"Droll" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... retorted Kenny, his eyes droll and tender. "I suppose you belong to the ferryman's union." He dropped his knapsack into the boat and busied himself with the painter. "If the boat had two oars," he told her laughing, "or I one arm, I know I could manage. As it is, ...
— Kenny • Leona Dalrymple
... people of France. It is, in short, from this lower, or lowest species of literature—if it must be so designated—that we gather the real genius, or mental character of the ordinary classes of society. I do assure you that some of these chap publications are singularly droll and curious. Even the very rudiments of learning, or the mere alphabet-book, meets the eye in a very imposing manner—as in the ...
— A Bibliographical, Antiquarian and Picturesque Tour in France and Germany, Volume One • Thomas Frognall Dibdin
... was looking at the lady respectfully enough, but behind the respect lurked curiosity, for even a servant may question the drolleries and vagaries of his masters. And here, indeed, was a most droll mass of absurdities. ...
— Ainslee's, Vol. 15, No. 6, July 1905 • Various
... one swinging in the hammock, the other rolling about on the pine-needles, as they related their experiences boy-fashion. Ben's were the most exciting, but Thorny's were not without interest, for he had lived abroad for several years, and could tell all sorts of droll stories of ...
— St. Nicholas Magazine for Boys and Girls, V. 5, April 1878 - Scribner's Illustrated • Various
... that "his voice was clear and sonorous, his eye beaming with fire, his head of the antique cast, his hands beautiful, and his gesture graceful and abounding—at once Rabelais and Fontaine, with the droll humor of the one and the ...
— Luther and the Reformation: - The Life-Springs of Our Liberties • Joseph A. Seiss
... bowed gravely, making a negative gesture which was not a little droll, and proved to an observer that in his youth the sailor had been witty and loving and beloved. Perhaps his fossil life at Guerande hid many memories. When he stood, solemnly planted on his two heron-legs in the sunshine ...
— Beatrix • Honore de Balzac
... the pies, for Mrs. Smith had not much to give, and her spirit was generous, though her pastry was not of the best. It looked very droll to see pies sitting about on the thresholds of closed doors, but the cakes were quite elegant, and filled up the corners of the towel handsomely, for the apron lay in the middle, with the oranges right and left, like two sentinels ...
— Aunt Jo's Scrap-Bag VI - An Old-Fashioned Thanksgiving, Etc. • Louisa M. Alcott
... something at once so droll and so sad about this child, with her precocious knowledge and ignorant simplicity, that the lad's honest tender heart was touched with a sudden pity as he listened to her artless chatter. He was almost glad when her confidences drifted away to more childlike subjects of interest, and she told ...
— My Little Lady • Eleanor Frances Poynter
... o'clock, or to the shortest, the military mass. Although in Madrid he had spoken ill of the religious orders, so as not to be out of harmony with his surroundings, considering them anachronisms, and had hurled curses against the Inquisition, while relating this or that lurid or droll story wherein the habits danced, or rather friars without habits, yet in speaking of the Philippines, which should be ruled by special laws, he would cough, look wise, and again extend his hand ...
— The Reign of Greed - Complete English Version of 'El Filibusterismo' • Jose Rizal
... soldiers that ever served in the British army. General Sir Charles Napier, in his own eccentric way, said of him that he was "as brave as ten lions, each with two tails and two sets of teeth." Sir Charles rivalled Mr. Roebuck, the radical English commoner, in the scantiness of his commendations; his droll eulogy of Sir Hugh Gough will therefore be appreciated. On the 8th of February, Sir Harry Smith made his junction with the army of his chief, and was received in terms not more flattering than just from a general who never refused to merit ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... subject, but the whole manner of treating it was sportive and jocular. The unlimited dominion of mirth and fun manifests itself even in this, that the dramatic form itself is not seriously adhered to, and that its laws are often suspended; just as in a droll disguise the masquerader sometimes ventures to lay aside the mask. The practice of throwing out allusions and hints to the pit is retained even in the comedy of the present day, and is often found to be attended with great success; although ...
— Lectures on Dramatic Art - and Literature • August Wilhelm Schlegel trans John Black
... the strange mind of Pepys. He is, however, capable also of moralising. "Oh, that the King would mind his business!" he would exclaim, after having delighted himself and his readers with the most droll accounts of His Majesty's frivolities. "How wicked a wretch Cromwell was, and yet how much better and safer the country was in his hands than it is now." And often he will end the bewildering account with some such bitter comment as the assertion ...
— Among Famous Books • John Kelman
... despair—to find that the Western wood-pewee led the matins! Now, this bird has a peculiar voice. It is loud, pervasive, and in quality of tone not unlike our Eastern phoebe, lacking entirely the sweet plaintiveness of our wood-pewee. A pewee chorus is a droll and dismal affair. The poor things do their best, no doubt, and they cannot prevent the pessimistic effect it has upon us. It is rhythmic, but not in the least musical, and it has a weird power over the listener. This morning hymn does ...
— A Bird-Lover in the West • Olive Thorne Miller
... was excellent, as Mrs. Layton's always were, and there was a great deal of jollity as it progressed. Larry was very droll and kept the boys in roars of laughter as he told of some of the funny incidents in his experience, and Tim was not ...
— The Radio Boys at the Sending Station - Making Good in the Wireless Room • Allen Chapman
... the same kind of objection which alleges that competition is a droll plan by which to restore the conduct of the public business to business principles and methods, since no private business selects its agents by competition. But the managers of private business are virtually free from personal influence in selecting ...
— American Eloquence, Volume IV. (of 4) - Studies In American Political History (1897) • Various
... went into a pawn-shop and bought a pistol. He was in a fever to get back to his lodgings. He found Minetti waiting for him. He tried to conceal the pistol, but he knew that Minetti had seen it. Minetti was as pleasant as one could imagine. He told the most droll stories of his life in London. It appeared that he had lived there in a hotbed of exiled radicals; but he, himself, seemed to have no convictions. Everything he described was touched with a certain ironic humor. When he rose to go ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1917 - and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various
... got to speak of Literature. The stranger expressed himself with enthusiastic admiration of Racine. A droll incident happened during our dialogue. My gentleman wanted to let down a little sash-window, and could n't manage it. 'You don't understand that,' said I; 'let me do that.' I tried to get it down; but succeeded no better than he. 'Monsieur,' said he, 'allow ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XVI. (of XXI.) - Frederick The Great—The Ten Years of Peace.—1746-1756. • Thomas Carlyle
... numerous productions, some of which appear to us almost admirable, at any rate touching and delicious or piquant and finely comic in observation, there is a dreadful pell-mell. What a throng of volumes, what a flight of tales, novels of all sorts, droll, philosophic, and theosophic. There is something to be enjoyed in each, no doubt, but what prolixity! In the elaboration of a subject, as in the detail of style, Monsieur de Balzac has a facile, unequal, risky ...
— Balzac • Frederick Lawton
... politician, a typical Norman mother, full of sense and fire, quietly proud of the activity and intelligence of her son, and quite as much in the day's work as he. 'Not a pretty trick,' she said, 'to play with Dr.——. He ought to be ashamed of it—and I am sure he is,' she added, with a droll twinkle in her eye, 'for it has turned out very badly! He will just be beaten like plaster. It would have been cleverer to behave like a decent man!' Bonnebosq had a very lively, cheery aspect on that Sunday afternoon. It is a busy prosperous little place, with ...
— France and the Republic - A Record of Things Seen and Learned in the French Provinces - During the 'Centennial' Year 1889 • William Henry Hurlbert
... with ashes and soot; A bundle of toys he had flung on his back, And he looked like a peddler just opening his pack; His eyes, how they twinkled! his dimples, how merry! His cheeks were like roses, his nose like a cherry; His droll little mouth was drawn up like a bow, And the beard on his chin was as white as the snow; The stump of a pipe he held tight in his teeth, And the smoke it encircled his head like a wreath; He had a broad face, and a little round belly, That shook, when he laughed, like a ...
— De La Salle Fifth Reader • Brothers of the Christian Schools
... misapprehension of personalities his lordship addresses a love missive to the maid. Susan accepts in perfect good faith, and an epistolary love-making goes on till they are disillusioned. It naturally makes a droll and delightful little comedy; and is a story that is particularly clever ...
— The Devil - A Tragedy of the Heart and Conscience • Joseph O'Brien
... Spinach Mr. Stewart Orr has produced a picture-book unique of its kind. Nothing could be more droll than the situations in which he represents the frog, the pig, the mouse, the elephant, and the other well-known characters who appear in his pages. Little folk will find in these pictures a source of endless delight, and the artistic skill which they display will ...
— Condemned as a Nihilist - A Story of Escape from Siberia • George Alfred Henty
... sigh, his chair, a better view to gain; Cafes, salons, mansards alike their windows open throw, And pretty girls wear radiant smiles to greet the passing show. Ah, here they are! Yes, here they come! preceded by the boys, Who imitate in fashion droll, yet with no actual noise, But merely by the gesturing of finger or of hand, The cymbals, flute, and (best of all) the trombones of the band. The babies even laugh and crow, upheld in nurses' arms, And have no fear of trumpets loud, or the bass-drum's ...
— Poems • John L. Stoddard
... laughed the cockney. "You poor droll mortal! As if I could ever be afraid of that! What is the matter with my going into training myself? Two can train, you know—even three. You almost make me feel sorry I tried to remedy ...
— Ghosts I have Met and Some Others • John Kendrick Bangs
... I had ever before seen upon a dog's countenance, an expression of singular appeal and childishness, so comic withal in its contrast with the rough hair, round eyes, and long nose of the creature, that as I watched him an involuntary laugh escaped me. "Certainly," I said to him, "you are a droll dog. One might do a good deal with you in a traveling caravan!" As the evening wore on he became more tranquil. Perhaps he began to have confidence in me and to believe that I should restore him to his owner. At any rate, before we retired ...
— Dreams and Dream Stories • Anna (Bonus) Kingsford
... dare to say any more to Phyllis, but ran away as soon as she could get an opportunity, to play with Hetty and laugh admiringly at all her droll remarks. ...
— Hetty Gray - Nobody's Bairn • Rosa Mulholland
... of bribery is one of the causes seriously retarding progress in Hungary. There is as yet no wholesome feeling against this corruption, even amongst those who ought to show an example to the community. They have also a droll way of cooking accounts down in these parts, but there is a vast deal of human nature everywhere, so "let no more ...
— Round About the Carpathians • Andrew F. Crosse
... up again and raised the couple from their kneeling posture, it seemed that a grave and solemn personage had left him. This young man was again the dark-faced, clear-eyed Roy, droll and dry, with the enigmatic ...
— The Man of the Forest • Zane Grey
... They grew angry with Columbus, and threatened to take his life if he did not command the ships to be turned back toward Spain, but his patience did not give out, nor was his faith one whit the less. He cheered the hearts of the men as best he could, often telling them droll, funny stories to distract their thoughts from the terrible dread ...
— The Junior Classics • Various
... pulpit stairs, under the arm of the boy from the parsonage, and the irreverent way in which he made his descent, in view of the assembly, after depositing his burden, was thus rebuked by an old lady who was always droll and quaint. "Why, Matthew, when you come down the pulpit stairs of a Sunday, you throw up your heels like a horse coming ...
— Autumn Leaves - Original Pieces in Prose and Verse • Various
... priests and courtiers, minions and soldiers, cooped up in the church, while he, their master, sat out there enjoying sunshine and shadow and telling the beads of his sweetest sins. A mad thought came into his mind—would it not be droll to girdle the church with soldiers sworn to slay whoever dared to issue from the church without the summons of the King, and so hold them there to hunger and thirst and belike die, so long as it pleased him ...
— The Proud Prince • Justin Huntly McCarthy
... Justice—a stately gentleman—and the other persons of quality, how they did gaze! And the dresses of the ladies very fine, and did make the place—which was splendid, and they tell me the largest in the building—like a piece at the play-house! And the Counsel, how they did talk! Mighty droll to hear them contradict! One would have it that Black was White; which convinced me I had fallen into error, until another had it that he who had spoken was wrong, and White was Black! Good lack! who shall decide when Counsel differ? and I was mightily content ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 100, 13 June 1891 • Various
... adamantine armour and mounted on coal-black steeds. Their helmets were quite awful, and surmounted by plumes plucked from the wings of the Harpies, which were alone enough to terrify an earthly host. It was droll to observe this troop of gigantic heroes commanded by infants, who, however, were arrayed in a similar costume, though, of course, on a smaller scale. But such was the admirable discipline of the infernal forces, that, though lions ...
— The Infernal Marriage • Benjamin Disraeli
... teens! Their sarks, instead o' creeshie flainen, Been snaw-white seventeen hunder linen!— Thir breeks o' mine, my only pair, That ance were plush o' guid blue hair, I wad hae gien them off my hurdies, For ae blink o' the bonie burdies! But wither'd beldams, auld and droll, Rigwoodie hags wad spean a foal, Louping an' flinging on a crummock. I wonder ...
— Poems And Songs Of Robert Burns • Robert Burns
... language, and this has doubtless been a great hindrance to him, and has prevented him from making his book as characteristic as his Italian sketches. Nevertheless he is piquant enough in some places. We will give his droll account of his entrance into Rhenish Prussia. After being robbed by the innkeeper at Liege, he gets into the Aix-la-Chapelle diligence; and, on reading the printed ticket that has been given to him at the coach-office, finds that he has the fourth seat, and that ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - Volume 55, No. 343, May 1844 • Various
... vexed, and suggested the kitchen as a more suitable place for him. Mrs. Linton eyed him with a droll expression—half angry, half laughing ...
— Wuthering Heights • Emily Bronte
... comrade, in a sort of droll assurance that it could be no voice from the grave, no ghostly inhabitant of a cave, who could require to have such a matter explained. He then condescendingly told her that when the eggs of the eider-duck are taken she lays ...
— The Billow and the Rock • Harriet Martineau
... and droll errors of these old psalm-books can, after the lapse of centuries, be pointed out and must be smiled at, there is after all something so pathetic in the thought of those good, scholarly old New England saints, hampered by poverty, ...
— Sabbath in Puritan New England • Alice Morse Earle
... but he always said he was lookin' forward to the day when he could afford to get as drunk as he sometimes thought he'd like to be. He was a droll sort of a cuss, Jake was. He claimed he'd been savin' up his appetite and his money for nearly three years so's he could see which would last the longest in ...
— Anderson Crow, Detective • George Barr McCutcheon
... digression. Saadi gives this whimsical piece of advice to a pugnacious fellow: "Be sure, either that thou art stronger than thine enemy, or that thou hast a swifter pair of heels." And he relates a droll story in illustration of the use and abuse of the phrase, "For the sake of God," which is so frequently in the mouths of Muslims: A harsh-voiced man was reading the Kuran in a loud tone. A pious man passed by him and said: "What is ...
— Flowers from a Persian Garden and Other Papers • W. A. Clouston
... than its foreignness. He put the card into his waistcoat pocket, keeping his own meanwhile in evidence; and as he leaned against the door-post he met with the smile of a straying thought what the expanse before the hotel offered to his view. It was positively droll to him that he should already have Maria Gostrey, whoever she was—of which he hadn't really the least idea—in a place of safe keeping. He had somehow an assurance that he should carefully preserve the little token he had just tucked in. He gazed with unseeing lingering ...
— The Ambassadors • Henry James
... rooms, good cookery, not dear; we shall have a couple of months there, if we can make it out, and converse or - as my grandfather always said - 'commune.' 'Communings with Mr. Kennedy as to Lighthouse Repairs.' He was a fine old fellow, but a droll. ...
— Vailima Letters • Robert Louis Stevenson
... the best idea,' said Mr. Pickwick to himself, smiling till he almost cracked the night-cap strings—'It is the best idea, my losing myself in this place, and wandering about those staircases, that I ever heard of. Droll, droll, very droll.' Here Mr. Pickwick smiled again, a broader smile than before, and was about to continue the process of undressing, in the best possible humour, when he was suddenly stopped by a most unexpected interruption; to wit, the entrance into ...
— Bardell v. Pickwick • Percy Fitzgerald
... A droll little comedy of misunderstandings, told with a light touch, a venturesome spirit and an eye ...
— The Scarlet Feather • Houghton Townley
... didn't think we free-born Yankees—descendants of the Puritan Fathers—were going to claim relationship with any of those effete European aristocracies, did you?" with a droll look at Sara. ...
— Sara, a Princess • Fannie E. Newberry
... love of this world, or the thirst for conquest, been stronger or more active than among these nations. Their official motto is exactly the reverse of their real aspiration. Under a false flag they play the smuggler with a droll ease of conscience. Is the fraud a conscious one? No—it is but an application of the law of irony. The deception is so common a one that the delinquent becomes unconscious of it. Every nation gives itself ...
— Amiel's Journal • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... take place, when Mr Walcot was to leave them in the outskirts of the village, the little girls heard a few words, which threw some light on what had been passing. They caught from Sophia, "I must consult my parents;" and as they hurried homewards with her, they ventured to cast up a glance of droll meaning into her face, which made her try to help smiling, and to speak sharply; and then they knew that they ...
— Deerbrook • Harriet Martineau
... just now," said Molly, "in such a droll carriage, with yellow wheels and a glass body. It looks like a sort of ...
— Light O' The Morning • L. T. Meade
... of meteorology than did any other man of his time: therefore he probably did more to hold back the science of meteorology than did any other man of his time. In Nature, 41-135, Mr. Symons says that Prof. Schwedoff's ideas are "very droll." ...
— The Book of the Damned • Charles Fort
... Deacon, but Deacon was only a part of it; the rest was two meal-bags and a small boy. The meal-bags were full, and hung dangling down on either side of the horse, and to each was tied a leg of little Charlie Gray. It was droll for a tiny boy to wear such heavy clogs upon his feet, but droller still to see him resting his curly head upon the ...
— Dotty Dimple at Her Grandmother's • Sophie May
... under the seal for the Minster, nor for the giant figures on Alnwick Castle, nor for the droll man at the beautiful town of Durham; but I or somebody better than me will tell of them, and of Mrs. Green's drawings and painted jessamine in her window, and Mr. Wellbeloved and his charming children, and Mr. Horner, [Footnote: Francis Horner.] at Newcastle, and ...
— The Life And Letters Of Maria Edgeworth, Vol. 1 • Maria Edgeworth
... smile stirred about Ryder's mouth. 'I would not pain her for the world,' he said. 'She is a kindly little woman, and her hospitality is charming; but you must admit she is droll. What are ...
— In the Roaring Fifties • Edward Dyson
... appeared, rather than let the affair pass unnoticed in our pages. We do so from a wish to preserve certain traits and anecdotes which the occasion drew forth,—to give the pleasant rather than the "untoward" events of the day: though we must own the whole appears to have been a very droll business, always excepting ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. XIX. No. 532. Saturday, February 4, 1832 • Various
... evening with the cover for the harmonium. It is a clever piece of work. He turns his hand to almost anything, and can even make his own suits. Tonight he was decidedly droll, and in his broken language gave us a description of a certain wedding. There was only one person, a woman, who was able to read the marriage service, and she would not, as she did not approve of the marriage. It ended in the bride's brother ...
— Three Years in Tristan da Cunha • K. M. Barrow
... thought uneasily, "what is it that I bring home this time? How much is paste? My God, how droll that smile of Clinch.... Which is the false—his jewels or mine? Dieu que j'etais bete!—— Me who have not suspec' that there are two trays within my jewel-box!... I unnerstan'. It is ver' simple. In the top tray the false gems. ...
— The Flaming Jewel • Robert W. Chambers
... enabled me the easier to get my hand between her thighs and thus to feel her charming pouting little cunt. I began attempting to frig her clitoris, but stooping she drew her cunt away, and looking at me with a droll innocent expression of alarm, and with a perfect unconsciousness of the import of her words, cried,—"Oh! take care what you are at. You don't know how a lodger this last summer suffered for seizing me in that way and hurting me very much. I screamed out, aunt came up, and, do you know, ...
— The Romance of Lust - A classic Victorian erotic novel • Anonymous
... of Elia are, Lamb did not spend all the "riches of his wit" in their production. His letters—so full are they of "the salt and fineness of wit,"—so richly humorous and so deliciously droll,—so rammed and crammed with the oddest conceits and the wildest fancies, and the quaintest, queerest thoughts, ideas, and speculations—are scarcely inferior to his essays. Indeed, some of the best and most admired of the essays are but extended letters. The germ of ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 14, No. 85, November, 1864 • Various
... "That is really droll," cried Lady Juliana, with a laugh of delight; "and I must have the dear sick beggar; he ...
— Marriage • Susan Edmonstone Ferrier
... corruption of "aye, aye." It is used as an expression of triumph and its employment in this connection is both droll ...
— Nights With Uncle Remus - Myths and Legends of the Old Plantation • Joel Chandler Harris
... the clerk attending on his vicar, who is about to perform a wedding service and make two people for ever happy. He christens the two officials "the joiners, no rough mechanics, but a portly full-blown vicar with his clerk, both rubicund, a peony paged by a pink. It made me smile to observe the droll clerical turn of the clerk's beaver, scrubbed into that fashion by his coat ...
— The Parish Clerk (1907) • Peter Hampson Ditchfield
... "Yes, it will be droll enough; but not for everybody. They are rich sacristans, who pay the expenses. They don't look to money, provided the journal bites, tears, burns, pounds, exterminates and destroys. On my word of honor, I shall never have been in such a fury!" added Ninny Moulin, ...
— The Wandering Jew, Complete • Eugene Sue
... to the scenic arrangements, so that it is no longer the case, as with Plautus, that everything needs to take place on the street, whether belonging to it or not. Plautus ties and unties the dramatic knot carelessly and loosely, but his plot is droll and often striking; Terence, far less effective, keeps everywhere account of probability, not unfrequently at the cost of suspense, and wages emphatic war against the certainly somewhat flat and insipid standing expedients of his predecessors, e. g. against ...
— The History of Rome (Volumes 1-5) • Theodor Mommsen
... pink, and, and made you want to laugh too. A cunning white throat supported this pretty head, as a stem supports a flower; and, altogether, she was like a flower, except that flowers don't talk, and she talked all the time. What she said seemed droll, for the girls about here were in fits of laughter; but Clover only caught a word now and then, the ...
— What Katy Did At School • Susan Coolidge
... asinine employ on earth, To hear them tell of parentage and birth, And echo conversations dull and dry, Embellished with, he said, and so said I. At ev'ry interview their route the same, The repetition makes attention lame, We bustle up with unsuccessful speed, And in the saddest part cry—droll indeed! The path of narrative with care pursue, Still making probability your clue, On all the vestiges of truth attend, And let them guide you to a decent end. Of all ambitions man may entertain, The worst that can invade a sickly brain, Is that which angles hourly for surprize, And baits its hook ...
— Early Reviews of English Poets • John Louis Haney
... unawares,—to see them as they really are. You are welcome to come and see me in my night-cap, when the spirit moves me. When I'm not out walking, I'm always at home. Busy at work, too?" she continued, putting a tiny cap upon her fist. "That looks droll, and ...
— Flora Lyndsay - or, Passages in an Eventful Life • Susan Moodie
... seeing you through the leaves advancing with eager and rapid steps to the spot, conceals himself behind the entrance, and as you are just on the point of entering the hut, your foot just on the step, the droll sportsman puts his ugly head out of the window, as a yellow tortoise would his out of his shell, asking you, in most polite terms, what o'clock it is; or if it should chance to be raining a deluge at the time, remark in compassionate ...
— Le Morvan, [A District of France,] Its Wild Sports, Vineyards and Forests; with Legends, Antiquities, Rural and Local Sketches • Henri de Crignelle
... wholesome to withstand me. Yet were this woman purchasable, I would purchase. And—if she refused—I would not hinder her departure; but very certainly I would put Perion to the Torment of the Waterdrops. It is so droll to see a man go mad before your eyes, I think that I would laugh and quite forget ...
— Domnei • James Branch Cabell et al
... remark to the totally unprovided side of his table; he turned his head just in time to catch Westby's humorous mouth and droll droop of an eyelid. The other boys smiled, and Irving's cheeks ...
— The Jester of St. Timothy's • Arthur Stanwood Pier
... his writing table "Noctes Ambrosianae" or the London "Punch." His chair is wide, so that he can easily roll off on the floor when he wants a good time at laughing. His inkstand is a monkey, with the variations. His study-cap would upset a judge's risibilities. Scrap books with droll caricatures and facetiae. An odd stove, exciting your wonder as to where the coal is put in or the poker thrust for a shaking. All the works of Douglass Jerrold, and Sydney Smith, and Sterne, the scalawag ecclesiastic. India-rubber ...
— Around The Tea-Table • T. De Witt Talmage
... Posson Jone'," he continued, "you make a so droll sermon ad the bull-ring. Ha! ha! I swear I think you can make money to preach thad sermon many time ad the theatre St. Philippe. Hah! you is the moz brave dat I never see, mais ad the same time the moz rilligious man. Where I'm goin' to fin' one priest to make like dat? Mais, why ...
— Short Stories for English Courses • Various (Rosa M. R. Mikels ed.)
... was sincere and musical, and perhaps its beauty barbed the offence to Mr. Archer. The blood came into his face with a quick jet, and then left it paler than before. 'It is a physical weakness,' he said harshly, 'and very droll, no doubt, but one that I can conquer on necessity. See, I am still shaking. Well, I advance to the battlements and look down. Show me your ...
— Lay Morals • Robert Louis Stevenson
... be the case. The laird was what his country neighbours called "a droll, careless chap", with a very limited proportion of the fear of God in his heart, and very nearly as little of the fear of man. The laird had not intentionally wronged or offended either of the parties, and perceived not ...
— The Private Memoirs and Confessions of a Justified Sinner • James Hogg
... which have for their point the passions of the natural man breaking forth, in members of this persuasion, in a shape more droll than distressing. One of the best of these is a north-country anecdote preserved by Francis Douglas in his Description of the East Coast of Scotland. The hero was the first Quaker of that Barclay family which ...
— The Book-Hunter - A New Edition, with a Memoir of the Author • John Hill Burton
... have a tendency to do this at times, but in the Pouter it is carried to an enormous extent. The birds appear to be quite proud of their power of swelling and puffing themselves out in this way; and I think it is about as droll a sight as you can well see to look at a cage full of these pigeons puffing and blowing themselves out ...
— Darwiniana • Thomas Henry Huxley
... laughed, and even the old man smiled. He seemed to like to see them both happy, and when supper was over he told several humorous stories in his quaint, droll fashion. For a time Glen forgot her exciting experiences of the afternoon, and Samson did not once allude to them. At length he arose and laid his ...
— Glen of the High North • H. A. Cody
... Ibn al-Karibi and said to him, "Answer the summons of the Commander of the Faithful," whereto he replied, "I hear and obey." "But on condition," added Masrur, "that, if he give thee aught, thou shalt have a quarter and the rest shall be mine." Replied the droll, "Nay, thou shalt have half and I half." Rejoined Masrur, "Not so, I will have three- quarters." Lastly said Ibn al-Karibi, "Thou shalt have two- thirds and I the other third;" to which Masrur agreed, after much higgling and haggling, and they returned to the palace together. Now when Ibn al-Karibi ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 5 • Richard F. Burton
... come to see this Garrulier, whom she had so often heard mentioned at five o'clock tea, near, so as to be able to describe him to her female friends subsequently in droll phrases, to imitate his gestures and the unctuous inflections of his voice, perhaps, in order to experience some new sensation, or, perhaps, for the sake of dressing like a woman who was going to try for a divorce; and, certainly, ...
— The Works of Guy de Maupassant, Volume II (of 8) • Guy de Maupassant
... his other hardships, he is seldom permitted to open his mouth unless spoken to; and then, he might better keep silent. Alas for him! if he should happen to be anything of a droll; for in an evil hour should he perpetrate a joke, he would never ...
— Omoo: Adventures in the South Seas • Herman Melville
... majority, and the droll way in which Sam gave it put everybody in a good humour, and a very happy, delightful time ...
— Winter Adventures of Three Boys • Egerton R. Young
... madman!—a poor simpleton, of good family, who was so good-humored and harmless that he was allowed to go at large, and free scope given to his innocent freaks. He, however, possessed a kind of droll, pointed wit, which he sometimes brought to bear most effectively, sparing neither rank nor position. The half-biting, half-droll remarks of this Diogenes of Istria was all that now afforded enjoyment to the broken-down old hero. It was with intense delight ...
— Queen Hortense - A Life Picture of the Napoleonic Era • L. Muhlbach
... that! The little house close to the ramparts! Two arms, two eyes, and nothing here," he tapped his breast, "but flames that made ashes quickly—in her, like this ash—!" he flicked the white flake off his cigar. "It's droll! You agree, hein? Some day I shall go back and kill her. ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... droll—that plucky horse, dashing along with the rest, shooting over the fences, up to time, and acting like a soldier charging under command. I could just have gone down and kissed the splendid creature, and the whole crowd—thousands and thousands—set ...
— Phemie Frost's Experiences • Ann S. Stephens
... Jerrold is not at all like her—neither, I fancy, are his people. Mrs. Browne has recently arrived, and is to spend the summer with her daughter. Lady Hardy, who is not with her. She talks so funny, and her slang is so original, and her grammar so droll, that I find her charming, and if many of the Americans are like her, you are to be congratulated, as you can never lack variety. Once more, good-by, ...
— Bessie's Fortune - A Novel • Mary J. Holmes
... self. Once or twice she tried to turn the talk to his altered future, and the obligations and interests that lay before him; but he shrugged away from the subject, questioning her instead about the motley company at Violet Melrose's, and fitting a droll or malicious anecdote to each of the ...
— The Glimpses of the Moon • Edith Wharton
... satisfaction and amusement of all the spectators, officers, soldiers, and servants [Footnote: Denshchiki ] who were watching us from their tents, we had twice carried the winning party on our backs from one end of the ground to the other. Especially droll was the situation of the huge fat Captain S., who, puffing and smiling good-naturedly, with legs dragging on the ground, rode pickaback on the feeble ...
— Stories by Foreign Authors: Russian • Various
... from the table she noticed a little bronze figure which she had not yet seen. It was an old Italian work of Flemish taste: a nude woman, with short legs and heavy stomach, who apparently ran with an arm extended. She thought the figure had a droll air. She asked ...
— The Red Lily, Complete • Anatole France
... adorers, that they were in no danger. We were about to remark that it was surely beyond post-time, and must have been a runaway knock, when our host, who had hitherto been paralysed with wonder, sank into a chair in a perfect ecstasy of laughter, and offered to lay twenty pounds that it was that droll dog Griggins. He had no sooner said this, than the majority of the company and all the children of the house burst into a roar of laughter too, as if some inimitable joke flashed upon them simultaneously, and gave vent to various exclamations of—To be sure it must be ...
— Sketches by Boz - illustrative of everyday life and every-day people • Charles Dickens
... little fellow was coming to think for himself and had an active and earnest mind. In fact, he was so precocious and said such droll things as greatly to amuse the king and those around him. Here is one of his sayings, spoken in a spell of cold weather when the butter could not be spread on the bread. The prince bent a piece of bread ...
— Historical Tales, Vol. 9 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality. Scandinavian. • Charles Morris
... quote from Dr. Memes's translation, which, however, is everywhere incorrect, and in a degree absolutely astonishing; and, where not incorrect, offensive from vulgarisms or ludicrous expressions. Thus, he translates un drole, a droll fellow—wide as the poles from the true meaning, Again, the verb devoir, in all tenses, that eternal stumbling-block to bad French scholars, is uniformly mistranslated. As an instance of ignoble language, ...
— Theological Essays and Other Papers v2 • Thomas de Quincey
... news of the ban to Giuseppe de' Franchi. She had learned it from one of her damsels, who had had it from Shloumi the Droll, a graceless, humorous rogue, steering betwixt Jews and Christians ...
— Dreamers of the Ghetto • I. Zangwill
... laughed at their droll appearance, but felt the freedom and increased marching power; and as Lord Howe wore just such a coat himself, who could complain? He wore leggings of leather, such as were absolutely needful to forest ...
— French and English - A Story of the Struggle in America • Evelyn Everett-Green
... what a strange thing it was not to know what money was; it had never occurred to him before; he asked himself a queer question, What was money? The idea of it seemed to go to pieces, as a printed word does when you look steadily at it, and to have no meaning. It affected him as droll, fantastic, like a piece of childish make-believe, when the woman took some more money from him for his meals and lodging. But that was the way the world was worked. You could get anything done for money; ...
— The Quality of Mercy • W. D. Howells
... sterling good sense and simple naturalness of Randy, and the total absence of slang and viciousness, make these books in the highest degree commendable, while abundant life is supplied by the doings of merry friends, and there is rich humor in the droll rural characters. ...
— Dorothy Dainty at Glenmore • Amy Brooks
... apparently, but his swarthy, large- mouthed, droll eyed face affirmed the experience of a sage. He wore a blue flannel shirt, with loose trousers belted round his waist, and he crushed a soft felt hat between his hands; his hair was clipped close to his skull, and as he rubbed ...
— The Minister's Charge • William D. Howells
... son—sufficiently to ensure his future, he plucked off the mask and allied himself with Sophia in her hostility towards Madame von Platen. He did worse. Some little time thereafter, whilst on a visit to the court of Poland, he made one night in his cups a droll story of the amorous persecution which he had suffered at Madame von ...
— The Historical Nights Entertainment, Second Series • Rafael Sabatini
... night; you are in love, that is a matter of course, I am beloved by no one in all the world; and you ask pity of me! Parbleu! Moliere forgot that. If that is the way you jest at the courthouse, Messieurs the lawyers, I sincerely compliment you. You are droll." ...
— Les Miserables - Complete in Five Volumes • Victor Hugo
... their Esterbrooks. Let us say, in every school and in every house, the child must not only learn to read and write, he must learn to draw. We cannot afford to let our young folks grow up without this power. A new French book is just now much talked about, with this droll title, "The Life of a Wise Man, by an Ignoramus." It is the story of the great Pasteur, whose discoveries in respect to life have made him world renowned. I turned to the book, eager to find out the ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 497, July 11, 1885 • Various
... with us, a welcome guest. Her conversation was so strong, simple, shrewd, and with such a droll flavoring of humor, that the Professor was wont to say of an evening, "Come, I am dull, can't you get Sojourner up here to talk a little?" She would come up into the parlor, and sit among pictures and ornaments, in her simple stuff gown, with her heavy travelling-shoes, ...
— The Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, 1995, Memorial Issue • Various
... this warning in mockery of the frogs or their foe, and plump one after another in the depths, as frogs follow their leader in swift succession. They had nothing against Hawkins. They all liked him, for he was a droll, good-natured fellow, always up to some pleasantry. One day he laughed out in school. "Was that you laughed, Henry?" asked the teacher, with unerring suspicion. "I was only smiling, Mr. Slack." "The next time, see that you don't smile ...
— A Boy's Town • W. D. Howells
... that time was a Dutchman who had joined the Belgian Army in 1914. He was a very droll fellow, and told me he was the clown at one of the Antwerp Theatres and kept the people amused while the scenes were being changed. I can quite believe this, for shouts of laughter could always be heard in his vicinity. He was very good at imitating ...
— Fanny Goes to War • Pat Beauchamp
... who seemed not only to know one another, but to know the same people in towns along the line. Between stations they gossiped, smoked, chewed, spat, and swore together like so many New England crossroad sages, but when the train stopped they gave encouraging attention to the droll performances of one of their number, a shaggy, unshaven, rawboned man, of middle age, gray-haired and collarless, who sat near the window and uttered convincing imitations of the sounds made by chickens, roosters, pigs, ...
— American Adventures - A Second Trip 'Abroad at home' • Julian Street
... that extremely droll, lugubrious look on her long, mask-like face which makes the faces of insects so funny and uncanny, like pantomime masks, sat down as if nothing had happened, apparently to scheme out the best way to possess herself of a kingdom ...
— The Way of the Wild • F. St. Mars
... took their seats to-night and looked around the room they saw a droll sight. The old lady, who had been knitting on the veranda, was seated at a small table in one corner; and on each side of her in a chair sat a cat! One cat was a gray "coon," the other an Angora; and both of them sat up as grave as judges, nibbling bits of cheese. Mrs. McQuilken herself, ...
— Jimmy, Lucy, and All • Sophie May
... this compromise monarchy at work today are to be had, as felicitously as anywhere, in the Balkan states; perhaps the case of Greece will be especially instructive. At the other, and far, end of the line will be found such other typical instances as the British, the Dutch, or, in pathetic and droll miniature, the Norwegian. ...
— An Inquiry Into The Nature Of Peace And The Terms Of Its Perpetuation • Thorstein Veblen
... Third; the women with hooped petticoats and high head dresses; clergymen with five or six tier wigs; men with cocked hats and queues; and female servants with mob caps. That to Emblem Fifteen, upon the sacraments, is peculiarly droll; the artist, forgetting that the author was a Baptist, represents a baby brought to the font to be christened! and two persons kneeling before the ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... for the king's cause, would have recognized readily enough in these two strange opposites two of the most dreaded of the myrmidons of Tristan l'Hermite, no less than his two chief hangmen, Trois-Echelles and Petit-Jean. Trois-Echelles was the long, cadaverous hangman; Petit-Jean was the stout, droll hangman, but when it came to a push and a pinch, both were hangmen and hung in the same manner, if not with the same manners. Petit-Jean pulled a flagon of wine from under the platform of the gallows, lifted it to his lips, drained a mighty ...
— If I Were King • Justin Huntly McCarthy
... A merry droll acted as host and dipped freely for all with the long spoon, commenting the while he dispensed the mess according to the wants of the miscellaneous gathering: "Pot-luck! 'Tis luck, and they're no field mice in it! There's everything else!" ...
— Under the Rose • Frederic Stewart Isham
... always been a very faithful, hard-working and willing beast, with rather droll ways of his own, and we were sorry that his end should come so soon. He could never be accused of being a handsome dog, in fact he was generally ...
— The Home of the Blizzard • Douglas Mawson
... tributary of the creek. They were waiting for daylight, and for the guard to grow sleepy and careless. With little more emotion than hunters waiting in a blind for the birds to go over, the two men examined their rifles and six-shooters. They talked in undertones, laughing a little at some droll observation or reminiscence. Only by a sparkle of deviltry in Babe's blue eyes, and an added gravity of expression upon Ralston's face, at moments, would the closest observer have known that anything unusual was about to take place. Yet each ...
— 'Me-Smith' • Caroline Lockhart
... back in the convent with my nuns, and Sister Flora was trying to teach me English grammar in good French, and I was correcting her in bad French, and she begins to laugh because it is all so droll. 'I am Scotch, and I teach you English all wrong, and you tell me what I ought to say in French which is all wrong; let us go into the garden,' for she was a perfect love, and always covered my faults. I am sitting ...
— Kate Carnegie and Those Ministers • Ian Maclaren
... 'There is Noverre, the famous Composer of Ballets; he has been in Berlin, I believe.' Noverre made thereupon a beautiful dancing-master bow. 'Ah, I know him,' said the King: 'we saw him at Berlin; he was very droll; mimicked all the world, especially our chief Dancing Women, to make you split with laughing.' Noverre, ill content with this way of remembering him, made another beautiful third-position bow; and hoped possibly the King would say something farther, ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XXI. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle
... come," Eagle told Katarina and Marie. Holding their hands, she walked between them toward me, and bade them notice my height. "I am his Cloud-Mother," she said. "How droll it is that parents grow down little, while their children grow ...
— Lazarre • Mary Hartwell Catherwood
... it would be droll," Pope said, aloud, "if our exteriors were ever altogether parodies. But time keeps a diary in our faces, and writes a monstrously plain hand. Now, if you take the first letter of Mr. Alexander Pope's Christian ...
— The Certain Hour • James Branch Cabell
... them all Mackintosh blankets with the buffalo-robes are drawn, by what power this deponent sayeth not, not knowing. No watch is kept, for there is little danger of intrusion. Once a whole party was startled by a white bear smelling at them, who waked one of their dogs, and a droll time they had of it, springing to their arms while enveloped in their sacks. But we remember no other instance where a sentinel was needed. And occasionally in the journals the officer notes that he overslept in the morning, and ...
— The Man Without a Country and Other Tales • Edward E. Hale
... a droll origin. It was originally intended for a statue of John Sobieski, the Polish king who saved Vienna from the Turks. In the first year of the Restoration, the enthusiastic Viner purchased the unfinished statue abroad. Sobieski's stern head was removed ...
— Old and New London - Volume I • Walter Thornbury
... down her hands to clasp them over her laughing face a moment. "And I don't remember what you were saying!" They both laughed a long time at this; it seemed incomparably droll, and they ...
— The Minister's Charge • William D. Howells
... favourite received in the course of the evening was fairly, but not too cordial. But enthusiasm and hilarity reached fever-heat when, on turning his face from them, the audience discovered that their droll was wearing (in a somewhat grotesque fashion) the grand cordon of the Legion of Honour on his back! Then it was felt that France must be safe in the hands of a man whose sense of the fitness of things rivalled the taste of the pig whose soul soared above ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 99, October 4, 1890 • Various
... said the Austrian, earnestly, with one finger to his temples. "It is a funny picture, I know. I cannot recall. But the word caucus I remember. That is a droll word." ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... rub her rough nose, scratch her between her horns, or bring her wisps of grass when she was tied near the house. Her calf was unlike all other calves. There was no rest until Amy had seen it, and she admitted that she had never looked upon a more innocent and droll little visage. At the children's pleading the infant cow was given to them, but they were warned to leave it for the present to Abram and Kitten's care, for the latter was inclined to act like a veritable old cat when any one made too free with her ...
— Nature's Serial Story • E. P. Roe
... cloisters, one shouldn't complain," said she, glancing indicatively round. "One can still be out of doors, and yet not get the wetting one deserves. And the view is so fine, and these faded old frescoes are so droll." ...
— My Friend Prospero • Henry Harland
... think that we live in a bad age, O tempora, O mores! as 'tis in the adage. My foot was but just set out from my cathedral, When into my hands comes a letter from the droll. I can't pray in quiet for you and your verses; But now let us hear what the Muse from your car says. Hum—excellent good—your anger was stirr'd; Well, punners and rhymers must have the last word. But let me advise you, when next I hear ...
— Poems (Volume II.) • Jonathan Swift
... a couple of years I pretended to follow the classes, so as to draw the allowance of 1,200 francs which my father made me. I lived with one of my college chums, who is a painter, and I set about painting also. It amused me. The calling is droll, and not at all fatiguing. We smoked and ...
— Therese Raquin • Emile Zola
... whisker At a pink-eyed girl demure. Ev'ry maid In silk arrayed At her partner shyly glances, Paws are grasped, Waists are clasped As they whirl in giddy dances. Then together Through the heather 'Neath the moonlight soft they stroll; Each is very Blithe and merry, Gamboling with laughter droll. Life is fun To ev'ry one Guarded by our magic charm For to dangers We are strangers, Safe from any ...
— The Emerald City of Oz • L. Frank Baum
... bosses, crimson ribbands, sheets with lead Ruled, and with pumice-powder all well polished. These as thou readest, seem that fine, urbane Suffenus, goat-herd mere, or ditcher-swain 10 Once more, such horrid change is there, so vile. What must we wot thereof? a Droll erst while, Or (if aught) cleverer, he with converse meets, He now in dullness, dullest villain beats Forthright on handling verse, nor is the wight 15 Ever so happy as when verse he write: So self admires he with so full delight. In sooth, we all thus err, nor man there be ...
— The Carmina of Caius Valerius Catullus • Caius Valerius Catullus
... "You droll little man, why did you not ask me that before, if you wanted to know? Finish your wine, and come to the door. There's your change, and thank you for your custom, though it isn't much. Come to the door, ...
— After Dark • Wilkie Collins
... house! Ha, ha, ha! "And do you know how pretty you are, child?" "No, my Lady." You are right there! "And how old are you, child! And take care they do not spoil you by flattery, child!" Oh, how droll! It is ...
— Bleak House • Charles Dickens
... him he tossed his head coquettishly, and trotting away a few steps, turned and looked at her with a droll air. Colina called him in dulcet tones, and held out ...
— The Fur Bringers - A Story of the Canadian Northwest • Hulbert Footner
... This is droll. After spending a deal of space and fine writing in describing the present prospect, he concludes by telling us candidly it is all of no use, for the whole scene has changed. This is like Walpole's story of the French lady who asked for her lover's picture; and when he demurred ...
— Famous Reviews • Editor: R. Brimley Johnson
... his mistress, Madame R——, who was of the party, that the fire-ball had penetrated her house, which was close adjoining, without having effected any injury. Madame R—— laughed heartily, and observed, "Well, it is very droll that the lightning should make so free with my house when I am not at home." This little sprightly remark dispersed the gloom which had overshadowed most of the ladies present. All the large houses in Paris are well protected against the perilous effect of electric fluid, by conductors, ...
— The Stranger in France • John Carr
... was at her side, as spotless in broad white collar and blue jacket as on the morning before, and carrying the same droll air of consecration, awe, and responsibility. ...
— The Flower of the Chapdelaines • George W. Cable
... instantly says I cry halves, and if the first refuse he is instantly threatened with an information. The manner in which they cheat each other has, with all its infamy, occasionally something extremely droll and ludicrous. I was one day in the shop of a Swiri, or Jew of Mogadore, when a Jew from Gibraltar entered, with a Portuguese female, who held in her hand a mantle, richly embroidered ...
— The Bible in Spain • George Borrow |
