"Prattle" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... Affectation, why this mock grimace? Go, silly thing, and hide that simp'ring face. Thy lisping prattle, and thy mincing gait, All thy false mimic fooleries I hate; For thou art Folly's counterfeit, and she Who is right foolish hath the better plea; Nature's true idiot I ...
— Tales and Novels, Vol. V - Tales of a Fashionable Life • Maria Edgeworth
... not my custom to prattle away my purposes, since every intention once betrayed is no ...
— Beethoven: the Man and the Artist - As Revealed in his own Words • Ludwig van Beethoven
... "foolish and noisy talk. Islandic, bulldur, stultorum balbuties." Dr. Ogilvie, however, has queried its derivation from the "Spanish balda, a trifle, or baldonar, to insult with abusive language; Welsh, baldorz, to prattle. Mean, senseless prate; a jargon of words; ribaldry; anything jumbled ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 206, October 8, 1853 • Various
... pale, and his long beard bleached like the thistle down; his blue eye was cloudless, yet it was obvious that its vision was failing. His motions were feeble, and he spoke little, except when he answered the prattle of his grandchildren, or asked a question of his daughter, who sate beside him, matured in matronly beauty, or of Colonel Everard who stood behind. There, too, the stout yeoman, Joceline Joliffe, still in his silvan dress, leaned, like a second Benaiah, on the quarter-staff ...
— Woodstock; or, The Cavalier • Sir Walter Scott
... We prattle of the dead past, and use to fancy that peace must dwell there, if nothing else. Only in the past, say we, is security from jostle, danger, and disturbance; who would live at his ease must number his days backwards; ...
— Idolatry - A Romance • Julian Hawthorne
... Golden Stairs." She told me the very next day that she had been married less than a year, and one of the first things I noticed about her was the pleasure it gave her to refer to her husband or to quote him. Her prattle was so full of, "My husband says, says my husband," that it seemed as though the chief purpose of her jabber was to parade her married state and to hear herself talk of her spouse. The words, "My husband," were music to her ears. ...
— The Rise of David Levinsky • Abraham Cahan
... confront these guests. Who then? She dreaded the flash of her own mother's eye. Yes, indeed, her pretty mamma had ceased to love her, banished her more and more from her presence, made sharp or dry responses to her prattle. Cecilia sighed inaudibly as she crouched there. Hark! The visitors approached the window; she could touch one by extending her arm from her hiding-place. Who were they? Oh, some of her mamma's gentlemen friends lounging in for an afternoon call. They spoke in ...
— Stories by American Authors, Volume 7 • Various
... to care was her son Theodore; for as for little Henri, she seemed to have forgotten that she had such a child; but she delighted in seeing her handsome Theodore well dressed, and encouraged him to prattle before company, and to show himself off in public places, even when he was but an infant. She employed the most famous artists in Paris to draw his picture; she hired dancing-masters to teach him to carry himself well, and music-masters to teach him to sing and play; and sometimes, ...
— The Fairchild Family • Mary Martha Sherwood
... stretched his one good arm and the other that was visibly twisted and scarred between wrist and elbow, above his head, "let's go downstairs and prattle. I see a car in front, and ...
— Poor Man's Rock • Bertrand W. Sinclair
... my hope, but I never think of it except in my best moods. The work to which I dedicate the ensuing years of my life, is one which highly pleased Leslie, in prospective, and my paper will not let me prattle to you about it. I have written what you more wished me to ...
— Reminiscences of Samuel Taylor Coleridge and Robert Southey • Joseph Cottle
... could have written dialogue under such conditions, and it is not less true than strange that these fetters act as no more than a beating of time to the feet that dance in them. The emotion is throughout at white heat; there is lyrical splendour even in the arguments: and a child's prattle, in nine-line stanzas of two rhymes apiece, goes ...
— Figures of Several Centuries • Arthur Symons
... prepared to his liking—broiled kids' flesh, the red wine, the mushrooms sought through the early dew—his hunger and thirst so daintily satisfied, as he sat at table, like the first-born of King Theseus, with two wax-lights and a fire at dawn or nightfall dancing to the prattle and laughter, a bright child, never stupidly weary. At times his very happiness would seem to her like a menace of misfortune to come. Was there not with herself the curse of that unsisterly action? and not far from him, the terrible danger of the father's, ...
— Greek Studies: A Series of Essays • Walter Horatio Pater
... marble-mosaic landing by an active boy, and, almost before we could ask for rooms, were shown into a suite of magnificent apartments. I had a glimpse of a garden in the rear,—flowers and plants, and a balcony up which I suppose Romeo climbed to hold that immortal love-prattle with the lovesick Juliet. Boy began to light the candles. Asked in English the price of such fine rooms. Reply in Italian. Asked in German. Reply in Italian. Asked in French, with the same result. Other servants appeared, each with a piece of baggage. ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... the truth, and you shall hear it. That man's father is an outlaw. He is a fugitive from justice. All this prattle about him ...
— Captain Pott's Minister • Francis L. Cooper
... tiresome than the prattle about "absolute justice," "eternal truth," "inalienable rights," "the identity of the ethics of Christianity with those of Socialism," and a lot of other theories, which lost their footing in scientific literature and transmigrated to begin ...
— The Art of Lecturing - Revised Edition • Arthur M. (Arthur Morrow) Lewis
... whenever we meet, Clara and I; Prattle and laughter, and kisses sweet, Clara and I. Were I but twenty, and not two score, Clara and I would laugh still more, With plenty of hopeful years in store For Clara and I, Clara and I; With plenty of hopeful years in store For Clara ...
— Hesperus - and Other Poems and Lyrics • Charles Sangster
... chemical laboratory, and the daylight is allowed to pour unobscured into all its murky recesses. Through the dim and lofty passage-ways resounds the laughter of children; on the scenes of so many hoary crimes the prattle of innocent girls is heard; a multitude of scientific instruments labor to demonstrate the laws of nature, and to simplify the problem of existence which the crimes of the Kurts had tended to complicate. Thomas Rendalen, ...
— Essays on Scandinavian Literature • Hjalmar Hjorth Boyesen
... shore;—and if he is fond of children, he must be delighted with the numberless pretty and happy little faces—the fair forms of Saxon men and women in miniature—that crowd about him on the green sward;—he must be charmed with their innocent prattle, their quick and graceful movements, and their winning ways, that awaken a tone of tender sentiment in his heart, and ...
— Flowers and Flower-Gardens • David Lester Richardson
... to Jenny Lavender. Stay—had he not? What was that faint something, without a name—a sort of vague uneasiness, which had seemed to creep over him whenever he had seen her during those months—a sense of incongruity between her light prattle and his own inmost thoughts and holiest feelings? It was so slight that as yet he had never faced it. He recognised now it was because his heart had refused to face it. And conscience told him, speaking loudly this time, that he ...
— The Gold that Glitters - The Mistakes of Jenny Lavender • Emily Sarah Holt
... Prattle (Mr.), medical practitioner, a voluble gossip, who retails all the news and scandal of the neighborhood. He knows everybody, everybody's affairs, and everybody's intentions.—G. Colman, Sr, The Deuce is ...
— Character Sketches of Romance, Fiction and the Drama - A Revised American Edition of the Reader's Handbook, Vol. 3 • E. Cobham Brewer
... The prattle of little children and the voice of maternal love make sweet music in its doleful streets, and glorious devotion dignifies and illumines the ...
— London's Underworld • Thomas Holmes
... heart to sympathize. Thousands of mothers have been led into the kingdom of God by the hands of their little children. There were hundreds of mothers who would not have been Christians had it not been for the prattle of their little ones. Standing some day in the nursery, they bethought themselves: "This child God has given me to raise for eternity. What is my influence upon it? Not being a Christian myself, how can I ever expect him to become a Christian? ...
— The Wedding Ring - A Series of Discourses for Husbands and Wives and Those - Contemplating Matrimony • T. De Witt Talmage
... lamps were now lighted in Granny's handsome sitting-room, and a huge turf fire burned on the hearth, for it was a wintry evening. The tea-table had been placed to one side, near Granny's chair, and as Madam laughed heartily at Terencia's prattle no one could have suggested that the coming of this bright little creature had been as a nightmare to the old lady for many ...
— Terry - Or, She ought to have been a Boy • Rosa Mulholland
... superior endowments which finds its manifestation in language is to receive the name of reason, what shall we style the rest? We had thought that the love and intelligence, the soul, that looks out of a child's eyes upon us to reward our care long before it begins to prattle, were also ...
— Chips from a German Workshop - Volume IV - Essays chiefly on the Science of Language • Max Muller
... you tell me, Master Peter," answered Becky. "But what's in the wind that makes you say that? You know I am not a woman to go and prattle about other people's affairs, but I should just like to know, that I ...
— Washed Ashore - The Tower of Stormount Bay • W.H.G. Kingston
... father had guided his toddling steps; the home to which he had brought his bride in the bloom of a beautiful maidenhood; where Ruth had come to them as the blessing of God to make the house resound with prattle and laughter, and fill it with the sunlight of her presence; make it attractive by her grace and beauty,—the soul beauty that looked out from loving eyes and became, as it were, a benediction. He was to go, she to stay. God above ...
— Daughters of the Revolution and Their Times - 1769 - 1776 A Historical Romance • Charles Carleton Coffin
... clothes were sifted over with dust and fine particles of manure. The seat grated beneath his legs. The great headlines in the newspaper announced that the troops were arriving. Columns of childish, reportorial prattle followed, describing the martial bearing of the officers, the fierceness of the "bronzed Indian fighters." The city was under martial law. He read also the bickering telegrams exchanged between ...
— The Web of Life • Robert Herrick
... yourself, and you remember what your mother used to say to you. I believe that the younger one is, the better one understands the young. I am very much afraid that a woman of thirty, who doesn't know what it is to be a mother, will find it hard to learn to prattle and ...
— The Devil's Pool • George Sand
... sweet memory, to women's hearts Their days of maidenhood. And then they will be sorry that they came To sing me to my death; And all the butterflies will mourn for me. I bear away with me The sunshine's dear remembrance, and the low Soft murmurs of the spring. My breath is sweet as children's prattle is; I drank in all the whole earth's fruitfulness, To make of it the fragrance of my soul That shall ...
— English Literature - Its History and Its Significance for the Life of the English Speaking World • William J. Long
... possessed of a celerity of motion resembling omnipresence and ubiquity; for nowhere could he go without meeting them, and that oftener than once a-day, in the course of his walks. Sometimes the presence of the sweet Lycoris was intimated by the sweet prattle in an adjacent shade; sometimes, when Tyrrel thought himself most solitary, the parson's flute was heard snoring forth Gramachree Molly; and if he betook himself to the river, he was pretty sure to find his sport watched by Sir Bingo or some ...
— St. Ronan's Well • Sir Walter Scott
... the talk of those fat agitators. Who prattle of Gladstone, or Churchill, or worse; Expect not your rights from professional praters, But manfully trust in your ...
— British Socialism - An Examination of Its Doctrines, Policy, Aims and Practical Proposals • J. Ellis Barker
... juvenile visitor stayed her hour and then obediently went away, in spite of Jed's urgent invitation to stay longer. She had asked a good many questions and talked almost continuously, but Mr. Winslow, instead of being bored by her prattle, was surprised to find how empty and uninteresting the shop seemed after ...
— Shavings • Joseph C. Lincoln
... griefs, and torments, the unspoken broodings which would surely enough prey upon his spirit. She pictured herself sitting at his side, or walking with him, for hours—he absorbed in his own sorrowful thoughts, she striving vainly to distract him by a tinkling prattle on every topic except the one nearest his heart. Oh, how fearfully wide asunder they were! A sensation of the enormous distance which can exist between two souls in daily companionship filled her with a sickening, shivering heaviness. She thought she would have to cry out because of the ...
— Robert Orange - Being a Continuation of the History of Robert Orange • John Oliver Hobbes
... arrival at Mrs. Brown's, she took Minnie out with her for a walk through the village. Minnie waited by her aunt's side, and pointed her to all the changes which had taken place since her visit a year before. She was pleased to listen to the little girl's prattle, and their walk ...
— Aunt Amy - or, How Minnie Brown learned to be a Sunbeam • Francis Forrester
... chronometer time for my observations, and that, too, with a precision which Bob himself could not surpass; and in a very short time she could steer as well as either of us, which was an immense advantage when shortening or making sail. Add to all this the amusement we derived from her incessant lively prattle, and the additional cheerfulness thus infused into our daily life, and the reader will agree with me, I think, that it was a lucky day for us when we first fell ...
— For Treasure Bound • Harry Collingwood
... consume our sorrows. Whoever has once seen the blissful chalice, will scorn the wine-cup. Glorious drink! thy color is the seal of purity, and reason proclaims it genuine. Drink with confidence, and regard not the prattle of fools, ...
— The Lands of the Saracen - Pictures of Palestine, Asia Minor, Sicily, and Spain • Bayard Taylor
... nothing of her until the next day, but he never felt any solicitude. He knew that some of the men had persuaded her to remain with them, and he was too considerate to rob them of the pleasure of listening to her innocent prattle, while they racked their ingenuity and threw dignity to the winds in the effort to entertain her. Each one strove to make her think more of him than the others, and it ended ...
— A Waif of the Mountains • Edward S. Ellis
... when I came back last year! And how she danced with pleasure to see my civic crown, And took my sword, and hung it up, and brought me forth my gown! Now, all those things are over—yes, all thy pretty ways, Thy needlework, thy prattle, thy snatches of old lays; And none will grieve when I go forth, or smile when I return, Or watch beside the old man's bed, or weep upon his urn. The house that was the happiest within the Roman walls, The house ...
— Lays of Ancient Rome • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... neglecting any work; she is only idle, as she always is idle. But love throws a new glory and a new interest around her indolence. The endless little notes with which she worries the Post-Office and her friends become suddenly sacred and mysterious. The silly little prattle hushes into confidential whispers. Every crush through the season, becomes the scene of a reunion of two hearts which have been parted for the eternity of twenty-four hours. Love, in fact, does not in the least ...
— Modern Women and What is Said of Them - A Reprint of A Series of Articles in the Saturday Review (1868) • Anonymous
... mother, he, on his side, might well renounce manhood, and annihilate himself, dedicate himself to God, to whom his mother gave him. And he still felt within him the soft bitterness of that last interview: Marie smiling painfully at memory of their childish play and prattle, and speaking to him of the happiness which he would assuredly find in the service of God; so penetrated indeed with emotion at this thought, that she had made him promise that he would let her hear him say his ...
— The Three Cities Trilogy, Complete - Lourdes, Rome and Paris • Emile Zola
... Letters" are my bedside books. If I wake at night, I have one or other of them to prattle me to sleep again. They talk about themselves for ever, and don't weary me. I like to hear them tell their old stories over and over again. I read them in the dozy hours, and only half remember them. I am informed ...
— Roundabout Papers • William Makepeace Thackeray
... consult his fly-book. Neither of them seemed in a very talkative mood; indeed, when you are in front of a Highland river, with its swift-glancing lights, its changing glooms and gleams, its continual murmur and prattle, what need is there of any talk? Talk only distracts the attention. And this part of the stream was especially beautiful. They could hardly quarrel with the sunlight when, underneath the clear water, it sent interlacing lines of gold chasing ...
— Prince Fortunatus • William Black
... it fade away, and beginning it over again. The old servant, Marguerite, was the only domestic mamma had brought with her, and she used to accompany us. Gay and daring, she always knew how to make the men laugh with her prattle, the sense and crudeness of which I did not understand until much later. She was the life of the party always. As she had been with us from the time we were born, she was very familiar, and sometimes objectionably so; but I would not let her have her own way with me, though, and I ...
— My Double Life - The Memoirs of Sarah Bernhardt • Sarah Bernhardt
... talking from morning till night, A sign of our wisdom it be, The swallows are wiser by right, For they prattle ...
— Talkers - With Illustrations • John Bate
... none: the enemy fell without mercy. Fury everywhere raged and the cowardly cunning of weakness. Ne'er may I men so carried away by injurious passion See again! the sight of the raging wild beast would be better. Let not man prattle of freedom, as if himself he could govern! Soon as the barriers are torn away, then all of the evil Seems let loose, that by law had been driven deep ...
— Hermann and Dorothea • Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
... hard for Mabel to keep her secrets. When her papa came home at night, she always climbed upon his knee to tell him every thing that had happened in her little world during the day; and her papa always listened to her prattle with a great deal ...
— The Nursery, March 1878, Vol. XXIII. No. 3 - A Monthly Magazine for Youngest Readers • Various
... feel settled, Kate; the dear old place will again ring with happy voices, old friends will be there," and he whispered low and tenderly, "In time, I trust, an heir will prattle at our knees, how happy would my dear mother be could she see our union consummated, ...
— A Heart-Song of To-day • Annie Gregg Savigny
... being ignorant of the comprehensive schemes which may be in contemplation, might mistake egregiously in judging of things from appearances, or by the lump. Yet every f—l will have his notions—will prattle and talk away; and why may not I? We seem then, in my opinion, to act under the guidance of an evil genius. The conduct of our leaders, if not actuated by superior orders, is tempered with something—I do not care to give a name to. Nothing now but a miracle can bring this campaign ...
— The Life of George Washington, Vol. 2 (of 5) • John Marshall
... tables for the banquet; and they deserved to be under the thraldom of such a task. When they were yet in flesh and blood, and ate the fruits of the earth, they were of that equivocal kind, who seem the friends of all men and yet are the friends of none; whose tongues continually prattle of the noble precepts of virtue, which they feel not in their hearts; who only abstain from evil because it is accompanied by danger, and from doing good because it requires courage and self-denial; who traffic with religion, ...
— Faustus - his Life, Death, and Doom • Friedrich Maximilian von Klinger
... nature as well as dignity. Viola said, she had heard her father speak of Orsino, and that he was unmarried then. 'And he is so now,' said the captain; 'or was so very lately, for, but a month ago, I went from here, and then it was the general talk (as you know what great ones do, the people will prattle of) that Orsino sought the love of fair Olivia, a virtuous maid, the daughter of a count who died twelve months ago, leaving Olivia to the protection of her brother, who shortly after died also; and for the love of this dear brother, ...
— Tales from Shakespeare • Charles and Mary Lamb
... her place, lost in thought, and hardly conscious of the jolting coach, or of Papillon's prattle, who would not be satisfied till she had dragged ...
— London Pride - Or When the World Was Younger • M. E. Braddon
... only seen thee in French, and in this English text thou comest to me like an old love, at once a surprise and a recollection. Dear little book, I would say nothing about thee if I could help it, but a publisher pleads, and "No" is a churlish word. So for him I will say that I like thy prattle; that while travelling in a railway carriage on my way to the country of "Esther Waters," I passed my station by, and had to hire a carriage and drive across ...
— Confessions of a Young Man • George Moore
... pretty musical prattle ran on as merrily and continuously as the babble in some brook; and still Robert's thoughts wandered, in spite ...
— Lady Audley's Secret • Mary Elizabeth Braddon
... only part of his—which is true, and only natural and reasonable, all things considered. But women never consider as a rule. A man can't go on talking lovey-dovey talk for ever, and listening to his young wife's prattle when he's got to think about making a living, and nursing her and answering her childish questions and telling her he loves his little ownest every minute in the day, while the bills are running up, and rent mornings begin to fly round and hustle ...
— On the Track • Henry Lawson
... restrained in conversation; he did not interrupt her often, instantly apologized and forebore when he did; he poured out none of his wonted sophomoric diatribes, sometimes sensible, more often inane, as the prattle of a great man in his hour of relaxation is apt to be. She had to do most of the talking—and you may be sure that she directed her conversation to conveying under an appearance of lightness many valuable lessons in the true wisdom ...
— The Fashionable Adventures of Joshua Craig • David Graham Phillips
... ministers, compared with whose wisdom our learning is child's prattle for they are one with the sages of history. Their minds drink of the limitless ocean of all past knowledge and catch the gleam of discovery to come. Furthermore"—here his voice grew hard and his ...
— The Tyranny of the Dark • Hamlin Garland
... performance of "Don Giovanni," when the final rehearsal already had been held, the overture still remained unwritten. It had to be written overnight, and it was she who sat by him and relieved the rush and strain of work with her cheerful prattle. It is said that, among other things, she read to him the story of "Aladdin and the Wonderful Lamp." Be that as it may;—she rubbed the lamp, and the ...
— The Loves of Great Composers • Gustav Kobb
... but picked up her basket and proceeded with her out of the valley. Chris gave a hand to the child, and save for Tim's prattle there was no speaking. ...
— Children of the Mist • Eden Phillpotts
... aging people and lying lost amid sunless forests, the rose that blooms in the shadow underneath Melisande's casement, Melisande's hair that falls farther than her arms can reach, the black tarn that broods beneath the castle-vaults and breathes death, Golaud's anguished search for truth in the prattle of the child, that could not but call a profound response from Debussy's imagination. But, above all, it was the figure of Melisande herself that made him pour himself completely into the setting of the play. For ...
— Musical Portraits - Interpretations of Twenty Modern Composers • Paul Rosenfeld
... garbled and misrepresented, and how, in all probability, he would be accused of showing the white feather. Under ordinary circumstances he would have been very indifferent to what was said of him: he could well afford to allow idle tongues to prattle forth slander about him till weary of the occupation, but he could not bear to fancy that Mrs Edmonstone, or rather her friend, should hear anything to his disadvantage which he might not be present to refute; still, happily, ...
— Ronald Morton, or the Fire Ships - A Story of the Last Naval War • W.H.G. Kingston
... caressed; by turns gentle and rattling; exacting yet generous; fearless—of her mother, for instance, whose irrationally hard and strict rule she has often defied—yet reliant on any who will help her. Jessie, with her little piquant face, engaging prattle, and winning ways, is made to be a pet; and her ...
— Charlotte Bronte and Her Circle • Clement K. Shorter
... mother's admonishment not to annoy people with too much talk, I apologized to the young ladies. Smilingly, they begged me to continue, for they seemed to enjoy my boyish prattle. ...
— Tales of Aztlan • George Hartmann
... was resumed in this singular way; there was something piquant in not seeing his companion, her presence manifested only by her sweet breath, the slight rustling of the glazed cloth which afforded her such scanty room, and the prattle which ...
— The Son of Clemenceau • Alexandre (fils) Dumas
... mystical poem, or rather series of poems, in six books, written in Persian rhymed couplets, as the title indicates. In the second poem of the First Book we read that an oilman possessed a fine parrot, who amused him with her prattle and watched his shop during his absence. It chanced one day, when the oilman had gone out, that a cat ran into the shop in chase of a mouse, which so frightened the parrot that she flew about from shelf to shelf, upsetting several jars and spilling their contents. ...
— Flowers from a Persian Garden and Other Papers • W. A. Clouston
... of competence, and of the power of breeding up her darling Eugene according to his birth. She did not even know what her father had written, and could only go about her daily occupations like one under a weight, listening to her sisters' prattle about their little plans with a strange sense that everything was coming to an end, and constantly weighing the comparative evils of yielding ...
— Love and Life • Charlotte M. Yonge
... what mouth of the Nile it had been conveyed to the sea. For this reason the Egyptians look upon children as endued with a kind of faculty of divining, and in consequence of this notion are very curious in observing the accidental prattle which they have with one another whilst they are at play, especially if it be in a sacred place, forming omens and presages from it. Isis meanwhile having been informed that Osiris, deceived by her sister Nephthys, who was in love with him, had unwittingly ...
— Legends Of The Gods - The Egyptian Texts, edited with Translations • E. A. Wallis Budge
... directly to the attitude of the three hardened attendants who mistook his consideration for cowardice and taunted him for it. Just to prove his mettle he began to assault patients, and one day knocked me down simply for refusing to stop my prattle at his command. That the environment in some institutions is brutalizing, was strikingly shown in the testimony of an attendant at a public investigation in Kentucky, who said, "When I came here, if anyone had told ...
— A Mind That Found Itself - An Autobiography • Clifford Whittingham Beers
... her book, soon after her husband came in, and commenced preparations for the evening meal. This was soon ready, and despatched in silence, except so far as the aimless prattle of their little girl interrupted it. Tea over, Mrs. Fenwick put Anna to bed, much against her will, and then drew up to the ...
— Home Lights and Shadows • T. S. Arthur
... him rising and expanding. A sob lodged in his tight throat and pained him. He was grateful for the deepening shadows, for the droning prattle from the old lips. He sank into a chair. The droning continued, sounding far off. A thousand incidents and faces (smiling and blending) sprang upon him out of the past—the happy, irresponsible past, the seductive, confident, ambitious past. Surely Fate ...
— The Desired Woman • Will N. Harben
... the Watling Street! Yet we have not turned—Where are we?" Rothgar gnawed at his heavy moustache as though the answer were difficult to frame; and before he had time to evolve it, Elfgiva, who had caught the exclamation, had broken off her prattle. ...
— The Ward of King Canute • Ottilie A. Liljencrantz
... came back,—the fourth was never more heard of. In a few days after, the husband and father returned from Winchester (where he had been for salt) and instead of the welcome greeting of an affectionate wife, and the pleasing prattle of his innocent children, was saluted with the melancholy intelligence of their fate. It was enough to make him curse the authors of the outrage, and swear eternal enmity to the ...
— Chronicles of Border Warfare • Alexander Scott Withers
... the Brownings, but, at one time, Lowell, who was not, however, a very good Florentine. "As for pictures," I find him writing, in 1874, on a later visit, "I am tired to death of 'em,... and then most of them are so bad. I like best the earlier ones, that say so much in their half-unconscious prattle, and talk nature to me instead of high art." But "the older streets," he says, "have a noble mediaeval distance and reserve for me—a frown I was going to call it, not of hostility, but of haughty doubt. These grim palace fronts meet you with an aristocratic start that puts ...
— A Wanderer in Florence • E. V. Lucas
... a large dose to swallow, but Miss Peckham swallowed it, and much delighted with the gallant youth, so much more appreciative of her than the others at camp, she sat listening attentively to his prattle of what he had seen and done, keeping her hat off the while to let her hair ripple in the breeze the way he said he liked it, regardless of the fact that the sun was ...
— The Campfire Girls at Camp Keewaydin • Hildegard G. Frey
... only languidly interested in these announcements. She listened distraitly to the prattle of the children who surrounded her while she was served ...
— Penny of Top Hill Trail • Belle Kanaris Maniates
... I sit night after night in my mother-in-law's "budwar," the crimson-satin chairs staring at me, the wedding-cake ornament with its silver leaves glittering in the electric light; I sit there listening vaguely to her admonitions and endless prattle of Augustus's perfections. I have now heard every incident of his childhood: what ailments he had, what medicines suited him best, when he cut all those superfluous teeth ...
— The Reflections of Ambrosine - A Novel • Elinor Glyn
... oration! Good heavens, what wasn't there in it! I am positive that it would have reduced to rigidity even a Petersburg audience, let alone ours. Imagine an article that would have filled some thirty pages of print of the most affected, aimless prattle; and to make matters worse, the gentleman read it with a sort of melancholy condescension as though it were a favour, so that it was almost insulting to the audience. The subject.... Who could make it out? It was a sort of description of certain impressions and reminiscences. But of ...
— The Possessed - or, The Devils • Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... alive, you've done nothing but prattle of Pollyanna ever since you came home from Boston and found she was expected. I thought you were dying ...
— Pollyanna Grows Up • Eleanor H. Porter
... ingratitude; and hence Her ways have not been ways of pleasantness, Nor all her paths of peace. But her distress And grief she has lived past; your giddy round Disturbs her not, for she is learned profound In deep brahminical philosophy. She chews the cud of sweetest revery Above your worldly prattle, brooklet merry, Oblivious of all ...
— Birds and Poets • John Burroughs
... went those pretty babes, Rejoicing at that tide, Rejoicing with a merry mind They should on cock-horse ride. They prate and prattle pleasantly, As they ride on the way, To those that should their butchers be ...
— English Fairy Tales • Flora Annie Steel
... flew by, and Harry Forsyth remained in this state of semi- imbecility, free from anxiety about his mother and sister at home, forgetful of all but his animal comforts and the superficial interest he felt in such prattle as this. His bodily health improved before his mental activity; perhaps it was owing to the freedom from worry consequent upon this lethargic state of mind that he was able to ...
— For Fortune and Glory - A Story of the Soudan War • Lewis Hough
... minds. She informed them that she was the only child of Eldon Maise and how she spent her winters in a fashionable boarding school, only coming to the country in summer to spend her vacation. Eldon Maise, as Peri knew, was the rich man of the "clan." But the lively prattle of his sister and their dainty cousin on topics of interests common only to girls, bored him and he soon found himself becoming interested in ...
— Pearl and Periwinkle • Anna Graetz
... attributes of the house of mourning. The boats were all drawn up on the beach; and, though the day was fine, and the season favourable, the chant, which is used by the fishers when at sea, was silent, as well as the prattle of the children, and the shrill song of the mother, as she sits mending her nets by the door. A few of the neighbours, some in their antique and well-saved suits of black, others in their ordinary clothes, but all bearing an expression of mournful sympathy ...
— The Antiquary, Complete • Sir Walter Scott
... whenever his companion seemed to be addressing him in particular. But, as if reserving all his regrets for the parting moment, Bushie—now mounted on Burl's shoulder, now walking hand in hand with Kumshakah—kept up a lively prattle which never ceased, and to which the others listened with pleased ears. Sometimes, while riding aloft, he would amuse himself by catching at the slender, pliant branches of the trees brought within his reach, which he would draw after him as far as he could bend them, ...
— Burl • Morrison Heady
... generally two or three times a year) he always sent for them, and expressed a very great satisfaction in finding in their looks the charge he had given concerning them so well executed: but when they arrived at an age capable of entertaining him with their innocent prattle, what before was charity, improved into affection; and he began to regard them with a tenderness little inferior to paternal; but which still increased ...
— The Fortunate Foundlings • Eliza Fowler Haywood
... my hair. He looked through my heart to the mud that was there. Like a black-mailer hating his victim he spoke: "When I see all your squirming I laugh till I choke Singing of peace. Railing at battle. Soothing a handful with saccharine prattle. All the millions of earth have voted for fight. You are voting for talk, with hands lily white." He leaped to the floor, then grew seven feet high, Beautiful, terrible, scorn in his eye: The Devil Eternal, Apollo ...
— Chinese Nightingale • Vachel Lindsay
... never confirmed by an oath, and never broken." Especially was Towandahoc attached to the Buckingham family, who ever treated him kindly, and to the little girl who played with his bow and arrows, and tried in her artless prattle to pronounce his name. Unbroken peace had hitherto prevailed between the red men and the pale faces, owing to the just and friendly treatment the natives had experienced; but symptoms of another spirit began now to appear. The war waged between England and France had extended to ...
— Holidays at the Grange or A Week's Delight - Games and Stories for Parlor and Fireside • Emily Mayer Higgins
... her perception of that one fleeting look might, after all, be but a flickering dream. And when, at times, she sat and heard the young girl speak, not with apparent method, but rather as one who is unwittingly drawn into discursive prattle, about her cottage home in Samos, and the lowly lover from whom the invading armies had torn her, and watched the moistened eye and the trembling lip with which these memories were dwelt upon, an inward pity and sympathy tempted her to forget her own distrust; until one day she ...
— Continental Monthly , Vol. 5, No. 6, June, 1864 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... so glad to talk and take our turns to prattle, when so rarely we get back to the stronghold of our ...
— Leaves of Life - For Daily Inspiration • Margaret Bird Steinmetz
... struggle o'er, You face the world and ask no favor; You stand where you have stood before, The old salt hasn't lost its savor. You now can laugh with friends, at foes' Ne'er heeding Mrs. Grundy's tattle; You've dealt and taken sturdy blows, Regardless of the rabble's prattle. ...
— A Unique Story of a Marvellous Career. Life of Hon. Phineas T. • Joel Benton
... in her eyes of something he could not read. It was as though she struggled to recall a memory of something gone by,—something sweet yet unholy which she did not understand, would not ask about, and could not forget. And, at other times, in the midst of her childish prattle, she would say what would make him glance at her strangely, in a voice like hers, yet whose subtle intonations were not like hers. Also, he had not found many women who were at times as honestly regardless of him as though he had not been there. ...
— Nicanor - Teller of Tales - A Story of Roman Britain • C. Bryson Taylor
... surprise. Yerba broke the silence by suddenly turning to Milly. "Certainly, you remember how greatly interested we were in the conversation of a party of gentlemen who were there when we came in. I am afraid our foolish prattle must have disturbed YOU. I know that we were struck with the intelligent and eloquent devotion of ...
— A Ward of the Golden Gate • Bret Harte
... audiences is given by the author of Southern Lights and Shadows. "The young ladies of Australia," he says, "are in many respects remarkable. At thirteen they have more ribbons, jewels, and lovers than any other young ladies of the same age. They prattle insipidly from morning to night. The first time I visited a theatre I sat next one of them who had at least half a dozen rings worn over her gloves.... The affectation of ton among them is astonishing. ...
— The Magnificent Montez - From Courtesan to Convert • Horace Wyndham
... quarters, but their silence could be bought with a few shin plasters. This "hush" money and that made from running errands were enough to keep the children supplied with spending change. Often, when their childish prattle had caused some adult to be punished, Mrs. Huff would keep them in the house for a night to escape the wrath of ...
— Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States - Volume II. Arkansas Narratives. Part I • Work Projects Administration
... away for a month or two, but more than a year had now elapsed without her even hearing of him. Proportionably great was her surprise and joy at his sudden re-appearance, and his happiness was not less real at seeing once more those he so dearly loved. What with Bibi's eager questions, and the prattle of the little ones, an hour or two had glided away swiftly enough, when Boulanger suddenly asked what had ...
— The King's Warrant - A Story of Old and New France • Alfred H. Engelbach
... would have none of his duets to-night. She scarcely smiled when receiving him, and would scarcely condescend to talk to him. She was in no mood for talking with this immature young man —this boy, who came with his prattle when she wished to be alone. It was ...
— Fan • Henry Harford
... did never entertaine me with other than the Latine tongue. As for others of his household, it was an inviolable rule, that neither himselfe, nor my mother, nor man, nor maid-servant, were suffered to speake one word in my companie, except such Latine words as every one had learned to chat and prattle with me. It were strange to tell how every one in the house profited therein. My Father and my Mother learned so much Latine, that for a need they could understand it, when they heard it spoken, even so did all the household servants, ...
— Literary and Philosophical Essays • Various
... uncle." I made no secret of the way I employed my time, and I rather fancy that my artless tales of the pilots and so on entertained Madame Delestang so far as that ineffable woman could be entertained by the prattle of a youngster very full of his new experience among strange men and strange sensations. She expressed no opinions, and talked to me very little; yet her portrait hangs in the gallery of my intimate memories, fixed there by a short and fleeting ...
— A Personal Record • Joseph Conrad
... shall come," a prattler 'gan to prattle: * "Needs cease thy blame!" I was commoved to rattle: 'In time,' quoth he: quoth I ' 'Tis marvellous! * Who shall ensure my life, O cold ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 3 • Richard F. Burton
... Love! bound in thy rosy band, Let sage or cynic prattle as he will, These hours, and only these, ...
— A History of Nursery Rhymes • Percy B. Green
... next to theirs, and as she sat sewing she could hear the children's talk, for they soon forgot to whisper. At first she smiled, then she looked sober, and when the prattle ceased she said to herself, as she glanced ...
— Aunt Jo's Scrap-Bag VI - An Old-Fashioned Thanksgiving, Etc. • Louisa M. Alcott
... splendid motion picture actor," declared the younger Miss Stanton, audaciously. "He sticks close to his cues, you see, and won't move till he gets one. He will answer your questions; yes, he has said he would; but you may prattle until doomsday without effect, so far as he is concerned, unless you finish your speech with ...
— Aunt Jane's Nieces Out West • Edith Van Dyne
... upon this tribute as we went away. We had learned through the innocent prattle of our hostess's busy tongue that she desired a garden, but that Hans thought it a waste of time; that she had suggested open plumbing, and that Hans declined to go to the expense; that she saw little of her brothers nowadays, as Hans did not approve ...
— Many Kingdoms • Elizabeth Jordan
... the philologer: the botanist looks upon the astronomer as a being unworthy of his regard: the lawyer scarcely hears the name of a physician without contempt; and he that is growing great and happy by electrifying a bottle, wonders how the world can be engaged by trifling prattle ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson, LL.D, In Nine Volumes - Volume the Third: The Rambler, Vol. II • Samuel Johnson
... prattle immensely, and they were on the best terms. She told Tom she should like to go to school to Mr. Stelling, as he did, and learn just the same things. She knew she could do Euclid, for she had looked into it again, and she saw ...
— The Mill on the Floss • George Eliot
... learning to climb chimneys. Up to the age of seventeen, as I have shown, I had a great contempt for the female race, and when age brought with it warmer and juster sentiments, where was I?—I could no more dance nor prattle to a young girl than a young bear could. I have seen the ugliest little low-bred wretches carrying off young and lovely creatures, twirling with them in waltzes, whispering between their glossy curls in quadrilles, simpering with perfect equanimity, and cutting pas in that abominable ...
— The Fitz-Boodle Papers • William Makepeace Thackeray
... 60 Say, does her language your ambition raise, Her barren, trivial, unharmonious phrase, Which fetters eloquence to scantiest bounds, And maims the cadence of poetic sounds? Say, does your humble admiration choose The gentle prattle of her Comic Muse, While wits, plain-dealers, fops, and fools appear, Charged to say nought but what the king may hear? Or rather melt your sympathising hearts Won by her tragic scene's romantic arts, 70 Where old and young ...
— Poetical Works of Akenside - [Edited by George Gilfillan] • Mark Akenside
... grass and green plants and summer meads That were a delight to eye and heart. One found there whatever one would, whatever May should bring— Shade from the sun, limes by the brook, A gentle breeze which brought the prattle Of Mark's court people. May's friend, the green turf, Had made herself a charming costume of flowers, In which she shone back at the guests with a festival of her own; The blossoming trees smiled so sweetly at every one, That heart and mind smiled back again. The pure notes ...
— The Development of the Feeling for Nature in the Middle Ages and - Modern Times • Alfred Biese
... now coursed smoothly and happily along, Pippity entertaining us with his lively prattle, and Grilly, full of his antics and his learning, affording a never-failing fund of amusement. Nor did he ever omit, when the supply of cocoa-nuts was about exhausted, to go down and assemble his tribe, who forthwith took their places up the height, passed the nuts one to another, and, when ...
— St. Nicholas Magazine for Boys and Girls, Vol. 5, January 1878, No. 3 • Various
... with reason, at the freedom of his speech; yet, his manner, was so much beyond anything I had been accustomed to for ease and pleasantness, that I soon forgave him, and when he encouraged me, began to prattle about my affairs, being only, with all my conceit, the silly lassie ...
— The Empire Annual for Girls, 1911 • Various
... heard her mother's mortuary prattle with a face from which no impatience of it could be inferred, and Mr. Ferris made no comment on what was oddly various in character and manner, for Mrs. Vervain touched upon the gloomiest facts of her history with a certain impersonal statistical interest. They were ...
— A Foregone Conclusion • W. D. Howells
... proud she was of these! Can you forget how, sitting on your knees, She used to prattle volubly, and raise Her tiny feet to ...
— Life and Literature - Over two thousand extracts from ancient and modern writers, - and classified in alphabetical order • J. Purver Richardson
... pompously proffered. So long as he stays in Quito he will not lose sight of the contrast between big promise and beggarly performance. This outward civility, however, is not hypocritical; it is mere mechanical prattle; the speaker does not expect to be taken at his word. The love of superlatives and the want of good faith may be considered as prominent characteristics. "The readiness with which they break a promise or an agreement (wrote Colonel Hall ...
— The Andes and the Amazon - Across the Continent of South America • James Orton
... presumably directed to one or the other of her sisters, but their faint, reluctant answers apparently did not disturb her. She was treating them as though they were dingy frumps; and they revolted against all this prattle about Paris. It was distinctly unbecoming in a woman whose sins were so grievous to ripple on so light-heartedly about the unholiest of cities when they sat there as jurors waiting to hear her ...
— Otherwise Phyllis • Meredith Nicholson
... infant prodigy, Clarence, in our care for a little while that she might not be distracted by his innocent prattle while selecting the ...
— Successful Recitations • Various
... succeed, how helpless he seemed against her. He looked completely insignificant. Ursula and Gudrun, both very unused, were mostly silent, listening to the slow, rhapsodic sing-song of Hermione, or the verbal sallies of Sir Joshua, or the prattle of Fraulein, or the responses of the ...
— Women in Love • D. H. Lawrence
... twinkling with humor, so Polly and Button-Bright were not at all afraid of the wonderful personage whose fame as a humbug magician had spread throughout the world. After greeting Dorothy with much affection, he stood modestly behind Ozma's throne and listened to the lively prattle of ...
— The Road to Oz • L. Frank Baum
... light, Love shut our eyes, and all seemed right. True, the world's eyes are open now: —Less need for me to disallow Some few that keep Love's zone unbuckled, Peevish as ever to be suckled, Lulled by the same old baby-prattle With intermixture of the rattle, When she would have them creep, stand steady Upon their feet, or walk already, Not to speak of trying to climb. I will be wise another time, And not desire a wall ...
— Christmas Eve • Robert Browning
... the idea of quitting the country in his company seemed less repulsive to her than at first. He was rich, and she would no longer be obliged to support herself by a degrading occupation. After the first buzz of scandal and excitement at her elopement the world would cease to prattle, or if it did she would be in America and safe from its strictures. The King was too poor in friends to refuse her recognition at his court. And, after all, there need be no scandal. She would go to America in the role of a professional beauty and Jawkins ...
— The King's Men - A Tale of To-morrow • Robert Grant, John Boyle O'Reilly, J. S. Dale, and John T.
... woman. I've been in England for years, you know, and the women over there are doing all the men's work and getting better wages at it than the men ever did. After the war they'll never go back to their tatting and prattle. I'm going to your shipyard and have a look-in, but not the way a pink debutante follows a naval officer over a battle-ship, staring at him and not at the works. I'm going on business, and if I like ship-building, ...
— The Cup of Fury - A Novel of Cities and Shipyards • Rupert Hughes
... curls, merry expression, roguish nose and soft radiance swept all his misgivings and prejudices before her. One might as well hold grudges against a flower, he thought. He liked the confiding way she had of suddenly slipping her little hand into his great one. Her prattle amused him, and he was both flattered and worried by the fearlessness with which she followed him everywhere. She seemed to bring a veritable shower of song into this home of long silences. The very chaos made Mrs. Wade's heart beat tumultuously, and once when ...
— Dust • Mr. and Mrs. Haldeman-Julius
... to the eager prattle. He remembered afterward that Bobby's hands and face were hot with fever. Just now he was staring at the narrow staircase. Vos Engo and Loraine were descending slowly. The former was white and evidently very weak. He leaned on the girl ...
— Truxton King - A Story of Graustark • George Barr McCutcheon
... prostrated with a severe typhoid fever, and was so kindly cared for by this dear family, who, by tender ministration, nursed the little spark of hope, and brought me from death unto life. Their two sweet children and their musical prattle will ever be recalled as illuminated pictures upon the red-lettered page of ...
— The World As I Have Found It - Sequel to Incidents in the Life of a Blind Girl • Mary L. Day Arms
... that no gesture, motion, or deportment be taught our youth but what by their allowance shall be thought honest; for such Plato was provided of. It will ask more than the work of twenty licensers to examine all the lutes, the violins, and the guitars in every house; they must not be suffered to prattle as they do, but must be licensed what they may say. And who shall silence all the airs and madrigals that whisper softness in chambers? The windows also, and the balconies must be thought on; there are shrewd ...
— Areopagitica - A Speech For The Liberty Of Unlicensed Printing To The - Parliament Of England • John Milton
... part, I never care For those lips that tongue-tied are: Tell-tales I would have them be Of my mistress and of me. Let them prattle how that I Sometimes freeze and sometimes fry: Let them tell how she doth move Fore or backward in her love: Let them speak by gentle tones, One and th' other's passions: How we watch, and seldom sleep; How by willows we do weep; How by stealth we meet, and then ...
— The Hesperides & Noble Numbers: Vol. 1 and 2 • Robert Herrick
... is.— What would you have? You have forbid my stirring For manly sports beyond the castle walls, And I obey; you bid me turn a chamberer, To pick up gloves, and fans, and knitting-needles, And list to songs and tunes, and watch for smiles, And smile at pretty prattle, and look into The eyes of feminine, as though they were The stars receding early to our wish Upon the dawn of a world-winning battle— 410 What can a son or man do more? ...
— The Works of Lord Byron - Poetry, Volume V. • Lord Byron
... longed more than either to get away from Aunt Deborah, the storm of whose vituperation seemed ringing in his ears so long as he continued within sight of her dwelling. One would think the clack of the mill and the prattle of his pretty cousin Cicely might have drowned it, but it did not. Nothing short of leaving the spinster fifty miles behind, and setting the great city between him and her, ...
— Aunt Deborah • Mary Russell Mitford
... credit-account with the Recording Angel. Originally a Nonconformist, he had joined the Church of England after he had made his fortune (cf. Shavings from the Workshops of our Merchant Princes, which appeared in the pages of "Prattle"). Then, the famous inventor of the Imperishable Boot had taken to endowing churches; and he published pamphlets denouncing drink and gambling, pamphlets sent to his son at Harrow, who (with an eye to backsheesh) had praised ...
— The Hill - A Romance of Friendship • Horace Annesley Vachell
... that our little Mistress Merciless and Master Sweetheart became fast friends, and the Queen of Sheba was handmaiden to them both; for the simple, loyal creature had not a mind above the artless prattle of childhood, and the strange allegory of the lame boy's speech filled her with awe, even as the innocent lisping of our little Mistress Merciless delighted her heart and came within the comprehension of her limited understanding. ...
— The Holy Cross and Other Tales • Eugene Field
... absorbing this prattle, the visitor gazed about him. The bed had been unslept in, and here and there were evidences of a hasty and unpremeditated leave-taking. Upon an open desk lay a half-finished poem, obviously intended for no eyes save the ...
— Under the Rose • Frederic Stewart Isham
... air. Regularly, every day, there was a single bird, not singing, but awkwardly chirruping among the green madronas, and the sound was cheerful, natural, and stirring. It did not hold the attention, nor interrupt the thread of meditation, like a blackbird or a nightingale; it was mere woodland prattle, of which the mind was conscious like a perfume. The freshness of these morning seasons remained with me far ...
— The Silverado Squatters • Robert Louis Stevenson
... of religious feeling? By describing the Cabinet Order everywhere as an outcome of religious feeling. Is an insight into social movements to be expected from such an illogical mind? Listen to his prattle about the relation of German society to the Labour movement and ...
— Selected Essays • Karl Marx
... of France, the fairest, the most ill-starred; I had fought and conquered shoulder to shoulder with her sons. A soldier, a noble, of the proudest and bravest race in Europe, it had been left to the prattle of a hobbledehoy lackey in an English chaise to recall me to ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 20 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson |
