"Engaging" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... politician by repeating the artless and unstudied remarks which fall from his lips in a conversation which the reporter has been invited to take notes of. He tickles the author's vanity by showing him off as he sits in his library unconsciously uttering the engaging items of self-portraiture which, as he well knows, are to be given to the public in next week's illustrated paper. The feathered end of his shaft titillates harmlessly enough, but too often the arrowhead is crusted with a poison worse than the ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)
... other cognate countries, where—in some instances, perhaps—there may exist, what possibly is wanting with us, the light of written history to guide us in elucidating the special subjects that may happen to be engaging our investigations—ever remembering that our Scottish Archaeology is but a small, a very small, segment of the general circle of the Archaeology of Europe and ...
— Archaeological Essays, Vol. 1 • James Y. Simpson
... man would be cautious how he dealt in blood. He would feel some apprehension at being called to a tremendous account for engaging in so deep a play, without any sort of knowledge of the game. It is no excuse for presumptuous ignorance, that it is directed by insolent passion. The poorest being that crawls on earth, contending to save itself from ...
— Selections from the Speeches and Writings of Edmund Burke. • Edmund Burke
... of Versailles that has the noble bearing of this American envoy and his suite. They have the refinement of the Old World, with all the simple elegance of the New. Though they have perfect dignity of manner, they have an engaging modesty which I have never seen equalled by the best of the proud English nobles with whom they wage war. I am told they speak their very language with a grace which the haughty Islanders who oppress them never attained. They are independent, yet never insolent; elegant, yet always respectful; ...
— Burlesques • William Makepeace Thackeray
... herself, soon checked every endeavour at intimacy on their side by the coldness of her behaviour towards them; but Elinor, from politeness, submitted to the attentions of both, but especially to those of Lucy, who missed no opportunity of engaging her in conversation, or of striving to improve their acquaintance by an easy and frank communication of her sentiments, until one day, as they were walking together from the Park to the cottage, she asked Elinor if she were personally acquainted with ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol. I • Various
... Thompson slight and quiet as her husband was big and hearty. But her smile was as engaging as his, and an indefinable something about her made the girl feel at home the moment she crossed the threshold. "I came to see Mr. Thompson about a horse, and he insisted that I stay to dinner," ...
— The Gold Girl • James B. Hendryx
... Duke, together with the protocol of the audience on the 17th of November, I received through Gille. My thanks and reply I shall send shortly. Likewise also the programme of a very exceptional solemnity which takes place on the 5th February, and which is already engaging my attention in ...
— Letters of Franz Liszt, Volume 2: "From Rome to the End" • Franz Liszt; letters collected by La Mara and translated
... comforts; and the reason of that love was more thy inward than thy outward excellences, which yet were many. God knows, and thou knowest it, I can say it was a match of Providence's making; and God's image in us both was the first thing and the most amiable and engaging ornament in our eyes." ...
— The Complete Works of Whittier - The Standard Library Edition with a linked Index • John Greenleaf Whittier
... looked forward with solicitude to the effect which such a mode of life, newly entered upon at his age, would have upon his mind and character. He hopes rather than dares to predict that he will be provided "with useful and profitable occupation, engaging so much of his thoughts and feelings that his mind may not ...
— John Quincy Adams - American Statesmen Series • John. T. Morse
... soon passed off, as Fred began to talk over school affairs in a very animated manner; sending messages to his friends, discussing the interests of the coming half-year, the games, the studies, the employments; Alex lamenting Fred's absence, engaging to write, undertaking numerous commissions, and even prognosticating his speedy recovery, and attainment of that cynosure,—the prize. Never had the two cousins met so cordially, or so enjoyed their meeting. There was no competition; each could afford to do the other ...
— Henrietta's Wish • Charlotte M. Yonge
... commanding phrase, but one or two must suffice. It is a delight to read his published correspondence, because of this power of strong and luminous utterance, which he wields with such Titanic ease. Then, again, there is no affectation or cant, but an engaging candor and straightforwardness which bespeak a true man, considering the time when they were written. What clarity of political vision there is in such ...
— Essays on Scandinavian Literature • Hjalmar Hjorth Boyesen
... then, it's no use engaging foreigners; Mere folly and waste, we've all within ourselves. Ah, well now, come! But about the woodwork? Heh! Who were ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol. 2 • Charles Dudley Warner
... reached his goal, a dozen more men burst into the room, and emboldened by this reinforcement, one of the men engaging De Conde came too close. As he jerked his blade from the fellow's throat, Norman of Torn felt a firm, warm hand slipped into his from behind, and his sword swung with a resounding blow ...
— The Outlaw of Torn • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... brought to perfection, insomuch that it is quite unmannerly here not to have a mistress, and scandalous not to keep her well. The women have many accomplishments, both natural and acquired, having graceful motions, winning looks, and engaging, free, and sprightly conversation. They are all delicately shaped, not injured by stiff-bodied stays, but left entirely to the beauty of nature, and hardly is there a crooked body to be seen, among them. Their eyes and teeth are singularly beautiful, ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 11 • Robert Kerr
... that with subdued and chastened feelings we all met the next day, the elder ones steeling their hearts, and recovering their minds to enter into a regular discussion and investigation of the fate destined for them; the younger ones meek and sorrowful but most loving and engaging in their simple reliance on our words, and their quiet, but watchful anticipations of our looks and wishes, and this day happened to ...
— Yr Ynys Unyg - The Lonely Island • Julia de Winton
... the attractive nom de guerre of Nux Vomica. The little goddess of the golden locks, dancing with a well-known roue, is Fanny My*rs, a very efficient partner in the dance, and if report be true not less engaging in the sacred mysteries of Cytherea." It would fill the ample page to relate the varied anecdote with which Crony illustrated, as he proceeded to describe the Scyllo and Charybdes of the unwary and the gay; who in their voyage through life are lured by the syrens of sweet voice, and the Pyrrhas ...
— The English Spy • Bernard Blackmantle
... the opportunity he had long wished for, of engaging in a naval fight. As the "Weymouth" was cruising in the Channel, a sail was seen on the lee bow. Captain Jumper immediately ordered the ship to be kept away, and clapped on all the canvas she could carry in ...
— John Deane of Nottingham - Historic Adventures by Land and Sea • W.H.G. Kingston
... various allies—Chios, Lesbos, Samos, Teos, Priene, Erythrae, Phocaea, Myus—and had succeeded in gathering together a fleet amounting to above three hundred and fifty vessels.[14284] This time Phoenicia did not despise her foe. Before engaging, every effort was made to sow discord and dissension among the confederates, and induce the Greek captains to withdraw their squadrons, or at any rate to remain neutral in the battle.[14285] Considerable effect was produced ...
— History of Phoenicia • George Rawlinson
... however, as the two young ladies sate on the sofa, pretending to work, or to write letters, or to read novels, Sambo came into the room with his usual engaging grin, with a packet under his arm, and a note on a tray. "Note from ...
— Vanity Fair • William Makepeace Thackeray
... things to think of. I was employed in the delicate operation of extracting amber nectar by a tedious dripping process, and simultaneously engaging with a rapid-fire German at short range. I understood very little of what she said, and what I did gather was not complimentary. I fired a volley or two at last myself, and then retreated in good order ...
— The Van Dwellers - A Strenuous Quest for a Home • Albert Bigelow Paine
... the station, and there was the confusion that always follows engaging a carriage and seeing that the baggage has safely arrived. Cora found time to slip off for a minute and whisper words of cheer to Freda. Then she rejoined her chums, and made ready for the ...
— The Motor Girls on Crystal Bay - The Secret of the Red Oar • Margaret Penrose
... way to Tripoli with a stock of cheap watches to hawk about,—not a very great opening truly, but it turned out lucky enough, because it was there he came upon a Dutch traveller—a rather famous man, I believe, but I don't remember his name. It was that naturalist who, engaging him as a sort of assistant, took him to the East. They travelled in the Archipelago together and separately, collecting insects and birds, for four years or more. Then the naturalist went home, and ...
— Lord Jim • Joseph Conrad
... to you," he retorted, but an uncomfortable expression suddenly crept into his face. A loud, angry discussion ensued, the whole gang engaging. Three to one was the way it stood against the leader, who was forced to admit, secretly if not publicly, that he had no right to talk freely of the matter to the girl. In vain she pleaded and promised. Her tears were of no avail, once Sam had ...
— The Daughter of Anderson Crow • George Barr McCutcheon
... order to fulfil the enormously profitable contracts when the demand for munitions was so imperative, special legislation was found absolutely necessary before the end of the first year of the War. Employers had to be prohibited from engaging workmen who had been on munitions work within six weeks before taking up new employment, unless they had a certificate that the workmen had left with the former employer's consent, or a tribunal ...
— Rebuilding Britain - A Survey Of Problems Of Reconstruction After The World War • Alfred Hopkinson
... possessions, Dr. Alec proposed a drive, to carry round the first instalment of gifts to the aunts and cousins. Rose was quite ready to go, being anxious to try a certain soft burnous from the box, which not only possessed a most engaging little hood, but had funny ...
— Eight Cousins • Louisa M. Alcott
... and this includes the latest phases of the subject. The practical and discriminating character of the author's study of China will be appreciated more than ever at this time when practical questions relating to Chinese administration, commerce, and other matters of the first importance, are engaging so much attention. This new edition is indispensable for any one who wishes a compact, authoritative presentation of the ...
— Other Worlds - Their Nature, Possibilities and Habitability in the Light of the Latest Discoveries • Garrett P. Serviss
... of the province; and while the peace of the whole world was endangered by their abduction, as that of Greece and Troy had been by the rape of Helen, they were quietly enlisting in less warlike expeditions—in fact, engaging themselves to work upon that great railroad, of which mention has been ...
— Acadia - or, A Month with the Blue Noses • Frederic S. Cozzens
... was. If he had the vanity which so often goes with his kind of temperament, it was most cleverly concealed. Safe in the dignified consciousness of his unquestioned gifts, secure in his achievements, he had a winning gentleness, and an engaging manner ...
— Told in a French Garden - August, 1914 • Mildred Aldrich
... is of contract, partly expressed and partly understood, and regulated by local custom. If it were desirable to regulate the arrangements of the trade by Act of Parliament, and if it were provided (1) that no person could advance money or money's worth to a fisherman, with the view of engaging in or equipping him for the fishing, without thereby constituting himself a partner of the fisherman, to the extent of such advance, proportionately to the value of the boat, drift of nets, etc. possessed by the fisherman and used in the fishing, and becoming liable as ...
— Second Shetland Truck System Report • William Guthrie
... occur to her to plead in excuse that the duties of a lodging-house, and the necessity of providing sustenance for herself and Anastasia, made serious inroads on the time that ought, no doubt, to have been devoted to education; or that the lack of means prevented her from engaging teachers to supplement her own too limited instruction. She had, in fact, been able to impart to Anastasia little except reading, writing and arithmetic, some geography, a slight knowledge of Miss Magnall's questions, a wonderful proficiency ...
— The Nebuly Coat • John Meade Falkner
... a native of the soil she would stop and continue her search for others. The next moment I have seen her course and kill a wild rabbit. She is perfectly steady from hare if I tell her not to run, and is, without any exception, one of the prettiest and most useful and engaging creatures ever seen. She is an excellent rat-killer also, and has an amazing antipathy to a cat. When I have been absent from home for some time, Mrs. B. has observed that she is alive to every sound of a wheel, ...
— Anecdotes of Dogs • Edward Jesse
... British men-of-war, and compelled to serve for years before they could obtain their release, or revisit their country and their homes. Such instances become known, and their effect in discouraging young men from engaging in the merchant service of their country can neither be doubted nor wondered at. More than all, my Lord, the practice of impressment, whenever it has existed, has produced, not conciliation and good feeling, but resentment, exasperation, and animosity between the two great commercial ...
— The Great Speeches and Orations of Daniel Webster • Daniel Webster
... fluctuations in international prices for these products and weather conditions. Despite government attempts to diversify the economy, it is still heavily dependent on agriculture and related activities, engaging roughly 68% of the population. After several years of lagging performance, the Ivorian economy began a comeback in 1994, due to the 50% devaluation of the CFA franc and improved prices for cocoa and coffee, growth in ...
— The 2005 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency
... enterprises the young American sailors were always engaging—braving equally the perils of the deep and not less treacherous reefs and shoals of business but always struggling to become their own masters to command their own ships, and if possible, to carry their own cargoes. The youth of a nation that had fought for political ...
— American Merchant Ships and Sailors • Willis J. Abbot
... have both an army and a country to contend with. You may march over the country, but you cannot hold it; if you attempt to garrison it, your army would be like a stream of water running to nothing. Even were our men to disperse, every man to his home, engaging to reassemble at some future day, you would be as much at a loss in that case as now. You would be afraid to send out your troops in detachments; when we returned, the work would be all to do." Paine then turns to those who, frightened by the proclamation, betrayed their country, and ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 4, No. 25, November, 1859 • Various
... brother named Darius who was famous as "the champion beer-drinker of the West," having the engaging gift of being able to consume untold quantities without ever becoming drunk. In their way they ...
— Roosevelt in the Bad Lands • Hermann Hagedorn
... way he was quite as good to look at as the young maiden; tall, blond, stalwart, blue-eyed, pleasant-featured, with the frank engaging air which seems to belong to those who go down to the sea in ships, Lieutenant John Seymour Seymour was an excellent specimen of that hardy, daring, gallant class of men who in this war and in the next were to shed such imperishable ...
— For Love of Country - A Story of Land and Sea in the Days of the Revolution • Cyrus Townsend Brady
... mule-jenny, engineers, builders, clerks, brigades of workingmen and workingwomen of all sorts, have been needed. In the name of their liberty, of their security, of their future, and of the future of their children, these workmen, on engaging to work in the mill, had to make reserves; where are the letters of credit which they have delivered to ...
— The Philosophy of Misery • Joseph-Pierre Proudhon
... of engaging address, of a genial disposition, a pleasing speaker, he was the most popular ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Volume 5, 1920 • Various
... expostulate with this virago, upon the barbarity of this assertion, she very prudently declined engaging in private conversation with such an artful and wicked man; and, calling up the people of the house, insisted upon his ...
— The Adventures of Ferdinand Count Fathom, Complete • Tobias Smollett
... said la Peyrade, "might have some appearance of justice if I were the only barrister in Paris; but as the streets are black with them, and as, only yesterday, Thuillier himself spoke of engaging some more important lawyer than myself, I have not the slightest scruple in refusing to defend him. Now, as to the marriage, in order that it may not be made the object of another brutal and forcible demand upon me, I here renounce ...
— The Lesser Bourgeoisie • Honore de Balzac
... Bright. It was at Oxford that he met Vice-Chancellor Benjamin Jowett, the Master of Balliol College, Prof. Max Mueller, Lord and Lady Herschell, and Prof. James Russell Lowell, his old and unvarying friend. The account of his visit to Europe is told with most engaging directness and simplicity, and though the book has no permanent value, it affords ...
— The Arena - Volume 4, No. 20, July, 1891 • Various
... well-known figure in astronomical history. His celebrity was not, however, of such a kind as the Royal Astronomer of Austria that he was ought to enjoy. A not unimportant element in his fame was a suspicion of his being a black sheep in the astronomical flock. He got under this cloud through engaging in a trying and worthy enterprise. On June 3, 1769, an event occurred which had for generations been anticipated with the greatest interest by the whole astronomical world. This was a transit of Venus over the disk of the sun. Our readers doubtless know that at that time such a transit afforded ...
— Side-lights on Astronomy and Kindred Fields of Popular Science • Simon Newcomb
... the lobby a little later he found Le Drieux seated comfortably and smoking a long cigar. The pearl expert nodded to the young ranchman with so much evident satisfaction that Arthur could not resist engaging him in conversation. ...
— Aunt Jane's Nieces Out West • Edith Van Dyne
... wrapped her in rugs, found her book, indicated her whereabouts to a mariner in case of need. All this leisurely done, in the way of a man who has privilege and duty for his warrants. Enquiring then, with an engaging lift of the eyebrows, whether she was perfectly comfortable, and receiving with a pleasant nod her answering nod of thanks, he left her and returned to the train. Tracked through the crowd, and easily by his height, bare head, and leisurely motions, ...
— Rest Harrow - A Comedy of Resolution • Maurice Hewlett
... Voyages is the double interest of discovery and colonization, constantly blending and reacting upon each other, but still remaining matters of separate concern. It is obvious that in the mind of the narrator discovery is always the more engaging theme. Champlain is indeed the historian of St Croix, Port Royal, and Quebec, but only incidentally or from chance. By temper he was the explorer, that is, the man of action, willing to record the broad results, but without the instinct which led Lescarbot to set down the minutiae of life in ...
— The Founder of New France - A Chronicle of Champlain • Charles W. Colby
... and his command to be in position by two P.M., while Sykes's division, supported by Hancock's division of the Second Corps, march out the turnpike to a corresponding distance, each force then deploying towards the other, and engaging the enemy supposed to be ...
— The Campaign of Chancellorsville • Theodore A. Dodge
... to keep all London in a cage, these games were hardly more important than the shoutings and whistlings that rose from the street below. It seemed to him that all his life—he had lived eleven years—he had been standing in a corner watching other people engaging in meaningless ploys and antics. The sun was hot, and yet the children ran about and made themselves hotter, and he wondered, as when he had been in bed with one of his frequent illnesses he had wondered at the grown-up folk who came and went, moving their arms and legs and speaking with their ...
— The Ghost Ship • Richard Middleton
... Germans attacked our line from the Ypres-Poelcappelle road to within a short distance of the Menin highroad, it being evidently their intention while engaging us closely on the whole of this sector to break our front in the vicinity of the Ypres-Roulers Railway, to the north and to the south of which their strongest and most ...
— New York Times Current History; The European War, Vol 2, No. 3, June, 1915 - April-September, 1915 • Various
... subjects, and in nervous patients who do not bear pain well, and particularly when the dislocation has existed for a day or two. In quite recent cases, however, the surgeon may succeed in replacing the bone by taking advantage of a temporary faintness, or by engaging the patient's attention with other matters while he carries out the ...
— Manual of Surgery Volume Second: Extremities—Head—Neck. Sixth Edition. • Alexander Miles
... give the allies time to unite. Hurriedly crossing the straits, he invaded Denmark, whose terrified king promptly signed a treaty with him (1700), paying a large indemnity and engaging to keep the ...
— A Political and Social History of Modern Europe V.1. • Carlton J. H. Hayes
... ships-of-war." In December Welles transmitted this report to Congress with the still sager remark that "The subject of iron armature for ships is one of great general interest, not only to the navy and country, but is engaging the attention of the civilized world." Such was the higher administrative preparation for the ironclad battle of ...
— Captains of the Civil War - A Chronicle of the Blue and the Gray, Volume 31, The - Chronicles Of America Series • William Wood
... enough to you now. Marot's end was to baffle his pursuers and to benefit the exiles. How could he do this better than by engaging as a seaman aboard this brig, the Dorothy Fox, and sailing away from England in her? There are but thirty of a crew. Below hatches are close on two hundred men, who, simple as they may be, are, as you and I know, second to none in ...
— Micah Clarke - His Statement as made to his three Grandchildren Joseph, - Gervas and Reuben During the Hard Winter of 1734 • Arthur Conan Doyle
... made them, which was generous enough—two hundred and fifty dollars each for the voyage to Manila. So Cheyne came back disappointed, and Frewen then went to Apia in the Casilda's whale-boat, and succeeded in engaging ten natives of Niue,{*} who, with half a dozen Samoans, made up a sufficient complement for ...
— John Frewen, South Sea Whaler - 1904 • Louis Becke
... Anita was engaging Potan in talking of his plans. The brigand leader was boasting of them: of his well equipped ship, the daring of his men. And questioning her about the size of the treasure. My ...
— Brigands of the Moon • Ray Cummings
... Robespierre. Eugene was come to request of Bonaparte, as general of the interior, that his father's sword might be restored to him. The prayer of the young supplicant was as interesting as his manners were engaging, and Napoleon felt so much interest in him, that he was induced to cultivate the acquaintance of Eugene's mother, ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 10, Supplementary Number, Issue 263, 1827 • Various
... flight was to be in a measured course of five miles from Ft. Meyer to Alexandria, Va. It was not an easy flight, and it was considered to be more difficult than crossing the English Channel, a feat then engaging ...
— Modern Americans - A Biographical School Reader for the Upper Grades • Chester Sanford
... successive bustle occasioned by the discussion and removal of the morning meal, became apparently sensible, that his friend and ostensible patron Albert ought not altogether to be suffered to drop to leeward in the conversation, while he was himself successfully engaging the attention of those members of his family to whom he had become so recently known. He went behind his chair, therefore, and, leaning on the back, said with a good-humoured tone, which made his purpose ...
— Woodstock; or, The Cavalier • Sir Walter Scott
... talking to you. I daresay it was a surprise to her to hear words of affection from her daughter's mouth, and the unfeigned homage of my admiration evidently touched her deeply. Her manner changed and became even more engaging; she dropped ...
— Letters of Two Brides • Honore de Balzac
... Ocean trade, of Western Ocean packets, of Western Ocean hard cases. The new life attended closely upon the old, and the nine chapters of "Almayer's Folly" went with me to the Victoria Dock, whence in a few days we started for Rouen. I won't go so far as saying that the engaging of a man fated never to cross the Western Ocean was the absolute cause of the Franco-Canadian Transport Company's failure to achieve even a single passage. It might have been that of course; but the obvious, gross obstacle was clearly the want of money. Four hundred and sixty bunks for ...
— A Personal Record • Joseph Conrad
... in the middle of the table is of a redness that enthralls the human soul. As for Harriet herself, she is the personification of comfort, airy, clean, warm, inexpressibly wholesome. And never in the world is she so engaging as when she ministers to a man's hunger. Truthfully, sometimes, when she comes to me out of the dimmer light of the kitchen to the radiance of the table with a plate of muffins, it is as though she and the muffins were a part of each other, and that she is really offering some of herself. ...
— Adventures In Contentment • David Grayson
... self-distrust, an under-graduate who is mildly excited about an ingenious line of reasoning, a wit who loves to play tricks with the subtlety of a curiously agile brain, a casuist who sees quickly the chinks in the armour of an adversary. But with all his boyishness, and charm, and humility, and engaging cleverness, there is a light in his eyes too feverish for peace of mind. I cannot prevent myself from thinking that his secession, which was something of a comedy to his friends, may prove something ...
— Painted Windows - Studies in Religious Personality • Harold Begbie
... there were no spare hands there, Miss Foote wrote to a parish officer in Susan's and her own native county, to ask if a laborer of good character and sound qualifications could be sent to her by the parish, on her engaging to pay him twelve shillings a week for a year and a half, while her experiment of cultivation was under trial; and longer, if it should be found to answer. This was all she could undertake, as she could not afford to carry on the scheme at a loss. ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 2, No. 12, May, 1851. • Various
... The scene engaging the children was that of the youthful St. Meriadoc's first school-going; where his parents (Duke and Duchess of Brittany) call with him upon a pedagogue, who introduces him to the boys and girls, his fellow scholars. For a sample ...
— Brother Copas • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... David a courtesy with such a grace and flow, coupled with an engaging smile, that the sailor was fascinated, ...
— Love Me Little, Love Me Long • Charles Reade
... at anchor, and she was engaging half-a-dozen long canoes, whose occupants were raining arrows upon the deck, and every now and then, with terrible temerity, they were paddled rapidly near enough to hurl their spears at ...
— Jack at Sea - All Work and no Play made him a Dull Boy • George Manville Fenn
... laid the foundation of his fortune by a generous gift of four hundred dollars in notes of the Bank of North America. The first pamphlet that Carey published in Ireland was a treatise on duelling. Soon after his arrival in America he gave a practical illustration of the text by engaging in a duel with Colonel Oswald, in which he received a wound that stayed him at home for more than ...
— The Philadelphia Magazines and their Contributors 1741-1850 • Albert Smyth
... noises in the Grieves' room ceased he listened for something which he knew must be in the air, and caught it—the sound of a child's long, smothered sobs. On most nights they would not have made much impression on him. Louie's ways with her brother were no more engaging than with the rest of the world; and she was not a creature who invited consolation from anybody. David, too, with his power of escape at any time into a world of books and dreams or simply into the wild shepherd ...
— The History of David Grieve • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... the discussion of garden plans to make him more than earn his fare. For the Whirlpoolers are very thrifty, the richer the more so, especially those of Dutch trading blood, and they are not above stopping father on the road, engaging in easy converse, praising the boys, and then asking his opinion about a supposititious case, rather than send for him in the regular way and pay his ...
— People of the Whirlpool • Mabel Osgood Wright
... themselves, at the moment, greatly in demand. The economical headmistress must always be on the look out for an acquisition to her staff who will, like Count Smorltork's politics, "surprise in herself many branches." If the headmistress can solve her difficulty about her domestic arts teacher by engaging a college-bred woman, with a degree to put on the prospectus, all sorts of ordinary subjects for her odd hours and undertaking to teach cooking as well, she will jump at the chance, and pay her L10 to L20 more salary than the ordinary assistant-mistress. ...
— Women Workers in Seven Professions • Edith J. Morley
... we shall arrive at a sequence of figures such as is shown in Fig. 3. This is all we can discover empirically regarding the mutual relationships of three forces engaging ...
— Man or Matter • Ernst Lehrs
... for a few years longer, when she departed to join the loved one that had preceded her. The husband and father became a lonely and bowed man, whose years were far less than they seemed. Although a farmer in a small way, he committed the sad error of engaging in stock speculations, more with a view of diverting his mind from his gnawing grief than with the hope of bettering his fortune. It is hardly necessary to relate what followed. He was successful for a time, and improved ...
— Brave Tom - The Battle That Won • Edward S. Ellis
... arrived. He sleeps, by his own choice, in No. 2. He has had a conversation with the butler, whom he had been instrumental in engaging for us, which began by his asking how he liked his situation? He expressed himself satisfied with everything, but added, "But there's something very queer about the house," and then proceeded to tell ...
— The Alleged Haunting of B—— House • Various
... not find what a mortal wound he hath given their morality, all the lovers of the truth will see it; and it may be, the Lord sparing life, and continuing the same gracious and great assistance, he hath had in engaging with many and great adversaries to the truth at home and abroad, they may see somewhat from his pen, which may make the lovers of our Lord Jesus Christ in sincerity, and of the operations of his Spirit, sing over these successors to Sisera, who with ...
— Christ The Way, The Truth, and The Life • John Brown (of Wamphray)
... was born in 1566-67. His early life was full of interest and activity, and his life in Holland and America no less so. In early life he filled important stations. Steele's "Chief of the Pilgrims" is a most engaging biography of him, and there are others hardly less so, Bradford's sketch being ...
— The Mayflower and Her Log, Complete • Azel Ames
... at Spottsylvania Court House that the Federal infantry rushed over the works, and, engaging in a hand-to-hand fight, drove out the Confederate infantry. On one part of the line the artillerymen stood to their posts, and when the Federal troops passing the works had massed themselves inside, fired to the right and left, up and down the lines, cutting roadways through the compact ...
— Detailed Minutiae of Soldier life in the Army of Northern Virginia, 1861-1865 • Carlton McCarthy
... emotions will of course disappear along with it,—but the emotions themselves, and their claim to be engaged and satisfied, will remain. Now if we find by experience that humane letters have an undeniable power of engaging the emotions, the importance of humane letters in a man's training becomes not less, but greater, in proportion to the success of modern science in extirpating what it ...
— English Prose - A Series of Related Essays for the Discussion and Practice • Frederick William Roe (edit. and select.)
... is, it has this drawback for those who live in the vicinity—especially if they happen to be anxious mothers—that it is infested with adders; and as these engaging reptiles were specially numerous and specially aggressive in the "dry year" 1826, it is not surprising that when, owing to the cottage at Aikieside being otherwise required, John Cairns was offered a ...
— Principal Cairns • John Cairns
... my engaging Thomas on the spot, at outrageous wages, and with permission to sleep in the gardener's lodge, empty since the house was rented. The old man—he was white-haired and a little stooped, but with an immense idea of his personal dignity—gave me his ...
— The Circular Staircase • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... world was spinning at a rate that required nimble wits to keep account of its revolutions. But his own wits were nimble, almost feminine in the rapid delicacy of their intuition—almost feminine, but not quite. And he felt, vaguely, that there lay his mistake in engaging a woman with a woman's own weapons; and that the only chance a man has is to ...
— The Common Law • Robert W. Chambers
... in for supplies, and that seeing the steamer they were rather dubious as to her nationality, and had therefore spoke me, to gain the required information. A brisk conversation was then kept up; my object in engaging them in it was to enable the Alabama to get under way ere the whalers took the alarm, feeling certain that the preparations were being made to go ...
— The Cruise of the Alabama and the Sumter • Raphael Semmes
... comfortable; cordial; genial; glad, gladsome; sweet, delectable, nice, dainty; delicate, delicious; dulcet; luscious &c. 396; palatable &c. 394; luxurious, voluptuous; sensual &c. 377. [of people] attractive &c. 615; inviting, prepossessing, engaging; winning, winsome; taking, fascinating, captivating, killing; seducing, seductive; heart-robbing, alluring, enticing; appetizing &c. (exciting) 824; cheering &c. 836; bewitching; enchanting, entrancing, enravishing[obs3]. ...
— Roget's Thesaurus
... became an habituee of the court. The moral atmosphere of Whitehall was not calculated to strengthen her conjugal virtue, but its perpetual gaiety was destined to dissipate her sense of neglect. It was not possible for a woman endowed with so much beauty, and possessed of such engaging manners, to be disregarded, in a court entirely devoted to love and gallantry; and accordingly she soon became an object of general admiration. This was by no means pleasing to my Lord Chesterfield, who, ...
— Royalty Restored - or, London under Charles II. • J. Fitzgerald Molloy
... must indeed have been, to have inspired so remarkable a passion. For Hippisley was making love to her all over again. Their happy relations were proclaimed, not only by her own engaging frankness, but still more by the marvellous renaissance of her beauty. She had given up her habit of jealousy as she had given up eating sweets, because both were murderous to her complexion. Not that Hippisley gave her any cause. He had ceased to cultivate ...
— The Best British Short Stories of 1922 • Edward J. O'Brien and John Cournos, editors
... with "Friends" who were interested in the cause, to discuss the best mode of engaging the members of the Society to unite their efforts on behalf of the oppressed and suffering slaves; and though no immediate steps were resolved on, yet I found so much good feeling in many of them, that I cannot but ...
— A Visit To The United States In 1841 • Joseph Sturge
... withers, under the miser's avaricious tyranny. At length, old Grandet pays his debt to nature, and Eugenie is left with the millions. Until now she had waited for the wandering lover's return; but he, engaging in the slave-trade, has lost all the generous impulses of his youth, and comes back only to deny his early affection and marry the ill-favoured daughter of a Marquis. Eugenie takes a noble revenge for this desertion ...
— Balzac • Frederick Lawton
... do not deny that there is something very engaging in a frank and unpretending manner; some persons have it more than others; in some persons it is a great grace. But it must be recollected that I am speaking of times of persecution and oppression to Christians, such as the ...
— Apologia Pro Vita Sua • John Henry Cardinal Newman
... coach to Sir W. Coventry, where with him a good while in his chamber, talking of one thing or another; among others, he told me of the great factions at Court at this day, even to the sober engaging of great persons, and differences, and making the King cheap and ridiculous. It is about my Lady Harvy's being offended at Doll Common's acting of Sempronia, to imitate her; for which she got my Lord Chamberlain, her kinsman, to imprison Doll: when my Lady Castlemayne ...
— Diary of Samuel Pepys, Complete • Samuel Pepys
... engaging smile, and five minutes later he was wrecking the pantry of all the edibles his fellow-boarders had overlooked, the while his landlady told him her life's history, wept over the memory of her departed husband, and confessed that she hoped ...
— Laughing Bill Hyde and Other Stories • Rex Beach
... what manner these debts were contracted,—and that they were contracted by persons engaging, not for themselves, for they had nothing; all their property was apparently their mistresses'. You will now see in what manner the payment of them was exacted; and we shall beg leave to read to you their own accounts of their own proceedings. Your Lordships will then judge whether they were ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. XII. (of XII.) • Edmund Burke
... potentate here appears before us obstinately pursuing one favorite project, devoting to it the untiring efforts of a long reign, and bringing all these terrible resources to bear upon it; but forced, in the evening of his days, to abandon it—here we see the mighty Philip II engaging in combat with a few weak and powerless adversaries, and retiring from it at last ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to Prose, Vol. VIII (of X) - Continental Europe II. • Various
... to see the woman who had been preferred to her; and perhaps some astonishment also, not to see a more engaging and more beautiful person; both those feelings restrained within the limits of good breeding, and both not lasting for more than a few moments—so far as I could see. I say, "so far," because the horrible agitation that she communicated to me disturbed ...
— The Haunted Hotel - A Mystery of Modern Venice • Wilkie Collins
... Circumstance from the Iliad and AEneid, does not only insert it as a Poetical Embellishment, like the Authors above-mentioned; but makes an artful use of it for the proper carrying on of his Fable, and for the breaking off the Combat between the two Warriors, who were upon the point of engaging. [To this we may further add, that Milton is the more justified in this Passage, as we find the same noble Allegory in Holy Writ, where a wicked Prince, some few Hours before he was assaulted and slain, is said to have been ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele
... replied that the Report was engaging the attention of the Government; that he trusted it would not be in the category of those Reports "which have gone before" and produced no result; but that he could not give ...
— Chapters in the History of the Insane in the British Isles • Daniel Hack Tuke
... his tone was one meant to conciliate, for suddenly he thought he saw a way to end this deplorable scene. "And aren't you a child? A pretty, engaging child, I ...
— The Making of a Soul • Kathlyn Rhodes
... and Persephone, what we actually possess is some actual fragments of poetry, some actual fragments of sculpture; and with a curiosity, justified by the direct aesthetic beauty of these fragments, we feel our way backwards to that engaging picture of the poet-people, with which the ingenuity of modern theory has filled the void in our knowledge. The abstract poet of that first period of mythology, creating in this wholly impersonal, intensely spiritual way,—the ...
— Greek Studies: A Series of Essays • Walter Horatio Pater
... 'ouns, I call it," whispered Janey Harman, who had taken, in the holidays, a "course" of Lever's Irish novels. Margaret did not make very satisfactory progress with her commercial calculations. After hopelessly befogging herself, she turned to that portion of Colenso's engaging work which is ...
— The Mark Of Cain • Andrew Lang
... one of the most accomplished of dilettanti, worst of poets, and silliest of men, had latterly put the coping-stone to a life of folly by engaging in a most bare-faced intrigue with the notorious Lola Montez. The indecency and infatuation of this last liaison—far more openly conducted than any of his former numerous amours—had given intense umbrage to the nobility whom he had insulted by elevating the ...
— The Magnificent Montez - From Courtesan to Convert • Horace Wyndham
... to ascertain anything like truth as regards her, but her beauty and engaging manners will, it is thought by many, gain for her, for a time at least, a greater amount of popularity than his friends who now blame the marriage expect. That he is passionately in love with her no one doubts, and his countenance on late occasions, ...
— The Letters of Queen Victoria, Vol 2 (of 3), 1844-1853 • Queen Victoria
... A.) afterwards walked together for an hour on the Cobb; she is very conversable in a common way; I do not perceive wit or genius, but she has sense and some degree of taste, and her manners are very engaging. She seems to ...
— Lectures and Essays • Goldwin Smith
... and making a prodigious sensation in all directions. Nor, in general, is it possible to secure it again until the whale is fairly captured and a corpse. Consider, now, how it must be in the case of four boats all engaging one unusually strong, active, and knowing whale; when owing to these qualities in him, as well as to the thousand concurring accidents of such an audacious enterprise, eight or ten loose second irons may be simultaneously dangling about him. ...
— Moby-Dick • Melville
... notes in which each side conceded much to the other. They did not indeed dispose of the slave trade, but they reached an agreement by which a joint squadron was to undertake to police efficiently the African seas in order to prevent American vessels from engaging in ...
— The Path of Empire - A Chronicle of the United States as a World Power, Volume - 46 in The Chronicles of America Series • Carl Russell Fish
... spoke; the genial, engaging smile of a fond old father. But the eyes, surrounded by laughter crinkles, were as unreadable as two disks of gray slate. They were the eyes of a poker player—or ...
— —And Devious the Line of Duty • Tom Godwin
... disciples of Nimrod; excited by enthusiasm, they shook their naked blades aloft till the steel trembled in their grasp, and away they dashed over rocks, through thorny bush, across ravines, up and down steep inclinations, engaging in a mimic hunt, and going through the various acts supposed to occur in the attack of a furious elephant. I must acknowledge that, in spite of my admiration for their wonderful dexterity, I began to doubt their prudence. I had three excellent horses for my wife and myself; ...
— The Nile Tributaries of Abyssinia • Samuel W. Baker
... moment before a big dinner when the assembled guests, expecting the summons to zakuska, * avoid engaging in any long conversation but think it necessary to move about and talk, in order to show that they are not at all impatient for their food. The host and hostess look toward the door, and now and then glance at one another, and the visitors ...
— War and Peace • Leo Tolstoy
... was not checked or foiled by the discovery of faults or blemishes in those whom he had taken into his life. Even in our ordinary human relations we do not know what we are engaging to do when we become the friend of another. "For better for worse, for richer for poorer, in sickness and in health," runs the marriage covenant. The covenant in all true friendship is the same. We pledge our friend faithfulness, with all that faithfulness ...
— Personal Friendships of Jesus • J. R. Miller
... shoulders and trickled in little, hurrying drops down to the nearest jumping-off place. "Come, drownd your sorrer," Bill advised amiably. "Nobody said nothing but Sammy, and I'll gamble he wishes he hadn't, now." If his counsel was vicious, his smile was engaging—which does not, in this instance, mean ...
— The Uphill Climb • B. M. Bower
... disapproval towards Merryon after that interview, realizing possibly its injustice. He even declared in a letter to his wife that Mrs. Merryon was an engaging chit, with a will of her own that threatened to rule them all! Mrs. Davenant pursed her lips somewhat over the assertion, and remarked that Major Merryon's wife was plainly more at home with men than women. ...
— The Safety Curtain, and Other Stories • Ethel M. Dell
... her dazzled eyes with her hand and looked critically around. "The maple would be lovely," she said, "but—do you know," and she turned to her companion with an engaging smile, "these sunrise rooms seem meant for Alaska cedar? And the rugs should be not old blue, but a soft, ...
— The Rim of the Desert • Ada Woodruff Anderson
... Roman fleet He therefore surrendered Sicily. The independence and integrity of the Carthaginian state and territory, on the other hand, were expressly recognized in the usual form; Rome binding herself not to enter into a separate alliance with the confederates of Carthage, and Carthage engaging not to enter into separate alliance with the confederates of Rome,—that is, with their respective subject and dependent communities; neither was to commence war, or exercise rights of sovereignty, or undertake recruiting within ...
— The History of Rome (Volumes 1-5) • Theodor Mommsen
... She would not go to her relations, to Lady Jane; that were to give the clew, and invite the pursuit. An Italian lady of high rank had visited at Lady Jane's,—taken a great fancy to Nora; and the lady's husband, having been obliged to precede her return to Italy, had suggested the notion of engaging some companion; the lady had spoken of this to Nora and to Lady Jane Horton, who had urged Nora to accept the offer, elude Harley's pursuit, and go abroad for a time. Nora then had refused; for she then had seen ...
— My Novel, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... le jour," "De moi pendant la nuit," "De moi encore," "Memoirs pour mon coeur"; still he parades himself on every possible occasion, and not always to his own advantage. His conduct in passing himself off as a single man in an English family who were kind to him during his exile, thereby engaging the daughter's affections, is entirely inexcusable. That a person of Madame Recamier's good judgment did not perceive the discredit that must attach to such revelations is only to be accounted for by supposing her blind to Chateaubriand's follies. But with all her ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 14, No. 84, October, 1864 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... Sudra. Verily, those Brahmanas that take their food from Sudras, take the dirt of the earth. If one engages in the service of a Sudra, one is doomed to perdition though one may duly perform all the rites of one's order. A Brahmana, a Kshatriya, or a Vaisya, so engaging, is doomed, although devoted to the due performance of religious rites. It is said that a Brahmana's duty consists in studying the Vedas and seeking the welfare of the human race; that a Kshatriya's duty consists in protecting men, ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 4 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... camp, apparently to serve as general "striker" and man of all work, brought food at noon and left it without engaging in conversation. ...
— The Rainy Day Railroad War • Holman Day
... dispensaries and hospitals for the poor. Whether they will go to the logical conclusion of engaging physicians to give free treatment to all regardless of income depends largely upon what the next generation of private physicians do. The state already says when a physician's training fits him to practice. It will soon expect him to pass rigid examinations in the social and economic aspects of ...
— Civics and Health • William H. Allen
... rapacious; fond of exterior pomp and appearance, giddy with prosperity; and as he imagined that his fortune was now as strongly rooted in the kingdom as his ascendant was uncontrolled over the weak monarch, he was negligent in engaging partisans, who might support his sudden and ill-established grandeur. At all tournaments he took delight in foiling the English nobility by his superior address: in every conversation he made them the object of his wit and raillery: every day his enemies multiplied upon him; ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part B. - From Henry III. to Richard III. • David Hume
... not that work they like best, or can do best, or which is most remunerative, but that which lies near at hand. This restriction implies that large numbers of women undertake low-skilled, low-paid, ineffective, and irregular work at their own homes or in some neighbouring work-room, instead of engaging in the more productive and more remunerative work of the large factories. Every limitation in freedom of choice of work signifies a reduction in the average effectiveness ...
— The Evolution of Modern Capitalism - A Study of Machine Production • John Atkinson Hobson
... happy, field-marshal, to discharge a small part of my obligations toward you, by yielding to your demand. Ask quickly, that I may the sooner give!" said Anna Leopoldowna, with an engaging smile. ...
— The Daughter of an Empress • Louise Muhlbach
... OR FAILURE.—It is wistful as well as pleasing to think of the young passing year by year into the world, and engaging with its duties, its interests, and temptations. Of the throng that struggle at the gates of entrance, how many may reach their anticipated goal? Carry the mind forward a few years, and some have climbed the hills of difficulty and gained the eminence ...
— Searchlights on Health - The Science of Eugenics • B. G. Jefferis and J. L. Nichols
... thoughts of engaging in the business," I continued, "and would, if I could buy a tract of land on the banks of the Loddon or the Campaspe. All the pasturing that is desirable within sight of Mount Macedon skirt is already sold, ...
— The Gold Hunter's Adventures - Or, Life in Australia • William H. Thomes
... an air of authority. His hair, in his youthful days, was of a light color, but care and trouble, according to Las Casas, soon turned it gray, and at thirty years of age it was quite white. He was moderate and simple in diet and apparel, eloquent in discourse, engaging and affable with strangers, and his amiability and suavity in domestic life strongly attached his household to his person. His temper was naturally irritable, but he subdued it by the magnanimity of his spirits, comporting himself with a courteous and gentle gravity, ...
— Christopher Columbus and His Monument Columbia • Various
... also obliged me with some choice insults, which I have found engaging. When I lectured in Barcelona in the Casa del Pueblo, La Veu de Catalunya undertook to report the affair, picturing me as talking platitudes before an audience of professional bomb throwers and dynamiters, and experts with the ...
— Youth and Egolatry • Pio Baroja
... thought of deceiving you," responded Harry with one of his engaging smiles. "We are from the South, and you are from the North, of course. It may be ...
— A Little Union Scout • Joel Chandler Harris
... confirmed the surrender of the monasteries; yet even this act contains much falsehood, much tyranny, and, were it not that all private rights must submit to public interest, much injustice and iniquity. The scheme of engaging the abbots to surrender their monasteries had been conducted, as may easily be imagined, with many invidious circumstances: arts of all kinds had been employed; every motive that could work on the frailty of human nature ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part C. - From Henry VII. to Mary • David Hume
... with passionate tenderness, and called me "sister." What a recognition it was for me! Her beautiful face, lighted up with a new animation, appeared more lovely than ever. There was the same open-hearted manner of other days, now made doubly engaging by the warmest manifestation of genuine affection. I had never dreamed that Mr. Logan was the brother of whom this loving girl had so often spoken to me at the sewing-school, nor that the inexpressible happiness of calling ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 16, No. 96, October 1865 • Various
... candour that is one of his most engaging qualities). Well, you know, it was rather silly of uncle to fling away his life by trying to get into the boat first; and as this document may be printed in the English papers, it struck me, an English peer, ...
— The Admirable Crichton • J. M. Barrie
... was, for its size, the most splendid Graham had seen. The beautiful white-limbed figures that supported the galleries reminded him once more of the restored magnificence of sculpture; they seemed to writhe in engaging attitudes, their faces laughed. The source of the music that filled the place was hidden, and the whole vast shining floor was thick with dancing couples. "Look at them," said the little officer, "see how much ...
— The Sleeper Awakes - A Revised Edition of When the Sleeper Wakes • H.G. Wells
... a sense, he includes them all. If he does not excel Stothard in the gift of grace, he does in range and variety; and he more than rivals him in composition. He has not, like Miss Greenaway, endowed the art-world with a special type of childhood; but his children are always lifelike and engaging. (Compare, at a venture, the boy soldiers whom Frank Castlewood is drilling in chapter xi. of Esmond, or the delightful little fellow who is throwing up his arms in chapter ix. of Emma.) As regards dogs and horses and the rest, his colleague, Mr, Joseph ...
— De Libris: Prose and Verse • Austin Dobson
... arrived at New-York, he put up articles for engaging more hands, it being necessary to his ship's crew, since he proposed to deal with a desperate enemy. The terms he offered, were, that every man should have a share of what was taken, reserving for himself and owners forty shares. Upon which encouragement ...
— The Pirates Own Book • Charles Ellms
... delirious; so that of all I then went on to relate concerning my residence on the island I can scarcely remember a word. After this I was asked whether I desired to "ship"; of course I said yes; that is, if he would allow me to enter for one cruise, engaging to discharge me, if I so desired, at the next port. In this way men are frequently shipped on board whalemen in the South Seas. My stipulation was acceded to, and the ship's articles ...
— Omoo: Adventures in the South Seas • Herman Melville
... great deal, he was fond of music and games, and was never so pleased as when engaging in some wild frolic with his sisters and any chance youngster that happened to stray in. His sister, Lady Trevelyan, has recorded that during those days of gloom which followed her father's failure, matters were made worse ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 5 (of 14) • Elbert Hubbard
... of no use shouting back at the man; it was of no use engaging in a wordy quarrel with him; and of little service to take note of the covert smiles of the station-master and the sidelong winks he directed at the manager of the sugar factory—a manager now wonderfully transformed—the worthy Herr Winterborgen, ...
— With Joffre at Verdun - A Story of the Western Front • F. S. Brereton
... moral fibre in British boys. And there is much in this plea. The life does make boys enduring, self-reliant, good-tempered and honourable, but it most carefully endeavours to destroy all original sin of individuality, spontaneity, and engaging freakishness. It implants, moreover, in the great majority of those who have lived it the mental attitude of that swell, who when asked where he went for his hats, replied: "Blank's, of course. ...
— Another Sheaf • John Galsworthy
... and its dependencies, the strong frontier Town, and, as it were, key of Swedish Pommern, should be evacuated by the Swedes, and be garrisoned by neutral troops, Prussians and Holsteiners in equal number; which neutral troops shall prohibit any hostile attack of Pommern from without, Sweden engaging not to make any attack through Pommern from within. That will be as good as peace in Pommern, till we get a general Swedish Peace. With which Friedrich Wilhelm gladly complies. [22d ...
— History Of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Volume IV. (of XXI.) - Frederick The Great—Friedrich's Apprenticeship, First Stage—1713-1728 • Thomas Carlyle
... his distinction either metaphysical or arbitrary in its source. As a matter of observation, and for the practical purposes of morality, there are kinds of action whose consequences do not go beyond the doer of them. No doubt, you may say that by engaging in these kinds in any given moment, the doer is neglecting the actions in which the social element preponderates, and therefore even acts that seem purely self-regarding have indirect and negative consequences to the rest of the world. But to ...
— On Compromise • John Morley
... another little laugh. "That would be rather typical of our insular methods. But do you know what an engaging, what a reviving spectacle you presented, as you stood there flourishing your hat? What do you imagine people thought? And what would have happened to you if I had just chanced to be a policeman instead ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume X (of X) • Various
... town had not been utterly destitute of common sense, they would have made some proposal to the Parliament, with a petition to the purpose I have mentioned; promising to improve the "cloths and stuffs of the nation into all possible degrees of fineness and colours, and engaging not to play the knave according to their custom, by exacting and imposing upon the nobility and gentry either as to the prices or the goodness." For I remember in London upon a general mourning, the rascally mercers and woollen-drapers, ...
— The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, D.D., Vol. VII - Historical and Political Tracts—Irish • Jonathan Swift
... to you, and very much so," urged the Professor, somewhat more anxiously. "Besides," added the German, with a now really engaging smile, "I have met your demand, Herr ...
— The Submarine Boys for the Flag - Deeding Their Lives to Uncle Sam • Victor G. Durham
... allowed me to sit in at some of the meetings in the Executive Chamber, and it was at one of these that I met for the first time the most engaging Chief of the Forestry Bureau, Gifford Pinchot. At night Zulime and I dined with William Dudley Foulke and at nine o'clock we went to ...
— A Daughter of the Middle Border • Hamlin Garland
... temperance. That thought grew upon me as I travelled over the last six or eight miles. I carried it up to the platform, and, strong in the confidence of the sympathy of the chairman, I broached the idea of engaging a special train to carry the friends of temperance from Leicester to Loughborough and back to attend a quarterly delegate meeting appointed to be held there in two or three weeks following. The chairman approved, the meeting roared with excitement, and early next day I proposed ...
— Railway Adventures and Anecdotes - extending over more than fifty years • Various
... central figure, she had at least a modest part in it. The short lot had not fallen to the properest Daughter, that she quite realized; yet would any one of them succeed in winning Jacob Moody's attention, in engaging him in pleasant conversation, and finally in bringing him to a realization of his mistaken way of life? She doubted, but at the same moment her spirits rose at the thought of the difficulties involved in ...
— New Chronicles of Rebecca • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... appears to have imagined that the ROYAL SOCIETY was really formed on the principle of Campanella; to withdraw the people from intermeddling with politics and religion, by engaging them merely in philosophical pursuits.—The reaction of the public mind is an object not always sufficiently indicated by historians. The vile hypocrisy and mutual persecutions of the numerous fanatics occasioned ...
— Calamities and Quarrels of Authors • Isaac D'Israeli
... certainly no Virginians, ever thought or behaved or talked in 1740 like the personages in Weems's stories, whatever they may have done in 1790, or at the beginning of the next century. These precious anecdotes belong to the age of Miss Edgeworth and Hannah More and Jane Taylor. They are engaging specimens of the "Harry and Lucy" and "Purple Jar" morality, and accurately reflect the pale didacticism which became fashionable in England at the close of the last century. They are as untrue to nature and to fact at the period to which they are assigned as would ...
— George Washington, Vol. I • Henry Cabot Lodge
... wire of the military telegraph line to Fort Fetterman late that night. It was known that a small escort would leave that point early in the morning, going through with a staff-officer en route to join the field column now busily engaging the hostile Indians along the northern foot-hills of the Big Horn range. Major Miller asked the commanding officer at Fetterman to hold back a brace of horsemen to await the arrival of a courier just leaving ...
— 'Laramie;' - or, The Queen of Bedlam. • Charles King
... the meaning of this, turned about slowly. The speaker was a tall young corporal, Sam Vicary by name and by birth a Somerset lad—a curly haired, broad-shouldered fellow with a simple engaging smile. He had come out with one of the later drafts, and nobody knew the cause of his enlisting, but it was supposed to be some poaching trouble at home. At all events, the recruiting sergeant had picked up a bargain in him, for, ...
— Corporal Sam and Other Stories • A. T. Quiller-Couch
... set of relations, or in any one of those situations that, by a logic of their own, immediately fall, for the fabulist, into movement, into a march or a rush, a patter of quick steps; but altogether in the sense of a single character, the character and aspect of a particular engaging young woman, to which all the usual elements of a "subject," certainly of a setting, were to need to be super added. Quite as interesting as the young woman herself at her best, do I find, I must again repeat, this projection of memory upon the whole matter of the growth, ...
— The Portrait of a Lady - Volume 1 (of 2) • Henry James
... while the French fire at this part was crushed by that of the Russians opposed to them. All day, however, the cannonade continued unabating on both sides, the men-of-war aiding the land forces by engaging the forts. ...
— Jack Archer • G. A. Henty
... their jibes at the old fellows. They tore at, struggled with, the leathery fragments. But the latter had no teeth, and the malicious Aoyama would see to it that it stuck in their throats. "How, now, ancients? Is not the meat of this tanuki tender beyond measure? Truly one cannot call this engaging in the practice of war; to enjoy such a delightful mess."—"Just so," grunted Montaro[u]. "One can then eat the knobs off one's helmet. The flesh of this fellow is so tender it sticks in one's throat, as unwilling to allow it ...
— Bakemono Yashiki (The Haunted House) - Tales of the Tokugawa, Volume 2 (of 2) • James S. De Benneville
... of his new family, with softnesses of sentiment that he could hardly credit and was wholly impotent to express. With a face, voice, and manner trained through forty years to terrify and repel, Rhadamanthus may be great, but he will scarce be engaging. It is a fact that he tried to propitiate Archie, but a fact that cannot be too lightly taken; the attempt was so unconspicuously made, the failure so stoically supported. Sympathy is not due to these steadfast iron natures. If he failed to gain his son's ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. XIX (of 25) - The Ebb-Tide; Weir of Hermiston • Robert Louis Stevenson
... his noble friend, Lord Gules, to the Evergreens?—Why? because he intended to ask his mother to order his father to pay his debts, which she couldn't refuse before such an exalted presence. Young Ponto gave me all this information with the most engaging frankness. We are old friends. I used to tip him when he was ...
— The Book of Snobs • William Makepeace Thackeray
... him, and because he alone knew for a certainty of the death of Smerdis the son of Cyrus, having killed him with his own hands, and finally because Prexaspes was in very great repute among the Persians. For these reasons they summoned him and endeavoured to win him to be their friend, engaging him by pledge and with oaths, that he would assuredly keep to himself and not reveal to any man the deception which had been practised by them upon the Persians, and promising to give him things innumerable 64 in return. After ...
— The History Of Herodotus - Volume 1(of 2) • Herodotus
... What an engaging, pretty, naive, little woman this was! I commented inwardly. A sweet aroma of feminine health breathed from her body, bosom, hair—a tumbly black mass—as perfume breathes from ...
— Tramping on Life - An Autobiographical Narrative • Harry Kemp
... suppose through opposition—extremely irascible men; like farmers. Urbanity was the last note in their gamut, the City—urbs quam dicunt Romam—the last of places in their ken. There was no engaging them in dialectic, an Athenian art which they frankly despised. If you happened to disagree with them, their answer was a sturdy Anglo-Saxon brick. If you politely asked your way to Puddlehampton, and to be directed ...
— On The Art of Reading • Arthur Quiller-Couch
... A puppy fawns upon its dam, and a spaniel endeavours, by a thousand attractions, to engage the attention of its master who is at dinner, when it wants to be fed by him. Man sometimes uses the same arts with his brethren, and when he has no other means of engaging them to act according to his inclinations, endeavours by every servile and fawning attention to obtain their good will. He has not time, however, to do this upon every occasion. In civilized society he stands at all times in need of the co-operation and assistance ...
— An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations • Adam Smith
... occasions: it will be right also for the boys, until such time as they go out to war, to make processions and supplications to all the Gods in goodly array, armed and on horseback, in dances and marches, fast or slow, offering up prayers to the Gods and to the sons of Gods; and also engaging in contests and preludes of contests, if at all, with these objects. For these sorts of exercises, and no others, are useful both in peace and war, and are beneficial alike to states and to private houses. But other labours and sports ...
— Laws • Plato
... and good purposes. He has a rare power of realizing scenes and characters,—a power equally rare of presenting them in vivid, pictorial delineation. He must be a very engaging lecturer, imparting to his official labor an interest which does not always belong ...
— Atlantic Monthly,Volume 14, No. 82, August, 1864 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... expounding his philosophy. It was a system of radical idealism, teaching that the only reality is the absolute Ego, whose self-assertion thus becomes the fundamental law of the world. The Fichtean system had not yet been fully worked out in its metaphysical bearings, but the strong and engaging personality of its author gave it, for a little while, immense prestige and influence. To Friedrich Schlegel it seemed the gospel of a new era sort of French Revolution in philosophy. Indeed he proclaimed that the three greatest events of the century were the French Revolution, ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. IV • Editor-in-Chief: Kuno Francke
... not a temporary influence, however powerful; but there must be a correspondent continued effort to promote it amongst your families and neighbours, and to the utmost extent of your power in the world; engaging meanwhile in earnest prayer; and then consecrating yourselves more fully to this work under the influence of two things, a deep sense of personal responsibility and of the constraint of divine love. Submit, then, to this ...
— The Wesleyan Methodist Pulpit in Malvern • Knowles King
... have not the least desire to glorify the boss in this. He is not glorious to me. He is simply human. Often enough he is a coarse and brutal fellow, in his morals as in his politics. Again, he may have some very engaging personal traits that bind his friends to him with the closest of ties. The poor man sees the friend, the charity, the power that is able and ready to help him in need; is it any wonder that he overlooks the source of this power, this plenty,—that he forgets ...
— The Battle with the Slum • Jacob A. Riis
... entertainment of castle-building and the ordered sequence of the tides in favour of the infinitely more variable delight of running water and a sufficiency of mud. Perhaps I have said enough to suggest the charm of an engaging volume, itself a memorial of one whose kindly laughter will be ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 158, April 21, 1920 • Various
... present conditions. Your personal experience based on large and varied observations among the people, and your evidently thorough study of past history make your judgment acceptable, and your manner of giving it to the reader is eminently interesting and engaging, and above all convincing. I do not think that what I have said here will be of much interest or satisfaction to you, as coming from a simple business man, but I wished to thank you for the enjoyment your book has given me and to ...
— Napoleon's Campaign in Russia Anno 1812 • Achilles Rose |
