"Sly" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... explains to his 'dearly beloved sister' some passages of Scripture, and adds—'The Spirit of God shall instruct your heart what is most comfortable to the troubled conscience of your mother.' This communication ends with the subdued or sly postscript, 'I think this be the first letter that ever I wrote to you.'[32] In July, while Knox was in London, Mary Tudor ascended the throne, and everything began to look threatening. In September Knox acknowledges the ...
— John Knox • A. Taylor Innes
... and very sly. She was very sly: very indeed. In fact she used to go about the house so very slyly, getting into all sorts of mischief which the people could never find out till afterwards, that they gave her the name of ...
— Mary Erskine • Jacob Abbott
... the queen's behest, but also to the end that I may let you see that even the religious, in whom we in our boundless credulity repose exorbitant faith, may be, and sometimes are, made—not to say by men—even by some of us women the sport of their sly wit. ...
— The Decameron, Volume I • Giovanni Boccaccio
... moment if he were only sure of that. He thought of the women he knew. Georgina was the first to come up in his mind. He had been to see her, and had come away at a loss to understand what he had ever seen in her. She had struck him as vulgar and middle-class, sly, with a taste for intrigue. He remembered that was how she had struck him when he first saw her. But if anyone had described her as vulgar and middle-class six months ...
— Evelyn Innes • George Moore
... you know me. You see nothing has changed in me. I'm still the same Eddie—richer, balder, foolisher, perhaps. It seems you ought to know all about the ten years without being told. But I'll tell you. I'm an art collector on the sly. Pictures—horrible things that don't look like anything. I don't know why I collect them, honestly. Pictures mean nothing to me. Never did. Particularly the kind I pick up. But it's a habit that keeps me cheerful. ...
— Erik Dorn • Ben Hecht
... certain to wake and overwhelm me with chatter when the interruption would be least acceptable: indeed, as I watched her, a slight twinkling of the eyelids warned me that the present appearance of repose might be but a ruse, assumed to cover sly vigilance over "Timon's" movements; she was not to be trusted. And I had so wished to be alone, just to read ...
— Villette • Charlotte Bronte
... going alone and on the sly to her lover's chambers, she had undoubtedly compromised her own good name. To confess to her own folly and imprudence was almost beyond her power, and to clear her lover's name at the expense of her own was what she felt he himself would scarcely ...
— Vera Nevill - Poor Wisdom's Chance • Mrs. H. Lovett Cameron
... was sly and lazy, and not wanting in a gift for making money that was rather the fruit of avarice than any general length and breadth and depth of native wit. Having occasion to visit, as a young man, the little humdrum capital of his State, he stayed there, and engaged in the trade of lobbyist before ...
— The President - A novel • Alfred Henry Lewis
... me if I told you, too, that later on—ah, as late as possible, I trust—attaining the object of a long cherished ambition, you will have a table d'hote at Belleville Batignolles, and will be courted by the old soldiers and bygone dandies who will come there to play lansquenet or baccarat on the sly? But, before arriving at this period, when the sun of your youth shall have already declined, believe me, my dear child, you will wear out many yards of silk and velvet, many inheritances, no doubt, will be melted down in the crucibles of your fancies, many flowers will fade about your head, ...
— Bohemians of the Latin Quarter • Henry Murger
... of his boarding-house in Front Street he met Hennesey, his runner. Hennesey was a small man, sly, shrewd, and persuasive, and so far had given satisfaction in the difficult business of soliciting incoming crews to board at Murphy's house instead of the Sailors' Home, the Provident Seamen's Mission, and other like institutions. But Murphy's ...
— The Grain Ship • Morgan Robertson
... He drove her over to Elmhurst that morning, and he drives over two or three evenings a week to meet her on the sly and get her report. That may be politics, but it ain't ...
— Aunt Jane's Nieces at Work • Edith Van Dyne
... and fro in the quadrangle, near the statues of the Patron Saint and his sister; and hopping on behind them, in and out of the old arches, is a raven, croaking in answer to the bell, and uttering, at intervals, the purest Tuscan. How like a Jesuit he looks! There never was a sly and stealthy fellow so at home as is this raven, standing now at the refectory door, with his head on one side, and pretending to glance another way, while he is scrutinizing the visitors keenly, and listening ...
— Pictures from Italy • Charles Dickens
... know a boy named Buck?" he questioned as he deliberately paid for the paper that was held up to him, and searched the unpromising little face before him. Then marvelled at the sullen, sly change upon the ...
— Lo, Michael! • Grace Livingston Hill
... of cat, tipcat, or "sly," so called by Wilson, in his life of Bunyan [Wilson's Edition of Works, vol. i., fol. 1736], is an ancient game well known in many parts of the kingdom. A number of holes are made in the ground, at equal distances, in a circular direction; a player is stationed ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... doubt we were off for a ramble, perhaps to Apsley House, in the Park, to get a sly peep at the old Duke before he retired for the night, for Harry had told me the Duke always went to bed early, I sprang up to follow him; but what was my disappointment and surprise, when he only led ...
— Redburn. His First Voyage • Herman Melville
... it strange that the Arabs stood outside, watching the boy go. You're not to blame, because you didn't see the sly look in my fellows' faces. I had the sign, and neglected it, in spite of my resolutions. But after all, if we're in for trouble, I don't know that it isn't as well those cowards have taken French leave. If they'd stayed, we'd only have had an enemy inside ...
— The Golden Silence • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... doing all the stealing, feared she might be discovered, and adopted a less hazardous method of making herself a rich woman: she stole books, and sold them to the second-hand dealer. She was sly enough to take books that had been on the shelves for a long while, and not to do all her business with one dealer: she would go first to one and then ...
— The Goose Man • Jacob Wassermann
... "A SLY, artful, treacherous jade?" articulated Mrs. Sutton, energetically. "I have no patience with her. And they say she is so overjoyed at her conquest that she trumpets the engagement everywhere. Such shameless carrying on I never heard of. ...
— At Last • Marion Harland
... his 'Tales of the Hall;' that Southey had no reason to be dissatisfied with the pecuniary result of his epics and articles, nor Mr. Millman cause to weep over the 'Fall of Jerusalem.' There were rumours even, embodied in sly newspaper paragraphs, that Mr. Murray was paying Lord Byron at the rate of a guinea a word; though this was disputed by others, who asserted that the remuneration was only five shillings a syllable. However, all these reports had led the public to the not unjust conclusion, that booksellers, ...
— The Life of John Clare • Frederick Martin
... Sly," said Doris, surveying the scene, with her hands in her jacket pockets. "So ...
— A Great Success • Mrs Humphry Ward
... threats availed him nothing, and John Rebstock who, though still young, was a sly fox in crooked ways, contented himself with a philosophical denial of everything alleged against him, adding only in an injured tone that nobody would believe ...
— The Mountain Divide • Frank H. Spearman
... had done the murder. From the agent she had heard no details, and though the case had made a great sensation at the time it happened, years ago, she had been far away in South Africa, and had not given much attention to it. Some sly hints of Secundina's, however, had shown her that the servants knew, and she had not been able to resist asking questions. Afterward she could not put out of her head Secundina's description ...
— The Guests Of Hercules • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... he glanced at her keenly out of the corner of his eye. It was a trick of his which always irritated her because it reminded her of the sly and furtive side of ...
— One Man in His Time • Ellen Glasgow
... Winchesters, as they liked to call themselves, had kept under cover, and were advancing Indian fashion. And now a consuming rage seized them all. They felt as if an advantage had been taken of them. While they were fighting a great battle in front a sly foe sought to ambush them. They did not hate the Southern army which charged directly upon them, but they did hate this band of sharpshooters which had come creeping through the woods to pick them off, and they hated them ...
— The Rock of Chickamauga • Joseph A. Altsheler
... conduct them down to dinner; instead of that, he began to upbraid them for the manner in which they had treated an English crew, and then he ordered them to be taken down below and imprisoned in the hold. Having accomplished this, and feeling greatly elated by this piece of sly vengeance, he went into his fine cabin, and he and his officers sat down to the grand feast ...
— Buccaneers and Pirates of Our Coasts • Frank Richard Stockton
... Puss is found, Cat-like, forever chasing round and round. She has no claws, but crouching sly and low She stealthily puts out her undertow. And when an old seadog comes in her way I'll warrant you there is the deuce ...
— A Phenomenal Fauna • Carolyn Wells
... it in its true light," declared Rhoda Schuyler. "Of course, she was angry when he came to her house after being forbidden, unless the sly thing wrote the note just to lure him on, but in any case, she was alone with him, she used the knife on him and she ran away. What more evidence do you need? Now, to find her. That's a task I shall never give up or neglect until ...
— Vicky Van • Carolyn Wells
... part of the country there was a well-to-do farmer, whose marriage had brought him one son, whom he petted beyond all measure, as a cow licks her calf. So by degrees the child became very sly: he used to pull the horses' tails, and blow smoke into the bulls' nostrils, and bully the neighbours' children in petty ways and make them cry. From a peevish child he grew to be a man, and unbearably undutiful to his parents. Priding himself on a little superior ...
— Tales of Old Japan • Algernon Bertram Freeman-Mitford
... amazement. After what he had seen in the hangar, the boy's sly cunning filled him with amazement. He had an overwhelming desire to confide in someone, and Ernest ...
— Battling the Clouds - or, For a Comrade's Honor • Captain Frank Cobb
... not be seen. My life on it, there are plenty of holes and corners in the old house over the way. Run off with a wench! Holy brother Julian! Contemptuous brother Julian! Stand-by-thyself brother Julian! Run away with a wench at last! Well, there's a downfall! He'll be for marrying her on the sly, and away!—I know the old fox!—for her conscience-sake, probably not for his! Well, one comfort is, it's damnation and no reprieve. The ungrateful, atheistical heretic! As if the good old mother wasn't indulgent ...
— The Poetical Works of George MacDonald in Two Volumes, Volume I • George MacDonald
... chary of the same, God wot it was my great folly, For love of one sly knave of them, Good store of that same sweet had he; For all my subtle wiles, perdie, God wot I loved him well enow; Right evilly he handled me, But he loved ...
— Poems & Ballads (Second Series) - Swinburne's Poems Volume III • Algernon Charles Swinburne
... agreeable news. In fact, this wealth of Mr. Trirodov's is of comparatively recent origin. I'm quite sure of that. Of recent origin, I assure you," repeated Ostrov, giving a sly wink. ...
— The Created Legend • Feodor Sologub
... Biddy Shea, Both standin' at the gate, An' they wor just about to kiss Aich oother sly and shwate. They coom togither loike two rams. An' mashed their noses flat. They niver shpake whin they goes by. O'Grady's ...
— Poems Teachers Ask For, Book Two • Various
... the last month, there's been less talk. And by the way," she added, "that Fran-girl went by with Simon Jefferson just now, the two of them in Brother Gregory's buggy. They're going to Blubb's Riffle—he with his weak heart, and her with that sly smile of hers, and it's a ...
— Fran • John Breckenridge Ellis
... Cipolla made this speech, were two very wily young wags, the one Giovanni del Bragoniera by name, the other Biagio Pizzini; who, albeit they were on the best of terms with Fra Cipolla and much in his company, had a sly laugh together over the relic, and resolved to make game of him and his feather. So, having learned that Fra Cipolla was to breakfast that morning in the town with one of his friends, as soon as they knew that he was at table, down ...
— The Decameron, Vol. II. • Giovanni Boccaccio
... criticism, making a speech, studying the law."[9] These innocent looking definitions are probably not without an ironic sting. It requires no great stretch of the imagination, for example, to catch in Hazlitt's eye a sly wink at Lamb or a disdainful glance toward Leigh Hunt as he gives the reader his idea ...
— Hazlitt on English Literature - An Introduction to the Appreciation of Literature • Jacob Zeitlin
... The sparkle of society was no more agreeable to him than the rattle of cutlery. "I have scarcely [he writes] seen anything of the ——s since your departure; business and an amazing want of inclination have kept me from their threshold. Jim, that sly poacher, however, prowls about there, and vitrifies his heart by the furnace of their charms. I accompanied him there on Sunday evening last, and found the Lads and Miss Knox with them. S—— was in great spirits, and played the sparkler with such great success as to silence ...
— Washington Irving • Charles Dudley Warner
... honorably distinguishes the Anglo-Saxon race all over the world, remaining impartial spectators of the fight. Travis had never equalled this feat, but he had seen a good deal of low life and hard knocks on the sly, proper and fashionable as he always appeared in ...
— The International Monthly, Volume 5, No. 3, March, 1852 • Various
... bridesmaids that the light did not fall in full glare upon her, and it was not strange they did not know her at once. She heard their smothered exclamations of wonder and admiration, and one, Kate's dearest friend, whispered softly behind her: "Oh, Kate, why did you keep us waiting, you sly girl! How lovely you are! You look like an angel straight ...
— Marcia Schuyler • Grace Livingston Hill Lutz
... and called "straitlaced", because she would not evade rules or join in certain doubtful undertakings. No one liked fun more than Patty, when it was open and above-board, but she could not bear to be mixed up in anything which seemed sly or underhand. In her bedroom particularly she found cause of trouble. Her three companions, Ella Johnson, May Firth, and Doris Kennedy would get up after Miss Rowe had made her evening rounds, relight the gas, and read storybooks in bed, a proceeding which was, of course, ...
— The Nicest Girl in the School - A Story of School Life • Angela Brazil
... luxuriously furnished. In effect, he occupied a small flat in the house of an ex-butler, and had furnished the place himself in a Sybarite fashion. The ex-butler and his wife and servants looked after Hay, and in addition, that languid gentleman possessed a slim valet, with a sly face, who looked as though he knew more than was good for him. Indeed, the whole atmosphere of the rooms was shady and fast, and Paul, simple young fellow as he was, felt the bad influence the moment he stepped ...
— The Opal Serpent • Fergus Hume
... making a great deal of noise, mostly threats. They were passing to candidates specific questions as to their stand on the larger issues. Many candidates who had subscribed and declared themselves dodged up to headquarters on the sly and assured the State chairman that they had pledged their positions because it seemed to be a reform year, and they had to do something to shut up the yawp of the reformers. When they privately assured Presson that they would be found on the right side just the same after election, he ...
— The Ramrodders - A Novel • Holman Day
... maiden, quite a young sprig, A farmer did choose for his bride; Her favours, however, to a soldier man jig, And sly to ...
— The Son of His Mother • Clara Viebig
... us are," corrected Ned, with a sly glance at Stacy, who was eating industriously. "Others are eating ...
— The Pony Rider Boys in Texas - Or, The Veiled Riddle of the Plains • Frank Gee Patchin
... you for twenty years. Day by day I have hated you more. I've watched you, watched you, watched you! But, you sly jade, you've been too clever for me till now. Yes; I followed you from the hotel. I dogged you. I foresaw what would happen. Now the end has come. I've hated you for twenty years—ever ...
— The Joyous Adventures of Aristide Pujol • William J. Locke
... said, had more than once entered the lists and broken a lance on his brother poet's behalf, as when he parodied Ambrose Philips in "The Shepherd's Week." His "Mr. Pope's Welcome from Greece," written when Pope had finished his translation of the "Iliad," was a fine panegyric, in which he had a sly dig at the ...
— Life And Letters Of John Gay (1685-1732) • Lewis Melville
... identical results. Various measures were discussed without leading to any parliamentary decision or useful law. It was evident that on all subjects of free-trade and financial philosophy the government and the majority of the house were at issue—the one desiring to restore protection under various sly and indirect pretences, the other anxious to develop free-trade principles, and a system of national finance in harmony with the principles ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... job, too," I said, for Nina's face of disgust made me forget to whom I was talking; "it is those sly digs in the ribs which ...
— Godfrey Marten, Undergraduate • Charles Turley
... off whatever they could seize. When I opposed them, the club or tomahawk, the musket or kawas (i. e. killing-stone), being instantly raised, intimated that my life would be taken, if I resisted. Their skill in stealing on the sly was phenomenal! If an article fell, or was seen on the floor, a Tanna-man would neatly cover it with his foot, while looking you frankly in the face, and, having fixed it by his toes or by bending in his great toe like a thumb to hold it, would walk off with it, assuming the most ...
— The Story of John G. Paton - Or Thirty Years Among South Sea Cannibals • James Paton
... hostile Trojans. Helen coifed with flame. Menelaus. Love ... Greater men than Grimshaw had written of Priam's tragedy. His audacity called attention to his imperfect, colourful verse, his love of beauty, his sense of the exotic, the strange, the unhealthy. People read his book on the sly and talked about it in whispers. It was indecent, but it was beautiful. At that time you spoke of Cecil Grimshaw with disapproval, if you spoke of him at all, or, if you happened to be a prophet, you saw in him the ultimate ...
— O. Henry Memorial Award Prize Stories of 1921 • Various
... Devils are you here, why did n't you come into the Pit to night, and eat an Orange,—who have you got with you, by my lost Maidenhead, a meer Country Widgeon, you sly Toads will bubble him finely; let me go snacks, or I'll discover it. Come, Fellows, drink about; positively it's very cold, fitting so behind at the ...
— The Fine Lady's Airs (1709) • Thomas Baker
... That is what the Press can do. It vitiates our mundane values. It enables a gang to fool the country. It cretinises the public mind. The time may come when no respectable person will be seen touching a daily, save on the sly. Newspaper reading will become a secret vice. As such, I fear, its popularity is not likely to wane. Having generated, by means of sundry trite reflections of this nature, an enviable appetite for breakfast, I dress and step out of doors to where, at a pleasant table, I can imbibe some coffee and ...
— Alone • Norman Douglas
... is sniffin' round the bloomin' locus' trees; And the clover in the pastur is a big day fer the bees, And they been a-swiggin' honey, above board and on the sly, Tel they stutter in theyr buzzin' and stagger as they fly. The flicker on the fence-rail 'pears to jest spit on his wings And roll up his feathers, by the sassy way he sings; And the hoss-fly is a-whettin'-up his forelegs fer biz, And the ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume VI. (of X.) • Various
... to take the slightest interest in his explanations. On the contrary, with those expressive shrugs of the shoulder and shakes of the head which convey so much to the bystander without absolutely committing the actor,—with an occasional sly, mysterious, undertone remark to his colleagues,—he indicated very plainly, that, though his humanity would not permit him to give a worthy man cause for so much unhappiness, yet that "he could, an if ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 10, No. 57, July, 1862 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... Selwyn found himself with nobody to talk to, which came as near to embarrassing him as anything could, and which so enraged his hostess that she struck his partner's name from her lists for ever. People were already glancing at him askance in sly ...
— The Younger Set • Robert W. Chambers
... talk and quote and excite herself, applying every now and then a little sly touch of the goad, to make her still run on, and so forget the tragic hour which had overshadowed her. And meanwhile all he cared for was to watch the flashing of her face and eyes, and the play of the wind in her hair, and the springing grace with which she moved. ...
— The Marriage of William Ashe • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... like to know, parson?" and a sly twinkle shone in the captain's eyes as he asked ...
— Rod of the Lone Patrol • H. A. Cody
... refused; Giuliano Cassiani had been sent to prison in 1617 for publishing some verses of Testi against Spain. The Inquisition withheld its imprimatur. Attempts were made to have it printed on the sly at Padua; but the craftsman who engaged to execute this job was imprisoned. At last, in 1622, Tassoni contrived to have the poem published in Paris. The edition soon reached Italy. In Rome it was prohibited, ...
— Renaissance in Italy, Volumes 1 and 2 - The Catholic Reaction • John Addington Symonds
... grave, wise, and manly appearance, as became him who bore a king's welcome, but his expression was keen, sly, and penetrating. ...
— The Prose Marmion - A Tale of the Scottish Border • Sara D. Jenkins
... nah afeerd," returned Jennet. "Boh whot mays ye so inqueesitive? Ye want to get summat out'n me, ey con see that plain enough, an os ye stand there glenting at me wi' your sly little een, ye look loike an owd fox ready to snap up a chicken ...
— The Lancashire Witches - A Romance of Pendle Forest • William Harrison Ainsworth
... Purchase. "Here come I with news enough to upset a town, and simmin' to me here's a pair that won't value it more'n a rush. Well-a-well! Am I to go away, my dears, or wish 'ee fortune? You're a sly fellow too, Tom Trevarthen, to go and get hold of a schoolmistress, when 'tis only a little schoolin' you want to get a certificate and be master of a ship. That's the honest truth, my dear,"—she turned ...
— Shining Ferry • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... concerning Nannie, and rejoiced that she could feel so easy as to the child's moral culture. She didn't care for Mrs. Flin's foolish prattle about her great acquaintances, and her own future anticipations of a higher station. It was not half of it that she heard; but if one sly innuendo was sent at the good man to whom she was so much indebted, there was a determined look that cowed the slanderous tongue before it could speak out its full meaning. Oh! what a relief was it to the poor ...
— The Elm Tree Tales • F. Irene Burge Smith
... capital. His unscrupulous tyranny and his gross disregard of common righteousness appear in his relations with John the Baptist and with Herodias, his paramour. Jesus described him well as "that fox" (Luke xiii. 32), for he was sly, and worked often by indirection. While his father had energy and ability which command a sort of admiration, Antipas was ...
— The Life of Jesus of Nazareth • Rush Rhees
... the new teacher appeared than Clara set to work to do everything in her power to make Edna appear to disadvantage, by all sorts of mean innuendoes, by sly hints, by even open charges, till the child was almost in tears over the ...
— A Dear Little Girl at School • Amy E. Blanchard
... night the Christmas-pie, That the thief, though ne'er so sly, With his flesh-hooks, don't come ...
— Devon, Its Moorlands, Streams and Coasts • Rosalind Northcote
... night a sly fox took off our best duck! Run for a gun! there a hen hawk flies! We always have the very worst of luck, The anxious ...
— Memories and Anecdotes • Kate Sanborn
... eagle; a sharp call to follow as the mother's long jaws closed over the small of the back, just as the fox turned to leap away. Then she flung the paralyzed animal back like a flash; the young wolves tumbled in upon him; and before he knew what had happened Eleemos the Sly One was stretched out straight, with one cub at his tail and another at his throat, tugging and worrying and grumbling deep in their chests as the lust of their first fighting swept over them. Then in vague, vanishing glimpses the old he-wolf appeared, quartering swiftly, ...
— Northern Trails, Book I. • William J. Long
... That period is still distant. Solitude and sleep are now no more than the signals to summon up a tribe of ugly phantoms. Famine, and blindness, and death, and savage enemies, never fail to be conjured up by the silence and darkness of the night. I cannot dissipate them by any efforts of reason. Sly cowardice requires the perpetual consolation of light. My heart droops when I mark the decline of the sun, and I never sleep but with a candle burning at my pillow. If, by any chance, I should awake and find myself ...
— Edgar Huntley • Charles Brockden Brown
... repeated the list of his subtle arguments, enforcing them with sundry embraces, pats, and pinches, for he was eloquent and plausible to a degree. Paco let Manuel go on, taking care to give him many a sly corroborative wink, for he was certain that Garnet had no confidence in his remarks. But he came in with the final stroke. After having had himself implored and entreated by his two allies, who promised eternal secrecy by the nails of Christ, he finally drew a letter from his pocket. It was from ...
— The Grandee • Armando Palacio Valds
... breed! If the United Provinces had but ground to stand on, they would, like the philosopher who boasted of his lever, move the world! The sly rogues think that the Amsterdammers have naturally an easy seat, and they wish to persuade all others to ride bare-back. I shall send the pamphlet up into the Indian country, and pay some scholar to have it translated ...
— The Water-Witch or, The Skimmer of the Seas • James Fenimore Cooper
... though he never let on, caught the sly remark. Less guileless than he looked was Lacy, a little man, forever lighting his pipe. He struck another match now, and between puffs delivered a belated message. So many years senior was Lacy to his skipper that he used to talk to ...
— Sonnie-Boy's People • James B. Connolly
... me when I have fallen asleep: Come, see how I have witched the world in white.— So faint his voice no other ear can hear. And I steal forth from out my father's lodge, And of the world there only waketh I And bears and wildcats and the sly raccoon And deer from out whose eyes there look the souls Of maidens who have died ere they knew love. And then the world we shorten with our feet That wake no echoes, but the horned owl Sigheth to think that thus our wingless speed All but ...
— The Princess Pocahontas • Virginia Watson
... at this Lorraine, wriggling it off bit by bit; till now, as we perceived on Lyttelton junior of Hagley's visit, Lorraine seems all lying unscrewed; and France, by any good opportunity, could stick it in her pocket. Such opportunity sly Fleury contrived, they say;—or more likely it might be Belleisle and the other adventurous spirits that urged it on pacific Fleury;—but, at all events, he has got it. Dilapidated Kehl yields straightway: [29th October, 1733. Memoires du Marechal de Berwick (in Petitot'e Collection, ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. IX. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle
... sinking to rest an hour before midnight, he whispers in our ears or peeps into our eyes. He is here, there, and everywhere; he is omnipresent—this curse of Finland. He is very small, his colour is such that he is hardly visible, and he is sly and crafty, so that the unwary stranger little guesses that his constant and almost unseen companion will speedily bring havoc to his comfort and dismay into his life. The little wretch is called Mygga ...
— Through Finland in Carts • Ethel Brilliana Alec-Tweedie
... tone, that double reply of "I know it," his laconicism, which was not favorable to dialogue, stirred up some smouldering wrath in the stranger. He launched a furious glance on the sly at Marius, which was instantly extinguished. Rapid as it was, this glance was of the kind which a man recognizes when he has once beheld it; it did not escape Marius. Certain flashes can only proceed from certain souls; the eye, ...
— Les Miserables - Complete in Five Volumes • Victor Hugo
... Game an assurance that he's getting up that moment, and Parson needn't wait, the luckless fag returns to find his master snoring like one of the seven sleepers. The same process has to be repeated. Shouts and shakes, and an occasional sly pinch, have no effect. Parson is tempted to leave his graceless lord to his fate, and betake himself to his French verbs; but a dim surmise as to the consequences prevents him. At last he braces himself up for one desperate effort. With a mighty tug he snatches the clothes ...
— The Willoughby Captains • Talbot Baines Reed
... of the mark, and shall I say the face was that of Saronia? Art thou a seer, Chios? After all, then, my news was not news to thee? Thou art a sly fellow!' ...
— Saronia - A Romance of Ancient Ephesus • Richard Short
... But sly Puritan maids found a way to circumvent and outwit Puritan law makers, and to prevent their unsanctioned lovers from being punished, too. Hear the craft of Sarah Tuttle. On May day in New Haven, in 1660, she went to the house of a neighbor, Dame Murline, to get some thread. Some very loud ...
— Customs and Fashions in Old New England • Alice Morse Earle
... shook their heads, and spoke of warming pans, to the vehement displeasure of Peregrine, who was sure to respond that the Queen was an angel, and that the Whigs credited every one with their own sly tricks. ...
— A Reputed Changeling • Charlotte M. Yonge
... themselves and looked on, regarding the window with sly, furtive glances in which there was a distinct ...
— A Fool and His Money • George Barr McCutcheon
... the guide made a deep reverence to "Her Excellency," but to Nina the look in his eyes seemed both sly and suspicious. ...
— The Title Market • Emily Post
... much to blame for our bad marriages. We live amid hallucinations; and this especial trap is laid to trip up our feet with, and all are tripped up first or last. But the mighty Mother who had been so sly with us, as if she felt that she owed us some indemnity, insinuates into the Pandora-box of marriage some deep and serious benefits, and some great joys. We find a delight in the beauty and happiness of ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. I, No. 1, Nov. 1857 • Various
... Dominie Sampson bore a disappointment which supplied the whole town with a week's sport. It would be endless even to mention the numerous jokes to which it gave birth, from a ballad, called "Sampson's Riddle," written upon the subject by a smart young student of humanity, to the sly hope of the Principal, that the fugitive had not, in imitation of his mighty namesake, taken the college gates along ...
— Guy Mannering • Sir Walter Scott
... child: That our darling old "Santa," as sly as a fox, May leave at your door both ...
— Christmas Entertainments • Alice Maude Kellogg
... we were on the voyage. I got to London only in time to go on board the ship in the docks, and we had been out for days at sea before he learned that Rachel was dead, or I that Luke had been down, on the sly, to Deerham. I had to get over that precious sea-sickness before entering upon that, or any other talk, I can tell you. It's a shame it should ...
— Verner's Pride • Mrs. Henry Wood
... with grave simplicity, "is, that all depends upon the person whose regard is to be won. There are silly girls, and weak women, who, liking mysteries in other affairs, are best pleased to be wooed with small artifices;—with having their vanity and their curiosity piqued with sly compliments—" ...
— Deerbrook • Harriet Martineau
... mine; could words be better chosen to make us see the lion and the cat as members of the same genus? No wonder the Sorbonne considered him an infelicitous writer; why could he not have said "cat," and have done with it, instead of giving a couple of sly but telling touches, which make the cat as like a lion as possible, and then telling us that we must not call her one? Sorbonnes never do like people ...
— Evolution, Old & New - Or, the Theories of Buffon, Dr. Erasmus Darwin and Lamarck, - as compared with that of Charles Darwin • Samuel Butler
... wholesome one,' said she; 'but I know you have your own theories of the proper way to amuse a child.' She felt a revival of her disgust for the sly treachery he had revealed once before. He gave her a cold keen glance, and the lines round his mouth tightened ...
— The Giant's Robe • F. Anstey
... Sly Aversion Capital Meerschaum Extravagant Travel Alley Concur Travail Fee Attention Apprehend Superb Magnanimity Lewd Adroit Altruism Instigation Quite Benevolence Complexion Urchin Charity Bishop Thoroughfare Unction Starve Naughty Speed Cunning Moral Success Decent ...
— The Century Vocabulary Builder • Creever & Bachelor
... three-cornered chestnut-rails, Bound the pasture where the flocks were grazing Where, so sly, I used to watch for quails In the crops of buckwheat we were raising; Traps and trails! There the ...
— The World's Best Poetry, Volume 3 - Sorrow and Consolation • Various
... joy of bringing the good news down to Donegal. Anne bade him farewell with a sly smile of triumph. Admirable woman! she floated above them all in the celestial airs. But she was gracious to her son. The poor boy had been so long in California that he did not know how to go about things. She urged him to join them in Rome for the visit to the Pope, and sent her love ...
— The Art of Disappearing • John Talbot Smith
... Mary's!" she suddenly thought, and then felt as if she had been getting ready to go all day. She felt deceitful, sly, in spite of her constant reiteration that it had just ...
— The Shield of Silence • Harriet T. Comstock
... sigh of lassitude. And we, of course, were going with it. A few yards away from the stern-post was the jolly-boat with the crew. I looked at them, and in my heart I could not condemn them for their sly departure; they were all there, arraiz, wife, children, and crew, so heaped together that they seemed only a meaningless tangle of arms and legs and heads; the water was half an inch from the gunwale, and the one man at the oars, hampered, paralyzed on ...
— The Spinner's Book of Fiction • Various
... not to be found?" cried a growling old sheet-anchor-man, one of your malicious prophets of past events: "I though so; I know'd it; I could have sworn it—just the chap to make sail on the sly. I always s'pected him." ...
— White Jacket - or, the World on a Man-of-War • Herman Melville
... that. Mrs. Hawthorne seldom expressed herself quite seriously. As she seldom looked serious either, one could hardly hear her say it was the loveliest party she ever was to without suspecting her of a humorous intention. By the sly gleam of her eye one should know she was doing it to amuse you, imitating a child, a country-woman, a shop-girl, for the sake of promoting an easy pleasantness. With her bearing of entire dignity, her honest handsomeness, her air of secure and generous wealth, she was truly not one whom the ordinary ...
— Aurora the Magnificent • Gertrude Hall
... are the crumbs gathered from the table of the Uneasy Woman, or worse, of the pharisaical and satisfied woman, from good and bad books, from newspaper exploitations of divorce and scandal, from sly gossip with girls whose budget of marital wisdom is ...
— The Business of Being a Woman • Ida M. Tarbell
... them over a bottle and bite them in their bargains. He kept them poor, that they might not be able to rebel; and sometimes merry, that they might not think of it." How graphic is this picture, with its vision of sly, crafty Christopher, as he denies the players their well-earned wages and then hurries them off to a neighbouring tavern, there to get them hilarious on cheap wine and grudgingly to pay the reckoning. "All their articles of agreement," continues Colley, "had a clause in them that ...
— The Palmy Days of Nance Oldfield • Edward Robins
... drop in on you on the sly, Steve, to admire your orbs; but you mustn't come here—until Amy thinks it is safe for me.' When he has gone she adds, 'Until I think it is safe ...
— Alice Sit-By-The-Fire • J. M. Barrie
... As Stephen Sly and old John Naps of Greece, And Peter Turph and Henry Pimpernell, And twenty more such names and men as these Which never were, nor ...
— Familiar Quotations • John Bartlett
... thin, wicked lips quivered with bad passions; the tiny hands sheathed and unsheathed the little swords and daggers. Episodes, common to life, were taking place in every direction. Here two martial manikins paid court to a pretty sly-faced female, who smiled on each alternately, but gave her hand to be kissed to a third manikin, an ugly little scoundrel, who crouched behind her back. There a pair of friendly dolls walked arm in arm, apparently on the best terms, while, all the time, one ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 4, No. 24, Oct. 1859 • Various
... windows?' But 'e keeps at it of evenin's, s'yin' as 'ow you do this and that, an' 'e fair talks me down, Jimmy does. But I know w'at I knows; so to relieve my feelin's a bit I've been bringin' you the flowers on the sly, Sir; meanin', as I says before, no 'arm ...
— On With Torchy • Sewell Ford
... always been allowed to drink when at home and now he frequently drank on the sly when down to Cedarville. On these excursions he was generally joined by a weak-minded boy named Hurdy, who was usually willing to do ...
— The Rover Boys in Camp - or, The Rivals of Pine Island • Edward Stratemeyer
... near overheard. Bessie and the girl stopped quarrelling. The landlord, startled, cast a sly eye in Bessie's direction. She ...
— Bessie Costrell • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... simple lodge. Even Boss McGinty was ignorant as to many things; for there was an official named the County Delegate, living at Hobson's Patch farther down the line, who had power over several different lodges which he wielded in a sudden and arbitrary way. Only once did McMurdo see him, a sly, little gray-haired rat of a man, with a slinking gait and a sidelong glance which was charged with malice. Evans Pott was his name, and even the great Boss of Vermissa felt towards him something of the repulsion and fear which the huge Danton ...
— The Valley of Fear • Arthur Conan Doyle
... of mediaeval magic; the thoroughly Ingoldsbian 'Legend of Sheppey,' with its irreverent farce, high animal spirits, and antiquarianism; the equally characteristic 'Lady Rohesia,' which would be vulgar but for his sly wit and drollery. But none of these are as familiar as the versified 'Legends,' nor have they the astonishing variety of entertainment found ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol 4 • Charles Dudley Warner
... begins, he stops short and his eye Through the lost look of dotage is cunning and sly. 'Tis a look which at this time is hardly his own, But tells a plain tale of the days that ...
— Lyrical Ballads with Other Poems, 1800, Vol. 2 • William Wordsworth
... rabbit. Well, I just guess he was. But if he had seen Danny Fox instead he wouldn't have been so pleased. No sireemam. And in the next story, if the little meadowmouse doesn't play hide-and-seek in the snow till that sly old fox comes around, I'll tell you what happened ...
— Little Jack Rabbit and the Squirrel Brothers • David Cory
... all. I know of only half a dozen. They have been here at the house a number of times. The man who seems to dominate them all is a man known as 'Gunpowder' Gerry, a powerful, cunning, sly-eyed fellow about 45 years old. He is the business agent of the union and runs everything, although few persons know it. In some mysterious way he has got a very strong hold on Dave and can make him do anything he wants ...
— Campfire Girls in the Allegheny Mountains - or, A Christmas Success against Odds • Stella M. Francis
... brother; is not that old vein of bitterness yet exhausted?" But be it known to you that that last sarcasm was especially for my own behoof. She is a sly jade,—conscience; like many other folks, she has a trick of expressing her rebukes in general language; as thus: "What a contemptible set of creatures the race of men are!"—hoping that some folks will practically take it to heart. Sometimes I do; and sometimes, I suppose, like my fellows, I look ...
— The Eclipse of Faith - Or, A Visit To A Religious Sceptic • Henry Rogers
... enterprise yesterday, the Colonel remarked, with a sly twinkle in his eye, "Demosthenes was the son of a cutler, Cromwell's father was a brewer, your General Grant was a tanner, and a Mr. Garfield, who held, I gather, an important post in your government, was once employed ...
— Ruggles of Red Gap • Harry Leon Wilson
... privileged person, of urbane and distinguished manners, suddenly elongated towards them a mobile upper lip, his sleek head slightly on one side, his kind, sly eyes ...
— Prisoners - Fast Bound In Misery And Iron • Mary Cholmondeley
... carefully out. Well, well, well, well! Not so bad! A dark brown tail, a glossy body, and what fine over-hair! For once Arni of Bali had some luck! The fox was dead; it had been shot in the belly and just crept in there to die. Sly devil! Poor beast! Blessed creature! Arni ended by feeling quite tenderly towards the fox. He hardly knew how to give utterance to ...
— Seven Icelandic Short Stories • Various
... it was to raise a tempest, sharp and obscure, in Julie's mind. The contrast between the pose of the letter and the sly reality behind bred a sudden anguish of jealousy, concerned not so much with Warkworth as with this little, unknown creature, who, without any effort, any desert—by the mere virtue of money and blood—sat waiting in arrogant expectancy till what she desired ...
— Lady Rose's Daughter • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... tergedder ez much ez ole marster did. W'en Mars Dugal' went ter de sale whar he got Dilsey en Mahaly, he bought ernudder ban', by de name er Wiley. Wiley wuz one er dese yer shiny-eyed, double-headed little niggers, sha'p ez a steel trap, en sly ez de fox w'at keep out'n it. Dis yer Wiley had be'n pesterin' Dilsey 'fo' she come ter our plantation, en had nigh 'bout worried de life out'n her. She did n' keer nuffin fer 'im, but he pestered her so she ha' ter th'eaten ter tell her marster fer ter make ...
— The Conjure Woman • Charles W. Chesnutt
... Muir in his sly Scotch way; "it would be far safer to promise to influence him to his injury. Mankind, pretty Mabel, have their peculiarities; and to influence a fellow-being to his own good is one of the most difficult tasks of human ...
— The Pathfinder - The Inland Sea • James Fenimore Cooper
... black hat of soft felt; his clothes were black and glistening with use and grease. He was of medium height, not especially stout, but still strong and well knit; he moved too briskly for a tramp, and his eyes were too sly and furtive to belong ...
— The Bread-winners - A Social Study • John Hay
... that I ever come to. After I had walked around until my head cleared off a little, I went in the tent sly and still, to go to bed without letting Jim hear me. I was ashamed, and didn't want to talk. I heard Jim roll over on ...
— How Private George W. Peck Put Down The Rebellion - or, The Funny Experiences of a Raw Recruit - 1887 • George W. Peck
... circumstantial case in a long time. Inspector Price, therefore, conceived the idea of trapping Strollo into a confession by placing a detective in confinement with him under the guise of being a fellow-prisoner. It was, of course, patent that Strollo was but a child mentally, but he was shrewd and sly, and if he denied his guilt, there was still a chance of his escape. Accordingly, a detective named Repetto was assigned to the disagreeable task of taking the part of an accused criminal. He was detailed to the ...
— True Stories of Crime From the District Attorney's Office • Arthur Train
... of the colloquy the sly rogue having mustered all his energies, fairly grasped the grog-kid in his arms, and, making a clean spring from the deck, placed himself, at the first bound, beyond the reach of the horror-stricken seaman. This exploit was not so adroitly performed as it might have been if Jacko had ...
— The Lieutenant and Commander - Being Autobigraphical Sketches of His Own Career, from - Fragments of Voyages and Travels • Basil Hall
... attention he was capable of. "You wish to make your way by night, without being recognized, into the courtyard of Master Nicolas-Denis Lollier, postmaster at Belleville, in order to see the beautiful Josephine? Ah, ha! my sly dog!" ...
— The Companions of Jehu • Alexandre Dumas
... Means not—a throne propp'd up with bleaching bones; A country sav'd with smoking seas of blood; A flag torn from the foe with wounds and death; Or Commerce, with her housewife foot upon Colossal bridge of slaughter'd savages, The Cross laid on her brawny shoulder, and In one sly, mighty hand her reeking sword; And in the other all the woven cheats From her dishonest looms. Nay, none of these. It means—four walls, perhaps a lowly roof; Kine in a peaceful posture; modest fields; A man and woman standing hand in hand In hale old age, who, looking ...
— Old Spookses' Pass • Isabella Valancy Crawford
... in the face with a sly smile, saying, "If you credit the old man of Chalcedon with the needful skill, he ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... They have a sly, four-legged creature on land, all dressed in fur, and sporting a fine, thick tail, and they say that when this Madame Puss wants to catch a bird that is wheeling in the air, she will manage to first catch its eye. Then the little creature will not be able to look away, ...
— Lord Dolphin • Harriet A. Cheever
... head of the concern himself. He flitted about restlessly, tugged at his whiskers continually, and his voice, as he rattled off his correspondence to Miss Brown, had a happy boyish lilt. Occasionally, chancing to catch Miss Summers' eye, he would nod with a sly knowing smile. ...
— The House of Toys • Henry Russell Miller
... a-goin' to give him the notes down to pay his liabilities after the race: only your governor said (which he wrote it on a piece of paper, and passed it across the table to the lawyer and my lady), that some one else had better book up for him, for he'd have kep' some of the money. He's a sly old cove, your gov'nor." The expression of "old cove," thus flippantly applied by the younger gentleman to himself and his master, displeased Mr. Morgan exceedingly. On the first occasion, when Mr. Lightfoot used the obnoxious expression, his comrade's anger ...
— The History of Pendennis, Vol. 2 - His Fortunes and Misfortunes, His Friends and His Greatest Enemy • William Makepeace Thackeray
... fresh colours, and still showed the gold sheen in her yellow hair. Her hair was put up now, pulled smoothly back over her temples; she spoke in a low, sober, measured voice, and to La Testolina's sly suggestions responded with a little blush, a little shake of the head, and a very little sigh. "Ser Baldassare is good to me," she would say; "would you have me do him a wrong? Last Friday he gave me a silver piece to spend in whatsoever I chose. I bought ...
— Little Novels of Italy • Maurice Henry Hewlett
... as I spoke, for Rosa eyed me with a sidelong glance and gently waved the docked tail, which was her delight; for the sly thing liked to be flattered and was as fond of compliments ...
— Aunt Jo's Scrap-Bag, Vol. 5 - Jimmy's Cruise in the Pinafore, Etc. • Louisa M. Alcott
... the Cat, but one could hardly recognize them, they looked so miserable. The Cat, after pretending to be blind for so many years had really lost the sight of both eyes. And the Fox, old, thin, and almost hairless, had even lost his tail. That sly thief had fallen into deepest poverty, and one day he had been forced to sell his beautiful tail for a bite ...
— The Adventures of Pinocchio • C. Collodi—Pseudonym of Carlo Lorenzini
... commonly pettish; a taunt is intentionally insulting and provoking; the sneer is supercilious; the taunt is defiant. The jeer and gibe are uttered; the gibe is bitter, and often sly or covert; the jeer is rude and open. A scoff may be in act or word, and is commonly directed against that which claims honor, reverence, or ...
— English Synonyms and Antonyms - With Notes on the Correct Use of Prepositions • James Champlin Fernald
... cried, as he came into my room with his usual hurried step, the next morning but one, carrying an open letter in his hand, 'what's this you've been doing—you sly old fellow? You ought to have been a ...
— Wilfrid Cumbermede • George MacDonald
... Warrant for a Patent and the Patent itself (May 19, 1603) licensing the company of actors, "Laurence Fletcher, William Shakespeare, Richard Burbage, Augustine Phillippes, John Hemmings, Henrie Condell, William Sly, Robert Armyn, Richard Cowly and the rest of their associates" as the King's Servants (L. 87, 88); the Accounts of the Revels at Court in the reigns of Elizabeth and James, containing entries showing ...
— The Facts About Shakespeare • William Allan Nielson
... we're a-goin' to have a beauty in this 'ere house?' inquired Christopher one evening of his sister, with a look of sly search, as if to see whether she ...
— A Red Wallflower • Susan Warner
... meant in a minute; and soon her hair was flying in the wind, as she ran into the house for her handled mop. She looked first in the parlor, and then in the front hall; but at last she found it in the wash-room. She was very sly about it, for she was not sure Ruthie would approve of this kind of housework. Then Charlie tugged out a pail of water, and dipped in the mop; and between them both they thrust it through the opening of the pen, upon piggy's back. But the dirty creature ...
— Dotty Dimple at Her Grandmother's • Sophie May
... nearer, heralded by the small gray cloud. When she was sure that a horseman was coming, she perversely removed herself to another spot where she would not be seen. And there she sat, out of sight from below and thus fancying herself undiscovered, refusing so much as a sly glance around her ...
— Starr, of the Desert • B. M Bower
... been too preoccupied to remark anything—sly puss!" said the major, laughing heartily. "My dear Mrs. Mayburn, I shall ask for your congratulations tonight. I know we shall have yours, Mr. Graham, for Grace has informed me that Hilland is your best and nearest friend. This little girl of mine has been ...
— His Sombre Rivals • E. P. Roe |
