"Whimsically" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... right," he affirmed with a confidence he did not feel. "I'm going to get you out of this or die in the attempt. Sh! Don't oppose me," he went on whimsically. "I've always wanted to be a hero, and here's my chance. Now tell me what ...
— Truxton King - A Story of Graustark • George Barr McCutcheon
... become a grave, yet not unfriendly, place; the white straining Nereids were taking on a tinge of violet, the verdure was of a deeper hue, that was all; and the fountain plashed unhurriedly, as though measuring a reasonable interval (he whimsically imagined) between the asking of a riddle and its solution given ...
— Gallantry - Dizain des Fetes Galantes • James Branch Cabell
... whimsically that it was lucky no one else had heard that question. "So hard that my success at it ...
— Blue Bonnet's Ranch Party • C. E. Jacobs
... this position he had won in a community where he had experienced the unique sensation of being a pioneer in at the rebirth of a great city, as well as the outdoor sports that kept him fit, that had endeared California to Ruyler, and in time caused him whimsically to visualize New York as a sternly accusing instead of a beckoning finger. Long before he found time to play polo at Burlingame he had conceived a deep respect for a climate where a man might ride horseback, shoot, drive a racing car, ...
— The Avalanche • Gertrude Franklin Horn Atherton
... it was waiting for something, too," she thought. "But it ought to know it won't get it," she added whimsically. ...
— Christmas - A Story • Zona Gale
... where plain brick-work is set off with pointed arches and plain tracery. Though the main groundwork of his opinions is correct, yet he has a thousand little notions, picked up from old books, which stand out whimsically on the surface ...
— Bracebridge Hall • Washington Irving
... VI. of England, the baby king, doomed already to expiate sins that were not his, by the saddest life and reign. The French historians whimsically but perhaps not unnaturally, have the air of putting down this baseness on Philip's part, and on that of his contemporaries in general, to the score of the English, which is hard measure, seeing that the treachery of a Frenchman could in no way be attributed to the other nation of which he was the ...
— Jeanne d'Arc - Her Life And Death • Mrs.(Margaret) Oliphant
... dreaming of this ballad of mine that led me to think of Monna Vittoria, whom you will remember if you bear in mind the beginning of this, my history, the lady that Messer Simone of the Bardi was whimsically pledged to wed if he failed to win a certain wager that I trust you have not forgotten. And thinking of Monna Vittoria led, in due time, to a meeting with Monna Vittoria that was ...
— The God of Love • Justin Huntly McCarthy
... a habit of loving me, you know,' he went on half whimsically. 'No one would know anything about it. It would be our secret, our little experiment. If only you'd try it. Dearest, I do love you ...
— Franklin Kane • Anne Douglas Sedgwick
... at Prestidge later in the day is of course contemporary history. If the interruption I had whimsically sanctioned was almost a scandal, what is to be said of that general scatter of the company which, under the Doctor's rule, began to take place in the evening? His rule was soothing to behold, small comfort as I was to have at the ...
— The Death of the Lion • Henry James
... which the good man was not likely first to break, when Johnson suddenly stopped, and turning round to him, exclaimed, "Sir! don't you think that 'Me miserable' is miserable stuff?" On another occasion he thus whimsically described the different manner in which he felt himself disposed towards a Whig and a Tory. "If," said he, "I saw a Whig and a Tory drowning, I would first save the Tory; and when I saw that he was safe, not till then, I would ...
— Lives of the English Poets - From Johnson to Kirke White, Designed as a Continuation of - Johnson's Lives • Henry Francis Cary
... put out the light and crept into bed with a sigh. "Such a wonderful time," she breathed, "and he is good looking. Jack——" Then she smiled whimsically into the dark. "It must run in the ...
— Lucile Triumphant • Elizabeth M. Duffield
... Magus was yet more whimsically metamorphosed. Some traces of Jerry still remained, but not a vestige was left of the original Dimber Damber. His tawny mother had not known her son. This alteration, however, was not owing to change of dress; it was the result of the punishment he had received ...
— Rookwood • William Harrison Ainsworth
... many busy shuttles across every sheet of water in the vicinity of Stockholm. Even then it was a suburb, but the houses were called villas, and there were plenty of trees between the buildings, and the roads meandering whimsically among miniature lawns and gardens had no pavements, and the lake came right ...
— The Soul of a Child • Edwin Bjorkman
... Darrow smiled whimsically. "Indeed I do, Helen," he said quietly; "that is why I don't want to touch his life. Science would ruin him quicker than an office—in the long run. What he wants is a job of action—something out West—or in the construction of our great and good city. Now, if I had a political pull, instead ...
— The Sign at Six • Stewart Edward White
... founded on the similarity between the conduct of the Syndic and the accused, could not but triumph, otherwise the little debauch of the former would have been condemned in the person of the latter. This trial, which terminated so whimsically, nevertheless proves that the best and the gravest institutions may become objects of ridicule when suddenly introduced into a country whose habits are not prepared to ...
— Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte, Complete • Louis Antoine Fauvelet de Bourrienne
... fellow. By the way, have you noticed any limpers around this morning—among the spectators, I mean?" he remarked, whimsically. ...
— The Boys of Columbia High on the Gridiron • Graham B. Forbes
... a sister—Minnie Hescott. I should like to ask them both." She looks at him. "They are quite presentable," says she whimsically. ...
— The Hoyden • Mrs. Hungerford
... which Peacock, partly from conviction and partly from affectation, seems to have been pretty consistent in performing the office of a wet blanket. Testing his intellect on other people's enthusiasms, falling sedately and whimsically in love with various ladies, amongst them his future wife, but keeping such feelings as he had for the most part to himself, Peacock slipped through all the critical stages of youth till in 1816 he published "Headlong Hall." Brains will not ...
— Pot-Boilers • Clive Bell
... was a suitable termination to the festival wanting, for Alexander, pleased with the genial character of these demonstrations, repaired himself to the bridge, where he was received with shouts of rapture by his army, thus whimsically converted into a horde of fauns and satyrs. Afterwards, a magnificent banquet was served to the soldiers upon the bridge. The whole extent of its surface, from the Flemish to the Brabant shore—the scene so lately of deadly combat, and of the midnight havoc caused by infernal ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... the control panel of Triplanetary's newly reconstructed space-ship, his hands grasping the gleaming, ebonite handles of two double-throw switches. Facing the unknown though the physicist was, yet he grinned whimsically at ...
— Triplanetary • Edward Elmer Smith
... new flame the burnt-out fires of Opdyke's professional ambition. For a minute or two, he lay quite silent, while two scarlet patches glowed upon his cheeks, and while the eyes above them seemed to fix themselves on distant vistas far beyond the limits of Dolph's sight. Then at last, he spoke, whimsically as far as his mere wording went, but in a voice which ...
— The Brentons • Anna Chapin Ray
... snip!" he said whimsically, as he pulled her toward him determinedly. "I've a notion to chastise you! Talking like that with the whole of life before you! ...
— The Return of Peter Grimm - Novelised From the Play • David Belasco
... Jack, whimsically. "I haven't the advantage of being a girl with a brother and a baker's dozen of beaux in bell buttons and gray. I'm only an old fossil of a 'cit,' with a scamp of a nephew and that limited conception of the delights ...
— Starlight Ranch - and Other Stories of Army Life on the Frontier • Charles King
... course—my horse—how stupid of me!" The tone of the man's answer was one of half apology, and he was smiling whimsically now as if at his own predicament, as he continued. "I have no horse. Really, you know, I wouldn't know what to do with one ...
— When A Man's A Man • Harold Bell Wright
... father's suggestion, thrown out as it were in jest, whimsically, fired my fancy instantly. 'How glorious!' I said. ...
— The Record of Nicholas Freydon - An Autobiography • A. J. (Alec John) Dawson
... down the crawling line. "Forward, the Standard Oil Brigade!" he yelled whimsically as ...
— Rowdy of the Cross L • B.M. Sinclair, AKA B.M. Bower
... astonishment at what had fallen from the last speaker; for he had evidently confessed that the Slave Trade was inhuman and unjust, and then he had insinuated, that it was neither inhuman nor unjust to continue it. A more paradoxical or whimsical opinion, he believed, was never entertained, or more whimsically expressed in that house. The noble viscount had talked of the interests of the planters; but this was but a part of the subject; for surely the people of Africa were not to be forgotten. He did not understand the practice ...
— The History of the Rise, Progress and Accomplishment of the - Abolition of the African Slave-Trade, by the British Parliament (1839) • Thomas Clarkson
... said the fairy princess, whimsically mimicking her accent. "Ah! ah! ma belle! you think I have no eyes;—Virginie sees deep in here!" she said, laying her hand playfully on Mary's heart. "Ah, petite!" she said, gravely, and almost sorrowfully, "if you love him, wait for him,—don't ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. IV, No. 22, Aug., 1859 • Various
... irregularly happy place. Dickens seems to have had a like joy in things misshapen or strangely shapen, uncommon or grotesque. He saddled even his heroes—those heroes are, perhaps, his worst work, young men at once conventional and improbable—with whimsically ugly names; while his invented names are whimsically perfect: that of Vholes for the predatory silent man in black, and that of Tope for the cathedral verger. A suggestion of dark and vague flight in Vholes; something of old floors, something ...
— Hearts of Controversy • Alice Meynell
... troubled spirits have come as near happiness as they are like to get . . . for after all, happiness (as the mathematicians might say) lies on a curve, and we approach it only by asymptote. . . . The frequenters of this alley call themselves whimsically The Ludlow Street Business Men's Association, and Charles Lamb or Eugene Field would have been proud to preside at their annual dinners, at which the members recount their happiest book-finds ...
— The Haunted Bookshop • Christopher Morley
... immeasurably sad, an invocation to the memory and to the spirit of Robert Browning, not speaking of him in an elegiac strain as of a great poet who had lived his life to the full and struck his clear-toned harp, solemnly, sweetly, and whimsically too, year after year; but as of something great and noble wholly lost and ...
— Joyous Gard • Arthur Christopher Benson
... a jacket of reddish brown merino, holding in her left hand a green cord, which was tied to the collar of an English terrier, and with her right arm linked with that of a man in knee-breeches and silk stockings, whose hat had its brim whimsically turned up, while snow-white tufts of hair like pigeon plumes rose at its sides. A slender queue, thin as a quill, tossed about on the back of his sallow neck, which was thick, as far as it could be seen above ...
— Analytical Studies • Honore de Balzac
... whip-cracking of carters, and the snorting of terrified horses. In the distance, to the right, the lofty trees on the quay seemed to be spun of glass, like huge Venetian chandeliers, whose flower-decked arms the designer had whimsically twisted. The icy north wind had transformed the trunks into columns, over which waved downy boughs and feathery tufts, an exquisite tracery of black twigs edged with white trimmings. It was freezing, and not a breath stirred ...
— A Love Episode • Emile Zola
... Pete's hat and turned it over, gazing at the two little round holes curiously. "Pete, old scout," he said, smiling whimsically, "here's hopin' they never come closer to gettin' you than they did to gettin' me. Keep a-ridin'—for you sure got to be that 'Ridin' Kid from Powder ...
— The Ridin' Kid from Powder River • Henry Herbert Knibbs
... warm arms,—but to-night he seemed to see her in a glass, somewhat dimly. She stood a little remote, quiet, sweet, and holy, and his spirit chastened itself before her. Dear were his friends to him; his heart lodged them in spacious chambers and lapped them with observance; now he thought whimsically and lightly of his guests as though their lodgings were far removed from that misty central hall where he himself abode. Loyal with the fantastic loyalty of an earlier time, practiser of chivalry and Honor's fanatic, for a moment those ...
— Sir Mortimer • Mary Johnston
... eyes—she had seen many old men with white beards. She knew that other black-wigged women lived in every tenement; that other dark-browed girls were, at that same moment, rocking other babies. She fell to wondering, whimsically, whether God had fashioned the people of the slums after some half-dozen set patterns—almost as the cutter, in many an alley sweatshop, fashions the frocks of ...
— The Island of Faith • Margaret E. Sangster
... aught in any other world,—LIFE itself,—is at stake; it is subjected to a science, or rather an art, proverbially difficult in theory and uncertain in practice, about which there have been ten thousand varieties of opinion, —whimsically corresponding to the diversity of sect, creed, and priesthood, on which sceptics like you lay so much stress; in which even the wisest and most cautious practitioners confess that their art is at best only a species of guessing; while the patient ...
— The Eclipse of Faith - Or, A Visit To A Religious Sceptic • Henry Rogers
... snuggled up close to him as he commenced to puff at his pipe, using a match for the first time in many moons and smiling whimsically when he struck the same, as memory played ...
— The Aeroplane Boys on the Wing - Aeroplane Chums in the Tropics • John Luther Langworthy
... Schoverling whimsically, "I might as well show under true colors, since you have led the way," and he called in all the men. At sight of their real numbers, Selim gave ...
— The Rogue Elephant - The Boys' Big Game Series • Elliott Whitney
... of all her slender body, Lydia roused herself. "Well, I can speak—can you?" she asked whimsically. "Don't you remember me?" ...
— The Squirrel-Cage • Dorothy Canfield
... he reopened his eyes and looked at her whimsically. Nature, in fact, had put forth a supreme effort; from that moment ...
— Number Seventeen • Louis Tracy
... philosophy is his about the delights of beggary! It has all the humor of Rabelais with no touch of the Touraine grossness. It has something of the wisdom of Aurelius, only clad in homespun instead of the purple. The philosophy of contentment was never more merrily nor more whimsically expressed. A synod of sages could not formulate a scheme in praise of poverty more impressive than the contagious humor of his light-hearted merriment. The strolling player has the best of the argument, but he has it because he is speaking ...
— A History of the Four Georges and of William IV, Volume III (of 4) • Justin McCarthy and Justin Huntly McCarthy
... you!" He smiled. "I guess that I was afraid that they would tell Judge Strong, and that the church would put me out. And, with most of them, that—probably, is exactly what would have happened. I am not sure but you will consider me unsafe, and avoid me in the future," he added whimsically. ...
— The Calling Of Dan Matthews • Harold Bell Wright
... withdraw these bags from the pressure to which they are subject; the merchant, with a careless air, gives a slight push with his fist to the bottom of the crown, to raise it up, smooths the front upon his knee, and presents to your eyes an object at once whimsically fantastical, which recalls confusedly to your memory those fabulous head-dresses favored by box-keepers, aunts of opera dancers, or duennas of provincial theaters. Further on, at the sign of the Gout du jour, under the arcades of the Rotunda, elevated at the end of the wide opening which separates ...
— The Mysteries of Paris V2 • Eugene Sue
... so," he went on; "but we will try it again. Adalina Park is in its full glory now, and there are pretty drives outside of the parks." He smiled whimsically. ...
— Polly and the Princess • Emma C. Dowd
... their own affairs. The new-comer went on quietly with her unpacking, taking no notice of her room-mates, but when the gong sounded for tea she allowed Betty and Sylvia to pass, then looked half-appealingly, half-whimsically ...
— A Patriotic Schoolgirl • Angela Brazil
... farmer. I'll add you two lambs to my flock," he replied, whimsically, glancing at Tom who was ...
— Frontier Boys on the Coast - or in the Pirate's Power • Capt. Wyn Roosevelt
... of a past order of things testifies to real convictions once suffered for. Durham, at any rate, always alive in practical issues to the view of the other side, had enough sympathy left over to spend it sometimes, whimsically, on such perceptions of difference. Today, especially, the assurance of success—the sense of entering like a victorious beleaguerer receiving the keys of the stronghold—disposed him to a sentimental perception of what the other side might have to say for itself, in the language ...
— Madame de Treymes • Edith Wharton
... the door open before Neale could knock at it. He came in with a smile, and glanced half-whimsically, half as if he had queer news to give, at the two people who looked so inquiringly ...
— The Chestermarke Instinct • J. S. Fletcher
... her laughing greeting, which suddenly threw light upon his mental darkness. Climene had been disappointed of hopes that the wild imagination of these players had suddenly erected upon the incident of his meeting with Aline. Poor child! He smiled whimsically at Columbine. ...
— Scaramouche - A Romance of the French Revolution • Rafael Sabatini
... were guiltless of rent or hole. She never thought of mating them. That was the sorter's work. But with Eddie's socks it was different. They had not, as yet, required the work of her machine needle. She told her self, whimsically, that when the time came to set her crude work next to the masterly effects produced by the needle of Eddie's ma every fiber in her would shrink from the task. Of course Martha did not put it in just that way. But the thought was there. And bit by bit, week by week, ...
— Defenders of Democracy • Militia of Mercy
... that watched him wink as at a play of sparks in a furnace, and his arms and hands were never still, yet never, even for a second, fell into a curve that was ungraceful. Sometimes his head was bent whimsically forward as if in invitation. Sometimes he threw his whole body backward, exposing his brown throat, and staring up at the sun like a sun worshipper dancing to his divinity. Sometimes he crouched on his haunches, clapping his hands ...
— The Call of the Blood • Robert Smythe Hichens
... and I dare say there is gossip, but I do not know it. It was difficult to get land for the golf links, we heard, because of the Spanish jealousy of the English occupation, which they will not have extended any farther over Spanish soil, even in golf links. Gibraltar is fondly or whimsically known to the invaders as Gib, and I believe it is rather a favorite sojourn, though in summer it is frightfully hot, held out on the knees and insteps of the rock to the burning African sun, which comes up every morning over ...
— Roman Holidays and Others • W. D. Howells
... fellow. He preferred to look upon him as a friend whom he had met once in worthy combat, but with whom he was now at peace. When the bull charged him he dodged him easily among the bushes and called out whimsically: ...
— The Sun Of Quebec - A Story of a Great Crisis • Joseph A. Altsheler
... Sezanne del Montes and Gays and Trudys, all bent on playing parlour steeplechase, and you can't find a plain chair to sit down or eat a plain meal or read a newspaper. It's more than a blamed nuisance—it's cause for a trial by jury," he added, whimsically. "Now ...
— The Gorgeous Girl • Nalbro Bartley
... parallel which he runs between past and present is false—whimsically false. At one time we hear it uttered as an impeachment against our age, that every thing is done by committees and companies, shares and joint effort, and that no one man, or hero, can any longer move the world as in the blessed days ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine—Vol. 54, No. 333, July 1843 • Various
... the morning down at the brook. Shirley was enchanted to be allowed to help build a dam—the height of his ambition, Doctor Hugh whimsically told them. Shirley paddled around in the brook and brought him stones and he laid them in a chain that made a crude dam, both getting very warm and very wet and having a thoroughly ...
— Rainbow Hill • Josephine Lawrence
... much where you go, do you, Dot?" asked her father whimsically. "The main idea with you seems to be to keep moving. How about it, Mother—want to take a little drive?" Mrs. Blossom glanced ...
— Four Little Blossoms on Apple Tree Island • Mabel C. Hawley
... the committee was dissolved. She had always hated the committee, for, as her grandfather used to say, a committee is a device by which the incompetent check the activities of the competent.... She liked Verschoyle. He was a lonely little man and she thought whimsically that only lonely people could swallow the birds and fishes which are so necessary as the finishing touch to the ...
— Mummery - A Tale of Three Idealists • Gilbert Cannan
... cable that the Premier took part in most of the sports on board ship, and of course lost most of the events. Well, there is no harm in a Premier beginning to be whimsically athletic near fifty. But, unless now and then he could manage to win something it was obviously only an attempt to make him interesting to the cables, on the principle that a polar bear is prodded in a cage to make him perform for ...
— The Masques of Ottawa • Domino
... dear," protested her husband, with a hasty caress and a nervous glance at the clock—he was due at the bank in ten minutes." Don't fret about what can't be helped; besides"-and he laughed whimsically—"you must look out or you'll be getting as bad as mother over her hair wreath!" And with another hasty pat on her shoulder he ...
— Across the Years • Eleanor H. Porter
... anything in its way, except some of the happier efforts of the late Mr. Charles Bennett, to which, nevertheless, it is greatly superior in execution. To this clever artist's invention everything seems to present itself with a train of fantastic accessory so whimsically inexhaustible that it almost overpowers one with its prodigality. Each fresh examination of his designs discloses something overlooked or unexpected. Let the reader study for a moment the famous "Birds of ...
— The Library • Andrew Lang
... till they are twenty-one, for it is more than adequate provision for such children. If other people think fit to throw away their money, let them." I have not read the will myself, but I heard there was something queer of the sort, very whimsically expressed. The principal heir, Yefim Petrovitch Polenov, the Marshal of Nobility of the province, turned out, however, to be an honest man. Writing to Fyodor Pavlovitch, and discerning at once ...
— The Brothers Karamazov • Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... that it is often the most whimsically inconsequent, the most utterly ordinary, the most intrinsically prosaic of inanimate things that, with a sudden and overwhelming rush, will call into being memories the tenderest, the deepest, the saddest? It may ...
— Ainslee's, Vol. 15, No. 6, July 1905 • Various
... caught the perfume of a rose on her breast. "Monsieur, we are all rejoiced to see you safe." Her tone took, half-whimsically, the note of court and compliment. The fingers that I still held were berry stained. She showed them to me with a laugh and a light word, and so made excuse to draw them away. Her hair had grown long enough to blow into her eyes, and she ...
— Montlivet • Alice Prescott Smith
... clothes, shiny and grown tight for him. Above his winged collar his sensitive face showed pale and thin in the early morning light. His eyes, brown, soft, were like Suzanna's—they had vision. He smiled now, half whimsically and wholly lovingly ...
— Suzanna Stirs the Fire • Emily Calvin Blake
... whimsically at Many Eyes, standing against the perpendicular back ledge of the Council Rock, and with her heart full of love for the girls who could get so much fun out of a kite, wished success to their cause with all her soul. Then she stood up in the center of the rock and sent forth the clear ...
— The Camp Fire Girls Do Their Bit - Or, Over the Top with the Winnebagos • Hildegard G. Frey
... numbing of the faculties from the blow and his fancy, though vivid now, was vague. He was not at all sure that he was still in Richmond. The window still showed that it was night, and the rain was pouring so hard that he could hear it beating against the walls. At all events, he thought whimsically, he had secured shelter, though at ...
— The Shades of the Wilderness • Joseph A. Altsheler
... shining down on her, calm and bright and constant through the skylight. There was no world about her. She was sunk in a pit of blackness, with but that small square of pallid light framing the star that she had so whimsically and oh, so ineffectually named. Miss Longnecker must be right; it was Gamma, of the constellation Cassiopeia, and not Billy Jackson. And yet she could not ...
— The Four Million • O. Henry
... men about him upon the conduct of life as well as upon the technical points of law and oratory. So many of the brilliant young politicians of this period had been brought into close relations with Cicero in this way, that when he found himself forced out of politics by the Caesarians, he whimsically writes to his friend Paetus that he is inclined to give up public life and open a school, and not more than a year before his death he pathetically complains that he has not leisure even to take the waters at the spa, because of the ...
— The Common People of Ancient Rome - Studies of Roman Life and Literature • Frank Frost Abbott
... live here. That's my baggage. I've been through it, as I told you, but—" The young man frowned whimsically and lit a cigarette. "It doesn't diagnose. I can't find a solitary symptom of anything worth while. Sit down, ...
— Laughing Bill Hyde and Other Stories • Rex Beach
... one eyed his passenger whimsically as the boat stole up to the rungs, so Graeme permitted himself no more than a careless glance at the forbidding ladder and ...
— Pearl of Pearl Island • John Oxenham
... where profit would have been precious. It had been open to him to see so much more of her, and he had but let the good days pass. Fierce in him almost was the resolve to lose no more of them, and he whimsically reflected, while at Chad's side he drew nearer to his destination, that it was after all Sarah who would have quickened his chance. What her visit of inquisition might achieve in other directions was as yet all obscure—only ...
— The Ambassadors • Henry James
... they ever needed a husky nephew they need him now," declared Bob whimsically. "I don't know how long they've been sick, but this place looks as though no one had cleaned it up in a year. The animals need ...
— Betty Gordon in the Land of Oil - The Farm That Was Worth a Fortune • Alice B. Emerson
... shot from an unseen bow. And close to the sky, high on the rocky sides of the Yosemite treasure-chest, were curiously traced bas-reliefs, which might have been carved by a dead race of giants: heads of elephants, profiles of Indians and Titanic tortoises, most of them appropriately and whimsically named by ...
— The Port of Adventure • Charles Norris Williamson and Alice Muriel Williamson
... use to them except when in the water. Their bills are narrow, like that of the albatross, and they stand and walk quite erect, from which circumstance, and their white bellies, Sir John Narborough has whimsically likened them to little children standing up in ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 11 • Robert Kerr
... went on easily—he could not help talking easily, though his tone had the true ring of sincerity. There seemed to be no bit of agressive self-assurance about this young gentleman; he seemed to be just quietly, pleasantly, whimsically, unsubduably his natural self. "But, Clara, you must remember that it was as sudden with me as with you. I hardly thought about explaining. And then, I'll be frank, I was afraid if I did tell, you wouldn't have me. I did side-step a ...
— No. 13 Washington Square • Leroy Scott
... back to Chicago," George went on, whimsically, "we're going to write up a story of our capture by two bold, bad men who gave their names as Red Mike of the Gulch and Daring Dan of the Devil's Dip ...
— Boy Scouts on the Great Divide - or, The Ending of the Trail • Archibald Lee Fletcher
... a fascinating person to Bruce, who would have liked to prolong the conversation, but the disheveled customer in the chair was growing restless, so he took the address, thanked him, and went out wondering whimsically if through any cataclysm of nature he should turn up a hair-dresser, sweet-scented, redolent of tonique, smelling of pomade, how it would seem to ...
— The Man from the Bitter Roots • Caroline Lockhart
... remarked whimsically upon one occasion, "but I sometimes wish the Lord had made me only half as good and put the rest of it into looks. But there, I reckon He knew what He was about, as a good Captain should. Some of us have to be homely, or the purty ones—like Mistress ...
— Anne's House of Dreams • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... but now so bare, fairly sagged and steamed with offerings of Thanksgiving. Somehow the steam got into Eph's eyes and made them wet, till all he could do was to say whimsically: ...
— Good Cheer Stories Every Child Should Know • Various
... colonel said whimsically, "I am afraid we are rather like the shepherdess and the chimney-sweep of the fable I read you very long ago. We climbed up so far that we could see the stars, once, very long ago, Patricia, and we have come back to live upon the parlor table. I suppose it happens ...
— The Rivet in Grandfather's Neck - A Comedy of Limitations • James Branch Cabell
... in his chair and smiled whimsically. "I've done some studying along those lines, too, and I reckon I know myself pretty well. I've the ...
— Heart of the Sunset • Rex Beach
... fellow, I've got to look out for the feeding of a lot of boarders to-day," complained Eph, whimsically. ...
— The Submarine Boys and the Middies - The Prize Detail at Annapolis • Victor G. Durham
... old man; don't forget you're a gentleman," and then have wondered whimsically whether that was not a snobbish sentiment. The great cricket match was perhaps the most searching and awkward time they annually went through together, for Jolyon had been at Eton. They would be particularly careful during that match, continually saying: "Hooray! ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... her arm gently, he guided her to a retired corner of the studio which was curtained off to make a cosy and softly cushioned recess. "You have told me half a romance! Perhaps I can supply the other half." He paused, looking at her, whimsically pleased to see the warm young blood flushing her cheeks as he spoke, and her eyes drooping under his penetrating gaze. "Long, long ago—as you put it—in the days of good Queen Bess, there lived a certain Hugo de Jocelin, a nobleman of France, famed for fierce deeds of arms, and for making ...
— Innocent - Her Fancy and His Fact • Marie Corelli
... smiling rather whimsically). You're a much finer person than I am, Victor. Of course that's not saying much. I'm not very much good, am I? (Laughing gently.) But that's exactly why I'm not going to do what you want me to. It's not the only reason, though. The real reason is that I ...
— Redemption and Two Other Plays • Leo Tolstoy et al
... himself; and for that reason, among others, perhaps fatal to his country; measures, the effects of which, I am afraid, are for ever incurable. He made an administration, so checkered and speckled; he put together a piece of joinery, so crossly indented and whimsically dove-tailed; a cabinet so variously inlaid; such a piece of diversified mosaic; such a tesselated pavement without cement; here a bit of black stone, and there a bit of white; patriots and courtiers, king's friends and republicans; Whigs and Tories; treacherous friends ...
— Selections from the Speeches and Writings of Edmund Burke. • Edmund Burke
... But will you?"—whimsically. She glanced at the sophisticated simplicity of Magda's white gown, at the narrow suede shoes and filmy stockings—every detail of her dress and person breathing the expensiveness and luxury and highly specialised civilisation of the city. ...
— The Lamp of Fate • Margaret Pedler
... caution," he said. "If you disturb their order in the book, or even the position on the page, the names you send me will mean nothing to me. Not that it will be any great loss," he added whimsically. "I suppose I've become a sort of fan on this, like the business men who claim that their office ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science September 1930 • Various
... doctor then. If he tries to tell the truth for once he'll strangle," suggested Selwyn whimsically to March. ...
— A Daughter of Raasay - A Tale of the '45 • William MacLeod Raine
... into begging, and in assuring her of the love and loyalty she longed for, all forgot their words of thanks till Larry said whimsically, "I'm afraid things are getting a little mixed here, and I'm not quite certain, now, whether we're to be grateful to Joyce for a beautiful home, or she to us for deigning ...
— Joyce's Investments - A Story for Girls • Fannie E. Newberry
... the word an instant, glancing whimsically at Peter, a trace of a smile on her lips, then she made her way down a slant declivity and presently returned with an entire flower plant, new to Peter ...
— Her Father's Daughter • Gene Stratton-Porter
... of her married life, Mary-Clare often wondered how she could have endured them but for the vision and strength she received in her "Place," as she whimsically called it—getting her idea ...
— At the Crossroads • Harriet T. Comstock
... his poems were intended for the understanding few. Yet the sunetoi, as he called them, gave him but scanty encouragement. The cold phrases of kindly Horace Smith show that he had not comprehended "Prometheus Unbound"; and Shelley whimsically complains that even intelligent and sympathetic critics confounded the ideal passion described in "Epipsychidion" with the love affairs of "a servant-girl and her sweetheart." This almost incomprehensible obtuseness ...
— Percy Bysshe Shelley • John Addington Symonds
... work, Ernestine. You have the real, true, fundamental love for it. I always loved to see your face light up when you spoke of your work. Is your face lighted up now?" he asked, a little whimsically, but earnestly. ...
— The Glory Of The Conquered • Susan Glaspell
... to the Normans. The phenomenon of the organs of speech yielding to social or moral influences, and losing the power of repeating certain sounds, was prominently observable amongst the Normans. No modern French gazette-writer could disfigure English names more whimsically than the Domesday Commissioners. To the last, the Normans never could learn to say 'Lincoln,'—they never could get nearer than 'Nincol,' or 'Nicole.'" The "chivalry" of Virginia and the Carolinas—our Southern Northmen—might cite this last fact in evidence of their tongues ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 18, No. 108, October, 1866 • Various
... hours later, to be precise, at half-past two, Maria Vittoria stepped into her coach before the Pilgrim Inn. Wogan held the carriage door open for her. He was still in the bravery of his wedding clothes, and Maria Vittoria looked him over whimsically from the top of his peruke ...
— Clementina • A.E.W. Mason
... helplessly, waiting for her to speak. Billy Louise drew herself up primly and ended by contradicting the action. She gave him the sidelong glance which he was least prepared to withstand—though in justice to Billy Louise, she was absolutely unconscious of its general effectiveness—and twisted her lips whimsically. ...
— The Ranch at the Wolverine • B. M. Bower
... arrangement of the poem is matter which disturbs a reader's satisfaction, till he gets accustomed to the poet's way, and resigns himself to it. It is a heroic poem, in which the heroine, who gives her name to it, never appears: a story, of which the basis and starting-point is whimsically withheld for disclosure in the last book, which was never written. If Ariosto's jumps and transitions are more audacious, Spenser's intricacy is more puzzling. Adventures begin which have no finish. Actors in them drop from the clouds, claim an interest, and we ask in vain what ...
— Spenser - (English Men of Letters Series) • R. W. Church
... musical, her manner was dignity itself. "I did not know the spaces were so wide." She spoke with a frank simplicity, looking at him very honestly and very gravely, and Gilbert felt tacitly rebuked. He was struck by the fact that this country girl, in the coarse dress and sunbonnet, whom he had whimsically likened to a rustic lass, to be helped across a brook for a kiss, had instantly, by a mere glance, clothed the situation in an impregnable mantle of conventionality. He took her basket and held out his hand, feeling as though he were about to assist a princess from her carriage. ...
— Treasure Valley • Marian Keith
... whimsically: "Don't you think I might take my hands down now? I'm unarmed you know and you could still shoot me if you ...
— The Winning of Barbara Worth • Harold B Wright
... Rogers he commented: "A successful book is not made of what is in it, but what is left out of it." Clemens was at the time contemplating a uniform edition of his books, and in one of his letters to Mr. Rogers on the matter he wrote, whimsically, "Now I was proposing to make a thousand sets at a hundred dollars a set, and do the whole canvassing myself..... I would load up every important jail and saloon in America with de luxe editions of my books. But Mrs. Clemens ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... with you there," said Allen, adding whimsically: "But what a man should do and what he does do are often ...
— The Outdoor Girls in the Saddle - Or, The Girl Miner of Gold Run • Laura Lee Hope
... after she had resumed her seat and I had opened the window, the minstrel having wandered to the next hostelry, where the process of converting "Love's Sweet Dream" into a nightmare was still faintly audible. Judith looked at me whimsically, as I stood breathing the comparatively fresh air and ...
— The Morals of Marcus Ordeyne • William J. Locke
... me," he began whimsically. "I met a tourist with spectacles walking along Duke of Gloucester Street. 'Sir,' he said courteously, 'I am looking for Kingsborough. I am told that it is a city.' 'Sir,' I responded, with a bow that did honour to my grandfather's ghost, 'it was once a chartered ...
— The Voice of the People • Ellen Glasgow
... passed along to take orders for luncheon. Four hours out? It seemed like forty minutes. And we had a pleasant feeling of intimacy in the discovery that both of us liked lobster salad and detested oysters. It was another bond; I told her whimsically that it was an omen, nor did she object to ...
— The Worlds of If • Stanley Grauman Weinbaum
... for not believing me. It is against your whole theory of life. Not to believe in yourself were a great calamity. My grandfather was so unfortunately accurate that with advancing years he came whimsically to consider himself infallible. And when, urged by the clamoring of his equally accurate family, he sometimes consented to consult the dictionary, and he found that he differed from it, it never disturbed his ...
— From a Girl's Point of View • Lilian Bell
... start, and realized the full extent of the loss. To her surprise his furrowed brows relaxed and he smiled whimsically. ...
— Colorado Jim • George Goodchild
... for a closer inspection of the safe, and, as his flashlight played over the single dial, he shook his head whimsically. No, it would be hardly true to call that modern; it was only an ancient monstrosity, a helpless thing at the ...
— The Further Adventures of Jimmie Dale • Frank L. Packard
... FALK [whimsically]. Nay, To retribution—well-earned punishment. Thro' all our life there runs a Nemesis, Which may delay, but never will relent, And grants to none exception or release. Who wrongs the Ideal? Straight there rushes in The Press, ...
— Love's Comedy • Henrik Ibsen
... rough with furze-clad projections at the top, and falling abruptly to a bay; then, perhaps, masses of a low, dark rock, girding a basin of turf, as at Watermouth; again, a recess and beach, with the mouth of a stream; a headland next in order, and so the dark coast runs whimsically eastward, passing from one shape to another like a Proteus, until it unites with the massive sea-front of Exmoor.' At the eastern ridge of the county, the hill on which Oldbarrow Camp stands rises more than eleven hundred feet straight ...
— Devon, Its Moorlands, Streams and Coasts • Rosalind Northcote
... tell you why you shouldn't," he answered whimsically. "No one ever ought to cry before breakfast. It's shocking for the appetite and may ruin the complexion for the rest of the day. ...
— The Way of an Eagle • Ethel M. Dell
... rollicking good-humor about Lund. This morning he was grim, his face, with its beak of a nose and aggressive chin beneath the flaming whiskers, and his whole magnificent body gave the impression of resolve and repressed action. Rainey fancied whimsically that he could hear a dynamo purring inside of the giant's massiveness. He had seen him in open rage when he had first denounced Honest Simms, but the serious mood was ...
— A Man to His Mate • J. Allan Dunn
... family!" he chuckled. Whimsically he raised both arms aloft in a gesture of welcome. ...
— The Man from the Bitter Roots • Caroline Lockhart
... so numerous and so whimsically contrasted were these various objects. But amongst this motley assemblage there were some who appeared more capable of interesting her heart and her fancy. She espied those who were no sincere partakers of the general ...
— Gomez Arias - The Moors of the Alpujarras, A Spanish Historical Romance. • Joaquin Telesforo de Trueba y Cosio
... in delight at the prospect of a ride. David lifted her up, and Joe settled her comfortably in the saddle, encircling her with his arm. Then he looked down whimsically into ...
— David Dunne - A Romance of the Middle West • Belle Kanaris Maniates
... it, if you can, and I promise you shall have my assistance; for, besides my natural contempt for his lordship, I have at present the enmity of a rival towards him. Fash. What, has he been addressing your old flame, the widow Berinthia? Col. Town. Faith, Tom, I am at present most whimsically circumstanced. I came here a month ago to meet the lady you mention; but she failing in her promise, I, partly from pique and partly from idleness, have been diverting my chagrin by offering up incense to the beauties of Amanda, our friend Loveless's wife. Fash. I never have seen her, but ...
— Scarborough and the Critic • Sheridan
... Patsy thought for a moment, and smiled whimsically while her eyes grew strangely starry in that early twilight. "Wouldn't I like to be choosing those fortunes, and wouldn't they be an odd lot, entirely! There'd be singing hearts that had learned to sing above trouble; there'd be ...
— Seven Miles to Arden • Ruth Sawyer
... our joint debate," she replied whimsically, her voice betraying nothing of the tumult within. "But we are having it in an unlocked for place and fashion. And you have the worst of it. Be careful, please. Don't try to get up. The men have gone back for help. Our affairs seem to be decidedly mixed; but never mind; we shall ...
— A Woman for Mayor - A Novel of To-day • Helen M. Winslow
... past two minutes. She got him a glass of water to help the tablet down his throat, and stood close beside him while he swallowed it and thanked her, and began to make some show of eating his breakfast. She was, in fact, the same whimsically charming Helen May he had come to ...
— Starr, of the Desert • B. M Bower
... gift, Madam," says I, whimsically; "and may mean much or little. Give me leave to ask whether 't is Pursuit or Attainment as your la'ship ...
— The Ladies - A Shining Constellation of Wit and Beauty • E. Barrington
... Robert, whimsically, "though I don't believe the marksman could come so close to me again without finishing me. I think it was Peter's spy because I saw him come out of the house, and cried to him to halt, but he fired first. My own bullet, ...
— The Rulers of the Lakes - A Story of George and Champlain • Joseph A. Altsheler
... building," he goes on, whimsically, "and I saw that repair really seemed out of the question. Nothing but a new church would do! So I took the ax that I had brought with me and began chopping the place down. In a little while a man, not one of the church ...
— Acres of Diamonds • Russell H. Conwell
... There was something so whimsically good in the conduct of the ladies in these particulars, as at first made me smile; but when I considered it more thoroughly, I perceived herein a refinement of charity which, though extremely uncommon, was entirely rational. ...
— A Description of Millenium Hall • Sarah Scott
... often used: for instance, for a set of hangings for a banquet hall, what could be more whimsically appropriate than the representation of "Dinner," giving a feast to "Good Company," while "Banquet" and "Maladies" attack the guests! This scene is followed by the arrest of "Souper" and "Banquet" by "Experience," who condemns ...
— Arts and Crafts in the Middle Ages • Julia De Wolf Addison
... it, though," he meditated whimsically. "It would be a mean, low trick to make it think so. This yere job rightly belongs to a water-tank. Oh, gosh! And ten miles yet, across that darned dry lake, tuh ...
— McClure's Magazine, Vol. 31, No. 1, May 1908 • Various
... sufficiently evident. From behind the huge bulk of one of those sharply-defined masses of cloud already mentioned, was seen slowly to emerge into an open area of blue space, a queer, heterogeneous, but apparently solid substance, so oddly shaped, so whimsically put together, as not to be in any manner comprehended, and never to be sufficiently admired, by the host of sturdy burghers who stood open-mouthed below. What could it be? In the name of all the vrows and devils in Rotterdam, what could it possibly portend? ...
— The Works of Edgar Allan Poe - Volume 1 (of 5) of the Raven Edition • Edgar Allan Poe
... cases like this. Having nothing else to do I've tried whittling—with this result. Tie it up, Lu, and explain yourself—if you can," he answered, whimsically holding out a finger he had cut and that was ...
— Dorothy's Travels • Evelyn Raymond
... writers, especially the dramatic, have not been insensible to the poetical situations afforded by the distresses of the banished Moriscoes. Their sympathy for the exiles, however, is whimsically enough contrasted by an orthodox anxiety to justify the conduct of their own government. The reader may recollect a pertinent example in the story of Sancho's Moorish friend, Ricote. Don Quixote, part. 2, ...
— The History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella The Catholic, V2 • William H. Prescott
... villagers and peasantry. They stopped before the hall door, where the music struck up a peculiar air, and the lads performed a curious and intricate dance, advancing, retreating, and striking their clubs together, keeping exact time to the music; while one, whimsically crowned with a fox's skin, the tail of which flaunted down his back, kept capering round the skirts of the dance and rattling a Christmas box with ...
— The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, Gent. • Washington Irving
... Paredes smiled whimsically. He took two faded photographs from his pocket. They were of young men, after the fashion of Blackburns, remarkably alike even without the gray, obliterating marks of ...
— The Abandoned Room • Wadsworth Camp
... board of directors that night," Will went on, whimsically, "this man Stephen Carson went directly to a safety deposit vault where three or four hundred thousand dollars' in the way of cash and jewelry, were hidden. He took the whole bundle and disappeared. Is that ...
— The Call of the Beaver Patrol - or, A Break in the Glacier • V. T. Sherman
... bustled about his shop, in pettish displeasure at being summoned hither so hastily, to the interruption of his more abstract studies; and, unwilling to renounce the train of calculation which he had put in progress, he mingled whimsically with the fragments of the arithmetical operation, his oratory to the passengers, and angry reflections on his idle apprentices. "What d'ye lack, sir? Madam, what d'ye lack—clocks for hall or table—night- watches—day watches?—Locking wheel being ...
— The Fortunes of Nigel • Sir Walter Scott
... to recall that when at luncheon, I apologised half whimsically for my desertion, Mr. Roosevelt told me that I had acted "with perfect tact." Anyway, I look back to the incident with interest. I hold that I probably got nearer to seeing the United States Cabinet actually at work than do most people. Business had actually ...
— The Adventure of Living • John St. Loe Strachey
... looks as though you would both have to give up yourselves to business—particularly sorry about Gray, for that is my fault. For the good of our State I wish you both were going to sit side by side at Frankfort, in Congress, and the Senate, and fight it out"—he smiled whimsically—"some day for the nomination for the Presidency. The poor old commonwealth is in a bad way, and it needs just such boys as you two are. The war started us downhill, but we might have done better—I know I might. The earth was too rich—it made life too easy. The horse, the bottle of ...
— The Heart Of The Hills • John Fox, Jr.
... in latitude 9 degrees 4' north, when the Nautilus returned at noon to the surface of the sea, it lay in sight of land some eight miles to the west. Right off, I observed a cluster of mountains about 2,000 feet high, whose shapes were very whimsically sculpted. After our position fix, I reentered the lounge, and when our bearings were reported on the chart, I saw that we were off the island of Ceylon, that pearl dangling from the lower ...
— 20000 Leagues Under the Seas • Jules Verne
... about it. You stick with them, Loney, and find out. I'm taking Al's trail with Yack. You fix it." And he added whimsically, "Not so much tobacco, Lone. I don't eat it or smoke it ...
— Sawtooth Ranch • B. M. Bower
... basis and substance for the tissue of whimsically expressed happiness and confident appreciation of the good things of life, which Mr. Brumley had set before himself as his agreeable—and it was to be hoped popular and profitable—life-task, certain assumptions had been necessary. ...
— The Wife of Sir Isaac Harman • H. G. (Herbert George) Wells
... if he doesn't? Well, we do learn to restrain ourselves in some things; and there are people who really want someone else to take the last cookie, though they aren't very common. But it's all right, the world seems to be getting on." She gazed whimsically upon her great-nephew and added, "Of course, when you watch a boy and think about him, it doesn't seem to be getting on ...
— Penrod • Booth Tarkington
... done Miles stood again with his hands in his little pockets and his back to me—stood and looked out of the wide window through which, that other day, I had seen what pulled me up. We continued silent while the maid was with us—as silent, it whimsically occurred to me, as some young couple who, on their wedding journey, at the inn, feel shy in the presence of the waiter. He turned round only when the waiter had left us. "Well—so ...
— The Turn of the Screw • Henry James
... solicitation was he lounging intimately in the single rocker the room boasted; yet once again the bald fact remained that though it was not yet nine by the clock, he was present, his legs comfortably crossed, his eyes, beneath drooping lids, whimsically observing the girl as she went about the perfunctory labour of putting ...
— Where the Trail Divides • Will Lillibridge
... you always see plenty of game when you haven't got a gun; and so I guess we'll run across all sorts of things, from bobcats to alligators!" Paul went on to remark, whimsically, but there was one scout who chose to take his words ...
— Boy Scouts on a Long Hike - Or, To the Rescue in the Black Water Swamps • Archibald Lee Fletcher
... the world's beauty is the gainer." He pointed the reference frankly by a smile at Sylvia, who flushed with pleasure and looked down at her plate. She was surprised at the delight which his leisurely, whimsically philosophical little speech gave her. She forgot to make any answer, absorbed as she was in poring over it and making out new meanings in it. How he had understood at less than a word the secret uncertainty of ...
— The Bent Twig • Dorothy Canfield
... like a grand old lady holding off her skirts so's not to touch anything," Robin thought, now, whimsically. ...
— Red-Robin • Jane Abbott
... lifted whimsically. "Of course. How should you know? There was a clumsy attempt to do me bodily harm, to—assassinate me. Funny, isn't it? So ill considered and so impracticable.—But about this Avenger matter, if you find it inconvenient ...
— Flowing Gold • Rex Beach
... learn that the more you give the more you have to give. This give-and-take of friendly conversation develops mentality, and fluency in expression. Longfellow said: "A single conversation across the table with a wise man is better than ten years' study of books," and Holmes whimsically yet none the less truthfully declared that half the time he talked to find out what he thought. But that method must not be applied ...
— The Art of Public Speaking • Dale Carnagey (AKA Dale Carnegie) and J. Berg Esenwein
... hadn't, Greg, but, upon my word—-" She puckered her lips and raised her eyebrows whimsically, and gave her head a little shake. Doctor Gregory gave her a shrewdly appraising look, ...
— The Heart of Rachael • Kathleen Norris
... alone, and the shadowy hope for April lent a new tone even to their gayety, and deepened the exquisite happiness of the dark, snowbound day. The tiny house was full of laughter, for Bert had given his wife all the little things she had from time to time whimsically desired. The fancy cheeses, and the perfumes and soaps, made her laugh and laugh as she unwrapped them. There were fuzzy wash-cloths—a particular fancy of hers—and new library paste and new hair-pins, and a can-opener that ...
— Undertow • Kathleen Norris
... Katherine smiled whimsically as she looked after him. "My first 'romance,'" she thought. "With a baby elephant! Slim is a dear boy and I hate myself now because I used to make such fun of him." And where the passionate laments of the girls had failed to move her, ...
— The Campfire Girls on Ellen's Isle - The Trail of the Seven Cedars • Hildegard G. Frey
... whimsically. "Jove! lady dear, isn't the blue of the sky and the sea and the gold of the sand just crying out to be the setting of a lovers' paradise? Aren't we here alone just hidden from the world, while the very gulls themselves are screaming: ...
— Mufti • H. C. (Herman Cyril) McNeile
... rock, unsoftened by other vegetation than rusty moss and the dull green splashes of lichen, all this was hidden, except when the mist, white and delicate where we stood, but thick and black above, opened whimsically and delusively, as mountain mists will do, and gave us vistas into the upper desolation. After such momentary rifts the mist thickened again, and swooped forward as if to involve our station, but noon sunshine, reverberated from the plains and valleys and ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 10, No. 62, December, 1862 • Various
... thought of Sophie this wise. A jealous feeling stabbed at him. The virus was still in his blood, he became suddenly aware. And then he laughed out loud, at his own camouflaging. He had known it all the time. And this trip it would be kill or cure, he said to himself whimsically. ...
— Burned Bridges • Bertrand W. Sinclair
... specialize in criminal law, do you, Mr. Hamilton?" he remarked whimsically. "If you do, you will have to be up in the latest tricks of the trade. The man who forged this letter—the same man, by the way, forged the signature on that mortgage—accomplished it like this: He took a bundle of Mr. Lawton's old letters, cut out the actual words he desired, and pasted ...
— The Crevice • William John Burns and Isabel Ostrander
... novelist—refilling his pipe—said whimsically, "Some day, Mr. King, I shall write a true story. It shall be a novel of to-day, with characters drawn from life; and these characters, in my story, shall bear the names of the forces that have made them what they are and which they, in turn, have come to ...
— The Eyes of the World • Harold Bell Wright
... about river-gods and mistakes Felix for one), to borrow a suit of the Mayor's clothes—into which he gets in time to interview that worthy when he returns with his grim lady. "You'll get a month," says she with damnable iteration; and the resourceful Felix, with an eye to the whimsical will, whimsically suggests that justice would be better fulfilled by his putting in the month at the Mayor's house as odd-job man than by his being conveyed to the county jail. And the Mayor ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 152, February 14, 1917 • Various
... the shelf, and I've been quite smug and self-satisfied most of the time. There's been a twinge of regret every now and then, but nothing I couldn't whistle away. But now—" his words quickened; he spoke them whimsically, yet passionately, in her ear—"between you and me, I'd give an eye, an ear, or a leg—anything I possess in duplicate—to come off the shelf, and have one more fling. I'm stiff! I'm stiff! And, ye gods, I'm only four-and-thirty! I always thought I'd ...
— The Keeper of the Door • Ethel M. Dell
... at any rate," she said, whimsically smiling, "that the moral of my little exhibition has not been ...
— The Lady Paramount • Henry Harland
... Bellamy. I hope you didn't hurt your fingers, putting the fire out. Are you a very awkward person?" she asked, looking up at him whimsically. ...
— Ambrotox and Limping Dick • Oliver Fleming
... wandering whimsically far afield, but as I caught the good- humoured flicker of the professor's glance at our companion I thought I saw a purpose in his deviation. Saffren turned toward him wonderingly, his unconscious, eager look remarkably emphasised ...
— The Guest of Quesnay • Booth Tarkington
... small and tender, perhaps white. And there was a grace in her movements, dispite the ungainly dress and shoes, which suggested a more intimate knowledge of velvets and silks than of calico. In my mind's eye I placed her at the side of Phyllis. Phyllis reminded me of a Venus whom Nature had whimsically left unfinished. Then she had turned from Venus to Diana, and Gretchen became evolved: a Diana, slim and willowy. A sculptor would have said that Phyllis might have been a goddess, and Gretchen a wood ...
— Arms and the Woman • Harold MacGrath |
