"Menial" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... Although no riches I amass'd; A menial I disdain'd to be, An' keep my vow unto the last. I have ceased to labour in the lan', Since e'er I noticed to my wife, That the idle and contented man Endureth to ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel , Volume I. - The Songs of Scotland of the past half century • Various
... Thou has beheld me other than I am. Hast thou not seen my morning chambers filled With sceptred slaves, who waited to salute me? With eastern monarchs, who forgot the sun, To worship my uprising?—menial kings Ran coursing up and down my palace-yard, Stood silent in my presence, watched my eyes, And, at my least command, all started out, Like ...
— All for Love • John Dryden
... than your neighbour? You have lost your all—no, no, say not so; your neighbour has lost houses and lands, but his health has gone also; and while you are robust, he lies on the uneasy pillow of sickness, and watches some faithful menial prepare his scanty meal, and then waits till a trusty hand bears the food to his ...
— Words of Cheer for the Tempted, the Toiling, and the Sorrowing • T. S. Arthur
... not admit of interference, were seated by themselves, and ministered to by their squires and pages, to whom such menial services were not accounted disgraceful, but, on the contrary, a proper step of their education. The number of those distinguished persons seated upon the present occasion at the table of dais, as it was called, (in virtue of ...
— Waverley Volume XII • Sir Walter Scott
... escaped slaves were living in Northern communities. Some of them had acquired homes, had educated their children, and in some States had become citizens and voters. Already social pariahs, restricted generally to menial labor, bearing the burdens of poverty and prejudice, they now had thrust before them the spectre of the kidnapper, the slave-catcher with his affidavit, and the United States [Supreme] Court, which was made by this ...
— Frederick Douglass - A Biography • Charles Waddell Chesnutt
... wise, through five dreary years, Mary Turner lived. Nine hours daily, she stood behind a counter. She spent her other waking hours in obligatory menial labors: cooking her own scant meals over the gas; washing and ironing, for the sake of that neat appearance which was required of her by those in authority at the Emporium—yet, more especially, necessary for her own self-respect. With a mind keen ...
— Within the Law - From the Play of Bayard Veiller • Marvin Dana
... should think, as a menial slave, which I understand to be thy condition," replied the soldier. "But I have understood from him, that the masters of this idle science make it their business to substitute, in their argumentations, mere words instead of ideas; ...
— Waverley Volume XII • Sir Walter Scott
... complied; and this son of an English duke, who, by the death of an elder brother, became in time a duke himself, went on a service that among gentlemen of the land would be deemed nearly menial, with as much alacrity as if he felt honoured by the request. It was by a training like this, that England came, in time, to possess a marine that has achieved so many memorable deeds; since it taught those who were destined ...
— The Two Admirals • J. Fenimore Cooper
... topic of this poor menial's tragic history, it may be as well to trace the progress of the romantic legend, as it blossomed after the death of the Man, whose Mask was not of iron, but of black velvet. Later we shall show how the legend struck root ...
— The Lock and Key Library/Real Life #2 • Julian Hawthorne
... those menial activities had been to clean the animal cages. And there Shann Lantee had found something new, something so absorbing that most of the tiring dull labor had ceased to exist except as tasks to finish before he could return to the fascination of the ...
— Storm Over Warlock • Andre Norton
... better survive their misfortune in quiet resignation. Those branded in the face were made gate-keepers, so that their livelihood was perpetually marked out for them. It is sufficiently obvious why the castrated were specially charged with the duty of serving females in a menial capacity. One name for eunuch is "cleanse man," and it is explained by a very old commentator that the duty of these functionaries was to sweep and cleanse the court; but it is perhaps as likely that the original idea was really "purified man," or man deprived ...
— Ancient China Simplified • Edward Harper Parker
... queen Don Garcia bore his complaint and his petition: "Oh, my mother, wouldst thou see me dishonored by a menial? Am I not thine only son, the rightful heir of Arragon, Castile, and Navarre? who may command here, if I may not? Assert my authority, then, and order the false Pedro Sese that he give ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 2, No. 12, May, 1851. • Various
... of policy it deserves to be remarked, that however it might strengthen the personal influence of the sovereign to enroll amongst the menial servants of the crown gentlemen of influence and property, it is chiefly perhaps to this practice that we ought to impute that baseness of servility which infected, with scarcely one honorable exception, the public characters of the reign ...
— Memoirs of the Court of Queen Elizabeth • Lucy Aikin
... of the decaying monarchy. At first they were only robbers. They soon rose to the dignity of conquerors. Half the provinces of the empire were turned into Mahratta principalities. Freebooters, sprung from low castes, and accustomed to menial employments, became mighty Rajahs. The Bonslas, at the head of a band of plunderers, occupied the vast region of Berar. The Guicowar, which is, being interpreted, the Herdsman, founded that dynasty which still reigns in Guzerat. The houses of Scindia and Holkar waxed great ...
— Critical and Historical Essays, Volume III (of 3) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... he, whilst the task he prest, A purer spirit warmed the stripling's breast, Whose opening soul, by kingly pride inspired, Disdained the toil a menial slave required; The royal branch on high its foliage flung, And showed the lofty ...
— Persian Literature, Volume 1,Comprising The Shah Nameh, The - Rubaiyat, The Divan, and The Gulistan • Anonymous
... their inheritance, and their enemies were mostly driven out of the land, but in their midst ever dwelt the Gibeonites, safe from molestation, though the menial services of the tabernacle were performed by them, because of the deceit by which they purchased their lives, and they were contented to be thus reduced to perpetual bondage so they might escape ...
— Mrs Whittelsey's Magazine for Mothers and Daughters - Volume 3 • Various
... was still more frequent. It often meant that a family, noble and opulent to-day, saw all its members handed over to-morrow to be the serfs or slaves of some uji in whose be they were enrolled to serve thenceforth, themselves and their children, through all generations in some menial position,—it might be as sepulchre-guards, it ...
— A History of the Japanese People - From the Earliest Times to the End of the Meiji Era • Frank Brinkley and Dairoku Kikuchi
... intimated more than once that the higher training of Negroes has resulted in sending into the world of work, men who could find nothing to do suitable to their talents. Now and then there comes a rumor of a colored college man working at menial service, etc. Fortunately, returns as to occupations of college-bred Negroes, gathered by the Atlanta conference, are quite full—nearly sixty per cent. of the total ...
— The Negro Problem • Booker T. Washington, et al.
... tender, kind, and true. Her dames were fair of form and face, With charm of wit and gentle grace, With modest raiment simply neat, And winning manners soft and sweet. The twice-born sages, whose delight Was Scripture's page and holy rite, Their calm and settled course pursued, Nor sought the menial multitude. In many a Scripture each was versed, And each the flame of worship nursed, And gave with lavish hand. Each paid to Heaven the offerings due, And none was godless or untrue In all that holy band. To Brahmans, as the laws ordain, The Warrior caste were ever fain The reverence ...
— The Ramayana • VALMIKI
... capital and labor, 'which makes it so difficult to maintain free institutions in all wealthy and highly civilized nations where such institutions as ours do not exist.' In all slaveholding States, true policy dictates that the superior race should direct, and the inferior perform all menial service. Competition between the white and black man for this service, may not disturb Northern sensibility, but it does not exactly suit our latitude." South Carolina House Journal, 1856, p. 36; Cluskey, Political Text-Book, 14 ...
— The Suppression of the African Slave Trade to the United States of America - 1638-1870 • W. E. B. Du Bois
... "Offer these vows to God, to him well due; To him thy churches build, thine altars rear." Discoursing so, together wend the two, 'Mid barons bold, that king and cavalier. The Nubian prince commands the menial crew Forthwith to bring the hospitable cheer; And hopes that now the foul, rapacious band, Will not dare snatch the victual ...
— Orlando Furioso • Lodovico Ariosto
... was indeed hurt at being put to menial employment, or whether he simply felt it an imposition to require him to carry a pile of boards and three sturdy lads in addition, it is impossible to say. At all events, he refused ...
— Apples, Ripe and Rosy, Sir • Mary Catherine Crowley
... boy himself. What consideration had been offered for his passage he did not know; he only remembered that he had been told "to make himself handy." This he had done cheerfully, if at times with the unskillfulness of a novice; but it was not a peculiar or a menial task in a company where all took part in manual labor, and where existence seemed to him to bear the charm of a prolonged picnic. Neither was he subjected to any difference of affection or treatment from Mrs. Silsbee, the mother of ...
— A Waif of the Plains • Bret Harte
... Yuen-min-yuen, we were precluded from further complaint. Had we refused those that were considered sufficient for a minister of state, the man might have thought that nothing less than the Emperor's own would have satisfied us. If the menial servants of his Britannic Majesty's Ministers were no better lodged than the ministers themselves of his Chinese Majesty, they would be apt to think themselves very ill used. We accepted them, however, such as they ...
— Travels in China, Containing Descriptions, Observations, and Comparisons, Made and Collected in the Course of a Short Residence at the Imperial Palace of Yuen-Min-Yuen, and on a Subsequent Journey thr • John Barrow
... alone, and then pulled a string by which communication was made between his room and that in which the clergyman sat. It was not a vulgar bell, which would have been injurious to the reverence and dignity of a clerical friend, as savouring of a menial's task work, nor was it a pipe for oral communication, which is undignified, as requiring a man to stoop and put his mouth to it,—but an arrangement by which a light tap was made against the wall so that the inhabitant of the ...
— Marion Fay • Anthony Trollope
... arts, as painting and writing, or become traders or husbandmen. Consequently they sometimes grow rich, and it will also sometimes happen that Brahmans become poor. That fact works its usual consequence, and rich Sudras sometimes employ poor Brahmans in menial occupations. ...
— Bulfinch's Mythology • Thomas Bulfinch
... no more than natural, I suppose, (with a sneering laugh,) that I should wait, and long, and hunger, for the love that you took only as your right. So I waited, and to-day I triumph in the thought that Deane Phelps' petted wife is a dependent upon my bounty, a menial in the house where I reign supreme, and which knows no law but my will. I have forgotten how to love, but each day (and I have conned the lesson well) I learn better ...
— Clemence - The Schoolmistress of Waveland • Retta Babcock
... studies in this field would seem to point them out for the work of rescuing these literary treasures from a fate as bad as that which befell those plays which perished at the hands of Warburton's "accursed menial." The present play has some remarkable features in it. It is taken from contemporary history (the only one as far as we know of that class in which Massinger was engaged). It was written almost immediately after the events it describes. These events took place in the country ...
— A Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. II • Various
... catch Fitzalan before he went out to lunch. And twenty minutes after making this decision she was sitting in the anteroom of a suite of theatrical offices in the Empire Theater building. The girl in attendance had, as usual, all the airs little people assume when they are in close, if menial, relations with a person who, being important to them, therefore fills their whole small horizon. She deigned to take in Susan's name and the letter. Susan seated herself at the long table and with the seeming of calmness that always veiled her in her hours ...
— Susan Lenox: Her Fall and Rise • David Graham Phillips
... by the allowance made for us, his two pupils, still, in a great town, and with so large a family, it left him little room for luxuries. Consequently, he never had more than two servants, and at times only one. Upon this plea rose the scheme of the mother for employing these two young girls in menial offices of the household economy. One reason for that was, that she thus indulged her dislike for them, which she took no pains to conceal; and thus, also, she withdrew them from the notice of strangers. ...
— Autobiographic Sketches • Thomas de Quincey
... however, but on account of the profound state of ignorance in which their elementary schooling has left them, leading them to the misapprehension that, from the standpoint of culture, they are as good as anybody and certainly above their menial position. ...
— The Curse of Education • Harold E. Gorst
... of the local freight train on the previous evening, he entered Hod Burrage's door as he had entered the doors of trades-places all his life. To him, Hod Burrage was not a personality, but a menial existing for the sole purpose of waiting upon and attending to the wants of him, Bill Carmody. The others—the old men, and the crippled ones, and the hard-handed grubbers of stumps, who sat about in faded mackinaws and patched ...
— The Promise - A Tale of the Great Northwest • James B. Hendryx
... of the records of courage, devotion, and self-sacrifice on the part of these women, who were generally of high birth, but gave themselves to poverty and the most menial offices, and left names which have perpetuated the sanctity of their order, and come down to the present day as types ...
— Memories of Jane Cunningham Croly, "Jenny June" • Various
... fallen upon Haman. He foreboded his doom. He was humbled, disappointed, degraded, disgraced. He had been paraded, before the multitudes, the menial of the Jew. He had been forced to confer on the man he hated the very honours his soul most coveted. "And Haman hasted to his house mourning and having his head covered." And he told his wife and the friends whom he had gathered to consult upon the ...
— Notable Women of Olden Time • Anonymous
... belonged to a totally different class from that in which Mr. and Mrs. Jocelyn had their origin, and prejudices die hard, even among people who are intelligent, and, in most respects, admirable. To Mrs. Jocelyn and her daughters work was infinitely preferable to dependence, but it was nevertheless menial and undignified because of its almost involuntary and hereditary association with a race of bond-servants. He is superficial indeed in his estimate of character who thinks that people can change their views and feelings in response to a brief demonstration of the essential ...
— Without a Home • E. P. Roe
... States. If honestly received and fairly applied, this provision would have been enough to guard the rights of the colored race. In some States it was attempted to be evaded by enactments cruel and oppressive in their nature, as that colored persons were forbidden to appear in the towns except in a menial capacity; that they should reside on and cultivate the soil without being allowed to own it; that they were not permitted to give testimony in cases where a white man was a party. They were excluded from performing particular kinds of business, profitable and ...
— An Account of the Proceedings on the Trial of Susan B. Anthony • Anonymous
... to do the work of a menial, but not in a menial spirit. It was his to wait upon his lord at table, to be a graceful cup bearer, a clever carver, able to select the titbits for the ladies, and then to assign the other portions according ...
— The House of Walderne - A Tale of the Cloister and the Forest in the Days of the Barons' Wars • A. D. Crake
... he muttered, "that a Jewish man, a tricked and unsuspecting husband of a menial, like her who has perished with this preacher, did behold a new-born baby in the manger of an inn, eighteen hundred ...
— Tales of the Chesapeake • George Alfred Townsend
... kept by her sewing-chair; coming home at night to a cheerless house and a solitary meal for which she had no appetite; getting up in the night to go to Grandma Fergus taken down suddenly with one of her attacks; helping Mrs. Smith out with her sewing and spring cleaning. Menial, monotonous tasks many of them. Not that she minded that, if they only got somewhere and gave her something from life besides ...
— Cloudy Jewel • Grace Livingston Hill
... Climate. The Land occupied. India Presents a Wide Field for European Agency. The Difference between Europeans and Natives. India never called "Home" by Europeans. Highly Educated Natives. Native Gentlemen. Natives in Subordinate and Menial Positions. The Position of Europeans changed. Advantages and Disadvantages. Improved Condition of European Society. The Effect on Europeans of Home Literature. Increased Effort for the Spiritual Good of ...
— Life and Work in Benares and Kumaon, 1839-1877 • James Kennedy
... the Indians travelled early and late, with all speed. Both Christie and Bullen were compelled to assist in paddling, as well as to labor at the most menial tasks when in camp, receiving as a recompense only kicks and blows. They had, indeed, become slaves, and were treated as such, while at all times their tormentors found delight in assuring them that they would most certainly be burned to death on reaching the villages near Detroit. ...
— At War with Pontiac - The Totem of the Bear • Kirk Munroe and J. Finnemore
... goddess such an office; if he shrugs his shoulders at the notion that a sharp gamekeeper must necessarily excel in imagination, we readily grant that we only speak here of imagination in a limited sense, of its service in a really menial capacity. But, however slight this service, still it must be the work of that natural gift, for if that gift is wanting, it would be difficult to imagine things plainly in all the completeness of the visible. That a good memory is a great assistance ...
— On War • Carl von Clausewitz
... his arm through Hastings', strolled about with him, and introduced him to several of his own friends, at which all the nouveaux opened their eyes with envy, and the studio were given to understand that Hastings, although prepared to do menial work as the latest nouveau, was already within the charmed circle of the old, respected and ...
— The King In Yellow • Robert W. Chambers
... dressed his hair. Royal apparel agreed but ill with his condition after three days of sackcloth and ashes. As luck would have it, Esther had issued the command that the bathkeepers and barbers were not to ply their trades on that day, and there was nothing for Haman to do but perform the menial services Mordecai required. Haman tried to play upon the feelings of Mordecai. Fetching a deep sigh, he said: "The greatest in the king's realm is now acting as bathkeeper and barber!" Mordecai, however, did not permit himself to be imposed upon. He knew Haman's origin too well to be deceived; ...
— THE LEGENDS OF THE JEWS VOLUME IV BIBLE TIMES AND CHARACTERS - FROM THE EXODUS TO THE DEATH OF MOSES • BY LOUIS GINZBERG
... as more than a distasteful necessity—somebody must wait on him and do him menial service; he was not feared, indeed, for surely such a dog would not dare to be false, but cordially disliked. Beaumaroy won him from the beginning. Whom he conceived him to be Beaumaroy himself never knew, but he opened ...
— The Secret of the Tower • Hope, Anthony
... steals a lowly jackal in a lordly lion's den, Base Duryodhan's humble menial came to proud ...
— Maha-bharata - The Epic of Ancient India Condensed into English Verse • Anonymous
... little newspaper editor from Phil's native town, the assistant on a Peddletonian weekly, who made his little annual joke about the "first egg laid on our table," and who was the menial of every tradesman in the village and under bonds to him for frequent "puffs," except the undertaker, about whose employment he was recklessly facetious. In Washington he was an important man, correspondent, and clerk of two house committees, a "worker" in politics, and a confident critic of every ...
— The Gilded Age, Part 5. • Mark Twain (Samuel Clemens) and Charles Dudley Warner
... performed by the women, not from any necessity of a slavish condition or an enforced obedience, but because, where the men and boys must be warriors and hunters, the women and girls felt that it was their place and their duty to perform such menial labor as, to their unenlightened nature, seemed hardly suitable to those who were ...
— Historic Girls • E. S. Brooks
... only once and that was at a hotel in the White Mountains. She and a party of ladies and gentlemen dined at the hotel, and I was a waiter." She looked up at him. "Yes, a waiter, with a white apron on and a Greek Testament in my pocket. The employment was menial, perhaps ...
— Old Ebenezer • Opie Read
... worshipped by the readers of the "Bow Bells Novelettes," and for the same reason—a profound sense of personal weakness. That tendency to devolve our duties descends on us, which is the soul of slavery, alike whether for its menial tasks it employs serfs or emperors. Against all this the great clerical republican stands in everlasting protest, preferring his failure to his rival's success. The issue is still between him and Lorenzo, between the responsibilities ...
— Varied Types • G. K. Chesterton
... school, but they placed him as foot-boy with the cure of the village, hoping that under that learned man he might pick up an education for himself. But the cure kept him so busily employed in grooming his mule and in other menial offices that the boy found no time for learning. While in his service, it happened that the celebrated lithotomist, Cotot, came to Laval to operate on one of the cure's ecclesiastical brethren. Pare was present at the ...
— Self Help • Samuel Smiles
... exhibitions of his strength. He may possess constructive talent, but never that creative power which we call genius because it suggests the genii. "No man is a hero to his valet," says the adage. Carlyle assumes this to be the fault of the latter—due to sawdust or other cheap filling in the head of the menial. Yet, may not the valet be wiser in this matter than the world? The hero, the greatest genius, is not always aflame with celestial fire, impelled by that mysterious power which comes from "beyond the clouds"— may be, for most part, the commonest kind ...
— Volume 1 of Brann The Iconoclast • William Cowper Brann
... antagonistic to her desires, she never ceased to love her; for this woman had made herself a mother in every respect, aye, even more watchful and exacting. While acting in a servant's capacity, doing the most menial of service, she developed in the maid those seemingly trifling motives of mind and soul which in the end make up the character of a life; and very few mothers ever have the tact to so understand these very minute ...
— Mistress Penwick • Dutton Payne
... himself. There is something grand beyond all things else, in the conception of this eternal progress of the individual nature; its passage from condition to condition; sphere to sphere; life to life; always busy, working for the mighty Master; falling and sinking to mere menial toils, or achieving and rising to more noble trusts; but, at all events, still working in some way in the great world-plantation, and under the direct eye of the sovereign World-Planter. The torture of souls on the one hand, and the singing of psalms on the ...
— Charlemont • W. Gilmore Simms
... command of a troop of horse, not complete, in number about forty.[355] His military talents were well known, for he had distinguished himself in several campaigns in Flanders.[356] But, as he took into the field only his menial servants, no very important posts were entrusted to him; and his career appears not to have been signalized by any remarkable military exploits. In short, it may be truly said of him as of Dr. Donne by Izaak Walton, that "nothing in his life became ...
— Memoirs of the Jacobites of 1715 and 1745 - Volume III. • Mrs. Thomson
... with you, I will scorn all falsehood. For once, and, if possible, only for once, the truth shall stand out plainly. I love him as I never, never can love another man. I love him as I never thought to love any man. I feel at this moment as though I could be content to serve him as his menial. For she who is his wife must so serve him—and how long should I ...
— The Bertrams • Anthony Trollope
... a hoe, sauntered toward the cornfield, and was soon hidden by a clump of young weeping-willows, the sunny green branches of which trailed to the darker verdure of the sward. Screened by the drooping foliage, the shirking menial cast his body on the grass to store up energy for ...
— A Dream of Empire - Or, The House of Blennerhassett • William Henry Venable
... burdens which men in prison must bear. They are deprived of liberty, separated from friends, no social intercourse, and constantly maintaining an unnatural position. The convict's place is lower than the most degraded menial; he must ask for permission even to get a drink of water. No serf of earth, no slave, however wretched, has a sadder lot. These unhappy mortals have yielded to temptation, have fallen, and are paying the penalty of violated law. Who can think of these degraded beings, ...
— The Twin Hells • John N. Reynolds
... It was not so much on account of the menial position to which she was assigned, as the manner in which the change had been made known ...
— Kidnapped at the Altar - or, The Romance of that Saucy Jessie Bain • Laura Jean Libbey
... out of breath, less menial than most men's slaves, his head and shoulders upright and the hand that held a letter thrust well forward as if what he had to do were more important than ...
— Caesar Dies • Talbot Mundy
... years ago half the inhabitants of Prussia were practically in the toils of serfdom. It was only by an edict of 1807, to take effect in 1810, that personal serfdom with its consequences, especially the oppressive obligation of menial service, was abolished in the Prussian monarchy. Caste extended actually to land. All land had a certain status, from which the owners and their retainers took their political position and rights. The edict of 1807 was in reality a land reform bill, and gave for the first time ...
— Germany and the Germans - From an American Point of View (1913) • Price Collier
... pause, for mother and son had nothing to answer. Dora turned to take her gloves, which she had laid on a side table, and as she did so the other door opened, the principal door leading to the hall. Moreover, it was opened without the menial pause, and they all turned in surprise, knowing that there were ...
— From One Generation to Another • Henry Seton Merriman
... naught but stuff, This "power" that you're said to be "behind The throne." I'm sure 'twere accurate enough To represent you simply as inclined To push poor Markham (ailing in his mind And body, which were never very tough) Round in an invalid's wheeled chair. Such menial Employment to ...
— Black Beetles in Amber • Ambrose Bierce
... story more grotesquely human than the above, or more out of keeping with one's best thoughts about God. Again, there is a story which is told, I think, of one of the first monasteries of the Benedictine order. One of the monks was a lay brother, who had many little menial tasks to fulfil; he was a well-meaning man, but extremely forgetful, and he was often forced to retire from some service in which he was taking part, because he had forgotten to put the vegetables on to boil, or omitted other duties which would lead to ...
— The Thread of Gold • Arthur Christopher Benson
... earlier, and had less dainty food. They were forced to pay implicit obedience to their superiors; modesty in demeanour, as becoming their age, was strictly required before their elders; and they had to perform many offices which would now be deemed menial. ...
— The Rival Heirs being the Third and Last Chronicle of Aescendune • A. D. Crake
... 'T was but a day he had been caught; And snorting, with erected mane, And struggling fiercely, but in vain, In the full foam of wrath and dread To me the desert-born was led: They bound me on, that menial throng; Upon his back with many a thong; Then loosed him with a sudden lash— Away!—away!—and on we dash! Torrents ...
— MacMillan's Reading Books - Book V • Anonymous
... with an indolent and epicurean censure, the lighter delinquencies which he may happen to detect, laughs perhaps at his own laxity, and, when at length alarmed, discharges the culprit without a character, and relieves himself, at the expense of he knows not whom, by making of a corrupted menial a desperate outcast. If it be said that a man cannot be expected to change his mode of life for the sake of his servants, it might be answered, that any mode of life by which each individual indulging in it hazards the perdition of several of his fellow-creatures, ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, No. 576 - Vol. 20 No. 576., Saturday, November 17, 1832 • Various
... have undergone the same fate. Simnel, apart from his followers, was too contemptible to be an object either of apprehension or resentment on the part of the king. He was pardoned, and, it is said, made a scullion in the royal kitchen, from which menial office he was afterwards advanced ...
— Traditions of Lancashire, Volume 2 (of 2) • John Roby
... was taken prisoner. This was a terrible fate, a far worse fate than death, for the Saracens usually sold their captives as slaves; and Sir Dietrich as he languished in captivity, wondering whether he was destined to spend the rest of his days serving the infidel in some menial capacity, vowed that if he should ever regain his native Germany he would build there a chapel to St. Peter. Nor did his piety go unrewarded, for shortly afterward a body of his compatriots came to his aid, worsted his foes, and set him ...
— Hero Tales and Legends of the Rhine • Lewis Spence
... this is not all; it carries with it a consciousness of superiority, and inspires a superior bearing. These influences are more potent in the formation of female than male character. The mistress is relieved absolutely from all menial duties, and is served by those who are servants for life, and compulsorily so. She is only under the obligations of humanity in her conduct toward them. They must do her bidding. She is not afraid to offend by giving an order, nor is she apprehensive of being deserted ...
— The Memories of Fifty Years • William H. Sparks
... indignation strong, The fatal secret 'scap'd Sir Lanval's tongue: 'Yes!' he declar'd, 'he felt love's fullest power! Yes!' he declar'd, 'he had a paramour! But one, so perfect in all female grace, Those charms might scarcely win her handmaid's place; Those charms, were now one menial damsel near, Would lose this little ...
— The Lay of Marie • Matilda Betham
... kitchen wasn't as menial as it sounds. It was really rather cosy. The five-room flat held living room, front bedroom, dining room, kitchen, and maid's room. The room off the kitchen was intended as a maid's room but Nettie had no maid. George's business had suffered with the rest. George and Nettie ...
— Gigolo • Edna Ferber
... not a drayman and I resented the menial duty of sliding those heavy filecases down four flights of stairs; but at a time like this, I thought philosophically, a man has duties he cannot shirk; besides, Le ffacase was old, I could afford to humor him even if it meant ...
— Greener Than You Think • Ward Moore
... Farmer Bob is somewhat saner— He minds his stock and is the gainer; Content to pass his life amid The scenes that his old father did. With hose in hand he cleans the byre, And saves himself a menial's hire; But gives his girls an education That may unfit them for their station. But don't ask Bob to tempt the tide, Even on a turbine down the Clyde; Neptune and Ceres don't agree, And farmers ...
— Literary Tours in The Highlands and Islands of Scotland • Daniel Turner Holmes
... there in the morning, till they are driven away by the heat; as soon as the sun gets low in the heavens, they return to their post, and either pass the day on neighbouring roofs whilst they bake, cook, wash and dry the linen; or, if they have slaves to attend to such menial occupations, they sew and embroider in the ...
— History Of Egypt, Chaldaea, Syria, Babylonia, and Assyria, Volume 3 (of 12) • G. Maspero
... scarcely finished a hasty meal, ere his menial announced to him that five men, each leading a barbed steed, desired to speak with him. The Disinherited Knight had exchanged his armour for the long robe usually worn by those of his condition, which, being furnished ...
— Ivanhoe - A Romance • Walter Scott
... Jury, do you doubt what I say? Look at this Honorable Court,—at its Judges, its Attorney, at its Marshal, and its Marshal's Guard: they all hold their offices by petty serjeantry of menial service rendered to the Slave-Power. It would be an insult to any one of this august fraternity to hint that he had the faintest respect for the great Principles of American Liberty, or any love of justice for all men. I shall not be guilty of that ...
— The Trial of Theodore Parker • Theodore Parker
... before him deprived him of repose. Freed women, living at Parramatta, unprovided with public shelter, ran headlong into vice, and dropped all around him, slain by rum and dissipation. He stood aghast and powerless before the devastation: at times he observed, "I envy the situation of the most menial servant, who is free from this solemn and sacred responsibility."[105] The reply of Macquarie was witty rather than relevant. He told Lord Sidmouth, in effect, that the sorrows of Marsden were too deep for discovery: noted ...
— The History of Tasmania , Volume II (of 2) • John West
... of his own dawning greatness, Elmendorf refused to accept rebuff. Who was she to treat with scorn the man whose merest word now could move a million stalwarts! "You must pardon me, Miss Allison," he answered, with emphasis. "I am not here in the capacity of a menial in the household. The events of the past few days have conspired to make me a factor in affairs, with power and influence far exceeding that wielded by my late employer. Furthermore, I should see him, or rather he should seek to see me, within the next ...
— A Tame Surrender, A Story of The Chicago Strike • Charles King
... occupation of Farmer Jenner; which land I had received notice not to trespass upon. This toad-eating parson I knew well, and I was well acquainted with his occupation; which was literally that of whipper-in to the squire's hounds. He was as much at the squire's beck and command as one of his menial servants in fact, I had often seen him obey such orders as no servant would have obeyed. I have heard Mr. Beach, when a hound skirted, halloo out, "d—- my blood, Williams, don't you see that bound! flog him in, or cut his liver out," &c. &c. Then his reverence ...
— Memoirs of Henry Hunt, Esq. Volume 2 • Henry Hunt
... five or six in all; two or three stood vacant, and served as playgrounds for the children in bad weather. Of his relatives at the top, Buncombe never spoke; he either did not know, or viewed with indifference, the fact that Mrs. Handover served his lodger in a menial capacity. About once a month he invited three or four male friends to a set dinner, and hilarity could be heard until long after midnight. Altogether it was a strange household, and, as he walked about the streets of the neighbourhood, Harvey ...
— The Whirlpool • George Gissing
... a species of military servant, yet it is not considered in the Army that the striker's work is really menial, or in any way degrading. Some of the best and brightest of the commissioned officers now serving in the Army have been employed in the past as strikers to officers. No private soldier is compelled to serve as striker. ...
— Uncle Sam's Boys as Lieutenants - or, Serving Old Glory as Line Officers • H. Irving Hancock
... such; and stretching, as best he could, from his wretched fix, begged him to reach the door and tell his man Mole where he was. At the same time—as the occasion was most urgent (for it was now 9.44)—he held out half a sovereign. The porter took it respectfully enough, but to Mr. Quail's horror the menial had no sooner grasped the coin than he made off in the opposite direction, pushing his trolley indolently before him and crying "By your leave" in a tone that mingled insolence with ...
— On Nothing & Kindred Subjects • Hilaire Belloc
... morning at breakfast, re-possessed of her lively elegance and dignified simplicity, they gazed at her, and at each other alternately, with astonishment!—and Mrs. Horton, as she sat at the head of her tea-table, felt herself but as a menial servant: such command has beauty if united with sense and virtue. In Miss Milner it was so united. Yet let not our over-scrupulous readers be misled, and extend their idea of her virtue so as to magnify it beyond that which frail mortals commonly possess; nor must they ...
— A Simple Story • Mrs. Inchbald
... habitable earth; when the philosopher and the pious Christian could use the salutation of 'brother,' and the physician and divine be as one man; when the rich and the poor should know no distinction; the great and the small be equal in dominion, and the arrogant master and his menial slave should make a truce of friendship with each other, all following the same law of reason, all guided by ...
— The Underground Railroad • William Still
... themselves repainted and regilded; but their number is not great. One hears of such because they are in their way memorable; and one does not hear of the poor wretches who sink down out of the world—back behind counters, and to menial work in warehouses. Of ordinary bankrupts one hears nothing. They are generally men who, having saved a little with long patience, embark it all and lose it with rapid impotence. They come forward once in their lives with their little ventures, and ...
— The Struggles of Brown, Jones, and Robinson - By One of the Firm • Anthony Trollope
... country company of which her father, Roger Kemble, was manager, the great Mrs. Siddons has been seen, as a contemporary writer describes, "walking up and down both sides of a street in a provincial town, dressed in a red woollen cloak, such as was formerly worn by menial servants, and knocking at each door to deliver the playbill of her benefit." And to come to a later instance, the reader may bear in mind that before that ornament of Mr. Crummles's company, Miss Snevellici, took her benefit ...
— A Book of the Play - Studies and Illustrations of Histrionic Story, Life, and Character • Dutton Cook
... I have given up expecting to have servants do somethings as they ought to be done. Toast is one of the things. They are outside of the limitations of the menial mind.' ...
— A Red Wallflower • Susan Warner
... purse-proud, common-place people of the world. But there is a higher motive still, which has its origin in that love of independence which springs up spontaneously in the breasts of the high-souled children of a glorious land. They cannot labour in a menial capacity in the country where they were born and educated to command. They can trace no difference between themselves and the more fortunate individuals of a race whose blood warms their veins, and whose name ...
— Roughing it in the Bush • Susanna Moodie
... and military service, is simply impossible. It is no exaggeration to say that a vast number of the European community would hear with pleasure and approval that every Hindoo and Mohammedan had been proscribed, and that none would be admitted to serve the Government except in a menial office. That which they desire is to see a broad line of separation, and of declared distrust drawn between us Englishmen and every subject of your Majesty who is not a Christian, and who has a dark skin; and there are some who entirely refuse to believe in ...
— The Letters of Queen Victoria, Volume III (of 3), 1854-1861 • Queen of Great Britain Victoria
... this writ, not only deputies, etc., but even their menial servants, are allowed to lord it over us. What is this but to have the curse of Canaan with a witness on us? To be the servant of servants, the ...
— James Otis The Pre-Revolutionist • John Clark Ridpath
... of the man whip through the livery of the menial like a knife, and Henry, stumbling forward with a working face, clasped that hand proudly in his strong white one: only he dropped on one knee to do it, as if to show that, though gentlemen might be pleased to show him kindness now ...
— Captivating Mary Carstairs • Henry Sydnor Harrison
... Ambrose brought home a small packet which had been conveyed to him through one of the Emperor's suite. It was tied up with a long tough pale wisp of hair, evidently from the mane or tail of some Flemish horse, and was addressed, "To Master Ambrose Birkenholt, menial clerk to the most worshipful Sir Thomas More, Knight, Under Sheriff of the City of ...
— The Armourer's Prentices • Charlotte Mary Yonge
... Imperial Rome, on many an altar pour'd The victim blood, with godlike titles graced, BACCHUS, or DIONUSUS; son of JOVE, Deem'd falsely, for from FOLLY'S ideot form He sprung, what time MADNESS, with furious hand, Seiz'd on the laughing female. At one birth She brought the brethren, menial here, above Reigning with sway supreme, and oft they hold High revels: mid the Monastery's gloom, The sacrifice is spread, when the grave voice Episcopal, proclaims approaching day Of visitation, or Churchwardens meet To save the wretched ...
— Poems, 1799 • Robert Southey
... curious glance upon the custodian of this strange place, and saw a man who was evidently a gentleman, though very plainly and simply dressed, and employed at this moment in menial toil. He had a thin, worn face, and his eyes gleamed brightly under their heavy brows. He looked like one who had seen both trouble and suffering, and had grown somewhat reckless under ...
— The Lost Treasure of Trevlyn - A Story of the Days of the Gunpowder Plot • Evelyn Everett-Green
... woman realise this, and at least as many women as men will prefer privation with self-respect to comfort with contempt. Let us, then, in the name of our common nature, ask those who have her training in hand, to teach the woman to despise the man of menial soul and to loathe the luxury that ...
— Principles of Freedom • Terence J. MacSwiney
... plutocratic."[658] "The property question is the issue which is creating a new political cleavage in the State. Somewhat dimly at present, but with growing clearness of vision, the worker begins to see that he will remain a menial, outcast and forlorn, until he has made himself master of the machine he tends, and the ...
— British Socialism - An Examination of Its Doctrines, Policy, Aims and Practical Proposals • J. Ellis Barker
... to discuss on immortal essences, to dispute with the disbeliever on gnomes—a paradox will be the darling of his bosom for a month, and a good chimera be his bedfellow by night and theme by day for a year. He is fickle, and casts off his menial mistress at an hour's notice—his mind never weds any of the strange, fantastic idealities, which he woos for a time so passionately—deep disgust succeeds to the strongest attachment for them—he is as great a rake among the wayward "rebusses of the brain" which fall ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 10, No. 272, Saturday, September 8, 1827 • Various
... last began to assist his master in giving lessons the accounts had fallen into arrear, and Mrs. Skene had to resume her former care of them; a circumstance which gratified her husband, who regarded it as a fresh triumph of her superior intelligence. Then a Chinaman was engaged to do the more menial work of the establishment. "Skene's novice," as he was now generally called, was elevated to the rank of assistant professor to the champion, and became a person of some ...
— Cashel Byron's Profession • George Bernard Shaw
... David Jenison had won more than his spurs; these volatile, impressionable people, in disdain for their own positions in life, were saying, "Blood will tell." Down to the lowliest menial the sentiment regarding him underwent a subtle but noticeable change. He was no longer the guileless outsider: he was exalted even among those who once ...
— The Rose in the Ring • George Barr McCutcheon
... to his home in Gex, and then to Geneva. She entered a convent and worked as a menial so as to be near him. The Bishop made Father La Combe her official adviser, so as to ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Vol. 13 - Little Journeys to the Homes of Great Lovers • Elbert Hubbard
... into his bath. Not a movement, not a quiver of the eyelid betrayed one single emotion which he may have felt— neither loathing nor sympathy, only placid indifference. He was just a half-starved menial, thankful to accomplish any task for the sake of satisfying a craving stomach. Marat stretched out his shrunken limbs in the herbal water with ...
— The League of the Scarlet Pimpernel • Baroness Orczy
... system was afterward introduced in all the Spanish settlements, the Indians being everywhere seized upon and compelled to work in the mines, to till the plantations, to carry burdens and to perform all menial and laborious services. The stated tasks of the unhappy natives were often much beyond their abilities, and multitudes sank under the hardships to which they were subjected. Their spirit was broken, they became humble and degraded, and the race was rapidly wasting away. ...
— The Land We Live In - The Story of Our Country • Henry Mann
... tasks that filled each day - Such menial duties; but her way Of looking at them lent a grace To things the ...
— New Thought Pastels • Ella Wheeler Wilcox
... was a golden brassard indicating that he was contracted to a Class One, and in his pocket was a carefully forged card indicating the same thing. No one noticed him; he was just another Sixer going to his menial job. ...
— But, I Don't Think • Gordon Randall Garrett
... of the infinite distance between the two, and of the depth of debasement implied by placing the two races, in any respect, on the same level. The Southern mind had no antipathy to the negro in a menial or servile relation. On the contrary, it was generally kind and considerate of him, as such. It regarded him almost precisely as other people look upon other species of animate property, except that it conceded to him the possession of human ...
— Bricks Without Straw • Albion W. Tourgee
... door-keeper in the house of my God than to dwell in the tents of wickedness." Better to have the temple-spirit, even as a menial, than the unhallowed heart in the glittering high places of sin. "God's worst is better than ...
— My Daily Meditation for the Circling Year • John Henry Jowett
... having sprained his ankle, and Long Thompson is down with small-pox, so you'll have to do it. I offered 'em my services, but the manager he said that intelligent lads couldn't be spared for such menial work, and told me to ...
— The Iron Horse • R.M. Ballantyne
... the moral and personal to the menial characteristics of Mr. Johnson's speeches, we find that his brain is to be classed with notable cases of arrested development. He has strong forces in his nature, but in their outlet through his mind they ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 18, No. 109, November, 1866 • Various
... the original Pine Street Coffee House, no less; I believe he would be capable of going to the original itself, if he could only find it. In the branch he seats himself at a table covered with waxcloth, and a pampered menial, of High-Dutch extraction and, indeed, as yet only partially extracted, lays before him a cup of coffee, a roll and a pat of butter, all, to quote the deity, very good. A while ago, and R. L. S. used to find the supply of butter insufficient; ...
— The Letters of Robert Louis Stevenson - Volume 1 • Robert Louis Stevenson
... mean, vulgar, raffish, ignominious, undignified; moderate, reasonable, cheap; humble, lowly, obscure; feeble, faint, weak; subdued, grave, gentle; ignoble, groveling, abject, degraded, servile, menial, sordid, base. ...
— Putnam's Word Book • Louis A. Flemming
... ancient literature and many monuments bear distinct evidence, all the more impressive because frequently only casual, that, from the earliest ages, the Africans had shared, in common with other less civilized peoples, the doom of having to furnish the menial and servile contingents of the more favoured sections of the human family. Now, dating from, say, five hundred years ago, which was long indeed after the disappearance of the old leading empires of the world, we have ...
— West Indian Fables by James Anthony Froude Explained by J. J. Thomas • J. J. (John Jacob) Thomas
... monk; while in the same breath the Fleming exclaimed, "Beware the cucking-stool, Dame Scant-o'-Grace!" while he conducted the noble youth across the court. "Let my good horse be cared for," said the cavalier, as he put the bridle into the hand of a menial; and in doing so got rid of some part of his female retinue, who began to pat and praise the steed as much as they had done the rider; and some, in the enthusiasm of their joy, hardly abstained from kissing ...
— The Betrothed • Sir Walter Scott
... rebelled against coercion from Vincent. She had even loved it, but she had loved it when he had seemed to her a superior being; coercion from one who only yesterday had been under the dominion of nerves and nurses was intolerable to her. She was at heart a courtier, would do menial service to a king, and refuse common civility to an inferior. She knew how St. Christopher had felt at seeing his satanic captain tremble at the sign of the cross; and though, unlike the saint, she had no intention of setting out to discover the stronger lord, she knew that he might ...
— The Happiest Time of Their Lives • Alice Duer Miller
... I know," broke in Bela with a sneer, "you need not always remind me that my future wife—the bride of my lord the Count's own bailiff—does menial work for a village schoolmistress and a ...
— A Bride of the Plains • Baroness Emmuska Orczy
... reasons will show themselves for leaving it indefinite) I enjoyed the acquaintance of two Southern gentlemen,—gentlemen, however, of widely different kinds. One was a general, a lawyer, a rake, a drunkard, and white; the other was a body-servant, a menial, an educated man, a fine man-of-business, a Sir Roger in his manners, and black. The two had been brought up together, the black having been given to the white gentleman during the latter's second year. "They had played marbles in the ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 90, April, 1865 • Various
... I have said in few words that Bessy Goodwin had been sent to school, and had since returned home. She had been home nearly a year before the period to which I brought up my history, but now she no longer was employed in any menial service, the girl who had been hired during her absence being still retained. Bessy now superintended the household, but did nothing more; and there was a greater degree of comfort and expenditure than had formerly been the case. Whether ...
— Poor Jack • Frederick Marryat
... how support a life so bereft of its wonted supplies? Can we wonder that they should still remain the same low abject and degraded creatures that they are, loitering about the white man's house, and cringing, and pandering to the lowest menial for that food they can no longer procure for themselves? or that wandering in misery through a country, now no longer their own, their lives should be curtailed by want, exposure, or disease? If, on the other hand, upon the first appearance of Europeans, the natives become alarmed, ...
— Journals Of Expeditions Of Discovery Into Central • Edward John Eyre
... returned to his sprinkling. All the while he smoked steadily a long corncob pipe, and to watch him at his task, was to receive an impression that the hauling of manure was sufficient to fill one's life with dignity and contentment. The work appeared no longer a menial employment but a sober and serious share of the great ...
— The Miller Of Old Church • Ellen Glasgow
... with scientific speculations, to the Browns, who are at breakfast—a meal that has been intruded upon by John; who has recounted enough of a certain story to put Jemima in hysterics, and Angelina in a fainting fit—bringing down a hurricane of abuse upon him—John, the impertinent menial—John, the venomous viper, that has recoiled upon its benefactor—John, the dark villain, that has plotted with the unworthy man, Spohf, who, of course, out of mere envy, mere spite, mere jealousy, ...
— Christmas Comes but Once A Year - Showing What Mr. Brown Did, Thought, and Intended to Do, - during that Festive Season. • Luke Limner
... Public" which they recently put forth, they explained, that, instead of taking the places of better men, as they are accused of doing, they considered that, in performing the menial work they did, they opened the way to higher and more lucrative employments for others; saying several times, in their simple, impressive ...
— Life at Puget Sound: With Sketches of Travel in Washington Territory, British Columbia, Oregon and California • Caroline C. Leighton
... sport in bringing pets to the table. It may be necessary sometimes; but the true sportsman would always prefer to leave the unpleasant task of execution to menial hands, while he goes out into the wild country to capture his game by his own skill,—if he has good luck. I would rather run some risk in this enterprise (even as the young Tobias did, when the voracious pike sprang at him from the waters of ...
— Fisherman's Luck • Henry van Dyke
... her aunt's house, she would have remained at Nuncombe without complaint. Had her aunt since her coming given her orders as to her mode of life,—enjoined, for instance, additional church attendances, or desired her to perform menial services in the house,—she would have obeyed, from custom, without a word. But when she was told that she was to marry Mr. Gibson, it did seem to her to be necessary to do something more than obey. Did she love Mr. ...
— He Knew He Was Right • Anthony Trollope |
