"Impromptu" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... fellow-townsmen to wash their hands of the controversy. But he was an intimate of Judge Graves, and after talking with that gentleman he became a partisan overnight; and when he had stopped to get his mail he had been lured behind the window by the debate in progress. He was in the midst of some impromptu remarks when he recognized a certain brisk step behind him, and Isaac D. Worthington ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... suddenly the Black Growler darted forward almost as if she was a thing alive. The Varmint II started at the same moment and an impromptu race was on. ...
— Go Ahead Boys and the Racing Motorboat • Ross Kay
... gave me great pleasure to get your last letter, for these little impromptu effusions are the genuine letters. I rejoice that man and nature seem harmonious to you, and that the heart beats in unison with the voices of Spring. May all that is manly, sincere, and pure, in your wishes, be realized! Obliged to live myself without the sanctuary of the central ...
— Memoirs of Margaret Fuller Ossoli, Vol. II • Margaret Fuller Ossoli
... illustration of the power of the law over the lawbreaker. Sinclair glanced down in wonder at Kern. It was in character for the sheriff to make a speech. A moment later the sheriff's own words had explained his reason for the impromptu address. ...
— The Rangeland Avenger • Max Brand
... have been an excellent trainer, however modest may have been his own native gifts as an actor. Moliere, like Shakspere in so many ways, was like him in being author and actor and manager; and in the 'Impromptu de Versailles' he has left us a most instructive record of his own methods of rehearsing ...
— Inquiries and Opinions • Brander Matthews
... the business rest there and went up with Locke again to enjoy the brilliant moonlight and listen to the impromptu concert which the crew had begun with a mouth ...
— Isle o' Dreams • Frederick F. Moore
... moment, Mr. Guppy presents his friend under the impromptu name of Mr. Weevle and states the object of their visit. Krook, with his bottle under his arm (he never gets beyond a certain point of either drunkenness or sobriety), takes time to survey his proposed lodger ...
— Bleak House • Charles Dickens
... disbursements, flitted before the mind of the agitated Mr. Adolphus Casay. Ten o'clock came; Bunken seemed to snore the louder and sleep the sounder. What was to be done? why, nothing but to get up an impromptu influenza, and try his rhetoric on the presiding magistrates ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 1, October 9, 1841 • Various
... for the press, I came upon some notes made by Mr. Dakyns on the margin of his Xenophon. These were evidently for his own private use, and are full of scholarly colloquialisms, impromptu words humorously invented for the need of the moment, and individual turns of phrase, such as the references to himself under his initials in small letters, "hgd." Though plainly not intended for publication, ...
— Cyropaedia - The Education Of Cyrus • Xenophon
... crew were kind to him; for men still have compassion upon one another, and give succor according to the need of the moment,—not to the balance of good and evil in the sufferer. The wind freshened, an impromptu, bowsprit was rigged, and the "Resurrection" limped towards New York. Manetho's partial stupor was relieved by hot grog and the cook's stove. He gave no further account of himself than that he had fallen ...
— Idolatry - A Romance • Julian Hawthorne
... happily-adapted recollection than the actual impromptu of a boy of nine. But another, in which, after a painful silence, he replied to the brutal enquiry of a ne'er-do-well relative as to when he meant to grow handsome, by saying that he would do so when the speaker grew good,—is characteristic of the easily-wounded spirit and 'exquisite sensibility ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Oliver Goldsmith • Oliver Goldsmith
... out and the doors closed, leaving Cleek alone in the stable; and the last Logan and Sir Henry saw of him until he came out and rejoined them he was standing in the middle of the floor, with his hands on both hips, staring fixedly at the impromptu bed in front of the ...
— Cleek, the Master Detective • Thomas W. Hanshew
... pen, an achievement which he cannot be said to have accomplished until Vanity Fair had come out. In inquiring about him from those who survive him, and knew him well in those days, I always hear the same account. "If I could only tell you the impromptu lines which fell from him!" "If I had only kept the drawings from his pen, which used to be chucked about as though they were worth nothing!" "If I could only remember the drolleries!" Had they been kept, there might now be many volumes of these sketches, as to which the ...
— Thackeray • Anthony Trollope
... Matveitch, however, rarely talked of that time; but two or three times a year, addressing himself to the crooked old emigrant whom he had taken into his house, and called for some unknown reason 'M. le Commandeur,' he recited in his deliberate, nasal voice, the impromptu he had once delivered at a soiree of the Duchesse de Polignac. I remember only the first two lines.... It had reference to a comparison between ...
— The Jew And Other Stories • Ivan Turgenev
... speech from the Court, and the district attorney added his own tribute, while Silvia was given an impromptu reception by jurors, court officers and spectators. When this was over, and the throng that had surrounded her and her client went their way on the quest of new sensations, she found herself standing alone with him before the bench, ...
— An American Suffragette • Isaac N. Stevens
... the protection of their common Mother, to whose love and service she and they were alike pledged. In consequence of this unanimous choice, the holy Foundress, prostrating herself with the whole community before the statue of the Blessed Virgin, addressed to her impromptu, the following prayer:— ...
— The Life of Venerable Sister Margaret Bourgeois • Anon.
... born at Arezzo, was the son of Benedetto Accolti. Known in his own day as l'Unico Aretino, he acquired great fame as a reciter of impromptu verse. He was listened to by large crowds, composed of the most learned men and the most distinguished prelates of the age. Among others, Cardinal Bombo has left on record a testimony to his extraordinary talent. His high reputation with ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia
... dinner. The commandant bowed from the window, but a young Hungarian journalist leaned out and without a moment's hesitation poured forth a torrent for fully fifteen minutes with scarce a pause for breath. I told him that such impromptu oratory seemed marvellous, but he dismissed it as nothing. "I'm politiker!" he explained, with a wave of ...
— Antwerp to Gallipoli - A Year of the War on Many Fronts—and Behind Them • Arthur Ruhl
... afforded a cheerful break in the dullness and monotony of their usual life; for, owing to the absence of almost all the young men with the army, there had been a long cessation of the pleasant interchange of visits, impromptu parties, and social gatherings that had formed a feature in the ...
— With Lee in Virginia - A Story of the American Civil War • G. A. Henty
... we met a party of Eesa girls, who derided my colour and doubted the fact of my being a Moslem. The Arabs declared me to be a Shaykh of Shaykhs, and translated to the prettiest of the party an impromptu proposal of marriage. She showed but little coyness, and stated her price to be an Audulli or necklace [26], a couple of Tobes,—she asked one too many—a few handfuls of beads, [27] and a small present for her papa. She promised, naively ...
— First footsteps in East Africa • Richard F. Burton
... listening to in the Methodist conventicles of those days, so that he brought an absolutely open mind to a consideration of Miss Clairville's voice and method when he first heard her sing. That had been one evening in an impromptu and carelessly inadequate manner in company with Miss Cordova—whom, with her bleached hair, green eyes accentuated by badly-drawn, purplish-black eyebrows, and a shrill American accent, he was learning to dislike and avoid as much as possible; but now a better ...
— Ringfield - A Novel • Susie Frances Harrison
... the types of an age that vanished for ever in his grave, and who is the more interesting, as in him we see the race from which the Norman sprang, began, in the rich full voice that pealed deep as an organ, to chaunt his impromptu war-song. He halted in the midst, and with great ...
— Harold, Complete - The Last Of The Saxon Kings • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... person observing that Mr. Dallas looked very wise on a certain occasion, his Lordship is said to have broke out into the following impromptu."—Life, Writings, Times, and Opinions of Lord Byron, ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Vol. 7. - Poetry • George Gordon Byron
... done, than the collection of sifted earliest fragments known of rymed song in European languages. Of Eastern I know nothing; but, this side Hellespont, the substance of the matter is all given in King Canute's impromptu ...
— The Crown of Wild Olive • John Ruskin
... few minutes Mrs. Scott, Miss Percival, the Cure, and Jean were seated round the little vicarage table; then, thanks partly to the impromptu and original nature of the entertainment, partly to the good-humor and perhaps slightly audacious gayety of Bettina, the conversation took a turn of the frankest ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... all rather mild." I kept talking to the man, but really addressing myself to the women. "There's something nearly every evening: prestidigitating, or elocutioning, or a little concert, or charades, or impromptu theatricals, or something of that sort. I can't say there's dancing, though really, I suppose, if any one wanted to dance there would ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... it?" asked Pilar, thoughtfully. "Maria purisima! It isn't as if he were an impulsive or hospitable man, fond of getting up impromptu entertainments. This is done in a hurry. What can be his object? for he always ...
— The Car of Destiny • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... when he himself set fire to one of the largest of the vessels. It was now day, and the people were warned by a deserter from his force, but Jones managed to hold the whole town at bay till he made good his retreat. This daring affair was an impromptu of Jones's genius, justified in his view by similar depredations of the British on the American coast; but it had an ugly look of ingratitude to the place which had sheltered his youth, and first given him promotion ...
— Great Men and Famous Women. Vol. 2 of 8 • Various
... him, en masse, he seized a chair, and swung it flail-like about his head. For a few moments, there was a crashing of glass and china, and a clatter of furniture and a chaos of struggle. At its center, he stood wielding his impromptu weapon, and, when two of his assailants had fallen under its sweeping blows, and Farbish stood weakly supporting himself against the table and gasping for the breath which had been choked out of him, the mountaineer hurled aside ...
— The Call of the Cumberlands • Charles Neville Buck
... he no longer spoke to a lawyer named Peat; to which he replied, "I choose to give up his acquaintance—I have common of turbary, and have a right to cut peat!" An impromptu of his on a learned serjeant who was holding the Court of Common Pleas with his glittering eye, ...
— Law and Laughter • George Alexander Morton
... Sonnet Sleeping in the Snow With the Rain Ode, on the Death of a Friend Lines: to a Young Lady who had jilted her Lover Vicarious Martyrs: to a Hen-pecked Schoolmaster Stanzas: on seeing Lady Noel Byron To Louisa The Orator and the Cask The Maid of the War Impromptu: on being asked by a Lady to write a Verse in her Album Mary: a Monody On the Marriage of Miss Nicholl Carne Impromptu: on the Death of Mr. Thomas Kneath, a well-known Teacher of Navigation, at Swansea EXTRACTS FROM ...
— The Death of Saul and other Eisteddfod Prize Poems and Miscellaneous Verses • J. C. Manning
... out! hold tight!" for suddenly the slant of the deck was reversed, and they came coasting down to an impromptu seat ...
— A Bookful of Girls • Anna Fuller
... "master Sam is there, I'll warrant you: he's always on hand when there's any singing or dancing. We must not let them see us, or they will stop singing." "Who makes their songs for them?" inquired the young man. "Oh, they make them up as they sing them; they are all impromptu songs." By this time they were near enough to hear distinctly every word; and, true enough, Sam's voice was heard above all others. At the conclusion of each song they all joined in a hearty laugh, with an expression of "Dats de song for ...
— Clotel; or, The President's Daughter • William Wells Brown
... their skates and dragged Tess and Dot to school. Almost all the older scholars who attended school that day went on steel. At recess and after the session the Parade was the scene of races and impromptu games of hockey. ...
— The Corner House Girls at School • Grace Brooks Hill
... the next Saturday was made up in this impromptu fashion, without one of the members realizing what an important occasion that outing ...
— The Girls of Central High on Lake Luna - or, The Crew That Won • Gertrude W. Morrison
... policemen joining their energies to make a free passage for it. In front walked the policeman carrying the little girl, a child apparently of about twelve years old. Her right foot lay stiffly across his arm, held straight and still in an impromptu splint of umbrellas and handkerchiefs. Immediately behind came the lady whom George had caught sight of, holding the other girl's hand in hers. She was bareheaded and in evening dress. Her opera-cloak, with its heavy sable collar, showed beneath it a dress of some light-coloured satin, ...
— Sir George Tressady, Vol. I • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... thing that, at fifteen, he thought it. Her one simple idea was to be happy and, as a means to that end, to have people happy about her. His father, or Anne's father, could have told him that all her ideas were simple as feelings and impromptu. Impulse moved her, one moment, to seize on the faithful, defiant little heart of Anne, the next, to get up out of the sun. Anne's tears spoiled her bright world; but not for long. Coolness was now the important thing, not Anne and not Anne's mother. As for ...
— Anne Severn and the Fieldings • May Sinclair
... which is not full of his own fierce vitality and fancy. If he is dull it is hardly ever because he cannot think of anything; it is because, by some silly excitement or momentary lapse of judgment, he has thought of something that was not worth thinking of. If his joke is feeble, it is as an impromptu joke at an uproarious dinner-table may be feeble; it is no indication of any lack of vitality. The joke is feeble, but it is not a sign of feebleness. Broadly speaking, this is true of Dickens. If his writing is not amusing us, at least it ...
— Appreciations and Criticisms of the Works of Charles Dickens • G. K. Chesterton
... HIM.—When the first stone of a new theatre in Cranbourne Street was laid the other day by some Magnates of the Theatrical Profession—beg pardon, "the Profession," we should have said—Mrs. BANCROFT made a telling impromptu speech, and then Mr. YARDLEY, ancient Cricketer and Modern Dramatist, was hit on the head—accidentally, of course—by the bottle which is in use on these occasions. "Very YARDLEY treated," observed Sir DRURIOLANUS, in his happiest ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 101, November 14th, 1891 • Various
... world's opinion, as usual, veered completely round, and John Todhunter was esteemed a shrewd, sensible man—only not brilliant; that he was brilliant could not be said of him. In fact, the man could hardly talk, and it was a fortunate provision that no impromptu deliveries were required of him ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... consciousness, rebound the wounds, lifted the body in his strong arms and bore it down the beach. A sail-boat lay in a cove, with a little skiff in tow. Waring arranged a couch in the bottom, and placed the old man in an easy position on an impromptu pillow made of his coat. Fog opened his eyes. 'Anything come ashore?' he asked faintly, trying to turn his head towards the reef. Conquering his repugnance, the young man walked out on the long point. There was nothing ...
— Castle Nowhere • Constance Fenimore Woolson
... is only getting up from his seat. How wonderful he is! I never heard anything more impressive in my life. After all, unpremeditated art is the greatest art. Such an effect as that could never have been produced except impromptu." ...
— The Green Carnation • Robert Smythe Hichens
... Hunter and Lightbody, and that Miss Hunter was made use of against her. Having a most contemptible opinion of her Albina's understanding, and knowing that her young friend had too little capacity to be able to deceive her, or to invent a plausible excuse impromptu, Mrs. Beaumont turned quick, and exclaimed, "My dear, what could Lightbody be saying to you when I came up?—for I remember he stopped short, and you both looked ...
— Tales and Novels, Vol. V - Tales of a Fashionable Life • Maria Edgeworth
... thing rather tame. In the whole hour and a-half there was not so much savage fighting, not so much damage done, as a couple of earnest, but unscientific men, who have no time to waste, will frequently crowd into an impromptu affair not exceeding ...
— Andersonville, complete • John McElroy
... had no power of combining, as a public speaker should always do, that which I had studied with that which occurred to me at the moment. It must be all lesson,—which I found to be best; or else all impromptu,—which was very bad, indeed, unless I had something special on my mind. I was thus aware that I could do no good by going into Parliament—that the time for it, if there could have been a time, had gone by. But still ...
— Autobiography of Anthony Trollope • Anthony Trollope
... Herakles, which Browning here translates. Aristophanes, naturally, is not convinced; impressed he must have been, to have borne so long a reading without demur: he flings them a snatch of song, finding in his impromptu a hint for a new play, the Frogs, and is gone. And now, a year after, as the couple return to Rhodes from a disgraced and dismantled Athens, Balaustion dictates to Euthukles her recollection of the "adventure," for the ...
— An Introduction to the Study of Browning • Arthur Symons
... inhabitants, guiltless of offence, and seeking to perform their duties conscientiously, should be condemned to live in such incessant fear, and have nowhere to turn for protection! This state of things, of course, gave rise to many impromptu vigilance committees. Every colored person, and every friend of their persecuted race, kept their eyes wide open. Every evening I examined the newspapers carefully, to see what Southerners had put up at ...
— Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl - Written by Herself • Harriet Jacobs (AKA Linda Brent)
... toast to their young hostess, which was drunk standing, and then the guests repaired to the drawing room, where impromptu stunts were in order. Every one was obliged to do something, if only to make a remark appropriate to the occasion. Nora sang, Anne recited, Grace and Miriam did a Spanish dance that they had practised during vacation with remarkable spirit and effect. ...
— Grace Harlowe's Junior Year at High School - Or, Fast Friends in the Sororities • Jessie Graham Flower
... then improvised several others, equally, if not more difficult, to the surprise both of Sterkel and his friends. "What raised our surprise to real astonishment," said Ries, as he related the story, "was, that the impromptu variations were in precisely that graceful, pleasing style which he had just heard for the ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 1, No. 7, May, 1858 • Various
... three cakes into nineteen exactly even portions, while Katherine waited with the penknife ready. Even the hitherto irreproachable Maudie Heywood and Cynthia Greene were occupied with scissors, making plates out of sheets of exercise paper. Beds drawn up alongside the impromptu table served for seats, and the girls crowded together as closely as they could. Raymonde and Morvyth, by virtue of their expedition to the shops, were voted mistresses of the ceremonies, and dispensed the provisions. ...
— The Madcap of the School • Angela Brazil
... career, he had started the store. He had also meant to do general repair work in the backroom shop. But in recent years it had degenerated into an impromptu club hall, funk hole, griping-arguing-and-planning pit, extracurricular study lab and project site for an indefinite horde of interplanetary enthusiasts who were thought of in Jarviston as either young adults of the most resourceful kind—for ...
— The Planet Strappers • Raymond Zinke Gallun
... her in a taxi an hour later she was still blushin' from answerin' questions. I had that paper with the city seal on it in my inside pocket, though. My next job is on the Reverend Percey, the one who did the job for Mr. Robert the time I stage-managed his impromptu knot-tyin'. Course, I couldn't sign him up for anything definite, but I got a schedule of his spare time from six o'clock on, and ...
— Wilt Thou Torchy • Sewell Ford
... little speech in which my father's learning and my uncle's services and the amiable qualities of your humble servant were neatly interwoven, delivered in a falsetto tone, as if learned by heart, though it must have been necessarily impromptu; and then, reseating himself, he made a gracious motion of the head and hand, as if to authorize me to ...
— The Caxtons, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... the result of such an experiment would be. I, to whom nature had denied the impromptu faculty; who, in public, was by nature a cypher; whose time of mental activity, even when alone, was not under the meridian sun; who needed the fresh silence of morning, or the recluse peace of evening, to win from the Creative Impulse ...
— Villette • Charlotte Bronte
... they won him round, and departed one morning gleefully in the little toy train that runs out across the Gwebi Flats to the Eldorado Gold Mine. And to Diana's joy, they had a luggage-van fitted up as an impromptu saloon for them, and were able to spin along with both doors wide open, enjoying the air and the country. The Eldorado is the show mine of Rhodesia, having a native compound equal to any in South Africa, and charming ...
— The Rhodesian • Gertrude Page
... that height, by Mr. Potter's voice melodiously belling a flourish of laughter on the other side of a closed door bearing his card. It was rich laughter, cadenced and deep and loud, but so musically modulated that, though it might never seem impromptu, even old Carson Tinker had once declared that he liked to listen to it almost ...
— Harlequin and Columbine • Booth Tarkington
... first scattered skirmishers of the coming army of flowers. It was a day of soft wind, when the shadows of the clouds go sweeping over the hills. Quite casually I happened upon a girl clambering over a hedge, and her dress had caught in a bramble, and the chat was quite impromptu and most idyllic. I remember she had three or four wood anemones in her hand—"wind stars" she called them, and I thought it a pretty name. And we talked of this and that, with a light in our eyes, as ...
— Certain Personal Matters • H. G. Wells
... last night! One would imagine they had all come by appointment, expressly to have an impromptu dance, which they certainly enjoyed, by the way. There was little Captain C——, the Susceptible and Simple, who so innocently says "I seen" and "I done it," without the faintest suspicion of the peculiarity, and looks so sweet, and guileless, ...
— A Confederate Girl's Diary • Sarah Morgan Dawson
... moralising never deduct a grain! Vaudemont felt this as he saw her glide towards the beggar; but when she came bounding back to him, she had forgotten his dislike to her songs, and was chaunting, in the glee of the heart that a kind act had made glad, one of her own impromptu melodies. ...
— Night and Morning, Volume 4 • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... please her distinguished guests speedily displayed itself in a very plentiful, if not very dainty repast. To the duckling, peas, and other delicacies, intended for Mr. Kneebone's special consumption, she added a few impromptu dishes, tossed off in her best style; such as lamb chops, broiled kidneys, fried ham and eggs, and toasted cheese. Side by side with the cheese (its never-failing accompaniment, in all seasons, at the carpenter's board) came a tankard of swig, and ...
— Jack Sheppard - A Romance • William Harrison Ainsworth
... next morning by a Norwegian mucker who was organizing a strike over the incident of the tainted pork. Five minutes later, every man in the shed was around the stove in an impromptu indignation meeting. It was agreed that Max, the German boy, should go in first; if the steward put him out, we were all to leave with him and refuse to work. He was allowed to take breakfast but was refused a dinner pail. ...
— From the Bottom Up - The Life Story of Alexander Irvine • Alexander Irvine
... Crevel without a word; and Crevel could not help smiling at the child's astonishment when threatened with this impromptu tubbing. ...
— Poor Relations • Honore de Balzac
... not enough, for as Cora raised her hand, in automobile-signal fashion, to warn her follower of an impending stop, the end of the impromptu race course was reached. ...
— The Motor Girls on Crystal Bay - The Secret of the Red Oar • Margaret Penrose
... result of our population living in a furnace, it happens now that when you rebel on being forced to take an impromptu Turkish bath at a theatre, the usher answers your complaint with “It can’t be as warm as you think, for a lady over there has just told me she felt chilly and asked ...
— The Ways of Men • Eliot Gregory
... promptly overpowered, disarmed, and their muskets used in disarming their friends who were panic stricken by the vigorous onslaught, and soon succumbed to Jack's bellicose persuasiveness. It then became an easy task to carry out the impromptu plan of campaign of putting each soldier into his sentry-box and casting both him and the box into the running stream. The call for help was unavailing; none came, and soon no voices were heard, but the following day the funeral knell was sounded by the ...
— The Shellback's Progress - In the Nineteenth Century • Walter Runciman
... and stage-setting. These can well be made in the school as a part of the manual training and sewing work. In giving the play, it will generally be better not to have pupils memorize the exact words of the book, but to depend upon the impromptu rendering of their parts. This method will contribute more largely to the ...
— Children's Classics in Dramatic Form - Book Two • Augusta Stevenson
... evidence of its effect behind. This was especially apparent in the swelling torrent of muddy water, drained from the slopes of the mountain-side above the house and now impetuously rushing down an impromptu gully which the flood had scooped out for itself across the grounds, following the course of the carriage drive almost up to the entrance-gate, where the suddenly-created cataract, diverging into a hollow to the left, made another exit for itself through the ...
— The White Squall - A Story of the Sargasso Sea • John Conroy Hutcheson
... carry on this warfare. He at once saw what would be the effect of the new departure. And so promptly and energetically did he denounce the "arch-apostate Egerton, alias Arnold, Ryerson" as a deserter, that he secured with little difficulty an impromptu verdict from the public against him. This he the more readily accomplished, by the aid of at least half a dozen editors of newspapers in various parts of the province, while Dr. Ryerson was single-handed. Not only did these editors join with great vigour in the hue and cry against ...
— The Story of My Life - Being Reminiscences of Sixty Years' Public Service in Canada • Egerton Ryerson
... Countess. 'She declared half the pleasure of a thing consisted in preparation and anticipation; but I disagree with her entirely. I like all my pleasures served up to me hot and spiced—without any flavour reaching me beforehand. That is why I am so charmed with the idea of surprise parties and impromptu picnics, and all that kind ...
— Lover or Friend • Rosa Nouchette Carey
... at least so far as the arrangement of his words were concerned. The floating thoughts were most beautifully arranged, and delivered on the spur of the moment. What accident gave rise to the singular request, that he should deliver this lecture impromptu, I never learnt; nor did it signify, as it afforded a happy opportunity to many of witnessing in part the extent of his reading, and the extraordinary ...
— The Life of Samuel Taylor Coleridge - 1838 • James Gillman
... set the candle on Kitty's impromptu stepladder. "We saw your interest in the affair, and attacked you on that side. You had seen me once. Being a newspaper writer—the New York kind—you would not rest until you learned who I was. You would not forget me. You were too ...
— The Drums Of Jeopardy • Harold MacGrath
... till Paul came to her with a hatful of late flowers and, standing by her, held the impromptu basket while she made up a bouquet to suit ...
— The Mysterious Key And What It Opened • Louisa May Alcott
... lesson to the common or European widow, the humpy type of widow! One could spend whole days in their company—I had done it—commencing quite early in the morning with a sleighing excursion, finishing up quite late in the evening with a little supper party, followed by an impromptu dance; and never detect from their outward manner that they were ...
— Idle Ideas in 1905 • Jerome K. Jerome
... the impromptu speakers, a white-haired, toil-marked farmer, told how forty years before he had gone to the next prefecture and opened new land. "With his spectacles and moustache," explained the chairman—if the man who ...
— The Foundations of Japan • J.W. Robertson Scott
... Cooktown was hailed with thankfulness, for there were of course many discomforts and unpleasantnesses. The blacks had a disagreeable habit of prowling about in the night and peeping at their guests as they tried to sleep in the impromptu hammocks. The food was coarse and monotonous; the men rough, and ...
— Queensland Cousins • Eleanor Luisa Haverfield
... frowning at the other houses over the way. The sleepiest and shabbiest of soldiery go wandering about, with the double curse of laziness and poverty, uncouthly wrinkling their misfitting regimentals; the dirtiest of children play with their impromptu toys (pigs and mud) in the feeblest of gutters; and the gauntest of dogs trot in and out of the dullest of archways, in perpetual search of something to eat, which they never seem to find. A mysterious and ...
— Pictures from Italy • Charles Dickens
... people," finally said Mrs. Gibson, laughingly, "this impromptu reception is liable to last all night unless it is checked by a stern hand. It is almost five o'clock, and we haven't even seen our rooms yet. Besides, Anne will have to leave before long for the theatre. Let us hurry with our dressing, order an early dinner and keep Anne here for it. Shall you ...
— Grace Harlowe's Senior Year at High School - or The Parting of the Ways • Jessie Graham Flower
... Puddingpote Bower (wheeze),' replied Crowdey slowly and pompously, adding an 'e' to the syllable, to make it sound better, the haddocks, hashed mutton, and all the horrors of impromptu hospitality rushing ...
— Mr. Sponge's Sporting Tour • R. S. Surtees
... water, sailed down the swift eddies and then vanished in the next whirlpool. A couple of orioles in brand-new yellow uniforms, with black epaulets on their shoulders, were busy in the tree over our heads, but stopped now and then in their work to refresh themselves with a little impromptu duet. ...
— Ilka on the Hill-Top and Other Stories • Hjalmar Hjorth Boyesen
... my new friends, who now surrounding me, formed themselves into a sort of triumphal procession. First went Iguma and her supporters, then followed four of my attendants, then I came with two on either hand, the rest bringing up the rear, all shouting and singing impromptu verses in praise of me, for I could tell by certain words that such was the case. The words were ...
— The Two Supercargoes - Adventures in Savage Africa • W.H.G. Kingston
... friendly interrogators had discussed the topics with him so as to be familiar with his views. Every lawyer does this with his witnesses. Nor can it be supposed that the admirable replies which he made to the enemies of America were otherwise than strictly impromptu. He had thorough knowledge of the subject; he was in perfect control of his head and his temper; his extraordinary faculty for clear and pithy statement never showed to better advantage; he was, as always, moderate and reasonable; but ...
— Benjamin Franklin • John Torrey Morse, Jr.
... an impromptu of his moved the town to laughter. At some dinner party it appeared the ladies sat a little too long; Oscar wanted to smoke. Suddenly the hostess drew his attention to a lamp the shade ...
— Oscar Wilde, Volume 1 (of 2) - His Life and Confessions • Frank Harris
... correspondent's reply, the perfect letter would make perfect conversation. It should call up the voice, gesture, and bearing of the writer. Though it may be more studied than oral speech, it must appear no less impromptu. This, indeed, is its essential charm, that it contains the mind's first fruits with the bloom on, that it exhale carelessly the mixed fragrance of the spirit like a handful of wild flowers not sorted for the parlor table but, as gathered ...
— A Williams Anthology - A Collection of the Verse and Prose of Williams College, 1798-1910 • Compiled by Edwin Partridge Lehman and Julian Park
... being seen at it, he could get some idea of the treatment next Friday if he cares to come to the dress rehearsal. You know we arranged to run right through it for the first time. We thought of a small impromptu dance after the rehearsal, so if Mr. Holroyd would like to come a little earlier I shall be charmed ...
— The Giant's Robe • F. Anstey
... sounds had come from the interior of the to-hol-woh. But now the fat boy half rolled out, gasping for breath. Ned, having picked up a paddle that lay near this impromptu Turkish bath, administered a resounding slap on Stacy's anatomy, while Tad and Walter threw him ...
— The Pony Rider Boys in the Grand Canyon - The Mystery of Bright Angel Gulch • Frank Gee Patchin
... of the morning whose dawn T. Haviland Hicks, Jr., had blithesomely hailed with an impromptu musicale and saengerfest on "Lookout There!" rock, and the football triumvirate were in togs. The squad, over in the bunkhouse, noisily donned gridiron armor for the morning practice, and the pestiferous Hicks was ...
— T. Haviland Hicks Senior • J. Raymond Elderdice
... and an impromptu indignation meeting. Stanning had gone to work scientifically. From the moment that, ducking under the guard of a sturdy town youth, he had caught sight of Sheen retreating from the fray, he had grasped the fact that here, ready-made, was his chance ...
— The White Feather • P. G. Wodehouse
... six feet seven and a-half several yards of snow-white muslin—the innocent cause of the disaster; and how, light as a bird, she sprung, merrily laughing, from the room, with the fluttering fragments of her cobweb dress gathered in an impromptu drapery around her graceful ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII No. 6 June 1848 • Various
... outrage that they should be driven from the homes in which they had believed themselves settled for life. The man Redgrave—he of the six feet two who had presented the address to Mutimer—was a powerful agent of ill-feeling; during the first few days he was constantly gathering impromptu meetings in New Wanley and haranguing them violently on the principles of Socialism. But in less than a week he had taken his departure, and the main trouble seemed ...
— Demos • George Gissing
... (La.) described in an interesting manner Club Life among the Women of the South. Mrs. Blake gave a powerful address on Wife, Mother and Citizen. Miss Shaw closed the meeting with an impromptu speech in which, according to the reporter, she said: "It is declared that women are too emotional to vote; but the morning paper described a pugilistic encounter between two members of Congress which looked as if excitability were not limited to women. It is said that 'the legal ...
— The History of Woman Suffrage, Volume IV • Various
... "Faust Symphony" I have not yet received. My last number of the Zeitschrift is that of July 6th. I am glad that Stade does not disapprove of these Faust-things.— Schondorf's Polonaise, Impromptu, etc., which Kahnt has sent me, I have read through with pleasure and interest. With the next sending to Rome please enclose the "Petrus" Oratorio by Meinardus (the pianoforte score). In case the pianoforte score has not appeared, then ...
— Letters of Franz Liszt, Volume 2: "From Rome to the End" • Franz Liszt; letters collected by La Mara and translated
... of Schubert's cleverness in treating the pianoforte, which is already sufficiently evident in the dramatic accompaniments of his larger songs, before mentioned, attention is called to the Impromptu in B-flat—the air and variations known as "The Fair Rosamunde," the title due to the appearance of this melody in his opera of "Rosamunde." At least three of these variations display great finesse in treating the pianoforte. The first needs to be done ...
— The Masters and their Music - A series of illustrative programs with biographical, - esthetical, and critical annotations • W. S. B. Mathews
... the truth in respect to ordinary men, but you did yourself injustice. The common excitement and warm blood of youth pass away; but the heart of the wise man, the older it grows the warmer it feels." It is difficult to imagine a more graceful impromptu ...
— Reminiscences of Sixty Years in Public Affairs, Vol. 1 • George Boutwell
... seemed as much out of place "as a rich jewel in an Ethiop's ear," and hastily walked off with the prize before I could recover from my astonishment! I was a stranger to the ways of the world, and it did not occur to me, until years afterwards, that this was an IMPROMPTU comedy, ingeniously devised and skilfully performed by two capital actresses, for the purpose of swindling ...
— Jack in the Forecastle • John Sherburne Sleeper
... accompaniment—an easy change of chords—was played on the piano colla voce. And no one minded in the least a foot, more or less, at the end of a verse. The joke was the thing with the Madigans, and the impromptu rhyme that brought down the house was the one that ...
— The Madigans • Miriam Michelson
... enlarged: first one other couple and then another are moved to follow the example, and they in their turn assist in bumping out the limits of the ring till it has become some twenty feet or so in diameter. These impromptu ball-rooms rarely much exceed that size, but dozens of them may be found in the course of one's peregrinations around the large piazza. The occupants of some of them will be found to consist of town-bred Romans, and those of others of people from the country. There is ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, April, 1876. • Various
... of universal peace societies and of woman's rights associations. The movement had its grotesque aspects, which Lowell has described in his essay on Thoreau. "Bran had its apostles and the pre-sartorial simplicity of Adam its martyrs, tailored impromptu from the tar-pot. . . . Not a few impecunious zealots abjured the use of money (unless earned by other people), professing to live on the internal revenues of the spirit. . . . Communities were established where every thing was to ...
— Initial Studies in American Letters • Henry A. Beers
... think how the railroad has been pushed through this unwatered wilderness and haunt of savage tribes; how at each stage of the construction roaring, impromptu cities, full of gold and lust and death, sprang up and then died away again, and are now but wayside stations in the desert; how in these uncouth places Chinese pirates worked side by side with border ruffians and broken men from Europe, gambling, drinking, quarreling, and murdering ...
— The U.P. Trail • Zane Grey
... had been occupied by many an important personage. The walls were covered with names. Above some of them impromptu verses had been scribbled; others had perpetuated their profiles; and still others had drawn caricatures of those who had been the means of lodging them here. The guillotine also figured ...
— The Nameless Castle • Maurus Jokai
... fell into the modern sin of extempore writing, and deluged the world with the first hasty overflowings of his mind, instead of straining and refining it till he could bestow the pure essence upon us. In short, his career is summed up in the phrase that it was 'writing impromptu novels to buy farms with'—a melancholy end, truly, for a man of rare genius. Nothing is sadder than to hear of such a man 'writing himself out;' and it is pitiable indeed that Scott should be the example of that fate which rises most naturally to our minds. 'Something very perfect in ...
— Hours in a Library, Volume I. (of III.) • Leslie Stephen
... this way? He'd be more apt to strike for Mexico, wouldn't he? Still, long as I'd let Plummer put me on the committee, it was up to me to answer any calls. Might be entertainin' to see who he'd mistaken for an enemy alien this time. And if all I was expected to do was spill a little impromptu strategy—well, maybe I could, and then again maybe I couldn't. I'd take ...
— The House of Torchy • Sewell Ford
... a breach of politeness on our part not to attend Mr. Ketch in his impromptu evening visit! He shuffled along at the very top of his speed, his mouth watering, while the delicious odour of tripe and onions appeared to be borne on the air to his olfactory nerves: so strong is the force ...
— The Channings • Mrs. Henry Wood
... the word WELCOME. Piles of chairs, rented from I.O.O.F. hall in Bonneville, heaped themselves in an apparently hopeless entanglement on the ground; while at the far extremity of the barn a couple of carpenters clattered about the impromptu staging which was to accommodate ...
— The Octopus • Frank Norris
... inscribed "Zenith the Zip City—Zeal, Zest and Zowie—1,000,000 in 1935." As the delegates arrived, not in taxicabs but in the family automobile driven by the oldest son or by Cousin Fred, they formed impromptu processions through ...
— Babbitt • Sinclair Lewis
... standing, and his wife and he doted on one another and on little Miss Sophronia, their only child.) This item of the programme, carefully rehearsed beforehand, and executed pat on the moment with the prettiest air of impromptu, took Colonel Taubmann so fairly aback that he found himself stammering thanks before he well knew what had happened: and from that moment he was at the town's mercy. Before he could drop back in the chaise, and almost before the Mayor, casting off his robe ...
— Merry-Garden and Other Stories • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... Probabilities has got down to business. He has opened an impromptu peripatetic school of navigation, and triumphantly sticks a pin into every point that tallies with his yard-square chart. The evangelist has his field-glass to his eye in search of the unregenerated aborigines. The swell tourists are much swollen with travel; they loosen the belts of ...
— Over the Rocky Mountains to Alaska • Charles Warren Stoddard
... navy-yards had, moreover, to be guarded against surprises by the enemy's cavalry; and as men were so scarce, it was generally arranged that the navy-yard should follow the army lines. Constantly shifting position—caused by the rapid movements of the enemy, left these impromptu ship-yards unprotected; and then a small party of raiders would either burn them, or force their builders to do so. It was not until the appropriation was nearly spent—although not one efficient gunboat of this ...
— Four Years in Rebel Capitals - An Inside View of Life in the Southern Confederacy from Birth to Death • T. C. DeLeon
... as an entertainer, a mental uplift that was really welcome, so spontaneous and keen were his talks and comments on people and things. Gus, though having little practice, held his own at tennis and golf; in swimming races and other impromptu sports he greatly excelled; and when a young fellow who bore the reputation of an all-round athlete came for the week-end from the city, Gus put on the gloves with him and punched the newcomer all over an imaginary ring on the lawn to the delight of Mr. ...
— Radio Boys Cronies • Wayne Whipple and S. F. Aaron
... Indians from those at Santee would tell you they are naturally a most polite people—a people upon whom grace sits easily. There is many a little story of Santee I would like to tell, that would show the spirit which pervades the school. Something you may have read of their impromptu prayer-meetings, and the desire of many to work and study, not merely for themselves, ...
— The American Missionary - Volume 42, No. 1, January 1888 • Various
... on its own. Fortunately we had been going rather slowly since we were entering a town, and no one was hurt. Borwick, the musician of the Company, looked like a snow image; Darwin and the Old Bird were locked in each other's arms, and had an impromptu and friendly wrestling match in a snowdrift. McKnutt was invoking the aid of the Saints in his endeavours to prevent the snow from trickling down his back. Talbot and Gould, who had got off lightly, supplied the laughter. The wheel was ...
— Life in a Tank • Richard Haigh
... seated in loneliness and mental perturbation just where Angela had left him, but no longer pretending to read. His back was toward the southern end of the row. He had not even seen the cause of the impromptu reception at the Sanders's. He read what was taking place when Angela began to lose her voice, to stumble over her words; and, peering at her under his bushy eyebrows, he saw that the face he loved was flushing, that her young bosom was swiftly rising and falling, the beautiful ...
— An Apache Princess - A Tale of the Indian Frontier • Charles King
... period, while Harlan, his colleague, possessed a vigor and grasp of mind which I think the public never fully accorded him. Lane of Indiana was full of patriotic ardor, and like Baker of Oregon, had the rare gift of eloquent impromptu speech. Henry Wilson earned the gratitude of his country by his unswerving loyalty to freedom, and his great labors and invaluable services as chairman of the Military Committee. Howard ranked among the first lawyers and most faithful men in the body, and no man had a clearer grasp ...
— Political Recollections - 1840 to 1872 • George W. Julian
... shoji were pushed open; and drunken men could be seen with kimonos thrown back from their shoulders showing a body reddened with sake. They had taken the geishas' instruments from them, and were performing an impromptu song and dance, while the girls clapped their hands and writhed with laughter. Beyond the tea-house, the din of the festival was hushed. Only from the distance came the echo of the song, the rasp of the forced merriment, the clatter of the ...
— Kimono • John Paris
... upon whom the Spirit of the Lord had come, "the Golden Shoemaker" turned and preached, from the living text of his besotted friend, a telling impromptu Temperance sermon to the motley crowd. The whole incident was quite unpremeditated. He had never dreamt that he would do such a thing as he was doing now. But that by no means lessened the effect of his burning words, which went home to the hearts, and even to the consciences of not a few ...
— The Golden Shoemaker - or 'Cobbler' Horn • J. W. Keyworth
... Mr. Gryce's first thought. "He is going to show us the bow and confess to what was undoubtedly an accident." But Mr. Gryce felt more or less ready to modify this impromptu conclusion when, on passing through the arch himself he came upon the young man still standing in Section VI, with his eyes on the opposite gallery and his ...
— The Mystery of the Hasty Arrow • Anna Katharine Green
... station and returned with the luggage which he had left there. While he was away I stole into my room and took a good look at my new treasure; he still slept peacefully and calmly on. We were deep in impromptu carpentering and contrivances for use and comfort, when it occurred to me to look ...
— The First Violin - A Novel • Jessie Fothergill
... being among them. It is strenuous business handling these panic-stricken people. Heretofore, the offices for the naval and military Attaches have been located on the ground floor of the Chancellerie, but in the present emergency this space is converted into an impromptu German Embassy, all German affairs being concentrated here, while the Americans are taken care of on the floor above. We are stationed two by two at desks ranged along the walls of the entrance hall and we dispose ...
— The Note-Book of an Attache - Seven Months in the War Zone • Eric Fisher Wood
... and gazed at each other in strained and unnatural silence. They could find nothing to say to each other. Ordinary topics seemed to be precluded by their festive appearance and the formal nature of the occasion. Their informal meetings were usually celebrated by impromptu wrestling matches. This being debarred, a stiff, unnatural atmosphere descended upon them. William was a "host," they were "guests"; they had all listened to final maternal admonitions in which the word "manners" and ...
— More William • Richmal Crompton
... of the moon slowly climbing the warm heights of heaven. It was so quiet that the sound of waves and insects seemed like the softest whispers of nature. Rose and Edward had rowed down the bay for Helene, who usually accompanied them on their impromptu excursions by lake and wood. Seen in the pale brilliance of sky and water her loveliness had an almost unearthly quality, perfectly akin to the night, but giving her a strange effect of soft remoteness ...
— An Algonquin Maiden - A Romance of the Early Days of Upper Canada • G. Mercer Adam
... accorded us because it goes with our temperament, because we can be depended upon to insist on asserting ourselves and on expressing ourselves in what we do. If the present impromptu industrial machinery which has been handed over to us thoughtlessly and in a hurry, does not express us, everybody knows that we can be depended on to assert ourselves and that we will insist on one that will. ...
— Crowds - A Moving-Picture of Democracy • Gerald Stanley Lee
... but I am so glad, nobody could be more glad," said Lucy. Little Tom had been brought in, too, in his nurse's arms, and crowed and clapped his fat little baby hands for his father; and when his mother took him and stepped out upon the balcony, from which her husband was speaking an impromptu address to his new constituents, with the child in her arms, not suspecting that she would be seen, the cheers and outcries ran into an uproar of applause. "Three cheers for my lady and the baby," the crowd shouted at the top of its many ...
— Sir Tom • Mrs. Oliphant
... there were twelve or fifteen of the bric-a-brac things already mentioned; also an oil-painting by Elihu Vedder, "The Young Medusa." Every now and then the children required me to construct a romance—always impromptu—not a moment's preparation permitted—and into that romance I had to get all that bric-a-brac and the three pictures. I had to start always with the cat and finish with Emmeline. I was never allowed the refreshment of a change, end-for-end. It was not permissible ...
— Chapters from My Autobiography • Mark Twain
... Cockney, and English provincialisms—was awful and wonderful. Nothing was better than to get our uncle on his 'genteel behaviour,' which, of course, meant exactly the opposite, and brought forth inimitable stories, scraps of old songs and impromptu conversations, the choicest of which were between children, Irishwomen, or cockneys. He was the only man, I believe, who ever knew by heart the famous Irish Court Scenes—naughtiest and most humorous of tales—unpublished, of course, but handed down from ...
— Adventures in Criticism • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... could see only the humor of it. She was fascinated by the social niceties and the surroundings of the set she had drifted into. The little dinners, the impromptu teas, the light chatter and general atmosphere of luxury more than counterbalanced any other lack. She wanted only to play, and she was prepared to seize avidly on any form of pleasure, no matter if in last analysis ...
— North of Fifty-Three • Bertrand W. Sinclair
... were engaged upon this duty, it came on to rain in a manner worthy of the tropics. The vault reverberated; every gargoyle instantly poured its full discharge; we waded back to the inn, ankle-deep in impromptu brooks; and the rest of the afternoon sat weatherbound, hearkening to the sonorous deluge. For two hours I talked of indifferent matters, laboriously feeding the conversation; for two hours my mind was quite made up to do my duty instantly—and at each particular instant I postponed it till the next. ...
— The Wrecker • Robert Louis Stevenson and Lloyd Osbourne
... on the wharf till she left, singing college songs, giving an impromptu athletic exhibition, etc., to the intense delight of about fifty small boys (I can't conceive where they all came from), and the two or three hundred servant girls going home to P.E.I. ...
— Bowdoin Boys in Labrador • Jonathan Prince (Jr.) Cilley
... to mind and sometimes they were not, but the laws of hospitality held good in the woods as in the house, and they were welcomed civilly at least. Once or twice, when particular friends of his came on sap-boiling days, Davie ventured on an impromptu sugaring-off on his own responsibility. He made use of a small kettle for the purpose, so that the important matter of boiling down the sap need not be interfered with. He told himself that he was not disobeying his grandfather, but he knew that probably it had never come into his mind that ...
— David Fleming's Forgiveness • Margaret Murray Robertson
... Outside the doors of every hostelry, in Piccadilly and Bermondsey, in Blackwall and Oxford Street, were gathered bundles of hilarity, lingering near the scenes of their recent splendours. A thousand sounds, now of revelry, now of complaint, disturbed the brooding calm of the sky. A thousand impromptu concerts were given, and a thousand insults grew precociously to blows. A thousand old friendships were shattered, and a thousand new vows of eternal comradeship and blood-brotherhood were registered. A thousand wives were waiting, sullen ...
— Nights in London • Thomas Burke
... on resuming his work, his accuracy of aim was momentarily at fault. The Emperor rebuked him for having made an unwarranted boast and handed him over to the monono-be for execution. After the unfortunate man had been led away, one of his comrades chanted an impromptu couplet lamenting his fate, whereat the Emperor, relenting, bade a messenger gallop off on "a black horse of Kai" to stay the execution. The mandate of mercy arrived just in time, and when Mane's bonds were loosed, ...
— A History of the Japanese People - From the Earliest Times to the End of the Meiji Era • Frank Brinkley and Dairoku Kikuchi
... physiognomical outlines of sneaks' noses on a slate; and silence prevailed till the church clock struck the half-hour, when Clement got up, and taking the slate, where he had been solacing himself with imitating Edgar's caricatures, he was about to make it an impromptu dust-pan, and went down on his knees to sweep up Fulbert's malicious litter, but was rewarded with a vicious kick on the cheek. It was under the table, out of sight; and Clement, like a true son of his mother, made no sign, but went off ...
— The Pillars of the House, V1 • Charlotte M. Yonge
... and were fired upon by Capt. Preston's company. Crispus Attucks was the first to fall; he and Samuel Gray and Jonas Caldwell were killed on the spot. Samuel Maverick and Patrick Carr were mortally wounded. The excitement which followed was intense. The bells of the town were rung. An impromptu town-meeting was held, and an immense assembly was gathered. Three days after, on the 17th, a public funeral of the martyr took place. The shops in Boston were closed, and all the bells of Boston and the neighboring towns were rung. It is said that ...
— The Black Phalanx - African American soldiers in the War of Independence, the - War of 1812, and the Civil War • Joseph T. Wilson
... back to St. Ebbe's, where, however, she was not yet due. A longer leave of absence had been granted to her, in consideration of the fact that her holiday had been mainly spent in hard work in the impromptu hospital at Redcross. She would not have accepted the additional grant apart from the circumstance that Harry Ironside was in London. Annie admitted to herself, in the secret recesses of her heart, that now it had come to this, she ...
— A Houseful of Girls • Sarah Tytler
... had used then—"there is no reason why I should not tell a ghost story. True, I had never done so before, but the literary attainments which have enabled me to perfect my recent treatise upon the 'Disuse of the Comma' are quite equal to impromptu experimentation in the field of psychic phenomena." I was aware that the young people themselves hardly expected serious acquiescence, and that, too, stimulated me. I cleared my throat in a prefatory manner, and silence fell ...
— Humorous Ghost Stories • Dorothy Scarborough
... prisoners, while Nymani rounded up in addition the man Dane had burned to save Tau. When the younger spaceman returned from making the medic comfortable in the shelter, he found Asaki and Jellico holding an impromptu court of inquiry. ...
— Voodoo Planet • Andrew North
... indescribable scene it was! The strange-looking wall of propped doors which we had seen, was the impromptu, wall separating the bedrooms from the dining-room. Bedrooms? Yes, five of them; that is, five bedsteads in a row, with just space enough between them to hang up a sheet, and with just room enough between them and the propped doors for a moderate-sized person to stand upright ...
— McGuffey's Sixth Eclectic Reader • William Holmes McGuffey
... dumpy to be thought that—people noticed her hair, which was a most fashionable shade of red. Then, of course, in as much as she had Mrs. Norris for a mother, one could never be entirely sure that she might not burst forth in some altogether unexpected and delightful manner. Her impromptu bataille des fleurs, for example, was still remembered in Woodbridge although it took place nearly sixteen years ago. Somewhere her attention had been caught by the picture of a cherub, or possibly ...
— Tutors' Lane • Wilmarth Lewis
... from the impromptu couch which Abdul had made for him under the shadow of a mighty rock. The desert was no longer a shoreless sea of golden sand; they were reaching the reef of hills which was ...
— There was a King in Egypt • Norma Lorimer
... colloquy; trialogue; interlocution; improvisation; toast; equivocation, prevarication, quibbling; ambages, pseudology, amphibology, amphiboly, dilogy. Associated Words: extempore, extemporaneous, extemporize, extemporization, impromptu, improvise, improvisation, brogue, aphasia, amnesia, oratory, elocution, rhetoric, oratorical, rhetorical, rhetorician, elocutionary, peroration, voluble, ...
— Putnam's Word Book • Louis A. Flemming
... was it who could fling off such an apt impromptu, and how many more mute inglorious writers have we not who might do anything they chose if they would only choose to do anything at all? Some one else had written on an ...
— Ex Voto • Samuel Butler
... old maid, my dear," denied the impromptu poet pertly. "I merely said, or meant to say, that the idea you expressed might better be expected from an old maid, although I doubt if many old maids could have expressed it as well as ...
— Campfire Girls in the Allegheny Mountains - or, A Christmas Success against Odds • Stella M. Francis
... which we became acquainted. He had already christened the little island on which we had first landed, "Palm-Islet," and the spot upon the opposite shore, abounding in brilliant shells, had, from that circumstance, received the impromptu name of "Pearl-shell Beach." He now proposed to call the point, "Cape Desolation," from its waste and forbidding aspect; but finally fixed upon "Sea-bird's Point," as being more appropriate, the birds having, in fact, taken possession ...
— The Island Home • Richard Archer
... open one, and we just tore along for miles as fast as we could, and though he was driving himself, he managed to say all sorts of charming things; and when we got back to Kitty's more people came, and we had an impromptu dance and then supper, and all the servants had gone to bed, so we had to forage for things in the pantry, and altogether I have never had such fun in my ...
— Elizabeth Visits America • Elinor Glyn
... deeds occurred, the sentiment of the outlying communities of California was almost a unit in favor of the Vigilantes, and their action received the sincere flattery of imitation, as half a score of criminals learned to their sorrow on impromptu scaffolds. There was no large general organization in any other community, however. After a time some of the banished men came back, and many damage suits were argued later in the courts; but small satisfaction came to those claimants, and few men who knew ...
— The Story of the Outlaw - A Study of the Western Desperado • Emerson Hough
... and we were obliged to wear rubber boots to be able to get on at all, but we were used to it and it mattered not to us. The meeting was held in the parlors of the church instead of the schoolrooms as was our wont. For a change our leader said we would have an impromptu concert in the church choir so as to use the organ. Edwin Bruce, our leader and instructor, came from Boston and brought several fine singers with him. Mr. Blake and I were asked to come somewhat earlier. ...
— Sixty Years of California Song • Margaret Blake-Alverson
... look too much the pilgrim—there is Eastern dust showing through our Benton dust, and that spells of other 'dust' in your pockets. Get another hat, a flannel shirt, some coarser trousers, a pair of boots, don a gun and a swagger, say little, make few impromptu friends, win and lose without a smile or frown, if you play (but upon playing I will advise you later), pass as a surveyor, as a railroad clerk, as a Mormon—anything they choose to apply to you; and I shall hope ...
— Desert Dust • Edwin L. Sabin |
