"Popinjay" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... my son, I can see and feel for you too, but bear up; you are no boy now, you know. And I had set my heart on it too; so had our old friend. He wants you to go and see him, Dick, to help him make up his quarterly account, as you used to do. Perhaps she'll tire of this popinjay—and, when ...
— Miss Grantley's Girls - And the Stories She Told Them • Thomas Archer
... national judiciary. All sorts of novel questions were arising at that time, cases which had no precedents, which the English law-books did not reach, and where the man of native powers, pushing out like Columbus on the unknown, soon developed a sturdy strength and self-reliance the mere popinjay and student of the law could never get. Among the cases he argued was the British debt case, tried in 1793. The United States now had its Circuit Court, and Chief-justice Jay presided at Richmond. The treaty of peace of England provided ...
— Brave Men and Women - Their Struggles, Failures, And Triumphs • O.E. Fuller
... elsewhere, 'was it written by Theologians: a King rules by divine right. He carries in him an authority from God, or man will never give it him. Can I choose my own King? I can choose my own King Popinjay, and play what farce or tragedy I may with him: but he who is to be my Ruler, whose will is to be higher than my will, was chosen for me in Heaven. Neither except in such Obedience to the Heaven-chosen is ...
— Sartor Resartus, and On Heroes, Hero-Worship, and the Heroic in History • Thomas Carlyle
... "A pretty popinjay, brought out for my lady's amusement!" said the stranger, smiling; "you make rare sport with your antic tricks, at the fort yonder, I doubt ...
— The Rivals of Acadia - An Old Story of the New World • Harriet Vaughan Cheney
... this one overlooked that part of it, intent on the chieftaincy.—And now, God have mercy on us! there is to be all the round of wars and proscriptions and massacres over again: Roma caput mundi herself piteously decapitate; and with every booby and popinjay rising in turn to kick her about at his pleasure;—and here first comes Mark Anthony to start the game, ...
— The Crest-Wave of Evolution • Kenneth Morris
... it may be put to my account in purgatory, my Martin. You are spoiling a good outlaw. Have your way, only this gay popinjay of a knight must stay until his ransom be paid. We can't afford to lose that. But no harm shall befall him. Beside, we may want him as hostage in case this morning's work bring a hornets' nest about ...
— The House of Walderne - A Tale of the Cloister and the Forest in the Days of the Barons' Wars • A. D. Crake
... cannot tell when or how to make an end, being women in whom all kind of curiosity is to be seen in far greater measure than in women of higher calling. I might name hues devised for the nonce, ver d'oye 'twixt green and yallow, peas-porridge tawny, popinjay blue, and ...
— Elizabethan Sea Dogs • William Wood
... here, sir, when I left you to watch the side-steps of that French popinjay and the Whitworth woman? Did you hear what all that powwow was about at her tea fight this afternoon?" he demanded of fine Buzz, with a great anxiety. "There's been hell to pay, since you left, Governor, and I think this French scoundrel and Jeff's gang are preparing ...
— The Daredevil • Maria Thompson Daviess
... and spake the popinjay, Sae wisely counselled he. "Now say it in the proper way: Gae ...
— Phantasmagoria and Other Poems • Lewis Carroll
... merely a repetition of the trait shown in his first speech when he sneered at the popinjay-lord for talking in "holiday and lady terms." But not only does Shakespeare repeat well-known traits in Hotspur, he also uses him as a mere mouthpiece again and again, as he used him at the beginning in the poetic description of the Severn. The fourth act ...
— The Man Shakespeare • Frank Harris
... powdered hair, shone out resplendent. With great difficulty the artist had secured for Monty a costume in white satin and gold brocade, which might once have adorned the person of Louis himself. It made him feel like a popinjay, and it was with infinite relief that he took it off an hour or so after dawn. He knew that things had gone well, that even Mrs. Dan was satisfied; but the whole affair made him heartsick. Behind the compliments lavished upon him he detected a note of irony, which revealed ...
— Brewster's Millions • George Barr McCutcheon
... and Gridiron Grainge. Many animal surnames are to be referred partly to this source, e.g. Bull, Hart, Lamb, Lyon, Ram, Roebuck, Stagg; Cock, Falcon, Peacock, Raven, Swann, etc., all still common as tavern signs. The popinjay, or parrot, is still occasionally found as Pobgee, Popjoy. These surnames all have, of course, an alternative explanation (ch. xxiii.). Here also usually ...
— The Romance of Names • Ernest Weekley
... free; the cushat filling with her moan the mansions made by the Deity, the bulbul singing as if 'twere human harmony and the merle whom to describe tongue faileth utterly; the turtle, whose plaining maddens men for loveecstasy and the ringdove and the popinjay answering her with fluency. There also were trees laden with all manner of fruitery, of each two kinds,[FN342] the pomegranate, sweet and sour upon branches growing luxuriantly, the almond-apricot,[FN343] the camphor-apricot[FN344] and the almond Khorasan highs; the plum, with whose ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 6 • Richard F. Burton
... Senior-lieutenant Brettschneider—by God!—he was not one of the right sort, if the boy was telling the truth. With all due respect for an officer, he seemed to be a perfect popinjay. There were people like that here and there who were ready to burst with pride and conceit, and who looked upon an inferior as scarcely a ...
— 'Jena' or 'Sedan'? • Franz Beyerlein
... the art of mercurial dialogue, which in the South is a natural gift, is only learned under favourable conditions, and is often condemned by those who have it not, as a popinjay's accomplishment. Immediate cordiality to strangers is frowned upon as tending to divorce courtesy from truth. It is otherwise with the southern peoples. While the Englishman conceals his benevolence by a frigid aloofness of manner, or blurts out friendliness like an indiscretion, ...
— Apologia Diffidentis • W. Compton Leith
... slap your face," said old Mere Langlois, her great breast heaving. "Popinjay—you, that ought to be in a cage like ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... Hugh, "for whom I have a message that he will be glad to hear, and, popinjay, this for yourself; were it not for his presence it is you who should stop upon the road till you ...
— Red Eve • H. Rider Haggard
... reddish twigs, and more greenish and rounder leaves: Another kind there is, call'd perch, of limber and green twigs having a very slender leaf; the third sort is totally like the second, only the twigs are not altogether so green, but yellowish, and near the popinjay: This is the very best for use, tough and hardy. But the most usual names by which basket-makers call them about London, and which are all of different species (therefore to be planted separately) ...
— Sylva, Vol. 1 (of 2) - Or A Discourse of Forest Trees • John Evelyn
... shallow sort. He seeks, not a chance to test his mettle by hard and useful work, but an easy chance to shine. He craves the regard, not of men, but of women. He is, in brief, a hollow and incompetent creature, a strutter and poseur, a popinjay, a pretty one.... ...
— Damn! - A Book of Calumny • Henry Louis Mencken
... a mocking courtesy. "Marry!" said he. "Methought it was one of mine own saucy popinjay squires that I caught sneaking here and talking to those two foolish young lasses, and lo! it is a young Lord—or mayhap thou art a young Prince—and commandeth me that I shall not do this and I shall not do that. I crave your Lordship's honorable pardon, if I ...
— Men of Iron • Ernie Howard Pyle
... surrounded it on three sides with canals. The fourth side fronted on the Zuyder Zee. Then they advertised, in glowing language, the merits of the new land and Ryer Van Boompjes bought it and paid for his real estate. He was as proud as a popinjay of his island and he ruled over it like a Czar ...
— Dutch Fairy Tales for Young Folks • William Elliot Griffis
... author there are many words and phrases used which are now outdated. When they first appear a note of the current meaning is given, for instance "popinjay [parrot]". On the whole this is not confusing except where a word has changed or even reversed its meaning. We do not recommend learning by heart from a sort of vocab list, the words in use in Elizabethan times, unless you ...
— Clare Avery - A Story of the Spanish Armada • Emily Sarah Holt
... gaudy popinjay?" whispered the Lord of St. John to one of his Towton comrades, as, leaning against the wall, they overheard the sarcasms of Anthony, and the laugh of the courtiers, who glassed their faces and moods to his. "Is the time so out of joint that Master ...
— The Last Of The Barons, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... in the narrower but honest admiration of many, he is also a Perfect Ass. Thus, indeed, he comes down the centuries—a sort of Siamese Twins, each miraculously visible only to its own admirers; a worthy personage proceeding at one end of the connecting cartilage, and a popinjay prancing at the other. Emerson was, and described, one twin when he wrote, 'The gentleman is a man of truth, lord of his own actions, and expressing that lordship in his behavior; not in any manner dependent or servile, either on persons, or opinions, or ...
— The Perfect Gentleman • Ralph Bergengren
... dear, Tompkins is an American. He can handle these chaps in their own way. At any rate, I told Tompkins if his nerve failed him at the last minute to come and notify me. I'll attend to this confounded popinjay!" ...
— Master Tales of Mystery, Volume 3 • Collected and Arranged by Francis J. Reynolds
... sir," he said. "I don't care twopence for all the puppies that ever wore red coats, sir. My name is Nicholas Clam, Esq., No. 4, Waterloo Place, Wellington Road, Regent's Park, London; and I can shoot at a popinjay as well ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. 327 - Vol. 53, January, 1843 • Various
... For the most part it swayed lightly, with a certain moral effect only over the head of the rank and file, but it grew to a crushing beam for the officer who did not with alacrity habitually attend to his every duty, great or small. The do-nothing, the popinjay, the intractable, the self-important, the remonstrant, the I thought, sir—the It is due to my dignity, sir—none of these flourished in the Army of the Valley. The tendencies had been there, of course; they came up like the flowers of spring, ...
— The Long Roll • Mary Johnston
... young popinjay, as little officer cubs are like to be, answered flippantly that the colonel had commuted my sentence; that I was to be shot like a soldier, and that far enough afield so the volleying would not wake ...
— The Master of Appleby • Francis Lynde
... mullets of the field. No. 444, the Seal of THOMAS MONYPENY, A.D. 1415, has the Shield couche charged with Az., achevron between three crosses crosslets fitche issuing from as many crescents arg.: the Crest, on a helm, is a bird, probably a popinjay or parrot. The Seal of RICHARD STUART, No. 445, probably about 1350, may be compared with No. 414, p. 249: in the smaller and earlier example, the solitary individual who represents the crew may be assumed to be Richard Stuart himself; his vessel displays two banners which ...
— The Handbook to English Heraldry • Charles Boutell
... and almost everything he saw offended him at some point. And, yet in the midst of it all, he was conscious that he was surrounded by people who claimed and made good their claims to superiority. What was a lord, let him be ever so rich and have ever so many titles? And yet, even with such a popinjay as Lord Rufford, he himself felt the lordship. When that old farmer at the hunt breakfast had removed himself and his belongings to the other side of the table the Senator, though aware of the justice of his cause, had been keenly alive to the rebuke. He had expressed himself ...
— The American Senator • Anthony Trollope |
