"Playfulness" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... him for some time splashing about and puffing with all his might; a sort of playfulness which struck me as remarkable for so grave and sedate a character; and then a most unusual floundering, attended with a gurgling of the throat, struck ...
— The Adventures of Hajji Baba of Ispahan • James Morier
... he looked as if he were about to take up the matter seriously and argue it with her; but the next moment he smiled and tossed his head with jaunty playfulness—Bertram, to tell the truth, had now had quite enough of what he privately termed "scenes" and "heroics"; and, manlike, he was very ardently longing for the old easy-going friendliness, with all unpleasantness banished ...
— Miss Billy Married • Eleanor H. Porter
... ungenerous? The Lord forbid it! No matter how I am compromised, no matter how I am misjudged,—I am still willing to take you as my lawful wife Froeken Thelma,—but," and here he shook his forefinger at her with a pretended playfulness, "I will permit no more converse with Sir Philip Errington; no, no! I cannot allow it! . . . I ...
— Thelma • Marie Corelli
... the rear, without troubling any one, for no one troubled himself any further about me. The company was excessively lively; there were dalliance and playfulness; trifles were sometimes discussed with an important tone, but oftener important matters with levity; and especially pleasantly flew the wit over absent friends and their circumstances. I was too strange to understand much of all this; too anxious and introverted to take an interest ...
— The German Classics of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries: - Masterpieces of German Literature Translated into English, Volume 5. • Various
... her, herder. Ain't 'captains' enough to go 'round," said a cowboy, with an ill-attempt at playfulness, which was instantly frowned down. For, though all assured themselves that there was no substantial cause for alarm, and that women were "nervous cattle, always scared at shadders," they had already ...
— Jessica, the Heiress • Evelyn Raymond
... Happy were the hours spent with her in the discussion of every subject that could call forth her opinions, and her wide knowledge of the eventful times in which she had lived!—hours that exalted the feelings, informed the understandings, and animated the playfulness of younger minds, who found that forty years of difference between their age and hers, took nothing from their sympathies, but added a new and rare delight ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Volume 54, No. 335, September 1843 • Various
... element still onward, but away from the unconscious Richard, leaving that portion of the room unscathed, and for the present safe. Along the cornice under the lathing, beneath the eaves they crept—those little fiery tongues—lapping at each other in wanton, playfulness, and whispering to the dry old shingles on the roof above of the ...
— Darkness and Daylight • Mary J. Holmes
... brown eyes upon him, and was regarding him with such manifest unconsciousness of the drift of his speech, and, withal, a little vague impatience of his archness, that Mr. Carr was feebly alarmed. It had the effect of banishing his assumed playfulness, which made his serious ...
— Devil's Ford • Bret Harte
... her eyes bright with the joy of all this loving playfulness, tried to protest; but suddenly into the midst of this tumult came Mrs. Perkins's ...
— Cloudy Jewel • Grace Livingston Hill
... herself and her aunt by picking up shells, by running down to the edge of the water, and allowing the returning wave to chase her, and by digging holes in the sand. Her good aunt sat upon a rock, watching her movements, answering her numerous questions, and rewarding her playfulness with smiles. She was a sensible woman, and knew that children not only need time to play, but that they should also be encouraged in it by the approval of their friends ...
— Aunt Amy - or, How Minnie Brown learned to be a Sunbeam • Francis Forrester
... ponderous chains and gratings of strong iron, There rusted amid heaps of broken stone That mingled slowly with their native earth. There the broad beam of day, which feebly once Lighted the cheek of lean captivity With a pale and sickly glare, then freely shone On the pure smiles of infant playfulness. No more the shuddering voice of hoarse despair Pealed through the echoing vaults, but soothing notes Of joy fingered winds and gladsome birds ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction No. 485 - Vol. 17, No. 485, Saturday, April 16, 1831 • Various
... of the Alexandrian library. The very popularity of the scraps which such a writer leaves, secures the torments of Tantalus to his numerous admirers in all after ages. His letters, in their grace, freedom, minuteness of detail, occasional playfulness, delicious asides of gossip, and easy vigour of description, are more worthy of his powers, as a whole, than his poetry. The poetic fragments he has left are rarely of such merit as to excite any wish that they had been finished. His genius, although true and exquisite, was limited in its ...
— Poetical Works of Johnson, Parnell, Gray, and Smollett - With Memoirs, Critical Dissertations, and Explanatory Notes • Samuel Johnson, Thomas Parnell, Thomas Gray, and Tobias Smollett
... ease—absence of effort, spontaneity, freedom, a degage air. It is in rhythm what the perfect prose letter should be and is—flowing and unpremeditated without slovenliness—having the characteristics of the best conversation, as differentiated from mere argument or harangue. Its second quality is playfulness—a refusal to be too much in earnest in any direction, and a determination not to go to any unwelcome extreme. It has touches of sentiment and traces of wit and humour; but its dominant note is one of tempered geniality. Sometimes it may lean to the sentimental, sometimes to the ...
— By-ways in Book-land - Short Essays on Literary Subjects • William Davenport Adams
... tone, despite its playfulness, a delicate finality that told him plainly that she had no intention of pursuing the subject further, and, curiously, the man's heart smote him for a moment. He felt as if in some fashion wholly ...
— The Obstacle Race • Ethel M. Dell
... "She has the playfulness of the young leopard, and the cruelty," he thought, with a sense of disgust; forgetting that she did not know what he knew, and that, if Cigarette had waited to laugh until death had passed by, she would have never laughed all her life through, ...
— Under Two Flags • Ouida [Louise de la Ramee]
... toes! Whoever heard a horse spoken of in such terms? And after all the pains I have taken with your equine education, to talk in such terms of a little playfulness! I would not give two-pence to ride a horse that goes ...
— Yr Ynys Unyg - The Lonely Island • Julia de Winton
... had a strong personal resemblance to Benjamin Franklin. Sagacity, benevolence, and playfulness were expressed in both physiognomies. Bentham, however, differed from the man whose intellect presents many points of likeness, in that he was not a man of the market-place or the office. Bentham was in many respects a child through life:[350] a child in simplicity, good humour, ...
— The English Utilitarians, Volume I. • Leslie Stephen
... me, though it was great gain to her. Before her death we were separated for a time—only a short time,—but it proved to be a blessed separation, for the letters she wrote me sparkled with love and wit and playfulness, as though they had been set with pearls and rubies and diamonds. I shall show you my treasures before going to bed. I keep them in that box on the sideboard, to be always handy. It is not large, but its contents are more precious to me than ...
— Post Haste • R.M. Ballantyne
... The three families took different lines. The Druces show obedience though not respect; they growled and grumbled horribly, but submitted, though with ill grace, to the explicit prohibition. Non- interference is professedly Mary's principle, but even she said, with entreaty veiled beneath the playfulness, when it was pleaded that two of the youths had oars at Cambridge, "Freshwater fish, my dears. I wish you would wait for us! I don't want you to attend the submarine wedding of our old friends Tame and Isis." To which Pica rejoined, likewise talking out of Spenser, that Proteus ...
— More Bywords • Charlotte M. Yonge
... nothing in common, and he evidently designed that no comparison should ever be instituted between any one of them and himself. His chief merits are to be found in the facility with which he grasped an idea; the harmlessness and playfulness of his satire, which wrought a complete revolution in the style and manner of caricaturists; and above all in the excellence of his likenesses. The best and most graceful of the series was produced just after the wedding of her ...
— English Caricaturists and Graphic Humourists of the Nineteenth Century. - How they Illustrated and Interpreted their Times. • Graham Everitt
... to those who have the sense to comprehend it; but it implies a trust in the company not always to be risked." The truth is, that many, eminent for their genius, have been remarkable in society for a simplicity and playfulness almost infantine. Such was the gaiety of Hume, such the bonhomie of Fox; and one who had long lived in a circle of men of genius in the last age, was disposed to consider this infantine simplicity ...
— Literary Character of Men of Genius - Drawn from Their Own Feelings and Confessions • Isaac D'Israeli
... thought most fully possessed me, and when we had been at work perhaps an hour and a half, we were again interrupted by the violent howlings of the dog. His uneasiness, in the first instance, had been evidently but the result of playfulness or caprice, but he now assumed a bitter and serious tone. Upon Jupiter's again attempting to muzzle him, he made furious resistance, and, leaping into the hole, tore up the mould frantically with his claws. In a few seconds he had uncovered ...
— Short Stories for English Courses • Various (Rosa M. R. Mikels ed.)
... kind of sketch of a man, a tall child, yet with gleams of reason and wit, and all whose mistakes and follies have something arch about them. The true mode of representing him is to give him suppleness, agility, the playfulness of a kitten, with a certain grossness of appearance, which renders his conduct more absurd; his part is that of a patient, faithful valet, always in love, always in hot water, either on his master's or his own account, ...
— A Book of the Play - Studies and Illustrations of Histrionic Story, Life, and Character • Dutton Cook
... unable to work that for twenty minutes he sat over a pleasant little essay on Shakespear's garden that by means of a concordance and his natural aptitude he was writing for the book of the National Shakespear Theatre, without adding a single fancy to its elegant playfulness. Then he decided he needed his afternoon's walk after all, and he took cap and stick and went out, and presently found himself surveying that yellow and blue board and seeing it from an entirely ...
— The Wife of Sir Isaac Harman • H. G. (Herbert George) Wells
... she had been the merriest of the merry, and even now she had great playfulness of manner, and threw herself into the occupation of the moment with a life and animation that gave an uncommon charm to her manners, so that how completely sorrow had depressed and broken her spirit would scarcely have been guessed ...
— Henrietta's Wish • Charlotte M. Yonge
... a moment of debate with himself as to whether he should be forced to do a thing he would rather not do, he turned in his chair and laid down his pen as though separating himself from his work. Then he said, in a tone that ended playfulness: ...
— Bride of the Mistletoe • James Lane Allen
... threw himself into the task assigned to him, with his natural gallantry and a certain captivating playfulness which he still retained. Perhaps he was the more anxious to please in order that his companion might share some of his popularity, for it was undeniable that Miss Harcourt still seemed to excite only a constrained politeness among those with whom she ...
— A First Family of Tasajara • Bret Harte
... meaning. Long ago in a moment of playfulness, Betty had scratched her name on the hunter's rifle. Ever after that Wetzel called his ...
— Betty Zane • Zane Grey
... were even a little older; young women in forms and deportment, though scarcely so in years. One of a party of two of the last, appeared to me to possess all the grace of young womanhood, rendered radiant by the ingenuous laugh, the light-hearted playfulness, and the virgin innocence of sweet seventeen. She was simply, but very prettily dressed, and everything about her attire, air, carriage and manner, denoted a young lady of the better class, who was just old enough to feel all the proprieties of her situation, while she was still sufficiently ...
— Satanstoe • James Fenimore Cooper
... last, she smiled, and to make the caressing pride of her closing tone still prettier, lifted her figured muslin out sidewise between thumb and forefinger of each hand with even more archaic grace than playfulness. ...
— Strong Hearts • George W. Cable
... future gay audacity was already apparent under an air of timid playfulness, replied: "It is I who shall not dare to say ...
— Strong as Death • Guy de Maupassant
... the house. There was Uncle Jem, whom she did love, and whom she felt might have said a kind word for her; and Aunt Anastasia, who was that sort of a person that no one since she was born had ever thought of diminishing the five syllables by the use of any shorter name given in playfulness or love. No one, till that moment at least, had ever thought of calling her anything but Anastasia; but at that moment naughty Bab, with her little flattened nose and big mournful eyes, broke the spell by calling out, "Anasta-sia, indeed! Aunt ...
— Little Folks (December 1884) - A Magazine for the Young • Various
... produced without the risk of poisonous medicines. The mother, to whom the perpetual restlessness of disease and unaccountable deaths incident to her children are the causes of incurable unhappiness, would on this diet experience the satisfaction of beholding their perpetual healths and natural playfulness. (See Mr. Newton's book. His children are the most beautiful and healthy creatures it is possible to conceive; the girls are perfect models for a sculptor; their dispositions are also the most gentle and conciliating; ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Percy Bysshe Shelley Volume I • Percy Bysshe Shelley
... her whole appearance. Her hair was a rich, dark brown, fine and glossy, and although neatly arranged about the head, evidently required but little training to enable it to fall gracefully about her neck in beautiful ringlets. The general expression of her face, was a soft, bewitching playfulness, which, combined with the half timid, benevolent look, beaming from her large, mild, hazel eye, invariably won upon the beholder at the first glance, and increased upon acquaintance. Her voice we have already spoken of as possessing a silvery sweetness; and if one could be moved ...
— Ella Barnwell - A Historical Romance of Border Life • Emerson Bennett
... with good-humored playfulness, consented, and Robert drew from the portfolio one of his drawings, ...
— Evenings at Donaldson Manor - Or, The Christmas Guest • Maria J. McIntosh
... on illusion. Always conspicuous by its effulgence, it is invisible to the Kurus; and in ascertaining the strength or weakness of the Pandavas, that discus offers the best ground. Indeed, that scion of Madhu's race, endued with great might, vanquished with an effort and in seeming playfulness the formidable Naraka and Samvara and Kansa and (Sisupala) the chief of Chedis. Possessed of divinity and of soul superior to everything, that most exalted of male beings can, by his will alone, bring the earth, firmament, and heaven under his control. ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 2 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... features of the spirit are seen to be distorted with anguish. To this class of individuals belonged Widow White. Oh, how she felt as she trod to and fro within that dim-lit room! Her son—her only son, in the endearing playfulness of whose infantile smiles she had so often exulted; upon whose boyish accents she had so frequently hung with transport, and for whom she had pictured out such a bright and glorious future, was a condemned felon, and the ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII No. 6 June 1848 • Various
... the one ideal "Knickerbocker." Yet, much as we still admire it, does it wholly satisfy us? Is there not as much room as ever for an edition that shall express primarily not the absurdity of its subject-matter, but the delicate playfulness of Irving's humor and the lightness and grace of his exuberant style? Has there ever been a final "Don Quixote"? Certainly not in the recent monumental editions with their quagmire of footnotes. Moreover, ...
— The Booklover and His Books • Harry Lyman Koopman
... that this happy saying of Lord Albemarle's loses much of its grace and playfulness, by being put into the mouth of any but a ...
— The Complete Poems of Sir Thomas Moore • Thomas Moore et al
... he returned, with a slight bow, and a smile, in which, perhaps, irony was concealed by playfulness. "After the risk you have so lately run, even I, confirmed and obstinate sea-monster as I am, have no reason to complain of your distaste for our element. And yet, you see, it is not entirely without its charms. No lake, that lies within ...
— The Red Rover • James Fenimore Cooper
... replied. "He might prop a little, certainly; but it's only playfulness." So I swung into the deep seat of the stolen saddle, and lightly touched the ...
— Such is Life • Joseph Furphy
... him. She had left London at the latter end of January, on a visit to her father's house, in Leicestershire, and Lord Byron was in a short time to follow her. They had parted in the utmost kindness,—she wrote him a letter full of playfulness and affection, on the road; and immediately on her arrival at Kirkby Mallory, her father wrote to acquaint Lord Byron that she would return to him no more.' In my observations upon this statement, I shall, as far as possible, avoid touching on any matters relating personally ...
— Life of Lord Byron, Vol. 6 (of 6) - With his Letters and Journals • Thomas Moore
... Bates House. These friends then took Lamon into a room, locked the door, and in the most solemn and impressive manner laid upon him the responsibilities of guarding Lincoln's person until they should reach Washington. The scene was concluded by Dubois with a mixture of solemnity and playfulness, who said: "Now, Lamon, we intrust the sacred life of Mr. Lincoln to your keeping; and if you don't protect it, never return to Illinois, for we will murder you ...
— The Life of Abraham Lincoln • Henry Ketcham
... now, poor fellow," she said, with the most charming playfulness of manner. "Yes, monsieur, I have two characters to perform. I am the sister of the king, the sister-in-law of the king's wife. In this character ought I not to take an interest in these domestic intrigues? Come, tell me ...
— Louise de la Valliere • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... unfavorable to the prevalence of that noble freedom of sentiment which is the best possession of man. Nor can it be denied that he had many prejudices; which, however, frequently suggested many of his pointed sayings, that rather show a playfulness of fancy than any settled malignity. He was steady and inflexible in maintaining the obligations of religion and morality, both from a regard for the order of society, and from a veneration for the Great Source of all order: correct—nay, stern—in ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol. 5 • Various
... been enacted, and, in fact, it was like some sudden return to ancient and forgotten history. Moreover, it had the disadvantage of conveying an entirely wrong impression of what had really taken place; it shifted back the attention to what was after all more or less playfulness, or at the worst, mere verbal disorder, from the odious, brutal resort to physical violence which had just taken place. Moreover, it put a wrong complexion on even the verbal disorder, for it put the initiative with me instead of with Mr. Chamberlain, and, finally, ...
— Sketches In The House (1893) • T. P. O'Connor
... singular ideas and caprices, I know; my God! I do not wish to represent myself as better than I am. Above all, I would be frank with you and conceal nothing. You would ask why my husbands are the only victims of my playfulness? I have no power over others. And I always warn them what will be their fate. It is that which makes it so difficult for me to find a husband. It is on these conditions alone that Satan signs my contract, and then this contract, signed by him, acquires a virtue as wonderful as mysterious. ...
— A Romance of the West Indies • Eugene Sue
... Mr. Seward, with that playfulness which sits upon him so gracefully, and which draws its resources from a reading so extensive that not even John Gilpin has escaped its research, puts his argument to the people in a form where the Socratic and arithmetic methods are neatly combined, ...
— The Writings of James Russell Lowell in Prose and Poetry, Volume V - Political Essays • James Russell Lowell
... play. He would stare at strutting roosters, gaze after straddling hens, blink quizzically at the burro, frown upon the grunting pigs, all as if cataloguing these specimens, listing them in his thoughts, some day to make good use of the knowledge. But most of all he showed interest in and playfulness toward his mother and her doings. He would follow her about untiringly, pausing whenever she paused, starting off again whenever she started off—seemingly bent upon acquiring the how and ...
— Bred of the Desert - A Horse and a Romance • Marcus Horton
... I expected," whispered Max, who was too intent upon the work in hand to heed his friend's playfulness. "Now I will light the lantern and we will go upstairs. The door of the manager's room is sure to be locked, but we shall make short work ...
— Two Daring Young Patriots - or, Outwitting the Huns • W. P. Shervill
... demure but perfectly solemn, with which, on the deck of a Hudson River steamboat, as we were passing West Point, he indicated to me the Kosciuszko monument, saying briefly, "That's the place where Freedom shrieked." It was the quality of his temperament that made his playfulness delicious. Setchell was the mental descendant of Burton, as Burton was of Reeve and as Reeve was of Liston. Actors illustrate a kind of heredity. Each species is distinct and discernible. Lester ...
— Shadows of the Stage • William Winter
... without false delicacy, and correct without insipidity. Perhaps there is an intellectual composure in his manner, which may, in some passages, be said to approach to the reserved and prosaic; but he unbends from this graver strain of reflection to tenderness, and even to playfulness, with an ease and grace almost exclusively his own; and connects extensive views of the happiness and interests of society with pictures of life that touch the heart by their familiarity. He is no disciple of the gaunt and famished school ...
— The Illustrated London Reading Book • Various
... they looked clean, and tripped along, as it were, before the wind, with a weight of tackle that I could scarcely have lifted. Many of the country girls I met appeared to me pretty—that is, to have fine complexions, sparkling eyes, and a kind of arch, hoyden playfulness which distinguishes the village coquette. The swains, in their Sunday trim, attended some of these fair ones in a more slouching pace, though their dress was not so cumbersome. The women seem to take the lead in ...
— Letters written during a short residence in Sweden, Norway, and Denmark • Mary Wollstonecraft
... kindred mood, though perhaps of different degree. Haydn and Mozart seem again to be aiming at contrast; after a dignified opening Allegro and a soft, graceful slow movement, they frequently wind up with a Finale of which the chief characteristics are humour, playfulness, and merriment, so that the listener may part company from them in ...
— The Pianoforte Sonata - Its Origin and Development • J.S. Shedlock
... has probably never been excelled. His lucid arrangement of topics, his pure polished style, and his appearance of dispassionate conviction secured the pleased attention of his audience. The more tedious parts of his argument or narrative were from time to time relieved by touches of the playfulness which is more popular than humour; but the colleagues and opponents who thoroughly understood his object, knew that it was pursued with undeviating ...
— Memoirs of James Robert Hope-Scott, Volume 2 • Robert Ornsby
... Tribouillard, that Madame Violante was indeed a Lucretia, so true is it that all men are alike in fatuous self-conceit! And we are bound to say she had not so much as suffered him to kiss her mouth,—only a pretty diversion after all and a bit of wanton playfulness. ...
— The Merrie Tales Of Jacques Tournebroche - 1909 • Anatole France
... Homburg in the future years; but our friendship was kept alive by active correspondence. Literature was naturally his vocation, and he wrote much and well, with exemplary industry, enlivening his papers in 'Blackwood,' till his death in August 1865, with the same manly sense, the same playfulness of fancy and flow of spontaneous humour, which made his society and his letters always ...
— The Bon Gaultier Ballads • William Edmonstoune Aytoun
... factor too, in his forming his conclusion of silence. He had never seen Stephen look so well, or so attractive. He had never respected her so much as when her playfulness had turned to majestic gravity. All the boy and girl strife of the years that had gone seemed to have passed away. The girl whom he had played with, and bullied, and treated as frankly as though she had been a boy, had in an instant become a woman—and such a woman as demanded respect and admiration ...
— The Man • Bram Stoker
... of John Baker still held his arm around her, appeared to have come upon them all. They held their breath as this pretty woman, whose brief mourning had not seemed to affect her cheerfulness or even playfulness of spirit, passed before them. But she stood by her cabin and the camp—the only woman in a settlement of forty men—during the darkest hours of their fortune. Helping them to wash and cook, and ministering to their domestic needs, the sanctity ...
— Colonel Starbottle's Client and Other Stories • Bret Harte
... something unconnected with the story; an essay on writing, a critique on Walter Scott, or the history of Bonaparte, or something that would form a contrast, and bring the reader with increased delight to the playfulness and epigrammatism ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol 3 • Various
... She shook her head, but there was something almost of playfulness in her manner of doing it. "Ah, but I know you did. And why shouldn't you speak out, now that we are to be man and wife? I like a girl to speak out. I suppose if I want to be with you, you want as much ...
— The Eustace Diamonds • Anthony Trollope
... York to-morrow, and you are not to follow me," she said with a final effort at playfulness. "I have been at such a nervous strain over this wretched war that I must be frivolous and feminine for two whole weeks—and what so serious as ...
— Senator North • Gertrude Atherton
... used to have the curse, "Unstable as water, thou shalt not excel," flung at him. He enjoyed the expression of knock-out opinions such as: "I always bless God for making anything so strong as an onion!" He laughed easily, not from humour so much as from a romping playfulness. He took a young boy's pleasure in showing off the strength of his mane of dark brown hair. He would get a child to get hold of it, and lift him off the ground by it "with no apparent inconvenience." He was at the same time nervous ...
— The Art of Letters • Robert Lynd
... days. And here before us is of all pretty love-stories perhaps the prettiest. Idyllic as Daphnis and Chloe, romantic as Romeo and Juliet, tender as Undine, remote as Cupid and Psyche, yet with perpetual touches of actual life, and words that raise pictures; and lightened all through with a dainty playfulness, as if Ariel himself had hovered near all the time of its writing, and Puck now and again shot a ...
— Aucassin and Nicolette - translated from the Old French • Anonymous
... spiritual grace of modesty. What beautiful propriety in the distinction drawn between Rosalind and Viola! The wild sweetness, the frolic humor which sports free and unblamed amid the shades of Ardennes, would ill become Viola, whose playfulness is assumed as part of her disguise as a court-page, and is guarded by the strictest delicacy. She has not, like Rosalind, a saucy enjoyment in her own incognito; her disguise does not sit so easily upon her; her heart does not beat ...
— Characteristics of Women - Moral, Poetical, and Historical • Anna Jameson
... himself up in a pose that shows great knowledge of foreshortening, and is a marvel of roundness and fine modelling. The Virgin is of that charming Lombard type in which under chaste innocence appears that malicious playfulness which da Vinci excels in rendering. The colour of this majestic picture has blackened, particularly in the shadows, but it has lost nothing of its harmony, and perhaps it is more ideally poetic than if it had ...
— Great Pictures, As Seen and Described by Famous Writers • Esther Singleton
... attributes of whose works it will be a pleasing, if arduous task, in due season, to analyze and define; matchless alike in delicacy and strength, in powers the most gigantic, in purpose the most daring—with the invention of Shakspeare—the playfulness of Rabelais—the malignity of Swift—need I add the name ...
— Athens: Its Rise and Fall, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... Mr. Gladstone, even when short and business-like, are marked by a deference which he used to no one else; and the deference at times has the accent of affection. Sir Charles always enjoyed Mr. Gladstone's old-world courtesy, and especially his playfulness. ...
— The Life of the Rt. Hon. Sir Charles W. Dilke V1 • Stephen Gwynn
... wandered through the crowd with Mrs. Jeremy. The collection of animals was remarkable; they varied in size from Adams's cart-horse to Jeremy's blight; in playfulness from the Vicar's kitten to Miss Trehearne's chrysalis; and in ability for performing tricks from the Major's poodle to Dr. Bunton's egg of ...
— Once a Week • Alan Alexander Milne
... perhaps equal to any that had ever been known, Childers alone excepted. Their names were Careless and Atlas.....There was a story in circulation that Atlas, on account of his size and clumsiness, had been banished to the cart-breed; till by some accident, either of playfulness or fright, several of them started together; and his vast advantage in speed happening to be noticed, he was restored to his blood companions.....Alas for the men of Nottingham, Careless was conquered. I forget whether it was at two ...
— Life of Johnson, Volume 6 (of 6) • James Boswell
... breeze may coax a few brighter roses," said the fond father, emphasizing his words by patting Marguerite's cheek with childlike playfulness. ...
— Marguerite Verne • Agatha Armour
... be ready with your answer when the offer is made, wouldn't you?" He drew suddenly away from her, and stood still on the road, opposite to her. His face lost its playfulness; as it set into gravity, the lines upon it deepened, and his eyes looked rather sad. "This is wrong of me, perhaps, but I can't help it. I'm not going to talk to you about myself. Confessions and apologies and excuses, and so on, aren't in my line. I should probably ...
— The Secret of the Tower • Hope, Anthony
... wished to leave them was surprising; but as she truly said, "I am John Bull to the backbone, yet I do want to see Italy, just once. Everybody says it is marvellous, and that one gets no idea of it from books at all." The curate suggested that a year was a long time; and Miss Abbott, with decorous playfulness, answered him, "Oh, but you must let me have my fling! I promise to have it once, and once only. It will give me things to think about and talk about for the rest of my life." The curate had consented; so had Mr. Abbott. ...
— Where Angels Fear to Tread • E. M. Forster
... her?" continued Renovales with a good-natured smile that had not lost its playfulness. "Didn't she 'kid' you, for wearing that dazzling ...
— Woman Triumphant - (La Maja Desnuda) • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... me," he said, leaning over her and patting her cheek. "Hush! not a syllable from your lips. I will have no gainsaying of my words," he added, with a mixture of authority and playfulness, as she seemed about to reply. "Now shut your eyes and go to sleep; I will have no ...
— Elsie Dinsmore • Martha Finley
... the kind Father who had willed my surroundings to be those of comfort and prosperity, what did I do? Good reader! I smiled half consciously, and thus sanctioned her belief in my domestic happiness. I veiled the sorrow that dwelt in my young heart with the shadows of a borrowed playfulness, and I sullied the baby innocence of my unsuspecting ...
— The Doctor's Daughter • "Vera"
... envying the loud playfulness and mirth. Of those who passed him, gay in youth and hope, He took at Jupiter a shilling's worth Of gazing, through the showman's telescope; Sounds as of far-off bells came on his ears, He fancied 'twas the music of ...
— Choice Specimens of American Literature, And Literary Reader - Being Selections from the Chief American Writers • Benj. N. Martin
... sorrow with light and joy. It is the wealth of His interests and the variety of His sympathy which give to the ministry of the Son of Man its impressiveness and charm. With gladness as with grief, with the playfulness of childhood and the earnestness of maturity, with the innocent festivities and the graver pursuits of His fellow-men, with the cares of the rich and the trials of the poor, He disclosed the most intimate and tender feeling. His parables show that He had an open and observant ...
— Christianity and Ethics - A Handbook of Christian Ethics • Archibald B. C. Alexander
... girl inclines to reveries; she seeks solitude; her mother surprises her in causeless tears; her teacher discovers an unwonted inattention to her studies, a less retentive memory, a disinclination to mental labor; her father misses her accustomed playfulness; he, perhaps, is annoyed by her listlessness and inertia. What does it all mean? What is the ...
— The Physical Life of Woman: - Advice to the Maiden, Wife and Mother • Dr. George H Napheys
... watchfulness of the mastiff, with the courage and strength of them all combined. To this imposing array of canine virtues, those who enjoyed his more intimate acquaintance—the few—would have added the affectionate docility of the Newfoundland, and the delicate playfulness of the Italian greyhound. It must be owned, however, that he displayed little enough of the last-named qualities, excepting to Burlman Reynolds, Jemima Reynolds, and little Bushie, in whose society only would he now and then deign to unbend—i.e., untwist and wag his iron ...
— Burl • Morrison Heady
... every one turn and look after her, as she glided hither and thither on the boat. Nevertheless, the little one was not what you would have called either a grave child or a sad one. On the contrary, an airy and innocent playfulness seemed to flicker like the shadow of summer leaves over her childish face, and around her buoyant figure. She was always in motion, always with a half smile on her rosy mouth, flying hither and thither, with an undulating and cloud-like tread, singing ...
— Uncle Tom's Cabin • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... taintest all thou look'st upon!—The stare, Which on thy cradle beamed so brightly sweet, Were gods to the distempered playfulness Of thy untutored infancy: the trees, The grass, the clouds, the mountains, and ...
— Ancient and Modern Celebrated Freethinkers - Reprinted From an English Work, Entitled "Half-Hours With - The Freethinkers." • Charles Bradlaugh, A. Collins, and J. Watts
... us?" she went on with a gentle playfulness, though the tears were in her own eyes. "Whatever made you think of getting work out of Weircombe? Oh, you dissatisfied old boy! I thought you were ...
— The Treasure of Heaven - A Romance of Riches • Marie Corelli
... mind recovered strength. The continual sparkle of this happiness was a secret between ourselves, for she dreaded the eye of the Abbe Dominis, the representative of the world; she masked her contentment with playfulness, and covered the proofs of her tenderness with the ...
— The Lily of the Valley • Honore de Balzac
... had simply blundered straight at my work and written just what occurred to me in my own style, I should have done much better. I have a sense of humour. I deliberately stifled it. For it I substituted a grisly kind of playfulness. My hero called my heroine "little woman," and the concluding passage where he kissed her was written in a sly, roguish vein, for which I suppose I shall have to atone in the next world. Only the editor of the Colney Hatch Argus could have accepted ...
— Not George Washington - An Autobiographical Novel • P. G. Wodehouse
... tenderness, yet with a kind of grossness sometimes that was but a part, and perhaps an inevitable part, of his wide humanity. Pitt was slender, boyish, precise, punctilious in attire, his native composure only occasionally lightened by a flash of humor or sweetened by a show of playfulness, old beyond his years and young to the end of his short life, sternly self-restrained and self-commanded, gracious in a kind of melancholy, unconscious charm, a curiously unadorned, uncolored personality, that attracted where it did attract with a magnetism that was perhaps all the more ...
— A History of the Four Georges and of William IV, Volume III (of 4) • Justin McCarthy and Justin Huntly McCarthy
... continued to hum this as he straightened up and set his hands on his hips, regarding the twins through wickedly narrowed eyes. He was flushed with drink and inclined, as always at such times, to swagger with a sort of savage playfulness. ...
— Judith of the Cumberlands • Alice MacGowan
... interpose, in certain cases, and send certain races to labor for the good of mankind? This was the question which broke upon the lady's mind. It is very interesting to see the question thus stated, and to notice the graceful touch of apology, and of playfulness, in the manner of stating it. There was risk, and even peril, in making the suggestion, but, withal, some moral courage. Still a lady may sometimes venture where it might not be safe for a gentleman ...
— The Sable Cloud - A Southern Tale With Northern Comments (1861) • Nehemiah Adams
... Jane's trite prettiness of feature; but to Gabriella, who suffered from a maternal obliquity of vision, she seemed both brilliant and beautiful. Of course she was selfish, but this selfishness, as long as it was clothed in her youth and loveliness, was as inoffensive as the playfulness of a kitten. Her face was round and shallow, with exquisite colouring which veiled the flatness and lack of character in her features. Above her azure eyes her hair, which was not plentiful, but fine and soft, and as yellow as ripe corn, ...
— Life and Gabriella - The Story of a Woman's Courage • Ellen Glasgow
... first, not a syllable would he utter; if she spoke to him indirectly, he assented monosyllabically; if she questioned him, his answers were brief, constrained, and evasive. Still, though her spirits were depressed, her playfulness had not so totally forsaken her, but that it illuminated at intervals the gloom of Nightmare Abbey; and if, on any occasion, she observed in Scythrop tokens of unextinguished or returning passion, her love of tormenting her lover immediately got the better both of her ...
— Nightmare Abbey • Thomas Love Peacock
... Lazarus," he commanded. "I have heard that your head is like the head of Medusa, and turns into stone all upon whom you look. But I should like to have a close look at you, and to talk to you before I turn into stone," he added in a spirit of playfulness that ...
— Best Russian Short Stories • Various
... perhaps bring il disiato riso, the long-wished-for smile, but the Scarabee interpreted it in the simplest zoological sense, and neglected its hint of playfulness with the most absolute unconsciousness, apparently, of anything not entirely serious ...
— The Poet at the Breakfast Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... deep down under the surface which he had never had explained to him, and of how he had lost a cask once upon a time, and a week later had run upon it well upon its way to Japan. He emphasized the hide-and-seek playfulness of the undertows and ...
— The Alaskan • James Oliver Curwood
... fetch his books, each at the proper time, read Spanish with him, and make him look out the words in the dictionary when he knew them by intuition, remind him of orders to be written for his buildings, and manage him as her pupil. If she ruled, it was with perfect calmness and simplicity, and the playfulness was that of brother and sister, not even with the coquettish ...
— Dynevor Terrace (Vol. I) - or, The Clue of Life • Charlotte M. Yonge
... added, in this representation of them by these French appreciators of their attractions, a mode of speech in which the most ludicrous French, in the most barbarous accent, was uttered in alternate bursts of loud abruptness and languishing drawl. Sudden, grotesque playfulness was succeeded by equally sudden and grotesque bashfulness; now an eager intrepidity of wild enthusiasm, defying all decorum, and then a sour, severe reserve, full of angry and terrified suspicion of imaginary improprieties. Tittering shyness, all giggle-goggle and blush; stony and stolid stupidity, ...
— Records of a Girlhood • Frances Anne Kemble
... where, late in the autumn, the grass is greener than in August, and intermixed with golden dandelions, that have not been seen till now, since the first warmth of the year. But with me, the verdure and the flowers are not frostbitten in the midst of winter. A playfulness has revisited my mind; a sympathy with the young and gay; an unpainful interest in the business of others; a light and wandering curiosity; arising, perhaps, from the sense that my toil on earth is ended, and the brief hour till bedtime may be ...
— The Village Uncle (From "Twice Told Tales") • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... taunted his wife with her quick recovery. It was a taunt that pulled tight on the corners of his mouth; it was lacking in playfulness. Beecher was present at the bedside of the propped-up invalid. They turned on Tilton, did these two, and flayed him with their agile wit and ready tongues. Tilton protested they were wrong—he was ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 7 - Little Journeys to the Homes of Eminent Orators • Elbert Hubbard
... grew stronger and sturdier he evinced much curiosity, playfulness and drollery, and to these characteristics would have to be added, when he became partly grown, a kind of bear sense of humor which was ...
— Black Bruin - The Biography of a Bear • Clarence Hawkes
... playfulness, the Colonel apostrophized his prize, which he succeeded in hitting. "Here is my little friend in blue; shall I hurt it? no, I will not harm it." By-play of relief and gratitude on the governess's part, as he requited her amiability by ...
— Bluebell - A Novel • Mrs. George Croft Huddleston
... exhausted, the excuse of a long, and elaborate toilet had been tried next. Even the moments occupied in reprimanding the servant had been moments seized on as the pretext for another delay. The hasty entrance into the room, the nervous assumption of playfulness in language and manner, the evasive and wandering eyes, were all referable to the same cause. In the presence of others, Lady Janet had successfully silenced the protest of her own inbred delicacy and inbred sense of honor. In the presence ...
— The New Magdalen • Wilkie Collins
... assure you he did so only by compulsion; he would have come gladly if Uncle Sam had not ordered him off in another direction," Violet answered, with pretty playfulness ...
— Elsie at Nantucket • Martha Finley
... stretch before her their whole weary length Amid the sameness of obscurity. She wanted not seclusion, to unveil Her thoughts to heaven, cloister, nor midnight bell; She found it in all places, at all hours: While, to assuage my labours, she indulged A playfulness that shunned a mother's eye, Still, to avert my perils, there arose A piety that, even ...
— Count Julian • Walter Savage Landor
... sinner threw out fresh shoots; and she became enamoured of the attentive and admired Englishman. Horace was susceptible of ridicule: there his somewhat icy heart was easily touched. Partly in vanity, partly in playfulness, he encouraged the sentimental-exaggeration of his correspondent; but, becoming afraid of the world's laughter, ended by reproving her warmth, and by chilling, under the refrigerating influence of his cautions, all ...
— The Wits and Beaux of Society - Volume 2 • Grace & Philip Wharton
... of is that I can't induce them to quit. They're liable to put this freight aboard The Bedford Castle, and then pull down the dock in a spirit of playfulness and pile it in Captain Peasley's cabin. There ain't no convulsion of nature that's equal to ...
— The Silver Horde • Rex Beach
... with febrile symptoms. At the expiration of two hours after the seizure a plaster of ung. hydrarg. fort, was applied, and its effect was very quickly perceptible, for in ten minutes he resumed his usual looks and playfulness. On examining the arm about three hours after the application of the plaster its effects in subduing the ...
— The Harvard Classics Volume 38 - Scientific Papers (Physiology, Medicine, Surgery, Geology) • Various
... lambs on the lea Are in playfulness bounding, And the voice of the sea Is in harmony sounding; And the streamlet on high In the morning beam dances, For all Nature is joy ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel, Volumes I-VI. - The Songs of Scotland of the Past Half Century • Various
... can say things that no one else could say, and approach subjects that no one else could approach, simply by reason of the grave whimsical playfulness of his manner and the extraordinary malleableness of his evasive style. It is because his style can be as simple and clear as sunlight, and yet as airy and impalpable as the invisible wind, that he manages to achieve these results. He uses little words, little harmless ...
— Suspended Judgments - Essays on Books and Sensations • John Cowper Powys
... of chaffing an author Johnson has hardly an equal. De Quincey too often overdoes it. Macaulay seldom fails to excite sympathy with his victim. In playfulness Mr. Arnold perhaps surpasses the Doctor, but then the latter's playfulness is always leonine, whilst Mr. Arnold's is surely, sometimes, just a trifle kittenish. An example, no doubt a very good one, of Johnson's humour ...
— Obiter Dicta - Second Series • Augustine Birrell
... hopes were but illusory. All that a father could do for the welfare of an infant was scrupulously performed, but its expanding intellect, its innocent playfulness, ...
— The Wedding Guest • T.S. Arthur
... of the table. They did not comply; but I was assured that they would do it, and much more, by-and-by. The knocks continuing, I turned a wine-glass upside down, and placed my ear upon it, as upon a stethoscope. The spirits seemed disconcerted by the act; they lost their playfulness, and did not recover it ...
— Fragments of science, V. 1-2 • John Tyndall
... berth, full of meditation. His little companion was before him, pictured in his child-like innocence and playfulness. He saw him in the youthful zeal and freshness of the night when he brought the well-laden haversack into his dreary cell, and which kind act was repaid by a night of suffering in the guard-house. There was too much of life and buoyancy in the picture ...
— Manuel Pereira • F. C. Adams
... music. The chance was too good to be thrown away, and Haydn proceeded to execute the commission with alacrity, not a little stimulated, doubtless, by the promise of 24 ducats for the work. There is a playfulness and buoyancy about much of Haydn's music which seems to suggest that he might have succeeded admirably in comic opera, and it is really to be regretted that while the words of "Der Neue Krumme Teufel" have been preserved, the music has been lost. It would have been interesting ...
— Haydn • J. Cuthbert Hadden
... she, with a touch of playfulness, "I have seldom received a stronger compliment. After this compliance I think I could venture ...
— Opening a Chestnut Burr • Edward Payson Roe
... she answered, with a little laugh. "And now, as the curtain has dropped, and it is all over between us, why the best thing that we can do is to put out the lights and go to bed," and she laughed again and courtesied with much assumed playfulness. "Good- night, Mr. Cossey; good-night, ...
— Colonel Quaritch, V.C. - A Tale of Country Life • H. Rider Haggard |
