"Vis-a-vis" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... the form of the same key-syllable. Consider these words: wise, wiseacre, wisdom, wizard, witch, wit, unwitting, to wit, outwit, twit, witticism, witness, evidence, providence, invidious, advice, vision, visit, vista, visage, visualize, envisage, invisible, vis-a-vis, visor, revise, supervise, improvise, proviso, provision, view, review, survey, vie, envy, clairvoyance. Perhaps the last six should be disregarded as too exceptional in form to be clearly recognized. And certainly some words, as prudence from providentia, are so metamorphosed ...
— The Century Vocabulary Builder • Creever & Bachelor
... at a table in a downtown cafe there came to him a figure in khaki, wearing a short, close-fitting jacket with an odd emblem on the left sleeve—a young fellow who hailed Thompson with a hearty grip and a friendly grin. He sat himself in a chair vis-a-vis, laying his funny, wedge-shaped ...
— Burned Bridges • Bertrand W. Sinclair
... the grand march!" cried Monte, who, with Mac, represented the "two Dromios." "We separate at the end of the hall, and when the columns line up again, you dance with your vis-a-vis." ...
— Calvary Alley • Alice Hegan Rice
... up the pursuit, had captured some stragglers of their baggage-bearers, and with them some handsome apparel and drinking-cups. The baggage animals of the Hellenes and the mob of non-combatants were just about to cross, when Xenonphon turned his troops right about to face the Carduchians. Vis-a-vis he formed his line, passing the order to the captains each to form his company into sections, and to deploy them into line by the left, the captains of companies and lieutenants in command of sections to advance to meet ...
— Anabasis • Xenophon
... strange fancy,' said Cadurcis, 'and if you will go with me, I will take you in my vis-a-vis. It is here.' ...
— Venetia • Benjamin Disraeli
... agitated the soul of the young plotter, but while he was still shuddering the barkeeper entered with the candles and set them down on the table between the two men, who found themselves vis-a-vis in the ...
— The Redemption of David Corson • Charles Frederic Goss
... at the unexpected materialization in their midst of the mysterious and much heralded Miss Murdaugh she gave no sign, but played conservatively, her eyes always upon the slim, agile fingers of her vis-a-vis. ...
— The Fifth Ace • Douglas Grant
... so, too, did Mr. Winslow and his vis-a-vis. Standing at the top of the ridge was another officer. He was standing there looking down upon them and, although he was not smiling, Jed somehow conceived the idea that he was much amused about something. Now he descended the ...
— Shavings • Joseph C. Lincoln
... painters are standing in the doorway talking to a young woman who, beginning with newspaper work, has stepped suddenly into a niche of fiction. The tall, loose-jointed man at the left of the group, the editor of a conservative monthly, has for his vis-a-vis the artist who has had so much to do with the redemption of American architecture and decoration from the mongrel period of the middle century. Another night you may not see a single one of these faces, but ...
— People of the Whirlpool • Mabel Osgood Wright
... Brussels lace, a corsage, and a head-dress of scarlet velvet with pearls and white ostrich feathers. After the presentations the ball was opened with a quadrille, in which Lord Napier danced with Madame Limburgh, a daughter of General Cass, Mr. Ledyard and Mrs. Seward, Jr., being their vis-a-vis. In the same quadrille was Senator Seward and the beautiful Mrs. Conrad, of Georgia, having as their vis-a-vis Mr. Danby Seymour, M. P., and the niece ...
— Perley's Reminiscences, Vol. 1-2 - of Sixty Years in the National Metropolis • Benjamin Perley Poore
... between individuals of these civilizations on coming into social relations. The Oriental bows low, utters conventional "aisatsu" salutations, listens respectfully, withholds his own opinion, agrees with his vis-a-vis, weighs every word uttered with a view to inferring the real meaning, for the genius of the language requires him to assume that the real meaning is not on the surface, and chooses his own language with the same circumspection. The Occidental extends ...
— Evolution Of The Japanese, Social And Psychic • Sidney L. Gulick
... No, merit have no reward here. Reformer a man, like me! A man who also have ruin himself in dis service! I have lost in it so much as twenty thousand livres. What have I now? Tranchons le mot; je n'ai pas le sou, et me voila exactement vis-a-vis de rien. ...
— Minna von Barnhelm • Gotthold Ephraim Lessing
... Monsieur Monsieur le Chevalier de St. Ives, Baronet Anglois, an Cafe Conti, vis-a-vis le Pont Neuf, Quai Conti, ...
— Anna St. Ives • Thomas Holcroft
... considered. In medieval times, there are always a multitude of other titles to property besides production and saving. The title which is held in highest esteem for the time being is always because of this very extreme vis-a-vis of all other titles, strengthened ...
— Principles Of Political Economy • William Roscher
... taken off his hat to her, he is a knight of the ... ribbon; and a well-known flutterer among the ladies, as well as a vast composer of pretty little nothings."—"Indeed! and pray, cousin, do you see that lady of quality, just driving in at the gate in a superb yellow vis-a-vis,—as you seem to know ...
— Real Life In London, Volumes I. and II. • Pierce Egan
... condemnation that this brought, and I think that no man ever came near him without in some measure loving him. To me he was of a most winning personality, which his strong, gentle face expressed, and a cast in the eye which he could not bring to bear directly upon his vis-a-vis, endeared. I never met him without wishing more of his company, for he seldom failed to say something to whatever was most humane and most modern in me. Our last meeting was at Newburyport, whither he had long before removed from New York, and where ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... addresse ordinaire, c'est-a-dire sans presque jamais en toucher aucun. Tout au milieu de ce bel exercise, je m'avisai de faire une espece de pronostic pour calmer mon inquietude. Je me dis —je m'en vais jeter cette pierre contre l'arbre qui est vis-a-vis de moi: si je le touche, signe de salut: si je le manque, signe de damnation. Tout en disant ainsi, je jette ma pierre d'une main tremblante, et avec un horrible battement de coeur, mais si heureusement qu'elle va frapper au beau-milieu de l'arbre: ce qui ...
— Narrative And Miscellaneous Papers • Thomas De Quincey
... is the most exciting part of the whole affair, and the pleasantest." She is seated at breakfast in her cottage at Summering-by-the-Sea. A heap of letters of various stylish shapes, colors, and superscriptions lies beside her plate, and irregularly straggles about among the coffee-service. Vis-a-vis with her sits Mr. Campbell behind a newspaper. "How prompt they are! Why, I didn't expect to get half so many answers yet. But that shows that where people have nothing to do but attend to their social duties they are always prompt—even the men; ...
— A Likely Story • William Dean Howells
... vis-a-vis and her tall footman are both highly attractive—there are no seats in the vehicle—the fair owner reclines on a splendid crimson velvet divan or cushion. She must now be considered a beauty of the last century, being ...
— The English Spy • Bernard Blackmantle
... this new arrival. The men conversed in whispers when they spoke at all, and in the intervals between the courses they crumbled their bread upon the tablecloth in a manifest embarrassment. Not a word was exchanged between Paul and his vis-a-vis until, towards the close of the meal, the lady's attendant brought to her a small tray of silver with a fine little flacon of transparent Venetian ware, and a liqueur-glass upon it She had drunk nothing but water throughout the repast, but she now poured out a spoonful of some amber-coloured ...
— Despair's Last Journey • David Christie Murray
... been, had we been all sole alone, four men? Probably playing whist or euchre. And now we began with waltzes, which passed into polkas, which subsided into other round dances; and then in very exhaustion we fell back in a grave quadrille. I danced with Hosanna; Wolfgang and Sarah were our vis-a-vis. We went through the same set that Noah and his three boys danced in the ark with their four wives, and which has been danced ever since, in every moment, on one or another spot of the dry earth, going round it with the sun, like the drum-beat of England—right and left, first two forward, ...
— The Brick Moon, et. al. • Edward Everett Hale
... peace for a time, and ate and drank what was set before him. He was conscious that his was scarcely a dinner-table manner. He was too eager, too deeply in earnest. People opposite were looking at them, Ernestine talked to her vis-a-vis. It was some time before he spoke again, when he did he took up the thread of their conversation where he ...
— A Millionaire of Yesterday • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... restaurant and with a pre-occupied air seated himself at the same table with Mr. Mannering. After giving his order, he proceeded to unfold the evening paper laid beside his plate, without even a glance at his vis-a-vis. His thoughts, however, were not on the printed page, but upon the man opposite, whom he had followed from city to city, hearing of him by various names and under various guises; hitherto unable to ...
— That Mainwaring Affair • Maynard Barbour
... real sorry." Miss Upton's hearty sincerity was a sort of consolation. After she had given her luncheon order she spoke again to her vis-a-vis ...
— In Apple-Blossom Time - A Fairy-Tale to Date • Clara Louise Burnham
... flat-topped desk with the opened ledger upon it. A sheet of paper had blown to the floor and was sliding over toward him, its edges curling lazily. These seemed live, vibrant features. One of the clerks across the way had thought of something humorous and was leaning forward to tell his vis-a-vis. It had been so vital that he had laid his pen down to tell it. He was talking with half-shut lips, with eyes that shifted back and forth alert for a glance of disfavour. His rusty black derby sat on the back of his head: ...
— Stubble • George Looms
... danses se font au son de la voix, car ils n'ont point d'instrument de musique. La beaute de la danse, consiste dans l'exacte uniformite des mouvemens du corps. Les hommes, separes des femmes, se postent vis-a-vis les uns des autres; apres quoi, ils remuent la tete, les bras, les mains, les pieds, en cadence. Leur tete est couverte de plumes, on de fleurs;—et l'on voit, attachees a leurs oreilles, des feuilles de palmier tissues avec assez ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 15 (of 18) • Robert Kerr
... looked when she was dancing a quadrille as my vis-a-vis, with, as her partner, the loutish Prince Etienne! How charmingly she smiled when, en chaine, she accorded me her hand! How gracefully the curls, around her head nodded to the rhythm, and how naively she executed the jete ...
— Childhood • Leo Tolstoy
... about during the whole evening and danced either with her or vis-a-vis. He devoured her with his eyes, sighed, and wearied her with prayers and reproaches. After the third quadrille she had ...
— A Hero of Our Time • M. Y. Lermontov
... lighted his pipe, and smoked in silence. As the tobacco died low, he gazed about for a convenient utensil to use in pushing the ashes down in the bowl of his pipe. Looking down he saw the lady's hand resting upon his knee, and he straightway utilized the forefinger of his vis-a-vis. A suppressed feminine screech followed, but the fires of friendship were not quenched by so slight an incident, which Mrs. Vincent knew grew out of temperament, ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great - Volume 12 - Little Journeys to the Homes of Great Scientists • Elbert Hubbard
... Miss Ryder, my vis-a-vis, bowed, looking scornfully at my partner, who was only a clerk, while hers was a law student. I immediately turned to Mr. Parker with affable smiles, and went into a kind of dumb-show of conversation, which made him warm and uncomfortable. Mrs. Judge ...
— The Morgesons • Elizabeth Stoddard
... beard before a shabby old toilet-table, draped with trumpery lace, exhaled an essence of the eighteenth century. All the libertine graces of his youth reappeared; he seemed to have the wealth of three hundred thousand francs of debt, while his vis-a-vis waited before the door. He was grand,—like Berthier on the retreat from Moscow, issuing orders to an army that ...
— An Old Maid • Honore de Balzac
... often at the side of her girl friend. It frequently happened that they were vis-a-vis in a quadrille, when Lady Rosamond indulged in exchanging playful sallies of mirthful character. In appearance, manners and companionship those lovely girls might be considered as sisters. On more than one occasion had such a mistake been of concurrence, ...
— Lady Rosamond's Secret - A Romance of Fredericton • Rebecca Agatha Armour
... habit which wealthy Florentines then indulged of setting their mansions within a few feet of those opposite. Houses—or rather fortresses—that must have cost fortunes and have been occupied by families of wealth and splendour were erected so close to their vis-a-vis that two carts could not pass abreast between them. Side by side contiguity one can understand, but not this other adjacence. Every ground floor window is barred like a gaol. Those bars tell us something of the perils of life in Florence in the great days of faction ambition; while ...
— A Wanderer in Florence • E. V. Lucas
... lurid glare from seven-branched chandelier Or table lone with stately dais near— Two rows of arches o'er a colonnade With knights on horseback all in mail arrayed, Each one disposed with pillar at his back And to another vis-a-vis. Nor lack The fittings all complete; in each right hand A lance is seen; the armored horses stand With chamfrons laced, and harness buckled sure; The cuissarts' studs are by their clamps secure; The dirks stand out upon the saddle-bow; Even unto the ...
— Poems • Victor Hugo
... her head for a moment against the tips of her slim and beautifully cared for fingers. She looked steadfastly across the table at her vis-a-vis. ...
— The Double Traitor • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... still, this being my first appearance at a ball, I was sure to be closely watched by many a fair rival. Already the music for the opening dance was sounding. I was engaged for this one, and had for my vis-a-vis my step-mother and an imposing gentleman in heavy regimentals. My partner was an ordinary man of the period, of medium height, with common-place moustache and neatly trimmed side-whiskers, who made several differently worded remarks of the same ...
— The Doctor's Daughter • "Vera"
... was asking Essie Tisdale to marry him—this old Edouard Dubois with the bullet-shaped head and the brutal face that Van Lennop had found so objectionable upon each occasion that he had been his vis-a-vis in the dining-room? ...
— The Lady Doc • Caroline Lockhart
... vis-a-vis of Miss Laura, and smiled most killingly upon her dearest friend, and nodded to her and talked to her, when they met during the quadrille evolutions, and patronised her a great deal. Her shoulders were the whitest in the whole room: and they were never easy in her ...
— The History of Pendennis • William Makepeace Thackeray
... He had tried to buy the building, since it served his purpose well, but came against a deed of trust and the Court of Chancery, and had wisely refrained from going any further into a matter which must bring him vis-a-vis with a Master in Chancery, with all the publicity ...
— Jack O' Judgment • Edgar Wallace
... seconds passed, Sir M. realized that he was in danger and bethought him of his rifle which was almost within reach of his hand; but he dared not move and so continued gazing steadfastly at his visitor. The tiger too stood, surveying his vis-a-vis and then began to move round the table. The lamp either attracted or annoyed him and he raised his paw to the table. The weight of the huge paw tilted the table, the lamp toppled and fell with a crash. The terrified tiger gave a mighty roar, ...
— Bengal Dacoits and Tigers • Maharanee Sunity Devee |
