"Goldfinch" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... within a prison's gloom, I chearful sung, nor murmur'd at my doom, Where heroes bold and patriots firm could dwell, A Goldfinch in Content his note might swell; But death more gentle than the law's decree, Hath ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 17, - Issue 479, March 5, 1831 • Various
... put her off, for he told her that if during his transformation she showed the least fright he would not recover his natural form till many generations of men were under the mould. Nothing, however, would do for the lady but an exhibition of his powers; so one evening he changed himself into a goldfinch. While he was playing with her in this form a hawk caught sight of him and pursued him. The hawk dashed itself against a table and was killed; but the lady had given a loud scream at seeing her husband's danger, and neither goldfinch nor Earl did she behold again. Once ...
— The Science of Fairy Tales - An Inquiry into Fairy Mythology • Edwin Sidney Hartland
... me with your blarneyings, you siren!" he declared. "Who was it ate my goldfinch? Yes, you may well look guilty! Don't blink your eyes at me like that! I haven't forgiven you yet, and I don't think I ever shall. Ingred, old sport, are you coming to help me, or are you not? I want some one to hold ...
— A Popular Schoolgirl • Angela Brazil
... out of the cage and put in a finch, which had also been taken from the nest, but was reared far from such a machine, and he was frightened and did not reconcile himself to it for some time. I exchanged this bird for a goldfinch which had been caught after he was full grown, and his alarm at the little mill was so great that he did ...
— Myth and Science - An Essay • Tito Vignoli
... of it at the time, though I often went into the field. It was a quiet and pretty place enough; full of thickets, as I have said, where the birds built unmolested—there was generally a goldfinch's ...
— From a College Window • Arthur Christopher Benson
... and we were relieved from the trouble of watching for rocks, we saw by the flitting clouds, by the first russet tinge on the hills, by the rushing river, the cottages on shore, and the shore itself, so coolly fresh and shining with dew, and later in the day, by the hue of the grape-vine, the goldfinch on the willow, the flickers flying in flocks, and when we passed near enough to the shore, as we fancied, by the faces of men, that the Fall had commenced. The cottages looked more snug and comfortable, and their inhabitants were seen only for a moment, and then went ...
— A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers • Henry David Thoreau
... from the journey I was quite broken-hearted to find my beautiful goldfinch, which used to draw its water so prettily with an ivory cup and little chain, dead in its cage. The odious wretches of servants, to whose care I trusted it, let it die of hunger. My heart is deeply pained as I write this, seventy ...
— Personal Recollections, from Early Life to Old Age, of Mary Somerville • Mary Somerville
... meeting her. Well, there's a stranger story than that about the girl with long fair hair in the next carriage. You can see her now, in a pink bonnet, drinking sherry and soda water. It is supposed that she is old Goldfinch's daughter, and that he won't give her a farthing; but I know somebody who knows his lawyer, and that girl will have half a million, if she don't drink herself to death before old Goldfinch takes his departure from this wicked world. ...
— Kate Coventry - An Autobiography • G. J. Whyte-Melville
... my mother in the drawing room and entreating her to comply with my wish to enter the Navy, she was so intent on listening to my importunities and her patchwork that she did not observe that the cat was running away with her favourite goldfinch; the cat, with the poor bird in its mouth, was near the door, waiting to escape. Seeing what had happened, I immediately ran to the poor little bird's assistance, but, alas! too late, as the cruel animal had torn off one ...
— A Sailor of King George • Frederick Hoffman |
