"Waistcoat" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... battle. Two sandbags were tucked in front of the belt; one Mills bomb was in each of the bottom pockets of the tunic; 50 extra rounds of ammunition were slung in a bandolier over the right shoulder. In his haversack each man carried one iron ration, cardigan waistcoat, soft cap, and pair of socks; the waterproof sheet was folded and strapped on outside, and the mess-tin fastened to the lowest buckle of the haversack. Every other man carried a pick or shovel slung; and the Brigade, with a more intimate solicitude, ...
— The War Service of the 1/4 Royal Berkshire Regiment (T. F.) • Charles Robert Mowbray Fraser Cruttwell
... by way of denouncing himself, Mr. Amidon clapped his waistcoat shut and buttoned it, snapped the catches of the bags, and pretended to busy himself with the letters in his pockets; and in doing so, he found in an inside vest-pocket a long thin pocket-book filled ...
— Double Trouble - Or, Every Hero His Own Villain • Herbert Quick
... him queerly in the face, "you let me off easily, and I dare say I owe my life to you, or at any rate a whole waistcoat, and I admire your forbearance and spirit. What a pity that a courage like yours should be wasted as a mere court usher! You are a loss to his Majesty's army. ...
— The Virginians • William Makepeace Thackeray
... a bullfighter's suit from Don Enrique; and very gay and wonderful he looked in it, though Bumpo and I had hard work getting the waistcoat to close in front and even then the buttons kept bursting off ...
— The Voyages of Doctor Dolittle • Hugh Lofting
... continue to please in the closet. During the representation of this piece, Johnson attended every night behind the scenes. Conceiving that his character, as an author, required some ornament for his person, he chose, upon that occasion, to decorate himself with a handsome waistcoat, and a gold-laced hat. The late Mr. Topham Beauclerc, who had a great deal of that humour, which pleases the more for seeming undesigned, used to give a pleasant description of this green-room finery, as related by the author himself; "But," said Johnson, with great gravity, ...
— Dr. Johnson's Works: Life, Poems, and Tales, Volume 1 - The Works Of Samuel Johnson, Ll.D., In Nine Volumes • Samuel Johnson
... unpowdered in a bag: supported by Forster, the great Presbyterian, and by Mr. Home a young clergyman, his friend. Lord Balmerino followed], alone, in a blue coat turned up with red, his rebellious regimentals, a flannel waistcoat, and his shroud beneath; their hearses following They were conducted to a house near the scaffold; the room forwards had benches for spectators; in the second Lord Kilmarnock was put, and in the third ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole, Volume 1 • Horace Walpole
... pretty Palais Royal gold-rimmed sweetmeat box, and slipped it into his waistcoat pocket. It was only a child's gift, a tiny Paris toy; but it had been brought to him in a tender compassion, and he did keep it; kept it through dark days and wild nights, through the scorch of the desert and ...
— Under Two Flags • Ouida [Louise de la Ramee]
... testimony as to the appearance of Disraeli in his manhood may not here be amiss. Says N.P. Willis: "He was sitting in a window looking on Hyde Park, the last rays of sunlight reflected from the gorgeous gold flowers of a splendidly embroidered waistcoat. Patent-leather pumps, a white stick with a black cord and tassel, and a quantity of chains about his neck and pockets, served to make him a conspicuous object. He has one of the most remarkable faces I ever saw. He is lividly pale, and but for the energy of his action and strength of ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 5 (of 14) • Elbert Hubbard
... arms sculptured on the slab, or an inlaid circle of slate. On one slate gravestone, of the Rev. Nathl. Rogers, there was a portrait of that worthy, about a third of the size of life, carved in relief, with his cloak, band, and wig, in excellent preservation, all the buttons of his waistcoat being cut with great minuteness,—the minister's nose being on a level with his cheeks. It was an upright gravestone. Returning home, I held a colloquy with a young girl about the right road. She had ...
— Passages From The American Notebooks, Volume 1 • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... Fate," he decided. "Here are two beans." Burton folded them up in a piece of paper and placed them carefully in his waistcoat pocket. ...
— The Double Life Of Mr. Alfred Burton • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... in his waistcoat pockets, the critic hunted into one corner a solitary half-crown, and having caught it between his finger and thumb, he gave it to Mrs. Lobkins and ...
— Paul Clifford, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... do without one, and so he took his; but in spite of this, he determined that, sooner than submit to such an indignity, he would sit up all night. Accordingly, when all the rest were fast asleep, Melchior, with his boots off and his waistcoat easily unbuttoned, sat over the fire in the long lumber-room, which served that night as 'barracks'. He had refused to eat any supper down-stairs to mark his displeasure, and now repaid himself by a stolen meal ...
— In the Yule-Log Glow, Book II - Christmas Tales from 'Round the World • Various
... felt to his feet as though they were made of wood or iron—oily and heavy. He then drew on the shapeless, baggy trousers with their telltale stripes, and over his arms and chest the loose-cut shapeless coat and waistcoat. He felt and knew of course that he looked very strange, wretched. And as he stepped out into the overseer's room again he experienced a peculiar sense of depression, a gone feeling which before this had not assailed ...
— The Financier • Theodore Dreiser
... may wear a complete suit of gray with a white duck waistcoat and light linen to the afternoon dance, completing his costume with black patent leather shoes or oxford ties, light gray gloves, and straw hat with black and white band. But whether it be for summer or winter, the dark ...
— Book of Etiquette • Lillian Eichler
... patrons were now unloosed, and they all acceded unhesitatingly to the terms which I had proposed. An elderly Englishman, with a very white waistcoat, and a very large watch-chain, came up to me, and, patting my shoulder, said, "Why, my son, you have done better than you promised; you have given us the newspapers in much less than thirty-six hours after ...
— John Whopper - The Newsboy • Thomas March Clark
... seen the name of the wonderful English actress on the bill-boards in front of Abbey's Theatre, and he had been told that Miss Terrell was English, and confused the two names. As he passed Van Bibber he drew his waistcoat into shape with a proud shrug of his shoulders, and said, anxiously, "I gave your friend a good introduction, ...
— Cinderella - And Other Stories • Richard Harding Davis
... weight of the grip it wasn't mine," said Dexter, "and I was the most surprised guy in Great Britain and Ireland when I found whose it was! I opened it, of course! And right on top was a waistcoat and right in the first pocket was a ...
— The Quest of the Sacred Slipper • Sax Rohmer
... short, fat man wearing a huge diamond ring and an excessively dirty white waistcoat. This was the Minister for Dredges and Artesian Bores, a gentleman who hoped to receive a C.M.G. ship for his clamorous persistency in advocating the claim of the colony to "'ave a Royel dook ...
— Rodman The Boatsteerer And Other Stories - 1898 • Louis Becke
... waistcoat): "My figure is not adapted for the narrow seats in your peers' gallery, but I can assure you you are doing me an injustice. I was one of the first to predict, both in private and in public, that Mr. Asquith ...
— Margot Asquith, An Autobiography: Volumes I & II • Margot Asquith
... got the effect. He wore a yellow shirt, collar, tie, and waistcoat in order that the photographic result should be the purest white. The yellow linen was the completing horror under the spoiled mustard color of his face with its mouth the color of ...
— We Can't Have Everything • Rupert Hughes
... blow hard?" inquired the traveller, planting himself firmly on the hearth-rug, with his back to the fire, and his thumbs hooked into the armholes of his waistcoat. ...
— The Floating Light of the Goodwin Sands • R.M. Ballantyne
... of the fifteenth century men's dress was still very short. It consisted of a kind of tight waistcoat, fastened by tags, and of very close-fitting breeches, which displayed the outlines of the figure. In order to appear wide at the shoulders artificial pads were worn, called mahoitres. The hair was allowed to fall on the forehead in locks, which covered the eyebrows and eyes. The sleeves were ...
— Manners, Custom and Dress During the Middle Ages and During the Renaissance Period • Paul Lacroix
... could trust Their own protectors; nor was their surprise Less than their grief (and truly not less just) To see an old man, rather wild than wise In aspect, plainly clad, besmeared with dust, Stripped to his waistcoat, and that not too clean, More feared than all ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 6 • Lord Byron
... and a whip in her hand. After her came, limping, an old man, with a worsted nightcap buttoned under his chin, and a broad-brimmed hat slouched over it, an old rusty blue cloak tied about his neck, under which appeared a brown surtout, that covered a threadbare coat and waistcoat, and, as he afterwards discerned, a dirty flannel jacket. His eyes were hollow, bleared, and gummy; his face was shrivelled into a thousand wrinkles, his gums were destitute of teeth, his nose sharp and drooping, his chin peaked and prominent, so that, when he mumped or spoke, they approached ...
— The Adventures of Roderick Random • Tobias Smollett
... it was a comfort that the presence of a comparative stranger deprived us of the dreary duty of suggesting to each other, in respect of his errand, edifying possibilities in which we didn't ourselves believe. At ten o'clock he came into the drawing-room with his waistcoat much awry but his eyes sending out great signals. It was precisely with his entrance that I ceased to be vividly conscious of him. I saw that the crystal, as I had called it, had begun to swing, and I had need of my ...
— The Coxon Fund • Henry James
... feet tall, or thereabouts, and more than half as wide. His hair and beard were grayish red and his face reddish brown. He was dressed in the regulation "shore togs" of a deep sea sailor, blue double-breasted jacket, blue trousers and waistcoat, white "biled" shirt, low collar—celluloid, by the look—and a "made" bow tie which hung from the button by a worn loop of elastic. His hands were as red as his face and of a size proportionate to the rest of him. He seized the captain's ...
— Cap'n Dan's Daughter • Joseph C. Lincoln
... or stray, belonging to a gipsy deported that morning by the police, and on whom its master's sins had been visited. So without scruple he carried the basket home to his lodgings, and on the way, had the misfortune to encounter his uncle, while shirtfront, coat, and waistcoat were fresh from the muddy and bloody fray, and his visage in the height ...
— The Young Step-Mother • Charlotte M. Yonge
... the ideal servant in his dark-blue suit, high collar, and stiff white waistcoat. A wave of revulsion passed over Mostyn. He was thinking of the crude dining-room in the mountains; Drake, without his coat, his hair unkempt; Mrs. Drake in her soiled print dress and fire-flushed face, nervously waving the peacock ...
— The Desired Woman • Will N. Harben
... spinning up along the shining Mohawk, and still his eyelids would not close. In his waistcoat-pocket lay a bulky letter, the last of many in the same superscription—a prim, unformed, school-girlish hand—that had come to him during the last two years of his cadet life. Its predecessors, carefully wrapped and tied, ...
— Under Fire • Charles King
... of the story, Mr. Bingle," said Sigsbee, settling back in his chair and linking his plump hands benevolently across his expansive and somewhat overhanging waistcoat. "That is the best part ...
— Mr. Bingle • George Barr McCutcheon
... he meets her eye. He may permit himself the indulgence of submission. He may even, without disgrace, suffer his hand to tremble when it touches hers; but if one of her farmers were to show himself susceptible and sentimental, he would merely prove his need of a strait waistcoat. So far I have always done very well. She has sat near me, and I have not shaken—more than my desk. I have encountered her looks and smiles like—why, like a tutor, as I am. Her hand I never yet touched—never underwent that test. Her farmer or her footman ...
— Shirley • Charlotte Bronte
... another dissentient southerner. He was an enormously fat man, the new disputant, and wore a mass of very greasy hair, hanging down over his shoulders. His flannel shirt, an exceedingly dingy specimen of British manufacture, did duty for a waistcoat also; but he was decore, though it was very doubtful to what order the medal on his breast ...
— Notes in North Africa - Being a Guide to the Sportsman and Tourist in Algeria and Tunisia • W. G. Windham
... Rudolf drew his shirt over his head and tucked it into his trousers. "Give me the jacket and waistcoat," he said. "I feel ...
— Rupert of Hentzau - From The Memoirs of Fritz Von Tarlenheim: The Sequel to - The Prisoner of Zenda • Anthony Hope
... below his master's window, with his coat off, and his hands in his waistcoat-pockets, meant this as a happy and delicate allusion to things and times ...
— Freaks on the Fells - Three Months' Rustication • R.M. Ballantyne
... the locomotive faculty in a man in a strait waistcoat. Neither St. Augustine nor Calvin denied the remanence of the will in the fallen spirit; but they, and Luther as well as they, objected to the flattering epithet 'free' will. In the only Scriptural sense, as concerning ...
— The Literary Remains Of Samuel Taylor Coleridge • Edited By Henry Nelson Coleridge
... have thoughts about my yesterday's antagonist. Would I encounter him? Not likely. The butt of my whip had no doubt given him a headache that would confine him for some days to his quarters. But I was prepared for any event. Under my waistcoat were his own double-barrelled pistols, which I intended to use, if attacked. It was my first essay at carrying "concealed weapons," but it was the fashion of the country at the time—a fashion followed by nineteen out of every twenty persons ...
— The Quadroon - Adventures in the Far West • Mayne Reid
... bodies and patting some special favourite, to keep it quiet while the curraghs were being launched. Then the screaming began again while the pigs were carried out and laid in their places, with a waistcoat tied round their feet to keep them from damaging the canvas. They seemed to know where they were going, and looked up at me over the gunnel with an ignoble desperation that made me shudder to think that ...
— Synge And The Ireland Of His Time • William Butler Yeats
... man's prospects in life in the Montana affair—just as he had closed avenues of credit. Mayo bumped against him and crowded him back across the sidewalk to the hotel's granite wall. He put his two raw, swollen hands on Fogg's immaculate waistcoat and shoved salt-stained, ...
— Blow The Man Down - A Romance Of The Coast - 1916 • Holman Day
... several moments to be unaware of it. Felicia was paler than ever. She seemed to be struggling, as she sat there, to conceal her fear and aversion for the man who leaned toward her, talking in rapid French, with many gesticulations. He was badly dressed in a travelling suit of French cut, with a waistcoat buttoned almost to the chin. A floppy black tie hung down over the lapels of his coat. His black moustache, which seemed to have suffered from the crossing, was drooping, and gave to his mouth a particularly sinister ...
— The Lost Ambassador - The Search For The Missing Delora • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... first Sunday in the chapel, there came an exhorter or revivalist, accustomed to dealing with prisoners from the platform, and dubbed "The Old War-horse of Salvation," or some such title. He had his white waistcoat, his raucous, shouting voice, his phrases, his anecdotes, his "my men," "my friends," "fellows"; his "I'm saved, I hope, and you can be!" Oh, the phariseeism of that "I hope!" At the end of his uproar, he called upon those of his hearers (we had all sat quite silent ...
— The Subterranean Brotherhood • Julian Hawthorne
... the above, there was an Italian patriot, whose devotion to the 'Kingmaker' displayed itself in a somewhat eccentric fashion. With much mystery, he showed me a portrait of Garibaldi, secreted in a watchkey seal, while his waistcoat buttons and shirt studs contained heads of those generals who served in the campaign of the Two Sicilies. It was rather a novel kind of hero-worship, though, I fear, likely to be little appreciated by him who inspired ...
— Herzegovina - Or, Omer Pacha and the Christian Rebels • George Arbuthnot
... glowing particle in the genial and brilliant mass, and tends to keep alive the general fire, from which he derives and to which returns at once light and geniality. It is admitted that he who has discovered the grand arcanum, and has the philosopher's stone in his waistcoat-pocket, is, so to speak, ex officio, a magician. But M. Le Prun had no need of any such discoveries. He had the gold itself, and was, therefore, a ready-made magician, and as such was worshipped accordingly with ...
— The International Magazine, Volume 2, No. 2, January, 1851 • Various
... ready-made clothing which, shrinking sensitively on each successive application of the tailor's sizzling goose, had come to disclose his person with disconcerting candour—sleeves too short, trousers at once too short and too narrow, waistcoat buttons straining over his chest, coat buttons refusing to recognise a buttonhole save that at the waist. Circumstances these that added measurably to his apparent age, lending him the semblance of maturity attained while still ...
— The Day of Days - An Extravaganza • Louis Joseph Vance
... Embassy. My coat's limp sleeves are signalling me To dress anon. My waistcoat yawns. My shirt obtuse Seems raising high its wristbands ...
— Enamels and Cameos and other Poems • Theophile Gautier
... Simon's appearance was little in his favour: not that his small dimensions signified—Caesar, and Buonaparte, and Wellington, and Nelson, all were little men—not that his dress was other than respectable—black coat and waistcoat, white stiff cravat, gray trowsers somewhat shrunk in longitude, good serviceable shoe-leather (of the shape, if not also of the size, of river barges), and plenty of unbleached cotton stocking about the gnarled region of his ...
— The Complete Prose Works of Martin Farquhar Tupper • Martin Farquhar Tupper
... and the Bow-Street officer benignly patted a pair of curly heads as he passed them, drew a chair to the table, and wiping his forehead, sat down, quite at home. Bill then deliberately seated himself, and unbuttoning his waistcoat, permitted the butt-ends of a brace of pistols to be seen by his guests. Mr. R——'s companion seemed very unmoved by this significant action. He bent one inquiring, steady look on the cracksman, which, as Bill afterwards said, went through him "like a gimlet through a penny," and taking out ...
— Lucretia, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... to this gaudy fly like a huge, two-hundred-pound salmon; his white waistcoat gave out a mild silver reflection as he slowly came to the surface and gorged the hook. He made not even a plunge, not one perceptible effort to tear out the barbed weapon, but, floating gently to her feet, allowed himself to be landed as though it were a pleasure. Only miserable ...
— Democracy An American Novel • Henry Adams
... out, Fenn felt a sharp wrench in the region of his waistcoat, and a moment later the stranger had vanished into the fog with the ...
— The Head of Kay's • P. G. Wodehouse
... young man," said Captain Bluenose, nodding his head approvingly, and filling his pipe from a supply of tobacco he always carried in the right pocket of his capacious blue waistcoat. The Captain gazed with a look of grave solemnity in the manly countenance of the young sailor, for whom he entertained feelings of unbounded admiration. He had dandled Bax on his knee when he was a baby, had taught him to make boats and to swim and row when he became ...
— The Lifeboat • R.M. Ballantyne
... wedding day, we may suppose that honest John Hull dressed himself in a plum-colored coat, all the buttons of which were made of pine-tree shillings. The buttons of his waistcoat were sixpences; and the knees of his small-clothes were buttoned with silver threepences. Thus attired, he sat with great dignity in Grandfather's chair; and, being a portly old gentleman, he completely filled it from elbow to elbow. On the opposite ...
— Grandfather's Chair • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... say something, to speak a few words of thanks for their help; but she stopped at the sight of the two people standing on opposite sides of the little bed. The man with his coat off, his white waistcoat and shirt gleaming in the light, the woman opposite him clothed in her decolette' gown, with jewels glistening in her hair and on her neck. But she did not notice the dress, when she saw the light in the woman's eyes as they rested on the man. ...
— Drusilla with a Million • Elizabeth Cooper
... directly to their aid, in an infinitesimal proportion it is true, but Cyrus Harding, with all his intelligence, all his ingenuity, would never have been able to produce that which, by the greatest chance, Herbert one day found in the lining of his waistcoat, which he was ...
— The Mysterious Island • Jules Verne
... aspect. He had an immense head set on a neck so short and thick that it seemed as if he must infallibly choke at every morsel he swallowed, and a belly capacious enough to have held a firkin of liquor. He had made himself easy by unbuttoning his waistcoat and the upper part of his breeches, and lolled back in his seat as if he had no mind to stir for the rest of the morning. One of his eyes was closed up, and had a French plaister across it, but the other stared ...
— Athelstane Ford • Allen Upward
... blissful day when he was called back to join the engineering staff in work covering design. Laying aside his overalls, he emerged as a crisp young engineer in a linen collar and nifty cravat—although not till later did he don a cream-colored waistcoat—and thereafter his hours were seven instead of nine. With a desk and a stenographer he entered upon work of a somewhat statistical character. He followed the designs of rival companies as best he could through their advertising and articles covering their respective ...
— Opportunities in Engineering • Charles M. Horton
... fifta dolla—no!" answered her betrothed. "I keep in de pock'!" He showed her where the bills were pinned into his corduroy waistcoat pocket. "See! Eesa yau! Onna my heart, ...
— In the Arena - Stories of Political Life • Booth Tarkington
... inside the theater, in the office, is a man in a circus waistcoat adding up dollars with a blue pencil, and he knows that the play ...
— Behind the Beyond - and Other Contributions to Human Knowledge • Stephen Leacock
... which he ate hastily and without much appetite. After finishing the meal, he hunted up Welton. He found the lumberman tilted back in a wooden armchair, his feet comfortably elevated to the low rail about the stove, his pipe in mouth, his coat off, and his waistcoat unbuttoned. At the sight of his homely, jolly countenance, Bob experienced a pleasant sensation of slipping back from an environment slightly off-focus to the normal, accustomed and real. Nevertheless, ...
— The Rules of the Game • Stewart Edward White
... Then I walked off to a seat at the end of the platform to do a little thinking, but before I had really got settled I saw Fred walking towards me with his head somewhere near the second button of his waistcoat. I shouted to him, and after we had sat on the bench for quite a minute without speaking we both began to laugh at the same time, until a porter and a ticket-collector came to see what was happening. The porter was a burly man with a cheerful countenance, and he seemed so pleased ...
— Godfrey Marten, Undergraduate • Charles Turley
... once—it was at least two sizes too large for him, such being the accepted fashion at Brimfield just then; had the pockets set at rakish angles, exhibited a two-and-a-half-inch cuff at the bottom of the trousers and contained a cunning receptacle for a fountain pen and pencil in the waistcoat, (Clint called it a vest, but the tailor set him right.) Amy viewed that suit with frank envy, for the coat was fully two inches wider across the shoulders than his and the trouser cuffs were deeper. He tried it ...
— Left Tackle Thayer • Ralph Henry Barbour
... the green and fretted gravestone, dimly aware that his heart was beating with an unusual effort. He felt ill and weak. He leant his hand on the stone and lifted himself on to the low wooden seat nearby. He drew off his glove and thrust his bare hand under his waistcoat, with his mouth a little ajar, and his eyes fixed on the dark square turret, its bell sharply defined ...
— The Return • Walter de la Mare
... He began to undress at once. He had taken off his coat and waistcoat, and was turning towards a looking-glass to undo his tie, when his father came up to him; with an abrupt movement M. Etienne Rambert put both his hands on his son's shoulders and looked him straight in the eyes. Then in a stifled but ...
— Fantomas • Pierre Souvestre
... keeps his word by coming down dressed like the proverbial methodist Mawworm. An enormous white tie, doubled. His hair combed sadly straight. A high black waistcoat, his trousers shortened, white ...
— Happy-Thought Hall • F. C. Burnand
... to him, the slower he walked, and the more chop-fallen did he appear. Indeed, Sir James looked such a grand old gentleman, as he stood there like a statue, in his laced waistcoat and silk stockings, with his powdered hair falling over his fine velvet coat, and his hand resting upon his silver-hilted sword, that poor Chips felt as bashful as if he were going before the ...
— Harper's Young People, June 15, 1880 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various
... and George's waistcoat was red, and he had made himself smart enough, but he did not linger amongst his fellow- servants at the Cross. He hurried through the crowd, nodding sheepishly in answer to a shower of chaff and greetings, and made his way to the by-street where the Cheap Jack ...
— Jan of the Windmill • Juliana Horatia Ewing
... of Ponsard, applauded Deburau and Rouviere, and seen the rise and fall of Courbet and Dupont. If he was not of the giants he was of their immediate successors, and he had seen them actually at work. He had hacked for Balzac, and read romantic prose at Victor Hugo's; he had lived so near the red waistcoat of Theophile Gautier as to dare to go up and down in Paris (under the inspiration of the artist of la Femme qui taille la Soupe) in 'un habit en bouracan vert avec col a la Marat, un gilet de couleur bachique, et une culotte en drap d'un jaune assez malseant,' together with ...
— Views and Reviews - Essays in appreciation • William Ernest Henley
... hurrah! sounded, and then Faiz Talab found himself alone on his side of the wall. That was all very well, but it was not of much avail to have escaped so far, to end his days with eighteen inches of a British bayonet through his best embroidered waistcoat. If it had been any Indian regiment, or, better still, his own regiment, the Guides, he could at once have secured safety by declaring who he was. But with British soldiers, none of whom would probably understand a word he said, and all heated ...
— The Story of the Guides • G. J. Younghusband
... transformed, and, with their gay handkerchiefs hanging from the button-holes of their coats, capered about with the lasses so that it was a pleasure to look at them. One of them, who evidently thought a deal of himself, fumbled in his waistcoat-pocket for a long while, that the others might see him, and finally brought out a little silver coin, which he tried to put into my hand. It irritated me, although I had not a stiver in my pocket. I told him to keep his pennies, I was playing only for joy, because I was ...
— The German Classics of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries: - Masterpieces of German Literature Translated into English, Volume 5. • Various
... the bargain concluded, when two or three of the company began to envy me the possession of the horse, and forcing their way into the bar, with much noise and clamour, said that the horse had been sold too cheap. One fellow in particular, with a red waistcoat, the son of a wealthy farmer, said that if he had but known that the horse had been so good a one, he would have bought it at the first price asked for it, which he was now willing to pay, that is, to-morrow, supposing—'Supposing your ...
— The Romany Rye - A Sequel to 'Lavengro' • George Borrow
... fashion"—they sparkle for a week, retire to their silver paper, make way for the new comers, and, years after, like the Sleeping Beauty, rush to life in all their pristine splendour, and find (save in the treble-gilt aodication and their own accession) the coat, the immortal coat, unchanged! The waistcoat is of a material known only to themselves—a sort of nightmare illusion of velvet, covered with a slight tracery of refined mortar, curiously picked out and guarded with a nondescript collection of the very greenest green pellets of hyson-bloom gunpowder tea. The buttons (things of ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 1, July 17, 1841 • Various
... Fritz. A little of the Bedlam cold kept me nice and quiet. The bed that night if you like—but Heaven defend me from the blankets and the sheets and the pillows till I'm able to bear them! And as to putting on coat, waistcoat, and breeches, all together, the next morning—it was as much as I could do, when I saw myself in my breeches, to give the word of command in the voice of a gentleman—'Away with the rest of them! The shirt for to-morrow, ...
— Jezebel • Wilkie Collins
... what the few rags on her back will be worth when she is "shoved into Potters' Field." At the sign of the "Three Martyrs" Mr. Levy is seen, in his fashionable coat, and a massive chain falling over his tight waistcoat, registering the names of his grotesque customers, ticketing their little packages, and advancing each a shilling or two, which they will soon spend at the opposite druggery. Thus bravely wages the war. London has nothing so besotted, ...
— Justice in the By-Ways - A Tale of Life • F. Colburn Adams
... a silver whistle from his waistcoat pocket, put it to his lips and sounded a call. In a moment Smain same running lightly over the sand. Count Anteoni said something to him in Arabic. He disappeared, and speedily returned with a pair of field-glasses. While he was ...
— The Garden Of Allah • Robert Hichens
... examples, see pieces 1 and 2 in the specimens of Esperanto, pp. 167-8 [Part IV, Chapter II], and read the Note at the beginning of Part IV. As the Esperanto dictionary only consists of a few pages, it can be easily carried in the pocket-book or waistcoat pocket. ...
— International Language - Past, Present and Future: With Specimens of Esperanto and Grammar • Walter J. Clark
... in one of them, there're as gaudy as a salmon-fly," said Drysdale, feeling the stuff which the obsequious Schloss held out. "But it seems nice stuff, too," he went on; "I shouldn't mind having a couple of waistcoats of it of this pattern;" and he chucked across to Schloss a dark tartan waistcoat which was lying near him. "Have you got the ...
— Tom Brown at Oxford • Thomas Hughes
... he cried. 'I understand that a stable-boy sleeps there alone every night. Perhaps that is his supper which you are carrying to him. Now I am sure that you would not be too proud to earn the price of a new dress, would you?' He took a piece of white paper folded up out of his waistcoat pocket. 'See that the boy has this to-night, and you shall have the prettiest frock that money ...
— Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes • Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
... strolled on, and when he returned he seated himself in the shade near the house. The letter of Captain Vince was taken from his coat-lining and secured in one of his breeches pockets; his heavy coat and waistcoat lay upon the ground beside him, with the cocked hat placed upon them. As he leaned back against the tree and inhaled the fragrant breeze which came to him from the forest, Dickory was a more cheerful young man ...
— Kate Bonnet - The Romance of a Pirate's Daughter • Frank R. Stockton
... was Philip Meryon. His dark tweed suit and fur waistcoat disclosed a figure once singularly agile and slender, on which self-indulgence was now beginning to tell. Nevertheless, as the bonne passed him she duly noted and admired his pictorial good looks, opining at the same time that he was not French. Why was he ...
— The Case of Richard Meynell • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... least extraordinary feature of his appearance. He constantly wore a full-trimmed scarlet waistcoat of most uncommon dimensions, a light grey coat, which altogether gave him an air of singularity and whim as remarkable ...
— Irish Wit and Humor - Anecdote Biography of Swift, Curran, O'Leary and O'Connell • Anonymous
... initiate us in the art of drinking, recounting the feats of his youth, and his drinking-bouts with my father, adding, with a smile, "But you'll never be a par with, your Uncle, Ned, till you can carry the six bottles under your waistcoat." ...
— The Sketches of Seymour (Illustrated), Complete • Robert Seymour
... falling on the stone, like drops of water, had spread into fair, round rosettes, the tutor had starved into a slight cough. Then he began to draw the buckle of his black pantaloons a little tighter, and took in another reef in his never-ample waistcoat. His temples got a little hollow, and the contrasts of color in his cheeks more vivid than of old. After a while his walks fatigued him, and he was tired and breathed hard after going up a flight or two of stairs. Then came ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 3, Issue 17, March, 1859 • Various
... a sudden shivering of the floor and a creaking of woodwork proclaimed the fact that the vessel was under way again, and his cousin, turning pea-green, rolled over on his side with a hollow moan. Sam finished buttoning his waistcoat ...
— The Girl on the Boat • Pelham Grenville Wodehouse
... adjust themselves to their enforced companionship, and it wasn't such a very hard matter, though it cost him some painful wrenches and much twisting of the fingers, for Mr. Trimm to get his coat unbuttoned and his eyeglasses in their small leather case out of his upper waistcoat pocket. With the glasses on his nose he subjected his bonds to a critical examination. Each rounded steel band ran unbroken except for the smooth, almost jointless hinge and the small lock which sat perched on the back of the wrist in a little rounded excrescence like a steel wart. In the flat ...
— The Escape of Mr. Trimm - His Plight and other Plights • Irvin S. Cobb
... the kind rode out on horseback he often took Tom along with him, and if a shower came on he used to creep into his majesty's waistcoat pocket, where he slept till the ...
— The History of Tom Thumb, and Others • Anonymous
... arrival, was of a severe satirist, who concealed scalpels in his sleeves and carried probes in his waistcoat pockets; a wearer of masks; a scoffer and sneerer, and general infidel of all high aims and noble character. Certainly we are justified in saying that his presence among us quite corrected this idea. We welcomed a friendly, genial man; not at all convinced that speech is ...
— Literary and Social Essays • George William Curtis
... old doctor left me the buttons for his full dress waistcoat and his favorite copy of Gray's Anatomy. I couldn't exactly set up housekeeping with my share of the estate, but when the lawyer read that part of the will aloud and a grin went around the room I flounced out ...
— Where There's A Will • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... quantity of garments which he wore added no little to his apparent bulk. The outer garments exposed to view were, a rough fox-skin cap upon his head, from under which appeared the edge of a red worsted nightcap; a red plush waistcoat, with large metal buttons; a jacket of green cloth, over which he wore another of larger dimensions of coarse blue cloth, which came down as low as what would be called a spencer. Below he had black plush breeches, light-blue worsted stockings, shoes, and ...
— The Phantom Ship • Frederick Marryat
... they here ranged themselves in a line along the ribbon, and criticised the several dancers. Some of these spectators seemed most egregious fops. One of them, with the exception of his linen, was dressed completely in purple silk or satin, and another in a rose-coloured silk coat, with white satin waistcoat and small clothes, and white silk stockings. The greater part of the ladies were dressed in fancy habits from the antique. Some were sphinxes, some vestals, some Dians, half a dozen Minervas, and a score of Junos and Cleopatras. ...
— Travels through the South of France and the Interior of Provinces of Provence and Languedoc in the Years 1807 and 1808 • Lt-Col. Pinkney
... way of performing most of his toilet outside his tent, and while Joseph made his discouraging report he was engaged in buttoning his waistcoat. He nodded gravely, but his manner was not that of a man who fully realised his position of imminent danger. Some men are like this—they die ...
— With Edged Tools • Henry Seton Merriman
... very odd: and exhibits the patient in by no means an elegant or dignified attitude. For this bath it is not necessary to undress, the coat only being taken off, and the shirt gathered under the waistcoat, which is buttoned upon it; and when seated in the water, which rises to the waist, a blanket is drawn round and over the shoulders. Having remained ten minutes in this condition, we dried and rubbed ourselves with coarse towels, and after tea minutes' walk, proceeded to supper ...
— The Recreations of A Country Parson • A. K. H. Boyd
... him a clean-shaven, white-haired man, meticulously dressed in black—black swallowtail coat, open waistcoat, and frilled shirt-front, on which his laundress must have spent hours of labour; closely fitting black knee-breeches, black silk stockings, black polished shoes. They silhouetted, too, in the moment before ...
— Corporal Sam and Other Stories • A. T. Quiller-Couch
... engaged in conversation with Zabulon, a man of about forty, of short stature, somewhat round shouldered with spectacles. He wore a high silk hat, a loose coat and a large golden chain across his waistcoat. In a somewhat sing-song voice he was speaking of the greatness of Buenos Aires, of the future that awaited those of his race in that city, of the good business he had done. The affectionate attention with which the old man and his son listened ...
— Luna Benamor • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... it straight out that the monarch knew he had only contributed the coat and waistcoat, and did not know exactly how he was to lay his hands on the 250 pounds. What with piracy—for we have been told of at least one case in which Alcinous had looted a town and stolen his housemaid Eurymedusa—what with insufficient changes of linen, toping like an ...
— The Humour of Homer and Other Essays • Samuel Butler
... Kangaroo Bank, a florid man, wearing a white waistcoat, came out through the glass doors with a digger who ...
— The Tale of Timber Town • Alfred Grace
... pantaloon, to the knee, which leaves the lower leg bare, is confined at the waist by a girdle or sash of colored cotton or silk. Then there is worn a cotton shirt, with a short, loose vest, or waistcoat, as they were formerly known, covering the same; the latter often ornamented with rows of silver ...
— Miss Caprice • St. George Rathborne
... with dangerous coldness, and gave a smile as thin as the edge of a knife. Then he removed a spark of cigar-ash from the sleeve of his coat; he fixed his eyes for a while on the cornice of the room, and at last he inserted one of his white hands into the breast of his waistcoat. "I must apologize to you for the deplorable levity of my brother," he said, "and I must notify you that this is probably not the last time that his want of tact will cause ...
— The American • Henry James
... the wilds, now that you have won Cinderella and Eldorado, as I predicted, I wish you a divine unrest. It is the best I Can hope for you. Eldorado and domesticity mean the fishy eye, the heavy jowl, and the expanded waistcoat; and remember that although the red gods may be silent so long that you will forget them, yet there will come a day when they will call and you will hear nothing else. Then, as you would keep your happiness, get up and follow—follow 'to the camp of ...
— The Silver Butterfly • Mrs. Wilson Woodrow
... place I have desired long to see: have you not good tippling houses there? May not a man have a lusty fire there, a good pot of ale, a pair of cards, a swinging piece of chalk, and a brown toast that will clap a white waistcoat on a cup of ...
— History of English Humour, Vol. 1 (of 2) - With an Introduction upon Ancient Humour • Alfred Guy Kingan L'Estrange
... lolling in it like a little king, and he not only ordered roast-beef for the awe-struck Shovel, but sent the lady back for salt. Then he whispered, exultantly: "Quick, Shovel, feel my pocket" (it bulged with two oranges), "now the inside pocket" (plum-duff), "now my waistcoat pocket" (threepence); "look in ...
— Sentimental Tommy - The Story of His Boyhood • J. M. Barrie
... true, for Mr Webster had "got himself up" that morning with elaborate care. His morning coat still smelt of the brown paper in which it had come home. His waistcoat was immaculately white. His pearl-grey trousers were palpably new. His lavender kid-gloves were painfully clean. His patent-leather boots were glitteringly black, and his tout ensemble such as to suggest the ...
— Saved by the Lifeboat • R.M. Ballantyne
... to another attempt to kiss her. She evaded it by diving her head into his waistcoat, and saying, ...
— Frontier Stories • Bret Harte
... hair fell upon the collar of a round jacket with square pockets, which reached to the hips only, a garment peculiar to the peasantry of western France. Beneath this jacket, which was worn open, a waistcoat of the same linen with large buttons was visible. Some of the company marched in wooden shoes; others, by way of economy, carried them in their hand. This costume, soiled by long usage, blackened with sweat and dust, ...
— The Chouans • Honore de Balzac
... broad-brimmed hat, usually of a black or dark brown color, with a gilt or figured band round the crown, and lined under the rim with silk; a short jacket of silk, or figured calico (the European skirted body-coat is never worn); the shirt open in the neck; rich waistcoat, if any; pantaloons open at the sides below the knee, laced with gilt, usually of velveteen or broadcloth; or else short breeches and white stockings. They wear the deer-skin shoe, which is of a dark brown color, ...
— Two Years Before the Mast • Richard Henry Dana
... have done it at Windsor, or at the ball,' said Melmotte, pulling down his waistcoat. 'By George, Alfred! I'm in earnest, and somebody had better look to it. If I'm not presented to his Imperial Majesty to-night, by G——, there shall be no dinner in Grosvenor Square on Monday. I'm master enough of my own house, I suppose, to be able ...
— The Way We Live Now • Anthony Trollope
... to speak, as their jargon was unintelligible to all but themselves. Not the least insult was offer'd to any person, save one Captain Conner, a letter of horses in this place, not many years since remov'd from dear Ireland, who had ript up the lining of his coat and waistcoat under the arms, and watching his opportunity had nearly fill'd 'em with tea, but being detected, was handled pretty roughly. They not only stripp'd him of his cloaths, but gave him a coat of mud, with a severe bruising into the bargain; and nothing but their ...
— The Siege of Boston • Allen French
... example was followed by the whole company." Thomson, the author of the "Castle of Indolence," was once seen lounging round Lord Burlington's garden, with his hands in his waistcoat pockets, biting off the ...
— Autobiography, Letters and Literary Remains of Mrs. Piozzi (Thrale) (2nd ed.) (2 vols.) • Mrs. Hester Lynch Piozzi
... enchanting and scholarly volume is this, just small enough to be carried in the waistcoat pocket, and exquisite in paper, print, and binding."—Notes ...
— Horace • William Tuckwell
... eyelids. But he had scuffled and edged his way in the thin air of Connecticut as errand-boy, daguerreotypist, teacher, doctor;—so he came into the Gurney garden that night, shrewd, defiant, priding himself on detecting shams. His waistcoat and trousers were of coarser stuff than suited his temperament; a taint of vulgarity in his talk, his whiskers untrimmed, the meaning of his face compacted, sharpened. It was many a year since a tear had come into his black eyes; yet tears belonged ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 11, Issue 67, May, 1863 • Various
... leading to it, on which, to get the best possible view of the spectacle, I stood for three mortal hours. The attendant gentlemen were well dressed, but wore "shocking bad hats;" and the king wore a sort of shooting suit, a short brown cut-away coat, an ash-coloured waistcoat and ash- coloured trousers with a blue stripe. He stood bareheaded. He dressed in this style in order that the natives might attend the reception in every-day dress, and not run the risk of spoiling their ...
— The Hawaiian Archipelago • Isabella L. Bird
... neck-cloths first. A languid violet; A serious brown. Bandannas are much worn. I note with pleasure that your Highness knows The delicate art of building up a stock. Here's a check pattern makes an elegant knot. How does this waistcoat strike your Lordship's fancy, Down ...
— L'Aiglon • Edmond Rostand
... Nota proprietatem verbi. 'Vest,' enim apud politos id. q. vulgo 'waistcoat' appellatur. Quod et feminae usurpahant, ut ...
— Verses and Translations • C. S. C.
... He wore a white waistcoat embroidered with gold, in the old style, and his linen was of dazzling whiteness. A shirt-frill of English lace, yellow with age, the magnificence of which a queen might have envied, formed a series of yellow ruffles on his breast; but upon ...
— Sarrasine • Honore de Balzac
... field till he was close to the figure on the ground. Then he quietly removed his jacket and waistcoat and laid them down. Then ...
— Facing Death - The Hero of the Vaughan Pit. A Tale of the Coal Mines • G. A. Henty
... miserably cheap creatures. Mr. Craik V. Purdy, simply gorgeous about waistcoat and watchchain, presented us to his wife, a short, red-haired woman (I do dislike red hair, don't you, Mamma?). She was very stout, but I don't understand why she was such a "drawback." She had the jolliest face and ...
— Elizabeth Visits America • Elinor Glyn
... Clay got the telegram all right." Miss Ronder's thin bosom was a little agitated beneath its white waistcoat. "You'll never forgive me if things aren't looking as though we'd lived ...
— The Cathedral • Hugh Walpole
... which hung over the bureau. Every thing was ready for his toilet, the footman having carefully arranged the whole. He put the cravat with lace trimmings around his neck and arranged the tie before the looking- glass in the most artistic manner; then he slipped into the long waistcoat of silver-lined velvet, and finally put on the long-tailed brown coat with bright metal buttons. He was just going to put the heavy silver watch, which his wife had given him on their wedding- day, into his vest-pocket, when his eye fell upon the blue ribbon embroidered with ...
— LOUISA OF PRUSSIA AND HER TIMES • Louise Muhlbach
... said that when the King rode out on horseback he often took Tom along with him, and if a shower came on he used to creep into his Majesty's waistcoat pocket, where he slept till ...
— The Junior Classics, Volume 1 • Willam Patten
... dare say, the most infernal costume ever devised by man—a tightish snuff-coloured jacket with diminutive tails, an orange waistcoat, snuff-coloured breeches, grey-blue worsted stockings, and square-toed shoes with iron toe-plates. Add a flat-topped cap with an immense leathern brim; add Genevan neck-bands; add, last of all, a leathern badge with "G.F.H." ...
— The Adventures of Harry Revel • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... I left this case in my room, locked, and the key in my waistcoat pocket; in the right-hand side-pocket of my overcoat I carried my Deane and Adams, loaded in every chamber; also my right hand, as innocently as you could wish. And just that night I was not followed! I walked across Regent's Park, and I dawdled on Primrose Hill, without the ...
— Dead Men Tell No Tales • E. W. Hornung
... still wear a bodice, and begging her not to make hot weather an excuse for going about with naked arms 'and legs and feet thrust into slippers,' but to adopt fine thin stockings; 'and,' says our author, 'although the tenue du lever for a gentleman is a cotton or silk night-cap, a waistcoat with sleeves, or a dressing-gown, he is recommended to abandon cette mise matinale as early as may be, that so attired he may receive none but intimate friends.' Unmarried women, until they pass thirty, are debarred from wearing diamonds or expensive ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 462 - Volume 18, New Series, November 6, 1852 • Various
... button-holes in the billiard-room and the 'bus was announced. A greasy oil-lamp hung from the roof. Sometimes Sally rubbed the windows and said she could tell by the bushes where they were, and the embroidered waistcoat continued to drone out the measure of his amusements. He would have to run up to London, then he must have a shy at trente et quarante at Monte Carlo, then he must get back for the spring meeting at Newmarket. Frank asked him if he didn't think he could manage to amuse ...
— Spring Days • George Moore
... the dacoit walked back. Nayland Smith's next move filled me with surprise. For just as, silently, I was thanking God for my escape, my friend began shedding his coat, collar, and waistcoat. ...
— The Insidious Dr. Fu-Manchu • Sax Rohmer
... already done throughout the kingdom of Ireland. For what greater proof could this author give of his Christianity, than, for bringing about this Swearing-act, charitably to part with his coat, and sit starving in a very thin waistcoat in his garret, to do the corporal virtues of feeding and clothing the poor, and raising them from the cottage to the palace, by punishing the vices of the rich. What more could have been done even in the ...
— The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, D.D., Vol. VII - Historical and Political Tracts—Irish • Jonathan Swift
... neatest boy you might ever have hoped to see. Aye—but he did not inherit that from me! Indeed, he used to reproach me, oftentimes, for being careless about my clothes. My collar would be loose, perhaps, or my waistcoat would not fit just so. He'd not like that, and he would tell ...
— A Minstrel In France • Harry Lauder
... both tea and ablutions were forgotten, so long as the owner of Ferth Place and the new Lady Tressady were in sight. The village eyes took note of everything; of the young man's immaculate serge suit and tan waistcoat, his thin, bronzed face and fair moustache; of the bride's grey gown, the knot of airy pink at her throat, the coils of bright brown hair on which her hat was set, and the buckles on her pretty shoes. Then the village retreated ...
— Sir George Tressady, Vol. I • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... another room, but he frequently came down some steps into the main room, his jaunty, tarred boots with red turn-over tops coming into view each time before the rest of his person. He wore a full coat and a horribly greasy black satin waistcoat, with no cravat, and his whole face seemed smeared with oil like an iron lock. At the counter stood a boy of about fourteen, and there was another boy somewhat younger who handed whatever was wanted. On the counter lay some sliced cucumber, some ...
— Crime and Punishment • Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... behind him. Murtagh Cosgar is about sixty. He is a hard, strong man, seldom-spoken, but with a flow of words and some satirical power. He is still powerful, mentally and physically. He is clean shaven, and wears a sleeved waistcoat, heavy boots, fell hat. ...
— Three Plays • Padraic Colum
... armies, that men could fight without spatterdashes, that hair-powder was not heroism, and that long tails were only an imitation of the monkey; that muskets did not fire the worse for having brown barrels, and that the cuirass was a better defence for the body of the dragoon than a cloth waistcoat, however covered with embroidery. But why shall not improvement go a little farther? Why shall not the arm of the dragoon be a little protected as well as his body? A slight and simple covering of steel rings would effect the purpose, ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 364, February 1846 • Various
... easily dominated by a stronger nature, the giant was struggling in vain to resume his pose of not understanding Brice's allusions. Presently, with a sigh, that was more like a grunt of hopelessness, he thrust his fingers into an inner pocket of his waistcoat, and drew forth a somewhat tarnished silver dollar. This he held toward ...
— Black Caesar's Clan • Albert Payson Terhune
... frightened at the sight of so many gentlemen, which made him tremble: and the beadle gave him another tap behind, which made him cry. These two causes made him answer in a very low and hesitating voice; whereupon a gentleman in a white waistcoat said he was a fool. Which was a capital way of raising his spirits, and putting him ...
— Oliver Twist • Charles Dickens
... the magazine down, settled his white waistcoat with both hands, and lounged towards his friend with audacious but slightly veiled and shining eyes. "They sort of sing themselves to you," he said, quietly, leaning beside the editor's desk, and looking down upon ...
— A Sappho of Green Springs • Bret Harte
... was quite happy, and with my first six months' money I got father a new pipe and a comforter agin the winter, and as pretty a shepherd's plaid shawl as ever you see for mother, and a knitted waistcoat for my brother Jim, as had wanted one this two year, and had enough left to buy myself a bonnet and gown that I didn't feel ashamed to sit in church in under Master Harry's own blue eye. Mrs. Blake looked very sour when she saw ...
— In Homespun • Edith Nesbit
... our inn, and had with us a Mr. Jackson, one of Johnson's schoolfellows, whom he treated with much kindness, though he seemed to be a low man, dull and untaught. He had a coarse grey coat, black waistcoat, greasy leather breeches, and a yellow uncurled wig; and his countenance had the ruddiness which betokens one who is in no haste to 'leave his can.' He drank only ale. He had tried to be a cutler at Birmingham, but had not succeeded; and now he lived poorly at home, and had some scheme of dressing ...
— Life of Johnson - Abridged and Edited, with an Introduction by Charles Grosvenor Osgood • James Boswell
... before, in the newspapers of the Canton. The slope of the hill was such that the hats of the lower ranks concealed the faces of those immediately behind, and the assembly was the darkest and densest I ever beheld. Here and there the top of a scarlet waistcoat flashed out of the cloud ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 20, No. 118, August, 1867 • Various
... man," commented Mr. Wade, shutting up his gold pencil case and putting it in the pocket of his comfortable waistcoat. "But clever men are ...
— Roden's Corner • Henry Seton Merriman
... emerging with a grave expression on his puckered face. He seemed uncertain about it. He was solemn as a judge. 'You could alter the buttons here and there, you know,' and he looked anxiously at his wife. The coat ran up behind, the waistcoat creased badly owing to the strain, and the trousers were as tight as those of a cavalry officer. Anywhere, and any moment, he might burst out into unexpected revelation. 'A little alteration,' he suggested hopefully, 'and it would be all right—don't you ...
— A Prisoner in Fairyland • Algernon Blackwood
... singing, for her permanent attitude of visitation to Stephen's eyes during his sleeping and waking hours in after days. The profile is seen of a young woman in a pale gray silk dress with trimmings of swan's-down, and opening up from a point in front, like a waistcoat without a shirt; the cool colour contrasting admirably with the warm bloom of her neck and face. The furthermost candle on the piano comes immediately in a line with her head, and half invisible itself, forms the accidentally frizzled hair into ...
— A Pair of Blue Eyes • Thomas Hardy
... to him. When I returned from Flint House that night I let myself in with my latchkey and went straight to my bedroom. My clothes were wet through, and I lit a fire in my room to dry them. As I was spreading them out in front of the blaze the key of the study dropped out of the waistcoat pocket on to the floor. I had forgotten all about it till then. I picked it up and placed it ...
— The Moon Rock • Arthur J. Rees
... see or hear of you again,"—he put his finger in his waistcoat pocket, significantly. "And there are other ...
— The Web of Life • Robert Herrick
... peculiarly characteristic and expressive of modern picture-making and novel-writing,—called "Hauling" or more definitely "Paysan rentrant du Fumier," which represents a man's back, or at least the back of his waistcoat and trousers, and hat, in full light, and a small blot where his face should be, with a small scratch where its nose should be, elongated into one representing a chink of ...
— On the Old Road, Vol. 2 (of 2) - A Collection of Miscellaneous Essays and Articles on Art and Literature • John Ruskin
... are to me, my summer-child!" said the mother, smiling affectionately as she saw Henrik had placed her shoes under his waistcoat, to warm ...
— The Home • Fredrika Bremer
... inheritance to the eldest. There are traces of agreement, though chiefly lost, in their pontifical dress. Before the Indian Archimagus officiates in making the supposed holy fire for the yearly atonement of sin, the Sagan clothes him with a white ephod, which is a waistcoat without sleeves. In resemblance of the Urim and Thummim the American Archimagus wears a breastplate made of a white conch-shell, with two holes bored in the middle of it, through which he puts the ends of an otter-skin strap; and fastens a buck-horn white button to the outside of each; as if ...
— Chronicles of Border Warfare • Alexander Scott Withers
... man, who could paint pictures, write books, organize colonies oversea, and with a sword pick the buttons from a waistcoat, forgot the twenty good years still before him; forgot that men loved him for the mistakes he had made; that in parts of the great city of Paris his name was still spoken fondly, ...
— Real Soldiers of Fortune • Richard Harding Davis
... in all England was presently riding to Penny Green on Sabre's bicycle. On his arm blazed the khaki brassard, in the breast pocket of his waistcoat, specially cleared to give private accommodation to so glorious a prize, were a half-crown and two pennies, the most thrillingly magnificent sum he had ever earned,—his army pay. His singing thought was, "I'm in the Army! I'm in the Army! I don't care for anything ...
— If Winter Comes • A.S.M. Hutchinson
... Reverend Dr. Samuel Cooper (who died in December, 1783) as Copley painted him,—he hangs there on my wall, over the revolving bookcase. His ample coat, too, I see, with its broad flaps and many buttons and generous cuffs, and beneath it the long, still more copiously buttoned waistcoat, arching in front of the fine crescentic, almost semi-lunar Falstaffian prominence, involving no less than a dozen of the above-mentioned buttons, and the strong legs with their sturdy calves, fitting columns of support to ...
— A Mortal Antipathy • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... everybody knows, while wearing plaid trousers and side-whiskers, on the right hand of a peer, in full view of thousands, at a political meeting, untroubled, bland, conscious of his worth, and will rise at the word, thumbs carelessly thrust into his waistcoat pockets, begin with a jest (the same one), and for an hour make aspirates as uncommon as are bathrooms ...
— Old Junk • H. M. Tomlinson
... very nice," said Mr. Bickford, daintily flecking cigar ash from his glorious white waistcoat. "Er—by the way—I see that you customarily wear a silk hat, ...
— The Skipper and the Skipped - Being the Shore Log of Cap'n Aaron Sproul • Holman Day
... it is the indispensable condition of certain positive operations. Liberty as a force may be as impotent as its opponents allege. This does not affect its value as a preliminary or accompanying condition. The absence of a strait-waistcoat is a negation; but it is a useful condition for the activity of sane men. No doubt there must be a definite limit to this absence of external interference with conduct, and that limit will be fixed at various points by different thinkers. We are now only urging that it cannot be wisely fixed for ...
— On Compromise • John Morley |
