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Ornamental   /ˌɔrnəmˈɛntəl/   Listen
Ornamental

noun
1.
Any plant grown for its beauty or ornamental value.






WordNet 3.0 © 2010 Princeton University








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"Ornamental" Quotes from Famous Books



... ability of which he is possessed; but still he objects to the intrusion. The bridge that is to be constructed by the Company to give access to the wood, or forest, is in itself all that could be wished, forming, rather than otherwise, an ornamental structure to his lordship's grounds; but then he fears that should an engine chance (of course, these chances are not within his control) to pass under the bridge at the same moment as he is passing over, his high blood horses would prance and rear, and suffer injury therefrom. His lordship ...
— Railway Adventures and Anecdotes - extending over more than fifty years • Various

... Ornamental additions to the costume are very rare. In the whole assembly I only noticed four women who were dressed differently from the others. The cords which fastened their spencers, and also their girdles, were ornamented ...
— Visit to Iceland - and the Scandinavian North • Ida Pfeiffer

... infant in his cradle, each human being in his turn enters upon the dance with the inevitable terror. But death is not depicted as a skeleton, white, polished, cleaned, articulated with copper wire like the skeleton of an anatomical cabinet: that would be too ornamental for the vulgar crowd. He appears as a dead body in a more or less advanced state of decomposition, with all the horrid secrets of the ...
— Seeing Europe with Famous Authors, Volume V (of X) • Various

... peculiarities; I often catch a look of wondering speculation in his eye when it turns upon me. It is all because I will not let him lay out flower-beds in the usual way, and make the bit of ground in front of the house really neat and ornamental. At first he put it down to meanness, but he knows by now that that cannot be the explanation. That I really prefer a garden so poor and plain that every cottager would be ashamed of it, he cannot bring himself to believe, and of course I have long since given up trying to explain myself. ...
— The Private Papers of Henry Ryecroft • George Gissing

... stern and striking effect. Over the Lodge, upon a dial was inscribed the appropriate motto, "Venio sicut fur." The Gate, which crossed Newgate Street, had a wide arch for carriages, and a postern, on the north side, for foot-passengers. Its architecture was richly ornamental, and resembled the style of a triumphal entrance to a capital, rather than a dungeon having battlements and hexagonal towers, and being adorned on the western side with a triple range of pilasters of the Tuscan order, ...
— Jack Sheppard - A Romance • William Harrison Ainsworth

... Is she less gifted with strength of intellect, with calmness, or comprehensive understanding than man, employ the greater efforts to supply this defect. Let the solid preponderate over the merely ornamental. Plant not the pliant osier, but the firmer elm. Instil principles of severe reasoning, and form habits of connected thought. Is she rich in imagination? Madam de Stael tells us she is, that this is ...
— The Young Maiden • A. B. (Artemas Bowers) Muzzey

... mustache had developed itself; and, though it presented nothing remarkable, it gave brilliant promise of soon becoming all that its ambitious owner could possibly desire, especially as he was a reasonable person, and had no taste for monstrosities. He had paid proper attention to this ornamental appendage, which is so indispensable to the making-up of a soldier; and the result, if not entirely satisfactory, was ...
— The Young Lieutenant - or, The Adventures of an Army Officer • Oliver Optic

... thereabouts. He says he is a nearer relation, but I know much more about it than he does. If you want an ornamental bishop with good legs for gaiters, and a portly figure for an apron, Dr Pendle's the man. But as a God-fearing priest' (with a groan), 'a simple worshipper' (groan) 'and a lowly, repentant sinner' (groan), 'he ...
— The Bishop's Secret • Fergus Hume

... horticulturist, gardener, florist; agricultor^, agriculturist; yeoman, farmer, cultivator, tiller of the soil, woodcutter, backwoodsman; granger, habitat, vigneron^, viticulturist; Triptolemus. field, meadow, garden; botanic garden^, winter garden, ornamental garden, flower garden, kitchen garden, market garden, hop garden; nursery; green house, hot house; conservatory, bed, border, seed plot; grassplot^, grassplat^, lawn; park &c (pleasure ground) 840; parterre, shrubbery, plantation, avenue, arboretum, pinery^, pinetum^, ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget

... tombs—flat, sturdy, short stones, each bearing a semblance, at least, of some short Hebraic epitaph, unmoved through heaven knows how many centuries! apparently immovable; the place, in this respect, being very unlike our more ornamental cemeteries. On his right was the Mount of Olives; a mount still of olives, sprinkled over with olive-trees quite sufficiently to make it properly so called, even to this day. Then he passed by the garden of Gethsemane, ...
— The Bertrams • Anthony Trollope

... anatto, of vast size, with its ornamental coat of mail, and broad large scales margined with bright red, peoples the waters in immense numbers. It is most frequently caught by the native fishermen; and when salted, forms the staple food of all classes on the banks of the Lower Amazon. It swims at great speed, and attains ...
— The Western World - Picturesque Sketches of Nature and Natural History in North - and South America • W.H.G. Kingston

... but the very summit, where they stopped. Tricksey-Wee and Buffy-Bob could see above them a great globe of feathers, that finished off the mountain like an ornamental knob. ...
— The Light Princess and Other Fairy Stories • George MacDonald

... with an unfriendly criticism of life as it goes on in our societies; it is there that he best displays the freshness and surprising trenchancy of his intellect; it is there that his style becomes plain and vigorous, and therefore, according to his own formula, ornamental. Yet he did not care to follow this vein singly, but must drop into it by the way in books of a different purport. "Walden, or Life in the Woods"; "A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers"; "The Maine Woods,"—such ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 3 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... masterful, and picturesquely flamboyant, without even an occasional betrayal of the bitterness which makes the one attribute savour of insolence, and the other of oppression, his wife had regarded him as exactly fulfilling the part for which he had obviously been cast—of a good-humoured, ornamental, domestic tyrant, to be openly obeyed and covertly coerced. A husband who assisted her acquisition of social laurels; who gave her more money than she asked for; who designed for her the most elaborate and enviable dresses—yes, her mother ...
— A Comedy of Masks - A Novel • Ernest Dowson and Arthur Moore

... the "White House." The chief public offices and halls for the assembly of congress are contained in one building known as the Capitol. It stands on a hill, and is said to be the finest building in the Union. It is surrounded by ornamental grounds, ...
— Peter Parley's Tales About America and Australia • Samuel Griswold Goodrich

... fillets of the inner bark of a tree wound spirally round each curl, radiate from the head in all directions. Some have it hanging all round the shoulders in large masses; others shave it off altogether. Many shave part of it into ornamental figures, in which the fancy of the barber crops out conspicuously. About as many dandies run to seed among the blacks as among the whites. The Man ganja adorn their bodies extravagantly, wearing rings on their fingers and thumbs, besides throatlets, bracelets, and anklets ...
— A Popular Account of Dr. Livingstone's Expedition to the Zambesi and Its Tributaries • David Livingstone

... Nigel observed that the group of orchids was abundant, but a large proportion of the species had small inconspicuous flowers. Some, however, had large clusters of yellow flowers which had a very ornamental effect on the sombre forest. But, although the exceptions were striking, he found that in Borneo, as elsewhere, flowers were scarcer than he had expected in an equatorial forest. There were, however, more than enough of striking and surprising ...
— Blown to Bits - The Lonely Man of Rakata, the Malay Archipelago • R.M. Ballantyne

... added to the house by the same occupant, who has, however, religiously preserved all the old rooms, which still exhibit the "fittings" that existed in Cowley's time. The bed-chambers are wainscotted with oaken panels. The staircase is a very solid structure, with ornamental balusters, leading toward the small study in which the poet wrote,—a little back room, about five feet wide, looking upon the garden. It may be distinguished in our back view of the house, by a figure placed at the window. Cowley ended his life in this house ...
— The International Monthly Magazine - Volume V - No II • Various

... Burbank, and no one doubts that if his method could be extended the whole nation would benefit in an economic way. Yet Burbank has been unable to teach the rest of us how to apply his shrewd "common-sense" and his keen intuition to the improvement of useful and ornamental plants. It was necessary for scientists to study what he had done in order to make available for the whole world those principles that make his practice really productive of desirable results. In the same way it is well for every parent and every teacher—everyone who ...
— Your Child: Today and Tomorrow • Sidonie Matzner Gruenberg

... die or printing conical rolls in sections, and securing them to the staves so as to change their position for making a greater variety of ornamental designs for graining and ornamenting hollow ware, substantially as and for the purposes ...
— Scientific American, Vol. 17, No. 26 December 28, 1867 • Various

... her fingers; the widow looked at the stranger from under her eyelashes, and her voice thrilled through him till he began to think of magnolias and mocking-birds and other ornamental things which soften a man's feelings down to the fluffiness ...
— Phemie Frost's Experiences • Ann S. Stephens

... thousand times more useful, Sally. I don't pretend to compare with you in the useful arts, and I am only a bungler in ornamental ones. Sally, I feel like a useless little creature. If I could go round as you can, and do business, and make bargains, and push ahead in the world, I should feel that I was good for something; but somehow ...
— The Pearl of Orr's Island - A Story of the Coast of Maine • Harriet Beecher Stowe

... know what business you've come upon, and we can settle it in five minutes after the moon's well up. I'll just agree to everything you and the other two trustees want. Lord knows why they ever put me on the school board. Maybe it's because I'm so ornamental. They wanted one ...
— Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1909 to 1922 • Lucy Maud Montgomery

... writing an article on sea-bathing, for instance, and have come to the sentence which begins: "In the well-remembered words of Coleridge, perhaps almost too familiar to be quoted"—and then one may have to look them up. On these occasions a library is not only ornamental but useful. But do not let us be ashamed that we find it ornamental. Indeed, the more I survey it, the more I feel that my library is sufficiently ornamental as it stands. Any reassembling of the books might spoil the colour-scheme. Baedeker's ...
— Not that it Matters • A. A. Milne

... husbandman, horticulturist, gardener, florist; agricultor[obs3], agriculturist; yeoman, farmer, cultivator, tiller of the soil, woodcutter, backwoodsman; granger, habitat, vigneron[obs3], viticulturist; Triptolemus. field, meadow, garden; botanic garden[obs3], winter garden, ornamental garden, flower garden, kitchen garden, market garden, hop garden; nursery; green house, hot house; conservatory, bed, border, seed plot; grassplot[obs3], grassplat[obs3], lawn; park &c. (pleasure ground) 840; parterre, shrubbery, plantation, avenue, arboretum, pinery[obs3], ...
— Roget's Thesaurus

... Cape Horn, they entered the Pacific Ocean, and on reaching the north-west coast, anchored in some of the bays and harbors north of Columbia River. They were visited by canoes from the shore, and traffic commenced. The natives exchanged their furs for articles useful or ornamental. The ship went from port to port until a cargo of furs was obtained, and then sailed for Canton, and disposed of them to the Chinese for silks and teas. After an absence of a couple of years the ship would return ...
— Jack in the Forecastle • John Sherburne Sleeper

... And in time, afterwards, there were made therein many chapels and other very rich ornaments, whereof there is no need to discourse further, since this is enough on this subject for the present, and above all because everyone can see how much of the useful, the ornamental, and the beautiful has been added to this beginning of Maestro Jacopo's by many supreme Pontiffs, Cardinals, Princes, and other people of ...
— Lives of the Most Eminent Painters Sculptors and Architects - Volume 1, Cimabue to Agnolo Gaddi • Giorgio Vasari

... plain holes in belly, obliquely. Ornamental back. Flat head. Pegs turned with key from behind. 12 strings—viz., 1 single (treble), 4 doubles, 1 single, and 2 singles off ...
— Shakespeare and Music - With Illustrations from the Music of the 16th and 17th centuries • Edward W. Naylor

... angles to the back part. The woman wears no hat as a general rule, but in lieu thereof adorns her head with a bamboo comb, at times inlaid with mother-of-pearl, at others covered with a lamina of beaten silver, but nearly always ornamented with decorative incisions. A pair of ear plugs with ornamental metal laminae are placed in the enlarged ...
— The Manbos of Mindano - Memoirs of the National Academy of Sciences, Volume XXIII, First Memoir • John M. Garvan

... upon the parapet of the church, which are highly ornamental, were fixed at the same time with those of the ...
— An History of Birmingham (1783) • William Hutton

... perfectly clear, let us see what our machinery of government would be, if it were really like the English. The presence or absence of the crowned head makes no essential difference; it is only a kind of ornamental cupola. Suppose for a moment the presidency abolished, or reduced to the political nullity of the crown in England; and postpone for a moment the consideration of the Senate. Suppose that in our House of Representatives the committee of ways ...
— The Critical Period of American History • John Fiske

... "willing to submit himself to the same process of examination? If the work of retraction were to begin he would have a lot to do." And then came the passage which has already passed into Parliamentary history. "If we are to stand in white sheets, my right hon. friend would have to wear that ornamental garment standing in a very ...
— Sketches In The House (1893) • T. P. O'Connor

... house, and its high ceiling was a noticeable feature. The furniture had all been made at the factory; the floor-mats were woven there; and one gazing around him might well have wondered to what useful or ornamental purpose the green willows growing everywhere in Spenersberg Valley might not be applied. The very pictures hanging on the wall—engraved likenesses of the great masters Mozart and Beethoven—had their frames of well-woven willow twigs; and the rack which held the books and sheets of music was ornamented ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 11, - No. 22, January, 1873 • Various

... dependent and insolvent; living, perhaps, on the not too gracious bounty of moneyed relatives. But how came "the Wanderer" into her circle? Was it by the humid vehicle of AEsthetic Tea, or by the arid one of mere Business? Was it on the hand of Herr Towgood; or of the Gnadige Frau, who, as an ornamental Artist, might sometimes like to promote flirtation, especially for young cynical Nondescripts? To all appearance, it was chiefly by Accident, and the grace ...
— Sartor Resartus - The Life and Opinions of Herr Teufelsdrockh • Thomas Carlyle

... but, when he died, this edifice was found to be all facade and no foundation, and Freddie inherited nothing but debts. He had been expensively educated for a career as an Ornament of Society, but he found that career cut short, for Society suddenly ceased to find him ornamental. I suppose there were too many ...
— The Gloved Hand • Burton E. Stevenson

... the bridge on both sides, but it has been broken down. The ornamental parts of these massive structures seem to have been the only portions the invading vandals of the ...
— The English Governess At The Siamese Court • Anna Harriette Leonowens

... containing at its base some dozen or fifteen single layer boxes of choice apples and on its sides something like twenty bushels of apples put on in varying shades of red and green with a handsome ornamental plant crowning the whole. The seal of the society decorated with national colors appears upon the front. The picture taken of this monument is shown as a frontispiece of this number. It is incomplete in that the photographer cut off both ends of it, which ...
— Trees, Fruits and Flowers of Minnesota, 1916 • Various

... should work and make their sons work, if only because an idle class was both out of place in a republic and conducive to unrest in the masses, it was quite otherwise with women. They were for men to shelter, and it was their sole duty to be useful in the home, and, wherever possible, ornamental in public. Nor had he the least faith in ...
— The Avalanche • Gertrude Franklin Horn Atherton

... and covering of terrestrial Animals, I shall next add an Observation I made on the skin and Scales of a Soal, a small Fish, commonly enough known; and here in Fishes, as well as other Animals, Nature follows its usual method, framing all parts so, as that they are both usefull and ornamental in all its composures, mingling utile and dulce together; and both these designs it seems to follow, though our unassisted senses are not able to peceive them: This is not onely manifest in the covering of this Fish, but in multitudes of others, ...
— Micrographia • Robert Hooke

... learn to dignify and glorify common labor and put brains and skill into the common occupations of life; shall prosper in proportion as we learn to draw the line between the superficial and the substantial, the ornamental gewgaws of life and the useful. No race can prosper till it learns that there is as much dignity in tilling a field as in writing a poem. It is at the bottom of life we must begin, and not at the top. Nor should we permit our grievances to ...
— Masterpieces of Negro Eloquence - The Best Speeches Delivered by the Negro from the days of - Slavery to the Present Time • Various

... generally on the side—though occasionally on the back—on a board of wood, or wrapped in a mat of reeds or palm fibers, and covered with a tub-shaped clay dish. On the dish there was frequently an ornamental design, but beyond this, there was no attempt at decoration. The body was frequently pressed together in order to be brought within the compass of the dish. Sometimes, the knees were pulled up or the body placed in a semi-sitting posture, and there are indications that the ...
— The Religion of Babylonia and Assyria • Morris Jastrow

... Fr. herce harrow, portcullis. In early English the word is used in the sense of 'harrow' and also of 'triangle,' in reference to the shape of the harrow. By-and-by it came to be used variously for 'bier,' 'funeral carriage,' ornamental canopy with lighted candles over the coffins of notable people during the funeral ceremony, the permanent framework over a tomb, and even the tomb itself. Cp. Spenser's Shep. Cal., ...
— Marmion • Sir Walter Scott

... the Eskimo women are of the useful rather than the ornamental kind. The handling of the native lamp, for instance, requires great skill. If the lamp is well trimmed, it is as clear and smokeless as our own lamps; if it is neglected, it smokes and smells vilely. As the Eskimos are not highly romantic, a ...
— The North Pole - Its Discovery in 1909 under the auspices of the Peary Arctic Club • Robert E. Peary

... for the male, no pleasure in his society; she only tolerates him as a necessary evil, and, if he is killed, goes in quest of another in the most business-like manner, as you would go for the plumber or the glazier. In most cases the male is the ornamental partner in the firm, and contributes little of the working capital. There seems to be more equality of the sexes among the woodpeckers, wrens, and swallows; while the contrast is greatest, perhaps, in the bobolink family, where the courting ...
— Wake-Robin • John Burroughs

... morning visit to the family at the great house,—another fine place, commanding another fine sweep of country. The park, studded with old trees, and sinking gently into a valley, rich in wood and water, is in the best style of ornamental landscape, though more according to the common routine of gentlemen's seats than the singularly original place which we have just left. There is, however, one distinctive beauty in the grounds of the great house;—the magnificent firs which ...
— Our Village • Mary Russell Mitford

... three or four of them. When daylight came, they retrieved them with a boat, but were dismayed at finding that these birds were neither mallards, nor porchards, nor any known form of British duck; their colouring, too, seemed strangely brilliant. Then they remembered the neighbouring Zoo, with its ornamental ponds covered with rare imported and exotic waterfowl, and they realised what they had done. It is quite possible that they had killed some unique specimens, imported at fabulous cost from Central Africa, or from the heart of the Australian ...
— The Days Before Yesterday • Lord Frederick Hamilton

... performance in Berlin. He relates two pleasing incidents in his "Autobiography." He had been invited to a select dinner party given at the royal palace, and between the king and Spohr, who was seated opposite, there intervened an ornamental centerpiece of considerable height in the shape of a flower vase. This greatly interfered with the enjoyment by the king of Spohr's conversation. At last his Majesty, growing impatient, removed ...
— Great Violinists And Pianists • George T. Ferris

... streets, for a good many people lived there; but when the procession had passed through these it came upon a broad plain covered with gardens and watered by many pretty brooks that flowed through it. There were paths through these gardens, and over some of the brooks were ornamental ...
— Dorothy and the Wizard in Oz • L. Frank Baum.

... opened upon a lawn covered with orange, magnolia, and other ornamental trees. The house was low on the ground, and it was not more than three feet from the window-sill to the lawn. Without explaining any thing, Captain Passford took his daughter's trunk, carried it to the window, and then dropped ...
— Taken by the Enemy • Oliver Optic

... I scarcely know even their names. I entertain them at your request. Why should I be ashamed of my oilskins? They are in accord with the life I live here. I make no pretence, you see, Cecil," he added, with a faintly amused smile, "at being an ornamental member of Society." ...
— Jeanne of the Marshes • E. Phillips Oppenheim

... whom the pressure of civilization helps to suppress all natural expression of feeling, and the disturbance of so many cross rhythms tends to obliterate the primary pulsations. The rhythm is an essential part of the work, and not a mere ornamental adjunct; people sing, not to "keep their spirits up," but to help on the work; until the workman has acquired the rhythm he works imperfectly, and tires very quickly. Those forms of work which do not admit rhythm, such as adding figures, copying MSS., etc., are the most fatiguing. ...
— Wagner's Tristan und Isolde • George Ainslie Hight

... education, domestic and academic and purely ornamental, as Miss Eliza termed the music, had been gained at home. Instruction in the "principal branches," again Miss Eliza's name, had been received mostly from Miss Asenath. Geography she had taught her niece with the aid of the same faded globe that had fixed the shape of the world and the ...
— The Heart of Arethusa • Francis Barton Fox

... in the ornamental parts, for I had an uncommon natural genius for many things, and soon topped in accomplishments most of the persons around me. I had a quick ear and a fine voice, which my mother cultivated to the best of her power, and she ...
— Barry Lyndon • William Makepeace Thackeray

... passed into a plain open, court coolly shaded, having in the centre a jet of water which arose and fell into a bowl of alabaster. The water overflowing the bowl was caught again in a circular basin which, besides the ornamental carving on the edge and outside, furnished an ample pool for the gold fish ...
— The Prince of India - Or - Why Constantinople Fell - Volume 1 • Lew. Wallace

... the holes were all dug, Bob got his sketch, showing the placing of the fence posts and the location of the two gates at the entrance to the property; also sketches for two extra large posts, one on each side of the driveway. These posts were ornamental and made specially strong by steel rods, not only to support the gates, but with two bolts placed near the top for attaching a sign, for it had been decided that there should be a sign, cast in concrete for permanency, and painted white with deep blue letters and border. The sign was to be fifteen ...
— Hidden Treasure • John Thomas Simpson

... which became the inferior apartments of a palace. She came at last to a room which she took to be the butler's office, where there were dressers with a great array of costly Venetian glass, and a great many pieces of silver—cups, tankards, salvers, and other ornamental plate—in presses behind glazed doors. One of the glass panels had been broken, and the shelves ...
— London Pride - Or When the World Was Younger • M. E. Braddon

... their maintenance, are easily allowed to pass their time, and take their degrees, with little or no improvement; than which there cannot well be a greater absurdity. For, if no advancement of knowledge can be had from those places, the time there spent is at best utterly lost, because every ornamental part of education is better taught elsewhere: And as for keeping youths out of harm's way, I doubt, where so many of them are got together, at full liberty of doing what they please, it will not answer the end. But, whatever abuses, corruptions, or deviations from statutes, have crept into ...
— The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, Vol. III.: Swift's Writings on Religion and the Church, Vol. I. • Jonathan Swift

... in the full bloom of ornamental sorrow. A very shallow crape bonnet, frilled and froth-like, allowed the parted raven hair to show its glossy smoothness. A jet pin heaved upon her bosom with every sigh of memory, or emotion of unknown origin. Jet bracelets shone with every movement of her slender hands, cased in ...
— Atlantic Monthly Volume 6, No. 37, November, 1860 • Various

... a very different class of apple-trees, grown only for ornament and usually known as "flowering apples." They are mostly native in China and Japan. They are small trees, or even almost bushes, with profuse handsome flowers and some of them with very ornamental little fruits. They have come to this country largely from Japan where they are grown for decoration, as the cherries of Japan are grown not for fruit but for their flowers, being of very different species from the cherries of Europe ...
— The Apple-Tree - The Open Country Books—No. 1 • L. H. Bailey

... injures the value of the article; to avoid which the bundles are exposed and spread about now and then in the open air. This operation is called ventilating by the planters, and is continued until there is no apparent heat in the heaps. The plant is quite ornamental, and its blossoms form a pleasing feature in a garden ...
— An Englishman's Travels in America - His Observations Of Life And Manners In The Free And Slave States • John Benwell

... twenty regiments only, of which scarce a dozen had been in active service. "If a volunteer organization is fit to decide the great wars of the nation, is it not ridiculous to keep an expensive organization of regulars for the petty contests with Indians or for an ornamental appendage to the State in peace?" The thing to be aimed at seemed to me to be to have a system flexible enough to provide for the increase of the army to any size required, without losing any of the advantage of character ...
— Military Reminiscences of the Civil War V1 • Jacob Dolson Cox

... myself a Butterfly from choice. I only do it because I'm trying to be honest, and I think that it's just about what I am. But do we really know what a butterfly is? Have we given that ornamental (though I say it—that shouldn't) and light-minded (though I say it with shame) and light-hearted (though the very lightest of hearts must weigh something, you know) insect a square deal? I confess that only a light-hearted ...
— We Three • Gouverneur Morris

... Abelia.—Very ornamental evergreen shrubs, bearing tubular, funnel-shaped flowers. They succeed in any ordinary soil if the situation is warm and sheltered, and are readily raised by cuttings. Height, ...
— Gardening for the Million • Alfred Pink

... of blossoms as in our villages. You never see the cottager at work among his roses; once his necessary labours are over, he smokes and talks to his neighbours: to grow flowers for aesthetic reasons were too ornamental, too unproductive a hobby. AEsthetically the Dutch are dead, or are alive only in the matter of green paint, which they use with such charming effect on their houses, their mills and their boats. What is pretty is old—as indeed is the case in our own country, ...
— A Wanderer in Holland • E. V. Lucas

... demeanor invited the Governor to assume the responsibility. His Excellency was manifestly shirking. He looked over his shoulder in the direction of the fireplace, as if he felt an impulse to arm himself with the ornamental poker and tongs. ...
— All-Wool Morrison • Holman Day

... "father of the family" was about to be extended over a new and vast area. A whole continent was to be "fenced around," and "olive-trees," and "fig-trees," and all plants useful and ornamental, were destined to flourish in that vast garden to the end of time. The great and eternal Father was, by his providence, directing the mighty operation from above, and marking the various points of the compass to which the floating germs were to be wafted. He knew that he ...
— Irish Race in the Past and the Present • Aug. J. Thebaud

... place to undulating hills; no pleasure-ground could have been more tastefully laid out than the country to the right, and the various groups of trees, disposed upon the sides of the elevations that bounded the western side of the valley, were most ornamental. On the opposite side, the country was less inviting, and the hills were bleak and bare. At length a clear horizon appeared to the south, the direction in which the river was flowing; Captain Sturt landed to survey the country, and beneath him was the great object of his ...
— Australia, its history and present condition • William Pridden

... the main street of the village, with its flagstone sidewalk overhung by a lofty canopy of elm-boughs. Here, for the space of a block, was concentrated such fashionable elegance of mansions and ornamental lawns as Octavius had to offer; and it was presented with the irregularity so characteristic of our restless civilization. Two or three of the houses survived untouched from the earlier days—prim, decorous structures, each with its gabled centre and lower wings, each with ...
— The Damnation of Theron Ware • Harold Frederic

... took a look at the threshing-floor, the barn, the corn-stacks, the outhouses, the windmill, the cattle-shed, the vegetables, and the hempfields; everything was, as a fact, in excellent order; only the dejected faces of the peasants rather puzzled me. Sofron had had an eye to the ornamental as well as the useful; he had planted all the ditches with willows, between the stacks he had made little paths to the threshing-floor and strewn them with fine sand; on the windmill he had constructed a weathercock of the shape of a bear with his jaws open and a red tongue sticking ...
— A Sportsman's Sketches - Works of Ivan Turgenev, Vol. I • Ivan Turgenev

... S. Onofrio again recalls his wooden statue of S. Jerome in Faenza, and finally the motive of the cut flowers in glasses is borrowed from the triptych of Hugo van der Goes in the Gallery of Santa Maria Nuova, Florence. The ornamental accessories are singularly fine and careful in finish, and it would seem as though Signorelli had been inspired in this, not only by the great tryptych, but also by the followers of the Paduan Squarcione. In the last chapter I have pointed out the extreme realism with which the ...
— Luca Signorelli • Maud Cruttwell

... he answered. "I was only figuring that it's a bit too ornamental for its present purpose. I see the girth has been broken and mended—mended with a doubtful piece of string. Why wasn't it sent to the saddler t' be properly fixed up? I've half a notion ter chuck it right away and ride ...
— Kiddie the Scout • Robert Leighton

... paved with painted bricks—a tessellated pavement. A fountain, with jet and ornamental basin, occupies its centre; and several trees, well trimmed, stand in large vessels, so that their roots may not injure the pavement. Around this court you see the doors of the different apartments, some of them glazed and tastefully curtained. ...
— The White Chief - A Legend of Northern Mexico • Mayne Reid

... for a fight, a card-party, or a hurdle jumping,—but entirely too Quixotic for the sober requirements of Yankee warfare. When anything absurd, forlorn, or desperate was to be attempted, the Irish brigade was called upon. But, ordinarily, they were regarded, as a party of mad fellows, more ornamental than useful, and entirely too clannish and factious to be entrusted with power. Meagher himself seemed to be less erratic than his subordinates; for he had married a New York lady, and had learned, by observation, the superiority of the pelfish, plodding native before his own fitful, ...
— Campaigns of a Non-Combatant, - and His Romaunt Abroad During the War • George Alfred Townsend

... locations I have yet seen in the country so destitute of wood about them? A man seems to think it his duty to extirpate everything that grows higher than a pumpkin; one would imagine it ought to be easy enough to leave clumps of trees in picturesque spots, so as to produce the effect of the ornamental plantations at home. Now I do not mean exclusively the lowest grade of settlers, for of course from them so much taste was not to be expected; but gentlemen farmers ...
— Cedar Creek - From the Shanty to the Settlement • Elizabeth Hely Walshe

... with pathetic innocence, many of them with nothing on but an old shirt, and cotton trousers rolled up to the knees. Some had red shirts and blue trousers, others considered that a shirt was an effective outer garment. Some wore highly ornamental, dandified shirts, and trousers tucked into high, rusty, mud-covered boots. A few young men were in white straw hats, white shirts, and white trousers, with crimson leis round their hats and throats. Some had diggers' scarves round their waists; ...
— The Hawaiian Archipelago • Isabella L. Bird

... has been alluded to in a former page. Here we have only to regard the plant in its ornamental character, as an occupant of the ...
— The Culture of Vegetables and Flowers From Seeds and Roots, 16th Edition • Sutton and Sons

... miles, which was accomplished in a short time by the spirited horses, the carriage entered, through an ornamental gate, upon a smooth driveway, which led up to a handsome mansion, of large size, with a veranda stretching ...
— Try and Trust • Horatio Alger

... of Calistoga: Kelmar, Mrs. Kelmar, a friend of theirs whom we named Abramina, her little daughter, my wife, myself, and, stowed away behind us, a cluster of ship's coffee-kettles. These last were highly ornamental in the sheen of their bright tin, but I could invent no reason for their presence. Our carriageful reckoned up, as near as we could get at it, some three hundred years to the six of us. Four of the six, besides, ...
— The Silverado Squatters • Robert Louis Stevenson

... commemorative monuments (usually rough-hewn slabs or boulders, and in a few cases well-shaped crosses) of early Christian date found in various parts of the British Isles, bearing lettered and symbolic inscriptions of a rude sort and ornamental designs resembling those found on Celtic MSS. of the Gospels; lettered inscriptions are in Latin, OGAM (q. v.), and Scandinavian and Anglican runes, while some are uninscribed; usually found near ancient ecclesiastical sites, and their date is approximately fixed according ...
— The Nuttall Encyclopaedia - Being a Concise and Comprehensive Dictionary of General Knowledge • Edited by Rev. James Wood

... carried away by some of those who had attacked our village, and that she must have been taken to Erivan, as the nearest market for slaves, for such was no doubt the purpose for which she had been seized. My sword, pistols, and gun, which had formed part of the ornamental furniture of my bridal chamber, were found buried in its ruins, and with these for my protection, and with some pieces of silver in my purse, I bid adieu to Gavmishlu, making a vow never to return until I ...
— The Adventures of Hajji Baba of Ispahan • James Morier

... instead of butter. Home baking is strenuously suggested. It is shown how reduction in personal and household expenditure can be effected, for example, in the laundry by using curtains and linen that can be washed in the house. A special appeal to dispense with starched and ornamental lingerie is made. In these and many other ways the style of living is simplified so that the amount of domestic service in every home is greatly cut down and much labour set free for war work ...
— The War After the War • Isaac Frederick Marcosson

... greater variability of the males—as shown in more brilliant colors, ornamental feathers, scent-pouches, the power of music, spurs, larger canines and claws, horns, antlers, tusks, dewlaps, manes, crests, beards, etc.—as due to the operation of sexual selection, meaning by this "the advantage which certain individuals have over others of the same sex and species ...
— Sex and Society • William I. Thomas

... small imported type and is purchased from Bisya traders. As these gongs, when new, have several ornamental triangular figures on the front, the Manbo is taught to value them at as many pesos minus one as the gong has figures. This gives a gong that cost originally about 2 pesos a value ...
— The Manbos of Mindano - Memoirs of the National Academy of Sciences, Volume XXIII, First Memoir • John M. Garvan

... and dishevelled after her journey of exploration, Girdlestone was standing by the door to receive her with a sardonic smile upon his thin lips. "How do you like the grounds, then?" he asked, with, the nearest approach to hilarity which she had ever heard from him. "And the ornamental fencing? and the lodge-keeper? How did ...
— The Firm of Girdlestone • Arthur Conan Doyle

... shay, while Mary was riding Lord Keppel in the rear; and the mind of the tanner was as tough as good oak bark. His premises had been intruded upon—the property which he had bought with his own money saved by years of honest trade, his private garden, his ornamental bower, his wife's own pleasure-plot, at a sacred moment invaded, trampled, and outraged by a scurvy preventive-man and his low crew. The first thing he had done to the prostrate Carroway was to lay hold of him by the collar, and shake his fist at him and demand his warrant—a magistrate's warrant, ...
— Mary Anerley • R. D. Blackmore

... seventeenth century were less remarkable for the cultivation of useful or ornamental plants than for the formal arrangement of their walks, arbours, parterres, and hedges. Amongst the various decorations introduced were jets d'eau, or fountains, artificial cascades, columns, statues, grottoes, rock-work, mazes or labyrinths, terraces communicating with each other by ...
— The Natural History of Wiltshire • John Aubrey

... isn't such a thing—in the course of Nature. But you shelter from Nature in houses, you protect yourselves by clothes that are useful instead of being ornamental, you wash—with such abstersive chemicals as soap for example—and above all you consult doctors." He approved himself with a chuckle. "Have you ever found anyone seriously ill without doctors and medicine ...
— A Modern Utopia • H. G. Wells

... hardly be said to be fit to be so. It is ugly, and straight, and small. There is a garden attached to the house, half in front of it and half behind; but this garden, like the rest of the parish, is by no means ornamental, though sufficiently useful. It produces cabbages, but no trees: potatoes of, I believe, an excellent description, but hardly any flowers, and nothing worthy of the name of a shrub. Indeed the whole parish of Hogglestock should have been in the adjoining ...
— Framley Parsonage • Anthony Trollope

... number of letters addressed to Sir Francis Clavering, Bart., which found their way to his hall-table, was quite remarkable. The French cook sent in his account to my lady; the tradesmen who supplied her ladyship's table, and Messrs. Finer and Gimcrack, the mercers and ornamental dealers, and Madame Crinoline, the eminent milliner, also forwarded their little bills to her ladyship, in company with Miss Amory's private, and by no means inconsiderable, account at ...
— The History of Pendennis • William Makepeace Thackeray

... are doing, Reade," he said at last. "Your line measurements are right, and your angles tally faultlessly, I'm glad I kept you back today. You can help me here even more than in the field. Tomorrow, however, I shall have to keep Rice back. He's our ornamental draughtsman, and puts in the fine, flowery work on our maps. Here's ...
— The Young Engineers in Colorado • H. Irving Hancock

... free from the contagion of their frantic delusions, their savage manners, their ludicrous jargon, their scorn of science, and their aversion to pleasure. Hating tyranny with a perfect hatred, he had nevertheless all the estimable and ornamental qualities which were almost entirely monopolized by the party of the tyrant. There was none who had a stronger sense of the value of literature, a finer relish for every elegant amusement, or a more chivalrous delicacy of honor and love. Though his opinions were democratic, his tastes and his ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume XIII • John Lord

... ornamental insects, sober and industrious, ugly, mischievous, destructive, all have revelled—and the butterfly brings the art of inconsequent revelling to the acme of perfection—in the comparatively dry air, in the glowing skies, and in the succession ...
— My Tropic Isle • E J Banfield

... In Rome Phoebicius and his young wife met again; there many admired the beautiful woman, and made every effort to obtain her favor, but to him she was only a lightly won, and therefore a lightly valued, possession; nay, ere long no more than a burden, ornamental no doubt but troublesome to guard. When presently his handsome wife attracted the notice of the legate, he endeavored to gain profit and advancement through her, but Sirona had rebuffed Quintillus with such insulting disrespect, that his ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers

... low, ornamental stone fence, some three feet high, and stood there for a moment, glancing about him. This was Stangeist's house—he could just make out the building as it loomed up a shadowy, irregular shape, perhaps two hundred yards ...
— The Adventures of Jimmie Dale • Frank L. Packard

... hall of the university, where I was to receive the degree of LL.D. The ceremony was not unlike that at Cambridge, but had one peculiar feature: the separate special investment of the candidate with the hood, which Johnson defines as "an ornamental fold which hangs down the back of a graduate." There were great numbers of students present, and they showed the same exuberance of spirits as that which had forced me to withdraw from the urgent calls at Cambridge. The cries, if possible, were still louder and ...
— Our Hundred Days in Europe • Oliver Wendell Holmes

... would desert the royal cause. No words can exaggerate the self-abnegation of those men. I have seen a supper party under my father's roof where our guests were two fencing-masters, three professors of language, one ornamental gardener, and one translator of books, who held his hand in the front of his coat to conceal a rent in the lapel. But these eight men were of the highest nobility of France, who might have had what they chose to ask if they ...
— Uncle Bernac - A Memory of the Empire • Arthur Conan Doyle

... Winkelmann on this subject is inimitable. He says, that "beauty with the ancients was the tongue on the balance of expression," and in this sense the groups of Niobe and Laocon are master- pieces; the one in the sublime and severe; the other in the studied and ornamental style. ...
— Lectures on Dramatic Art - and Literature • August Wilhelm Schlegel trans John Black

... Gothic (what I call grocer's Gothic, for it always reminds me of brown sugar and arrowroot), common around watering-places; small gables sticking out everywhere, till it looks like a cluster of dog-kennels; walls faced with ornamental tiles and lath and plaster; small shrubberies round, and a name on the gate. There were two especially beautiful ones. The General had one and we had the other. Ours was quite new. There was no furniture in it; but this, as we had been so long without it, we did not miss. But everything ...
— With Rimington • L. March Phillipps

... constructive skill, are due to Huguet his successor, who may perhaps have travelled in France and England, and had come back to Portugal with increased knowledge of how to build, but with a rather confused idea of the ornamental detail he had ...
— Portuguese Architecture • Walter Crum Watson

... larger collection. The Roman remains stored here were described as "one of the most comprehensive collections of Roman relics in England," and included ornaments and articles in glass, iron, and bronze. There was also much pottery and tiles; also coins, images, and all kinds of useful and ornamental articles of the time of the Roman Occupation in Britain. Besides self-coloured tiles, there were some that were ornamented, one representing the "Capitoli Wolf," a strange-looking, long-legged animal, with its face inclined towards the spectator, while between its fore and hind ...
— From John O'Groats to Land's End • Robert Naylor and John Naylor

... nature of the garments covering the mummies of the ancient Egyptians has been satisfactorily decided by the microscope. It is very probable that the cultivation of the plant at the beginning of the thirteenth century was carried on purely for the purpose of ornamental gardening, and even when the seventeenth century was fairly well advanced, the Egyptians still ...
— The Story of the Cotton Plant • Frederick Wilkinson

... in the full uniform of Admiral of the United States Navy, of which he was the founder. Cover stamped in red, white and gold on a navy blue silk cloth, showing in beautiful colors the colonial flags and American shield with its thirteen stars and stripes, with Jones' sword in gold as ornamental back stamp. Size, 5-5/8 x 7-7/8; nearly ...
— The Young Oarsmen of Lakeview • Ralph Bonehill

... of future "dash" are made to the girl's parents; and drinking, drumming, and dancing form the ceremony. The following is, or rather I should say was, a fair list of articles paid for a virgin bride. One fine silk hat, one cap, one coat; five to twenty pieces of various cottons, plain and ornamental; two to twenty silk kerchiefs; three to thirty jars of rum; twenty pounds of trade tobacco; two hatchets; two cutlasses; plates and dishes, mugs and glasses, five each; six knives; one kettle; one brass pan; two to three Neptunes (caldrons, the old term being ...
— Two Trips to Gorilla Land and the Cataracts of the Congo Volume 1 • Richard F. Burton

... otherwise, his host of falsities fall without an enemy, self-discomfited and destroyed. But of this he never seems to have had the slightest apprehension. He falls to work, an artificer of fraud, against all the rules of architecture;—he lays his ornamental work first, and his massy foundation at the top of it; and thus his whole building tumbles upon his head. Other people look well to their ground, choose their position, and watch whether they are likely to be surprised there; but he, as if in the ostentation of his heart, builds upon a precipice, ...
— Memoirs of the Life of Rt. Hon. Richard Brinsley Sheridan Vol 2 • Thomas Moore

... black locust for fence posts. This makes no mention of the great variety of native timber trees such as pines, tulip poplar, and others which I try to protect from fires so as to get as great a variety of trees as possible to use for various purposes. I also encourage the growth of ornamental trees and shrubs such as dogwood, redbud, and holly to add beauty to ...
— Northern Nut Growers Association Incorporated 39th Annual Report - at Norris, Tenn. September 13-15 1948 • Various

... French Army reaped no profit from its experience of Marechal de Saxe, and the high theatricalities, ornamental blackguardisms, and ridicule of death and life. In the long-run a graver face would have been of better augury. King Friedrich's soldiers, one observes, on the eve of battle, settle their bits of worldly business; and wind up, many of them, with a hoarse whisper of prayer. Oliver Cromwell's soldiers ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XVI. (of XXI.) - Frederick The Great—The Ten Years of Peace.—1746-1756. • Thomas Carlyle

... to grow vastly businesslike. He must have the full names correctly, ages, birthplaces. Gratton answered for himself and for Gloria, who stood now with her hand on the back of a chair just within the living-room door. Across the room was the fireplace; over it an ornamental mirror. She wondered dully what she looked like; the "bride"! But from where she stood she could see only the reflection of the window across the room, the strip of curtain at the side stirring softly in the evening breeze. ...
— The Everlasting Whisper • Jackson Gregory

... time all standing in a cluster in the porch of the villa, before which stood the tubs with the finny spoil of the fish—pond, on a small paddock of velvet grass, about forty yards square, separated from the high—road by a low ornamental fence of green basket—work, as already mentioned. The firing from the great guns increased, and every now and then I thought I heard a distant sound, as if the reports of the guns above us had been reflected from ...
— Tom Cringle's Log • Michael Scott

... a small stock of French goods—laces, ribbons, and other articles, useful and ornamental—and these they exchanged for the products of the forest. The young men, as a rule, sought business and pleasure in the great woods. Some of them became voyageurs, or boatmen, in the service of the traders. In their light canoes ...
— Story Hour Readings: Seventh Year • E.C. Hartwell

... those grave courts and passages turned to glance curiously at the pretty little widow. She had the air of a person not used to be on foot and unattended—a kind of aerial butterfly air, as of one who belonged to the useless and ornamental class of society; utterly different from the appearance of such humble female pedestrians as were wont to make the courts and alleys of the Temple a short-cut in their toilsome journeys to and fro. Happily a porter appeared, who was able to direct her to Mr. Saltram's chambers, and ...
— Fenton's Quest • M. E. Braddon

... "is more than ornamental—she is extremely useful. From the fact that I may not be privileged to present her to you, I must be careful that she cannot consider herself neglected. And so good ...
— The Double Traitor • E. Phillips Oppenheim

... were struggling vigorously to prevent the current from carrying them below a favorable landing-place. These tall, slender men, with bronzed faces and gleaming eyes, with their round skull-caps, their gaudy jackets and ornamental leggings, bore no small resemblance at a distance to certain of our North American red-skins. Each man had a long knife in his belt, and from experience I can say that a Servian knife is in itself a complete tool-chest. With its one tough and keen blade one may ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, Vol. 22, August, 1878 • Various

... qualities which endow the diamond, the ruby or the topaz with their peculiar attractiveness. The two essential qualities, namely, brilliancy and hardness, are only possessed by certain rare minerals; a brilliancy which makes them unrivaled for ornamental purposes and a hardness which protects them from wear and tear and makes them ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 1082, September 26, 1896 • Various

... numerous canals intersecting the plains were overhung with palms. The eye fell with pleasure upon the tall trunks with their waving plumes, upon the bouquets of broad leaves with their centre of yellow dates; upon the cereals and other useful and ornamental plants growing under their gentle shade, and forming a carpet for the rich and sumptuous vegetation above. Around the villages perched upon their mounds the orchards spread far and wide, carrying the scent of their orange trees into the surrounding country, and presenting, with ...
— A History of Art in Chaldaea & Assyria, v. 1 • Georges Perrot

... while the Indian spoke, as if he felt that a splendid prospect of decorative, ornamental, and other delights was opening up to her. Nootka returned the glance as if she felt that a splendid opportunity of securing such delights for her was ...
— The Walrus Hunters - A Romance of the Realms of Ice • R.M. Ballantyne

... associated with brighter and happier times; for here, on pleasure bent, lingered many of the Kings of France from Louis XI onward, and here in 1675 Madame de Sevigne sojourned, a circumstance which casts about it a literary as well as a romantic glamour. The great well in the courtyard, with its ornamental railing of wrought iron, is quite equal to the famous well of Quentin ...
— Legends & Romances of Brittany • Lewis Spence

... not the ornamentation your friend objects to?[4] If it is, I would observe that there is no evidence of progress in the decorative and ornamental arts during the Ming Dynasty; and even in the Jesuit instruments that part of the work is purely Chinese, excepting in one instrument, which I am persuaded must have ...
— The Travels of Marco Polo Volume 1 • Marco Polo and Rustichello of Pisa

... various ways (split-stitch and couching) in which the sewing down may be done, and the various directions it may take—vertical, horizontal, following the ornamental forms, or ...
— Art in Needlework - A Book about Embroidery • Lewis F. Day

... said he, pointing to a standard bearing at its top an ornamental iron crotch in which a big plantation bell was swung. "Soon's I get my bref from all dat smoke I'll go back an' git ...
— In Old Kentucky • Edward Marshall and Charles T. Dazey

... a card for one of the leading clubs of the city, and if my time had allowed me to avail myself of his courtesy, he would have put me in the way of seeing any or all of the State institutions to the best advantage. The governorship of an American State, let me add, is no ornamental sinecure. This was not only a man in high position, but a very busy man. Is there any other country where a mere letter of introduction is so generously honoured? If so, it is to me ...
— America To-day, Observations and Reflections • William Archer

... again brought forward. I stood firm to my first demand for a long time; when, however, the bookseller's wife complimented me on my production in the highest terms, and said that she discovered therein the germs of genius, which she made no doubt would some day prove ornamental to my native land, I consented to drop my demand to twenty pounds, stipulating, however, that I should not be troubled with the ...
— Lavengro - The Scholar, The Gypsy, The Priest • George Borrow

... the young man with the yellow hair, who was wandering about. "Here are two swell boats!" They all went to look at them and saw two beautiful canoes in a wooden shed; they were as beautifully finished as if they had been ornamental furniture. They hung side by side, like two tall, slender girls, in their narrow shining length, and made one wish to float in them on warm summer mornings and evenings along the flower-covered banks of the river, where the trees dip their branches into the water, ...
— Maupassant Original Short Stories (180), Complete • Guy de Maupassant

... his own. Him Teucer pierced beneath his ear, and pluck'd His weapon home; he fell as falls an ash Which on some mountain visible afar, Hewn from its bottom by the woodman's axe, 220 With all its tender foliage meets the ground So Imbrius fell; loud rang his armor bright With ornamental brass, and Teucer flew To seize his arms, whom hasting to the spoil Hector with his resplendent spear assail'd; 225 He, marking opposite its rapid flight, Declined it narrowly and it pierced the breast, As he advanced to battle, of the son Of Cteatus of the Actorian ...
— The Iliad of Homer - Translated into English Blank Verse • Homer

... to ask her to stay with me, be sure I never would have uttered a persuasive word. But it was asking her to leave gay society, and the incense of admiration, to bury herself in a dull house. Then she was 'ornamental;' I liked to see her about; she was satirical, and pleased me by a little spicy abuse. They called her handsome. She was too small, I think, too slight, perhaps; and then her complexion was almost swarthy. ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol 3 No 3, March 1863 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various

... cousin to the Queen of England, himself a Coburg, finally declined the honour. And Spain could not wait. There was a certain picturesqueness in Prim, the usual ornamental General through whose hands Spain has passed and repassed during the last century. He was a hard man, and the men of Spain, unlike the French, understand a martinet. But Spain could not wait. She must have a king; ...
— The Velvet Glove • Henry Seton Merriman

... had crossed the meadow and came to a rocky height which rose at one side of it; such as one is never very far from in New England. Here there were no dandelions, but Esther eagerly sought for something more ornamental. And she found it. With exclamations of deep delight she endeavoured to dig up a root of bloodroot which lifted its most delicate and dainty blossom a few inches above the dead leaves and moss with which the ...
— A Red Wallflower • Susan Warner

... together. Time and roughing it have made their marks on both of us. Scars mar your polished face, now changed from spotless white to rich autumnal russet; and mine, too, the sun, and wind, and other smoke than that of Orinoko have darkened. You have lost your ornamental silver cap, and amber-mouthed stem, and I my polished two-storied 'tile' and the tail of my coat. But never mind; if we are battered and bruised, and scratched and scarred, and knocked around till the end of time, we will never lose our identity; ...
— Continental Monthly , Vol IV, Issue VI, December 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy. • Various

... appearance, also deadening the sound of moving dishes. Large and neatly folded napkins (ironed without starch), with pieces of bread three or four inches long, placed between the folds, but not to completely conceal it, are laid on each plate. An ornamental centre-piece, or a vase filled with a few rare flowers, is put on the centre of the table, in place of the large table-castor, which has gone into disuse, and is rarely seen now on well-appointed tables. A few choice ...
— The Whitehouse Cookbook (1887) - The Whole Comprising A Comprehensive Cyclopedia Of Information For - The Home • Mrs. F.L. Gillette

... for Making All the Most Useful and Ornamental Knots in Common Use, with Chapters on Splicing, Pointing, Seizing, Serving, etc. Adapted for the use of Travellers, Campers, Yachtsmen, Boy Scouts, and All Others Having to Use or Handle Ropes ...
— Knots, Splices and Rope Work • A. Hyatt Verrill

... clematis.[235] The lentisk, which rarely exceeds the size of a low bush, is conspicuous by its dark evergreen leaves and numerous small red berries;[236] the arbutus—not our species, but a far lighter and more ornamental shrub, the Arbutus andrachne—bears also a bright red fruit, which colours the thickets;[237] the styrax, famous for yielding the gum storax of commerce, grows towards the east end of Carmel, and is a very ...
— History of Phoenicia • George Rawlinson

... under discussion greater attention has been paid to the introduction of European and Asiatic chestnuts than to any other foreign species. The former is a moderately strong grower usually, with a low, rather broad top. The latter makes a small tree chiefly of value for ornamental purposes. Both are grown principally from second generation seedlings, which seem better adapted to American conditions than ...
— Northern Nut Growers Association Report of the Proceedings at the Second Annual Meeting - Ithaca, New York, December 14 and 15, 1911 • Northern Nut Growers Association

... church of the second order of importance, with a charming mouse-colored com- plexion and a pair of fantastic towers. There is a commodious little square in front of it, from which you may look up at its very ornamental face; but for purposes of frank admiration the sides and the rear are perhaps not sufficiently detached. The cathedral of Tours, which is dedicated to Saint Gatianus, took a long time to build. Begun in 1170, it was finished only in the first half of the sixteenth century; but the ages ...
— A Little Tour in France • Henry James

... and left. The long spandrils of the groining are painted with conventional scrollwork of leaves and flowers in a style contemporaneous with the architecture. The monogram and crown of St. Etheldreda are found in several parts of the ornamental design. The total expense of the decoration has ...
— Ely Cathedral • Anonymous

... restive prancing of the horse was not unlike the dancing about of the cockle-shell bark to which I had been condemned for the last ten days. The British Garden I found to be a splendid horticultural developement, containing the choicest fruit-trees of North Africa, with ornamental trees of every shape, and hue, and foliage—all the growth of thirty years, and the greater part of them planted by the hands of Colonel Warrington himself. The villa is on the site of an ancient haunted ...
— Travels in the Great Desert of Sahara, in the Years of 1845 and 1846 • James Richardson

... was this prince among men, her champion, beaten to his ornamental knees by Fate, and contemplating a miserable, uncertain career to keep his godlike body from actual starvation. And she—she with more money than even she knew what to do with, powerless to aid him, prevented from flinging open her check book and bidding him to ...
— The Green Mouse • Robert W. Chambers

... and considered, I all the while thought I discovered yet greater merits beyond that which I have already mentioned. The right proportion of the larger divisions, the ornamental, as judicious as rich, even to the minutest, were found out; but now I recognized the connection of these manifold ornaments amongst each other, the transition from one leading part to another, the enclosing of details, homogeneous indeed, but yet greatly varying in form, from the saint to the monster, ...
— Autobiography • Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

... restored by Mr. George Gwilt, in 1832, from much external mutilation to something like its original state. The eastern side consists of four bays, divided by buttresses, and surmounted by pointed gables, with ornamental crosses on the apices. In each of the gables there is a triplet of narrow lancet windows, which light the space between the internal vault and the roof. They have sculptured heads in the moulding above the central light in ...
— Bell's Cathedrals: Southwark Cathedral • George Worley

... suit of half-armour be much too big for me, Ben?" said Roy, pausing before a bronzed ornamental set of defensive weapons, which had evidently been the work ...
— The Young Castellan - A Tale of the English Civil War • George Manville Fenn

... the gentlemen's cabin, or sat with doffed hats and chatted gallantly in the ladies' cabin, which was visible as a distant background, seen over a long row of tables with green covers and under a long row of gilded wooden stalactites, which were intended to be ornamental. The little pendent prisms beneath the chandeliers rattled gayly as the boat trembled at each stroke of her wheels, and gaping backwoodsmen, abroad for the first time, looked at all the rusty gingerbread-work, and wondered if kings were able to afford anything half ...
— The End Of The World - A Love Story • Edward Eggleston



Words linked to "Ornamental" :   plant, flora, nonfunctional, plant life, ornament, decorative, flowering maple



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