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Gayety   Listen
noun
Gayety  n.  (pl. gayeties)  (Written also gaiety)  
1.
The state of being gay; merriment; mirth; acts or entertainments prompted by, or inspiring, merry delight; used often in the plural; as, the gayeties of the season.
2.
Finery; show; as, the gayety of dress.
Synonyms: Liveliness; mirth; animation; vivacity; glee; blithesomeness; sprightliness; jollity. See Liveliness.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Gayety" Quotes from Famous Books



... of age, had effaced the strongly marked characteristics of middle life, and mutually assimilated them all. They were a group of merry youngsters, almost maddened with the exuberant frolicsomeness of their years. The most singular effect of their gayety was an impulse to mock the infirmity and decrepitude of which they had so lately been the victims. They laughed loudly at their old-fashioned attire—the wide-skirted coats and flapped waistcoats of the young men, and the ancient cap and gown of ...
— The Great English Short-Story Writers, Vol. 1 • Various

... to her with an assumption of gayety. She received it on her part with unfeigned seriousness, and threw it over her shoulder like a gun. This combined action of the child and heroine, it is quite unnecessary to ...
— Frontier Stories • Bret Harte

... whose honoured name is now perfectly familiar to every lover of poetical description, has lately published a ballad which we are solicitous to preserve in this paper. The gayety of the beginning, contrasted with the solemnity of the conclusion of this terrifick ballad cannot fail to strike all who relish The Castle of Otranto, or The Romance ...
— Translations of German Poetry in American Magazines 1741-1810 • Edward Ziegler Davis

... eyes on Keith's face, had grown very white; yet she managed to give a light laugh, and her voice matched Mazie's own for gayety. ...
— Dawn • Eleanor H. Porter

... a suggestion of the older critics, that gayety belongs naturally to all trochaics, as such, and gravity or grandeur, as naturally, to iambics; and he attempts to find a reason for the fact; while, perhaps, even here—more plausible though the supposition is—the fact ...
— The Grammar of English Grammars • Goold Brown

... finally, after much protestation from the girls, but at the earnest solicitation of Mealy Jones, "post-office" started. Piggy did not urge, nor protest. He had gone through the games listlessly, occasionally breaking into a spasm of gayety that was clearly hollow, and afterwards sinking into profound indifference. For how could a well-conditioned boy be gay with a heartache under his Sunday shirt and the spectacle before his eyes of a freckled human cock-sparrow darting round ...
— The Court of Boyville • William Allen White

... conceded him to what is beyond the grave. At once my own mind came back to me, not the humble, church-censored mind I had during his life, but my very own, and it was like another conversion. I remembered scenes and thoughts and faces that I had not recalled since girlhood. The innocent gayety of my youth came back to me, and I recalled distinctly with what naive, happy worldliness I faced the world then, and not the Kingdom of Heaven that I have been staring at since through William's eyes ...
— A Circuit Rider's Wife • Corra Harris

... them, embarrassment and depression were at first masked under a polite gayety; but the excitement of the drama gained on them; appearances were to be kept up in the roles of a comedy absolutely forced upon ...
— A Young Man in a Hurry - and Other Short Stories • Robert W. Chambers

... in a quadrille. Remark the good-humored pleasure depicted in his countenance. Has he any secret grief? Has he a pain anywhere? No, dear Miss Jones, he is dancing like a true Briton, and with all the charming gayety and abandon of ...
— The Christmas Books • William Makepeace Thackeray

... was playing on the pier when the steamer landed at Cottage City (or Oak Bluff, as it was formerly called), and the pier and the gallery leading to it were crowded with spectators, mostly women a pleasing mingling of the skating-rink and sewing-circle varieties—and gayety was apparently about setting in with the dusk. The rink and the, ground opposite the hotel were in full tilt. After supper King and Forbes took a cursory view of this strange encampment, walking through the streets of fantastic tiny cottages among the scrub oaks, and saw something ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner

... farewell festivity to their cousins. And Ian Stewart was there. With Mrs. Fletcher's connivance, he took Mildred home alone in a canoe, by the deep and devious stream which runs under Wytham woods. She went on talking with a vivacious gayety which was almost foolish. He saw that it was unreal and that her nerves were at high tension. His own were also. He did not intend to propose to her that day; but he could no longer restrain himself, and he began to speak ...
— The Invader - A Novel • Margaret L. Woods

... prowling, tomahawk in hand, in search of scalps. When he left the big Atlantic liner with twenty other raw English lads of his own street-bred sort, he thought he was saying good-bye to civilization forever. And here, all around him, arose the massive stone-built city, teeming with life, with gayety, wealth, and poverty, carriages, horses, motor cars—why, it was just like London, after all! And once more ...
— The Shagganappi • E. Pauline Johnson

... the old regard, he thought of her as the possible wife of some millionnaire. When she returned to Yerbury, and shut herself up in stately despair, refusing even Sylvie's proffered sympathy, she puzzled him. How could she, so fond of admiration and gayety, live this nun's life, without the nun's spiritual exaltation? He passed her once or twice in the hall, as he was calling on Fred, but neither ...
— Hope Mills - or Between Friend and Sweetheart • Amanda M. Douglas

... was nothing now to hold him, everything to urge him away from the place. And Bland pined for the gay cafes on Spring Street. (They are not so gay nowadays, but that is beside the point, for Bland remembered them as being gay, and for their gayety he pined.) ...
— The Thunder Bird • B. M. Bower

... us all the way. When I think of the tons of candy and the mountains of flowers and the wagonloads of latest books that we lavished, and of the hard feelings it made in other quarters, and of our loneliness amid all this gayety, and of our frantic efforts to make the prom a success, with ten couples dancing and the rest decorating the walls, I sometimes wonder whether the college was worth our great love for ...
— At Good Old Siwash • George Fitch

... or his own inherent strength of will, or both combined, the earl gradually recovered from the bitterness of lost hopes, whatsoever they had been, and became once more his own natural self, perhaps even more cheerful, since it was now not so much the gayety of a boy as the composed, equable serenity of ...
— A Noble Life • Dinah Maria Mulock Craik

... started, and then turned piteously from them; but when they were done she tried to smile, and said, with forced gayety, that she saw they were guisers, and it was a fine night, and would they take a chair. The male stranger did so at once, but the female said, rather anxiously: "You are sure as you don't know who we is?" Their hostess shook her head, and then he of the poker offered her three ...
— Sentimental Tommy - The Story of His Boyhood • J. M. Barrie

... for a moment, while he felt again as he had felt at Laura Wilde's, not only her fascination—her personal radiance—but the conviction that she carried at heart a deep disgust, a heavy disenchantment, which her ostentatious gayety could not conceal. Even her beauty gave back to him a suggestion of insincerity, and he wondered if the brightness of her hair and of her mouth was as artificial as her brilliant manner. It was magnificent, but, after all, it ...
— The Wheel of Life • Ellen Anderson Gholson Glasgow

... two hours later. His face was red, his mustaches were jauntily curled, a smile of good-humored gayety beamed on his lips. He was wearing a pair of stout high boots, a short jacket, and leather breeches, and he looked like a sportsman. His whole costume was worn, but strong and very becoming to him, making him look ...
— Creatures That Once Were Men • Maxim Gorky

... week of the beautiful weather that midsummer brings, and the days passed full of gayety. Both Archdale and his mother did everything for the enjoyment of their guests. They showed them the most beautiful views on shore, and by sailing took them to places of interest not to be reached by land, while dinner-parties and garden-parties made them acquainted with ...
— The Bay State Monthly, Volume 3, No. 1 • Various

... Paris takes its apéritif the “4 z’Arts” became the meeting-place of the painters, poets, and writers of the day. Montmartre gradually replaced the old Latin Quarter; it is there to-day that one must seek for the gayety and humor, the pathos ...
— The Ways of Men • Eliot Gregory

... sidewalk are lined with groups of men and women playing cards and dice and drinking gin and bitters, vermouth or absinthe. There is an air of happiness and life about Hanoi which is typically Parisian and even during war time it is a city of gayety. An immense theater stands in the center of the town, but has not been opened since the ...
— Camps and Trails in China - A Narrative of Exploration, Adventure, and Sport in Little-Known China • Roy Chapman Andrews and Yvette Borup Andrews

... but then an irresistible desire to laugh shone in her eyes, passed like a slight shiver over her delicate cheeks, made her upper lip curl and her nostrils dilate, and at last a clear, bright burst of mirth came from her lips, a torrent of gayety which was lively and sonorous as the song of a bird. She repeated, with little mischievous exclamations which issued from between her white teeth, and hurt Parent as much as a bite would have done: "Ha!... ha!... ha!... ha! she beat ... she beat ... my husband ... ha!... ha! ha!... ...
— The Works of Guy de Maupassant, Volume II (of 8) • Guy de Maupassant

... runs so noisily over pebbles and rocks that it seems to be conversing with them and with the trees of the neighboring forest. In proportion as they had felt themselves alone on the road from Rome to Otricoli, they now felt themselves compassed about with the life, the fecundity, the gayety ...
— Life of St. Francis of Assisi • Paul Sabatier

... settled down in the trenches before Santiago, smuggled musical instruments—guitars, banjos, mouth organs, and what not—appeared among the negro troops as if by magic, and they were ever in use. It was at once a scene of cheerfulness and gayety, and the officers had their usual trouble in making the men go to sleep instead of spending the night in talking, singing, and gaming. In the peaceful camp of the Third Alabama, in that state, the scenes were similar. There was always "a steady hum of laughter and talk, dance, song, shout, and ...
— The Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, 1995, Memorial Issue • Various

... no sooner out of Mrs. Benton's mouth than she regretted them. At the name of "mother" Mrs. Trent's forced gayety vanished, and she lifted her eyes to her companion's ...
— Jessica, the Heiress • Evelyn Raymond

... hand, as was, perhaps, naturally to be expected of a young, beautiful, and impulsive woman suddenly raised to so conspicuous a position, and to the possession of such unbounded wealth and power, expended her royal revenues in plans of personal display, and in scenes of festivity, gayety, and enjoyment. She adorned her palaces, built magnificent barges for pleasure excursions on the Nile, and expended enormous sums for dress, for equipages, and for sumptuous entertainments. In fact, so lavish were her expenditures for these and similar purposes during ...
— Cleopatra • Jacob Abbott

... time I left Wentworth's roof I had arranged to share with two Catholic friends a suite of rooms at a private hotel in Dover Street. Both belonged to well-known Catholic families, and had ready access to the world of Catholic gayety, especially in so far as this was represented by balls. One of them, through his skill as a dancer and his buoyant vivacity in conversation, was in much wider request. By the agency of Augustus Savile and others—of "social fairies" (as Lord ...
— Memoirs of Life and Literature • W. H. Mallock

... the most moderate indulgence in alcohol disturbs the association of ideas, and renders them more superficial, without the subject being aware of it. This slight degree of alcoholic narcosis causes in man a temporary feeling of pleasure and gayety to which he soon becomes accustomed. In this way there is created in him a desire for more, too ...
— The Sexual Question - A Scientific, psychological, hygienic and sociological study • August Forel

... encounter of wits as essential to the idea of the future life of those whom we thus deprive of half their faculties and then call BLESSED! There are not a few who, even in this life, seem to be preparing themselves for that smileless eternity to which they look forward, by banishing all gayety from their hearts and all joyousness from their countenances. I meet one such in the street not unfrequently, a person of intelligence and education, but who gives me (and all that he passes) such a rayless and chilling look of recognition,—something ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)

... school with a Latin speech. After dinner there is a regatta among the boys, which is one of the characteristic and pleasing old customs. All the fashionables of London who have sons at Eton come down to witness their happiness, and the river bank is full of gayety. The evening finished with the most beautiful fireworks I ever saw, which lighted up the Castle behind and were reflected in the Thames below, while the glancing oars of the young boatmen, and the ...
— Letters from England 1846-1849 • Elizabeth Davis Bancroft (Mrs. George Bancroft)

... while he turned to Effie or some other fair-faced lass? Ah, it seemed to me then in a rebellious heart that my lot was bitter. And fearful that my sorrow would abroad, I broke into a desperation of gayety till my mother's hand was on my arm. But all the while, Angus had been by, perplexed shadows creeping over his brow;—and in fresh terror lest my hidden woe should rise and look him in the face, all my mother's pride itself shivered through ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 11, No. 63, January, 1863 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various

... women enjoy a great freedom of intercourse with the other sex, without regard to the law of Mahomet. The favourite daughter of the Khan was even more independent than usual. By her side alone he forgot his cares and disappointments; by her side alone his eye met a smile, and his heart a gleam of gayety. When the elders of Avar discussed in a circle the affairs of their mountain politics, or gave their judgment on right or wrong; when, surrounded by his household, he related stories of past forays, or planned fresh expeditions, she would fly to ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - April 1843 • Various

... everything passed off as usual. They were both general favorites, and as a matter of fact few people remarked that Flaxen's dress was not good enough. She certainly forgot all about it, so complete was her absorption in the gayety of the evening. ...
— A Little Norsk; Or, Ol' Pap's Flaxen • Hamlin Garland

... but what an earthly coronet well lined with ermine might symbolize and ensure. Meanwhile weeks flew by; while Eleanor studied the Bible and sought for light in her solitary hours at night, and joined in all Mr. Carlisle's plans of gayety by day. September and October were both gone. November's short days begun. And when the days should be at the shortest—"Then," thought Eleanor, "my fate will be settled. Mr. Carlisle will have me; and I can never disobey ...
— The Old Helmet, Volume I • Susan Warner

... can joke when one is well, even in old age; but in sickness one's gayety falters to grief; and that which seemed small looks large; and the ...
— The Woodlanders • Thomas Hardy

... the curious comedy traits with cunning and savage ferocity. In some of their lighter moods and pilfering habits, they add to the gayety of life. ...
— Hunting with the Bow and Arrow • Saxton Pope

... heroine: "With her it was lightly come and lightly go and never come back again. . . . Sheer gayety of heart and genial good fellowship, the difficulty of saying nay to earnest pleading . . . so little did she know of love's heartaches and raptures and torments and clingings and jealousies," etc. A woman who had never been in love, yet confessed to criminal intimacy with ...
— Volume 1 of Brann The Iconoclast • William Cowper Brann

... was never married. The Odes of Horace want the higher inspirations of lyric verse. His amatory verses are exquisitely graceful, but they have no strong ardor, no deep tenderness, nor even much light and joyous gayety; but as works of refined art, of the most skillful felicities of language and of measure, of translucent expression, and of agreeable images embodied in words which imprint themselves indelibly on the memory, ...
— A Smaller History of Rome • William Smith and Eugene Lawrence

... she seemed laboriously etching lines into the faces before her—Manette and Julien, Julien and Manette; and there came into her eyes the youth and light and gayety of the days when Julien came of an afternoon and the riverside rang with laughter—the dearest, lightest days ...
— Northern Lights • Gilbert Parker

... assemblage would have disappointed the reader; for while the court was numerously represented, with every functionary in his utmost splendor of decoration, it was outnumbered by the brethren of the Holy Orders, whose gowns, for the most part of gray and black material unrelieved by gayety in color, imparted a sombreness to the scene which the ample light of the chamber could not entirely dissipate, assisted though it was by refractions in plenitude from heads bald ...
— The Prince of India - Or - Why Constantinople Fell - Volume 2 • Lew. Wallace

... around here all his life apparently. Think of that,—to have lived around here all one's life! I, to be sure, am here now; but then, have I not been—' And here followed a revery of remembrances, that glittering network of gayety and folly which only young hearts can weave, the network around whose border is written in a thousand hues, 'Rejoice, young man, in thy youth, for it ...
— Castle Nowhere • Constance Fenimore Woolson

... his fervid imagination, easily builds for himself a whole edifice of local and personal grievances on the pattern of the supposed national one. Was Ireland once a rich and splendid country? So was every town and neighborhood once full of gayety and prosperity, when "the family" lived at home and did not travel or spend the season in London. Full of extravagant reverence for birth and rank, it is always, in the Irishman's mind, not his fault, nor that of his compeers of the working and middle classes, that trade and agriculture ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 103, May, 1866 • Various

... Don Luis, with forced gayety, as he thrust a hand under the arms of Tom and Harry. "Come, we will have our ride and our talk. We will be back here in half an hour and then we shall hear this affair ...
— The Young Engineers in Mexico • H. Irving Hancock

... he saw the black, uneasy night give way to the coming day. Haggard and faint he arose from the couch to watch the approach of the sun that is indifferent to wealth and poverty, to gayety and dejection. From far off in the gray light there came the sound of a five o'clock bell. A little later the shrieks of factory whistles were borne to his ears, muffled by distance but pregnant with the importance of a new day of toil. They were calling him, with all poor men, to ...
— Brewster's Millions • George Barr McCutcheon

... have said more; but he put her away with affected gayety, and said he was coming down immediately,—and he did. But ...
— Bart Ridgeley - A Story of Northern Ohio • A. G. Riddle

... the house doing things neatly and in order, as their grandmothers did before them, ought to be balanced by hearty exercise in the fresh air, by seasons of mirth, and by freedom from restraint. The out-of-door exercise, the gayety, the deliverance from tasks, are quite as necessary for older girls as for ...
— Hold Up Your Heads, Girls! • Annie H. Ryder

... in impenetrable gloom, remained A blighting shadow o'er the village spread. But youthful spirits are invincible, Nor fear nor superstition long can quell The bubbling flow of that perennial well; And so the youths and maidens soon regained The wonted gayety that late had fled. All save Winona, in whose face and mien, Unto the careless eye, no change was seen; But one that noted might sometimes espy A furtive fear that shot across her eye, As in a forest, 'thwart some bit of blue, Darts a rare bird that shuns the hunter's ...
— Indian Legends of Minnesota • Various

... such proceedings as these the citizens were struck with alarm, and the appearance of the city was changed. In place of that extreme gayety and dissipation,[157] to which long tranquillity[158] had given rise, a sudden gloom spread over all classes; they became anxious and agitated; they felt secure neither in any place, nor with any person; they were not at war, yet enjoyed no peace; each measured the public danger ...
— Conspiracy of Catiline and The Jurgurthine War • Sallust

... gave such interest to the rocky shore and dark woods, and the few houses which seemed to be securely wedged and tree-nailed in among the ledges by the Landing. These houses made the most of their seaward view, and there was a gayety and determined floweriness in their bits of garden ground; the small-paned high windows in the peaks of their steep gables were like knowing eyes that watched the harbor and the far sea-line beyond, or looked northward all along the shore and its background ...
— The Country of the Pointed Firs • Sarah Orne Jewett

... distinguished beauty definite in its appeal; before she was seven-teen she had her little reputation for it; she moved easily into a circle higher than even her father had ever known. She was witty, young, lovely, and in this happier atmosphere her natural gayety and generosity might well develop. She went about continually, and every year the circle of her friends was widened by ...
— The Heart of Rachael • Kathleen Norris

... Lamartine's Saleve aux flancs azures; we dined there, and did not return till nightfall." They were days devoted to debauches platoniciennes, to "the free exchange of ideas, the free play of fancy and of gayety. Amiel was not one of the original members of these Thursday parties; but whenever he joined us we regarded it as a fete-day. In serious discussion he was a master of the unexpected, and his energy, ...
— Amiel's Journal • Mrs. Humphry Ward

... Olivia's anguish was still greater. After any of these interviews between her lovers, of which there were several, she usually retired to solitude, and there indulged her grief. It was in such a situation I found her one evening, after she had been for some time supporting a fictitious gayety.—'You now see, my child,' said I, 'that your confidence in Mr Thornhill's passion was all a dream: he permits the rivalry of another, every way his inferior, though he knows it lies in his power to secure you to himself by a candid declaration.'—'Yes, pappa,' returned she, ...
— The Vicar of Wakefield • Oliver Goldsmith

... were all deserted. It was at this hour that the inn garden was full. The gayety and laughter overflowed the walls. Everyone talked at once; the orders were like a rattle of artillery—painting for hours in the open air gives a fine edge to appetite, and patience is never the true ...
— In and Out of Three Normady Inns • Anna Bowman Dodd

... With affected gayety she gave Bailey a piece of money, and again implored him to be gone. Her entreaty was so earnest, that the boy had not the heart to stay there. But he stopped at the bottom of ...
— Life And Adventures Of Martin Chuzzlewit • Charles Dickens

... — N. cheerfulness &c. adj.; geniality, gayety, l'allegro[Fr], cheer, good humor, spirits; high spirits, animal spirits, flow of spirits; glee, high glee, light heart; sunshine of the mind, sunshine of the breast; gaiete de coeur[Fr], bon naturel[Fr]. liveliness &c. adj.; life, alacrity, vivacity, animation, allegresse[obs3]; jocundity, ...
— Roget's Thesaurus

... "inconsiderately and precipitately," to enter a cloister. His friends "instinctively felt he was not qualified or fitted for the sublime vocation to which he aspired, and they accordingly used all their powers to dissuade him from the course he had chosen. All their efforts were fruitless, and from the gayety and frolic of the banquet" which he had given his fellow-students as a farewell party "he went to the monastery." He was so reckless that he took this step even without the consent of his parents. "He knew little about ...
— Luther Examined and Reexamined - A Review of Catholic Criticism and a Plea for Revaluation • W. H. T. Dau

... a charm that depended less on feature than on expression; a lover of music, books, and a quiet life. She brought him a small dowry by which the chateau was restored to comfort, and bore him two children, a boy and a girl, by whom it was enlivened with natural gayety. The next twenty years were the happiest that Albert d'Azan and his wife ever saw. The grand avenue of beeches became to them the unconscious symbol of something settled and serene, ...
— The Valley of Vision • Henry Van Dyke

... things. She was bright enough to comprehend his meaning, if she chose. Would she? She gave no sign, if she did, as she unrolled the package and placed its contents—a small flag of Ireland and its mate, in size, of the United States—behind the kitchen clock, where the blended colors made a bit of gayety upon ...
— Reels and Spindles - A Story of Mill Life • Evelyn Raymond

... and is unpleasantly surprised; speaks with forced gayety] Yes, you are a fine partner—running away ...
— Plays by August Strindberg, Second series • August Strindberg

... enough. The truth is, there's nothing really gay any more. There's too much money. Money suffocates gayety." ...
— The Grain Of Dust - A Novel • David Graham Phillips

... of summer, such as seem to sprout up daily and scatter enough seeds to insure an equal good time on the morrow, had given the scouts such a round of gayety, that a full week dashed by before they could again settle down to work on ...
— The Girl Scouts at Sea Crest - The Wig Wag Rescue • Lillian Garis

... very glad to meet his schoolmate and playfellow, Ben, who by his gayety, spiced though it was with roguery, had made himself a ...
— Paul Prescott's Charge • Horatio Alger

... heartlessness of society. She had envied him his genius,—the musical talent that made him independent of the world, of the love of men and women. He could never appreciate what it was to be alone in the world, to find one's higher feelings misunderstood, to be obliged to pass from one gayety to another, to be dissatisfied with the superficiality of life, and yet to find no relief;—all this ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. XII. July, 1863, No. LXIX. - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various

... brave pretense of gayety. With alacrity she responded to Verinder's challenge of a bet on the relative sizes of their catches. But as soon as the rest were out of sight she sat down in a shady spot and fell ...
— The Highgrader • William MacLeod Raine

... powdered wife, and speculation as to how she was best cooked, is the first instance we have been able to find of what is called "American humor," and Captain Smith has the honor of being the first of the "American humorists" who have handled subjects of this kind with such pleasing gayety. ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner

... society of the crippled wit, buffoon, and poet, who was coarse, profane, ungodly, and physically an unsightly wreck. In this society, which the burlesque poet amused by his inexhaustible wit and fancy, and his frank, Gallic gayety, she showed an infinite amount of tact and soon made his salon the most prominent social centre of Paris. There, Scarron, never tolerated a stupid person, no matter of what blood ...
— Women of Modern France - Woman In All Ages And In All Countries • Hugo P. Thieme

... easy life, which these rehearsals had given her, made the real hardship and loneliness of her present life all the more irksome, and that night she felt as if she could not bear it much longer. She longed with all a girl's love of gayety to go to the Kirmess, and no one thought to invite her. She could not go alone even if she yielded to temptation and spent her own money. Laura would have to hire a carriage if she ventured to try it; so it was impossible, for six or seven ...
— A Garland for Girls • Louisa May Alcott

... believe that it is only because your happiness is far more precious to me than my own, that I have decided to write you this letter. When you first told me that you loved me, you said, and you have often said so since then, that it was my "brightness and gayety" that attracted you. I knew there was something underneath my gayety better worth your love, and was glad I could give you more than you asked for. I knew I was not a mere thoughtless, laughing girl, but that I had a heart as wide ...
— Stepping Heavenward • Mrs. E. Prentiss

... grow in grace, yet gayety Would have no place except for me; I greet the gardener with a grin, E'en though I lie the grave within. I'm with the King, yet shun the Queen; I walk in grey, ah! yes in green; I gleam in gold, yet live in gloom, And at a wedding ...
— Mother Truth's Melodies - Common Sense For Children • Mrs. E. P. Miller

... Spanish girl. Even in her bearing and expression you could discover more or less of this union of different races. There was shyness and frankness; there was mistrust and confidence; there was sentimentality and gayety. In short, Clara Munoz Garcia Van Diemen was a handsome and interesting ...
— Overland • John William De Forest

... tall forest trees caroled as gayly as if no storm-cloud were hovering near. At an early hour Mr. Carrollton had arisen, thinking, as he looked forth from his window, "She will tell me all to-day," and smiling as he thought how easy and pleasant would be the task of winning her back to her olden gayety. Madam Conway, too, was unusually excited, and very anxiously she listened for the first sound of Maggie's footsteps ...
— Maggie Miller • Mary J. Holmes

... Jeoffry with a shout of welcome, so they greeted the young newcomer, but in his reception there was more enthusiasm and laughter, as if there were some special cause for gayety in the mere sight ...
— His Grace of Osmonde • Frances Hodgson Burnett

... charming they instinctively depended upon Sempland. There was something thoroughly attractive in Sempland, and Fanny Glen unconsciously fell under the spell of his strong personality. The lasting impression which the gayety and passionate abandon of Lacy could not make, Sempland had effected, and the girl was already powerfully ...
— A Little Traitor to the South - A War Time Comedy With a Tragic Interlude • Cyrus Townsend Brady

... squire, who knew the effort it cost her, fell readily into her mood of forced gayety until the simulated feeling became a real one; and they entered Dalton neck and neck together, after ...
— The Squire of Sandal-Side - A Pastoral Romance • Amelia Edith Huddleston Barr

... returned, and was somewhat surprised to find his royal friend playing the part of concierge. "It was not rare to meet in this atelier the great men of finance, who counted themselves among his most passionate admirers." Here was conversation, not without gayety, but without loud laughter or revelry. Scheffer was very fond of music of the highest order. He was a generous patron of musicians, and loved to listen to music while he was engaged in painting. His friends sometimes held an extemporaneous ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 4, No. 23, September, 1859 • Various

... me a new world — All is gayety, good-humour, and diversion. The eye is continually entertained with the splendour of dress and equipage; and the ear with the sound of coaches, chairs, and other carriages. The merry bells ring round, from morn till night. Then ...
— The Expedition of Humphry Clinker • Tobias Smollett

... and chattering with his usual gayety, Hannah, who had long owed a grudge both to mistress and man, was tempted to convey the letter from Tom's pocket, where it was but half deposited, into her own. Her only motive was to vex and disappoint those ...
— Jane Talbot • Charles Brockden Brown

... nothing of it. This was the last evening that she would breathe the same air with him, or gaze on the starry sky and the deep sea; an eternal night, without a thought or a dream, awaited her: she had no soul and now she could never win one. All was joy and gayety on board ship till long after midnight; she laughed and danced with the rest, while the thoughts of death were in her heart. The prince kissed his beautiful bride, while she played with his raven hair, till they went arm-in-arm to rest in the splendid tent. Then all became still on board ...
— Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen • Hans Christian Andersen

... to Giovanni to be two of him that night. One self was utterly absorbed in the performance, intent on making every speech tell, every song win its meed of applause and laughter, every little figure act with the spirit and gayety of life. The other self hovered somewhere in the air among the rafters of the hall, critically watching the whole scene. He remembered a sensation something like it when he and Cimarron had crossed a mountain torrent in Spain on a log a hundred ...
— Masters of the Guild • L. Lamprey

... to us two genii as companions in our life in this lower world. The one, amiable and of good companionship, shortens the troubles of the journey by the gayety of its plays. It makes the chains of necessity light to us, and leads us amidst joy and laughter, to the most perilous spots, where we must act as pure spirits and strip ourselves of all that is body, on the knowledge of the true and the practice of duty. Once when we are there, it abandons ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller

... most longed to hear, repeated the name and strove to call attention to his gesticulating comrades on the upper deck; but he was deaf to both. Eagerly, anxiously, incredulously he was searching along that crowded rail, and all on a sudden he saw her. Yes, there she stood, all gayety, grace and animation, stylishly gowned and fairly burdened with roses; and it was right at him she was gazing, nodding, smiling, all sweetness, all confiding, trusting joy; with just a little of triumph, too, and a tinge ...
— Found in the Philippines - The Story of a Woman's Letters • Charles King

... skipper, issued his orders with the true Marblehead twang; Moor kept up a fire of pun-provoking raillery; Warwick sung like a jovial giant; while the Kelpie danced over the water as if inspired with the universal gayety, and the very ripples seemed to laugh as ...
— Moods • Louisa May Alcott

... the judicial circuits of Illinois in which Lincoln had an extensive though not very lucrative practice gives some graphic and interesting reminiscences. "The terms of the court were held quarterly and usually lasted about two weeks. They were always seasons of great importance and much gayety in the little town that had the honor of being the county seat. Distinguished members of the bar from surrounding and even from distant counties, ex-judges and ex-Members of Congress, attended and were personally and many of them popularly ...
— The Every-day Life of Abraham Lincoln • Francis Fisher Browne

... worse than most vain, selfish fashionable women; and all that day, since her return from riding, haunting, remorseful thoughts of the long ago had been clinging to her, making her more anxious to leave that neighborhood for a time at least, and in scenes of gayety forget, if possible, that such things as broken vows or ...
— Aikenside • Mary J. Holmes

... years agone. Its note is easily imitated, and boys will render it so perfectly as to deceive any but the shrewdest ear. An English lady tells me its voice reminds one of children at play, and is full of gayety and happiness. It is a persistent songster, and keeps up its call from morning to night. Indeed, certain parts of Wordsworth's poem—those that refer to the bird as a mystery, a wandering, solitary voice—seem to fit our bird ...
— Birds and Poets • John Burroughs

... whiteness of a complexion tinged in the cheeks as though by the reflection of a sea-shell. Her full, dewy lips disclosed milky rows of childlike teeth within. Her eyes were of the clearest azure; but, in spite of their expression of mingled tenderness and gayety, one who could pause to lay the finger upon an imperfection, would note that something was wanting to complete their beauty;—the eyebrows were too faintly traced, and the lashes too light, though long. The low brow, straight, slender nose, the soft curve ...
— Fairy Fingers - A Novel • Anna Cora Mowatt Ritchie

... there was plenty of good fodder everywhere. At one time there had been a cow for every stall in the cowshed; and the oxshed, which was now empty, had at one time been filled with oxen. And then there was life and gayety, both in cabin and cowhouse. When the mistress opened the cowshed door she would hum and sing, and all the cows lowed with gladness ...
— The Wonderful Adventures of Nils • Selma Lagerlof

... trace from the beginning his slow rise in political and civic power. And it is a peculiar feature of the day and of Franklin's individual character that many of his reforms took their start in the gayety of social intercourse. There was nothing morose, nothing stern, in our genial philosopher. Though always temperate, his vivacity and easy politeness made him welcome in any merry company of the day. He could sing with the best of the young blades and even compose his own ditties; and one of these ...
— Benjamin Franklin • Paul Elmer More

... When they appeared at Court, the aristocracy present was indecorous in its efforts to view the dominant beauties. Lords and ladies clambered on any eminence to gaze. The crowd surged upon them, and it was with difficulty they entered their chairs because of the mob outside. The gayety of Vauxhall ...
— Some Old Time Beauties - After Portraits by the English Masters, with Embellishment and Comment • Thomson Willing

... ninety-six per cent are toiling; no one with leisure to turn the bare and cheerless cabin into a home, no old folks to sit beside the fire and hand down traditions of the past; little of careless happy childhood and dreaming youth. The dull monotony of daily toil is broken only by the gayety of the thoughtless and the Saturday trip to town. The toil, like all farm toil, is monotonous, and here there are little machinery and few tools to relieve its burdensome drudgery. But with all this, it is work in the pure open air, and this is something ...
— The Souls of Black Folk • W. E. B. Du Bois

... an air of health and gayety about him. He caressed me greatly (ME GRACIEUSA FORT); afterwards questioned me about my way of life in Vienna; and asked, if I had diverted myself well there? I told him what business had been the occasion of my journey, and that this rather ...
— History Of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. VIII. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle

... was so much gayety around that these little girls looked so real. From the side of their weather-beaten boat dragged an old fishnet. Each girl had on her head a queer half-hood, black, and from under this Nellie's brown hair fell in tangles on her bare shoulders, and Dorothy's beautiful yellow ...
— The Bobbsey Twins at the Seashore • Laura Lee Hope

... all dined together in a cheap little restaurant in Soho and were very gay, with the gayety of people who are whistling to keep their courage up. After dinner Eileen said good-bye, first to Excalibur and then to the curate. She was much more demonstrative toward the former than toward the latter, which is the ...
— Scally - The Story of a Perfect Gentleman • Ian Hay

... droll- looking dog that seemed to possess almost human intelligence. In the daily care of living things and dependent creatures that could bloom or be joyous without jarring upon her feelings, as would human mirth or gayety, her mind became wholesomely occupied part of each day; she could smile at objects which did not know, ...
— Taken Alive • E. P. Roe

... Woods, the Succession of grateful Odours, the Voice of Pleasure pouring out its Notes on every Side, with the Observation of the Gladness apparently conceived by every Animal, from the Growth of his Food, and the Clemency of the Weather, throw over the whole Earth an Air of Gayety, which is very significantly expressed by the Smile ...
— The Vanity of Human Wishes (1749) and Two Rambler papers (1750) • Samuel Johnson

... dismissal of his subject or his own preoccupation with it, had somewhat unsettled him. He cleaned his pen obtrusively, going to the window for a better light, and whistling from time to time with a demonstrative carelessness and a depressing gayety. He once broke into a murmuring, meditative chant evidently referring to the previous conversation, in its—"That's so—Yer we go—Lessons the first, boys, Yo, heave O." The rollicking marine character of this refrain, despite its utter incongruousness, apparently struck him ...
— Cressy • Bret Harte

... passionate expressions of a despair "wishing only for death," bore fitful and variable witness to her first sense of a heavier yoke than yet had galled her spirit and her pride. At other times her affectionate gayety would give evidence as trustworthy of a fearless and improvident satisfaction. They rode out in state together, and if he kept cap in hand as a subject she would snatch it from him and clap it on his head again; while in graver things she took all due ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 1-20 • Various

... they were delivered by the aspiring tradesman. His keen eye rolled quickly, and often, from the vessel to the countenance of his companion; but several moments elapsed before he saw fit to make any reply. The reckless gayety with which he had introduced himself, and which he had hitherto maintained in the discourse, was entirely superseded by a musing and abstracted air, which sufficiently proved, that, whatever levity he might betray in common, he was far from being a stranger to deep ...
— The Red Rover • James Fenimore Cooper

... his immortal masterpiece, "Don Quixote," Cervantes wrote a great number of plays which were not successful. When Cervantes speaks of his own dramatic works in his old age, his simplicity and gayety are very touching, because he was evidently deeply wounded at the ...
— Great Men and Famous Women, Vol. 7 of 8 • Charles F. (Charles Francis) Horne

... hour of intrigue I allowed to Mr. Robert Carruthers another of very delightful gayety with all of the "chiffon pinafore" ladies upon the ballroom floor. I have in my blood that gayety which led some of my ancestors to laugh and compliment each other and play piquet up even to the edge of the guillotine, and ...
— The Daredevil • Maria Thompson Daviess

... his bow, Gwendolen's better self, conscious of an ingratitude which the clear-seeing Klesmer must have penetrated, made a desperate effort to find its way above the stifling layers of egoistic disappointment and irritation. Looking at him with a glance of the old gayety, she put out her hand, and said with a smile, "If I take the wrong road, it will not be ...
— Daniel Deronda • George Eliot

... had not yet retired, and Juana blushingly admitted us. Uncle Lance jollied the old people like a robust, healthy son amusing his elders. We took seats as before around the small table, and Uncle Lance scattered the gloom of the jacal with his gayety. ...
— A Texas Matchmaker • Andy Adams

... Alice revealed again, but in clearer lines, the sickness and weariness and the hopelessness of the elder woman's face, and Ben's consideration and watchful care of her took something out of the ride. The rapture, the careless gayety, of their first ...
— Money Magic - A Novel • Hamlin Garland

... the mind to be included in the picture and that it comes to the aid of the theatrical perspective, with reference to what is indicated in the distance, or half-concealed by intervening objects); the contrast of gayety and gravity (supposing that in degree and kind they bear a proportion to each other); finally, the mixture of the dialogical and the lyrical elements (by which the poet is enabled, more or less perfectly, to transform his personages into poetical beings)—these, ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. IV • Editor-in-Chief: Kuno Francke



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