to see ye sit Is a right strange thing.' ...
— Christmas - Its Origin, Celebration and Significance as Related in Prose and Verse • Various
... chest, glanced across at Fong Ling, and gave his social circle a rather poor version of the usual white-toothed smile. "Jokes can wait—especially busted ones. On with the dance; let joy ...
— The Million-Dollar Suitcase • Alice MacGowan
... voice. "The young woman has not received a modern education. She cannot drive a motor, play bridge, insist upon your going to the most fashionable restaurant and ordering eight dollars' worth of worthless imitation food, dance like a fiend, and spend money generally like the manager of an international war. She's been asleep so long that she might be just the one ...
— Best Short Stories • Various
... idea was thus resisted, it must have taken some hold upon thoughtful men, for we find that in the second half of the same century the St. Vitus's dance and forms of demoniacal possession akin to it gradually diminished in frequency and were sometimes treated as diseases. In the seventeenth century, so far as the north of Europe is concerned, these displays of "possession" on ...
— History of the Warfare of Science with Theology in Christendom • Andrew Dickson White
... the less a prison whose only approach or egress was through the corridors of the papal palace. The Lady of Forli had been received with hypocritical cordiality by the family of the Pope at one of those intimate gatherings in the Borgia apartments which, devoted to song, dance, and feasting were greatly enjoyed by Alexander and his children, and so shamelessly disgraced the residence consecrated to the head of ...
— Romance of Roman Villas - (The Renaissance) • Elizabeth W. (Elizbeth Williams) Champney
... Flatteries, to drinke those men, Vpon whose Age we voyde it vp agen With poysonous Spight and Enuy. Who liues, that's not depraued, or depraues; Who dyes, that beares not one spurne to their graues Of their Friends guift: I should feare, those that dance before me now, Would one day stampe vpon me: 'Tas bene done, Men shut their ...
— The First Folio [35 Plays] • William Shakespeare
... Esther, with a new glance at her. "Did you never dance? O there's nothing I care for at parties but to dance. And there are just enough here to night; not a crowd. Aunt Zara will send you to dancing-school, I suppose. But it isn't so pleasant to begin to learn when you are ...
— Trading • Susan Warner
... and to read and write, we knew little more than Catherine herself of the world; little more of the pleasures and sins of court life, and not one-tenth as much as she did of its graces. Still she had taught us to dance and make a bow. Her presence had softened our manners; and of late we had gained something from the frank companionship of Louis de Pavannes, a Huguenot whom the Vicomte had taken prisoner at Moncontour and held to ransom. We were not, I ...
— The House of the Wolf - A Romance • Stanley Weyman
... becoming every moment something new, to live in life and in death too, always to live, to be unafraid of life, to let it flow through his body, to let the blood flow through his body, not to struggle, to offer no resistance, to dance. ...
— Triumph of the Egg and Other Stories • Sherwood Anderson
... five hundred men did dance, The stoutest they could find in France; We with two hundred did advance, On board of the Arethusa! Our captain hail'd the Frenchman, 'Ho!' The Frenchman then cried out 'Hullo!' 'Bear down, d'ye see, to our Admiral's lee.' 'No, no,' ...
— Will Weatherhelm - The Yarn of an Old Sailor • W.H.G. Kingston
... youth did was to summon his slaves, and bid them beat drums all night under the date tree, for he feared to fall asleep. So the slaves beat the drums, and the young man danced till four o'clock, and then it grew so cold he could dance no longer, and one of the slaves said to him: 'It is getting light; the tree is safe; lie down, master, ...
— The Violet Fairy Book • Various
... and across the river, waiting for the show, whatever that was—fire to come down from heaven, I suppose, and consume me, bones and baggage. But by evening, like real islanders, they had wearied of the business, and got away, and had a dance instead in the big house of the village, where I heard them singing and clapping hands till, maybe, ten at night, and the next day it seemed they had forgotten I existed. If fire had come down from heaven or the earth opened and swallowed me, ...
— Island Nights' Entertainments • Robert Louis Stevenson
... I blame you, I can't help dreading lest the Sphinx may name you. You were not wise to give her this last chance; She's so astute! She'll lead you a fine dance. You had possession—nine points of the law, Why should you for her meagrims ...
— Turandot: The Chinese Sphinx • Johann Christoph Friedrich von Schiller
... drawing or piano-playing, to more than a soulless accuracy. And I hardly showed much greater aptitude when, on bright Sunday mornings, which invited not at all to the delights of dancing, with many another tiny lad and lass I was marshalled up to dance in the dancing saloon of Mr. Hoppe, the royal dancer, and learnt to take up the first to the fifth positions and swing the girls round in the polka mazurka. I became an ardent, but never a specially ...
— Recollections Of My Childhood And Youth • George Brandes
... ever-ready chatter and her superficial brightness were a novelty, it had seemed for a short time that luck might be glancing towards her. A young man of foreign title and of Bohemian tastes met her at a studio dance, and, misled by the smartness of her dress and her always carefully carried air of careless prosperity, began to pay a delusive court to her. For a few weeks all her freshest frocks were worn assiduously and credit was strained to buy new ones. The flat was adorned ...
— The Shuttle • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... hardly kicking, father. One I used to try and ride would stand perfectly still till I was on and tried to make him go, and then he used to bring all his legs close together, put his head down, arch up his back, and somehow or other, when he began to dance about, we always got shot off, and came down on our backs. You never saw ...
— First in the Field - A Story of New South Wales • George Manville Fenn
... suffers a metamorphosis, blazoning out into the paganish saturnalia of bonfires, which in Calvados is transferred from St. John's Eve le jour des Rois. Red flames leap skyward, fed by dry pine fagots, and our erstwhile devout peasants, throwing moderation to the winds, join hands, dance, and leap for good luck through blinding smoke and embers, shouting ...
— Christmas: Its Origin and Associations - Together with Its Historical Events and Festive Celebrations During Nineteen Centuries • William Francis Dawson
... pitcher and fling them on the ground, shouting, "Am I a robber? Am I a robber? Who dared to call me a robber?" Then, getting more and more excited, he picked up the pitcher, and holding it on his shoulder began to dance wildly about. His wife called out to him, "Oh, take care, take care! You will drop it!" But he paid no attention to her. Suddenly, however, he began to feel giddy and fell to the ground, dropping the pitcher as he did so. It was broken to pieces, and a great cry of sorrow went up from ...
— Hindu Tales from the Sanskrit • S. M. Mitra and Nancy Bell
... can scarcely regard dancing as a manly accomplishment. It is necessary that a gentleman should dance, perhaps, but it appears to me that he should do so simply because it is necessary; and to pass through the measure without ostentation or offence should be his ...
— Confession • W. Gilmore Simms
... the Copley party came over to get acquainted with some of the moving picture people and arrange for a big dance on Saturday night, Ruth was as good as her word, and remained in Mr. Hammond's office, recasting certain scenes in her story that Mr. Hooley proposed to make ...
— Ruth Fielding on the St. Lawrence - The Queer Old Man of the Thousand Islands • Alice B. Emerson
... Colonel W. S. Smith, and Mrs. Knox were to arrange the ceremonials. These arrangements were as follows: a sofa at the head of the room, raised on several steps whereon the President and Mrs. Washington were to be seated. The gentlemen were to dance in swords. Each one, when going to dance, was to lead his partner to the foot of the sofa, make a low obeisance to the President and his lady, then go and dance, and when done, bring his partner again to the ...
— Memoir, Correspondence, And Miscellanies, From The Papers Of Thomas Jefferson - Volume I • Thomas Jefferson
... saw the boys go in, and know you are having a nice time, so I send over the candy Molly Loo and Merry brought me. Mammy says I can't eat it, and it will all melt away if I keep it. Also a picture of Jack Minot, who will dance on one leg and waggle the other, and make you laugh. I wish I could come, too. Don't you ...
— Jack and Jill • Louisa May Alcott
... changed since I saw them together in the ball-room, expressing the very spirit of the dance! The King always opened the grand ball by leading out his sister, and each equaled the other in majesty and grace. I have often seen them dancing the Pavane d'Espagne, which must be performed with the utmost majesty and grace. The eyes ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol 6 • Various
... take vengeance for the insults offered to God, and to put a stop to the injuries which the Christians of these islands, and especially our missions in Pintados, are suffering. The play ended with a tourney-dance, for which prizes were given. Thus everything was as well and splendidly performed as one ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898 (Vol 27 of 55) • Various
... splendid," said the captain. "We'll be across in half an hour. We'll catch the train for Paris, and you shall dance at the Closerie to-night." ...
— Tales from Many Sources - Vol. V • Various
... appetites into action, confuses, terrifies or emotionalizes, weakens the power of concentration. This is why all kind of excitement is bad. This is the reason why persons who drink strong drinks, who allow themselves to get into fits of temper, who fight, who eat stimulating food, who sing and dance and thus develop their emotions, who are sudden, vehement and emotional, lack the power to concentrate. But those whose actions are slower and directed by their intelligence develop concentration. Sometimes dogmatic, wilful, excitable persons can concentrate, but it is spasmodic, ...
— The Power of Concentration • Theron Q. Dumont
... come to a stand; she gave a sudden backward leap, raised herself on her hind legs, came down on all fours with a great clatter of hoofs, and began a circular dance over the smooth road. Round she went, stepping as daintily as a maiden at a May-day dance, while the rider clung to the reins, dug his bare heels into the glossy sides of his steed, and yelled "whoa," as if his salvation lay in ...
— Aunt Jane of Kentucky • Eliza Calvert Hall
... drove her ashore, and the honour falls to us. We should only make a big fire of her and dance round it. Where ...
— A Sea Queen's Sailing • Charles Whistler
... become dry, and he was choking, unable to continue. On hearing the name of Camille, Therese received a violent shock. The two murderers contemplated one another, stupefied, pale, and trembling. The yellow gleams of light from the fire continued to dance on ceiling and walls, the soft odour of roses lingered in the air, the crackling of the wood broke the ...
— Therese Raquin • Emile Zola
... background, built up so as to leave somewhat over a semicircle for the orchestra or space enclosed by the lower tier of seats (Fig. 40). An altar to Dionysus (Bacchus) was the essential feature in the foreground of the orchestra, where the Dionysiac choral dance was performed. The seats formed successive steps of stone or marble sweeping around the sloping excavation, with carved marble thrones for the priests, archons, and other dignitaries. The only architectural ...
— A Text-Book of the History of Architecture - Seventh Edition, revised • Alfred D. F. Hamlin
... thus, my love! as on the midway slope Of yonder hill I stretch my limbs at noon, Whilst through my half-closed eye-lids I behold The sunbeams dance, like diamonds, on the main, And tranquil muse upon tranquillity; Full many a thought uncalled and undetained, And many idle flitting phantasies, Traverse my indolent and passive brain, As wild and various as the random gales That swell and ...
— Poems of Coleridge • Coleridge, ed Arthur Symons
... about order and good behavior is ever taught. Soon after this meeting I went up on the street, and there, near a saloon with six visible entrances, a street musician was playing his organ, while small girls, perhaps not yet in their teens, were being encouraged to dance. ...
— A Trip Abroad • Don Carlos Janes
... priests. The Dutch envoys used to stay here when they were brought through the country, like prisoners, to pay their annual tribute for being allowed to trade with Japan. They were subjected to all kinds of indignities, and used to be made to dance and sing, pretend to be drunk, and play all sorts of pranks, for the amusement of the whole court as well as for the Mikado and the empress, hidden ...
— A Voyage in the 'Sunbeam' • Annie Allnut Brassey
... and a dance to be given to celebrate the opening of the two Cowperwood homes—the reception to be held in Frank Cowperwood's residence, and the dance later at his father's. The Henry Cowperwood domicile was much more pretentious, the reception-room, parlor, music-room, and conservatory being in ...
— The Financier • Theodore Dreiser
... what pain it was to dance! What dreadful noise of fiddles in my ears! What sights of ugly belles within my eyes! ——Then came wandering by, A shadow like a devil, with red hair, 'Dizen'd with flowers; and she bawl'd out aloud, Clarence is come; false, fleeting, ...
— Tales and Novels, Vol. III - Belinda • Maria Edgeworth
... shedding down upon us a pestiferous dungeon influence, Colonel Warrington suddenly stopped, as if to breathe and repel the deadly miasma, and turning to me, said: "Well, Richardson, what do you think of this? Capital place this for young ladies to dance in, so light and airy. Many a poor wretch has entered here, with promises of fortune and royal favour, and has met his doom at the hand of the assassin! In my long course of service, how many Kaëds and Sheikhs I have known, who have come in here and ...
— Travels in the Great Desert of Sahara, in the Years of 1845 and 1846 • James Richardson
... darkness with a bolder lamplight came on, and made way for another sort of entertainment. An odd, rapid, phantasmal glitter, advancing from the garden by torchlight, defined itself, as it came nearer, into a dance of young men in armour. Arrived at length in a portico, open to the supper-chamber, they contrived that their mechanical march-movement should fall out into a kind of highly expressive dramatic action; and with the utmost possible emphasis ...
— Marius the Epicurean, Volume Two • Walter Horatio Pater
... long-locked drawers of that piece of furniture, and looked over the ledgers; trusts, monopolies, systems came out of their cyclone cellars; turf associations dredged the dump-docks for charters, whither a feminine municipal administration had consigned them; all-night cafes, dance-halls, gambling houses reopened, and the electric lights sparkled once more on ...
— The Gay Rebellion • Robert W. Chambers
... agreed to go into a booth and have something to eat. The tables were ranged all around, and in the centre there was a boarded platform for dancing. The ladies were there already dressed for partners; and the music was so lively, that I felt very much inclined to dance, but we had agreed to go and see the wild beasts fed at Mr. Polito's menagerie, and as it was now almost eight o'clock, we paid our bill and set off. It was a very curious sight, and better worth seeing than any thing in the fair; I never had an idea that there were so many strange animals ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 20, - Issue 563, August 25, 1832 • Various
... to dance in, what?" suggested Noel. "We ought to have come here by moonlight. Let's get down and investigate. The others can't ...
— The Keeper of the Door • Ethel M. Dell
... his old sister who kept house for him, and two of the maids, and all four began capering about round the fire. He was a douce, quiet man, as all the country knew, and here he was like old Nick at the carlin's dance, hobbling around and waving his drink above his head. We both set off running, and he waved the more when ...
— The Great Shadow and Other Napoleonic Tales • Arthur Conan Doyle
... it, Pearl laughed, and began to dance up and down with the humoursome gesticulation of a little imp, whose next freak might be to ...
— The Scarlet Letter • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... birds shall sing their best for thee and me; And every sunrise listeners will we be, And so of singing get the goodliest share; When the thrushes sing so sweetly, We would fain be footing featly, But our hearts dance time instead in the ...
— Primavera - Poems by Four Authors • Stephen Phillips, Laurence Binyon, Manmohan Ghose and Arthur Shearly Cripps
... overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah: it shall never be inhabited, neither dwelt in from generation to generation; but wild beasts of the deserts shall lie there, and their houses shall be full of doleful creatures, and owls shall dwell there, and satyrs shall dance there." ...
— Pilgrimage from the Alps to the Tiber - Or The Influence of Romanism on Trade, Justice, and Knowledge • James Aitken Wylie
... people's business which the close communion of a ship so promptly breeds in most of us, we fell to wondering who and what he might be; but the minute the suspect came into the salon for dinner the first night out I read his secret at a glance. He belonged to a refined song-and-dance team doing sketches in vaudeville. He could not have been anything else—he had jet buttons ...
— Europe Revised • Irvin S. Cobb
... cautiously towards the ladder: then, when they got very near, hesitate a little whether to go under or run the risk of falling into the street by essaying the narrow passage: then they would get very close up to the foot of the ladder, and dodge and dance about, and give the cart little pushes from side to side, until at last the magnetic influence exerted itself and the perambulator crashed into the ladder, perhaps at the very moment that the man at the top was stretching out to do some part of the work ...
— The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists • Robert Tressell
... undramatic; sometimes rich and splendid, sometimes threadbare and vulgar. And by this I do not mean that the old-fashioned set pieces are of necessity bad, and the freer portions necessarily good. Good and bad may be found in the new and the old Wagner alike. That sailor's dance is to me as odious as anything in Meyerbeer, and the melody which ends the love-duet is scarcely more tolerable. On the other hand, not even in "The Valkyrie" did Wagner write more picturesquely ...
— Old Scores and New Readings • John F. Runciman
... up from babyhood under a constant surveillance that knows no laxity until after marriage, and does not altogether cease even then. The growing bud is taught to play the piano or guitar, to embroider, to sing a little, to dance a little less, to speak and read French, to powder her face with art, and to walk like a very queen. She is usually married before she is seventeen, especially if her father has money; and, until the day of her death, she never sees a modern newspaper, ...
— From Yauco to Las Marias • Karl Stephen Herrman
... nobler purpose given Than those long wasted amid fashion's glare, And deep resolves the future shall be fraught With holy deeds, her earnest musings share— Though in the dance her step no more may glide, The glittering circle miss its chosen queen, Around the vacant place a closing tide Will leave no record where her ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII. No. 3. March 1848 • Various
... To dance and drill and write dreary German exercises, when one is thirsting to drink deeply at the well of knowledge; to go round and round the narrow monotonous course that had sufficed for Sara's moderate abilities, like the blind horse ...
— Uncle Max • Rosa Nouchette Carey
... Kara to our dancing grounds? It may take me some time and Mrs. Phillips is to arrive in less than an hour for our first dance rehearsal. I have an idea, or perhaps a hope, that our Greek dance which Evan is to lead, will be one of the most beautiful, beautiful things that has ever been ...
— The Girl Scouts in Beechwood Forest • Margaret Vandercook
... did not ask him to dinner; spoke contemptuously of him in presence of the Officers. The Chaplain was so inconsiderate, he took to girding at the Crown-Prince in his sermons. 'Once on a time,' preached he, one day, 'there was Herod who had Herodias to dance before him; and he,—he gave her John the Baptist's head for her pains!'" This HEROD, Busching says, was understood to mean, and meant, the Crown-Prince; HERODIAS, the merry corps of Officers who made sport for him; JOHN THE BAPTIST'S HEAD was no other than the Chaplain ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. IX. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle
... better; another, better yet. By this time he has got to feel pretty well; quite happy. He has no fear or shame. He can curse, and swear, and break things. "He is fit for treason, stratagems, and spoils." He fears no consequences, and can accomplish impossibilities. If he is a cripple, he fancies he can dance like a satyr; if he is slow and unwieldy, he can run like a hart; if he is weak and feeble in strength, he can lift like Samson, and fight like Hercules; if he is poor and pennyless, he is rich as Croesus on his throne, and has money to lend. ...
— Select Temperance Tracts • American Tract Society
... the French people dance; and Phil Elderkin showed me a picture with girls dancing under a tree, and, says he, 'That 's the sort ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 91, May, 1865 • Various
... interposes Mr. Hodge in my behalf. "Here is luckily no question of Stripes at all. John may bless his Stars that he hath gotten off without a Rib-Roasting; and to your Worship, after the Tune they have made you dance to, and the Piper you have paid, what is this miserable little Fine of Fifty Florins?" So my Master paid; and Leaving another Ten Florins for the poor Losels in the Gaol to drink his health in, we departed from that place of Durance, thinking ourselves, ...
— The Strange Adventures of Captain Dangerous, Vol. 2 of 3 • George Augustus Sala
... Eve there had been a dance at Piping Tree, and because she had danced twice with Gay (who had ridden over in obedience to a whim), Abel had parted from her in anger. For the first time she had felt the white heat of his jealousy, and it had aroused rebellion, not acquiescence, in her heart. Jonathan ...
— The Miller Of Old Church • Ellen Glasgow
... interpreter, as usually even the mayors knew only the Magyar language—not a word of German. That was the perfect region for getting at Magyar character expressed in the colour and line of costume, manner of living, point of view, folk song and dance. It is all still vividly clear to our mind's eye. We saw the first Magyar costumes in a village not far from Buda Pest. To make the few miles quickly, we had taken an electric trolley, vastly superior to anything in New York at the time of ...
— Woman as Decoration • Emily Burbank
... are made with thanksgiving for the past and prayer for what remains. The Mediterranean merchantman retires to his native town and offers prayer to the protector of the city to grant him a quiet age there, or dedicates his ship, to dance no more "like a feather on the sea," now that its master has set his weary feet on land.[22] The fisherman, ceasing his labours, hangs up his fish-spear to Poseidon, saying, "Thou knowest I am tired." The old hunter, whose hand has lost its suppleness, ...
— Select Epigrams from the Greek Anthology • J. W. Mackail
... Here, where with jovial and unclouded brow, Glad April seems to wear a constant smile, Troop boys and damsels: One, whose fountains flow, On the green margin sings in dulcet style; Others, the hill or tufted tree below, In dance, or no mean sport the hours beguile. While this, who shuns the revellers' noisy cheer, Tells his love sorrows ...
— Orlando Furioso • Lodovico Ariosto
... near, The day of judgment too will soon appear! It should have been my bridal! No one tell, That thy poor Gretchen thou hast known too well. Woe to my garland! Its bloom is o'er! Though not at the dance— We shall meet once more. The crowd doth gather, in silence it rolls; The squares, the streets, Scarce hold the throng. The staff is broken,—the death-bell tolls,— They bind and seize me! I'm hurried along, To the seat of blood already I'm bound! Quivers each neck as the naked steel ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, • Editor-in-Chief: Kuno Francke
... architecture had thrown open its bronze doors, and out there surged and rustled a throng of Bacchanalian beings who sported and shouted around a terminal god, which, with smiling, ironic lips, accepted their delirious homage. White nymphs and brown displayed in choric rhythms the dance of the Seven Deadly Sins, and their goat-hoofed mates gave vertiginous pursuit. At first the pagan gayety of the scene fired the fancy of the solitary spectator; but soon his nerves, disordered by the rout and fatigued by the spoor of so many odours, warned him that something ...
— Visionaries • James Huneker
... them. The king, coming to the spot, reads the challenge, and cuts the boots down, whereupon Bombastes falls on his majesty, and "kills him," in a theatrical sense, for the dead monarch, at the close of the burletta, joins in the dance, and promises, if the audience likes, "to die again to-morrow."—W. ...
— Character Sketches of Romance, Fiction and the Drama, Vol 1 - A Revised American Edition of the Reader's Handbook • The Rev. E. Cobham Brewer, LL.D.
... half-past eight every morning. She was bored by all the holy heroines who seemed to have taken vows of celibacy at the age of four. "Devil take them all," she thought whimsically one morning. "But I dare say these good little people have no more reality than our 'little good people' who dance reels with the dead on November Eve. I wish Dan O'Leary had taught them all to shake their feet," and at the picture of jiggling little saints Eileen nearly gave herself away by a peal of laughter. For she had learned to conceal ...
— The Grey Wig: Stories and Novelettes • Israel Zangwill
... show well outward. The prince and count Claudio, walking in a thick-pleached alley in mine orchard, were thus overheard by a man of mine: The prince discovered to Claudio that he loved my niece, your daughter, and meant to acknowledge it this night in a dance; and, if he found her accordant, he meant to take the present time by the top, and instantly break ...
— Much Ado About Nothing • William Shakespeare [Knight edition]
... at the public expense, and all of them crowded every night. Among the gaunt, haggard forms of famine and nakedness, amidst the yells of murder, the tears of affliction, and the cries of despair, the song, the dance, the mimic scene, the buffoon laughter, went on as regularly as in the gay hour of festive peace. I have it from good authority, that under the scaffold of judicial murder, and the gaping planks that poured down blood on the spectators, the space was hired out for a show of dancing ...
— Selections from the Speeches and Writings of Edmund Burke. • Edmund Burke
... the handsomest man I have ever seen, and I think the wickedest. His tall fine presence, set off by a magnificent uniform, was seen at every Court I held. At every Court ball he claimed my hand for the first dance; as far as my lonely state allowed he sought me at every opportunity, and I, like a fool, ...
— A Queen's Error • Henry Curties
... with years and yet straightening themselves when their muscles ached, were promenading the hall, not sedately, according to the wont of Marshmead social gatherings, to fulfill a terrifying rite, but gayly, as if only by premeditation did they withstand the beckoning of the dance. ...
— Country Neighbors • Alice Brown
... dinner, which Thomas also had in his room, despite Killigrew's protests. The villa would be filled for a whole week, and a merry dance he would have to avoid the guests. At nine, just as he was on the point of going to bed, the second man ...
— The Voice in the Fog • Harold MacGrath
... is of women. In such cases the first care should be not to fasten this sense of rush on to anything; the second care should be to go to work to cure it, to relax out of that contraction—just as you would work to cure twitching St. Vitus's dance, or any other ...
— Nerves and Common Sense • Annie Payson Call
... natural border from a gauze skirt, which hung down perfectly straight and innocent of fulness, and allowed a pair of white pyjamas to appear beneath. These were fastened tightly round the ancles, which were encircled by little bunches of the tinkling bells, which the ladies make such use of in the dance. Round the shoulders comes a filmy scarf of various colours, which also plays a prominent part in all their movements, and answers in its way to the fan ...
— Diary of a Pedestrian in Cashmere and Thibet • by William Henry Knight
... passenger, a very genteel spirit, who made a very low bow to Minos, and then threw himself into an erect attitude, and imitated the motion of taking snuff with his right hand. Minos asked him what he had to say for himself. He answered, he would dance a minuet with any spirit in Elysium: that he could likewise perform all his other exercises very well, and hoped he had in his life deserved the character of a perfect fine gentleman. Minos replied it would ...
— From This World to the Next • Henry Fielding
... Roomans an' anshunt Britons went to church arm-in-arm it wur always Whitsuntide, an' arter church vetched their banners out wi' brass eagles on, an' hed a morris dance in the market-pleace. The anshunt Britons never hed any tailory done, but thay wur all artists wi' the paint pot. The Consarvatives painted thurselves bloo, and the Radicals yaller, an' thay as danced the longest, the Roomans sent to Parlyment ...
— A Cotswold Village • J. Arthur Gibbs
... rights, and insure, from the government to which he sailed respect and hospitality. He had sailed around the world under it—visited savage and semi-civilized nations—had received the hospitality of cannibals, had joined in the merry dance with the Otaheitian, had eaten fruits with the Hottentots, shared the coarse morsel of the Greenlander, been twice chased by the Patagonians—but what shall we say?—he was imprisoned, for the olive tints of his color, in a land where not only civilization rules in its brightest conquests, ...
— Manuel Pereira • F. C. Adams
... writer, describes a similar scene that occurs later that same year. "The savages descending in torrents from the mountains our people are ordered not to go out. The bagpipes begin to play, but the dance in a quarter of an hour is interrupted by a battle. The cries of children and infirm persons incite them, as the rabble does when dogs fight. The men, like frightful wild animals, are clad in coarse woollen jackets with large girdles of leather studded with copper nails. Their ...
— The Choctaw Freedmen - and The Story of Oak Hill Industrial Academy • Robert Elliott Flickinger
... kept us alive on the way. This we heard was a privilege that Uganda Wakungu enjoyed both at home and abroad, although in all other countries the sound of the drum is considered a notice of war, unless where it happens to accompany a dance or festival. Leaving the valley of Uthenga, we rose over the spur of N'yamwara, where we found we had attained the delightful altitude of 5000 odd feet. Oh, how we enjoyed it! every one feeling so happy ...
— The Discovery of the Source of the Nile • John Hanning Speke
... (Holle's edition) please address to Weimar, as I have no time left for revisings in Rome. Send me also a copy of the "Aufforderung zum Tanz" ["Invitation to the Dance"] that is so drummed at everywhere. You forgot to let me have this piece of salon-fireworks with the other music, and I too did not remember it at the time; years ago I had to play this "Invitation" over and over again, times innumerable—without the smallest "invitation" ...
— Letters of Franz Liszt, Volume 2: "From Rome to the End" • Franz Liszt; letters collected by La Mara and translated
... One evening, towards the end of the so-called Scotland month, Huggo unexpectedly walked into the house. Rosalie was sitting with Harry in the dining-room over the end of dinner. Doda was upstairs putting last touches to herself before going out to a dance. Doda was eighteen then (it was 1919), had left school, and, with a large circle of friends, was going out a great deal. Benji was still at school, at Milchester. Harry had never resumed relations with ...
— This Freedom • A. S. M. Hutchinson
... if you would put me to Verses, or to Dance for your sake, Kate, why you vndid me: for the one I haue neither words nor measure; and for the other, I haue no strength in measure, yet a reasonable measure in strength. If I could winne a Lady at Leape-frogge, or by vawting ...
— The First Folio [35 Plays] • William Shakespeare
... more before she succeeded in heaving the saddle upon the back of the flinching sorrel. Because she took up the saddle by horn and cantle instead of doing it as Jean had taught her, she bungled its adjustment upon the horse's back. Then the sorrel began to dance away from her, and Robert Grant ...
— Jean of the Lazy A • B. M. Bower
... yet would not believe. So great had been their confidence that they had sent out no scouting parties. Only a day or two before they had been enjoying themselves at a great dance. The boy who had come with the news that Santa Anna was at hand must be distraught. Certainly he had looked like ...
— The Texan Scouts - A Story of the Alamo and Goliad • Joseph A. Altsheler
... drove in at Jack full tilt, only to be met by a healthy American fistic uppercut, planted with such accuracy that the Mexican's wiry form was actually lifted off its feet. He whirled round twice in the air, as if performing some sort of grotesque dance, and then ...
— The Border Boys Across the Frontier • Fremont B. Deering
... lines which at evening record his day's experience will be more musical and true than his freest but idle fancy could have furnished. Surely the writer is to address a world of laborers, and such therefore must be his own discipline. He will not idly dance at his work who has wood to cut and cord before nightfall in the short days of winter; but every stroke will be husbanded, and ring soberly through the wood; and so will the strokes of that scholar's pen, which at evening record the story of the day, ring soberly, yet ...
— A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers • Henry David Thoreau
... explain that it is yet too early for the gates to open. Meantime let them sing and dance to while away the time. One of them sings therefore. After the song they fall into an 'antick dance full of gesture and swift motion' and thus continue till the crowing of a cock gives the signal for the whole palace ...
— The History of London • Walter Besant
... will," replied Dick, satisfied by this concession. He climbed into bed again, and lay watching the pink patch on the wall. Yellow bars began to appear and to dance in the midst ...
— Nine Little Goslings • Susan Coolidge
... singing as loud as they could and making as much noise as they might, and when they came into the open space hard by the fountain they paused for a while in their progress, and broke into as lively a morris-dance as ever I had seen skipped. How they twisted and turned and tripped; how bravely they made music; how lustily they sang. I recall them now, those bright little human butterflies. I can see the pretty faces and slim figures of the girls, the blithe carriage ...
— The God of Love • Justin Huntly McCarthy
... emotional range music is appropriate to all intense occasions: we dance, pray, and mourn to music, and the more inadequate words or external acts are to the situation, the more grateful music is. As the only bond between music and life is emotion, music is out of place only where emotion itself is absent. If ...
— The Life of Reason • George Santayana
... pictures were blooming vines and foliage such as never grew in this world, and coiled among the branches of the vines there was always the scaly body of a serpent, and behind every flower there was a serpent's head. It was a veritable Dance of Death by one who had felt its sting. In the wood box lay some boards, and every inch of them was cut up in the same manner. Sometimes the work was very rude and careless, and looked as though the hand of the workman had trembled. It would sometimes have been hard to distinguish ...
— The Troll Garden and Selected Stories • Willa Cather
... good fellow, if you will keep my secret I will keep yours." In human nature, the sense of the comic seems to be implanted to keep man sane, and preserve a healthy balance between body and soul. But for this, the sorcerer Imagination or the witch Enthusiasm would lead us an endless dance. ...
— The Function Of The Poet And Other Essays • James Russell Lowell
... dancing meanwhile, in a free little ballet-manner, a wine-dance, dancing separate and ...
— Touch and Go • D. H. Lawrence
... seems to me too, sir," said Robert. "We're permitting the Marquis de Montcalm to make the fighting, to choose the fields of battle, and as long as we do that we have to dance to his music. But, sir, that's only my opinion. I would not presume to give it in ...
— The Sun Of Quebec - A Story of a Great Crisis • Joseph A. Altsheler
... black men, parked on the soil of the West Indies; but for individuals there are degrees of suffering and privation. (* "If the slaves are whipped," said one of the witnesses before the Parliamentary Committee of 1789, "to make them dance on the deck of a slave ship—if they are forced to sing in chorus; 'Messe, messe, mackerida,' [how gaily we live among the whites], this only proves the care we take of the health of those men." This delicate attention reminds me of the description of an auto-da-fe in ...
— Equinoctial Regions of America V3 • Alexander von Humboldt
... you-all will be ready to dance at my wedding next month. It's going to be very quiet, but I couldn't think of being married without you and Miss Elsie—and Mr. Barlow, he feels just like I ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume VII. (of X.) • Various
... 'I sing, dance, and play on instruments. I am proficient in dance and skilled in song. O lord of men, assign me unto (the princess) Uttara. I shall be dancing-master to the royal maiden. As to how I have come by this form, what will it avail thee to hear ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 2 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... talk is not good, Manida. They are our enemies,—we shall conquer them, we shall see their chestnut locks waving aloft, we shall dance and shout all night around them, and the eyes of the maidens shall meet ours in the merry ring, sparkling with joy, as we shout "Victory! victory! our enemies are slain,—our foot is on their necks, we have slain our enemies!" What more, ...
— The Bride of Fort Edward • Delia Bacon
... This much I had time to notice as he neared us. Cousin Egbert had not ceased to shout, nor had he paid the least attention to my tugs at his coat. When the cab's occupant descended to the pavement they fell upon each other and did for some moments a wild dance such as I imagine they might have seen the red Indians of western America perform. Most savagely they punched each other, calling out in the meantime: "Well, old horse!" and "Who'd ever expected to see you here, darn your old skin!" ...
— Ruggles of Red Gap • Harry Leon Wilson
... likened the crown and parliament to dancers in a minuet, to a tune composed by the cabinet—the crown led off one way, the parliament to the opposite corner; and they then joined hands, when the dance ended as it began. He also compared ministers to the Spartan, (it was an Athenian,) who, in an engagement by sea, seized the stern with his right hand, which was instantly chopped off; and who then renewed the effort with his left, which ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... all of you people, I pray you draw near, A comical ditty you all shall hear. The boys in this country they try to advance By courting the ladies and learning to dance,— And they're ...
— Cowboy Songs - and Other Frontier Ballads • Various
... in a rousing fashion, with huge camp-fires, a double supply of rations, and the roasting of several small porkers confiscated at Manchester, when that town was first entered. In the evening several pieces of "home-made" fireworks were set off, and the more hilarious of the boys in blue got up a dance, ladies being represented by several cavalrymen who had appropriated portions of feminine attire found in deserted houses that had been passed. The "boys" were bound to have their play at any cost, no matter how tired ...
— An Undivided Union • Oliver Optic
... with it Tania's dance ceased as abruptly. She stood poised for a single instant on one dainty foot, with her graceful arms still swaying above her flower-crowned head. Her audience watched her breathlessly, for the effect of the child's grace had been ...
— Madge Morton's Victory • Amy D.V. Chalmers
... were to proceed till the oasis could be reached, as the destruction of the whole caravan might be the result of delay. Almost in silence we moved over the glittering plain. The fiery sun struck down on our heads, and the heat was such that the air seemed to dance around us. Hour after hour we moved on, a few words being now and then exchanged, or songs sung by the light-hearted, or tales told by the most loquacious of story-tellers. I observed skeletons of camels and men sticking out of the sand, as the caravan deviated slightly to avoid them; for ...
— Saved from the Sea - The Loss of the Viper, and her Crew's Saharan Adventures • W.H.G. Kingston
... were discussing an event which had been arranged for that night: a country drive, to be followed by a musical evening and dance. The invitations had been issued by the Weynes, a young couple who had recently made their home in the county. The husband was a popular novelist, who had left the distractions of London in order to win fame in peace and quietness in the country. Mrs. Weyne, who had been slightly acquainted with ...
— The Hand in the Dark • Arthur J. Rees
... proper things to do. The more agreeable of these consist of dancing, building temples, and shouting very loud; the less agreeable, of wearing green carnations and burning other philosophers alive. But everywhere the religious dance came before the religious hymn, and man was a ritualist before he could speak. If Comtism had spread the world would have been converted, not by the Comtist philosophy, but by the Comtist calendar. By discouraging what they conceive ...
— Heretics • Gilbert K. Chesterton
... elan of St. George slaying the dragon, this bronze relief of Siena is the finer of the two; it is more perfect in its way, and Donatello shows more apt appreciation of the spaces at his disposal. The Siena plaque, like the marble relief of the dance of Salome at Lille, to which it is analogous, has a series of arches vanishing into perspective. They are not fortuitous buildings, but are used by the sculptor to subdivide and multiply the incidents. They give depth to the scene, adding ...
— Donatello • David Lindsay, Earl of Crawford
... walking proper begins varies much with different children, the limits being from eight to sixteen months. When a child which is beginning to walk falls, it throws its arms forward to break the fall; this action must be instinctive. In the twenty-fourth month Preyer's child began spontaneously to dance to music ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 358, November 11, 1882 • Various
... there were dotted discoloured slabs, some sunk a foot or two into the soil, a few lying prone upon it, and the remainder thrown by the gradual subsidence of their supports into every variety of angle, as though they had been suddenly halted in the maddest whirl of a grotesque dance of death. ...
— Dawn • H. Rider Haggard
... is entirely a question of the almighty dollar. If there were no slaves, the swamps and morasses of the south could not be cultivated. It has been found that the negro will dance, and sing, and starve, but he will not work in the fields when free. Besides, they assert, that the slaves are generally well cared for, and that it is only a few detestable masters that beat ...
— Willis the Pilot • Paul Adrien
... a meeting out-of-doors means a dance. The Polynesians have ever made this universal human expression of the rhythmic principle of motion the chief evidence of emotion, and particularly of elation. Civilization has all but stifled it in many islands. Christianity has made it a sin. It dies hard, for ...
— White Shadows in the South Seas • Frederick O'Brien
... quite an intimate feeling between us and the people there. I had been much pleased, with them before, in attending one of their dances, on account of the genuine independence and politeness of their conduct. They were willing and pleased to dance their Highland flings and strathspeys for our amusement, and did it as naturally and as freely as they would have offered ...
— At Home And Abroad - Or, Things And Thoughts In America and Europe • Margaret Fuller Ossoli
... Madden and his lady, a fine, noble, pretty lady, and he, and a fine gentleman seems to be. We four were most together; but the whole company was very simple and innocent. A good-dinner, and, what was best, good musique. After dinner the young women went to dance; among others Mr. Christopher Pett his daughter, who is a very pretty, modest girle, I am mightily taken with her; and that being done about five o'clock, home, very well pleased with the afternoon's work. And so we broke up mightily civilly, the bride ...
— Diary of Samuel Pepys, Complete • Samuel Pepys
... When the dance was nearly over Mytor heaved out of his chair, drew the rich folds of his native Venusian tarab about his bulk, and padded softly to a corner of the room, where the shadows lay deepest. Smiling, he rested a moist, jeweled paw on the table at which ...
— Bride of the Dark One • Florence Verbell Brown
... the party giving information to a person at the Farm, as to their intentions. They buried those who were shot near the Stockades of the Fort, and for more than a week after they were gone, the Saulteaux, in their savage fondness to exhibit the scalp in their war-dance, and obtain possession of the toes and fingers of the slain, made several attempts by night to disturb the graves, but were prevented getting these trophies, by ...
— The Substance of a Journal During a Residence at the Red River Colony, British North America • John West
... whistling. In this double capacity of dancer and musician he continued, until an idle piper, who observed his zeal, obeyed the unanimous call of seid suas (i.e. blow up), and relieved him from the latter part of his trouble. Young and old then mingled in the dance as they could find partners. The appearance of Waverley did not interrupt David's exercise, though he contrived, by grinning, nodding, and throwing one or two inclinations of the body into the graces with which he performed the ...
— Waverley, Or 'Tis Sixty Years Hence, Complete • Sir Walter Scott
... a thousand lances lay: Singly to combat or in troops they ride; On horseback or afoot, they mix in fray. Worthiest of all Rogero is espied, Who always conquers, jousting night and day; And so, in wrestling, dance, and every deed, Still from its rivals ...
— Orlando Furioso • Lodovico Ariosto
... wasn't a man a girl vamped in the Subway the safest kind? Where did working girls get a chance to meet men, anyhow? About the only place was the dance hall, and goodness knows what kind of men you did meet at a dance hall. They were apt to be the kind to make questionable husbands; like as not they were "sports." But the Subway! Now there you were more likely ...
— Working With the Working Woman • Cornelia Stratton Parker
... and through the open window one could see all that was going on. Lanterns, hung from the branches, gave the leaves a grayish green tint. Rustics and their partners danced in a circle shouting a wild dance tune to the feeble accompaniment of two violins and a clarinet, the players seated on a large table as a platform. The boisterous singing of the peasants at times completely drowned the instruments, and ...
— Une Vie, A Piece of String and Other Stories • Guy de Maupassant
... the shadow, hundreds of workers are dancing and flapping their wings. They appear thus to generate the necessary heat, and accomplish some other object besides that is still more obscure; for this dance of theirs contains some extraordinary movements, so methodically conceived that they must infallibly answer some purpose which no observer has as yet, I believe, been able ...
— The Life of the Bee • Maurice Maeterlinck
... published and unpublished. And they too often thought we were a frivolous generation, not so staid and decorous as we might be, and repressed and checked us; while we on the contrary urge on you to enjoy more fully the splendour of your youth and vitality. We desire to see you dance and sing and laugh and bubble over with the delicious inexhaustible flow of vital energy; we know that it need not interfere with the refinement of perfect manners and decorum, and we know too that there is the force which will sober down and do good work, and there is the health-giving ...
— Three Addresses to Girls at School • James Maurice Wilson
... great misfortune befell. Edmond Aubrey's mother passed by the Tree, and the fairies were stealing a dance, not thinking anybody was by; and they were so busy, and so intoxicated with the wild happiness of it, and with the bumpers of dew sharpened up with honey which they had been drinking, that they noticed nothing; so Dame Aubrey stood there astonished ...
— Personal Recollections of Joan of Arc - Volume 1 (of 2) • Mark Twain
... is stern and rough, Us'd to command, untaught to plead for favour. Far be it we should honour such as these With humble suit; no, rather let my head Stoop to the block than these knees bow to any Save to the God of heaven and to my king, And sooner dance upon a bloody pole Than stand uncover'd to the vulgar groom. True nobility is exempt from fear; More can I bear than ...
— King Henry VI, Second Part • William Shakespeare [Rolfe edition]
... waterfalls, or to "Piney Ridge," or to "Columbine Ledge," or to stroll along "Snake Lane"? What sweet peace and repose is over all! The snakes in Snake Lane are as free from venom as are grasshoppers, and the grasshoppers themselves fiddle and dance as at no other time. Cherish your Sundays. I think you will read a little deeper in "Nature's infinite book of secrecy" on Sunday than on Monday. I once began an essay the subject of which was Sunday, but never finished it. I must ...
— Our Friend John Burroughs • Clara Barrus
... THE INDIANS.—In dealing with the Indians the aim of Penn was to make them friends. Before coming over he sent letters to be read to them.. After his arrival he walked with them, sat with them to watch their young men dance, joined in their feasts, and, it is said, planned a sort of court or jury of six whites and six Indians to settle disputes with the natives. In June, 1683, Penn met the Indians and made a treaty which, unlike most other treaties, ...
— A Brief History of the United States • John Bach McMaster
... to remain for it, and as so many were reserving themselves for the winding-up assembly of the ladies, on Sunday morning, I thought I would do the same. Some of our party stayed, however, for the night. They found a miscellaneous dance at a house in the vicinity,—negroes, borderers, and reprobate Indians, all collected in one incongruous mass. A vagabond frontier man there asked a girl to dance. She refused, and was going to dance with another. The first drew his pistol, ...
— Continental Monthly , Vol I, Issue I, January 1862 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... essential difference from mere appearances; for the light laughter that bubbles on the lip often mantles over brackish depths of sadness, and the serious look may be the sober veil that covers a divine peace. You know that the bosom can ache beneath diamond brooches, and how many blithe hearts dance under coarse wool. But I do not allude merely to these accidental contrasts. I mean that about equal measures of trial, equal measures of what men call good and evil, are allotted to all; enough, at least, to prove the identity of our humanity, and to show that we are all subjects of the same ...
— Humanity in the City • E. H. Chapin
... they held a revel this Little Fairy would fly away from the dance and wander down by the river to watch the ripple of the water as it flowed over the ...
— Sandman's Goodnight Stories • Abbie Phillips Walker
... times explore, New Behns, new Durfeys, yet remain in store; Perhaps, where Lear has raved, and Hamlet died, On flying cars new sorcerers may ride; Perhaps (for who can guess th' effects of chance?) Here Hunt may box, or Mahomet may dance." ...
— The Works of Lord Byron: Letters and Journals, Volume 2. • Lord Byron
... necessary nuisance once pencil police policy pace race rice space trace twice trice thrice nice price slice lice spice circus citron circumstance centre cent cellar certain circle concert concern cell dunce decide December dance disgrace exercise excellent except force fleece fierce furnace fence grocer grace icicle instance innocent indecent decent introduce juice justice lettuce medicine mercy niece ounce officer patience peace piece place ...
— The Art Of Writing & Speaking The English Language - Word-Study and Composition & Rhetoric • Sherwin Cody
... at the burnished coils of her hair. "Are you going to the dance at the Club to-night?" he asked, ...
— The Lamp in the Desert • Ethel M. Dell
... he could desire. But Trundle, the cypher, no one thought of him, no one cared about his speech. Most likely, in his "nervousness," he mumbled forth some indistinct words which no one could hear, so it was best and most charitable to pass him by altogether in the report. At the dance at night, where he surely would have led off the movements, still not a word of him. And at last, "long before Mr. Pickwick was weary of dancing, the newly-married pair had retired from the room." Mr. Lang fancies that they had gone upstairs; but ...
— Pickwickian Studies • Percy Fitzgerald
... which shines in all his actions, took the hand of the Queen of Poland, and conducted her to the platform, where his majesty opened the dance, and was followed by nearly all the princes, princesses, great nobles, and ladies of the court. At its termination, the king, with the same grace and majestic deportment, conducted the young queen to her place. The king then danced a second time, and led out the ...
— Louis XIV., Makers of History Series • John S. C. Abbott
... you, dear. And if you are not art, what is? I wish to put a little more nature into you, and get you away from this cold clay and marble into the sunshine, to dance and laugh as the others do. I want a flesh-and-blood girl, not a sweet statue in a grey pinafore, who forgets everything but her work.' As he spoke, two dusty hands came round his neck, and Bess said earnestly, punctuating her words with soft ...
— Jo's Boys • Louisa May Alcott
... consumed in idleness. By the command, and after the example, of Narses, they repeated each day their military exercise on foot and on horseback, accustomed their ear to obey the sound of the trumpet, and practised the steps and evolutions of the Pyrrhic dance. From the Straits of Sicily, Buccelin, with thirty thousand Franks and Alamanni, slowly moved towards Capua, occupied with a wooden tower the bridge of Casilinum, covered his right by the stream of the ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 4 • Edward Gibbon
... the sentimentalist is devoted to publicity. He loves to conduct campaigns and drives, to "get up" a demonstration or an entertainment. I do not mean that he is a hypocrite but only that he loves the lime-light. When any tragedy befalls man his impulse is to organise a dance in aid of it. It is extraordinary how many people there are who will aid a charity by dancing to whom one would feel it quite hopeless to appeal for the amount of the dance tickets. And yet they are not wholly selfish people; there does lie back of the dance a certain sympathetic ...
— Our Lady Saint Mary • J. G. H. Barry
... now calls kopita. Mann is a new word. O-patz means "playing on the piano," as well as "below, down there." When the piano is played he sings in a hoarse voice, with lips protruded, as well as he can, but does not get the tune. He likes to dance, and always ...
— The Mind of the Child, Part II • W. Preyer
... comes near. She never goes abroad, nor sees company at home; to prevent all misfortunes, she has her breeding within doors; the parson of the parish teaches her to play upon the dulcimer, the clerk to sing, her nurse to dress, and her father to dance;—in short, nobody has free admission there but our old acquaintance, Mother Coupler, who has procured your brother this match, and is, I believe, a distant relation of Sir Tunbelly's. Fash. But is her fortune ...
— Scarborough and the Critic • Sheridan
... is how the victims of thy persecution take vengeance on thee!" With these words he puts a light to the pyre. At once the drums strike up, the trumpets blare, and men, women, and children begin to dance. In two long rows they dance, the men on one side, the women on the other, advancing till they almost touch and then retiring again. After that the two rows join hands, and forming a huge circle trip it round and round the blaze, till the post with its grotesque face is consumed in the flames ...
— Balder The Beautiful, Vol. I. • Sir James George Frazer
... the tango with a skeleton partner. Her face is livid with terror and fatigue, her limbs are drooping, but she is held by inexorable bony claws. On the feet of the skeleton are dancing pumps, a touch which adds to the grimness. This ghoulish dance does not lack ...
— Raemaekers' Cartoons - With Accompanying Notes by Well-known English Writers • Louis Raemaekers
... had its effects subsided, and the graves of its 25,000,000 victims were hardly closed, when it was followed by an epidemic of the dance of St. John, or St. Vitus, which like a demoniacal plague appeared in Germany in 1347, and spread over the whole empire and throughout the neighboring countries. The dance was characterized by wild leaping, furious screaming, and foaming at the ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 07 • Various
... with merry smiles as they watched her was very droll. I never saw a human being so thoroughly amused as the black Sheykh from the Soudan. Next day we dined at the Austrian agent's and the Baroness at last made the Maohn dance a polka with her while the agent played the guitar. There were a lot of Copts about who nearly died of laughing and indeed so did I. Next day we had a capital dinner at Mustapha's, and the two Abab'deh Sheykhs, the Sheykh of Karnac, the Maohn and ...
— Letters from Egypt • Lucie Duff Gordon
... forgotten, not even a pine from the tropics, and a bench under the pine that was just large enough for two. This latter was an ideal little spot in which to bring a friend or a book. One could sit there and gorge one's self with sweets; a dance was perpetually going on—the gold-and-purple butterflies fluttering gayly from morning till night; and the bees freighted the air with their buzzing. If one tired of perfumes and dancing, there was always music ...
— In and Out of Three Normady Inns • Anna Bowman Dodd
... good news, not without numerous eager interruptions from Neil, and when he had ended the latter executed what he called a "Punic war-dance." It was rather a striking performance, quite stately and impressive, for when one's left shoulder is made immovable by much bandaging it is difficult, as Neil breathlessly explained, to display abandon—the latter spoken ...
— Behind the Line • Ralph Henry Barbour
... her pinnacle, and had already begun to find how cold was the atmosphere up there, and how much more human she was than people expected and allowed for her to be. She felt like a statue set up in the market-place, that hears the children piping and mourning, and longs to dance and weep with them; but they did not ask her to do either—did not want her to do either—and if she had come down from her pedestal and begged to be allowed to play with them or comfort them, they would only have ...
— The Farringdons • Ellen Thorneycroft Fowler
... at all! If you pray you will never aid me! I know you will say the end is wicked and the means dishonorable. But find out I will—and speedily! It will only be the price of another dance with the Chevalier de Pean, to discover all I want. What fools men are when they believe we love them for their sakes and not for ...
— The Golden Dog - Le Chien d'Or • William Kirby
... among the exceptional few has rendered almost impossible the production of genuine folk-songs. The spectacle, therefore, of a homogeneous throng of partly civilized people dancing to the music of crude instruments and evolving out of dance-rhythm a lyrical or narrative utterance in poetic form is sufficiently rare in the nineteenth century to challenge immediate attention. In Negro Folk Rhymes is to be found no inconsiderable part of the musical and poetic life-records of a people; ...
— Negro Folk Rhymes - Wise and Otherwise: With a Study • Thomas W. Talley
... the most sagacious and well trained were made to march into the theatre with a regular step. At the voice of their keeper, they moved in harmonious measure, sometimes in a circle, and sometimes divided into parties, scattering flowers around them. In the intervals of the dance, they would beat time to the music, and were careful to keep in proper order. After this display, the elephants were feasted, as the Romans were in the habit of feasting themselves, in grand style. Splendid couches were ...
— What the Animals Do and Say • Eliza Lee Follen
... these forebodings were thrust into the background. The builders and frescoers had done their work well in his villa. A new colonnade was being erected. Coloured mosaic floors were being laid. The walls of the rooms were all a-dance with bright Cupids and Bacchantes—cheerful apartments for their prospective mistress. But it was over to the country-house of the Lentuli that Drusus made small delay to hasten, there to be in bliss in company ...
— A Friend of Caesar - A Tale of the Fall of the Roman Republic. Time, 50-47 B.C. • William Stearns Davis
... bank, throwing his head around to listen and see if any one was coming, then tearing it to pieces, jerking his head from side to side, looking and listening in fear of hunters' rifles. Besides the bear dance, there were porpoise and deer dances with one of the party imitating the animals by stuffed specimens with an Indian inside, and the movements were so accurately imitated that they ...
— Travels in Alaska • John Muir
... parasol. They are soft-hearted, bold to face the world, and very confident in circumstances. Then, too, they are ignorant of any other way to progress with a flirtation which is all-engrossing. In warm latitudes it is so natural to make an offer after the fifth dance. It is the way of the people in those latitudes, and seems to lead to no harm. Men and women do marry on small incomes; but they do not starve, and the world goes on wagging. Mary Bonner, however, ...
— Ralph the Heir • Anthony Trollope
... altogether the scene of festivity, there could be no longer a doubt; and, as in all cases of the sort, the danger was magnified, as it flew from lip to lip, even as the tiny snow ball becometh a mountain by the accession it receives in its rolling course. Suddenly the dance was discontinued, and indeed in time, for the lingers of the non-combatant musicians, sharing in the general nervousness, had already given notice, by numerous falsettos, of their inability to proceed much longer. ...
— The Canadian Brothers - or The Prophecy Fulfilled • John Richardson
... what she calls a bit of fun when the day's work is over; and she would not get nearly so much as she does, if she were in Lady Margaret's place. She dwells in three chambers in her mother's tower, and never comes down except to hall," (namely, to meals,) "with now and then a decorous dance under the eyes of the Lady Countess. No running races on the green, nor chattering away to everybody, nor games—except upstairs in her own room with a few other young damsels. Antigone would think she was in prison, ...
— Our Little Lady - Six Hundred Years Ago • Emily Sarah Holt
... instance, les tricoteuses were represented by comely, albeit plump maidens, who seemed more inclined to dance round a Maypole than haunt ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 102, June 4, 1892 • Various
... Through every dance Nan laughed and talked with a feverish gaiety, conscious of that long, long gaze that never varied. She felt almost hysterical under it at last. It made her desperate—so desperate that she finally quitted ...
— The Odds - And Other Stories • Ethel M. Dell
... sweeter voice than hers for song or speech I never heard. She was soprano in the choir, and I a solemn bass, And when we unisoned our voices filled that holy place; The tenor and the alto never had the slightest chance, For Mary's upper register made every heart-string dance; And, as for me, I shall not brag, and yet I'd have you know I sung a very likely bass when ...
— Songs and Other Verse • Eugene Field
... me!" exclaimed Anne. "I gave my word to Mr. Pilgrim that nothing should induce me to dance or play at cards." ...
— The Three Brides • Charlotte M. Yonge
... frilled shirt of lawn showing above a vest of crimson velvet, fawn-coloured baggy trousers, and soft sheepskin boots. A snow-white turban crowned his whole appearance. His horse was thoroughbred and young, and he controlled its ceaseless dance to admiration. He told me that the stallion was his own, an uncle's gift, and quite the best in all the mountains; although mine, he added out of mere politeness, was undoubtedly a pearl of breeding ...
— Oriental Encounters - Palestine and Syria, 1894-6 • Marmaduke Pickthall
... "for this vain life of man! They eat, they drink, they dance, they sing, they marry and are given in marriage, they have castles and gardens and villas, and the very beauty of Paradise seems over it all,—and yet how close by burns and roars the eternal fire! Fools that we are, to clamor for indulgence and happiness in this life, ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 09, No. 51, January, 1862 • Various
... much to the communicative seaman, who replied, "that for distress he knew nocht's on't; only, that Adrian Brackel beat her when she would not dance on the rope, and starved her when she did, to prevent her growth." The bargain between the countess and the mountebank, he said, he had made himself; because the Countess had hired his brig upon her expedition to the continent. None ...
— Peveril of the Peak • Sir Walter Scott
... traveler who had any money or valuables drew a long breath when he reached a region where there was really a protecting law. Men were shot down in the streets on little or no provocation, and the murderer boasted of his crime and defied punishment. The dance-halls were run day and night. The drinking of whiskey, and, moreover, bad whiskey, was a thing universal. Vice was everywhere and virtue was not. Those few who had an aim and an ambition in life were ...
— The Story of the Outlaw - A Study of the Western Desperado • Emerson Hough
... was put up. The victim was a German, wearing the white crescent of the Second Division of the Eleventh Corps, whom we had nicknamed "Sigel." Hardship and exposure had crazed him, and brought on a severe attack of St. Vitus's dance. As he went hobbling around with a vacuous grin upon his face, he spied an old piece of cloth lying on the ground inside the Dead Line. He stooped down and reached under for it. At that instant ...
— Andersonville, complete • John McElroy |
