"Crafty" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... furniture; raged as though each wished to be louder than the other, and made the house echo with their noise. I avow that so much hubbub seemed suspicious to me on the part of two men, one so sage and so measured, and to whom this rank was of no consequence; the other always so tranquil, so crafty, so master of himself. I knew not why this sudden fury succeeded to such dejected oppression; and I was not without suspicion that their passion was put on merely to excite mine. If this was their design, it succeeded ...
— The Memoirs of Louis XIV., His Court and The Regency, Complete • Duc de Saint-Simon
... regard for the feelings of others, rendering it so impossible for him to say no, and above all his vacillating disposition, were his paramount characteristics still: in a degree they ever would be. Easily led as ever, he was as a very reed in the hands of the crafty old woman of the world, located with him. She had determined that he should become the husband of her daughter; and was as certain of accomplishing her end as if she had foreseen the future. Lord Hartledon himself afterwards, ...
— Elster's Folly • Mrs. Henry Wood
... robe of seeming truth and trust Did crafty observation; And secret hung, with poison'd crust, The dirk of Defamation: A mask that like the gorget show'd, Dye-varying on the pigeon; And for a mantle large and broad, He wrapt him ...
— The Complete Works of Robert Burns: Containing his Poems, Songs, and Correspondence. • Robert Burns and Allan Cunningham
... the young chief that confusion for the time prevented Great Oak from speaking, which might have been mistaken for yielding; when that crafty chief springing from among the ever-green bushes, confronted the chiefs, and in a loud voice of ferocious exultation and of triumph, ...
— Birch Bark Legends of Niagara • Owahyah
... as many moments, and not one distinguishable from the first!" exclaimed Wei Chang, regarding the array of plates with pleasurable emotion. "Here is a means of baffling Fang's crafty confederacy that will fill Wong Ts'in's ears with waves of ...
— Kai Lung's Golden Hours • Ernest Bramah
... brightness which fascinated you on your entrance into life; you have retained two weaknesses of intelligence,—mystery and prayer. There is no mystery" she said, in a more solemn tone; "there is only reason, which dispels all mystery! It is man, crafty or credulous man, who invented mystery,—God made reason! And prayer does not exist," she continued mournfully, "for an inflexible law will not relent, and a ...
— Raphael - Pages Of The Book Of Life At Twenty • Alphonse de Lamartine
... man, turning short round, without replying to the smith, and addressing the aged Bassus, "why did you join the plotters, you who are so crafty, so sagacious, and yet so earnest ...
— The Roman Traitor (Vol. 1 of 2) • Henry William Herbert
... What a rogue, eh? One might have taken him in the act, knife in hand, and he'd say it wasn't true! A crafty fellow too—he defends ...
— Woman on Her Own, False Gods & The Red Robe - Three Plays By Brieux • Eugene Brieux
... scarcely handled with Browning's accustomed skill and subtlety. King Victor, of whose "fiery and audacious temper, unscrupulous selfishness, profound dissimulation, and singular fertility in resources," Browning speaks in his preface, is an impressive study of "the old age of crafty men," the futile wiliness of decrepit and persevering craft, though we are scarcely made to feel the once potent personality of the man, or to understand the influence which his mere word or presence still ...
— An Introduction to the Study of Browning • Arthur Symons
... Chebron cried excitedly, pacing up and down the chamber. "Mysa cannot bear Plexo. She spoke of him with something like horror when she heard of the proposal Ptylus made. I do not like him myself. He is thin lipped and crafty and cruel. Mysa had better be ...
— The Cat of Bubastes - A Tale of Ancient Egypt • G. A. Henty
... Right"—is quite a development of a Kingship that originated in foreclosure proceedings, when Prussia was taken for a debt by the crafty, rich ...
— Face to Face with Kaiserism • James W. Gerard
... at once penetrated the design of His crafty interrogator. And in His answer He took care not to mention His disciples, speaking only of Himself. He affirmed that He had nothing to say which He had not already said a hundred times in the synagogues and the Temple, before friends and foes. He had no secret doctrines ...
— Love to the Uttermost - Expositions of John XIII.-XXI. • F. B. Meyer
... sometimes they settled on the white and wax-like blooms of the plant that creeps and clambers about the trees of the forest; and their purple wings flashed out on the great blossoms as, when the caravans go from Nurl to Thace, the gleaming silks flash out upon the snow, where the crafty merchants spread them one by one to astonish the mountaineers of the ...
— Tales of Three Hemispheres • Lord Dunsany
... there are no tigers in Aino-land. For this reason, also, foxes are crafty and eloquent even at the present day.—(Written down from memory. Told by ...
— Aino Folk-Tales • Basil Hall Chamberlain
... Crafty Lion,—perhaps with the gout, Kept his cave; where, to solve any doubt, Many visitors go: But the Ass, he said "No! They go in, but I've seen none ...
— The Baby's Own Aesop • Aesop and Walter Crane
... Frau Schnitzelhaaser. And so great an admiral, too. One must remember that also. And how fortunate we were to have him: one must not forget that. Had it not been for him the crafty Belgians would have attacked the Fatherland, but they were struck down before they could do it. So much better to prevent a bad deed like that than merely to punish after. So wise. And had it not been for him, if it had not ...
— Tales of War • Lord Dunsany
... crafty answer, And in words like these responded: "As a man I will esteem you, And as hero will regard you, If you can split up a horsehair With a blunt and pointless knife-blade, And an egg in knots you tie me, Yet no knot ...
— Kalevala, Volume I (of 2) - The Land of the Heroes • Anonymous
... millionaire never so much as mentioned their existence. It was surmised, accordingly, that he voyaged over the seas with a bevy of light-hearted nymphs; a disreputable mode of conduct for a man of his advanced years, and all the more aggravating to other people since, like a crafty and jealous old sultan, he screened them from public view. Impropriety could be overlooked—it could pass, where a millionaire was concerned, under the heading of unconventionality; but such glaring selfishness might end in being fatal ...
— South Wind • Norman Douglas
... bundled herbs on the pantry shelves of a thrifty housewife; and still higher up there would be orange groves and lemon groves and dusty-gray olive groves. Each succeeding picture was Byzantine in its coloring. Always the sea was molten blue enamel, and the far-away villages seemed crafty inlays of mosaic work; and the sun was a disk of ...
— Europe Revised • Irvin S. Cobb
... said the crafty Isaac to himself, "and then see if Chloe will dare to cheek me as she has done of late. I rather flatter myself I shall take it out ...
— Jack Harkaway and his son's Escape From the Brigand's of Greece • Bracebridge Hemyng
... starry banner, veil your pride, The blood-red cross before— Emblem of that by Jordan's side Man's freedom price that bore, No land is strong that owns a slave, Vain is it wealthy, crafty, brave." ...
— Travels in the Great Desert of Sahara, in the Years of 1845 and 1846 • James Richardson
... thou? Whence derived? With what intent Placed where perpetual hindrances exhaust Thy wasted strength, in baffled effort spent? Where in blind maze, with crafty windings crossed, With stumbling-blocks beset, with pitfalls strewed, Thou wanderest, in endless error lost; Athirst beside glad rivers that elude, With mocking lapse, thy tantalized pursuit, And hungering where gilded husks delude With bitter ashes as of Dead Sea fruit, Ashes ...
— Old-Fashioned Ethics and Common-Sense Metaphysics - With Some of Their Applications • William Thomas Thornton
... crafty savage induced the tree to give up. Wherever the bark was cut, the fluid poured forth to heal the break and hardened like blood on a cut finger. The native caught it while it was still soft and applied ...
— The Romance of Rubber • United States Rubber Company
... best among the priests are the Jesuits, who returned from repeated banishment with the Austrians in this century. Their influence is very extended, and the confessional is their forte. Venetians say that with the old and the old-fashioned these crafty priests suggest remorse and impose penances; that with the young men and the latter-day thinkers they are men of the world, and pass off pleasant sins as trifles. All the students of the government schools are obliged by law to confess twice a month, and are given printed certificates of ...
— Venetian Life • W. D. Howells
... after the report of it had been made there, he happened to discover our British envoy among the spectators. The penetration of this illustrious person was too great, and his attachment to the interest of his royal master too well known, not to render him very disagreeable to that crafty and tyrannical prince, whom God had so long suffered to be the disgrace of monarchy, and the scourge of Europe. He at first appeared very languid, as indeed he was; but on casting his eye upon the Earl of Stair, ...
— The Life of Col. James Gardiner - Who Was Slain at the Battle of Prestonpans, September 21, 1745 • P. Doddridge
... um for tandy!" cried the crafty Paul, seeing a chance to make capital out of his little sister's strategic move. "Us dive oo glasses ...
— The Outdoor Girls in a Motor Car - The Haunted Mansion of Shadow Valley • Laura Lee Hope
... Roman took care, on the one hand, how he betrayed to the Knight more than he yet knew, or he disgusted him by apparent reserve on the other. Crafty as Montreal was, he possessed not that wonderful art of mastering others which was so preeminently the gift of the eloquent and profound Rienzi, and the difference between the grades of their intellect was visible in their ...
— Rienzi • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... Accident and crafty prearrangement had combined to bring the affairs of that ancient commonwealth to such a crisis. The general insurrection and the fight at Salo had given a pretext for disposing of the Venetian mainland; soon ...
— The Life of Napoleon Bonaparte - Vol. I. (of IV.) • William Milligan Sloane
... was conscious not only of a singular disappointment, but an equally singular perplexity. Felix Bonpre was not at all the sort of personage he had expected to see. He had imagined that a Churchman who was able to obtain a character for saintliness in days like these, must needs be worldly-wise and crafty, with a keen perception and comprehension of the follies of mankind, and an ability to use these follies advantageously to further his own ends. Something of the cunning and foresight of an ancient Egyptian sorcerer was in the composition of the Archbishop himself, for he judged mankind ...
— The Master-Christian • Marie Corelli
... summed up in this: to arrive at seizing a morsel—the biggest possible—of that prey which the fortunate of earth consume. And to this same category, little matter what their station in life, belong the profligate, the arrogant, the miserly, the weak, the crafty. Livery counts for nothing: we must see the heart. No class has the prerogative of simplicity; no dress, however humble in appearance, is its unfailing badge. Its dwelling need not be a garret, a hut, the cell of the ascetic nor the ...
— The Simple Life • Charles Wagner
... intervention of the officers of the law could no longer be avoided. Poor Jacques could be consigned to earth without the intervention of priest or police, but the murder of Olga was a matter for official investigation. With that crafty and subtle way the astute sleuths of the Chicago constabulary have of informing the public through the intermediary of the press of all measures projected against evil-doers, of moves to be made, of arrests to be attempted, all citizens were in possession of the fact that owing to ...
— The Strange Adventures of Mr. Middleton • Wardon Allan Curtis
... brain which is profound, an eye which is all-seeing and a heart as cold as an Antartic mountain. There is the exceptional type of criminal who is greedy—for money and its luxurious possibilities; selfish—with regard for no other heart in the world; crafty—with the cunning of an Apache, enjoying the thrill of crime and cruelty; refined and vainglorious—with pride in his skill to thwart justice and confidence in his ability to continually broaden the scope of ...
— The Voice on the Wire • Eustace Hale Ball
... is a positive bazaar! There is a deep, crafty old merchant sitting like a spider over his pile of sheeny silks in the corner—he hopes to get good prices from the unwary tourist; there is another with a stall of beautiful brass and copper hand-worked things, and others with ...
— Round the Wonderful World • G. E. Mitton
... I should know her again," she declared, "and I'm perfectly sure that I've seen her before. She isn't very tall nor very dark. She's big and she looks stupid and slow, not a bit like a crafty thief, or like a college girl either. She had a silk bag on her arm. I wish I'd asked her what was ...
— Betty Wales Senior • Margaret Warde
... and press'd, And hid it wanton in her breast. But I, be sure, was in amaze, To see my sister's artful ways: "These are returns," I said, "quite fit To me, who nursed you when a chit. For shame, lay by this envious art; Is this to act a sister's part?" But vain were words, entreaties vain, The crafty witch secured my swain. By heavens, my sister does me wrong; But oh! she shall not triumph long. Well Venus knows I'm not in fault 'Twas she who gave the first assault And since our peace her treach'ry broke, ...
— The Satyricon, Complete • Petronius Arbiter
... never dreamed that common and illiterate men, such as these grooms and retainers, could have any conception of reasons of State, or the crafty designs of courts. He now found that, though they could neither writer nor read, they had learned the art of reading man (the worst and lowest side of character) to such perfection that they at once detected ...
— After London - Wild England • Richard Jefferies
... was wrong, because it is the first duty of an assistant to hinder and obstruct the book-snatcher, who carries on his work by methods of crafty and fraudulent exchange rather than by plain theft, which is a mere brutal way. For, first, the book-snatcher marks his prey; he finds the shop which has a set containing the volume which is missing in his own set; next, he arms himself with a volume ...
— In Luck at Last • Walter Besant
... he but known it—made a great mistake. Instead of going into Murgatroyd's shop after he had watched Byner and Prydale away from it—he should have followed those two astute and crafty persons, and have ascertained something of their movements. Had he done so, he would certainly not have troubled to return to Peel Row, nor to remain in Barford an hour longer than was absolutely necessary. ...
— The Talleyrand Maxim • J. S. Fletcher
... question. He might have been talking to a block of wood for all the answer he received. His crafty, cruel mind churned over ...
— Man Size • William MacLeod Raine
... their strength,—they feel before others and prophesy their mission. Madame Roland had beforehand seemed carried on by hers to the heart of action. She hastened on the day after her arrival to the sittings of the Assembly. She saw the powerful Mirabeau, the dazzling Cazales, the daring Maury, the crafty Lameth, the impassive Barnave. She remarked with annoyance and intense hate, in the attitude and language of the right side, that superiority conferred by the habit of command and confidence in the respect of the million; on the left side, she saw inferiority of manners, and the insolence that ...
— History of the Girondists, Volume I - Personal Memoirs of the Patriots of the French Revolution • Alphonse de Lamartine
... he declared, 'and I only wish you could get a job on the Sparrow-hawk, for you would see enough on that trawler to make you write till you wore out your pen. The skipper is an old villain, and that crafty too——' ...
— Chatterbox, 1905. • Various
... his laugh, and to whom Wogan had been drawn because of his simplicity. There was no simplicity in Henry Whittington's face now. It remained above the edge of the step staring at them with a look of crafty triumph, a very image of ...
— Clementina • A.E.W. Mason
... strove to trick me, and more than once he all but caught me in some trap. He was a crafty man, and relied not upon brawn, but upon wits. Yet I was ever on the watch, and I but learned ...
— The Lord of Death and the Queen of Life • Homer Eon Flint
... lately—yesterday Blind Charlie invited me to have supper with him. The supper was in his private dining-room; just us two. I suspected that the old man was up to some game, and when I saw the cocktails and whiskey and wine come on, I was pretty sure—for you know, Miss West, when a crafty old politician of the Peck variety wants to steal a little information from a man, his regulation scheme is to get his man so drunk he doesn't know what he's ...
— Counsel for the Defense • Leroy Scott
... the reincarnation of a mythical character, half buffoon, half magician. He was cunning, crafty, humorous, and evil, all in one, and no doings of the animal folk ever progressed very far without the entrance of the "coyote doctor" on the scene. He was the doer of tricks and caster of spells, but still ...
— Hunting with the Bow and Arrow • Saxton Pope
... take your pick). Second, and not apart from the first goal, the United States must be sufficiently strong to prevent or deter use of effective military power against us. It is not inconceivable that our so-called superpower status could be defeated in battle by a crafty and well-prepared adversary. Witness what happened to the powerful victors of WWII in Vietnam. Third, U.S. military forces must be of sufficient size, configuration, and readiness to bring a major conventional conflict to a successful termination. ...
— Shock and Awe - Achieving Rapid Dominance • Harlan K. Ullman and James P. Wade
... it happed on a day that he sat in Regin's hall And hearkened many tidings of what had chanced to fall, And of kings that sought their kingdoms o'er many a waste and wild, And at last saith the crafty master: "Thou art King Sigmund's child: Wilt thou wait till these kings of the carles shall die in a little land, Or wilt thou serve their sons and carry the cup to their hand; Or abide in vain for the day that never shall come about, ...
— The Story of Sigurd the Volsung • William Morris
... awkward carriage of his head; hut, withal, a dignity in his large person, and a consciousness of high position and importance, which gives him ease and freedom. Very simple and frank in his address, he may be as crafty as other diplomatists are said to be; but I see only good sense and plainness of speech,—appreciative, too, and genial enough to make himself conversable. He talked very freely of himself and of other public people, and of American and English ...
— Passages From the English Notebooks, Complete • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... with whole ones, crafty man! And they became "The Business Man's Lunch" forthwith. A pocketful of roast chestnuts—and no mess nor trouble! And when they were boiled—well, we all know how good boiled chestnuts are. As to the meal, a new variety of mush appeared, and gems, muffins, and pancakes that made old epicures ...
— The Forerunner, Volume 1 (1909-1910) • Charlotte Perkins Gilman
... well imagine that the winning smile which often illumines the features of a sleek and crafty pretender, is supplanted by audible chuckling when he retires from company. Having long since gotten rid of his conscience, he can afford to be merry at the expense of ...
— Primitive Psycho-Therapy and Quackery • Robert Means Lawrence
... existing is not positively known (for the black is more subtle and crafty than any thing human), but it is suspected by many of the whites, the more moderate of whom are disposed to ward off the impending blow by some system of gradual emancipation—declaring all black children born after a certain date free—or by some other action that will pacify ...
— Among the Pines - or, South in Secession Time • James R. Gilmore
... repeated here. Not to grow mawkish while we must be kind, let us not forget that this woman is an old plotter. If she did not devise the assassination, she was privy to it long. She was an agent of contraband mails—a bold, crafty, assured rebel—perhaps a spy—and in the event of her condemnation, let those who would plead for her spend half their pity upon that victim whose heart was like a woman's, and whose hand was merciful as ...
— The Life, Crime and Capture of John Wilkes Booth • George Alfred Townsend
... memorandum-book, and took down her summary of the crafty Triplet's facts. So easy is it for us Triplets to draw the wool over the eyes of ...
— Peg Woffington • Charles Reade
... Apostate and subtlest enemy to our faith made a decree forbidding Christians the study of heathen learning: for, said he, they wound us with our own weapons, and with our own arts and sciences they overcome us. And indeed the Christians were put so to their shifts by this crafty means, and so much in danger to decline into all ignorance, that the two Apollinarii were fain, as a man may say, to coin all the seven liberal sciences out of the Bible, reducing it into divers forms of orations, poems, ...
— Areopagitica - A Speech For The Liberty Of Unlicensed Printing To The - Parliament Of England • John Milton
... his crafty son, Aurungzebe, who succeeded in keeping his empire together until 1707, and with him the grandeur of the Grand Moguls waned and after him ceased to be, although not until the Mutiny was their rule extinguished. As I have just said, in India the sense of ...
— Roving East and Roving West • E.V. Lucas
... house for a month and—well, some things about her look mighty queer to me. She hasn't been inside a church since she came to Corinth. I would be the last man in the world to cast a suspicion on anyone but—" he finished with a shake of his head, and an expression of pious doubt on his crafty face that said he could, if he wished, tell many dark ...
— The Calling Of Dan Matthews • Harold Bell Wright
... their government would have alarmed the people of the South into an intensified opposition. The politicians of South-Carolina, more open and frank in the exposition of their views than other leaders in the South, have been obliged to submit the control of their discretion to the more crafty and subtle influences of other States. Policy required that the contemplated new form of government should be confined to the knowledge of the leading spirits only. It would not bear the hazards of submission to the people as a basis ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. II. July, 1862. No. 1. • Various
... in a former chapter. In separating their lot from that of Naples, in rejecting even freedom unless it was accompanied by disruption, they hastened the ruin of the Neapolitans and of themselves, and surely played into the hands of the crafty tyrant who desired nothing better than to fish in the troubled waters of his ...
— The Liberation of Italy • Countess Evelyn Martinengo-Cesaresco
... little realm. One of my ancestresses fought as a shield maiden—as I thought myself until today—in the great Bravalla fight long ago. It is her mail which I have on now. Arnkel pretended to agree to this, being crafty. It pleased the chief, and deceived me—till yesterday. Then at last I knew that he did but wait for the death of my grandfather, Thorwald, and then would get rid of me and my claims. So Thorwald died, ...
— A Sea Queen's Sailing • Charles Whistler
... admit in a public speech, that the text of the letter was spurious, while still maintaining, against General Garfield's solemn denial, that the signature was genuine. The prompt action of General Garfield and his friends did much to render this crafty and dangerous trick abortive, but there was not sufficient time to destroy altogether the effect of its instant and wide dissemination. The forgery cost General Garfield the electoral votes of New Jersey and Nevada and five of the six votes of California. ...
— Twenty Years of Congress, Volume 2 (of 2) • James Gillespie Blaine
... bouillon, whose other ingredients are partridges, and tomatoes, and potatoes, and onions, and salt pork, and flour in combination delicious beyond belief. Nor ever did we tire of them, three times a day, printed statement to the contrary notwithstanding. And besides were many crafty dishes over whose construction the major portion of morning ...
— The Forest • Stewart Edward White
... wretches. Then presently came Helen of the starry eyes and sweet pale face, she and her women to minister. And she knelt down with ewer and basin and a napkin to wash the feet of the poor. To whom, as she knelt at the feet of Odysseus, and rinsed his wounds and wiped away the dry blood, spake that crafty one in her ear, saying: "There are other wounds than mine for thy washing, lady, and deeper. For they are in the heart of King Menelaus, and in ...
— The Ruinous Face • Maurice Hewlett
... inspired—inflated with the divine magnetic current which flows from the spirit world to the inhabitants of earth. If a player desires to represent a certain character,—let it be the subtle, fiend-like Richard III. or the crafty Richelieu,—the customary mode of studying such characters is to endeavor to imagine one's self to be the person. That is the first step towards mediumship; for it is one degree from the natural, towards the superior state. Usually, through ignorance, the student proceeds ...
— Strange Visitors • Henry J. Horn
... but partly also through crafty design, the wave of generous sympathy for the suffering little island of Porto Rico which has been sweeping over the country has come very near being perverted into the means of turning awry the policy ...
— Problems of Expansion - As Considered In Papers and Addresses • Whitelaw Reid
... Emperor himself wished to see the costly manufacture, while it was still in the loom. Accompanied by a select number of officers of the court, among whom were the two honest men who had already admired the cloth, he went to the crafty impostors, who, as soon as they were aware of the Emperor's approach, went on working more diligently than ever; although they still did not pass a ...
— Andersen's Fairy Tales • Hans Christian Andersen
... opposite nations of Europe, and even Asia, mingling peaceably on her canals. Here were Turks in their bright red caftans and turbans; there Armenians in long black robes; and Jews, whose habitually greedy and crafty countenances had for the nonce assumed an expression of eager curiosity and expectation. The mercantile spirit of the Venetians prevented them from extending to individuals the quarrels of states; and although the ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXLII. Vol. LV. April, 1844 • Various
... radiant of Paradise, Brightest of splendors, dwelling-place most fair, That home most blessed, where thou mayst enjoy Glory and bliss to everlasting life. Suffer this people's cruelty; not long Can faithless men afflict thee sinfully With chains of torment by their crafty wiles. Straight will I send unto this heathen town 110 Andrew to be thy comfort and defense; He will release thee from thine enemies. Thou hast not long to wait; in very truth But seven and twenty days fulfil the ...
— Andreas: The Legend of St. Andrew • Unknown
... it's strange. It must have been done awful crafty and still. They say it was such a—funny way to kill a man, rigging it all ...
— Plays • Susan Glaspell
... few; for you may not only be remiss and negligent, remitting the weight of the business upon him, and depending upon him for its being carried on, by which he makes himself master, and brings you to be forgot in the business; but he may be crafty too, and designing in all this, and when he has thus brought you to be as it were nobody, he shall make himself be all somebody in the trade, and in that particular he by degrees gets the capital interest, as well as stock in the trade, while the true original of the ...
— The Complete English Tradesman (1839 ed.) • Daniel Defoe
... opposite Strasburg, and was deep in secret negotiations with officers of the garrison for the capitulation of that city and the entry of the emigrant army. These intrigues had been going on for some time, and so crafty were Viomenil's plans (he was the greatest diplomat the emigres could boast), and so successful was Monsieur de Thessonnet, aide-de-camp to the Prince de Conde, in carrying them out, that when Calvert arrived at head-quarters the possession of Strasburg by the emigrant forces seemed ...
— Calvert of Strathore • Carter Goodloe
... mutineers, the bitches' whelps that snatched Their food and bit the hand that nourished them, Have stolen her. You ingrate Henry Greene, I picked you from the gutter of Houndsditch, And paid your debts, and kept you in my house, And brought you here to make a man of you! You Robert Juet, ancient, crafty man, Toothless and tremulous, how many times Have I employed you as a master's mate To give you bread? And you Abacuck Prickett, You sailor-clerk, you salted puritan, You knew the plot and silently agreed, Salving your conscience with a pious lie! Yes, all ...
— The White Bees • Henry Van Dyke
... himself, Dakota's gaze sought Sheila. It was evident to Sheila that he was thinking pleasant thoughts, for several times she looked quickly at him to catch him smiling. Once she met his gaze fairly and was certain that she saw a crafty, calculating gleam in his eyes. She was puzzled, though there was nothing of fear from Dakota now; the presence of the parson in the cabin ...
— The Trail to Yesterday • Charles Alden Seltzer
... execution of this task. He had a swift and facile brush, considerable versatility in the treatment of monotonous subjects, and a never-failing sense of humour. His white-cowled monks, some of them with the rosy freshness of boys, some with the handsome brown faces of middle life, others astute and crafty, others again wrinkled with old age, have clearly been copied from real models. He puts them into action without the slightest effort, and surrounds them with landscapes, architecture, and furniture, appropriate to each successive situation. The whole is done with so much grace, ...
— Sketches and Studies in Italy and Greece, Complete - Series I, II, and III • John Symonds
... goes, the brave cacique had a greater admiration for courage than anything else in the world, and instead of hating Ojeda for the crafty way in which he had been captured, he seemed to hold him in high esteem as the bravest of the Spaniards. Whenever Ojeda appeared in his cell he would rise and courteously salute him, while he treated the visits of Columbus with haughty disregard. So far as the captive ...
— Historical Tales - The Romance of Reality - Volume III • Charles Morris
... right to do so. The Church, in her works of art, had labored to represent Christ and his apostles as perfectly-formed men—men with spiritual faces. She had never represented any of her saints as a wine-bibber, a gross beef-eater, or a narrow-headed, crafty, cringing creature. These living men could not be the rightful successors of those whose statues and pictures adorned that cathedral. Archbishop Hughes, in his sermon on that occasion, had argued that all the forms of the church had a holy significance. ...
— Half a Century • Jane Grey Cannon Swisshelm
... at the fellow, and as he saw the utter change that had come over Leyden, a tiny shiver ran rippling up his spine. All Leyden's anger and irritation had gone; the crafty, calculating man of the world peered out through glittering eyes; if Barry had entertained any foolish notions of the man's mettle before, they were dissipated now. Yes, there was no doubt of it. Leyden was laughing ...
— Gold Out of Celebes • Aylward Edward Dingle
... said, the kings of Spain were wont to show themselves to theirs, the incautious Indian is said to have fallen entirely into the trap. Going with Ojeda, accompanied by only a small escort, to a river a short distance from his main encampment. Caonabo, after performing ablutions, suffered the crafty young Spaniard to put the heaven-descended fetters on him, and to set him upon the horse. Ojeda himself got up behind the Indian prince, and then whirling a few times round, like a pigeon before it takes its determined flight, making the followers of Caonabo ...
— The Life of Columbus • Arthur Helps
... withall cheatinge, cousininge, and crafty; a remarkable raskall, a damnable deceiver, and ...
— A Collection Of Old English Plays, Vol. IV. • Editor: A.H. Bullen
... well wove In warp and woof, but there's some flaw in it; I've known a brave man fly a shepherd's cur, A wise man so demean himself, drivelling idiocy Had wellnigh been ashamed on't. For your crafty, Your worldly-wise man, he, above the rest, Weaves his own snares so fine, ...
— Germany and the Germans - From an American Point of View (1913) • Price Collier
... succession to the Numidian kingdom, and had been rebuked by Scipio, who told him he should cultivate the friendship, not of individual Romans, but of the State. But in Jugurtha's heart a noble sentiment found no echo. Brave, treacherous, restless, an able commander, a crafty politician, adroit in discerning and profiting by other men's bad qualities, wading to the throne through the blood of three kinsmen, he in some respects resembles Shakspeare's Richard III.,—his 'prime of manhood ...
— The Gracchi Marius and Sulla - Epochs Of Ancient History • A.H. Beesley
... such attempt was only equaled by their willingness and ability to benefit those who treated them with confidence and integrity. But he soon perceived that his arguments in favor of mercy and justice were powerless, when opposed to the fierce and crafty harangues of Coubitant; and he, therefore, forbore to make any further reply, and even appeared to acquiesce in the decision of the council, that the only means of securing the safety and independence of the Indian tribes was ...
— The Pilgrims of New England - A Tale Of The Early American Settlers • Mrs. J. B. Webb
... be left to her option, or taking it for granted that his partner, well aware of the intimacy of Allerton's standing in her father's family, would of course place Julia on board the ship commanded by George. But that partner was a crafty old fox, who had long since seen the growing affection of the two young people, and, with all that eagerness to destroy happiness, that they are past enjoying, that characterizes the majority of old people, decided that Miss ...
— An Old Sailor's Yarns • Nathaniel Ames
... crafty, ambitious woman, who embittered the life of the king. She was very jealous, and with reason enough, of the continued influence of Henrietta; and the palace was the scene of disgraceful domestic broils. Henry, in one of his letters ...
— Henry IV, Makers of History • John S. C. Abbott
... Kit sat on the box of a chariot, drawn by two beautiful ponies. The circus line had been formed, and the parade began. Behind him was a circus wagon, or rather a cage on wheels, through the gratings of which could be seen a tiger, crafty and cruel looking. In front was an elephant, with two or three performers on his back. Kit was dressed in street costume, his circus dress ...
— The Young Acrobat of the Great North American Circus • Horatio Alger Jr.
... reader admire for that I call it a deception when the prophet exclaimeth unto his Creator, "O Lord! Thou hast deceived me," and when the Apostle Paul sayeth unto certain of his disciples, "Being crafty, I deceived you with guile." Kind deception which saveth souls! Blessed seduction ...
— The Most Ancient Lives of Saint Patrick - Including the Life by Jocelin, Hitherto Unpublished in America, and His Extant Writings • Various
... 'You crafty old sinner!' thought Creighton. 'But you're not far wrong. That boy mustn't be wasted if he is ...
— Kim • Rudyard Kipling
... goin' to do?" he continued, a crafty gleam coming into his eye. "Are we goin' to foller some cow's tail around until they jump us again? Are we goin' to leave Rufe here, to patrol a hundred miles of range lone-handed? Not on your life—not me! We're goin' to ride this range by day's works, fellers, ...
— Hidden Water • Dane Coolidge
... indeed, that it should be so, Edgar. The matter began in a quarrel between two men, John Lyon and Gilbert Mahew. Lyon was a crafty and politic man, and was held in great favour by the earl. There was a citizen who had seriously displeased Louis, and at his request John Lyon made a quarrel with him and killed him. The matter caused great anger among the burgesses, and Lyon had to leave ...
— A March on London • G. A. Henty
... Does the crafty old woman suspect? Perhaps my preparations for Carlotta's return have been inordinate, for they have extended to the transformation of the sitting-room downstairs into a lady's boudoir. I have been busy this happy week. But what care I? It will not be long before I have to say to her, "Antoinette, ...
— The Morals of Marcus Ordeyne • William J. Locke
... consultation. Would this crafty and desperate Indian attempt to escape? Was not all this a ruse on his part? Would not the United States imperil its peace and security if this boy and this man were to be allowed together? This mighty question oppressed the mind of the agent in charge for a whole day. Then, after the ...
— Shadows of Shasta • Joaquin Miller
... Kam Baksh, whom he killed near Hyderabad in the Deccan, and secured to himself the empire. On his death, which took place in 1713, his four sons contended in the same way for the throne at the head of the armies of their respective viceroyalties. Mu'izz-ud-din, the most crafty, persuaded his two brothers, Rafi-ash-Shan and Jahan Shah, to unite their forces with his own against their ambitions brother, Azim-ash- Shan, whom they defeated and killed, Mu'izz-ud-din then destroyed his two ...
— Rambles and Recollections of an Indian Official • William Sleeman
... nonsense: sometimes a scenical representation of persons or things, a counterfeit speech, a mimical look or gesture passeth for it: sometimes an affected simplicity, sometimes a presumptuous bluntness giveth it being; sometimes it riseth from a lucky hitting upon what is strange, sometimes from a crafty wresting obvious matter to the purpose: often it consisteth in one knows not what, and springeth up one can hardly tell how. Its ways are unaccountable and inexplicable, being answerable to the numberless rovings of fancy and windings of language. It is in short, a manner ...
— Sermons on Evil-Speaking • Isaac Barrow
... the bird in the spring an attentive ear might detect its discordant voice, or the chuckling note of his mischievous spouse and accomplice, in the great bird medley; but later her crafty instinct would seem to warn her that silence is more to her interest in the pursuit of her wily mission. In June, when so many an ecstatic love-song among the birds has modulated from accents of ardent ...
— My Studio Neighbors • William Hamilton Gibson
... Even now, under the softening influence that death imparts, that thought was intolerable to her. This was quite aside from his treatment of her in his will, which, indeed, was strangely little to her. It was the memory of the crafty and common nature under that polished exterior that made her recoil from the thought ...
— A Manifest Destiny • Julia Magruder
... and intense. She considered him her father's evil genius, and believed him to be somehow at the bottom of the troubles of her life. Thus every year this man, John Wiggins, grew more hateful, and she accustomed herself to think of him as an evil fiend, a Mephistopheles, by whose crafty wiles her father's heart had been estranged from her. Such, then, was the nature of Edith's bereavement; and as she mourned over it she did not mourn so much over the reality as over her vanished hope. He was gone, and with him was gone the ...
— The Living Link • James De Mille
... providence of God fall into divers temptations, judge not themselves by reason thereof to be less acceptable in God's presence. But, on the contrary, having the way prepared to victory by Jesus Christ, they shall not fear above measure the crafty assaults of that subtle serpent Satan; but with joy and bold courage, having such a guide as here is pointed forth, such a champion, and such weapons as here are to be found (if with obedience we will hear, and unfeigned ...
— The World's Great Sermons, Volume I - Basil to Calvin • Various
... of fierce and crafty braves who lounged about the wooden fort at Vincennes watched eagerly the outgoing and incoming of the troops, and were prompt to dog and waylay any party they thought they could overcome. They took advantage of the unwillingness ...
— The Winning of the West, Volume Three - The Founding of the Trans-Alleghany Commonwealths, 1784-1790 • Theodore Roosevelt
... up Mapfabvisheen, the Giant's servant, because he had not seen him for a long time. The little Ssassaror had been an active member of the Egg-stealer's Guild until the night three years ago when he had tried to creep into Mapfarity's strongroom. The crafty guildsman had avoided the Giant's traps and there found the two geese squatting upon their ...
— Rastignac the Devil • Philip Jose Farmer
... be very crafty, and to steal great numbers of eggs. They attempt, also, together with the Chimango, to pick off the scabs from the sore backs of horses and mules. The poor animal, on the one hand, with its ears down and its back arched; ...
— The Voyage of the Beagle • Charles Darwin
... When Juechziger's crafty eye saw that the arrow he had thus been pointing was, so to speak, ready to be loosed from the bow, he adroitly changed the subject of conversation to something that lay much ...
— The Young Carpenters of Freiberg - A Tale of the Thirty Years' War • Anonymous
... Perhaps a dodge? This crime has been committed either by a brute or by a crafty blackguard. In any case we'll easily succeed ...
— The works of Guy de Maupassant, Vol. 5 (of 8) - Une Vie and Other Stories • Guy de Maupassant 1850-1893
... sleeplessness and deep anxiety—for the crafty Jarmuthians had proved unexpectedly unwilling to credit him as the Atlantean outcast and would-be renegade he ...
— Astounding Stories, March, 1931 • Various
... attributes to the spies themselves: "Before using spies we must assure ourselves as to their integrity of character and the extent of their experience and skill." But he continues: "A brazen face and a crafty disposition are more dangerous than mountains or rivers; it takes a man of genius to penetrate such." So that we are left in some doubt as to his real opinion ...
— The Art of War • Sun Tzu
... Scriptures, too, there are several observations respecting the wolf,—in them it is stated that he lives upon rapine, is violent, cruel, bloody, crafty, and voracious; he seeks his prey by night, and his sense of smell is wonderful. False teachers are described as wolves in sheep's clothing; and the Prophet Habakkuk, speaking of the Chaldeans, says, "Their horses are more fierce than the evening wolves." ...
— Le Morvan, [A District of France,] Its Wild Sports, Vineyards and Forests; with Legends, Antiquities, Rural and Local Sketches • Henri de Crignelle
... can't marry the girl to young Henfrey until he is proved innocent, and that cannot be until the guilt is fixed upon the crafty old Giulio." ...
— Mademoiselle of Monte Carlo • William Le Queux
... and forced them into a temporary captivity. When they were held apart, they spent their time planning up new things to do together, once the parental ban was off their intercourse. When they were together, it was Scott who supplied the imagination for the pair of them. Catie's share lay in the crafty outworking of the plan. When their plans came to disaster, as often happened by reason of the boldness of Scott's young conceptions, Catie took the disappointment with the temper of a little vixen, kicked against ...
— The Brentons • Anna Chapin Ray
... this design, has shewn himself a very great master of stage propriety. He has softened the character of Herod, well knowing that so cruel a tyrant as the story makes him, could not be born upon the English stage. He has altered the character of Sohemus, from an honest confident, to a crafty enterprising statesman, who to raise his master to the throne of Judea, murthered the natural heir. He has introduced in his drama, a character under the name of Salome, the king's sister, who bore an ...
— The Lives of the Poets of Great Britain and Ireland (1753) - Vol. IV • Theophilus Cibber
... blond woman who rose, curtsying deferentially,—a tallish man, with an aquiline nose and abundant iron-gray hair. You have never seen Mr. Wakem before, and are possibly wondering whether he was really as eminent a rascal, and as crafty, bitter an enemy of honest humanity in general, and of Mr. Tulliver in particular, as he is represented to be in that eidolon or portrait of him which we have seen to exist in the ...
— The Mill on the Floss • George Eliot
... evil, And crafty the gold-baited snare; But virtue, in fiery upheaval, May cast fine device ...
— Dreams and Days: Poems • George Parsons Lathrop
... one, and once the outer veneer was broken through, there was no saying to what extremes of abuse, of threatening, even of violence itself, they might descend. Cornelia recalled the two faces; the woman's hard, sullen, coarse; the man's mean and crafty, ...
— Flaming June • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... attempted the life of Louis Napoleon because he had not acceded to the labors of Cavour and thus hastened the liberty of Italy. And yet Italy was standing and France. Houses are divided everywhere and they stand. Beelzebub is crafty enough to cast out devils here and there in order to confound his kingdom with the Kingdom of Heaven. Of course he does not cast all the devils out—if he did he would lose his kingdom—only enough to make ...
— Children of the Market Place • Edgar Lee Masters
... were both silent for a little while. Oliver stood frowning, tracing a pattern on the pavement with the toe of his polished boot, and gazing at it. He was evidently considering the situation. Francis stood with his back to the railings, his eyes fixed, with a somewhat crafty look, upon his brother's face. He was not yet sure that his long-cherished scheme for extracting money from Oliver would succeed. He believed that it would; but there was never any counting upon Oliver. Astute as Francis considered ...
— Brooke's Daughter - A Novel • Adeline Sergeant
... the supreme courts had been less favoured during the preceding reign. Louis XI., that cautious and crafty reformer, after having forbidden ecclesiastical judges to examine cases referring to the revenues of vacant benefices, remodelled the secular courts, but he ruthlessly destroyed anything which offended him personally. For this reason, as he himself said, ...
— Manners, Custom and Dress During the Middle Ages and During the Renaissance Period • Paul Lacroix |
