"Staid" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... that by no possible union of unlucky chances could I, desiring to appear as a staid, sober gentleman, and not as a ruffler or debauched gallant, have had a worse introduction to my new life. To start with a duel would have hurt me little, but a duel on such a cause and on behalf of such a lady (for I should ...
— Simon Dale • Anthony Hope
... if it does enter, it promptly and absolutely disappears. Ill-temper cannot live there, the very flowers smile it away. The atmosphere itself acts like "laughing gas." So the house fairly rings with merry laughter from elderly staid women equally as from the younger ones, whose contact with serious and saddening life has not been so ...
— London's Underworld • Thomas Holmes
... red squaw staid all the forenoon, and toward the middle of the afternoon she went away, O my mother was loth to have her go away, All the week she thought of her, she watch'd for her many a month, She remember'd her many a winter and many a summer, ...
— Leaves of Grass • Walt Whitman
... well with his firm lips. Though dressed in black as became his calling, yet it was with an elegance derived from the love of clothes that is peculiar to the adventurer he had been, rather than to the staid medicus he now was. His coat was of fine camlet, and it was laced with silver; there were ruffles of Mechlin at his wrists and a Mechlin cravat encased his throat. His great black periwig was as sedulously curled as any ...
— Captain Blood • Rafael Sabatini
... you mazed amid old memories stand, So shall you toil, and shall accomplish nought, And ever in your ears a phantom Band Shall blare away the staid official thought. ...
— The Works of Rudyard Kipling One Volume Edition • Rudyard Kipling
... was hue and cry made, To have these bold thieves apprehended and staid; The Cripple he creep on his hands and his knees, And on the hieway great posting ...
— Devon, Its Moorlands, Streams and Coasts • Rosalind Northcote
... have staid an instant after I found what he was doing if his movements had not excited my attention. He had lighted the large hanging lamp over the counter where the mail was sorted; and, as I was about to pass on to the relief of Bully, I saw him hold a letter up to the light, as if ...
— Down The River - Buck Bradford and His Tyrants • Oliver Optic
... first to admit that, socially speaking, his present situation was not the equal of the positions he had held. There was none of the staid dignity about his present employer which was inborn in men like Lord Tipperary or Lord Bannister, and which Sir Herbert Marcobrunner, with the easy assimilative faculty of his race, had very successfully ...
— The Yellow Streak • Williams, Valentine
... pleasure in being in this family. Bristol is the largest meeting we have in our Society in England, and to me it was a very trying one on the First-day morning. I was much cast down after meeting; but we staid over the Monthly Meeting on Third-day, which afforded me relief of mind, and I left with as much comfort as I could ...
— Memoir and Diary of John Yeardley, Minister of the Gospel • John Yeardley
... Mr. E., who is left in charge of all our affairs. We believe him to be a Union man, but have never spoken of it to him. We were gloomy enough crossing the lake, for it was evident the heavily laden boat would be difficult to manage. Last night we staid at this plantation, and from the window of my room I see the men unloading the boat to place it on the cart, which a team of oxen will haul to the river. These hospitable people are kindness itself, till you ...
— Strange True Stories of Louisiana • George Washington Cable
... was a great accession to the Rebel cause. She brought to it the prestige of her great name. To secure the active cooperation of "staid old Virginia," "the Mother of Statesmen," in the struggle, was, in the estimation of the Rebels, an assurance of victory to their cause. And the Secession of Virginia for a time had a depressing influence upon the friends of the ...
— The Great Conspiracy, Complete • John Alexander Logan
... Thermoscope in the Air was at 8-7/8 inches; being put into a somewhat large evaporating glass, fill'd with water, it fell (after it staid a pretty while, and had been agitated in the liquor) to 8. inches: then about half the Salt, or less, that had been used twice before, and felt much less cold than the water, being put in and stirr'd about, the tincted Spirit subsided with a visible progress, ...
— Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society - Vol 1 - 1666 • Various
... the daily resort of the corpulent priest for exercise; of the ambitious student for thought and study; of the nursery maid with her youthful charge; and of wooing lovers and coquettish senoritas, accompanied by their staid chaperones. On Sunday forenoons a military band gives an out-of-door concert in the central music stand, on which occasion all grades of the populace come hither, rich and poor alike, the half-fed peon in his nakedness ...
— Aztec Land • Maturin M. Ballou
... insurrection of 1715, and of the part which Lord Derwentwater took in that event, an account has already been given.[404] "Happy," observes the biographer of Charles Radcliffe, "had it been for him, happy for his lady, and happy for his family, had the earl staid at home, and suffered himself to be withheld ...
— Memoirs of the Jacobites of 1715 and 1745 - Volume III. • Mrs. Thomson
... all," replied Mr. Galloway. And if you wonder at a staid old proctor chattering about this desultory news with his clerks in business hours, it may be explained to you that Mr. Galloway took the greatest possible interest, almost a boyish interest, in the college school. ...
— The Channings • Mrs. Henry Wood
... pocket their likings, and eat humble pie. But how has your father got into difficulties?" she burst out with an expression of frightened distress. "He always had plenty. Dolly!—tell me!—what do you know about it? what is it? How could he get into difficulties! Oh, if we had staid at home! Dolly, how is it possible? We have always had plenty—money running like water—all my life; and now, how could your father have got ...
— The End of a Coil • Susan Warner
... Nan Sherwood promptly. "Up in the air, down on the ground or all around?" and she carried out her speech in action, finally spinning about on one foot in a manner to shock the more staid Elizabeth. ...
— Nan Sherwood at Pine Camp - or, The Old Lumberman's Secret • Annie Roe Carr
... a boat, on the 3d September, where they caught plenty of fish; and going on shore, procured some lemons. They saw also some buffaloes, on their return to the ship. The 6th they went out of the harbour of Sierra Leona, and staid one tide three leagues from the point at its mouth, the ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume X • Robert Kerr
... had to undergo plenty of raillery from their companions. We will pass that over. For several days, as they passed to and fro, they saw nothing of the young farmer. But one evening, as they were again alone, having staid at the same acquaintance's as before, the young farmer popped his head over a stone wall, and said, "Good evening to you, young women." He was soon over the wall, and walked on with them to the end of the town. On the Sunday at the chapel Jane saw ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 2, July, 1850. • Various
... hardly help believing, much grace; liable to the frailty of childhood, at times she would differ with the little ones and rather loved her own way, but she was very easy to lead though not one to be driven. She had most tender affections, a good understanding for her years, and a remarkably staid and solid mind. Her love was very strong, and her little attentions great to those she loved, and remarkable in her kindness to servants, poor people, and all animals; she had much feeling for them; but what was more, the bent of her mind was remarkably toward ...
— Elizabeth Fry • Mrs. E. R. Pitman
... all too soon, the great picture seemed to shrink; the quivering pulsation of light and color gave way to staid, commonplace gardens. Instead of hawthorn hedges there was the stench of river smells—we were driving over cobble-paved streets and beneath rows of crooked, crumbling houses. A group of noisy street urchins greeted us in derision. And then ...
— In and Out of Three Normady Inns • Anna Bowman Dodd
... compliance with her aunt's suggestion, she was timid, silent, and altogether without self-reliance. Even they who knew her best had never guessed that she possessed a keen sense of humour, a nice appreciation of character, and a quiet reticent wit of her own, under that staid and frightened demeanour. Since her engagement with Brooke Burgess it seemed to those who watched her that her character had become changed, as does that of a flower when it opens itself in its growth. The sweet gifts of nature within became visible, the petals sprang to view, and ...
— He Knew He Was Right • Anthony Trollope
... and to the left, wheresoever he would. The King of Valencia with his knights was near the wall watching him, and Alvar Faez and his company were in readiness lest the French should defy them. And after Abenalfange had staid their awhile he drew off and went his way to Tortosa. And Yahia was perplexed with Alvar Faez, and sought for means to pay him, and he threw the two sons of Abdalla Azis into prison, and many other good men of the town also, and took from them great riches. Then he made a covenant with Alvar ...
— Chronicle Of The Cid • Various
... is doubtful whether you had a right to come and interfere while the fish was near his hook; it is doubtful whether he did or did not have a sort of right to try to catch the fish, without your interfering; and you ought to have been willing to have given him the benefit of the doubt, and so have staid away, or have given up the fish to him after ...
— Forests of Maine - Marco Paul's Adventures in Pursuit of Knowledge • Jacob S. Abbott
... dry keels launched into the vernal waters. Again, in the warm twilight of evening, you hear the laugh and song go up under the wide-spreading elms. Now, too, comes the Exhibition of the Wooden Spoon, where the low-appointment men burlesque the staid performances of college, and present the lowest scholar on the appointment-list with an immense spoon, handsomely carved from rosewood, and engraved with the convivial motto: ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 2, No 3, September, 1862 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy. • Various
... his friend Little Tim, who, knowing well the red man's staid and self-possessed character, was somewhat surprised to see by his flashing eyes and quick breathing that he was ...
— The Prairie Chief • R.M. Ballantyne
... of Ernest and Frank was of another kind. Their natures were much less excitable, and it did not appear that the recent arrivals had altered their outward demeanor in the slightest degree; they continued calm, staid, and reflective, as they had ...
— Willis the Pilot • Paul Adrien
... animal, and naturally conservative in its tastes—averse therefore to uproar, and to all those given to change. Its propensities are to meditation and contemplative tranquillity, for which reason it has ever been held in reverence by nations of a similar staid and composed disposition, and has been the favourite companion and constant friend of grave philosophers and thoughtful students. By the ancient Egyptians cats were held in the highest esteem; and we learn from Diodorus Siculus, their ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 419, New Series, January 10, 1852 • Various
... camp at the head of the Arkansas river until sometime in April, then we pulled out for Bent's Fort to dispose of our pelts. We staid at the Fort three days. The day we left the Fort, we met a runner from Col. Freemont with a letter for Carson. Freemont wanted Carson to bring a certain amount of supplies to his camp and then to act as a guide across the mountains to Monterey, California. ...
— Chief of Scouts • W.F. Drannan
... subsequently as the Dauphin. Poutrincourt and De Monts went energetically to work, and succeeded in obtaining the services of all the mechanics and labourers they required. The new expedition was necessarily composed of very unruly characters, who sadly offended the staid folk of that orderly bulwark of Calvinism, the town of La Rochelle. At last on the 13th of May, 1606, the Jonas, with its unruly crew all on board, left for the new world under the command of Poutrincourt. Among the passengers was L'Escarbot, a Paris ...
— Canada • J. G. Bourinot
... had made too few prisoners for the pomp of a triumph; he therefore took some Gauls, the tallest he could find, of triumphal size, as he said, put them in German clothes, made them learn some Teutonic words, and sent them away to Rome to await in prison his return and his ovation. Lyons, where he staid some time, was the scene of his extortions and strangest freaks. He was playing at dice one day with some of his courtiers, and lost; he rose, sent for the tax-list of the province, marked down for death and confiscation some of those who were most highly rated, and said to the company, ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume I. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot
... grave-hill, there staid One skeleton, tripping behind; Though not by his comrades the trick had been played— Now its odour he snuffed in the wind: He rushed to the door—but fell back with a shock; For well for the wight of the bell and the clock, The sign ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 20, No. - 582, Saturday, December 22, 1832 • Various
... Priscilla sharply, but ended the exclamation with a saucy laugh and said instead, "Yes, truly as thou sayest, my May, mine eyes ache with gazing upon nothingness and my tongue aches with speaking naught but wisdom. It is out of nature for young maids to be as staid as their elders, and methinks I do not care to be. Let us be young while ...
— Standish of Standish - A story of the Pilgrims • Jane G. Austin
... you know the kind of maid Sets my heart a flame-a? Eyes must be downcast and staid, Cheeks must flush for shame-a! She may neither dance nor sing, But, demure in everything, Hang her head in modest way, With pouting lips that seem to say "Kiss me, kiss me, kiss me, kiss me, Though ...
— Bab Ballads and Savoy Songs • W. S. Gilbert
... psychology must have a place in it for the abnormal as well as the normal, and for the exceptional as well as for the staid and universally accepted. Those who have been fathering new religions and seeking to make the abnormal normal have been quick to avail themselves of the suggestions and permissions in the new psychology. Once we have crossed the old and clearly defined frontiers, almost anything seems possible. ...
— Modern Religious Cults and Movements • Gaius Glenn Atkins
... Path, Nickens and Woodson did not see Bibb on his first visit, in 1837, when he staid with Job Dundy, but were subsequently told of it by Bibb. They first saw him in May, 1838. Mrs. Path remembers this date because it was the month in which she removed from Broadway to Harrison street, and Bibb assisted ...
— Narrative of the Life and Adventures of Henry Bibb, an American Slave, Written by Himself • Henry Bibb
... lines to the valet of Monsieur d'Arblay, and desired he would come instantly to the inn for the baggage of Madame d'Arblay, who was then on the road. Hardly five minutes elapsed ere Franois, running like a race-horse, though in himself a staid and composed German, appeared before me. How I shook at his sight with terrific suspense ! The good-natured creature relieved me instantly though with a relief that struck at my heart with a pang of agony—for ...
— The Diary and Letters of Madame D'Arblay Volume 3 • Madame D'Arblay
... Hawkesworth, 'that this young gentleman has, as perhaps you know, a grandpapa, a grandmamma, and also six or seven aunts. With his grandmamma he cannot be left, for sundry reasons, unnecessary to mention. Now, one of his aunts is a staid matronly lady, and his godmother besides, and in all respects the person to take charge of him,—only she lives in a small house in a town, and has plenty of babies of her own, without being troubled with other people's. Master Henry's other five aunts ...
— Scenes and Characters • Charlotte M. Yonge
... Government has existed for about a hundred years, and the number of females who have demanded to be invested with equal political and civil rights and to be placed upon an exact equality with the male portion of our population, compared with those who have remained in retirement, who have staid at their homes and lived and ruled within that sphere in which it seems God intended that they should rule, is as a drop in the sea. So it appears in this conclusive way that the women of America do not demand this state of things. They do not protect ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume II • Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and Matilda Joslyn Gage
... staid New York Times, which had until now stayed out of UFO controversy, broke down and ran an editorial entitled, "Those Flying Saucers—Are They or ...
— The Report on Unidentified Flying Objects • Edward Ruppelt
... rest, and she should not see him again the whole day through. So she called out, "The great Calla is fully blown now. You were admiring the buds the other day; will you remain a moment; I should like to show it you?" Anton bowed and staid behind. A few more awkward moments, then her brother rose too; and, hurrying to Anton, she took him to the room ...
— Debit and Credit - Translated from the German of Gustav Freytag • Gustav Freytag
... utmost simplicity, any of my auditors should still reproach me for introducing such abstruse matters, I must shelter myself behind the authority of the wisest of men. "If they (the ancient moralists), before they had come to the popular and received notions of virtue and vice, had staid a little longer upon the inquiry concerning the roots of good and evil, they had given, in my opinion, a great light to that which followed; and specially if they had consulted with nature, they had made ...
— A Discourse on the Study of the Law of Nature and Nations • James Mackintosh
... tranquil. It was destined for the decision of the important bet, and has been productive of general confusion throughout the house. It was settled that the race should be run at five o'clock in the afternoon. Lord Merton breakfasted here, and staid till noon. He wanted to engage the ladies to bet on his side, in the true spirit of gaming, without seeing the racers. But he could only prevail on Lady Louisa, as Mrs. Selwyn said she never laid a wager against her own wishes, and Mrs. Beaumont would not take sides. As for me, I was not applied ...
— Evelina • Fanny Burney
... Pilot laid his great brown hand on his daughter's shoulder. "Don't be ruffled. Let an old sailor have his joke: it won't hurt, God bless us; it won't hurt more'n the buzzing of a blue-bottle fly. But you're that prim and proper, that staid and straight-laced, you make me tease you, just to rouse you up. Oh! them calm ones, Mr. Scarlett, beware of 'em. It takes a lot to goad 'em to it, but once their hair's on end, it's time a sailor went to sea, and a landsman took to the bush. It's simply terrible. Them mild ...
— The Tale of Timber Town • Alfred Grace
... Fathers by the score have written us on the subject. One says, "I have solved the problem of keeping my boys off the streets, or, rather, Journeys has done it for me." "I have never spent a happier evening. The boys staid up with me till after their usual bed time and when they had retired, I read on for half the night," says another. "I feel young again, and John and I are great chums. Reminiscences of a Pioneer kept me telling stories long after we had finished reading ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 10 - The Guide • Charles Herbert Sylvester
... considerably to the north-west of Hudson's Bay. The whole extent of his journey was about thirteen hundred miles. It was however doubted, whether what he deemed to be the mouth of the Coppermine River was actually such. It is certainly singular, that though he staid there for twenty-four hours, he did not actually ascertain the height to which the tide rose, but judged at that circumstance from the marks on the edge of the ice. There are other points in the ...
— Robert Kerr's General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 18 • William Stevenson
... many a staid citizen, many a parson, teacher, high official, high military dignitary, etc., learns that his daughter has secretly taken to prostitution. Were it allowable to mention all these daughters by name, either a social revolution ...
— Woman under socialism • August Bebel
... it is to be really afraid. I didn't until a fellow came up to me at the club and asked me if I had seen the detectives. Fear is a terrible thing, Rodney; there is nothing so demoralising as fear. You know my staid old club of black mahogany and low ceilings, where half a dozen men sit dining and talking about hunting and two-year-olds. There is a man in that club who has asked me for the last ten years what I am going to ...
— The Untilled Field • George Moore
... in his place of power be able to hold a part of the ground which would all be finally lost if he should join the crusade against the Administration. Under these motives Mr. Seward retained his portfolio. He staid on and on, continually hoping to do some act of patriotic service, and steadily losing that great host of friends who for twenty years had looked to him with unfaltering faith for ...
— Twenty Years of Congress, Volume 2 (of 2) • James Gillespie Blaine
... at St. John, Leavitt lived in the family of Simonds and White who lived together during the greater part of the ten years he was in the Company's employ, and when they separated their families he staid sometimes with one and sometimes with the other. Simonds and White were supplied with bread, meat and liquors for themselves and families from the store, and no account was kept whilst they lived together, but after they separated they were charged against each family; the (workmen ...
— Glimpses of the Past - History of the River St. John, A.D. 1604-1784 • W. O. Raymond
... king Helge, but firm and staid; The sword that bites the sharpest has the limberest blade. Kings are adorned by mercy, as shields by flowers, And spring can more accomplish ...
— Fridthjof's Saga • Esaias Tegner
... on the which this image staid Was (O great pitie!) built of brickle* clay, That shortly the foundation decaid, 500 With showres of heaven and tempests worne away; Then downe it fell, and low in ashes lay, Scorned of everie one which by it went; ...
— The Poetical Works of Edmund Spenser, Volume 5 • Edmund Spenser
... nurse; he staid by his friend till he went to sleep, and then "turned in" upon a settee beneath his berth. The boat pitched and tumbled about so in the heavy sea that Bobby did not sleep long, and when he woke he found Tom ready to assist him. But our hero felt better, ...
— Now or Never - The Adventures of Bobby Bright • Oliver Optic
... him quite beyond the measure of anything intrinsically humorous in it, and he staid watching the exertions of the heated truckman and two silk-capped, sarcastic-faced freight-men, till the piano was well on the platform. He was so intent upon it that his interest seemed to communicate itself to a young girl coming from the other quarter, with a suburban, ...
— A Pair of Patient Lovers • William Dean Howells
... Acerrae with the foot and all the heavy arms and a third part of the horse, and carrying with him the rest of the horse and six hundred light armed foot, marching night and day without remission, he staid not till he came up to these ten thousand near a Gaulish village called Clastidium, which not long before had been reduced under the Roman jurisdiction. Nor had he time to refresh his soldiers, or to give them rest. For the barbarians, that were then present, ...
— Plutarch's Lives • A.H. Clough
... divine goodnesse, which I there make the measure of his providence. That ground limits the essence of the world as well as its duration, and satisfies the curiositie of the Opposer, by shewing the incompossibilitie in the Creature, not want of goodnesse in the Creatour to have staid the framing of the Universe. But now roused up by a new Philosophick furie, I answer that difficultie by taking away the Hypothesis of either the world or time being finite: defending the infinitude of both, which though I had done with a great deal of vigour and life, and semblance ...
— Democritus Platonissans • Henry More
... partake of every article of the dessert twice over, commenced an harangue, in which he set forth the extreme caution and reserve he considered it right and advisable for young gentlemen to exercise in their intercourse with young ladies, towards whom he declared they should maintain a staid deportment of dignified 275 courtesy, tempered by distant but respectful attentions. This, repeated with variations, lasted us till the tea was announced, and we returned to the drawing-room. Here Freddy made a desperate and final struggle to remove ...
— Frank Fairlegh - Scenes From The Life Of A Private Pupil • Frank E. Smedley
... hail, thou Goddess, sage and holy! Hail, divinest Melancholy! Whose saintly visage is too bright To hit the sense of human sight, And therefore to our weaker view O'erlaid with black, staid Wisdom's hue: Black, but such as in esteem Prince Memnon's sister might beseem Or that starred Ethiop queen that strove To set her beauty's praise above The Sea-Nymphs, and their powers offended; Yet thou art higher far descended; Thee bright-haired Vesta, long ...
— MacMillan's Reading Books - Book V • Anonymous
... New York factory city with very staid ways," she said. "You go to a dance at the country club every Saturday night and to tea parties and things in between. You fight, bleed and die for your social position and once in a while you stop and wonder why.{HORIZONTAL ELLIPSIS} It's a bore. You can see ...
— The Blood of the Conquerors • Harvey Fergusson
... Reginald, throwing himself from his horse, assisted Wuzeer Singh to reach the small loophole, through which he could communicate with those within. After a few words had been exchanged, the gates were opened and the party entered. A staid-looking citizen, with several younger men, received them; and though they treated the rajah with marked respect, they did not otherwise show that they knew who he was. The old man only addressed him as sahib, and begged leave to show the way into the interior of the ...
— The Young Rajah • W.H.G. Kingston
... some mutual acquaintances was accepted as all-sufficing credentials for my respectability. We had happened to fix on the same hotel at our destination; and in the evening, after dinner, I met in the corridor the staid and severe-looking gouvernante, who saluted me with "Oh, Mr. Muirhead, I have such a headache! Would you mind going out with my little girl while she makes some purchases?" I was a little taken aback at first; but a moment's reflection convinced me that I had ...
— The Land of Contrasts - A Briton's View of His American Kin • James Fullarton Muirhead
... believe, speaks to the best of her knowledge. A thief it could not be, for he hath not taken the least thing; and it is plain he had the girl's watch in his hand. If it had been a bailiff, surely he would have staid till our return. I can conceive no other from the girl's account than that it must have ...
— Amelia (Complete) • Henry Fielding
... that," Le Fenu exclaimed. "What do you call yourself? Have you so soon forgotten the fact that you are a staid married woman? What do you ...
— The Mystery of the Four Fingers • Fred M. White
... no telling what these sarpints may take into their heads to do. They're a bad set of craytures, always barring Mr. Shasta, and I'd've thought a good daal more of the same if he'd only staid a ...
— Adrift in the Wilds - or, The Adventures of Two Shipwrecked Boys • Edward S. Ellis
... required his prompt and cheerful obedience, and, when out of their sight, Archie was very careful to do nothing of which he thought his parents would not approve. Every vacation he paid a visit to his cousin, and sometimes staid until late in the winter, to engage in his favorite sport. He was well known to the village boys, among whom his easy and obliging manners had ...
— Frank, the Young Naturalist • Harry Castlemon
... make the best use of it." She was used from her childhood to this sort of academic doubt of everything, conducted side by side with a practical acceptance of everything. Professor and Madame La Rue, in actual life devotedly faithful married lovers, staid, stout, habit-ridden elderly people, professed a theoretical belief in the flexibility of relationships sanctioned by the practice of free love. It was perhaps with this recollection in her mind that she suggested, "Don't you suppose it will be like the institution of marriage, very, very ...
— The Bent Twig • Dorothy Canfield
... Jacob staid with Laban for a month, helping him with his flocks and becoming more and more in love with Rachel. Then Laban asked him if he would like to be his shepherd and if so what wages he would wish. Jacob ...
— The Farmer Boy; the Story of Jacob • J. H. Willard
... During the Rebellion—a comparatively staid and respectable affair—a correspondent, after the first two years, became so expert as to anticipate battles, and knew as much about war as a general. War news and buckwheat cakes enlivened the matutinal meal. The chances pro and con gave a zest to conversations else ...
— Punchinello Vol. II., No. 30, October 22, 1870 • Various
... don't try and Find me out, For I would not go with you again for the world. I am so much better Off here. I wish you would be a good boy, and leave off your Bad ways; for I am sure, as every one says, I don't know what would have become of me if I had staid with you. Mr. [the Mr. half scratched out] the gentleman I am with, says if you turn out Properly, he will be a friend to you, Too; but he advises you to go, like a Good boy, to Arthur Beaufort, and ask his pardon for the past, and then Arthur will be ...
— Night and Morning, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... you, Joseph," answered the laird, "what this—this outbreak of superstition imports? You must be aware that nothing in the world could annoy me more than that Miss Galbraith should learn folly in her father's house. That staid servants, such as I had supposed mine to be, should use their tongues as if their heads had no more in them than so many bells hung in a steeple, is to me a ...
— Sir Gibbie • George MacDonald
... shouldered with that experience the first day. But I have tried to think it over calmly since, and I can see nothing else to have done." He paused in his pacing up and down, a smile struggling with his serious look. "It was quite a hot-headed business for one of the staid Brices, wasn't it?" ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... acquainted with the north-western parts of Mexico, I left Captain Davis and joined Captain Swan. Captain Townley joined us with his two barks, but Captains Harris and Knight went along with Swan. On the 27th Davis went out of the harbour with his ship, but we staid behind for some time, to provide ourselves with wood and water. By this time our men began to be much afflicted with fevers, which we attributed to the remains of a contagious distemper that lately raged at Realejo, as the men belonging to ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume X • Robert Kerr
... find out when the burdocks and mustard were planted on the dump; and I am sure that they were never hoed or watered. Nature practices a wonderfully rigid economy. For nearly half the summer she even refused rain to the plants, but still they thrived; yet I staid home from a vacation one summer that I might keep my plants from dying. I have since learned that if the plants in my hardy borders cannot take care of themselves for a time, they ...
— Manual of Gardening (Second Edition) • L. H. Bailey
... as she heard it. "No, not particularly. I am really indifferent. But I think it would look rather silly to refuse, don't you? Besides, it would be good for him to see how old and staid I have become." ...
— The Keeper of the Door • Ethel M. Dell
... white strangers came. They staid not long. This time not so many come—next time not ...
— The Flute of the Gods • Marah Ellis Ryan
... not an adventurer?" remarked the staid British landowner—one of a class perhaps the most conservative and narrow-minded in all ...
— The White Lie • William Le Queux
... always honoured you, I suppose I need not tell you at this time of day; for you know I staid not to date my respects to you from that title which now you have, and to which you bring a greater addition by your merit, than you receive from it by the name; but I am proud to let others know, how long it is that I have been made happy by my knowledge of you; because I am sure it ...
— The Works of John Dryden, Vol. 6 (of 18) - Limberham; Oedipus; Troilus and Cressida; The Spanish Friar • John Dryden
... for the prison where the trooper is confined, the old lady has managed to draw about her, with her lavender- coloured dress, much of the staid calmness which is its usual accompaniment. A wonderfully grave, precise, and handsome piece of old china she looks, though her heart beats fast and her stomacher is ruffled more than even the remembrance of this wayward son has ruffled it ...
— Bleak House • Charles Dickens
... plucking of the Autumn primrose that Benson had seen: a somewhat different operation from the plucking of the Spring one: very innocent! Our staid elderly sister has paler blood, and has, or thinks she has, a reason or two about the roots. She is not all instinct. "For this high cause, and for that I know men, and know him to be the flower of men, I give myself to him!" She ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... heaving of the bosom, the eye now and then lost in reverie, all betrayed the soft tumult that was going on in her little heart. The aunts were continually hovering around her, for maiden aunts are apt to take great interest in affairs of this nature. They were giving her a world of staid counsel how to deport herself, what to say, and in what manner ...
— The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, Gent. • Washington Irving
... run over. Hevings! is there no help for us—no halting-place this side of hetairism? Are we all pedaling at breakneck pace to the Grove of Daphne, where lust is law? Is the bike transforming this staid old world into one wild bacchic orgy or phallic revel? Have we toiled afoot thus far up the social mountainside, only to go bowling down on a pneumatic tire—"as low as to the fiends?" Head us, ...
— Volume 1 of Brann The Iconoclast • William Cowper Brann
... fervent prayer for the restoration of the valuable animal which had carried him so many thousands of miles, preaching the everlasting gospel to his fellow-sinners. Mr Cunningham, who was remarkable for the staid and orderly, if not stiff, demeanour, which characterised the anti-burghers, was not only surprised but grieved, and even scandalised, at what he deemed so great an impropriety. He remonstrated with his guest. But Mr Hill ...
— Heads and Tales • Various
... laden in the evenings. Sailors and fisher-folk travelled the red, winding harbor roads, light-hearted and content. There was always a certain sense of things going to happen—of adventures and farings-forth. The ways of Four Winds were less staid and settled and grooved than those of Avonlea; winds of change blew over them; the sea called ever to the dwellers on shore, and even those who might not answer its call felt the thrill and unrest and mystery and possibilities ...
— Anne's House of Dreams • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... Madame Pierron, a beautiful and genteel woman of twenty-five years, with her black fillets and her marble profile, who still retained the obvious awkwardness and vacant eye of young married women. Tranquil, staid and silent, she came and went and lived, totally blind ...
— Light • Henri Barbusse
... turning loose a lot of boys and girls, with no keeper, to enjoy themselves in some wild sea place! No, no: the only way to give the arrangement any shade of propriety, will be to be elderly, infuse as much vinegar as possible into my countenance, wear my spectacles, and walk at a staid pace up and down the parade, while my two sons ...
— The Trial - or, More Links of the Daisy Chain • Charlotte M. Yonge
... mother who had come to visit a soldier son at the barracks, brought him to the hotel for a meal, and for a space the radiance of blue and scarlet and the glint of steel cast a military glamour over the staid company. ...
— A Versailles Christmas-Tide • Mary Stuart Boyd
... the four corners of Berlin's most important street crossing are occupied by cafes. This is where Unter den Linden and Friedrichstrasse meet. On the southwest corner there is Kranzler's staid old cafe, a very respectable place, where the lower hall is even reserved for non-smokers. On the southeast corner is Cafe Bauer, known the world over. However, it has seen better days. It has been outdistanced by competitors. On the northeast ...
— All About Coffee • William H. Ukers
... oblique way Amongst innumerable stars, that shone Stars distant, but nigh hand seemed other worlds; Or other worlds they seemed, or happy isles, Like those Hesperian gardens famed of old, Fortunate fields, and groves, and flowery vales, Thrice happy isles; but who dwelt happy there He staid not to inquire: Above them all The golden sun, in splendour likest Heaven, Allured his eye; thither his course he bends Through the calm firmament, (but up or down, By center, or eccentrick, hard to tell, Or longitude,) where the great ...
— Paradise Lost • John Milton
... and myself, to the opposite bank of the river. I directed the men to cross and follow us to Johnson's Ranch. We arrived there early that day. Making known our situation, he drove his cattle up to the house, saying, 'There are the cattle, take as many as you need.' We shot down five head, staid up all night, and with the help of Mr. Johnson and his Indians, by the time the men arrived the next morning, we had the meat fire-dried and ready to be placed in bags. Mr. Johnson had a party of Indians making flour by hand mills, they ...
— History of the Donner Party • C.F. McGlashan
... lieng sicke at Beneuento, and obteined a fauourable answer, wherewith returning towards England, he came to the king at Roan (where he had left him at his setting foorth forward) certifieng him how he had sped in this voiage. The forsaid Anselme was also staid by the king at Roan, and could not be suffered to passe ouer into England all that time, till it might be vnderstood by the returne of the archbishop, what the popes pleasure should be further in that matter. [Sidenote: Pope Gelasius succeded pope[9] Paschall.] Shortlie after ...
— Chronicles of England, Scotland and Ireland (2 of 6): England (3 of 12) - Henrie I. • Raphael Holinshed
... applicants on the spot. Neither of these parties, however, graduated, so the State of Ohio lost nothing. We went to Baltimore by rail, there took a boat up to Havre de Grace, then the rail to Wilmington, Delaware, and up the Delaware in a boat to Philadelphia. I staid over in Philadelphia one day at the old Mansion House, to visit the family of my brother-in-law, Mr. Reese. I found his father a fine sample of the old merchant gentleman, in a good house in Arch Street, with his accomplished daughters, who had been to ...
— Memoirs of Three Civil War Generals, Complete • U. S. Grant, W. T. Sherman, P. H. Sheridan
... have got something done in my Lord Evelin's business, and would have got money before now, that might serve me to go a volunteer with the King, or maintain me anywhere; but my friend at home must have worse thoughts now of my affairs than ever, having staid so long here, and got nothing done. However, I now resolve to go to Scotland, not being able to subsist longer here. I have sent the inclosed note, that, according to your kind promise, I may have the little money which will carry ...
— Memoirs of the Jacobites of 1715 and 1745 - Volume II. • Mrs. Thomson
... permanence; that fast-anchored isle has defied the surges and roaring currents; the grave seems beautifully constant; it has not betrayed our confidence; it is not weary of its precious charge; it has kindly staid behind to permit and encourage our griefs when all else may have fled. The winter's snows have fallen, the tempests have beaten, there; and now, this April or May morning, it is as steadfast and quiet as when ...
— Catharine • Nehemiah Adams
... and one on the hole. When the squirrel appeared, as it usually did in a short time these would start up with well feigned cries of alarm. In a moment the entire study-hall was in an uproar, all pursuing the bewildered squirrel. The first or second time this occurred, the staid professor took active part in the exciting chase. The frequent recurrence of squirrel hunts in the study-hall awakened suspicion in the minds of the faculty. An investigation was made, Paul and Stockie were called to the president's room and interviewed ...
— The Story of Paul Boyton - Voyages on All the Great Rivers of the World • Paul Boyton
... glory, 'Twas thy fell sword that pierced thy father's heart! Now go—and at yon gates relate thy story— Say Brutus claims to be the chief in glory, 'Twas his fell sword that pierced his father's heart! Go—Now thou'rt told what staid me on this shore, Grim ferryman, push off, and swiftly ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller
... while the knocking was growing more uproarious and more unlike the staid career of life in such a palace. Scandal was at the door, with what a fatal following she dreaded to conceive; and at the same time among the voices that now began to summon her by name, she recognised the Chancellor's. He or another, somebody must ...
— Prince Otto • Robert Louis Stevenson
... more seemly employed. My Lord, because of one or two misadventures by reason of the slipperiness of the ice, was fain to go by London Bridge, which we did; my Lord as suited his humor ruffling the staid citizens as he passed or peering under the hoods of their wives and daughters—as became a young gallant of the time. I, being a plain, blunt man, assisted in no such folly, but contented myself, when they complayned to me, with damning their souls for greasy ...
— New Burlesques • Bret Harte
... Transcendentalism, like all idealistic movements, had its "lunatic fringe," its camp-followers of excitable, unstable visionaries. The very name, like the name Methodist, was probably bestowed upon it in mockery, and this whole perturbation of staid New England had its humorous side. Witness the career of Bronson Alcott. It is also true that the glorious affirmations of these seers can be neither proved nor disproved. They made no examination and they sought no validation of consciousness. An explorer in search of the North Pole must bring ...
— The American Spirit in Literature, - A Chronicle of Great Interpreters, Volume 34 in The - Chronicles Of America Series • Bliss Perry
... influences of his teachings. How different were they from poor Gottfried's lessons, and the humble habits of those who lived beneath them! Yet I was sorry, deeply sorry, that our separation should have been thus, and almost wished I had staid to share his fate, ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Vol. 3, July, 1851 • Various
... course, to express more than he seems actually to say. He economises. He will not spoil good things by exaggeration. The rough, promiscuous wealth of nature he reduces to grace and order: reduces, it may be, lax verse to staid and temperate prose. With him, the rhythm, the music, the notes, will be felt to follow, or rather literally accompany as ministers, the ...
— Plato and Platonism • Walter Horatio Pater
... reassuring. When Julia left him, at her own door at six o'clock, she was her radiant, confident self again, and they kissed each other at parting like true lovers. To his eager demand for a promise Julia still returned a staid, "Mama'd be crazy, Mark. I ain't sixteen yet!" but on this enchanted afternoon she had consented to linger, on Kearney Street, before the trays of rings in jewellers' windows, and it was in the wildest spirits that Mark bounded on upstairs ...
— The Story Of Julia Page - Works of Kathleen Norris, Volume V. • Kathleen Norris
... when the heated partisans of South Carolina in their zeal for free trade and State rights had made a step in advance of the more staid and reflecting Statists, and undertook to abrogate and nullify the laws of the Federal Government legally enacted, they found themselves unsupported and in difficulty, and naturally turned to their ...
— The Galaxy - Vol. 23, No. 1 • Various
... staid gentleman, newly lighted from his travels; brother of Oria'na, who "chases" Mi'rabel "the wild goose," and catches him.—Beaumont and Fletcher, ...
— Character Sketches of Romance, Fiction and the Drama, Vol 1 - A Revised American Edition of the Reader's Handbook • The Rev. E. Cobham Brewer, LL.D.
... larn, sir, that we don't take as long to fix up a town hereaway as you do in the old country," remarked Hunky Ben, as old Jacob Crossley ambled up on the staid creature which we have already introduced ...
— Charlie to the Rescue • R.M. Ballantyne
... boy-friend, a little Irish boy, who called himself "Chairlier-Shauzy." I suspect his name was Charley O'Shaughnessy. He was just as poor and alone in the world as Biddy, and almost always staid in the ...
— Harper's Young People, February 24, 1880 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various
... a whisper, of Mr. PUNCH how the latter very staid individual came to be there, I understood that, of all the absurd men of this century, he was selected as the most representatively preposterous. The PRINCE OF WALES was not asked, lest his morals might be hurt by something that was said. And ...
— Punchinello, Vol. 1, No. 6, May 7, 1870 • Various
... relatives, and it is good for us to be married. Do not be afraid even though you did not come here of your own accord. I go to Kaodanan," he said. Then they married, and the sun went to shine on the world, because it was his business, and the big star also had business when it became night. Aponibolinayen staid alone in the house, and in the afternoon the sun again went home, but first he went to fish in the river. He went home when he had caught the big fish for them to eat—both those married. And when he arrived in their house he found Aponibolinayen, who was cooking, and he saw that she still broke ...
— Traditions of the Tinguian: A Study in Philippine Folk-Lore • Fay-Cooper Cole
... the horn, that sent staid old cows scurrying this way and that to get out of the way, and the car swerved from the road and took to the open field, headed straight toward the hill where the two horsemen were. Jerking his horse about, Steve rode down to meet the new ...
— Man to Man • Jackson Gregory
... some time with a circus company. Evenings he staid inside the big tent to see the doings, and daytimes he had a two-cent side-show in a small tent of his own, where the monkey played wonderful tricks, and marched to the ...
— Harper's Young People, February 10, 1880 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various
... this creature of "a million moods" to the staid and sedate girl of other types. So the Thoracic girl seldom lacks for attention. She does not have as many intimate friends as the fat girl, for she is less comforting, and comfort is one of the first requisites of friendship. But she has a longer line of beaux dancing attendance ...
— How to Analyze People on Sight - Through the Science of Human Analysis: The Five Human Types • Elsie Lincoln Benedict and Ralph Paine Benedict
... for behind Mr. Humpage came a pretty child with long floating light hair, with a staid fresh-faced woman in grey, and last a girl of about nineteen or twenty, who seemed to have caught the very audible whisper, for she glanced in its direction as she passed in with the slightest possible gleam of amused surprise in her eyes and a ...
— The Giant's Robe • F. Anstey
... was Mrs. Trollope, a portly lady, of any age between thirty and forty, staid and sedate, as became her character, and attentive to her 'thees' and 'thous,' which lent their cloak for plain speaking, of which she was not chary. She frequently admonished her daughters—perhaps adopted for the evening—against the vanities by which ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 89, March, 1865 • Various
... wood and fill water. I found many of the islanders much inclined to be friends with us, especially the old people; on the other hand, most of the younger were daring and insolent, and obliged us to keep to our arms. I staid till I saw no disturbance was like to happen, and then returned to the ship, leaving the party under the command of Lieutenants Clerke and Edgcumbe. When they came on board to dinner, they informed me that the people continued to behave in the same inconsistent manner as in the ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 14 • Robert Kerr
... proceeds. That this must necessarily be the case, will be admitted by the reader who understands what has been already discussed, and is fully demonstrated by Plato in the Parmenides, as will be evident to the intelligent from the notes on that Dialogue. In addition therefore to what I have staid on this subject, I shall further observe at present that this doctrine, which is founded in the sublimest and most scientific conceptions of the human mind, may be clearly shown to be a legitimate dogma of Plato from what is asserted by him in the sixth book of his Republic. For he there affirms, ...
— Introduction to the Philosophy and Writings of Plato • Thomas Taylor
... proceeded on his journey to Mesopotamia, and at length came to Haran; and meeting with shepherds in the suburbs, with boys grown up, and maidens sitting about a certain well, he staid with them, as wanting water to drink; and beginning to discourse with them, he asked them whether they knew such a one as Laban, and whether he was still alive. Now they all said they knew him, for he was not so inconsiderable a person as to be unknown ...
— The Antiquities of the Jews • Flavius Josephus
... it fust or last. And so, no matter what day or hour Ketury had a mind to rap at anybody's door, folks gen'lly thought it was best to let her in; but then, they never thought her coming was for any good, for she was just like the wind,—she came when the fit was on her, she staid jest so long as it pleased her, and went when she got ready, and not before. Ketury understood English, and could talk it well enough, but always seemed to scorn it, and was allers mo win' and mutterin' to herself in Indian, and winkin' and blinkin' as if she saw more-folks round than ...
— Oldtown Fireside Stories • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... bee's long smothered hum, on the blue flag Loitering amidst the mead; or busy rill, Which now through all its course stands still and dumb Its own memorial,—purling at its play Along the slopes, and through the meadows next, Until its youthful sound was hushed at last In the staid current of the lowland stream; Or seen the furrows shine but late upturned, And where the fieldfare followed in the rear, When all the fields around lay bound and hoar Beneath a thick integument of snow. So by God's cheap economy made rich To go upon ...
— Excursions • Henry D. Thoreau
... sea-air." I could have told that without reading the letter, for it was written quite clearly in Derrick's face. He looked ten years younger, and if any of his adoring readers could have seen the pranks he was up to that morning in our staid and respectable chambers, I am afraid they would no longer have spoken of him "with ...
— Derrick Vaughan—Novelist • Edna Lyall
... Bacon's word) transmit convictions."—Kirkham cor. "I reside at Lord Stormont's, my old patron and benefactor." Better: "I reside with Lord Stormont, my old patron and benefactor."—Murray cor. "We staid a month at Lord Lyttelton's, the ornament of his country." Much better: "We stayed a month at the seat of Lord Lyttelton, who is the ornament of his country."—Id. "Whose prerogative is it? It is the King-of-Great- Britain's;" [518]—"That is the ...
— The Grammar of English Grammars • Goold Brown
... slept out of doors Many a frozen night, and merrily Answered staid drinkers, good bedmen, and all bores: "At Mrs. Greenland's Hawthorn Bush," said he, "I slept." None knew which bush. Above the town, Beyond "The Drover," a hundred spot the down In Wiltshire. And where now at last he sleeps More sound in ...
— Last Poems • Edward Thomas
... two princes set out with all their retinue; they arrived at the place of encampment, and staid there till night. Then Schahriar called his grand vizier, and, without acquainting him of his design, commanded him to stay in his place during his absence, and to suffer no person to go out of the camp upon any occasion whatever. ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments Volume 1 • Anonymous
... untrod by any white foot but that of a missionary. And it was whispered that in the days when he was "wild" he had penetrated into regions nearer at hand, but more obscure and mysterious even than Africa. All this made the county think more of him now when he appeared staid yet genial, in the fulness of manhood, with a crisp brown beard and a few gray hairs about his temples mingled with his abundant locks, and that capability of paying his way which is dear to every well-regulated community. But for ...
— Sir Tom • Mrs. Oliphant
... the British heart were lost The terrors of the charging host; For not an eye the storm that view'd Changed its proud glance of fortitude, Nor was one forward footstep staid, As dropp'd the dying and the dead. Fast as their ranks the thunders tear, Fast they renew'd each serried square; And on the wounded and the slain Closed their diminish'd files again, Till from their line scarce spears' lengths three, Emerging from the smoke they ...
— The Fifteen Decisive Battles of The World From Marathon to Waterloo • Sir Edward Creasy, M.A.
... named Siren in his father's stables which would win the Goodwood Cup; how, having gone down to see Norton's people when the long vacation began, he had seen Siren daily, and had talked of her until two every morning in the smoking-room, and had then staid up two hours later to watch her take her trial spin over the downs. He remembered how they used to stamp back over the long grass wet with dew, comparing watches and talking of the time in whispers, and said good night as the sun broke over the ...
— Gallegher and Other Stories • Richard Harding Davis
... was wholly resplendent in a new waistcoat of his own devising, and an evening coat which almost swept the floor as he executed the evolutions of his western style of dancing. Other gentlemen were, perhaps, more grave and staid. We had with us at least one man, old in government service, who dared the silk stockings and knee breeches of an earlier generation. Yet another wore the white powdered queue, which might have been ...
— 54-40 or Fight • Emerson Hough
... Tim staid away the blessed night, but when the daylight came, It brought him back his courage, and it filled him full of shame; And then he said, unto himself, "There wasn't any cat Could make him leave that room again—he'd ...
— The Old Hanging Fork and Other Poems • George W. Doneghy
... the passage; when I, too, got my invitation. The lad had just received, with an expression of polite surprise, though he knew he could claim it as his right, a slice of crumbling shortbread, and taken his staid departure, when Jess cleared the tea-things off the table, remarking simply that it was a mercy we had not got beyond the first cup. We then ...
— Auld Licht Idylls • J. M. Barrie
... house, staid and softly toned, did none of these things. It gave the Liberry Teacher, in her neat, last year's best suit, a feeling as of gentle welcome-home. She felt contented and belonging even before quick-smiling, slender little Mrs. De Guenther came rustling gently in to greet her. Then followed Mr. ...
— The Rose Garden Husband • Margaret Widdemer
... next year returns, burst out again in bloom, But can it e'er be told who will next year dwell in the inner room? What time the third moon comes, the scented nests have been already built. And on the beams the swallows perch, excessive spiritless and staid; Next year, when the flowers bud, they may, it's true, have ample to feed on: But they know not that when I'm gone beams will be vacant and nests fall! In a whole year, which doth consist of three hundred and sixty days, Winds sharp as swords and frost like unto spears each other rigorous ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book II • Cao Xueqin
... during the recess of Congress by a visit from the "Chicago Zouaves," a volunteer organization which had been carefully trained by its young commander, Captain E. E. Ellsworth, in a novel drill based on the quick movements of the Moors. The staid old military organizations were magnetized by the rapid, theatrical manner in which the Zouaves executed the manual and several gymnastic company movements. Their uniform was loose scarlet trousers, gaiter boots, and buff-leather leggings, ...
— Perley's Reminiscences, Vol. 1-2 - of Sixty Years in the National Metropolis • Benjamin Perley Poore
... her beauteous face and hearing her thus inquire concerning his sickness, hoped that she might be willing to afford him a remedy. But at the same time, observing the grave and staid expression of her countenance, he became afraid, feeling himself to be in the presence of a judge whose sentence, he suspected, would be against him. Nevertheless he swore to her that this love had taken root in his heart ...
— The Tales Of The Heptameron, Vol. III. (of V.) • Margaret, Queen Of Navarre |
