"Townsfolk" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... began to assist the Spaniards, and the townsfolk were reduced to every privation. The Spaniards also suffered and Don Frederic wished to raise the siege. He suggested this step to his father, but Alva was made of sterner stuff. He sent from Nymwegen a grim message: "'Tell Don Frederic,' said Alva, 'that if he be not decided to continue the siege ...
— A Wanderer in Holland • E. V. Lucas
... which frightened the townsfolk, and sent them home in silence, used to fill our hearts with peace, for it was to us the crown and triumph of the year. We were not dismayed by the leaves that fell with rustling sound in Tochty woods, nor by the bare stubble ...
— Kate Carnegie and Those Ministers • Ian Maclaren
... the sunshine. They were nearly all pretty, and the flapping hats of Tuscan straw half hid and half revealed charming curves of cheek and chin, little tip-tilted noses, soft brown eyes. Many of the townsfolk were out too on this day of days and the streets were crowded with gay, vociferous people. There was so much to see. The old picture-gallery was free to all, and the very beggars might go in to see the sly, pale, almond-eyed Byzantine Madonne ...
— Olive in Italy • Moray Dalton
... destroyed and the project of transporting coal to Krupp's effectually quashed. From the point of view of moral, the Germans were the laughing-stock of the town; they were deeply enraged and the townsfolk proportionately delighted. ...
— Two Daring Young Patriots - or, Outwitting the Huns • W. P. Shervill
... only twenty years old when the townsfolk thought she must be twenty-five, so long had she been the beauty of Somerset. Her mother had always looked with apprehension on the possible time when her daughter would marry and leave her; for Judge Custis had long ceased to have the full confidence of his lady, whose fortune he had embarked ...
— The Entailed Hat - Or, Patty Cannon's Times • George Alfred Townsend
... of the statutes, which thus punish both militem and skartabell196 if he spread calumny against a citizen of the Commonwealth—and since general equality before the law has now been proclaimed, therefore Article 3 is likewise binding on townsfolk and serfs.197 This decree of the Marshal the Scribe will enter in the acts of the General Confederation, and the Apparitor ...
— Pan Tadeusz • Adam Mickiewicz
... Quarrels had grown frequent between the soldiers and the rope-walk hands, the soldiers usually getting the worst of it. On the evening of the 5th, an altercation began just below the Old State House, between the sentinel of the guard and a crowd of townsfolk. An alarm was rung from one of the steeples, and many citizens hurried to the place, most of them thinking that a fire had broken out. A sentry was at the corner of King and Exchange streets, where the Custom House stood, and ...
— The Bay State Monthly, Volume 3, No. 6 • Various
... moment of pleasant conversation before they went to bed. It is easy to imagine the horror with which the little party must have listened to the rush of the savage band, hoping perhaps at first that it was but some tumult in the street, or affray between the townsfolk and the caterans—never very far off and often threatening St. John's town—till the cries and clashing of the arms came nearer, and wild torch-light flared through the high windows and proved the fatal object of ...
— Royal Edinburgh - Her Saints, Kings, Prophets and Poets • Margaret Oliphant
... But not long had he been imprisoned before the heavy door was again thrown open, and he was summoned forth. Two men of the king's bodyguard led him into the great hall, where he was met by a loud clamour of voices. He looked about him fearlessly at the crowd of townsfolk and vikings, who were there, as he now well knew, to bear witness against him and to hear him condemned. As he stood facing them the vikings broke into fierce cries for speedy vengeance, and he felt the hot blood rush to his cheeks and brow. His clear blue eyes flashed in bold challenge ...
— Olaf the Glorious - A Story of the Viking Age • Robert Leighton
... In vain did the great St. Nicolas warn his flock by exhortations, threats, and fulminations. The evil increased unchecked, and it was sad to see the contagion spreading itself among the well-to-do townsfolk, the lords, and the clergy, as much as and more than among the poor artisans ...
— The Miracle Of The Great St. Nicolas - 1920 • Anatole France
... kindly after the young gentleman as he passed through the inn-hall from his post-chaise, and the obsequious chamberlain bowed him upstairs to the Rose or the Dolphin. The trim chambermaid dropped her best curtsey for his fee, and Gumbo, in the inn-kitchen, where the townsfolk drank their mug of ale by the great fire, bragged of his young master's splendid house in Virginia, and of the immense wealth to which he was heir. The postchaise whirled the traveller through the most delightful home-scenery his eyes ...
— The Virginians • William Makepeace Thackeray
... struck myself into a byway, intending to seek hospitality for the night at a house of M. de Laval's; and on the second evening to render myself with a good grace to the eulogia and tedious mercies of the Vitre townsfolk. ...
— From the Memoirs of a Minister of France • Stanley Weyman
... Civil War, and sustained a fearful siege lasting seventy-six days, the townsfolk and Royalist forces being eventually forced to surrender to Fairfax. The Saxon doorway of Trinity Church, and St. ...
— What to See in England • Gordon Home
... that a holy memory had shed upon it a peculiar lustre. Nelson was hardly keeping up to its early rate of progress, and its central mound, instead of a church bore an ugly fort, into which the nervous townsfolk passed over a drawbridge for their Sunday worship. Wellington was still unsatisfactory, its one wooden church serving for a congregation which was "neither so regular nor so good" as might have been wished. Altogether the diocese appeared to the bishop as "an inert mass which ...
— A History of the English Church in New Zealand • Henry Thomas Purchas
... that I can cheerfully testify. She was not popular in A——, nor was her eccentric brother. Unpleasant tales were told about Matthai. I never knew all the particulars, but they had something to do with the murder of a slave in antebellum days. The townsfolk were extremely reticent on the subject, and very mercifully so, for, as I have since learned, the tragedy occurred in our ...
— The Statesmen Snowbound • Robert Fitzgerald
... but he felt sad, for his stomach had forgotten the baker's breakfast, and he did not see where he was likely to get any supper. So he pulled out his pipe, and made a mournful song to himself of the dancing gnats and the bitter odour of the bonfires in the townsfolk's gardens. And the children drew near to hear him sing, for they thought his song was pretty, until their fathers drove them home, saying, "That stuff has no ...
— The Ghost Ship • Richard Middleton
... a servant appeared who had been in search of Marie. The children ran to meet her and related their experience with the Emperor. The servant called all the townsfolk together to see the knife and the contents of the bag, but wise Hans kept the ...
— After Long Years and Other Stories • Translated from the German by Sophie A. Miller and Agnes M. Dunne
... Chamberlayne's body down. Three of 'em came with it—Stephen Chamberlayne, the doctor who'd been called in, and a solicitor. Everything was done according to proper form and usage. As Chamberlayne had been well known in the town, a good number of townsfolk met the body at the station and followed it to the cemetery. Of course, many of us who had been clients of Chamberlayne's were anxious to know how he had come to such a sudden end. According to Stephen Chamberlayne's account, our Chamberlayne had wired to him and to his solicitor to ...
— The Middle Temple Murder • J.S. Fletcher
... once a family of affluence and distinction, in a city of Khorasan, and the townsfolk used to envy them for that which Allah had vouchsafed them. As time went on, their fortune ceased from them and they passed away, till there remained of them but one old woman. When she grew feeble and decrepit, the townsfolk ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 1 • Richard F. Burton
... I will tell you. The great Daimios and the Hatamotos have fallen out about this affair of Matagoro, and lately it has seemed as if they meant to come to blows. The country will be agitated, and the farmers and townsfolk suffer great misery, if we cannot quell the tumult. The Hatamotos will be easily kept under, but it will be no light task to pacify the great Daimios. If you are willing to lay down your life in carrying out ...
— Tales of Old Japan • Algernon Bertram Freeman-Mitford
... townsmen, fell down quite dead over the wall. Now, when Captain Resistance was dead—and he was the only man of war in the town—poor Mansoul was left wholly naked of courage. Then stood forth Mr. Ill-pause, that Diabolus brought with him as his orator, and persuaded the townsfolk to take of the tree which King Shaddai had forbidden; and when they saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was pleasant to the eye, and a tree to be desired to make one wise, they took and did eat. Now even while this ...
— The Worlds Greatest Books - Vol. II: Fiction • Arthur Mee, J. A. Hammerton, Eds.
... his clothes were of parson grey, noticeably shabby also. The quiet sweetness of his smile, and a composed look of submission were suggestive of the purification of sorrow, but were attributed by the townsfolk to disappointment; for he was still but a schoolmaster, whose aim they thought must be a pulpit and a parish. But Mr Graham had been early released from such an ambition, if it had ever possessed him, and had for many years been more than content to give himself to the hopefuller ...
— Malcolm • George MacDonald
... be regaled was an exhibition by the true-hearted men of Coventry, who were to represent the strife between the English and the Danes, agreeably to a custom long preserved in their ancient borough, and warranted for truth by old histories and chronicles. In this pageant one party of the townsfolk presented the Saxons and the other the Danes, and set forth, both in rude rhymes and with hard blows, the contentions of these two fierce nations, and the Amazonian courage of the English women, who, according to ...
— Kenilworth • Sir Walter Scott
... went out with the turn of the tide, Father Ignacio and the Ancient accompanying us to the beach, followed by a crowd of the townsfolk, who carried for us water and provisions for a longer voyage than ours promised to be. The venerable priest raised his hands in parting blessing as we shoved off, and I saw two big tears roll down the furrowed ...
— Stories by American Authors (Volume 4) • Constance Fenimore Woolson
... with the English conquerors of Britain. But though Britain had long been Roman, her distance from the seat of Empire left her less Romanized than any other province of the West. Socially the Roman civilization had made little impression on any but the townsfolk, and the material civilization of the island was yet more backward than its social. Its natural defences threw obstacles in its invaders' way. In the forest belts which stretched over vast spaces ...
— History of the English People, Volume I (of 8) - Early England, 449-1071; Foreign Kings, 1071-1204; The Charter, 1204-1216 • John Richard Green
... if I were to offer my next month's salary as a fee. These hills are very remote to the townsfolk, and one dago more or less of no importance, but I'll see what ...
— Cavanaugh: Forest Ranger - A Romance of the Mountain West • Hamlin Garland
... curious, half abashed, went with him. The party was five in number, consisting of the bride and bridegroom, a rosy, middle-aged peasant woman, evidently the mother of the bride, and an elderly couple who looked like humble townsfolk, and were probably related to one or other of the newly-married pair. Dalrymple opened the attack by stumbling against the mother, and then overwhelming ...
— In the Days of My Youth • Amelia Ann Blandford Edwards
... five Italophil families, are Yugoslav; and in the month of September 1919 the Yugoslav army was represented by eight men. Truth compels us to mention that on a certain night these men, instead of doing patrol duty, were sleeping off the effects of a carouse; and when the townsfolk looked out of their windows in the morning they saw machine guns and Italian soldiers. At 4 a.m. they had crept into the town with the help of a certain Conte Nino di Fanfogna, who had assembled a National Guard of thirty peasants, the employees of those ...
— The Birth of Yugoslavia, Volume 2 • Henry Baerlein
... you'll be looked at a great deal more than the clergyman. We are a terribly inquisitive town; and weddings are scarce at Kingcombe.—Take your wife, Nathanael. There you go—a very handsome, interesting young couple. Nay, don't cheat the townsfolk by taking the ...
— Agatha's Husband - A Novel • Dinah Maria Craik (AKA: Dinah Maria Mulock)
... out of his own time—who should have been born in 1460, in the days of Albrecht Duerer. Celestin Nanteuil "had the air of one of those tall angels carrying a censer or playing on the sambucque, who inhabit the gable ends of cathedrals; and he seemed to have come down into the city among the busy townsfolk, still wearing his nimbus plate behind his head in place of a hat, and without having the least suspicion that it is not perfectly natural to wear one's aureole in the street." He is described as resembling in figure "the spindling columns ...
— A History of English Romanticism in the Nineteenth Century • Henry A. Beers
... leavened—so to speak—the whole. In the long side streets, which were full of second-hand dealers and pawnbrokers, existence had not resolved itself into its various constituents. Girls and gamblers were next-door neighbors to old, peaceable townsfolk, who lived soberly on the interest of their money, and went to church every Sunday with their hymn-books in their hands. The ironmonger had gold watches and antique articles among the lumber in ...
— Pelle the Conqueror, Complete • Martin Andersen Nexo
... Renard," said one of the townsfolk to Max's friend. "They say wolves don't devour each other, but it seems that Max is going to set his teeth in Colonel Bridau. That's pretty serious among you gentlemen ...
— The Celibates - Includes: Pierrette, The Vicar of Tours, and The Two Brothers • Honore de Balzac
... entailed a good deal of exertion and this was his first trip abroad since his accident. Besides, seeing would probably mean being seen and he was not in the mood to answer the questions of curious, even if sympathetic, townsfolk. Judah made several attempts at conversation, but the replies were not satisfactory, so he gave it up after a little and, as was his habit, once more broke forth in song. Judah Cahoon, besides being sea cook on many, many voyages, had been "chantey man" ...
— Fair Harbor • Joseph Crosby Lincoln
... killing a man and that the great mystery which had hung over him so long was to be cleared up at last. The butcher and the baker had closed their shops and taken a holiday. All the farmers from round about, and all the townsfolk, were there with their Sunday clothes on, trying to get seats in the Court-house or gossipping outside in low whispers. The High Street was so crowded you could hardly move along it. I had never seen the quiet old town in such ...
— The Voyages of Doctor Dolittle • Hugh Lofting
... this simplicity and personal retirement Mr. Stanlock was a good deal of a mystery to many citizens who knew really little about him. Or perhaps he was a mystery to these fellow townsfolk because of his modest qualities. Knowing little about him, they imagined more. Leading citizens who knew his good qualities were ever ready with a word of praise for him. But the trouble was, the needed tangible evidence of his broad ...
— Campfire Girls in the Allegheny Mountains - or, A Christmas Success against Odds • Stella M. Francis
... Gettysburg?—No? Ah, well: Brief is the glory that hero earns, Briefer the story of poor John Burns. He was the fellow who won renown,— The only man who didn't back down When the rebels rode through his native town; But held his own in the fight next day, When all his townsfolk ran away. That was in July sixty-three, The very day that General Lee, Flower of Southern chivalry, Baffled and beaten, backward reeled From a stubborn ...
— Complete Poetical Works of Bret Harte • Bret Harte
... penance the splendid choir of the Cathedral caught fire, and the townsfolk, in a state between grief and rage, found themselves unable to stay the progress of the flames until nearly everything that could burn had vanished. The nave suffered less than Conrad's splendid choir, ...
— Beautiful Britain • Gordon Home
... of Aristophanes, Aeschylus and Euripides engage in an interesting and instructive dispute. "Come," says Aeschylus, "tell me what are the points for which we praise a noble poet." Euripides replies, "For his ready wit and his wise counsels and because he trains the townsfolk to be better citizens and worthier men."[268] Aeschylus then goes on to show that he has merited well of his countrymen because he has preached the military virtues and his dramas have been full of Ares. Euripides he accuses of softening the moral fibre of the Athenians ...
— Rhetoric and Poetry in the Renaissance - A Study of Rhetorical Terms in English Renaissance Literary Criticism • Donald Lemen Clark
... the night the townsfolk of Waroona stood in knots and groups in the roadway discussing the mystery surrounding ...
— The Rider of Waroona • Firth Scott
... about Jack would be whispered round by now, and I could never walk the old streets again without seeing nods and shudders everywhere. See him? That's him! Killed his best friend! Wheatman of the Hanyards! Never held his head up since! And hadn't ought to! The chatter of the townsfolk crept into my ears between the hoof-beats, and made ...
— The Yeoman Adventurer • George W. Gough
... I have sat at my chalet window and seen the world go by. The path from the village below to the peaks and pastures above runs past my nest. On it, in the summer months, there was a straggling procession of tourists and climbers, peasants and townsfolk. They were of all nationalities, and their loud voices proclaimed the immutability of the curse of Babel. I used to be annoyed at the close proximity of the path, until, one day, I discovered its marvellous opportunities for anthropological research. Then ...
— Mountain Meditations - and some subjects of the day and the war • L. Lind-af-Hageby
... Scutari had greatly advanced since my first visit in 1901. New shops and businesses had been opened, and the streets repaved. I made the acquaintance of many of the townsfolk, and was struck by-the far higher standard of cleanliness to be found here than ...
— Twenty Years Of Balkan Tangle • Durham M. Edith
... She must have seen our ship; and if, as seems, the townsfolk know who we are, how much more must she! Yes, doubt it not, she still longs to hear news of her own land, and some secret sympathy will draw her down towards the sea to-night. See! the light is in the ...
— Westward Ho! • Charles Kingsley
... I reflected, must be caused by some person or thing. A ghost is a spirit, and insubstantial, and I had never heard that the ghost which some of the townsfolk (chiefly servant maids) had seen in St. Alkmund's Churchyard had done more at any time than glide silently among the tombs. And even as I decided that the sound must have a natural cause, I had startling confirmation of my conclusion in a new sound—nothing else than a sneeze, ...
— Humphrey Bold - A Story of the Times of Benbow • Herbert Strang
... the Scythians, would assuredly have been considered the height of wickedness, in the judgment even of those who recognize no law. On Saturday the inhabitants of the country places used to leave their fields, and come from all sides to Laon to get provisions at the market. The townsfolk used then to go round the place, carrying in baskets, or bowls, or otherwise, samples of vegetables, or grain, or any other article, as if they wished to sell. They would offer them to the first peasant who was in search of such things to buy; he would promise to pay the price agreed upon; ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume II. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot
... came to call them to luncheon. She had heard them talking at the rear of the hotel shortly after Sheriff Hardy had inquired for Lorry. Several townsfolk came in, ate, and departed on ...
— Jim Waring of Sonora-Town - Tang of Life • Knibbs, Henry Herbert
... brave man flees, treachery is manifest and it is for wise men to reserve themselves for better occasions. This proved to be the case with Don Quixote, who, giving way before the fury of the townsfolk and the hostile intentions of the angry troop, took to flight and, without a thought of Sancho or the danger in which he was leaving him, retreated to such a distance as he thought made him safe. Sancho, lying across his ass, followed him, as has been said, ...
— Don Quixote • Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
... in the next place, Diabolus, that he might make Mansoul as sure as he could, frames and imposes a new oath and horrible covenant upon the townsfolk: to wit, 'That they should never desert him, nor his government, nor yet betray him, nor seek to alter his laws; but that they should own, confess, stand by, and acknowledge him for their rightful king, in defiance ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... coachman to whip up his horses with the reins and to drive over these vagabonds. At a word from me the three footmen jumped down and did their duty by dealing out lusty thwacks to the sergeants. A crowd collected, and townsfolk and passers-by ...
— The Memoirs of Madame de Montespan, Complete • Madame La Marquise De Montespan
... that's the very reason they were planted with the vegetables—to catch eyes. You can't imagine how many eyes they have caught, nor how many owners of eyes they have lured inside my gate. This is a good road, and is a very popular short country drive for townsfolk. Oh, no; I've never had any luck with automobiles. They can't see anything for dust. But I began when nearly everybody still used carriages. The townswomen would drive by. My flowers, and then my place, would catch their eyes. They would tell their drivers to stop. And—well, somehow, I managed ...
— The Valley of the Moon • Jack London
... known as Bishop's Lynn, and galled itself under the yoke of the Bishop of Norwich; but Henry freed the townsfolk from their bondage and ordered the name to be changed to Lynn Regis. Whether the good people throve better under the control of the tyrant who crushed all their guilds and appropriated the spoil than under the episcopal yoke may be doubtful; but the change pleased ...
— Vanishing England • P. H. Ditchfield
... carried on with the Oddi of Perugia in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries.[1] This was one of those duels to the death, like that of the Visconti with the Torrensi of Milan, on which the fate of so many Italian cities in the middle ages hung. The nobles fought; the townsfolk assisted like a Greek chorus, sharing the passions of the actors, but contributing little to the catastrophe. The piazza was the theatre on which the tragedy was played. In this contest the Baglioni proved ...
— Sketches and Studies in Italy and Greece, Complete - Series I, II, and III • John Symonds
... callers that afternoon, friends among the townsfolk, and more still after supper. It was late—late for South Harniss, that is—when Albert, standing in the doorway of the bedroom he nor they had ever expected he would occupy again, bade his grandparents ...
— The Portygee • Joseph Crosby Lincoln
... the body of the young Marc-Antoine Calas, whose ill-inspired suicide was to be the first act of a tragedy so horrible. The fanaticism aroused in the townsfolk by this incident; the execution by torture of Jean Calas, accused as a Protestant of having hanged his son, who had gone over to the Church of Rome; the ruin of the family; the claustration of the daughters; the flight of the widow to Switzerland; her introduction to Voltaire; ...
— A Little Tour in France • Henry James
... spoken of as "a rash and willful young man of twenty-five," and Hamid as "an elderly gentleman, fifty or sixty years of age, respected for his prudent and peaceable conduct, acceptable to the better class of Mussulman townsfolk, and trusted as a ruler likely to preserve the traditional policy of the realm." Immediately upon the interment of the late Sultan, however, which took place two short hours after his suspicious death, Khalid proclaimed himself ruler. He gathered ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 1082, September 26, 1896 • Various
... of Japan has its own peculiar dialect; and that of Oki, as might be expected in a country so isolated, is particularly distinct. In Saigo, however, the Izumo dialect is largely used. The townsfolk in their manners and customs much resemble Izumo country-folk; indeed, there are many Izumo people among them, most of the large businesses being in the hands of strangers. The women did not impress me as being so attractive as those of Izumo: I saw several very ...
— Glimpses of an Unfamiliar Japan • Lafcadio Hearn
... was walking among the willows near the gardens, where he overheard a conversation between some basket-makers who were cutting the osiers for their use. In this fatal dialogue the suspicions of the neighbouring townsfolk were revealed to him for ...
— A Group of Noble Dames • Thomas Hardy
... imagined, students are not generally popular with the townsfolk, who resent the unequal treatment of the two classes, not because they wish for the same measure of license, but because anything like rowdiness contrasts strongly with their own habits; and extravagance, not an uncommon failing among ...
— Dutch Life in Town and Country • P. M. Hough
... fruitless. President Dickinson had a few state militia at his disposal, but did not dare to summon them, for fear they should side with the rioters. The city government was equally listless, and the townsfolk went their ways as if it were none of their business; and so Congress fled across the river and on to Princeton, where the college afforded it shelter. Thus in a city of thirty-two thousand inhabitants, the largest city in the country, the government of the United States, the body which had just ...
— The Critical Period of American History • John Fiske
... deep well, and a very rustical-looking pump, half hidden by water-plants and savin bushes and tall grasses. The kitchen is a modern addition, proving beyond doubt that La Grenadiere was originally nothing but a simple vendangeoir—a vintage-house belonging to townsfolk in Tours, from which Saint-Cyr is separated by the vast river-bed of the Loire. The owners only came over for the day for a picnic, or at the vintage-time, sending provisions across in the morning, and scarcely ever spent the night there ...
— La Grenadiere • Honore de Balzac
... other Mary; but she continued to back, slowly and with a certain grace that could have come only of confirmed habit. Now Lynde had no desire to return to Rivermouth, above all to back into it in that mortifying fashion and make himself a spectacle for the townsfolk; but if this thing went on forty or fifty minutes longer, that would be ...
— The Queen of Sheba & My Cousin the Colonel • Thomas Bailey Aldrich
... are so clamorous," he said, "that a flag of truce may be despatched to Massena, in half an hour's time. The Portuguese are right so far that, if the place must be surrendered, there is no reason for any longer exposing the troops and the townsfolk to the French bombardment. Therefore it is imperative that, if we are to make our way out, we must do ...
— Under Wellington's Command - A Tale of the Peninsular War • G. A. Henty
... cross the double rows of grenadiers which guarded this road, but was rudely repulsed, and thus had need to go back of their line and around the rear of the mansion. When opposite to the outhouses used for servants I paused in the great crowd of townsfolk who were applauding or sullenly listening to the music heard through the open windows. I had no great desire to linger, but as it was dark I feared no recognition, and stayed to listen to the fine band of the Hessians and the wild clash of their cymbals, which, before these ...
— Hugh Wynne, Free Quaker • S. Weir Mitchell
... had won for himself this surname must now be told. The army of the Romans besieged Corioli, that was a town of the Volsci; and while they were busy with the siege, and thought only of the townsfolk that were shut in the town, there came upon them of a sudden an army of the Volscians from Antium, and at the same time the townsfolk sallied forth from the city. Now Marcius chanced to be on guard, and he, having a chosen band of soldiers with him, not ...
— Stories From Livy • Alfred Church
... chapel of St. Andrew's and also in the parish kirk where Rutherford was colleague with that servant of the Lord Mr. Blair, he listened to Rutherford upon the love of God and the loveliness of Christ. One day he was present, standing obscure among a mass of townsfolk, when Rutherford, after making a tedious argument on the controversies of the day which had almost driven Pollock from the Kirk, came across the name of Christ and then, carried away out of his course as by a magnet, ...
— Graham of Claverhouse • Ian Maclaren
... to his grave—a man who had fought the Lord's fight even unto the death. The shops were closed and the factories shut that day in the parish, yet no master stopped the day's wages; but for many a year afterwards the townsfolk felt the want of that brave, hopeful, loving parson and his wife, who had lived to teach them mutual forbearance and helpfulness, and had almost at last given them a glimpse of what this old world would be if people would live for God and each ...
— Tom Brown's Schooldays • Thomas Hughes
... possibility that the whole province will be overrun stares him in the face. From the beginning he asked for protection. From the beginning he was promised complete protection; but scarcely a word of complaint is heard. The townsfolk are calm and orderly, the Press dignified and sober. The men capable of bearing arms have responded nobly. Boys of sixteen march with men of fifty to war—to no light, easy war. The Imperial Light Infantry is eagerly filled. The Imperial ...
— South Africa and the Transvaal War, Vol. 2 (of 6) - From the Commencement of the War to the Battle of Colenso, - 15th Dec. 1899 • Louis Creswicke
... precentor, "for we saw her oursel's a short year syne, and Hendry Munn there allows there's townsfolk that hae passed her in the glen ...
— The Little Minister • J.M. Barrie
... trial like a good Christian all the same, he and half a score of his clan, as many as the church court could get the names of. I was a witness against them, much against my will, with John Splendid, the Provost, and other townsfolk. ...
— John Splendid - The Tale of a Poor Gentleman, and the Little Wars of Lorn • Neil Munro
... which reposes the body of the defunct" (it is written that Sylla had six thousand of these at his funeral), then the long line of wax images of ancestors (thus the dead of old interred the newly dead), then the relatives, clad in mourning, the friends, citizens, and townsfolk generally in crowds. The throng is all the greater when the deceased is the more honored. Lastly, other trumpeters, and other pantomimists and tumblers, dancing, grimacing, gambolling, and mimicking the duumvir whom they are helping to bury, close the procession. This interminable multitude ...
— The Wonders of Pompeii • Marc Monnier
... was carried out it caused a fierce amount of strife, ill-feeling, and hostility. The discontent and disaffection which Mr. Chamberlain's previous schemes aroused were but as morning breezes compared with the storm and tempest his new proposals raised. His daring and dash almost dazed his fellow townsfolk, for, like Napoleon, he rushed on from one exploit to another with a rapidity that astounded his friends and confused and ...
— A Tale of One City: The New Birmingham - Papers Reprinted from the "Midland Counties Herald" • Thomas Anderton
... the procession, but row upon the outskirts, interested in the curious medley, and observant of the many birds which perch upon the branches of the floating trees and sing blithely on their way. The current bears hard upon the Aurora beach, and townsfolk by scores are out in skiffs or are standing by the water's edge, engaged with boat-hooks in spearing choice morsels from the debris rushing by their door—heaping it upon the shore to dry, or gathering it in little rafts which they moor to the bank. It is a busy scene; the wreckers, ...
— Afloat on the Ohio - An Historical Pilgrimage of a Thousand Miles in a Skiff, from Redstone to Cairo • Reuben Gold Thwaites
... the man of whom Guido and I had talked that morning. There was a great crowd behind the chariot, Reds and many Yellows, seemingly at peace that day, friends of Guido, and followers of Simone, and revellers of many kinds and townsfolk of many classes. I could see that Monna Vittoria was in the thick of the crowd that followed the Car of Triumph, and presently she made her way beneath the shelter of the arcade, and stood there hard by one of the pillars, watching the lady Beatrice on her throne and Simone dei Bardi keeping ...
— The God of Love • Justin Huntly McCarthy
... against the assaults of his entire army. Wallenstein vowed that he would capture it "though it were fastened by chains to heaven." But each mad attack of his wild troopers was beaten back from the walls by the desperate townsfolk; and at last, with twelve thousand of his men dead, he retreated from before the stubborn port. A superstitious load was lifted from the minds even of those who pretended to be his friends. Wallenstein ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 11 • Various
... lofty linden-trees lying, Which for centuries past upon this spot had been rooted, Spread in front of the village a broad and grass-covered common, Favorite place of resort for the peasants and neighboring townsfolk. Here, at the foot of the trees, sunk deep in the ground was a well-spring; When you descended the steps, stone benches you found at the bottom, Stationed about the spring, whose pure, living waters were bubbling Ceaselessly forth, hemmed in by low walls for convenience of drawing. ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, • Editor-in-Chief: Kuno Francke
... would do. On he came, taller than Andras by several inches, but heavier of build. He too sprang high and well, but as he came down his heel just grazed the edge of the boat. Dead silence reigned amidst the townsfolk, but Andras only ...
— The Orange Fairy Book • Andrew Lang
... life as a whole was not likely to be absent in towns where numbers of young clerks were members of a corporation at variance with the authorities of the city. University records are full of injuries done to masters and students by the townsfolk, and of privileges and immunities obtained from Pope or King or Bishop at the expense of the burgesses. When a new University was founded, it was sometimes taken for granted that these conflicts must arise, and that the townsmen ...
— Life in the Medieval University • Robert S. Rait
... a city of Khorassan a family of affluence and distinction, and the townsfolk used to envy them for that which God had vouchsafed them. As time went on, their fortune ceased from them and they passed away, till there remained of them but one old woman. When she grew feeble and decrepit, the townsfolk ...
— Tales from the Arabic Volumes 1-3 • John Payne
... gentleman used to nothing but high days and holidays. Not that either the state or ceremony at Mr. Maurice's required great effort to encounter with composure—trivial enough at its best, wonderful though it was to the townsfolk, unused to anything beyond. But Andrew had seen the world in foreign parts, and neither Mr. Maurice's mansion-house and gardens, nor his gay upholstery, nor his silver tea-service, nor his condescending manners, struck the least spark of' surprise from Andrew's eyes, or ...
— Not Pretty, But Precious • John Hay, et al.
... be on the route between Alexandra Grove and her principal customers. Suddenly, out of Victoria Street, they came up against the vast form of the Byzantine cathedral. It was hemmed in by puny six-story blocks of flats, as ancient cathedrals also are hemmed in by the dwellings of townsfolk. But here, instead of the houses having gathered about the cathedral, the cathedral had excavated a place for itself amid the houses. Tier above tier the expensively curtained windows of dark drawing-rooms ...
— The Roll-Call • Arnold Bennett
... the townsfolk on the pavement, or in the double-decked trams, I saw that the bulk of them saluted, not grudgingly or of necessity, but in ...
— Traffics and Discoveries • Rudyard Kipling
... and the terrified townsfolk, repenting of their determination to stand in their own defence, when once they had caught the gleam of the maquahuitl, and faced the fierce presence of the boy cacique, turned to hurried flight beneath the walls ...
— Historic Boys - Their Endeavours, Their Achievements, and Their Times • Elbridge Streeter Brooks
... a certain Russian town, a gang of seven carpenters were hastily repairing an icebreaker which the townsfolk ...
— Through Russia • Maxim Gorky
... cared for the young girl without making her conspicuous by any undue attention. No tidings had come in of any discovery in the mill-stream or in the river into which it ran, and there being nothing with which to feed gossip, the townsfolk who had gathered about the hotel porches gradually began to disperse, till only a few of the most persistent remained to keep up ...
— The Chief Legatee • Anna Katharine Green
... to found a Free Library in this town was the holding of a public meeting in April, 1852, under the provisions of the Museums and Libraries Act of 1850, which allowed of a 1/2d. rate being levied for the support of such institutions. Whether the townsfolk were careless on the subject, or extra careful, and therefore, doubtful of the sufficiency of the 1/2d. rate to provide them, is not certain; but so little interest was shown in the matter that only 534 persons voted for the adoption of the Act, while 363 voted against ...
— Showell's Dictionary of Birmingham - A History And Guide Arranged Alphabetically • Thomas T. Harman and Walter Showell
... had chained herself to a turtle dove whose eternal cooing was beginning to weary her beyond endurance; that now her last hope of the riches, which one had a right to expect in the house of a magician, had vanished, and that if it were not for the gossip of the townsfolk, she would return ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... His idealism had made him ridiculous in the eyes of the townsfolk. He had spent money he could ill spare in a hopeless cause, which was not even a worthy one. And now everybody was laughing at him or sneering—he grew hot with shame. That his motives were honourable only heightened the ludicrousness of his action: it seemed as if he had made a fool ...
— Elder Conklin and Other Stories • Frank Harris
... fighting desperately, with diminishing strength, but the thought of safety outside the walls gave them force to make one last stand. With backs to the gate and faces to the foe, Adam and Clym and William made a valiant onslaught on the townsfolk, who fled in terror, leaving a breathing-space in which Adam Bell turned the key, flung open the great ponderous gate, and flung it to again, when the ...
— Hero-Myths & Legends of the British Race • Maud Isabel Ebbutt
... lustily, the bailiffs presented an address, and followed by his own train and by the gentlemen who had assembled to meet him, the earl rode into the town. He himself took up his abode at the house of Sir Thomas Lucas, while his followers were distributed among the houses of the townsfolk. Two hours after the arrival of the earl, the party from Hedingham took ...
— By England's Aid • G. A. Henty
... Stead. "That is not the way in these days—at least not always. So poor father said last time we went into Bristol, when he had been talking to the butter-merchant's man. He said the townsfolk would know the reason why, if the soldiers were for holding out long enough ...
— Under the Storm - Steadfast's Charge • Charlotte M. Yonge
... Tisbett had a truly dreadful time placing his party in the old stage, as the townsfolk, fearful that so good a chance for seeing the Peppers would not happen during the three days' stay, insisted on crowding up close to the ancient vehicle, and getting in everybody's way, thereby calling forth some exclamations from Mr. King that could not be ...
— Five Little Peppers Midway • Margaret Sidney
... but showing themselves freely at the windows, and exchanging quips with the townsfolk, sat the three ladies of the company. Climene, the amoureuse, beautifully gowned in flowered satin, her own clustering ringlets concealed under a pumpkin-shaped wig, looked so much the lady of fashion ...
— Scaramouche - A Romance of the French Revolution • Rafael Sabatini
... "So—the townsfolk smoking the King's jest—two stout servitors led the merchant down to the landing by the upper ferry, and there, having hoisted him aboard a boat, thrust off into the stream. The current soon swept them past the town; and for a while, as the boat ...
— Merry-Garden and Other Stories • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... The townsfolk vied with each other in praising the lamp, and one said one thing, and another said another. The innkeeper's old mother maintained that it shone just as calmly and brightly as the stars of heaven. The magistrate, who had sad eyes, thought ...
— Stories by Foreign Authors • Various
... early Gothic, is very stately and picturesque, and the trappistine, which is a distilled liquor of the Chartreuse family, is much prized by people who take a little glass after their coffee. By the time I had done with the Abbey, the townsfolk had slid en masse down the cliff again, the yellow afternoon had come, and the holiday takers, before the wine-shops, made long and lively shadows. I hired a sort of two-wheeled gig, without a board, and drove back to Etretal in the rosy stage of evening. The gig dandled me up and ...
— The Galaxy - Vol. 23, No. 1 • Various
... were horizontal rather than vertical. There were different estates rather than different states. The feudal class was homogeneous throughout Western Europe: the clerical class was a single corporation through all the extent of Latin Christianity; and the peasantry and the townsfolk of England were very little different from the peasantry and the townsfolk of France. We have to think of a general European system of estates rather than of any balance of ...
— The Unity of Civilization • Various
... Prince de Conde's army and the throngs of emigres who came and went and did a vast deal of talking and even laughing over their misfortunes, but who never seemed to learn a lesson from them. Coblentz was full of these exiles from France, who treated the townsfolk with a mixture of condescension and rudeness which caused them to speedily become detested. There was one little cafe in particular, Les Trois Colonnes, which they frequented, and where they laughed and gambled and made witty speeches and tremendous threats ...
— Calvert of Strathore • Carter Goodloe
... On Sunday, as the townsfolk were at church about eleven o'clock, the firebell rang out its note of alarm, scattering the congregation into the streets. It was the signal for the mustering of the volunteers. The officer in command at the Castle was ...
— The Red True Story Book • Various
... Brussels. It is real, while modern Brussels is only mock-turtle. And Bruges is more picturesque, the food is as well flavoured, there are several resorts where ripe old Burgundy may be had at not an extravagant price, and the townsfolk are less grasping, ...
— Promenades of an Impressionist • James Huneker
... would follow him as blindly and confidently as do the army and navy officers, the nobles, great and small, and the land-holding squires of Prussia, to whom his writings are as seductive as the pipings of the Pied Piper to the townsfolk of Hamlin. ...
— Face to Face with Kaiserism • James W. Gerard
... the hunters and their dogs rode away, Saint Ailbe had something more to say to them. And he bade all the curious townsfolk who had gathered about him and the wolf to listen also. He repeated the promise which he had made to the wolf, and warned every one thenceforth not to hurt her or her children, either in the village, or in the woods, or ...
— The Book of Saints and Friendly Beasts • Abbie Farwell Brown
... of Cooper's Hill, just opposite, are gathered the wondering rustics and curious townsfolk, who have run from Staines, and none are quite sure what the bustle is about, but each one has a different version of the great event that they have come to see; and some say that much good to all the people will come from this day's ...
— Three Men in a Boa • Jerome K. Jerome
... the second station beyond Venosa—at Spinaz-zola. Aware of this fact, I had enquired about the place and received assuring reports as to its hotel accommodation. But the fates were against me. On my arrival in the late evening I learnt that the hotels were all closed long ago, the townsfolk having gone to bed "with the chickens"; it was suggested that I had better stay at the station, where the manageress of the restaurant kept certain sleeping quarters specially provided ...
— Old Calabria • Norman Douglas
... of our coming sped through the streets ahead of us, and out of the houses poured the townsfolk to watch our passage and to point me out one to another with many whisperings and solemn head-waggings. And the farther we advanced, the greater was the concourse, until by the time we reached the square before the Communal ...
— The Strolling Saint • Raphael Sabatini
... skirts, and Happy Pete with sagging head at their heels. At the first sound of the fiddle Lafe tried to rise, and did rise. He stood for a moment on his shaking legs, and there, to the amazement of the gaping crowd of his townsfolk, he swayed to and fro, watching and listening as the wonderful music filled and thrilled through ...
— Rose O'Paradise • Grace Miller White
... and he fled, leaving behind him the damning evidence—a tin suggestive of sardines and labeled "Poison!" That the gentleman should have chosen broad daylight for his nefarious design, should have been careful to label his tin, seemed to the good townsfolk under present scare conditions proof that they had at last discovered the real German spy, full of his devilish cunning. The tin was taken possession of by the police. And then the Sergeant's little daughter, who happened to have had a few lessons in French, suggested that the word on the ...
— New York Times, Current History, Vol 1, Issue 1 - From the Beginning to March, 1915 With Index • Various
... by the marks of sympathy that reached her from all sides. Country people trudged long distances into town that they might gaze once more on the worn face of the man who had often assuaged not only physical but mental pain, and had been as ready to help and comfort as to prescribe. Townsfolk sent flowers for the dead and dainties for the living; but better than all their gifts was the regret that they expressed for the death of a man whom everyone liked and respected. Mr. Colwyn's practice, though never very lucrative, had been an exceedingly large one; ...
— A True Friend - A Novel • Adeline Sergeant
... fair deeds must toil and cost contend toward an accomplishment hidden in perilous chance: yet if men have good hap therein, even to their own townsfolk is their ...
— The Extant Odes of Pindar • Pindar
... in reed baskets, or piled on low round tables: vegetables and fruits, loaves or cakes baked during the night, meat either raw or cooked in various ways, stuffs, perfumes, ornaments,—all the necessities and luxuries of daily life. It was a good opportunity for the workpeople, as well as for the townsfolk, to lay in a store of provisions at a cheaper rate than from the ordinary shops; and they took advantage of it, ...
— History Of Egypt, Chaldaea, Syria, Babylonia, and Assyria, Volume 2 (of 12) • G. Maspero
... of the lanes near Hastings!] No one takes any notice. As Mende has without doubt an important future before it, let us hope that these drawbacks will not afflict travellers in years to come. The little capital of the Lozere must by virtue of position become a tourist centre; surely the townsfolk will at last wake up to the importance of making their streets ...
— The Roof of France • Matilda Betham-Edwards
... And good St. James was Francois—brothers they, And had a small, clean bakeshop, where they sold Bread, cakes and little pies. Well, so it went! These were not Italy's saints, nor yet the gods, Majestic, calm, unmoved, of ancient Greece. No, they were only townsfolk, common people, And graced a common church—that stood and stood Through war and fire and pestilence, through ravage Of time and kings and conquerors, till at last The century dawned which promised common men The things they long had hoped for! O the time Showed a fair face, was daughter ...
— The Campfire Girls on the Field of Honor • Margaret Vandercook
... went forth again, Mrs. Barlow clucking after him like a disgruntled fowl, he found young Pitt smothered in a crowd of scared, half-dressed townsfolk—mostly women—who had come hastening for news of how the battle had sped. The news he gave them was to be read in the lamentations with which they ...
— Captain Blood • Rafael Sabatini
... townsfolk, Greeks and natives, came out and offered to surrender. They said that the Khalifa was in his house, and that he had about a thousand of his bodyguard with him, but that they could not offer any successful resistance. ...
— With Kitchener in the Soudan - A Story of Atbara and Omdurman • G. A. Henty
... such was the multitude of those who died in the city by day and by night that it was an astonishment to hear tell thereof, much more to see it; and thence, as it were of necessity, there sprang up among those who abode alive things contrary to the pristine manners of the townsfolk. ...
— The Decameron of Giovanni Boccaccio • Giovanni Boccaccio
... Line nowadays!' It was in this ancient Dunham that the Nixons had waged successful trade for perhaps a hundred years, in a shop with bulging bay windows looking on the market-place. There was no competition, and the townsfolk, and well-to-do farmers, the clergy and the country families, looked upon the house of Nixon as an institution fixed as the town hall (which stood on Roman pillars) and the parish church. But the change ...
— The House of Souls • Arthur Machen
... chief of the White Hoods, seeing that many of the townsmen were sorely discouraged by their want of success, went to Philip Van Artevelde (the son of Jacob Van Artevelde, who was murdered by the townsfolk for making an alliance with England) and persuaded him to come forward as the leader of the people. On his doing so Philip was at once accepted by the White Hoods. Two of the leaders of the party of peace were at once murdered. As his father had been a great man and an excellent ruler, Philip ...
— A March on London • G. A. Henty
... he went, and down Gold Street, and at the end of Gold Street is the harbour and the broad Solent beyond. And as he paced along, slowly and gravely, the townsfolk flocked to door and window, and many a blessing they called down ...
— More English Fairy Tales • Various
... on their feet in an instant. We scrambled down the narrow stairs, and out into the starlit night. Leiden was a city of the dead. Not even a dog played sentinel for the sleeping townsfolk; not a cat sprang out of the shadows as I led my band through a labyrinth of canal-streets, floored as if with jet nailed down with stars. But suddenly the spell of silence was broken by an explosion of sound which crashed into it like breaking glass. A brassy blare of music ...
— The Chauffeur and the Chaperon • C. N. Williamson
... trammelled streets, work and worry in their little offices absurdly, harmfully to the rights of proper men. Like other mountaineers Joe had small realization of the advantages of easy interchange of thought and the quick commerce which come with aggregation. He thought the concentration of the townsfolk was a sign of an unmanly dread of those first settlers whom they wished to drive away unjustly, ...
— In Old Kentucky • Edward Marshall and Charles T. Dazey
... the corpse lying on the ground, the procession swept on. It turned out that the lady was the wife of a jeweller to whom the King of Bassorah was desirous of granting a boon, and at her request the boon obtained was a proclamation commanding that all the townsfolk should every Friday enter the mosques two hours before the hour of prayer, so that none might abide in the town, great or small, unless they were in the mosques or in the houses with the doors locked upon them; but all the shops were to be left open. Then the lady had permission ...
— The Science of Fairy Tales - An Inquiry into Fairy Mythology • Edwin Sidney Hartland
... did not care much for society of any kind. He never had cared much for it. In Nethermuir he had "kept himself to himself," as far as most of the townsfolk were concerned, and it must be owned, that beyond his own small circle of friends in the manse, and in one or two other houses, he had not been a very popular person. He had no time to give to anything ...
— Allison Bain - By a Way she knew not • Margaret Murray Robertson
... in Brunswick, By famous Hanover city; The river Weser, deep and wide, Washes its wall on the southern side; A pleasanter spot you never spied; But, when begins my ditty, Almost five hundred years ago, To see the townsfolk suffer so From vermin was ...
— The Home Book of Verse, Vol. 1 (of 4) • Various
... keep his feet away from the little street where all the life there was might be found. At night he would creep cautiously along the ramparts and descend by a quiet staircase into an angle of the walls, where he could look on unseen upon the gathering of townsfolk in the inn where he had often gone with his father in earlier days. The landlord, Nicolas, was a most bitter enemy now. There was the familiar room filled with bright light from an oil-lamp and the brighter flicker of a wood fire where the landlord's ...
— Stories By English Authors: France • Various
... Along the beach the townsfolk thronged, and down the causeway, beneath the vast monolithic plinth of the fortified gate, jostled and ...
— Darkness and Dawn • George Allan England |
