"Second-best" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... unsupported story of a conversation which Mina would not repeat, with his empty purse which could supply no means of proving what he said. He ran the risk of losing what chance he had of Janie Iver's favor, and he was in sore peril of coming off second-best again in his wrestling-bout with Harry Tristram. The Man in Possession was strong. The perils that had seemed so threatening were passing away. Mina was devoted; Neeld would be silent. Who would there be who ...
— Tristram of Blent - An Episode in the Story of an Ancient House • Anthony Hope
... to find a mere site than to find anything on the site. Suppose one is castle-stalking in Maine, suppose one is looking for primaeval walls in the Volscian or the Hernican land. If one does not find the exact thing that one wishes, the second-best luck is to find the place where it once was, and to find nothing there. Best of all is to find a fortress of the right age on its mound surrounded by its ditch; next to this is to find the mound surrounded by its ditch, but supporting nothing at all. If there is nothing at all, there is nothing ...
— Sketches of Travel in Normandy and Maine • Edward A. Freeman
... particularly towards the end of the play. This taste was, it seems, first acquired in consequence of a feud that formerly existed between Doria's family and his own, in which his side came off so decidedly second-best, that he only remains of his race; all the rest having been murdered by Doria and his father's faction. From such deadly foes, it may be observed, that tragic heroes always ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 1, Complete • Various
... Kate chose a second-best cushion from the couch and, lifting the bandaged foot as gently as might be, placed it, with many little pats and pulls, under the afflicted member. Josephine screwed her lips into a soundless expression of pain, smiled ...
— The Uphill Climb • B. M. Bower
... lick you. No, I've lent my clothes to a young feller as was goin' to a party, and didn't have none fit to wear, and so I put on my second-best for a change." ...
— Ragged Dick - Or, Street Life in New York with the Boot-Blacks • Horatio Alger
... it is extremely coarse, Agnes. Why didn't you get a good dress? You have enough second-best ...
— 'Our guy' - or, The elder brother • Mrs. E. E. Boyd
... or a trade-union rule about a high-speed lathe; but if the craftsman conforms to opinion as such, and not through positive concurrence of his own judgement with it, he has accepted the fallacious conclusion as his own, and lets his work fall to second-hand and to second-best. ...
— The Unity of Civilization • Various
... had thus loosed free speech, was leagues distant from the gossip and the unrest which was its source. Her pink hair bows, even the second-best ones, lifted her to a state which made it much pleasanter to idle in her window, sniffing at the honey-suckle, than to hurry down to the piano. She longed to make up something which, like a tune of water rippling over pink pebbles, was running through ...
— Missy • Dana Gatlin |
